Harry

"Do you really want to move in tonight?" Malfoy asked, his eyes focusing on the white tile. Harry's eyes lingered on his sweats. He didn't think the other man had noticed just how low those had slipped or the sharp hip bone that was revealed as a result. Harry shrugged and slung his backpack on the counter. Draco flinched but he ignored it in favor of pulling out the first wad of cash MU had given him for housing.

"Here's your money." He offered easily. Draco gaped.

"You've been carrying that around?" He demanded. Harry felt the color rise on his cheeks.

"I mean. I stopped at the bank first." He admitted, shrugging. Draco continued staring like he was crazy.

"Google me first." Draco repeated. Harry rolled his eyes. He was almost a hundred percent sure that they had already covered that bit.

"What you're not concerned about my background?" Harry protested. A little offended, what, was he not threatening?

"I already checked you out Potter." Draco scoffed as if reading his mind. Harry fixed his beanie self-consciously.

"So my googling is the only thing stopping me from moving in right now?" Harry pushed.

"Yes." Draco turned away, heading for his fridge. When he opened it, Harry's mouth watered a little at the full to the brim fridge. He glanced around again at the open kitchen with marble counters, the floor to ceiling windows, and matching furnishing. He was just starting to notice how far away this was from a typical college apartment. He had never been so happy to have missed a deadline.

"Then I'm going to start unpacking and send for my stuff." Harry resolved.

"Where were you planning on staying tonight?" Draco asked, the least hostile his tone had ever been.

"Didn't know. Guess it's a good think you took me in huh?" Harry joked, smiling.

"You're actually an idiot." Draco announced like it was a particularly surprising but pleasant revelation. Harry decided not to take offence.

"Good thing that doesn't make my money any less good, huh?" Harry suggested. When it was clear Draco wasn't going to say anything more, Harry shrugged and headed down the hallway.

"First door on the left is you!" Draco called. Harry shrugged and nudged open the plain white door. Inside was large, way larger than he had been expecting. What was this, a penthouse? The other big surprise was that it was furnished. There was a massive bed with the headboard against the left wall and the same floor to ceiling windows on the far wall. There was a desk beside him and he casually dropped his backpack down beside him. Holy shit. He had dreamed of this room, except in his dream it was included with his third job when he was actually making money, doing something.

He sighed, his excitement from this morning finally draining. He dropped heavily on the bed and bounced. That would be nice to put to use at some point. He pulled his phone out of his pocket, lazily calling his only friend from home. It rang once before it picked up.

"What's up?" Ron Weasley answered cheerily. Ron had lived five streets over Harry's entire life but they had only met in fifth grade when the elementary schools merged into one large middle school. Ron had few friends because of his family's lack of money and took to Harry's lonely self right away. Now he was heading to Magicae City Community College. For now, he was commuting just like his dad commuted to work in the city.

"Mate, I found a place." He announced with pride.

"That soon?" Ron questioned, surprised. Harry was positively giddy with triumph.

"Yeah, this pompous twat named Draco Malfoy put this fucking sick place up for a fraction of the rent that it's worth." Harry explained gleefully. Maybe his luck really was turning after all.

"Draco Malfoy? Do you know what" Ron started, protesting frantically. He always was dramatic.

"No. He told me to Google him and I said no. I don't care." Harry stressed.

"Mate, you really should…" Ron tried again.

"I don't want to." Harry repeated.

"Fine." Ron gave in. "But think about it all right?" He insisted.

"I will." Harry conceded.

"Good, so what's the place like?" Ron asked giddily. Harry could only imagine how Ron would react to a place like this.

"Fucking amazing. You should visit one weekend." He suggested. That had always been the plan anyways, to hit up parties together in the city.

"I don't think so." Ron laughed as if the idea was ludicrous. Harry was a little hurt to be honest.

"Why not?" He demanded.

"My family and the Malfoys don't exactly get along." Ron explained with a tone that suggested he was most definitely leaving something out.

"Does this have to do with why everyone wants me to Google him?" Harry demanded, a little peeved.

"Yeah." Ron answered with a chuckle.

"Mate, my past is fucked up but I get to leave it behind, why shouldn't he?" Harry demanded, the logic perfectly clear in his mind. "You really are noble bastard." Ron observed.

"I try." Harry shrugged and idly waved towards his backpack. The bag floated easily to him, with a little more concentration he slid the zipper along to open the front pouch. He used his other hand to lift the card out and pulled it to him. He smirked in triumph for a beat before his bag crashed to the ground.

"What was that?" Ron squawked.

"Nothing, don't worry about it." Harry grumbled, looking at the card anyways. "When you get here you should really check out this little café, it's called the Chamber of Secrets."

"What kind of name is that? Sounds like a euphemism for twat." Ron laughed.

"I know right? But it's based on a children's book about wizards, never read it." Harry shrugged. The things people would spend their time reading.

"Yeah you never were one for fantasy." Draco

"No, always preferred reality." Harry smirked as he lifted his bag again and carefully redid the zipper.

"Never understood why, don't you get bored?" Ron asked, genuinely curious.

"No, not really." He admitted honestly, spinning his bag with an easy circle of his finger. He got it to go faster and faster and fast until the canvas started to some before stopping it and dropping it on the mattress.

"You're an odd one." Ron declared with exasperation. Harry laughed.

"You could say that." You could also say that he was a freak, a demon, or a crime against humanity but he preferred special. Euphemism were nice that way.

"Are you going to try to pull tonight?" Ron asked his voice a little giddy. He was also far too nosy, "Nah, I'm a little tired, I think I'm just going to unpack a little and go to bed." He admitted.

"C'mon, mate I need you to pull through here. Only one of us gets to actually live the bachelor life. I'm living through you." Ron reminded him. He rolled his eyes. Bachelor was not the first term he'd use to describe himself.

"Trust me mate, you wouldn't want to hear about who I'd pull if I went out tonight." He mocked. Ron had never had an issue with his sexuality, he had always just been a little grossed out by the details.

"But I thought you thought that you were bi?" Ron whined. Harry laughed.

"Exactly and I've had to pretend to be straight for years, do you really think the first person I hook up with is gonna be female?" He laughed. Not that he had even really had much success pulling girls in the past, that was part of the reason he still put probably in front of his sexuality. He hadn't told Ron yet but he was ninety percent sure he was gay. But who knew, maybe the perfect girl would walk down the street tomorrow? He didn't really like labels.

"C'mon! Can't you help a bloke out just this once?" His friend begged. Harry rolled his eyes.

"I am not your own personal spank bank Ron Weasley, if you want to hook up with someone, you've gotta make the move." He advised, at least he was ninety percent sure that that was how it worked.

"How? I don't have a car, I live in a house with my parents and my younger sister and I'm in the literal middle of nowhere." He whined. Ah the perils of commuting.

"Calm down, we'll go out this weekend all right?" Harry suggested easily.

"And what happens if I don't get lucky, crash at your place? I don't think so." Ron snarked.

"Honestly, do you really think Malfoy will hold a grudge over whatever happened?" Harry suggested. If it was a family beef it had to have been years ago since this was the first that Harry had even heard of it.

"Yes." Harry wasn't sure that he had ever heard Ron with that serious of a tone.

Draco

Harry was loud which was good, but not exactly necessary. The microphone that Draco had set up in his room would work just fine even if Potter was whispering. He had thought about setting up cameras too, but those were too tricky to keep running all of the time. The microphone was set to only turn on when the door closed. Draco's earbud told him that Potter was on the phone with fucking Ron Weasley of all people. What were the odds of those two being friends? They were talking about him, which was to be expected, and Harry was still stubbornly refusing to learn about his past apparently because the idiot had a dark past of his own. Lovely. Draco sighed chucked off the earbud and turned to his window. Harry technically had the larger room but Draco had an advantage. He got the balcony. He opened his slider and ran towards the railing, hard, before leaping off. There was always a moment when he wondered if he was insane. A moment when he started to fall, to plummet towards the ground, towards death, and he wondered for a moment of this was it. And then the air caught and he was soaring, twisting, rising, rocketing around turns and kicking off walls. The city was new challenge, nothing like the country sides he grew up in. Now, there were windows, people inside: talking, laughing, celebrating. They had no idea that he was here. They had no idea that he was going to free them, free them from everything wrong in this world. He whooped, gliding up, up, up until he was far above the rooftops. He through flips, twirling, corkscrewing up through the clouds. Everything was falling into place and it was all going to be okay.

Harry

Campus felt like something out of a movie. Harry showed up a half an hour early for his meeting with his academic advisor. He hadn't chosen a major yet, but he knew that he wanted to do something to help people. What exactly that meant was up in the air. He wasn't looking forward to telling his advisor that. He found the English department's office easily and wound his way to the office of Minerva McGonagall PHD. He waited anxiously, pacing quickly. He glanced at his watch nervously and two minutes to his appointment he knocked.

"Come in." The order was calm and easy and Harry pushed open the door. The woman behind the desk had severe features, thin lips, a high aristocratic nose, and high cheekbones. "Have a biscuit Potter." She offered casually, gesturing to the plate in front of her. Harry sat nervously, grabbing a pastry but not eating it.

"Do you know how many students have gotten full rides in the history of this university?" She asked coolly.

"No ma'am." He admitted, embarrassed. He should probably have known that right. It didn't say anything in the letter.

"Three. Including you." She informed him meaningfully.

"I'm honored ma'am." He explained, blushing and looking at his biscuit.

"I'm sure you are. What is important is that you understand that people will be watching you Mr. Potter, expecting great things." She told him gently.

"I'm…I'm not sure I'll live up to those expectations, I mean, I'm just Harry." He shrugged. There never had been anything remarkable about him: average grades, average participation. The only thing unique about how wasn't exactly something that he could put on college applications.

"Of course, I'm just letting you know that there may be some strange reactions among your professors. I assume that you would prefer to be treated like any other student?" McGonagall checked brusquely.

He nodded vigorously.

"Wonderful. Now, for the matter of your schedule, it says here that you have no idea what you plan to major in, is that still true?" She asked. He blushed, wishing he had a better answer.

"Yes Ma'am," He admitted nervously.

"Well then, we can begin filling your General Education requirements. I recommend you take classes in a wide variety of areas this semester so you can begin exploring your options." She suggested.

"Okay." He shrugged. He hadn't really gotten so far as to think about what classes he was going to take.

"You need to take a freshman year seminar, here is the list of class topics." She handed him a sheet of paper with courses listed in a neat font.

He stared at the list blankly, seeing more courses than he ever could have imagined. He realized after a beat that he was probably taking too long, that most students would have looked up the options on that website that he hadn't had time to sign into yet. He recognized McGonagall's name dizzily and pointed to it before reading the name.

"You would truly like to take my seminar on how King Arthur is depicted through literature?" McGonagall asked skeptically. He cringed internally. "Yes Ma'am." He lied; it was far too late to back up now.

"At eight every Monday morning?" She checked again. He cringed. That sounded like it should have been outlawed by the Geneva Convention.

"Yes Ma'am." He repeated. She raised a perfectly sculpted, highly skeptical eyebrow.

"You can change your mind Potter, I won't be offended." McGonagall assured him. He sighed in relief and nodded profusely.

"Do you have a recommendation?" He asked hopefully to pacify her. "Is it the time?" She asked knowingly. "Yes ma'am." He agreed, blushing.

"One of my colleagues teaches a course on Piracy throughout the ages as a Freshman Seminar, it comes highly recommended and takes place Wednesdays at eleven." She offered helpfully.

"That sounds very interesting." He agreed gratefully.

"Now tell me, do any other courses look interesting?" She asked, handing him the large binder from her desk. He flipped through idly, his eyes swimming as he took in title after title, some of which he didn't even know the meaning of.

"I have no idea." He admitted.

"You should at least take an English class, start there." She suggested.

"I still…" He trailed of, this was terrible, he had no interests.

"Romantic Poetry, very few male students, excellent skill to have." She recommended with a wink, already scribbling it in.

"That's…" Not at all what he wanted. Though, who's to say that poetry won't work just as well on men.

"Intro to Gender studies will fulfill your History requirement and Climate Change as a Social Debate will satisfy your first science requirement." She continued without missing a beat.

"Oh, okay. Thank you." Harry stuttered. She handed him a copy of his schedule. He had no classes on Mondays at all and no classes that started earlier than nine. Wonderful.

"Have a nice day Mr. Potter." She responded dismissively and Harry clumsily left the room, the chair screeching on the floorboards and the door closing too loudly. He leaned against the door nervously, okay, first professional interaction with his advisor, not too bad, right? He groaned and put his head in his hands. The "Hehem" almost made him jump out of his skin.

"What?" Harry gasped, taking note of the primly dressed brunette in front of him.

"If you'll excuse me, I'd rather not be late for my meeting because of your existential crisis." She gestured for him to move over and he hurried to comply.

"Sorry." He stuttered as she closed the door behind her. Something told him that her meeting was going to go much better than his.

Draco

"Well I see here that you satisfied a number of core requirements during high school, do you have the official record of those exams so that we can exempt you from those courses?" Draco's academic advisor was a short man with glasses that perched precariously on the tip of his nose. "Professor Flitwick" was written in gold on a cheap name plate that perched messily among the piles of paper on his desk.

"No." Draco cut him off. That was not part of the plan.

"What?" The pixie jumped, looking at him like he had three heads.

"I don't want to use those credits. Put me in English 101, Biology 101, American History 101, and Economics 101." He rattled off easily.

"Those are the exact classes that you'd be exempt from because you took them at a college level in high school." The professor stressed.

"Yes." Draco confirmed.

"Why would you want to take classes when you already know the material?" Flitwick asked, clearly befuddled. "I wouldn't want to strain myself my first semester, would I?" He asked, smirking.

"But Mr. Malfoy" The older man protested, clearly about to squawk something about potential and remarkable SAT scores.

"Thank you professor, I'll be going now." Draco cut him off, not in the mood for that lecture again.

...

Harry

Harry could've skipped as he crossed the quad. There were students under trees, throwing footballs and frisbees, and clubs handing out flyers. A girl stopped him, smiling pleasantly as she did.

"Hey, would you be interested in joining Feminist United?" SHe asked cheerily, holding a yellow flyer out. He took it warily.

"Me?" He asked nervously. He was ninety percent sure he was missing some criteria for that club. He glanced down at the flyer and right across the top was "All Genders Welcome." Guess not.

"Yeah, you look like the type." She shrugged, still smiling, but softer. When she moved her brunette ponytail swung behind her. It was strangely hypnotizing and not in a good way.

"What does that mean?" He asked, genuinely very confused. She raised her eyebrows skeptically, flicking down his scarf, flannel, skinny jeans, and converse.

"You know." She told him confidently before turning away and heading to her next victim. He shoved the flyer in the side pocket of his bag and headed towards that cafe. He wouldn't have classes for two days so he had time to kill.

...

The cafe was busy, packed to the brim with students. Harry sighed and resolved to get his coffee to go. He waited in line anxiously, feeling highly out of place. He felt like bouncing and he really should go for a run one of these days but it would be harder in the city. Along with moving things, he had quickly discovered that he was stronger than he should be. Not crazily so, but for someone who never worked out, he had a little too much ease the first time he tried lifting. As an extension, running was too easy. His legs were strong, he ran fast and hard without any effort and definitely in a way that would attract attention. At home he would run in the woods where no one could see but here he'd have to find another way to relax. The barista cleared his throat suddenly and Harry realized it was probably his turn.

"Vanilla chai latte, large." He ordered quickly and stepped to the side. The coffee was quickly offered and he grabbed it nervously; he was moving for the door when a voice called out to him.

"Hey, freshman!" A voice called. He spun, finding a group of students gathered around a table looking at him expectantly. He pointed to himself warily and a girl with bright red lipstick and blonde hair nodded passionately. He walked over nervously and one of the guys, a blonde haired bloke in a polo pulled out a chair for him. He sat down nervously.

"We need you to settle a debate for us." An African American girl with perfectly curled hair announced. He shrugged.

"How do you define a sandwich?" The blonde asked passionately. Harry looked around for a beat, waiting for someone to start laughing but they continued to stare at him seriously.

"I don't know. The same way as anyone else?" He answered timidly.

"Stuff in between bread?" The blonde suggested.

"How much bread is required?" The bloke added.

"More than one piece?" The African American girl continued.

"What about sub rolls, that's one piece?" The bloke rounded on the girl.

"What differentiates an open faced sandwich from a pizza?" The blonde posed wisely, then they all rounded on him.

"What do you think?" The bloke asked. Harry froze, utterly overwhelmed.

"I think...I think you need two pieces or two connected pieces of bread and I think you need meat." He proposed. The blonde scoffed immediately.

"Meat? What about a PB and J?" She snapped decisively but not angrily.

"That's not nutrition, that's a dessert." Harry pointed out. He had never liked PB and J.

"That's a good point! Are pastries sandwiches?" The guy posed.

"What about wraps?" Harry through in, they all sat up, jumping on these new angles.

Harry wasn't sure but he thought that he may have just made friends.

A/N: Hello all, I hoped you liked this chapter. This fic should move pretty quickly but I'm writing it in between chapters of Dangerous Desires, my main fic, at the moment. I'm well aware that these two would have registered for classes far before the day before classes start but what can I say other than creative license. I'm trying to keep OC's to a minimum here so every character for the most part is based on a character in canon. Bonus points if you can guess who's who.

Please, please, please leave me a review, they keep me going.