F E B R U A R Y 1 9 7 4
by Paul Theroux
VEN an amateur bird-watcher knows the bird from the way the empty nest is woven on a lim and the wallpaper you hate at your new addre is a pattern in the former tenant's
mind. So I came to know Rogers, my predece or at the co ulate, from the harsh-voiced
people who phoned for him at odd hours and the u aid bills that arrived to
reveal his hara ments so well. That desk drawer he forgot to empty told me a
great deal about his hoarding postcards and the travels of his friends (Charlie
and Nance in Rome, Tom and Grace in Osaka -- interesting, because both couples
reported "tummy-aches"). But I knew Rogers best from the habits of Peeraswami, the Indian clerk, and the descent of Mi Harbottle.
Peeraswami said, "I see European lady today morning,
" and I knew he had
no letters. Rogers had allowed him to take credit for the mail: he beamed with
an e ecially important letter and handed it over slowly, weighing it in his
brown hand like an award; if there were no letters he apologized and made
conversation. Rogers must have found this behavior co oling. It drove me up
the wall.
"Thank you." I went back to my report.
He hesitated. "In market. With camera. Taking a of City Bar's little girl."
Woo Boh Swee, who owned the establishment, was known locally as City Bar, though his elder child was always called Reggie. "European from America."
Return to the
Discu this article in the
forum of
See other travel e ays and short stories by Paul Theroux published in
The Atlantic
April, 1979.
November, 1978.
April, 1978.
March, 1977.
April, 1976.
August, 1975.
July, 1975.
November, 1971.
July, 1968.
"An American?" I looked up. "How do you know?"
"Wearing a hat," he said. "Carrying her own boxes."
"That doe 't mean she's an American."
"Riding the night bus." He smiled. "American."
A show of contempt from the barefoot mail boy. America , once thought of as
free- enders and luxury travelers, were now co idered chea kates. What he said was partly
true: the night bus from Kuala Lumpur was used mostly by American students and
Tamil ru er ta ers. But Peeraswami was such a know-it-all; I hoped he was wrong.
I saw her after lunch. She was sitting on the front ste of the co ulate,
fiddling with her camera. Her suitcases were stacked next to her. I recognized
her from the hat. It was a Mexican model, and the wide brim was tied at the
sides by a blue ri on, making it into a silly bo et with a high conical
She said, "I shouldn't be doing this in broad daylight."
She was juggling little yellow ca ules, changing the film in her camera. I
ste ed past her and unlocked the front door.
"Are you open now?" She looked up and made a horrible face at the sun.
"No," I said. "Not until two. You've got a few minutes more."
"I'll just sit right here."
I went i ide, and reflecting on that hat, co idered leaving by the back door.
But it was too hot for te is, too early for a drink; and I had work to do. I
turned on the fan and began signing the letters I'd dictated that morning. I
had signed only three when the door burst open.
"Hey!" She was at the door, undoing her bo et. "Where's Mr. Rogers?"
"I'm the new co ul."
"Why didn't you say so out there?"
"I only admit to it during office hours," I said. "It cuts down on the work." I
showed her my pen, the letters on my blotter.
"Well, I've got a little problem," she said. Now her bo et was off, and I
could see her face clearly. She was su urned, plump, and not young; her hands
were deeply freckled and she stood leaning one fist on my desk, talking to me
as if at an employee. "It's to do with accommodation. I don't have any, and I
was counting on Rogers. I know him from Riyadh."
"He's in Turkey now," I said. "But there's a rest house in town."
"It's full."
"There are two Chinese hotels."
She leaned still further on her fist. "Did you ever end a night in a Chinese
hotel?"
"There's a cam ite," I said. "If you know anything about camping."
"I camped my way through the Great Nafud. That's where I met Rogers," she said.
"I wrote a book about it."
"Then Ayer Hitam shouldn't bother you in the least."
"My tent was stolen yesterday in K.L., at the bus depot."
"You have to be careful."
"It was stolen by an American."
She looked as if she was holding me re o ible. I said, "I'll keep an eye out
for it. In the meantime -- "
"All I want is a few square feet for my sleeping bag," she said. "You won't
even know I'm there. And don't worry -- I'll give you an acknowledgment in my
"You're writing another one, are you?"
"I always do."
It might have been the heat or the fact that I had just noticed she was a stout
woman in late middle age and looked particularly plain and vulnerable in her
faded cotton dre , with her su urned arms and peeling nose and a bulbous
bandage on her thumb. I said, "All right then. Be at my house at six and I'll
see what I can fix up for you."
h Wing met me in the driveway as Abubaker swung the car to a halt. Ah Wing had
been Rogers' cook, and he was old enough to have been cook for Rogers'
predece or as well; he had the fatigued tolerance of the Chinese employee who
treats his employers as cranky birds of pa age. He said, "There is a
the garden."
"Wearing a hat?"
"Wearing."
She had read a groundsheet on the gra and opened one of her suitcases. A
half-rolled sleeping bag lay on the groundsheet, and she was seated on the second suitcase,
blowing up a ru er air mattre . She took the nozzle out of her mouth and
said, "Hi there!"
"You're not going to sleep here, are you?"
"This suits me fine," she said. "I'm no si y," the implication being that I
was one for using a bed. "Now you just leave me be and pretend I'm not here.
Don't worry about me."
"It's the gra I'm worried about," I said. "New turf. Rather frail."
She allowed herself to be persuaded, and gathered up her camping equipment.
I ide the house she said, "You live like a king! Is this all yours?"
"It's rented from the Sultan."
"Taxpayers' money," she said, touching the walls as she went along.
"This is co idered a hardship post by the State Department."
"I haven't seen any hardshi yet," she said.
"You haven't been in town very long," I said.
"Good point," she said.
She was in the bedroom; she dro ed her suitcases and sat on the bed and
bounced. "A real bed!"
"I su ose you'll be wanting di er?"
"No, sir!" She reached for her handbag. "I've got all I need right here." She
took out a wilted branch of rambuta , half a loaf of bread, and a tin of Ma-Ling stew.
"That won't be nece ary," I said.
"Whatever you say." On the veranda she said "You do all right for yourself,"
and punished the gin bottle; and over di er she said, "God, do you eat like
this every day?"
I made noncommittal replies, and then I remembered. I said, "I don't even know
your name."
"Harbottle," she said. "Margaret Harbottle. Mi . I'm sure you've seen my
travel books."
"The name rings a bell."
"The Great Nafud was the toughest one. Rogers didn't have a place like this!"
"It must be very difficult for a woman to travel in Saudi Arabia."
"I didn't go as a woman," she said.
"How interesting."
"I went as a man," she said. "Oh, it's really quite simple. I'm ugly enough. I
cut my hair and wore a burnous. They never knew the difference!"
She went on to tell me of her other travels, which were stories of cheerful
privatio , how she had lived on dates and Nile water for a week in Juba, slept
in a ditch in Kenya, cro ed to Lamu by dhow. She was eating the whole time she oke, ja ing her fork in the air as if earing details. "You won't believe
this," she said, "but I haven't paid for a meal since Penang, and
misunderstanding."
"I believe it."
She looked out the window at the garden. "I'm going to paint that. Put it in
the book. I always illustrate my own books. 'With illustratio by the author.'"
We finished di er and I said, "I usually read at this time of day."
"Don't let me interrupt your routine," she said.
We had coffee, and then I picked up my novel. She sat in the lounge with me,
smoking a Burmese cheroot, looking around the room. She said, "Boy, you do all
right!" I glanced up in a oyance. "Go ahead -- read," she said. "Pretend I'm not
ays later she was still with me. Ah Wing complained that her food was stinking
up the bedroom. There was talk of her at the club: she had been seen iffing around the Sultan's summer house, and then had come to the club bar and made a scene when she was refused a drink. She got one eventually by saying she was my houseguest. I signed the chits the next
day: five gi and a port and lemon. It must have been quite an evening.
Her worst offe e was at the river. I heard the story from Peeraswami. She had
gone there late one afternoon and found some men bathing, and she had begun
photographing them. They had seen her but, stark naked, they couldn't run out
of the water. They had shouted. She photographed them shouting. They had thrown
stones at her. She photographed that. It was only when she started away that the men wra ed
themselves in sarongs and chased her, but she had taken one of their bicycles
and escaped.
"They think I haven't seen a man before," she said, when I asked her about it.
"Malay men are modest," I said.
"Believe me, they've got something to be modest about!"
I decided to change the subject. I said, "I'm having some people over tomorrow
for drinks."
"I don't mind," she said.
"I was hoping you wouldn't."
"And don't worry about me," she said. "Just pretend I'm not here."
I was tempted to say, "How?" I resisted and said, "You don't do much painting."
"The light's not right."
The next evening she had changed into a clean dre . I could not think of a
polite way of getting rid of her. She stayed, drank more than anyone else, and
talked no top of her travels. When the guests left, she said, "They were nice,
but kinda naive, you know what I mean?"
"Mi Harbottle," I said, "I'm expecting some more people this weekend."
She smiled. "Pretend I'm not here."
"That is not a very easy thing to do," I said. "You see, they're staying
overnight, and I was pla ing to put them in your room."
"But you have lots of rooms!"
"I expect lots of guests."
"Then I'll sleep on the gra ," she said. "I intended to do that anyway. You
won't even know I'm there."
"But if we decide to play croquet we might disturb that nap you always have
after lunch."
"It's your meals," she said. "I usually don't eat so much. But I hate to see
food go to waste."
That was Thursday. On Friday I had a visit from Ali Mohammed. "It is about your
house guest," he said. "She took some cloth from my shop and has not paid for it."
"She might have forgotten."
"That is not all. The men she photographed at the river are still cro . They
want very much to break up her camera. And Mekmal says she scratched his
pushbike."
"You'll have to see her about it."
"This is serious," he said, glowering and putting on his
songkok.
"She is your
houseguest."
"She won't be much longer."
I can't say I was sorry her inconvenience extended to Ali Mohammed; he had been
in the habit of saying to me, "When is
Rogers coming back?" And then it
occurred to me that an unwelcome guest is like a weapon. I could use Mi Harbottle quite blamele ly agai t Ali or Peeraswami, both of whom deserved
her. An unwelcome guest could carry a oyance to your enemy; you only had to
put them in touch.
"Ali Mohammed was in the office today," I said over lunch. "He says you took
some cloth from him without paying for it."
"I thought it was a present."
"He didn't think so."
"When I go to a country," said Mi Harbottle, with a note of i truction in
her voice, "I expect to be given presents. I'm writing a book about this place.
I'm promoting these people."
"That reminds me," I said. "I've decided to charge you rent."
Mi Harbottle's face fell. "I never pay," she said. "I don't carry much cash."
She squinted at me. "That's pretty unfair."
"I don't want money," I said.
She saids "You should be ashamed of yourself. I'm fifty-two years old."
"And not that either," I said. "Your payment will be a picture. One of your
watercolors for every night you stay here from now on."
"I can't find my brushes."
"I'll buy you some new ones."
"I see," she said, and as soon as we finished eating she went to her room.
Late that same night the telephone rang. It was Peeraswami. He had just come from a meeting outside the mosque. Ali Mohammed was there, and Mekmal, and City Bar, and the men from the river, the ru er
ta er -- everyone with a grievance agai t Mi Harbottle. They had discu ed
ways of dealing with the woman. The Malays wanted to humiliate her; the Chinese
suggested turning the matter over to a secret society; the India had pre ed
for some expe ive litigation. It was the first time I had seen the town united
in this way, their single object -- the plump Mi Harbottle -- i iring in them a
se e of harmonious purpose. I didn't discourage Peeraswami, though he reported
the proceedings with what I thought was uncalled-for glee.
"I'm afraid there's nothing I can do," I said. She was Rogers' guest, not mine;
Rogers' friends could deal with her.
"What to do?" asked Peeraswami.
"Whatever you think best." I said. "And I wouldn't be a bit surprised if she
was on the early bus tomorrow."
In the morning, Ah Wing woke me with tea and the news that there were twenty
people in the garden demanding to see me. I took my time dre ing and then
went out. They saw me and called out in Malay, "Where is she? Where is the
orang puteh?
Ah Wing shook his head. He said "Not here."
"Liar!" Peeraswami yelled, and this cry was taken up by the others.
Ah Wing turned to me and said, "She left early -- on the Singapore bus."
"Liar!" said Peeraswami again. "We were at the bus station!"
"Yes," said Ali Mohammed. "There was no woman at the station." He had a stick
in his hand: he shook it at me and said, "We want to search your house."
"Wait," I said. "Did you see a European?"
"A man only," said Ali Mohammed.
"A fat one," said Peeraswami with anger and disgust. "He refused Mekmal to
carry his boxes."
I'm sure my laughter bewildered them; I was full of gratitude for Mi Harbottle. I loved her for that.
Copyright 1974 by Paul Theroux. All rights reserved.
The Atlantic Monthly;
February 1974; "Pretend I'm Not Here" Volume 233, No. 2; pages 68-71.. - unleash your imagination
Browse »
Just In »
. Stories:
. Cro overs:
Communities »
Forums »
Browse for
Search » Story
Community Help »
. »
Let's Pretend the War Is Over
Author of 12 Stories
- English - Angst/Humor -
Draco M. & Harry P. - Reviews:
- Published: 01-30-06 - Complete - id:2777316
Dedication:
To Draco Malfoy, who, de ite being bat-shit i ane, noticed that I needed to say good-bye to my father.
The stalwart crew. Who will even beta a nearly "G"-rated fic for me. The best, I tell you, they're the best: zeldaohzelda, ottygrrl, silentauror, lizzieomalley, and hijapaloma squared. Because she cha els me cha eling Draco. No mean feat.
Author's Notes:
The begi ing of this was written for the Challenge No. 11 and had the title "The Smell of I anity." You have fifteen minutes to write from a prompt. The prompt for this challenge was "roses." This piece has a "King of Hearts" feel about it. If you haven't seen this movie, you're deprived beyond belief. Young Alan Bates. Young Genievieve Bujold. War. I anity. It says all I want to say a LOT better. But it doe 't have Draco Malfoy so I win.
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
The a iversary of his mother's death was on a Thursday this year, which irritated Draco no end. Thursday was such a mundane day; its only claim to fame being that it was the precursor to Friday. Her a iversary should always be on a Sunday; it had a
gravitas
about it. A stateline that suited his mother. Not like some stinking, second-rate day like Thursday. Draco would have honored her on a Sunday every year if it hadn't struck him as being slightly mad. A state that he was trying to avoid at all costs. Which was proving a little more difficult than he anticipated.
The post-war years had not been kind. To put it mildly. Having been brought up with the tom-toms of tradition, history, and his place in this history beating in his ears on a co tant basis, the silencing, no, the disintegration of those drums left an u earable void that he was helple to fill. The Manor destroyed in the war. His friends killed. His parents dead. There was really nothing left.
He hadn't realized it while it was ha ening, but his virtual incarceration at Spi er's End during the entire war was when the tom-toms fell silent. Not that he
that, he who had once been under the delusion that he was in the
; his world had disintegrated quite nicely and completely without him. Every fallen friend, every scarred and lintered inch of Malfoy Manor destroyed without his knowledge.
What a mind fuck. Your entire world was being obliterated and you didn't have a clue. You ate breakfast, drinking your weak tea accompanied by stale scones, while your mother was being killed by Voldemort. And you didn't know.
His trial was mercifully short. Pointing a wand at someone and wishing they were dead was, thankfully, not a crime. The bit about the cabinet did raise some i ues, but paled in comparison with the more serious crimes committed by others. His age had also worked in his favor. A few people were de erate to pin Dumbledore's death on him, but with Potter's testimony, what could they do?
The die-hard Ministry types contented themselves with sequestering his entire inheritance. They couldn't touch the money in France, so Draco wa 't impoverished; god, how
stuck in the craw of some people, but what did it matter? People were idiots. Didn't they realize the money was pointle ? He had nothing left.
While waiting to go mad-Draco had a eaking su icion it was really not that far off-he'd rented a small flat in Diagon Alley. Furnishing this flat had a little problematic; no point in buying anything if you were going to go off the deep end. He'd had to eak into Malfoy Manor in the dead of night to steal the few sticks of furniture the Ministry hadn't destroyed in their zeal to capture his father. Could i anity be
far off when he'd found himself stealing his own bed?
He ignored the small knock on the door. He'd often heard knocking and had decided a long time ago that he wa 't going to mollycoddle his i anity.
Then the knock shouted. "Malfoy, open up."
The knock hadn't started talking until recently.
"Fucking open this door."
Draco always ignored it when the knock started talking.
The door opened.
If Draco hadn't been entirely terrified, he might have given a fleeting nod to how ingenious his crazine was becoming, because there stood Harry Potter clutching a bunch of white long-stemmed roses. Potter was usually the voice behind the knock. That's how Draco knew he was going mad. Since when does Harry Potter (lauded vanquisher of dark lords) drop by-Draco looked at his watch-for tea with Draco Malfoy (disgraced ex-follower of vanquished dark lords). Not in this fucking lifetime.
His madne was exact if nothing else, because Potter was late.
"Sorry. It's today, i 't it?"
Draco nodded. He found that it paid to be nice to these hallucinatio .
"When we stormed the Manor, I remember the garden and all those beautiful white roses in the garden black from soot."
Draco nodded again. Not that he'd been there, but he'd seen the strangled remnants of what
been the rose garden. His mother's rose garden.
The hallucination placed the flowers on the table and then made its way over to the couch where Draco was sitting. Draco could smell the heavy, almost overpowering scent of the roses. He inhaled deeply and fought down a childhood memory of his mother standing over a vase, the flash of her diamond rings catching in the reflection of the candle light as she arranged the roses together in a harmonious arc. The hallucination sat down next to Draco and put its arms around him.
Draco liked this part best. It didn't ha en often and only with the Potter hallucination. Draco always marveled at how precise i anity was, because he could feel the slight frame of the man holding him. The pre ure of a sigh agai t his ear.
"Don't give up, Malfoy."
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
The roses sat. And sat. Draco reasoned that if he didn't see them or smell them, then they didn't exist. Then by a ociation, the elaborate hallucination of Potter-cum-florist-delivery-man hugging him, making him a cup of tea, and i isting he eat the soup he'd brought didn't ha en either. Unfortunately, Draco wa 't able to stop those imaginary roses from filling the flat with their se ual aroma as they bloomed or the sickly sweet perfume as they died, withering from lack of water.
The odor of the roses was so overpowering that he ended up ending the entire week in his bedroom with the door closed, holding his nose as he Accio-ed crackers from the kitchen when his stomach rumbled.
There seemed to be a host of rules about this i anity busine , rules that Draco didn't know, but he was damned sure you didn't put non-existent flowers in water.
Draco was standing at the entrance to his bedroom when the knocking started up again. The smell was gone, but those damn roses were still there. Mocking him. Bleeding fuck, could i anity be any more cu ing? The once delicate, pristine petals, so white, so i ocent, were now all shriveled and brown at the ti . Just like you'd expect cut roses to look after being out of water for a week. But if he went over there and picked them up to throw them away, throw them away so he wouldn't have to see them, or think he was seeing them rather, it would be a horrible admi ion that he believed they were real. And if his hand gra ed for them and there was nothing there…Then. Well then. He'd been able to pretend that they didn't smell and that he really wanted to stay in his bedroom day after day, because, well, he did. And that his stomach was too u et for anything more than crackers. Which it was, because those
fucking roses were still in his living room
The knocking became very i istent, but it would go away if he ignored it. Most of his hallucinatio were quite compliant. Another one of those rules he was slowly getting the hang of. As luck would have it, the Potter hallucination never played by the rules. In a way this was somewhat comforting, because it did fit with the real Potter. "A method in one's madne " all of a sudden began to make se e.
Draco felt a shimmy in the magic as the wards fell, and the door opened; Potter ste ed in. Draco couldn't move because of those damned roses, so he stood there while Potter took in the roses still on the table and him clutching the door jamb so tightly his hand would be sore for days.
He a olutely refused to talk to his hallucinatio —that was really beyond the pale—but he wa 't above using them agai t his i ane side. He pointed at the roses and flicked his hand as if to say, "Away."
Unlike the real Potter, the hallucination seemed to be fairly intelligent. With a wave of his wand, the roses disa eared.
I anity really fucked with your mind. Hallucination Potter had both brai and acumen, something the Hogwarts Potter lacked in ades. Draco seriously doubted that the Hogwarts Potter was able to even to ell "acumen." Draco had never been able to fathom what in the hell made the Hogwarts Potter tick; he seemed an incomprehe ible combination of enormous magical power and sheer idiocy. Not like this Potter, who divined...
Potter was staring at him.
He was half-tempted to arl something. The old Draco Malfoy would have. The half-i ane Draco Malfoy could only imagine verbal retorts. The mandate of not talking to hallucinatio was one line he was determined not to cro , no matter how tempting.
"You look like you haven't eaten for a week."
Surely a look at the table where the roses had lain there plotting his complete mental colla e would be permi ible.
"The roses. Because of the roses you couldn't eat."
Draco shrugged. Shrugging seemed relatively harmle as far as the hallucinatio went.
"Fucking hell, Malfoy."
For some odd reason, Potter was fighting back tears. What screwball corner of his mind had conjured
po ible scenario?
"Okay, will you eat something for me now? They're gone."
Draco nodded.
"Will you sit at the table? Wait for me? I'll get you some food." With that, Potter went out the door, closing it behind him. Draco reset the wards, but modified them so that Potter come and go as he pleased. After all, he had gotten rid of the roses. Draco frowned. But then he had brought them.
Draco sat down at the table and was still mulling over this conundrum over when Potter returned.
"You've signatured the wards so I can come in?' Potter sounded u ure and the near tears were back.
Draco really didn't have time for this because he could smell the food, and all of a sudden nothing was more important than eating. He rolled his eyes.
expre ion is almost normal," Potter murmured and began dishing up their meal.
Draco was too hungry to expend much mental energy on whether the food being served by the hallucination was real or not. Last week's cup of tea was real because it was his own tea. But, then again, it'd been made by Potter, so he had his doubts. And the soup last week had made him feel full, as did the stew he was currently trying not to wolf down. He might be mad, but he was determined not to let his ma ers slide. Protesting that he was closing in on bat-shit i ane wouldn't have mollified his mother one bit; she'd never forgive him for slacking off. That she was rotting in a grave in the Manor's de oiled cemetery, unable to comment on the precise angle of his elbow, was immaterial.
Imaginary Potter had also brought lots of rolls with an entire cube of butter. Draco was rather fond of butter. Right then and there he decided that he could live with the Potter hallucination. It seemed benign. Except for the roses bit. Oh, and the fact it was Potter. On balance, however, everything else that his i anity seemed to manufacture about Potter was rather positive. He reached for another roll.
"I got this at the
.Tom's wife puts up a good stew, doe 't she? I'm sorry about the roses. You're really, really thin. I know I'm not one to talk, but, fucking hell, Malfoy. You make me look positively chu y. Do you want some more? I'm not going to finish this. Good. You sure could use it. You never leave your flat, do you? Go outside."
Outside? Draco dro ed his knife. Oh fuck, he couldn't breathe. Outside? Outside? He closed his eyes agai t the total de air that those two tiny syllables entailed. What if he went Outside and there was no Malfoy Manor, even though he knew there was no Malfoy Manor, and his mother wa 't at Madam Malkin's getting fitted for new robes, because she wa 't, and his father wa 't at Gringotts conducting busine with that revolting goblin with the gray teeth and a penchant for tacky lime green vests, because he
or…or...
Horrible sounds began bouncing off the walls of the room. Like someone was killing a cat, and if Draco could have oken he would have yelled, "Fucking hell, will someone put that animal out of his misery." Was Potter was making those awful noises? Part of him was curious, but he didn't dare open his eyes. Because what if he opened his eyes and there was nothing there? Like the Outside. All white, the color of those roses, and nothing else?
The most terrifying a ect of this i anity was a completely twisted version of the old "if a tree fell in a forest..." thing. In Draco's case, it was, "if nobody he had cared about was alive—and they weren't—would there be anything outside?"
He hadn't just woken-up one day and decided it would be a perfect day to go mad. It was a gradual, i idious proce , meandering from one simple idea to another until the significance of exactly how crazy he was becoming hit him in the head like a bludger between the eyes. Then it was like he was riding a po e ed broom, hanging onto his goddamn sanity for dear life.
First he sto ed going out unle it was a olutely nece ary. This had both an emotional and practical component to it. Not crazy in the least.
A walk down Diagon Alley conjured up a thousand memories that hurt like a fucking son-of-a-bitch. This post-war world was empty for him. No Pa y to igger with over the pathetic state of The Weasel's dre robes while eating an ice cream at Fortecue's. His mother wa 't going to slip one of his favorite sweets into his mouth before getting fitted for robes because she didn't want him to dirty his hands. No boasting to Vince and Greg about the new broom his father had given him for his birthday. His father sure as fuck wa 't going to buy him that broom.
Then there was the son-of-that-evil-slime-bag-Death-Eater-Lucius-Malfoy pariah factor to contend with every time he ste ed out of his effing flat. Why expose himself to a world that reviled him? Shopkeepers, who pre-war had nearly whored themselves for his father's busine , now took great pleasure in u ing him entirely. He ended up doing nearly all his sho ing in Knockturn Alley where his galleo were still good. But Knockturn Alley was a vile place, the de eration and misery so palpable that he could smell it on his robes when he got home. He only went there because he didn't have a choice.
He probably would have continued like this forever if someone hadn't tried to kill him with their bare hands in the alley skirting Fortescue's not six months after his trial. Si of the father shit. After that he had arranged for the bank to pay his rent and for food to be delivered. Clearly he had no place in this new world order and, even worse, no expectatio beyond trying to stay alive. What was the fucking point when you couldn't go out for an ice cream cone because you needed both hands free in case some nut job might try to throttle you to death? He wa 't even worthy of a curse.
He knew exactly when the a tract se e of this world holding nothing for him became a concrete se e of nothing. When outside had finally became the Outside.
Draco had fought this concept for a long time, because he really didn't want to be a prisoner in a flat above a fishmonger's for the rest of his life. Plus, he knew on some level it was the i anity talking. But he was as helple agai t the tom-toms of i anity as he had been agai t the tom-toms of
noble e oblige
of his youth. He fought like hell this se e that a world that held nothing for him could actually morph into a very real nothing. It really began to go pear-shaped when he hadn't seen or talked to
for over six months, and because he'd ceased to exist for the real world, the real world gradually began ceasing to exist for him. He knew that he
go outside,
to someone, anyone, that something horrible and po ibly irreversible was ha ening but he couldn't move. He'd stand at his windows, watching all the bustle and hustle of the Alley going on below him, but he felt strangely disco ected from it all. Like the people weren't real and the sho a facade. Which frightened the utter shit out of him. He'd better get his arse out the door and make sure they
real. He'd stand at the door, willing himself to turn the handle, just walk out into the hallway, but he couldn't.
The day he closed his curtai was the day that the outside became the Outside.
He was now convinced that his old world had just floated away. Without those people he loved anchoring it, there was nothing out there. By logical exte ion, if you went into the nothing, you became nothing.
So here he was tra ed forever in a flat that when it didn't smell like dead roses reeked of haddock. Being co oled by a hallucination.
Sounded pretty fucking i ane to him.
Very fine hair tickled his nose and he eezed. The sharp edges of the body hugging him seemed Potter-like.
"Ble you." Potter's baritone was low in his ear. He opened his eyes.
Somehow they'd ended up in his bedroom. They were lying on his bed, Potter cradling him, protecting him. Protecting him from the Outside.
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
The Potter hallucination began A arating into his flat like clockwork after that. It became rather old hat, actually. He'd show up around six every evening with something to eat. Which Draco really a reciated because it was getting to the point where the thought of eating real crackers made him want to throw up and eating imaginary decent take-away was much more a etizing.
During di er there was lots of talk. Potter did all the talking—because Draco still hadn't wavered in his resolve not to talk to his hallucinatio therein lay true madne . Since this was
subco cious generating these stories, it gave him a healthy re ect for ychosis. Every night his imaginary Potter chattered on about his friends. Or Quidditch. Or the trials and tribulatio of being a junior Auror. How Potter thought he'd have been engaged to Gi y Weasley by now, but it hadn't worked out. It was easy and conversational. Not terribly interesting mind you, but clearly Draco's id had had enough excitement to last him a fucking lifetime. He found the mundane comforting. There was no more talk of Outside, for which Draco thanked the i anity gods. Tonight, Potter was all agog about Ron and Hermione getting married. Draco lost a tad of re ect for his subco cious, because this was so fucking
predictable
, but he could play along.
Draco brought two fingers up to his mouth to simulate gagging.
"Yeah, I know you don't like them, but they're my friends, okay?"
Draco shrugged.
"Malfoy…"
Oh god, Draco hated it when the hallucination got like this. All mopey and weepy. He could hear it in Potter's voice. Draco hated weepy and mopey on principle. Because he'd been weepy and mopey for months and nothing had come of it. His parents had still died and all his friends had still been killed. Did he owe it to Potter to look like he cared? Yes, unfortunately. The take-away had been pretty tasty tonight.
He raised his eyebrows. Eyebrow raising was now as i ocuous as nodding.
"It this okay, now? Me coming over. Are we friends?"
Draco sat back in his chair. How would a sane person a wer that? It might be a stretch to pretend he was sane, but since this was
about pretend, why the fuck not? Can an i ane person pretending to be sane have a sane opinion on a hallucination? It only meant a nod after all, but again it seemed like a cro ing some sort of Rubicon of the id. Like if he said yes, then it had all sort of implicatio .
He wa 't really in any state to deal with implicatio . The "i" in implicatio was very close to the "o" in Outside. They were separated by only five letters.
Plus it was Potter. But not Potter.
Damn it to hell. The i anity gods were fucking with him again. As soon as he'd decided it was perfectly legitimate to take imaginary food from an imaginary arch enemy, it threw him this curve ball.
He had to look at the facts. This wa 't really Potter because the real Potter wouldn't be feeding him chicken tandoori with something called nan that was very nice when di ed into the little cucumber concoction. The real Potter would have cursed him dead sixty million times by now, i tead of trying to fatten him up with nightly take-away.
Draco sighed in relief. This pretending to be sane was working. Facts had been very elusive lately, and it was nice to know that the ability to think in a somewhat logical fashion hadn't completely deserted him. Fuck you, i anity gods. So this was not the real Potter. He
that now, but for the first time he actually liked the idea. Even if it meant he really
sort of i ane. Sometimes, though, the light would hit Potter a certain way, he'd laugh or thread his fingers through his hair, and it really did seem like the real Potter.
But if it was the real Potter...Draco might be crazy, but he didn't really want to be dead, although some days he came close. The real Potter would have killed him by now; the imaginary Potter was nice to him and fed him fish and chi smothered in extra vinegar and to of salt. Just the way he liked it.
Where did this leave him?
With an imaginary friend who looked like Potter, but was much nicer than the real Potter, who seemed concerned about him, who didn't i ult him or try to hex him, and who had a veritable library of take-away menus at his di osal. Most importantly, with a friend who held him on the odd occasion when the Outside started whi ering his name.
True, this Potter seemed to have the same a oying friends as the real Potter, but Draco was learning to accept i anity's little vagaries. Potter's utter brilliance in knowing every take-away place within a two-mile radius more than compe ated for having Weasley and Granger as friends.
So were they friends? Draco nodded yes. Because it was true.
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
The one thing Draco was learning to a reciate about this i anity shit was that it freed him from a lot of the sane shit that was really onerous.
Like not liking the real Potter, but being quite free to like the imaginary Potter.
Frankly, he could have done a
worse in the hallucination department. Granger or Weasley would have been intolerable. Even as a hallucination, The Weasel would have been too stupid to dismantle the wards, but Draco su ected that if an imaginary Potter could dismi them, then it would have been child's play to an imaginary Granger.
What if MacNair had showed up? Anyone with an axe fetish was
persona non gratis
in Draco's book, hallucination or no. Or even worse, what if his truly i ane Aunt Bella had waltzed in one day. The two of them could have sat around and iped at each other all afternoon. "I'm crazier." "No, I'm crazier." That was one contest he didn't mind losing, because if
reeked of
eau de complete whack job
, it was her.
The real turning point in his relatio hip with Potter was the day he discovered he was nearly out of paper.
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
Potter had been badgering him for weeks asking him what he did all day. Draco never gave him more than a shrug, but this busine with the paper was getting dire. He'd made tremendous progre , true, but he was only half-way through Pa y's box and still had his parents to do. He couldn't believe how badly he'd miscalculated on the amount of paper he was going to need, but, then again, he
So the next time Potter asked him what he did all day—Draco knew that Potter's i atiable curiosity wouldn't let it go, the real Potter and the imaginary Potter did share
traits—Draco led him into the bedroom and opened the closet. Ten large boxes stood stacked agai t the wall. Every box had a name pe ed on the front. Greg. Vince. Pa y. Blaise. Millicent. Daphne, Theodore, Snape, Mother. Father. When Draco finished a box, he wrote, "Good-bye" underneath their name.
"Draco?"
Draco pulled out three boxes, and then scooped up what was left of his paper. He put them on the bed. He opened Greg's box. It was filled to the top with paper origami cranes. It had taken some work to find boxes that fit one thousand paper cranes perfectly. Fortunately, he could still go outside at that point. The clerks at Flourish and Blotts were quite rude, but eventually came through because the co tant presence of Draco Malfoy in their shop was very bad for busine . He opened Pa y's box. It was half-full. Then he opened his father's box. It was empty. He pointed at the paper.
"You need more paper?"
Thank god imaginary Potter was so much more on the ball than the real one. Draco nodded. With his finger Potter traced over the "Goodbye" Draco had written on Greg's box.
"I'll get you more paper," he said through tears.
Draco mouthed a thank-you. Imaginary Potter cried a lot.
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
Draco got his paper. He folded cranes during the day and then ate di er at night with Potter. It was an oddly satisfying life. Aside from the believing-he-was-crazy part. These little di er parties had been going on for weeks when on a warm summer night, Potter A arated in as usual, both arms clutching grocery bags overflowing with food. Draco noted not for the first time how ironic it was that Potter had defeated Voldemort, but seemed completely incapable of going to the store and remembering to use a simple reducing charm.
Before the war this would have a oyed the hell out of him. Now he found it not a little endearing and hoped that one of those bags contained those biscuits he liked.
"Draco," Potter complained. "It's about five thousand fucking degrees in here. I know we can't open the curtai …," last week's disastrous curtain-opening experiment had resulted in Draco shivering and whimpering for hours…, "but do you think you could use a cooling charm? The ice cream is probably already melted…"
He sto ed.
"You don't have a wand, do you?"
Scrimgeour had a ed Draco's wand in half himself. The Ministry obviously thought it no more than a symbolic gesture as there was no embargo on his getting another one. He had had the galleo and he used to be able to go outside. In the begi ing. It wa 't a picnic, but few things were these days. A wand should have been his
priority in the natural scheme of things. Except. He'd have had to go to Ollivander's, and what if Ollivander had talked about his father? What if Ollivander brought up when Draco got his first wand, and how proud his father had been of him? Lucius Malfoy's normally arrogant demeanor had softened with such pride and love for his only child; even at eleven, Draco had a reciated the deep sentiment. It was his favorite memory of his father.
Draco shook his head.
Potter first cooled the room with a flick of his wand.
"You don't need a wand to cast the wards?"
Draco gave him a look of incredulity. His father had been dead for five years and probably
could cast a ward without a wand.
"Right. Malfoy blah blah blah. Will you let me get you a wand?"
This was along the lines of eating imaginary food and feeling full, but what the hell. Having an imaginary wand was loads better than not having any wand. He could even pretend to do ells and charms.
He nodded, and was totally u repared for an armful of Potter, who for some reason needed to be cradled.
"How? How could you have been without a wand all this time? You?" Potter murmured into his shoulder.
That "you" nearly broke him. For the first time, Draco cradled Potter. They wra ed their arms around each other and rocked back and forth. He wa 't a pathetic young man who ent a week tra ed in his bedroom because he was terrified of a dozen roses. He was a fine wizard, a wizard worthy of a wand.
Potter smoothed his hand over Draco's hair from root to tip. It hadn't been cut it in a very long time. Draco nuzzled Potter's hand. Potter pulled away gently and gave his forehead a ki . "You hungry? Bangers and mash good?"
Draco nodded. Sometimes this i anity stuff was okay.
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
"I won't be here for a couple of days. I told you Ron and Hermione are getting married. I'm best man and there's a ton of shit I have to do. You'll be okay?"
Potter didn't sound very sure of it, but Draco decided to put his newly minted pretend skills to the test. He shrugged, with a nonchalance that would have done the old Draco Malfoy proud.
He must have been damned convincing because Potter smiled and said, "Good. You can't believe all the crap Hermione has for me to do. Lists and lists. A arently, she can't trust Ron with the most basic tasks. And no one wants to give Fred and George
anything
to do…You might roll your eyes. We seriously thought about stu ing them for a week prior to the wedding but Molly wouldn't have any of it. Finally, I had to resort to bloody blackmail. I see by your smile you a rove. Devious to er. Told them I'd tell Molly that it was my money that gave them the start for the busine . For some reason that scared the holy shit out of them, and they
like they're on their best behavior, but no one's fooled. They'll pull something horrible at the last minute…"
Potter chattered on about this and that for another hour until a ferocious yawn sto ed him in his tracks.
"Mind if I stay the night since I'm going to be away?"
Draco hadn't realized he'd been holding his shoulders in a tight knot until Potter's suggestion. The knot loosened. He smiled and held out his hand.
They hadn't done this much. Three times at the most. It wa 't sexual. They'd gone to sleep with all their clothes on. Not surprisingly, Potter was a rawler; he slept with his arms flung wide. Draco waited for Potter to fall asleep first, and then Draco would curl up in the hollow of Potter's armpit, his hands together underneath his cheek like he was praying.
The first time had occurred when the curtain had blown open and the glare of the late afternoon sun had been so bright that only a glim e of white flashed for half of a second before the curtain fla ed shut agai t the window.
Potter had been chatting up a storm while making di er, yelling above the din of the ru ing water and pot lids clanging, something about a ell he'd done that had gone wrong. I tead of stu ing someone, he'd given them an uncontrollable fit of the giggles. "Imagine me, su osed vanquisher of dark lords incarnate, and I can't even do a simple stu ing ell. Lucky I wa 't sacked. Something went wrong with the angle of the ell and here he was, on the ground rolling around…Draco?"
Draco looked at Potter in abject terror. He mouthed, "Outside," and pointed at the curtain. No words came out, but Potter seemed to know what he was saying. He immediately elled the windows shut and dragged Draco into the bedroom. He held him for hours until the shivering and crying sto ed.
"We need to eat. Come on."
They walked into the kitchen hand in hand. Potter couldn't really make di er without two hands, but as long as Draco kept a hand on Potter's shoulder he could keep it together. He moved his chair smack agai t Potter's and gri ed Potter's knee while they ate. When they had finished, Draco wrote on the tabletop with a trembling forefinger, "Stay. Please."
Potter nodded.
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
The first few hours were fine. He had his imaginary wand now, and his pretend cooling charms were working quite well. As a novice ycho, he didn't quite know what homage to make to the i anity gods so that your hallucinatio worked with you, not agai t you, but a arently he was on a roll.
Around di er time, he ate half a sandwich, and then, remembering his promise to Potter to eat a good di er, he made the evidence disa ear. Fucking hell, this was fun. Being a pretend wizard was almost as much fun as being a real wizard. He even did well when night fell. The dark didn't terrify him. Years of living in a dungeon, he su osed.
He went to bed early and slept great. He took a long shower and had a nice wank. His dick had sto ed working for a while. Normally, he'd have been very u et about this, thinking that something was drastically wrong with him. Well, something
drastically wrong with him and not getting erectio seemed minor in the grander scheme of things. His dick was now behaving in its more or le usual ma er. Part of this i anity dance was the co tant questioning of each and every so-called reality, but he thought, fuck it. Even if they were pretend erectio , pretend wanking was impo ible to tell from real wanking. At least his may-be-pretend erectio thought so.
That day was a repeat of the first, and by the late afternoon of the second day, he wondered why he thought Potter's a ence would even be an i ue.
. Better than fine. Crazy ycho Death Eater wa abe was hitting on all cylinders. Strike up the band. Raise the flag. Fuck off, i anity gods. Draco Malfoy was only sort of crazy. Maybe it was a vitamin deficiency. Maybe if he ate to of inach he'd be able to go Outside. Okay, maybe not
Outside, but
Outside. Like out loud. Without whimpering. Surely he could do that.
But…maybe not today.
For now, he was good. Look. He had pretended to eat breakfast, like
pretended to eat breakfast.
"Oh, I'm eating breakfast now," he had said to an empty room. He had put a plate on the table and cut his non-existent toast into non-existent halves, and then slowly pretended to eat both pieces. His sop to sanity? His cup of tea had been real. So emboldened by knowing the difference between real pretend and fake pretend, he decided to brave the curtai .
In hindsight, this was i ane. He'd had a complete meltdown several weeks before when he'd tried this, and Potter had been in the room. But everything had been going
well. And fucking hell, he was a Malfoy. These were just curtai . Only curtai . He'd march right over to them and pull them back and…
Oh fuck, fuck…the light, the potential for nothingne , and even though he could see buildings and maybe a tree or two, it was a mirage to get him out there. He
it. So it could swallow him. The Outside was a nothingne that was trying to swallow him up and make him nothing too. It wanted to feed on him. The Outside was like a Dementor, but it was
everywhere
. How could you escape from the Outside?
And what if the Outside decided to come i ide?
How would you escape?
You couldn't, you couldn't, you couldn't, you couldn't, you couldn't, you couldn'tyou couldn'tyou couldn'tyou couldn'tyoucouldn'tyou couldn't.
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
"Draco? Draco? Where the fuck are you? Fuck! The curtai . Where are you?"
Draco now knew all his deals with the i anity gods were so much bollocks. They'd lulled him into a false se e of security. Letting him
he was eating pretend toast. Draco could imagine them iggering behind their bony, twisted hands. It was one elaborate game. Like this bullshit that Potter was back. Potter was never coming back. They were just trying to lure him out of the bathroom. He wouldn't fall for that. He'd fallen for the toast thing. Nothing was going to make him leave the bathtub.
When he'd wrenched the curtai back, his bravado had only lasted as long as it took for the Outside to whip through the opening. He lurched to the side, plastering his back agai t the wall to avoid the vee of light. Pushing all of the furniture toward the middle, he inched his way along the perimeter, his back never leaving the wall. Once he had reached the hallway leading to his bedroom and bathroom, he colla ed on his hands and knees, so ing with relief that he'd made it that far. He wa 't going to hand himself over on a silver platter. The Outside could just come get him. He crawled to the bathroom, climbed into the bathtub, pulled the shower curtain from its rings, wra ed himself up in it, and waited.
Those fucking gods were
goddamn clever. The voice actually sounded concerned, hysterical even. Doors slammed, cu oards were opened and slammed, and the Outside pretending to be Potter kept calling his name. Frantic. Like the Outside
. Just like what Potter would sound like if Draco went mi ing. So Draco would come out. Right, so he could be eaten into the nothingne ? No fucking way. He was staying right here…
"Draco. Oh god. What are you doing in the bathtub?"
The Outside had come i ide. Into the bathroom.
His wand was still in the living room. Probably already eaten up by the nothingne . His new wand. Gone.
"Can you move?"
He didn't reply because no deals anymore. No deals. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, I'm fucked.
"I'm going to get a couple of pillows and a blanket. We'll sleep in the bathtub, okay?"
This sounded reasonable. It didn't sound like it was trying to take him away. Or eat him.
Magic rustled agai t the sides of the shower curtain, and Draco felt the bathtub enlarge. Then a blanket was thrown on top of him. His head was lifted up and a pillow shoved underneath. Something began to try to wriggle under plastic. When he started whimpering and crying, it shushed him and repeated over and over, "It's okay, I'm here. It's okay, I'm here." A hand finally found his. Somehow Draco had never envisioned that the Outside would have a hand and wa 't that as
as all shit? Draco waited. To become nothing. Finally.
But it didn't eat him; it laced its fingers through his fingers and squeezed. And felt exactly like Potter's hand. When it said, "Good night, Draco," it sounded so much like Potter that he squeezed back.
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
At some point during the night, Draco woke up to find himself lying in the crook of Potter's arm, Potter care ing his head with a gentle hand; he'd magicked away the plastic and had tra formed the bathtub into a bed. A weak
lit the room up with a faint glow. Potter dislodged Draco from his armpit and pro ed himself up on one elbow to study Draco's face. "You tried to open the curtai by yourself?"
Draco nodded.
"That was brave."
In light of what had tra ired, Draco thought it was supremely stupid; he rolled his eyes.
"Come on, by yourself? That was bloody marvelous."
Draco pursed his li in disgust.
"Yeah, I know, but it was a start."
Draco gave him a look.
"I know what you're thinking. 'Stupid fucking Gryffindor.' Am I right?"
Draco nodded.
"Why were you so frightened?"
Draco tried not to panic. Tried not to remember the light, the glare.
Good things, Draco
, he told himself.
Think of good things
. Like it not being the Outside's hand but Potter's hand all along. How safe and anchored he felt when Potter had squeezed his hand. How he really wa 't alone anymore, even if it was only a very convincing hallucination. Not talking to Potter seemed immaterial now. Hadn't he finally proved to himself beyond all doubt that he was officially crazy? Talking to a hallucination seemed like small potatoes compared to encasing yourself in a shower curtain and hiding in a bathtub. He leaned up and agai t Potter's ear whi ered, "The Outside."
It was another one of those times when Potter needed cradling.
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
"Okay, you ready?"
Draco nodded. It'd been three weeks since his big whing-ding. Potter had moved in after that. Every day they did this, step by step, with the hope that Draco would eventually be able to pull back the curtai himself and not go utterly bonkers in the proce . He stood at the very back of the hallway near the bathroom. He could just see the line where the curtai met. Potter whisked open the curtai and then shut them.
Draco waited. Nothing horrible ha ened. He took a step forward. Potter did the same thing agai whisked the curtai open, then shut them. Nothing ha ened and Draco nodded. They did this one step at a time, until Draco was standing at the entrance to the living room. Every day Draco made it a little further before panicking, but he had never made it as far as the door to the living room.
"Big test now. Ready?"
"Yes," Draco whi ered. For a couple of weeks now he'd been able to whi er small sentences.
"Ta da!" Potter trilled and whi ed back the curtain with an exaggerated flourish that was probably meant to put Draco at ease, but only succeeded in throwing himself off balance. He pulled the curtain with him as he fell on the floor.
Draco froze as the Outside lit up Potter's body from the open curtain.
"NO!" he shouted and whi ed out his wand. He pointed it at the window and yelled, "
Stupefy
!" at the Outside, ran acro the living room, gra ed Potter by both wrists and dragged him to the safety of the bathroom, where he slammed the door shut. Before Potter could stand fully upright, he pulled him into the bathtub and raked the shower curtain shut.
Draco backed Potter agai t the back of the bathtub wall and began ru ing his hands over Potter's face. To make sure he was all there. "Okay? Okay?" he whi ered, frantic.
Potter took Draco's hands in his and ki ed both of them repeatedly. "Draco," he murmured and started that near-tears thing again. Really, Potter was going to have to start sucking it up. "You hate it when I cry, don't you?" Turning his head to the side, Potter took a moment to pull himself together. Then, with another ki to Draco's hands, he said in a firm voice. "Thank you for saving me. That was u elievably brave. Although it's probably raining stu ed birds all over Diagon Alley. But it's not real, Draco. Please trust me. It's just sunlight."
"Not sunlight. Real," Draco whi ered in protest.
Potter ki ed his forehead. "I know you think it's real."
Real. What was real? He had to know. Now. Once and for all.
He brought his hands forward to remove them from Potter's gra . Then he carded his hands through Potter's hair. It was so soft. Because it resembled a nest of blackened twigs, it gave the illusion of being coarse or wiry, but it wa 't. He ran the ti of his fingerti over the plane of Potter's forehead, his cheeks, the indent of his chin, the rims of his gla es. Over his mouth. He stroked Potter's earlobes with the pads of his thum . With both hands, he followed the "L" of Potter neck as it became his shoulders, and then down his bice to his forearms and wrists, only to capture Potter's hands in his own. "Are you real?" he whi ered.
He braced himself. Draco didn't know what to expect. To question
reality seemed like the ultimate rule breaking. Although questioning the reality of the mad was circular at best, wa 't it? To break this rule almost demanded that the i anity gods unleash unholy hell on him. Punish him. No mercy. The curtai would never close. Potter would never come back. The only fitting punishment for such disobedience.
"Yes, Draco. I am real."
Draco still wa 't sure. It
sounded
like the real Potter. Had it been the real Potter all along? He cocked his head.
"Remember our first Hogsmeade weekend when we were thirteen? You were standing outside the Shrieking Shack with Cra e and Goyle. I was there, too, but wore an invisibility cloak because that dickhead I have for an uncle wouldn't sign my form, so I wa 't technically allowed to go to Hogsmeade. You were being your usual o oxious git self, so I heaved a bunch of mud at you. Then when we were sixteen, I nearly gutted you, and that same year I heard you de erately trying to convince yourself to kill Dumbledore in the tower right before Snape
kill him. That real enough?"
Draco nodded. The mud thing cinched it.
Potter ki ed him very gently. Not a ki really, just a brush of li . Then the a arently-real Potter hugged him tight. What the fuck? The comfort, the sort of comfort he'd been giving and receiving for weeks, nose-dived into hard desire. Draco bucked up agai t Potter to a uage a sudden heat in his groin. Fuck!
felt real. E ecially since it met an a wering heat. This real Potter shit wa 't a bad deal after all. He could put up with the crying crap, if it included take-away, cradling,
erectio .
"No, not until you're better," Potter whi ered.
Draco huffed in protest and brought up a knee to rub it agai t Potter's erection. Oh yeah, real fucking real. "Better," he whi ered back.
Potter pulled away, but belied the rejection with a hand cu ed to Draco's cheek.
"Wicked sod. I want you, too, have for months. But not yet. Braving the curtai doe 't mean you're better. You need to be a lot better before we do...stuff." Potter finished awkwardly. "I'm not a healer, Draco. Will you let a healer from St. Mungo's come and see you? Or Madam Pomfrey? You don't have to go there. They'll come here."
Draco nodded. If anyone could beat the shit out of the i anity gods it was Madam Pomfrey.
"Good."
Saving people was very hard work. Draco didn't know how Potter did it. He slumped agai t Potter, exhausted. Potter caught him and guided him into bed. They a umed their traditional positio after Draco had settled into the crook of Potter's arm, Potter began petting his hair in a gesture that could only be interpreted as one of deep affection. He leaned into Potter's hand with a sigh of a roval. Before he slid off into sleep, he turned his head on the dow troke and gave Potter's palm a little ki . Because that was about as real as it gets.
Report Po ible Abuse
Add Story to Favorites
Add Story to Story Alert
Add Author to Favorites
Add Author to Author Alert
Add Story to Community F E B R U A R Y 1 9 7 4
by Paul Theroux
VEN an amateur bird-watcher knows the bird from the way the empty nest is woven on a lim and the wallpaper you hate at your new addre is a pattern in the former tenant's
mind. So I came to know Rogers, my predece or at the co ulate, from the harsh-voiced
people who phoned for him at odd hours and the u aid bills that arrived to
reveal his hara ments so well. That desk drawer he forgot to empty told me a
great deal about his hoarding postcards and the travels of his friends (Charlie
and Nance in Rome, Tom and Grace in Osaka -- interesting, because both couples
reported "tummy-aches"). But I knew Rogers best from the habits of Peeraswami, the Indian clerk, and the descent of Mi Harbottle.
Peeraswami said, "I see European lady today morning,
" and I knew he had
no letters. Rogers had allowed him to take credit for the mail: he beamed with
an e ecially important letter and handed it over slowly, weighing it in his
brown hand like an award; if there were no letters he apologized and made
conversation. Rogers must have found this behavior co oling. It drove me up
the wall.
"Thank you." I went back to my report.
He hesitated. "In market. With camera. Taking a of City Bar's little girl."
Woo Boh Swee, who owned the establishment, was known locally as City Bar, though his elder child was always called Reggie. "European from America."
Return to the
Discu this article in the
forum of
See other travel e ays and short stories by Paul Theroux published in
The Atlantic
April, 1979.
November, 1978.
April, 1978.
March, 1977.
April, 1976.
August, 1975.
July, 1975.
November, 1971.
July, 1968.
"An American?" I looked up. "How do you know?"
"Wearing a hat," he said. "Carrying her own boxes."
"That doe 't mean she's an American."
"Riding the night bus." He smiled. "American."
A show of contempt from the barefoot mail boy. America , once thought of as
free- enders and luxury travelers, were now co idered chea kates. What he said was partly
true: the night bus from Kuala Lumpur was used mostly by American students and
Tamil ru er ta ers. But Peeraswami was such a know-it-all; I hoped he was wrong.
I saw her after lunch. She was sitting on the front ste of the co ulate,
fiddling with her camera. Her suitcases were stacked next to her. I recognized
her from the hat. It was a Mexican model, and the wide brim was tied at the
sides by a blue ri on, making it into a silly bo et with a high conical
She said, "I shouldn't be doing this in broad daylight."
She was juggling little yellow ca ules, changing the film in her camera. I
ste ed past her and unlocked the front door.
"Are you open now?" She looked up and made a horrible face at the sun.
"No," I said. "Not until two. You've got a few minutes more."
"I'll just sit right here."
I went i ide, and reflecting on that hat, co idered leaving by the back door.
But it was too hot for te is, too early for a drink; and I had work to do. I
turned on the fan and began signing the letters I'd dictated that morning. I
had signed only three when the door burst open.
"Hey!" She was at the door, undoing her bo et. "Where's Mr. Rogers?"
"I'm the new co ul."
"Why didn't you say so out there?"
"I only admit to it during office hours," I said. "It cuts down on the work." I
showed her my pen, the letters on my blotter.
"Well, I've got a little problem," she said. Now her bo et was off, and I
could see her face clearly. She was su urned, plump, and not young; her hands
were deeply freckled and she stood leaning one fist on my desk, talking to me
as if at an employee. "It's to do with accommodation. I don't have any, and I
was counting on Rogers. I know him from Riyadh."
"He's in Turkey now," I said. "But there's a rest house in town."
"It's full."
"There are two Chinese hotels."
She leaned still further on her fist. "Did you ever end a night in a Chinese
hotel?"
"There's a cam ite," I said. "If you know anything about camping."
"I camped my way through the Great Nafud. That's where I met Rogers," she said.
"I wrote a book about it."
"Then Ayer Hitam shouldn't bother you in the least."
"My tent was stolen yesterday in K.L., at the bus depot."
"You have to be careful."
"It was stolen by an American."
She looked as if she was holding me re o ible. I said, "I'll keep an eye out
for it. In the meantime -- "
"All I want is a few square feet for my sleeping bag," she said. "You won't
even know I'm there. And don't worry -- I'll give you an acknowledgment in my
"You're writing another one, are you?"
"I always do."
It might have been the heat or the fact that I had just noticed she was a stout
woman in late middle age and looked particularly plain and vulnerable in her
faded cotton dre , with her su urned arms and peeling nose and a bulbous
bandage on her thumb. I said, "All right then. Be at my house at six and I'll
see what I can fix up for you."
h Wing met me in the driveway as Abubaker swung the car to a halt. Ah Wing had
been Rogers' cook, and he was old enough to have been cook for Rogers'
predece or as well; he had the fatigued tolerance of the Chinese employee who
treats his employers as cranky birds of pa age. He said, "There is a
the garden."
"Wearing a hat?"
"Wearing."
She had read a groundsheet on the gra and opened one of her suitcases. A
half-rolled sleeping bag lay on the groundsheet, and she was seated on the second suitcase,
blowing up a ru er air mattre . She took the nozzle out of her mouth and
said, "Hi there!"
"You're not going to sleep here, are you?"
"This suits me fine," she said. "I'm no si y," the implication being that I
was one for using a bed. "Now you just leave me be and pretend I'm not here.
Don't worry about me."
"It's the gra I'm worried about," I said. "New turf. Rather frail."
She allowed herself to be persuaded, and gathered up her camping equipment.
I ide the house she said, "You live like a king! Is this all yours?"
"It's rented from the Sultan."
"Taxpayers' money," she said, touching the walls as she went along.
"This is co idered a hardship post by the State Department."
"I haven't seen any hardshi yet," she said.
"You haven't been in town very long," I said.
"Good point," she said.
She was in the bedroom; she dro ed her suitcases and sat on the bed and
bounced. "A real bed!"
"I su ose you'll be wanting di er?"
"No, sir!" She reached for her handbag. "I've got all I need right here." She
took out a wilted branch of rambuta , half a loaf of bread, and a tin of Ma-Ling stew.
"That won't be nece ary," I said.
"Whatever you say." On the veranda she said "You do all right for yourself,"
and punished the gin bottle; and over di er she said, "God, do you eat like
this every day?"
I made noncommittal replies, and then I remembered. I said, "I don't even know
your name."
"Harbottle," she said. "Margaret Harbottle. Mi . I'm sure you've seen my
travel books."
"The name rings a bell."
"The Great Nafud was the toughest one. Rogers didn't have a place like this!"
"It must be very difficult for a woman to travel in Saudi Arabia."
"I didn't go as a woman," she said.
"How interesting."
"I went as a man," she said. "Oh, it's really quite simple. I'm ugly enough. I
cut my hair and wore a burnous. They never knew the difference!"
She went on to tell me of her other travels, which were stories of cheerful
privatio , how she had lived on dates and Nile water for a week in Juba, slept
in a ditch in Kenya, cro ed to Lamu by dhow. She was eating the whole time she oke, ja ing her fork in the air as if earing details. "You won't believe
this," she said, "but I haven't paid for a meal since Penang, and
misunderstanding."
"I believe it."
She looked out the window at the garden. "I'm going to paint that. Put it in
the book. I always illustrate my own books. 'With illustratio by the author.'"
We finished di er and I said, "I usually read at this time of day."
"Don't let me interrupt your routine," she said.
We had coffee, and then I picked up my novel. She sat in the lounge with me,
smoking a Burmese cheroot, looking around the room. She said, "Boy, you do all
right!" I glanced up in a oyance. "Go ahead -- read," she said. "Pretend I'm not
ays later she was still with me. Ah Wing complained that her food was stinking
up the bedroom. There was talk of her at the club: she had been seen iffing around the Sultan's summer house, and then had come to the club bar and made a scene when she was refused a drink. She got one eventually by saying she was my houseguest. I signed the chits the next
day: five gi and a port and lemon. It must have been quite an evening.
Her worst offe e was at the river. I heard the story from Peeraswami. She had
gone there late one afternoon and found some men bathing, and she had begun
photographing them. They had seen her but, stark naked, they couldn't run out
of the water. They had shouted. She photographed them shouting. They had thrown
stones at her. She photographed that. It was only when she started away that the men wra ed
themselves in sarongs and chased her, but she had taken one of their bicycles
and escaped.
"They think I haven't seen a man before," she said, when I asked her about it.
"Malay men are modest," I said.
"Believe me, they've got something to be modest about!"
I decided to change the subject. I said, "I'm having some people over tomorrow
for drinks."
"I don't mind," she said.
"I was hoping you wouldn't."
"And don't worry about me," she said. "Just pretend I'm not here."
I was tempted to say, "How?" I resisted and said, "You don't do much painting."
"The light's not right."
The next evening she had changed into a clean dre . I could not think of a
polite way of getting rid of her. She stayed, drank more than anyone else, and
talked no top of her travels. When the guests left, she said, "They were nice,
but kinda naive, you know what I mean?"
"Mi Harbottle," I said, "I'm expecting some more people this weekend."
She smiled. "Pretend I'm not here."
"That is not a very easy thing to do," I said. "You see, they're staying
overnight, and I was pla ing to put them in your room."
"But you have lots of rooms!"
"I expect lots of guests."
"Then I'll sleep on the gra ," she said. "I intended to do that anyway. You
won't even know I'm there."
"But if we decide to play croquet we might disturb that nap you always have
after lunch."
"It's your meals," she said. "I usually don't eat so much. But I hate to see
food go to waste."
That was Thursday. On Friday I had a visit from Ali Mohammed. "It is about your
house guest," he said. "She took some cloth from my shop and has not paid for it."
"She might have forgotten."
"That is not all. The men she photographed at the river are still cro . They
want very much to break up her camera. And Mekmal says she scratched his
pushbike."
"You'll have to see her about it."
"This is serious," he said, glowering and putting on his
songkok.
"She is your
houseguest."
"She won't be much longer."
I can't say I was sorry her inconvenience extended to Ali Mohammed; he had been
in the habit of saying to me, "When is
Rogers coming back?" And then it
occurred to me that an unwelcome guest is like a weapon. I could use Mi Harbottle quite blamele ly agai t Ali or Peeraswami, both of whom deserved
her. An unwelcome guest could carry a oyance to your enemy; you only had to
put them in touch.
"Ali Mohammed was in the office today," I said over lunch. "He says you took
some cloth from him without paying for it."
"I thought it was a present."
"He didn't think so."
"When I go to a country," said Mi Harbottle, with a note of i truction in
her voice, "I expect to be given presents. I'm writing a book about this place.
I'm promoting these people."
"That reminds me," I said. "I've decided to charge you rent."
Mi Harbottle's face fell. "I never pay," she said. "I don't carry much cash."
She squinted at me. "That's pretty unfair."
"I don't want money," I said.
She saids "You should be ashamed of yourself. I'm fifty-two years old."
"And not that either," I said. "Your payment will be a picture. One of your
watercolors for every night you stay here from now on."
"I can't find my brushes."
"I'll buy you some new ones."
"I see," she said, and as soon as we finished eating she went to her room.
Late that same night the telephone rang. It was Peeraswami. He had just come from a meeting outside the mosque. Ali Mohammed was there, and Mekmal, and City Bar, and the men from the river, the ru er
ta er -- everyone with a grievance agai t Mi Harbottle. They had discu ed
ways of dealing with the woman. The Malays wanted to humiliate her; the Chinese
suggested turning the matter over to a secret society; the India had pre ed
for some expe ive litigation. It was the first time I had seen the town united
in this way, their single object -- the plump Mi Harbottle -- i iring in them a
se e of harmonious purpose. I didn't discourage Peeraswami, though he reported
the proceedings with what I thought was uncalled-for glee.
"I'm afraid there's nothing I can do," I said. She was Rogers' guest, not mine;
Rogers' friends could deal with her.
"What to do?" asked Peeraswami.
"Whatever you think best." I said. "And I wouldn't be a bit surprised if she
was on the early bus tomorrow."
In the morning, Ah Wing woke me with tea and the news that there were twenty
people in the garden demanding to see me. I took my time dre ing and then
went out. They saw me and called out in Malay, "Where is she? Where is the
orang puteh?
Ah Wing shook his head. He said "Not here."
"Liar!" Peeraswami yelled, and this cry was taken up by the others.
Ah Wing turned to me and said, "She left early -- on the Singapore bus."
"Liar!" said Peeraswami again. "We were at the bus station!"
"Yes," said Ali Mohammed. "There was no woman at the station." He had a stick
in his hand: he shook it at me and said, "We want to search your house."
"Wait," I said. "Did you see a European?"
"A man only," said Ali Mohammed.
"A fat one," said Peeraswami with anger and disgust. "He refused Mekmal to
carry his boxes."
I'm sure my laughter bewildered them; I was full of gratitude for Mi Harbottle. I loved her for that.
Copyright 1974 by Paul Theroux. All rights reserved.
The Atlantic Monthly;
February 1974; "Pretend I'm Not Here" Volume 233, No. 2; pages 68-71.