GAH!  Haven't updated in five years...  XX  Wow, I suck.

Anyway.  (Look, reviewer who corrected my grammar!  I changed it to 'anyway!')  For those of you who are interested, this chapter is chock full of Harry/Draco.  Hope it's satisfactory.

Chapter Eleven

Day Three

            Draco Malfoy felt a pang.

            He wasn't sure what it was at first.  He looked down at his stomach, frowning, and poked at it inquisitively.  No, he wasn't hungry...

            The pang panged again.  It burrowed into his chest and stretched through his body, leaving him feeling strangely dense and hollow at the same time.  He didn't like it.

            He sat for a while, thinking about it.  It wasn't as if there was really anything else to do (he had already filled up the parchment his father had given him with tiny animated doodles of Snape being hung by his own intestines).  And as he thought, a vague, horrible realization began to creep over him: he was lonely.

            Draco Malfoy, mini-evil-incarnate, he-who-ruled-Slytherin-with-a-fist-of-steel, was lonely.

            Draco decided this couldn't possibly be right, so he thought about the panging, empty feeling for a while more.

            His thoughts, nasty little buggers that they were, veered about for a while before swerving right back to the same conclusion: Draco Malfoy was lonely.

            Blasted thoughts.

            But he had to admit, it did make some sense; this was the longest he'd ever gone without degrading/ordering someone to do menial tasks.  Well, except for that one time when he was five, and his mother got so irritated with his constant yammering that she put a silencing spell on him for a week.  But that was beside the point.

            The point was, Draco was experiencing feelings.  And a feeling that wasn't disgust, extreme godliness, or sadism, at that.  It was confusing.  It made him feel weak.

            It was also, horribly enough, the reason that he smiled when Harry Potter entered the room.

            Hermione and Ron awoke to the sound of muffled gnawing to their left.

            Groggily disentangling themselves from each other, they looked around until their eyes fell on the sight of Lockhart furiously chewing at the ropes twined around his wrists.  They stared at him.  He paused, and stared back.

            Hermione frowned.  "Stupefy," she said sternly, and then tsked to herself as she reinforced his bonds. 

            "Do you think it worked?" questioned Ron, "The whole door-opening thing, I mean."

            "I don't know," Hermione frowned.  "Lockhart waking up might have interfered with it somewhat, but it seems he was concentrating most of his energy on getting out of those ropes."

            "Well, let's check, then."

            The two hustled down the hall, their footsteps surer this time.  They slowed when they reached the familiar door.

            "Back again, are you?" the doorknob called through the semi-shade.

            "Yes," Hermione replied cautiously, "Will you let us through?"

            The doorknob was silent for a moment.  Then it started choking.

            "Hey!" yelped Ron, backing up a step, "What... what's wrong?"

            "Gyyeahchgahhh," the doorknob replied.  A lump swelled beneath its keyhole mouth, slowly moving upwards as it continued to gag.  After several long moments of dumbfounded silence, a small package came popping out of its gaping mouth.  Hermione carefully picked it up.

            "What was that?" she asked slowly, "are you all right?"

            "Just open the damn package," the knob rasped, looking thoroughly nauseous.  Hermione raised her eyebrows, then gestured for Ron to open it.  She held her wand at the ready, aiming it at the small brown object in Ron's palm.  Ron stared at her.

            "You know," he said, "that's not very reassuring."

            Hermione rolled her eyes.  "It's just a precaution," she snapped testily, "Lockhart may have planted a trap or something of the sort."

            Grumbling under his breath, Ron tapped dubiously at the package with one finger, then quickly yanked the covering back.

            They stared at the small lumps resting in Ron's palm.

            "Bertie Botts...?" Ron said slowly, tilting his hand so the five beans rolled around sluggishly. 

            "Gah!  Stop that!" one of the beans snapped, "I get motion sickness."

            Ron and Hermione stared.

            The beans stared back.

            "Well," said one of the reddish beans after a pause, "are you going to eat us, or what?"

            "Erm," said Hermione, "Please excuse us for a moment."  She looked pointedly at Ron, who gave her his patented 'wuh?' look until she tsked irritably to herself and folded his fingers over the beans.

            "Do you have any inkling of what's going on?" Hermione whispered.

            Ron was still staring at his hand.  "Can all of them talk like that?  If that's the case, I'm never buying Bertie Botts aga-"

            "RON!" hissed Hermione, "pay attention!  Do we eat them?"

            "Seems like we have no choice," Ron shrugged.  "You might as well do a couple scanning spells on them first, though."

            "Good thinking."  Hermione gently pried his fingers open, and the five beans blinked grumpily up at her.  "Um, hello," she said uncertainly, "We... we just wanted to do some checking spells on you to make sure you won't poison or asphyxiate us."

            "Glad to see you trust us!" snapped the blue bean, scowling up at her from Ron's palm.

            "Why is everything in Lockhart's mind so irritable?" Hermione grumbled.

            "HEY!" the doorknob and beans shrieked.

            Before any more abuse could be exchanged, a blue light flared at the tip of Hermione's wand and flashed over the five beans.  After a while, the light faded into pale green.  Briskly tucking her wand back into her robes, Hermione straightened and said, "Well, nothing seems to be wrong with you.  So, which ones are we supposed to eat?"

            "Us!" two red ones said sulkily, obviously still miffed over being called poisonous.

            "I still feel kind of weird about this," mumbled Ron as he gingerly picked up a bean.  "I mean, they talk."

            "Just eat it, Ron," Hermione said wearily, before popping a bean into her mouth.

            The next thing she knew, the hall had stretched to the size of the Great Hall, and giant boulders were raining from the sky.

            "What's the matter with you?" Harry said dubiously, hovering by the doorway.

            "Nothing.  I'm fine!" snapped Draco, which was quite a feat, considering he was presently engaged in a ferocious battle with his facial muscles, trying to force them back into their original sneer-formation.   

            Harry was still staring at the grimacing Draco suspiciously, and seemed as if he was about to back out of the room again, when the school decided to take a walk to the lake.  Barely keeping his grip on his plate of food, Potter was flung unceremoniously into the Great Hall, and the door slammed behind him.

            Adjusting his glasses and grumbling to himself, he made his way across the gently careening room and dumped the plate on Draco's rock.  Sighing tiredly, he leaned against it, letting his head fall onto his arms.

            "Thanks," said Draco, digging in.

            "There is something wrong with you!" yelped Harry, immediately springing back into life and stumbling back a few paces.  

            Malfoy felt a similar surge of alarm and horror building in his throat, but in typical Malfoy fashion, refused to show it.  "I was raised to be polite," he said coolly, "I suppose I can't expect some people to recognize good manners, though."

            Looking moderately appeased, Harry warily leaned back against the stone.  They sat in silence for a moment, Draco eating away, until a thought struck him.

            "Hey," Malfoy said around a mouthful of bread, "what are you so edgy about anyway?  You were the one who started this whole truce thing in the first place."

            Harry sighed.  "I know.  I just guess I'm not used to it.  It throws everything off when you're not nasty."

            Draco rolled his eyes.  "Typical Gryffindor."

            "What do you mean?"

            "Everything's in black and white for you.  Where's the fun in that?  Actually, I think I'll start fawning all over you just to make you squirm.  Sit, sit."  He genially patted a space of rock across from him, plastering a freakishly huge leer over his face.  Harry eyed him warily, looking momentarily horrified, then rolled his eyes before slowly complying.  Draco noted that while Potter was still traumatized by his nice-ness (score one for Draco!), he seemed grateful for the chance to rest his feet.  He also noted with a sense of fascinated horror that part of him liked helping Potter.  The other part told him to shut up.

            "Are you always this contrary?" Potter asked when Draco offered him some soup with a sickeningly sweet smile. 

            "It comes naturally to me," he responded smugly.  "Father told me never to waste my talents."

            Harry snorted.  "Makes sense.  You should always make the most of the stuff you have in scarcity."  Both were surprised to note the lack of edge in Potter's voice.  He was almost... teasing.  As if he was... getting used to Fake Nice Malfoy (because yes, it was totally, totally fake).

            Draco took a vicious bite out of his turkey, and told himself firmly that the lonely-pangs most certainly had not turned into warm-fuzzies. 

            Hermione pressed herself into the floor, chest heaving, as the rumbling slowly subsided.  Finally daring to look up, she peeked over her arm at the three shiny boulders littered around her. 

            "Hey," said one, "what's the matter with you?"

            Hermione shrieked and ran back a few paces before tripping over Ron.

            "Ron!" she gasped, "are you all right?"

            "I think I am," he said slowly, rubbing his bruised side, "if you consider being the size of an ant to be 'all right.'"

            "Size of an- what are you talking about, Ronald Weasley?" 

            He gestured at their surroundings, and it suddenly hit her.  They had shrunk, and the 'boulders' were actually the three remaining beans.  She gaped, then ducked as a dust ball the size of Colorado went breezing over her head. 

            "You two ready?" said the lone blue bean, "we can't just lounge around here all day."  With that, all three beans began rolling towards a strip of light that was streaming through a crack between the floor and an enormous brown plank that appeared to be the door. 

            Ron sighed as he slowly dragged himself to his feet.  "I have a feeling this is going to be a long, long day," he sighed.

            "Yes!  I completely agree, Roger Whitely is the most incompetent Keeper in Quidditch history."

            "And if the Thunderbolts would only recruit Gary Shanker, all their problems would be solved."

            "Exactly.  But that's not going to happen any time soon, what with their five-foot height restriction..."

            Harry and Draco were currently discovering the almost eerie parallels in their Quidditch opinions.  Draco's lunch lay abandoned next to his sword, and the space between them was littered with the breadcrumbs they had used to sketch out potential Quidditch diagrams.

            "You know," Harry said after a while, picking absently at a chunk of bread, "I'd always wondered why we could predict each other's movements so accurately on the field.  I guess we just have similar Quidditch-minds."

            "Hmmm.  Well, don't expect me not to use this information against you, Potter,"  Draco said with an evil smile.  "Next time I see your shoulders tense before a dive, I'll know it's a Wronski Feint." 

            "I never expected anything else from you," Harry said demurely, flashing him a  grin that made his stomach flip.

            Will you look at that, I'm hungry again, Draco thought hastily, violently suppressing the flush that was threatening to spread over his cheeks.  He snatched a chunk of bread from Potter's hands and stuffed it in his mouth, ignoring his protesting and rather full stomach.

            Completely oblivious, Harry continued on, jabbing at the half-eaten diagram lying between them.  "Then again, I can now report to Angelina all of the future tactics you have planned for your team."

            The flush was quickly dissipating.  Draco eyed Harry coolly.  "Ah, so you were just trying to get information from me the whole time.  Tricky, Potter."

            Harry rolled his eyes and threw the Marcus Flint breadcrumb at his head.  "Lighten up, Malfoy.  Not everyone is out to get you.  You're not that special, you know."

            Draco blinked.  But before he had a chance to reply, he was interrupted by an earsplitting bang from somewhere deep within the school.  Jolting in alarm, they looked towards the door.  Surprisingly enough, it was open.  He and Potter had been talking for longer than he'd thought. 

            "Potterella!!" a shrieking baritone rang through the halls, "Where ARE you?!"

            Malfoy's eyebrows slowly ascended towards his hairline.  "...Potterella?" he repeated slowly.  Then his face burst into a manic, evilly gleeful grin.  "Potterella??"  He doubled over with laughter.

            "I heard you the first time!!" Harry snapped, face crimson with embarrassment and frustration.  "Will you shut up? Malfoy, you have to hide me!!"

            Draco shut up.  He eyed Potter with a raised, calculating eyebrow.  "I do, do I?  Since when am I obligated to help you, Potter?"  There.  This niceness thing had gone on long enough.  Draco decided his Pleasant Quota was more than filled for the day.

            The shrieks and thundering footfalls were rapidly growing louder.

            Potter stared at him, green eyes flabbergasted.  "Since... since... truce!" he sputtered, looking increasingly panicked. 

            "That," responded Draco idly as he picked at his nails, "means only that I don't actively torment you.  It doesn't mean I have to actively be nice to you."

            "Then what do you call your behavior of the past hour??" Potter looked on the verge of screaming, but too terrified of being overheard to do so.  His voice was wavering dangerously, and he was raking at his hair, making it straggle even more crazily.

            Draco was greatly amused.

            "Potter," he said, resting his chin in his palm and smiling beatifically, "Bugger off."

            "WHERE IS HE?"

            Crabbe and Goyle exploded into the room in a whirl of chiffon and lace.  Wheeling about, their eyes fell on the frozen figure of Draco, who was staring at them in abject horror.  "Hey, you!" snarled Goyle, pointing a meaty finger at him, "Potterella gives you your food, doesn't he?  Out with it, where'd he go?!"

            Recovering his wits (a Malfoy always kept his wits about him), Draco straightened and glared at them from his pink rock.  "How should I know," he snapped, "I'm not Potter's- Potterella's keeper."      

            "Hmph!" sniffed Crabbe, "We're wasting our time here, Greggy."  Casting Draco a scathing look, he grabbed Goyle's sleeve and marched him out of the Great Hall.        

            A fork to Draco's left heaved a great sigh of relief.

            Gradually untensing, Malfoy rolled his eyes and tapped it with his wand.  The fork promptly turned into a bleary-eyed and disoriented Potter.  "Hey," he said, surprised, "We don't learn human transfiguration until seventh year!"

            Malfoy shrugged.  "I skipped ahead in the book."

            Harry cast him an impressed look, and Draco preened.  "Anyway," Harry said, "Thanks.  I really thought they were going to get me for a second there."

            Draco shrugged the comment off.  Rubbing his eyes, he sighed, "So that explains your hissy fit.  That is a sight I'm never going to burn out of my memory..."

            Harry nodded grimly.  "I'm surprised you handled it so well.  I almost choked on my own tongue the first time that I saw them." 

            They sat in silence for a moment.  Then:  "Why did you help me, Malfoy?"

            Draco winced.  He'd thought he'd skillfully directed their conversation away from that point.  Now what was he supposed to say?  'Well, the thing is, Potter, I have no resistance against wobbly puppy eyes, especially when they are huge, green, and more specifically, YOURS'? 

            No.  Nope.  Not going to happen.

            "Can't insult the food bearer.  Don't want you bringing me Thai food out of spite."

            Potter grinned, but he still looked a bit speculative, as if he didn't completely believe him.

            "Well," he said with a sigh, "I guess I'd better get back.  The elves will be starting on dinner now..."

            Draco nodded, relieved.  He was suddenly exhausted, and his thoughts were a jumbled mess.  His relationship with Potter had done a 180 in the space of an hour, and the result was a very Conflicted and Confused Malfoy.  He needed some alone time.

            Casting Draco one last searching look, Harry gathered up the plates and left.

TBC

Finally, es finito.  sigh   Again, I take a century to write one freaking chapter (and one I'm not remarkably proud of, at that).  Oh, well. 

So.  To all you people who reviewed: thanks for the love!  And again, thank you so much for your patience and for bearing with me and my crazy schedule.  Hopefully, the next chapter won't take six months to write.