The warm July air blew patterns across Harry's skin, although he shivered in spite of it. The starry sky felt as though it was flooding his vision with light, and for a moment he considered going back inside but shook the idea off quickly.
It was two months to the date since the Battle of Hogwarts, marked in Harry's mind as two months Since I Died. That was how life seemed to be these days, in the slowness of recovering and learning how to live in a world free of Voldemort. There were the Days Before – his whole childhood marked by danger lurking around the corner – and the Days After – marked by fear and flashbacks. Hermione had been reading, of course, her only coping mechanism, really. She threw around words like "post traumatic stress" and "anxiety" as if she had been studying them her entire life. Harry preferred to call it "Maybe I Should Have Stayed Dead".
He couldn't have, not really. Not when the world needed him to defeat Voldemort, and especially not now that Teddy needed him. But it was his one selfish wish.
He glanced around furtively before reaching into his jeans pocket and pulling out a cigarette and a lighter. There were charms for this, of course, but his magic had been unstable to say the least in the Days After; once he had set fire to Andromeda's back garden, so for now he stuck to lighters.
He leaned out over the edge of the Astronomy Tower, cigarette resting between his lips, and gazed out at the shadowy outline of the Hogwarts grounds. They were all here, of course, to celebrate and to mourn. Everyone had been offered a bed to stay in for the night. Naturally, most Gryffindors Harry's age were currently seated in the Common Room, getting pissed on Ogden's firewhisky and cheap muggle rum.
Harry worried the cigarette between his fingers before taking another drag. It wasn't as if he didn't want the company, didn't enjoy seeing his friends. Ron and Hermione were departing the next day for Australia, to work on restoring her parent's memories. Harry ought to be sitting downstairs with them – but when the room got too crowded and it became hard to breath it was easier to just escape. Most of them could escape without leaving – drinking their thoughts away until their eyes shone and they fell into easy sleep. He couldn't, though. It was nothing against the alcohol, he understood why it was how they coped. But for Harry in the Days After, it made it worse. He'd drink and the room would shrink, and the shadows would lurk around the corners until he fell into nightmares.
That's why he smoked, he reflected, taking a long drag of the cigarette. Smoking receded the shadows. It calmed his breathing when everything was too much.
There were probably healthier ways to achieve the same thing. Meditation, maybe. Occlumency, probably. But he'd never been good at either. When he smoked, at least he didn't have to put in effort.
He took another drag – too deep – and coughed.
"Surely that's not how you're supposed to do it," came a drawl from behind him.
Harry whirled fast, his cigarette falling from his fingers. He didn't bother stomping it out, the castle was all stone, anyways. His heart was pounding in his chest, his vision blurring around the edges.
"Steady," came the voice, much closer this time.
Harry's breathing began to slow, his brain catching up to his surroundings. He was in Hogwarts, he was perfectly safe, and he recognized that voice.
"Malfoy?" Harry croaked, almost incredulously. As the name passed his lips, the blonde man materialized in front of him.
His hair seemed ragged, sticking up in ways Harry knew a young Draco Malfoy never would have let it. There were dark circles under his eyes – the kinds Harry had from nighttime wanderings and shrieking nightmares. He wore lazily unbuttoned black robes. His skin and hair were stark against the night, not like Harry who blended into the dark except for the whites of his eyes.
"Didn't realize the Saviour of the Wizarding World startled so easily," Malfoy drawled back, but there was no malice in his tone. Harry shifted to the side – the other man was standing much too close to him, and fumbled with his cigarette pack in his attempt to light another. He needed to take a drag, needed to calm himself down, couldn't hope to do that with Draco Malfoy standing that close to him.
In the Days Before, Harry would have bristled at the nickname. Now he just shrugged. "Wasn't expecting you," he said dully, not quite looking at Malfoy's eyes.
"Give that to me," Malfoy said suddenly. He took the lighter and cigarette from Harry's hands, surprisingly gently. With one hand, he delicately placed the end in Harry's mouth. With the other, he flicked the lighter to light it.
Harry took a drag, willing his thoughts to calm. He couldn't think, couldn't move like this – and all the help his brain could supply him was one word – beautiful. Draco Malfoy was bloody beautiful.
"Why are you here?" Harry asked, once his words had returned. He hadn't seen Malfoy since his trial in front of the Wizengamot. Harry and returned Malfoy his wand, then. Had spoken in his defence. But had not stuck around to see the results of the trial. Hermione had insisted he shouldn't get too invested, that he couldn't save everyone. She was right, of course. Eventually, days had faded into weeks, and he had stopped being curious about the outcome.
His question was vague, but Malfoy seemed to understand. He gestured for Harry's cigarette, and spoke only after taking a deep drag and handing it back.
"My punishment, if you could call it that," he said. They sank down against the wall in unison, sitting next to each other on the stone under the stars. "I'm here until the end of eighth year. Can't leave school grounds, can't use magic outside of classes, can't drink, can't share rooms with other students. You get the idea, I'm sure." He cast Harry a piercing gaze. "Why aren't you back inside with all the others?"
"Don't feel like it," Harry settled for. "Needed some space."
"To brood," Draco responded, his mouth quirking up.
"To brood," Harry confirmed solemnly.
Harry quietly filed away another discovery under his list of Days After traits: gets along with Draco Malfoy. It wasn't so surprising, not really. They had been children, raised for different purposes, on opposite sides of a war.
"Must not be bad, being here this summer," Harry said after some silence. "Better than," he gestured broadly.
"Better than what, Potter?" Draco growled. "Better than getting to go places? Or see your friends? Better than being the world's saviour?"
Harry rolled his eyes, his hand bumping Draco's as he passed him the cigarette. "I could visit," he said quietly. When Draco raised his eyebrows, Harry repeated himself.
"No one's allowed to visit me," Draco responded sardonically. He didn't, Harry noted, say no.
"I'm the Saviour of the Wizarding World," Harry said, letting his amusement tinge his voice. "I can do what I want."
He was sure he had wanted to say more, something about how Ron and Hermione were leaving, how Ginny would barely look at him, and how the quiet at Andromeda's house was oppressive. About how every time he looked at Teddy he was filled with love greater than anything he could have ever imagined and grief stronger than a tidal wave. About how he dreamed of having the luxury to have stayed dead. About how different the Days After Harry was than the Days before Harry. About how beautiful Draco looked in the moonlight.
Instead they were kissing. Harry wasn't sure who started it or even how it had happened, but he was keenly aware of Draco's lips on his; hands under his sweater and roaming. Harry instinctively curled his hands in the ends of Draco's hair, pulling his head back. Draco let Harry maneuver him, and then his lips were on Draco's neck and he was tasting the sweet of his skin mixed with the salt of his sweat.
It wasn't gentle, but nothing between them ever had been. Harry's teeth found his neck and he was biting and sucking, urged on by Draco's murmurs and moans. He found Draco's lips again, hands reluctantly detangling from his hair to unbutton his shirt and pull his robes down off his shoulders. They paused in unspoken agreement, Harry leaning back so Draco could pull his shirt off his head
Harry was back on him, then, Draco pliant underneath his hands. He pushed Draco down, straddling him as he lay down on his cloak, kissing anger and longing and apology across the pale scars on Draco's chest and abdomen.
He propped himself above Draco, breathing shakily. Harry was keenly aware of where their bodies lined up, his as lean as Draco's from a year starving and on the run. His mind was barely keeping track of his body, but somehow he was stretched out, hips lined up with Draco's, hands holding Draco's hands above his head, pinned to the stone underneath them.
"You are so goddamn beautiful, Draco Malfoy," he whispered in the other boy's ears. He felt the moment Draco's breath stopped, the moment he started breathing again. Then he saw stars as Draco shifted his hips against Harry's.
"Your room," Harry groaned, mustering every ounce of self control to let go of Draco's wrists and prop himself up slightly. "Let's go there."
Draco smirked lazily up at him. "What's wrong with the astronomy tower?"
Harry bit his collar bone, none too gently. "Nothing, particularly, except for all the Gryffindor's getting pissed off some shit rum and this being the closest place to be sick from it."
He felt Draco shudder under him. "Point taken. Let me up, then."
Reluctantly, Harry flipped himself off of Draco's waist and stood slowly. His whole body was burning to touch and be touched.
"Let me disillusion you," Draco whispered into his ear. He had clearly followed Harry up and was now pressed behind him, bare chest to bare back. Harry shuddered and nodded.
He let Draco kiss his shoulder while he tapped his head, the feeling of cold water running down him countered by Draco's warm body and warm kiss made Harry shudder. In that moment, he knew two different things to be true.
The first, that going back to Draco Malfoy's rooms was probably a terrible, terrible decision.
The second, that he would do whatever Draco wanted, whatever he needed, because in the Days After it seemed that there was one thing that was true: Draco Malfoy was inevitable.