By: PepperjackCandy
Rating: PG13 (up to "second base" explicit, beyond that implied)
Disclaimer: Harry? Not mine. Hagrid? Not mine either. Ron? Hermione? Nope and nope. Ginny? Not her either, nor Neville, for that matter. Draco? No (too high-maintenance, anyhow). They're all JK Rowling's.
Warning: This will be a slash story (Harry/Draco) eventually, though romantically-slashy, rather than erotically-slashy. Hence the PG-13 rating.
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Several weeks passed, and Harry and Draco started preparing their teams for their first Quidditch match of the season. At least, Draco assured Harry that he was preparing. And that was all the Slytherin would say on the matter.
Ron had, of course, tried to watch the Slytherin team practicing, but they'd set wards around the pitch, so by the time Ron got close enough to see what they were doing, the Slytherins were just standing there, looking at him. It was driving Ron crazy.
Additionally, the rumors coming out of Slytherin House were confusing at best. First, the rumors had said that the team needed one Beater, then it was two Chasers, then it was one Beater again. Finally, rumors said that what the team had needed all along was one Keeper, and that a diminuitive second-year by the name of Aaron Llamas had gotten the position.
Then the day of the first Quidditch match arrived. Harry was pacing nervously around, wiping the sweat from his palms.
"Nervous?" Ron asked, smiling.
"What do you think?" Harry responded, "This is my first game as captain. We're up against Slytherin, and have no idea what to expect, and . . ." Harry had almost been about to say that he feared his friendship with Draco would suffer because of this game, but remembered at the last minute that no-one knew about his friendship with Draco.
So, he grasped the first idea to come to mind and ran with it. "And we have a completely untried Keeper. What if Annie blows it completely?"
"She won't blow it. She's the best Keeper I've ever seen outside the professional leagues, Harry. You're not only a gifted Seeker, you're also an excellent judge of Quidditch players. You saw her talent immediately, Harry. That, not because you've been with the team longer than anyone else, or because you've won Gryffindor more games than anyone else ever has, is why you were made captain."
Harry sighed. "I only hope you're right."
A few minutes before the game, Draco came to see Harry. In his best British 'stiff-upper-lip' tone, as if he were visiting the dentist, rather than talking to a fellow student, Draco said, "Potter. I just wanted to come by and say that no matter what happens, no hard feelings, all right?"
Harry looked at Draco, and what he saw in his silver eyes wasn't at all 'stiff-upper-lip.' "Ron, could you leave us alone for a minute?"
"You sure you want me to?"
"Yeah. I'll be fine." He demonstrated to Ron that he was still packing his wand, if he needed to defend himself.
After Ron left, Draco relaxed. "What I really wanted to say is that I'll still be your friend after all this if you'll still be mine. No matter what happens." He smiled warmly.
Harry returned the smile. "Of course. No matter what."
Harry held out his hand, and Draco took it firmly. Then the two young men pulled themselves towards each other for a stereotypically masculine back-slapping hug.
"See you after the game, then?" Draco nodded as he turned to leave.
Harry nodded back. "The usual place."
And with that, Draco was gone.
Ron returned soon after Draco left. "What was up with him?"
Harry avoided the subject. "Let's go over those plays you came up with again."
He saw a momentary flicker of suspicion in Ron's eyes before he nodded and said, "All right, first play . . ."
The announcer called out their names as the Gryffindor and Slytherin teams took the field. As team Captains, Harry and Draco were each the final names called and each got much more applause than any of the other players.
Murmurs of anticipation worked their way through the crowd. Never before had a team's plans been clouded in as much secrecy as Slytherin's plans had been. The murmurs grew louder as the teams went into their opening positions.
There were no surprises among the Gryffindors, but then Draco's friend Erik took up position as Keeper. And then simultaneously, Draco and the new kid, Aaron, moved into their places - Aaron as Seeker and Draco as Beater.
The mumbling of the crowd grew to a roar as the arrangement of the players sank in.
What the hell's Draco playing at? He's supposed to be Seeker, not Beater! Harry thought. Suddenly, Harry realized why Draco had thrown caution to the wind and come to see him before the game. He was up to something, and wanted Harry to know that, this time at least, it wasn't personal.
From where Harry sat circling the field looking for the Snitch, he could watch every move that Draco made. Draco played like he was born to be a Beater, with nerves of steel and dead-on aim. Harry knew that several of his teammates were going to have bruises after run-ins with Draco. And Harry was very surprised to feel pride welling up in his chest as he watched his friend play.
Then Harry saw the Snitch. It was soaring up from ground-level on the other side of the pitch, but Harry thought he could *just* reach it if he flew fast enough. He checked Aaron's position, and saw that he was halfway along the field, quite a bit higher than Harry was, and apparently not paying any attention to Harry or the Snitch at all. Harry flew for the Snitch.
No sooner had he reached it, than it disappeared, and Harry couldn't tell where it went. All he knew was that the crowd was in an absolute uproar about something.
He looked down and saw Draco about five feet below him, grinning up at him, and pointing upwards. There, above his head was Aaron, holding the Snitch. A Bludger hovered high over Aaron's head.
It only took Harry a fraction of a second to figure out what had happened. Draco had apparently knocked the Bludger into the Snitch from below to push the Snitch upwards into Aaron's hands.
Harry could hear the announcer saying, "Mmmmm. . . . It doesn't look like there's anything in the rule books prohibiting plays like that. So, I guess that SLYTHERIN WINS!"
If the crowd had been in an uproar before, it was absolutely insane now, with Slytherins, and some Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws, celebrating like Slytherin had just won the Quidditch World Cup, and not just a single school game.
Gryffindors, and the other Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws, on the other hand, were protesting. Cries of "Foul!" and "Cheaters!" rang out from that side of the pitch. Harry could hear Hagrid's voice booming, "Never trust a Slytherin!"
For his part, however, Harry was surprised to notice that he didn't have very much rancor towards Draco at all. In fact, he found it amusing that Draco had made him promise to continue their friendship 'no matter what,' knowing that this maneuver was in the works. He offered Draco a half-smile and touched his temple in a pantomime of a salute, which Draco returned.
After the team had cleaned up and everyone had gone to dinner, Ron was still fuming. "That *must* be illegal! I can't imagine the Department of Magical Games and Sports condoning that sort of behavior."
"Ron, calm down," Hermione interrupted his ranting. "It's not like it's snooker*, where the balls are all stationary. It's probably just dumb luck that he got it at all."
Harry wasn't so sure about that. He knew that Draco had something planned when he came to visit him before the game, and suspected that this 'snooker play' came off exactly as planned. But he didn't say anything to Ron and Hermione, lest they figure out that Harry and Draco weren't rivals anymore.
"Harry?" Ginny whispered in his ear. "Did you know that was coming?"
Harry shook his head shortly. "I knew it was something, but didn't know *what.*"
They finished their supper, Ron still complaining bitterly about the play Draco had used to win the game, and retired to the Gryffindor common room. Ron ranted on about the Slytherin Quidditch team for another few minutes, and then he finally got down to working on his homework.
"What did you get for number 35, Harry?" Ron asked.
Harry didn't respond.
"Harry?"
"What?" Harry's eyes took a moment to focus on Ron's face.
"What did you get for number 35?"
Harry looked down at the scroll in front of him. "I haven't done that one yet. I'm only on number 24."
"Oh." Ron said, disappointed. Sighing, he went back to work.
Harry was just wondering if he and Draco *would* still be meeting that night, or if he'd be too busy celebrating with his fellow Slytherins, when one of the school owls flew in though the window with a note for him. Usual time, usual place? was all it said.
He tore off a corner of his scroll and wrote the single word Yes on it and sent it back.
Soon afterward, he retired to bed. As he left, he heard Hermione say, "Harry's been sleeping a lot lately, hasn't he? But then, his schoolwork has been getting better and better. Apparently, the extra sleep's been good for him."
He woke at the usual time and filled his bag with his Potions, Care of Magical Creatures and Introductory Arithmancy books and sufficient scrolls and quills to get his homework done for those classes.
He arrived at the room in the Astronomy Tower where he and Draco met and opened the door to find Draco already there, staring distractedly out the window. "Hey." He began.
"Hi." Draco smiled at him, as Harry pulled out his books and set to work.
After he'd been working on his Potions essay for a while, he looked up at Draco, who looked very Byronic staring out into the moonlit night, his hair falling into his eyes.
"What's up?" Harry asked.
Draco slid from the windowsill and sat on the floor next to Harry. "Are you angry that I kept my plans for today's game secret from you?"
Harry shook his head. "I guess I'm a *little* disappointed, but not angry."
Draco gave him a lopsided smile. "That's good. Of course, I *am* sorry that I kept it from you. But as you told Ginny a while back, the fewer people who know about a conspiracy the better." His silver eyes glittered with humor.
"So why'd you give up being Seeker, anyhow?"
"I was just doing it to make my father happy. And to compete with you. But neither of those matter anymore. It'll also be much easier to keep up the image that we're still rivals if I get a couple of chances to knock Bludgers at you throughout the year."
He continued. "And that's one of the things that Erik and I've been talking about. He pointed out that I'm really too aggressive to just sit back and wait, like a Seeker has to. I'm more of a 'go in there and beat someone silly' type."
"I guess I'd have to agree with that. You certainly seem to have found your calling. How long'd it take you to work up that 'snooker play'?"
Draco chuckled. "Liked that, didn't you? And I bet you'd just *love* to be able to teach that to your own Beaters. Well, guess what?
"I have no idea how I do that. It's just something I . . . can do. Sort of like when you went after me in first year for stealing Neville's Remembrall."
Harry snorted good-naturedly. "Like I believe that."
"Really!" Draco raised his right hand as if making a pledge. "We were at practice one day and I just thought 'I wonder if I could . . . .' And I did. Everyone else on the team, and I do mean *everyone* has tried it, and none of them can do it even by accident. That's when we started setting the wards around the pitch so no-one would see us practicing."
"Well, I hope you don't mind if the Gryffindor team tries it anyhow."
"Go right ahead and be my guest. Let me know how it works out, will you?"
They went back to their Potions homework, and after they'd finished that, Harry picked up his Introductory Arithmancy book.
"You like that?" Draco indicated the book.
"Actually I do. I didn't trust Hermione at first when she told me that it's a fun class, but it really is. It's certainly different from my other classes."
They went back to work in companionable silence, Draco sitting on the windowsill, Harry on the floor just beneath him.
After a few minutes, Harry said, "What time were you born, Draco?"
"12:35."
"A.M. or P.M.?" Harry began scribbling on a scrap of paper.
"Half-past midnight. Why?"
"We're learning some foreign algorithms for birth augurs and I don't have any idea what time of day I was born. So I figured I'd do your birth augurs instead."
Draco's eyes widened. "You . . . I mean, you . . . ." He stammered.
"I what?"
But Harry didn't get any farther than that, for all thought fled from his mind when Draco placed his hand at the back of Harry's neck, pulling him closer and pressing his lips to Harry's.
After an initial moment of shock, Harry found himself returning Draco's kiss. He slid his hands up to play with Draco's white-blond locks as Draco gently lowered him to the floor. Draco lightly nibbled at Harry's lower lip, making Harry moan softly.
Draco pulled his head back and took Harry's glasses off. Then he drank in Harry's green eyes for a long moment before lowering his lips back to Harry's.
Harry kissed Draco's cheek, then the hinge of his jaw, until he reached the other boy's neck, which he kissed and licked gently, sending shivers down both of their spines.
Harry pushed Draco over, taking the top position and moved back up to Draco's mouth, which his kissed lingeringly.
Suddenly, Harry found himself sitting upright. Panic lit Draco's silver eyes. "Harry. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to . . . " And that quickly, Draco was gone.
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A/N: Let's have a show of hands. How many of you thought "1 Samuel 18?" and looked it up in your Bibles? How many already knew what 1 Samuel 18 is?
Well, for those of you who are curious and either (a) don't have Bibles, or (b) don't feel like going to get it, 1 Samuel 18 is a large part of the story of David and Jonathan.
I could go on for days, quoting key verses and such, but let's just suffice it to say that some interpret the story to be just one of very close platonic friends. Others interpret it as a tale of same-sex romantic love. Much like this chapter. Are Harry and Draco just very close platonic friends? Are they experiencing same-sex romantic love? Only the following chapters will tell for sure. ;-)
And for anyone who would like on-line Bible access, I refer to The Bible Gateway all of the time.
Also, I'm in no way an expert on *any* sport, much less Quidditch, so I have no idea if the 'snooker play' would work in JKR's universe, but since I've moved everyone over to my universe for the duration of this story, it works over here. 8-)
Would Hermione say "snooker" or "billiards"? I know she wouldn't say "pool," because that's an American term. I just have this wonderful image of Hermione saying "snoooker" with a nicely-drawn-out "oo" sound that I can't quite shake.