Chapter 6: How It All Went Wrong

Harry walked to his Muggle Studies classroom with a feeling like dread. He hadn't texted all morning. He hadn't received one either. Part of him wanted to, but another part of him said "What's the point? It's over. Nothing more to say."

Unless he just had the courage to give his name and just damn the consequences!

Of course, he couldn't do that. He couldn't face it when it all, inevitably, went horrible, horribly wrong, as everything in his life seemed to do. The delicious glow of his, well, calling it a date seemed better than anything else, had faded completely by the time he walked through the classroom door and saw the basket of phones sitting there for the students to hand in. He clutched the phone tighter in the pocket of his robes and decided to wait until the end of class.

"Excellent news, class!" He looked up, increasingly annoyed at the cheerful, excited face of the professor, only worsening his existing feeling of depression. What did she have to be so damned cheerful about? The rest of the class were also watching here, in the wary but interested way they always did in Muggle Studies when the professor was excited about something. She continued.

"The Headmaster has found a way to tie every phone into the same network, as the Muggles call it! It neatly bypasses all of the magical interference issues and means that any phone we tie into the system can talk to any other phone! Isn't that just wonderful?!"

Hermione raised her hand. "Sorry Professor, but I thought we were handing our phones in today."

"That's the exciting part! We are extending the lesson! Now you can text anyone you wish in the class! Today's lesson will be about exchanging phone numbers and adding people to your contacts! Another very useful skill if you ever need to make connections in the non-magical world!" She waved her wand over the phones, and they buzzed. "Now. You are added to the network! Happy texting, class. And don't forget to take full advantage of the photo and video capabilities! Those muggles are really quite ingenious!"

Harry sat, frozen. His first emotion was relief, a huge wave of relief that he could still talk to his mysterious texting partner. It was replaced, almost immediately, by horror.

They were going to find out.

They would find out that Harry was gay, that he'd been texting a Slytherin, that he'd gone on…well…what he'd decided to call a date…with a SLYTHERIN.

No. No…it might not happen that way. What were the chances of other Slytherins getting Harry's number to compare it with? Unlikely. Probably, no one would. In fact, he could even pretend that he had put his phone in the basket with the rest, and taken out a new one. Except then that would negate the whole part about being able to talk to his text friend.

It was all so confusing. He barely focused enough on the class to exchange numbers with Ron and Hermione and few of his other friends. Ron and Hermione both had new phones, having put their phones into the basket immediately upon arriving in class, and Ron, especially was happy about this, as it meant Lavender no longer had his number. Hermione, though she said nothing, had shot Lavender a particularly nasty glare when she approached Ron with her phone outstretched, and Lavender had quickly turned away and pretended to be heading for someone else instead.

He was still deep in thought when he left the classroom, heading for the Great Hall for the noon meal. He nearly collided with Draco Malfoy just outside the door.

"Oh! Give me your number, Potty. I simply won't survive if I can't talk to you over the holidays!" Draco sighed dramatically. All the Slytherins still in earshot laughed as though Draco had actually said something witty or even slightly funny.

"Yeah, you have to spend time with your slimy Death Eater family, Malfoy. I'll gladly give you my number, just to give you a break." Harry pretended a matching concern.

"What, still jealous I have parents? My word, Potter, shouldn't you be over that whole orphan thing by now?"

This time it was Harry who lost his temper. But Ron and Hermione were quicker, each taking an arm and marching him past Malfoy and down the hall.

"Honestly, Harry! Why do you even bother responding to him?" Hermione sighed in exasperation. "It's so predictable now! One of you insults the other, the other insults in return, and one of you says something way over the line and then one of you loses your temper and pulls out his wand, and then you both get detention. It's ridiculous. Why can't you just forget about each other? Learn to ignore each other if you can't get along?"

"It's not that simple, Hermione," Harry answered through gritted teeth.

She gave him a look, but dropped the subject.

Shortly after, Harry sat in the Great Hall with his phone in his hand, wondering. If he sent a text, who would it be? It had taken him until now to realize, with something like horror, that it may not be the same person to reply after all. The thought somehow just hadn't occurred to him. Now he found himself dreading the moment of confirmation. The one number in his phone without a name attached as yet, the important one. How many phones had been in the basket? Had he been the only one to hold his back? Probably. He tried very hard to hold down his sick feeling of loss, that seemed ridiculous when he had known that it was coming, had already been prepared for it.

It was just, just…he had finally had something for himself! Something that wasn't to do with his damned scar or his history or any expectations about him at all. It had just been two people, talking, freely, easily, without any pressure on him at all. And now he felt sure he had lost that, not once, but twice in one day, because his hopes had been raised high in between.

He ate quickly and left the hall, once again almost colliding with Draco Malfoy.

"What the fuck are you trying to do?" He spat, his bad mood boiling over. "Run into on purpose? Why the fuck are you so obsessed with me? Why don't you just leave me the fuck alone."

Malfoy looked even more pale and sneering than usual. "Just fuck off, Potter!" He snarled. "Not everything is about you." He stormed off, and Harry followed suit.

Ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Harry was so relieved he would be going to Ron's for the holidays. He didn't think he could stand it, rattling around the castle with the fraction of the student population that would still be there. He needed distraction and comfort, both things that could be found at the Weasley's. They were packed and ready to leave, only waiting for Hermione to come down so they could go to the train together.

"You are going to turn you phone on, aren't you Harry?" Hermione asked, as they made their way our of the train to the platform, where they could see both the Weasley's and Hermione's parents waiting. "Apparently it will work outside of Hogwarts, but only to other phones outside the castle. But that means we can text each other over the holidays! And you haven't used it once since we got the project extension!"

"Yeah!" Now Ron was looking with suspicion at Harry. "You were on your phone all the time before. Haven't even seen you turn it on since then."

How could Harry explain? He couldn't, of course. And the way they were both looking at him. He tried to smile normally.

"You're right. I should get some homework in." He pulled his phone from his pocket and turned it on.

Almost immediately, it buzzed. He looked at the screen for a long moment.

Five New Messages

Hope flared, and then died within him. Several students pushed past them, but Harry didn't notice.

The first message was from Seamus, which had made him immediately doubt that the rest would be from the one person he really wanted to hear from. The second and third were from Ron and Hermione, like Seamus' message it was from the day they had gotten the project extension.

The fourth was from an unknown number.

Harry's heart thudded in his chest.

'So…just curious here. Dissimulo?'

Harry closed his eyes for a moment, feeling a sensation of heat through his entire body. He opened his eyes quickly, before Ron and Hermione could notice and comment, and looked at the last message.

'Guess not. Sorry. Nevermind that.'

His heart sank again. He'd wasted so much time when they could have been talking. He'd made him think he had the wrong number! Why had he been so damned stupid and afraid.

Harry decided he wasn't going to waste even another second of his time.

'It's you. I didn't turn my phone on because I didn't think it would be. I'm sorry.'

The answer was so quick, Harry didn't even have the time to put his phone back into his pocket.

'What the fuck?! I thought I'd lost contact with you this whole time and you just didn't have your phone turned on?!'

'I'm sorry! I'll make it up to you!'

'How?'

Harry bit his lip. Should he? He shrugged. No point in pretending to by shy about this now.

'On my knees. Like in the Room of Requirement.'

"Honestly, Draco!" Pansy Parkinson's shrill voice rang out in the corridor behind him. "Don't ignore me because your little fuck buddy finally texted you back. Room of Requirement? What does that even mean?"

Harry looked up, his face gone white, his mouth hanging open in shock, to meet the eyes of Draco Malfoy. Malfoy's eyes met his.

The change of expression was gradual. At first, he only looked annoyed, presumably because of Pansy, then he noticed Harry, and a sneer began to curl at his lip, then he noticed Harry's expression, and the phone in his hand, and the sneer died away, to be replaced with an expression of utter blankness. They two boys stared at each other, each with a phone in his hand, the entire rest of the corridor, the train, the platform, and everything, fading out in one moment of long, slow, horrified mutual realization.

And then the moment was broken. Pansy grasped Draco's arm, her voice a background buzz of indecipherable words, Ron and Hermione had noticed Draco, but only assumed another fight was imminent, and were hustling Harry off the train to their waiting parents.

Harry said nothing, he let himself be dragged along in their wake, phone still clutched in his hand, now so hard that his knuckles had gone white.

Oooooooooooooooooooooooooo

First of all, I must apologize mightily for this long and suspenseful wait. Family issues, mother in hospital, emergency surgery, etc etc. The usual life being a pile of shit break was needed. All is good now though, and Harry and Draco should certainly not be left hanging so long again.

If you enjoyed this, do please leave a short review. It means a lot to me and spurs me on to update faster.

Of course, you could always leave a long review too, detailing every single flaw and failure, those are fine, too.

Yours,

Loony Luiny