"Harry, you're back
Cyrusys 1
"Harry, you're back!" The transparent girl arose from a stall with a beaming smile, accompanied with a flirtatious lash beating.
"Yea." Harry suppressed an eye-roll. He had an objective after all. "Myrtle, you said something about a boy coming in here and crying. Who was it?"
"I am not telling you! He comes to visit me, unlike you!" Harry watched as Myrtle folded her arms and threw her nose into the air, as if she would really be such a hard nut to crack after bathing with Harry during the Tri-Wizard Tournament. However, there was a slim chance. "You made a promise to visit me, Harry."
"I know, Myrtle. But this is very important to me. We both know you could help me if you wanted too, right?" Harry was mentally beating himself into kind-tones and empathetic eyes.
"Oh, Harry." There was a long pause when Myrtles face was simply bleeding confliction.
"Come on, Myrtle. It would really mean a lot to me."
"No."
Harry was slightly taken aback. Myrtle had never shown a thread of resolve or defiance towards Harry in a one-on-one situation. He never thought he would be begging to a ghost…in a bathroom. "Please, Myrtle." One again, that slight hesitation gave Harry a fleeting glance at hope.
"No. Now go away!"
Harry entered the Great Hall feeling slightly deflated, but went through the motions typical of a hungry teenage boy just the same. It was not until he was half way through a slice of mincemeat pie that he saw the trademark red Weasely hair did he pause in his conveyer belt consumption of the dessert. The sighting sparked a twinge of jealousy; at first glimpse it was suspect to be Ginny snogging Dean. It was not until the mass of back cloaks and Gryffindor propaganda rotated and rearranged slightly did Harry noticed with relief that it was Ron with Lavender.
"Really, that's no way for a prefect to behave, especially in the middle of dinner!" snapped a very motherly voice from behind a newspaper.
"Hermione! Didn't see you. I was talking to Myrtle and…um, Hermione?"
Harry had to bend his neck to see all of Hermione's face as it was turned towards the massive polyester meteor otherwise named 'Ron's snogging of revenge'. She was on the brink of tears once again. "Hermione, it doesn't matter, let's talk…"
"In the common room." She finished and determined for him.
"But."
"Now!" She said, half grabbing Harry and making a very solid march out of the Great Hall with not a glance back at the source of her anger. The walk to Gryffindor Tower was silent and very tense. Harry knew better than to talk with the air around Hermione so thick with anger and rage. It was not until they were firmly settled in the common room that Hermione looked even remotely capable of a logical conversation.
"Hermione, this is getting out of hand."
"I can not believe the nerve of them!"
"He doesn't really mean for it to upset you." 'That's a lie' His conscience told him.
"It dishonors the name of Prefect, the House of Gryffindor, all the 6th years!"
"I think I am going to step out for some fresh air. I would recommend you do the same from time to time, Hermione." He said and quickly excused himself after giving her a small kiss on the forehead, if for nothing else than to shut her up with shock. "Please have pleasant dreams." He smiled softly as he climbed through the Portrait hole and into the cold hallways of Hogwarts, embarking on another eve's quest to evade looming homework readings.
Harry walked around the corridors, carefully avoiding the red-eyed cat and its master, Filch, the many ghost, teachers, prefects or other people in general who might interrupt his aimless roaming. He swung into the same bathroom of his failed attempt at persuading Myrtle to quell his curiosity to find it empty and smelling rather foul. He rounded the wall of sinks away from the door and opened the window to let out the offending scent, pausing to take in the serene night and its general splendor. Every now and then, when the war was out of mind and the starry sky was in sight, things seem so elegantly simple. Taking a closed eyed, deep breath of the night air, Harry turned to the nearest sink to wash away the remainder of a sweet treat that Hermione deprived him of upon their hasty exit from dinner, the Great Hall, and what was presumably a great tart. He turned the faucet on, wet his hands and turned the knob off before lathering up with soap (a habit forcefully instilled upon him at the Dursleys, lest he waste their precious water on his bothersome hands).
But before he could wash away the soapy foam, there was an outstanding crash of the bathroom door being thrown quite violently against the wall, followed by its equally noisy rebound into closure and incidental locking. Out of instinct and war-brought jumpy nature, Harry ducked down under the sink on the opposite side of the circular sink pillar, even though he would not be seen either way behind the pillar. He listened closely to ensure this hasty person was not threatening the disclosure of his location, however rather then hearing advancing foot steps towards his hiding place, he heard the un-corking of a vial, one large swallow, and lastly the sound of the vial being unceremoniously shattered on the porcelain sink. But what his ears absorbed next was more shocking than a bludger upside the head, heavy sobbing, deep gasping and then what could only be the snagging of a cloak along the stone wall as the person came to a heap against the opposite wall that Harry was sheltered by. 'What the hell?'
Harry did not want to do two things. One was being seen, and second was not to embarrass this person by interrupting them during what was obviously a dark hour. So, in order to kill the two said birds, Harry employed a suggestion from the headmaster before the start of term. Harry pulled his Invisibility Cloak out of his pocket and wrapped himself in it, but not before wiping his still soapy hands on his black student cloak first. He half crawled out from behind his shelter, noting the familiar label from a vial of calming draught from the infirmary, and slowly began his careful and guarded endeavor towards the door. He rounded the column of sinks but before light footing across the floor, he was stopped dead by the picture slapped in front of him.
A very blond Slytherin was ungracefully piled against the stonewall with his left sleeve rolled up revealing an angry looking Dark Mark. 'Bursting into a bathroom, downing a sedative, crashing into a heap against a wall, airing out one's Dark Mark and having a good cry can not be healthy' was the only thought going across Harry's metal dialogue. This thought however distracted him from his progress towards the door enough to deteriorate the perception of his surroundings…he stepped on the shattered glass which noisily grinded between his shoe and the stone floor. 'Oh. Shit." Harry was painfully slammed against the door of the bathroom before he even saw the figure leave the floor. His Invisibility Cloak was torn from his body and thrown against the sinks.
"Evening, Potter" said Draco, though the crack in his voice and the tear stains on his porcelain cheeks still leading a wet path back to his reddened eyes was noted by Harry before the fear of being cornered could really register.
"Sounding strong through the tears, hears to courage, aye?" Said Harry, still apparently not getting the idea that he was pinned by, and alone with, one very pissed off Death Eater.
"Slytherin's have a natural sense of self-preservation, you, Potter, obviously lack an ounce of it." Draco was clearly able to regain his footing and attitude alarmingly fast given the situation he was discovered in.
"I don't need preserving if there is no threat."
"If you don't see me as a threat then you're as insane as Dumbledore." Draco spat.
"If that's the case I am doing just fine judgment wise."
"You thick headed Gryffindor!" Draco punched Harry one in the stomach then threw him back first into the nearest sink. Harry fell into a neat little pile of robes along the pipes, but before he could get back up, Draco had taken his Invisibility Cloak and bolted into the hall, Harry quick on his heals. "I think I'll do you a great favor by keeping you out of trouble, Potter" said Draco, dangling Harry's cloak like a carrot on a string at the end of the corridor.
"Give it here, Malfoy!" Harry was now getting the point into his head that the situation had gone from bad to terrible.
"Like Hell. You can buy it back though." Draco knew the carrot was turning deliciously orange to Harry.
"I'll bite, what is my Cloak worth to you?" Harry's eyes were now glaring daggers.
"That little potions book of yours."
"The hell you want my book for?"
"Shall we say, it's for a friend, not for my own interest?"
"You have friends?" Harry said in mock shock. Draco responded by shoving the cloak into his pocked and patting it twice to emphasize the security of his newly acquired treasure. "No. Now give me my cloak back!"
"Like I said, Potter, your abilities to judge a situation and circumstance are unbelievably poor." Draco now sounded merely agitated by the conversation, a world away from a few minutes before when he was an emotional display of unchecked weakness and fear. With the final insult Draco was gone into the night taking Harry's cloak, but giving Harry the answer Myrtle denied him in the same bathroom before dinner. This was not the first time Draco dissolved into tears in a bathroom, and with this thought, Harry felt that he and Malfoy were in even grounds for bargaining, a cloak for a secret.