Harry Potter was looking at his feet. He had been doing so for quite a while since Draco Malfoy decided to corner him in a deserted city street and yelled at him about every single terrible thing that had ever happened in his life from not getting a handshake to his wife being an absolute fucking bitch.

Harry allowed the fury from his former enemy to wash over him in waves. He stared at the gravel, finding patterns in the pale black cemented rocks and shells. A few feet away lay a single penny, old and rusty. Harry wanted nothing more than to step around his attacker and pick it up, inspect in, slip it into his pocket and walk the rest of the block to get home.

As Harry had not responded to anything Malfoy said, said speaker got more and more agitated as he waited for some kind of reaction. A shouting match that was not one sided, a punch, a grimace, a slap to the face, or even Harry walking away in a hurry. He had not expected this, he had not expected nothing. And the thought that something was very, very wrong crept up his spine and infiltrated him anger, causing his lashing words to change into words of what he thought was "trying to be nice" words.

"Potter, what are you? A spineless blast-ended skrewt? Why aren't you fighting back?"

Harry stared at the penny some more, wondering what year it was and if it was lucky. Maybe he would pick it up and have a good evening.

"Are you even listening to me? Are you fucking serious? I'm talking to you, man! Answer me!"

Harry shifted his gaze to his shoes- faded green converse that were so threadbare from the years he had worn them that her could feel the ground below and his toes were cold. Maybe it was time for a new pair? Nah, they were fine, had a few more years in them surely. It was not like they had ever failed him before.

Maybe it is time for a change though, Harry though down to his feet, It's not like I'm attached to my shoes or anything-they don't mean anything to me. I wonder how much a new pair costs...

"Saint Potter! Boy-Who- Lived! Scumbag! Prat! Prick! Gryffindor! Goody Two Shoes! Mudblood! Weasel! Dickhead! Asshole! Murderer!"

Murderer!

Harry's head shot up so fast Malfoy thought it would break off and roll on to gravel.

"I am a murderer and all of those things you were saying. You should remember, however, that I am neither a muggleborn not a member of the Weasley family. Have a nice day, Draco, I hope it gets better." Harry finally stepped around Malfoy and knelt to pick up the penny. The year on it was three years before his birth year. Bad luck. He straightened up, nodded to the blond again and then began to make his way down the road as calmly as possible. Malfoy followed closely behind him almost stepping on the back of his shoes, demanding to be listened to and asking what the fuck was wrong with Harry. Harry just stared straight ahead.

When the two men reached Harry's house, he stopped and turned to face Malfoy again.

"Draco, I do not know how you found me but I would appreciate it greatly if you would not let anyone else find out. I like my privacy. I hope you got what you wanted from me today. Now I am rather tired. Have a good night, Draco. Goodbye."

Harry turned away but Draco grabbed his bicep.

"I did not bloody get what I wanted. You aren't sodding responding to anything zi say. What is wrong with you?"

"Many things."

Draco gaped at him and his hand slackened so Harry pulled his arm free and walked to his front door, only a few feet away.

"Wait!" Harry looked over his shoulder with a confused face. "Can I come in, for tea or something? Come on, Potter, don't make me say please."

"Alright." Harry opened the door with the smooth gold key he always kept in his front right pocket. The door opened with a click and Harry walked through it, leaving the door open from Draco to come in. Harry did not wait for him and walked to the kitchen.

The kitchen was quite small, Malfoy decided when he stepped into it. There were only muggle appliances which were unfamiliar and they were all crammed into the hallway like space. Harry put the water in a kettle to warm up before grabbing two blue teacups from a shelf and setting them on the counter.

"I don't understand you Potter."

"I do not expect you to, Draco. What do you like in your tea?"

"Why don't you talking like a fucking human, not a stupid machine? What is wrong with you? Tell me Potter, I want to know."

"The things you want are never what really matters. The only thing that matters is need and truth."

"I bloody need to know, then." Draco rolled his eyes to the ceiling "Just tell me what happened to you and I'll leave you alone. Ok? Good? Now speak, idiot."

"How do you want your tea, Draco?"

"Fuck!" Malfoy through his hands up in defeat and reluctantly repeated his tea preferences to the green eyed one, glaring at him rather enthusiastically while his glare-ee jumped into action. Malfoy took a small sip at the blue clay teapot he was presented with and his heart warmed just a tiny bit. It was perfect. "Potter, have you made tea this way before?"

"No."

"It tastes just the way I wanted it to. Good job." Harry shot Malfoy a look that might have passed for an almost glare and Malfoy's breath caught in his throat for a moment. It was almost like the real Harry was shining through his new, disgustingly polite and calm mask. "What were you thinking! Just now, when you shot me that look?" Malfoy's face was warming slightly, he felt jumpy. Maybe he had broken though! Maybe he would see the real Harry, the one he knew and lov- hated. The one he knew and hated.

"What do you mean, Draco? I merely turned to you to thank you for thinking that the tea I made for you was good. Is everything alright?"

"No, it's not bloody alright! Why can't you be the Potter I know! Yell at me! Fight me! Anything! Just stop being... well, just stop being what you are now. It's terrible! You're like a shell of a person. You should damn well open up and tell me what the matter is with you, this instant."

"There is nothing wrong with me. I'm perfecting healthy."

"No you're not, you fucking prick. What happened to the Harry Potter I know?" Draco grabbed Harry's arms, "Potter what happened to you? To your openness, your smiles, your stupid Gryffindor braveness that I hated you so much for, your power and grace and love. Your warmth. Your friendship and acceptance and goodness. What happened to your feelings? Your emotions? Where is it? Where do you have it hidden away? Tell me, and I swear to Merlin I'll help you get it back! Please, Potter, let me in. Let me in. Please don't make me beg anymore, it's below my dignity."

Harry looked at Draco, tears begging to fall clung to his eyelashes and he looked at his feet again. His pair of converse looked to same as they had before, though now he could see them better in the light. There was one tiny hole that he had missed. He could see his red sock through it. It blinded him with the contrasting colors and he closed his eyes which shot open the moment he felt hands moving to rub his shoulders.

Malfoy was standing in front of him, a good three inches taller than him. He pulled Harry into his chest and wrapped his arms around his body. Harry's arms lay useless by his sides. He did not respond.

Malfoy pulled Harry from the kitchen, leaving both of their blue teacups behind to cool. He dumped the two of them on the couch and then rearranged them so that Harry was sitting on Draco's lap with the blonde's arms tightly around him. And the tears began to fall.

One by one, slowly onto Draco's new sweater he had bought with last month's paycheck. Then they fell faster and faster until Harry felt himself sobbing into Malfoy's chest, his hands holding on to the soft fabric with pale hands. Draco let him. He almost asked Harry to continue with his tears when Harry finally, after about an hour, stopped crying. Harry hiccuped a little and gave Malfoy a tiny watery smile.

Draco's sweater was green like his converse had been before they were faded. Before everything happened. It was a beautiful green. Harry stared at it with a hunger that not even he could understand.

Avada Kedvra green, Draco thought to himself, looking down into Harry's bright eyes that were devouring his sweater. Harry's eyes match my sweater and the shoes he was looking at when I tried to talk to him. Avada... Murderer... He wants to die! He thinks he's a murderer. Oh...

"Harry we need to talk. I want to understand everything that happened to you since the final battle and understand why you are the way you are. And then we are going to warm up our teas and drink it by the fire that I'll conjure. But you have to speak first. Ok?"

Harry stared at Malfoy's sweatshirt with an intensity that would surely burn a hole in the thick, now wet, fabric. Finally, after many moments and a few sighs, Harry nodded.

They sat in silence as they both waited for Harry to speak. Harry was having trouble opening his mouth.

"Bill, Charlie, and Percy dead. The Weasley's refuse to even look at me." Silence and a squeze on the shoulder. "Hermione's parents are dead as well. She married Ron. Ginny was engaged to Neville. He died." A tear fell in Harry and Draco's intertwined arms, staining their pale skin. "Dumbledore on the tower- I saw you with Snape. Snape died giving me the truth. I'm so...I'm so sorry. Bellatrix, your father, other dead eaters that I never found the names for dead at my hand, my wand, the spell from my mouth. Voldemort died from his own backfired curse. And then there was black." Harry looked away from Draco's liquid storm eyes at the scratchy sofa they were sitting on. The patterns stood out to him, crisscrossing, confusing his already disturbed mind.

"What happened next, Pot- Harry?" At the sound of his given name form the lips of his once sworn enemy, Harry jumped a little and looked back at his human cushion.

"Woke up in the hospital- St. Mungo's. Pomfrey dead at Hogwarts. New healer. My magic threw her into a wall, head hit a shelf. She died in front of me." Two tears fell now, sliding down Harry's face and landing on Draco's thigh. The wetness darkened the grey pants to an almost black color. "Told me I was unstable. Took my wand away. Ran away to here. Nightmares every night. Their eyes... dead eyes staring..." Harry could talk no more, he could see Remus and Pettigrew, Snape and Seamus and Dean and Percy swimming in his mind, asking him, pleading to know why. Why he let them die. Why he did not save them. Was he not the Savior? The Boy-Who-Lived? What right did he have to life if he could not save the ones he cared the most about? How dare he survive. How dare he?

Draco rocked him as he sobbed, his own tears surfacing in his grey eyes, blurring the way-too-tidy room. he could feel the guilt radiating from Harry. It shot daggers into his heart and left his chest crumpling under the pain of it all. Harry was hurting. Harry was crying. Harry thought it was his fault.

You know something horribly wrong has happened when the Boy-Who-Lived-To-Save-The-World-When-So-Many-Others-Had-Lost-Hope is bloody crying on the shoulder of the enemy.

What had happened to the world to allow this to occur?

Harry's face went blank right before Draco's eyes. The transformation was horrifying, "I am sorry you had to hear all of that. I will go heat up your tea." He extracted himself from their messy embrace and walked to the kitchen. The only thing that looked out of place was his red rimmed eyes. Draco stared, slack-jawed, after him.

"You stop right now, Potter. I worked hard to get you to fucking open up. Don't make me do it again."

Harry blinked and turned away but Malfoy grabbed his arm again and they were nose to nose.

"Sorry, Malfoy. But this is who I am now."

"No it's not. It's a terrible excuse for who you are. I will not stand for it. I want you to yell at me and punch me and let all your emotions out. I know they're in there. Let them out, Potter- Harry. I want it."

"It's too much. You'll go away just like the rest of them." Harry stepped back.

"The rest of them?"

"Shit!"

"Harry?"

"All my ex-boyfriends- what? are you going to judge me now? The Golden Boy: a slut."

"No."

"Fine then, all the guys I managed to get left when they saw who I really was. It's better when I'm passive."

"You're not passive, you're a bloody doll. You've lost you power, Harry. It's scary to me because it was the one thing I ever wanted from you and now you've lost it and yet I still want something from you. I can't fucking figure it out. But it doesn't matter. I hate this new you. I want you the way you were before. Stubborn and a prat. And I'm not going to stop until you change back." The clock on the wall with a weird looking mouse on it rang at them and Draco fell silent. A second later, he opened his mouth again, "I'm leaving now, to go back to my home. But first I want to connect our floos. I want you to contact me whenever you need me. If i don't hear from you in three days, I will come back here and I won't be happy about it. I'll be back next week anyway."

Harry stared at his feet for about three minutes while Draco stared at him. But he looked up when Draco lifted his chin with his long bony finger and into the grey eyes that he could swear looked right into his soul.

"Ok, Malfoy."

"Good."

And with that, Draco Malfoy walked out of the front door to Harry Potter's house and Harry collapsed onto the couch again- alone this time.

Maybe it was time to get some new shoes, after all, nothing bad could come out of it a little something new.

A/N: yeah so i just got a new pair of converse and was in a bad mood.