The Sleeping Beauty Curse

Chapter 15

"Will you be Astoria, Harry, or shall I be Ginny, I wonder," Draco said sarcastically under his breath, and Harry ignored him with a will. It was either that or throttle him.

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"Are you going to be late home again?" Draco asked on Monday morning. Harry had been late home the previous evening, and he'd tried to sneak out of bed without Draco noticing that morning. He was due in at work at ten, but he'd thought he'd try to get in for eight to deal with some extra stuff.

"I don't plan to," Harry said, turning back to where Draco lay in bed, obviously cross.

"That means yes," Draco said, and Harry couldn't deny it. "Would you mind if I invited some people over this evening, then? You can join us if you're home on time. And if you're not, I won't be bored to death."

"Who?" Harry asked.

Draco's eyes flashed with annoyance. "Does it matter, if you won't be there?"

Harry supposed it didn't. "All right," he said, "I trust you." He hadn't meant it to sound so patronising, but it did. As he left the room, he heard the whistle of something flying through the air, and he dodged. Draco had thrown a slipper at him. Harry left for work feeling guilty and uncomfortable, and promising himself he'd try very hard to get home on time that night.

He was late home. Of course he was. There'd been too much to do, and then there'd been an incident in a town that didn't have its own Floo. They'd had to Apparate there in steps, Harry feeling faintly nauseous as he did so, because he wasn't really supposed to be leaving the office, let alone doing risky magic like this. They'd sorted the problem, but in the end Harry didn't get home till midnight.

Draco had already gone to bed, and his back was turned on Harry when Harry slipped in beside him, trying not to wake him up, even though he was pretty sure Draco wasn't asleep. Draco's nightmare that night was the worst it had been in ages, and Harry tried not to feel like he was to blame.

The next few days passed in a similar manner, with Draco barely talking to Harry, except to tell him, nose in the air, that he'd have guests round, and Harry was welcome to come. Welcome to come! It was his own bloody house! But Harry had the strangest feeling that Draco was trying to tempt him to come home on time, and that made him feel even worse. He didn't know what was wrong with him. It was like he was trying to ruin things on purpose, and he couldn't even tell why, let alone stop himself.

Harry would almost have suspected Draco of making up his guests – who was he inviting round, anyway? – except there was evidence of them, wherever he looked. Stacks of plates left lying round, and glasses smeared with lipstick, and empty bottles of alcohol. They weren't there for long, exactly – they were there for just long enough for Harry to notice them, before Draco Vanished them when Harry's back was turned.

Things kept appearing in the house, too: vases filled with flowers; stacks of new books, some wizarding, some Muggle; and boxes of chocolates, which Draco would eat in front of Harry, feet still in Harry's lap, if Harry ever came home early enough to sit there with him. There were samples, too, from Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes, although Draco didn't seem to do anything with those except glare at them out of the corner of his eye, as if he expected them to suddenly jump up and explode.

"You're allowed to go out and see your friends, you know, if you don't want me to be around when you see them," Draco said angrily one morning as Harry was about to leave for work. Harry blinked at him, and this seemed to make Draco even angrier. "Ron and Hermione!" he said. "I mean – Weasley and Hermione. Granger."

Ron mostly left work on time, Harry realised, now he came to think of it. And he'd been asking Harry to leave work on time as well, pretty much every day. Had his friends all been hanging out with Draco, while he'd been sending himself blind over paperwork in the office? "I—" he said, and stopped, confused and upset, and not sure what to do about it.