After All TBGC
Updated: May 19, 2005
Summer 2/Part B:
“Stop following me.”
“I can’t.”
“Yes, you can.”
“No, I can’t.”
“Yes, you can!”
“No, I can’t!”
“Yes, you can!!”
“No, I can’t!! Snape ordered me to stay with you and I’m
not disobeying him because it bothers you.” Draco
couldn’t help but feel that the fact it bothered him might have been something of an
added incentive for obeying the Professor.
Turning around, Draco crossed his arms
over his chest and stared down at the black haired boy in annoyance. Over the year, Harry had grown, but so had Draco
and while their height difference was less Draco was still a good deal taller.
“What do I have to do to make you
go away?”
Harry brightened some, “Talk to
Snape?”
“…”
Harry’s face darkened and he
leaned against a wall, waiting. Finally,
Draco started walking again. He’d been
walking around the castle all afternoon, trying to find something to do and Harry had just
followed with his hands clenched at his sides, stubbornly refusing to offer suggestions.
Three corridors later, Draco felt as
if a vessel might have popped in his temple. “Stop
it!”
Harry went past him, continuing down
the corridor as if he hadn’t heard. After
a moment, Draco started walking again, staying behind Harry at first, to see where he was
going, and then speeding up when he realized that he didn’t like following nearly as
much as he liked leading, even if he didn’t know where he was going.
Draco suddenly stopped as he found
himself standing in the entrance hall for the fifth time that day. “How the…?” but stopped himself
when he remembered that Harry was standing there. It
wouldn’t do to look as if he hadn’t known where he was going, especially when he
realized that Harry didn’t look in the least surprised.
He looked around, trying to decide
what he wanted to do. He could always go down
to the dungeons, but Snape had said he would be there all day working on his research and
that he didn’t want to be disturbed. Somehow,
Draco figured that his coming in and looking for something to entertain himself would
count as a ‘disturbance.’
Looking around again, he eyed the
great, large doors leading outside and nodded to himself.
At least outside it was easier to tell if you were going in circles. Besides, if Potter weren’t allowed to go off
on his own, perhaps this time they could actually make it to the broom shed.
Opening the door, he started out
before he realized that Potter was still standing next to the stairs and not moving to
follow him. In fact, he looked vaguely smug. Draco cocked an eyebrow suspiciously. “What are you doing? I thought you were supposed to follow me.”
“Yes, but I’m not allowed to
go outside, either. Don’t let that stop
you, though.”
Bloody Snape, he’d finally found
something he needed Potter for and it contradicted one of his bloody rules. With a huff, Draco threw shut the door. After an hour walking around the perimeter of the
castle, trying to find something to amuse himself, he gave up and headed back towards and
entrance.
It really wasn’t fair at all. Not that he wanted to be alone in particular, it
was a great expanse of a castle, larger even than Malfoy Manor, no matter how much he
hated to admit it. Left alone, he’d
probably get lost and then someone would have to come find him and he’d have to admit
that he was lost. It was more the idea that
he couldn’t be alone that bothered him the most.
Well, not unless he left the castle, but what if it was raining when he decided he
wanted to be alone?
Sitting outside the door, Draco put
his chin in his hands and looked out over the grassy plane, trying to waste time before
going back inside so that it wouldn’t look as if he were hopelessly bored on his own. The only interesting thing he could think of to do
was get Harry in trouble, but the only good idea he could come up with so far was making
Harry break into the broom shed, but that wouldn’t work if Harry weren’t allowed
to leave the castle. Of course, getting him
to leave the castle altogether was another way to get him in trouble, but he wasn’t
quite sure how he was going to go about that, yet.
Getting off the step, Draco swiped at
his backside, making sure there wasn’t any dirt on him before he headed inside. He’d figure something out, it was just going
to take longer than he’d thought.
Draco had been raised under the
strictest code of etiquette and, not surprisingly, among those was had been to always eat
everything that was put in front of him, never ask for more, never eat with his hands, no
matter how practical it may seem, keep his elbows off the table and his feet on the floor,
and never be so goush as to add anything to the food.
His parents had always led by example and when they had eaten out, or gone to
functions it was with the highest of wizarding society and so it wasn’t very
surprising that Draco had never been around anyone who broke those rules. Until last summer.
It had been more than just unsettling
when Harry had ordered something called fish sticks instead of eating the Halibut in cream
sauce and he’d been horrified when Harry had not only poured a sweet smelling red
sauce on top of it, but picked up each stick with his hands and then licked his fingers
when he was finished. The little barbarian
hadn’t even unfolding his napkin! It had
been… traumatizing, which was the excuse Draco was using for having forgotten all
about it until three nights ago when he’d sat down to a lovely meal of chicken in a
thick portabella mushroom glaze and seen something that he vaguely recalled Harry having
referred to as a grilled cheese sandwich. And
while Draco wasn’t entirely sure what a grilled cheese sandwich was, he was fairly
certain it wasn’t meant to have catsup on it.
Then, as if that hadn’t been bad
enough, Harry had crossed his legs in his chair, leaned with his elbows on the table, and
slouched! It was unthinkable! It’s was disgusting! It was… curious,
which was probably the worst of it. There was
a part of him that perpetually asked whether it tasting as disgusting as it looked or as
good as Harry made it seem. Of course, he
wasn’t about to try it. No self
respecting Malfoy ate anything with his hands and certainly nothing called fish sticks or
grilled cheese sandwiches.
Potter’s bad habits were not the
only thing bothering Draco, however, because he still had yet to come up with anything
that would get Harry in any real trouble. Oh,
he’d discovered the other morning that if he snuck back in the room after Harry
cleaned it and undid the bed, even in the slightest, Snape would spend half an hour
lecturing Harry, but that was hardly what he had been going for. No, Snape lecturing someone was amusing, but not
nearly so much as when he lost his temper and went red in the face and choked on what he
was saying.
He’d thought that if could get
Harry out of the castle there were several things that would more than likely achieve such
an effect, like flying. He was fairly certain
that Snape would blow his calm if he found Harry had broken into the broom shed, or even
the greenhouse. Draco vividly remembered his
father caning him for sneaking into theirs, telling him that it was for his own good and
that many of the magical plants there were deadly.
However, Harry didn’t seem likely
to leave the castle. In fact, he seemed
perfectly content, if a little annoyed at times, to follow Draco around and when Draco did
something like going outside he looked just as happy to sit on the stairs inside the door
and wait. It was infuriating and it was
boring, but there wasn’t very much he could do about it.
Looking down at the chessboard he
moved his pawn forward and took another look around the room while he waited for Harry to
make his move. Snape had said he was going to
be in his workroom all afternoon and that he wasn’t to be bothered unless one of them
was afflicted with a mortal wound. Draco had
considered interrupting him and blaming it on Harry, but he wasn’t sure what Snape
was working on and some potions were very volatile in certain stages. So, since he didn’t fancy being blown up, or
otherwise injured, he’d decided against it.
Harry moved his knight and Draco
quickly checked him and went back to thinking. He
could always riffle through Snape’s desk and say Harry had done it, but then what
would he say he’d been looking for? Or
he could break something, but the few glass objects there were around the room were either
unmarked potions, or priceless artifacts and he wasn’t brave enough to touch
something when he didn’t know what it might do.
If only Snape left things out that he
could identify, like Potions ingredients. Draco
had read loads of books on potions and even if he’d never made anything more
complicated than something to change his hair blue, he knew he could do it, or was fairly
sure that he could. But Snape didn’t
leave potions ingredients lying around, he kept them locked up in his storeroom, wherever
that was.
Harry had just reached over to move
his queen, which would leave him open for a check mate, when an idea struck Draco so
suddenly that he couldn’t even suppress his cry of, “Ah ha!”
The dark haired
boy’s hand jumped back from the chessboard; as if he thought he’d been about to
do something wrong and he stared at Draco with apprehensive eyes. “What do you mean ‘ah ha’?”
Draco smirked, knowing full well that
the expression infuriated Harry. “I’m
bored.”
Harry narrowed his eyes,
“And?”
“I want to break into
Snape’s storeroom.”
The green eyes went impossibly wide. “Why would you want to do that?”
“I want to make something.”
“Are you mad? Do you have any idea how angry he’ll be if
you go poking around his storeroom?”
Draco pretended to think for a moment,
“Yes, and I’m rather looking forward to it.”
He stood up and went over to Snape’s desk, picking up one of the potion’s
manuals and sitting in the stiff backed chair to flip through it. “I’m fairly good at potions, actually,
so I’m pretty sure I can suss
something out. How would you feel about…
oh, no, that’s no good… that’s just gross… you can do that? Here we are!
Ignisefflo three drops of this and
you’ll be breathing fire for half an hour. And
it’s easy, all we need is…”
“I’ll go outside.”
Draco tilted his eyes to look at Harry
over the rim of the book, but didn’t put it down.
“What was that?”
“This is some stupid scheme to
get me into trouble, like messing the room up when I wasn’t looking, right?” Draco didn’t answer, but apparently, Harry
didn’t need him to. “So, fine,
I’ll go along, but not his storeroom. I
rather fancy the idea of surviving the summer, if you don’t mind.”
It hadn’t occurred to Draco that
Harry knew what he was up to; he hadn’t thought he was that transparent. Not that it mattered, except that Harry willingly
getting himself into trouble wasn’t nearly as much fun. Biting his lip behind the book so that Harry
couldn’t see the undignified gesture, he finally decided that having company outside
was far too appealing to pass up.
Shutting the book, he set it on the
desk and stood up, “All right, let’s go.”
Harry relaxed, heaving a relieved sigh
before pulling his shoes on and following him out the door.
Draco decided it was a lovely day the moment they stepped outside. It was warm, but breezy, and the sun was hiding
behind bright white clouds. Perfect
conditions for flying, assuming they were successful in breaking into the broom shed…
which they weren’t, but it had been an admirable try.
“Now what?” Harry sat on the grass next to the still locked
door and Draco was sorely tempted to join him, except that Malfoys don’t sit on the
ground.
“Now, we think of something else
to do.”
Harry tilted his head up at the sky
and smiled a little and Draco was struck by how genuine it was. He didn’t think he’d ever seen anyone as
genuine as Harry and he was fairly sure that was what bothered him the most about the
other boy. “There’s a tree that
attacks people.”
“Can we attack it back?”
“Not and do any damage, I
don’t think. It’s a rather large
tree.”
“Then no. Think of something else.”
Harry looked around the pitch. “We could go swimming in the lake. Snape hates it when I come in dirty, so I bet he
wouldn’t be keen on soaking wet.”
It was appealing, but… “Then
I’d have go too, and my robes would be absolutely ruined. No, keep thinking.”
“We could see if Hagrid left Fang
behind and go into the Forbidden Forest.”
“Isn’t that a bit
dangerous?”
“It’s broad daylight, so as
long as we don’t go too far in we’d be safe.”
It was a thought. “How much trouble would that get you
in?”
“If I lead the way, you can say I
took you and that will probably get me grounded until the start of term.” After a moment, he nodded his consent and Harry
stood up, leading the way across the grounds yet again.
As they trudged towards the groundskeeper’s hut, Draco was struck by the very
odd realization that having Harry help get himself into trouble hadn’t taken any of
the fun out of it at all, so far. In fact, it
was kind of nice to have someone intelligent to plot with.
Usually, he was stuck with Crabbe and Goyle and they couldn’t string together
a proper thought that didn’t involve food, let alone give him intelligent feedback.
Harry stopped and Draco almost ran
into him, having lost himself in his train of thought.
They were standing outside the dirty little cottage and he waited while Harry
opened the door, bringing out a very large boarhound, “This is Fang, he has a great
sense of danger.”
Harry patted the dog’s head and
Draco cringed as the beast began licking the other boy, large tongue drooling all over his
hand. It was disgusting, it was undignified,
it was… unsanitary.
“Are you going to lead us into
the forest, or should I go back and start gathering ingredients?”
Frowning, Harry took Fang’s
collar and started walking to a small path in the dense trees. It was very dark in the forest, despite it being
mid-afternoon and Draco wondered if this had been such a good idea, after all. Of course, he couldn’t voice that, it
wouldn’t do to look like a coward, but it wasn’t a bad idea to be cautious.
“Potter, you said the dog could
sense danger?”
Harry nodded mutely, looking around at
the tall trees above them and then the dark forest ahead as they followed a little path
through the forest.
“How will we know when he senses
it?”
“If he smells something,
he’ll start to whine. If it’s
dangerous, he’ll run.”
“He’ll attack?”
“Oh, no, Fang’s a bloody of
coward, he’ll take the fastest way out of the forest.”
Draco came to an abrupt halt. “He’ll run? How does his running help us if there’s
danger?!”
Harry made hushing noises and lowered
his voice, “If Fang runs, I’m going to follow.
I’d suggest you do the same.”
As if on cue, Fang stopped moving and
crouched down defensively. A moment later, he
let out a high-pitched whine. Draco
wasn’t entirely sure what he should be doing, but Harry had stepped closer to the
dog, so he opted to follow.
Fang didn’t move, but kept
whining, as if he wasn’t sure what he was smelling and Draco was about to suggest
they turn back around, bravery be damned, when Harry did it for him. “Let’s go back. I reckon this’ll get me in loads of trouble,
anyway.”
Fang sat up suddenly and turned
around, wagging his tail at something behind them.
“Indeed it will, Mr.
Potter.”
Snape
had found them, and despite the fact that getting Harry into trouble had been his idea and
despite the fact that he knew he would not be the one getting yelled at, he cringed.
-tbc-