Work Text:
Daddy isn't coming back. He has been waiting for days and days, and Daddy isn't coming back.
He wants him back so much. He wants Daddy to tell him hs bedtime story, to give him his bottle and some chocolate. He wants Daddy to tuck him into bed and tell him what a good boy he is.
But at the same time he no longer has the sick feeling in his tummy whenever Daddy gives him a bath, or whenever Daddy tells him to show him how much he loves him. But no matter what, he misses Daddy so much.
He had been staying in the house alone with only Pansy for company. He had been trying to act like a Daddy to himself, trying to do thinks that Daddy did, like baths and milk. He can do the bath one okay, though he always feels like Daddy is going to come in and tell him off when he makes the water warm and not cold, so he made sure the water made his skin go bumpy because even if Daddy isn't here, it doesn't mean he should be bad, in case Daddy finds out when he gets back.
He can't do the milk one. He doesn't know how to keep the milk from curdling or to warm it up and cold, smelly milk just didn't feel the same. The first time the milk had gone lumpy he hadn't realised until he was already drinking it, and had spit it out all over his blankets. It tasted disgusting, and little lumps clung to his chin.
He had cried after that, it wasn't fair, he wanted Daddy so bad. Daddy looked after him and made everything better.
On the third day of being alone, in a fit of unbearable sadness, he had thrown Pansy across his bedroom. Her porcelain body had shattered instantly upon impact with the metal of his bedframe, leaving his only friend scattered in broken pieces on his bedroom floor. He had cried again after that, great wracking sobs heaving their way through his skinny frame.
He collected the pieces of Pansy up, wincing as the sharp edges sliced his fingers. But no matter how much he tried, Pansy was too broken for him to put back to together again.
On the sixth day, he had decided that he wasn't going to come out of his room until Daddy came back. Because Daddy would eventually, Daddy always knew how to take care of him.
But on that day, it wasn't Daddy who came back. It was the Crab man, the one who refused to talk to him and just left him with Pansy and his dummy.
He had heard the back door open and close, and immediatly crawled under his bed, keeping his thumb in his mouth to stiffle any noise. He didn't even move as the stomping went on around the house - and he knew it couldn't of been Daddy because Daddy didn't stomp. Daddy's footsteps were light and graceful.
The Crab man had stomped his way up the stairs, had gone into Daddy's room, and then back out and into Draco's room. Draco pushed himself further under his bed, wanting the man to leave him alone so Daddy could come back.
"Shit, kid. I know you're in here, I've checked every other room. Listen, I know you're hiding somewhere," The man pauses, and then goes on in a harder voice, "I swear to Salazar, if I have to physically pull you out from that bed. . ." He trailed off, but the threat was clear. The Crab man knew where Daddy's belt was, and he didn't want to be belted for being bad so quickly crawled out from under the bed.
Draco shuffled backwards when the man reached for him, but the man was faster and stronger and grabbed his arm. Then Draco felt a horrible feeling, like he was going to be sick, it pulled at his insides and burned, and when it finally stopped, Draco knew they weren't in his bedroom anymore.
He throws up on the floor after a few seconds, and then freezes like a deer caught in headlights, because that's never happened before. He doesn't think it's a good thing, and he doesn't want to be punished-
"Ah, fuck," The Crab man mutters, waving it away with his wand. Draco gapes. Daddy never just waved his messes away like that, Daddy always made him clean it up himself.
"Where's D-Daddy?" He dared to whisper. The Crab man looked uncomfortable.
"He's, well, he's going to be gone for a little while."
Draco felt a surge of hope, and felt the bad feeling in his tummy return. "But he's coming back?"
The Crab man nodded. "Yes, he is. But he might be gone for a while."
"D-Did he send you to l-look after me?"
"Yes, he did." The Crab man looks a bit uncomfortable. "It's late, I should probably make you some dinner." The Crab man turns around and leaves the room, leaving Draco to jump to his feet and anxiously follow him.
He hovers behind the man as he starts pulling things out of cupboards and setting them down on a counter. He isn't sure what he's meant to be doing, Daddy always prepared his dinner out of sight whilst he was playing with Pansy or colouring - but he has neither now and he doesn't know what to do.
"Go sit down," The man waves his wand and a door opens to reveal a room with a table and two chairs. He sits stiffly in one, feeling out of place. He still didn't understand why Daddy's friend had needed to take him so far away from home.
The door opens and the man comes back, two plates floating behind him. One gracefully floats to land in front of Draco, and the other comes in rest in front of the man.
Draco struggles with cutting up the chunks of broccoli and chicken to eat-able sizes, because Daddy does that for him, yet says nothing. The man has already given him dinner, and he doesn't want to bother him. Only bad boys bothered grown-ups.
If the Crab man see's him struggling he doesn't say anything.
"You must be tired," He says when Draco's finished. He isn't, not really, but he isn't supposed to argue with his babysitters, so nods anyway. "There's a spare bedroom." And then the man stands up and Draco follows him nervously.
The other times the man hadn't wanted to play, but what if he took him away so they could play in his own home? Except the house doesn't feel like the man's own home because it just seems empty.
The man opens a door and lets Draco go inside first, and then lingers in the doorway.
"Uh, night." He says, shutting the door behind him with a click. Draco hears his stomp go back through the house. He wants to open the door and ask the man why he is here, and why Daddy let him go to another house. He had never been allowed off Daddy's property before, and was only occasionally allowed in the garden, under Daddy's supervision.
But the man clearly doesn't want him around, so he stays in his room, climbing under the covers in his robes because the man didn't give him any pyjamas. He sucks on his thumb as he squeezes his eye shut and tries not to cry.
Daddy obviously didn't plan his trip with the Crab man very well, because there's no toys for him to play with, and he's very bored. He doesn't tell the man this, though. Good boys are quiet and don't complain.
He isn't sure what his boundaries are. He doesn't know if he's allowed outside his bedroom or not, so takes to waiting for the man to let him out.
Right now, he's eating a piece of toast whilst the man writes something. There's no butter or jam and the toast is dry and scratches his throat. He tries to see what the man is writing, but the paper is upside down and the writing is all curvy and he can't make it out.
"Listen," The man says suddenly. Draco puts down his crust. "there are going to be some people coming aound soon." Draco goes still in his chair. "Most likely tommorow. They might be a bit angry at first, but they won't hurt you. I just need you to be. . . I don't know. Good. Be good."
"What about Daddy?" It's the mans turn to stiffen.
"They'll explain everything to you. About Vol- your Daddy." He nods, and Draco thinks the man is trying to convince himself, not Draco.
He wants to ask questions but Daddy had never liked it when he had done that, so he doesn't.
Draco had been in his bedroom when the front door had opened the next day. There's suddenly a lot of shouting, and then silence. For a moment he freezes, and then quickly scrambles under the bed.
He presses his ear to the floor and hears voices beneath him, but not shouting. There seems to be more than one new person. There's a lot of noise, and then he can only hear one voice. And then they stop and it's replaced by another noise and Draco realises it's the sound of multiple footsteps. Heading up the stairs.
Draco's room is right at the end of the hallway, and he starts to tremble as the footsteps get closer. The man had told him to be good, and hiding isn't good, so at the last second he wriggles out from under the bed and presses himself into the corner of the room just as the door opens.
The person who opens the door isn't the man. It's a dark haired man with glasses. The glasses-man spots Draco and goes towards him. Draco whimpers and the man suddenly stops.
"Um, Malfoy?" Draco doesn't know who that is. The glasses-man seems think he should though, because he simply stares at Draco and waits, yet Draco doesn't know what he's waiting for. Maybe he's waiting for him to say something back, however Draco's words have deserted him.
And then another person is entering the room. This one isn't a man, it's a woman with wild hair. She almost reminds him of the hateful woman except her expression isn't one of malice, it's one of warmth.
"Hello, Draco." She says. He doesn't say back. She doesn't seem to mind.
"I'm Hermione. This is Harry. He can be a bit slow sometimes, so you'll have to excuse him."
Harry rolls his eyes. He doesn't seem slow.
"So, this place seems pretty empty." She says.
"Uhuh," Draco mumbles. He has his noise back, yet can't quite make his words work.
"And Crabbe says that you get lonely," He never told him that, but it's right. "so, he has asked us to take care of you for a bit."
Draco looks back at Harry. He's nodding along, and doesn't look angry at him for not talking.
"Wh-what about D-Daddy?" He stutters.
Harry and Hermione both make weird faces, and then Harry starts talking.
"Well, your old Daddy, he wasn't very nice." Draco shrugs. Daddy was nice when he was good. "So that's why Crabbe wants you to come with us. And your old Daddy, he won't know."
Draco meets his eyes for half a second before dropping them back to the floor. "He won't?" He whispered.
"Nope." Harry says. He sounds very certain.
He thinks about Daddy. Daddy, who gave him Pansy and told him his bedtime story and gave him chocolate.
Daddy who made him have a bad feeling in his tummy and made him hurt. Daddy who belted him and hit him hard enough to bruise. His decision is made before he can think it through properly.
"Okay," He says quietly. Harry and Hermione stand, and so he follows them out of the room. Crab man is standing there, his arms bound in front of him with a ginger-man pointing his wand at him. He doesn't look at Draco. He suddenly looks very, very old.
"Wh-" He starts to say, but then the ginger-man turns to look at him and Draco decides that it's not a nice look so he shuts up and let's himself be lead down the stairs. They get out the front door and he starts to worry, because he's only supposed to go outside with Daddy's permission. Hermione has her hand on his back so he can't really stop.
Harry's arm is around his shoulders and he feels sick and like he's being stretched far too much and he knows they're not in the Crab man's house anymore.
There are more people than he's used to.
There's Hermione, who he learns is very clever and has a cat. The cat is called Crookshanks and she says he likes Draco a lot, because he always rubs his face against his legs.
There's Ron, who was the angry ginger one. He isn't actually very angry. He always seems a bit awkward around Draco, never really saying much. He's not mean, though. Draco thinks that maybe he's just shy.
And then there's Harry. Harry is never really awkward around Draco. He is a bit like a Daddy, in a sense. Except he hasn't said to call him that, yet he hasn't said not to. Out of the three of them, Draco thinks Harry would be better at being a Daddy. His Daddy, at least. He hopes Harry doesn't mind.
He doesn't understand these people. They're not like Daddy.
Harry and Hermione come back to the house straight away with him, and the ginger man comes back a little later.
Hermione tries to sit him on the couch, but he refuses because he's only allowed on the couch with Daddy. She lets him sit on the floor and tells him she'll be right back, leaving him with Harry.
Harry sort of looks at him, and then doesn't again when he sees Draco looking back. Hermione comes back quickly, with pencils and paper. She lets him doodle while she and Harry talk in another room. He can only make out bits and pieces. He tries to stop listening because he's supposed to listen to adult conversations but he can't help it.
"Messed up - sick bastard- going to-"
"I know - Occulmens- mind set-"
He scribbled over the paper, using all the dark colours without realising it. He never meant to make his pictures dark, yet it always happened.
The voices stop and the footsteps start coming closer, so he makes it look like he's really concentrated on his drawing. Hermione comes over to him, smiling widely.
"What are you drawing, Draco?" He shows her. Her face twitches, but her smile stayed fixed on her face.
"That's, um, nice."
"Thank you." He said quietly. She looked surprised, handing the picture back to him.
"Oh, I almost forgot. Harry's making dinner, are you hungry?"
He shrugs. He isn't hungry, yet he isn't not hungry. Maybe somewhere between.
"He'll make you some anyway, so you can eat it if you're hungry."
There's a loud thud, and the door opens again and the angry ginger one walks in. Draco shrinks backwards, not wanting to make him angrier. He had seen what angry men could do.
"Oh," The ginger man says, staring at him.
"Ron, can we talk?" Hermione says, ushering Ron out of the room. She throws Harry a look he can't decipher before leaving them.
Draco went back to his drawing.
At dinner, it was only Draco and Harry. Ron and Hermione were still upstairs, talking. They had been doing it for a long amount of hours.
Harry had been nice and cut his meal up into bite sized pieces without him asking. Draco eats it slowly, wanting to put off the inevitable. He doesn't even have Pansy to comfort him anymore.
His only wonder is that if Harry would prefer the bath or the bed. If he had a bed, that was. Was he to share Harry's? He shared Daddy's bed once. It wasn't a night he liked remembering.
"You don't have to eat it all, if you want." Harry said. Draco nodded, putting down his fork. It had been starting to make him feel ill.
"Right, I should show you to your room." Harry stood, gesturing to Draco to follow him. Draco stumbled after him, his thumb slipping into his mouth.
Harry led him up two flights of stairs, keeping up a one-sided conversation. Draco nodded where he thought appropriate, though he wasn't really keeping up with what Harry was saying. He wasn't used to being talked to so much.
"This is your room here," Harry said as he pushed open a door. Draco followed him in. Harry went to the wardrobe and started pulling out items of clothing. "There should be something that fits you. . ." He muttered to himself. He pulled out a pair silk green pyjamas and handed them to Draco. "Try these." He told him, leaving the room.
Draco tugged off his robe and pulled on the pyjamas. They were a bit too big but otherwise fit him fine. "Done." He called through the door. He assumed Harry was still there.
Harry was still there, and came in again with a book. It reminded him of the Crab man and when he got angry.
Would Harry be angry if he tried? Would he be angry if he didn't? The Crab man had only yelled when he was angry, but Daddy. . .
No. He would be good. That's what Daddy told him to be. Harry had said Daddy wouldn't know, but Draco didn't believe him. Daddy always knew.
"Do you want a story?" Harry asked. He nodded, as that meant that he would have until the end of the story to decide what to do. He climbed into the bed, pulling the seats over him. Harry didn't give him his bottle, so he sucked on his thumb instead.
"Which one?" Draco shrugged. He didn't know any stories, only the one Daddy told him and the one the Crab man read to him once. He can't remember what one that was now.
"Okay, then I guess we'll go by order." Harry smiles. "Babbity Rabbity and her Cackling Stump."
Harry's voice was nice to listen to. So nice, in fact, that he almost fell asleep for real when he was at the last part. His nerves and trembling hands were the only thing keeping him awake. When Harry finished the final sentence he steeled himself and reached his hands over, tugging at his belt.
Harry jumped backwards, the book falling to the floor. Draco froze, knowing he's miscalculated.
"I'm sorry, D-Daddy, I-I th-thought y-you wanted-" He can finish was he's saying because his throat has gone all tight and his eyes are going all watery. Daddy never likes him when he cries, it always makes him get a belting, but it just makes him more upset.
"Jesus," Harry says, more to himself than Draco. "I'm going t-to, it's not you, I j-just need. . ." He doesn't finish, instead stumbling from the room and leaving Draco trembling in his sheets.
He hears raised voices outside and shudders, knowing they're because of him. He's made him so mad. He is going to be so, so angry.
He hears footsteps outside, then the door opens, and it's not Harry but Hermione. Her eyes look a bit puffy, but she's smiling at him.
"Hey, Draco." She says as she crosses the room to sit on his bed. He watches her warily. He thinks that she might be here to deliver his punishment, like the other lady had when he had wet the bed. He hopes she isn't. That punishment was one of the worst.
"Harry isn't mad at you." She goes on. Draco stares at her.
"He's not?" He says in a small voice. Hermione shakes her head.
"Not at all, he's mad at Vol-Your other Daddy."
"Oh,"
"C'mon, you look wide awake. I'll see if we can find a DVD to watch." Hermione gets off his bed. He follows her, not knowing what she was actually talking about. He had never heard of a DVD before.
Hermione leads him downstairs, into the room which he had drawn in earlier. She gets him to sit on the couch, and then wraps him up in not one but two blankets. He's grateful for it. He's always cold.
Hermione searches for something in a basket before pulling it out.
"Aha!" She says.
He is fascinated by the DVD. The way the colours move across the screen so effortlessly, the way the sound matches up to the dinosaurs.
There are different dinosaurs. He likes Ducky the best, or maybe Spike. Ducky is very energetic and says things in threes a lot, but Spike doesn't talk much.
Half way through the movie Ron walks in, looking at them in confusion. Draco keeps his eyes on the DVD.
"Ron, a word, please?" Hermione goes into the other room, leaving him to watch the DVD by himself. He can hear them talking if he listens real hard. He thinks they're talking about him.
He slips his thumb back into his mouth, the digit familiar and comfortable. His focus keeps going off the DVD, he's so tired. But he isn't in bed and he isn't supposed to sleep anywhere but his bed.
Hermione come back, a bottle in her hands. "Here," She gives him it. He replaces his thumb with the nipple of the bottle, tasting hot chocolate. It's a nice taste. Daddy only let him have it once before, and he can't remember much of what happened afterwards.
He starts to nod off as he finishes the bottle, the DVD playing in the background. He doesn't want to sleep, but he can't help it.
Curled up on the couch, his eyes slip closed, and for the first time, he almost feels safe.