Recast Part 2/2
Living with Theo was something of a relief to Draco anyway. There was no pressure to exert himself to get on with him, but living somewhere inhabited by someone else, listening to the plumbing when Theo took late-night baths, was just what Draco wanted right now.
Sadly, that was not the end of Draco’s involvement in creepy goings-on. He went to Diagon Alley to buy shoes. He was looking in the mirror at the pair he had on when someone screamed. He swung round and would have stared about him if the shop had not at that moment gone pitch black. Peruvian Darkness Powder? He would have taken his wand out of his pocket and tried Lumos, but somehow he wasn’t sure that was a good idea. There was the sound of more shouting and running. The part of the shop Draco was in was a long way away from the door. He felt very isolated and suddenly realised the full horror of his situation as his skin prickled violently. He stood in the dark; he knew he should have a strategy, but what?
He’d just thought of fatherless Scorpius when a hand came down on his shoulder. He probably would have screamed if the hand hadn’t quickly clapped itself over his mouth.
“It’s me - Harry Potter,” a voice whispered in Draco’s ear. It sounded like Harry Potter, and Draco was willing to assume that it probably was. He melted in relief more than he would have been completely comfortable admitting but the next moment they both froze. Someone was moving in the shop. An odd kind of scuffle as if someone was dancing on the spot. Then the sound of someone taking shoes off the shelves and throwing them about. One hit the side of Draco’s head.
Draco remembered Disapparation. Normally, he was nervous of splinching himself and never Apparated under stress, but he thought now was an exception. The only thing stopping him was Potter, who had pushed Draco behind him, an arm clamped round his back. If he went, he’d take Potter with him. Potter wasn’t going himself because it was his job to, if possible, bring in whoever was in the shop with them. Later Draco would look back at this train of thought and decide it was probably his best from the whole situation.
Right now, though, Harry was yelling “Stupefy!” as someone ran in a circle around them. Harry whirled round, taking Draco with him, but the spell didn’t hit anyone. Then the steps withdrew. Draco decided the person had Disapparated; somehow the shop felt different.
“Lumos,” said Potter. A ray of light shone from his wand. Draco imitated him and together they advanced, probing the shop’s shadowy recesses. No one lurked there, though when Potter looked behind the counter he retreated hastily.
“Someone’s dead,” he said. He sighed. “We’ll have to investigate the scene later.”
They found something blocked them from nearing the door; an invisible force field repelled them. The light that ought to show through the door and window was blotted out by the darkness within, and they couldn’t hear anything from what must surely be a shocked Diagon Alley outside.
“The Aurors will be here to deal with it soon,” said Potter. He headed back to some seats.
“How did you know it was me and not the killer?” asked Draco.
“I caught sight of you just before the lights went out.”
They couldn’t have spent much more than half an hour in the dark shop together, but it was a depressing time, both of them longing for lights and busyness and people they knew. Draco wondered if the killer had followed him, and whether that was why the shoe shop had been targeted. He didn’t ask Potter in case he agreed that it was very probable. They gratefully seized on the subject of a quite different case which Draco had taken memories for recently.
*
Draco tried not to pay too much attention to the deaths that followed. The murder victim in the shoe shop had the letter “D” scored into their skin. Other victims had “I”, “M” and “C”. People often mused that the combination of letters seemed vaguely familiar but wasn’t bringing to mind a particular name or word. Draco had been afraid that first “D” stood for Draco, and could not help but be relieved it hadn’t been followed by an “R” or an “M”.
Then there was the thing Draco always tried to reduce down in his mind so it was more a fact than an experience. Pansy begged him to walk her crup while she and her husband were way for the weekend. Draco was knocked out and abducted and woke up in the Chamber of Secrets, worrying stupidly about Pansy’s crup. He scrambled to his feet when Potter charged in, summoned by some cryptic note. The serial killer was Polyjuiced as a student, so that was really weird and creepy. He tutted at both of them for not finding them out - he’d wanted them to, he said, he’d chosen Draco especially, but he’d let him down. Then Potter had just begun pitting his Auror skills against serial killer skills when the rest of the Aurors came in, as arranged. And Draco didn’t want to be rescued, but he kind of was.
Life began to retune itself after that, the signal having fuzzed over.
*
A strange time. Draco felt like nothing so much as an angry tired child who needed to go to bed. He wished he could stop time, go to bed, and come back and acquit himself better. People kept asking him questions in a rude, slightly threatening way that was not quite the interrogation of a suspect (he knew the difference, after all) and, mostly other, people being nice - tender and careful and congratulatory. He stopped paying much attention to who was who. Weasley clapped him on the back once and he was relieved to see that it was a reflex and he hadn’t really meant to do it to him. And then it was rather late and it seemed as if he’d have to chase after people to prolong the whole business, and he realised he could just go to bed. It seemed rather momentous, like it had been as a child to admit that his birthday was over. And so this day ended. He had strange dreams.
*
He hadn’t been up long and had just decided that his life was like a room out of which an ugly, dominating piece of furniture had been taken out - was the way it looked now the ultimate goal? Was that empty space an illusion or something to fill? - when he got an owl from Potter. He should meet Potter at the Ministry, Potter had things to tell him. Thought was succeeded by the happy rush of magnet meeting metal, and he dashed about as quickly as he could.
Draco approached Potter looking composed yet urgent.
“We’ve discovered more about who the killer is and how he was able to - to accomplish some of what he did.” Potter paused.
“I get it, something uncomfortable is coming up,” said Draco.
“He’s Luke Cobbing, Ryan Cobbing’s brother.”
Draco stared, subject to a peculiar hot and cold churning.
Potter looked sympathetic. “Ryan seems to have known about the murders from the outset, though you weren’t a factor in Luke Cobbing’s plan for a while. He took an Unbreakable Vow to help his brother, though we’re not sure under what circumstances. His attitude towards the murders is disapproving but not enough, not like a normal person. And obviously it’s his brother, which might be a bit confusing for anyone.”
“And obviously Ryan was weird to start off with. Fuck it. I seriously did almost know this, honestly I did. The picture and the cake were based on things from the Miscellaneous memories, weren’t they? And DIMC - Department of International Magical Cooperation, where their uncle works.”
“I believe so. I hope you won’t worry about it. I mean, some people go wrong and it matters. But within a limit almost all we do is make mistakes and we can’t beat ourselves up over it because it’s only rarely that we even get to make the connection. We can’t worry about a world in which things were different.”
It dawned on Draco that Potter was worried about the people who were killed while Draco wasn’t understanding what his pensieve was telling him, and was worried Draco was too. Draco hadn’t even got to that bit yet; he was still on taking it as a blow to his ego, that he could have appeared in a better light to himself and everyone else but had missed his chance. That unhappiness about the difference between them welled up, with a tinge of curious sympathy.
“Did you make mistakes?” he asked.
“Of course I made mistakes. We never actually fucking caught him, he came to us!” Potter flushed but didn’t shout.
Draco was fascinated by the idea that they shared the same failure. But Potter’s failure was intrinsically of a different calibre to Draco’s.
“And you’re trying not to worry about it?”
“That’s right,” said Potter. “I’m sure the Daily Prophet will pick up on the fact that I personally haven’t kept anyone safe from Luke Cobbing. I don’t know if you’ll enjoy that.”
Draco opened his mouth but didn’t in the end say anything. He felt an urge to be nice, make Potter feel better, assure him that he didn’t take pleasure in things that made him feel bad, but ultimately felt crippled by awkwardness about committing himself to a Potter-positive position - which was absurd, seeing as it could only be politic.
“We’re getting off track. Other things to tell you... Unbreakable Vows are always interesting when we get to the trial. After they’ve been made, choices are very limited and the individual is, in a way, acting under duress. But the individual usually chooses to make a vow it is their responsibility to avoid. Would you like me to pass on a message from Ryan?”
Draco was finding the subject of Ryan repugnant, and didn’t really feel he would like. But it was a temptation he couldn’t resist, all the same. “Go on then.”
“He said he was very sorry about it all.” Draco snorted. “And that he wished he could have worked with you under different circumstances. He thought things could have been very different.” This seemed more allusive than a mere apology and Draco felt even more nauseated and insulted. He remembered his own thoughts, the lust he’d squandered every now and then on such an undeserving object. At least Ryan had been considerate enough not to take him up on it. Though who knew what the terms of his Vow were. Draco wondered whether Potter thought he had been taken up on it. Passing on messages from criminals seemed a little out of place in an Auror.
Draco shrugged. “Well, I don’t need to have all my feelings about it now; I’ll be reading about it in the papers for months.”
“True. There’s a press conference later today but a lot won’t come out until the trial stage. It seems like there’s something more to tell you, but I don’t think there is.”
“It does all seem suddenly more... life-sized,” said Draco. “Anyway, I’ll get back to my life, nothing more for you to worry about here, thanks.”
“Oh yeah, the other thing I was going to tell you: this is your recommendation to have some counselling session at St. Mungo’s,” said Potter, with what Draco imagined to be habitually deliberate casualness.
“I won’t, but thank you.”
They bid each other farewell a little awkwardly. Draco felt empty as he left the Ministry and was relieved to remember he was going somewhere.
*
“Where’s Robert?” he asked Astoria.
“In a drugged sleep. We were up all night having a deep emotional conversation, it was pretty exhausting. Hopefully we won’t be having any more of them.”
Draco had prepared himself to embark on a deep emotional conversation if it was desired, and was pleasantly surprised to find himself wrong-footed.
“Strange having the killer caught, isn’t it? There’s nothing to look forward to now,” Astoria continued.
Draco laughed. “I’ve been feeling really strange since yesterday without managing to sum it up.” He hesitated. “Do you want to know what I know or...”
“Oh yes, tell me how it happened.”
“I’m sorry I didn’t work it out,” said Draco when he’d covered the facts.
“I wouldn’t be too sorry. I think I’d only have been jealous of you.”
“Oh, right. I’m sorry on my own behalf, too,” he admitted.
“Oh, yes, of course, you would be.” Astoria paused and said, as Draco was thinking, “There’s been time to forget how you work. I don’t think you should be, if that’s any comfort. In fact, I’m firmly opposed to it. Don’t act like you’ve failed a test set by that. You’d have to allow him the right to judge you, and that would be absurd.”
“Good point,” said Draco. He didn’t say that Cobbing wasn’t so much a problem in himself, but in as much as Draco let himself succumb to the notion that he represented the universe. Maundering on about his issues to his ex-wife at a time like this would be absurd, he mercifully realised before he embarked on it.
Astoria asked questions about the impression Draco had gained of Luke Cobbing during their brief encounter. She didn’t seem to find his brief answers satisfactory and came out into the open.
“Do you think that if I were allowed to visit him, I would be able to ... get to him? Work upon his mind, make him feel painful remorse and torment?”
“Not without Dark magic, and you don’t want to get into trouble,” said Draco. “I think evil maniacs are just... blank. I can’t imagine you getting a purchase on his mind.”
Astoria looked as if she felt he was underestimating her powers a little, but not as if she’d made up her mind to prove it.
After that, Draco wondered who he could go and talk to next. There were his parents, and Pansy, who apparently had her crup back and was feeling weirdly guilty about asking him to walk it, but he hesitated. Suddenly that moment in the Chamber of Secrets when he’d sworn revenge on Harry Potter came back to him, vividly intact and unexpected. He was inclined to laugh and think of himself as a child in a sulk, full of a resolve at once absolutely real and unreal to run away from home and make Father sorry. Just as he was about to sweep those thoughts away, the figure of Potter bobbed to the surface, as Draco had seen him then. Almost deliciously infuriating, encouraging in Draco the animalistic desire to snap at him. The intoxicating, swaggering conviction that he should be the one to stop Potter being too much. Change the rules for him. Something. He wouldn’t let this feeling slip away. He would leap on it and let it take him somewhere new. Today was the first day of the rest of his life. Draco was tired of waiting for things to happen or finish happening to him, and hoping it wouldn’t be too painful. This was not what he’d expected his moment to look like but then unexpectedness was how you knew things were real.
Draco almost reached for parchment and quill with which to work on a strategy, but realised the unwisdom of leaving a record. Punishing Potter for always being... Draco’s mind had already stuttered to a halt. It was hard to put into words exactly what he resented Potter for. But it didn’t matter. He had this feeling and it was strong and right now what would give him the most satisfaction was doing something about it. The most obvious suggestion to suggest itself was aiming at Potter’s integrity. Blackening his reputation or even corrupting him in actuality. Headlines flashed into his head. Draco decided to ignore the sense of discomfort at what he was doing, the way he was reminding himself of his adolescent years and the way he would have loved everyone to agree there was nothing special about Potter at all, for Potter to be humiliated by his stripping of glory. He held onto that still delicious idea of a Potter who wasn’t Potter, but, despite the appeal, was forced to drop it. He was too much a part of the wizarding world who bought into Potter as something that made it feel good about itself.
The simplest approach of all: making Potter suffer? Draco thought of seducing his ex-wife and appropriating his children and basically living the part of Potter’s life that Potter didn’t get. Draco liked this one a lot, but sadly it was fatally flawed. He would bounce right off Ginny Weasley if he ever tried to get near her, and dealing with her and the Potter children had no appeal. The day-by-day part of living Potter’s life would, he suspected, hurt him more than it hurt Potter. There was the Barty Crouch/Moody approach, which Draco felt he might as well touch on in this trajectory. Even in his somewhat manic form of mind, this was way too creepy. He found picturing the Draco he would have to be to do that somewhat amusing, though.
The real idea, the idea he hadn’t been aware of circling around but felt he must have been when the shot of recognition went through him - seduce Potter himself and, probably, break his heart. Draco imagined it; he would feel as if the air around him was crackling with power, and Potter’s face would be puzzled as he began to wield it. He slid down on his back across the sofa and kicked his legs over the am with glee. Draco was no stranger to the beautiful idea, the consoling fantasy. But rarely, very rarely, did he wade into the beauty to see if it remained the same as reality rippled it.
He could see at once that sincerity was the bait. It was too late to perform charm, polished and urbane. Draco had learned that he was not his father. He was surly and obvious and impatient. He didn’t think, though it made him a little sore to admit that he knew it, that Harry was to be dazzled by glitter, anyway. Though he didn’t, perhaps, need to be humble and sweet. Maybe Potter was not immune to the draw of the tense, grudgy, fractious old rivalship. He thought of it, Potter’s look and touch, and his imagination shorted out. He wanted terribly to be too close to Potter. He would try and cope with it when it happened, if it ever did. Draco was a little surprised to feel in himself the confidence that he could make Potter be interested in one or another of his selves.
He left it there. He would try things at the right time which would present itself in due course. And fuck it, he should cheer up. No mad killer on his back. He was free!
*
Draco went into work the next morning without thinking about it. He found himself halting as he entered the office.
“Hard not to stick, isn’t it?” said Grace, looking up. “At least, we can say quite truthfully that we never really liked him.”
“Always thought there was something funny about him,” Draco said wryly.
The subject of Ryan seemed to draw them like a tongue to a sore tooth. It was not so much that they had a trust in him betrayed by his proximity to and abetting of violence, creepiness and evil, but that somehow they found themselves comforted by the process of pointing this out. Ryan probably wished he was here, Draco realised suddenly.
“Now that it’s over - in a way - the Beltane Ball won’t have that awkwardness to it,” Grace said.
“Oh yes,” said Draco. “I’d forgotten about that.” He made a face. “More self-congratulatory speeches than usual, I bet.” He thought about the discomfort he usually experienced at the Ball - it was one of the wizarding customs the Ministry was keen on, and was celebrated on May Day, the day before the Battle of Hogwarts anniversary, treated as an adjunct to that occasion. Draco felt prickled by unfriendly looks at certain points during the speeches, and was unsure whether he should appear to be enjoying himself or solemn and cowed. Usually, of course, it was one of the most prolonged periods of the year in which he saw Potter, if one counted literally seeing him rather than engaging with him. One of its trials, normally. But it struck Draco that it might be a useful time to approach Potter and begin his campaign. Providing he wasn’t monopolised too much, anyway.
*
Pansy had to come with him. “You have to,” he told her, seeing her wrinkled nose. “I used to spend most of it in a corner with Astoria. I didn’t go last year.”
“And I bet Astoria put it on her “Divorcing Draco: the Pros” list. You should actually test out what they say about beginning a new slate and forgetting old quarrels and ask women to dance. They wouldn’t dare refuse you. So what if they’re frosty?” Pansy was starting to get belligerent.
“You’re missing the point,” said Draco. He knew why Pansy didn’t want to go; while she could carry off meeting people who still remembered her as the enemy, it wasn’t something she actively enjoyed and Beltane was awkward. Also, and this was really it, she didn’t want to go with Draco, Head of the Pensieve Archive. It didn’t put her on the loftily self-sufficient footing of her and her husband Perseus’s careers, and people would, Draco had to admit, remember more clearly what they held against both of them on seeing them together.
“I need someone of my own there,” Draco said.
“You need someone of your own on a permanent basis. You can’t ask someone as an actual date?” But she was relenting.
*
It was not, in fact, too bad this year. People kept asking him about Luke Cobbing. Draco wanted terribly to make a marvellous story out of it and imply all sorts of things about his own role in it, but somehow he hadn’t the heart. Not to do more than very faintly imply, anyway. Before the fires were lit the Minister made a speech about how safe they all felt now thanks to the Aurors’ tireless work, with his hand on Potter’s shoulder, and after the fires were lit he made a speech about how they all felt safe now there was peace and tolerance in the Wizarding world, with his hand on Potter’s shoulder. And that seemed to be it. Usually Potter said something. Perhaps he’d demanded compensation for stress this year in the form of being let off speech-making. Not that he’d get off doing it at Hogwarts tomorrow. And not that Draco would be there.
Draco stared across at Potter like he always did, at points, during these occasions, as though Potter wasn’t quite real, or was on the other side of a two-way mirror. He wasn’t even disoriented when Potter seemed to grasp the other end of his gaze and, frowningly, follow it back. But when Potter’s face was indisputably turned to his and he gave him a small smile before turning away, Draco was jolted. He swung round himself, flushing.
But it was easy not to take himself or others too seriously tonight. Someone had disinterred another old custom and everyone was garlanded with flowers and looked like an illustration from a calendar or a children’s book. Draco plunged into the crowd and, quite at random, as the band struck up, asked a witch to dance. She smiled graciously and allowed him to lead her onto the floor. He looked round and saw Pansy smirking in relief, hand extended to meet that of a respectable wizard. He danced four times more, once with Pansy and once with Grace, and thought that he had paid his dancing dues now. He talked to Jonathan Dickleton, who had been taken on by the Ministry as part of his parole at the same time as Draco. He’d risen from the Document Archive to the glamour of Unspeakable, but he hadn’t retracted his and Draco’s grateful latching onto each other.
And then Draco spotted Potter, standing alone, apparently feeling also that his dancing duty was done. (Poor Potter. Draco had been watching him every ball for years try to make excuses and only dance once or twice without appearing rude.) As he watched, Potter walked away, perhaps to find a friend or to make his way out to find a lavatory. Now was it, the time, his moment.
Draco hurried after Potter while trying not to look as though he was hurrying. He hoped it didn’t look too much like a scuttle with skips in it. He arrived just behind Potter. “Potter,” he said to Potter’s back, in the calm, pleased tone of someone who’d remembered that yes, he would like to talk to that person, now they were inches away. Potter’s shoulders looked pretty broad, he noticed.
Potter turned round, not looking actively pleased perhaps, but polite and ready to engage.
“I think I’d like to talk to you a bit, if you don’t mind?” asked Draco.
“Sure.”
Draco found it hard to be sincere standing up in a ballroom only slightly distanced from the crowd, but the plunge had to be taken.
“Going through something like - Cobbing - has brought up the past for me. Somehow I’ve always seen you as the anti-me, even after we left school, which is obviously a bit sad. And with this stuff recently, you were the anti-me near me more often than usual. I kept falling back into old thought-patterns and it didn’t help an already difficult experience. I want not to resent you. I want to feel you don’t resent me - if you ever think about me.” (Draco couldn’t help adding that last bit.) “Could we do a quick re-enactment of that first train ride to Hogwarts?” He stuck out his hand.
Potter, looking surprised, shook it. “Well. It’ll be nice to think there are no hard feelings, definitely. I haven’t resented you, you know, not since the end. I don’t think. I’ve tried not to have more bitter feelings than I can help.” He looked embarrassed.
“And I think I’ll just offer a blanket apology for being such a horror in school,” said Draco, with a wry, self-aware smile.
Potter smiled too and was obviously trying to remember if he should apologise too. Draco could have thought of a few things, but that would not show the forgive and forget attitude he was going for. Potter had thought of something, his mouth was opening, but Draco interrupted him.
“I won’t keep you, I’m sure there are plenty of demands on you.” He walked on, feeling pleased with himself. It had hardly stuck in his craw at all, saying that, not like it would have twenty years ago. And Potter could surely buy it more now than he could have done twenty years ago. An apology that takes all that time to mature must be of a high quality when finally brought into the light, right? Draco was startled to realise he felt empty somewhere, in a warm, room-to-stretch-out way. Maybe he’d, well, meant what he’d said. On some level. It was a strange idea to contemplate. He experimented, pretended he was a person who’d say it and mean it for the purpose of getting on with their life. It felt quite nice apart from the wave of panic at the thought of the “rest of his life” part. For a moment, Draco had wavered in his resolve. But no, Potter was going to be what Draco did next. It didn’t hurt to experiment with other ways of unburdening himself of his Potter issues.
He looked around him. The band was playing something fast and jolly and everyone looked not quite themselves, with the flowers and formalwear. For the first time Draco felt the ball to be, like all festivities were meant to be, a time apart from real time. Next year, he didn’t know how, but he knew things would have changed.
*
The next day was, as some people called it, Potter Day, and a day off work. Draco thought of Scorpius at Hogwarts experiencing a day of solemnity. Potter would be giving a speech to him, amongst others, about good and evil and the importance of moral courage and love (Draco had been mandated to attend the first anniversary). He and Astoria had been careful to bring Scorpius up knowing what was and wasn’t said in public, but Draco realised now he wasn’t sure what Scorpius did think of all that. He hoped he didn’t feel too uncomfortable on occasions like this, weighed down by inherited guilt placed there by Draco and Lucius or his fellow students. He suspected not, not to any real degree. Scorpius still seemed so simple.
As usual on this day, Draco thought a bit about unpleasant memories, and managed not to think any further. Daphne had fought at the Battle, and Astoria had, of course, wanted to fight too. So they used to talk about it a bit, and not from a perspective Draco was comfortable with. He would feel more comfortable chalking that up as an advantage of divorce if Daphne wasn’t dead,
He spent a lot of time thinking, not about these things, but about things that didn’t matter. It was only the next day, when he was back at work, that he began thinking about Potter, and plans. Now he had laid a groundwork that should disarm suspicion, instead of approaching him directly again and perhaps risking that, he should probably think of situations that would throw him and Potter together (again) without revealing his connivance. Shame he was thinking of serial killers rather than this when Luke Cobbing had kind of done it for him.
Draco was not really disrupted from these thoughts when he opened a paper aeroplane that landed on his desk.
Dear Draco, I feel a bit awkward about this, considering everything, so excuse this letter. Would you like to have dinner with me? Tonight is fine for me, but let me know if you’d prefer another time. Or, of course, if you’d rather not go at all. Harry.
Draco physically recoiled, leaning back in the chair and feeling like the Aethonon he’d seen rear up once when startled by something. Grace looked up and he quickly assumed a slightly bored expression. Had Potter somehow worked out what he was up to and decided to cruelly bait him? This seemed the most likely explanation, yet even this seemed impossible when Draco thought about it. If Potter had leapt to the right conclusion, it was, admittedly, the right one, but considering the evidence available to Potter it was also some leap. Maybe Potter had access to detective instruments of sophistication beyond anything Draco knew about. He laid aside these thoughts for a minute and began on another track. Why would Potter, quite off his own bat, ask him to dinner? Draco hadn’t started trying to be fascinating yet and he was forced to admit that if Potter had managed to form an attraction to him all by himself it was baffling. The idea ought to be nice, thrilling even, but somehow it left him furiously confused, even upset. Let’s say Potter was sincerely drawn to Draco and wanted to have dinner with him. Would Draco have been pleased to get a letter from anyone else saying “considering everything else I feel a bit awkward about this” and offering him a get-out?
Frowning, Draco vigorously scrawled below Potter’s note “Come down here and see me, please. I don’t understand.”
It chafed; he wanted to choose an approach himself and have it be the right one. But being open could be considered a tactic if his plan was still valid.
Potter had a busy job, Draco reminded himself as the minutes passed and Potter did not materialise. Or perhaps it had been a practical joke and its purpose had been fulfilled. Thank God he hadn’t said “Yes, I would love that!” Surely though, that wasn’t really Potter’s style, and at their age. Not to mention that, if the aeroplane came from Potter, as he suddenly doubted, it was actually a guileless gesture on his part. The Daily Prophet would surely be glad to buy it from Draco, if he’d offered. Merlin, if he’d wanted revenge (he was beginning to feel the need of a different word) perhaps he’d just missed his moment.
Potter opened the door, looking strained. He jerked his head to indicate that Draco should follow him outside.
“What don’t you understand? Do you mean you don’t believe me or...”
“Yes.”
“Okay. Well, I... would like to get to know you better. Maybe in the finding-you-attractive way. I wouldn’t be surprised if you didn’t want to, so don’t feel bad about saying it. But I would like it.” Potter spoke quickly, nervously but clearly.
“I would like to go as well, then,” said Draco. He smiled at Potter for what felt like, and probably was, the first time.
Potter smiled back, looking relieved but still a little afraid. They arranged things quickly, a restaurant, a time.
A date with Potter. Draco would feel more enthusiastic about it if he could believe it.
*
When he was there, sitting opposite Potter, at a romantically lit table, Draco found himself watching the alert tilt of his head, sometimes dipping in self-deprecation, and his mouth, set in pleasant determination that this would go well. His skin looked soft in this light. Draco wanted to get to the point and touch.
“That getting-to-know-you stage. I don’t like it much and it probably is a bit more awkward when it’s me and people are... I try to choose well, and they want to be there because they like the real me, but they don’t know the real me yet and it feels like we’re both trying too hard,” said Potter, trying to give a fuller explanation of why they were both here.
“So you thought that because getting to know me should be difficult, it might actually be easier?” asked Draco.
“Yeah! I like a challenge.”
Draco felt his lips curve. Look at what he seemed to have found easiest himself after Astoria - not find a nice witch or perhaps a wizard this time and start again, but seduce the Boy Who Lived and possibly dump him to cheer himself up.
“And, I don’t know, I started seeing similarities between us. We’re both bisexual and just getting over divorce, after all.”
Draco remembered how the Wizarding world knew Potter was bisexual. He and Ginny Weasley had broken up for a year or two, a while before they got married, and Potter had had a fling with Viktor Krum, which was discovered by the press,
“That Viktor Krum thing,” said Draco. “I couldn’t decide who I was jealous of. What was he like?”
“Well, he’s a good bloke but in the end I thought he was better in bed than out of it. Hermione seemed to discover his hidden depths better than I did when she was fourteen. Lots of silences that seemed moody but probably weren’t really.”
Draco thought he should have left the question until it was more acceptable to clarify, what Krum was like in bed.
“Had you lost interest in Quidditch, then, weren’t into talking about that?” asked Draco.
“I had, actually. Of course, I lost interest in that last year, and then, it seems funny now, but I got kind of superstitious about it. I think I thought,” and here Potter blushed and hesitated, “that I’d given it up as part of my youthful innocence. Of course, it was kind of tricky with Ginny. But then James got into it and I started playing with him and going to games.”
“James is on the Quidditch team, isn’t he?” asked Draco.
James was. They talked about the personality types associated with the various Quidditch positions and how Albus and Lily both refused to be interested in Quidditch at all, Albus more because he just wasn’t sporty and Lily more because of her mother being a professional and Harry still being the most talked about Hogwarts Quidditch player.
“Scorpius likes Quidditch but he always said he just wasn’t interested in trying out for Hufflepuff’s team. He isn’t competitive, but I did wonder if not wanting to draw attention to himself had something to do with it. You know. Being a Malfoy.”
“I think if anything is going to stop people harking back to what “Malfoy” used to mean, it’s a Malfoy getting into Hufflepuff. Though the name suggests you were doing your damndest to hark back.” Potter looked as if he thought he might have offended, but couldn’t stop himself. Draco was not keen on the names of Potter’s children, if it came to it, but the dead people connection put them beyond the realm of criticism he felt comfortable making.
“For some reason, when he was born I couldn’t bear to give him anything but one of the most Malfoy names. I wasn’t sure then what I’d like Scorpius to be like, whether I wanted him to be unfashionably traditional in defiance of the people who went off our family, or a diplomat, someone who’d get them to like us. Of course, he just was, it had nothing to do with me.” He talked about Scorpius, and how he’d been surprised by and then welcoming of so many things about him. He could see Potter nodding along, identifying with him and approving of such a nice human side. Then he felt guiltily aware of using Scorpius, and remembered properly how great he was, and ended up going on longer. Then there was a pause.
“Are you still close to your ex-wife’s family?” asked Draco.
“Oh yeah. What was awkward was that it was actually Ginny who got a bit frozen out by her mum for a while there. But really, when you have children, there’s no breaking the ties, is there?”
Draco was silent. Their family had been perfectly nice and close and everything, but after the marriage broke down there had been an automatic separation of Malfoys and Greengrasses. He didn’t like Harry insinuating, unconsciously yes, that what he had was a pallid approximation of the real thing.
“Do you get on with Ginny, now?”
Harry rubbed his hair. “It wasn’t a question of not getting on - not for me and not even for her, I don’t think. We don’t speak alone much now. When we do it’s kind of just like it always was. Which is weird. But it doesn’t last long enough for it to have to be different.”
“Over it at all? I think I’m getting over mine,” Draco said smugly.
“You made me think about it!” Harry protested. “I guess I’m over it enough to want to move on. Maybe not so over it that I can always believe it happened.”
“Poor Potter.” Draco almost meant it. The last bit had been a touch too self-pitying. But all through the meal, facing Harry, he’d noticed a weight of seriousness about him. Something habitually effortful. What he needed was someone fun to give him a holiday. Draco didn’t think he could really undertake to be that person, even though he was supposed to be in seduction mode. The snarlingly stimulating school rival he could have done, but Draco was beginning to suspect that wasn’t what Harry wanted.
Harry smiled at him. “I feel very middle-aged tonight, do you?”
“I’m not flattered. I suppose you mean the civilisation of it?” Draco looked about him. He thought they were finished here. “Your place or mine?”
“Mine.”
*
Draco had found himself taking control when they got to Harry’s flat, pushing him into the bedroom, and being slow about undressing so he could look at Harry’s hurriedly revealed body. Harry seemed eager, having undergone a burst of energy. He let Draco handle him, almost as if he were something he thought of buying, familiarising himself with his contours, the texture of his skin and hair, his smell, and, of course, his cock, though he didn’t want to give him too much too early. Draco loved the feel of Harry’s cock jutting into his palm. He could see so much on Harry’s face, the pleasure he didn’t give into, the warmth of finding himself given attention, the impatience to get into Draco’s pants, the flickering comparing of the man he was to the Draco Malfoy in his head. Draco tried to catch and define and remember everything, though really he knew he was going to be rewatching it in a pensieve later.
And now he was lying on his back, legs spread open and Harry kneeling between them, rocking his cock just a little up into the warm, wet suction of Harry’s mouth. He was torn between closing his eyes and trying to completely lose himself in the sensation, and wanting to prop himself up on his elbows to stare at the exact shape of Harry’s lips stretched around his cock. He reached out and wrapped his fingers in Harry’s hair, which inspired him to take Draco’s cock deeper into his mouth. This seemed to have been a mistake, and Harry lifted his mouth off to cough.
“Do you want to fuck me?” he asked. He seemed determined to please, which was funny seeing as Draco had imagined himself taking on that role.
While Harry got out the lubricant and, after a moment’s hesitation, offered it to him, Draco tried to immerse himself into the prospect of that world of skin-to-skin, of bodies, that offered him the clarity he longed for right no. Because against all his expectations, this thing, this “let’s be nice grown-ups and sleep together” thing with Harry Potter was fucking scary. He reminded himself of a teenage about to lose their virginity and almost willing to run away rather than to have what they most desired. His angry amusement at his own absurdity forced an expression into his face which Potter took as a sign to lay on his stomach, his legs spread, holding his erection but not fondling it too much.
Draco touched the hollow of his back, dragging his palm over the rise of Potter’s buttocks, allowing his finger to lightly trace Potter’s crack. He ruffled the hairs on Potter’s inner thighs and roughly massaged the skin near Potter’s balls. He squeezed Potter’s balls. Potter squirmed a little; in pleasure, Draco hoped. Then he uncapped the lube and smeared a little on Potter’s arsehole. He didn’t bother taking too much time fingering. He put a couple of finger in and stabbed and stretched them. Potter seemed to like it. He lubed up his cock. With Potter facing away from him, he got more into it. He reached round to grasp Potter’s hips and pull them off the mattress. Potter tried to move his legs out of the way and managed to make Draco stumble. Succeeding in not making an irritated noise, he arranged his knees on either side of Potter’s and pulled Potter’s arse cheeks apart. Once he was partly inside he slid home all at once. Potter pushed his arse back at him and steadied himself with his hands. Potter was responsive, and while he was largely concentrating on pounding him into the mattress, Draco recovered some of that awed enthusiasm with Potter’s body.
He fell asleep trying not to be too conscious of Harry’s breathing.
Draco was nudged awake. He screwed his eyes up and found Harry Potter leaning over him. Harry Potter began to laugh.
“You’ve forgotten where you are, haven’t you? You look like I’ve broken into your house.”
Draco had indeed been boggling at him and wondering what he was doing there. He laughed self-consciously and, still disorientated, squinted at his watch.
“It’s morning. You have to get going a little later than me, but you know.”
In other words, he was offering breakfast rather than a wake-up call just as he left himself.
Draco was given coffee and installed by the toaster to await his toast while Harry boiled himself an egg and he tried to decide whether the previous night had been a success or a failure. Or just plain mediocre. Harry seemed cheerful enough, if not particularly intimate - keeping up a fairly constant chit-chat about nothing in particular. Draco became conscious of the way he was brooding and roused himself to respond in similar mode. He longed to ask Harry what he was thinking, what they were even doing here, being pleasant over breakfast when they hardly knew each other. He wanted to be with a friend suddenly, someone who knew him. He was too old for this. But he didn’t ask anything.
*
It seemed possible to Draco then that things would end there - that there was not as much between them as he had thought. But things tottered on in their uncertain, unpredictable way.
It was curiosity that impelled Draco to owl Harry asking him to come over a couple of nights later, despite the contradictory urge to make no move he wasn’t invited to make. Curiosity, the desire to poke, took him over sometimes.
Harry was more ruffled that night - his hair literally so. He had a touch of stubble. He’d come to find out what Draco was like, not so much to present himself. Draco was short with him as he hovered in the living room and awkwardly talked about how he’d just got off work. He told him what he wanted him to do and Harry quickly caught on and responded in like fashion.
Draco was on his back, Harry on top of him. He found it was better this way, “facing his fear” he thought impatiently, assuming it was Harry turning away that had sent him into that distant state of mind before. He listened to the blood thudding in his ears and followed the other rhythm he and Harry had going as they fucked.
He liked being in his own flat in the morning, better able to be his short-tempered morning self as if Harry just happened to be there.
“I think I thought you’d be tidy,” said Harry. “You’re not, very.”
That night left Draco calmer than the first. He thought perhaps he should stop letting himself feel like he had done, not only about Potter the last little while, but about Astoria. As if the success or failure of himself depended on things between them being how he wanted them. Perhaps it would be the right thing for both his bad old self and the self of tomorrow to nip in the bud whatever connection Harry hoped they could make. Draco could get on with his life and learn to appreciate its simple joys and all that.
But things went on, somehow, even as he considered stopping it. They even went for drinks, furtively, after work, and went to places and did things while they laughed at themselves and admitted to being two forty-year-olds who hadn’t dated in years. They lingered in each other’s flats after sex. Draco was beginning to believe Harry was a real person. He was beginning to know how to get specific responses out of him; the different smiles which meant different kinds of amused and pleased, the suspicious look just before he realised Draco was winding him up, surprise, anticipation. It went on, like eating something delicious until one felt nausea ought to have set in. It was better when they had the confidence to stop being polite, weren’t afraid they’d fight painfully if they weren’t prevented.
They learnt about each other’s jobs. Draco found that it was interesting to often have a different perspective on stories in the Prophet. He started to actually worry about Harry. He didn’t seem so invulnerable now. Harry remembered that Draco had probably seen the memories Snape had given him, and talked about their role in changing his lifeview, teaching him things about love and bravery and how what really mattered lasted longest. He saw a lot of meanings Draco hadn’t. Maybe, he found himself thinking, Harry really was just that great. He was okay with that thought. He wondered if he should hate himself. But he didn’t. He felt it was okay that he wasn’t Harry Potter. And then they talked about Snape, which was a strange topic, Snape being a strange man.
The sex mattered, of course. It both changed how things were between them and was changed. Draco learnt how to make Harry respond how he wanted in bed, too. He learnt that they both liked it more often than not when Draco was in control, that Harry liked being told what to do, that Draco often felt an amount of tenderness and euphoria he found it difficult to control when he felt Harry trusted him. Harry learnt when Draco wanted to be fucked, and when hard, and when gently. Sometimes it was intense and rough, but Draco found that on the whole Harry was more leisurely and relaxed than he’d expected. Draco relaxed more.
They got to know each other’s friends through the other’s conversation. It was a little strange. Harry could ask with accuracy whether Pansy had responded a certain way when Draco told her something, but neither of them pretended personal enthusiasm or sympathy for these people.
Hogwarts broke up for the summer, and then, at the same time that Draco and Harry saw each other much less, they were forced to take stock of the fact that they had been seeing each other a lot. It began to seem like they had a secret. Draco had never contemplated telling his friends and family that he was fucking Harry Potter, but now he contemplated, amused and awed, the impossibility of doing so.
Harry was swept along by a wave of Weasley family activity, and Draco, Astoria and Scorpius managed to put in quite a lot of time as a family too, and went on outings. Scorpius was at the age for disdaining that kind of thing, but this year at least he seemed to be glad of it. Draco tried not to engage him in too many earnest father-son talks.
It wasn’t as if either of them was having a terrible time, but it did make the times they spent together particularly bright. Draco couldn’t help feeling warmly satisfied that Harry obviously made a point of seeing him. When the kids were back at school they settled back into their routine, perhaps more into it than they had been before. That felt warm and comforting, though it was less comforting when Draco realised he now wasn’t afraid of Harry but of losing him. He seemed now to encapsulate a world not of glittering glory but sweet, earthy normality and rightness. He neutralised so much of Draco’s uneasiness.
“I think we should tell people,” said Harry, a few weeks after term began. Draco froze. “Not publically, I suppose, if we can help it, but people. Family and friends. Maybe we could even make an effort and meet each other. I’d like to meet Scorpius over the Christmas holidays.”
Draco agreed, firstly because what a lovely sign of trust and commitment and willingness to make an effort for Draco, and partly because he’d decided telling people would be fun. Draco enjoyed it, anyway, though Harry seemed a lot more deliberately patient and effortful about their reactions. Draco practically rolled on the floor when Harry described Weasley’s astonishment, though neither it nor the things Harry wasn’t mentioning were complimentary. When it came to in-person meetings, Draco admitted he was touched and impressed by how well his own and Harry’s connections coped with the bizarre social situation.
And then there was the night when Harry said, “When we first started, I felt a bit like I was using you. For distraction, I suppose. I felt like I didn’t know what I was doing, so I might as well do the most outlandish thing possible and see if I got a kick out of it. I don’t think I thought it would actually work. And it does, doesn’t it? I love you, you know.”
Draco kissed him and said, “I love you too” with what he thought remarkable poise. He waited until Harry was asleep to go out to the living room and sit on the sofa to have a little panic. To think of Harry feeling he’d been dishonourable. Draco wondered if he ought to have confessed to the Operation Revenge ideas he’d had when they were getting together, but he decided to do the sensible thing and keep it to himself. So that was it, then. He truly had something of great value, however he’d stumbled into having it. All Draco had to do now was appreciate it.