Maniac

Pairing: Hansy (Harry Potter x Pansy Parkinson)

Universe: muggle AU

Rating: T

Summary: Olivie Advent cont'd.

Prompts: Passive-aggressive war over a parking spot.

Until March, Pansy's sorority house getting kicked off frat row was the worst thing that had ever happened to her. Then it was the suspension by the university they were dealt in April. By late May, the worst thing that had ever happened to her was her rejection from campus housing for the summer. By the first of June, it was her new address: the very last available studio in a dilapidated building well at a distance from the rest of campus, where she would be spending her summer and, by the looks of it, her final year.

Hardly a victory lap, she thought with the opposite of relish.

"Great," Pansy muttered aloud, pulling into her parking spot in the alley and catching sight of motion from the rearview mirror. She climbed out of the car just in time to see a group of boys wandering into her new building, all four of them shouting to each other about weed or Zeppelin or something else unintelligibly male.

"BIG D," yelled one, prompting one of the larger boys to turn in answer, and Pansy grimaced, hitting the alarm button a second time on her white BMW.

Disgusting.

"Hey," said a voice behind her, and she turned to find a boy with messy black hair calling out to her from his car window. "You're in my parking spot."

"Harry," bellowed the boy called Big D. "Hurry up, asshole!"

The boy who was apparently Harry (or Asshole) rolled his eyes, or so she guessed through the mirrored lenses of his sunglasses. "Hey," he said to Pansy again, ignoring the other voices drunkenly calling out for his attention. "Come on. Move."

He was better looking than the others, or maybe it was just the way he was driving the car. He had the windows down, one elbow resting on the door, one hand at the top of the steering wheel while he looked at her. He was rumpled and at ease and she would have bet money that his white t-shirt smelled like sea breeze laundry detergent, or something within that category of quintessential boy smells. From the angle she was looking, she could see the lines on his long legs, tan up to the point where his shorts had ridden up on his thighs.

Boys driving were their own genre of unhelpful appeal.

"My spot," she corrected him. "Landlord said so."

"Are you sure?" he prompted, dropping his sunglasses to look at her as if she were the kind of sorority girl who maybe didn't know how to read, and she gave him the sort of smile that suggested he was the sort of boy who maybe shouldn't try to push her buttons.

"I'm sure," she said sweetly, putting her headphones in and turning to go inside as he growled after her in frustration.

Living with his cousin Dudley was the goddamn worst. Luckily, it was short term; only for the summer while his usual roommates, Ron and Hermione, were off working their various internships elsewhere.

Still, having to live with Dudley's gang of idiot thugs coming and going was enough to make Harry ponder the potential benefits of being homeless. Piers, for example, was constantly sleeping on his couch, and Dennis and Malcolm were always touching his recording equipment. His Victrola (a gift from Hermione) had coffee spilled down the side, and he was pretty sure Gordon was eating his cereal. He had to keep his guitar with him all the time now, just to make sure they didn't touch it when he wasn't looking.

All of that might have been fine, but then there was the girl who lived above them. Priscilla or Princess or something. She kept parking in Harry's spot, and every time he asked Dudley for the lease agreement to show her, Dudley insisted he would get around to digging it up and then, shock of all shocks, didn't. (Harry would've called the landlord himself, but sublets were… frowned upon, and/or expressly forbidden.)

At first Harry tried to be nice about it, which didn't work. Then he tried being a dick about it, which definitely didn't work. Eventually, it became clear they had totally different schedules. She was gone all day, doing whatever it was she did—her nails, probably—and he was gone at night, when he used the university recording studios. By the second week he simply pulled into the spot when she wasn't home and locked his car, satisfied.

One night he came home to find a cone in the spot and rolled his eyes, getting out and moving it out of the way like a normal human being with opposable thumbs. The next time, she had posted a sign with his license plate number saying DO NOT PARK HERE, which he removed. Again, with his working thumbs.

Very infrequently did they run into each other in person. Only once did they actually speak, though it wasn't especially noteworthy. She had been looking over something at the time, a frown painted on her lips in coral-pink, and for half a second he thought about asking her what was wrong until she looked up, conjuring a snotty layer of impatience at the sight of him.

"Can you keep it down?" she offered snidely, glancing at the guitar case in his hands. "Seriously. It's getting ridiculous. And stop parking in my spot."

"It's not your spot," Harry said. "For the last fucking time—"

But she left, walking away as if he hadn't even spoken at all.

There was constant music from his apartment. There were people coming in and out at all hours, waking Pansy when she was trying to rest for her internship. It had been hard enough to try and squeeze in all the courses she needed to graduate pre-law with a double major in history and econ, and now that she was having to take a creative writing course over the summer for her fine arts elective in addition to the hours at work, she was losing her mind.

She'd always been bad at writing; she had always preferred math because there was always an answer. History, too, had already happened. There was nothing to invent. Writing was a pain, and if she couldn't get something passable together, her 4.0 was going to take a hit from her pass-fail arts elective, of all things. What a fucking joke. Unfortunately, she doubted Yale Law was going to be thrilled with her being president of a sorority that had gotten itself kicked off the row, much less whatever this did to her grade point average.

But Harry what's-his-face was always playing that heavy metal shit and distracting her and keeping her up at night, and the one time she wanted to try leaving to get coffee, she came back to find Harry was parked in her spot again. Furious, she left a note that said she would absolutely tow him if he did it again; don't test her.

When she came out the next morning, the note was taped to the wall with an irreverent scrawl beneath it: Go for it, princess.

She was livid. "I'm going to fucking murder him," she said over the phone to Daphne, who was sympathetic, albeit not nearly as enraged as Pansy needed her to be.

"Don't kill him," Daphne suggested unhelpfully. "Just like, make a schedule or something. Compromise."

Fuck schedules. Fuck compromise.

"Yeah, sure, a schedule," Pansy said, googling numbers of towing companies as she spoke.

"What the fuck did you do to my car?"

"What car?" she demurred, theatrically bemused.

To her credit, Harry's storming up to her apartment hadn't seemed to faze her much. Passive-aggressive notes were one thing, but he'd expected her to cave under the pressure of someone actually protesting to her face.

Turned out, no.

"It was parked in my spot—"

"My spot," she said, glancing at her nails.

"—and now it's go- Oh, okay, so you admit it, then," Harry fumbled retroactively, a bit taken aback. "What did you do to it?"

"Made it disappear," she said, smiling thinly. "I'm a witch."

He glared at her, and the irksome smile broadened. She was pretty and monstrously awful, like some kind of glittering, toxic snake.

"I take it you had it towed?" he prompted, exasperated by the runaround she was still all too happy to give.

"You parked it in my spot," she replied, impassive.

"It's not your—" He broke off, about to pinch the bridge of his nose before remembering he was wearing his goddamn glasses. "Look," he began, "Penelope—"

"Pansy."

"Fine, whatever, sure—look," he said, "please. I can't afford to get my car out of an impound lot right now, okay? I can't." It was going to be hundreds of dollars he resolutely didn't have. If he did, he wouldn't be spending the summer here in the first place, would he?

"Probably shouldn't have parked in my spot," she advised, and Harry tightly clenched a fist, gritting his teeth.

"Can you just—"

"Maybe we can come to a deal," she suggested. "A contract, if you will."

This, Harry suspected, was going to be a lot like bargaining with the devil.

"Yes?"

"The spot is mine," said Pansy. "Non-negotiable."

"It isn't y-" He broke off, stopping himself. "Fine. Where am I supposed to park, then?"

"The street," said Pansy, obviously fully aware that street parking in this neighborhood was impossible to find. A mere myth, like Santa or the tooth fairy. "And I have two more conditions."

"What? No," Harry snapped. "Giving up my spot is already a condi-"

"The first of these conditions," Pansy continued, again as if he had never spoken at all, "is that you will stop playing so much loud music."

"I don't play any music," Harry said, frustrated.

"You have a guitar. I've seen it."

"What? No." He blinked. "I mean yes, but—"

"And as for the second," she went on, "your friends have got to stop coming and going at all hours. It's impossible to think, and—"

"Wait," Harry said, staring at her in disbelief. "You think those are my friends?"

She gave him a look of impossible boredom.

"So should I get my coat?" she asked him, opening the door just enough for him to see that her keys were hooked on the wall beside the frame. Her apartment, unlike Dudley's, was spotless and fully furnished. Harry hadn't lived in a place that nice since… ever. Not that he could think about it now, nor do anything but seethe in the glow of her privilege. "Or are we going to argue some more?"

He stared at her.

And stared.

For half a second he considered taking her keys, but then no, she'd probably have him arrested. Or executed. Or deported.

"You know what? No," he said. "No. Fuck your conditions."

She blinked, and aside from that one moment by the mailbox, it was the first time he had ever seen her look vulnerable. Her eyes, usually narrowed beneath dark brows, suddenly went wide and soft, almost fearful.

Just as quickly, though, she was back to her usual portrait of entitlement.

"What are you planning to do, then?" she demanded. "I'm not helping you get your car back unless you do something about the noise and your shitbag crew, and certainly not if you're going to keep parking in my spot—"

"I don't need your help," Harry snapped, and reached forward, closing her apartment door on himself as her face promptly flamed with fury, the slap of a half-formed expletive just audible when the door fell shut.

Harry dug out his phone as he stomped down the corridor, dialing the first contact on his speed dial when he reached the stairwell.

"Hermione?" he said, descending irritably to his apartment. "Yeah. I, uh. I need you, please."

Pansy was already exhausted after a long day at the library when she caught sight of him sitting atop the trunk of his car, elbows resting placidly on his knees. She pulled up next to him, double-parked, and glared at him through the window.

"You've got to be kidding me," she said, but before she could make any threats, he had already pulled open her rear passenger door, tossing his guitar into the backseat and then sliding into the passenger side. "What the—"

"Can't use my car or I'll lose my spot," Harry said, and she glared at him. "Just take a left when you get to the light," he added, buckling his seatbelt.

"What the fuck do you think you're doing?"

"That," he said, twisting around to point to his guitar case, "is an acoustic guitar."

"So?"

"So," he said flatly, "just drive."

The last thing she wanted to do was play some sort of maniacal guessing game, but it seemed like Harry wasn't going to move until she indulged him. That, and he was clearly in her parking spot.

Again.

"I could just dump you in the river," she said.

"What river?"

"Doesn't matter. I could find one."

"Great," he said. "Drive."

So she drove, reluctantly. He said nothing except to direct her to campus, and specifically to the music school, where he instructed her to park and then wrenched open the door, pulling out his guitar and snapping his fingers when she didn't move.

"Come on," he said.

She rolled her eyes and followed, wanting to punch him. Maybe she still would. But on the other hand, she was curious now. He let her into the building without any further explanation, swiping his access card, and then pushed open one of the doors on the left.

"Get in," he said.

She glared at him, but entered.

She walked in to find a girl with extremely curly hair looking up from where she was perched on a stool, holding a violin. A thin, gangling redhead was seated at the upright piano.

"These," Harry said, "are my actual friends. Hermione is poly sci and a classically trained violinist. Ron is in the screenwriting program, though he plays when we need him." He paused to pull his guitar out of its case, revealing a smooth, worn looking wood. "This," he said bluntly to Pansy, "is an acoustic guitar, not an electric guitar. What you're hearing all night is my cousin Dudley's music."

"Okay," Pansy said uncertainly, bristling. "So?"

"Harry, hang on," interrupted Hermione, frowning at Pansy. "Isn't this the girl who had your car towed?"

Ron's eyes narrowed. Agitated, Pansy lifted her chin. "He was in my spot," she said.

"It's not your spot," Hermione and Ron said in unison, but by then Harry had already tossed the guitar strap around his neck, taking a seat between the other two.

He strummed something for a moment, and for whatever reason, Pansy waited without argument.

Curiosity, she supposed.

"We have a folk band on the side," Harry said to Pansy. "Ron and Hermione are both working this summer, but they came back for the weekend." He glanced at Hermione, who reluctantly raised her violin. "Thatta girl," said Harry approvingly, grinning at her, and then he turned to Pansy. "Sit," he said.

Astoundingly, she sat.

Harry strummed a little more, tuning with Hermione and Ron, and then after a few runs from each of the instruments, he tapped out a rhythm. "Alright?"

"Alright," said Ron, with a nod from Hermione.

And then Harry was… singing.

"She take my money," he sang in a silky baritone, "when I'm in need—"

Pansy blinked as Hermione played an irreverent riff on the violin.

"—yeah, she's a triflin' friend indeed. Oh, she's a gold digger, way over town—"

Pansy glared at Harry, who stifled his obvious laughter, cutting the other two off with a wave of his hand.

"Wrote that for you," he said.

She rose to her feet with a scoff of disgust, but he caught her arm.

"Sit down," he said again. "Just listen."

Again, Ron and Hermione gave Pansy matching looks of displeasure, but Harry tapped his foot four times, and Hermione grudgingly raised her violin to her shoulder.

"Entitled in the worst way," sang Harry, "feelin' nothin' that I wanna put in words. Wanna maybe take my mask off, so I can see what's under yours."

He glanced up at her, expectant. She sat very still, and he continued strumming.

"Don't need to read your lips to know what you're tryna say, think I can see damn well what's written on your face. Doll, you make me crazy, make me such a maniac. You make me wanna drive away, make me wanna come right back."

He finished with another strum, slowly fading into nothing, until finally the song ended, or it stopped.

"You wrote that?" Pansy asked, clearing her throat after a moment of silence.

"It's not finished," Harry said. "But yeah."

She glanced down at her hands, feeling a wave of something she hated to call by its name.

"I can't write shit," she admitted.

Harry rose to his feet, taking a step towards her, and then reached for her cheek, carefully lifted her chin with one finger.

"Give me back my parking spot," he said, "and maybe we can work something out."

Ultimately, it didn't matter. By the end of the summer, they mostly took one car.

a/n: My D/Hr Advent fic, Run the Gauntlet, posted yesterday on AO3 if you are interested in a tale of dramione working at a magical renaissance faire. (I will post it in this collection next week.) As for the above, the lyrics to Gold Digger are, tragically, not mine. The others are, and the moment I start my long-deserved folk band it will be my lead single.