Denial
Draco must have headed off to his room, though I couldn't tell as he was invisible. I finally remembered to close the portrait hole and I slowly wandered off to breakfast. When I arrived at the Great Hall I discovered that most of the school had indeed already begun their breakfast. As I made my way to the Griffindor I made a passing mental note that Draco wasn't yet at the Slytherin table.
My head was is a bit of a daze and I just sat at the first seat I saw available. I was sharply brought back to reality by two voices shouting my name in unison. Looking up I saw Ron and Hermione looking rather annoyed that I hadn't sat down in the seat they had reserved for me. Feeling somewhat dumb I moved over to sit with the two.
"Since when do you not sit with us?" Hermione demanded.
"I'm sorry, I wasn't thinking. I guess I was just spacing out or something, I just didn't see you two."
"You didn't see us jumping up and down and waving for you to sit with us?"
"No, Herm, I didn't. Pass the eggs, Ron." Something told me this was a conversation I didn't want to have.
"Sure, here," Ron passed the eggs on to me, but not without helping himself first. "So, uh, you OK Harry? You usually don't sleep late, is there something wrong? Have a rough night last night?"
Oh God, I am not prepared to answer questions about last night
"I'm fine, nothings wrong, It just took me a while to fall asleep last night, no biggie."
I hurridly began piling breakfast on my plate, though once it was there it didn't look very appetizing, so I just poked at my eggs. From the corner of my I saw Draco enter the Great Hall and sit next to Crabbe and Goyle. Hoping no one would notice, I turned my head slightly towards where he was sitting. I saw that he wasn't eating either and he looked rather annoyed with Crabbe and Goyle. Other than that, he looked surprisingly normal considering that he looked half dead last night.
I forced myself to look back down at my eggs and began stabbing them mercilessly; runny egg yolk splattered all over my plate.
"Whoa, Harry! What did your eggs ever do to you? Can't you eat like a normal person?" Ron reached out to still my fork, which I set down.
"I'm not hungry," I mumbled as I pushed away my plate.
"Ooooohhh! I know what's wrong with Harry!" Hermione grinned knowingly, "I've seen this before, Harry's in love!"
I nearly fell backwards out of my seat at this announcement.
"I am NOT," I practically seethed, shocked by her presumption.
"Oh no? 10 sickles say you dreamt about some girl or other last night!"
Oh, a girl, that's right
"Actually…I think I did," I finally confessed, biting my lip in penance for what I thought she meant originally.
I allowed Hermione to keep her smug look as long as she wanted to remain willfully misinformed.
God help me if she knew what I thought she had been referring to. But I'm not in love with Draco! That would be silly. I'm not in love with him. I'm not
My eyes wandered over to the young man with whom I most emphatically was NOT in love with. His former smile was long gone and was now replaced with a scowl. I realized, though, that I was scowling too.
After a while I heard Ron and Hermione's chairs scrape the floor as they stood up from the table.
"Come on, Harry, if you're not going to eat breakfast you might as well make an effort not to be late to class."
Hermione tugged my ear playfully as she walked past me. I shrugged out of my seat and followed obediently. Hermione marched off ahead as Ron and I walked behind.
"It's OK, Harry, I know what you're going through." Ron patted me on the shoulder.
I hesitantly looked over at him, not entirely sure what it was exactly that Ron though I was going. I saw, though that he was staring at Hermione.
"You're still stuck on Hermione?" I whispered.
Ron nodded silently. It was fairly common knowledge that Hermione refused to date Ron and that Ron refused to get over it. She never gave any reason, but Ron was sure that she was secretly seeing someone.
"So tell me, Harry, who're you stuck on?"
"No one, OK? Really."
"But you said you dreamt about some girl!"
"Yea, but just some leftover dream about Cho, nothing serious."
"Ooohh, I get it. You're just sexually frustrated in general! You know, you have better be careful, or you'll end up sleeping with just any old person, and then end up regretting it."
My thoughts went back to early that morning when I woke up with Draco in my bed. Sure I'd been dreaming about Cho, but it sure wasn't Cho I'd been bloody well feeling up when I woke. I quickly banished that thought from my brain and turned back to Ron.
"You know, Ron, you sound like you know what you're talking about. So who'd you sleep with?"
Ron laughed bitterly, "There is no way in Hell that I'm going to tell you that."
"I guess that's fair." I allowed Ron to drop the conversation, God knows I didn't want to give him permission to have free reign on my secrets, so I bally well wasn't going to force them out of him.
Funny, it seems like we've all got secrets from each other
That day Potions class was with the Slytherins as usual, but there really wasn't anything usual about it. Normally the classroom would have been filled with malicious banter led by Draco, but today Draco walked right past me and sat at his desk, staring down at his hands folded in front of me. This normally wouldn't have bothered me at all, truly. I was in truth not a little sick of Draco's previous habit of insulting me and my friends. Nonetheless, it seemed wrong for him to ignore us completely. He simply walked right past us as if we weren't there at all and sat down stiffly in his chair. It was so unnatural, so unlike Draco. I was not the only one to notice either.
Usually Draco had such a commanding presence he filled the room and drew the attention of everyone in it. It was hard to ignore Draco, and it seemed he knew it. So when Draco walked into a room and ignored every living sole in it, everyone noticed. It was Pansy Parkinson who approached him first.
"Draco, baby, what's wrong?" She asked placing a hand on his shoulder.
"Sod off, Parkinson," Draco bit back, flinging her hand away. It was in fact an awsome thing to see Draco retain every bit of his pride, even when being defensive.
Pansy knew better than to push it any further, so she merely backed away as though nothing had happened and all of the class hadn't just seen her being rejected by Draco. No one else dared talk to Draco after that, though and Draco didn't bother talking to anyone else. I couldn't help but wonder at Draco's behavior. Surely he wasn't acting like this because his father had beaten him last night. He's undoubtedly had to show up to class many times after being beaten by his father, but he'd never acted like this before. This was something no one had ever seen and no one quite knew how to deal with it.
Ron, however was more than pleased.
"Get a load of that, Harry, Draco didn't insult us at all once during the whole of potions!" He pointed out gleefully as we left the dungeons after class. "It was great!"
"I don't know, It was kind of odd, didn't you think, I mean, he really wasn't himself."
"Who bloody cares! Malfoy's a complete bastard no matter what he does, but I prefer a complete bastard who doesn't insult me to one that does! You know I have half a mind to go insult him while he's down."
"Ron, that's an awful thing to say, don't you dare do that!"
"What, you're actually defending Malfoy? I don't believe it have you gone mad?"
"I'm not defending his past actions, I'm just saying that I don't want to see you acting like that!"
"Whatever," Ron sulked.
"Ron, Harry, wait up!" Hermione ran to catch up with us.
"What's up Hermi, stopped to ask Snape for extra homework?" Ron asked bitterly under his breath. I silenced him with an elbow to the ribs.
"So Harry, wasn't that odd, Malfoy's behavior today? What do you thinks up with that? I mean, he usually lives to insult us. Do you think he's sick?"
"Why on earth should I know?" I asked, struggling in vain to keep the defensiveness out of my voice.
"I was just asking, It was more a rhetorical question than anything. It was odd, though, like there was something wrong with him."
"Well Hermione, you're the smart one, why don't you tell us what's wrong with him. But for my part, I don't see that there's anything but improvement," Ron pointed out.
"Hmm… maybe Draco's in love too."
At that I nearly choked, but I managed to wheeze out a reply.
"Considering the way he treated Pansy, I seriously doubt it."
"Who said he had to be in love with Pansy? I mean, just because two people look like their meant to be together it doesn't mean their supposed to be. Some of the best couples are far from obvious to the rest of the world."
"Look, Herm, philosophize on your own time, for my part, it is a little too soon after breakfast for me to want to think about Malfoy being in love with anyone." Ron made fake vomiting noises and I tried to pretend to laugh. Hermione just glared.
"Ron if you ever truly fall in love I'll be extremely surprised." At that, Hermione stormed off.
"Bitch," was all Ron could say in response.
I had to struggle with my mixed emotions to that conversation. It seemed that perhaps Hermione was being insensitive to Ron's feelings, but at the same time, what she said had made sense, as much as I really didn't want to confess to agreeing with her. I had to wonder about Hermione, though, it did seem that she spoke with a fair bit of conviction just to put her words down to speculation. Did she really know what she was talking about? Who was Hermione in love with? Did she really know as well as she claimed how to spot love?
Oh God, what if Hermione's right about everything? I shook my head firmly trying to rid my head of unwelcome thoughts.
I am not in love with Draco. I'm not, I'm not, I'm not. It can't be true. Can it? I mean it's not unlikely for Hermione to be wrong once in her life, is it?
All day long my mind kept going around in circles. I just couldn't pass off what Hermione had said. The fact was that I never took anything she said with a grain of salt, it was always most likely that she was right. But I didn't, couldn't believe her now.
Maybe, just maybe she's right in another way. Maybe I am in love. Not with Draco though. God, no. I must be in love with someone else. That's it. I'm in love with someone, but I just don't know who. And Draco's in love with someone else too, anyone else. Yes that's it, we just don't know who we're in love with. Because obviously I don't care at all about Draco. I don't think about him endlessly. Just watch me not think about Draco. Not thinking about Draco…Not thinking about Draco…Not thinking about Draco…Not thinking about Draco. See, I'm not thinking at all about Draco. Besides, Draco and I decided that we would say goodbye at the Griffindor tower and leave it at that. And that's what we did. Draco didn't talk to me at all today. He didn't look at me today. He didn't even insult me at all today. I bet he didn't even think about me. I bet he doesn't even give a fuck about me. Damn it he probably couldn't even give a fuck if I died. He doesn't care at all that I fucking saved his life. He's just an arrogant prick!
"Harry!" Hermione suddenly pulled me out of my thoughts. "I know you may be thwarted in love, but it's really no reason to take it out on that poor unsuspecting pillow."
"I AM NOT IN LOVE!!!!" I screamed for the whole commons room to hear. I then threw down the pillow I had evidently been beating up and I ran upstairs to bed. Once in my bed, though, I didn't sleep. I just kept playing the past twenty-four hours in my head. Repeatedly my mind stopped at the moment when I thought Draco had kissed me.
You fool, he was invisible, you probably fucking imagined it
*********************************************
The following week followed much in the same vein. I'm sorry to say that my mood did not improve. All week I kept looking over at Draco, just to prove that he still didn't give a fuck about me. Draco kept being irritable to Crabbe and Goyle and he kept walking into class totally aloof and totally ignoring me and my friends. Nothing changed, nothing happened, frankly the week was boring. That is, until Friday potions with the Slytherins.
When I arrived in potions that day I was determined not to look over at Draco. Instead I walked straight over to my desk, not looking up at all. I could feel my stomach turn in knots as I forced myself to look down at my desk instead of glancing across the room. My eyes shot up instantly, however, when I heard I fight break out on the other side of the room. I couldn't hear what the argument was over, all I really saw was the conclusion.
I heard Draco shout, "Bite me!" and saw him punch Goyle in the face.
Damn, that takes gall, even if you are Draco Malfoy
The huge boy fell backwards off his seat and hit his head on the corner of the table behind him, leaving him unconscious on the floor. Draco stood over him, fists clenched and seething.
For a while no one moved, we all stood staring at Draco in disbelief. The first one to move was Professor Snape. I looked up at him as he approached Draco. His eyes were a mixture of disbelief, shock, and fury.
"Mister Malfoy, do you wish to explain this rash attack on your fellow housemate and need I add friend?"
Draco turned his head up towards his head of house with a sneer.
"Friend?" Draco paused at this word as if truly trying to contemplate its meaning, then continued. "Forgive me sir, but the argument was between me and that son of a bitch.," he pointed down at the unconscious boy on the floor, his sneering becoming even more pronounced.
"Very well then, MR. Malfoy, since you are opposed to the company of your friends, you shall have a taste of your enemy." Snape had an odd look on his face as if enjoying a private joke. "Go sit with Potter, you shall be his partner for the rest of class."
I could not bring myself to look at Draco, so I kept my eyes fixed on Snape. His face had now become unreadable as his eyes followed Draco over to me. Not that his expression was blank, I'd just never seen this expression before and didn't know how to read it. I figured Draco must have been standing behind me, for I saw Snape command Hermione to move out of her seat. I glanced, then at Hermione, I figured she'd have been more than irritated by Snape's command, but she merely got out of her seat obediently and smiled gently at me. I looked back up and saw that the whole class was staring at me, I would have looked away, but I was still afraid to look over at Draco who was now sitting next to me.
Finally Snape began the lesson and the class's attention was finally taken away from me. I now chanced glancing over to Draco. His face, too was entirely unreadable, but I had a suspicion that his expression was similar to that on my own face.
I now couldn't tear my eyes away from Draco and likewise Draco's eyes were staring intently at me. To anyone watching it must have merely appeared as a stare-down of two enemies. I was vaguely aware of Snape giving instructions for the days assignment, yet still Draco and I stared at each other uneasily. It had been nearly a week since we had been this close. That strange night when we had been so oddly close, not only physically but emotionally too, sharing private details that we normally wouldn't dream of telling an other person, let alone a person considered an enemy for so long. It struck me as odd. For so many years Draco and I had been enemies, for that one night I dare say we were friends, but now as we sit side by side, staring at each other, I have no idea what we are anymore. If there is any rift between us right now, it surely is not the result of years of petty rivalry. I can tell as we look at each other that the same feeling of closeness we had that night has changed into something else. I'm not sure, but overall the feeling is uncomfortable. But whatever the emotion was that passed between the two of us as we stared each other down, it was intense.
Finally I heard Snape end his lecture and the class began brewing.
"Do you know what we're supposed to be doing?" I asked hesitantly.
"Yes, but only because I've made this type of potion before."
"Good, 'cause I didn't hear anything Snape just said."
Finally I managed to look away from Draco and we began to make our potion.
"Draco," I said working up my courage to attempt a normal conversation in public. "Why did you hit Goyle?"
"No real reason, actually. I mean he didn't do anything particularly out of the ordinary for him, anyway. Honestly… I think I'm just used to working my frustration out on you, but it got redirected at Goyle."
"You mean that you would have otherwise hit me like you hit Goyle?!" I asked in a shocked, panicked sort of whisper.
"No, I'd probably have issued some particularly cutting remark, but that wouldn't have fazed Goyle, so I punched him."
I looked over at Draco as saw that he was now working his frustration out on a poor unsuspecting toad's spleen.
"What are you frustrated at now?" I asked pointing at the toad's spleen he was mutilating with a knife.
Draco ignored my question and continued his attack on the spleen.
"If you keep chopping like that your going to ruin that." I reached my hand over and placed it over his. At the touch he did stop his violent chopping. He began again, though, once I removed my hand.
"Look Harry, I don't think it's a good idea for us to talk in public."
"OK, if that's what you want."
"I think it's best."
So we finished the rest of the class without talking except for occasional commands issued to me as to what to do next with the potion.
As we left potions, Draco seemed to pause as if he wanted to say something to me, but was afraid of who might be listening. Before I got too far away from the Dungeons, though, Draco shocked me by suddenly grabbing me by the collar of my robes and slamming me against the wall. I was confused for a moment, thinking that he was truly angry at me. He moved his mouth next to my ear, I could feel his hot breath against by skin.
"Meet me tonight at the north tower, alone. Eight-thirty." He then lowered his voice even more than before and whispered, "I'll have your cloak, I just want to talk." He then released me and stormed off.