Disclaimer: Harry Potter and its characters are copyrighted to J. K. Rowling. I do not own the characters in this story.

A/N: Please R&R

CHAPTER TWO

Draco Malfoy stumbled drunkenly into a bed-and-breakfast on the outskirts of London.

"You have a room available?" he asked, looking around. His sneer of disgust at the overly quaint furnishings was luckily dulled by the effects of the alcohol. He'd have nowhere to sleep tonight if this place didn't board him.

"I shouldn't have waited so late at night to find a place," he quietly berated himself for procrastinating the unpleasant task of finding lodgings in a muggle city.

"Yes, one room left," the serious older lady replied, surveying him critically.

Draco nervously hoped there wasn't anything wrong with the muggle outfit he had picked out. He had stuck to simple jeans and an understated black sweater. They clung to the curves of his body in a way he felt made him look actually quite attractive. Loose wizarding robes really showed off nothing of his fine figure.

"This way, then," the brunette lady stated, leading him down a tall. Her tight, professional bun reminding him of that annoying McGonagall, and Draco leered at her behind her back.

"How long will you be staying," she asked in a polite yet distant voice.

"A week."

Draco had figured a week in one place would be long enough. As long as he suspected his father's followers might be tracking him, it was better not to stay in any one place too place.

She told him the price and he fumbled with his muggle money before handing over what he hoped was the correct amount. He must have counted right because the woman gave a polite smile and shut the door as she left.

A small cherry wood dresser stood along one wall, and Draco unpacked the two changes of muggle clothes he had, leaving three new robes in his small bag. He would have to buy more clothes the next day. If he wanted to blend in with the muggles he needed more than three muggle outfits to seem authentic. With a twinge, Draco realized he would also need a muggle job to get the money to pay for said muggle clothes.

"Dammit," he muttered. "How the hell am I supposed to find a muggle job with no job history or references?" He couldn't exactly tell his future employer that he had been the district manager of a potions manufacturing corporation. And he didn't think the muggles would be too impressed to know the Chudley Cannons had given him a callback to tryout as a second string seeker.

He would have to fabricate a muggle background to explain why he was in London with no history of employment. And while he was at it, he realized he'd probably be safest creating a whole new muggle identity, complete with a less unusual name.

"Drake Atwood," he mumbled some minutes later and decided the name would have to do. He had chose Drake because it was similar to his own first name, and he'd picked Atwood only because it happened to be the last name of the author of some muggle book lying in his new room.

Satisfied with this small bit of progressive, Draco climbed exhaustedly into bed. Tomorrow Drake Atwood would have to find himself a job.

Five months ago, Harry Potter had graduated from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. For the last two years, he had planned on becoming an Auror, and with his N.E.W.T.'s he probably had a good chance of getting the job. But at the last minute, he decided not to apply.

For eleven years, Harry had been an absolute nobody when one day he was suddenly thrust into the limelight. The incessant attentions of wizards such as Colin Creevy had been an unwanted nuisance to Harry. But the attention he received his first six and a half years in the wizarding world was exceedingly modest compared to the lavish interest people started paying him after Voldemort was officially dead.

Some new story about the Boy Who Lived headlined the newspapers nearly every day, and Harry was thoroughly sick of it. So after graduation he decided to escape publicity by moving back into the muggle world for a little while.

Ron and Hermione had accompanied him on a last trip to Diagon Alley before Harry would say goodbye, at least for awhile, to his life as a wizard. Their trip to Diagon Alley had been a tense affair because Hermione and Ron had recently broken up from a year-long relationship. They were civil but nothing more, and Harry was regretting spending the day with them together.

"Well, I guess that's that," Harry said as a lull settled into their conversation.

"Yeah," Ron said sadly.

He popped a piece of candy into his mouth as the three of them stepped from Diagon Alley into the Leaky Cauldron. Ron and Hermione would be leaving the pub the way they had come in, but Harry would be going out a separate exit, one leading into muggle London.

"I'll miss you both," Harry said. "You've seen the flat I bought in London, so you've got no excuse to not visit me."

"We'll visit," Hermione promised, squeezing Harry into a tight hug.

Ron awkward shook Harry's hand and slapped him on the back. "Bye, mate."

"Bye."

Harry pushed open the door and found himself on a bustling London street. Not far from here, there was a coffee shop called Merlin's where Harry had been hired. The job was not glamorous or exciting, but he had wanting something low key and low pressure and this was certainly it.

Harry walked passed the coffee shop on his way home to his new flat and smiled. He'd originally noticed the shop because in one window stood a large cardboard cutout of the muggle idea of what a wizard looked like. The inside was supposed to decorated to look like a wizard's house. Harry was pleased with the irony that he had left the wizarding world to work in a muggle coffee shop that tried to create a fantasy world of magic.

During his five months at Merlin's, Harry had realized that he was not the only wizard who enjoyed the irony of a muggle establishment attempting to create the magical world. Several witches and wizards had stepped into the cafe to order a cup of coffee and a pastry, and Harry was exceedingly grateful that they had so far all been very discreet. They gave him knowing winks and smiles, but none of them had been too suspicious acting. And thankfully none of them seem to have tipped off the wizard press to his current place of employment either.

Harry always received a certain comfort when he spotted a, usually muggle- born, witch or wizard enter the door of Merlin's. Even though he was cutting himself off from the magical world for awhile, these surprising reminders of its existence were nice. And Harry had been promoted to store manager so he didn't feel quite so stupid when people recognized him and wanted to know what the Boy Who Lived was doing serving them an eclair.

Yes, Harry had always been pleased to see the occasional wizard enter the shop, and he was no longer startled when he found himself face-to-face with an unexpected visitor from his other life. But no amount of wizards from his past could prepare him for the day he glanced up and found himself looking into the pale face and startled grey eyes of Draco Malfoy.