The problem with Felix Felicis, Draco considered as they stepped outside, was that it lulled you into a false sense of security. He wanted to panic, he really did, but the insistent humming in his blood overrode his senses with the certainty that he was on the right path. It was like being drunk, and he could only hope that it didn't lead to the same sort of regrets.
His internal conflict must have shown on his face, though, because a voice piped up, hesitant.
"You don't have to, you know".
"Mmhm?" Draco hummed distractedly, pulling at the cotton of his shirt from where it had moulded against his stomach as the heat of the morning enveloped him, damp and heavy. He really should have worn something lighter, he thought belatedly, tugging at the collar that felt more like a noose around his neck. His wand buzzed against the pulse point of his wrist, and he was seconds away from considering risking a cooling charm in front of a Muggle when a hand wrapped gently around his other arm, halting him in his steps.
He looked up, noticing the other boy had stopped on the edge of the kerb, observing him with a slight frown. He must have been talking for a while, Draco realised with a foreign sense of guilt. He wasn't there to idly chit chat to the Muggles, but he couldn't help offering an encouraging smile.
"She can be a bit meddling. Ellen, I mean." Scott said, his mouth twisting in a grimace. For some reason, he too looked guilty. A set of keys dangled from his fingers and Draco averted his eyes, focusing on the gentle swaying of metal. He shrugged helplessly, unable to explain why he had jumped at the opportunity with the enthusiasm of a single mum meeting a pre St Mungo Lockhart, to then deflate like a jittery teenager.
Cars sped around them, loud and unfamiliar sounds of a world he didn't belong to, and his wandering gaze landed on a huge poster of a suggestive woman in lingerie, eerie in her stillness. Draco had never felt so wrong footed and out of place as he was in that moment, the adrenaline and novelty of two days of travel finally crashing down on him, leaving him disoriented. But he couldn't possibly say all that, not without sounding insane or, worse, like an idiot.
The other boy must have read his silence as confirmation, because he continued a little more firmly.
"She can't help it. But you look uncomfortable, and no one expects you to go for breakfast and come out with a two months contract for a summer rental you didn't ask for. So, you know, feel free to say screw it and go your way. No hard feelings."
Draco allowed himself an almost welcomed moment of internal panic, before letting the calming effects of the potion settle his thumping heart. "No!" He assured, cringing at how loud it came out. Letting out a long breath, he fumbled for an explanation, glad to hear his tone of voice was back to a normal level. "Truth be told, I need a place to stay. I'm not sure that mold infested hovel I slept at can be even accounted as an accommodation, unless you are a goblin, which I am not -".
He bit down on his tongue, mentally cursing his stupid mouth and his stupid heritage, but the other boy looked simply amused.
"Clearly." He agreed, mouth curving in what looked suspiciously like a teasing smile.
Draco briefly considered the possibility of hooking up with a Muggle, instantly imagining Lucius' horrified reaction to the news. Thoughts of his father were enough to tamper down whatever insanity had overcome him, although his gaze dallied on the other boy's lips for a little longer than necessary.
"Ok, then." Scott said, his grin widening. "Shall we?". He jiggled the keys in front of Draco's face and tilted his chin in the direction of a white car that looked bulkier and squarer than most.
A twirly, lavender font that stated "Le Parfait Paris" took over most of the car's side, and Draco noticed that there weren't any back doors, like the taxi had. He resigned to slide in the passenger seat, fasting his seat belt as per Lupin's instructions. He was aware that this particular Muggle's job qualification didn't encompass driving, and he couldn't help feeling a slight unease, like mounting behind someone else's broom. The boy looked to be in his late teens, maybe a couple of years older than himself, but Draco couldn't recall for certain when people started learning how to drive. Both the bus and the taxi drivers had seemed much older, and he hoped this guy knew what he was doing.
Despite his reservations, the car journey turned out to be smooth, almost relaxing. Scott fiddled with the radio before settling for some upbeat tune that Draco unsurprisingly didn't recognise, but found himself enjoying nonetheless while it droned quietly in the background.
They occasionally engaged in trivial conversation, thanks to which Draco discovered that the other boy worked as a trainee pastry chef at his uncle's bakery and doubled as a delivery driver during the summer months, when their usual hand flew back to Alabama to help with his family's farm seasonal harvest. Not that Draco had any idea what that actually meant. He nodded along, offering little, harmless information about himself, but mostly listening.
"You'll like him. Evan, I mean." Scott affirmed with conviction, finally breaching the topic of Potter that Draco dreaded but at the same time was so curious about. "He is great, Allie wouldn't have left if she could help it. Allie - she is, or was, his roommate. They have been sharing almost from the moment he arrived in the States, and he might look a bit grumpy at the prospect of changing things, but you'll get along."
His voice was so fond and eager that Draco almost snickered, knowing all too well how famously him and Potter had gotten along in the past. "I hope so." He offered, trying to keep the dubious inflation out of his voice.
"Well, here we go". The other boy said, pulling the car into one of the free spaces in front of a four storey building in pale yellow, covered in identical sets of tall windows paired with small, metal railings balconies.
The front door of the building was left ajar, and Scott pushed it, muttering something about a damn Mr Carl-something and his damn disregard for the rules. Draco followed the Muggle up several flights of stairs until they stopped on the third floor and continued down the corridor to the last door, marked 18C.
The knowledge that Potter was behind that flimsy wooden barrier, probably looking like the entitled speccy git he had always been, made Draco vibrate in anticipation. His hand raised on its own accord, as if to knock, but Scott quickly pulled another set of keys from his pocket and unceremoniously unlocked the door, already yelling "Honey, I am home!", the "os" stretching ridiculously.
"In here!" A muffled voice piped back from somewhere inside, familiar and yet changed in a way that made Draco's toes curl. "I hope you have some Madeleines with you, or you might as well go."
Scott laughed, rolling his eyes and giving Draco a wink "Tough luck, fat ass! But I come bearing gifts nonetheless, and from your motherland at that."
He gestured for Draco to follow and they moved past the cozy looking lounge, stopping in front of an open door. With a familiarity that must have come from a more than comfortable friendship, Draco watched as the Muggle poked his head through, hanging lazily with an arm around the frame.
"Before you ask, it's not a treacle tart, or whatever you call dessert in that country of yours."
"It is amazing!" Potter protested, before turning suspicious "If it's not food, what is it?"
"Well, if you must know, I have solved all of your problems. The obvious ones, at least" He teased, before Draco felt himself being dragged helplessly into the room "Ellen found you a stray!"
He barely had the time to register the pull, that he was suddenly face to face with the boy he had so valiantly tried to push at the back of his mind for the majority of the past year.
Potter was sitting cross-legged in the middle of the floor, pieces of what looked like a puzzle scattered all around him, but hastily scrambled to his feet as soon as he noticed the new visitor, grabbing a t-shirt from the nearby chair and pulling it over his head. Draco spotted a glint of the owl amulet before it disappeared under blue cotton.
Oddly enough, the first thought that crossed his mind was that the Potter he knew must have been starved because the boy in front of him definitely wasn't. They were roughly the same height now, Potter an inch or so shorter, not enough for Draco to feel any satisfaction, but gone was the bony prat he remembered from school. The boy in front of him had well defined muscles, broad shoulders and looked healthier than ever. Only by comparison, Draco realised how gaunt and tired his Potter had looked, like the weight of the world was heavy on his shoulders.
And maybe it had been.
This new version appeared not to have a care, and Draco's traitorous mind thought that it suited him.
His second thought was that the speccy git wasn't speccy any more. His awful round glasses were nowhere in sight, leaving his very green eyes unframed but for black, long lashes. A dusting of faint freckles covered the top of his cheeks and the bridge of his nose, with a couple of stray ones darker against his lips. Suddenly Draco had to look away, aware of just how long he had been staring in silence. It wasn't like he could explain his lingering gaze with the truth. He was just taking in the changes a year had made to someone that used to be so familiar, but to the boys in the room he was just a stranger raking his eyes over one of them with perplexing interest.
"Hello" Potter said smiling, with an awkward little wave that had Draco's lips tugging at the corner in response. "I am Evan".
The name sat wrong, and Draco faltered, almost blurting out his real one.
"Eves, this is Dean. Dean, Evie. Or, Eveline- ouch!" Scott interjected, rubbing at his calf where Potter had landed a kick. "He is here for Allie's room."
"Evan" Draco repeated, conscious of how confusing this was going to get quite soon, the name not sounding any less wrong out of his own mouth. "Hi."
He took notice of his proffered hand just as the other boy's palm came in contact with his own, shaking firmly up and down twice.
Potter had shaken his hand, he registered hysterically, before telling himself to get a grip already.
The other boy looked unfazed, but Draco could see Scott's amused grin at the corner of his eye, so he added lamely "Sorry, I am let jagged."
Potter and his friend bursted out laughing, and the tension Draco could perceive in the air dissipated, leaving them all smiling. He didn't allow himself to think about how unsettling it was to have his nemesis regarding him with such an easy expression, when they had probably never shared a smile before.
"She is meddling, Ellen is." Potter commented, shaking his head fondly. "I assume you know that at the moment I am only looking to cover the rest of Summer, as my better half has left me unexpectedly stranded. I mean, the contract gets renewed in September, so if it works…" he babbled, stopping as Draco put his hand up in front of his chest.
"Suits me just fine, I arrived in the country yesterday and haven't decided what to do yet". We don't need more than a month, anyway, he thought to himself.
"Sweet. If you want to have a look at the room now… This is mine" He said, gesturing at the space around them. Only then Draco looked, surprised at finding the bedroom to be an organised chaos. Clothes were piled on top of a chair, a few pairs of shoes and flip-flops poking from under the bed. His mother would have frowned in disapproval, but Draco found it strangely homely, proof of how much the last year had messed with his head.
The bed was a small double, covered in a thin blue sheet, roughly made but for a pillow hanging skewedly at one end. Muggle photographs of Potter and his friends were scattered across the walls.
"The landlord is so chilled," Potter assured, already half out of the room, and Draco followed his voice. That too, had changed, taking on a deeper timber that was just slightly tainted by a foreign inflection. "She won't mind changing the name in the contract. She lives downstairs, actually, so we could pop around later. She comes home from work around 5:30. If you- uhm, like it, that is".
They entered a second room next to his, and Draco found that he liked it just fine. It was quite bright, the bay window open just enough to let a nice breeze caressing his overheated skin. It was bare, but for a double bed similar to Potter's, a chest of drawers, a desk and chair and a single picture of an orange tabby hanging just above the bedside lamp.
"She took the best view!" The other wizard joked, not sounding resentful in the slightest. "And I got stuck with that stunning transmission pole".
"And the fucking palm tree!"
"Definitely the fucking palm tree!" Potter agreed with his friend, both snickering like idiots.
Draco peered out of the window, finding that it overlooked a neat looking garden and some nice townhouses, and nodded to himself. It would do.
They discussed rent and a few other terms, to which he could only consent to, before the two boys dragged him for a tour of the flat, that wasn't big at all.
"So, how come the other girl left?" he found himself asking curiously as they walked around the tiny kitchen. Not that he had any idea how to cook anything, Draco pondered with a sense of dread.
"She got accepted into pre-law at UCLA, and ended up enrolling for a last minute summer program. She wasn't sure she could even make it to college before, so it wasn't really a decision at all." Scott explained, pride swelling his tone.
"She is set on a warpath to change the world." Potter added, equally admiring.
"And aren't you?" Draco couldn't stop himself from asking, recalling the way the other boy had never seemed able to stop himself from being the self appointed hero of every injustice.
To his surprise, Scott snorted rather loudly "Evan is allergic to anything that could attract any form of recognition."
"I just don't like being the centre of attention." Potter scoffed, and Draco grudgingly acknowledged how it ringed true.
"Allie would call it a manifestation of your lack of sense of self worth."
"Well, I would call it Allie-never-outgrew-her playing doctor phase and can go and get stuffed."
"Point taken." Scott allowed, before grinning lasciviously at his friend, "That didn't stop you from blushing like a demure virgin when you were made employer of the month."
Draco's mind procured a vivid image of the other's boy red cheeks under the paper crown, realising belatedly that Potter hadn't been wearing glasses in that picture either. The lack of spectacles bothered him more than it was rational.
"Oh, sod off, you wanker. Anyway," he said, turning his abnormally green eyes back to Draco "she is great!"
He sounded so affectionate that Draco spared a moment to wonder if the two were involved as more than friends, but then Potter directed his thumb towards the third boy with a cheeky grin.
"Much better than this one!" And Draco suddenly remembered something that Muggle woman had said at the cafe.
"There are only two rooms, though. Where is yours?" He asked Scott, recalling the way Ellen had called him Potter's roommate, or something.
Scott's eyes widened and he looked uncomfortable, almost shifty. "Ehm, I don't actually live here. And when I stay over we, err. . ."
"We share." Potter finished firmly, chin titled defiantly in a way that Draco recognised as so quintessentially his that a wave of nostalgia hit him before he could even consider the words.
Oh….
Oh!
"Are you two a couple?" He blurted out, hoping that his shock didn't pass for disgust because, well, that would have been a bit hypocritical. He had never exactly hidden his own sexuality, but at the same time it was something he didn't flaunt around, keeping his and Theo's escapades exclusively between the boundaries of the Slytherin dungeons. He had definitely never considered that the Gryffindor could share his same inclinations.
"A coupla idiots" Scott replied, tempting a charming smile that fell just this side of a grimace instead.
"Don't mind him. He was dropped on the head one too many times and he is now afflicted by. . .Idiocy" Potter shrugged, not really answering the question. He still looked guarded, and Draco felt the need to rectify that.
"Uh, me. . . Me too. Well, not idiocy, of course. . ." He waved a hand embarrassingly at himself to deliver his point, cringing at the awkwardness of the whole situation. Fuck Potter and his ability to take even being queer away from him.
The other wizard relaxed visibly, and Scott even went as far as waggling his eyebrows in his direction, cementing Draco's newfound belief that Muggle teenagers weren't any less fuckers than magical ones.
"Uhm, okay, great. Well, we. . . Never mind" The Gryffindor fumbled for words, apparently back to the old eloquence Draco was familiar with. "That is good, great. Not everybody is, you know. . ."
Prompted by their long-established pattern, Draco snapped "I am not a bigot, Pott-". He faltered as soon as he realised his mistake, but his mind could only provide a lame "P-Potty".
The other boys looked at him in bafflement, before starting to wheeze.
"Potty?" The damn recipient of his embarrassment asked, tears of mirth pooling at the corners of his eyes.
"What kind of insult is that?" Scott butted in as soon as he managed to catch his breath.
"An English one, at that" Draco said, aiming for haughtily when he really wanted to die inside.
"Sure is!" The Muggle conceded, sounding deeply amused. "I do wonder what is going on with your country, though, as this one over here invokes Merlin every time he is nervous or flustered. We thought he was obsessed with the Sword in the Stone but turned out he was as ignorant about Disney as an Amish would be. So, unfortunately, he is just a weirdo."
Draco barely had the time to register the need to talk to Lupin about the apparent flaw in his enchantment, before the other boy was saluting them with a hand to his forehead.
"Anyway, ladies, I shall depart. I'll leave you two to bond and figure out if this apartment sharing thing is meant to be. Eves, I'll talk to you later. Dean, if I won't see you again, it was a pleasure. Bye". And he was out of the door with a dramatic flair that would have put Snape to shame.
As he felt the effects of the Felix Felicis subtly buzzing at the back of his mind, telling him that it was going to be ok, Draco turned nervously towards Potter and asked "So, what's the Sword and the Stone?".
