If I Could Live One Day Over

Disclaimer: No, Harry Potter is mine, but if I could pretty please borrow Draco Malfoy and Hermione Granger for a little while please?

A/N: Poem mine, based on “Hurt” by Christina Aguilera.

If I could live one day over,

I would choose that day when I said those fateful words

When I looked you in the eye

And told you those lies

That eat away at my soul.

“Hermione?” she looked at him, her chocolate brown eyes raking over him.

She knew him so well, so much better than anyone had ever taken the trouble of getting to know him before. Better than his mother. Better than his father. Better than any Slytherin. Better than himself.

And she knew him well enough to tell that behind his famous Malfoy mask, he was anxious. No, worried to death. She could see the slight widening of his grey eyes, the slight worry in them, painting a tinge of iron in them, the tenseness of his clenched jaw and the way his milky skin went even paler.

Well enough to see that his whole body was shaking all over, shaking with great paroxysms of vulnerability, though he tried to keep himself still. Well enough to see that the icy façade that had served him so well for sixteen years of his life was fast vanishing into the air, wisps of melted steam floating away, leaving him bare.

Well enough to see that the thing he was about to say was going to tear him apart in front of her, and well enough to see that he was so, so worried, and how if she messed up this chance she would never get another one.

Well enough to know that that was what she was going to have to do.

“Hermione,” he said again, and she smiled at him, a warm, melting smile that made his heart quicken. “I love you.”

She looked at him with those dark, dark eyes that looked like a deer’s and opened her mouth to say those words she would regret for the rest of her life.

“Well. That’s—unexpected. Um. I’m sorry?”

If I could live one day over,

I would tell you how much I miss you

Take you in my arms;

Take the pain away

Take back the words I said

Undo all my mistakes.

She had known how those careless-sounding words would hurt him, would tear him apart from the inside out. Known how those words were possibly the worst thing she had ever, ever said to him. Known how that indifference had struck a chord in him, a chord that his damned father Lucius had implanted, a chord that she had tried her hardest to remove, a chord that she had opened up and rubbed until it had become a raw, raw wound.

And she had known that she had to. Known that the War was coming up, known that the Death Eaters were coming, known that if he had been with the Mudblood best friend of Harry Potter he would have been doubly targeted. Known, as Dumbledore had told her a few weeks ago, that the chances would have been next to impossible for him to get through the War alive.

And known that she might have saved his life with those words, but that she had killed his heart.

If I could live one day over,

I would cross out all those errors

That I drove into your soul.

I would tell how much I loved you

And kiss the pain away.

“What?” his voice was trembling now, ever so slightly, a wounded look coming in his grey eyes, all the insecurity Lucius had beaten into him coming back in a flood of hurt. Hurt and despair welling up, mixing with angriness because of her indifference.

“So this was all just a game to you?” his voice was harsh, cold, lashing out as he had always done afater a beating by his father. Resorting to the old insults, the sneers, the Slytherin Prince and the hate. Resorting to the empty nothing inside of him as he snarled at her because the nothing was so much better than hurting like that.

“Well?” she snapped, knowing she had to do this, hating herself for doing it, blinking away tears in her eyes. “What do you want me to say? I don’t love you back? I never did? This doesn’t mean anything to me? I warned you not to make too much of it?”

He stared at her, silver eyes wide. He looked so lost, so vulnerable she wanted to break down and hug him, but she couldn’t, she couldn’t, she couldn’t.

“Or do you want me to tell you the truth?” she asked, her smile widening as she leaned into him. His breath coming in short, panting, frightened gasps as he scrambled back and hit the wall.

She hated herself for doing this, knowing what it was doing to his trust. Knowing how he had run to the Order, bloody and beaten and bruised and scared, terrified, whimpering incoherently after one beating too many by his father and his Aunt Bellatrix. Knowing, as she had before she started, that her voice, her smile, her dark hair and eyes would bring back memories. Knowing how much like Bellatrix she looked at that moment.

Knowing he was seeing Bellatrix in her, and knowing she was about to exploit that, and drive it deeper still.

Tell you I never hated you,

Tell you how much I loved you,

Tell you that I’ve needed you

Since you’ve been away.

“I hate you,” she murmured, leaning further into him as his silver eyes turned black with fear and betrayed trust. “I always hated you.”

He let out an incoherent cry, and she smiled at him. “Did you think I ever really forgave you? All those years of tormenting us, of calling me Mudblood—you really thought that would be erased by a few mumbled apologies and quick snogs? You really thought anyone ever forgave you for being who you are, what you’ve done. That anyone trusts you? That anyone could love you?

“No one could love you, Draco Malfoy, because you won’t let anyone and you never will, and. That. Sickens. Me,” she spat as his face and watched as his eyes went blank and he was back again, lost in a world of memories as his face contorted and he whimpered and fell to the floor, curling up, his arms around his knees drawing them up to his chest, his mask breaking, his tenuous control flying apart as he murmured, “I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to, it was an accident, I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry.” And his eyes were so vacant as he looked up at her and cringed, and she knew he was seeing his father and his Aunt in her, and it killed her to have him look at her with so much fear.

Tell you that I’m so sorry

For hurting you that way

Tell you I never meant to kill you

When I said those words that day.

It had worked, sort of. He had been betrayed, so betrayed, that he’d retreated inside himself. He’d made a better spy than ever, his Occlumency reaching heights unknown even to Snape himself. Only Hermione knew that his Occlumency was so easy, so effortless because of the simple fact that it was easy to him because he had no emotions to block. Knew that she had killed them all that day when he had laid bare his soul to her, and she had stamped all over it.

Knew that she made such a terrible, terrible mistake.

“I shouldn’t have lied, Draco,” she murmured to the empty air in front of her, staring at the wall against where she had driven him.

“I’m so sorry.”

“I only tried to help.”

And she had. But she should have left it, should have taken the risk. She had been selfish, so very selfish, because she couldn’t bear the thought of his dying and leaving her here all alone just like Ron had done. So selfish.

And in the end, she had just made it worse. She stared at the picture she held in her hand. It was a Wizarding photo, but for all its subject moved, it might as well have been a Muggle one. He stared at her, eyes unblinking and dead, blond hair falling deadly around his face. His eyes were black. Not silver, not iron, not steel. Black.

His body wasn’t dead, no. He was fine, better than most people, better than Arthur Weasley, who had lost his legs, better than Tonks, who had lost a hand, better than herself, who had been scarred so terribly on her collarbone.

Nothing was damaged.

Just his heart.

And if I could live one day over,

I would never let you go

Again.