If there was one thing in his life Draco had never been able to control, it was time. It slipped through his fingers like sand and, the more he tried to keep it contained within his fists, the more it seemed to pass without his notice. The curse of all mortals but, still, he believed he was too young to be feeling like his life was already stuck on fast-forward.
Yet, he had turned 17 in the blink of an eye. There were so many moments he could never get back or do differently. Sure, he had always talked about his future with anticipation and a tad of arrogance, boasting about how he was going to be just like his father. But, in truth, Draco had always been scared.
He had been scared of not having lived enough, done enough, made a name of himself enough. He had been so preoccupied with the idealisation of what his life should be, infact, that somehow he had forgotten to actually live it. Trying too hard to make every situation about himself, often he had neglected to pay attention, to make memories, to enjoy the moment. He had done things, many things, but rarely for the pure joy of doing. At the back of his mind, perhaps, he had always been aware of this flaw of his, but never had a reason to do anything about it. Time was plenty, afterall.
Then, at sixteen, everything had changed dramatically. For the first time all his energy had to be focused on survival and, when minutes became numbered, he had realised that there was so much he had taken for granted. With the looming prospect of death, Draco had wished so hard for a taste of living.
The last month gave him just that. When Lupin had suggested he go, the idea had sounded ludicrous. In truth, it had been so easy to relax into the role that, now it was over, Draco was not ready at all. With no one to impress, no name to carry and zero expectations, he had found parts of his personality he had never got to explore before. He couldn't let it all go before having the chance to figure it out. He needed to know where the new pieces of the puzzle fitted in his old world, now that there was no other way than back.
Mostly tough, if he were to be a tad more honest with himself than he was willing to, he was afraid to find out he no longer had a space in Harry's life, now that the truth was laid bare.
Better that way, he chided himself, like a mantra. Easier. It would be much easier if you don't care. You know how it ends, the voice insisted, sounding too panicked to be convincing.
Nothing tells you a situation is truly fucked up like not being able to believe your own inner voice, Draco thought irritably. Silencing all the chattering in his mind, he grabbed the plate he had piled up with left-overs, a bag of crisps and some coke. Hooking his pinkie around the handle of two mugs, he tried to balance everything, resorting to nudge the door open with his elbow.
Harry was standing behind it, and Draco almost dropped everything onto the floor.
"Merlin's tits!" He swore, readjusting the crisps against the hollow of his arm. Harry looked back at him, offering no help.
"Merlin's tits?" He said, dubiously. Draco was starting to suspect the last few days had fried his brain, if the aura of deep confusion in Harry's eyes was anything to go by.
"Merlin's bollocks? More appropriate?" He asked, in his best Professor Snape's impression.
"No. I mean, yes." Harry replied, a hint of frustration in his voice. "I mean, Merlin's tits does not really sound like you, does it?"
"You don't really know me that well." Draco said, unloading onto the table. "If you are suggesting that I am somehow Weasley polyjuiced, I am discouraged to see that your propensity for jumping to idiotic conclusions is still very much presents. Unless you and the Weasel did use to snog in the corridors and this was your way to keep it kinky. In that case, I am flattered. And, to be honest, I am way better looking so I could see why he would want to polyjuice as-".
"Calling me stupid," Harry interrupted his nervous blabbering, planting a finger firmly upon Draco's lips. "Is not going to change the fact that you were the one "snogging" me just the other day."
Draco stared at the index pressing against his mouth, feeling himself going cross-eyed. Then, out of nowhere and for no apparent reason, his tongue poked out of his parted lips and, to his absolute horror, licked at Harry's skin.
"Ahhh." Harry yelped, jumping backwards. "What are you doing?"
"I don't know." Draco admitted. He really, really wanted to bolt.
"This is weird." Harry sighed, slumping down on a chair and still eyeing him wearily.
"Most definitely." He agreed, taking the chair opposite and pushing the plate of food towards the other boy. Maybe he could suggest they make out in the shower, as it couldn't get any weirder anyway. "We are out of tea." He said instead, seemingly apropos of nothing. He could feel his cheeks warming and cursed his pale complexion to hell.
"Ehr, it's okay." Harry said in the same tone of voice he would use when asked questions during Potions.
Draco was ashamed to admit he was still thinking of him under the shower. He pinched the bridge of his nose, willing the mental image away.
"Do you remember our last interaction?" He said after a while, gaze fixed on the other boy's hands.
"Which one?" Harry asked, and Draco thought he could hear a hint of teasing.
"The one- Merlin! The one you don't want repeating if you ask any more stupid questions!" He hissed through gritted teeth. This seemed to sober Harry up.
"Right." He said. "Can't say I don't, no. I'm not sure my nose has been the same since."
"Your nose is fine, Potter." Draco assured him, his cheeks aflame.
"Well, yeah." Harry adjusted his glasses and looked at him directly in the eyes. "Where are you getting with this?"
In truth, Draco had not been prepared to find Harry awake. In his mind, in every scenario he had envisioned - and there had been many - Harry would have roused to find Draco already in the room. He would have looked confused and a little lost and vulnerable, not sarcastic or expectant as he was now. He would have listened raptly to Draco's well rehearsed monologue, nodding along in the right places but waiting patiently for it to finish without interruptions or stupid questions.
An interactive Harry had never been an option and it put Draco dangerously off balance.
"Maybe we should talk about the other interaction?" He offered doubtfully, after he had failed to recollect anything of the flawlessly scripted explanation he had prepared in his mind.
"No." Harry said, firmly. The bastard.
"Okay." Draco sighed. "Okay. Well, not that you got the chance to talk much when we last said goodbye, but I guess you were hiding in my train compartment to find out if I was a- a Death Eater or something."
"Not really, I just enjoyed watching Parkinson petting you like a dog."
"Sarcasm is not a good look on you." Draco lied. "Regardless, great detective work, Potter. As you can see for yourself you were wrong." He extended his left forearm over the table for the other boy to see.
Harry blinked, his jaw dropping open, and Draco quickly looked down in worry.
Oh, that. Fuck.
"What's that?" Harry asked, hesitantly touching the raised, darkened skin his magic-charged grip had left behind. Draco watched him trace the outline of his own handprint in a daze, almost hypnotized, before snatching his arm back.
"That's your own mark, oh my Lord. I am now at your service." He wasn't sure what made him joke about that, when just a year before he had been terrified at the prospect of being branded with the real Dark Mark. There was something about Harry, though, that gave a reckless sort of courage he never knew he had in him.
"Sarcasm definitely does not look good on you." Harry said, but he was still staring unblinkingly at the spot where Draco's arm had been just seconds before. "I- I did that?"
"Yes." Draco admitted. "But it wasn't like you meant to, so no point in dwelling over it. It doesn't make me yours… Your servant, I mean, or whatever."
"But I thought…" Harry whispered, trailing off awkwardly. He ran his fingers through his hair. They were so messy that Draco believed he must have done the exact same thing several times, while he was hiding in the kitchen.
"You thought I was a Death Eater." He said, bitterly. "Well, I was definitely heading that way I guess… Oh, do eat your damn food!"
He had forgotten to bring any cutlery, but Harry obeyed almost mechanically, picking at a strip of chicken with his fingers and putting it in his mouth. He sucked on his tips and Draco almost lost his train of thoughts again.
"After you landed my father in Azka- do not give me that face!" He grimaced, and Harry quickly stuffed his mouth with more food. "After my father was captured, You-Know-Who wasn't really happy with my family. I was given a job, as you rightfully suspected, but I wasn't meant to succeed, if you get what I mean…" Making sure to stress the last part, he braved it and looked up directly into green.
"So you what, deflected?" Harry asked dubiously and Draco wanted to say yes. He did not like the uncertainty that lingered in the air, the unconvinced way Harry was looking back.
"I thought I had killed you, you know? For an entire year, I thought I had left you to choke on your own blood. So did your friends, by the way, they just could not prove it. They missed you. They could not stop wondering what had happened to you. And neither could I." He added, after a long pause.
"No one knew where you had gone." He continued, before Harry could speak. "Well, no one but Lupin, of course. He looked so stressed nobody even thought to suspect him…"
Harry shook his head at that, and Draco's heart broke at the helplessness in his gaze.
"But- why?"
"That's a conversation you better have with him."
He told the other boy, relieved that Lupin, at least, had definitely more explaining to do than he had. "Don't be too hard on him." He asked, surprising even himself. "He had your best interest at heart. You loved it here, did you not?"
"It was peaceful." Harry admitted, chewing on his bottom lip, a conflicted frown upon his face. "I never- I…"
"Your life used to be a shit-show after another. Yeah, I have gathered."
They almost smiled at that, both remembering how easy it had been to talk about that sort of stuff when they had been Evan and Dean.
"Still." Harry said, his smile slipping away. "It was not his choice to make. I had -it was… I was the one…Dumbledore said…"
"The prophecy?" Draco guessed, before he could think about it. The mention of Dumbledore's name had made his stomach churn. He was not ready to talk about that, not ready for the other boy to know what he had almost done.
"How do you know about the prophecy?" Harry asked, sharply. The tone shifted again. There was definitely distrust in his voice now.
"It's a long story." He deflected. "But I know you are the only one that can defeat him."
"Yeah. Dumbledore said so. Not that it was necessary, really. Vold-" But Draco stopped him hurriedly, kicking his shin from under the table.
"Stop- I mean sorry. But don't say that name."
Seeing that Harry was about to protest he added, quickly. "There is a taboo on his name. He knows you are the only idiot willing to say it and that's how he was hoping to find you." He explained, repeating what he had heard his aunt Bellatrix saying during the Easter break.
"Oh."
"He missed you, too." Draco said, his voice once again working before his brain.
Harry startled them both by laughing loudly and then clamping a hand over his mouth. They stared at each other with wide eyes and some of the tension ebbed away, letting them relax back onto their chairs.
"Well, he has been trying to kill me for years for a reason." Harry said, still a ghost of a smile on his lips.
"What exactly do you know about the prophecy?" Draco asked, not sure why he was willingly steering the conversation back towards such difficult topics.
"That I am the "Chosen-One." Harry replied, wrinkling his nose in distaste. "And everything that it entails. Why?"
He didn't appear scared or worried, but mostly frustrated, like he couldn't believe this was actually his life.
So, not everything, Draco thought with a pang of sadness. "No, no reason. That's what he knows too, I think."
They remained silent for a while, Draco content with letting Harry think he had heard of the prophecy from his father. It would not be his job to tell the other boy the full extent of it, but Snape's. Draco refused to take on that particular responsibility. He was already trying his damned best to forget about it.
"So, what was the job you were given?"
Dusk was slowly setting over the city, and a soft, peach hue filtered through the window, casting long shadows across the flat. Harry's skin glowed gold, the light bouncing off his glasses and hiding his eyes from view. Draco swallowed.
"To kill Dumbledore."
Harry laughed again, this time in disbelief.
"Wow. He really wanted you dead." Something must have caught his attention on Draco's face, though, because his expression quickly morphed. "No." He said, shaking his head. "No! You can't tell me- You can't expect me to believe you have killed Dumbledore. That's ridiculous."
He stood up, looked at Draco and sat down again. He pushed the mostly untouched plate away and started drumming his fingers on the table, trying to catch a gaze Draco was not so willing to give. "No offence, but that's an unlikely scenario, if I am being generous." He said, with the sort of finality one had when sure to have won the argument.
"None taken." Draco mumbled, grabbing the bag of crisps just to give his fingers something to do. The plastic crinkled in his grip. "And of course I haven't."
Running a hand across his face to shield himself from the reaction he was sure would come, he added, voice hoarse. "Snape did." Of course, he did so on Dumbledore's orders but, nonetheless something was telling him Harry was not supposed to know that. Not yet, at least.
The silence was so heavy that he had to force himself to peer through his fingers.
"Bullshit!" Harry snapped, as soon as their eyes met.
The bag of crisps popped in Draco's grasp, spilling all over the floor. He didn't realise he was standing until he felt them cracking under his feet.
Harry, too, had gotten up. He was pacing in front of the window, disappearing and reappearing against the dimming patch of light that was coming from the outside. They had failed to notice the approaching night, and the room was now cast in semi-darkness.
"Lumos!" Harry said just as Draco reached for the light switch. To the astonishment of both, a floating ball of golden sparks appeared as if out of thin air, stopping just two feet from reaching the ceiling. Draco followed its ascent, mesmerised. It was bright, even in contrast with the lightbulb he had just turned on, and, in every shape and form, not so different from the spell he had so often casted with his wand.
"I didn't know you could do that." He whispered, looking at the reflection dancing across the walls.
"Neither did I." Harry replied, but he wasn't paying any attention to the light. His gaze was firmly planted on Draco and, now that he could see him fully, Draco noticed he was slightly trembling.
"Bullshit." He repeated, and his voice, too, trembled.
"It isn't!"
"Dumbledore is not- He cannot… He can't be dead. You are mental."
He went to push past, the strange ball of light following in his wake like an angry cloud, but Draco grabbed him by the arm.
"You weren't fucking there. I had to, you know? It was him or me, and of course it wasn't going to be fucking him, was it? You said it yourself… I almost killed a girl." His voice broke as Harry struggled in his clutch. "Katie, or something. She was your chaser. It was only thanks to Ginny Weasley that she survived. If it wasn't for her and her Loony friend she might have died… They allerted Hagrid…"
Harry went slack under his fingers, but Draco had to continue. It was now or never. "I didn't mean to, not really. Dumbledore told me that I wasn't a killer. But, Harry, damn it, it wasn't for lack of trying. I never stood a fucking chance, but I had to try. You weren't fucking there."
"It wasn't my fucking choice." Harry yelled, hissing in pain when Draco's fingers dug harder into the skin of his bicep.
"I almost killed a girl…" Draco repeated, as if addressing himself. "She was just a means to an end, and I almost killed her. Everything changed then, I couldn't stop thinking about it. Thinking that I had already killed you, so what did it matter anyway. Once a killer…" He could feel tears trailing down his cheeks and he hastily wiped them away with his free arm.
"Let me go." Harry demanded, but he didn't make any attempt to free himself. Draco obliged regardless, slumping against the wall and letting himself slide to the floor. He hugged his knees and, once sure that Harry wasn't leaving, he continued.
"It was a stupid plan, the cursed necklace. I didn't expect it to succeed, but I should have packed it better. I don't know what the fuck I was thinking, using paper… I had wine ready, too. Fucking poisoned wine and I was going to give it to Slughorn. You don't know Slughorn, I suppose, but there's a greedy fucker if I've ever known one. I poured it down the sink in the prefects' bathroom, after that. Even considered drinking it myself, if you can believe it. " He snorted wetly at that. "There I was, doing whatever I could to survive, and I almost drinked poisoned wine on a whim."
"Shit." Harry said, eloquently.
"My plan, though, my real plan was kind of brilliant. And it worked, too. There I was, with Dumbledore at my mercy. His mercy, he said. He was right, really, but it didn't look like it. He was weak, very weak. His hand looked black, burnt… Severely…"
"I remember." The other boy interrupted, his voice calmer but agonisingly mournful.
Draco took a deep breath. "I couldn't do it. After all, you were right. I didn't have it in me, and not just power, as you clearly meant. He was wandless, and looked like a strong wind could blow him over the edge. But I couldn't. At the end, I didn't have to."
Harry shook his head once more and collapsed onto the floor himself, hiding his face in between his legs.
"No." He mumbled, mouth pressed against the fabric of his t-shirt.
"Lupin was already there. I think I was in shock, frozen, and then suddenly I woke up in a house I had never seen before and he was spilling the beans like he had been longing to do so for a year. Imagine my surprise at finding that you had been suntanning in California all along."
The other boy's head snapped up at these words. "Again, not my fucking choice."
"Yeah, well. I wouldn't complain too much. Long story short, turns out I actually like you when given the chance to know you better. It was an even harder pill to swallow than finding out Muggles are sort of people, after all. It really helps you have grown two feet in height and one around the shoulders." He said, giving Harry an appreciative once-over. It wasn't really the moment, but it sort of worked.
"Really?" Harry replied, sounding unimpressed. Draco counted it as an improvement from the broken quality his voice had had just minutes before.
"I don't go snogging people out of pity, Potter."
"Fucking hell, Malfoy!"
"If I am not mistaken - and I am not- you were the one that snogged me first, so you must not find me repulsive in the least. In fact, if I recall correctly, you were rather enjoying said snogging." He challenged, raising one eyebrow.
"Will you quit saying the word "snogging"? Merlin! Jesus!"
"Well, I'd suggest we take matters further. To the shower, pheraps?" Draco said, not really expecting anything of the sort.
"The- what? You are insane." Harry told him, half yelling. "Damn, you are deflecting. We are not talking about that! Definitely not now. Where is my wand?"
"If you are thinking of hexing me, I am not sure I want to tell you."
Harry froze midway to standing, looking bizarrely down at him as if the thought had never even crossed his mind. Looming over him in half-crouched precarious balance, Draco was tempted to grab his t-shirt and pull him back down. In an annoying display of telepathic abilities, Harry scooted out of reach before Draco could do anything that stupid.
"I don't want to hex you. I want to talk to Remus."
"And how, if you don't mind me asking, were you thinking to do so?" Draco queried, a bit more snappish than intended.
"Don't patronise me!"
"Stop being so fucking sensitive! I am just saying that I could help you with that, if you were to ask." And, that said, he stood up and went to his room in search of the necklace.
"Remus Lupin!" Harry had shouted into the owl's eyes. Draco had barely had the time to discern the voices of Granger and the Weasel that Harry was already telling him to get out. "You too, please." He had heard him asking his friends. "I need to talk to Remus! Alone." Then, the door had slammed shut behind him
Nevermind that it was his room Harry had taken over.
He waited patiently on the sofa, zapping aimlessly between channels on the tv. When Harry reemerged, an hour or so later, he had nearly fallen asleep.
"Where are you going?" He asked, yawning. Harry didn't reply, but went past him, heading towards the front door.
It made no sense. The digital clock on the vhs player read 1am, and Draco rubbed his eyes, thinking he was hallucinating.
When he looked up, Harry was still there, fumbling for his keys.
"Hey!"
"Swimming." Harry replied, and Draco thought he must have heard him wrong.
The other boy was wearing swimming shorts, though, and nothing else. He reached for the light windbreaker that hung by the door and pushed the handle open.
Draco scrambled to follow. He was still wearing his shoes from earlier that day, when he had come home to find Harry awake. It felt like ages ago. His feet ached uncomfortably as if agreeing with him.
"Hey, what do you mean?!" He asked again, trying to keep his voice down in the corridors of the building.
Harry grabbed his new skateboard from where it lay piled with all the others, and turned towards the exit.
"Stop, Harry, fuck! That's not fair." Draco told him, unchaining one of the bikes with the help of his wand. He pushed it outside, shivering a little as the cold breeze met his skin. It was still fairly warm for that time of night, but the wind was sharp and he wished he too had grabbed a jacket.
He had to pedal fast, to keep up. There were a few people around, mainly couples and young drunks, but none paid them any attention.
"Hey." He shouted again, when Harry showed no signs of stopping. "Don't be a fucking idiot! None of this is my fault, you know? I didn't ask for any of this any more than you have. And you liked me, too. Before knowing, you considered me a friend. And that was me, I've never been anyone else but myself. I thought that you, of all people, would understand that someone can change. We just got the chance to meet again, under different circumstances, but it was still us. Harry, damn it…Stop!"
And Harry did. He swerved suddenly, tumbling ungracefully off the skateboard and onto the pavement. Draco managed to break just short of colliding with him.
"My father, he used to be kind of a arse, too." Harry started, a calculating expression upon his face. Draco frowned, and Harry tilted his head to the side, as if observing a rather intricate puzzle.
"My mum fell in love with him anyway. I never really understood it but, maybe, she was a fucking idiot too." That said, he snatched up his skateboard and ran in the direction of the beach without looking back.
Draco watched him getting smaller and smaller into the distance, feeling lost. Only when Harry disappeared under the water, he broke into a sprint, leaving the bike behind, forgotten in the middle of the path.
Harry's jacket lay abandoned on the sand, next to his glasses and shoes. Without thinking too much about what he was doing, Draco kicked his own shoes off and waddled after the other boy, clothes and all.
"You are insane!" He spat Harry's words back at him, once he had located his mop of black hair emerging from the water. Harry shrugged.
Under the moonlight, shivering and dripping in a way that would have given others the appearance of a drowned rat, Harry looked beautiful instead. Draco had half the mind to tell him so. Before he could, though, Harry looked at him firmly, like it was a decision he had already made, and said "We are going home."
Somewhere, in the deepest parts of Draco's heart, a bubble popped.
