Title: Understanding Draco

Author name: Triola

Category: Romance

Sub Category: Angst

Summary: Harry doesn't understand. Draco sort of wants him to. Draco thought-drivel.

DISCLAIMER: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.

Author notes: Dunno where this came from really. And mucho love to the lovliest of betas, Lami.

Warning: Mild slash

Harry hadn't understood.

When Draco first met Harry, it had been in Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions. They had both been eleven, and Draco was eager to make new friends. He'd seen the small, insecure looking boy for the first time and he'd tried his best to impress him and make him feel at ease. He used every skill his father had taught him, all the things he knew worked on the other pureblood children, talking about Hogwarts and Quidditch and anything else that came to mind. For some reason, it hadn't worked. The small boy with the green eyes looked even more uncomfortable the further into the conversation they got and Draco realised with a sinking heart that his plan wasn't working. The boy didn't understand.

They'd met again at the train to Hogwarts. Draco now knew that the small boy was Harry Potter, the one and only, who he had dreamt of meeting ever since he'd first heard the stories at the age of four. He sought him out at once and offered him, in the only way he knew how, his help and friendship. Harry hadn't understood what he truly wanted and turned him down. In his disappointment, Draco vowed to hate Harry Potter and anything related to him for the rest of his life.

He did a good job in the start. Harry might not want to be his friend, but Draco would still make damn sure Harry Potter knew exactly who he was and what he was good for. That was why Draco, every time Harry was close, would insult him, his friends or his family. He would rat him out every time he did something wrong, and trip him every time they passed each other in the hallway. He even went so far as to arrange a midnight duel between the two of them, only to tell Filch about it so that he could catch Harry red handed. Of course, he didn't, and Harry walked free without ever understanding how badly Draco wanted to see him suffer.

They'd served a detention together. Out in the forest, with Neville Longbottom and Hermione Granger, as well as the caretaker. That was the first time Draco saw Voldemort, although he did not realise it at the time. He had only seen the disgusting, dark, terrifying creature that slithered close to the dead unicorn and started drinking its blood. It reminded Draco all too much of the horror stories wizarding children told each other about the demons of the night. He'd heard the tales about unicorn blood as well. He knew what drinking it signified. Of course he did the only sensible thing, he turned around and ran. Harry later called him a coward, but Harry didn't understand, Harry hadn't grown up with wizarding horror stories.

In their second year, Draco tried out for the Quidditch team. He went through three gruelling practices before he was admitted, having by then outflown four opponents and also two very enthusiastic Beaters who had been told to aim the Bludgers at the five aspiring Seekers non-stop until all but one had caved. That one was Draco. He had been ecstatic and had owled his father at once. Lucius had rewarded his son by equipping the entire team with new brooms. Draco only realised afterwards that this made it seem as if he'd bought his way onto the team. Harry Potter made sure to point it out to him, though, and Draco vowed to beat him at the next Gryffindor-Slytherin match. He didn't, and Draco's father told him he was disappointed in him. He didn't understand that Draco had done his very best, but that Harry Potter had still beaten him, because when it all came down to it, Harry Potter was the better Seeker. Draco regretted not trying out for Chaser, but was determined to beat Harry the next time.

He didn't. Not that year, nor the next one, or the one after that. So Draco had to find other ways to show Harry that he was just as good as him, if not better. Most of them failed. No matter how hard he tried, Harry was somehow always one step ahead, and Draco was the one left behind to get mauled by hippogriffs and sprayed by mud. To add insult to injury, Harry got a brand new Firebolt, the very kind Draco had begged his father to buy him, and now outflew him more thoroughly than ever before. And Draco really regretted not trying out for Chaser, because he was good at catching things, dammit, and if only he'd had the foresight to realise that he could never compete with Harry on a broom, he would have been able to make people see that. But he hadn't, and he didn't. He would never be remembered as the brilliant Chaser he could have been, or even the brilliant Seeker he would have been, had Harry Potter not been around. No, he wouldn't be remembered at all. Because the winners write history, and against Harry he always seemed to lose.

In their fourth year, Harry entered the Triwizard Tournament, a mere child of fourteen. Draco watched, his emotions a wild torrent of jealousy and horror and envy and fear, and for once he didn't mind that Harry had a Firebolt, because otherwise he'd have been torched, and who would Draco then fight? And while he felt oddly bereft when Harry pulled Weasley out of the water—Weasley of all people, could Harry not understand why that was wrong on so many levels?—he suddenly had other things to occupy his mind with. Things were happening out in the world, big things, dangerous things. His father's messages became more and more cryptic, his mother's smiles more and more strained. He knew their master was on the rise once again, that he would free the world of tainted blood and bring their family to its rightful place at the top, yet—

When Draco was fifteen, the Ministry invaded the school, and his father said it was a good thing. The old fool Dumbledore could no longer play the part of mad dictator, he would have to follow rules. There would be no more awarding the Gryffindors a thousand points, just so they could beat Slytherin to the House Cup. There would be order. There would be rules. Draco was, understandably, thrilled. Finally the Slytherins would get what they deserved. There would be no special treatment for the Headmaster's favourites; their hard work would no longer be for naught. Draco embraced the new regime with a fervour, burning to make up for all the injustice Slytherin felt on a daily basis, and if he terrorized the Golden Trio in the process, surely that could be blamed on the heat of the moment.

In the end, the rules didn't matter. Nothing did, except for the fact that his father had been sent to prison. Azkaban, the wizarding prison, from which you came back either mad or dead. His father, his wonderful father, in the prison feared by every sane wizard in the country. Draco was naturally upset. In truth, he was more than upset, he was livid. He was livid, he was anguished, he was out of his mind with anger and grief, and on top of everything, he was so afraid he didn't know where to go or what to do. His father could die. He could die. What would he do without his father? What would his mother do? What would the Dark Lord do? To them? Harry didn't understand. He thought it was a good thing. He was happy to have put a Death Eater in prison. He didn't realise it was someone's father. He could never understand. Harry didn't have a father.

The summer before sixth year was torture. Sixth year was torture. Everything was torture. The Death Eaters came frequently to their home; sometimes the Dark Lord was with them. Draco met him, for the first time. He peed his pants. A month earlier that would have embarrassed him, but now he was too terrified to care. His mother tried to shield him as best she could, but it didn't help much. Taking the Dark Mark hurt more than anything he'd ever experienced. Even Crucio, which he was becoming better and better acquainted with, or having his mind ripped open by an uncaring Legilimens, his flimsy Occlumency shields ripped apart by sheer force. He cried a lot. Sometimes he threw up. Nobody cared. Nobody understood why he wasn't proud to wear the mark, why he wasn't eager to accept the Dark Lord's assignment. They didn't understand that while he told everyone that Harry Potter was the bane of his existence, he was lying through his teeth. Harry Potter wasn't the bane of his existence, the Dark Lord was. Because if this assignment didn't kill him, the Dark Lord surely would.

Sometimes Draco wondered how he made it through sixth year at all. Afterwards, he didn't remember much of it, his mind turning it into a hazy blur of crying, vomiting, nightmares, near-murders and Harry Potter. For once in his life, he didn't want Harry's attention, and suddenly he had it full force. Harry watched him, Harry followed him, asked questions about him, demanded to know what he was up to. Harry even tried to kill him, and Draco couldn't even muster up the energy to be angry. He just wanted to be left alone. He wanted people to stop interfering. He wanted Dumbledore to die. When he talked about it, afterwards, people couldn't understand how he wanted Dumbledore to die. The kind, old man, who'd only ever tried to help him, only ever been kind to him. But they didn't understand that none of that mattered. Because if the choice stands between your Headmaster and your mother, you can't help it, you really want your headmaster to die.

Except, apparently, he didn't really want that at all. Because when the moment came, when he was finally there, he couldn't do it. He'd done the planning, he'd repaired the cabinets, let in the Death Eaters, he even had his wand trained. There was no way he could miss. He wouldn't have missed. If he'd fired the curse at all, he couldn't possibly have missed. But he didn't. Looking into those calm, blue eyes, he couldn't. And Draco knew in that moment that he was dead. He would be killed, one way or another. He was dead. And as that knowledge hit him, harder than Harry's fists ever could, he didn't feel dread—he felt relief. As he lowered his wand he knew that it was over, and he could feel nothing but relief.

After that, everything happened so very fast. Before he knew it the other Death Eaters were there, then Severus killed Dumbledore and they were all on the run. Oh, how they ran. In the end, he made it back to the manor, which had now been turned into full-time headquarters for the Death Eaters. Surprisingly, Draco wasn't killed, although he was severely punished. But he could tolerate pain by now. There's only so much Crucio you can take before you get tired of screaming. He quickly learned to do nothing, to fade into the shadows, to remain unnoticed. It worked as well as anything else, and Draco was not ashamed of the fact that he would rather hide than be sport for the other Death Eaters. He kept to himself, keeping up with the news so that he'd know if anyone he knew died or went missing. There were quite many to keep track of, but he did try. Secretly, he was beginning to root for the other side. Azkaban and madness must be preferable to this.

When they brought Harry Potter in, it was the single most frightening day of his life. And after the year he'd been through, Draco thought that was saying quite a lot. When they told him, he thought everything was over. Harry had been stupid enough to get caught, and now the Dark Lord would win. Looking at him, even with the almost comically swollen face, Draco couldn't help recognizing him at once. His father was right beside him, eager to be the one to capture the Chosen One, and Draco felt the reluctance swell in him, like a large, malignant tumour. He told them he couldn't be sure. A blatant lie, but with the way Harry's face was looking, they'd be fools not to believe him. It was worse with Granger and Weasley. There was nothing to obscure their faces. He tried to hedge, draw it out, wait for the aurors to come storming in, but in the end, of course it was them. Stupid, stupid, stupid them, getting caught like that. Draco didn't think any of them understood how frightened he was, how much danger they were really in, or how much he risked, lying for them like that. They escaped, of course, as they always did. Draco wished he could have gone with them.

The rest of the war, Draco survived. That was all he was doing, all he cared to do. Each and every day he did his best to survive, but when he actually did, no one was more surprised than himself. The aftermath of the war was a piece of cake compared to daily Crucios and Greyback's unhealthy obsession with young boys. It was nothing, after taking the Dark Mark, after watching his father come back from prison, more things in common with his Aunt than ever before. He never thought he'd be thankful to a Weasley, but after she killed Bellatrix, he could have kissed the mother one. Watching his father go back to Azkaban for a year was hard, but not as hard as watching him lick the Dark Lord's shoes. And by a stroke of luck—also known as Harry Potter's testimony—he and his mother walked. They paid a rather large fine, but that meant nothing. He no longer cared about money like that; he was alive. He was breathing. He was free.

He ran into Harry half a year later. On an open street in Muggle London. He looked as hesitant as Draco felt, but he needed to ask why. Why he'd saved them, why he'd testified. Harry shrugged and looked at him, his green eyes open and vulnerable underneath bangs of black hair, and Draco realised he'd been wrong. Harry could have blamed it all on the life debt, but he didn't. He could have left them to rot in Azkaban, but he hadn't. Harry did understand. Harry had seen what he'd gone through in their sixth year, he'd known what the Dark Lord had asked of him, he's seen him lower his wand, he'd watched him hedge, watched him lie, seen him struggle. He understood that Draco had only done what he needed to to survive, he understood because Harry had done what he needed to to survive. Finally, finally, after years of trying, Draco had managed to make Harry understand.

A year later, when Draco kissed Harry, Harry didn't push him away. Harry kissed back. When Draco woke in the middle of the night from a bad dream, Harry didn't say anything, just held him. When Harry woke up in the middle of the night, Draco returned the favour. They fought a lot. They always had, and they were different, so they rarely agreed. But it didn't matter, because Harry understood. Harry had seen him cry, vomit, rage, and break things. He'd seen him push people away out of self-disgust. Then he'd hit him for pushing people away out of self-disgust. He'd kissed Draco's Dark Mark and said it made him look like one of Hell's Angels, and Draco had no clue what Hell's Angels was, but Harry made an effort, in that strained joking voice he used at Ministry gatherings, which told Draco that he was uncomfortable, but he was trying. And so Draco tried too.

And that was the start of something new, something tender and fragile, something that broke every time one of them said the wrong thing, only to be pieced back together a couple of hours later, a week at the most. And for the first time, Draco understood as well. It had always been about Harry. Everything, ever since that day in Madam Malkin's, it had been about Harry. Even before, when he only knew the tales, it had been about Harry. And so when Harry kissed him, Draco didn't feel the need to push him away, he just kissed right back and let it be with that. Because Harry understood, and now Draco did too.