When Harry entered, his back was turned. He was leaning across three sinks, his shoulders hunched and his head hanging down. His normally immaculate hair was in disarray, his vest chucked to one side. Deep, dry sobs wracked his body and his shoulders shook with the force of them. In the mirror, Harry could see that his tie was loosened, his top button undone. Water dripped off his face as he stared at himself in some emotion caught between horror and despair.
'Too much,' escaped his lips as he stared at himself. 'Too damn much.'
Harry entered the room, shutting the door silently behind himself and spelling it locked. He approached his year mate slowly without making a sound.
'Malfoy?' he asked first, when he was standing mere feet away from him. Then - 'Draco?'
A soured laugh left the other boy's lips. 'Perfect Potter, come to flaunt his power over others? Come to recruit me? Convince me to join Dumbledore's side - hah! If only you knew!' Grey eyes glanced up at him in the mirror, cutting into him even through the glass pane.
'What was it like?' Harry asked. 'To know that you are the reason that someone hurt so much - the reason that she should have died?' He paused and old demons flickered before his eyes. 'Do you see Katie's face behind your eyelids, Draco? Do you hear her scream? I wonder - could you live with yourself if you killed someone?'
Draco let out a harsh, inhumane noise somewhere between a scream and a roar. He span around, splashing water across the mirror as he did so. 'You know nothing!' he yelled.
Harry took another step closer, so he was nose-to-nose with the taller boy. 'I know enough. Voldemort is inside my head. I see what happens at those Death Eater meetings. You aren't part of that yet. You wouldn't cope.' Again, he paused, this time steely determination crossing his face. 'You're not a killer, Draco. You're still just a boy. If this world was perfect, you wouldn't take lives but save them.'
'You don't know me!' the blonde protested, angry and scared, leaning as far away from Harry as he could, leaning back against the sinks.
For a moment, Harry considered what he was doing. He thought of Ron and Hermione and Ginny. He thought of Quidditch and prefects and everything in the past six years that had revolved around Draco. Around Malfoy. Most prominently - that first introduction. He remembered him as an arrogant, spoilt young boy who thought he deserved the world.
And that's all Draco was, really. His parents had spoilt him rotten, tried to protect him, even as their protection was probably one of the main reasons why Draco would never be fit to become a Death Eater. Harry remembered Draco's face in Potion's classes - his fierce determination and glee when he succeeded. His skill in charms and his half hidden fascination with anything Madame Pomfrey said in reference to medi-wizardry.
Then Harry stopped thinking and wrapped his arms firmly around Draco, hugging him tightly.
The blonde stiffened for a moment, his muscles tensed and, for half a moment, Harry thought he might be pushed away. But then Draco relaxed and he slumped against him, another round of sobs shaking him. They stood for a long time, half an hour, an hour maybe, until finally Draco's sobs stopped and he drew away, half turning from Harry.
'I don't want any of this,' Draco explained, looking resolutely at his own reflection as he straightened himself up.
Harry's laugh echoed Draco's from earlier. 'You think I did? You think I asked to be a God-damned boy-hero? Jesus, Malfoy, if I had my way I'd be some nobody who happened to be good at Quidditch and Defence Against the Dark Arts.'
'If you were, would you have accepted my hand in first year?' Draco asked, his eyes moving to Harry's reflection.
This time when Harry laughed, there was true humour in it. 'You were a pompous git who had just insulted the first friend I'd ever made, so no, probably not.'
Something in Draco's eyes darkened, but Harry instinctively knew that the foul emotion was not directed at him, so he ignored it.
'Would you now?'
Harry considered a moment, staring at Draco thoughtfully for a long moment. Then he bent and picked up the other boy's vest from the floor, passing it over. As Draco took it, their fingers touched and their eyes met. There was no flash of indescribable feeling, but an understanding passed between them and Draco smiled.
'I don't know,' Harry answered his question finally. 'I don't know you.'
Draco hesitated a moment, before he leant forward, lowered his head, and brushed his lips lightly across Harry's. 'Go out with me?' he murmured, breath hot against Harry's face.
Green eyes flickered shut and Harry wavered a moment in indecision. Then, feeling as though he was selling his soul to the devil, he nodded sharply, once.
He wasn't prepared for the onslaught that followed. Draco's arms came up around him, spinning them so the blonde was pressing him against the sinks. Then his lips were attacked brutally with kiss after kiss and he gasped from the sensations, a tongue plunging into his mouth as he did so. And yet, the arms that held him, held him as though he might break, as though he might run, as though he were something precious. And so Harry smiled under Draco's lips and started to return as good as he got.
That was the first time that Draco wept before him. It was the first time for a lot of things. It was the first time he'd kissed a boy. The first time he'd pitied Draco. The first time he felt absolutely certain that he was fighting on the right side of the war.
When the kissing had stopped Draco had shown him the Vanishing Cabinet, had explained what his task was. He explained what the Dark Lord expected of him and his family. He told Harry about how much he loved his parents, how much he wanted them to live, which he knew they wouldn't if he failed. Harry hadn't known straight away what to do.
Written: 10th October 2009
Chances of continuation: nil
Feel free to use this piece of writing for whatever the hell you want, so long as you credit me (either this account or my main one - Calistabelle) and let me know what you do with it.
Much love,
Cal