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Malfoy waits for him on the front steps of the castle, cross-armed under the light drizzle. He hasn’t changed since the last time Harry saw him, some years ago. He’s still tall, dressed in expensive robes, with mean eyes and a mouth set in a perpetual frown.
“The Sorting’s already started. Professors are supposed to be here before the Sorting starts,” he drawls.
“Good evening to you, too, Malfoy,” Harry says, dropping his trunk on the wet, black grass. The Knight Bus was caught up in a storm in Bristol.
“Nothing good about it from where I’m standing,” Malfoy says dryly. He turns on his heel, and disappears into the darkness of the castle, black robes fluttering behind.
It’s going to be a long year.
* * *
Malfoy snickers when Harry speaks at dinner, or in the staffroom. He rolls his eyes at Harry’s jokes, snorts at his ideas, lets out displeased sounds when Harry so much as walks into a room.
The others look at Harry, waiting for him to say something.
Harry just ignores him. He’s not going to stoop to Malfoy’s level.
* * *
Malfoy is head of Slytherin house, a title nobody else wanted. The Slytherins adore him. They wave at him when he strolls in for breakfast, and there’s always a group of them accompanying him out.
Over pints at the Three Broomsticks, Neville tells Harry it has been like that since Malfoy started teaching. For years after the war, the Slytherins didn’t have a Head of House. When Malfoy came on board, things really improved for them.
“He’s not that bad, you know,” Neville adds with a shrug.
“No, he’s a ray of sunshine,” Harry says, and their laughter fills the room.
Hagrid joins them later. They talk well into the night.
London, the Ministry, Grimmauld Place—they all seem far away, like the memory of a bad dream in the razor-sharp morning.
It’s good to be back home.
* * *
When Slytherin wins the first match of the year, against Gryffindor, Harry tries not to care. Fails. He’s seen Malfoy around the pitch, yelling at the players. He’s seen him hovering around them in the Great Hall, giving them pep talks before training sessions.
Two can play at that game.
* * *
Gryffindor wins the match against Ravenclaw.
Malfoy waltzes into Harry’s office. He takes in the bare room cursorily—Harry’s stripped it of his predecessors’ traces, but didn’t put anything back on the walls—then bestows Harry with his most intense glare.
“You’re not head of Gryffindor. You’re not allowed to help the Quidditch team. Did you think I wouldn’t recognise your old—and may I add, stupid—techniques?”
Harry is ready. He knew Malfoy would say just that, just in that tone, standing just there.
“I am allowed to speak with the students, aren’t I? Impart my wisdom?”
“Impart this,” Malfoys says, and shows Harry the middle finger before storming out in the most dramatic fashion.
Harry laughs, despite himself.
* * *
The Gryffindors complain about Malfoy every chance they get.
“He takes points away from Gryffindors for talking, but not from Slytherin!”
“He says perfection doesn’t exist, but then only gives top marks to Nott and Parkinson!”
“He gives his own students more points for the same quality of work! It’s not fair!”
Harry starts doing the same, to even things out.
* * *
Slytherin wins the match against Ravenclaw. Gryffindor beats Hufflepuff.
The month before the final match of the season between Gryffindor and Slytherin, the tensions are higher than ever. Harry and the other teachers stop more than a dozen duels in the corridors. Only Malfoy walks by them, unbothered.
Harry finds him alone in the teacher’s room, marking essays. Sort of. He’s writing a dissertation in the margins of some poor student’s work.
“You really shouldn’t let the students duel,” Harry tells him, tapping a tray with his wand. A coffee mug appears on it. “They can injure each other. I had to escort Roney to the Hospital Wing this evening.”
Malfoy rolls his eyes. “They’re teenagers. If they want to duel, nothing will stop them. Not even the great Harry Potter.”
“You could at least pretend to take it seriously,” Harry retorts, but the sting of it is missing. He’s not yet so old as to not remember what it was like to be a teenager. “It would help with the—optics.”
“You’ll find I’m not interested in optics anymore.”
Harry blinks away Malfoy’s cryptic words, and pulls up his own stack of essays to mark. He soon gets bored of reading the same facts about Boggarts, and listens to the scratching sound of Malfoy’s quill instead.
When the bell rings, they get up in silence.
* * *
Harry wakes up early the day of the match. He skips breakfast, much too nervous for food.
The game is intense. It’s a bright, cool day, but Harry’s hands sweat around the wooden handrails. The Gryffindors scored early and they’re ahead in points, but the Slytherins can still win if they catch the snitch. And Claire, the girl playing Seeker for Slytherin, is good—the best Harry’s seen since Ginny.
Gryffindor scores another goal, and the crowd around Harry erupts in applause. Harry stands up and waves his red scarf, searching for Malfoy in the crowd. He’s bent over the handrail, eyes set below the goal posts. Harry follows his gaze, and spots the Snitch. Just then, Claire plunges towards the glittering ball. In a matter of seconds, it’s done.
The disappointment settles in Harry’s belly like a heavy stone.
The green tribunes explode in cheering as the commentator announces Slytherin’s win. Malfoy is the only person sitting still amidst a cloud of green confetti. He waits until Harry’s eyes find him, and shows Harry the middle finger.
* * *
Exams are around the corner. Harry’s stressed for the students, wants all of them to do well, and loses sleep over the ones that are struggling. The fourth year in particular is a mess. Only two can cast a working Reducto, and Harry takes it personally. Needless to say, he’s in a sour mood when Malfoy ambushes him in the corridor leading to the staffroom.
“I understand your disappointment about Quidditch, but could you stop displaying such blatant favouritism? It’s in bad taste. Even for you.”
“What are you talking about?”
Malfoy huffs impatiently, like he does when the first years follow him around the Great Hall.
“Multiple students have told me you cheat them out of their house points. It’s pathetic. And it won’t make a difference; Slytherin is two hundred points ahead.”
“How about this?” Harry says, and keeps walking, annoyed. He hadn’t checked the points and didn’t know the Gryffindors had fallen behind so much. “I’ll stop if you do.”
“Excuse me?” Malfoy exclaims. “Who told you I’m being unfair with the points?”
“Don’t you have a class to go to?”
He falls into step with Harry.
“Is it Turner and Sage?”
Harry swallows his surprise. It was Turner and Sage.
“For the love of Circe, Potter,” Malfoy says indignantly. “You are aware, aren’t you, that those two have failed Potions every single year? I knew you were a moron, but not enough of a moron to listen to Turner and Sage.”
Harry stops, then, and actually looks at Malfoy. He’s slightly flushed from the effort of keeping up with Harry’s stride, from saying quite so many words instead of just rolling his eyes and waving his hands. There are fine lines around his eyes, around his mouth. Yet there is (there always was) something striking about him. Harry would go as far as saying he’s handsome, if not for his overall—Malfoyness.
Harry takes a step towards him. Malfoy flinches. The flush spreads further up his neck.
Harry laughs. “Don’t insult people you’re scared of, sweetheart.”
* * *
Malfoy doesn’t scoff anymore. He doesn’t snicker when Harry speaks. He pretends Harry doesn’t exist. Which suits Harry just fine. Just fine, really.
* * *
Harry hardly makes it through the Leaving Feast. The Great Hall is draped in green, a truly horrific sight.
After the students leave, Malfoy gets drunk on wine, like a teenager. Harry watches him swaying unsteadily towards the double doors. He also stands up.
The night is warm, so the front doors have been left open. Moonlight spills through them, catching in Malfoy’s hair. He turns at the sound of footsteps, and his gaze becomes wary when he recognises Harry.
Harry, admittedly also drunk himself, extends a hand.
“I shouldn’t have listened to Turner and Sage. I’m sorry.”
Malfoy’s eyes slip towards Harry’s outstretched hand.
He looks up at Harry. “Fuck you.”
Harry laughs, and retracts his hand. “Fair enough.”
Malfoy takes a step towards him. He’s taller than Harry, and looks a lot less drunk close up, his gaze clear and focused. Harry thinks, stupidly, that he will punch him. Or kiss him.
“You’re such a condescending, self-important, arrogant prick. I’m not surprised the Ministry’s had enough of you.”
Harry grins.
“What can I say? We weren’t all born with the cocksucking talent of the Malfoys.”
He fixes Malfoy, ready for the retaliation.
Malfoy only rolls his eyes. “Go to sleep,” he says, as if admonishing a student, then turns around and walks away.
On the way to his quarters, Harry feels a muted disappointment, which unquestionably, and yet aimlessly, includes Malfoy.
The last day whizzes by, and then Harry’s back in London, in his dark and grimy house. The kitchen table is covered in old case files he never got around to throwing away. His bed is unmade, and there’s a spider web spreading from the bedside lamp all the way to the headboard.
It takes him days to get the place back in order. It takes him days to get over the fact that he thought Malfoy might kiss him.
* * *
He spends the summer locked in Grimmauld Place, dreaming up Quidditch strategies.
* * *
Harry sits down at the teacher’s table towards the end of the Sorting Hat’s song, dripping wet and freezing—why did he think flying here was a good idea?
Malfoy scoffs so loudly, Harry can hear him from the other end of the table.
For some mysterious reason, Harry feels relief.
* * *
Malfoy has the Quidditch team start training on the second day of school.
Harry organises a Quidditch fan club on the weekends, which is mostly a cover-up for discussing strategies with the Gryffindor team captain.
Malfoy bribes Madam Reville with macarons and elf wine, and steals the best training slot from the Gryffindors.
Harry puts on his best tie, and wins back the slot.
Malfoy runs to McGonagall, who gives the slot to the Hufflepuffs.
“You coward. You’re so used to getting everything you want, you lily-livered spoiled little brat, you can’t even lose with dignity,” Harry whispers at him through Binns’s translucent body.
“Please enlighten me,” Malfoy says, articulating every word, and holding up his spoon with the rigidity of a prince. “When exactly did I lose?”
Harry swallows the insult he has in mind for Malfoy along with a spoonful of soup.
* * *
The match is violent. The thick rain makes it hard to keep up with what’s happening. No goals are scored in the first thirty minutes, and even the commentator is out of things to comment on. The players mostly zigzag against the swollen clouds, avoiding Bludgers.
Just when Harry’s attention starts to drift, a gasp ripples through the stadium. The two Seekers are darting towards something only they can see, so far away the crowd can’t tell which one is leading.
A Bludger hits one of them. The player slips off the broom.
Harry acts on instinct. He runs to the edge of the stand to get a better aim, and points his wand at the falling body. The spell slows down the fall. Through the walls of pelting rain everybody can make out the green hem fluttering down.
Madame Reville catches Claire before she hits the ground.
The Gryffindor Seeker lands next to them, clutching the Snitch.
The stadium is silent.
* * *
“I want him off the team,” Malfoy is yelling just as Harry turns the corner towards the Hospital Wing.
McGongall tries to reason with him, but Malfoy is in no mood to be reasoned with.
“I don’t care! He’s a menace, and he shouldn’t be allowed next to a bat ever again. This is supposed to be a children’s game, not the World Cup.”
“We’ll let his Head of House decide that.”
“Can I at least see Claire?”
“Soon, Draco,” Hagrid says, and almost crushes Malfoy when he tries to pat him on the back. “You heard the Healer. He needs to make sure she’s fine.”
Malfoy’s eyes land on Harry. “You,” he yells, lacking his habitual composure, “what do you want?”
“Is she OK?” Harry asks McGonagall, ignoring Malfoy.
“She hasn't woken up yet. Thomas from St Mungo’s just arrived.”
Harry nods. As he closes the Hospital Wing doors behind him, he hears Draco’s exasperated voice. “Why is he allowed to go anywhere he pleases? Why doesn’t anybody tell him no, just once?”
“Heya, Harry,” Thomas says, a diagnostic spell spilling out of his wand. Harry often worked with him when he was an Auror.
“How is she?”
“She’s stable. But her arm has been badly hit. She won’t play again this year.”
The rain beats against the window.
“Make sure Draco Malfoy is here when she wakes up.”
“Will do.”
* * *
The Slytherins want revenge.
Harry tries everything. He holds speeches about house unity. He opens his Quidditch fan club to all the houses.
The only two Slytherin students that show up at the fan club put explosives in the pumpkin juice.
As a last resort, Harry goes to Malfoy’s office. It doesn’t look anything like how Harry remembers it from Snape or Slughorn’s time. It looks like the Manor.
Malfoy evidently brought his own furniture.
Harry was there when the Aurors seized Malfoy Manor, and Lucius and Narcissa with it. As far as he knows, the Manor is still under surveillance for Dark activity. He wonders who Malfoy bribed to get all this furniture out, and how much it cost him.
On an antique dresser, the Quidditch Cup glistens in the lamplight.
“What do you want?” Malfoy asks, following Harry’s gaze.
Harry tells him. Malfoy laughs in his face.
* * *
There are students gathered in knots outside the girls’ bathroom on the third floor. Harry walks into the high-ceilinged room, and thinks he walked into the past.
Blood and water are running towards a drain in the middle of the tiled floor. Next to it, a body; limp. The Gryffindor Beater that hit Claire.
“Get out of the way!”
Harry turns just in time to see Malfoy take in the scene.
He freezes next to Harry, the blood on the floor reflected in his grey eyes. He looks up, and their eyes meet. There’s no doubt about it; they’re both thinking about the same afternoon.
A girl lets out a sob, and Harry remembers where he is.
“Get Madam Pomfrey,” he tells the girl. He crouches next to the student on the floor, and starts closing up the wounds. He can hear Malfoy giving instructions to the other students.
The rest of the afternoon is a blur. Hospital Wing. Waiting for the Aurors. Filling in reports. All throughout the chaos, Harry can’t stop thinking about the blood on the bathroom floor, reflected in Malfoy’s eyes. He looks for him in every crowd, but they only meet much later, in McGonagall’s office.
It’s dark outside. Malfoy’s white shirt, usually done up, is hanging open at the neck.
Jacob, an ex-colleague of Harry’s, is interrogating Malfoy.
“And do you have any ideas who could have done this?”
Malfoy shakes his head. “I don’t.”
“You’ll need to start an investigation.”
“Of course.” After a pause. “Of course I will.”
“You better. We have to catch them young, otherwise we’ll have another Death Eater on our hands. But I forget. You’re well acquainted with Death Eaters. I saw your father just the other week. He looked dreadful.”
“That’s enough,” Harry says, stepping forward. He’d forgotten how much of an idiot Jacob was.
“Stay out of it,” Malfoy says dryly. And then, to Jacob. “I said, I’ll start an investigation.”
Jacob asks Harry a couple half-arsed questions, then takes out a Ministry-issued Portkey and disappears with a pop.
Harry and Malfoy leave the office together. When they reach the bottom of the circular stairs, Malfoy turns without a word and starts walking.
“Wait,” Harry says, but Malfoy doesn’t stop. Harry almost breaks into a run to catch up with him, and grabs his hand. “I said, wait.”
Malfoy stills. They look at each other. Harry meant to say something (he had it all planned out), but something (the warmth of Malfoy’s arm) distracted him.
“Yes?” Malfoy asks in that impertinent manner of his, removing his hand from Harry’s grip.
“I just wanted to say I’m sorry.”
Malfoy laughs. It’s a sharp, mirthless sound. “Of course you did.”
He starts walking. Harry follows him.
“I didn’t know what the spell would do. I never meant to hurt you.”
“Don’t be daft. I was trying to use a Cruciatus on you.”
Harry shudders. The violence of their youth comes back to him in waves. Malfoy, on the ground, covered in blood—
“Still. I wouldn’t have used that spell if I knew what it did.”
Malfoy lets out some sound of exasperation, and starts walking faster. “Take your hero musings somewhere else, I beg you.”
“I’m really sorry.”
“I heard you the first time.”
“I should have got more than detention for that. I should have been expelled.”
Malfoy stops abruptly, and Harry almost bumps into him.
“And I should have been sent to Azkaban. And you know what, that would have probably saved us both a lot of trouble. But it didn’t happen. Instead,” he waves a hand around, “this happened. So. Take. Your. Musings. Somewhere. Else.”
* * *
The Gryffindor Beater makes a full recovery, and the attacker is discovered and expelled. Still, the House War rages on.
All the other teachers complain about it to Harry. They think Harry will do something about it. Harry tries. The problem is, nothing seems to be working.
“All due respect, Professor, but you’re a hypocrite. We’ve all heard the stories from your time at Hogwarts.”
Harry never knows what to reply to these (perfectly legitimate) accusations. He’d like to say it was different back then, but the only time he tried that the students rolled their eyes at him, and Harry’s had enough of eye-rolling for a lifetime.
“Plus,” adds the fifth year he was just scolding for hexing a group of Slytherins, “you and Professor Malfoy are still at each other’s throats. How can you expect us to forgive and forget, when you two still hold a grudge forty years after graduation?”
“It hasn’t been forty years,” Harry says, appalled. “Only thirteen. How old do you think we are?”
“I don’t know. Ancient?”
Despite lacking in maths skills, the boy has a point.
“We have to lead by example,” he tells a sullen-looking Malfoy. He’s once again marking essays by rewriting them in the margins, locked away in his firelit office. “This has got out of control.”
“Get out of my office, Potter, or the only example I’ll be leading with will be of how to kill a Gryffindor.”
“The students noticed we don’t get along. It validates their feud.”
“It validates their feud,” Malfoy mocks. “Have you considered the feud is already valid?”
“I’m only asking you to be cordial. Show them we can get along.”
“We’re cordial enough. Any more cordial than this, and I’ll hang myself.”
Harry takes off his glasses and rubs his temples. He’s tired. He’s annoyed.
“Let’s do something. I don’t know. A duelling club.”
“Oh, yes. Nothing brings people together quite like a duelling club.”
“Any sort of club. That we run together.”
“I’d much rather drink poison.”
“Jesus Christ,” Harry says. “Can you stop acting like a child?”
“Can you stop trying to solve animosity? You’ve done enough for the country. Read a book. Pick up a hobby. Whatever you want, as long as you don’t do it in my vicinity.”
“I’m not trying to solve animosity. I’m trying to get along with my colleague.”
“Yeah. In order to solve animosity.”
“And what’s wrong with that?”
Malfoy snorts. “Everything. Literally, everything.”
Harry’s done with this conversation. He starts walking towards the door. “I’ll think of a club.”
“Do what you like. I won’t be joining.”
“Yes, you will,” he says, and slams the door on his way out.
* * *
McGonagall makes Malfoy co-host the Patronus Club.
Harry waits for him in front of the Great Hall, cross-armed and grinning. Malfoys walks past him, towards the double doors.
“Give me one order, and I’ll finally use that Cruciatus Curse on you. I’ll mean it, too.”
“That’s very reasonable of you,” Harry says, and follows him inside where more than a hundred students are waiting.
Harry breathes a sigh of relief. Because of Malfoy, half of the Slytherin sixth and seventh years are there as well.
Harry holds an impromptu speech, something that was supposed to be about the spell but turns into more of a plea for the students to behave.
“And then we’ll all hold hands and dance together,” Malfoy says when Harry’s finished. Laughter rises up from the crowd, Gryffindors and Slytherins alike. Harry decides to consider that a victory.
The audience gasps as his stag gallops around the Great Hall. After he demonstrates the wand movements a couple of times, he and Malfoy walk amongst the students, giving a helping hand here and there.
“It’s going well,” Harry smiles when they meet again by the Hufflepuff table, pushed against a wall. “Look, that’s almost a frog!”
“If your standards for well are very low, then yes, one could go as far as to say it’s going well.”
“What’s your Patronus?” Harry thinks to ask just then, leaning against the table.
“None of your bloody business.”
“God, you’re exhausting.”
“Careful. Somebody will hear you. It might validate their desire to kill a Slytherin.”
Harry rolls his eyes, for once.
Malfoy strolls away and pretends to help a hopeless Ravenclaw, before leaning against the Ravenclaw table on the other side of the room. He takes out a paperback.
When the clock strikes nine, he quits the Great Hall with the students, leaving it to Harry to move all the tables back to their place. Harry doesn’t mind. His club was a success.
* * *
Harry sits down next to Malfoy at the dinner table. Malfoy looks up at him.
“Leading by example again?”
“Precisely.”
“As long as you don’t talk to me,” he says, and turns his back to him.
* * *
The Gryffindors win the next match, which means they are in the lead for the Quidditch Cup. The prospect of losing their ten-year streak puts the Slytherins in a foul mood. Even at the Patronus Club, they stick together like a hurt herd, scowling at anybody who dares approach them.
“Go over there and say something,” Harry whispers to Malfoy.
“You go over there if you have something to say,” Malfoy says, cross-legged on the Gryffindor table, with another paperback propped against his knee. “I personally don’t.”
“They won’t listen to me. They hate me.”
It’s not an exaggeration. Harry finds mean caricatures of himself at the end of every class with the Slytherins.
“I wonder why. Could it be because you support the Gryffindor Quidditch team, even though you should stay impartial?”
“My Quidditch fan club is open to all the houses,” Harry says, deciding that’s true enough to warrant being said out loud.
“Or maybe because you used to cheat them out of homework points last year?” Malfoy carries on, ignoring Harry.
“I apologised for that.”
“Yeah. To me.”
Harry blinks at Malfoy.
“Right, then,” he says, standing up.
Malfoy reaches forward, and grabs Harry’s arm, pulling him back down.
“Not now, you idiot. It’s almost nine, and I have plans.”
“You know, you’re supposed to help me get the place back together,” Harry manages, too aware of the ghost of Malfoy’s fingers around his wrist.
“Oh, I know,” Malfoys says serenely, and goes back to his book.
“What plans?”
“You’d like to know, wouldn’t you, love.”
Harry, so hot all of a sudden, has never been more grateful to be ignored for the sake of a book.
* * *
“So you admit it!” one fifth year yells, hitting the desk with her little fists.
“I admit it, and I apologise sincerely.”
“Apologies don’t win house cups,” another one chimes in. The whole class is looking at him with murderous eyes.
“Indeed. But you still won the house cup that year, so there’s that.”
“You should be sacked!”
“We should write to the Board of Governors!”
“You should,” Harry says grumpily, for the seventh time this week. Being actually let go from a job had been less painful than witnessing the Slytherin’s enthusiasm for his potential departure.
Despite all that, they warm up to him in the following days.
“Thank you,” he tells Malfoy at dinner, a couple weeks later.
“You’re welcome,” Malfoy replies, picking up the best-looking tart from a silver plate, not bothering to ask for what.
* * *
Almost half the students in the club manage to produce fully-formed Patronuses, and, as a consequence, the castle fills with translucent animals of all forms and sizes. It soon becomes obvious they’re using them to eavesdrop on each other and, more annoyingly, on the teachers.
“Maybe this is why the spell is not in the curriculum,” Malfoy comments when a blue-ish snake slithers between Harry and Malfoy’s dinner plates.
“Maybe you should keep your opinions to yourself,” Harry says, waving his hand and dispelling the Patronus.
“Maybe you should go back to your seat at the end of the table.”
“Maybe you two should just fuck.”
They both turn to Neville.
“Really, cut it off,” he says, breaking some bread with more force than necessary. “We’re all dying here.”
* * *
It’s an interesting idea, fucking Malfoy. Once it gets into Harry’s head, Harry can’t get rid of it.
It’s outrageous. It’s insane. It goes against everything Harry stands for. And yet—
He starts looking at Malfoy differently. Starts noticing the expanse of his neck, emerging from his stiff collar like a marble statue. Malfoy’s long, pale hands holding up books and newspapers are suddenly the hottest thing Harry’s ever seen. Who knew knuckles could be so interesting to look at?
Harry wants to touch them. He wants to bring those hands together over Malfoy’s head. Wants to wipe that arrogant smile of his pretty face, tear apart his done-up shirts and—
“Jesus,” he exclaims into the darkness of his room. He falls asleep full of shame.
* * *
Malfoy doesn’t seem to be a victim of the same compulsions. There’s nothing different in his voice when he speaks with Harry. His gaze never lingers. He carries on as usual, insulting Harry left and right, with a constant tone of bored indifference.
It will pass, Harry repeats to himself when an accidental touch sends his heart into a frenzy. It’s just a weird phase, like when he was into that smuggler who resisted Veritaserum. Or that bank robber that kept calling him honey.
* * *
Slytherin wins the final game against Gryffindor. Malfoy finds Harry in the crowd.
“It looks like the Cup is not leaving my office anytime soon.”
“Aha,” Harry says, distracted by the way his body is reacting to Malfoy’s hot breath on his neck.
“You and your pathetic excuse for a Quidditch fan club can suck it.”
Harry grabs Malfoy’s waist. He doesn’t know if he’s angry about the game, turned on, or just insane.
“You want me to suck it? All right. I’ll suck you off. Right now.”
Malfoy lets out a sound, something indecipherable. Harry pulls Draco closer, until his lips are almost touching Malfoy’s ear.
“Or, as usual, you’re all talk and no action?”
Malfoy breaks free of Harry’s grip. Looks at Harry with big eyes like some scared animal, then turns around without a word.
* * *
Once the Patronus Club finishes, and the exams are in full swing, Harry doesn’t have a lot of time to worry about Malfoy. They barely see each other, and then the year finishes—Slytherin wins the House Cup as well, of course.
Over the summer, Malfoy’s face fades from his fantasies (it really does).
* * *
He sits down next to Malfoy just as the first years stumble in, wide-eyed and terrified.
“Look at that. I made it on time this year.”
“Impressive. I expect you’ll be awarded an Order of Merlin, First Class.”
“I should hope so. The three already on my mantlepiece are getting lonely.”
Malfoy rolls his eyes, and Harry wonders how they haven’t rolled right out of his head yet.
“Did you have a good summer?”
“Not as good as yours, apparently,” Malfoy says, straight against the backrest. He claps when one Andrej Jaksić gets sorted into Slytherin.
“I did have a good summer, actually.”
It’s not entirely true, but it feels true now, back at Hogwarts, sitting next to Malfoy.
“Yeah, I don’t care,” Malfoy says.
“We have to talk about the Patronus Club.”
If glares could kill, Harry would be a dead man.
Malfoy ignores him for the rest of the feast. Harry doesn’t mind. He makes small talk with Neville. Whistles when students get sorted into Gryffindor. Wonders what had got into him last term, when he thought he was actually attracted to Draco Malfoy.
* * *
Yeah, no, he’s definitely attracted to Malfoy. They’re pushed together, shoulder against shoulder in McGonagall’s office. Harry could have stood anywhere else: next to Neville. Or Hagrid. Heck, he could have stood next to Binns. But he’s standing next to Malfoy, listening to him complaining about too many meetings, entirely of his own accord, his heart beating like it wants to jump out of his chest.
* * *
It’s a sunny day. The sound of laughter travels through the open windows of the staffroom, but Harry’s stuck inside, marking homework.
Malfoy comes in.
“School started a week ago, and I haven’t seen you trying to influence the Quidditch Cup results yet. Are you unwell?”
“I’ve decided to remain impartial this year.”
“I see. So you’ve decided to do your job correctly.”
“That is exactly what I decided. Will you do the Patronus Club with me, then?”
“No.”
“The Slytherins won’t come if you don’t.”
“I suppose you’ll just have to become more popular with the Slytherins.”
“I’ll go to McGonagall again.”
Malfoy looks up, gaze disquietingly sharp. “No, you won’t.”
It takes Harry hours to recover.
* * *
“You must want something from me. I’ll do anything.”
“Anything?” Malfoy says, tapping a quill against his chin as he walks amongst steaming cauldrons, barely paying attention to Harry. “Interesting.”
“Anything,” Harry assures, and half hopes Malfoy heard the edge in his voice, half hopes the Earth will swallow him instead.
Malfoy takes his time, stopping to inspect each cauldron and scribble on his notepad.
“Fine. I’ll do your stupid Club.”
Malfoy dips his finger in the blue concoction. He makes a disappointed face, and starts writing furiously.
“So?” Harry asks after a while.
“I’ll think of a favour later. An anything from the Saviour of the Wizarding World is surely too precious to be spent right away.”
“Right,” Harry says, feeling like he walked into a trap of his own design. “OK, we have a deal.”
He extends a hand. Malfoy looks up from his pad. Seems to consider Harry’s outstretched hand.
“You didn’t shake my hand when I first offered it to you.”
“Yeah. You were trying to convince me not to speak to the boy that became my best friend, because he was too poor.”
Malfoy’s smile turns into a grin. “Oh. So you do remember.”
“How could I forget? You were the most annoying, spoiled little rich boy I’d ever met. It left quite the impression.”
“And now?”
“And now you’re still the most annoying, spoiled little rich boy I’ve ever met.”
“Good. I pride myself on being consistent.” A pause. “So, anything?”
“Anything.”
Malfoy shakes his hand.
* * *
Harry watches the first game of the season from the Slytherin stands, dressed in impartial black. Malfoy, as Head of House, can safely be adorned with a green scarf.
The Slytherins are winning.
“This must be hell for you,” Malfoy beams at him. “Or something. Is that what Muggles fear? Hell?”
“Yeah, that’s it,” Harry sulks. “I don’t understand how you got them to play so well.”
“What else do the Slytherins have left, Harry?”
Suddenly, hell’s a very pleasant place to be in. Harry wouldn’t trade it for anything else.
“I don’t know, Draco. You tell me. Draco.”
The Slytherins score, and Malfoy applauds with an air of regal dignity before turning towards Harry.
“Well. Harry. They don’t have anything left. Not the prestige. Not the assurance they will be respected later on. Just the stained reputation of being the children of Blood Purists, Death Eaters and conservative old men. And winning silly Cups at school.”
* * *
“Professor, what’s your Patronus?”
Dozens of students have asked Malfoy this question, but none as dear to him as Claire. Harry looks up, hopeful.
“Maybe I can’t produce a Patronus.”
Claire laughs, as if the idea that Malfoy can’t do something is beyond ridiculous. And, Harry reasons, it sort of is.
Claire switches gears. “What do you think about in order to cast your Patronus, Professor?”
“It’s not polite to ask that in good society, you know,” Draco says.
“Oh, I know,” Claire smirks.
Malfoy laughs. Moves closer to Claire, yet speaks loud enough for Harry to hear.
“I think of the day I got this job.”
Harry believes him instantly.
* * *
“Are you in love with someone or what?” Harry asks later. They’ve moved all the tables back into place and are now making their way to their respective quarters.
“You’ve taken an interest in my love life, now?”
“Is that why you won’t show us your Patronus?”
Draco rolls his eyes, but softens it with a smile. “Yes, Potter. I understood the question.”
“Are you in love with me, maybe?” Harry asks, grinning.
Draco bursts into laughter. “You wish.”
“You were quite obsessed with me in our youth.”
“Good thing we grew old.”
“You’re gay, aren’t you?” Harry dares.
Malfoy stops. Looks Harry up and down. Smiles wider. “Yeah, I’m gay.”
“I’m gay, too.”
“I know. How could I not? The papers mention it once a week.”
“So you could have fancied me when we were at school.”
Malfoy covers his smile with his hand. Looks away, then back at Harry.
“Of course I fancied you. Who didn’t?”
“Oh, of course,” Harry laughs, but relief settles somewhere deep inside him. “You were just following the popular opinion.”
“Exactly. Just another sheep in the Potter herd.”
“I need to reconsider all those midnight duels you kept roping me into.”
Malfoy crosses his arms, tilts his head up.
“What’s with all this talk about me fancying you? Are you trying to tell me something, Potter?”
Harry looks around at the deserted corridor. Bites the inside of his cheek. He shouldn’t—but the way this conversation’s been going—and they’re always together—surely—
He takes a step towards Draco. “Maybe I am.”
Harry can’t see if Malfoy is flushed in the dim light, but he can see the dimples in his smile.
“Well, it’s good to see you’re as bold as ever. Truly the hero we all know and love.”
“I quite fancy you. Now.”
“Yeah,” is all Malfoy says, still smiling. “I can see that.”
“Oh. Can you?” Harry says, inches away from Malfoy’s face. “And?”
Malfoy’s eyes settle on Harry’s lips.
Harry holds his breath, but Malfoy only moves Harry out of the way, and starts walking. “And I’m flattered. But we’re colleagues. It would be improper.”
Harry’s heart drops to his stomach. He catches up with Malfoy.
“You’re a fucking arse.”
“Me? What did I do?”
“Lead me on? Manipulated me into admitting I fancy you?”
“It’s not my fault you’re naive. And/or a slut.”
Harry screams into his pillow that night.
* * *
Harry fears Malfoy might avoid him going forward, but the opposite happens.
Malfoy becomes a shameless flirt.
He winks at Harry during faculty meetings. He steals from Harry’s plate, resting the weight of his body on Harry’s arm while he picks and chooses the best bits. He puts his legs on Harry’s lap when they’re alone in the staffroom.
If Harry leans into it, if he tries to touch back, Malfoy backs away.
It drives Harry up the wall.
“Please,” Harry finally cracks one Sunday afternoon. Malfoy had tortured him all day long.
They spent the morning in the forest, looking for unicorn hairs. It was warm for March, and Malfoy took off his robe and hung it on a branch. The sun caught in his hair, and his smile was bright, and when Harry found a strand of unicorn hair, Malfoy kissed him on both cheeks, leaving burning marks behind.
Afterwards, they had too much wine with their lunch at Hagrid’s, and Malfoy rested his head on Harry’s shoulder. Flushed with drink, he didn’t protest when Harry put an arm around him, only closed his eyes and hummed to Hagrid’s story about the latest centaur drama.
They walked shoulder to shoulder back to the castle, where Malfoy helped Harry track down a Boggart for the final third-year exam.
They’re both sweaty and tired when they catch it, and they sit down with their backs against the cold dungeon wall, knees touching. The Boggart’s rattling in a chest next to them, and Harry can feel his heart beating.
They look at each other.
Malfoy leans over, and wipes some lamp oil from Harry’s cheek.
Harry grabs him. Malfoy lets himself be pulled on top of Harry, effectively straddling him, but stops inches away from Harry’s lips.
“Please,” Harry begs, his arms on Malfoy’s hips.
“Please what?” Malfoy answers, letting all his weight on Harry’s thighs.
A whimper comes out of Harry’s mouth.
“What do you want?” Malfoy carries on, arms wrapped around Harry’s neck. “Tell me. With words.”
“I want you to kiss me,” Harry manages.
“Aha,” Malfoy says, tilting his head and grinning. “What else?”
“I want you to take off that goddamn shirt,” Harry says, and actually moves his hands to Malfoy’s collar.
“Aha,” Malfoy says, letting him undo one button. “And then?”
Harry leans forward but Malfoy moves his head out of the way. Harry’s lips land under his jaw, but Harry doesn’t care. He kisses his neck all the way to his ear, his hands searching for skin under his shirt.
“Merlin,” Malfoy half-laughs, half-moans. “Contain yourself, Professor.”
He pushes Harry away, but doesn’t stand up.
“You know,” Harry says, breathless, “I checked the rules. There’s nothing in there about professors dating.”
“I never said there was,” Malfoy says, buttoning up the one button Harry undid. “I said it would be improper.”
“The students wouldn’t know.”
“The students knew before you did.”
That was true, unfortunately. Harry found indecent drawings of them ever since his first year there.
“So then why?”
Malfoy stands up, offers Harry a hand.
“Because I said so. You didn’t tell me what you’d do to me after I took off my clothes, by the way.”
“I’d murder you, that’s what I’d do,” Harry says, accepting Malfoy’s hand.
* * *
One day, Malfoy does something he’s only done once in the three years they’ve been colleagues. He comes into Harry’s office.
“May I come in?”
“It depends. Are you going to annoy me?”
“Yes.”
Harry drops the essay he’d been reading. “Yeah, OK. That should be more entertaining than this.”
“I told you to give them more difficult homework. Then they won’t all write the same thing.”
Malfoy inspects the books on Harry’s shelf. Harry suddenly finds all the titles he owns inadequate.
“Did the seventh years behave? They were a mess earlier,” he tries to distract him, but Malfoy’s already picked up an Auror thriller Harry’d picked up in an International Portkey Hub, and never even cracked open.
“They all behave in my class, Potter.”
“I hate it when you call me Potter.”
The things he’s saying lately.
“More reasons to call you that, then. Potter.”
“Of course,” Harry says. When did he become the one rolling his eyes in the relationship?
Malfoy puts the thriller back on the shelf, his face showing exactly what he thinks about the book (it’s trash). He turns to Harry.
“Do you still fancy me?”
“You know I do,” Harry says, resigned to having turned into Malfoy’s ego booster.
“Good, because I’m about to tell you something you won’t like.”
“Oh, god,” Harry says. “What happened?”
“I’m dropping out of the Club.”
“What? Why?”
“Because the Slytherins like you enough now. And I’m busy.”
Harry stares at him, open-mouthed.
“You still owe me the anything, by the way,” Malfoy says from the threshold.
* * *
Harry promised himself he’d ignore Malfoy (that should teach him a lesson), but breaks his promise first thing in the morning, when he bumps into him in the staffroom. He’s reading the Prophet, a steaming cup of coffee by his side.
“I’m really upset with you,” Harry announces.
Malfoy looks at him over the newspaper.
“Why? You know I’m right about the students. They adore you now.”
“I know. But this was our club.”
“If I remember correctly, I had to be coerced into joining.”
“But things have been going well, haven’t they?”
“They have, indeed.”
“You seemed to enjoy it a lot.”
“I enjoyed it enough.”
“So then what’s wrong?”
“What’s wrong, Harry, is that my role has been rendered futile. I was there to lure the Slytherins to your little friendship club. The Slytherins have been lured.”
Harry can’t contain a snicker. He isn’t sure if he’s angry yet, or only getting there. “OK. I see. You want to have me spell it all out for you.”
Malfoy raises the newspaper, so that his face is obstructed again. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I’m sorry I made it seem like I only wanted to run the Club with you in order to get the Slytherins to join. I also wanted to spend time with you.”
“Oh, spare me your little speech. I’m not doing the Club anymore, and there’s that. No need to try to tell me what I want to hear.”
“I’m not telling you—I’m telling you the truth. I want to run the Club with you. I want to do it with you.”
Malfoy lets out a laugh. For the first time in a long time, it’s vicious. “The truth? You wouldn’t know the truth if it knocked you off the broom.”
“Excuse me?”
Malfoy lowers the newspaper.
“I’ll tell you the truth. You know you have a type, don’t you?”
“What?”
“You, Potter, have a type. You like people that don’t like you back.”
“What?”
“What? What?” Malfoy mocks. “What I just said. Go and process it somewhere else, I’m trying to digest the news. We have a new Minister of Education, and he hates my guts.”
“I do not have a type.”
“What you don’t have is a sense of perspicacity.”
“Draco, I fancy you.”
Malfoy rolls his eyes and smooths up the page with a sharp movement, hiding himself from view.
Harry clenches his fist. The newspaper flies away from Malfoy’s hands, and slaps the windowpane. Malfoy watches it fall to the ground, then turns towards Harry.
“I knew you could do wandless magic, and I was already thoroughly impressed. I didn’t need another demonstration.”
“What’s wrong with you?” Harry says, exasperated. “Why are you so—mean?”
“Mean?”
“Yes. Mean. I understand I wasn’t very gallant about my feelings, I understand I could have done things differently about the Club. But I don’t understand why you’re acting like I’m doing this for any other reason than not knowing how to go about us?”
Malfoy brings his hands together. Makes a show of thinking intensely.
“OK. Maybe I was mean, as you call it. Let me correct that wrong, and be clear instead. I’m not interested in pursuing anything with you, Harry James Potter. I’m not interested in working with you more than my present contract forces me to. And, as a friendly piece of advice, from one colleague to another, I think you should consider the possibility that you do have a type, and that you only go for people that won’t have you back, probably so you can avoid intimacy, as proven by your divorce, and your disastrous love life, so exhaustively covered by the gossip columns. Hopefully, the idea that you’d dump me the second I’d let you—have your way with me—will be of some consolation to you in the following days and weeks. Have a good rest of the day.”
Malfoy summons the newspaper straight into his hands, and goes back to reading.
“Oh,” he adds, not bothering to look up. “The anything still stands. We shook on it, and I put a curse on the handshake. If you break it, all your unruly hair will fall off.”
* * *
“Do you think Professor Malfoy left because I wouldn’t stop pestering him about his Patronus?” Claire asks, drowning eyes looking up at Harry.
“Of course not,” Harry says, in what he hopes is an appropriately concerned and sweet tone of voice, not at all contaminated by hatred and vitriol and loathing. “It’s a busy period for him.”
“Is it? He was hanging out with Professor Longbottom at Hagrid’s this afternoon.”
Harry has never hated anyone more than he hates Draco Lucius Malfoy.
* * *
Harry doesn’t go watch the final match between Slytherin and Gryffindor. He goes to the Three Broomsticks, and gets drunk before noon.
* * *
“You’re really pathetic.”
Harry jerks awake. He was in a pub just a few seconds before, and now he’s in his bed. Malfoy’s in it, too. He’s trying to force a vial of something down his throat.
Harry pushes it away. “What are you doing here?”
“Drink this, you idiot,” he says, forcing the contents of the vial into Harry’s mouth. “You passed out. Rosmerta called Hagrid. Hagrid called me.”
“Get—” Harry chokes. “—out of my face, or I’ll hex you. I’ll curse your lineage back ten generations of racists.”
“Well. Isn’t that lovely,” Malfoy says, standing up. “My anti-hangover potion turned you witty. I’ll have to write to the Potioneer Guild, maybe they’ll finally let me in.”
“Get. Out.”
Malfoy rolls his eyes.
“Normal people say thank you, Draco, for not letting me fall into an alcoholic coma despite my irrational, and frankly dangerous, behaviour. You’re really the best. How can I ever make it up to you? ”
Harry gets out of bed, and starts checking the robes on the floor for his wand.
“Merlin. I’m going.”
* * *
Harry pretends Malfoy doesn’t exist for the remaining weeks of the school year. Malfoy, for the most part, takes this in stride. Only when Harry refuses to return his goodbye under the blazing midday sun does Malfoy offer signs that he is an actual human being, capable of actual human feelings.
“You’re really making a thing out of this,” he says, waving to a group of Slytherins boarding the Hogwarts Express.
Harry feigns interest with his cuffs.
“And to think you called me a child,” he blurts out, and he sounds like the spoiled little brat he really is.
Harry walks away.
* * *
He misses him as soon as his trunk touches the floor of 12 Grimmauld Place.
* * *
Harry’s woken up by a strange, blue light. He rubs his eyes, then squints at his Patronus, tall in the middle of his bedroom.
But he didn’t cast his Patronus, did he? He was sleeping.
His stag speaks with Malfoy’s voice.
“I need my anything.”
* * *
Harry Apparates to the Manor in boxers and a stained t-shirt. He finds Malfoy, dressed in his fanciest robes, keeping his own against two Aurors. He makes his way to him, and points an accusatory finger at his chest.
“You liar!”
“Not now,” Malfoy whispers furiously.
Harry takes a look around.
“What are you doing here?”
“My father died earlier today. The Manor is now legally mine, as per Wizarding Law. Tell them to get out.”
“This house is under surveillance,” Dan (an idiot) announces. “Just because it changed owners, it doesn’t mean anybody can just walk in here.”
Harry looks at Malfoy. His eyes are red, and there’s a tremble to his lips. He turns towards the Aurors.
“You heard him. This is his house now.”
“Harry, with all due respect, this affair doesn’t concern you.”
“With all due respect, I’ll curse you if you don’t leave.”
Harry walks the two Aurors to the gate, and reassures them he’ll tell Robards it was all his fault and not at all theirs. He turns back into the living room, walks through the dining room, the tea room, the waiting room, and at last finds Malfoy in the kitchen, gulping down a glass of whiskey.
“Are you OK?”
Draco looks at him. Pours himself another glass.
“Yeah.”
“I’m sorry about Lucius.”
“He’s been dead to me for a long time. But thank you.” And then. “A drink?”
“Yes, please,” Harry says, and joins him by the counter.
Malfoy slides the glass towards him. “So now you know,” he says, looking out the window at the moonlit garden.
“So now I know,” Harry says, stepping closer to him, “that you’re the biggest idiot I’ve ever met.”
“That is—statistically inaccurate. You’re a teacher. To morons.”
“Let me show you something.”
Harry’s Patronus fills the kitchen with a blue hue. Malfoy watches it settle by the stove.
“Am I supposed to be impressed that you can cast your Patronus without a wand?”
“No, idiot. It’s a stag.”
“And?”
“Like yours.”
Malfoy starts laughing. “Very clever.”
“It’s true, though. I was wondering why it didn’t change into anything else.”
Malfoy’s smile falters a little. He pours himself another drink.
Harry takes a deep breath. “I—”
“No. Stop talking.”
“Draco—”
“You’ll break my heart, Harry.”
“What about my heart?”
“You’re a War Hero. Your heart’s seen worse.”
Harry lets out a small laugh. “No, it really hasn’t. I’m so in love with you, it’s not even funny.”
Malfoy pushes away the empty bottle, and opens the liquor cabinet. “You’re not in love with me.”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Harry says, dropping his glass. He stops Malfoy from opening another whiskey bottle, and tilts his chin towards him.
“What’s wrong with you? All your life, you acted as if I owed you something. Attention, friendship, adoration, I don’t know. And now, when I want to give it all to you, you’re suddenly not worth it? What, you think I’m too good for you?”
Malfoy stares at him.
“What happened to the spoiled brat that always wanted to tell me what’s what? You’ve been doing just that for the last three years, teaching me tolerance and forgiveness, teaching me how to be a better person, and now that I fell for you, you’re playing the Harry Potter could never love me back card? Are you—”
“Shut up,” Malfoy says, and his bottom lip gives the slightest tremble.
“I won’t—”
“Just shut up,” Malfoy says, and pulls Harry into a kiss.
* * *
“Fine,” Malfoy says later, from the first bed they stumbled upon in the labyrinth of rooms of the Manor. “We’ll do this. We’ll be—together. If you do one thing for me.”
“Anything,” Harry says, kissing the tail end of a white scar.
“Deal,” Malfoy says, and pulls Harry up into a kiss that just so happens to be the best thing that’s ever happened to Harry James Potter.
* * *
It takes five years for Draco to cash in his second anything.
They’re in the staffroom, marking essays. Well, Draco is. Harry is drinking his third coffee of the day, daydreaming about quidditch strategies. Now that he’s head of Gryffindor, he can stop pretending he’s impartial.
“Harry?”
“Draco?”
“I need the Saturday morning training slot.”
“No.”
“Half of the team members are new. They need to get used to playing together.”
“Tough luck. They’ll have to get used to playing together at another time.”
Draco puts down his quill.
“You still owe me an anything.”
Harry laughs. “And this is what you’ll use it for?”
Draco looks at the door. That’s Harry’s cue to lock it. Draco scoots his chair closer to Harry, and puts a hand on his nape. “Yeah.”
“I expected something more high-stakes.”
“Like what?” Draco asks, starting to kiss Harry’s neck.
“Or something romantic.”
“Romantic? You should have mentioned you’re a romantic. I would have put my pure-blood upbringing to good use.”
“Oh, god. What would that entail?”
“Oh, you know. A big proposal. Fancy three-day wedding.”
Harry lets out a moan, leans his head back. “I would never say no to you getting down on your knees.”
“Such a romantic,” Draco says, pulling another moan out of Harry.
Then it hits Harry.
“Are you a romantic?” he asks, straightening up. “Should I have proposed?”
Draco laughs. “Rest assured, I haven't been losing sleep waiting for you to propose.”
Harry puts his hands on Draco’s cheeks, forcing him to look at him. “Because I’d propose to you right away, if that’s what you wanted. You know that, right?”
Draco considers Harry for a beat. Puts his palm over Harry’s hand, then leans into it, and kisses it. “I don’t care about that. I just want to be with you.”
“You don’t want the big proposal and the three-day-wedding?”
“No, Harry,” Draco says, and smiles into Harry’s palm. “A small proposal and a one-day wedding should suffice, I think.”
“A small proposal and a one-day wedding it is, then,” Harry says, and kisses him full on the lips. “And you can have the stupid Saturday slot.” Another kiss. “And anything else you can think of, forever.”