The Basket Case

by Stray

13. September 2006

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or its characters and make no money off of it. I'm not sure I would even if I owned them.

Warnings: This is my first HP fanfic that you get to see. I'm not a native English speaker, but I try. And this is going to contain SLASH! If you don't like it, you can still read it if you harbour masochistic tendencies. Flames are used to warm my cold little heart. Constructive criticism is appreciated.

Beta-ed by: Vaughn and C. Dumbledore.

A/N: NC-17 part cut out as usual. The full version can be read on the other archives listed in my info or my LJ.

8 ·m 8 ·m 8 ·m 8 ·m 8 ·m 8 ·m 8

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Draco did not feel like coming down for the festivities at all. Harry and Podmore made excuses for him, using the shock he had received during the ceremony and his condition as explanations for his absence. The mention of his child's health was enough to stop even Mrs. Weasley from insisting that Draco come down and take part in the celebration. Listening to the noises coming from outside, Draco thought bitterly that she must have been about the only one to notice his absence, since the party went quite well without him being there. She sent him a plate of food from every course and a large slice of chocolate cake with enough frosting to cause an adolescent girl to break out in spots for years to come.

When Draco started feeling a bit better, he allowed Harry to let in a select few people who wanted to congratulate him or talk to him for another reason. The first one was Pinky, running around the house on a sugar-high, trying to cheer Draco up with a different type of cake every time she banged into the room. Next was Granger, who did not stay long, only until she caught Draco and Harry in a group hug and managed to squeeze the breath out of them. Seeing the red blotches on her cheeks and the smile reaching from one ear to the other, Draco wondered how much she had had already to drink, but Harry just laughed off the inquiry and accused Draco of being jealous because he wasn't permitted to have alcohol. To his credit, Harry had, too, only drank one bottle of Butterbeer, acting as if he was on a pub night and not his own wedding, saying that he wasn't in the mood to get drunk. Draco secretly appreciated his self-control and his willingness to show solidarity with him.

All of the Weasleys came to visit at some point in the evening. Lawrence (he insisted that Draco call him by his first name) brought a scroll with him from Gringotts: the long awaited account. Draco thanked him for his efforts, but he was in no condition to look at it at the moment, so he just put it down onto his nightstand and resolved to read it in the morning. The slowness with which the goblins were handling his request only served to remind him of exactly how low his standing had sunk as of late. As the proprietor of the Malfoy fortune, he had been used to being on top of their list of important clients, so every one of his requests had been treated with the utmost priority. Right now, with every day that had passed without the promised account arriving, Draco had been forced to realise repeatedly just how much he had really lost.

Around eight in the evening, he got a visit from Rita Skeeter, who was so inebriated that her acid-green quill kept writing 'hiccup' and striking it out every odd second. She already had one and a half parchments full of hiccups. By the time she managed to catch the right one of Draco's many outstretched hands in her own robust grip, she had forgotten why she had come, except to offer her congratulations. Then she remembered something and insisted that Draco read a line from her notes.

Draco Malfoy should be remembered as the wizard who sacrificed his masculinity as his own contribution to our hope for a better future: to create the wizarding world's next generation, while Cyrus Malfoy is nothing more than a man who has stolen the prospect for a family from his own kin.

Draco did not deny that reading this made him feel marginally better. He still was not in the mood to go down and mingle with the guests – mostly because they must have all been drunk by then. Finally, when his head felt like it was going to split into two from the racket, he asked Podmore for a Sleeping Potion, and he was already half asleep when Harry came back and slipped in behind him, still wearing his clothes.

"You could have waited for me," he complained. "What about our wedding night?"

"Mmm'sorry," Draco mumbled. He really had forgotten about that. There was nothing he could do, though, because in the next instant, he was already knocked out and sound asleep.

He woke up to the delicious scent of bacon drifting through the rift under the door. Harry was tucked into the blankets and attached to his back so firmly that Draco was not even able to stretch his muscles or turn onto his back without jostling him a bit. In the end, Draco managed to disentangle himself without waking him up; his bladder was so full that he had almost not made it to the bathroom in time.

After he had finished his business, he didn't go back up, but went into the kitchen, and let his taste buds be seduced by the rich food Mrs. Weasley was cooking. Looking around and seeing the grimacing faces coloured various shades of green of the people around the table, he was glad that he had not drunk anything last night. The Weasel looked the worst off, but he was the only one whose hangover did not prevent him from gobbling up a large plate of bacon with eggs and sausages while the others were staring at him with ill-concealed disgust and were most likely wondering how long he would be able to keep it all down.

To Draco's surprise, the assembly included a bleary looking Hermione Granger with Ginny Weasley and Katie Bell sitting on each side of her. The latter was occupied with feeding her son and finding his mouth with varied success due to the fact that her eyes were almost completely swollen shut - no doubt, thanks to previous night's drunken debauchery. Or she just was not a morning person either.

"Good morning," Draco greeted them with an exaggeratedly cheerful smile, mostly because it served to annoy the others present, providing him with the fleeting illusion that there were other people who had it worse than him. Having been reminded of the previous day's ordeal, though, he was not able to keep up the pretence for very long.

"Here you are, dear," he heard another cheerful voice – this time it was Mrs. Weasley – and a plate filled with mouth-watering food appeared in front of him. When he looked at her over his shoulder, he thought he saw her wink at him comradely, being the only other person who didn't seem to be struggling with a hangover.

Draco tucked in with gusto, suddenly realising how hungry he really was; not even the groans and nauseated expressions around him could detract from his appetite. Soon, he was left alone with his breakfast – the others being finished or just not being able to stomach the sight. Mrs. Weasley cleared the dirty plates and cutlery from the table and then left as well, possibly to get a good start on clearing away the ruins of last night's partying. From the corner of his eye, he caught a glimpse of Granger's arm briefly draped around the waist of one of the women. Draco shook his head disapprovingly. Honestly, as if they were Muggles! Never heard of a Sobering Charm, did they? They couldn't have been still as drunk that they needed to support each other like that, right?

When the dining table was, once again, clean of dirty kitchenware, Draco noticed that someone had left their newspaper behind. It was lying with the sports page on top, presumably because Weasley had been reading the Quidditch section. Draco put down his knife and dragged the paper close to him, turning it around in the process, only to be confronted with the headline on the front page. Actually, there were three headlines; curiously, all of them beginning the phrase 'Minister of Magic'. He remembered Hermione promising something along the lines that she would take care that Draco and Harry's names wouldn't get liberally splashed around the front page, but he had not expected the outcome to have such an overall effect. He scanned the articles for the letters forming the familiar 'Malfoy' word, until he remembered that he would not find it – at least not in connection to him.

He was no longer a Malfoy, after all.

It took nearly a full minute to come to terms with that realisation. Not that it was something new, of course – he had not spent the reception of his own marriage sulking in his room for nothing. It was just that this was the first time he was confronted directly with what that meant.

There: he found his name spelled as 'Draco M' next to Harry's carefully shortened in the same way – even though he wasn't the one whose surname would consist of only one letter from now on. Draco's eyes scrolled upwards to read the title of the article, and when he did, he found himself suddenly short of breath. He thought he was quite probably still asleep and dreaming, or there was something in his tea to make him hallucinate… He read the titles of the other three articles once again to make sure he wasn't misunderstanding anything. They read the same the second time, too.

He could practically feel the vein on his temple throbbing, which usually signalled his displeasure. He scrunched the Prophet into his fist, pushed back his chair without finishing his breakfast and stood up with the intention of confronting Harry about his findings. If Harry had known about these things, then he owed Draco some explanations, and he'd better make them damn quick!

Harry was woken up instantly by the loud bang of Draco slamming the door closed behind him.

"Draco?" he asked, working to blink away sleepiness and scowling against the light. For his sake, Draco sincerely hoped that Harry had not drunk much more the previous night after Draco had fallen asleep, because he sure as hell was not going to take a pounding head into consideration while screaming down the roof, demanding a credible explanation for the nasty trick Harry had played on him.

"What does this mean?" he spat, throwing the rolled up Prophet into Harry's face. Harry though, wasn't looking at the paper; instead he was blinking sleepily at Draco, looking like a disgruntled sloth just woken up from its digestive sleep.

"What?" was the intelligent answer to Draco's question. Draco didn't feel like clarifying, especially because he was convinced that Harry had known about the whole set-up and was now only playing clueless for Draco's sake.

"This… thing in Skeeter's article. Why didn't you tell me about it?"

Harry groaned and turned to his back, closing his eyes again and pulling up the blanket to his chin.

"Which one?" he asked finally, sounding a lot less sleepy and more irritated now, as if it were he who had been wronged and not Draco. "And, for the record: you were the one who straight out refused to come with me yesterday and locked himself in my office to sulk instead. Then, after everything that had happened, I really didn't think it would be a good time for confessions, but of course you are allowed to voice your objections if you disagree with me on that point."

Draco breathed out harshly. He had demanded a plausible explanation, but the truth was that he had not expected Harry to give him one. He had expected him to stumble over his words and generally act contrite, not to take the wind out of Draco's sails with something he could not even argue with. Now he felt stupid, and suddenly, he felt like he had turned into a neurotic wife – the kind he had always accused Pansy of being.

"Don't beat up yourself over it," Harry told him, his eyes still closed, making Draco start and wonder how he had managed to get to know him over the short time they had been together to assess his silence that accurately – even without seeing him. "Come here," he patted the bed beside him, "and tell me what made you fly off the handle. What did Skeeter write in that damned article?"

Draco obeyed, shucking off his housecoat, which he had hastily donned before hurrying to the bathroom, and climbing onto the mattress. Then he opened his mouth to answer the question and realised that, actually, he had not even read the articles, only the headlines. He told Harry as much, and then Harry asked him to read them to him, while pulling him into an embrace that seemed to be designed only for situations like this. So Draco supported the Prophet on his belly and started reading aloud.

"The Minister Of Magic Brings Old Law Back Into Force," was the title of the topmost article, with the – rather long-winded – subtitle: "Same-Sex Couples Are Allowed to Marry If They Produce Offspring."

The article was about the general history of the original law some eight-hundred years back, and how it had been changed over time to allow marriage if the couple promised to create children between them. The clause had later been completely disregarded and homosexual couples had started marrying right and left, the phenomenon later leading to a dangerous drop in the birth rate of the magical population – according to some 'historians', at least – Draco preferred to call them propagandists. Then it elaborated about how bringing back this institution – by keeping a close eye to the original condition being abided by – could only serve for the betterment of the wizarding world. Then it finished with the comments of several Wizengamot members stating mostly the same – only a lot more circuitously.

"It was very clever of Granger to utilize the word 'offspring' as the honey-trap to make those uptight pure-bloods with their ancient points of view accept her proposition," Draco commented appreciatively, after finishing the article. Harry mmm-ed, his voice still rough with drowsiness, but Draco could detect a slight hint of amusement hiding within it – no doubt due to the fact that, only a few months previously, Draco himself had not been much different from the ones he was criticising now.

"Can I go back to sleep?" Harry mumbled the question into the crook of Draco's neck, which caused delicious shivers to run down his back. "Or, better than that, can I get you naked?"

Draco nodded absently, revelling in the warmth he was enveloped in.

"We are definitely coming back to the 'getting naked'-part, but there is still more here. I want to read the rest first and perhaps it will also wake you up, as I don't appreciate the prospect of you falling back asleep in the middle of pleasuring me," he said then, eliciting a small chuckle from Harry and a minute tightening of his arms around Draco's middle.

"Go on then," Harry consented charitably, burrowing his face in Draco's throat and placing small kisses onto the warmed skin, which proved damn distracting, so Draco had no other choice but to wave away those generous lips with a regretful sigh.

His eyes drifted back to the paper and his attention was immediately drawn to the next article – the one that had made him drop his fork and rush up with the intent of questioning Harry about why he had needed to keep this secret from him.

"The Minister of Magic Marries Her Long-Time Life-Partner," Draco read the title. He immediately proceeded reading the rest, his interest piqued, forgetting completely that he was supposed to read it aloud. But Harry did not complain, whether he was reading it over his shoulder or not. According to the article, he had known this already, since he had been not only one of the guests at the wedding, but also one of the best men.

The passing of the new law yesterday led to a consequence unexpected by most: Minister of Magic Hermione Granger came out as someone who has been romantically involved with another woman for almost four years. Not only that, but they have also been living together and, with the help of magic, have created a mutual child. This is the biggest secret that has been revealed about a person in such a high political position for some years. But, as opposed to the previous scandal of this magnitude, that of Cornelius Fudge having kept the return of He Who Must Not Be Named under wraps for nearly a year, this secret professes no danger to wizarding society.

In fact, learned warlocks would say the situation is the exact opposite: the long-kept secret relationship was essential in the proposition for bringing back the old marriage law, and thus opening a path for other people in her shoes (like the also newly wed couple Draco M and Harry J. P.) to legalise their relationship, and thus ease the acceptance of society for children conceived this way. Until now, the young mothers and fathers of these children had no other choice but to either marry someone of a different gender to give their children legitimacy or choose to raise them with the taint of being the product of a socially unacknowledged relationship, even though they are no less important members of the wizarding world than the boy next door who has a mother and a father to hold up.

The phenomenon is not such an isolated case, as most of us may think! The Ministry expects an increasing number of young parents or parents-to-be to come out of their hiding, appear before the public, and embrace this new opportunity for them to air the skeletons in their closets. As another favourable aspect of the new law, other same-sex couples may consider having children now that they can legally bind their lives together if they do.

But, to get back to the marriage being discussed, this reporter is sure that the readers are waiting impatiently for the (other) bride's name to be revealed. This reporter considers it her pleasure to oblige; thus, let it be known that the newly wedded wife of Hermione Granger is none other than the onetime Chaser of the professional team Pride of Portree, the deservedly celebrated Quidditch player Katie Bell. About her history, readers of the Prophet may remember that approximately three years ago, Bell was rumoured to have had an affair with Puddlemere United's Keeper, Oliver Wood, and unjustly accused of throwing matches for his sake. She retired from her professional career shortly thereafter, but, as now appears, the cause had not – or not exclusively – been the scandal that had ruined her professional reputation, but the plans of her and her partner to try conceiving…

Draco put down the paper with a rustle that had jolted Harry out of his position – the snort in Draco's ear indicated that he had, indeed, dozed off on his shoulder.

Now that he knew and thought about it – replayed some past events, fragments of conversations that he had not been able to find an explanation for before – it made perfect sense. Not because Granger and Bell (Hell! Draco had no idea whether their names were still the same!) had been obvious about it, but Draco was observant enough to be able to remember and place all those small hints together, now he had come into this knowledge.

"Bloody hell!" he muttered, not quite believing it yet. Obviously, Harry had known about it. The Weasleys must have, too, and quite possibly, a lot of former Order members as well. The only one who had been kept in the dark was Draco… and Snape, too, until recently, Draco realised, remembering the veiled not-quite-explanation filled with half-uttered truths he had been given as a reason for Snape's intended non-attendance of Draco's wedding when he had asked him to stand by his side. And Draco had thought it was because he was angry with him for his association with Harry… though in all sincerity, probably that was a reason just as important as the other.

Draco's train of thought was diverted by the sudden tingling warmth of Harry's tongue tracing a path up his throat to his ear.

"Are you done yet?" he heard Harry's steamy voice whispering into his ear. He sounded a lot more awake than when Draco had started reading, and as Draco wiggled a bit to make himself comfortable, he felt more awake as well. Draco felt heat rising from under his collar, and breathing in deeply, he savoured the slow build of arousal. Suddenly, Harry's hands resting on his thighs (when had they moved there?) felt a lot heavier and warmer…

"Just a bit more," he threw back over his shoulder, his voice breathy from anticipation. He just loved those moments before they got to the actual sex part, when Harry let his hands wander and discover the most interesting places on Draco's body without the hurry of pressing arousal. So he lifted his paper back and started reading the last article while waiting with bated breath for those fingers to begin their questing.

The Minister Of Magic Resigns Her Post!

Following recent events (see above), the Minister of Magic announced her resignation yesterday. Many would accuse Hermione Granger that her decision of reinstating the law to allow the marriage of same-sex couples originated in self-interest, and the issue with the D.M-H.P. couple was only a cover up which permitted her to act in her own benefit. Hermione Granger herself does not pretend that her motivation was completely altruistic. She had this bill in her mind for years, she admits, and the only thing keeping her from proposing it to the Wizengamot was the exact same reason as mentioned above. The fact that another couple needed the law to be changed gave her a "reason to act to her own selfish ends," as she says, but it does not justify the fact that she is also a benefactor of her own initiative. For this reason, she feels that she is unfit to further act as the political leader of the British wizarding nation and therefore she thinks it is only appropriate to hand in her resignation as Minister of Magic. Until the early election, the position of the Minister of Magic is going to be filled by the Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot, Algernon Longbottom.

Just when Draco reached the last syllable of 'Longbottom', he felt Harry's hand unceremoniously lifting the hem of his nightshirt and sneaking under the fabric to cradle Draco's privates in a warm palm. Draco jumped a bit and couldn't help but moan at the forthright gesture, although it really should not have caught him unprepared. If there was something to say for all that blunt Gryffindorness, it was that Harry had never been hesitant or ambiguous about his designs on Draco's body – well, at least not after he had declared it his own playground.

"Are you done yet? You still owe me for last night," Harry said while his fingers proceeded to tease Draco's prick to full hardness. He did not have to do much to get the desired result, as Draco had been halfway there since he had first felt Harry's erection pressing against his bottom through the thin material of his nightshirt.

"I already said I was sorry," Draco couldn't refrain from objecting, even though he also thought that Harry had been sort of right. "It's not as if it would have been our first time." No, Draco verified, looking down at his bulging stomach, definitely not their first time.

"Yes, but I had planned something special," Harry said in a tone that suggested that he was sad about the lost opportunity to make last night something special. Stupid sappy Gryffindor. "Had I known that you'd sleep through our wedding night, I sure as hell would not have needed to muster up some liquid courage and ask the doc whether it would be safe for you to…" He did not continue, but the slip of one finger below Draco's balls, which made his stomach lurch with an unexpected realisation, spoke louder than words.

Draco swallowed. While it was true – technically – that this wouldn't be their first time, it was also a fact that that time in Copenhagen was the only occasion they had actually gone all the way.

When they had been teenagers, both of them had been a bit squeamish about bottoming. Their teenage desires and hormones had been satisfied just as easily by quick hand-jobs and the occasional blow-job when they had enough time and privacy. Neither of them had ever talked about wanting to go any further, or it had just ended between them before it could have come to that point.

Since they had started sleeping together a few weeks previously, Harry had showed great self-restraint, letting Draco "call the shots", as he had said, "pun intended", which caused Draco's face to heat up minutely. When Draco had asked him about it, he had said he was willing to wait for Draco to become comfortable with the idea. Fortunately, he also possessed a warehouse of knowledge of sexual activities that they could perform without penetration.

Naturally, Draco had known he would not be able to stall infinitely – not that he had wanted to, either. He was just a bit shocked about the abrupt declaration and didn't really feel ready to try yet. This was when the meaning of the second part of Harry's declaration reached his mind.

"You did not do what you just insinuated. Tell me you didn't!" Draco rasped out, feeling light-headed from the way that finger was slowly creeping lower and lower, leaving a tingling sensation in its wake and causing perspiration to dampen his skin. His head was spinning with desire in an infusion of trepidation, and a good measure of embarrassment about how he was supposed to ever look into Podmore's eyes again added to it – although that last thought was the least of his concerns and slipped from his mind almost as quickly as it had formed, next to what Harry's hands were doing to his body.

"I did." Potter sounded far too cheerful for Draco's taste. "But I doubt he is going to remember much of it, being drunk and all…" Draco nodded absently, while he was desperately thinking of a way to spread his legs wider to make way for that finger, without dislodging the heated solidity of Potter's prick resting in the cleft of his arse.

"But… what makes you think I'd want to…" he asked as a last resort to keep face against the overwhelming desire to abandon all pretence and decorum, and pounce clumsily on Harry like an overfed Cocker Spaniel in heat (pun intended, he heard Harry's declaration inside his head).

"I don't know." Harry chuckled, his voice darkening with repressed desire - he seemed to enjoy the banter like a hunter would the last minutes of hunting, knowing his prey has already lost any chance to get away.

"Perhaps because every time I suck you off you practically beg me to put my fingers into you? I bet I wouldn't even need to touch you; I could make you come with just my cock inside you." That last sentence was an admission as breathy as it could get. The continuation, however, turned into a growl, so primal that Draco had a hard time understanding the words. "You are the greediest bottom I have ever had the luck to meet. Don't expect me not to exploit that to the fullest."

Draco thought his heart was going to punch a hole through his chest any time now, both due to performance anxiety and the mounting arousal Harry was so skilled in eliciting from his body.

"But what if I want to be in you?" He tried to save at least a bit of his self-esteem. And yes, he needed to know the answer before he would be entirely comfortable with giving that last part of himself to Harry.

That question apparently brought the other man to a stop in his seduction and Draco felt his heart skip a beat in alarm. But then, after a second of thinking, Harry only gave him a kiss to his cheek – so anticlimactic in its chastity – and said, "I think we could make it work. Just need to figure out the mechanics… don't think you'd be able to endure the tempo for very long." He grinned unrepentantly, for which Draco almost swatted him, but had to concede that it was true. Nowadays, he wasn't even able to come up the stairs without becoming short of breath.

Draco was about to tell Harry that it really didn't matter as long as he did just anything to quell the suffocating heat of desire he had managed to ignite in his body, when Harry suddenly slipped out of the bed and started rummaging in one of the drawers. Draco thought with disappointment: there, he had done it, the moment was lost – but then Harry turned back and gave him a look that was pure need and appreciation, and Draco's breath caught in his throat from its intensity and the way it seemed to be focused only on him.

"What are you waiting for?" Harry asked with a flash of desire in his eyes, and then he was already loosening the drawstrings of his pyjama pants.

-o-o-o-o-

For a time, Draco was only able to hear his own harsh breathing over the ringing in his ears and then Harry's groan as he lifted his body, allowing Draco's cock to slip out of him, followed by drops of semen. As Draco opened one of his eyes, he saw Harry turn his head in every direction, undoubtedly searching for some kind of towel.

Draco, being in an uncharacteristically generous mood, reached for his wand, spelling both of them as clean as possible in his current state. He was only able to give a groan in acknowledgement for the breathy 'thank you' before he closed his eyes again. For a while, he listened to the sounds Harry was making while he arranged his body next to Draco's - close enough to touch but not so close as to become uncomfortable, with both of them needing to cool down and dry off the sweat from their skin. Then both of them slipped into a sated sleep.

Draco woke up at the rumbling of his own stomach an hour later. Harry was still sleeping; meanwhile, he had managed to somehow pull the blanket around him and make a tight cocoon of it, which reminded Draco that he was also cold. It did not look as if he would have been able to extricate the covers from Harry's tight grip without waking him up, so he sighed and decided to dress. It was almost time for lunch, anyhow.

With nothing else to do than watch Harry in his sleep or think about things he rather would not, Draco looked lazily around in the room for something to occupy him until meal time.

His eyes drifted onto a rolled up parchment sitting on his counter top. He instantly remembered what it was: the account of his vaults that Lawrence had delivered to him the previous night. Not that it was accurate anymore, since now that he was married to Harry, they'd have to include his vault to the list as well, but Draco didn't think it would matter much in the bottom line. He reached for the parchment absently, figuring that it would make for a bit light reading, better than the steamy romance novels Mrs. Weasley had on her bookshelf.

TBC