HD 'Charming' Chapter 6

0o0

Friday. Tea time. No 12 Grimmauld Place, rear garden, by the brand-new rose hedge.

"Potter."

Harry didn't seem to hear him, so Draco edged closer to the newly bedded rose bushes—sad specimens they were, too: every one runty and with prickly baby thorns —and spoke a bit louder.

"Potter!"

Nothing happened. Draco shook his head in disgust over Potter's typically oblivious state and carefully extended his wand.

Ah! Just as he'd suspected—wards. Of course, Potter had wards. Draco, as a Wizard, and now as one of the exceptionally small group of people on the planet actually privy to Potter's Unplottable address, courtesy of his darling Aunt Andromeda, had stealthily gained access to a lurkable spot near the service door of No. 12 Grimmauld Place and was finally able to sense these formidable wards of Potter's. Whether he could breach them was another matter altogether.

Blasted Potter! Making Draco's life yet more difficult when it was hard enough already! He wasn't even certain what precisely he was going to say to the git when he finally confronted Potter face-to-face!

He'd come up with it as he went along, Draco decided; the important thing was to actually see Harry. In person. Within reaching distance.

"Me faire une voie," Draco whispered, and tapped his wand thrice against the barrier. "Laissez-moi entrer!"

One thing at a time. First off, he had to find a way in.

The full force of Draco's not inconsiderable magic channeled down to a pinpoint beam, no larger than a single ray of light, and glowed brilliantly, oscillating from leaf green to cerulean blue to deepest amethyst. The ground rumbled faintly beneath his feet, causing all the Muggle houses along the Place to quiver gently on their foundations, and in the distance, he heard the sound of clay flowerpots crashing downwards from the windowsills of the home right next door. Technically, he wasn't trespassing in their yard and they'd never notice a bleeding thing due to No. 12's Fidelius, but still Draco winced. He hated the slightest indication his magic wasn't fully under his strict control.

But…he was rather understandably nervous.

Nothing happened, though. The neighbor's cat caught sight of him standing there patiently and hissed, hightailing it away from the narrow verge of overgrown weeds. And that was all. The sun shone. The breeze blew.

But no—wait—Potter was finally distracted from his infernal gardening; glancing about him with narrowed eyes, obviously wary. He clambered to his feet, Potter did, and strolled closer to his freshly spaded borders, peering at them suspiciously. Draco fixed his gaze upon that scarred, exceptionally memorable face, only three or four yards distant at last, and then concentrated with all his might on gaining the speccy git's notice. His father's book on Blood Magic had indicated the cure for this ancient and rather obscure Charm was simple; so ridiculously easy a mere child could manage it. Blaise had muttered in strictest confidence that it was true enough Harry had been bound by the Sleeping Beauty's constraints; his insider sources at St. Mungo's Medi-Magical Records Repository reported that the patient Head Auror Harry Potter had no memory of June 5th still, weeks later—and consequently no recollections of his brief, glorious time spent with Draco. If this were so, and the book's exceptionally infantile counterspell instructions were accurate, Draco could cure Potter easily enough and gain a fighting chance to be with him again, just as he'd wanted, all this time. He only had to want it badly enough.

Really, almost childishly simple, Draco exulted, not at all concerned about the degree of wanting required. That, he had that covered, most certainly. And those canny old ancients must've all been chalk players. Good on them, keeping to the obvious—but he'd no time to appreciate their wisdom the moment. Bigger fish to fry, yet.

Draco took a deep, slow breath and steadied himself, spine ramrod straight, chin lifted pugnaciously.

"See me, Harry," he ordered his unwary victim in a low, charged tone, lips white and pinched with tension. His hands shook some, though he willed them fiercely not to. "See me! I'm right here, Potter, for Merlin's Sake! Look at me!"

Surely, that was loud enough to snag Potter's attention, Draco hoped, settling back on his heels from his completely unconscious full-body tilt forward.

Surely.

Oh, gods—but nothing, nothing, nothing! Draco despaired, when Potter merely frowned at a particularly droopy botanical specimen. Boy Wonder clearly hadn't a clue.

Nothing for it, then.

Draco cast a quick boundary Silencio after a cursory glance at the house next door, reflexively gearing himself up for a Wizard's Shout, a blast of power rarely ever used except in the direst of situations, as it drained the caster dry of reserves for an indeterminate time and left him vulnerable as a mere babe. One should never attempt it, the classic texts advised, unless one had a trusted partner for support, both physical and magical—and Draco's partner of choice was but a short (endless) step away.

With a last, desperate gulp of air and silent plea to Merlin, Draco clenched his nerve-palsied fingers into fists and released his Shout, as loud as he possibly could. This might be his very last chance at the elusive, oblivious nit and he'd be fucked if he'd throw it away by holding anything back.

"SEE ME, HARRY POTTER!" he Shouted, but the actual sound of his voice was but the tip of the iceberg. The very air particles reverberated with the force of his concentrated will. It was deathly quiet all about him, other than the resounding echoes of his commanding spell.

"LOOK AT ME—PLEASE, HARRY!"

Harry's head snapped abruptly in Draco's direction, glasses glinting in the sunshine. "Um?" he could be heard to say, faintly.

Now, that did the trick! Draco gasped in relief and blinked rapidly, staggering forward, feeling as though his lungs were bursting. Oh—oh, yes, it did! Did the job right smart and Draco felt triumph of a sort previously unobtainable except in Quidditch matches at Hogwarts, when he was Snitch-snatching from uppity Ravenclaws—and then the self-satisfied flare over his own prowess was totally lost in the subsonic shattering of Harry's multi-layered protective wards—and a complex and contrary Charm far greater and more powerful than they ever were.

There was a shocking, blinding flash of white-blue incandescence (all the best and strongest magic generally resulted in Wizards and Witches blinking a bit afterwards and seeing electric blue spots), and an inverse explosion, entirely muffled by Draco's lingering Silencio. He was summarily flung straight through the straggly baby rosebushes (they caught at his knees and attempted to dig their nasty little claws into his trousers, the buggers) and ejected into the confines of No. 12's rear yard. Reeling, Draco found his way over to Potter in three great stumbling strides, to fetch up before his life-long obsession, red-faced and panting like a blown racehorse. He stood there gawping for a full three seconds, catching his breath, feeling stupidly idiotic again, because there was Harry, finally.

"Draco?" Potter was clearly puzzled. He raised his eyes to meet Draco's and blinked slowly and curiously, as if attempting to focus clearly, even though he had his spectacles perched right on his nose. "Malfoy?"

Just the one look.

"Harry!"

From Draco: a tentative hand extended out to a shoulder, lightly falling on a wrinkled, washed-out orange Muggle t-shirt, finding the bone and muscle underneath; taking the handful of warm, breathing flesh captured into a bloody death grip; not letting go. From Harry: a grubby palm extended up and out in return, dirty with potting soil and stained green from weeding, coming carefully to rest on Draco's one canted hip.

"What?" Harry's lips parted. He licked them and Draco was so hard. So, so hard.

One more small step for Draco, bringing him a hair's-breadth away from his goal; a matching half-pace for Harry and then Harry's musing eyes were brilliant and free of fog as they met Draco's full on; oh, so wide open and brimming with promise, and the only set of eyeballs Draco ever wanted to view across the breakfast dishes for the remainder of his earthly days.

One exclamation: "Harry!"; Harry's parted lips, dry from a day in the summer sun and physical labor; smooth, pink and beckoning, opening on a question he never had a chance to finish asking; his features blurring, whizzing past Draco nearly too quickly to comprehend, even though this surging forward to meet each other was accomplished in such excruciating slow motion Draco thought he'd expire from extreme old age before those lips met his, and then their lips were actually meeting, finally—for real. Finally.

Only one look required; just one taste.

To begin with, that is.

Now clamped together, key into lock, fingers clutching; now falling in unison, avoiding rake and barrow and trowel by coincidence only; now tearing at buttons and flies and extraneous cloth; now biting Harry's neck fiercely to brand him solely as 'the property of Draco Malfoy'; now Harry yanking Draco's slippery locks of pale hair hard, harder, to bring him closer, deeper, in; mouths coupling, edges hermetically sealing; now hips shoved together, no—slammed together (hands wrapping hands caging cocks, crushed by pelvic bones knocking and flesh pressing) and now—finally, finally – a blissful rocking motion, carrying them both away on a swell of Aphrodite's making.

Now coming! (One touch! That's all it took!) Now shouting 'round Harry's stabbing tongue through the brunt of that incomparable rush, as it was bloody impossible to keep quiet and Harry was arching his spine in feline glee as he rubbed against Draco's palm furiously. They were both rendered damp and sticky; grains of soil and flower seeds and saline in a fertile cloud all about them as they rolled over and over across the newly mown grass and the neophyte perennials, scattering the gathered wilting weeds willy-nilly.

Shoes toed off; clothes Vanished. Scorching late afternoon sun, beating down, burning into Draco's exposed shoulder blades and whiter-than-white back as it flexed, and Harry squinting up at Draco, his narrowed eyes tearing as he fingered silver-white tresses gilded honey-gold by the light. There was mingled spit for lube and Harry lapping soulfully at Draco's fingertips, whimpering "Now, Draco, now!" and how could he not instantly leap to do whatever Harry might desire? Erect again already (as if they'd not just both spent themselves completely but a moment ago) and his cock was so fucking swollen, it was bloody fucking magic singing through them both, and Draco's dick was thrumming with pent-up tension and Harry's was, too. Harry's was.

Push, shove, inch by inch, Draco's thighs quivering with careful effort (the befuddled Muggle neighbors on their doorstep, exclaiming foolishly over their fallen clay pots and scattered geraniums). "Silencio!" Harry growled and then it was only the wet, salacious sounds of Draco and Harry snogging gape-jawed whilst the world burnt bright about them—blue, yellow, grass-green—and another long, sliding inch-by-inch, till Draco was fully seated in the depths of Harry's gorgeous bum, his aristocratic nostrils flaring as he exerted every ounce of will not to bloody come right this instant and all the while Draco's plebian, salt-of-the-earth Harry dug his heels into Draco's waist and hissed imprecations. "Fuck me at once, you great idiot git!"

Draco's brain cells seared away into thin air as he hauled his clenched arse off Harry's hole by sheer force of will, withdrawing only enough to gain a smattering of necessary leverage, though Harry was following after his every move like a ruddy terrier, arse eating Draco's cock up in gulps, and finally, finally Draco had torn himself sufficient inches in reverse to make it good for the whore only he knew lived in Harry's body (his sensual Harry, who loved to be touched; who was lewdly gasping for his pleasuring: red lips parting, rolling his midnight hair through the grass clippings and begging to be shagged, by all that was holy!) Merlin, here was that dearly recalled eager Harry of Draco's fondest, most precious memory, now literally begging to bepounded right into the lawn!

Astonished, ecstatic, Draco complied. He lashed up an honest-to-Godric real rhythm, finally: sharp reverse, long angle forward at speed, which slammed directly into Harry's prostate every single time—ooh, that was it, that was it!—and followed through on it with grim, grinning determination, tight-jawed all the while and tweaking pert rose-brown nipples with the hand he wasn't using to brace himself; gnawing along Harry's scarred kneecaps when he should've been breathing. Harry nearly strangled Draco to death clamping his thighs noose-tight together 'round Draco's diaphragm as he thrust his welcoming hips higher, ever higher, curling his spine in a play to present a most willing target in this heady tug-of-war. There was no atom of distance left between them, not one.

There was a blinding flash of light—internally, this time—and Harry's cock went supernova, spraying particles of potential life across the planes of Draco's breastbone and the continual flex of his shadowed chest, as he plunged and thrust. Draco choked on the wonder of it, the sight of Harry's gloriously red cock spewing (it only took the one look, see?) and flung himself randily into his own reinvention, still at jackhammer pace, to Harry's faint, mewling delight.

Falling, falling, and wide awake with it, afterwards. Bright-eyed and bleary, they stared glassily at one another across the half-inch of neatly shorn grass beneath their respective cheeks and silently agreed to take a breather before any possible next-step hexing and complicated explanations. Or maybe they'd just shag again, Draco decided, expressing this notion to Harry with a quizzical eyebrow. Harry nodded, his cleft chin wibbling ever so slightly as he swallowed, apparently in total agreement that this was quite a brilliant plan of proposed action and should be abided by faithfully and soon.

"Fucking parched," Draco managed to croak out, after a long minute laying like a fish out of water on Harry's greensward. Shyness and tongue-tying terror had descended abruptly when his limp dick exited Harry's arsehole; Draco was nearly speechless with the enormity of not knowing what to say next. Hadn't said anything yet, either of them, at least not worthwhile, but then Harry waved a casual hand in the direction of his gardening tools, indicating Draco wasn't likely to be immediately ejected from Grimmauld on the basis of assaulting an Auror. A small Muggle box with a handle sat near the barrow, made of some smooth, shiny material, Draco noted curiously.

"Butterbeer in the ice chest, Malfoy," Draco's true love muttered genially, pink-cheeked and happily post-coital and seemingly not at all demure or retiring. "Help yourself, do."

After a long cool draught, Draco was more himself again, except he bitterly hated the 'Malfoy' and preferred Harry not use it again when addressing him, ever. But that was merely a minor quibble, not worth quarrelling over.

"Want one?" he asked casually, tossing the other bottle gently in his hand, deliberately not looking over at Harry. He couldn't; what if Harry didn't and only really wanted him to go away now he'd had a drink, never to darken his Unplottable doorway again?

"Don't shake it like that, prat!" Harry snapped when Draco's hands trembled; the heat, his rising anxiety and recent sleepless nights taking a bit of a toll. "Be all foam, now, nit. But, yeah—give it over, would you?" he went on to request, far more kindly. "Ta," he added, cool as a cucumber, as if he always sat about starkers in his rear garden with sex-mad intruders who magically bellowed and shattered the neighbor's flower pots like so many ninepins. And then he sat up in one smooth motion, tucking his legs under him Indian-fashion, smirking a bit.

Draco flushed faintly, swallowing, and instantly looked elsewhere. His eyes had strayed to gaze at Harry whether he willed it or not; wasn't that always the way it was? And such a Harry! Draco mused that Potter should always look this way: tousled and fresh with shagging, with grass bits in his hair and a smear of mud on his cheek.

"I am thirsty, thanks," Harry was certainly polite enough, now, Draco noted. He displayed none of Draco's awkwardness. "You wrung me quite dry there, Malfoy." But who could possibly hazard a guess as to what the next few minutes might bring? Certainly, not he, who'd been shagged and heartlessly abandoned by Potter once already.

Scowling, Draco tried not to glance Harry's way again immediately; this had devolved into a supremely stultifying moment conversationally and he'd not the foggiest clue as to how to ensure he'd be invited to stay.

They finished their respective butterbeers in a state of manly silence, each regarding their fingers, the condensation sweat coating the bottles, the disposition of the yard—pretty much anything other than each other. Having swigged his beer down in short order, same as Harry, Draco tucked the two empties carefully back in the cooler, regarding its construction with idle interest (it didn't seem to be Spelled and yet it was quite chilly inside) and then finally (finally!) ever so casually glanced over his shoulder at his nemesis, who was lounging back against the overturned barrow, still folded up like a human pretzel, his lovely pink cock swaying at half-mast and his shaggable bod stunningly naked, with the glow of the sun all about him in a radiant nimbus.

"Er—again?" Draco inquired hoarsely, his mouth dry as dust again and hoping like Hades Harry would agree. They'd discussed jackshite thus far (hadn't exchanged a single, stinking word; not about anything of note and yet, paradoxically, they'd never shut up the once on his birthday night, nattering away at each other like loony magpies the entire time) and Draco was very uncertain he'd done the right thing, imposing himself on Harry like this—as he hadn't been in the slightest when they'd been fucking like bleeding hares on crack only five minutes before.

Harry raised his chin in that challenging way he'd always had; green eyes seeking grey, measuring and matching. Songbirds warbled inconsequentially. A bit of a breeze caressed Draco's skin, sending goosebumps crawling over it; ittybitty nervous spiders on the lam. He shivered in general reaction, hearing the echoes of his question. It was cold, Draco thought forlornly, sitting naked by himself in the middle of a garden, even with the sunshine pouring down on the two of them. A golden river flowed at his feet and he was marooned on the sole island, naturally, freezing his arse off, metaphorically.

Harry finally bobbed that determined chin of his firmly and grinned at Draco's quirked eyebrows, a predatory curl settling onto his swollen mouth that had Draco's dick immediately red-hot and jerking an inch off his thigh in a blink of an eye.

"Oh, yes—please."

Just one look, really. That was all it required.

0o0

"Harry? Harry? Are you home?"

Hermione's voice echoed faintly through the hush of Grimmauld's newly redecorated Luna-style drawing room. Her calls to Harry's Floo and his Muggle landline had only reached the message-leaving service tied to each of them. Harry's not home right now. Please leave him your name, contact information and reason for calling, the disembodied female voice had advised her, politely.

"Harry? Huh, that's odd," Hermione's head hovered in the Floo, gazing intently about. There were no signs of life in the pleasant parlour and she couldn't hear any residual bustle emanating from the kitchen, either, though it was well past seven in the evening. "He'd said he'd be at home tonight."

"What?" Her boyfriend's question sounded behind her. "Harry's not in, Hermione? Well, leave him a message, will you? We're late as it is."

"Er—alright," Hermione answered, with one last suspicious glance about her. She was aware Harry'd gotten the final 'all clear' from St. Mungo's earlier and they'd been hoping to coax him out for drinks with the gang at the Leaky. She knew, as well, his cell phone had finally been returned just this morning via Post Owl, with a mysterious note attached that said only I'm coming, Potter! And she knew, too, the Auror force had determined their Chief was safe as houses in his Unplottable lair, as long as he mostly remained there, despite the whacknut texter still at large. Perhaps he was out in the back garden, fiddling with the borders he prized so highly…or maybe he'd ventured out briefly, to grab the Muggle Chinese take-away he was fond of.

Personally, she'd her own theories about the ID of the text-stalker, and she and Ron had had to engage in some fast reevaluation in re the person of one Draco Malfoy, utter prat, who was apparently beyond smitten with their Harry. Who, though it pained them to believe, was just as barmy about Malfoy, once he managed to remember it.

Whatever; Harry was a big boy now, the Head Auror once again, and all better physically and mentally. He could more than manage himself and Malfoy, the tosser.

She wouldn't worry about it unnecessarily, Hermione told herself firmly, and loudly cleared her throat one last time, just in case. Golden silence was her only answer.

"I'll just send him a text once we arrive at the Leaky," she decided aloud, and her head promptly disappeared from the hearth. This brief intrusion—and the three messages left previous and the two subsequent texts sent after to Harry's newly recovered Muggle cell phone—all went entirely unnoticed by the owner of the house. He was indeed out in his garden, busy fucking his old school rival across the smooth upturned metal belly of the barrow, right between the welded crossbars, with the rubber wheels spinning wildly and Draco assuming the most gorgeous Downward Facing Dog Harry'd ever been privileged to see—and he was not returning any calls for the foreseeable future.

0o0

Sunday p.m. Final entry in Head Auror Harry Potter's Healing Diary: Dear Old Thing, I suppose as you've been my unwanted but faithful confidante all along, I should let you know it's over. Finished, done with, happily ever after, The End. I met him again (the git wouldn't leave off; kept accosting me through the rose bush hedges and trampling my just-planted pansies) and finally, finally, after one hell of a lot of arglebargle and fuss, I allowed him into my house and we sat down together and talked.

Well, we talked quite a long while later, actually. We shagged our sodding brains out first.

That Malfoy! He's still a prat of the first order and a total arse, after all these years. Going on and on sulkily about how we'd met again, quite by accident, in a Muggle club in Piccadilly, and he decided on the spur of the moment to try and pull me, as he'd had a few in him already and it was a gay Muggle club, so he'd thought…yeah. Well, he assumed correctly, for once, and we Apparated to his flat in Belgravia and got straight to the shagging. I fucked him the first time, and I must have been fairly soused by then, as I told him I'd fancied him some when we were still at Hogwarts, after. And he must've been drunker yet, because he told me he fancied me now, like houses afire. And had, rather, for a very long time.

After that revelation, it was rather as if my brain exploded. A great big blinding light before my eyes, and I could finally see everything that ever happened between us so very clearly. All the fighting and the tussles and the hexing and the insults—everything had always been leading up to this, and we're both such nits we didn't get it; had never twigged we wanted to shag each other silly every night, and wake up in the same bed every morning, and have a bloody life together, me and him.

Gods, but he's such an utter berk. Looked at me with those intense eyes of his (I've always, always admired his eyes, Diary, no matter how he irked me otherwise; I thought they were so very full of passion and life, even when other people claimed he was distant and cold) after the second or third round and announced he rather more than merely fancied me, still. It was love for him (at first sight, the silly sod, at Madame Malkin's shop, as if one could actually fall into love at age eleven!) and I'd hurt him so much over the years we'd been acquainted, always acting as if he wasn't at all important to me. Forgetting.

Forgetting—that's the key, you know, Dear Diary. Maybe it was Mum or Dad, or even Dumbledore, but I've had another spell on me all along, hand-in-hand with the blood protection my Mum gave me to fend off Voldemort. And it was also for Love, and to protect me from harm. From a broken heart, get it?

It's known familiarly as the 'Sleeping Beauty', Draco says, and likely it was Mum who cast it, as she was especially gifted with Charms and had swotted up on all the old ones. He's gone and researched it recently and he's got books in his library at the Manor that Hermione would drool over, I bet. Chap's very well-read, really. I think he's even slogged through A History of Hogwarts, which is more than I ever did (or would want to!)

In any event, the Charm works something like an Obliviate to protect the recipient. If there's perceived to be any danger from the person they care for, the person they might love, they forget. They simply lose their memories of the time spent together; it all slips away and becomes vague and hazy. They draw a total blank when they come across that special person, and can't really recall them clearly when they don't. And, as to any love they might've felt, well…everything reverts back to start, really, the instant they're separated and the person who's under Sleeping Beauty continues on as if nothing ever happened. A bit like an Imperius or a Confundus, only far worse in a way. I don't think you can get at the memories even with Legilimancy or any of the truth serums, the Charm's so incredibly effective at blocking them. Blood Magic is nothing to sneeze at, really. The kicker is: it's completely up to the other person to lift the Charm. They've got to fight for it, if they really want it, and literally force the Sleeper to 'wake up' and remember them.

So, I was the Sleeper in this case (Beauty, Draco called me; git says 'complete with thorns', and then he'd the outright gall to laugh about it, the tit) and Draco was my Prince. And I didn't wish to recall June 5th or any attraction I'd ever felt for him; in fact, I totally resisted it, because I didn't trust him, and neither did I trust in love after my experiences with Ginny and the others, and, most importantly, I truly didn't want to open myself up for yet another world of pain. And too, I wasn't allowed by the machinations of the bloody Charm.

You know, Diary, there's so many different ways of being a cowardly git: you can face down a Dark Wizard bent on utter destruction and still be a faint-hearted twat. It takes raw courage to admit you love someone to their actual face, especially when you're expecting them not to care for you in return, and Draco's beat me to it, no contest, at least on that front. It took a great deal of liquid bravery for me to even mention I fancied him in that Muggle club. I truly didn't desire him before that, Diary; could've sworn that I absolutely despised him under Wizard's Oath or Veritaserum and been one hundred percent correct, and the Charm would've protected me to the very end. I never would've known this feeling. I'd have died not knowing this. My loss—our loss—would've been incalculable.

But then—I did. I saw him right before me, practically arse over tea kettle over my brand-new barrow, and I needed him—I need him now—and somehow the Charm understood that and released me, finally, and gave us both another bleeding chance. It just took one look. Right across my now bollocks-up perennial borders (thanks to Merlin and Hermione, they're magical plants) and the pile of raked-up grass clippings, and the idiot was Shouting like a bloody banshee and falling all over my wards and straight into my arms.

Or I was in his, perhaps. It doesn't matter—it was us, together. His hands, Diary—they're bloody beautiful. I never want to be without them.

Still, it did require far too many fateful twists and turns over the years to arrive where I am now, sitting in our drawing room with Draco on my brand-new sofa right beside me, watching the Muggle telly with me and scarfing up all my precious store of beer nuts, crisps and leftover take-away pad thai.

Casablanca is an excellent film, for being Muggle, but I don't see how Bogie ever managed it, walking away from Bergman like that. I couldn't manage it. Too cruel. The last thing I'd ever want to do, really: wound someone who loved me—and yet that's exactly what I did do, fuck it. I walked away—or rather, I woke up beside him at four o'clock in the morning on June 5th and bloody panicked and then scampered out of his flat like a daemon fleeing Hades. Well, Apparated to Battersea Rail Station, drunk as a badger, but you know what I mean, Diary.

And then I went to Sleep again and woke up in St. Mango's. And he couldn't get near me to rouse me, to rile me up and force me to remember. He didn't even realize I'd forgotten for ever so long.

The other thing, Diary. It's as though I took him, too, that night, in a very real way. He gave me himself, rather as if he was the present I'd always wanted but never knew to ask for, but on his birthday instead, in that ironical way things work out. And then, after, when I said nothing about it—didn't Owl or Floo, didn't text or ring him, didn't contact him in any way—that must've been bloody awful. Not a sodding word from me, when he'd stripped down all his defenses and came right out about caring for me and having done so for eons. But he didn't give up, either, even if he was rather a silly twit about the whole thing, not returning my cell to me straight-away and sending me piss-poor poetry and blackmail pictures and Merlin knows what else to the poor folks on my Contacts list instead. He's a real prince, my Draco—not. I don't know how much apologizing I'll be doing on his behalf, but I suppose it's worth it.

Merlin, yes…it is worth it. Whom am I kidding? That prick's my fucking Prince.

In any event, he's moved in to Grimmauld Place, as of today, and I've been given a clean bill of health by St. Mango's staff as of this morning. Draco had already Owled my Muggle cell back to me by Post, though he insists he's keeping my denim jacket for some reason, known only to him. Odd, that. Git never dresses down if he can help it. Oh, well.

Ron and Hermione ('Robert' and 'Harmony', hah! What a frigging hoot!) are alright with the situation, or so Hermione tells me, despite the fact it's Malfoy and all. Nice to know one's friends can trust in one's choices, when it comes down to the wire. It's alright, though. We'll be fine, I'm sure, even if other people quibble a bit. It'll all work out. Mum set it up that way, I think, to make it foolproof. Trust me, it nearly was, Diary—foolproof, that is to say. We were total arses all along the way, both of us. But she must've really loved me, my Mum, to protect me in so many ways—my life and my heart. And so must my own personal git-in-residence, to want me so much he braved hostile Gryffindors and Grimmauld's Fidelius, ancient Blood Magic Charms and Aunt Andy's unique take on extracting information.

And I love him, Diary. So much.

0o0

"—and it's not as if you don't know where you can always find me!" Draco was complaining. "Duh, Potty—Manor. I'm always checking in with the elves there. Leave me a frigging message, why don't you?"

"Ah, yeah, well…" Harry stalled. "I think I kind of didn't keep your card, you see, and then I couldn't recall even running into you in the first place. 'S the Charm thingy, Draco, acting up. Did I tell you they found me in Battersea rail station? I must've Apparated there—you're in Belgrave Square, aren't you?"

"Silly git," Draco grumbled, and fiddled with the sugar bowl, pursing his puffy, much snogged lips. "Can't believe the nerve of you, not taking my cell number along, Harry. It's unlisted, you realize! And you could've been assaulted by Muggles and killed outright! It was the middle of the night, Potter—there are unsavouries out and about, you know! Common criminals! Utter idiot prat! Leaving me to worry like that." Draco was ticked off, but the flush it lent his porcelain skin was breathtaking, in Harry's humble opinion. "Damn near killed me, after. Didn't know what to make of you." He abandoned the handle of the sugar bowl and plucked at the twisted sheets next, restless. Then he tugged viciously at the loosely-tied belt of Harry's other bathrobe he'd wrapped carelessly round his fit dampness—the raggedy old plaid one Harry had lent him after their bath. It slipped a bit, and Harry caught his breath sharply at the sight of all that expanse of delineated chest.

"Um, sorry," he replied, lifting his shoulders apologetically and stoically pouring out more tea. They'd a breakfast tray between them on the bed, which they hadn't once left in the last twelve hours except to visit the lav—and have a mind-blowing and very sloppy shag in Harry's claw-footed tub enclosure.

"You should be," Draco scolded, regarding the frayed weave of the bathrobe belt as if it offended him mightily. He raised his smoking grey eyes and glared fiercely at Harry instead. "Oblivious nit."

Harry grinned at the tea tray like the blithering idiot he'd been Transfigured into—he literally couldn't stop himself. Having company for breakfast was better even than knowing he finally had all his memories back in order (except the really grotty ones which involved vomiting up the excess of alcohol, thank Merlin). And his brand-new housemate was more than merely decorative, with all that shiny silky silver-gilt hair of his tangled down his bare back where Harry's hands had mussed it, and those glorious pecs rippling smoothly when he shifted, still damp from their bath, and the thin cotton sheet tented over his thighs, which was doing absolutely not a bleeding thing to obscure his incipient erection. A very nice erection, too: hefty and thick, it fit Harry's various orifices like it had been made for them, key into lock.

Harry grinned even more widely, in a totally sunny, soppy manner. He didn't want to think of lost time at all; he wanted to think of the future, which was suddenly a great deal rosier than it had been just yesterday afternoon.

"How soon to bring your things over, Draco? This morning, maybe? We could go flying after?" Harry was eager to get this new life of his started. "I've all these really brilliant brooms in the shed and it's beautiful out. We could make a day of it; run down to the coast, maybe. Have supper somewhere nice to celebrate."

Draco, who'd been staring intently at him, instantly returned his searching gaze to his lap full of interested cock and seemed to be all at once oddly shy, licking his lips nervously, long fingers restless around the chipped pottery mug Harry much preferred over Aunt Andy's fiddly little tea cups. "Um," he muttered, apparently addressing the bed sheets, "you're sure about this, Potter? You won't go changing your feeble excuse for a mind in a day or two? Wake up bright and early and forget all about me again when you return to the Ministry on Monday?"

"Oh, no!" Harry assured him, shaking his head vigorously. "Absolutely not! You're not exactly the forgettable sort, Malfoy, trust me. And I really do believe Mum's Charm can't affect me anymore—and certainly not if you're right here, prat, warming my bed."

He batted his lashes, fully aware his green eyes were one his best features, and Draco, gratifyingly, swallowed with some obvious difficulty and sucked in a tortured breath, edging imperceptibly closer and jostling the tea tray, which was precisely what Harry wished him to do.

"You're quite hard to miss, besides," Harry looked up through those lashes of his and tilted his chin just so, knowingly flirting heavily, a foolish smile dancing at the corners of his own well-snogged lips. "A great blond bloke rammed up my bum like clockwork, every hour on the hour—I'm barely going to be to manage to get astride my broom as it is, you realize. We may have to hold off till tomorrow to go flying."

Harry manfully attempted to appear suitably saddened by this possibility, but, upon consideration, it would be ever so much more pleasant all around to simply hole up in Grimmauld and shag Draco. They could enjoy the lovely sunny weather in the back garden just as well as on a broomstick.

"Er. Agreed, Scarhead," Draco mumbled, though his half-hearted riposte was quite half-hearted and lacked his trademark acerbic bite altogether. He, too, seemed quite distracted. "Very difficult to miss, a Malfoy, even for a speccy git with a brain like sodding sieve." Still, Harry's bedmate seemed slightly more confident of a positive response when he reached across the tea tray and tweaked one of Harry's much-suckled nipples playfully through the thin cloth of his robe. "But," he added, his tone taking on a note of definite threat, "you'd better make certain you don't go mislaying me again, Potter, or I will forward those handcuff photos to the Prophet, just as I've promised. You shan't forget about me then. "

"Yes, dear," Harry snorted, stifling a manic giggle. Malfoy's tiny passing snits were, er, 'cute'. Damned 'cute' actually, as was the whole of him, though the git would likely murder Harry were he ever to say so. "I am now duly threatened. But why not remind me of your exalted existence right this very minute, Malfoy—if you're so concerned? Perhaps bribe me into silence at the same time? Two birds, Malfoy. One cock." Draco raised an interested eyebrow and leaned a little closer.

"And then perhaps I won't be so tempted to flee when you piss me off later," Harry continued, "the way you always do. Prat," he sniggered, artfully letting his robe slide off one tooth-marked shoulder in a 'come here and shag me speechless' kind of way.

"Prat?" Malfoy demanded.

The stare Draco gave Harry was hot and intense and exhilarating, all at once; a breathtaking mix of all the feelings Harry had ever dreamt of seeing cast in his direction by a comely bloke with a fabulous arse. In fact, Draco was looking at him much the way Ron eyed a plateful of rare filet mignon—or Hermione, after that fourth butterbeer. A drooling, sloppy, 'I'm going to tear your knickers right the fuck off and devour you!' sort of stare.

"'Flee'?" Draco snorted, visible offended. "Hardly! I'll wager you'll be in no condition to flee, Scarhead, not when I'm finished with you," Harry's old school rival purred, a casual wave of his elegant hand Vanishing mug and tray and the ratty old borrowed bathrobe he was barely wearing. "And I'll never be finished with you, Potter—believe me."

Harry allowed his own loosened bathrobe to fall off altogether, so it puddled 'round his waist in folds of ancient red-and-yellow tartan. He cocked his chin inquiringly and waited patiently to see what might happen next.

"You're a dick, Potter; always running off at the mouth," Draco remarked, rearing up on his knees. He scooted over, close enough to grip Harry's exposed throat, and lowered his ice-pale pate so that his teeth snapped alarmingly close to Harry's chin. "And not knowing your own arse from a hole in the ground. Don't even know what you're talking about half the time, I daresay. Sodding barmy twat, not remembering those handcuffs, at least. Special order, they were. And how could you forget your own underthings, Potter? That's not normal, you know. Most people remember their own—"

"Pah!" Harry scoffed, interrupting. "You're the prick here, Malfoy. Took you long enough to come search me out, didn't it? Could've died of bloody old age, waiting for you."

"But I have, now," Draco taunted softly, nipping at the corner of Harry's smile. "Haven't I, Potter? Cornered you at last, you annoying little prick. And I know exactly what to do with you, too. To remind you."

Draco, of course, was quite his old snotty, stuck-up self, at least in Harry's befuddled opinion; issuing empty threats of harm and humiliation in a gravelly, incredibly sensual grumble, but his grey eyes were sinfully molten as they travelled leisurely over Harry's pleasurably achy body. Harry took a breath in sweet anticipation and grinned besottedly, just like the soppy smitten idiot he'd become overnight.

"Er—alright," he replied, closing his eyes, soot-black lashes having done their job admirably as enticement for the big, bad Malfoy. "Fire away, then, Malfoy."

"I do believe a little payback is in order—for my suffering," Draco was whispering, nibbling his merry, determined way across Harry's lips. Harry sighed his satisfaction with this act of aggression, and allowed his head to loll back fully. "Let's start with a very simple Sticking Charm, shall we?" Draco growled menacingly, tugging Harry forcefully against that miracle set of washboard abs. "My fucking cock up your hungry arsehole, Potty. On the count of three, then? Begin!"

0o0

Broadcast text message received on the Muggle cell phones of the following Wizarding subscribers, issued by Caller ID 'Draco Malfoy': [Granger, Hermione; Weasley, Ronald; Tonks, Andromeda; Malfoy, Narcissa; Malfoy, Lucius (in absentia; calls forwarded to Azkaban's Floo-messaging service); EntireLotofWeasels (owner-created distribution group); Parkinson-Zabini, Pansy; Zabini, Blaise; TheGryffGang (owner-created distribution group); TheSnakePit (OCDG); Shacklebolt, Mr. & Mrs. Kingsley; StupidAurors (OCDG); Harry'sOtherFriends (OCDG); Mum'sReallyDistantRelatives (OCDG); MugglesOfInterest (OCDG); AssortedVIPs (OCDG)]; FrenchMalfoys (OCDG) , as of July 31st, 12:01 a.m.: I'm sure UR all wishing Harry a Happy Birthday at this very moment. I know I am. Please see image attached, of Harry in silly hat, blowing out far too many candles. In honour of the occasion and to welcome his new permanent houseguest, URS truly, I take it upon myself as such to invite U to a surprise party for Potter at a location currently under Fidelius, but known to those who need to know it, to commence promptly as of four o'clock this very day, Potter's auspicious date of entry into this vale of tears, and to end only when the Charmed champagne fountain is exhausted. UR presence and presents are required for Potter's continued comfort and happiness. Please be aware that only sudden death and childbirth are sufficient excuse to skive out on this invitation. Attendance is REQUIRED. Longbottom, that last does refer to YOU. Potter prefers meaningful trinkets, Quidditch supplies and gift cards. Housewarming gifts also welcome, in honour of new décor and mine own residency. Truth or Dare to begin as of ten o'clock; Spin-the-Bottle as of midnight. Formal supper seating as of seven o'clock, promptly. Complimentary child-minders provided, as well as guided Portkeys for those unsafe to Apparate or Floo after the festivities are ended. No Muggle strollers. No shoes in the house. Please be dressed appropriately for the event. Weasel, that means YOU. No RSVP necessary. I'll see U all at 4 p.m. on the dot this afternoon OR KNOW THE REASON WHY. XOXO, Draco Malfoy

Finite.