Thanks to Sanguiyn my wonderful beta, who not only saves me from grammatical errors, but also dresses as a super hero when she does it.
Disclaimer:
Loosely based on '10 Things I hate about you', which was based on Shakespeare's 'Taming of the Shrew'.
You all know that I don't own the Harry Potter characters (JKR does). But if I did, something like this would happen to them...
The first thing Harry realised when he woke up was that he was naked. The second thing he noticed was that he was cold, even though he was wrapped up tightly in a blanket. He adjusted his glasses, which he had forgotten to take off last night, and looked around.
The clock on his bedside table told him that it was late in the morning, so all his dorm-mates would already be downstairs at breakfast.
Draco was on the far side of the bed. He was lying, fully dressed, on top of the bedcovers with his back facing Harry in dismissal. Harry felt a tiny flake break loose from the block of his confidence in Draco and drift away into a space of disappointment and anxiety.
Last night's warmth and intimacy had clearly diminished.
'I can make us go back to where we were,' he thought desperately, unravelling himself from his blanket and inching himself closer to Draco.
He slid a hand over Draco's hip to rest in the hollow of his waist. If Draco was asleep, the movement awakened him. He rolled half onto his back and stared up at the ceiling. Awkwardly, Harry bumped himself closer and hooked his knee over Draco's leg. When Draco didn't respond, Harry hoisted himself higher, almost to lie on top of him, and nuzzled Draco's jaw with his mouth. Even as he did it, he could tell that something was wrong.
Rather than drawing back, he rolled further across Draco and tried to establish a thirsty kiss. There was a weightless second in which Draco might have responded. But instead, he sat up abruptly and Harry sprawled sideways. His teeth snapped on a sliver of skin inside his lip and the pain of it made tears sting in his eyes.
"You should put some clothes on before your dorm-mates return from breakfast." Draco's voice had changed, almost back to the way it had been before their encounter in the Astronomy Tower.
Harry followed Draco's suggestion and got dressed, but he did it mechanically and painfully, disabled by Draco's coldness.
"Is everything alright?" Harry touched Draco's shoulder as he sat back down on the bed, trying to turn Draco's head so that he could see his face properly.
Draco kept his neck rigid, but when Harry didn't move his hand, he eventually turned his head and stared at him.
"Is everything alright?" he repeated almost mockingly. "No, I don't think so." There was a callousness in Draco that seemed almost brutal, and the way he stared at Harry's face was momentarily frightening.
Slowly, Harry let go of his shoulder, shaking his head as if to clear it after a ringing slap, while Draco turned away from him again. "Was it something I did? Something I said?"
"Yes," Draco answered shortly. "Something you said."
"What did I say? When did I say it?" Harry's chin and bottom lip jutted out, ready for further rejection, but his eyes were imploring.
"Last night, before you fell asleep," Draco replied. His voice remained cold and his face hard and emotionless.
Despite the look of Draco and the sound of his voice, Harry still wanted to crawl into Draco's arms and never move out of his reach again. "I didn't say anything before I fell asleep. At least I don't remember saying anything."
"You seriously don't remember?" Draco's face softened a little as he had the grace to look slightly surprised.
"No. What was it? What did I say?" Harry turned pleading eyes on him again, but Draco avoided them.
"Never mind, it doesn't matter."
"It does matter! You're obviously upset about it!"
"I'm not upset. And even if you hadn't said it, I would still feel the same. I've had it with the Gryffindor common room and sleeping in your bed, and being your boyfriend."
The words made Harry buckle with grief, his mouth stretched and saliva flooded his tongue.
"Don't say that! Maybe you just need a little bit of time on your own. Wait until tomorrow. Maybe you'll feel better then." He gasped desperately while reaching out to seize one of Draco's hands. "Maybe we'll be better then."
"My feelings are not temporary." Draco quickly snatched his hand away before Harry could take hold of it. "This isn't working. I want to break up with you."
Harry never experienced long goodbyes. People always left him so suddenly and unexpectedly that he never was given the chance to get ready for the loss of them. There never was any packing, never any proper goodbyes and all the tears were to be spent uselessly afterwards. It had happened with his parents and Sirius, and now it was happening with Draco. But, no matter how many times this unfairness had forced itself upon him, he wasn't prepared for it.
Draco's upcoming disappearance seemed such a terrible and random assault that it put every remaining corner of his world under threat. All the memories of warmth and certainty from last night started to drain away, leaving a place of yawning shadows and simmering questions.
What could he have possibly said that would cause Draco to want to leave him?
How was he supposed to go on without Draco?
Would anyone ever want him?
Was he destined to spend his entire life alone?
A sob cranked itself out of Harry's chest. He found it hard to breathe, and his skin crawled and itched so that he clawed one of Draco's forearms with his blunt nails.
"Take your hand off me," Draco said in a low voice, but Harry ignored him.
He bundled forward and piled himself into Draco's lap, an awkward mass of jutting elbows and knees. He clung to Draco, howling, "I'm sorry! Whatever it was I didn't mean it! Please don't leave me! Please!"
"Potter, get off me," Draco demanded through clenched teeth, not yielding into Harry's clutch.
Harry shook his head violently, bumping Draco's jaw. "No." The word was a stone in his mouth.
"I don't want to touch you anymore. Get off me." Draco still didn't move. He spoke so icily that Harry recoiled under another stab of despair.
Tears beaded at the corners of Harry's eyes and ran down his face. "Please Draco! I'll do anything! Don't leave me!" He buried his face into Draco's chest, his tears soaking into Draco's shirt, refusing to let Draco go.
"I said, get off me!" Draco finally exploded, pushing Harry roughly away from him, slamming him against the head of the bed.
The bed rattled violently and the back of Harry's head struck the headboard. He immediately grasped the place on his head that had come into contact with the bed, as a sharp pain caused it to pound agonisingly. He wasn't bleeding, but he could feel a particularly large bruise forming.
He slumped against the headboard and began to cry harder, oily tears running down his face and dribbling from his jaw. He hung his head forward and wept. It was like a thread of molten pain rising out of his throat and burning the cold air. His voice of pain echoed and shivered around them and seemed to catch and multiply. It went on and on until Draco scrambled off the bed and onto his feet. Feeling the sudden movement, Harry stopped and looked up at Draco.
Draco was gasping in anger and a red blaze burned on his cheeks, making the desolation of abandonment come fully down on Harry. Draco was angry with him. Draco was leaving him.
Later, Draco would realise that passion, not anger, had burned his cheeks and roughened his voice. But then real feelings weren't familiar to him, let alone naked ones; he was only used to faked sentiments and meaningless flirtations.
"I'm sorry. I screwed up." The words were whispered by Harry, when they should have been Draco's. Harry knew that apologising would be useless. Like Sirius and James and Lily, Draco seemed conclusively gone. He suddenly realised that 'gone' didn't necessarily mean 'dead'. There were other withdrawals and disconnections that were no less final. "I didn't mean to make you so crazy and angry."
Draco's eyes widened and his fists clenched as he turned red with anger. Harry flinched at his sight, expecting another push or even a blow, but Draco didn't move. He stood rooted to the floor breathing heavily, the space between them shimmering and splintering with threat.
"I'm not crazy!" Draco finally spat, before turning abruptly and leaving the room, his last shrill words vibrating endlessly.
"I'm sorry!" Harry yelled again at the void Draco left behind.
Misery almost choked Harry, tasting like acid in the back of his throat. He wanted to bury himself under his blanket, burrowing down into a security of blackness.
He lay back against his pillow, but the ceiling above him began a whirling that made his stomach heave, and the ground started to tremble beneath him. He sat up again, and concentrated on not being sick.
As the ground slowly levelled and the ceiling slowed in its rotation, he reflected on Draco's exit. It had been no more than an instant's flicker like a pale flame, but without Draco's closeness, sorrow expanded in his chest and rose into his mouth, more stifling than any nausea.
He drew his knees up to his chest and rested his chin on them, letting the tears run freely down his face as he took in the now empty room. The enormity of everything — the shadowed corners, the heavy old oak bedposts and the unmade beds surrounded by them — were suddenly frightening. Harry rocked his head on his bent knees and screwed up his eyes to ease the burning behind them.
He heard the dormitory door click open, and for a fleeting hopeful moment he thought it was Draco. He looked up and saw Seamus.
Seeing Harry gasping and sobbing, Seamus immediately climbed onto the bed and wrapped an arm around him, cradling his head to his chest. "What's wrong?"
Harry lifted his head and looked miserably up at Seamus before answering, "He broke up with me!" It came out as a whine instead of an explanation. "He broke up with me, and it's all my fault!"
"All your fault?" Harry could easily detect the confusion in Seamus's voice.
Harry nodded his head and buried his face into Seamus's chest again with a choked whimper. "He said that it was something to do with what I said last night, but I can't remember saying it and he wouldn't tell me what it was!" His voice was muffled, but Seamus could still understand him.
"You can't remember?" Seamus tried to soothe Harry's crying by resting his chin on the top of Harry's bent head and stroking his unruly hair, but Harry's sobs continued to get louder.
"We had sex and then I fell asleep! I don't remember saying anything! I've screwed everything up and I don't even know how!"
"I'm so sorry, Harry." Seamus sighed, and Harry felt the heat of his breath on his scalp. "You don't deserve to be hurt like this. Neither does Dean."
"What?" Harry froze, the river of tears seeming to dry on his face. "What happened to Dean?"
"He caught Ginny cheating on him with Michael Corner last night," Seamus explained regretfully. "He broke up with her immediately afterwards."
Harry wrenched himself out of Seamus's grasp. "Is he alright?"
"He's doing better than you are," Seamus observed, thumbing Harry's eyes dry for him. "Well, at least he's doing a good job at pretending he's alright. You know those silly straight boys, too proud to cry or even admit that they do."
Harry's tears stopped running, as he was deep in thought. "If Ginny and Dean have broken up then that means the pact is broken."
"Don't think about that now." Seamus pulled Harry back into another comforting hug. "It doesn't matter."
"Yes it does. You're not burdened by me anymore. You don't have to stay here. You can go be with Blaise." Harry appreciated Seamus's concern, but as soon as these thoughts came, he was uncomfortable with the weight of his arms and the thump of his heartbeat against his ear. Shortly after agreeing to the pact, he began to feel like the saboteur of Seamus's pleasure. And now that Draco had left him, he was starting to feel the same way all over again.
"Don't put me down with that, Harry. I'm not going to abandon you at a time like this, just because our pact is broken. Pact or no pact, I'm your friend and I have a duty to stand by you." Seamus was gentle, trying to soothe Harry, but Harry didn't want to be soothed. He needed to be alone now to taste the full flavour of his loss, to fondle it and explore its dimensions.
"You don't have too--"
"No, Harry, I insist," Seamus interrupted him. "I'll just go downstairs and tell Blaise that I can't hang out with him today."
Harry tried to object further but Seamus wouldn't cave. He gave Harry another reassuring squeeze, before getting to his feet and exiting from the room, assuring that he would be back soon.
After Seamus had left, Harry crumpled sideways onto the bedcovers, drawing his knees up to his chest and pulling a blanket over his head. Immediately in doing so, his breath stopped in his chest and his eyes squeezed shut; the blanket next to his face smelled of Draco's body.
The smell seeped through his nostrils, filling them like poison gas. He was overcome by his memory of last night, and the feelings of safety and happiness came with it like a glimpse of a lost world. He was desperate to know what he had said to offend Draco so much, but he simply couldn't remember.
He was locked into immobility, feelings the bubbles of another sob forcing their way up into his throat. He closed his eyes tighter and bit the inside of his mouth to contain it.
He had no idea how long he lay in the same position, hunched over, trying to bear Draco's scent. After a while he decided that he couldn't stand it any longer. The smell seemed to tease him, reminding him that he had almost defeated his inevitable solitude.
He pushed back the blanket, rolled sideways, and put his feet to the floor, each movement causing hot wires of pain to shoot through his joints. His feet were numb with cold, and the cramp in his legs almost made him stumble.
He ran to the door, and for a second it seemed that there was a weight pressing against it, trapping him in the room. But it yielded and banged open, and Harry ran down the stairs to the common room. He flew out of the portrait hole and ran down the corridor, his breath sticking in his chest as he searched for a place of refuge.