He hadn't expected it to be like this, hadn't expected it so soon. Hadn't expected it here.

But there he was, looking nothing like the boy he had once known and despised, less collected and cool, instead weary and rough around the edges. Tired, Harry thought.

As if he had sensed his stare, the blonde turned around and looked directly at him, obviously surprised. Sighing deeply, he made his way over to the raven-haired wizard, his silver eyes not once leaving the other.

For a second none of them spoke, before Harry heard a sound that was barely more than another, disguised sigh: 'What do you want, Potter?'

All malice had vanished from his voice, leaving it hollow and soft.

'Malfoy', he breathed.

'Yes?'

With that, the brunet snapped out of his trance-like state. What had gotten into him, he didn't know, but he did know that, if he didn't manage to get a hold of himself and answer, he was going to look like the idiot the other one had always thought him to be. And although he shouldn't have cared, he did.

'How are you?', he asked, it being the only thing he could think of.

'How do you think I am? Brilliant of course. It's not as if every mother is pulling her child over to the other side of the street when I pass, or as if it was impossible for me to even go inside the next store without being attacked by some girl I've never seen before. So, yes, thank you, I couldn't be better.'

For a second, the old venom, the old arrogance, the old Malfoy had shone through, but it disappeared as soon as it had come, leaving nothing but a lost boy, who knew that, with barely eighteen, he had lost his chance to live normally.

There was something else, too, something Harry couldn't quite pinpoint at once, since it felt so completely different from what the other one should have been. When he did, though, he felt his throat constrict and his hands start shaking.

Fear.

The blonde was scared, and for an irrational second, he wanted to take the former Death-eater into his arms.

'I'm sorry', he muttered instead.

'What?', Malfoy laughed, the sound tinted bitter, 'For once in my life, I do not blame you for what has happened, and now you apologize? Couldn't you have done this three years ago and saved me the mess all together?' He ran a hand through silver-blonde hair, suddenly looking exhausted again, 'You know what, Potter? Forget it. Now, if you don't have anything else to say, I shall be going and letting you get back to being the greatest hero the wizard world has ever seen. Goodbye.'

And with that, he turned and left, Harry staring after him.

He did not know why, but the encounter with his former schoolmate and (former?) archenemy had left him shaken. So when he got back to the small apartment he had rented to find Ginny waiting for him, being the sweet and loving girl she was, he couldn't hold her and kiss her like she would've deserved. Instead, he sat there, as if turned to stone, until she stopped her tender ministrations.

She wasn't hurt or angry, though, never was, since she blamed it on his trauma, like always, and left him to his thoughts.

Something about the other boy had just felt so off, and it wasn't just the fear or the obvious loss of his arrogance and malice. It had felt like he had broken and couldn't think of a way to fix himself.

He wondered if Malfoy still thought of him as an enemy.

Harry himself had given up his hatred for the fair-haired boy long ago, when he had found him in that bathroom, crying. Shortly before he almost slashed him to pieces.

He winced; he would never get used to the memory of the lifeless figure on the floor, blood rapidly flowing from the wounds he and his thoughtlessness had caused.

The Malfoy he had met today reminded him of the boy back then; the expressions on their faces the same.

Lying down, Harry banished all thoughts from his mind. He'd deal with them later.

He found that it was impossible to forget him. Not that he hadn't tried, he had, but there was always something on the brink of his conscious, nagging him.

There had been a time when he had felt the same way, in their sixth year, when he was constantly watching the blonde boy to find out what he was up to. The only difference was that back then; his obsession had been laced with hatred, while this one was filled with something that reminded Harry of concern.
Seeing him so broken had reminded of Myrtle's words, telling him how Malfoy and he weren't all that unlike: That they shared the pressure placed upon them as well as the desperate fear to disappoint and fail, shared the loneliness.

And suddenly he believed her, for what he had seen in the other's eyes had reminded him of himself.

Since he had defeated the Dark Lord, everything had changed. Of course, a great burden had been lifted from his shoulders, but to his utter surprise, he couldn't quite relish his new-found freedom as much as he would've expected.

Now that he was the Boy Who Lived Twice, no one seemed to expect anything from him at all.

Whatever he wanted he got, and everyone, including his closest friends was treating him as if he was going to shatter at the first unkind word directed at him.

Of course he knew they only worried about him, but the knowledge didn't help. Not when they watched every of his steps to make sure he was alright and helped him with every move.

When he had tried talking with them about it, they had blamed it on his trauma.

Somehow, they had lost enough of their closeness to make it impossible to tell them about these new, strange thoughts. Ron still thought the ex-Slytherin was the worst creature to ever have walked this earth, only surpassed by his father and Voldemort and Hermione would've declared him mad. Ginny was out of the question as well; she nowadays worried about everything, no matter if there was a reason to or not.

So there was no one there to stop him when he, on one cold winter morning, decided that it had been enough.

About a week ago he had remembered another detail of their conversation: Couldn't you have done this three years ago and saved me the mess all together? he had said. Did that mean that somehow he was to blame for Malfoy's obvious misery?

And if that was the case, how?

He had thought about it night after night, without ever reaching a conclusion, so, in the end Harry had decided to pay his former schoolmate a visit.

Maybe, he figured, if he saw him again, it would cure this obsession before someone was going to notice it.

Getting to Malfoy Manor wasn't a problem, getting himself to actually ring the doorbell was.

Back at home, with Ginny constantly fussing about him, it had sounded like a brilliant idea, coming here and sorting this out. However, now that he was standing in front of the estate, it didn't. After all, what was he supposed to say? It wasn't as if he and the other were exactly on speaking terms.

Feeling his courage leave him, Harry pulled himself together.

He had come all the way, so he was not going to back out again. Anyway, he didn't really want to lose another night's sleep thinking about the meeting and the implications the other had made.

So he knocked and to his surprise, it barely took a minute for the door to open.

It was Malfoy, his hair slightly messy, even paler complexion than usual and the same look in his eyes Harry remembered from their last encounter.

'Potter?', he asked incredulously, 'What in Merlin's name are you doing here?'

'I wanted to talk to you', he managed to answer, sounding a bit breathless even to his own ears.

The blonde just suspiciously raised one eyebrow, but nevertheless stepped aside after a moment.

They didn't talk while Malfoy led them to the salon, a circumstance the other was glad for, since it did give him a bit of time to collect his thoughts. Still, when the ex-Slytherin gracefully sat down, he had no idea what to say.

'So, Potter, now, if you would please tell me what I own this pleasure to…'

'Do you usually open the door yourself? Shouldn't you have house elves or something for that?' As soon as the words had left Harry's mouth, he cursed himself for them; his whole mind had suddenly gone blank and he'd just said the first thing he could think of. Which turned out to be incredibly stupid.

After having stared at his visitor for a second, the fair-haired boy answered, 'We do not get many visitors these days, so, as I was walking by, I figured I could go and open it myself. Although I'm not really sure what use this information could have for you', he paused for a second, 'Still, I doubt that you would've come here, just to ask me this. Is there anything else I might do for you?' Again, there was exhaustion in his voice.

'Well…I don't really know how to ask you this…'

'Spit it out, I beg of you. I doubt that I can take any more of this', he waved his hand dramatically.

Arrogance fitted him a lot better than defeat; the other thought to himself, before, once again, trying to put in words what had led him here.

'After we met, last time', he started, 'I couldn't help but notice how much you had changed since…well, since then. You just look so tired. And so…well, I wanted to know if you're okay.'

Harry didn't look up, couldn't, but from the corner of his eye, he saw the blonde's fists clench.

'What gives you the right to come here, suddenly acting as if you're concerned about me?', Malfoy asked, voice collected but obviously furious.

'Nothing', he mumbled, gaze fixed on his hands.

'Exactly. Now, if you could-'

'I just couldn't stop thinking about it', the brunet said, looking up.

'What?' the other one stopped dead in his tracks, 'You were…thinking of me?'

'I know this sounds kind of…wrong, us hating each other and everything, but…I couldn't help it. Just happened.'

The other one looked at him thoughtfully for a second before replying, 'I don't hate you. I thought I did for some time, but it turned out that I had been wrong all the way.'

Harry couldn't believe his ears. Never, never had he expected to hear these words from the fair-haired boy's mouth. At least not in this life.

'But I thought- You-', something in the former Death-eater's gaze stopped him. 'It doesn't matter, right?', he muttered, hand threading through his hair, 'But just so you know, I don't hate you either.'

With that, a bit of the sparkle returned to Malfoy's eyes, 'You don't?'

'Not anymore.'

'But…why? How?', his voice sounded a bit hopeful and a lot more alive than before.

Harry closed his eyes, 'Back then, in sixth form, when I saw you in the washing room, I just…I just knew that you hadn't wanted all this to happen, that you just didn't know how to get out of this mess again.'

'Oh', said the ex-Slytherin softly, 'I always figured that it had been that day that you really started despising me.'

'Why?'

'Because', he answered, looking the brunet directly in the eye, 'You threw a curse at me after that, which almost cut me to pieces.'

Harry winced at the memory, 'I'm incredibly sorry for that; I didn't mean to. The spell was something I read in a book, I had no idea what would happen. You have to believe me-'

'It doesn't matter.'

'What?'

'It doesn't matter', the blonde repeated, 'I deserved it.'

The raven-haired boy glared at him fiercely, 'No, you didn't! No one deserves that! It was just me and my-'

'Harry', the other one interrupted him, using his first name as if he always had, 'I wouldn't change it, even if I could.'

The words hit the ex-Gryffindor with a cold force. Blood was rushing in his ears and making his words sound hollow, 'What? Why? I almost killed you.'

'You did, but', Malfoy leaned back and ran a hand through his hair, 'Merlin, this is hard to explain…I have been so horrible to you and your friends over the years, I have done so many things I regret, so when you almost sliced me to death in that washing room, and I could feel how the blood was rushing from my body…it was like atoning for my sins.'

Harry couldn't breath, couldn't think. How could the boy in front of him really believe he had deserved what the brunet had done to him?

He wanted to shake him, to scream at him, until he stopped even thinking something like that, wanted to hurt everyone who had made the blonde think so lowly of himself, but most of all wanted to hold and fix him.

'Draco', he whispered, since it would've felt wrong to address him only with his last name now.

Hearing his first name, the fair-haired boy looked up with a mixture of surprise, interest and something the ex-Gryffindor couldn't quite place, since he has never seen it in his gaze before. They sat like this, just looking at each other for a moment or two, since Harry discovered that he, again, had forgotten how to speak at the thought that, under the plain white shirt the other one wore, there had to be the scars he had inflicted.

'Well', the blonde broke the silence, 'If that was what you wanted to talk about-'

'When we met the other day', the other hurriedly interrupted him, 'you said I could've saved you this whole mess by apologizing a few years earlier. What did you mean?'

For a second Malfoy, who mysteriously had been renamed to Draco in his head, stared at him expressionless, before sighing and covering his pale face with his hands. 'I just can't keep my mouth shut, can I?', he muttered more to himself than to his visitor, before looking back up, 'I suppose you are not going to leave before I tell you, right?'

Harry nodded.

'This is going to be a disaster', he ran his fingers through blonde hair, 'But okay. I suppose it had to come down to this one day…You see, seven, no, eight years ago, I met a boy. He didn't like me, I knew, but since we were going to attend the same school and I was somehow fascinated by him, I decided I try once more to make a good impression. So, next time I saw him, I gathered up all the courage I had and asked him to be my friend. Not in the most tactful way, I've got to admit, but-'

'You are talking about me', the other one interrupted.

He stared at him incredulously, 'Of course I am talking about you. Who else should I be talking about?'
Harry all but blushed, letting his host continue with the story.

'The boy, as you surely know, did not accept my hand, but let me stand there, feeling more humiliated and rejected than ever before. However, most of all I felt worthless, and I blamed him for that. So, during the next few weeks, I convinced myself that what I was feeling was nothing more than hurt pride and most of all, hate. It worked, but only for about two years, but still, I couldn't bear him to not notice me ', he stopped himself for a second, as if realizing that he had said more than he had planned to, 'So, what I actually wanted to get at was that through our entire time in school, I was trying to get your attention, even when it meant helping Umbridge or doing even worse things. When I finally realized where all of it was taking me, I couldn't stop anymore. At least not without hurting my family', he cleared his throat, 'Now, could you please-'

'Why didn't you just tell me?'

'Well, how should I have done that?', the ex-Slytherin asked sarcastically after a second of staring at him, '"Hello and sorry that I tried to make your life a living hell for the past years, actually I just wanted to be your friend?" Wouldn't exactly have gone well, don't you think?'

Harry had to agree. Why he did believe the other now, and wouldn't have before, he couldn't quite tell.

'But- well, it probably doesn't matter anymore', he stopped, thinking, 'Is it- is it still the same?'
'…I can't quite follow you, I'm afraid.'

'Do you still want me to see you?'

The fair-haired boy in front of him gave him a shocked look, before turning away. He could've been wrong, but Harry thought he saw him blushing.

'…Yes.'

For a moment, everything went blank in the brunet's mind, before returning just a touch lighter and warmer than before. He closed his eyes and thanked whoever might have been listening.

'Then…may I come back?'

The smile on Draco's face told him all he had to know.

When Harry got back home, he was in an exceptionally good mood; better than it had been for weeks. Ginny noticed, but decided not to ask.