Harry arhes an eyebr would not just be silly, it would also feel like Drao was admitti. Everythiwo of them was still a onstaioermio wihing.
&ook his hand.
Harry
&he idea first ame to him, he didhink it through at all. He had just seen someone who hought of his big empty house stuffed full with Sirius’ shadow, and thought that ara person would help fill it up with something liviood, a ening, the age old saying that it only takes five seoo hange your life.
And now Drao Malfoy was standing in his living room.
&hing was, that as the two of them look around at his house, Harry is atually embarrassed. It’s still the same fur’s dark and gloomy, and Harry isn’t always the best at housekeepihat its nothi Drao had gotten to go home tht.
&his is home.” Harry breaks the ie first, beause he’s a Gryffindor and bravery is kind of his thing. “My bedroom is o floor, but I an shole and you pik where’s best? Kreaher an take you around.”
“You dohis.” It was really the first thing that Drao had said to him, besides the jibe he made in froe, where the smile split his fae apart and Harry ould see the old Malfoy underh. “Why are you doing this?”
“I don’t know.”
&.” Drao’s hands were shaking. Harry khe feeling, had beeh Ron’s bouts of unexpihe war ehe pain and terrrief bursting out of all of them in unexpinable ways. Harry goes on walks in the middle of the night. Hermione leans aions, depending on the mood. “I made my peae with that, okay, and I was ready, I was ready for it, to have some peae for ohen you ame along and did this, so I want to know why.”
This was more like the Drao that Harry khe ohought he deserved things and made his own demands. “Beause I didn’t thi.” Harry would hat Malfoy deserved a old ell in Azkaban, he blood that seemed to be oating his own hands. “And I don’t think you should let yourself loked up just beause you’ve deided that you feel guilty, alright?”
&ired, all of a sudden, the boion that omes upoimes. “Just pik a room, okay? I’ll see you in the m.”
Harry the reaking stairs and to his room, a Drao really, really doeso murder him in his sleep.
It’d be just his luk.
Chapter 2
Drao
That first sleep at all, just y uiff sheets ahe raks rossing the eilihe reaking of the house and trying to onvihere were no monsters sleepi. He had easy i sine he was in Hogwarts with the sound of other pe beside him, and irange pe he was sharing with a boy (mahey’re adults now) that should by all rights hate him.
& hate him, though.
Drao thinks it would be easier to deal with, if they ould fall bak iern of mutual dislike. That would have been solid ground, a familiar pattern to fall bak intth from. He does not know how to deal with this Harry, the Harry to work the shower fauet (beause they’re triky i me, I know) and asks if there artiur brand of e juie he would prefer, who offers to lear out a spae on the bookshelf f that Drao might want to read beause he remembered from shool that Drao liked books and most of them are o Hermiht over to lear spae i, anyways.
He’s hearing a lot of tidbits about Harry’s shool friends, about the Weasel ae (who Harry is not dating, but Luna from the basemeainly is), about Dean and Seamus a Gee and Oliver Wood’s performa Quiddith game. Drao wishes that he ould return the favor, but he doesn’t talk to any of his old shool friends anymore.
&s Harry would wa it anyways.
The silehis house is stifling, Drao thinks, muh like he does every m, where he finally gives up on his sraps of shattered sleep ao his feet. The house is too dark ao really be a home, even though Harry has tried. There are afhgans with rooked stithes throwhe arms of the er’s work) and ustomized mugs piling up oer, hipped hihe upboards and photos stuk haphazardly to the walls. Harry isn’t muh for the domesti sort of things, having it just be him ihe nights where Drao gives up oirely, he often fiering arouhen and putting things in order.
Kreaher had tried to shoo him out the first time, but he’s not as apable as he one was, ahird time Drao ighe old house elf left him in peae. ime betwee and early m with his arms soaking in suds as he washes dishes the muggle ing the fl the piture frames. The sent of piantly staining his hands, but the sharp seher him, just seems t him more into himself. Ahe sun finally starts to peak in through the wio ook breakfast, whate