Chapter 20
Disclaimer: The main characters belong to JK Rowling (at least, their names do), but the setting, plot and some other characters are mine.
A/N: I was dynamic! This is a super-fast update by my standards. I now have a direction and future plans for this story, which helps. I'm really sorry for not doing individual review replies; just know that I love you all very much for reviewing! I'll try and get back to you all next time.
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On Monday morning, Harry was in a distinctly bad mood. After his sudden awakening at such a stupidly early hour, and subsequent need to secretly change half his bed linen, he had received far less sleep than he would have liked. When he had gone back to bed, some time after four o' clock, it had taken him a long time to fall asleep again, as he feared a recurrence of his dream.
Funnily enough, it had had more impact on him than most nightmares he had experienced, despite its decidedly enjoyable nature. He and Draco had agreed to wait, and he had been happy with that decision. He had been so sure that they weren't ready, but now his inane subconscious had raised questions about just how certain he really was.
"You look pissed off," Deb commented calmly, sliding into the chair on the opposite side of the kitchen table to where Harry was sitting, and checking that Lily was out of earshot. "Did you and the Dragon have a fight yesterday?"
He made a noncommittal sound and kept eating his porridge.
Picking up a piece of toast, Deb narrowed her eyes at him. "Look, you were mad at me yesterday, and after you found me I didn't really give you a chance to vent, so you were probably still angry afterwards. I don't want to cause any trouble between the two of you." She was about to take a bite of her toast when she paused sheepishly and added: "Well, at least not again."
Harry sighed. "Something did happen, but it wasn't because of you. Okay?"
"Okay." Evidently remembering their new agreement, she left it at that and started to eat her breakfast.
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When he reached his homeroom that morning, Harry was expecting things to be thoroughly awkward, and he wasn't disappointed. Ron and Mione were huddled over an English Lit assignment when he walked in, and while they didn't ignore him or anything like that, things had definitely changed. And if he wanted his life to be close to ordinary again, he was going to have to talk to them.
As he sat down at his usual desk, Mione looked up and caught his eye. She muttered something to Ron and he nodded. After rolling up the large piece of paper they had been working on, she twisted a chair round and sat down, facing Harry. "Hey."
"Hey," he said softly as Ron down on Mione's left.
"Look, I'm sorry," she said at last, not breaking eye contact. "We both acted like jerks these last few weeks. We talked about it this weekend, and neither of us want to lose you, or Dray, if you can forgive us."
Harry paused for a moment, unsure how to reply, but Ron cut into the silence after a few seconds. "If you're still mad, then just be mad at me. Mione only blanked the two of you because I wanted her to; she tried to talk me into apologising earlier. I'm sorry; it's my fault."
Mione turned to look indignantly at him. "No it isn't. If I were a true friend, I would have tried harder to get you to fix this!"
"Guys!" Harry held up both hands in a T-shape. "Time out, okay? I don't care whose fault it is. You both did it, but you've both apologised, so I'm fine with it, so long as you apologise to Dray as well." Suddenly he could sense someone behind him, and turned. "Speak of the devil. Now's your chance."
"Chance for what?" Draco pulled up another chair and sat down next to him.
"We're sorry," Mione said promptly. "Ron and I have been incredibly stupid in the last few weeks, and we want to apologise."
Draco turned to Ron with one eyebrow raised. "Is that right?"
Ron nodded. "Yeah. I'm sorry I was so insulting about it. If you guys want to… be together, it shouldn't bother us."
"What brought this on?" Draco still looked intrigued, but as he spoke, the answer dawned. "Oh yeah, you saw your sister with Deb on Friday, didn't you?"
Ron turned slightly green. "Don't remind me. I mean don't get me wrong, I can take you two being an item, but I'd rather not see anything actually happening, right? Now think about the fact that Ginny's my baby sister, so it's a whole lot worse."
"She's not such a baby any more," Harry corrected. "There's more going on with her and Deb than you know."
"Harry, please…"
Putting an arm round Ron's shoulders, Mione smiled. "I think he might be punishing you."
"You really do leave yourself open to it, you know," Harry told him, trying not to laugh.
Sadly for him, his fun was abruptly cut off by the bell ringing and the prompt arrival of McGonagall.
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It wasn't until lunchtime that Harry had a chance to speak to Draco on his own, and he wasn't going to let the opportunity slip past.
The blond was putting his books into his locker when Harry tapped him on the shoulder, his face unusually serious. "Dray… we need to talk."
Draco's heart sank. "I'm really not going to like this, am I?"
After a second or two, Harry's bright jade eyes widened behind his glasses and he shook his head rapidly. "No! It's not that bad, I promise."
As they started walking down the corridor, heading for nowhere in particular, Draco shot him a sideways glance and asked under his breath, a touch nervously: "So you're not going to end it?"
"What? No way!" Harry ran his hand through his hair, looking (and feeling) slightly rattled. "I just… I just figured we needed to talk about what happened yesterday afternoon."
"Okay." Draco still looked worried, and was silent for a moment. "I guess we should find somewhere private." He glanced out of the floor-length windows which had now replaced the lockers that lined the corridor further back. "I would say outside, but it's raining."
"Never mind the rain," Harry said, morecalmly than he felt. "There's that covered bit down in the courtyard; we could go there."
They took a staircase down past the science labs and reached the area he had suggested. The covered walkway around the courtyard was lined with benches, and they sat down, carefully making sure they weren't too close together. Today it was debatable as to whether that was because of their need to keep their relationship secret, or on account of their current situation.
"The rain's pretty," Draco said finally, watching the droplets streaming from the edge of the cover under which they sat. When Harry didn't reply, he turned to face him with a small sigh. "Okay, I'll stop putting it off. You wanted to talk."
"Yeah." Harry looked up into his eyes and took a deep breath. "I need to know… honestly. When you said that yesterday, were you thinking about it?"
"It was the first thing that came into my mind. I don't know why. I know we said we'd wait, and that's what I still want to do."
"I know. Me too." Then Harry made a small noise of frustration, right hand diving through his hair again, as it often did when he was nervous. "It's just… I don't know why it got to me so much."
Draco frowned. "I didn't know it had…"
Harry gave a short laugh and shut his eyes, not trusting himself to say it while he could still see Draco's face. "Oh, believe me, it got to me. It got right to my subconscious at three in the morning."
When he opened his eyes, Draco's pale eyebrows were raised and his mouth was slightly open. "Did you…"
"Have a dream? About you? Yes."
"Jesus." Draco slumped back against the bench, swallowing hard. "Sorry."
"Don't apologise." Harry half-smiled, beating down the embarrassment that was threatening to make him into a tomato. "It was… fun."
He was slightly concerned when Draco hid his face behindone hand, as he now had no indication of what the blond was thinking. But after a long moment, Draco took his hand away, and Harry discovered that he was laughing.
"What's funny?"
Draco shook his head, his features relaxing into a smile. "Do you realise that we only got together five weeks ago, and we've spent probably the majority of that not speaking to each other because of those stupid pictures? It just seems a little weird that we're having this kind of problem. And it's even weirder that it feels like we've been together for years."
"Is that a good thing or a bad thing?" Not sure of what his boyfriend was getting at, Harry was speaking quietly, staring down at the paving under his feet.
A hand gently touched his, twining their fingers together. "It's a good thing. Totally," Draco answered softly. "I'm not one for rushing into things, but… I guess you make me act different to usual. And if it's going to make us feel awkward or miserable, maybe holding off completely isn't the answer."
Harry's head shot up in surprise. "You mean…"
With the hand that wasn't holding Harry's, Draco gestured a 'no', shaking his head. "Not exactly. Look… thinking about how we got here in the first place, we might as well start being more open about this. I don't mean we should sleep together just yet, since that doesn't seem to be on the current wish-list for either one of us. I just mean that there's more to life than kissing. Right?"
Harry squeezed his hand, smiling. "Right. I can't promise that I won't dream about you again, though."
Draco smiled back at him. "I won't complain about that. I may even try encouraging my brain to dream about you too."
Suddenly, a door slammed on the other side of the courtyard, and they dropped each other's hands as three eighth-grade girls ran giggling down the path and out onto the sports field, dancing around in the heavy rain.
"We should go inside," Draco said at length, standing and offering a hand to help Harry to his feet. He didn't need it – they both knew that, but it was an excuse. And there weren't enough of them.
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A/N: The next update hopefully won't be too far away. Thank you all for reading; please review.
Note: If you like non-magic, if you like long stories, if you like Sirius/Remus… send me a message with 'DoI' in it to find out more about the upcoming fic, Degrees Of Involvement!
