Chapter Text
Hermione kisses her friends on the cheek and laughs as they try to press another drink into her hands.
“No, seriously,” she waves Ginny off.“I have to go!”
“One more drink!” Harry calls over from his spot at the table. Sitting next to Ron and Neville, talking about work and Quidditch like they do every time they get together.
“I have an early shift, I can’t, but I love you all and I’ll see you all at Luna’s birthday dinner tomorrow if you haven’t all died of alcohol poisoning by then,”
“We’ll come with you!” Ron slurs. “Shouldn’t be out at night on your own.”
Hermione scoffs. “I’m armed with a wand and I live close, I’ll be absolutely fine,”
“Ronald,” Ginny laughs. “You think you’re going to keep Hermione safe when you’re pissed out of your mind?”
Reaching into her bag Hermione pulls out eight Hangover potions and leaves them on the sticky table. “Take one before you leave and you’ll be right as rain tomorrow,” she tells them.
“Yes mum!” They all call out drunkenly.
Pulling on her coat, she waves one last time before heading out of The Leaky Cauldron to the Muggle side of London and into the pouring rain. She pulls up her hood and steps out from the safety of the pub doorway, dodging a group of young women who are all linking arms and running for shelter from the chilly February downpour. Hermione smiles and walks down the street, avoiding the odd person that staggers drunkenly out of the many pubs along the way, bringing with them the unmistakable scent of stale beer and warm bodies.
She makes her way to the bridge that will take her across the river and towards her house. The rain casts the city in a fuzzy haze, street lights sparkling in the many puddles and bouncing off the black river below. As Hermione nears the bridge, she notices the whole area seems to be unusually deserted. It isn’t that late but no one else seems to be around.
Perhaps everyone is hiding in the warmth and waiting out the rain? Tugging her coat a little tighter around herself, she steps onto the bridge and walks quickly across.
It isn’t until she’s half way over that she notices a lone figure standing completely still at the side of the bridge. The person is tall and seems to be wearing a cloak of some description, the fabric billowing out with the wind and rain. Hermione stops walking as she watches them bounce on the balls of their feet and slowly tug off the hood causing the most staggeringly pale-blond head of hair to fall free and the previously unknown person’s profile to come into view.
Hermione would know that profile anywhere without the shock of platinum blond hair to go with it.
Strong jaw, straight aristocratic nose and full pouty lips that she’s only ever seen in paintings or vividly described in works of fiction.
Why is Draco Malfoy standing on a bridge in Muggle London in the pouring rain?
Hermione gets her answer a second later when she watches him reach his long fingers out and pull himself onto the side of the stone bridge.
She stands rooted to the spot, paralysed with shock and terror at what she might be about to witness. Hermione watches him stretch his arms out wide at his side as he turns his face to the sky, allowing the rain to wash over him, soaking his clothes and plastering them to his body, slicking his white hair to his head and making his pale skin look almost transparent in the moonlight.
All the hair on Hermione’s body stands on end and goosebumps cover her skin as she watches him tug roughly on his hair and lets out the most agonisingly pain-filled scream into the black stormy night. The sound is so raw and guttural it almost knocks her off her feet. She instinctively wraps an arm protectively around her torso to try and hold her body's reaction to the sound in.
One slow blink later and the terror filling her stomach reaches its peak.
Hermione knows what he's about to do before she even sees him move.
Her wand is out in her hand and she’s Disapparating to his side before his feet have a chance to leave the stone. Wrapping her arms tight around him and forcefully tugging him off the edge of the bridge and onto the pedestrian walkway below.
They both hit the ground with a muted wet thud and painful grunt, a tangle of wet limbs and shock. Hermione’s confused eyes meet lifeless grey ones and one word falls from pale lips without the barest hint of emotion.
“Granger?”
“Malfoy, what on earth are you doing?” She coughs out, not releasing him from her grip.
“What does it look like?” He replies, his voice flat, devoid of all feeling.
Unable to stop herself answering a question when it’s posed, just like when she was at school, she fixes him with a stare and answers him. “Well, it looked like you were about to jump off this bridge,”
His eyes look to the sky but he doesn’t blink. “Right,”
Hermione’s stomach drops. “Why?” She almost whispers.
“Why not?”
“Well, you’ll more than likely leap to your dea—”
Grey eyes snap to hers and she sucks in a breath, shuddering at the realisation and the bone-deep cold she suddenly feels.
“Malfoy, what on earth is going on here? What are you doing?”
“This is it,” he says simply. “It ends here for me,”
The cold finality of his words snap Hermione out of the confusion she feels. Reaching for the hand that lays on the wet dirty pavement, she grasps it in hers and swallows down the emotion she feels.
“It doesn’t end here for anyone, Malfoy. Why would you think it does?”
His grey eyes meet hers and with a wince, she notices they’re still flat and lifeless. “I have nothing left to give. Because I have nothing left to live for, Granger. Because why should I be living after the things I’ve done? Why should I be alive when so many I loved are gone?”
“Malfoy—”
“And why do you even care? You of all people should wish for me to be at the bottom of that river after everything I did to you,”
Hermione raises her eyes to his and tugs on his hand. “I don’t want that!” She almost growls at him. “Don’t say that!”
His lips twitch, threatening to pull up into a smirk, she’s sure of it. “Do you ever get sick of being so fucking nice all the time?”
“Do you ever get sick of being such a self-centred prick all the time?” The words have left her mouth before she's had a chance to think and she regrets them immediately. “I don’t mean that,” she adds quickly.
“Yes you do. And you’re right, I am self-centred and selfish and cruel. I pollute the world just by being in it, I break everything I touch and I allow those I care about to die for me. I’m not brave or courageous like you and I don’t deserve to be breathing when so many are not,”
“You have people who care about you,” she says softly, knowing that his friends are still very much a part of his life.
Her work as a Healer at St Mungo’s brings her into regular contact with Theodore Nott who works as part of the research team that specialises in healing the long-term damage from Dark Magic. Although Hermione wouldn’t class him a friend, she knows enough about him to know he’s still close to Malfoy and the other Slytherins they went to school with. She’s heard him mention Malfoy many times and it’s always with affection.
“They have no other choice, they’re as alone as I am. We stick together. But they—” his voice cracks and his chin wobbles as the emotion he’s trying to keep away finally cracks through. “They would be much happier if I wasn’t here to cause them pain every day of their lives.”
“Malfoy—”
“They deserve better and this will set them free, Granger,”
Hermione feels a tear fall down her face and she wipes at her cheek. “No one will be set free from this, you’ll only cause more pain,” she looks at him and doesn’t let him look away. "Let me help you,”
He bites out a cruel laugh and looks away. “I’m beyond help. I was a long time ago,”
After a second, he meets her eyes and Hermione is sure she can see his lifetime of pain reflected in the glassy grey that looks like the beginnings of a storm.
He jerks and moves like he’s going to get back up and panic fills her chest again.
So Hermione does the only thing she can think of.
She looks quickly around to make sure no one else is on the bridge and lifts her wand.
The words are out of her mouth before she can stop them and definitely before Malfoy can do anything other than widen his eyes at the apparent threat.
“ Petrificus Totalus ,” she said softly.
She watches as his arms and legs snap together.
She watches as anger fills his eyes as she Disillusions them both and Disapparates them away and directly into the lounge of her house. Hermione feels the wards on her home flutter over her skin, subtle like a sleepy kiss early in the morning, allowing her access to her one safe place. She levitates a still bound Malfoy onto the sofa and sets about changing her wards to prevent him from leaving her house. With him still bound she pats him down, checking for his wand but comes up with nothing.
“You left without your wand?” She gasps, shocked he would go anywhere without it.
He can’t answer her but the rage in his eyes is evident.
He didn’t plan on needing his wand where he was going, she realises, and that hurts her for reasons she doesn’t fully understand.
Noticing he’s still soaked to the bone, she casts a quick drying charm and sits down beside him.
“I know you’re angry with me,” she says softly. “I know this is most likely one of the most unethical things I could ever have done, but it goes against every fibre of my being not to help you. You’re hurting, I can see that and I know I can help you,”
His eyes go a little wider at her words and she snorts.
“I’m aware that sounds arrogant, I’m fully aware. But I’m really good at my job and I made a promise to myself when I decided to become a healer and not join the Ministry with Harry and Ron, that I would help anyone in need. Regardless of what they’d done or who they were. I’m not here to judge, I’m here to help, to heal. No matter how challenging that might be at times.”
Malfoy still can’t answer her so she keeps talking.
“I don’t believe you deserve to die, Malfoy. I don’t believe anyone who suffered the way we did growing up does. You had your trial and everyone in the room agreed with me.”
She reaches down and brushes a thumb across the back of his hand. “I want to help you and I know your friends will too.”
Hermione casts a drying charm on herself and when she’s warm again, she takes a deep breath and casts her Patronus. She sends a message to Theodore Nott asking him to come to her house and that it’s urgent. She gives him her address and tells him she will open her Floo to him before sending her otter off with a wave of her wand.
Then she sat back and waits for Theodore Nott to arrive.