Author's Note: Thank you all for your kind reviews! I received more than I had expected to for the first chapter in one day, so you guys are awesome. And that's why I decided to write the next one for you now. As a big giant thank you and I love you. No joke. I LOVE YOU. And yes, in a totally creepy way.

Chapter 2

Harry sighed and rubbed his forehead tiredly as he tried to explain the situation for the billionth time to his friends. This was getting ridiculous. Merlin, he knew it'd be tough, but he didn't know that he was going to be grilled like a criminal! What was so strange about him walking down the corridor with the boy whom he had shared a mutual loathing with holding onto his arm, anyhow? Honestly.

"I told you, it's because he's lost his memory!"

Hermione shook her head. "But how is it that he can remember things from when he was young, but not when he was at Hogwarts?"

"I… don't… know."

"And why does that mean you have to help the stupid git," Ron muttered, glaring at nobody in particular.

Harry pinched the bridge of his nose impatiently. "I know you don't like him Ron, and I don't like him either, but I feel obligated to do something. I mean, I'm the reason why the bloody prat can't even remember that he hates me! I can't just sit here!"

"Why not?"

"Be-fucking-cause!" Harry roared, causing many students to turn and stare at him. He gazed back at them in fierce challenge, and most of them looked away.

Hermione gave him a stern look, and he wilted involuntarily. "Harry! Stop acting like a child. We're in the library," she scolded.

Harry rolled his eyes. Bloody friends trying to bloody annoy him to death. Gods. Times like these made him actually wish he could spend more time with Malfoy, which was unbelievable. No matter how tolerable the Slytherin boy had been recently, his best friends should be the ones to make things easier, not drive him mad with stupid questions.

"I know, okay? Can't you guys just accept that I'm going to help Malfoy and then be quiet? I mean, really. It's not that difficult."

"Fine. Merlin, you don't have to be so bloody nasty about it," Ron retorted.

Hermione just shot him a wounded look.

Harry sighed and shook his head. His temper had been flaring up ever since the whole incident had started, and now it had gotten a million times worse with Malfoy's questionable condition. And to top it all off, the stress of the chaos was threatening to give him a Voldemort-sized headache. But he didn't want to take it out on his friends, no matter how much they were bugging him at the moment.

"You know, you're right. I'm sorry. It's just—I feel so damn terrible about the whole thing. Malfoy's got no idea who he is and it's all my fault."

Ron patted his shoulder sympathetically. "I know it's rough but you can fix it, mate. You can do anything." His blue eyes lit up as he thought of something and he grinned. "But hey, look on the bright side. At least you knocked some compassion into the evil ferret." He laughed. "Get it? I mean literally knocked—"

"Yeah I get it, Ron. Ha, ha," Harry deadpanned.

Hermione pursed her lips. "Just try to be careful, okay Harry?"

"Be careful about what?"

"If Malfoy suddenly regains his memory..."

Harry took her hand and squeezed it reassuringly. "Don't worry, Mione. I've been able to handle him for years now. If he shows any signs of malice, I'll turn right around and beat his arse. Just because I'm helping him, doesn't mean I've got to like him."

"Like who?"

Harry turned around and spotted Malfoy coming up to their table, having appeared from behind one of the bookcases and sliding into a seat next to Ron. The redhead grimaced and shifted away a bit. The blond looked at him expectantly.

Shit. Hurry! Make something up! "Um, Snape," Harry muttered, shooting him a weak smile. He almost rolled his eyes at himself. Yeah, that was brilliant.

But Malfoy hadn't seemed to pick up on his lame excuse. The boy just glanced at Ron and Hermione with an uncertain expression crossing his normally pointy face, and it was then that Harry realised the magnitude of Malfoy's problem. He had no idea who these people were. They were strangers. They were strangers that he had taunted and tortured for years but had no recollection of doing so. Strangers with whom he'd undoubtedly shared memories with but couldn't remember. And those were the memories that helped him build on who he was. Without them, without these strangers… Malfoy was a stranger. To himself.

Harry shook his head, trying to clear his thoughts and remember where he was. "Uh, sorry. I realise I didn't properly introduce you," he said. "This is Hermione."

Malfoy held out his hand towards her. "Hi, I'm Draco."

Hermione looked surprised, but took his hand and shook it anyway. "Hello, Draco."

Harry smiled. Then he took a deep breath and prayed to Merlin that shit was not about to go down. "And this is Ron."

Malfoy held out a hand towards him, too. "Hello, Ron."

Ron just stared at him. He coughed. He looked at his hands. He drummed on the table. He played with the fraying ends of his sleeves. He fiddled with the cover of the book in front of him. Anything but look at or accept Malfoy's hand, which was still being offered out to him patiently. Finally, after a long and uncomfortable pause, he gurgled something incompetently and looked away. The rest of the table stared at him with mixed expressions of disbelief and weirded out looks.

Harry rolled his eyes. Well, it was a good try, anyways. He had known from the beginning that Ron would be the one who would have the most trouble adjusting to the new situation. He tried to amend the awkward moment by staying lighthearted. "Yeah, so these are my friends. Aren't they both charming?"

He let out a sigh of relief as Malfoy laughed and the tension left the table. The Slytherin boy didn't seem put off by Ron's awkwardness in the slightest.

"Fantastic. They aren't so bad, after all." Then Draco looked at Hermione in explanation. "Harry says that if I'm to be hanging around him, I'll also have to put up with you guys. But I don't think I'll mind all that much, since you seem quite civil."

Hermione giggled, somewhat apprehensively. "Um, yes. Thank you. I suppose that we will be spending more time together then."

Malfoy tilted his head in speculation. "But doesn't that mean that you will have to put up with my friends too, since you'll all be hanging around me? I've only met a few of them, but I don't reckon they'd be quite as charming."

Harry snorted and Ron looked horrified.

~x~

Draco glanced around warily, observing the students around him setting up their stations for the potion they were to brew today. But to be honest, he had no idea what on earth had been going on for the past 20 minutes since class had begun. Uncle Severus—well, Professor Snape—had given quite detailed instructions on what it was that they were making, but Draco couldn't seem to focus on anything, really. He hadn't been focused on anything since he'd woken up. He supposed it was probably one of the downsides of being brutally attacked by a bludger.

He sighed, tracing light, random circles on the table in front of him. If only he could remember what it was like being mauled by a bludger. It would probably be quite the story to tell. Draco thought back to when he'd visited Uncle—er, Professor Snape the previous night, and the man had wondered if Draco could possibly be more heavily affected by the memory loss. Draco didn't really know what to make of that statement. How much more could he be affected? He couldn't remember a single thing. Like why this instruction sheet was so tricky to interpret, for instance. He glared at it in frustration. Harry had told him that he'd been exceptionally brilliant at the subject, but he just couldn't seem to recall anything about it. Well, not unless somebody mentioned a very specific topic. Then, the answers just seemed to flood back to him. It was incredibly strange, and he preferred not to get into it too much.

Speaking of Harry… he glanced over at the pantry, where the boy was supposed to be getting supplies, frowning. What was taking him so long?

As he waited, Professor Snape suddenly appeared before him, a look of slight uneasiness that only Draco could detect cleverly masked by bored indifference. "Mr. Malfoy, did you understand today's lecture enough to complete the assignment, or might you need extra assistance?"

Draco shrugged. "I'm all right, sir. I think. I mean, I can remember bits and pieces. Like, I've never seen this thing before," he pointed to an odd-looking plant, "but somehow I know that it's a Gurdyroot. I'll be fine. Plus, Harry will help me."

Professor Snape snorted. As he walked away, Draco thought he heard him scoff, "Yeah, he'll help you. Right off a cliff, he'll help you."

He shook his head. He didn't know what that meant, but whatever. Harry had promised to help him, and he would. Wouldn't he? Though, Harry had never quite mentioned whether or not he was even good at Potions in the first place... Draco looked up just as Harry was coming back with an armful of jars and roots.

"Here. I think I've got all the ingredients," Harry mumbled, somewhat awkwardly, setting his pile down on the table. "Do you have the instructions?"

Draco nodded. "Yeah, here." As he watched Harry sort out his things on the table, a thought popped up into his head and he leaned back against the work table, trying to appear casual. "So, I hear you've got a girlfriend."

Harry stopped rearranging things and turned to look at him with a curious expression on his face. "Erm, yeah. I do."

"Ginevra, is it not?"

Harry raised his eyebrows. "Ginny. But you usually don't call her that, though."

"What do I call her?"

"Uh, never mind. But yes, Ginny's my girlfriend."

Draco felt a pang of jealousy in his chest and turned away a bit, absently beginning to rearrange the ingredients himself. "That's nice. Sort of. Not really."

Harry gave him an amused look. "Oh? And why is it not really?"

Draco smiled innocently. "I don't know…"

He bit his lip and dropped his gaze to Harry's mouth for a moment, before looking up into his eyes again and taking in his tanned appearance. Merlin, what a face. The boy was watching Draco's movements with an easy grin on his lips, his eyes shining bright with mirth and his arms crossed, sleeves rolled up to his elbows to reveal pretty, golden skin. Draco sighed. How could he have once hated this boy? He was adorable!

"She just doesn't seem like your type."

Harry chuckled tensely. "Um… I have a type?"

Draco was just about to reply, before suddenly the classroom disappeared around him. He widened his eyes as his surroundings changed to what he recognised as Flourish & Blott's, the small bookstore in Diagon Alley. He turned to ask Harry if this normally happened during Potions class, but didn't find him there. Instead, there was a small boy who resembled him very closely. But as Draco inspected him further, he realised that it was Harry. A very young Harry. It had to be. The boy had the same thin frame, that disheveled raven-coloured mane, and those dazzling green eyes almost hidden behind wide-rimmed glasses. The only difference was the unfamiliarly cold, hard glare that he wore.

Draco glanced around, only to discover that the boy's angry gaze was directed at him. He stared back in puzzlement. Why was Harry looking at him like that? He had never seen that fierce expression mar the smooth features of the other boy's face before… had he?

Harry's voice was like ice as he practically spat at him. "Malfoy."

Draco shrunk back at his sharp tone. He wanted to ask Harry why he was looking and acting like this, but his mouth apparently other ideas. "Potter," he sneered back, unable to stop his face from twisting into an expression of abhorrence as he said it. What? He almost stepped back in surprise. Why couldn't he control what he was doing?

"What a pleasure to see you shopping around with all us commoners," Harry told him, a sarcastic lilt replacing his normally sweet voice.

"The pleasure would have been mine had I never arrived here. I'll have to go elsewhere, seeing as vermin like you has polluted it." He glanced behind Harry at a large group of redheads who were all glowering at him as well.

"And if I had previously known that the ginger mutt family shopped here, I'd have avoided it like the vile plague that they are," he jeered again. Draco wanted to slap a hand over his mouth and shut himself up, but he couldn't. What was he saying?

Harry's impossibly green eyes narrowed. "Shut up, Malfoy. You don't know anything about them!"

Draco, helpless, felt his mouth curve up into a smirk. "Aw, defending your precious Weasel family, are you? A lowly little replacement for your dead mum and dad, eh, Potter?"

"Leave him alone!"

Draco's eyes flicked down to see a thin, redheaded girl glaring up at him for all she was worth. That had to be Ginny Weasley. Her brown eyes shone with blazing emotion and a fire that he hadn't expected out of such a small girl, and he felt the need to step back to protect himself. But of course, he didn't.

A cruel laugh escaped his throat without warning, instead. "Oh look, Potter! You've got yourself a girlfriend," he leered, with another smirk at Harry.

At that moment, Draco's father swept up behind him. "Come now, Draco. We're finished here."

He gaped at him. Why was his father here? Wasn't he dead? Was this some kind of sick joke? He turned to look at Harry again, whose green eyes pierced his with a jolt of pure, intense hatred. It was as if they had trapped him there, hypnotising him and making him unable to move or look away as the scene around them started to shift rapidly. He felt the room spiraling at full speed, and all that was constant were those glowing emeralds burning holes into his sockets. When he finally had the strength to tear his gaze away from them, the room had stopped spinning and he could see Harry clearly again. But it was normal Harry, whose eyes were not filled with contempt, but tremendous alarm.

"Draco? Draco!"

Draco rubbed his eyes and looked around in disbelief. The spinning and Harry's eyes had led him back to the Potions classroom. But where did Flourish & Blott's go? Young Harry? His father? What the hell was going on here?

"What happened?" he murmured, utterly perplexed.

"You were... in a trance, or something. You were out for a good five minutes. Are you okay?" Harry put a hand on his shoulder.

Draco looked down at Harry's hand and without thinking, batted it away with a glare. "Don't touch me, Potter!" he screeched. Harry recoiled in shock as Draco gasped and shook his head. "No, no, wait. I'm sorry, I don't know where that came from, I don't know—"

He dropped his face in his hands, still shaking his head. What had just happened? Had he been dreaming when he fainted? It was so vivid, as if it had once happened. But how could it have? He couldn't remember anything. Couldn't he? His head was throbbing as he recalled the way Harry glowered at him, the way his eyes flashed with loathing. He knew that they had once hated each other, but that look—it was more hate. It was a deep, fathomless, to the very core revulsion. It said I wish you never existed. And that terrified him more than anything else in the world. That wasn't real. It couldn't have been. He glanced up at Harry, who was still watching him with a worried look. Who is Harry Potter: the caring, concerned boy or the hateful, disgusted one? Then he looked down at his own hands, which had started to shake violently. And who was Draco Malfoy to begin with?

Draco shook his head once more, before grabbing his book bag off the chair. "I've got to go," he mumbled, not stopping to wait for a reply or approval. He sprinted out of the classroom and didn't stop until he was buried deep within the covers of his bed.

~x~

"I don't know, Hermione," Harry sighed as he slouched down onto one of the couches in the Gryffindor common room. "One minute we were having a conversation, and the next he was out like a light. I tried shaking him and slapping him and poking him, but nothing worked. I was about to fetch Snape when suddenly he woke up, only he was all confused and he looked at me as if he'd seen a ghost. After that he was rocking back and forth for a bit before bolting out of the room."

Hermione frowned deeply. "You don't think it could be some side effect of suffering from a rare concussion, do you?"

"I don't know. But whatever it was, it was weird. When he came to again, he looked at me as if I had just personally murdered his favorite owl. And when I touched his shoulder to comfort him, he yelled 'don't touch me Potter', but then got all horrified with himself for saying it and started apologising a bunch. Before he apologised though, it was kinda like old times—"

Hermione got a strange look on her face. "Old times, you say?"

"Yeah... Like how he would act if we were dueling or something."

She bit her lip. "What if… what if he had a flashback?"

"Of what?"

She turned to face him. "Like, of a bad memory. That had to do with you."

"Well, I'm sure there were lots of those, but—"

"What were you talking about before it happened?"

Harry thought back for a moment. "Um… we were talking about Ginny."

Hermione raised an eyebrow. "Ginny? Why?"

Harry shrugged. "He brought up how I was dating her."

Hermione made a 'hmm' noise. She gazed into the fireplace for a while in silence, and Harry let her. She was in assessment mode. Finally, she spoke up again. "That conversation must have had some sort of trigger on his memory. Do you think you could talk to him about it?"

Harry gave her a look. "He was pretty shaken up about it. I don't know if I should."

"This is important, Harry. If you talk to him, maybe it can help cure him."

Harry sat back and sighed. He wanted to, he really did. But he was walking on eggshells with Malfoy as it was already. Or at least, it felt like it. He never knew when the other boy could crack. So what if Malfoy suddenly hated him for asking? What if he pushed him away and didn't let him help him anymore? He shook his head at his ridiculous fears. Why did he have any reason to be scared? Malfoy was the one going through this nightmare.

He thought back to the way Malfoy had reacted to Harry touching him. He couldn't stop watching that terrible, familiar expression play over and over in his brain. It was as if the old Malfoy had made a swift reappearance and then disappeared just as quickly. Harry saw the internal battle in the other boy's grey eyes—the naïve, confused Malfoy warring with the bitter, angry one. Whether the blond had been aware of that battle going on inside of him, Harry didn't know. All he truly knew was that horrified look on Malfoy's face before he ran out of the room. It was as if he were not only frightened of Harry, but of himself as well. He had to get to the bottom of this, only to know if the other boy was okay. Harry shook his head, trying not to wonder when it had become important to him to make sure that Malfoy was okay.

"I'm going to go talk to him," he said, getting up suddenly, his decision made.

Hermione looked around. "But he's in Slytherin now. Can't you wait until dinner?"

Harry bit his lip. "No. I have to speak with him now." He pulled out his wand and summoned his invisibility cloak from his dorm. It came flying towards him and he caught it with one hand and stuffed it into his pocket. "You don't happen to know the Slytherin password, do you?"

Hermione sighed. "You know I don't like giving it to you."

"Please? It's for a good cause this time."

"You won't tell Ron for future pranks?"

"Erm…"

"Harry!"

"Fine, I won't. What is it?"

"Unicorn blood."

Harry rolled his eyes and headed for the portrait hole. "Original."

Hermione gave him a tiny half-smile. "Like I said before, be careful Harry. You never know."

He nodded at her. This time, Harry wasn't inclined to tell her not to worry.

~x~

Harry checked his map to make sure that Malfoy was in Slytherin and sure enough, he was in his dorm. He stashed it away in his pocket and hurried his way down to the dungeons, making sure to take the lesser-used corridors. Once he was close enough to see the portrait hole, he ducked into an alcove and threw the invisibility cloak over his head. Then, he checked his surroundings for passing students and finding the coast clear, snuck over to the entrance. He whispered the password and the door swung open to an almost empty common room. Zabini and Nott were sitting together on the couch facing the portrait, and they both looked over as Harry entered and snuck inside.

Zabini frowned. "Who just came in?"

Nott got up and checked the doorway. "There's nobody here."

They both looked around in confusion and Harry waited by one of the staircases with baited breath. Zabini shrugged. "Oh, well. Stupid portrait just opens whenever it fancies to."

"Yeah. So what were you saying about Draco?"

Zabini glanced around and his voice grew so soft that Harry had to strain to hear him. "He won't come out of the dorm. I've tried talking to him, but he just sits there with this strange, blank expression. It's really starting to scare me."

"Is it the accident?"

"I'm not sure. He's pretty upset over something, though. Goyle snuck into the kitchens and snatched some of Draco's favourites but he won't take them, and now Goyle's all upset too. I'm afraid everybody will lose their minds if he just sits there like that. I know I'm getting close."

Nott sighed. "Well, why don't you ask Potter to come help him? Isn't that his job, too?"

Zabini wrinkled his nose in disgust. "I doubt there's anything that Potter could do."

"Who knows? It's Potter. The prat can do just about anything."

"Ugh. As much as I hate to admit it, that's unfortunately much too true. I just don't know how to ask him without sounding like a prat myself."

Harry tried not to laugh out loud. Slytherins and their dumb pride. It's a wonder how they ever got by in life all alone. Well, if Zabini was too proud to ask for help, Harry had no problem with just butting in and doing it anyways. It was what he was good at, honestly. He took off the cloak and stepped towards them.

"Hey guys, what's up?"

The two boys turned around and Nott's eyes bugged out of his smallish head.

"Potter? How did you get in here?"

Harry smiled and motioned towards the portrait hole. "Same as you. Did you really think that the door just opened by itself? Come on, that's not very Slytherin of you."

Zabini's mouth hung open in astonishment. "Did you just hear—?"

"Yeah, I did. And I'm glad you think so highly of me, Zabini. By the way, that's a good look on you. Really brings out your best features."

Zabini immediately stopped gaping and glared at him. "Well? Are you going to go talk to him or not?"

Harry pretended to ponder over it. "I don't know…"

"Fucking talk to him, Potter! Or I swear, I will kill you."

Harry grinned. "Well, since you asked so nicely." He winked at them and stuffed his cloak in his robes as he headed towards the boys' dormitories. Glancing at his map one more time, he saw that Malfoy was still in his bed. He cautiously pushed open the door to the dorm.

"Malfoy?"

He searched around the room until he found a bed with Malfoy's blond hair peeping out from the tops of the covers. He sighed and walked over to sit on the bed next to him. "Hey, Draco. Are you awake?" He pushed back the bed sheets to find the boy's eyes slid shut. He was sleeping. Harry sighed and bit his lip, not knowing what to do. Should he let Malfoy sleep? He looked too peaceful to wake. He decided to wait until the Slytherin woke up to have their much-needed discussion. This way he would have more time to think out what he was going to say in the first place.

Harry leaned over, studying the smoothness of Malfoy's face and listening to the rhythmic sound of his breathing. He brought his fingers up to brush a few strands of hair away from Malfoy's forehead, and the other boy's mouth curved up in a small smile at his touch. Harry smiled back at him, forgetting that he was asleep and that he could not see it.

"You're pretty when you sleep," he murmured, letting his fingers trail lightly down the silken skin of Malfoy's cheek. He absently wondered how he had never known that such a beautiful face had been masked by the cool indifference Malfoy used to wear. And Merlin, what gorgeous skin he had. Harry immediately felt a bit jealous, his hand flying up to rub the slightly rough feel of his jaw before finding its way back to Malfoy's.

Suddenly, Malfoy began to stir and Harry whipped the hand away from the boy's face as if burned. Malfoy opened his grey eyes drowsily and for a moment, Harry saw a flash of panic in them before they settled back to normal.

"Harry. What are you doing here?" he asked, his voice groggy from sleep.

"Need to talk to you," Harry replied, still thinking about that brief look Malfoy had just given him. It worried him.

"Hmm. Were you just touching my face?"

That made Harry pay attention. He looked away, trying not to blush. "What? No, pfft. No. I would never do that, that's weird."

Malfoy smiled a little. "So that wasn't you," he remarked. Harry felt a warm affection go through him for the other boy, which was different. He'd certainly never felt that for the devious Slytherin before. He reached out and ran his finger along Malfoy's jaw line again, tracing the muscles as they tensed from his touch.

"Did it feel like that?"

"Mm-hm."

Harry laughed and retreated his hand. "Nope, that definitely wasn't me."

Malfoy chuckled too and turned his head to look at him. "So what do you need to talk to me about?"

Harry chewed on his lip anxiously. He really didn't want to ask the other boy about it. Maybe he could draw it out a bit more, because he really didn't have much time to plan what he was going to say earlier. Granted, he had gotten a bit distracted by Malfoy's flawless skin, but still. The point was that he was completely at a loss for words now. And also, he would be perfectly content to just sit here all night and trace swirly patterns on Malfoy's face.

"We don't have to talk about it right now. We can just hang out, if you'd like."

Malfoy smiled strangely. "It's about this afternoon, isn't it? In Potions."

Harry sighed and nodded. "I just want to understand so I can help you," he confessed.

"Yeah. I know you do." He studied Harry's face searchingly. "But why? How come you want to help me?"

"Well, I feel bad about—"

"Don't give me that. You hate me. Don't say that you don't. I'm still the same Draco Malfoy, you know, it's not like I'm a completely changed person from before. It's still me. So, you hate me. As in, present tense. So why the hell would you want to get involved with this?"

Harry struggled to come up with a response to that. He rarely even knew why he was doing it himself. All he knew was that he was following his gut instinct, and he was pretty damn good at doing that. It was in his nature. He could only say what he knew, and what he knew wasn't very much. Finally, he answered in the most honest way he could possibly think of. "I don't hate you, Draco. I just don't understand you."

"But you used to hate me. Did you not understand me then, either?"

"I… I don't know." And that was honest again.

Malfoy shook his head and looked away. "But then again, if what I saw were true I would've hated me, too."

Harry frowned. "What do you mean?"

"When I passed out, I had… I had a dream, of some sort," Malfoy paused, as if concentrating on remembering it clearly. "I was in a bookstore. Flourish & Blott's, to be exact. And you were there, except you were very young, and very angry. We started quarreling, and Ginny Weasley came up to me and began chastising me for speaking to you that way."

Harry stomach churned unpleasantly, and a feeling of dread passed through his chest. This was all too familiar to him as well, it couldn't have just been a dream of Malfoy's... but why was it so familiar? He couldn't put his finger on it, but he was starting to get the feeling that Hermione was right. Yet again. This was clearly not just a random dream. He had an idea of what it was, but he really hoped it wasn't that, because that was beyond weird. He tried it anyways.

"Did you say, 'Oh look, Potter! You've got yourself a girlfriend'?"

Malfoy turned to him slowly, his mouth forming a round 'o'. "How did you know that?" he whispered, a hint of fear in his voice.

Harry looked down at his lap. Shit. This was worse than he'd thought.

"That was a memory of us. Right before our 2nd year."

Malfoy was quiet. He stared at his hands for a long time, as if he'd never seen them before. "Your eyes…" he murmured, finally.

Harry was confused. "My eyes?"

Malfoy turned to look at him. "Your eyes. They're constant. They were so green back then, and they're so green right now."

"They were?"

Malfoy nodded. "It was like somehow, they led me back. To reality, I mean. But it was confusing because you had the same eyes, so I wasn't sure whether or not I was back yet, or even if I had gone in the first place. It was sort of frightening and perplexing, at the same time."

"Oh."

Harry didn't really know what else to say. He had never really thought of his eyes as anything special or complex before, or that Malfoy even noticed that kind of thing. Had that been a compliment just then? The two of them were hushed for another long while, neither boy moving or making a sound.

"Is that really how I used to be?" Malfoy asked, breaking the silence again.

"What?"

"In that… that memory. Was that who I was?"

Harry hesitated, not really wanting to tell him straightforward that yes, he had been a snarky little pureblooded prat, but knowing that there was only one way to put it. Besides, he couldn't give Malfoy some kind of censored version of his own life, that was just wrong. It's not like he cared too much about what Malfoy would think of himself when he heard the full story, anyway. To be honest, he sort of wished the boy would feel guilty for the way he'd been. So he decided to just go for it. In the nicest way possible, of course.

"Well truthfully, what you saw there was Draco Malfoy in a good mood. And as the years went on, your mood never really improved."

Malfoy paled. "I was worse than that?" Harry closed his eyes and nodded. The blond took a deep, shuddering breath in order to calm himself or something.

"So let me get this straight: I was a total shithead who turned into even more of a shithead as I got older."

"Yeah, pretty much."

"Brilliant. And now I'm having flashbacks. But not flashbacks that I know are flashbacks. I've officially gone insane."

Harry opened his eyes and looked at him sharply. "Flashbacks that you don't know are flashbacks? What do you mean?"

"I mean, I thought that it was a dream, not a memory. It felt like one. It still doesn't feel like it fits into my life, even though I don't know exactly what my life is, or was. It's not connecting in any way. I have nothing to connect me to my past, even with my flashbacks."

"It's as if you have to experience them all a second time."

Malfoy nodded. "Without the strength of my sanity to guide me."

Harry shook his head in disbelief. "You're going to need a lot more help than I thought you did."

Malfoy bit his lip. "But you'll still be there to give it, won't you?"

Harry observed his face, all scrunched up with worry that Harry wouldn't be there for him. Two weeks ago, Harry wouldn't have given a flying fuck about what happened to Draco Malfoy. Two weeks ago, he would have said 'hell no' and walked out without a stitch of shame. But now, he realised that there was no way he could refuse. He could never give up now, now that Malfoy had put all this trust and faith into him, no matter how twisted or awful the Slytherin turned out to be. This was something that Harry had to be prepared to dive into and never look back. Could he do that?

He nodded slowly, despite his conflicted feelings. He was a Gryffindor, after all. "Yes."

Malfoy held out his pinky earnestly. "Pinky promise?"

Something about the way Malfoy's eyes glimmered with hope made his decision for him. Harry grinned and hooked his pinky onto the other boy's.

"Pinky promise," he repeated firmly.

Author's Note: Guys, I've discovered that I write better in the middle of the night. It's 4:30am right now, and this is my 3rd draft. Everything I write before 10pm is complete shit.

So what do you guys think so far? Is it confusing? I have to admit, it's a bit confusing to write. More intense that anything I've written before, too. I don't really know how I feel about this chapter. Oh, and I made a Parent Trap reference somewhere in there. Sort of. I mean, I tried. It's the Lindsay Lohan Parent Trap, not the older one… all right? I hope something in this long, mundane a/n has given you the urge to review… and if it hasn't than I strongly urge you to review in an offensively blunt manner. I should've written this at the beginning because I don't think you'll read up to here. I wouldn't have! I'm going to stop rambling now. Until next time xoxo