Professor Snape had been annoyed earlier, more so than usual, but now, as everyone but the three of them has left, it feels much worse. He stares at the two students with something Draco can only describe as anger in his eyes. The tension it creates is heavy, and the professor is visibly holding back.
Draco evades his gaze, and spots in his peripheral Potter doing the same.
"I thought I made it clear there would be no wand waving, or fist fighting, in my class," he says, and his voice is eerily calm. However, anyone with a functioning brain and a pair of eyes, knows he is far from pleased. "Clearly, I was wrong."
"Professor, he started–"
Potter pauses at the finger held up in front of him, and reluctantly shuts his mouth with a sigh. Were he also not in trouble, Draco would have said something – perhaps grinned at him – but he stays quiet. Professor Snape is not one to be trifled with, lest you want to spend the remainder of the day scrubbing the entire floor of the Great Hall with your bare hands.
"Return here after your classes are done for the day," his gaze moves to Draco, "both of you. You will be cleaning all the cauldrons used today, and if you finish early, I am sure I can find more work for you."
Then, finally, he sends them away. They leave the Potions classroom in quick strides without as much as a single glance, not until they're sure Professor Snape wouldn't be able to hear them even if he tried. Potter is the first to speak.
"I hope you're proud of yourself," he says, and Draco pauses halfway up the stairs. He turns and stares down at the Gryffindor, who glares right back up at him. Their eyes meet, and once more does this familiar warmth spread in his chest. Draco averts his gaze elsewhere and tries to ignore it. He has just been inhaling too many fumes from that love potion, that's all. It must be lingering in his nose or something.
"I don't recall grabbing you by the collar," he replies, "planning on taking a swing at me, were you, Potter?"
"You know what you said." Potter takes a few steps closer, and Draco's first instinct is to take an equal amount away from him. He doesn't. Why should he? He's not scared of Harry Potter. "You'd want me to. Rile me up to get me into trouble, while you get away scot-free."
"Need I remind you we both have detention later today?" Draco says. "I didn't get away with anything."
Potter merely scowls, and when he passes him up the stairs, he nearly bumps into him. Perhaps he would have, if not for Draco all but recoiling to get out of his way. He quickly grabs the railing and steadies himself, but Potter has definitely noticed. The look he gives him before continuing up the stairs and disappearing around the corner is filled with confusion.
The fiery, wooden scent lingers long after Potter has left and he struggles to ignore it.
Pansy, Blaise and the others are nearly done with their lunch when he enters the Great Hall. He heads straight for the Slytherin table, not sparing a second glance in the general direction of the Gryffindors, and slumps down between Pansy and Theo with a sigh.
"So," Blaise pipes up from across the table, "what'd Professor Snape say?"
"Yeah, he looked about ready to pop," Pansy adds, and finishes the last of her pumpkin juice before continuing. "I swear, I thought he was going to kill Potter when he grabbed you." She looks amused at the thought.
Draco dares cast a glance across the room, and he spots the trio talking and eating at the Gryffindor table. "I have to spend most of my evening cleaning cauldrons with Potter," he says, and nearly rolls his eyes at the longing looks Weasley and Granger keep sending each other whenever the other one's not looking.
Blaise scoffs as he picks at the remainder of his fried eggs. "He was the one grabbing you," he says, casting a glance over his shoulder and the Gryffindor in question. "He should be cleaning those cauldrons on his own."
"There's no arguing with Professor Snape," Theo says, "and besides, you'll be done quicker with two people, right?"
"Yeah," Pansy agrees. Her attention wanders elsewhere for a moment as a group of Hufflepuffs enter the Hall. "Just tough it out."
"Easy for you to say, you're not stuck with Saint Potter nearly an entire evening."
The rest of the day goes by quickly, perhaps a little too quickly in Draco's opinion. He's not exactly thrilled to spend his evening downstairs in Potions with Potter, scrubbing cauldrons, all the while Professor Snape looms over them. As if he can't just cast a couple charms and clean them on his own. It's just a waste of time, really.
Much too soon does Defence Against the Dark Arts class end, and he finds himself reluctantly parting with his friends to walk down the corridors and the stairs leading to the Potions classroom.
When he gets there, Potter is already sitting on the floor, scrubbing a cauldron with a wet rag. Beside him is a pile of cauldrons, and Draco considers turning around and slipping back out the door he just came in through. He doesn't, because at the desk in the front of the classroom, sits Professor Snape with all of his attention on the bunch of – what he assumes are – essays. When the door shuts behind him, the professor looks up from his work, and merely nods at the pile on the floor.
"Potter," is all Draco says as he sits down on the cold stone floor, less than pleased to be here. He makes sure there is a significant amount of space between them, and grabs a cauldron from the pile, though not before pushing his sleeves up past his elbows.
"Malfoy." His eyes leave the cauldron in front of him for a short moment only, just long enough to toss him a rag. "Almost didn't think you were going to come."
Draco casts a glance in the direction of Professor Snape, and he finds him just as engrossed in the essays as before, now with a quill in hand. With him right there, just on the other side of the room, they have no choice but to be civil – or at least act like it. "Missed me, did you?"
Potter doesn't say anything and goes back to scrubbing his cauldron, while Draco begins on his own.
An unknown amount of time passes like this. Slowly but surely they work their way through the pile of cauldrons, and with only a few more left, Draco's wrists ache, his back hurts from hunching over for so long, and the skin of his palms is all wrinkly and weird from the moisture of the rag. He wants nothing more than to get back to the common room, wash up and sleep. Though, he supposes he should get some homework done first.
Stupid Potter and his ridiculous temper.
"What about this one, Professor?"
Draco looks up to see him pointing to a cauldron on a nearby desk, and he hadn't even noticed that one earlier. More work, then, he supposes with an inaudible sigh. Just like that, the common room seems so much further away.
"Pour the content into the phials and clean it," Professor Snape says without taking his eyes off his work, "thoroughly."
While Potter goes to get the cauldron, carefully pouring the potion into the phials one by one until it's all empty, Draco finishes cleaning the last remaining cauldrons. Once he's done, he massages his sore wrists gently and stretches to try to get rid of the full body ache from sitting on the floor for far too long.
It's only when Potter returns to his own spot on the floor – which seems to have somehow moved a bit closer to his own since last time – that he realises whose cauldron that is. Whose potion that is.
As the cauldron is placed between them, there is the scent of paper, of perfume, and lastly a warm, cosy fire. It wells up into the air around them, and despite moving further away, Draco can't escape it. He can practically feel the flames, feel the warmth they give wrap around him like a blanket on a chilly day, and hear it crackle and burn.
"I put all of it into the phials," Potter says, and Professor Snape hums in acknowledgment, though he isn't looking at the professor. He's looking at Draco, waiting for him to clean the cauldron.
He can't, he just can't. Not while it reeks of– of Harry Potter, and how unbelievably absurd is that? The potion can't have been as successful as they had thought.
"I–" He wraps his fingers around his wrist, digs them gently into the muscles there. "My wrists hurt."
For a couple moments, all Potter does is blink. His gaze shifts back and forth between him, his pale hands, and the cauldron between them. Once does it land on Professor Snape.
Then; "Could you at least hold it still for me?"
Draco nods, and while Potter scrubs the inside of the cauldron clean, he holds it steady an arms length away. The smell doesn't disappear no matter how he turns his head or how far away he keeps the cauldron from him, but it begins to disappear more and more as Potter scrubs it clean.
Eventually, he can ignore it, and eventually, he can't smell it anymore no matter how hard he tries.
Their eyes meet briefly as Potter drops the rag on the floor beside him, and both of them pull away. "I think we're done, Professor."
"You're dismissed," Professor Snape says, and with a simple spell, the pile of now clean cauldrons float back to their respective desks. "In the future, refrain from fighting in my class," he adds before they reach the door, "unless you want to spend every evening for an entire month doing the house-elves' work."
"Yes, Professor," they say in near unison, before finally leaving the Potions classroom for the evening, parting ways the moment they can.
However, halfway down the corridor, Draco stops and turns.
"Potter," he calls, as quietly as he can whilst still being heard. It must be dark by now, and Snape should still be able to hear them if he wants to.
The Gryffindor pauses, reluctantly turning to face him. He doesn't look all too pleased. "What is it, Malfoy?"
"Found that Quidditch girlfriend of yours, yet?"
"What's it to you?" Potter crosses his arms over his chest as he stares at him from down the corridor. "Worried for her well being, are you? What was it you said?" His lips form a thin line, and his eyes narrow behind his glasses. "'People I care about always seem to die', was that it?"
He then spins around on his heels and continues down the corridor and around a corner before Draco can reply.
Draco doesn't feel bad for what he had said earlier, he really doesn't. It's just that, he doesn't feel all that great about saying it, either.
