Title: To Hurt and Heal
Author: Cassis Luna
Rating: T or PG-13
Warnings: Mentions of psychological trauma

Summary: They say that everybody who gets out of Azkaban comes out a little mad. After the war, Draco Malfoy spends three months in Azkaban. Harry finds that he, inexplicably, still can't leave Draco alone.

Author's Note: This was supposed to be a small thing that became a very big thing. It was supposed to be a quick thing. IT ENDED UP BEING A TWO MONTHS KIND OF THING. Drarry is dangerous.

To Hurt and Heal

I

"Don't look as if you'll miss me, Potter," is Malfoy's amused quip fifteen minutes before he is due to be transported to Azkaban.

There is a wry, almost challenging smile on his lips, one that looks so out of place on his thin, wan face that Harry in his frustration almost wants to punch.

He isn't even sure anymore if he is angry because the old wizards in the Wizengamot hadn't listened to him (again) or because Draco Malfoy in general just has this talent of making people want to punch him, even when he is about to jump into the Dementors' arms.

Even when it is obviously only false bravado and ego enabling him to stand straight then.

His stiff shoulders and red-rimmed, sunken eyes fool no one in the room, though Harry suspects that Draco isn't really trying to deceive anyone.

The only ones present to send him off are Narcissa Malfoy and Harry himself after all.

Lucius Malfoy had already been sent to Azkaban since the Battle of Hogwarts, and it was quick and inevitable, and no one had argued the verdict of a life sentence—not his family, not even himself.

But Narcissa and Draco Malfoy—oh, Harry had fought tooth and nail for that.

But in the end, everything was decided on that blemish of ink, that monstrosity of a skull and a serpent.

Draco Malfoy is Marked. Narcissa Malfoy is not.

Three months, the Wizengamot had said. Three months in Azkaban and a magic ban, to be lifted on the 30th of August.

And it is a sentence obviously made light by the petition of Harry Potter—Gregory Goyle hadn't been so lucky—but three months is still three months and three months is more than enough to be locked in a cage, surrounded by Dementors.

"Malfoy," is the only thing Harry is able to say then, frustration making his tongue heavy, because Draco Malfoy, 17 years old and the sodding irritating slimy git that he is, saved him—

"The Ministry can't be going around leaving Marked Death Eaters unpunished," Malfoy says in reply, his face now fashioned into a careful mask of indifference. "It simply wouldn't be appropriate."

Harry shakes his head. "You told them it wasn't me. You... you saved me," he trails off, helpless, unsure how to convey the guilt that he feels for not being able to prevent this.

A wistful smile slowly slides its way on Malfoy's lips. "I did, didn't I?" And there is a distant look to his eyes, as if he is mulling over a thought that he has long since pondered. He sighs and fixes his robes, if only to avoid Harry's gaze.

"I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm glad I did."

Harry can't help his legs from moving forward at that admission, but a hand on his shoulder steadies him before he can do something stupid like grab Malfoy's shoulders and shake him and demand that he be angry.

One glance over his shoulder has him looking into Narcissa Malfoy's blank expression. She shakes her head, a minute tilt to the side, before returning her gaze to her son.

"I'll be waiting, Draco."

Malfoy nods to her, and Harry is sure that they have already had their moment before he had burst in the room to personally apologize. Or at least try to, but the words didn't want to come out.

"Take care of my mother," Malfoy says, the smile not quite reaching his eyes anymore. "It seems she's taken a liking to you. See you later, Potter."

And as he turns around and walks through the doors—because if he is going to hell, he certainly isn't going to be dragged there—, Harry thinks that no matter what anyone says, Draco Malfoy is undoubtedly a very brave man.

The Manor is beautiful in the morning, with its pristine white walls and marble floors. Sunlight filters through the halls and the air is fresh and crisp. Harry definitely believes that there is some magic in the works here, but is nonetheless grateful for all efforts to remove the remnants of Voldemort's stay.

Draco's room is no exception, and it's like his whole room is bathed in spring. It is large and spacious, with green walls and a beige carpet. His bed, with its green and white comforter, is situated on one side, and there is a large amount of floor before one reaches the other side and arrives at the balcony.

The glass doors and heavy curtains are pushed aside, revealing a table, two chairs, and a garden.

The sky is blue, the air is refreshingly cold, and in the middle of it all is soft, blonde hair swaying with the wind.

Harry swallows hard at the sight. He doesn't know if the heavy feeling in his gut is because of seeing Malfoy again or because of seeing the wheelchair that Malfoy is in.

Malfoy has his back to them, and doesn't show any sign that he heard them enter the room. Harry thinks that maybe he's asleep, but Narcissa strides towards the balcony and Harry follows mutely, and then he sees–

Draco Malfoy. Thin. Cheeks hollowed. Ghostly pale. And eyes open.

"Malfoy," Harry croaks out in greeting, but there is no response.

Malfoy doesn't raise his head or even turn to look at him. He's staring at the floor, eyes vacant, with only the rise and fall of his chest the indication that he's still alive.

The revulsion takes Harry by surprise and he takes a step back before he can stop himself.

The smile that Narcissa gives him is sad.

"You might want to come back in the afternoon. He's more… present then."

"Present," Harry repeats shakily. He looks at Draco's form and feels the guilt once again eating at his insides.

Three months in Azkaban. And he couldn't do anything about it.

He closes his eyes, has to look away for a while. When he opens them, Narcissa is watching him carefully, and Harry speaks, just as careful, "May I stay until then?"

Narcissa is surprised, and it's obvious how she tries to stop it from showing. She raises an eyebrow and then settles for, "Hiding from the Prophet, are you?"

Harry grins. It's weak, but it's real. He had spent the last three months trying to avoid every reporter and request for interview thrown his way. He thinks that Kingsley's probably exasperated with him, but Harry doesn't really care. He did his part. The wizarding world doesn't have the right to demand anything from him now. "I reckon this'll be the last place they'll think to look."

Narcissa chuckles. "I reckon as well." She straightens her shoulders, and then glances at her son. "I'll send Molly Weasley an Owl. Stay as long as you like."

Harry starts to refuse, insist that she doesn't need to, but the Weasleys know that he's gone to the Manor today. Tried all tricks and tactics to get him not to, but in the end, relented with the promise that he was to take a Portkey in case of an emergency. He figures that Aurors storming the Manor isn't an impossible idea should he be gone for an unusually long period of time.

"I… Thank you."

It's late in the afternoon when Malfoy starts to stir.

So far, Harry has spent his day engaging in small, polite talk with Narcissa and, when she had to leave due to a Floo-call, reading up on Potions with the book that Narcissa had Accio'ed from Draco's trunk. He, Ron, and Hermione all decided to return to Hogwarts for their last year, jokingly referred to by Ron as their eighth year, and Hermione had been nagging at them all summer to read up lest they want to go for a ninth.

He is halfway asleep in the middle of chapter 4 when Malfoy stirs, as if waking up from a long nap, and Harry waits, nervously, as Malfoy raises his head and finally sees him.

His eyes are no longer glazed, but they squint at him, trying to remember who he is.

Harry hopes Malfoy remembers who he is.

"Potter."

He releases a sigh of relief that he didn't know he had been holding.

"Uhm," he says, closing his book. "Hullo, Malfoy."

A furrow forms between Malfoy's eyebrows. "Right. Potter."

Harry nods patiently. "Yes."

Blinking, Malfoy turns his head around, looks at his surroundings. "Am I…"

"No," Harry responds quickly. He shakes his head, tries to calm himself. Right. He's supposed to be the calm one here. "You're out. You're in the Manor."

"Oh." The furrow deepens. There is a frown on his face, as he slowly looks at the marble floor, the white pillars, the white ledge of the balcony, and the garden. He looks at the table, his lap. His eyes widen, and then he takes a big, shaky breath. "Oh. Okay."

And Harry isn't prepared for the tears, the sudden, quiet tears that stream from Malfoy's eyes.

Malfoy opens his hands, stares at his palms, clean and pristine, and takes another shaky inhale. "Merlin."

Harry is at a loss. "Malfoy…" He starts, but doesn't know how to finish. There's something stuck in his throat.

"Merlin. Finally. I thought… I thought I was never going to get out."

Harry swallows whatever it is that's in his throat and it goes down, hard. "I… I'm sorry, Malfoy."

But Malfoy doesn't seem to hear him anymore, doesn't seem to remember that he's there.

He's sobbing, head buried in his lap, and whole body trembling in his wheelchair.

Harry looks at that small frame—those sharp elbows digging into his knees and his thin wrists hiding little of the stream of tears on his face crumpled in despair and agony. The line of his back hunched over on the wheelchair, with his shoulder blades jutting so sharply out, Harry's almost scared that it'll tear his skin.

It looks hideous, and he has to close his eyes and look away from the scene, from the image of Draco Malfoy falling into pieces.

He doesn't know what to do, doesn't know if Malfoy remembers he's there, doesn't think that Malfoy will welcome a hug. Not from him.

So he leaves the room, as quietly as he can, and stumbles his way to where Narcissa said the master room was.

He doesn't really know how he gets there, his vision's blurred and Harry belatedly realizes that they're tears. There's something really painful in his chest, like something clamping on his heart, and all he can think of is oh, god, I'm so sorry, Malfoy.

He registers the stunned surprise colouring her face once she sees him, but he doesn't know what he says to her, only remembers Malfoy's name slipping through his lips, and Narcissa's off, hurried footsteps, and then, down the hall, a turn of the knob and the creak of the door opening and the click as it closes.

And Harry crumples to the floor, gasping, and finally lets himself cry.

He doesn't understand it. Doesn't understand why it affected him so much.

He thinks he's crying because he didn't expect it… like this. He expected something to happen, people don't get out of Azkaban in the right state of mind, or at all, but he didn't… He doesn't even know what he thought anymore.

Did he think that Malfoy was going to get out of Azkaban okay and they can go through their eighth year in peace and everything's going to be alright and everyone's going to finally be happy?

Or maybe, maybe he's crying because of everything he hadn't been able to prevent.

Remus. Tonks. Fred. Snape. Dumbledore. Cedric. Sirius. God, Sirius.

And now Draco Malfoy losing his mind in Azkaban.

He should have been able to prevent at least that, right?

The war's over. Why are those around him still suffering?

Maybe he's tired.

He's tired trying to avoid the press, trying to avoid the Ministry, trying to avoid the Burrow and the Weasleys' insistence that he's family now, even though he's not, not really, and he feels like an intruder to their grief when they see him and have to pretend that they're not mourning a son, a brother.

He's trying to avoid himself most of all, because he's spent nights alone in Grimmauld Place and those nights were long nights, stretching impossibly further, as dark as a forest (dark as death), as quiet as the afterlife (like white noise) (the afterlife's not that peaceful after all), with each tick of the clock echoing through the walls and counting all the people that he lost.

But seeing Draco Malfoy like that reminds him, forces him to see that avoiding the problem doesn't really fix it, kind of makes it bigger and more daunting, and that yes, the war's over, but that doesn't mean that everything's okay.

Everyone's still suffering and he's still suffering and maybe he's not yet done losing people after all.

He manages to get himself off the floor and towards the fireplace in the master room, taking the liberty to Floo himself back to Grimmauld Place.

The night is still long and it is still dark and the house is still quiet, unbearably so, so he locks himself in his room and doesn't emerge until Ron's knocking on his door the next day.

A glance at the clock tells him it's past lunch time.

During the night, exhausted and eyes swollen after crying so much, he had somehow fallen asleep, and for this, he is grateful. He doesn't know how he could have survived that whole night awake.

"Harry," comes Ron's voice from the other side of the door, and it's soft and careful, and Harry knows at once that Ron knows something.

"I'm up," Harry says, voice cracking. He swallows the dryness down his throat, and then tries again. "I'm up."

"Mum sent you food. Have you eaten yet?"

He has a headache, but he forces himself out of bed anyway. He thinks he looks awful, his face feels sticky, but there's no point hiding it. Not from Ron, anyway.

And he's too tired to even summon the energy to look for his wand.

He opens the door, lets Ron see.

Ron's sharp intake of breath confirms that he does look awful. "Mate."

Harry rubs his face with his hands, rubs the stickiness of the dried tears off and onto his fingers. His eyes hurt. "That bad?"

"You look like Gilderoy Lockhart."

Harry snorts. "That bad, then."

He sighs, turning around and lying back down on his bed. His head's throbbing. "How did you know?"

"Malfoy's mum sent my mum an Owl. Said she's worried about you."

"That's… awfully friendly."

"I know. Mum couldn't believe it at first yesterday, kept saying at the start that Mrs. Malfoy's probably planning something, but Merlin, Harry, I think mum's planning to bake a pie to send over. Blueberry pies. It sounds ridiculous, but I think worrying about you is making them closer."

"That's… Well, that's good. I think."

Ron glances down at Harry's face, before sitting on the foot of the bed. "So. Malfoy's back, huh?"

Harry recalls the image of Malfoy sobbing in his wheelchair and keeps his eyes firmly on the ceiling. "Yeah."

"How is he?"

"Not good."

"Mustn't be, if you're like this."

Harry keeps quiet. Ron knows him best. Knows his obsession with Malfoy best, because he was the one who was so against it that he had to go through the process of trying to understand it. Harry doesn't know what Ron concluded at the end of that process, but Ron must have concluded something for him to be so calm about it now.

Or maybe it's because of the war.

The two of them are both quieter now, more introspective. It's more obvious in Ron, who's usually the first to blow up or give in to his more explosive emotions. They've fought over so many things during the war, that any of their remaining differences now just aren't important enough to fight over anymore.

Ron looks at him. "He is the reason you're like this, right?"

He takes Harry's silence as a yes. He sighs, stares at the floor. "Man, I still don't like him, but. I can't say I'm happy about what happened to him."

This time, Harry closes his eyes, and lets Malfoy's trembling shoulders appear behind his eyelids. "Yeah."

"D'you reckon he'll come back to Hogwarts?"

"I don't know. I think it… it depends."

Ron nods, understands what he doesn't say. "Mrs. Malfoy wrote for us to tell you that you can come back."

Harry nods, shame making his cheeks burn at how he just simply turned tail and ran from the Manor. "Thanks, Ron."

"You're coming back, aren't you?"

"Yeah."

"Alright." Ron looks like he still wants to say something, and he almost does. He's still looking at the floor, eyebrows furrowed, teeth worrying his lower lip, and his hand in a loose fist, but Harry sees the exact moment when he decides not to. "Alright, Harry."

"Come on," Ron says, and his smile doesn't quite reach his eyes, because he still doesn't agree about Harry's obsession over Draco Malfoy, and Harry doesn't like it himself either, but he's still thankful that Ron's trying.

Ron stands up, stretches, and gives him a little grin. "Aren't you hungry?"

Harry isn't, not really, but he goes and eats as if he is anyway.

Hermione's in Australia, reacquainting her parents with the daughter they forgot they had.

Harry and Ron are worried. Her letters talk about things that are okay (her parents are in good health, they know who she is now), but avoids talking about the things that are not (why they haven't come back to England yet, and how much do her parents know? How much of their memories were returned?). They know she's purposefully keeping it from them, because they're all going through something, and the last thing she wants to do is to add to that.

It has been three months since they last saw her, and it's like something's missing when she's not here. They both want to see her, but Harry knows that Ron wants that in a way that's different.

He knows that something happened during… well, during, and that's what they talk about while eating Molly's roast beef and mashed potatoes.

It's been three months since the end of the war, since whatever happened between Ron and Hermione happened, but it's the first time Harry has asked, mainly because it didn't seem the right time then to talk about such things when Fred's dead and Remus' dead and they had to arrange all those funerals.

After, when Harry's back in bed and Ron's gone and Kreacher's cleaned all the plates, Harry thinks to himself that maybe why Ron isn't angry at him for busying himself with Malfoy so much is because he understands what it's like for all your thoughts and attention to be consumed by one person.

Harry doesn't know yet if he likes that parallel.

Ron and Hermione.

Him and…

He succumbs to sleep before he can finish verbalizing that thought.

Harry visits the next morning.

Malfoy's gaze is blank again, and Harry expected that, but that still doesn't stop the well of disappointment in the pit of his stomach.

"He comes and goes," Narcissa says softly from beside him. Her gaze towards her son is sad. "It's episodic. The healers say it's a form of disassociation, his mind's way of getting through the trauma of Azkaban and being so near the Dementors."

Harry recalls what it feels like. The sinking feeling of dread and death, all the warmth seeping out from his fingertips, as if the blood in his veins is slowly turning to ice. He holds his breath, scared to ask. "Did they…"

Narcissa shakes her head firmly. "No, but I take it you've seen a Dementor before?"

Was almost Kissed by one, Harry thinks, but keeps it to himself. "Yes, I have."

"Then you know what it feels like. And to go through it again and again, every day, for three months."

Harry feels sick just thinking about it.

Letting out a soft sigh, Narcissa sits down on one chair and waves a hand for Harry to sit on the other.

He does, across from Draco, who's awake, breathing, but his gaze is distant yet again. His white blond hair sways with the wind, and his hands are placed on top of each other on his lap. He looks almost… gentle.

Narcissa follows his gaze. "I apologize for the other night, Mr. Potter."

"Harry," Harry cuts in. Mister Potter is too formal, too reminiscent of their old relationship, especially in this house. "And no. You don't have to apologize for that."

Narcissa looks at him in surprise, and it's clear that she did not expect that. But a smile slowly appears on her face, and it's wistful. "Thank you, Harry."

This time, she shifts in her seat so that her body is facing him completely, as if she is giving him her full attention. Her gaze turns serious. "I can't say I understand why you feel responsibility over my son. Rather, I'm actually worried about you."

Harry sits up straight, startled at what she's insinuating. The defence is immediately on his lips. "I don't… I don't mean any harm," he says, hurt.

"No, you misunderstand me," Narcissa rushes to assure him. She shakes her head. "Voldemort—" And the unflinching way that Narcissa says his name has Harry wondering just where did this woman hide all this courage. "—is gone, and so is his reign of terror, all because of you. You're a hero, Harry. You can have everything you want and it will be given to you. You can choose to live however you want. Concerning yourself over Draco is, I understand, a…" Here, her lips press tightly against each other, and there is an expression of pain that flitters across her face. "A hindrance to that, perhaps?"

"No—" Harry is quick to cut her off, disturbed to even hear those words from her. "No. I – I wouldn't be here. If I didn't want to."

And Narcissa looks at him, really looks, as if she's trying to figure out if what he's saying is true. And then, finally getting her answer, her shoulders relax and amusement tinges her smile. "Whatever did my son do to inspire such loyalty from you?"

"He saved my life. You saved my life. I… I want to…" Save him, too, Harry thinks, but that's not quite right. Not completely. Return the favour? That's not it, too. Not really.

But Narcissa's looking at him in a way that's soft, and pitying, as if she understands. Harry has to look away from that.

"You saved us. Believe me, we would not be here if it weren't for you. The Ministry would have had us all in Azkaban and then conveniently forgotten about us."

Harry thinks that Kingsley wouldn't have done that, but the Wizengamot is another issue.

"We made our choices. Now we are atoning for them. I am not proud of them. But given the chance to do it all again, to be given the choice to save the world or save my family, I… I don't think I would have been any wiser." This time, she glances back at her son, and says, slowly, "It just pains me, when I look back, to remember him having to make that choice as well."

The day is peaceful. It is bright and quiet and invisible birds chirp softly from different edges of the garden. It's a stark contrast from the heaviness of their conversation.

Narcissa sighs, soft and sad. "I hope you understand that I'm not trying justify what we did."

"No, it's fine," Harry replies, and it is. "It's alright. If you want to talk. I want to…" He pauses, surprised at the truth in his next words. "I want to listen."

Narcissa smiles that same amused smile. "You are kind. Remember, Harry. The world isn't nice to kind people."

She looks down at her hands on her lap, fingers clasped as if in prayer. "But even with that said, I still want to selfishly request this from you." She raises her head to look at him. "Please take care of my son."

Harry inhales, flattered and scared, but the answer is already on his lips. "Mrs. Malfoy–"

"Narcissa." Another smile.

Harry exhales, slowly. He now feels Narcissa's same surprise when he asked her to call him Harry instead. It feels… nice. "Narcissa. There's no need to request. I had already planned on it."

She reaches over, takes his hand in hers, and says, earnestly, "Thank you."

It's late afternoon, and Draco hasn't shown signs of leaving his stupor.

Harry excuses himself, doesn't want to impose by staying for dinner when he's already stayed for lunch. By now, he already knows a lot more about Draco than Draco would probably be comfortable with if he knew. He also knows a lot more about Narcissa, and Lucius, and it's disconcerting, to feel this new empathy for this family.

He wonders, If it were me, what would I have done?

True to her word, Narcissa did not make any justifications. She told her tale as it is, did not pretend that she is a saint. Apologized for what she said to him back then, about her cousin's death.

It still hurts, when Harry remembers it, but the apology soothes, even if just a bit. She also told him more about Sirius, growing up with him, family dinners with him and his brother. Harry thinks this is another way for her to apologize, and listens to her stories, enraptured, even as his heart still hurts, hurts and aches so much for Sirius and Remus, and oh, god, Remus.

He tries to hide it, how her words affect him, but he knows it shows on his face, as plain as day.

Before he stands up to leave, Narcissa looks straight at him and asks, "Are you alright, Harry?"

And Harry thinks that she's not just asking about the now, she's asking about the yesterday, the tomorrow, and his every day. And he doesn't know why he wants to be honest at this moment, maybe it's because Narcissa has also already bared herself, that it seems… safe to bare himself, too. In the end, he allows himself a little bit of honesty.

"No. Not really."

And Narcissa nods, doesn't offer meaningless words of comfort, just the understanding of the reality that he is not okay.

Harry looks at her, too, at the dark spots under her eyes. "Are you alright?"

Narcissa gives him a wry smile. "No. Not really."

And all at once, Harry can see it, the weight on her shoulders: Her husband forever lost in Azkaban, leaving her with a multitude of sins, a ruined name, and a tainted home that once hosted a madman. Her son, the only remaining love of her life, lost within his own mind.

Narcissa sighs, slow and heavy. "Summer is the host of many occasions between families and organizations of power. I have tried to be present in each and every one of them, but it's been… difficult since Draco returned."

"Occasions?" Harry asks, thinking of the many fancy invitations that he's thrown in the trash in the past three months. "You mean parties?"

"Yes," Narcissa nods, and then she chuckles. "Some of those you've declined to attend, I believe."

Harry gives a small, unrepentant grin.

Narcissa continues. "It is a must that I remain visible to other pureblood families. Of course, the Wizarding World knows of what part the Malfoy family has played in the war, but we cannot let that force us into hiding. There are those who are waiting for the opportunity to gain all that we have yet to lose." She glances at Draco wistfully. "We may have done bad things, Harry, but my son doesn't deserve to be stripped of everything he ever was and had."

She turns back to him. "It's been a bit tiring to attend so many functions. I dislike leaving Draco alone, especially as he is right now."

Harry imagines then of mornings, of Draco alone in his room, staring at the garden. Coming and going, but still returning to the same scene where there are flowers in his garden but no one to talk to.

And it's weird, how Malfoy has turned into Draco in his head now. Maybe he's been spending too much time with Narcissa, and it's weird to call Draco as Malfoy in her presence, or maybe what happened the other night kind of makes him feel like he's gotten to know Draco more as a person. He's a little less slimy, little Slytherin from Hogwarts now and a lot more human.

A little less Malfoy, a lot more Draco.

The words are slipping past his lips before it fully registers in his brain. "Tell me when you need to attend those parties. I can look after Draco when you're gone."

Narcissa blinks slowly at him, surprised. "I… Are you sure, Harry?"

No, but he's becoming more sure as he says it. The decision settles in his chest, comfortable and right. "I am." Then, he hastily adds, "If it's not too imposing."

Narcissa gives him another smile, and it's a little relieved, and real. "Nonsense, Harry. We're the ones imposing."

The next time that Harry comes to the Manor, it is a week after Draco was released. Narcissa is in Scotland. There are pancakes on the table, covered with temperature spells, and two sets of plates and cutlery. There is also a note in Narcissa's elegant handwriting, telling him to please help himself.

It is 8 in the morning, but Draco is already in his wheelchair, eyes staring distantly into the garden.

He is looking fuller now, more alive. His cheeks have filled and the colour is coming back to his skin. Inexplicably, Harry is suddenly very, very relieved that Draco isn't indisposed enough that he can't eat. Narcissa has told him, through the letters that they have started to exchange, that Draco's spending more and more time present with her lately.

His hair shines with the bright morning sun and Harry resists the urge to touch.

He sits down on the chair across Draco and lets the weirdness and the overall awkwardness of the situation sink in and settle. This is the first time he's here without Narcissa to talk to, just him and Draco, who's currently awake but is off in some other world in his head.

Draco Malfoy. From Slytherin.

Who lied to the Death Eaters to save you.

When he closes his eyes, he can still remember the heat of the flames of Fiendfyre licking his clothes. Draco screaming "DON'T KILL HIM" and the tight grip that Draco had on his waist as they flew above and out of the inferno.

That wasn't the grip of someone who wanted to serve Voldemort.

That was just the grip of someone who wanted to stay alive.

He turns away, from Draco's soft hair and the memories of fire.

He picks up his fork, takes a pancake from the serving plate, and lets it plop on his own.

"Potter."

His fork drops in surprise. Flushing, he looks up. "Malfoy."

"You're…" Malfoy squints.

Harry shrugs nervously. He feels like he's just been caught doing something he wasn't supposed to be doing. He supposes that it is weird to suddenly wake up and have your long-time enemy in your house eating your pancakes. "Yeah."

Harry sees the moment that Draco confirms that he really is indeed Harry Potter.

Draco slowly glances out towards the garden. "Is this the Manor?"

"Yeah."

"Oh."

And it's this conversation again and Harry's tense, wondering if what happened before will repeat itself. Narcissa isn't here to help him anymore and Harry wouldn't know what to do.

But this time, Draco seems to reconcile what he's seeing with whatever's in his head, and he visibly relaxes, leaning back on his wheelchair. "Come to observe me in my misery then?"

And Harry realizes that Draco remembers him, remembers a lot more about him, if he's going to go back to old habits and his usual snark. He feels unbearably happy at that.

"No, Malfoy, I'm just here to eat your pancakes."

Draco furrows his eyebrows at him, and then at the pancakes on the table. It takes a while for him to respond, but his eyes clear and he says, "Get your filthy fingers off my pancakes."

"Well, you're not eating them."

Draco, as he has always done, responds to the challenge. He lifts a hand, reaches towards the table. It's slow, but his palm manages to land on the fork. His fingers shake and Harry understands, with another pang in his chest, that it's probably been a while since Draco used his limbs.

He doesn't think his help will be welcome, but it's better than watching Draco struggle like this, and Harry looks up, but the words die on his lips when he sees Draco's gaze is vacant again. He's not moving anymore.

All of a sudden, the now familiar sense of despair takes hold of him and makes his fingers cold. His eyes are rapidly becoming warm and he blinks to keep them at bay. A swallow pushes down the lump in his throat and a deep breath eases the pain in his chest, just a bit.

Draco Malfoy isn't supposed to look like this.

He's not supposed to be like this.

With another deep, shaky inhale, Harry steps forward and arranges Draco back in his chair.

He removes Draco's hand from the fork, and Draco's fingers are long and soft to the touch, but they're cold, and Harry rubs them with his own to bring the blood back into them. Never mind that it's his first time touching Draco Malfoy's hand since that handshake during first year. His hand had been small then. Smooth, like it had never done a day's work in his life.

His hand's bigger now, of course, but it's calloused, and the nails are bitten to the edge, or scraped, or whatever it is that Draco did with them in those three months in his cell.

He looks at the untouched pancakes and wonders if Draco will get angry if he cuts them up for him.

He cuts them up anyway, because he wants to see Draco angry.

Angry is better. Anything is better than this.

When Draco comes to again, the pieces of pancake on his plate have gone cold. Harry's already on his third.

"Wipe that syrup off your face, Potter," is Draco's way of greeting him.

Harry does it automatically, out of shock and embarrassment. "You're back," he states dumbly.

"I didn't leave," Draco mutters, glaring at his plate. Harry doesn't know if Draco's glaring at it out of spite, or if he remembers that it wasn't cut up thirty minutes ago and is now trying to recall how it got to that state. Finally, Draco raises weary eyes at him and asks, "Did you just slice my pancakes?"

Harry shoves more pancakes in his mouth, just to save him the awkwardness of talking. He nods while chewing.

Draco goes back to glaring at the pancakes, and Harry finishes his third pancake mechanically. Once he's done and there's nothing left on his plate for him to stuff his mouth with (and there's no more excuse for him to shut up), he tries, "Do you want me to feed you?"

He braces himself, readies himself to stand up and run should a fork come for his head, but Draco just snorts and looks at him pointedly. "Weasel's going to have an aneurysm from laughing too much if he finds out that you're feeding me breakfast."

He raises an arm and tries to curl his fingers around the fork again.

It's slow and it's shaky, but Draco's there and he's trying, so Harry gets another pancake and respectfully looks away.

He's not really hungry anymore. In fact, he's fucking full, but he likes this, eating pancakes like this. By the time he's finished eating the fourth, Draco has managed to swallow three pieces. There's syrup on his lap and the front of his nightgown, and there's also some dripping down his arm, but Harry respectfully looks away from that, too.

Draco makes it through half of his plate, before the fork slips from his fingers and clanks loudly on the marble floor of his balcony, and Harry looks up at him, ready to ask if he should get it for him, but Draco's gone again.

His gaze is vacant, staring blankly at his plate.

Harry stands up before the squeezing pain in his chest can settle, and he goes around the table so he can pick up the fork near Draco's feet.

On his way up, he glances at Draco's face. There is no recognition, no life, but there is syrup at the corner of his mouth.

Harry sighs and reaches for a napkin. "You're the one who should wipe the syrup off your face," he mutters and gently dabs at Draco's cheek.

It's definitely weird, taking care of Draco Malfoy.

Or, well, he isn't really supposed to be taking care of Draco Malfoy. He's just really here to keep him company, avoid the media while he's at it, and eat the breakfast that Malfoy doesn't eat.

But he wipes the syrup off of Draco's mouth anyway, and his arm, and then searches for his wand in his pocket to charm Draco's clothes clean.

"What do you mean you didn't leave?" Harry asks twenty minutes later when Draco's back and the pancakes and the mess on the table had disappeared with a pop. Two steaming mugs of tea have replaced them.

Draco looks at him wearily, as if he's weighing whether he should agree to engage in civil conversation with him. In the end, he sighs and talks. "It's… hazy. But I still know what's happening. Sometimes. Don't think I didn't see you wiping my face like a child, Potter. Don't ever do that again."

"Should I have just left the syrup on your face?"

Draco snorts. "You should have just left, period."

"The pancakes weren't going to eat themselves," Harry defends.

"Don't you have enough pancakes with those weasels? I'm sure the Weaslette would love to fall all over your feet and hand feed you."

It's an attempt to get under his skin, and it works, because everything that Draco says works, but Harry tries his best to stamp down his irritation. "Don't call them that."

"I'll call them whatever I like."

Harry sighs loudly. He has forgotten what it's like, to have Draco Malfoy be such an irritating git. He almost wants to rise up to the bait. "Pancakes were Fred's favourite. They haven't cooked them since… Well, you know."

He looks at Draco then, and isn't prepared for the shame that's evident on his face.

He isn't surprised when, moments later, the expression on Draco's face melts away and his body goes slack.

"Fred isn't your fault, you know," Harry says, an hour later, when Draco comes back.

He's figured it out, somewhat. The things that make Draco disappear. But although Draco doesn't seem to like talking about the things that he did or the things he thinks that happened because of it, Harry thinks that maybe, Draco needs to talk about it.

"I know."

"Do you?"

Draco doesn't answer. He looks away. "So that's why you've been coming here, because of the lack of pancakes?"

Harry shoots him a grin. "You got me."

And that's how they spend the rest of the morning. When Draco's gone, Harry writes a letter for Hermione. He tells her that she'll be proud of the fact that he's been studying. He also tells her, for the first time, that Draco Malfoy is out of Azkaban and that Harry's been looking after him.

The next day, she Owls him in reply. At the end of her letter, she writes:

I'm not really sure about you involving yourself with Malfoy again, but I trust you as always, Harry, and I am worried about him. And I hope that it's been helping you cope with everything somehow. I know you've been trying to hole yourself up in Grimmauld Place lately. We are going to talk about that when I come back.

How is Malfoy? Say hullo to him for me.

Four days later, Harry returns, and is surprised when he opens the door and Draco turns his head to look straight at him.

"You're here," he comments, eyes wide and startled.

Draco raises an eyebrow at him. "This is my room, Potter."

"I guess. Err." Harry pauses by the door. "Can I come in?"

"You've been barging in here for the past two weeks, or so my mother tells me. Don't let something as trivial as the lack of my permission stop you now."

Harry flushes, but enters the room, anyway. "Excuse me, then."

He crosses the room, conscious of Draco's piercing gaze on him the whole time. As he nears, he glances at the table. "Eggs?"

Draco follows his gaze, towards the table with two sets of breakfast: French toast, runny eggs, slices of fruit, and a cup of coffee. He sighs. "Well, sit down, Potter. There's nothing much I can object to when even my house elf's making you breakfast."

Harry shrugs, and then takes the folded note on top of the napkin on his plate. It's from Narcissa, with pretty much the same message as before. He sits down, swallowing the saliva that's pooled in his mouth at the smell of the food. "Your mother asked me to come today."

"You can refuse her, you know. You're certainly under no obligation to babysit criminals."

Harry frowns at that, but doesn't rise up to the bait. "I know. I just want to. I'm the one who offered."

Draco stares at him, and there is genuine curiosity in his next question. "Why?"

Harry shrugs. "Free food." He starts to dig in into his breakfast. Draco continues to stare at him. He swallows down a mouthful of eggs and toast. "How are you feeling?"

Seeming to understand that he's not going to get a straight answer, Draco looks away. "Dreadful. My back hurts."

Harry tamps down the urge to smile. After so many visits of Draco just sitting there like a vegetable, it's refreshing to hear his usual snark. "Hermione says hi, by the way."

"Tell her she doesn't have to pretend to be civil just because the war's over."

"She's not pretending. She's really worried about you."

Draco scoffs. "Are you going to tell me that Weasley's worried about me, too?"

"Well, he's mostly worried about me. But he does ask about you from time to time."

"Probably just to make sure we're not hiding Death Eaters in our dungeons ready to ambush the Golden Boy to revive You-Know-Who," Draco mutters.

Harry's fork pauses halfway into his mouth. Bits of the egg plop back onto his plate. "Err. You're not, are you?"

Draco looks at him straight in the eyes, unamused. "Merlin, Potter, if we wanted you indisposed, Binky would have poisoned your pancakes by now."

Harry relaxes. He's glad Binky hasn't poisoned his pancakes. Those pancakes were great. "Okay, good. I'll tell Ron that."

Draco sighs loudly. "Why are you here again?"

Harry shrugs. "You know, I'm not really sure myself," he says honestly.

At that, Draco leans back in his chair, studying him.

Harry resists the urge to shove another mouthful of eggs in his mouth in an effort to avoid his gaze.

After a while, Draco looks out into the garden. His voice is small and quiet. "You've done your part. My mother escaped Azkaban, and for that, I am indebted to you. My sentence was also reduced because of you. I am not so ungrateful as to forget that. But this…" He glances back at him, eyes tired. "What do you get out of this?"

It hurts, to see Draco Malfoy so defeated. Once upon a time, Harry thinks he would have relished seeing Draco like this, atoning for everything that he did. Atoning for everything that he had to do to save his family.

Once upon a time isn't now.

"I'm sorry," he lets out in a rush. "You shouldn't have gone to Azkaban."

The smile that Draco sends him at that is dry. "Have you forgotten the things I've done?"

"No," Harry shakes his head, and then he meets Draco's eyes head on. "No, I haven't."

"What is this, then?" The smile turns into a smirk. "The Golden Boy's feeling guilty?"

"Don't call me that." Harry glares. It's getting harder to stay calm when Draco's so decided to be an asshole. "Look, Malfoy, there's no deeper, ulterior motive to this. Can't we just. I don't know, be friends?"

Draco flinches and looks away, mouth curled downwards. "We lost the chance for that back in first year. Too late for friendship bracelets now," he mutters.

Harry recalls it, 11-year-old Draco and the hand that he refused. He blinks, surprised at Draco's reaction. Surprised that Draco still remembers that moment and thinks much of it.

Draco sighs, snapping Harry out of his thoughts. "And besides, why would you even want to be friends with me?"

"Merlin knows why, you're such an irritating git," Harry responds, mimicking his sigh. He points his fork at Draco. "But I'm staying, so stop trying to pick a fight with me. I don't want to explain to Narcissa why I taped your mouth."

Draco raises an eyebrow at him. "I'm actually asking serious questions here. You're the one being all defensive about it."

Harry flushes with shame, because he knows that that's exactly what he's feeling right now. He shoves a piece of toast in his mouth. "Sorry. I just want to do it, okay? Isn't that reason enough?"

The look that Draco gives him tells him that no, it is not enough. Draco still looks like he wants to ask another question, but in the end, he just takes the napkin from his plate and unfolds it on his lap.

"Potter."

"Hm?"

"Stop eating like a Neanderthal. You're making a mess."

Harry swallows down his toast. He grins. "Sorry, Malfoy."

"Potter," Draco says, three days later. Breakfast and lunch has both come and gone, and this is the first time Draco has spoken today.

Harry looks up from his book.

Draco peers at him and then his book, trying to make sense of what he's seeing. He tilts his head. Swallows. It takes a while before he talks. "What are you doing in my house again?"

"Reading?"

Draco blinks, and his eyes clear. He sags back in his wheelchair, as if tired from the effort of coming into the world again. He clears his throat, swallows the dryness in his voice away. "Merlin, I thought they sent me to Azkaban, not some other dimension where you actually have the refinement to read a Potions book."

"I do want to pass my NEWTs this year, Malfoy."

"I'm not betting on it."

"That's why I asked Narcissa to let me borrow your books."

Draco's eyes widen and he glares. "Those are my–! Get your germs off them."

Harry rolls his eyes. "Why did I even worry about you? You seem fine for somebody who just spent three months in Azkaban."

Just like that, there is a flash of hurt in Draco's face. "What did you expect? A–"

And then he's gone.

Harry is stunned. The guilt starts to eat at him, quick and sharp.

"Sorry," he says, an hour later, Potions book tucked carefully away in Draco's trunk.

Draco looks at the trunk, and then at him in exasperation. "Well, don't start getting shy on my things now, Potter. Go on. Merlin knows you need all the help you can get."

"No, not just for that."

"For what, then?"

"For what I said."

"You say a lot of idiotic things."

"Malfoy."

Draco sighs, waving his hand. He looks tired today. Like it took more effort for him to come back. "For the record, I think it's safe to say we expected the same thing to happen when I entered that godforsaken place."

Harry relaxes, now that he's forgiven. The guilt recedes into something less piercing. "Well, to be honest," he replies, trying to look wistful. "I kinda expected you'd be nicer after you got out."

Draco gives him a deadpan stare. "I went to Azkaban, Potter, not a daycare center."

Harry shrugs, and the joke, surprisingly, makes him smile.

Draco looks away from it. He swallows. "I expected you to be swimming in your horde of fans, lording over everyone, giving out autographed posters of you holding You-Know-Who's severed head. Not skulking around here in my room."

"Would you like an autographed poster?"

That earns him a startled laugh.

Harry feels victorious.

And that's how they spend their time together. Draco gets better in the mornings after that. It still takes him a while to really wake up and be present, but it doesn't take him hours now.

The days are quiet. Peaceful. Undemanding.

Draco disappears in the middle of conversations, sometimes, but they pick it up as soon as he comes back. Sometimes, it takes a while for him to remember, but Harry waits patiently, every time.

The days pass by in a haze of breakfast and small conversations.

Three weeks after Draco was released from Azkaban, Harry enters his room and peers at the food on the table. "What's for breakfast today?"

"Banana pancakes."

Harry beams at the towering stack on the serving plate. Beside it lie a bowl of thinly sliced bananas, another bowl of crushed cashew nuts, and another of butter cubes. "Oh, that's a lot."

"I had Binky make extra. You keep on eating mine."

Harry laughs then, a sudden, surprised bark of laughter. There is warmth spreading in his belly at the thought of Draco thinking of him. "That's because you don't eat them. It's a waste."

"How am I supposed to eat them when you shove them in your mouth the first chance you get? Fucking manners, Potter."

Another round of laughter. "Sorry. Sorry, I'll ask next time."

Draco rolls his eyes, but his lips are twitching and he's looking livelier and he doesn't look so sick anymore. Maybe it helps that he can move his arms and fingers better now. He's been joining Harry eat for the past week, and that's definitely nicer than Harry eating alone while Draco watched with a sneer of mock disgust. It's also definitely nicer than eating alone in Grimmauld Place, on the long table with a lot of chairs but no more people to sit on them.

"Well? Sit down. I don't think you came here just to watch me eat."

Harry does as told. "No, I came for the pancakes." He transfers two pancakes on his plate (After three weeks of eating in the Manor, he's managed to divest himself of his bashfulness with the food.), scoops as much slices of banana as he can with his fork, and sprinkles that on top along with the crushed cashews. He unstops the bottle of maple syrup.

"You always come for the pancakes," Draco replies, getting his fork and reaching over the table towards the serving plate. His nose scrunches up at the sight of the puddle of syrup on Harry's plate.

Harry ignores that. "Well, if it makes you feel better, I'm also here to ask how you're doing."

"What the hell for?"

"Did you have a good sleep?"

"Don't be so polite around me. It's disgusting."

Harry shoves pancakes in his mouth. He's learned that Draco tries to be difficult on purpose, and the best way to deal with him when he's being a slimy sod is to ignore that he's being a slimy sod. He thinks he should be awarded for his discovery and canonized for his patience. "Did you have a good fucking sleep?"

And then Draco laughs.

Just like that, any irritation that he might have felt gives way to a certain kind of wonder at seeing Draco Malfoy laugh so unguardedly. Harry realizes he's staring.

"Yes, I did. Thanks for asking."

Harry swallows the pancakes down, hard. "It shows."

"Yeah. I might take a walk in the garden today," Draco says, smiling slightly as he turns to look at the budding flowers.

It's worrisome how the words are out before he can stop them. "Can I come with you?"

Surprise paints Draco's face, and it makes him look innocent, eyes wide open and eyebrows raised. After a while, Draco returns to his pancakes and says, without looking up, "Yeah, whatever, Potter. Do what you want."

But by the time they've finished eating their breakfast, he is gone again.

Harry takes hold of his wheelchair and pushes him around the garden anyway.

The next day, Harry comes and Draco's already in the middle of the garden, his wheelchair forgotten a distance away among a shrub of pink carnations.

Harry stops, his greeting dying on his lips.

It's a big garden, more spacious than Draco's room. The flora is lush, rich, and neatly trimmed, and colour blooms in every corner. There are roses, and lilies, and forget-me-nots. Carnations and lavender. In the middle of the garden stands a fountain, water dripping down the marble eyes of the woman standing proudly at the centre of it. The snakes on her head had told Harry who she is since day one.

And there, under the bright blue sky, stand Draco Malfoy, wearing plain trousers and a sweater, looking at the flowers with a small smile on his face.

Since the war ended, Harry's had time to clearly think and understand the nature of why he's so obsessed with Draco, really. He thinks Ron and Hermione understands, too, but are just waiting for him to figure it out for himself. He's figured it a long time ago, actually, but figuring it out and accepting it are two different matters.

But it's such a blow to the chest every time he comes across something like this, these moments that make his cheeks warm and makes it hard to breathe and even harder to look away.

Draco sees him, notices him staring, and turns an amused smirk in his direction.

"You can walk," Harry blurts out instead, by way of greeting.

"Excellent observation skills, Potter. I do still have my two legs with me."

Harry flushes at that. "But, I mean… Like your hand."

"I don't spend the rest of my days stuck in the wheelchair waiting for the next time Saint Potter comes back to save me, you know."

A flash of hurt lances through him with that. "I didn't mean that."

"Surprised I could do it without your help?"

"Malfoy."

"Or sad that you couldn't show off your hero complex and tell the world how you helped an ex-Death Eater walk again?"

"Malfoy."

Draco opens his mouth for his next retort.

Harry cuts him off before he really starts to go at it. "I'm happy to see you up on your feet again."

Draco's mouth closes. His eyes widen and Harry watches, amazed as Draco turns away and the tips of his ears colour. "Don't think so little of me."

"I'm not," Harry says, walking out of the balcony and into the garden. There are butterflies flying around. He doesn't know if they're real or magicked. "At least now I don't have to push you around. You were getting heavy."

Draco glares at him. "Are you saying I'm getting fat?!"

"Well, you haven't really been exercising lately."

Draco turns, one foot stepping in front of the other. "I'll have you know –!" And then his knees crumple from underneath him, and Harry thanks whatever god is up there that he still has his reflexes from fighting in the war. He leaps in, catches Draco's shoulders, but is knocked off balance by the sudden weight.

He ends up half on the bush of carnations and half on grass, Draco sprawled over his lap.

To his surprise, Draco starts laughing.

The small edges of the bush's branches dig painfully into his skin, but Draco's laughter is contagious, especially when he looks so open and relaxed like that.

"You're gonna have to help me up, Potter. I can't feel my legs anymore."

"Just a few minutes ago, you were talking so big about how you could do it on your own."

"I can, but you're already here, you might as well be of some use."

Harry nudges him with his knee. "I ought to shove you in the fountain, Malfoy."

"My mother will be livid with you."

"I'll explain that you were being an ass."

"Potter, are you going to help me up or not? It's rather discomfiting to be this close to your crotch."

And Harry laughs again.

Draco's smiling, and the sun is bright and his hair is bright, and there's more colour to his face now than there has been for weeks.

So Harry helps him up and Draco can walk, but he can only hold himself up for a few minutes, before his knees start to buckle beneath him. Harry helps him back to his wheelchair by keeping an arm around Draco's waist and a hand under his elbow, and Draco doesn't get angry and Harry pretends this isn't weird.

"What's for breakfast today?" Harry asks as he pushes Draco's wheelchair up the ramp that leads into the balcony.

"Is food the only thing occupying your head?" Draco says exasperatedly. He waves towards the table, where two plates have appeared during their frolic in the garden. On each plate lay a generous slice of pie. "Blueberry pie."

Harry immediately recognizes it, and his eyes brighten. "Oh. It's from Molly." He parks the wheelchair on Draco's side of the table and then sits down on his chair.

Draco nonchalantly takes his napkin and lays it over his lap. "Yes, she sent it over yesterday. Mother likes it."

Harry grins. "So? How is it?"

And Draco doesn't look at him, keeps his eyes resolutely on the napkin on his lap even though it's already unfolded properly. He clears his throat. "I like it. It's delicious."

Harry can't stop the soft smile forming on his face then. Molly Weasley baking a pie for the Malfoy family. Draco Malfoy saying that Molly Weasley's blueberry pie is delicious. There is warmth in his chest and it's threatening to spill out. He thinks he might visit the Burrow tomorrow.

"Molly would love to hear that."

The next day, Harry arrives at the Burrow, unannounced, and the whole house grows silent for a few seconds after he lands through their Floo. It's certainly been a while since Harry's visited, despite the numerous invitations he's had from all members of the family. But the Burrow is never silent for long, and all at once, cheers and greetings erupt from all sides.

"I told you he was going to come on a Tuesday! Give me five sickles!" George is howling, and Ron, grumbling, grudgingly shoves a hand down the pocket of his pants.

There is a flurry of red hair and he finds his arms filled with Ginny and his back roughly patted by Arthur.

At the back of the crowd, Molly wipes at her eyes surreptitiously using her apron, and Harry flashes her a shy grin.

Molly huffs, wipes at her eyes again, before waving a ladle in his direction. "Well, come on, then, Harry, you're just in time for lunch."

Over the table, after George tells him through a mouthful of food at how bad Ron is at gambling, Harry tells Molly that Draco liked her blueberry pie, enough to eat it at dinner and request it for breakfast again the next day.

Molly dabs at her eyes with her apron again. And again. And again. Until Arthur just laughs, pulls her in for a hug, and lets her cry on his shoulder.

August comes to a close, and the upcoming school year has everyone busy, so much that the invitations for whatever functions have stopped. He thinks that that's why Narcissa has stopped asking him to come to the Manor, though she has told him that he's welcome anytime he wants to.

Harry doesn't manage to anymore, though, because Hermione's back and he's been spending a lot of his time in the Burrow again, doing last minute house repairs and last minute shopping in Diagon Alley. They do it under Glamours, of course, and Harry wonders if Draco's well enough to walk around Diagon Alley, too.

He knows that Molly and Narcissa keep in constant correspondence, however, and Molly doesn't mention anything out of the ordinary, and so Harry doesn't ask.

September 1 is just around the corner.

Platform 9 ¾ is full and close to bursting by the time Harry pushes his cart through the wall. It is as Kingsley warned him: Common folk and paparazzi alike are going to be fighting tooth and nail to get a glimpse of him.

He pulls his hat down further to cover his eyes, even though he's confident his dirty blond hair and pudgy cheeks won't attract any camera shutter. He's not even wearing his glasses, and only Hermione's small hand on his back is keeping him from pushing his cart down the train track.

Ron, also under a Glamour, had already boarded ahead of them, as planned. People will be expecting them to come together in a group of three, Hermione had explained. Any group of three students will automatically be a target of scrutiny, no matter how good their Glamours were.

There were reporters shouting "There!" and pointing to various directions, but never the correct one. Harry resolutely ignores the vendors selling pins and balloons with his face plastered on them. It isn't even a flattering picture of him.

"Look, it's Draco Malfoy!"

Harry immediately looks up, searching, even though everything's blurred. He looks for where one person is pointing and where other people are looking, and he squints, willing his vision to focus, and realizes that they're looking at him.

And then, another person says, "Naw, that's not Malfoy. Malfoy's a thin lad. Do yer job properly, why don't ya?"

From behind him, Harry hears someone mutter. "Good. I don't really want to see Death Eater scum today."

Harry almost turns around in anger, but Hermione tightens her grip on the sweater on his back.

"Zach," Hermione's voice, altered into a high-pitched squeak, sounds from beside him, and she turns green eyes to him, a smile plastered on her thick lips. "I reckon we should hurry it up, don't you? We don't want to miss the train."

Harry grumbles, but allows her to lead him away.

As soon as they enter the compartment where Ron's waiting for them, they collapse on the bench and immediately take off their Glamours. They sigh loudly as they sag on their seats.

"It's crazy," Ginny says in disbelief, peeling one edge of the closed curtain away from the window to peek at the mess of people outside.

"They're bonkers, that's what they are." Ron shakes his head, a stricken look on his face. "They were selling Ginger Quills! 'Show your love for Ron Weasley' and all that shite! Ginger Quills!"

Brushing her hair away from her face, Hermione says seriously, "Their nibs are actually really comfortable to use."

Ron turns his horrified expression her way. "You bought a Ginger Quill?"

Hermione smiles, her eyes twinkling. "I passed by a shop selling them in Diagon Alley. Show your love for Ron Weasley and all that shite."

And Ginny bursts into laughter and Harry laughs along with her as Ron's face turns as red as his hair, and it's definitely new, this dynamic among them.

He and Ginny had come to an understanding that they weren't ready for a relationship, with both of them still mourning all they've lost. Ron and Hermione had bravely taken on the challenge, and Harry had been cautious at first, thinking that it was one more thing that had to change. But at the end of the day, he loves his friends, is immensely proud of them and their relationship, and—lately—have been thinking that maybe it won't be so different between all of them after all.

The Hogwarts Express this year is, as predicted, sparsely occupied.

"Parents wouldn't really want to bring their children back, after everything that's happened last year with the Carrows," Ginny says quietly, frowning at her hands on her lap as she recalls the things that happened last school year. As the train's horn sounds and it lurches into a start, she looks at Harry with a worried expression. "And, I overheard some people talking in Diagon Alley. Word's gotten around that Malfoy's also coming back."

Harr's lips press together thinly. He can imagine it, mothers whispering to each other, convincing each other not to send their sons and daughters to Hogwarts because of an ex-Death Eater. He can't really blame them, but it still sours his mood.

"It's just us and Malfoy then," Ron says, frowning. "Goyle and Nott's still in Azkaban. They're doing six months, right?"

Hermione nods. "Malfoy's sentence was reduced only because of Harry's petition."

"Do you reckon they'll take NEWTs this year?" Ron asks.

Harry remembers Draco and what he was like when he first came out of Azkaban. He had only spent three months there. Three months too long. He doesn't know what will happen to Gregory Goyle and Theodore Nott after those 6 months. "I don't think so."

"Harry." Hermione turns to him, face serious. "I think you should look for Malfoy."

Harry blinks at her in surprise. He had planned to, but didn't expect Hermione to suggest it. Over the past week, he had shared to his friends about his time in the Manor and Draco's condition. Ron hadn't been too happy talking about it, but with his best friend and his girlfriend (even his own mother!) so invested in it, he soon started asking his own questions. In time, they've managed to have conversations about Draco without anybody mentioning what an utter git he was.

"Well, I did plan to," Harry says.

Hermione shakes her head. "Now. I'm worried. You heard those people talking back at the station. I wouldn't put it pass the students to bring some of their hostility here."

Harry frowns, shaking his head in disbelief even as he moves to stand up. "Students wouldn't…" He trails off, but there is already a gnawing dread in his stomach.

"I'm with her, mate," Ron says carefully.

"Me, too," Ginny says, head shaking. Her eyes are shining, and it's obvious she's fighting the tears back. "Last year, Harry, Hogwarts wasn't even a school anymore. People were allowed to do certain… things."

Hermione reaches over to hold her hand.

Harry looks at her, tries not to think about worst case scenarios. Swallowing thickly, he nods and turns to leave the room.

"Do you want someone to go with you?" Hermione asks softly, but it's no surprise to everyone when Harry shakes his head.

"No, I think he'd be more comfortable with less people." He looks behind his shoulder and offers an assuring grin. "Next time?"

Hermione smiles. "Next time."

Heads peek from compartment windows and students whisper as he passes, but Harry's thankful that nobody attacks him and demands for an autograph. He thinks that maybe his three months out of the public eye have done wonders for his image: Golden Boy's not really interested in rubbing elbows, just wants to live in peace, try again next year.

The compartments really are free for all, but everyone knew that Slytherins usually occupied the ones at the back end of the train. Here, it's the same: students look at him in curiosity, but there is a sense of caution in the air, as if they're wondering what Harry Potter's doing in the den of snakes.

As he goes further, he passes by more and more compartments that are empty. It's quieter. The noise of people talking and chattering fades in the distance, and the decrease in the student population this year is more obvious here.

He's almost worried, thinking that maybe Draco decided not to return to Hogwarts after all, but there, after five rows of empty compartments, Harry sees it.

Draco Malfoy inside, leaning back on his seat with one arm propped on the window sill, eyes gazing out into the bright scenery on the other side of the glass. He's present, Harry knows this immediately. He sees this in the alertness in Draco's eyes and in the tension in his shoulders.

He relaxes, assured that Draco's safe and that he's coming back to Hogwarts after all. He knocks on the door, but that's the only courtesy he's willing to offer because he slides the door open immediately after anyway.

Draco jumps in shock, and he turns his head—

Harry's assurance is short-lived as he sees the purpling bruise on Draco's temple.

"What happened to your face?"

Draco relaxes back in his seat once he sees that it's just Harry. He frowns at the question. "I tripped."

Harry closes the door harder than he intended to and glares at him. "Don't lie," he says, lips thinning as he turns to look back at the bruise.

Draco matches his glare with his own. "I'm not lying."

"There's a fucking bruise on your face, Malfoy."

"I know. I can feel it."

"What happened?"

"I told you, I tripped."

"Malfoy–"

Draco's body jerks forward in his seat and his fist slams down on the window sill. "It's a fucking Trip Jinx, Potter! What did you expect?! Ex-Death Eater comes back to Hogwarts and gets a standing ovation from the student body?!"

Harry is stunned at the sudden outburst, and it does a lot for him to pull the lever down on his temper.

Draco clicks his tongue, irritated at himself for losing control, and turns his head away. He sags back in his seat.

Slowly, Harry sits down across from him. He stares at the bruise. "Who was it?"

"Don't bother your pretty little head over it," Draco scoffs, waving a condescending hand. "It's unbecoming of the Saviour of the Wizarding World to be so concerned over me that you'd threaten an innocent civilian."

"I'm not going to threaten them," Harry says in defence. "Just… talk to them."

Draco looks at him, an exasperated expression on his face. "In a threatening way?"

"In a gentle way."

Draco sighs tiredly, one hand rubbing at his other temple. "Why does it matter to you?"

"Shouldn't it?"

"No. We're not in the Manor anymore. You don't have to keep any more favours for my mother. You've done your part."

"I'm not doing this for your mother."

"Then what are you doing it for? Because you want to be friends with me?" Draco laughs, harsh and derisive, and Harry tries to stop the hurt from creeping in. "It's suffocating, Potter. Go bother somebody else with your goddamned hero complex. I'm sure there's a lot who'd love to have your attention."

It's not working. Everything that Draco says still stings.

Harry looks away, unable to look at Draco's sneer anymore, not when he's gotten so used to his face without it. "Yes, Malfoy, I do want to be friends with you," he mutters. He takes a deep breath to ease the tightness in his chest. "I… thought we already were."

He stands up, ready to flee, ready to lick his wounds. "I guess not."

And Draco crumples to the floor with a dull thud.

When Draco comes to, Harry's too tired from the onslaught of emotions he's been through for the day to explain why they're sitting on the floor of the compartment, legs folded in awkward angles to fit the tight space, and arms pressed against each other.

"Welcome back," Harry says instead. "I fixed your face."

Draco's head is bent dangerously close to Harry's shoulder. He doesn't move it. "My face doesn't need fixing. It's impeccable."

The smile is in Harry's voice. "Mm-hmm."

Minerva McGonagall, now Headmistress, welcomes all of them. After delivering a short but emotional speech, one that leaves many students dabbing at their eyes with their sleeves, the Sorting and the Welcoming Feast begins. Classes resume as usual, with the eighth years following the schedule of the seventh years.

But much is different, including the unusually quiet atmosphere of the school, made by the reduced student population and the grim, physical reminders of the war that had occurred in these very halls just months ago.

Some areas are still blocked for repairs, with the promise that repairs are to be complete before Halloween.

The first month is the hardest of all: Students have lost their reservations at ambushing them left and right to ask for pictures and autographs. He finds that he can't even relax in the Common Room without someone sitting next to him and asking him how he 'vanquished the Dark Lord'. Hermione's taken to spending long hours in the library just to be able to study in peace, with a grumble of The next time somebody disturbs me in the Common Room, I might actually hex their lips off.

Worst of all, adding to his budding irritation, he can't even go near Draco anymore without being blocked by a doting fan, though, Harry thinks, this is probably a good thing. Draco never really retracted what he had said back in the Hogwarts Express, and his words have done a good job in convincing Harry to grit his teeth and ignore the urge to actively seek out blond hair and pale skin.

But even so, at night, with a sense of guilt gleefully lounging in his stomach, he can't help but return to old habits:

Looking at the Marauders' Map.

"Huh," Hermione comments one fine weekend morning.

"Huh?" Ron asks, looking up from the chicken pot pie that he had been devouring. "What's huh?"

Hermione's twirling her quill, and there is an open tome laid out beside her half-eaten plate of breakfast. Ron and Harry have tried and failed to get her to stop studying on the breakfast table. ("It's too early for me to look at a book, 'Mione!"Ron had failingly pleaded.)

"Huh," Hermione repeats, pointing with her quill to the other side of the room.

Ron looks at where she's pointing, blinks, stares, and then also says, "Huh."

Harry, who is sitting across from them and thus facing backwards from their source of curiosity, turns on impulse. "What are you guys looking at?"

He scans the Great Hall, but sees nothing out of the ordinary. It's already late in the morning, and so the Great Hall is not as crowded as it usually is during meals. Students mill around and groups of friends cluster together in chitchat and laughter. He turns back to his own friends. "I don't see it."

Ron snorts, turning back to his beloved pie. "I'm surprised. You're always the first to see him."

Harry's cheeks slowly colour as he realizes who they're talking about. "I haven't… I mean. Not lately."

Ron rolls his eyes. "I see you with the Map at night, Harry."

"I don't use it to look for him!" Harry defends, blushing furiously, but he immediately knows that it's a pathetic lie. Ron and Hermione's eyebrows are both raised. "Not just him."

"Bollocks," Ron says. "You better start using it on Astoria Greengrass, too. They're getting awfully touchy."

It's really taking a lot of self-control not to turn in his seat right now. There's an ache in his heart, but he's used to that, so he stubbornly ignores it. "Well, it's not any of my business, is it?"

Hermione smiles at him sympathetically. "I guess not."

Harry starts looking for Astoria Greengrass in the Marauders' Map.

He's dismayed to find that, over the course of the next few weeks, her name and Draco's name are more often than not beside each other in the Slytherin Common Room.

But it's not any of his business.

It doesn't have anything to do with him.

Nothing at all.

He goes about his every day, studying for tests, avoiding photographs, and laughing with friends, resolutely pretending that it doesn't hurt.

"Harry," Ginny pleads, a day after all the Halloween festivities. It is late in the afternoon, and the sky is an overcast grey. In an hour, it will be dinnertime. They're sitting together in one of the stone benches in the clock tower courtyard, where Ginny had cornered him in a last ditch effort. "The Ravenclaws are decimating us. We need you."

Harry grins at her sheepishly. They've had this conversation before, numerous times in the Burrow, and he thinks Ginny's still trying just for the sake of it. "I'm sorry, Ginny. I just don't feel like it. I just want to finish the school year in peace."

Ginny sighs exasperatedly, crossing her arms like a petulant child. "Don't you miss flying?"

"I do," Harry says, laughing at her reaction. "Just not the attention, I guess? Besides, you're doing well. I watch all your matches and you haven't let anyone score yet."

Ginny preens at the praise. Then, she narrows her eyes at him. "Is it… because of… you know…"

Harry's eyes widens, waving his hands, the denial immediately on his lips. "Oh, no! No, no, no. It's fine, Gin, I'm not avoiding you, if that's what you're thinking. That's not it at all."

Ginny smiles, shoulders relaxing. "Okay. Good." Then, she looks around the courtyard, sees no one else, and then leans in to whisper. "Well, is it because of…?"

"Of…?"

"Well, uhm." She smiles, almost apologetically. "Malfoy?"

Harry's gobsmacked expression just makes her laugh. "I'm sorry. Ron's been telling me about it. I mean, he doesn't mean bad, he's just worried."

Harry feels his face burning. It's one thing to know that his friends know, and quite another to talk about it with them. He's gotten used to it being this open secret, the big elephant in the room that nobody is allowed to talk about. "I know he is. And. No. It's not about him. I think. I'm just really tired, I guess? I just want everyone to stop… I don't know, treating me like I'm, err, Harry Potter."

Ginny laughs, as she did before, before everything happened, as if she honestly finds him endearing. Her face is as bright as ever, her bright red hair flying as she throws her head back and laughs openly. Harry thinks he could fall in love with her again, if he tried. He thinks they could make it work.

"Okay, I'll lay off." She grins, eyes twinkling. "But could you maybe sit in on some practices? Beat some skills into our Seeker? He's good, really good, but he just doesn't have the same sense for the Snitch like you did."

Harry grins back at her. "Why don't you be the Seeker? Ravenclaw won't stand a chance."

And then, as always, he is the first to spot that blond hair.

Ginny sees him staring over her shoulder, turns around, and blinks. "Oh. Malfoy."

At the end of the courtyard, Draco is descending the steps from the clock tower. His pallor is paler than usual, like he's still sick, but his feet doesn't slow down. He nods at them in polite greeting, passing by them without losing stride. "Terribly sorry for the disturbance. Carry on."

Harry is up on his feet in a heartbeat. "Malfoy."

He doesn't know why it feels like he has just been caught doing something he isn't supposed to do. He just feels that Draco's gotten it all wrong somehow. Why that matters, he doesn't know either, because Draco and Astoria are probably going out, so he doesn't know why he feels the need to explain himself.

Draco doesn't stop, of course. He enters the bridge that leads to the Stone Circle, not once looking back.

Ginny takes hold of his sleeve. Harry looks at her, surprised, and she nudges her head towards Draco's direction.

To his surprise, she doesn't look annoyed at Draco's rudeness like he had expected her to be. In fact, she looks worried, and he is relieved and grateful all at the same time.

He thinks he could fall in love with her again.

But he knows that's not what she deserves.

And not what he wants.

"Malfoy! Wait!"

They're on the bridge, and the cold November wind slaps at their robes and bites their cheeks. Draco doesn't stop, but Harry hadn't really expected him to, and so he leaps forward and grabs Draco's wrist.

Draco turns to him, glaring, but he still looks pale and tired and despite what a git Draco's being, Harry can't help but be worried.

"What do you want, Potter?"

"Wait, Malfoy, I just want to talk."

"Well, I don't, now go away. Go back to your girlfriend. I'm sure she's waiting for you."

Harry blinks in confusion. "Ginny? She's not my girlfriend."

"Well, I don't really care who you choose to fuck. You do you."

Harry frowns. He hasn't let go of Draco's wrist yet. There are so many things he doesn't understand, why Draco's looking like he's about to pass out any minute, why he's lashing out so much, and at the back of his mind, at the very back of his mind, there is a small voice whispering to him that it almost seems like Draco's… jealous.

"Don't talk about her like that," he says, as calmly as he can to will away the irritation starting to itch under his skin.

Draco sneers, and suddenly, Harry is hit with a sense of sadness that it's been such a long time since he's seen Draco's face honest and open, mouth curved into a smile, eyes shining under the bright, morning sun. He hates that Draco's so guarded. Again. As if summer never happened. As if those banana pancakes shared together and walks in the garden didn't exist.

He hates that he's still holding on to them, like a lovesick idiot.

"You're the one who wanted to talk, Potter."

Harry drops his wrist, shaking his head. He glares back, scowling. "Merlin, Malfoy, what's gotten into you? I just wanted to ask how you're doing."

"Great. Splendid. Now, will that be all?" Draco turns away, ready to leave.

"No, Malfoy—"

Draco turns his head back, eyes burning with anger, mouth curled into a snarl as he hisses: "Leave me alone. Go fuck Weasley already, if you're so desperate for a shag—"

Harry slams his fist on the railing. The clang of metal rings loudly in the valley, and the bridge shakes with the force of his fist. There is the sound of blood rushing in his ears and he is light-headed with anger, at Draco for being such a dick, and at himself for still being so affected by him.

There is a look of shock on Draco's face, as if he hadn't expected Harry to get so angry like that, but Harry doesn't care anymore. If Draco wants to be a git, then fine.

He grits his teeth and walks away, before he can do anything else that he might regret later. "I don't even know why I keep trying. I'm done, Malfoy. I hope you're happy."

And he leaves, stomps his way through the bridge and back to the clock tower courtyard, hands shaking and heart beating furiously in his chest.

And behind him, he doesn't see Draco fall to the floor, bury his face in his hands, and mutter with a sad, shaky laugh:

"Damn it, Potter. Why didn't you punch me?"

II

Draco floats then, from one state of consciousness to another. One minute he's there, staring at the wooden floor of the bridge, knowing that he's doing it, his body's doing it, his own eyes are doing it, and the next he's in some haze, like somebody else is staring at the floor and he's just looking through their eyes. And then after that, it goes black all over, and he doesn't know how much time passes until the next time he sees the floor again, but it's darker now, and in one corner of his mind, it registers that oh, it's already night time.

There's a crack in the wood, and a small spider, so small he's surprised it hasn't been blown away by the wind yet, slips through it. He wonders if he can slip through it, too.

What did he say to Potter again? Potter was mad. It's been a long time since he last saw Potter that angry. He doesn't like it. He never did like it. But he could stand it then, years ago, so why does it hurt so much now?

They were talking about something. A girl. Potter's girl. Oh. Weasley.

His vision's starting to go dim at the edges again.

It'll be nice, he supposes. They're going to build the happiest family ever.

It hurts.

What did he say to Potter again?

It's dark. Darker than Azkaban.

Azkaban at least had moonlight shining through the bars.

But this is darker, pitch-black, all light blocked by the canopy of trees above. He hears the rustle of leaves more than he sees them, and he hears the incessant buzzing of insects. Something howls ahead and Draco wonders if this is real or if it's just in his head again.

He needs to leave. He knows he does. He always knows. But with Potter gone, it's been getting harder and harder to get out of his head. He thought he was getting better.

But no, he's just getting worse, and Potter's angry, and he misses the Manor, and the garden, and breakfast, and Potter.

There's another howl that sounds and echoes around him, and he doesn't know where he's going. He thinks he's walking, he's not sure, but it's dark here, and Potter's not around.

Draco wakes up to the scent of sweat, treacle tart, and fresh soap. He's being carried on someone's back, and he knows immediately who it is. His nose is buried in Potter's hair and he's not sure if this is real, but he feels like crying.

He thinks he already is.

Potter stops, pauses, and Draco realizes that they're still outside the castle. It's still dark, with only the moon and the light from the towers illuminating their steps. The wind is still cold, and their robes billow in the wind. Potter's carrying him, and he's probably heavy, but Potter's grip under his thighs are firm.

Potter says, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean what I said."

Draco's having a hard time concentrating. He doesn't understand what Potter's saying.

"I'm not going to stop pestering you, Malfoy. Stop trying to get rid of me."

The chuckle is out of his lips before he can stop it. Stupid Potter. Stupid, annoying Potter who doesn't know when to give up. The little bugger just has to save everyone, even those that don't deserve it. "I'm mad, Potter."

"You're insufferable, that's what you are."

There is amusement in Potter's voice, and Draco missed that, the sound of his voice when he's happy. He wishes he didn't.

Potter starts to walk again, and Draco crosses his arms, wraps it around Potter's shoulders to keep himself from falling. He buries his nose in Potter's neck, lets himself feel the warmth of Potter's skin and allows himself this one minute of weakness and selfishness, because, he promises, this will be the last time.

He wants to kiss Potter's neck.

Instead, he says, "Let me down."

Potter turns his head, looks at him from the corner of his eye. "Can you walk?"

"Yeah."

Potter kneels down and lets go of his legs, lets him step on the ground on his own and straighten himself up. Immediately, Potter stands and looks at him over, looks at him worriedly. "Are you okay?"

No. His vision's dimming again and he feels like his head's about to burst. "Fine."

"You look like you're about to throw up."

"Must be your imagination."

Potter rolls his eyes and takes his arm, pulls it over his shoulder. Once again, they're pressed together, which is just as well, because Draco's knees buckle.

Potter's hand is around his waist in an instant. "Merlin, Malfoy. You can ask for help, you know," he mutters through gritted teeth.

Draco's vision clears, just a bit, and he tries to straighten his legs once more.

Potter's voice is near his ear and it's soft. "You can ask me for help."

And Draco, in his delirium, replies, just as soft. "I know."

He knows.

The castle halls are quiet when they pass through them. Gone are the students, and the only noise that echo are their footsteps and heavy breathing. Draco spends the trip trying to focus on keeping himself awake so much that it takes a while for him to notice that they're already in front of a very familiar stone wall.

He laughs, a quiet laughter of disbelief. "Potter, why do you know the way to the Slytherin common room?"

Potter grins at him. "Trade secrets." He nudges his chin towards the wall. "I'll tell you when we get inside. Can you stand now?"

Draco does. He doesn't think he can do it for very long, but damn if he's going to keep hanging off of Potter forever. "We?"

Potter's smile gets bigger, and Draco curses his heart for feeling whatever it is that it's feeling. Must be the nausea.

Potter rummages through his robe pockets, gets his wand in one and a small piece of cloth in the other. With a swish and flick, the piece of cloth transforms into a huge cloak, sparkling like the night sky. He throws it around himself, and Draco tries hard not to stare dumbly at the spot where Potter once stood.

Of course, Potter would have an invisibility cloak.

"You little bugger."

A chuckle echoes in the dungeons. "What's the password?"

Potter is in the Slytherin dungeons.

Potter is in his room.

Granted, he's had Potter in his room before, but not… in Slytherin.

The shock and utter ridiculousness of it has Draco walking straight towards his bed to lie down and rest his aching head. There are a lot of gaps in his memory, and trying to make sense of everything that led them here isn't doing him any favours.

There's a sound of a bed creaking, and Draco can imagine that Potter's gone and made himself at home on the other, nearest bed.

That one had been Goyle's.

Draco sighs, rubs his hand over his face, and then keeps it there. "How did you know I was in the Forbidden Forest?"

Potter's voice is sheepish. "I have this Map that tells me where everybody is in the castle."

Draco snorts, shaking his head in incredulity. "You certainly have a lot of things, don't you?" He kicks his boots off and, uncaring of how muddy the ends of his robes are, puts his feet up on the bed and arranges himself so that he can look at Potter while keeping his throbbing head lying down. He'll Scourgify his sheets later.

"Yeah, well, you don't beat Voldemort empty-handed."

Potter is leaning back on his arms, keeping his feet and his own dirty boots firmly planted on the floor.

"Are you gloating?"

Potter rolls his eyes. There's a smile on his lips and a twinkle in his eyes, like a promise of something fun. "No, Malfoy."

He stands up, crosses the room, and sits on the free space above Draco's head. He rummages in his pocket once more and produces an old piece of folded parchment, which he lays on the bed in front of Draco's face. "Come on, tap your wand here and say I solemnly swear I am up to no good."

Resolutely ignoring Potter's distance from him (or the utter lack of it), Draco glares at the parchment. "Are you fibbing with me?"

"No, I am not fibbing. You're being difficult on purpose, aren't you?"

Still suspicious, Draco gets his wand from his own pocket. It's a new one, bought in a quick trip to Ollivanders' on the last day of August, on the very same day that Kingsley Owled him to say that his magic ban was over. He had been nervous, and ashamed, to meet the old man again after what the Death Eaters did to him in their very own dungeons, but Garrick Ollivander had taken one look at him, disappeared within his shelves of boxes, and returned with a wand and forgiveness.

"10 inches, rowan wood and unicorn hair, young Draco Malfoy. No matter how dark the road, the value is in your persistence to find the light."

It's not the same as his old one, of course, but he doesn't know where that is (Potter? The Ministry?) and he's too scared to ask.

Holding his breath, Draco taps the parchment with his wand and says, "I solemnly swear I am up to no good."

The parchment unfolds, and ink dances from the middle, towards the sides and the four corners, to form…

"Hogwarts," he says, breathless. He props himself up on one elbow, eyes wide. He looks back at Potter with his mouth open in amazement.

Potter grins at him in reply. He taps the lower right corner, the Slytherin Dorms, right where their names are placed beside each other.

It's definitely weird. Seeing their names together. They don't match, after all.

"You weren't at dinner," Potter says, continuing their conversation. "I checked the Map and didn't see you anywhere."

Draco looks at the area labelled Great Hall. It's empty, as expected. He doesn't know what time it is, but it's probably already after curfew. He thinks about the absurdity of Potter eating dinner, realizing that he's not there, and going out of his way to check this ridiculous map of his just to look for him.

He blinks, tries to stop himself from feeling happy about it. "Other people might call this stalking," he says instead.

Potter's cheeks are pink. "Shut up, I was worried."

He's definitely happy. Damn Potter. "Worried that poor little Draco went bonkers and wandered off into the Lake?"

"Yes, Malfoy, is it that weird of me to worry about you? Now stop trying to piss me off, I'm trying to have a civil conversation here."

Draco clears his throat loudly. He hopes the dark is doing its job covering his burning face. "Alright, so you didn't see me in the Map, and assumed that I was in the Forest?"

"Well, it's one of the places that isn't shown on the Map, so I took a hunch."

Draco looks at him disbelievingly. "You went to the Forbidden Forest on a hunch?"

Potter shrugs. "It's not the first time I've been to the Forest. And you didn't manage to get very far."

He's not mad. Potter's mad. He thinks of all the things that could have happened, all the ways that this day could have gone horribly wrong. "Merlin, Potter, you mean to tell me I almost got the Saviour of the Wizarding World ripped apart by wolves because he was stupid enough to come after an ex-Death Eater on a hunch?"

Potter's frowning again. "Stop calling me that. Stop calling yourself that."

"They're both true, Potter. Don't be so sensitive over it."

"So," Potter irritably cuts off, probably because if they continue talking about this, they are going to have another argument. "That's how I found you."

Draco huffs in reply. He shakes his head, still incredulous, but that movement reminds him that he still has a headache and so he lies back down on the mattress. It's ludicrous, that's what this whole thing is.

Potter being here, being so meddlesome with him and his life, and him enjoying it. Enjoying Potter's attention, his time, his concern, and those godawful smiles that he sends Draco's way when Draco's said something particularly funny.

He wants Potter to stop. He doesn't deserve it.

The Dark Mark burns, hot and heavy on his forearm, under his sleeve. He throws it over his eyes, and takes a deep, shuddery breath. He thanks his lucky stars and whatever higher being there is in the sky that nothing happened to either of them today, because he doesn't think he can forgive himself if something had happened to Potter all because he was crazy enough to wander where he's not supposed to wander and stupid enough to fall in love.

"Next time, don't do it. My life's not worth yours."

There is a pause, one that lasts long enough for the tears to prick his eyes, before Potter murmurs, "That's for me to decide."

Draco laughs, low and empty. "You can't save everyone all the time."

"I know. But I wanted to save you."

"It got easier, the more I did it," Draco finds himself explaining a while later.

He's still lying vertically on the bed, turned to his side, watching the ribbons of names glide over the Map. Potter didn't go back to the other bed anymore and had settled for lying down horizontally, just below the pillows. His thigh is just above Draco's head.

Draco had just Scourgified his clothes and his bed, unable to stand the grit and the dirt anymore, when Potter asked if he knew that it was the Forbidden Forest he was walking to, which evolved into the conversation they are having now.

"I had always been good at Occlumency. My aunt said I had a natural talent for it." He closes his eyes, smiling grimly as he remembers Bellatrix Lestrange and their late-night Occlumency training sessions to prepare him for his mission. He opens his eyes again, unwilling to dwell on the details of those. "Growing up trying to live up to my father's expectations to be ambitious and… cruel, I suppose, made it easy for me to, in my aunt's own words, empty myself of emotions."

The memories that he recalls now are a different kind, one that consists of stone floors, metal bars, a sinking coldness that penetrated your very bones, and the choice he made to avoid it.

"It kept me from giving in to the terror that the Dementors wanted me to feel. But the more I did it, the easier it got, and the harder it was to come back."

His eyes trace the map once more, down to the dungeons, and on the ribbon that reads Harry Potter.

"You remember the state I was in when I first got out of that place."

The bed shifts, and Draco can imagine Potter nodding.

"But it got better, didn't it? It became less frequent the last few times I went to the Manor."

"Mm," Draco says in reply. "My mother says it might be a relapse."

"Why?"

Draco recalls his summer days in the Manor. He recalls the happiness he felt, the frightening unfamiliarity of it after all those months—after he was given the Mark, his mission, and that soul-gripping fear of what the Dark Lord might do to his family should he fail. And he recalls thinking then, that the world isn't such a bad one to wake up to, if he woke up to banana pancakes and bright, green eyes.

And then he recalls the following weeks after.

Potter with his friends, always in the distance, always on the other side of the room, his green eyes now looking elsewhere.

Draco knows why. But he's not going to tell Potter that.

"I have no idea, Potter."

"I should go," Potter says, sitting up with a sigh. "Ron will be worried."

Draco nods mutely, because he's not about to do something stupid like ask Potter to stay. The throbbing in his head had lessened to a dull throb, and so he tries to sit back up again.

Potter is arranging his robes as neatly as he can, before he takes out his wand again, taps the Map, and says, "Mischief managed."

The ink disappears in a heartbeat and the paper folds itself once more. Potter pockets it together with his wand. He crosses the room to get the Invisibility Cloak on Goyle's bed, and then pauses. He turns to look at Draco. His eyebrows are creased with worry. "You okay, Malfoy?"

Draco doesn't know how to answer that, but he nods anyway. He will be.

Potter doesn't look assured, but he nods back and walks towards the door. He holds the cloak open. And then he sighs. He turns back to Draco, opens his mouth as if to say something, but decides against it. He closes his mouth again. Instead, he says with a small smile, "See you tomorrow, then."

The words are out of his lips before he can stop them. "Come back."

Potter looks surprised.

Draco already hates himself. He's not supposed to be doing this. "Tomorrow. Come back tomorrow, I mean." His heart's beating loudly in his chest, and he swallows, tries to steady his voice. "You have that cloak of yours."

And he doesn't know what it is that he said, but Potter's smiling, and god, it sucks how much he'd missed that smile. His head still hurts, but he finds himself smiling back anyway.

"Okay. After dinner."

Potter leaves, and Draco thinks, No. No, no, no, no, no.

III

At breakfast the next day, Harry is back to shamelessly seeking out that blond hair. He's relieved to see Draco at the Slytherin table, looking well and talking with some of the seventh years. He's so engrossed that he doesn't notice the girl behind him, not until Ron elbows him quite harshly in the stomach.

"Oof!" he exclaims, at the same time a quiet, lilting voice says, "Harry?"

Harry completely forgets about glaring at Ron and whips around in surprise.

A girl, tall and with brown hair falling down to her waist in soft curls, looks at him nervously. Around them, the people nearest are starting to whisper, watching with bated breath and wondering why a Slytherin would talk to Harry Potter.

"Hi, I'm Astoria."

Harry knows. He glares at the fourth year Ravenclaws on the other table whispering just a tad bit too loudly. With a sigh, he turns back to Astoria. "Hi, Astoria. You're Daphne's sister."

Astoria relaxes, knowing that she doesn't have to introduce herself after all. "Yes." She glances at Harry's already empty plate. "If it's alright, can I talk with you?"

He glances at Ron beside him, who just shrugs before returning to his breakfast, and then at Hermione across from him, who smiles at Astoria in greeting, before turning to Harry and nudging her chin towards the door. "Go on, then. We'll save you a seat in Professor Slughorn's class."

Harry smiles at her gratefully. He stands up and motions towards the door. There are too many people watching here. He hates it. "Mind if we take a walk?"

Harry already knows what they're going to talk about. They walk out towards the entrance courtyard, but there are still students milling around, killing time before their first class, and so they walk towards the boathouse instead.

Astoria ploughs on without preamble. "Draco told me about what happened last night."

Harry doesn't know what to feel with the knowledge of Draco and Astoria being close enough that she can call him by his first name and that he had already told her of what had transpired last night. "Oh."

Astoria smiles at his careful reply, and starts to explain. "I mean, I've been trying to help him. We've known each other since childhood, you see. Our mothers visited each other a lot. Narcissa told me what happened to him in…" Here, she frowns, looking down at her hands clasped in front of her. With a sad look on her face, she turns back to Harry. "She asked me to help, but lately, it's been getting worse, I think. And I can't be there for him all the time. Especially during classes."

Harry recalls that Astoria's in sixth year.

It's making sense now, then, the amount of time that she and Draco have been spending together. There's a part of him that's hurt, somehow, that Narcissa hadn't asked him, which he desperately tries to squash down, because of course he wouldn't have been able to help even if Narcissa had. Even though he and Draco are in the same year, they are still in different houses with different class schedules, and it's not like they can very well eat together or spend time after curfew together.

And he is supposed to be happy that Draco has other people to talk to and watch over him. He is. He's also just a bit… jealous.

They're in the middle of the meadow now, and the boathouse can be seen in the horizon. Clouds litter the sky, floating gently with the wind. Sunlight filters through gaps between them, bathing everything in a magical sort of glow, like a dream.

He looks at Astoria, at her big, grey eyes, her long eyelashes, and the way her hair curls against her high cheekbones. Not for the first time, he thinks, Wow, she's pretty.

Astoria stops abruptly, turns to him, and says, "But he told me about what you did for him."

Harry scrunches his eyebrows in confusion. "What I did?"

Astoria nods. "How you tried to help him back in the summer." Pink dusts her cheeks, and she shakes her head. "I'm sorry, we weren't gossiping or anything–"

Harry is quick to assure her. "Oh, no, I didn't think that."

Again, Astoria visibly relaxes. Harry wonders just how nervous she was before coming up to him.

"He actually didn't want to tell me anything at first. I was the one who insisted. It helps, you see. He likes talking about you." Here, she smiles at him, but it looks sad.

He stares at her, unsure of what to make of her words and her expression.

"It keeps him awake. I mean. Awake awake."

"I… don't understand what you're getting at, Astoria."

"Help him. Please."

And then it clicks. Why Astoria's sad smile looks so familiar.

He's seen it on himself.

He blurts out, "You like Malfoy, don't you?"

As soon as the words are out, he immediately regrets it, because it's inappropriate, insensitive, and Hermione and Ginny are both going to kill him when they find out.

But Astoria just laughs at his obvious horror, and though her cheeks are flushed with embarrassment, the sadness on her face is gone. "Is it that obvious?" She lets out a few more chuckles, unable to help herself. "But it's okay. I know he already likes somebody else."

This time, Harry manages to stop the "Who?" from slipping past his lips. He thinks the shock of the pain at knowing that Draco likes somebody else helped. He doesn't even know why it still hurts, because up until a minute ago, he had thought that that somebody else was Astoria—

Astoria who has now gone quiet and is looking at him as if she's trying to figure something out.

"You're nice, Harry. I was prepared for you not wanting to talk to me."

Harry frowns at her. "Why would I do that?" he asks incredulously, but he already knows why.

"Because I'm a Slytherin."

"You did nothing wrong," he says firmly. He thinks of Draco, Narcissa, and Severus Snape. "Slytherins are some of the bravest people I know."

Finally, she smiles again, real and genuine, one that reaches her eyes. "You're nice," she says once more. "I think I understand Draco a bit more now."

That night, when dinner has been eaten and students have returned to their respective dorm rooms, Harry rummages through his trunk for the Map and the Invisibility Cloak.

Ron throws something at his head.

"Hey!" Harry exclaims, glaring. He grabs the offending object and is surprised to see that it's a chocolate frog, sitting still and pretty inside its shiny box.

Ron throws something at him again.

Fast Seeker reflexes have him catching it with ease, and he stares at it in bewilderment. It's another chocolate frog.

Ron looks away, ears red and muttering, "Give the other one to Malfoy. Merlin knows he needs more fat under those robes of his."

Harry beams at him.

Draco jumps and stands up from his bed when he enters, and Harry remembers that oh, right, he's invisible. He takes off the cloak, and smiles sheepishly in greeting.

Draco stares at him dumbly. "I thought you weren't going to come."

Harry dumps his cloak on the other bed, and rummages through his robe pockets. "You told me to come."

"I know. But you didn't… have to."

"I wanted to. Here, catch." He throws the chocolate frog and is not surprised when Draco catches it easily. He grins. "Ron told me to give it to you."

Draco is still staring, but now it's towards the frog. "Why?"

"For you to eat it, of course." Harry resists the urge to roll his eyes. He's starting to think that all of Draco's bravado is just a ploy to hide how truly bashful he is. Bashful and Draco Malfoy. Now that's something that doesn't go together. "I also swiped some treacle tart from the kitchen."

"You what?"

He takes a miniature, balled piece of cloth from his pocket, puts it carefully on Draco's desk, and spells it back to its original size. He unties the knot of the cloth, and immediately, a scent of lemon fills the room.

"Treacle tart. It's my favourite," he said, rummaging through his pocket yet again. He produces two forks, and offers one to Draco. "Though you've probably already guessed."

Draco eyes the fork suspiciously, but he takes it anyway. "It's rather hard to miss."

"I got some extra for you."

"Extra? You stole a whole tart."

"Stole is a very strong word."

Draco shakes his head in disbelief. He's still staring at Harry and the tart like they're going to jump at him. "You and your sweet tooth will one day be the death of you, Potter."

Harry grins. He missed this—this light, easy banter. He pulls up Draco's chair and sits himself down comfortably. He likes talking about you, Astoria had said. He looks at the treacle tart, and thinks that it's time for a story.

"I never had any sweets as a child. The most I've eaten was the crumbs of chocolate cake I swiped off my cousin's plate while I was washing it. That probably explains why I'm such a glutton for it now."

It works. The suspicion is still on Draco's face, like he's wondering why Harry's suddenly so talkative, but it's mixed with a sudden curiosity. "Is that why you feel the need to bury your face in chocolate frogs after every meal?"

"Exactly. You're catching on."

"That also explains why everything you wore hung off you when we were first years."

Harry snorts, tearing off a chunk of tart with his fork. "Anybody whose clothes hang off him now isn't allowed to talk big." He shoves the tart towards Draco's mouth, fully expecting him to turn away. To his surprise, Draco takes the fork, cleans it free of tart, and gives it back to Harry.

Harry doesn't even bother to hide his grin.

Draco rolls his eyes and sits down on the edge of his bed. He pulls the plate closer towards him. "Distracting me with childhood stories in a bid to make me fat, are you?"

"Eating well-rounded meals in regular intervals in a day isn't going to make you fat. But I do hope that the childhood stories are working."

"It is. Do tell me more about this cousin of yours."

And it's just like before. Time spent together in easy company and conversation. It becomes a nightly thing, Harry quietly slipping in after dinner and slipping out just before midnight. Draco asks him to come back, every time, which doesn't really make a difference because Harry's still going to come back anyway. He thinks Draco just likes the assurance.

By now, he had fully taken over Goyle's bed as his. It's as messy as his own bed back in Gryffindor Tower, sheets rumpled and pillows skewed sideways. Sometimes, he forgets some of his things, a quill here and a Merlin card gotten from a chocolate frog box there, and these are the things that occupy the bed when he's gone.

Back in the summer, it had been breakfasts, and now it's late night snacks.

He swipes whatever he can from the kitchens—scones, chicken pot pie, sandwiches. His friends had been very supportive, as well. Ron continues his supply of chocolate frogs, Ginny gives some Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans once in a while, and Hermione provides him a weekly task list, because "I fully support whatever's making you happy, Harry, but I do hope the two of you aren't forgetting your homework?"

He thinks he should be embarrassed that his friends know what's going on between him and Draco. Or that they know that nothing's going on, but they're helping anyway. And he is embarrassed, but also, he's just very, very grateful.

Draco accepts the chocolate frogs every time, and even tries some of Ginny's Beans. He looks at Hermione's task list, and never fails to make totally unnecessary comments. "You haven't done your Potions essay yet? Potter, I've finished that days ago."

The late night snacking works. Draco doesn't look like an emaciated corpse now. Astoria tells him with a cheerful smile, when they pass each other by in the halls, that Draco has also been having a good appetite in the Great Hall lately. Personally, he thinks Draco's starting to become too addicted to the frogs.

They talk about classes, their lessons, and the occasional gossip.

("What's this I hear about you and Astoria getting it on in the boathouse?"

"Oh my god, Malfoy, I didn't do anything!"

"That's not what the Hufflepuffs said."

"I… We… We just talked!"

"Relax. I was joking. If you really had done something to her, I would have hexed you. She's like a little sister to me."

Well, you're not an older brother to her, Harry had wanted to say, but he had been happy, so shamelessly happy to hear it clearly said that Draco doesn't like her that way.)

Sometimes, Harry talks about himself.

It was uncomfortable, at first. He isn't used to talking about himself. But Draco's a good listener, all eyes and ears, nodding at the right times, and asking questions, but never too much. He doesn't pry, but Harry tells him anyway, because he likes the way Draco looks when he's really curious and invested.

And sometimes, Draco talks about himself, and sometimes they're nice stories about his childhood, his family, his friends, and sometimes they're not so nice, and more than once, Draco had ended up disappearing on him for a few minutes.

But those are the moments that Harry looks forward to the most, humbled by the trust he's being given.

Draco tells him about Goyle once.

Harry tells him a story about the Marauders.

(He cries during that one. He talks and talks and talks, until he realizes he's crying and his voice isn't coming out anymore, and he doesn't get to finish, but Draco already knows the ending anyway.)

On the night that November ends, Harry is lounging on his—it hasn't been 'Goyle's' for a while now—bed, staring at the green curtains falling from the bed's canopy. The colour is starting to grow on him. He likes it best on pale skin.

"Something that Astoria said disturbs me. She said she thought I might not have wanted to talk to her, just because she's a Slytherin," he starts, re-imagining that particular memory.

Draco looks up from his textbook, and tilts his head at the sudden topic. He is lying down on his bed, his chest on the mattress, in only his regular uniform after having thrown his robes over the chair. His hair is tousled from rolling over on the bed so much, and Harry's been trying not to look (or stare) at him.

"We're not exactly well-liked, Potter. You know that best."

Harry smiles wryly, recalling the utter dislike he used to have for anybody wearing green. Then, he recalls Draco in the Manor, Narcissa in the Forest, and Snape in the Shrieking Shack. "I also know best, now, that not everything is as simple as black and white." He glances at Draco. "I'm still alive because of a lot of Slytherins, you know."

One edge of Draco's lips quirk up into a small smile, as if he's still amused that Harry's still glorifying them. "There needs to be a villain in a narrative. That's what we're here for," he murmurs, eyes traveling to his clothed arm. "That's how the balance works."

Harry follows his eyes with his own and takes a deep breath. "The Sorting Hat wanted to put me in Slytherin."

Immediately, Draco's head shoot up. He's staring at Harry in disbelief. "What?"

Harry grins at him. "I told him I didn't want to be put here."

"You can choose?"

"Well, it is our choices that make us who we are."

"Don't pretend to be wise, Potter. It's unbecoming."

Harry bursts into laughter.

Draco shakes his head. "I can't imagine you as a Slytherin."

"Really? We would have been roommates."

"Yeah. We would have."

"We might not have made it through first year. You were an insufferable git back then."

"I…" Draco starts, and then pauses. He huffs. "Am I not anymore?"

And Harry hears the hidden question and smiles at him. "Less."

Draco's cheeks are pink. He stands up, takes his robes from the back of his chair, and unfolds it. "Try on my clothes."

It's a command, not a request, and Harry stands up eagerly. If he's being honest with himself, he just likes the thought of them trying on each other's clothes. He shrugs off his own robes, and puts on the offered one slowly.

It smells like Draco. Like hand cream and peppermint.

He swallows thickly, and looks up to comment that they're a bit tight, but Draco is staring at him, stunned and speechless.

Harry feels his own face heating up.

"It looks… nice on you."

"Be careful, Malfoy. I might just consider that a compliment."

He's flirting, he knows, but Draco seems to realize what he had just said and his cheeks go red and Harry can't resist.

He grabs his own robes from the bed, crosses the room, pulls at Draco's shoulder to turn him around, and can't help the big smile that slides its way to his lips when Draco simply lets him.

"Try mine."

Draco makes a face. "I absolutely can't imagine myself in Gryffindor," he says, but he's raising his arms, letting Harry slip the sleeves onto them.

"Me neither."

"I can't imagine you in Slytherin, either."

"Really? I'm pretty cunning." And he's turning Draco around again, completely aware that Draco can put the robes on his own, but he's letting him, and so Harry takes what he's being given.

"Cunning is the last word I'll think to describe you with."

Harry steps in close, as close as he dares, to clasp the robes together. He feels just a little bit guilty at his ulterior motives. "You have no idea, Malfoy."

Finally, he steps back, peruses his handiwork, and chuckles. "Red doesn't suit you at all."

Draco gives him a distasteful look. "It's a garish colour," he says, walking towards his wardrobe mirror to look at himself. He scrunches his nose up, and then sighs. He glances back at Harry through the mirror, studies him again from head to toe, and murmurs thoughtfully. "Green suits you. It matches your eyes."

Harry grins at him. "See? I would have been a great Slytherin."

"You don't belong here," Draco replies, rolling his eyes. "You're too nice. We have a reputation to uphold."

"Hmm, that's true. And Snape wouldn't have known whether to dock House points from me or give me more."

He watches Draco laugh, lets the warmth and happiness of the moment sink in, and lets that propel him into telling another story.

The story of Severus Snape.

IV

Draco doesn't know when he stopped trying to get Potter to leave him alone.

He just realizes that he has one day during lunch when an unfamiliar owl drops an unsuspecting letter on his lap. It's not his first time receiving hate mail, and so he's not really surprised when he opens it and sees one line:

Leave Harry Potter alone.

What surprises him is his reaction, his conviction, as he thinks strongly to himself, No. I don't want to.

He looks across the room, to the Gryffindor table, where Potter sits, laughing at whatever inane joke Weasley had said. He looks happy, surrounded by his friends, with no weight of any Dark Lord pressing down on his shoulders.

And then Potter looks up, catches his eye, and then sends him the most dazzling smile, and Draco thinks, with his heart dropping to his stomach and his fist crumpling the note, No. Don't take this away from me.

It becomes frequent. Daily, even. Since coming to Hogwarts, he had already asked the Headmistress to ban the Howlers, but if people are sending him Owls under the guise of innocent, enveloped letters, then that would definitely be harder to stop.

Instead, Draco stops reading them in the Great Hall. He pockets them, like dirty secrets, and reads them at night, before Potter comes. It hurts, of course it does, and at first, he had read them with the goal of finding out who they were from, but in the end, he realizes that he had been reading them like an act of penitence.

But it's during one night that he opens a letter with a hidden Stinging Hex, and the pain from the welt on his wrist makes him wonder, Why am I doing this again?

And it's when Potter comes in, stumbles on him sitting on his bed with a mess of opened letters scattered around him and cradling his wrist that he remembers what Potter had said: You can ask for help, you know.

Potter frowns at him as he enters, obviously taking in the scene and trying to understand what's happening. He glances at how Draco's holding his wrist that's covered by the sleeve of his robes. "What's wrong?"

And Draco had expected it to feel like tattling, or like giving up, but when he says it, he finds that he's just really, really relieved to finally be able to share anything with this man.

"I've been receiving letters."

"Oh?" Potter asks curiously, taking off his robes and throwing it on his bed without preamble, as if he lives here. Draco likes it.

Potter peers at the letters, but they're all folded, and so Draco hands him the nearest one, the very first one.

The way Potter's face darkens at the message warms him from the inside. It's fucked up, but he likes knowing that he can affect Potter like this.

Potter unfolds another letter, then another, then another, until he's gone through all of them, and he crushes the last one in his fist with his lips curled in distaste. He throws it in the garbage bin, and glares at the remaining letters on the bed. "How long has this been going on?" he demands.

Draco starts to gather the letters into a neat pile. "A week, maybe more?"

"Why didn't you tell me?" Potter's angry, and Draco wants to kiss his frown away.

It's hard when Potter's sweet enough to get angry for him. Draco closes his eyes and takes a deep breath before he does something stupid like confess.

When he opens his eyes, he looks straight at Harry's and says, "I'm telling you now."

And he knows, with the way Potter's tense shoulders slowly relax and the furrow in his eyebrows ease, that Potter understands the trust and humility that he's giving in that single act of telling.

"Give that to me," Potter mutters instead and snatches the pile of letters from Draco's hand. He turns back to his robes on the other bed, and shoves the letters inside one of its pockets with a grumble. "I'm giving these to Professor McGonagall. Have you read all of them?"

"Yes."

"Stop reading them." Potter sighs, fingers pressing on his temple. "Why do you even keep on opening them?"

Draco smiles slightly at the frustrated figure Potter's back makes. "Thought it might convince me."

"To what?"

"To leave you alone."

Potter whips his head back to look at him, stunned and hurt at his admission. "Why would you–"

And Draco cuts him off, because he's ready for this, he's been ready with these words for so long, and he just needs to try, one last time. "I'm not someone you should be friends with, Potter."

"Malfoy." Potter says, like a warning. "You're starting with that crap again."

"It's not crap," Draco affirms. He can feel the well of emotions rising up again, the shame, the guilt, and the need to escape from it, and it's making the edges of his vision go dark. He inhales sharply, struggles to keep himself here. "It's… People are obviously going to talk, you know. This isn't going to be the last time, and there's really nothing else that they can say about me that hasn't already been said, but you—you're going to get the worst of it. Harry Potter being friends with an ex-Death Eater, someone who's a little insane—"

A hand closes around his fingers, grips them tight and firm. Draco pulls himself back, fights his way back from the comfortable darkness in his head, towards the grounding, exhilarating reality of the hand holding his.

When he returns, completely returns, Potter's sitting on his bed, still holding his hand, and looking straight at him.

"I don't really care about what Harry Potter those people are imagining," Potter is murmuring. "This Harry Potter wants to be friends with that ex-Death Eater, someone who's a little insane."

Draco chuckles, smiles at him weakly. "Salazar, Potter, you didn't have to agree with the insane part."

Potter smiles back at him. "Your words, not mine. And look. You fought it off, didn't you?"

He did. He did. And he doesn't know if it's because it's the first time he's managed to stop himself from falling in the rabbit hole his mind has made, or if it's because of the pride in Potter's eyes as he looks at him, or Potter wanting to stay with him, that he finds his eyes becoming warm.

"Yeah." His voice is shaking. "Thanks."

Potter still hasn't let go of his hand. "Well then, has it convinced you?"

It's making Draco have a hard time concentrating. "What?"

"Have the letters convinced you to leave me alone?"

And Potter's too close, too near, and there is a traitorous hope crawling up his stomach and swelling in his chest at Potter's proximity, his words, the way he's looking at him. "No."

"I'm glad." There's a crinkle at the corner of Potter's eyes when he smiles, and Draco hates it, as much as he hates the way Potter's thumb is slowly tracing circles against his palm. There is pink colouring Potter's cheeks and he hates that, too. "I, err, I suppose this is a good time to tell you that I don't have exactly innocent intentions in, uhm, being friends with you."

And it's like a blow to the chest. Draco laughs, stunned and breathless, and he ducks his head, tries to stop the well of tears from falling.

"Stop. Stop," he says, voice trembling. "You don't get to say it first."

The thumb stops. There is confusion in Potter's voice. "What?"

Draco grips Potter's hand back. It feels right, Potter's hand in his. "Give me a moment," he says, and it's almost a plea. He doesn't want their first kiss to taste like tears. He takes a deep, shaky inhale, and musters the courage. "Give me a moment and then I'll kiss you."

A sharp intake of breath. And then an accusatory "…You don't say that and expect me to wait a moment."

And Draco laughs again, giddy and warm, and he wipes his eyes with his other hand, the one hit by the hex, and it still hurts, that one, but it's nothing compared to finally, finally getting this.

"Goddamn, Potter, you really have no patience."

And he swallows all the hesitation down his throat and pulls Potter down for a kiss.

Dear Harry,

Consider me surprised to see a picture of you and my son in an alleyway in Hogsmeade.

I am writing to spare you the suffering of wondering about my thoughts on the matter.

I would love it if you could join us for the holidays.

Love,

Narcissa

end