Chapter Text
May 1999 - One year after the Battle of Hogwarts
After the Battle of Hogwarts and the subsequent war trials ended, Draco found himself lost. Things were different now, harder in many ways, but mostly numbing. It had been two years since his sentencing and Draco was frozen in what felt like a relentless loop of nightmares, grief, and isolation.
Even with Potter and Granger’s testimonies on his behalf, and his lenient ruling in comparison to his father and many other Death Eater’s lifetime prison or death sentences, he was still a social pariah, and without magic he found that he had no place in his old life.
On top of the societal struggles he and Narcissa endured, and she certainly wasn’t much better off than he was in that department after his fathers death sentencing and the lack of credibility that now came with the Malfoy name, he couldn’t remember the last time he’d actually been able to sleep without drowning in a slew of dreamless sleep potions and copious amounts of firewhiskey. He quite dreaded the thought of waking up in the morning, and on more than one lower than low occasion he entertained the thought of asking someone to Avada him and put him out of his misery, since he couldn’t do it himself. Being stripped of his magic for ten years on a Ministry mandated sentencing made that impossible, but he thought himself too much of a coward anyway.
It was true that he had been dealt a dreadful hand, but didn’t he ask for it? Wouldn’t a quick killing curse be better than the long-suffering wreckage that was now his life? Didn’t he deserve it?
His days began and concluded in the very same way, every day—with a pounding headache from the potions he consumed the night before, Pip at his bedside with a fresh pot of tea and toast that would inevitably sit untouched until she returned with the lunch he would take at a maximum three bites of before losing his appetite. This would be followed by another mix of mind-numbing potions to get through the day until he finally passed out and suffered the most vivid and horrific nightmares. Finally, he’d wake soaked in sweat, often screaming, with the unfathomable dread of having to do it all over again the next day.
It was fucking brutal.
***
After months on end of this with Draco, watching him slowly fade into nothingness, with no response to her pleas of help, Narcissa had had enough. Her son couldn’t live like this. They couldn’t live like this. True, they had all suffered at the hands of the Dark Lord and the Death Eater reign, most disturbingly in their own home, which brought with it a plethora of unpleasant memories and trauma. True, they had lost Lucius, which brought such devastating loss, but also anger and so many unanswered questions. True, they had both had to come face to face with their mistakes and what they could have done differently. But also true that it was time to take back whatever semblance of a life they had left, and no one was going to help them do that outside of themselves.
She had spent months on end traveling Europe to the small amounts of remaining allies they had, blocking out her own thoughts, and trying to salvage what was left of their name with appearances and donations in support of the right causes. Admittedly so, Draco was left alone, and the guilt she felt was tremendous. She was in too much pain herself to realize how dark things had become for him, until she returned and found him lying in a puddle of his own vomit, screaming on the bathroom floor.
Narcissa dropped the tea tray she had brought to Draco’s quarters, the china shattering across the floor, and rushed to Draco’s side.
“Draco. Draco! Open your eyes. It’s me. It’s Mum. You’re safe, darling. You’re safe”, she cried over and over as she scooped him into her arms and held his head in her lap.
“I can’t do this anymore. I don’t WANT to do this anymore.” Draco sobbed, humiliated and ashamed of his own weakness, holding tight to Narcissa’s robes. He had moments like this more often than not, and ordinarily he was alone during it, but for his own mother to see him so low; there was no coming back from the devastation he felt. His pride was crushed.
Narcissa shushed her son, wiping his tears, “What happened while I was gone, Draco? How did you let this turn so dark? This is not who you are, this is not who WE are. Everything is on the right track, I promise it. Progress is finally being made, Severus has assured it.”
Pushing himself up and off of Narcissa’s lap, he shoved himself back, leaning against the bathroom sink, arms rested on his knees, heaving breath. Exasperated and head between his legs, he softly said, “I don’t see how, Mum. I’m barely alive.”
With long held tears streaming down her cheeks, she reached for Draco’s hands and took them into hers, brushing her thumbs along the backs of them. “It’s ok to feel this, Draco. You may have to in order to get through it, but you WILL get through this. WE will get through this, do you hear me?”
Draco sat silent and numb.
“Draco, do you HEAR me?” she pleaded with him. Draco said nothing.
They sat in silence like this for some time. Him staring blankly at the marble tile, her absently brushing his hair back from his forehead, together in the deafening silence.
Finally she rose, grabbing a plush towel from the sink and soaking it with warm water. She returned to Draco and bent down in front of him, wiping his tears and sweat stained face. Draco grabbed her wrist to stop her, finally meeting her eye and taking the rag from her. “Thank you.”, he said softly.
Another long silence, and Narcissa knew what she had to do.
“Look at me, Draco.” Draco complied.
“We are Malfoy’s. And I will be damned if we hide out in ruin. You’re going to clean yourself up, lift your head high, and you’re going to LIVE, because we deserve it as much as they do. Do you understand?”
Draco huffed out a loaded breath, “And how exactly am I supposed to do that? I can’t use my magic, our name is in ruins despite your endeavors--there is nothing left for me here.”
“Maybe you’re right, not here, not yet…” Narcissa said softly, a pregnant pause between them, “but in the meantime, perhaps somewhere else?”
Draco could see the wheels turning in her head, and he felt a sense of unstoppable dread float over him.
“What about London, temporarily of course… Muggle London?”
Draco stared at her in dismay, “and what exactly do you see me doing, Mum? Sitting in a muggle condo, watching Muggle-Flix and rotting away on muggle drugs?” That actually didn’t sound all that bad, Draco thought.
“No, Draco… no.” she exhaled in exasperation. “You’re going to find something to sink your teeth into. I don’t care what it is, the choice is yours, but you’re going to turn these emotions into something else, something new.”
Draco looked up at her in defeat, but in his bones he knew she was right, he just didn’t know how he was going to do that when he couldn’t even bring himself to get off the bathroom floor. What would living amongst muggles make any difference?
The only thing Draco had ever known outside of his pure-blood life in the wizarding world was art. Art was always his escape. Magic arts, muggle arts, any kind of art Draco could get his hands on he had always been interested in. It took him to another place emotionally, and he protected himself with it growing up with a father like Lucius, and the pressure of being the Malfoy heir.
He considered. He did quite enjoy muggle photography devices, particularly ones that shot the fabulously sexy witches that graced the covers of Wizarding fashion magazines. Draco grew up with one under his mattress at all times. Those photographers didn’t have it too rough it seemed. What a life that must be.
He could do that---spend his days with beautiful women, making art, the absolute center of attention. After all, that's what he used to be best at.
And no one had to know anything about his past—he could craft a new, entirely bollocks story of his life, where “Malfoy” was nothing more than a name, and he wasn’t a broken person.
That didn’t sound too bad, he thought.
He could bloody well look into that.