October the 15th, Fourth Year – Harry Potter

6:36 pm

It's been just over two months since I started this ride. I opened a door I wasn't entirely sure could be. I'm not even sure what had really possessed me to find him in the tower that first night. I had seen his name on the map, I had watched it for hours before finally deciding to go find him. The sight I'd found floored me. Draco Malfoy was not one you'd consider as vulnerable. Then again, he's not one most considered human. He was abstract, a distant, unattainable being. Breaching the steel walls that surrounded him was something I truly didn't believe was possible, but I tried all the same.

In the past two months he's changed, in little ways. The malice in his attempts to keep up the facade in public is gone. Not just with me, but with Hermione and Ron too. It has even seemed to mellow with others he once put effort into reducing to tears. Our private encounters have been few, only two since the night in the dorms. The bustle of the start of the term and being our fourth year, half way through our time in these hallowed halls. Great, now I'm turning into Hermione, too many and too big words without ever seeming to get to the point. I think I'm just nervous. His father has been keeping too close of an eye on him, something bad is coming. I can feel it, I can see it in the brief moments I catch his eye when no one really sees it. I do. Reciprocation is eminent too though. I can't expect him to lay himself bare and not do so in kind.

11:55 pm

The door to the dungeons opens, only it isn't Draco that opens it. I look down to see Dobby standing there shaking like a little leaf. I don't bother to drop even the hood of the cloak, he knows I'm there and isn't startled when, to anyone else, would be air speaking to him, "What's wrong?"

"Dobby is sorry. I tried to keep him awake, but he is…." Dobby's gaze darts behind him for a split second before he's talking almost faster than I can follow again. "Master's spirit is breaking. Lucius was here and he yelled and it was loud and…"

I hate doing it, but I hold up a hand, letting it free of the cloak so the elf can see it, silencing him effectively, "Let's go." I follow him quickly towards his private room, Dobby opening the door with little more than a snap of his fingers and in the same instant that the door is open he's gone. He had done his part, kept an eye on him until our meeting time. I don't even need to ask why he'd been tasked with trying to keep him awake the moment I enter the room. He's tangled in the emerald green, satin sheets of his bed, writhing in agony in his sleep, only softly crying at the moment.

I venture forward, invisible as I close the door. Heaving a sigh I slide the cloak free, laying it over the back of the arm chair before approaching the bed. I still don't understand why his pain stabs at my heart the way it does. I can't even talk it through with Hermione to figure it out either. Dobby is still the only one who knows about our… Friendship. Even though we've expressed more through Dobby in the past couple of months, it doesn't change the effect it has had. It's beyond a truce, he's as much my friend as Ron or Hermione… Yet, there's something else to it. His pain cuts me even deeper than theirs.

In his sleep he gasps, all but crying out as my weight on the bed causes it to dip and alert him, even if only subconsciously, that someone is near to him. "Please…no…" The sound of his voice, thick with agony and pleading, as though even in his sleep he's expecting the worst.

"Draco…" My tone is gentle, calm. I reach out to touch him and at first he stiffens, balling himself up tight as if to prepare for the worst of possibilities and not the better. "Wake up, come on, mate." I don't nudge him, that I know would only prove to make him fight harder. Instead I brush the blond, almost white, sweat drenched hair from his face, my fingers only barely touching his skin. That's all it takes and he bolts up into a sitting position, wide eyed and breathing heavily. It's as if I've pulled him from the fire in the knick of time.

"Harry…what…" He glances at the clock on the nightstand, realizing it's a quarter past midnight now, past our original meeting time. Realization crosses his alabaster features as a frown takes over his features. It's more than a drooping of the corners of his mouth, it reaches every inch of his features. As though he's let me down some how, like he's done something wrong. "Sorry, mate, Dobby was supposed to… Doesn't matter." Shaking his head he runs a hand through his hair, ever growing, and rubs his face with both palms, as much I think to shake whatever he was dreaming as it is to wake up and not be angry with Dobby for no reason. He's learning that he doesn't have to be his father, slowly.

"Want to talk about it?" As he shakes his head I simply nod. He's gotten to where he'll talk about things as he's ready to. We've kept things simple the rare visits or correspondence we have exchanged in the past couple of months.

"Maybe later, we're in the clear here for the night. It's the weekend." He scoots over a little, making more room for me to sit further on the bed, up against the thick, oak headboard beside him. I watch as he pulls his sheet covered legs to his chest, only loosely wrapping his arms around them as he looks at me. "How do you seem to understand? Why? I mean, everyone knows how you got the scar, but you were a baby. So, how do you…" He stops, brows furrowing like he can't quite figure out how to ask what he's trying to. I can see the question in his eyes though, I understand exactly what he's trying to tactfully ask.

"I'm not a stranger to nightmares. You know a little, from the rumors and the stories and even when we've gotten caught for half of what we've gone through the past three years. But, there's a whole other life outside of here, before here. This is the only place they ever silence. Yet, even this place isn't really as safe as the professors like us to think. We both know that." I heave a heavy sigh, letting my head rest against the headboard as I look at his ceiling, stone. I've counted most of the imperfections in the ceiling in this room, almost as completely as I have my own. "I told you before we're not that different when we're home. I… I may lack parents, and I'm used to that. I'm used to the abuse. I think that's why I was so quick to dismiss you first year, because of the way you treated Ron. I think if you'd done it differently, everything would have been different from the start. We're not that different. I'm no better to my 'family' than Dobby was to Lucius. In fact that's been my role in life as soon as I was old enough walk. It wasn't until after I came here that I had a real room." I shrug. At this point, for me, it's just fact. It hurts, to have blood treat me like I'm even less than people like Lucius treat house elves."

I can feel him shift on the bed beside me. He's actually moving closer! In the days since this we began down this path towards friendship, he hasn't been the one to initiate physical contact of any nature. While he has slowly gotten better at accepting it, initiating it hadn't happened. Until now. I can't help it any more than he can, initially I stiffen as I feel his hand come to rest on mine where it lay in my lap. It's a simple thing, and I relax almost instantly, far more used to kinder acts than he is. That much I've figured out. I let my head roll in his direction, looking not at his face but at our hands. The faintest scars on both, something that you wouldn't even notice most of the time, but in a quiet moment? That's when the tiniest lines are visible. That's when we're all the most vulnerable, isn't it?

"That's why you always stay behind during the Christmas Holiday, isn't it?" His voice is soft, like he already knows the answer and wishes he had the same choice. Like he understood completely.

"Yes." It's a simple answer. I could feel it, he understood all that single word held in it. I had the a mirror of horrors waiting for me when summer comes, not worse or better than his own, merely different. That's something we had sort of figured out, without a lot of actual words. The more we let our guards down, let just cordial words prevail hateful ones, we'd gleaned an understanding that we shared the same desire to just remind behind the security of Hogwarts' halls. Even though we knew there were scarier things after us here, there is also a strength we find here that we some how lose when we leave this place. But, maybe that's changing.

"Isn't there anywhere else you can…"

"I've gone with Ron once, but often his folks are in Romania visiting his brother Charlie now, what with Ginnie here now too and all. It's nice, but it's strange still. It's easier, somehow, to stay here and just revel in the quiet, the emptiness of this place when everyone else goes home. There's a peace in it. The demons haunt, but when everyone's gone there's no one there to find out. I can relax, breathe… I guess, it's like why you were in the tower that first night. I think I see it a little differently now though, I see it from the outside looking in. Like a two way mirror." I don't know what possessed me to reveal that much, to say it all out loud, lay it on the table. It's too late to take it back, I can only hope it's understood. Clear.

"The twilight hour, when there's no one left to judge you. The rare pieces of time when absolutely no one is looking at you and you don't have to pretend anymore." His voice is soft, like velvet. I feel the slow building weight of his head as he hesitantly rests his temple on my shoulder, fingers sliding across the area between each of mine, like he's considering taking my hand but is waiting for consent.

I relax my fingers, giving space for his to fill, I'm surprised even though I'm watching it take place. We're both watching as it happens, and it's like seeing it from the outside looking in on ourselves. "It's still a couple more months before the holiday. Maybe…"

"It'll only serve to force him to come here and fetch me himself. Then it's worse. No matter how much time we've left to come up with something, it all ends the same way. But…" He hesitates, as though he isn't sure how or if he's really ready to ask me something, thought I can't fathom what it could be. Then he's talking again. "We've gotten pretty good at hiding here, being civil without drawing attention to the lack of animosity between us in public. If we could…"

He sits up suddenly, turning to face me, though he takes my hand with his, moving their entwined state from my lap to his own. "If we pretended that I had convinced you that… that I brought you to their side. You could come with me… He might even behave then, his master would love it so he'd have to." His eyes are wide, there's the slightest twinkle of hope in them, as though only the smallest part of him actually thinks I would consider this plan.

"How would we do that? I mean, I know word has gotten back to him that we aren't fighting at all any more, but do you think it'd be stretching it from his perspective that I'd be turned that suddenly?" It wasn't a bad idea exactly, just a terrifying one. After all, look at what pretending has done to him? But, that's exactly why I'm already considering it, how we can make it believable. The only problem is the broken hearts it would cause if I continue to leave Ron and Hermione in the dark. His civility is one thing, but what it would take in public now for Lucius to believe us… "We're not going to be able to pull this off alone. I think… I think it's time to let Ron and 'Mione know. Not everything, just enough that they'll help sell it without buying it themselves."

"Does that mean… That means you'll do it? You'll come back with me over the holiday?" The hope that lights up his pale features is… I really don't know what the right word is, there's still so much about how he makes me feel, that I feel for him, that I don't understand. Though, he hasn't agreed to let them in on things, he hasn't shut the idea down yet either. He'd been so quick to do so until now.

"Does that mean we're letting the others know the truth?"

He flinches slightly, but instead of pulling away from me, his hand clasps mine tighter, almost clinging to it like a lifeline. "Okay." It's that simple, once again there didn't seem to be a need for more than that simple word.

I lightly place my other hand over his, offering just a little more comfort in the simplest of ways. It would be a slow process, I would talk to Hermione first. There's a chance the familial issues between Ron's family and Draco's that can't be quickly over come. Hermione though, she's logical. "We'll start simple. I'll have a chat with 'Mione. She'll know whether Ron should believe what the rest do or be let in, and when. She's brilliant at handling him. She fancies him but he's bloody clueless."

"Daft bugger." He cringes, looking apologetic until he sees that I understand his meaning. "It really is obvious though. She's always fancied him. But, he's the youngest boy, and they're very different people. He's also, honestly, Harry, not the cleverest bloke. I don't mean it to be cruel. I just think she's going to have to hit him with a brick for him to get a clue."

"I can't argue that."

October the 16th - 9:45 am

I hear the crackle of Dobby's magic when he pops into the room, I reach over to the nightstand for my glasses as I motion for the elf to be quiet a moment. Draco was finally sleeping peacefully, the last thing I wanted was to wake him. We'd talked until almost dawn. But, it is the weekend and a Hogsmeade weekend at that. Most of our year aside from a few that were too stressed over midterms to be bothered with such nonsense, were already gone for the day.

Reluctantly I slip out from underneath him, sliding a pillow into my place, the one I'd used so part of me remains with him. I scroll a quick note and leave it on the nightstand for him, then grab my cloak and follow the elf out of the dungeon.

Draco,

You were too peaceful to wake when Dobby came to fetch me. Most of the school is gone but I know 'Mione stayed behind. I'll send Dobby for you when I have spoken with her. We need time on our side, but with her on our side, everything will be fine. Breathe.

Harry