Sucker Love

Chapter 10 • Draco






Chapter
10 • Draco

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Mya Taylor Dasz was a dancer. She never had a
settled life – never started a family, or a traditional one anyway. She danced
in anything she could get into, no matter the paycheck that came along with it
– as long as there was a paycheck. Fairs, recitals, performances at colleges,
concerts by the beach – you name it, she’d done it. Despite the life that
picked her when she was growing up, she was always on the road, dressed in
mostly flannel, never knowing what her next step would be. She often hitchhiked
and crashed at an old friend’s when she was near their place; mostly famous for
stopping by unexpectedly.

 

I had met her when she dropped by our house
about a month before my tenth birthday, the snow still crisp beneath our feet
and the house elves failing to clear it in a speed to my father’s liking. It
was hardly an unusal winter – at least until her visit. It was probably
afternoon or early evening when the Muggle alarm went off at our house,
alerting my father immediately of some filthy, undeserving Muggle whom had
graced our doorstep, unexpected and uninvited. I’d been busy setting something
on fire – the memory long lost in my mind – but the alarm had, on my part, been
pretty surprising. It was common knowledge around our parts that Muggles
suffered instant death – if they were lucky – on the rare occurrence that they
set off our house charm-alarm by stepping too close to our front door. I had
immediately set off towards the only window in the study that showed a glimpse
of the front door. I remembered grumbling about the better view of the visitors
from my room, then shrugging and looking on anyway. I hadn’t been a stupid
almost-ten-year-old; I wouldn’t have tried to set something on fire in my own
room.

 

The view that graced me was extremely out of
the ordinary, completely dispoving my theory that the visitor was going to
receive a seriously ass and life-kicking for approaching our house and
disturbing its residents. My father was seen storming out onto the large stone
porch, fuming and joyous at the same time. I’d learned long ago that any
obstacle in my father’s way – no matter how large or annoying – was always
destroyed in the worst, most painful way. And he always enjoyed doing it,
causing pain; hence, the joyous emotion of the evening.

 

I had pressed my right cheek against the
window, sure that the new angle would give me a better view of what was going
on outside. It did, somewhat. Apparently, I’d missed my father’s greeting
towards the grungy, plaid-clad female in her thirty-somethings standing with
her hands spread towards him and a patronizing smile on her face. My mouth
dropped open in surprise, drool threatening to spill over the edge when my
father’s only reaction to the woman was his hand running through his – then
short and sane-looking – hair, another hand wave towards her in a dismissive
manner and a lip sync version of something that resembled, ‘Ah, hell.’ My
breath had made a hot circle of condensation on the glass by the time my father
had turned to go back inside the house – followed by the strange woman – and I
lazily detached my cheek from the cold window.

 

I had heard various voices downstairs, some
high and annoyed, some low and chuckling right after the new visitor had
entered our home. I couldn’t help but be curious as I quickly abandoned my
firestarter scheme and slinked down the hallway to the top of the stairs, careful
to sink my feet into the plush carpet in attempt to not make a racket. It was
the one thing I loved about the black, sink-right-through-them carpets in our
house back then – that it made sneaking around and eavesdropping a sinch.
Otherwise, I always argued that they were too furry; honestly.

 

Realizing that I could have been easily seen,
I’d decided to hide behind my mum’s newly purchased antique bookshelf – some
thousands of years old that she’d got on eBeard – and peaked through the edge
of the staircase which overlooked most of the living room. There, in the
parlor, was my mother and her smile – her everpresent, ‘The guests are here’
smile – and a tray of tea and biscuits in her aged hands. She set them down
carefully, not to rattle the cups by accidentally knocking into my pacing
father. I’d been right about him looking annoyed outside, and now I was sure he
said, ‘Ah, hell’ to the cold wind as he turned back inside because he’d just
issued a much...firmer version of my presumption. That version was directed
solely at the new visitor who didn’t seem phased by it in the least. I frowned.
I had to wonder exactly how stupid this lady was to not take a Lucius Malfoy
threat seriously. I shrugged. More entertainment for me.

 

Looking at her closely, I realized that she
must’ve not been from our neighborhood – which we kind of owned – or even from
London. She had that tan-and-careless look about her like she spent her days
picking flowers and laughing while she pushed her big, round sunglasses to the
top of her head as it held back her golden-blonde hair. I figured right then
and there that she must’ve been from the States or some place like that. There
definitely wasn’t anyone in London who was that tan and that laid-back. And I
could tell she was laid-back, just from her mannerisms that I’d noticed.
Actually, I just noticed the differences between my parents and she. While Mum
kept her legs crossed like a lady at all times, sitting up in with perfect
posture and collectiveness that was hard to come by raw, the lady leaned back
in her chair as much as she wished, relaxed and comfortable as if she didn’t
have an angry Mr. Malfoy shooting her death glares four miles a minute. While
Mum drank her tea like a proper lady, holding the cup with both her hands as if
it’d break and sticking out her pinky fingers, she’d take her cup with her
right hand, tilt her head back and drink the tea all in one swallow as if it’d
been a long overdue glass of water. It wasn’t that I respected her more because
of those things – they were just differences; and I wasn’t brought up with
diversity.

 

I had pressed my ear to the staircase, hoping
to gain some volume on the conversation, not realizing that it hardly made a
difference and I might as well have been in a more comfortable position instead
of hurting my ear like a moron. Nevertheless, I picked up on bits and pieces of
what was said.

 

“...come walzting in like you’re family,” my
father’s angry voice warned as he ran his hand through his hair for the
fiftieth consecutive time, “and set off the Muggle alarm, for bleedin’ sake.”
He seemed like he was going to pop any moment and I wondered what was so
different about this woman that he couldn’t just curse her to hell like he’d
done to so many other people. I may have been nine-awaiting-the-big-ten, but
again – I wasn’t a moron. I knew my father wasn’t the kind old man next door
with knit sweaters and reading bifocals.

 

The woman still didn’t seem a bit perterbed at
my father’s mood and opted to take a bite of her biscuit before answering. Her
smoky blue eyes eyes studied him carefully as she chewed, as if she was trying
to remember something about him or match him up with someone she’d once known.
Finally, after putting down her napkin on the glass coffee table along with the
remainder of her biscuit and dusting the crumbs off the front of her be,
e,
she turned to my dad and shook her head at him, all the while letting a small
grin slip through.

 

“You haven’t changed, Lucy,” she said, taking
immediate pleasure in seeing his face flame at her use of the newly-spoken
nickname. “I mean it. People change...but you – you are exactly like you were
all those years ago,” she said, pointing his finger lightly at him to
accentuate the subject of her phrase. “Still as stubborn and welcoming as I
remember with that stick up your ass about Muggles.” She shook her head softly,
smiling a bit more now, then stood up and enveloped him in a gentle hug before
my father could even respond. He looked shocked that anyone dare embrace him so
suddenly without his permission; fuck, I was shocked, too. The one question
scrolling through my mind was, ‘Who the hell was this lady?’ With ‘heck’ as,
you know, a substitute for the real deal.

 

“I missou,”ou,” she said even more softly than
she’d spoken her previous statements as she rested her head warmly on his
shoulder. Lingering there for one more moment, she pulled back from my father –
who was uncharacteristcally quiet – and placed a small peck on his cheek. “I
hadn’t visited in far too long.”

 

By this time, my mind was reeling. There were
two main things wrong with this progressing situation: my father had let a
Muggle hug him without incinerating and and my father knew a Muggle whom had
visited before – and lived. I pulled my ear back from the staircase and
blinked. You weren’t supposed to mess up a nine year-old kid like that right
before his birthday. I’d at least had a picture of who my father was before:
blonde, Muggle-hating, powerful wizard with a wife, one son and a wizard’s
chess trophy from a million years ago when he was in Durmstrang. Now his whole
‘Draco, don’t tolerate Muggles’ tune was old – false. I didn’t get it. I turned
back to the scene unfolding in the parlor, figuring that if I was this confused
already, not eavesdropping wouldn’t exactly make me feel better. I could at
least be more confused and feel special that I overheard it all.

 

“...small circus?” my father’s voice
pronounced again, as I tuned back into the action. “Doing toga dancing or
whatever it is you do over there.” He sounded disgusted and cold once more. I
smiled – there was the father that I knew and publically loved. The
big-on-dangerous-hugs lady was about to reply when – surprisingly – my mother
cut in. I’d almost forgotten she was there because she hadn’t said anything
during the little exchange I’d seen at all. I figured she was jealous or
something; Father was, after all, being hugged by some other woman...and I’d
seen my mum watch Beladonna and Raul: Stuck By Portkey. Long story short, I’d
decided that dramas were just a tad more frightening than my Malicious
Cruciatus 3 game.

 

“Not toga dancing, dear,m com corrected him
softly, clearing the coffee table slowly, “it’s yoga and folk dancing.” After
putting the last crumpled napkin back on the tea tray, she turned to the
visitor and smiled. “Right?”

 

The lady grinned back. “Sure enough,” she
approved and slapped my father on the shoulder, nodding to Mum as she carried
the tray half-way to the kitchen before one of our house-elves hurriedly took
it off her hands. “See? Now, this is a woman who could show you a thing or two
about paying attention, Luce.”

 

“Don’t callLuceLuce,” my father finally
ordered, though it sounded a bit like a whine, causing the lady to simply
smile, “and you still haven’t answered my question: what are you doing here,
Mya?”

 

The alleged Mya simply put her index finger to
her lips, signaling for my father to tone it da bia bit. “Wouldn’t get too
worked up, Luce. Your child’s already confused at what’s going on; yelling
won’t help.”

 

At my father’s confused look, Mya chuckled a
bit and scanned the house with her smoky eyes promptly, pursing her lips a bit
in thought, and causing me to cower back into the shadows. After she’d passed
my spot with her gaze, I leaned forward once more, colliding with her vibrant
eyes again. Apparently she suspected I’d been there...or saw my house robes.

 

“Come on,” she beckoned with her hand slowly,
her eyes dancing with amusement, “make your presence known, kiday Jay James
Bond on your own time.” I did as I was told – only because of my impeccable
manners – but couldn’t help but wonder who James Bond was and why I was even
listening to this...Mya. I figured it was because she didn’t bark our her order
at me, but almost asked me to with her soft voice.

 

As I descended down the stairs – in the
spotlight, apparently – my gaze met my father’s. He didn’t seem overly happy
that I was nosing in where I wasn’t supposed to and eavesdropping. To my
surprise, however, he didn’t comment on it. He merely put a hand on my shoulder
and pushed me forward towards the only Mya in the room.

 

She was dressed in a white tank top with a
baggy, blue and green flannel button-up over it and a pair of well-worn jeans
with what looked like cowboy boots to me. As I studied her, she – in turn –
studied me back. I could tell she was trying to match up the similarities
between my father and I. That didn’t amuse me terribly.

 

Finally, the comparison ended and she
half-smiled and half raised an eyebrow at me as she thrust forward her hand.
“Hey, Bond, I’m Mya Dasz, your long-lost aunt. And you?”

 

“Draco Malfoy,” I answered bravely, taking her
hand, although in my mind I was skeptic about her. My ‘long-lost aunt’? I knew
she’d been joking when she said it, but I wondered why father never...even
complained about her. It was like she never existed and suddenly – here she
was. Tan, sloppy and keen on calling my tempermental father a nancy-boy
nickname.

 

She nodded, acknowledging my introduction and
smirked at me good-naturedly. There – at least she had one Malfoy trait – the
smirk. It much resembled my own. “And you were eavesdropping why, Draco
Malfoy?”

 

I shrugged, looking down, thinking she’d scold
me as well as the inevitable shouting I’d get from my father later.
Surprisingly, she just tilted my chin up with her finger and winked
conspiratorily.

 

“Don’t worry. I’d want to see what was up,
too, if my father didn’t maim the damned Muggle at the door, as usual.”

 

That was my aunt. Mya Dasz who once defied my
father’s gruesome stare and rules of the Malfoys without so much as a shiver. I
later found out that my father – who had no trouble doing the Avada on
relatives as well as roaches – couldn’t harm Mya because of their dad.
Apparently, he didn’t want his children killing each other and after learning
about the Avada Kedavra in school, my father accidently killed the neighborhood
owl. Needless to say, a shielding charm was issued upon both of them so that
they wouldn’t accidentally – or in the future, purposely – kill one another.
I’d realized then where Mya’s courage had come from. If you couldn’t be harmed,
who wouldn’t stand up to my father and taunt him mercilessly by calling him,
‘Lucy’?

 

The other funny thing about the situation had
been that Mya – being a once-Malfoy and everything – had set off the Muggle
alarm. When she’d told me she was once a witch – and still performed a bit of
magic on bad men called tax collectors – I’d promptly asked her why she set off
the Muggle alarm. She could’ve just waltzed into our house and pissed off
Father even more by suprising him. She’d just answered that some witches and
wizards were classified as Muggles when they didn’t use magic for a long time.
My father had later explained to me that the alarm went off because Mya had
‘abandoned’ her villiage, her family name and her dignity by touring with
contagious vermin like Muggles and adapting to their ways. That had confirmed
my long-since formed opinion that my father was, in fact, a drama queen. I –
personally – never thought any less of my aunt because of the way she lead her
life, which was ironic because my first trip to Hogwarts – that was during her
second stay with us – had proved to be an anti-Muggle campaign one for me. When
I had said that I wasn’t a moron, I didn’t deem myself genious either.

 

Rolling to the edge of the way-too-small,
creaky twin-size bed I had been in for most of the night, I checked my watch
and closed my eyes at the confirmation of the time. Shaking my head out of the
non-existent sleep that had clouded my mind, I sat up, my legs dangling off the
edge of the bed and gracefully swooped across the room to collect my clothes.

 

Slipping on my slacks and robe, I stuffed my
shirt in a pocket and slipped on my shoes. An unaware Parvati was peacefully
sleeping on her half of the twin-size, her arm thrown across the pillow where
my delicate head had been and was now thankfully not. Her eyes moved slightly
behind the closed lids, indicating that she was having a dream as I scanned her
dormitory, half-empty and full of dainty snores with a few snorts thrown in,
courtesy of Brown.

 

My eyes landed back on Parvati whose snort had
caughtprecprecious attention and briefly a thought similar to, ‘What the hell
am I doing?’ crossed my mind. I wondered if Patil would ever know that she was
a pawn in a scheme so beyond her and her hair curlers. I wondered if any of the
chicks in the dorms even knew of the crap that Pansy and I caused
single-handedly then blamed on their fellow classmates and chums. I wondered if
they ever would know – know that the world was a fucked up cycle all packed up
into an ocean-blue marble that could be easily manipulated.

 

I blinked, my eyes adjusting to the dark of
the dorms and the thought passed as if it never was. I blamed the spontaneous
thinking development on Mya as I began walking towards the door.

 

I smirked at the fact that no one even knew
I’d sneaked into Gryffindor’s girl dorms – well, except for Parvati. As I began
thinking of how naïve that entire House was, I neared the door and another
brief thought flickered through my mind as I looked back on Parvati: ‘Is this
my life?’ That thought, too, quickly left as my mind shut the door on its ass
and I reached for the doorknob, almost out.

 

Then – naturally – I found myself on the
floor, not out of the girls’ dorms and in a fair amount of pain. Luckily, no
one had awoken and I raised my head to see what the fucking tripping device was
so that I could destroy it and the rest of its kind at some point later. As I
found my answer, I shook my head and laid it back against the ground in defeat.
Of course – Granger’s knapsack.

 

 

 

.

 

 

 

 

“So…how’d detention go?”

 

I tried not to smirk and kept my head down,
pretending like I wasn’t a fully able human being that hadn’t lost his hearing
just yet. Weasley, obviously, had some sort of different standards for me,
apparently. He was at the same table as Granger and I – some two feet away from
me, personally – and decided that as long as I was at that distance, I couldn’t
possibly hear a thing that the Do-gooders Anonymous members were discussing.
Fucking moron. I smiled – at least his dumbass tendencies had come in handy for
something in my life. I really was interested in hearing what Granger had to
say about detention – unless it had anything to do with that ‘Alfy’ business.
That just...wasn’t cool.

 

“It was...” Mya – or Granger – or whatever the
hell was is that I called her now, wasn’t quite as stupid as her companion. I
could tell that she snuck a glance at me from her spot at the head of the
table, determining whether I was in hearing distance of the conversation or not
and what was safe to say. “It was fine.” I was in hearing distance.

 

“Okay, because, I mean, me and Harry were
talking – ”

 

“Harry and I,” Granger automatically
corrected, which I found to be amusing. I could sense Weasley’s irritation
towards the whole grammar gig, but frankly I found it useful. I didn’t know if
I should’ve been afraid or something, but I agreed with Granger; ‘me and Harry’
bothered me for at least grammatical reasons if not for the millions of others.

 

“Harry and I,” Weasley stressed, emptying some
Castrypholic Powder into our cauldron carelessly, flicking some of the
mustard-brown dust on the table, “were thinking that we could probably get you
out of detention. We’re still working on it, but a distraction here, an
invisible cloak there – it would work.” I looked up and saw the moron looking
at Granger proudly, a wide smile plastered on his face and eyes sparkling with
this morning’s current dose of stupidity.

 

Granger, on the other hand, only looked more
and more...distraught as Weasley listed off the options of her escape on his
powdered hand. When he finished, she just looked as if she was waiting for him
to jump out and say, “Oh, come on, Mione! I was just kidding!” Unfortunately –
for his intelligence and my and Granger’s ears – the phrase never came and
Weasley still looked like he’d just invented the broom.

 

Slowly, she raised an eyebrow at him and
looked down, grinding her Sandlecrown pellets into smaller pieces than was
really necessary. Weasley was still awaiting her reply when she gathered the
lightweight powder and poured it into the cauldron carefully. Shaking out her
hands, trying to rid her hands of the Sandlecrown residue, she looked at
Weasley almost pitifully.

 

“Yeah...thanks, Ron,” she started carefully,
twisting her hands around – almost nervously – as if not to just come right out
and call him an idiot. I would’ve...but that’s a completely different story.
“But it’s not that bad. I mean, it sucks that we can’t use our wands but I have
detention for a month and...your,” she coughed, “brilliant plan is good. It
just wouldn’t, you know, work long-term.” She looked at the redheaded
Gryffindor as if she was his mother explaining to him exactly why he couldn’t
eat fourteen Chocolate Frogs before bedtime. “Plus, there’s a good chance we’d
get caught and...that’d just lead to you guys getting detention, too.”

 

Weasley’s eyebrows jumped up in hope. “Well,
yeah, we’d get detention but at least you wouldn’t be stuck alone with,” he
glared at me fiercly as if my neutral expression was legitimate and I really
didn’t have any responses towards it, “him.”

 

I had to restrain myself from just lunging
across the table, strangling the dumbass and doing the world a long-past-due
favor. He wanted to join Granger for detention...with Potter? Ah, hell no. I
knew that I couldn’t handle being in the same area with those two if my life
depended on it...which it may as well have.

 

I looked to the female at my table – she being
my last hope – and saw the emotions play over her face as she pondered the
thought. I could tell that she wasn’t completely opposed to the idea and – at
some horrible point – was even considering asking Weasley to go ahead with the
plan, but thankfully changed her mind. I don’t know why, but I was thankful
that Granger and I were alone in detention once more. It was – most likely –
that I did not want Potter and Weasley near me as much of the time as possible.
In fact, I wanted those two to cross the globe and land in Antarctica where a
snow storm would both kick their mindless asses and bury them alive with their
wands right in front of them but just a touch too far to reach. I admitted I
had issues with them.

 

“No, really, it’s fine, Ron,” she assured her
friend, sending me half-second glances again. “Thanks anyway.”

 

Weasley looked mildy shocked. “Well...if
you’ree, be, because – ”

 

“Mr. Weasley!” Snape’s voice interrupted his
ramblings. “Has your group received the Scornzing Lilac powder?” The redhead
paled and I realized that if weren’t for my and Granger’s knowledge, the moron
wouldn’t even have finished the potion for this project let alone received a
grade for it. It wasn’t much of a realization, but brough me humor nonetheless.

 

‘No,’ Granger mouthed, giving up the answer
briskly to her doomed friend.

 

“Uh – no,” Weasley recited, awaiting Snape’s
further instructions.

 

“Well,” the Potions Master sighed irritably,
“come and collect it over there along with the rest of the students. Or do we
need to send you a personal owl?”

 

“Well...I...” Weasley began, but Snape’s look
urged him to stop talking and walk a touch faster to the counter where everyone
was getting the appropriate dose of Scornzing Lilac. After he left, a thick
silence dominated our table, Granger working on Gonzie Syrup for the potion and
I pretending to grind some Bronzle chunks though I was done long ago.

 

“So...” Granger surprisingly started, sneaking
a bit longer glances at me now. I returned them. “How’d you get to be so
graceful about your midnight rendevous?”

 

I raised a tall eyebrow. “Excuse me?”

 

She smirked knowingly. “You heard me,” she
repeated, batting her eyelashes at me in an exaggerated manner. “I couldn’t
have performed a dive like that after a long, tiresome night with a certain,”
she dropped her eyes, pretending to mix the Gonzie syrup more rapidly now but
the smile still apparent on her face, “Parvati Patil.”

 

So she knew. “You were awake?”

 

She looked up, grinning. “I can’t say that I’m
a heavy sleeper...although, I doubt your trip and fall was the one that woke me
up.” Her expression changed to mild disgust. “Please...bring her to your
bachelor pad or something.”

 

I laughed and she raised an eyebrow at my
expression. We had this whole eye-brow raising thing going on by turns. Odd.
“You’ve no idea what real passion is. What I and,” - what’s her name? -
“Parvati have couldn’t be controlled once we get started.”

 

Granger’s face twisted intdeepdeeper look of
disgust before she shook her head and let out a sigh. “Passion or passing the
time is all I’m wondering,” she said, surprisingly calm but looking me straight
in the eye. “Parvati’s my friend and if you’re cheating on her or using her,
I’m going to make the Full-Body Recoil potion look like a birthday present for
you, okay?” Her voice was hardly threatening...just annoyed, like she had to
get this part out of the way.

 

She turned to dump the Gonzie syrup into the
cauldron before looking up, her previous look of disgust settling over her face
again. “Oh...and don’t detail these things for me. Your lack of volume control
is punishment enough.”