Wednesday, February 14, 2018
Harry climbed the stairs to the astronomy tower, his stomach a churning mess of dread and anticipation, a swarm of butterflies trying desperately to claw their way out of a yawning black hole. He was late, but he couldn't force his feet to move any faster.
He kept himself from running his hand through his carefully tamed hair with effort, not keen to ruin all the effort before Draco had even seen it. The new clothes, selected that afternoon by the combined style efforts of Ginny, Astoria, Pansy, Hermione and Blaise - Luna's selections being unanimously outvoted every time - itched and chafed uncomfortably, and most importantly felt... foreign. He missed his worn jeans and jumpers and falling-apart trainers; the man in his mirror just a few minutes ago, who'd stared back at him dazedly in tailored pants, fitted shirt, and polished shoes, hadn't been familiar. He regretted submitting to the others' opinions - they could pull off such stylish clothes, but... he couldn't. He wasn't anyone important, anymore. Just Harry. And Just Harry felt like an impostor in these clothes that would much better have suited Blaise. Or Draco.
He wished for just a touch of the elegant poise that Draco wore so effortlessly. Unfortunately, Just Harry only knew how to slouch.
They'd tried, giving him tips and pointers and crash courses in posture until his head was spinning. He couldn't remember any of it now. It had all flown out of his head the moment his fancy new shoes had touched the first step, at the base of the astronomy tower. Because this was it.
Draco was up there, with his elegance and his grace, and Just Harry knew - knew - he was deluding himself to even think he had a chance. Wasn't he?
The past few weeks, where he and Draco had settled into a comfortable routine of bickering and teasing jibes, had been so pleasant. Merlin, he'd missed their banter, all these years. Ginny was witty, but her wit was all sharp edges and barbed points. Harry wasn't any good at the sort of repartee she preferred. But Draco's snide, spiky banter... that, he could do.
It had been nice, running errands with Draco. When his sly remarks hadn't been at Harry's expense, he'd actually found them quite funny. And no one had even batted an eye, at seeing the former Death Eater and former Chosen One together. He hadn't thought he'd ever be allowed to move on from that, to have his own life, but it had happened quite without his knowing it.
It had thrown him, the moment he realized that, far from being upset to see them together, everyone had assumed they were, well, together. And thought they were cute. It was endearing and infuriating all at once, to have people assume they were together when it was all Harry wanted but didn't think he could ever have.
His steps slowed further as he neared the middle of the tower, the warring desires to run forward and back nearly evenly matched. He paused, halfway between one step and another, and reminded himself to breathe.
It's really happening. He still couldn't quite believe that it wasn't a dream, or some incredibly elaborate prank. He fumbled in his pockets for the folded piece of parchment, juggling the bag of chocolates and wine the girls had recommended, and the single red rose, all his own idea, that he'd bought on a whim when he went to pick up the chocolates.
The familiar words of Messrs. Mooney, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs reassured him, as they always did, and though the ink was maybe a bit more faded than he recalled from his youth, the cheerful, irreverent greetings were just as he remembered. He felt a momentary pang of loss for those men, taken from him before he'd really had a chance to know them. He thought he probably would have liked them.
His eyes found Draco on the map immediately, through long years of practice; he was there already, of course, pacing methodical circuits around the astronomy tower roof, and it eased some of Harry's anxiety to know that Draco was nervous, too. Smiling faintly, he refolded the map, carefully tucking it back into his pocket, then threw back his shoulders and rushed up the remaining steps, anxious to get this - whatever this turned out to be - over with.
He drew in a sharp breath as he burst through the door and Draco's silver eyes snapped to his, luminous in the moonlight. The worry lines around those eyes eased, and the scowl was replaced by a soft smile.
"You came."
Harry smiled. "Yes." He walked steadily forward, surer, now, on his feet.
—
"Harry," he said gently, "I lied to you."
It took a moment for those words to sink in - they were so different than what he'd expected. Draco had lied to him... about what? This? Everything? He knew the pain and confusion he felt showed clearly in his eyes, because Draco flinched and looked away.
Then he turned back, more fire in his eyes than Harry had ever seen. He didn't even notice the wand sweeping up until it was pointed right between his eyes. Draco stared at him for a long moment, expression closed, unreadable, then shouted "Memento!"
Harry's memories came rushing back: one by one, at first, then a trickle, then a stream, then a deluge that threatened to wash him away. His hands, clenched around the bag and rose, spasmed and came up to claw frantically at his head, trying to stem the tide of memory. He sank to his knees, overwhelmed; distantly, he heard the bottle shatter on the stones.
They had been so happy. He had been so happy.
That happiness he'd craved with Ginny and never found; all those years of wanting something he wasn't sure he'd ever be able to find. He'd had it. And Draco had taken it from him.
They had been together for months. All those years of rivalry and hostility had come to a head, during the Triwizard Tournament, and sparked something neither of them had been able to deny. They'd begun with clandestine meetings, in secret corners and darkened alcoves, and watching the stars late at night on top of the astronomy tower. They'd graduated to midnight picnics on the shore of the lake, and under the watchful trees at the edges of the Forbidden Forest. Then they'd found the small, abandoned room, in the Room of Requirement, and claimed it as their own. With the map and the cloak, it had been easy to meet there more often, stay for longer. His friends were increasingly occupied in other things, in each other; the lies that tripped off Harry's tongue, on the rare occasion he was questioned, came easier each day.
They kept coming, the memories, more and more, flashing by so fast he could scarcely keep up. Then the flood slowed, and he sank into another, more recent memory.
—
Friday, October 11, 1996
"It'll never work, Harry!" Draco prowled around the small, hidden room they'd made their own over the last months, like a lion in a cage. Harry felt a fierce upwelling of pride for this Draco, the one no one else ever got to see. The one who cared so deeply. He swung his feet idly as his eyes tracked Draco's circuits around the room.
"It might," he offered, just to keep Draco talking. Draco spun to face him, eyes flashing. Harry felt a physical pull as he looked into his lover's eyes, as if they were connected by more than just their mutual attraction. "You know it - I know you do," Draco growled. "I can see it in your eyes. See you fighting it. Don't. Just accept it. We were never meant to be together, Harry - we knew that from the start."
"No."
"Harry!" Draco stopped before him, exasperated, leaning down to look deeply into Harry's eyes. "It doesn't matter. Either way, I lose. If my side wins, I won't be able to save you. If yours does, you won't be able to save me. Don't you see?"
Harry set his jaw. "I will."
"You stubborn, beautiful bastard!" Draco pulled Harry up to stand in front of him, holding fiercely to his shoulders. "Look at me! Listen to me! What are you going to do? Waste your life pacing outside a jail cell? Fritter your money and fame away trying to get me pardoned? It's too late for me, Harry. I'm already marked."
Draco grabbed the sleeve of the robe he'd recently donned, ripped it savagely open to reveal the Dark Mark marring his beautiful skin, glared at it. "I'm a dead man walking."
Harry leaned down, kissed the inky lines that he knew Draco loathed being forced to take. "I'll fight."
Draco choked back a strangled sob. "Yes. You'll fight. At first. Look at me, Harry." He grabbed Harry's chin, forcing his eyes up to meet Draco's, flashing with suppressed emotion. "Do you really think the Weasleys will accept me? Me, Harry? A Death Eater —"
"Not by choice," Harry said softly, but Draco ignored him.
"A Death Eater, long past redemption - in place of their lovely, shining, heroic daughter? No. Of course not. She's your future, Harry."
He scowled. "I don't love her."
"You do. Oh, not like you love me, maybe. Not like you think you love me. But you will. You two fit, Harry. You and I –" his voice cracked, but he soldiered on, "you and I never did."
Draco looked down, and now it was Harry who forced eye contact, Harry's eyes that flashed dangerously.
"Yes. We. Do."
"No," Draco smiled at him, a twisted, bitter thing that could hardly be called a smile at all. "If we ever had a chance, then we missed it. I've made my peace with it - you should too."
"Never."
"I won't let you throw away your future! I'm not worth it, Harry."
"You are!" Harry grabbed a fistful of Draco's robe, started to haul him in for a kiss, but Draco planted his heels and held him at arm's length.
"No. And you know it, too. Deep down, where you won't admit it. But can you tell me, for sure, that you'll still think it's worth it, five years from now? Ten? I'll lose you anyway. Better on my own terms."
Harry gritted his teeth. "What are you saying, Draco?"
"This." Harry stumbled as Draco abruptly stopped pushing him away, pulled him in for a frantic, bone-crushing embrace and bruising kiss. When Draco stepped back, eyes closed, Harry felt tears on his cheeks that weren't his own. He touched them, frowning, as Draco looked up, smoothly raising his wand.
"Goodbye, Harry. Obliviate!"
—
Harry blinked, looking around frantically. He didn't know where he was.
"What - who - Malfoy! What did you do to me, Malfoy?"
Malfoy held up his empty hands, eyes curiously bright. "Nothing. I did nothing."
Harry glared. "You'd better not have! You know I'll kill you!"
Malfoy closed his eyes. His voice, when he spoke, was flat, emotionless. "Yes, Potter. I know."
"Wh—"
Malfoy inclined his head in a small nod, turned on his heel, and strode out the door.
And then Harry was spinning.
—
Wednesday, February 14, 2018
Harry came back to himself, kneeling on the cold stones at the top of the astronomy tower, staring at Draco's boots.
They'd been so happy. And then Draco - no, Malfoy - had ripped that happiness away from him.
He looked up at Draco, his customary masks scattered around them on the ground, empty of everything but raw emotion and betrayal. Draco had finally managed to break him - break him as no one else ever had, not even Voldemort.
He turned his face away, staring blindly out into the night sky, and croaked out "Why?" Even his voice was hoarse, broken.
Draco reached hesitantly out to touch him, but Harry flinched away from the touch. Draco drew his fingers sharply back as if they'd been burned and hid them behind his back; he didn't reach out again.
"I had to," he whispered. "I had to protect you. We'd never have been able to hide what we were, once I was forced to join the ranks of the Death Eaters."
"But why? Why did you have to? Why couldn't we have just... just run away?" But Harry's voice was small, defeated. He knew why.
Draco answered anyway. "Because I had no choice. Because it was the path laid out for me since before I was born. Because it was the only way I knew how to fight for you." He sighed heavily. "Because while I might have been able to disappear - what was one more Death Eater's kid, in the grand scheme of things? - You didn't have that option. Because no matter how much I needed you, the world needed you more. Because I knew that it was the only way that you'd stop fighting your destiny."
Harry didn't look up at him. "I can't... I... I have to go. I'm sorry, Malfoy."
He rose abruptly to his feet and bolted back down the tower stairs, leaving the ruined wine and chocolate where it lay. He didn't look back.