A Wonderful Fortuitous Love

50. A Little Truth

“I really don’t know what ‘I love you’ means. I think it means ‘Don’t leave me here alone.’”

- Neil Gaiman

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He did not see nor hear of Granger for the remainder of the wedding, and in all honesty that suited him just fine. Draco did not know if he was ready to confront her, if he could even look her in the eye. What Seamus had said kept replaying and replaying over and over again in his head until the words blurred together. Granger. Pregnant. Weasley.

It really couldn’t have been what it sounded like, right? Baby could have been a code word for… for… Okay, so maybe it looked bad. But there must have been some other explanation. Granger wouldn’t have gotten pregnant.

Only the more he thought about it the more it all made sense. He recalled the first night he had ever stayed in the flat:

“Well, Malfoy, I’m sorry to say but you’ll just have to scavenge for your own food, then.”

“Malfoys don’t scavenge. That’s yours and Weasley’s kind. Tell me, how is he? Sprouted out any children yet, or haven’t you had the wealth to keep them? Have you had to sell any?”

“Keep your mouth shut.”

He would never forget how angry she had looked, or how much hate had been laced into those last words. That conversation was the first among many other hints that he had not picked up on, the most recent ones involving Pansy’s own pregnancy:

I thought about – y-you know. Talking to Hermione. But I notice how she gets kind of weird about this sort of stuff.

And:

“She only just takes a test today?”

“She’s been too scared to do one sooner. I’d like to see you do better with an unplanned baby.”

He remembered how his words had her eyes dropping to the table, how her voice had suddenly become weaker.

So if Granger had been pregnant with Weasley’s child, then… then what happened? Where was it now? Clearly they hadn’t kept it, but if Hermione had a child out there somewhere, she would have told him… wouldn’t she? But then she hadn’t ever mentioned this either. He wondered why. He had told her about Astoria, if any that would’ve been the ideal time to spill her own sob story.

So what if she had told you, what would you have said? a part of him asked.

Draco realised he did not know the answer to that. Was it even something he wanted to know? He supposed he wondered what she had felt upon realising she was having a kid. Had she been happy? Did she smile or cry? Or was she devastated? What had gone through her mind knowing she was carrying her very own little Weasley? Draco wondered, but he wasn’t so sure he wanted to hear the answers, and the more he thought of it, the more he felt queasy to the stomach.

When nighttime approached, he knew he couldn’t try avoiding Granger again. He had tried that tactic so many times with very poor results, and it would to foolish to think it’d work this time. So Draco sought her out, searching over the tops of people’s heads and listening closely for the sound of her voice. After half an hour or so of asking twenty people if they had seen her, his frustration was escalating. He had just begun to consider asking Potter or Weasley when he spotted Neville. It would have to do, he reasoned, and he walked up to the slightly plumper man.

“Longbottom,” he said sharply, and Neville startled. “Have you seen Granger?”

Neville regarded Draco with apprehension, but he noticed there was no fear in his gaze as there once was when Draco approached him with Crabbe and Goyle back in school.