"Goddamnit, Malfoy! What is your problem?" Potter burst out.

"My problem?" Draco sneered, blood rushing out from his heart in a mad diaspora toward all the extremities of his body: his fingertips, his cheeks, the soles of his feet, the roots of his hair, and his – he was ashamed to admit it – prick. "My problem?"

"Yes, your fucking problem! You've been at me for years and you've never let up, not for a moment, not even when everyone else who hated me before has moved on! So tell me: what exactly is your bloody sodding problem with me?"

"Gah!" Draco exclaimed. The blood rush was making it hard to settle down enough for words. He took a step toward Potter and forced himself to take a deep breath. He took another step. Potter eyed him warily. "You want to know what my problem is?" he asked in a calm voice that unnerved himself as much as it – if the look on his face was any indication – unnerved Potter. "It's the way your hair swings over your eyes." He took another step. "It's how you smell like chocolate frogs and the air that rushes past my broom when I fly. It's that your eyes are the greenest thing I've seen out of the Slytherin common room and how they make it impossible for me not to provoke you."

"Malfoy..." Potter said, taking a faltering step backward. Draco countered it with two more forward.

"It's the way the corners of your lips always tilt upward even when you're not smiling. It's how your words alone have the power to keep me in a line, and how you refuse to respect me like most people do. It's how you're so nice to everyone that they don't realize you never really say anything to them." He took another step. His breath hitched in his throat and his blood buzzed as it found its way back to his heart. "It's the way you fly. It's your glasses. It's your scar. It's how you're the least heroic hero I could ever conceive of."

Potter's uncertain retreat had walked him straight up against a wall. There was nowhere else for him to go to escape Draco's advance. Draco took one last step forward and they stood toe to toe, eye to eye. Draco could feel Potter's chest rise against his when he inhaled sharply.

"It's how it's impossible for me to sit still when you're in the room."

Potter swallowed.

"You want to know what my problem is with you?" Draco said quietly. He paused, partly for dramatic effect and partly just because Potter's widened eyes made the green vibrant to the point of distraction. "It's that I'm forced to hate you because you won't let me love you."

Potter's lips parted, but only air emerged – no words. He stared into Draco's face without blinking. Carefully, Draco pressed his palm to Potter's. Potter's hand twitched against his, tightening and slacking in quick succession before relaxing and curling his fingers into the spaces between Draco's.

"The reason I can't let go like the others," Draco said, "is that I wasn't after you for the same reasons."

Potter's fingers tightened in Draco's."I thought you were. I thought you hated me – hated me for being the Boy Who Lived," he murmured. "I thought you'd have me dead as soon as look at me."

"Anything but that," Draco vowed. "Looking at you – I've done little else for eight years. I've wanted you for such a long time."

Potter's eyes closed and he shrank against the wall, in on himself. Then they opened again, as piercing as the sun making a sudden break out from behind the clouds. Draco barely had time to catch his breath before Potter lunged and pressed his mouth against Draco's. For a moment, Draco was frozen. Then he wrapped his arms around Potter and pulled him snugly against his body and kissed him back.

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