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Chapter Text

Hermione hadn’t meant to come. She had told herself a dozen reasons why it wasn’t her place: they had never been friends, she had not seen him in years, her presence would only draw whispers.

And yet, when the morning came, something restless in her chest drove her to put on her coat, to walk the long, wet road to the cemetery of Malfoy Manor.

She stood apart from the mourners, far back beneath the skeletal branches of a tree, her breath curling white in the winter air. From a distance she could see the sparse gathering: Narcissa Malfoy, elegant and unyielding in her grief; Pansy Parkinson with her gloved hand tight in Blaise Zabini’s arm; a few other Slytherins, their faces closed. It was a thin crowd, scattered like shadows, nothing like the spectacle she imagined for a pure-blood funerals.

Hermione kept to the edges, unseen, unsure why she stayed. The name carved in stone felt so final, so cold. For reasons she could not name, it hollowed something inside her.

Narcissa’s gaze shifted. Across the small gathering, her pale eyes found Hermione beneath the tree. Hermione’s breath caught.

For an instant, she thought Narcissa would turn away, pretend she hadn’t seen. But instead, Narcissa’s lips curved in the faintest acknowledgement.

When the service ended, she leaned close to Theodore Nott. Hermione saw it: the whisper against the winter air, the graceful tilt of Narcissa’s head, the quick, sharp flick of her eyes in Hermione’s direction. Theo’s jaw tightened, but he nodded once. Moments later, she swept into the Manor without another glance.

Theo lingered. When his eyes found Hermione, she froze. She considered slipping away, but he was already crossing the wet grass toward her.

“I’m glad you’re here,” he said simply. His voice was low, almost careful.

Before she could reply, he pressed something into her hands: a small box, worn at the edges, the brass clasp tarnished.

She felt the weight of it instantly, heavier than its size should allow.

Hermione looked down, stunned.

The box was old, the wood scuffed and bound with a faded green ribbon.

“What is this?” she whispered.

Theo’s gaze flickered, unreadable. “Something he left. For you.”

Her stomach lurched. “For me?”

“Yes.” He paused, almost reluctant.

Hermione stared at the box, breath caught in her throat, her pulse racing. Why would Draco Malfoy leave her anything?

But before she could ask, Theo stepped back.

His expression was unreadable, his nod final.

And then he turned and walked away, leaving her with nothing but the box clutched in her hands, and more questions than answers.

Chapter Text

Dear Granger,

I am not sure why I’ve started writing to you. Not that you’d reply. You don’t even know about this letter, and you certainly don’t know about my feelings. Perhaps this is only the fantasy of a dying man. But if I am to dream, let me begin again.

Dear Hermione,

I am dying. Perhaps that is the only reason why I finally found the courage to write. A man with little time left has nothing to lose but his silence.

I cannot tell you when it began; when loathing blurred into something far more dangerous. Perhaps it was the way you raised your hand in class, fierce and unyielding. Perhaps it was the night you laid bloodied but unbroken at Malfoy Manor. Or perhaps it was always there, buried under my cowardice, waiting for the day I would finally admit it. I only know that once it began, I was never the same.

I saw you at the Ministry gala. You wore that beautiful long dress, and I envied every person who stood close enough to draw your smile. I envied the air that touched your skin, the lace that dared to cling to your body. I even envied your glass of champagne, for it met your lips while I remained exiled in shadows. Can you see how far I have fallen, how utterly gone I am for you?

You consume me. Every thought, every hour, every faltering breath is haunted by you. And still I torture myself with questions I already know the answers to. If I had been another man - someone not carved by cruelty, not branded by a name you could never forgive - would you have loved me? If I were not Draco Malfoy, would you have looked at me without loathing?

This is my punishment: to never know what it feels like to be loved by you.

For every crime I committed, for every wrong choice, I am left with nothing but the certainty that when I leave this world, there will be no trace of me in yours. It is a shattering thought. And yet I write, because the ache refuses to be buried with me.

You are perfection, Hermione. You stood for what was right, and I despised you for it, because every time you triumphed, you held up a mirror to my failures. Hatred devoured me, but when the flames died, all that remained was longing.

Tell me, does he make you happy? Does he bring you flowers? He should. You deserve a love so strong it hurts. If you had been mine, I would have walked you through the manor gardens every morning, shown you the roses heavy with dew.

I remade this house with you in mind, though you will never walk its halls. Red and gold now line my rooms; your colours, not mine. Every night, I close my eyes and wonder if I will wake again. And yet, surrounded by your colours, the thought of another dawn without you is easier to endure.

Maybe tomorrow I will write again. Maybe tomorrow there will still be breath in me.

For now, I am so very tired.

But if sleep takes me tonight, know this: you were my first and only peace.

Sweet dreams, my muse.

Yours, Draco

Chapter Text

Dear Hermione,

I dreamed of you last night.

There were no names, no wars, no scars.

You were not Granger, I was not Malfoy.
You were simply mine. We were simply ours.

Time itself seemed gentler, reluctant to steal what little eternity we had in that moment.

We sat at the breakfast table together.

The morning was quiet except for the rustle of parchment and the sound of your laugh.

You poured my tea without asking, your hand brushing mine as though it belonged there.
Books were spilled across the table, your notes scrawled in the margins with impatient ink.

You hummed under your breath, absently tucking a curl behind your ear, and I thought then that I could live an eternity in that moment and never be tired of it.
Your existence was the prayer I had been whispering in silence all my life.

Later, your footsteps echoed down the corridor, quick and light.

A child’s voice rang out - our child - shrill with laughter as you chased them through the marble halls.
I could not see their face, but I knew them.

Brown curls tangled in the air, grey eyes glinting with mischief.
Their hand was small in yours, their joy so pure it filled every empty corner of this cursed house.
Your laughter joined theirs, and I swear even the walls seemed to breathe again.

Even the shadows of this house learned your name and bent toward your light.

The manor was different with you inside it. Sunlight streamed through windows long shuttered.
The portraits bowed as you passed, as though they knew it was you - not me - who had finally made this house a home.

There were flowers on the tables, books in every room, the faint scent of freshly baked pastries.
For the first time in my life, I understood what it meant to belong somewhere. What it meant to belong to someone.

And just as the dream began to bloom, it was torn from me, and I woke.

The bed was cold, the rooms were silent, the air heavy with nothing but my own breath.
I reached for you in the dark, half-expecting to find your hand, but my fingers closed around nothing.

I lost you twice, Hermione - once in this lifetime, and again in my dreams.

If there is a cruelty greater than dying, it is to glimpse happiness and know it will never be yours.

I almost wish I could sleep forever, if only to keep living that life beside you.

But even dreams are merciless. They are thieves, Hermione, because they stole you away from me.

They end, and I am left with nothing but emptiness.

Yours always,
Draco

Chapter Text

Dear Hermione,

There is a memory I cannot escape.
No matter how many years I put between us, no matter how many nights I try to drown it with Firewhisky, it returns.

Malfoy Manor. The night you screamed.

I still hear it. That sound has lived in my bones longer than any curse.

It rattles in my chest when I try to sleep, echoes in my skull when I wake.

I wanted to move, Hermione. I swear to you, I wanted to.

My body ached to step forward, to tell them to stop, to drag you from that floor and shield you with my own hands.

But I did nothing. I froze, cowardice binding me more tightly than chains ever could.

You may not even remember if I was there, perhaps my face was just another shadow in the room.

But I remember every second.

I remember your eyes, wide with pain but defiant still.

I remember how small you looked beneath her wand, and how vast my shame felt towering above you, doing nothing.

That night broke something in me.

The boy who parroted hatred, who wore cruelty like armour… he was stripped bare, and what was left was weakness.

And you, even bloodied, even trembling, were strength incarnate.

I hated you for it then.

Not because you deserved my hatred, but because you were everything I was not.

I will never forgive myself, though you likely never spared me another thought.

That is my hell: to remember your screams long after you forgot my silence.

If I had moved, if I had defied them, perhaps nothing would have changed.

Perhaps I would have been killed, and you would still have been broken.

But at least I would have fallen for something more than fear.

Instead, I lived.
And with living came this: a life bound to the sound of you suffering.

You were light in that darkness, Hermione.

You should have hated me forever, and perhaps you did.

But I wonder if you will ever know how much I hated myself first.

Yours in shame,
Draco

Chapter Text

Dear Hermione,

There was a day at the Ministry when I almost spoke to you.

Do you remember it? Of course not.

To you, it was another meeting, another hour of ink and parchment.

To me, it was everything.

You stood in the corridor, surrounded by colleagues and friends, the light catching in your hair until it crowned you with a halo.

For a moment, I thought I was looking at an angel.

And for a moment, I believed I could walk to you as though there were no past between us.

Your laughter carried down the marble hall, sharp and bright, and I forgot myself.

My lips even parted. I had the word ready - ‘coffee?’ - ridiculous in its simplicity.

Not an apology. Not a confession.

Just the smallest invitation into something ordinary, something human.

I even know how you take it: two drops of milk, no sugar, always stirred three times anti-clockwise, as though order could tame the chaos of the world.

But I swallowed it down.

What arrogance, to think you would ever say yes.

What cruelty, to ruin your peace with my shadow.

I contented myself with the fragments I was given.

Your handwriting, curling across a report we both signed.

The cadence of your voice in a crowded meeting, clear and certain, the way it silenced everyone else.

Once, your sleeve brushed mine as you passed me in the corridor, and I burned from that touch for weeks, though you never noticed.

I could have changed everything in that single moment.

Perhaps you would have smiled.

Perhaps you would have turned away.

I will never know, because I chose silence.

And that silence has been my undoing.

It would have been nothing to you, Hermione.

But it would have been everything to me.

Always in regret,
Draco

Chapter Text

Dear Hermione,

There are nights I cannot sleep because I picture you in another man’s arms; his shadow torments me more cruelly than my own illness ever could.

Does he know how lucky he is?

Does he understand that your smile is rarer than gold, that your laughter is a sound men would spend their lives preserving?

Does he touch you gently, reverently, as though you were both sacred and breakable?

Or does he take you for granted, blind to the miracle you are?

The thought is agony. I tell myself I should want only your happiness, but I am weak and selfish.

My jealousy is the proof of the monster I remain.

I should bless your joy, and yet I burn at the idea of it belonging to anyone but me.

I imagine your hand resting on another’s chest where mine will never lie.

I imagine his lips on yours, your head tipped back in laughter, your breath shared with him.

Though I have no claim, and never will, the thought guts me.

It is an agony death itself could not rival: to see, even in my mind, the life I will never have with you, lived by someone else.

You will never be mine.

And yet I cannot stop imagining you as though you were.

Better men will hold you, but none will love you as consumingly, nor suffer for it as I do.

Yours in torment,
Draco

Chapter Text

Dear Hermione,

My hand trembles as I write this.

The ink runs, smudged by fingers that no longer obey me.

Each line feels heavier than the last, as though the quill itself resists being lifted.

I fear that if I stop, if I allow silence to win, I will not wake again.

Writing to you is the only thing that keeps me tethered to this world.

Your face comes to me in fever-dreams, blurred but still brighter than anything else.

Sometimes I whisper your name into the empty room, my lips cracked, my voice a rasp, but it feels like prayer.

It is the only prayer I have ever known.

I imagine you moving through your days, carrying light with you wherever you go.

You are moving forward, as you always did, while I shrink backward, my body folding in on itself, the walls of this house pressing tighter.

You are sunlight and motion. I am shadow and stillness.

And yet, even as I fade, it is not death that frightens me.

I am afraid of vanishing without you ever knowing.

That I will disappear as though I never existed, that the world will keep turning and you will never hear my truth.

You are my anchor, Hermione.

The only weight holding me to this earth.

When breath fails, when my body falters, the thought of you keeps me alive another day.

I am vanishing.

But even in vanishing, I am yours.

Always,
Draco

Chapter Text

Dear Hermione,

This will be the last letter. I know it.

My hand can barely hold the quill, and each breath rattles as though my body is already loosening its hold on me.

I am so very tired.

I wanted to leave you words that would outlast me.

Something more than silence, something more than the shadow I have been in your life.

If nothing else, at least let me exist here, in ink and in confession.

I have loved you.

Fiercely, foolishly, secretly for so long I scarcely remember what it was to feel anything else.

My life has been a tapestry of wrong choices, and yet the single thread that bound them all, was you.

You were the only thing I wanted that was ever pure.

Do not mourn me. I am not worth your grief.

But if you ever think of me, let it not be as the boy who hated you, or the man who stood silent while you suffered.

Remember me, if you can, as someone who tried, however poorly, to love you with what little was left of him.

I leave behind no legacy.

No victories.

No family to carry my name.

Only these pages, and the hope that you will read them and know that you were my first thought in life and my last in death.

If there is another world beyond this one, I will spend it searching for you.

And if there is not, then let this be enough: that I loved you, and that in some small, secret way, you know it now.

Goodbye, Hermione.

You were my beginning and my end.

Yours, until there is no more of me left,
Draco

Chapter Text

Three months later

Hermione’s hands shook as she set aside the final page.

The ink had faded in places, the script broken and uneven, but every word sealed itself into her.

She pressed the letters to her chest, as though to anchor them there, to anchor him there, and only when the candle had burned to its base, she rose.

The world outside moved on, uncaring, but she moved as though underwater, her body pulled toward the only place that made sense.

Malfoy Manor was still and cold when she arrived, the grass and petals dripped with the morning’s dew.

The grave was modest, unmarked, save for his name etched in the stone - Draco Lucius Malfoy - and even that seemed too little for what he had carried in silence.

She knelt. She could not speak.

Her throat ached with words she couldn’t give voice to, choked by pain, and the weight of what they meant.

So instead, she wrote them.

Dear Draco,

I don’t know how to begin.

You spent your life writing words you could never speak out loud, and now I find myself the same.

I read them all. Every letter, every confession you thought would vanish into silence.

I read of your dream.

The breakfast table, the books scattered between us, a child’s laughter running through the halls.

And though it never was, though it never will be, I will carry it with me.

When I am lonely, I will sit at my own table and imagine you across from me, teasing me, pouring my tea.

When I close my eyes, I will picture that child’s small hand in mine, their curls tangled like mine, their eyes grey like yours.

It will never be our truth, but it will be my comfort: to imagine what life could have been, if only you had let me see you sooner.

You were wrong, Draco. You are not nothing.

I never thought I could have this kind of love… The kind you only ever find in books.

Fierce, impossible, enduring.

I told myself that was fiction, that the world was too sharp for fairy tales.

But then I read your words, and I realised you had lived that love for me all along.

And I am furious with you.

Furious, Draco.

Because in your silence, you denied me the very thing I have wanted all my life.

You let me walk through years believing love was compromise, that devotion was something smaller, safer, quieter than what you gave me in these letters.

You robbed us both of what could have been.

And yet… I forgive you. Even for the Manor.

I remember that night too - the screams, the terror, the helplessness.

For years I hated you for standing by.

But now I see you were shackled as much by fear as I was by pain.

And reading your confession, I know that guilt punished you far more than my anger ever could.

So, I forgive you, Draco.

I forgive you, because you have already suffered enough.

Your letters made me see a truth I had refused to face: the man I chose, the life I built - they were never enough.

They were comfort, not fire.

Duty, not destiny.

I needed this kind of love, the kind only you could give me.

And now it is too late.

You said you feared vanishing without a trace.

But you will not vanish, Draco.

You will live on in me, in every line you wrote, in every breath I take knowing what we lost.

If there is another world beyond this one, wait for me.

And if not, then know this: I will regret, until the end of my days, that I did not see you sooner.

That I only found you at the end, when it was already too late.

So, I asked you this: torment me, Draco.

Haunt me in dreams, in silence, in every empty room.

Do not leave me to peace, for I do not want it.

Stay with me, even if it drives me mad.

It’s my time now, I will carry this love for both of us.

Always,
Hermione