Harry was feeling uninspired. Uninspired and lousy and dull and a whole slew of other things that weren't important but made him want to bury his head in a pillow and scream.
So he did, and then he got dressed and took the floo to Wheezes.
Verity grinned when she saw him, a box of Nosebleed Nougat tucked under her arm.
"Don't you look cheery this morning!"
"Shove right on off, thanks."
He set to work in Fred and George's office, trying to outline a plan for the grand re-opening as he worked.
First, he needed to officially hire on his friends for their respective jobs. He didn't want to be exploiting them for free labour when he didn't have to. He also made a note to give Verity a pay bump and hire at least one more clerk for somewhere in the store. If everything worked as planned, she would need the help.
Second, he had to figure out a lot more new products, and he needed someone to test them. That also meant getting the warehouse up and running.
Third came the makeover. Not of himself, thankfully (though Hermione had been hinting at her desire to captain that ship for a while now), but for the shop. Vanishing old and expired products, fixing up the broken ones, talking to Dean about some new advertisement posters for the windows, and getting Luna in to give some tips on interior decorating.
She didn't exactly have the kind of style that he'd want for a house, but a joke shop was right up her street.
With a sigh, he looked at the orange gunk and admitted that he should probably wave the white flag and get a team to clear out the rest of the office. It felt wrong, somehow, letting strangers invade Fred and George's space, but he knew it would have to be done in the end, and putting it off wasn't helping anybody.
As for the actual logistics of the grand re-opening event... Harry groaned. He'd need to talk to the Prophet to get the word out, and he'd ask Luna to run something in the Quibbler too, though it'd reach considerably fewer people. Then there was figuring out the date. Malfoy had suggested the start of December, and he could write to McGonagall to figure out the nearest Hogsmeade weekend to that so they'd be sure to get some business.
And that just left...
"Potter."
Malfoy stood in the doorway, looking at the office with a sneer. Harry felt weirdly defensive of his progress, so he was already on edge.
"Malfoy," he replied gruffly. "Didn't know you were coming in today."
He stepped forward to stand beside Harry, and the pair of muggle trainers he'd donned caught Harry's eye, nearly making him laugh before he caught himself.
"Yes, well, I don't run my schedule by you, do I?"
Harry sighed. "What do you want?"
"I'm just monitoring your progress. It is my job, after all."
Harry gestured to the office, knowing it was obvious how far he'd gotten.
"With the plan, Potter, not the room."
"Oh."
"Oh." It sounded mocking coming out of his mouth.
"Well, I've got some things in place. Er... plans to put them in place, really."
Malfoy rolled his eyes. "What's the incantation?"
"Huh?"
"For the charm," he said slowly, like Harry was a child. "The one you're using to clear the room. What's the incantation?"
"Oh, abstergo. It's slow progress, but I'm getting there."
"I see."
Malfoy stood still, not saying anything, and Harry realised that he was waiting for him to cast.
With a slow twirl of his wand, Harry cleared a spot on the floor about the size of a galleon. Malfoy followed suit, and, for a while, they worked in silence.
Occasionally, Harry would hear the speaker on the bottom floor blast a staticky welcome message for visitors, but those moments were few and far between. Verity didn't come up to check on them like he thought she might, so he and Malfoy developed a rhythm all of their own.
The muttered incantations would refrain from overlapping and their hands always stayed just shy of bumping one another in the cramped section that comprised the area of the floor they could safely stand in. When Harry looked over some time later, Malfoy's brow was glistening with sweat, his cheeks a ruddy pink, his sleeves rolled up high enough to see all but the top edge of his dark mark.
When he caught Harry staring, his voice abruptly cut out in the middle of his spell, eyes flashing.
Harry didn't say anything, but the air in the room began to feel like thick syrup, trying to worm its way into his brain and suffocate him.
When neither of them offered up the first word, Malfoy sighed.
"Let's go for a drive," he said, and Harry was so taken aback that he agreed without thinking.
They glided out of the store and to the nearest apparition point while he still felt a little dazed, and the next thing he knew they were standing beside an old-looking blue car and Malfoy was opening the door to the driver's-side seat.
Harry walked around it slowly, taking in the simple frame, feeling like a fool as he pulled on the door handle gently and bent down inside. The silence was stifling as he closed himself in, but then Malfoy put the key in the ignition and they were sailing smoothly down dirt roads, casting a long shadow.
Harry recognised that they must be near Wiltshire, which he supposed made some amount of sense, though he didn't like the idea of being so nearby to the manor.
Malfoy rolled down the window on his side, the wind whipping his blond hair across his eyes and drawing Harry's attention to the tight grip he held on the wheel.
He was working up the courage to ask when the hell Malfoy had learned to drive when Malfoy spoke instead.
"You really want to own a joke shop for the rest of your life?"
"What's wrong with that?"
Malfoy tilted his head, considering. They'd slowed down slightly, but the car was still moving fast enough that sand and grit flew into Harry's eyes as he leaned out his own window to look at the passing scenery.
"Nothing, really. It's just that... well, you're the chosen one, aren't you? You could do anything. Be an Auror, a professor... even play for Puddlemere United if you wanted to. Hell, with all the magical energy you've got thrumming through your veins, you could Imperius the whole Ministry and make any changes to the Wizarding World that you want."
Harry huffed out a laugh. Wasn't that a thought? He'd been wondering the same thing himself, really, and he still hadn't found an answer. Was he going to sign on with Robards in the spring? Was he going to try for anything at all?
Harry leaned his head against the metal door frame, letting the last glints of setting sun flash over his face. "Don't I deserve to be happy?"
He hadn't meant to ask that, but it had come out anyway.
The car jerked a bit but Malfoy quickly righted it, stifling a sharp cough. "You... you do. Sure."
"It's like, just because I could do anything I want to, people think I should give up what I really enjoy so I can do something impressive."
"Well, that's—" Malfoy hesitated, flicking on the windscreen wipers to clear away the bugs crowding his vision, "that's bullshite."
Harry looked at him, watching the way his shoulders hunched up by his ears.
"Ministry inspector. Was that what you wanted?"
"Right, yeah. Being the one who goes around and tells people that their livelihood, their family business, their passion project has to close down, that was the dream right from the womb." He didn't take his eyes off the road, clearing his throat. "No, Potter, I didn't want to be a fucking inspector. It was the only job that was hiring and I needed the money. Still pays well, and no one else wants to take it, so I'm set."
Harry nodded morosely, focused on the way the dust specks seemed to float in the air around Malfoy's head and glow like fairies.
Harry wondered what Malfoy had been like as a child. Sure, he'd known him at Hogwarts, but like a real, proper child. Around Teddy's age, first starting to have any semblance of a personality. Had he always been so prickly, so severe?
He was a collection of angles—sharp words, smooth jaw, well-cut suit. With his hair all ruffled like it was, though, it was easier to imagine him at a younger age, when the lines weren't so defined, the edges not quite so steep.
"Would you stop staring at me?"
"Sorry," Harry murmured, but it took him half a minute more to look away.
"I'm not going to keep my sleeves rolled down for you."
"Okay."
"The mark's always gonna be there, Potter. I can't get rid of it."
"I know."
Malfoy worked his jaw, and his fingers flexed on the steering wheel again.
"When'd you learn to drive?"
Malfoy sucked in his cheeks, letting out a slow breath as he turned onto a more residential street—if you could call it that, considering how large the houses were. Trees were lining the space between mansions and a dog was barking somewhere, just barely loud enough to hear. Everything was that soft kind of darkness that came in slowly after sunset, when the air still had a hint of life and the humidity was only just beginning to wear off.
"Fifth year."
Harry blinked at him. "Really? So not after Hogwarts, then."
"Obviously."
"Why?"
"Does it matter?"
"To me, yeah."
Malfoy cut his eyes over to Harry, taking him in.
"Pansy thought it'd be good fun. Being the kind of thing our parents would frown upon made it all the more appealing, I suppose. Blaise and... and Crabbe had managed to find some beat-up old Anglia in the Forbidden Forest that we could drive. No idea how it ended up there, mind you, but we all tried it out. I took a liking to it more than the others."
Harry felt a small smile curve his lips.
"Do you still talk to them much? Other than Blaise, I mean."
"Well, Pansy's made it practically impossible to get rid of her. Crabbe's..." He cleared his throat like that was all he'd wanted to say, but when he spoke again his voice came out more slowly, pauses where it might have broken if he'd let it, "gone. Goyle doesn't have a permanent address, but I get a postcard every couple of months telling me about his new favourite foreign food or a landmark he found particularly thrilling. Nott still comes around to Blaise's place on occasion, but he was always the quiet type, so there's not much to report on there. And none of us have heard from Millicent in years. Last I knew, she and her parents were holed up somewhere in Scotland, but there've been rumours that she fled the country since then."
Harry thought of fire and Malfoy's long arms thrown around Goyle's unconscious body. He thought of smoke, the feeling of coughing it up, and Malfoy's face as he screamed Crabbe's name outside the Room of Requirement. It was hard to imagine the Slytherins living like Harry and his friends did, but being distant from one another seemed wrong too. They were bonded in the same way the Gryffindors had been, right?
At least Malfoy had Parkinson and Zabini, even if they seemed like two of the least pleasant people in the world.
"I don't have a lot of ideas," Harry admitted quietly, sensing that a change of subject might be necessary. "For the shop, I mean."
Malloy didn't say anything.
"I've been trying to come up with some, but they're never any good. I was hoping clearing out the office might help, but that'll only keep it for so long. My friends have been trying to help too. It's just not going anywhere."
"Why are you telling me?"
"I dunno. I guess I'm willing to try anything if it'll lead to some kind of breakthrough."
Malfoy huffed out a laugh. "I see. Well, you've still got time. I've seen owners who were worse off and still managed to pull it together in time."
"And how exactly did they do that?"
Malfoy shrugged, but Harry got the feeling that he actually had a lot to say on the topic.
"Maybe just try getting your mind off it for a while. Some of our best ideas come to us when we aren't trying to think of them."
Harry sighed. That would be a lot harder than he was making it sound.