You were always such a risk.
A risk when I first offered my friendship and a risk still when, once you denied me, I continued to associate with you. I ought to have left you alone, perhaps you – and I – would have benefitted from it. But no. I couldn't.
Even as an eleven year old I couldn't stay away from you.
Sometimes in the morning, when I woke to find you splayed out next to me, the sheets twisted round your ankles, your hair a ridiculous mess, the bleary, fresh early light casting pools of shadow over your naked skin, I sat up on my elbow and traced my name over your arm, your thigh, your chest and I wondered how we found ourselves there, after all those years. Locked away in my private room, away from the rest of the school, away from your oh so caring friends, away from Voldemort, away from everything. Just you and me in a room. Just you and me and rough, hungry kisses; skin against skin, my sweat sliding against yours as we moved together in a clumsy, passionate, desperately beautiful rhythm. There was no time for talking after you'd murmured my password, slipped through my door as silent as a shadow in your invisibility cloak. There were no words for how you made me feel, my lips against your throat, hearing my name fall from your tongue just before it was attacked by mine. Your nails digging into my back, leaving questionable crescent shaped marks; your fantastic body, arching to press against mine, your head tilted backwards, your chest heaving, your eyes shut, teeth biting down on your lower lip, swollen from my kisses.
You are Harry James Potter, hero and icon. And I am Draco Lucious Malfoy, son of a death eater. My destiny is to follow Voldemort, and yours is to destroy him. It makes me want to scream. It makes me want to...I don't know. Sometimes, when I saw you across the Great Hall, eating, laughing, talking with your friends, ignoring me, it made me want to cry. But Malfoys don't cry. Never. Not ever. So I picked a fight with you instead. But by then I no longer cared about hurting you. I never cared, really. I just wanted to see your face so alive. You got the same look in your eyes when you were angry as when we were tangled on my bed, with a heat between us so strong I sometimes thought I could die from it. It wouldn't be so bad, you know, Potter. Dying in your arms. Can't believe I just said that.
I know, by the way, about the nightmares. You see, I don't sleep easily. I don't need to really. Normally I'd just lie there next to you, listening to your breathing. It was wonderful. I closed my eyes and listened to the air hurtling into your lungs and it reminded me I wasn't alone. About ten weeks after we started and about three weeks after you starting staying with me until the morning, I began a habit of curling up behind you, my legs tucked into the bowl yours had made, my arms around your waist, my forehead against your shoulder blade. That way I could feel your breaths as well. I could even feel your heartbeat. So when you started having nightmares, I knew. You didn't wake up from them, instead you were trapped there. You would whimper like a child, sometimes you would cry. You would tuck your legs closer to you, wrapping your arms around yourself, as if trying to hold yourself together. It hurt me more than I would have thought it would. I usually just held you tighter to me, kissing your shoulder and whispering words of comfort in your ear. Once you turned round in my arms and wrapped yourself around me, your breath hot and heavy on my neck. I didn't sleep that night. Neither of us mentioned it ever. That or any of your nightmares. I don't know if you knew how I held onto you as you slept, that I counted your breaths, that I compared your heartbeat to my own to see if we matched. I expect you suspected it, as we often woke curled round each other like flower stems. It was beautiful.
I think it meant more to me than it did to you. At least as the beginning. You see, I'd never had close friends like you did. I know I had parents but they never hugged me or kissed me goodnight or sat with me when I couldn't sleep, so you see, what I had with you was so achingly unfamiliar. Contact became a necessity for me. I would brush past you in the hallways and feel the shivers run up and down my spine. I would bump into you in potions and my whole body would tingle. Even eye contact. You have the greenest eyes I've ever seen. I know them so well I could draw them right now from memory. You resisted at first, telling me when we were alone that this had to stop, that someone would notice. But we never did stop. I think it became as addictive for you as it did for me. Our little game. Ours was the most improbable and impractical relationship. But it brought me to life in ways I'd never thought possible. You brought me to life. I can't remember when I told you. I think it was before the Christmas holidays. When it suddenly dawned on me how long we would have to spend apart. It came out in an unexpected rush just before you left my bed to get dressed. 'Iloveyou'. You looked at me blankly for a second; I could see you trying to work out what I'd said. Then you looked at me and I felt with sudden certainty that you could see right into me. The silence ticked on in breathless anticipation. Then you smiled. You have the kind of smile that breaks hearts. That glorious, fantastic grin that lights up your whole face. Then you knelt on the bed in front of me and kissed me so achingly gently. 'I love you too' you said in a voice like a breath of spring air.
We spent longer together after the holidays. I told you what had happened to me and you looked so horrified that I regretted telling you. For the first time, we let Voldemort into our haven. You told me everything; laid everything out in front of me. I told you all I knew, all I'd heard and all I thought. With hushed voices and serious tones, we discussed. I think - no I know, we gained something from that. Something changed between us. I wasn't just your fuck buddy. I wasn't even just your lover. I was your confident. Your trust meant more to me than...well, a hell of a lot of things, Harry.
We had one year of Everything. Which was better than, frankly, my whole life previously. So I don't mind waiting. Really, Harry, I don't. You're alive, I can feel it. Which means that I will stay alive too, and I will wait until He is destroyed. Then I will wait for you to find me and kill my father and free my mother and bring me home with you. I know you will. I know you'll find me. I haven't seen daylight for ten months, one week and three days now. I must look like death. I don't have a wand anymore. I don't have anything much, except this book, this pen and you. Come and find me, Harry.