I missed writing these so much, it's like coming home. Thanks to all who read Ch.1! In theory, I'll be posting updates regularly, but what is regular anymore? I'll do my best to stay consistent. In the meantime, enjoy!

"Hey D. Whatcha doin, buddy?"

Beckett Sheridan, a brick wall of Scottish muscle terminally unable to read a room, called out to Draco Malfoy. Draco stood, rather menacingly, beneath the moving staircases. His eyes were fixed on one of the upper levels.

Beckett was equal to Draco in height; but where darkness rolled from the very core of Draco Malfoy, light burst from within Beckett. A smile permanently resided in the corners of his mouth, and when he let it loose, he was the most radiant human being in the room. In every room; in rooms that hadn't yet been touched by his physical presence. One simply could not be sour around Beckett Sheridan. Draco hated him a little for that, and silently cursed his involuntary participation in the adopt-a-Hufflepuff program.

"What the fuck, Sheridan? Announce yourself!" Draco snapped. Beckett, unfazed, took a large bite of ice cream from one of the Great Hall's brass goblets. "Who needs that much dairy? For breakfast?"

"Who needs to be lurking in the shadows of a magical castle on a Saturday morning?" Beckett said, lazily licking the spoon. Beckett was quite literally the only Hogwarts student who would speak to him after the war. Draco had worked up the courage to ask Beckett why only once in the last year.

"I was sorted into Hufflepuff, my good man. It was over for me before it even started"

Not true. Beckett could make friends with a lamppost. They shared a chuckle before he tacked on, "we don't get to choose our parents. It's a new day, and you can make your own choices now," he'd paused "...and you came back."

Draco would never say it out loud…or maybe he would, with enough Fire Whiskey…but he felt real love for Beckett that day. No one, not even his parents, had ever believed in him like that. He'd never had a real friend. He had lackeys, he had lovers, he had ships in the night. But when Beckett looked at him, he saw. He understood.

"Seriously, when was the last time you slept?" Beckett brought Draco back to the present moment.

He ran a hand through his unkempt hair. "Two days? Longer?" he replied.

"I know you live in a dungeon, but you need to sort all of this out." Beckett waved in Draco's general direction. "You look like dog shit." Draco smirked at his candor. He liked that about Beckett.

"Thanks, buddy." he replied.

"I'm serious. Go take a shower. Brush your teeth. Get an exorcism." They shared a laugh and Beckett paused a moment, surveying his friend. "Are you still having nightmares?"

Draco dropped his gaze to the stone floor and shifted uncomfortably. One of the more insidious consequences of his actions during the war was a constant connection to the darkness of the world. Voldemort may have been gone, but evil remained in seething, vibrating pockets. He could feel it all. When he slept, they laid their horrors bare in his dreams. Green bursts of light. Tortured faces writhing in pain, before freezing that way, in a most gruesome death. Billowing black clouds, screams. Searing pain in his arm. They'd been near constant for the last few months. Draco nodded in confirmation.

"I'm telling you, you need to talk to McGonagall. When has having hyper-realistic nightmares ever pointed to rainbows and puppies in this school?" Beckett scolded.

He'd been hounding Draco to see the Headmistress for weeks. He wasn't wrong. Draco heard the stories of Potter's connection to Voldemort; how it was a carefully guarded secret during the war. If the Dark Lo-Voldemort-had been made aware of this connection, it would have been catastrophic for the resistance. It could have been used to monitor the Order's efforts, or even control the mind of Harry Potter himself. Draco couldn't rule out such a thing happening to him, with whatever remnants of evil were left in the wizarding world. His arm burned, and shame consumed him.

"I know, I know" he inhaled deeply, calming himself. "I'll make an appointment for Monday. I'm sure she'll be thrilled to see me." Draco quipped, the sting of truth on his tongue.

"I always am!" Beckett chirped, digging back into his strange breakfast. Draco knew he wasn't being sarcastic. "Come on, you've hit your threshold for being a creep today. You need one of these." He lifted his goblet and Draco chuckled.

"I don't need a trough of ice cream, Sheridan. Could use a coffee, though. A big one." Beckett smiled and turned back toward the Great Hall.

Draco glanced up at Gryffindor Tower once more, before trailing slowly behind him.