~ There's only us, there's only this
Forget
regret or life is yours to miss ~
Harry
slowly opened his eyes the next morning just as the sun was warming the sky. He
turned his face towards the window and watched the rain splatter against the
glass and run down in little rivers. He was feeling extremely cozy; lying in a
warm bed with his head tucked under Draco's chin and their arms holding each
other loosely.
Harry tilted his head up to
look at Draco's face. His usually carefully styled hair was softly framing his
pale cheeks with silvery, blond wisps and his pink lips were slightly parted as
he breathed softly onto Harry's hair. Harry smiled and lightly kissed Draco's
collarbone.
Draco shifted beneath him, raising
his arms above his head as he stretched luxuriously. He opened his eyes and
squinted down at Harry.
"What are you doing awake
this early?" he yawned.
"I don't know."
"Well,
why don't you go make me breakfast?" Draco said sleepily, closing
his eyes again.
"Alright, I will,"
Harry answered cheerfully. "And I'll bring it to you in bed."
"Whatever makes you happy,"
Draco mumbled. "I'll have an omelette."
Harry gave him a quick peck on
the cheek, grabbed his glasses, and bounced off the bed and out of the room.
Draco smiled to himself and drifted off back to sleep.
Harry entered the kitchen,
oiled a frying pan and placed it on the burner. He collected plates and
utensils, setting them up on a tray with a single red rose that he took from a
vase on the kitchen table. He smiled at the flower and hummed to himself as he
went to the fridge to get out the ingredients for the omelette. He grabbed
cheese, mushrooms, onions, and red peppers before noticing that the egg carton
was completely empty.
"Shit!" Harry cursed
under his breath, straightening up and slamming the fridge door. He looked over
at the tray with the flower on it and frowned in disappointment.
"I'll just have to go buy
some," he thought to himself. He started down the hall to the bedroom to
get his wand so that he could summon the Ministry guards to accompany him
outside.
"This is stupid!" he
thought, stopping mid-stride. "I think I can manage to walk to the market
and back on my own."
Harry stood in the doorway of
his bedroom, watching Draco's sleeping form while chewing worriedly on his
bottom lip.
"If I go and come back
really quick he won't even know I was gone," he decided.
He quietly entered the room,
slipped on his jeans and a t-shirt, grabbed his wand, and returned to the
kitchen.
"Maybe I should leave a
note..." he thought guiltily, while tying up his shoes and wrapping his
cloak around him.
In the end he decided to just
leave out the empty egg carton for Draco to see in case he woke up. Harry
slipped his wand under his shirt and quickly left. The front door closed behind
him with a click as he went out alone for the first time in over a year.
* * * * * * * * *
Draco
suddenly woke to the smell of burning oil and groaned as he draped an arm over
his eyes.
"You'd better not be
burning my breakfast, Harry!" he shouted.
When there was no answer, he
lifted his arm and looked out the open doorway.
"Harry?"
Draco sat up, a sudden feeling
of foreboding coming over him.
"Harry, answer me!"
he tried again.
Silence.
Draco leapt out of bed, threw
on his black trousers from the floor and ran to the kitchen. There was a frying
pan smoking on the stove with a layer of blackened oil burning on the bottom.
Draco quickly turned off the heat and removed it to the sink.
"Harry?" he called,
looking into the living room and finding it empty. Panic building, he ran
around the entire apartment, looking everywhere, including the deck and the
outside hallway.
Draco closed the door and
leaned against it, running his hands through his hair in helplessness.
"Harry...where are
you?" he asked aloud, feeling lost.
He walked back to the kitchen
and suddenly spied the telephone on the wall. He quickly strode over and pushed
'the Weasleys' on speed-dial.
"Hello?" a groggy male voice answered on the other end.
"Have you seen,
Harry?" Draco asked, pacing back and forth.
"Draco?" Ron asked,
still half-asleep.
"Yeah"
"Harry? No..."
Ron suddenly sat up in bed. "Why? Is he missing?"
"He said he was going to
make me breakfast and when I got up he was gone...and there was a pan burning
on the stove..." he trailed off.
"Oh, God..." Ron
paled.
Hermione stirred in the bed
beside him and blinked her eyes open.
"I don't know what to do,"
Draco said desperately.
"Um...have you called the
Ministry guards yet?"
"No...I'll do that
now."
"Good...alright, you call
them and we'll be right over," Ron said, getting out of bed and searching
for some clothes.
"Thanks, Ron." Draco
hung up the phone.
* * * * * * * * *
Ron
barely registered the fact that that was the first time Draco had ever called
him by his first name.
"What is it Ron?"
Hermione asked, fully awake and watching him frantically throw on yesterdays
clothes from the floor.
"That was Draco on the
phone," he paused and looked over at her. "Harry is missing."
Hermione gasped and put her
hands over her mouth.
"What...how..."
Hermione spluttered.
"I told him we'd be right
over. He sounded really shook up on the phone."
Hermione sprang into action and
soon the two of them were on their way.
* * * * * * * * *
Draco
threw the pillows on the bed aside as he searched for his wand, he saw it
tucked in the corner and quickly grabbed it before turning towards the door.
Stopping suddenly he looked back towards the bed with a puzzled expression.
"Harry's wand is gone,"
he frowned.
Just then the doorbell rang and
Draco, half-hoping it was Harry, sprinted down the hall with his wand in hand.
He threw open the door to see Ron and Hermione standing there in rain soaked
cloaks.
"Have you heard anything
yet?" Ron asked hopefully.
"No." Draco led the
way into the kitchen.
Hermione patted his shoulder
before the three of them settled down around the table.
"Have you called the
Ministry?" Hermione asked.
"Not
yet, but I noticed something strange - Harry's wand is missing, too."
"Where does he usually
keep it?"
"Under
his pillow, with mine."
"Maybe he took it with him
this morning," Ron put in.
"I don't think he would've
taken it to make me breakfast," Draco answered, rubbing his eyes.
"Besides, I know he didn't because I saw him leave the bedroom without
it."
"So...you were in there
when someone took it?" Hermione pondered aloud.
"I must
have been..."
"So, whoever took Harry
came and got his wand quietly enough so as not to wake you?" Ron
asked in disbelief. "That doesn't sound like a Death Eater."
"Death Eaters can't get in
here," Draco interjected. "Dumbledore has this place magically
secured."
"Why would they take his
wand?" Ron puzzled.
"How would they know where
he kept it?" Hermione frowned.
The three sat in silence for a
few minutes before Hermione suddenly narrowed her eyes and looked over at
Draco.
"What if Harry took his wand?"
"What do you mean?"
Draco asked, glancing up.
"Did you check to see if
his shoes or cloak were gone too?" she asked.
Realization suddenly dawned on
the other two men.
"You think Harry went out on his own?" Ron asked slowly.
"Exactly," Hermione
answered, standing up.
"But that would be against
Dumbledore's orders," Ron said incredulously.
"Oh, and Harry's never
broken the rules before," Hermione quipped sarcastically with a roll of
her eyes.
Draco stood up and walked to
the front door, followed closely by Ron and Hermione.
"I can't believe
it..." Draco said hollowly. "His stuff is gone."
"I knew it!" she
crowed.
"I can't believe that
stupid git!" Ron said. "Where would he go? Especially
without telling you?"
"I don't know, he
said he was going to make me breakf-" Draco
stopped and clapped a hand to his forehead.
"What is it?"
Hermione asked in alarm.
Draco didn't answer. He turned
and walked back to the kitchen, looking around the cluttered counters, before
his eyes suddenly fell on the empty egg carton. He quickly walked over and picked it up.
"He went out for
eggs?" Ron noted in amusement. "I can't believe that idiot risked his
life to make you breakfast."
Draco stared at the carton
quietly.
"It's not your fault,
Draco." Hermione watched him carefully. "You know Harry was just
itching to go out anyway, it was just a matter of time before he did."
Draco stayed silent.
Hermione and Ron glanced at
each other.
"Do you want us to stay
with you while you wait for, Harry?" Ron asked tentatively.
"No, that's okay."
Draco looked up and smiled tiredly. "Thanks for coming over, and I'm sorry
I made you worry over nothing."
"Well, you didn't know
that Harry was just being thick," Ron smiled.
"We still don't know that
he's safe, I mean, he is still out alone," Hermione stated.
"If he's not back within
the hour I'll call you," Draco said, leading the way to the front door.
Ron and Hermione looked at each
other uncertainly before following. They didn't want to go before Harry got
back, nor did they want to leave Draco alone.
"Please call us as soon as
Harry gets back or...or for any reason," Hermione rushed.
"Don't be too hard on
him," Ron added. "You know how he gets when he wants to do something,
nothing can get in his way."
Draco pretended to smile as he
said goodbye and shut the door. Then he walked to the kitchen, sat in a chair
and rested his head in his hands, his blond hair falling around his face.
"I can't protect him all
the time..." he thought miserably. "One day I'll wake up to find him
gone and he won't ever be coming back."
Draco sat there for awhile until
he had come to a decision. "If I have to live without him eventually, then
I might as well start now."
Just then the sound of the front door
opening made Draco jump and look up.
"Draco?" Harry's
voice echoed down the hallway.
Draco closed his eyes.
"I'm so sorry, Harry," he said under his breath.
He rose out of the chair and
took a deep, steadying breath. A flash of pain flickered across his handsome
face before he replaced it with a mask of coldness and waited for Harry to come
in.
