Drarry Potions AU

Chapter Nine

"Merlin, Potter," Draco said when Harry finally arrived forty-five minutes later. "If you're going to set a time to meet someone, you should get there on time."

"Oh, sod off, will you?" he said, setting down a spray bottle, a cloth and a comb. "It took me longer than I expected to find out where my comb went!"

"Is that why your hair always looks so terrible? You never use your comb?" Draco guessed.

"Ha-ha," he said sarcastically, but Draco smirked when he didn't deny it.

Then he looked over at the items, his expression fading to a slight frown. "What's all this for, Potter?"

"I want to clean up that cut of yours still," he said sternly. "Your hair's matted with blood where the cut opened, and I know how attached you are to that platinum mop."

"Mop?" I said, aghast. "What the bloody---get that thing away from me!" Draco growled, taking a step back as Harry wet the cloth with the spray bottle and tried to wipe some of the dried blood from his hair.

"Look, Draco, it's either this, or the Hospital Wing, right?"

There it was again. Draco. His first name on Potter's lovely, soft-looking lips.

"Why do you keep calling me that?" he asked suspiciously, purposefully evading the question.

"What?"

"My first name. Draco. Why do you keep calling me that?"

"Because . . . it's your name?"

"So is 'Malfoy',"

"Is that what you'd rather me call you?"

Draco pondered that for a moment, unable to help the memories of Potter casually saying his first name: Draco. It was weird how naturally it sounded coming from his arch-nemesis.

"No," he decided finally, though "deciding" was probably the wrong word. It was more like it had just . . . slipped out, which was also unusual---Draco always thought carefully about what he wanted and was going to say before he actually said anything.

"Brilliant," Harry said. "Now hold still."

Draco took another step back as Harry came at him with the cloth again.

"Merlin, Draco, what's up with you and getting better?" he asked the Slytherin exasperatedly.

"Nothing, Potter," he snarled back, eyeing the cloth almost warily.

Harry noticed.

"Draco . . . are you . . . afraid of nurses?"

"No," Draco said, much too quickly. Harry gave him a skeptical look. "Alright . . . fine. I'm afraid of . . . all medical situations," he admitted finally, not meeting the other boy's emerald eyes.

"Look, I'm no doctor or anything," Harry said, "but I am trying to make sure that that wound is okay. And be honest, am I really worse than Madam Pomfrey?"

"Yes," he said out of instinct, still eyeing the cloth. Then thought about it in comparison to the Hospital Wing beds and immediately changed his answer to an admitted, "No. . ."

"Good. Then sit still and let me clean it up---and don't get your knickers in a twist; it's only water."