[HP] Three thousand days of innocence

The therapist announced that Narcissa had passed away just after one o'clock in the morning, and she told Lucius that she would take care of the necessary formalities and even find a coffin maker.Lucius looked disgusted and angry at what she said, and Ginny reached for her wand, ready for the worst, but the Malfoy chief just bent down and kissed Narcissa's smooth forehead one last time, Muttering something against her skin, she stood up and led Draco out of the room without a word; Ginny followed.

Outside Narcissa's bedroom was a small lounge, the color of which Ginny could not make out in the gloom, containing only a sofa and two chairs.Lucius pointed his wand at the wide marble fireplace, and a roaring fire was kindled in the grate.Draco jumped up in fright.

His shock caught Lucius' attention.Lucius didn't move, staring at his son for a moment without saying a word. "Are you still putting on a show?" he finally asked. "Your dead mother lies in the next room—"

"I don't remember anything," Draco insisted.His face was pale in the light of the fire, though he had wiped away most of his tears. "I've never seen this room, this house. I believe you say you're mine—my father. Because I've never seen you."

"There's something to remind you of!" Lucius yelled, walking towards him. "You can't go on like this!"

"You don't believe me?" Draco said.He stretched out his arms imploringly. "Pretending doesn't do me any good. I don't remember you."

"Where's your bedroom?" Lucius asked stiffly.

"I do not know."

"Your favorite Quidditch team?"

"I don't even know what Quidditch is—"

Lucius stretched out his hands and crossed the room with startling speed; Ginny barely managed to catch up between them with quicker reflexes. "Violence doesn't solve anything," she cried, frightened by the anger in Lucius Malfoy's eyes.

"Impossible," Lucius hissed.

"It's all true," said Ginny, lifting her chin. "Some people with dissociative fugue don't recover previous memories at all."

Lucius stepped back. "My son - my pureblood son - won't get Muggle disease," he cried.

"Then why doesn't he remember you?" She questioned him.

Lucius yelled, turned and walked away. "I can't handle you now." He said coldly, and opened another door.Outside is the main hallway. "I will discuss your case with our lawyers and will contact you once I have an answer."

"This—the psycho!" cried Ginny, stamping on the carpet. "How dare he leave you like this? How dare he—"

When Lucius left, Draco had turned away, staring into the warm depths of the fire. "He has every right to leave," he said softly. "His wife just..." Draco sighed. "That's really my mother, right? This is my childhood home?"

Ginny nodded.

He looked around the room. "He's right," he said. "I can't go on like this. I have to think about it."

Ginny held out her hand tentatively, she just wanted to hold him in her arms until everything was fine again - but he avoided her hand and took a few steps back. "Don't do that." He avoided her gaze and said hoarsely. "Please don't."

Stung by his rejection, she immediately withdrew her hand. "Draco, I—"

"What was my mother like?" he asked her.

How should she evaluate Narcissa?She had only seen this woman a few times in her life, and the last two times this summer, Narcissa had been polite. "Narcissa Malfoy...is a true lady," she said slowly. “She can tell you exactly what fork to eat with, and she—she can arrange parties on short notice. She always makes her guests feel right at home. We don’t have the same mindset, but I always She's been the perfect hostess for the first time here." Ginny looked up at him. "During the war, she risked her life to save you. More than once."

Draco kept scanning the room. "I think—I want to see my bedroom."

"As you wish," she said.She led him towards the door Lucius had left, but stopped just outside the door. "You're going to see something... that might scare you," she warned him.

He grunted darkly. "I don't think my nerves could be any tighter," he said.

Sure enough, Draco merely raised an eyebrow when Ginny yelped and a house-elf suddenly appeared in front of them. "Master Draco wants you to show him to his room," Ginny said to the little thing. "He hasn't been home for a long time and doesn't remember where he is."

"What is this?" he asked.

"Oh, Master Draco doesn't remember me?" the elf squealed. "I'm Karti, Master Draco, your house elf! You haven't been home for a long time!"

"Karti," Draco said slowly. "Lead the way."

As before, they seemed to be the only people in the house, for there were only the sounds of their footsteps and Kalti's high-pitched voice.Draco's old bedroom was at the far end of the other wing, shrouded in shadow, and the chilly atmosphere made the hairs on the back of Ginny's neck stand on end.She rubbed her arms tremblingly.

"It's been a while since no one's been here," Draco said, looking at the dark wooden door frame.

"Yes, Master Draco," Karti said, shaking her head violently, her ears slapping her face. "The hostess tried to go to your room several times but she cried too hard to make it. No one has been to your room since you went back to school after Easter break."

"Thank you, Karti," he said.

Karti's eyes were filled with pure joy. "Master Draco is so kind!" she cried, before disappearing suddenly.

"What a weird little thing," Draco said to himself.

"You have several in your family," said Ginny. "They're like servants."

Draco didn't ask any further, but turned the doorknob and they walked into the room.Darkness enveloped them immediately, and Ginny heard him fumble for the light switch on the wall, naturally.

"There's no electricity here," she said, and she lit her wand and looked for the lamp.The light illuminated only part of the room, where a huge four-poster bed was hung with heavy green draperies and trimmed with silver tassels; it didn't let go.There is a lamp on the bedside table.Ginny lit it with her wand and handed it to Draco.

"How can there be no electricity here?" He asked her, looking at the flickering light in his hand. "It's the 21st century. I thought no one lived like this anymore.

"Muggle electronics don't work in magical fields," she said. "We can do without electricity."

He raised the lamp and lit the room.Beside the bed stood a tall wardrobe, made of dark wood like the rest of the furniture.A door was open, revealing racks of plain black robes, oxford shirts and drab trousers.Draco walked over, took out a shirt, and looked at it very carefully.

"Here," he said.He handed her the lamp, and Ginny took it in confusion.He looked at the shirt carefully, at the seams, at the back collar, even took it up to his nose and smelled it. "Yes." He said, looking at her with wide eyes. "It's the exact same shirt I was found wearing. Hand-sewn - no tag -" He dug out a pair of trousers in the closet. "Damn, these are my clothes." He measured the pants at the waist. "I used to be skinny, right?"

"Er - I think so -" Ginny said, but he had put his clothes back and was looking at the table against the wall.He pulled out a chair and sat down, with his hands flat on the table.

"You're kidding," he said, picking up the silver quill and inkwell. "We write with feathers? Damn—" He stopped short.Ginny stepped closer and saw that Draco had picked up a lot of parchment - they should have been pressed under the ink tray before.It was covered with words: skilled cursive, ink marks, crossed out mistakes.Draco ran his fingertips over the intricate signature in the center of the paper above: Draco Scorpius Malfoy.

"This is my handwriting." He said softly with a smile. "Palmer always teases me about it. Says it looks like one of those fancy computer fonts."

Beneath it was a list, entitled "Summer Garden Party", in which Ginny recognized all the Slytherins of his class, as well as a few seniors.Pansy Parkinson's name is written several times and seems to have no connection to anything else. "Ex-girlfriend?" he asked.

"You hung out with her a lot at school," said Ginny, feeling very jealous. "I don't know if you talked about it or not."

He stood up suddenly. "what is that?"

Ginny held the lamp up and saw that the wall in front of the table was covered with pictures of magic; their motion must have caught his attention.The photos were not glued to the wall with magic tape as she had expected, but were individually framed and hung. "Photographs," she explained. "Our pictures move. Take a look."

He reached down and removed the one from the Daily Prophet, a photo of him and a few Slytherins at a party the summer before he disappeared.Another photo: him and Narcissa with their arms around each other, standing in front of the Hogwarts Express; he looks about 11 years old.Next: He, Crabbe and Goyle in formal robes with a Yule Ball behind them.The Draco in each picture was shaking his head, glaring at the real Draco in disgust.

"I used to be one of those rich upper-class snobs, right?" he said.

"We never liked you," Ginny admitted.He looked at her with raised eyebrows. "You're spoiled, always acting like you're superior to everyone else. You laugh at our family's poverty, call us pure-blood traitors, and do everything you can to spoil Harry. I hate you."

He looked at the photo, then at her. "I apologize for what I may have said to you, Ginny," he said softly.

"It's all over." She waved her hand awkwardly. "But do you remember anything? Anything, even a fragment..."

He frowned and looked again at the photo of the Yule Ball.He tilted his head, looked for a long time under the dim light, and then said, "There is a boy inside... dead."

Ginny's heart was pounding. "Yes." She said softly. "Merlin, Draco, you remember! Which one? What's his name?"

Another long pause. "I don't know," he said finally. "But it's the first thing I think about in eight years, so I guess that's an improvement too."

"Great," said Ginny sincerely, and when he looked up their eyes met.Everything disappeared into the darkness, only the two of them remained.She had another urge to hold him in her arms and hold him tightly until he stopped crying and could walk into this world with his head up again.Forgive me, she begged silently, reaching out to touch his face.He was rough and unshaven, but she didn't care.Forgive me, I am willing to use the rest of my life to make it up to you.

He took a quick breath and turned away from her hand.

As he busied himself rehanging the pictures he had taken off the wall, Ginny retreated to the last unexplored wall: the bookshelf.Bookshelves stretch from floor to ceiling and take up an entire wall, filled with books of all shapes and sizes. "Without TV and game consoles, I can only watch these things." He said, coming behind her. "It's funny though. I'm not much of a reader, so I can't imagine how I've collected so many books."

"Maybe they're all boring," said Ginny, stepping up to read the titles.A few Old English ones, a few French and Italian ones, a few potions books, Hogwarts textbooks, no novels.Not even a dirty magazine like the one she had had the misfortune to find in Bill and Charlie's old bedroom.There is no indication that a teenager ever lived here.

"Kinzie would say it's a lonely room," Draco said, looking around.There was nothing hanging on the walls other than pictures, and while there was plenty of room for more, there was no other furniture. "Only the basics. I'm very alone in this room."

"Listen to me—Ron said you had no friends—"

"No, I believe he's telling the truth," Draco said.He walked over to the unmade bed, the pillow still bearing the dent from his head.Almost gently, he took the quilt and spread it out, smoothing the sides.

After making the bed, he turned to her and took a last look at the room. "I don't want to be here any longer," he said. "Take me back to the Ministry of Magic."