Universal Chaos | By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 13263 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 1 |
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Chapter Ten—Calls Across the Distance
Draco woke early that morning and glanced across the bed at Harry, who, he had discovered, slept with his mouth open and his nose pointed at the ceiling as if he were adopting all the haughtiness in sleep that he kept away when awake. Harry had been strangely shy about sleeping in the same bed as Draco, even though by then they had already snogged and had each other’s cocks in their hands. Draco put it down to Gryffindor prudishness and stared at Harry until he admitted sheepishly that that was a strange thing to balk at and climbed in.
This was one of the few times that Draco had had a chance to watch Harry without him glancing up; he always seemed to know when eyes were on him. So he folded his hands beneath his chin now and stared to his heart’s content.
Harry had a slight hitch in his nose from where it had healed from breaking. Maybe from where his version of me stomped on his nose in sixth year, Draco thought. His eyelashes were absurdly long, making Draco’s old schoolboy instincts itch to pull one out. His lips were a very pale red, almost the color of the scar that Draco could see between his curls. Haughty expression or not, he was still very young, and it showed.
Strange that he acts so much like an adult despite that.
But…
Draco rolled to his back and stared up at the ceiling. These weren’t the kinds of thoughts that he could have while staring at Harry.
Not so much like an adult after all. Would an adult need constant reminders to consider his feelings as well as the feelings of others?
Draco sighed and linked his fingers together on his chest. He did better if he had something to rub when he got nervous—and, he sternly told his rebellious mind, Harry’s cock was out of the question at the moment.
Harry’s very selflessness and patience and gentleness made Draco uneasy. He was capable of getting angry, since he’d told Draco what had happened when the other version of Potter insulted Draco. If he hadn’t heard about that, Draco’s uneasiness might have built to fear.
Potter did always like to think he was in the right. Even looking back on their days in Hogwarts and acknowledging how much of what had happened between them was his fault, Draco knew he was right about this. And Harry had been the same person as Potter until the last few years, if what he’d told Draco about the separation between their universes was correct. He wanted to believe he was doing the good thing, the necessary thing. He was in love with being a martyr, wrongfully persecuted. Look at the way he suffered through what Umbridge was doing to him in our fifth year, when he had every right to go and tell someone.
Here Draco had to pause to contend with a wave of guilt. He had been one of Umbridge’s Inquisitors in that same year, after all, pretty firmly on the opposite side from Harry. And the thought of having contributed to any of the pain that Harry had suffered made him sick.
That wasn’t you, he reminded himself. That was another version of you. Take what comfort you can from that.
Draco took a deep breath and glanced sideways. Harry was stirring in his sleep, turning his head from side to side as if looking for a place to rest his nose. He would probably wake up soon, and Draco wasn’t sure that he would be able to finish his thoughts when he did. Harry had such a persuasive manner. He allowed Draco to focus on himself and his own needs, and no one had done that in so long that it was addictive. Draco would want to bask in the sunshine of Harry’s presence and not think about the stormclouds.
He had to, though, especially if he and Harry were to remain together.
I think he’s still in love with being a martyr, to a certain extent. He still doesn’t want to complain about the hurt he suffers. But instead of gritting his teeth and walking through it like that, he just doesn’t let it rise to the surface of his mind now. And that’s not a much better coping mechanism.
The therapy made him better able to cope with what he suffered, but it didn’t make him perfect. I think he thinks it did.
Draco sighed. He didn’t think it was fair that he had to help Harry when he was still in need of help himself.
But his parents’ suicide had forever shattered the illusion that life would be fair to him because he was a Malfoy. That was the insight he’d spent the last eighteen months resisting. He’d hidden from it in professional Quidditch and in his anger at Gregory and at Potter, the Potter of his universe. He needed to face up to it now, and he needed to show that he was strong in the way that his parents had taught him to be, the way he had thought sometimes, before their suicide, that he could become.
I’m not really as fragile as I told Harry I was. I won’t shatter if he left. I could face the Potter of my universe and face him down.
Draco sneered, his remembrance of his conversations with that Potter coiling like an adder in his stomach.
But I’ll never take him as my lover. Never. He tried to force me to fulfill my life-debts to him. That’s an offense against my magic, and against my life, and against my freedom. And he thought that was perfectly all right. No. Maybe someday I won’t hate him, but I could never be in love with him. I could never look at him and not wonder if he’d started seeing me the same way again, as a reward for his suffering.
Draco shook his head and made his decision as Harry’s eyes fluttered open and he gave Draco a sleepy smile. I’ll need to do something to help Harry as well as his helping me, and to cope with his having to return to his own universe. There are some books in the Manor library that might help with that.
“Good morning,” Harry murmured.
“And a very good morning it is.” Draco smiled at him and slid down his body, lapping gently at Harry’s hip and the crevices of his groin. Harry gasped and spread his legs. Draco looked up at him from between his knees, feeling his smile deepen as Harry gaped down at him. For once, his face bore the wide-eyed, startled expression that Draco remembered from Hogwarts when he got detention.
“I’ve—Draco, you don’t have to do that,” Harry breathed.
Draco felt his eyes narrow. Yes, he still likes being a martyr. He can’t comprehend that I might want to do this willingly.
“Watch me,” he snapped, and lowered his head.
*
Harry wandered out of the breakfast room in a daze. Draco had sucked him off as though he’d been doing it for years, and then climbed up, pinned Harry to the bed with his weight, and fucked his hand until he came. Then he gave Harry a bright, snarling, triumphant look, and climbed out of the bed to go shower. It was long minutes before Harry could bring himself to stir and follow him.
At the table, Draco was bold and challenging, offering speculations on magical theories and Quidditch teams that Harry felt unable to answer properly, especially because he wasn’t familiar with the record of Quidditch teams in this universe. Draco sighed at him and rolled his eyes, but also gave him soft smiles that Harry was sure weren’t feigned and reached across the table several times as if he wanted to play with his fingers. Harry would willingly have let him, but Draco drew his hand back each time and assumed an unreadable expression for a moment before launching himself into another rhetorical flight.
What’s got into him? And why don’t I find it more objectionable that he wouldn’t let me get a word in edgewise?
As though the universe had sensed his good mood and was determined to ruin it, an owl fluttered through the window and down to Harry. Harry stared at the messy writing scribbled on the outside of the envelope, and sighed. It was the way his own hand would have looked if he was drunk. He knew who it was from, therefore, before he opened it.
But it was for the best to open it. Harry hoped that Draco’s new signs of strength signaled that he wasn’t going to succumb to such a deep depression again, no matter what the other Harry did to him.
Potter, said the scrawl at the beginning, throwing Harry oddly back into memories of Hogwarts and Snape, who had been the only person to write his name with that much blotted hatred.
I’ve decided. I would rather that anything happen than that I go on this way. Come to me so that we can talk about therapy. The Mind-Healers at St. Mungo’s should be roughly the same as they are in your universe. I want you to tell me which ones are the best.
There was no signature. Presumably, he had thought that none would be needed.
Harry swallowed. He traced the letters with a finger for a moment, and then turned and walked towards the library, where Draco had vanished after breakfast. His steps were lighter, and his head was filled with a heady mixture of anger and hot hope.
I can believe that he’s changed as far as I would like. But I won’t know for certain until I go and talk to him.
He opened the door of the library and peered in. Draco looked up from the depths of a leather chair that made him look almost magisterial. His expression softened at the sight of Harry, though. Harry smiled, wishing he had the daring to step forwards and push Draco’s hair back from his face.
“The other Harry finally contacted me,” he said. “He might be serious this time. I’m going to his house.” He hesitated, wondering if he should set some time limit on his return. On the one hand, there was the possibility that the other Harry would try to curse him; on the other, it was plausible that they would need some hours to choose the best Mind-Healers at St. Mungo’s.
Draco raised an eyebrow and flicked his wand at Harry. Harry blinked and looked down at himself as he felt the tingling of a spell, but he saw nothing visible. “What did you do?” he asked, surprised for a moment that he was so calm about it. I reckon that shows how much I trust Draco not to harm me.
“That’s a curse that ensures any harm he tries to do to you will be redirected back at him three times,” Draco said calmly, and then looked back at his book.
“Thanks,” Harry said, pleased and dismayed both at once. That was probably Dark Arts—but I’m not fool enough to object, and of course I would be a fool to expect Draco to use anything else. “I hope I’ll be back in a few hours.”
“Do that.” Draco lifted his head and gave Harry a single intense glance. “I have some plans for this evening.”
Harry found himself blushing like a teenager, and he actually stood there for a moment, staring at Draco, before he nodded and cleared his throat. “I—all right, then. I’ll see you.” He waved one hand and walked in a daze towards the front doors of the Manor.
*
Draco couldn’t believe how much different he felt from only three weeks ago. It was as if he had been flying with a weighted broomstick for years, and only recently learned how to untie the weights.
That made him pause a moment and wonder if his depression had been real. If he could have ended the chokehold that seeing his parents’ corpses had placed him in at any time, if a little help had been all he needed to recover from it, then why should he assume that he’d done anything for the past eighteen months but feel sorry for himself?
Draco sneered and dug his fingers into the leather of the chair. No. I won’t think like that. That’s something the Potter I knew said to me, one of the last times we met. That would imply that I had no right to mourn, no right to feel as I did. And I won’t do anything to validate his opinion.
I still needed help and dedicated attention. Maybe I could have recovered at any time, but if so, then no one in my life cared enough to give me the help. That would speak far worse of them than it would of me.
Satisfied, Draco returned to his reading. He snorted softly as he came upon a passage that confirmed his suspicions. Potter had told Harry that the spell to call someone from an alternative universe was difficult and could only be performed at intervals of a year.
As usual, Potter had done the difficult thing instead of the simple one.
The spell he’d chosen was one only used in times of desperation, when someone needed a very specific kind of help from another version of themselves. There were far easier spells that would permit a few hours or days of contact, and with people from other universes that were not versions of oneself.
Draco traced the page. This spell will let me visit Harry at times when he goes back to his own universe.
That is all I require.
He leaned back in his chair and shut his eyes. Harry could not stay here forever; he had his friends and his home in his universe, and Potter wouldn’t permit it. Draco had thought about leaving his universe to go with Harry, but that had its own problems. He did not think he would be able to endure not playing for a Quidditch team. He did not want to leave Gregory behind. He would have to contend with another version of himself, who would have the Manor—
And whose parents were probably still alive.
Draco shuddered and shook his head. No. I don’t think I want to see them. I would either break down weeping or be jealous of myself. And either conclusion is undesirable.
Now that he had his strength back, Draco intended to retain it. It was not exactly ideal that he thought he was entering a love relationship with someone from another universe, but nothing about his situation had ever been ideal. If he could have chosen, he would have switched Harry and Potter’s places.
But then, if he could have chosen, he would never have endured the Dark Lord’s tortures and his parents would still be alive.
Draco smiled and opened his eyes.
I have my life back again. This time, I intend to cling to it with both hands.
Harry is perhaps the most precious thing in that life to me, but he is not the only thing. I wonder if will be able to accept that?
*
“I do want to get help.”
Harry leaned one elbow on the wall of the other Harry’s house and looked at him evenly. The other Harry stood up straight and took a deep breath, which was better than the sniveling lump Harry had left him as.
“But I don’t want you to be the one who takes me to St. Mungo’s,” the other Harry said stubbornly. “I want Draco to do it.”
“He has every right to reject your plea,” Harry said.
“But why?” The other Harry spread his hands. “Is what I’ve done that unforgivable?”
“If you still don’t see what you did wrong or if you still insist that you won’t apologize in person,” Harry said, folding his arms, “then yes, it is.”
The other Harry sat down on the couch as though Harry had managed to take all the strength out of his legs. Then he sighed and buried his head in his hands. “I’m trying,” he muttered. “But that takes more courage than I ever realized I had.”
Harry hesitated, then crouched down next to him. “That’s the first step, though,” he said, and tried not to feel like he was chirpy and false. Not every technique that every Mind-Healer uses works for every patient, he reminded himself. “To realize that it’s difficult and resolve to do it anyway.”
“If I need someone to help me?” The other Harry peered at him through his fringe.
“I’ve already tried apologizing to Draco for you,” Harry said sharply. “It didn’t work. I won’t try it again.”
“I didn’t mean that,” the other Harry said, though by the way his eyes darted away to the side, Harry thought he had wanted to try his luck with such a request. “I meant that I might need some help from Draco. Would he meet me here? Would he promise to listen to my apology with a clear and open mind? Would he promise to offer me his hand, even a kiss, if I asked for one?”
Harry shut his eyes. He’d been able to listen to the rest of it, though with a steadily mounting sense of disgust, but the last request made his hand clench into a fist without his conscious mind intervening.
And what right do you have to feel jealous? he asked himself. You knew from the beginning that any relationship you formed with Draco would have to be temporary. If Draco chooses to take the other Harry as a lover after you’re gone, it’s none of your business.
Slowly, Harry forced his anger back under control, though it fought him like a wild horse, and opened his eyes to look at the other Harry again. “You can ask for those things,” he said. “It doesn’t mean he has to grant you them.”
“How can he refuse to, if I genuinely need the help to apologize to him?” the other Harry asked. His tone wasn’t belligerent, which was the only reason that Harry didn’t walk out the door immediately. He folded his arms and looked shrunken in on himself instead. “If he wants the apology that badly, then he should be willing to give up anything to get it.”
Harry drew in his breath harshly through his teeth. “You still don’t understand,” he said. “This isn’t about Draco. You shouldn’t be making the apology in hope of rewards from him. You should be making it because it’s the right thing to do, and because it will help you to move on to healing. This has to do with you, and not him. He has no interest—not right now, anyway—in whether you recover or not. I think you could rot for all he cares. I have an interest in you because it hurts me to see any version of myself in such pain and acting so stupidly. Maybe Draco could have an interest in you someday. But you can’t act simply in hopes of that. Acting like that got you into this mess in the first bloody place.”
The other Harry had stared at him throughout his speech. Now he said, in a low voice, “So you didn’t show the letter I sent you to Draco?”
“What good would it have done your cause if I had?” Harry demanded. He had to stand up and turn away, because his anger was so sharp that it was slicing at him and he doubted he could stay polite if he kept looking at the other Harry’s witless face. “You didn’t say anything in the letter about wanting him to help you.”
“But it might have made him more sympathetic to me.”
Harry lost it so suddenly that he didn’t realize he’d done so at first. He whirled around and spat the first words that rushed into his brain, the way that he hadn’t done in almost two years. “What the fuck happened to you? When did you start caring only about what one bloody person thought? I’ve never done that in my life. I didn’t even do it when I worshipped Dumbledore and wouldn’t act without him ordering me to! Why do you keep doing things this way? You have to see that they don’t work. Stop ramming your idiot head against a brick wall and stand up and act like Harry Potter!”
After his words stopped ringing, the other Harry sat still, blinking. He didn’t cower and start weeping or lash out in his own anger the way Harry had expected. Instead, he examined Harry attentively for what looked like the first time.
“I’m glad you kept that courage, that conviction,” he whispered at last. “I’m glad you can still be Harry Potter. I’m glad for you.”
Harry shook his head. “I don’t understand you at all.”
The other Harry closed his eyes. “I didn’t tell you the truth about everything that’s happened in the last two years since the war.”
There’s a fucking surprise, Harry thought, but by chewing on his tongue, he managed to keep the words in this time. He was already ashamed of losing his temper that suddenly, and over something that was only as exasperating and stupid as the rest of the things the other Harry had done. He managed to look attentive instead, or at least he thought.
The other Harry started talking in a low voice. “I told you I felt lost. I told you I almost committed suicide. I didn’t tell you that Ron and Hermione found out about that, and tried to talk to me about it. I screamed at them and forced them out of my life. I didn’t want anyone interfering with my attempt to use Draco.”
“Wait a minute,” Harry interrupted, his brain swirling dizzily. “What—first, what in the world could you have said to force Ron and Hermione away from you? And second, you’re talking about your attempt to use Draco as if you understand it now?”
The other Harry shrugged. “I knew their weaknesses. I played on those, told Ron that I’d always thought he wasn’t good enough to be my best friend and—other things. I implied Hermione wasn’t really female because of her brain. And so on.”
Harry wiped a hand across his mouth. He wanted to be sick merely hearing the words.
“And as for using Draco—” The other Harry opened his eyes and gave Harry a gentle, exhausted look. “I knew it probably wasn’t going to work out. But I wanted so badly to solve one of my problems on my own, without Dumbledore’s help, or Ron’s, or Hermione’s.”
“But using Draco wouldn’t be solving your problems on your own.” Harry sank slowly to the floor and buried his head in his arms. His forehead ached to the point that he didn’t know if he would be able to stand up any time soon.
“It was enough like it for me that I could forget that.” The other Harry sounded as if he were giving that shrug again. Harry buried his head more fiercely still in his arms so that he didn’t have to see it. “I wanted—I wanted to do things my own way, for once, without thinking about others, without thinking about how much I might hurt them or whether it was the right thing. I spent years doing the right thing. For it, I got death after death of people I cared about, and an abusive childhood, and being manipulated by the one man I had trusted and looked up to most. And then the wizarding world thought it had the same right to criticize me and call me mad after I defeated Voldemort that it did when I was a student at Hogwarts. I just—I don’t care about the world any more, Harry. I don’t care about being Harry Potter. In fact, I tried to act as unlike him as possible. I wanted to be selfish. I thought someone else should make the sacrifices for once. I wanted to act out for the sake of acting out. Of course, I never meant most of the consequences to happen. I thought Ron and Hermione would come back eventually, and I thought Draco would accept me as a lover, even if I lied to him about the life-debts. People have lived together under worse circumstances and been happy, and fallen in love with each other.” The other Harry sighed longingly. “And it didn’t work out.
“I think this is the end of it, though. There’s nothing else I can think to demand that I would actually have a reasonable chance of getting, and—the pleasure of being friendless and knowing that no one understands you palls a little at times.”
Harry lifted his head. The other Harry looked back at him with wide eyes that Harry thought were guileless at last.
He’s just like a child, really. A little boy who never came out of the cupboard. A teenager who never grew past his fifth year. He made the deliberate choice to be selfish just like I made the deliberate choice to try and attend to other people’s problems, and if I believe the Mind-Healers, then maybe I can’t even blame him for it, completely. He wouldn’t have made that choice if other people hadn’t dumped all their problems on his shoulders and expected him to solve them, whether or not he could.
Harry sighed.
“I’ll owl Draco and ask him if he wants to come here,” he said. “But I can’t promise that he’ll agree, or anything like it.”
The other Harry bowed his head. His voice was quiet and ashen, as if he had finally given up all hope. “Thank you.”
*
MewMew2: Thanks for reviewing.
polka dot: No, he isn’t. But he still thinks he is, and that’s part of the problem.
SP777: It is pretty twisted, isn’t it? But the two versions of Harry are the only ones who really see it that way. As far as Draco’s concerned, he’ll never take the other Harry as a lover no matter what, so for him it’s not a triangle.
butterpie: Yes, exactly; Harry has forgotten his own feelings. Draco has a plan to make sure that he remembers them. And Harry really has forgotten he was dealing with a Slytherin, in part because Draco acted like less of one when he needed more help.
Thrnbrooke: Thank you!
Bookworm51485: It would be a possibility, but he would have to leave Gregory behind just when he’s recovered his friendship. As for the ending, I think the outlines are visible now.
FallenAngel1129: Thank you! I do think the ending is happy. And Harry thought earlier in the story that he would probably have heard about it if the Malfoys had killed themselves, so Draco in his universe still has his parents.
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