hey everyone, i'm sorry i haven't updated in such a while, i've been hideously overloaded with work, but the fic is still in progress, i've nearly finished chapter six, it will also be up soon.

disclaimer: hp not mine

enjoy and please review.

Crocodiles.

PART FIVE.

Harry sat up in bed writing an essay, with his Potions book open on his lap, trying to catch up some of the theory work Snape was setting in his absence, as he couldn't very well do the practical experiments. He was tired, his skin was sallow and his forehead was giving him a migraine, but he'd be damned if he was going to fail Potions –that, as Ron had said when he dropped the work off, was just too good an opportunity for Snape to put him in months of detention when they could be devising a better quidditch strategy.

He glanced over at Malfoy's bed. He was lying motionless, his back turned towards Harry. Unlike Harry, he had not attempted to work, though Pansy had brought him some arithmancy notes to glance over. The sight of his attacker, who was not his attacker, looking at him, or even breathing the same air as him, had warped his mind. Contact with Pansy had made him flinch away, and she had been hurt, she didn't really know why he was there. He had told her that he had some 'internal damage' from fighting with Potter, but that it would go away. Internal damage? That was certainly true. But he could not truthfully say that what he was feeling would go away in a hurry. Not when he didn't even want to have to think about it.

He kept dreaming about Harry assaulting him on the quidditch captain's desk. They went a lot further in his dreams. He kept trying to wake up so that he could get away and be safe, but he couldn't open his eyes until the very last moment. He awoke feeling angry and confused. He felt dirtied and disgusting, perverted, and he wouldn't let Snape access his memories any more in case those dreams materialised on the surface of his brain. Snape was clearly worried about him, shocked at the proud boy's weak spirit. Maybe, Malfoy thought in the back of his mind, maybe I did enjoy it after all. But he had no one around to vent his frustration and shame on, apart from Harry …and damned if he was going to go anywhere near him.

The Potions book slid off Harry's knees and struck him like deadweight on his ankles. He groaned, painfully, his throat still ruined, and set his essay on the bedside table, placing his quill carefully at the side before it blobbed all over the parchment. He had to lie back and rest for a minute, temples throbbing. Slight red spots had been appearing frequently at the edge of his vision since his scar had opened, and they had been worrying Madam Pomfrey. He lay still for a while, waiting for his head to stop spinning. He was staring at the underside of his eyelids when the weight was lifted off his feet, and he snapped his eyes open, expecting to see Madam Pomfrey holding a vial of the disgusting throat tonic, but what he was actually confronted with was Malfoy, looking extremely ill and very wary of him, holding the text book with both hands.

Harry sat up fast, swayed, then lay back down again. He raised a quivering eyebrow at Malfoy, who laid the book on the table and said, haltingly, "I thought maybe you were having another…another one." He approached the bed. Harry tried to shift away from him, exerting all his energy into wriggling to the other edge of the bed without rolling out. Malfoy simply got onto the bed beside him. He laid one cold hand on Harry's quivering collarbone. Harry gasped and tried to flinch away, shaking his head. He was shocked to see tears on Malfoy's face, but didn't know what to do. He didn't want to reach out to the boy, he wasn't used to dealing with his male friends like that. Comforting Hermione or Ginny was one thing, but this wasn't even Ron, it was Malfoy, and Harry was terrified that he might try to kiss him again. He didn't know why he had kissed the other boy during what was now referred to as his 'episode', but he was definite that he had no attraction towards boys, and was just getting over his slight confusion over his sexuality.

But Malfoy seemed to be on a voyage of self-discovery, running a hand from Harry's collarbone down to the dip of his stomach. Harry mouthed, 'Malfoy, no', but he couldn't speak out loud because he was still mute, and Malfoy still had tears running down his face, though looking at Harry… in almost a desirous way, but more checking him over, as though he was looking for something, some sign that would tell him how to feel, whether he really was attracted to other boys, as he was beginning to suspect, or whether this strange feeling he had was just some twisted by-product of what had happened to him.

Malfoy closed his eyes and stuck his nose into the curve of Harry's neck, "this is all your fault," he muttered, even though it wasn't. He heard Harry take some nervous, if not terrified breaths, as he realised what that meant. He sat up and looked into his face. Harry's eyes were fixed on the ceiling. "Please." Green eyes flicked to his. He leaned down and pressed his lips experimentally to Harry's, who tensed and remained completely motionless for a minute. He kissed him softly for a few seconds, then pulled away. Harry's eyes were fixed on the ceiling again. "Potter? I'm sorry." It came out as a hoarse whisper. And elicited no response. Malfoy swallowed, and turned Harry's face towards him. "I had to know. I can't get over this, so I had to know." Harry nodded. "But now I've assaulted you, right?" Malfoy bit his lip and shifted off and away.

When Madam Pomfrey entered that evening to give Harry his throat tonic, she found him staring into space, one hand covering his mouth. The Malfoy boy was sitting up writing out his arithmancy work.