Adult-FanFiction.org : Harry Potter

Muggle Technology and Heroism	By : Tommy-Lane Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 6929 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or any of its characters and I am not making any money off of this.

Chapter List
- 9
- 10
- 11
Pansy's door was bright yellow.

It stood out startlingly, squashed between the lifeless white paint on the paneled sides, standing exactly in the middle of two large windows with yellow curling curtains like someone had drawn a line between the two points and proclaimed that that was the only place a door could logically stand. The same person who had situated it there had probably also deemed the door be that ghastly shade of happy yellow (to match the dancing curtains when the breeze blew and the flowers that Harry knew littered the front garden in the summer) because Harry couldn't believe that Pansy would ever do such a thing willingly. The women liked blood reds, deep greens, and numerous shades of browns that Harry thought looked like dirt but she proclaimed was chocolate and cedar and syrup and why couldn't he tell the difference?

Harry scowled at it, glaring so hard that his head actually throbbed as he curled his fingers into a first in his pocket.

Fucking Pansy and her fucking yellow door which probably had an equally ridiculous name as the browns decorating her lounge - something like lemon or bumblebee or dandelion.

Over the years, Harry had come up with countless reasons as to why he couldn't be with Draco. He entertained the idea that it was because they were too different, too alike. Had begrudging began to accept that it was because the man wasn't attracted to him, that he didn't want him. He thought bitterly it was because of all the men, all the flings and one night stands, all those kisses that meant nothing and were forgotten just as easily. Or because of Ethan. But he had never even entertained the wild possibility that it was because of a woman.

Because of Pansy Parkinson.

Goddamn fucking fuck.

Harry rubbed his temple and closed his eyes, Merlin he needed to stop swearing in his head considering it wasn't doing a lick of good except perhaps keeping him from dissolving into tears and lying back down on his kitchen floor like an utterly pathetic love sick idiot. But then again the silent swearing was like conjuring a battle drum, something that beat with anger, simmering inside him and waiting to explode and he wanted that right now. Wanted to be furious beyond all reason, wanted to hit something and shout, wanted to take ahold of Draco's shoulders and shake him violently. Maybe punch him. Maybe hex him. Maybe claw at his perfect goddamn fucking face.

God who was he even kidding? If he got that close to him, Harry wouldn't be kicking and screaming (though he probably should) he would be trying to jam reason into his head, trying to talk him out of his course of action...trying to kiss him because even with all the aching in his head and body, and all the anger and hurt spewing like a fountain inside him, he could vividly recall everything that had happened between them.

He kept thinking about their last kiss. The one where Draco had grasped his wrist painfully tight and dragged him into a kiss that Harry knew now held the taste of agony.

God, last one. Fuck.

Harry cursed quietly and kicked feebly at the front door, dragging a rough hand through his mangled curls. The worst of it all was that he couldn't stop thinking about how well they fit, and not just sexually, but in all things. How they flowed together, how their days were entwined around each other, how Harry loved waking up to his flatmates drawl and having his breakfast interrupted with some sort of ridiculous manifestation of Draco's rather nutty behavior towards all things muggle. He loved their dinners together, their movie marathons even though they both already knew the films by heart by now, hell he even loved going grocery shopping with the man and all the useless knickknacks that were slowly taking over their flat.

He loved that Draco's employees all knew him as Draco's friend and not the famous Harry Potter, loved how they smiled at him and pointed towards Draco who was almost always bent over a cauldron or staring down at some ancient text with his brows knit together, loved how the men and women in his shop enjoyed his visits because it meant that their boss was about to get thoroughly distracted. He loved being that distraction.

He loved how his Secretary at the ministry knew Draco by sight and often made him a cup of coffee without being asked, loved how his fellow Auror's jested with Draco, choosing to ignore the man's troubled past even as Draco scowled at them and grumbled under his breath. He loved that Draco still popped by his office anyway, despite the rambunctious Auror's and terrible coffee.

He loved it all. And now it was gone. Draco had popped out of their kitchen and hadn't returned all through the long night that Harry couldn't sleep through despite his best efforts. The blonde had left him standing with his skin sticky and arse tender and heart breaking with a revelation that Harry couldn't make fit in his head. He felt like he had been left holding the last piece of an intricate jigsaw puzzle only to find that it wasn't the correct piece, that it wasn't even a part of the puzzle he had been constructing.

But then...then he remembered all those half sentences, all those quiet answers to questions Harry had had trouble asking in the first place.

Draco didn't want children because the world he lived in still saw the scar on his arm as a snake and skull and because kids would overrun his life. He didn't believe in soul mates, didn't think there was one person out there for everyone. He didn't kiss if he thought he'd have trouble stopping...it made the puzzle piece shudder in his hands, warping like it could possibly fit into the mystery that was Draco Malfoy despite one or two sides being drastically wrong.

And Harry had been right in a way, Draco didn't want to stop his useless flings, but not solely because of Ethan or the war, but because he knew he had a time limit - knew that every day that ticked by he was one step closer to finding himself married to his childhood friend out of duty. He didn't want to get involved with anyone - with Harry - because he didn't dare tempt himself with what he could have instead in only he would give up the notion that he needed to continue the Malfoy line.

"Potter, don't you dare kick my door one more time, you'll scuff it." Pansy sneered, the door swinging open so quickly Harry almost lost his balance with his foot halfway towards making contact with the solid yellow wood.

He teetered on his feet for a moment, his hand pushing up under his glasses to rub at his sore, tired eyes. "If you don't want it kicked then don't paint it goddamned yellow." He grumbled.

Pansy narrowed her eyes, her lips pursing as she studied him, one hand propped up on her hip with the other tapping thoughtfully against the door jam. Harry stared at her, trying to narrow his eyes into his own glare but he wasn't sure if he was managing it or not - Merlin he needed to sleep and give his eyes a rest, all the salt that had spilled from them earlier a scratchy irritant now in the light of day.

"So, I hear congratulations are in order." Harry spat or tried to anyways, but with a frown on his lips he realized that he only ended up sounding rather lost, or embarrassingly enough like he was about to fall apart again right there on her door step. He really needed to get a grip.

Something flickered in Pansy's dark eyes before she was sighing heavily, her chest heaving with irritation as she pushed her door open wider and stepped aside. "Ah, I see he finally told you then? Well come on in, no use shouting at me for all the neighbors to hear." She left the door standing open as she turned and walked back into her house, her socked feet making no noise against the plush carpeting. "Come on then, I don't have all day you know." She called back as Harry stared after her, feeling rather stuck to the front stoop and uncertain if he actually wanted to have this conversation now that it was actually happening.

But it wasn't so much about wants though anymore was it? Harry needed some answers, he needed something tangible and logical for him to grasp onto and since Draco had left in a swirl of confusing emotions with a bomb of a confession Harry didn't really have all that many places to turn to for answers. So with his stomach twisting up further into the knot growing inside him, Harry stepped past the threshold and closed the door behind him, wandering down the hall and into the lounge where he found her seated comfortably on an overstuffed chair with a glass of something clear in her hand.

"So it's true." He said, his throat tight despite his best efforts as he hovered in the doorway. "You're engaged to him?"

Pansy pursed her full lips before nodding and taking a sip of her drink. "Yes."

"For a year?" Harry pressed, taking a step forward and calling up the anger inside him to rise to the surface. He wanted her to see it for some reason, wanted that to be the face she looked into instead of all the hurt and pain and heartbreak. "You've been betrothed for a whole damn year and neither of you said a word?" It was more an accusation than a question but Pansy nodded anyway with a bored sort of look in her round eyes.

"Yes and it's about time he told you, Merlin the man has been trying to all bloody year, I'm rather amazed he finally managed it, thought I'd end up having to do it in my wedding gown. Did he spill the news over dinner? Or during one those movies he's obsessed with? Bone-something-or-other."

"No, he..." Harry blushed and glanced down at the rich brown carpet, unable and unwilling to share what had happened between them to her, bitterness curling inside him as he thought about how she was going to be the one to live her life with that privilege all too soon. She would get to wake up to him every morning, she would get to touch and kiss, she would get to weave her life together with his.

And Harry...Harry wouldn't be a part of it. How could he after what had happened? How could he stand by and pretend...his secretary was going to miss Draco terribly, she always said he was the only man with any class that came through their section of the Ministry. But Merlin, just the thought of not seeing him, of not getting to share the mundane details of his day with the blonde made the ache inside him throb.

"Ah, finally succumbed to your irresistible charm did he?" She said with dripping sarcasm and a smirk.

"Finally?" He repeated, eyeing her carefully as he did so, her comment startling his fragile nerves.

"Yes Potter, finally." She answered slowly, quipping one eyebrow at him as she took another drink from her glass that clattered with the cubes of ice resting inside.

"What..." Trailing off, Harry carded a hand through his hair and gripped his neck before dropping it lifeless by his side. "What does that mean?" He felt horribly wound up and confused, nothing was making any sort of sense. He felt like he had tumbled down the rabbit hole with Alice and into a world where Draco was a haughty Malfoy again with his nose stuck in the air and Pansy draped on his arm. He shook off the mental image and couldn't quite meet her eye as he started up again. "I mean, he doesn't, he said he can't...he can't want me...not really, not if he's going to..." He didn't really know where his rambling was going, why it mattered what Pansy thought about Draco's feelings for him anyway. What would it change? Nothing.

"Don't be daft, of course he wants you. Honestly Potter, he's been pulling your pigtails since you were eleven years old."

Harry blinked and glanced sharply down at her, his breath caught in his chest as the anger he was desperately trying to keep ahold of leaked slowly away with those few simple words. He sank down heavily onto the couch, feeling physically spent and emotionally wrought, his head falling into his hands as he breathed deep and tried to organize his thoughts. God why was it all so confusing? He didn't know what truth to grasp onto in. Didn't know if he should hope or not. How did you fight for someone who already told you there wasn't even a possibility?

"It was stupid of him to move in with you, I told him as such. Hell, it was stupid of him to ever befriend you but then Draco always has had a habit of tormenting himself." Pansy sighed and Harry could hear the click of her tumbler being set down on the glass coffee table as fabric rustled.

"Tormenting?"

"What else would you call it?"

Harry didn't know but tormenting sounded about right. He could remember how Ron had always laughed and shook his head at him, pointing out how they were practically dating without any of the benefits, how Hermione had told him he was settling down with Draco even though the man wasn't his. It was a cruel sort of irony to think that Draco had been doing and feeling the same things as him.

That they were both perhaps playing house all along. Like fools.

"Then why?" Harry grit out. "If you knew...know...that he and I...god, why would you hold him to this contract?"

"Me?" She snorted and Harry peeked up at her to see her shaking her head at the floor. "I'm not making him do anything, I'd happily release him if he asked but he's not going to Potter."

"But why? Surely he can't believe that marrying you is the only way for him to be a father...I mean...god there are so many options out there if it's that important to him." Like adaption. Like a surrogate. Hell, like a fucking one night stand with a deemed worthy pureblood while hopped up on fertility potions.

"None that matter."

"What the hell does that mean?"

"Think about it Potter, he's given up everything of his upbringing, of his heritage, and yes, I know, it’s mostly for the best. But now in the eyes of the purebloods he's nothing more than a mudblood, he's tainted, worse than that really because he did it to himself willingly. He is a blight on their world even if no one speaks out loud of things like this anymore, the thoughts and feelings are still there, their still the undercurrent of the old families. Draco has drug what was left of the Malfoy name through the mud in their eyes. But even still...that's not exactly why he's doing this, if he cared so much for his name he wouldn't have taken up with you and started warping his brain with that loud blaring box of yours in the first place."

"Then why?" Harry demanded, feeling a bit like he was on perpetual repeat. Why? Why? Why was everything crumbling for something as stupid as this? Why was it crumbling for something Harry wanted too?

Children. He wanted that. He wanted that with Draco.

"For his mother." She answered, rolling her eyes at Harry's incredulous look. "Don't give me that look, you can't possibly understand what he feels he owes her."

"Then enlighten me." He grit out, his chest aching as he curled his hand into a fist on his knee. Merlin but everything fucking hurt inside him.

"Has he told you about her illness?"

Harry sucked in a breath and felt a whole new sort of pang in his heart. Narcissa was sick? Why hadn't Draco told him? God he felt like he was seeing a part of his flatmate that he never even knew existed until last night. Draco had kept it all hidden so very well, tucked inside him, pretending he never even thought on it. "No." He whispered, remembering how quiet Draco always was after visiting his mother, how subdued and lethargic before snapping suddenly and often rather startlingly out of it - bouncing around their flat and pulling Harry along after him.

"Not surprising really." Pansy shrugged and crossed her short legs. "She fell sick during the war and Draco...well, he blames himself and don't ask me why Potter. He just does and let’s leave it at that. But regardless if he should or shouldn't feel responsible, when she took a turn for the worst last year he finally gave into her wishes that he'd been dodging since we were fifth years. We agreed on a time and date and to keep it a secret and live our lives apart until the time came." She paused and played with a stray thread on her knee. "I suspect Draco likes to pretend that it never will come."

"This is madness." Harry breathed for a lack of better wording, because boiled down to its core that's what all this was. Madness. Complete and utter madness. Draco's mother was severely ill from the sounds of it and as she crept towards death her son aligned himself to live her dream for him. For the Malfoy name. For the bloodline. It was all making Harry's head throb something fierce and he didn't know what to do. He felt like even as Pansy spoke and enlightened him of all the things he never knew that he was missing some key piece to the puzzle.

"Look Potter, he should have told you, god knows he should have," Pansy muttered, sounding tired and a bit resigned for the first time since he'd entered her house. "But if he wants to go through with this, I will marry him. I will give him his heir. And I will love him, maybe not like you do but there is more than one kind of love."

"But you know him, you know he's-"

"Gay? Obsessed with you? Will most likely want to name our child Bone?"

"Bond." Harry corrected instinctively before letting out a small rueful chuckle. "And yes, all of the above. So why are you doing this? I don't get it, why would you give up your chance for a happy marriage..."

"My reasons are my own." She said quietly and Harry watched as her foot encased in bright purple socks bounced in the air. "But you should know, in case he failed to mention, after we have a child we have agreed to have an open marriage. We'll stay together and please god, don't ask why again, but we will be free to be with other people."

I can't ask you to wait for me - Draco's words from the night before rang sharply in his head and Harry's stomach lurched, Draco's disjointed sentences taking on a whole new light for what felt like the hundredth time.

Goddamned fucking fuck.

"I just don't get how -" and then something else crept forward, tapping at his thoughts amongst the jumble of everything else. "Ethan?" He asked tightly, his mind suddenly consumed with thoughts of the other man who had spent countless nights taking Draco out and talking. Talking. Night after night. And he wanted a commitment, that's what Draco had told him at the tailors, but how could the blonde possibly be even considering it if he knew what his future held?

"He knows." Pansy answered and Harry let out a harsh breath that made something sharp shoot through his chest. "He's a pureblood, he understands."

So that was it. Ethan was willing to conform to whatever part Draco had left for him to play. He wanted to date him and then would willingly step back and wait. God, he wasn't just losing Draco to Pansy but possibly to Ethan as well and maybe that shouldn't have hit like a sledge hammer to the gut but it did and Harry had to fumble over his goodbye before the tears could well in his eyes.

He was fucking sick of crying anyway.

****

The moon was swollen full in the night sky, shining bright and silver against the midnight black all around, when Harry heard it. It was a soft clatter, like someone stumbling into a wall or a corner table, a rattle that sounded like a lamp teetering precariously. He knew those sounds so very well, but normally they were louder - two pairs of feet, two backs hitting plaster, drunken slurs and sometimes even giggles punctuated with hiccups.

Harry stared out his window, his eyes glued to the fuzzy silver globe in the sky from his spot curled up under his blankets, his hand curling in on itself under his pillow till he could feel his nails digging into his palm. He felt shot through. Depleted. He needed to shut his mind off and sleep, to process all that he had learned. But Draco was home - finally - and tipsy if not drunk from the sounds of it. He knew the smart thing to do was to ignore the other man, to maybe take a potion to lull him under, and confront him in the morning.

He knew what he should do.

But the moon was bright and large. Draco was home and alone. And Harry's heart wanted nothing more than to curl around the other man, to lay his hand on his chest and feel the answering beat. He needed a night of peace and maybe he shouldn't have felt that he'd get that with the cause of his turmoil next to him but...well logic and Draco had never gone hand in hand.

His socked feet felt cold on the floor, his hands blindly seeking his glasses and slipping them on crookedly before waving his hand and blinking in the soft light that filled his room. His room, in their flat, surrounded by things they'd bought together - half the clothes in his wardrobe (the nice half) picked out by Draco's keen eye, the lamp on his bedside a gift when Draco had first discovered the miracle of light bulbs and all their many forms they came in. His desk chair old and weathered and terribly unconformable before Draco go this hands (and his wand) on it. The man wasn't only in Harry's head and heart, he was everywhere.

He had thought endlessly on what Pansy had told him (because Merlin, how could he not?) and Harry wasn't sure how he felt about the grudging notion that he was starting to understand. A little at least. He could turn his head and look at it from Draco's angle, he could picture having his mother back and doing anything to keep her in his life. He could picture Draco, young and lost and terrified, watching not only his own life fall apart but his mother’s as well and not being able to do anything about it. He understood the importance of family. Of heritage. Of spending yourself for someone you love, for someone who protected you and sheltered you.

But he also understood the steps the blonde had taken to sever himself from the constraints of the pureblood way of life after the war, he understood that Draco needed to do it for more reasons than Harry could even pretend to understand. It was almost like the other man was split down the middle, with two drastically different ideas and thoughts and desires and Harry was starting to realize that Draco wasn't doing this just for his name, for his bloodline, for his mother’s wish, it was more, a deeper need that Harry couldn't see clearly but knew was there. But even still, he wasn't about to give up. He couldn't give up.

He paused outside Draco's closed bedroom door, a gentle light spilling out from beneath the crack under it. He listened to the quiet thuds and dragged a hand through his hair, nudging his glasses up his nose again even though they were already in place. Raising a fist, he knocked quickly, then with a deep breath he twisted the knob and inched the door open as all the noise from inside the bedroom ceased. "Draco?" He cleared his throat and shuffled inside, his gaze landing on the back of his flatmate.

Draco stood before his open wardrobe, his back and shoulders stiff, his head turning just a fraction to catch sight of Harry from the corner of his eye - a speck of glitter sparkling on his cheek. "Harry. I just -needed a shirt..." he trailed off, his voice quiet, his hand gesturing halfheartedly towards his wardrobe.

"Okay." Harry nodded, walking further into the room and standing at Draco's shoulder, his hand reaching out and gently brushing away the speck of glitter with his thumb. His cheek was ice cold and Harry battled with himself not to press his entire palm against his skin. "Where have you been?" The other man smelled of alcohol and smoke and he looked like he hadn't slept or even closed his eyes since he'd seen him last.

Draco's eyelids fluttered and he swayed slightly on his feet. "Theo's. He let me crash in his spare room." He shook his head and looked away. "He insisted we go out."

"You didn't need to go to his." Harry said softly, his thumb dropping down Draco's cheek, his touch reluctant to leave the other man's skin now that he felt the cool angles of it again. "You could have stayed." But even as he said it, Harry had a feeling that maybe Draco fleeing had been the best thing for both of them. They would have gotten nowhere with their emotions running so high - Harry needed to hear the details without trying to pry Draco back into his arms. He needed time to let the hurt dull to a painful thump inside him and for understanding to pry its way into his head. And Draco needed to not be pushed because backing the man into a corner only ever resulted in an explosion.

"Perhaps but I -" Draco's jaw clenched, his hands slipping into his wrinkled trousers pockets. "I don't know what to say." He replied and Harry couldn't help but smile at the honestly of it, at the raw emotions that pulled the words from the other man's throat. Draco wasn't hiding behind flowery wording, wasn't confusing him with double meanings and hazy answers. He wasn't shuttered. He simply didn't have the words and Harry understood that.

Nodding, Harry lifted his hands to Draco's shirt, carefully undoing the small black buttons holding the material together as he watched his fingers work. "Then don't." He whispered, listening to Draco's breath hitch as he parted the material and pushed it from his shoulder, the garment fluttering to the floor and curling around his feet. "We don't have to talk right now." He stared at Draco's stomach as he spoke, his fingers brushing over the firm muscles covered in pale skin. "Just...come to bed."

"Harry." Draco breathed as Harry pushed the blonde’s trousers to his feet, leaving the man standing before him in just his black boxers with his cheeks pinking and eyes boring into Harry's forehead. "This isn't a good idea. I should...go."

With a shake of his head, Harry grabbed Draco's hand and led him silently over to the bed. He dropped his glasses on the bedside table and sat down softly, scooting back on the surprisingly soft mattress and pulling Draco with him, over him - making the blonde all but crawl onto his own bed until he was hovering over Harry with his gray eyes dark and swimming, his lip red and wet and white around the edges like he'd been biting harshly into it a second ago.

"It's the turn of the moon, we always spend it together." Harry said softly, speaking for the first time about their nights together, vocalizing their taboo and watching as some unnamed emotion flitted across Draco's face. "You've got glitter, right here." He smiled as he brushed away another sparkling speck from his forehead, his head sinking back into the silky pillow.

"Theo's fault." Draco murmured, his gaze traveling over Harry's face and landing to fix heavily on his lips. "You know I loathe glitter. The monstrosity gets everywhere and could survive Fiendfyre." He was getting that far away cadence to his tone again with his gaze going hazy just like it had the other night. Like he was slipping under a spell he didn't want to even try to fight free of and Harry wondered when exactly he had started having that sort of pull over him.

He was so very tempted to give into it, he had a feeling it wouldn't be hard, he could pull Draco down to him - fix their lips together and arch up into him, pushing his body against the other man's and demanding an answering pull. They could lose themselves in each other so simply, pushing all the complication to the backs of their minds as they reached bliss. They could erase their memories of the past day with the melding of flesh, could rewrite history if only for a night.

With a shaky breath, Harry threaded his fingers around the back of Draco's neck, his other hand reaching up and pressing on the blondes back. Draco's weight was a heady experience in itself as he settled against him, the blonde's head coming to rest carefully against his shoulder with the help of Harry’s guiding hand. He stared up a the ceiling as he ran his hands down the other man's back, counting each bony knob beneath his fingertips as he savored the feeling of Draco's breath ghosting over his skin before flicking his wrist and catching the blanket that came soaring up to meet them - pulling it up their bodies until they were buried beneath it as the lights flicked off.

"Just stay with me tonight." Harry whispered, turning his head and tracing a finger along Draco's jaw as he shifted until they were lying on their sides, his arms wrapping tight around the other man as he pressed a delicate kiss to his lips. He pulled away before could become lost in it, his eyes closing on a deep sigh as he felt a conflicting storm of emotions swarm him.

But Draco was in his arms with his breath on his skin and his legs twined with his and moments before Harry finally succumbed to the dream world he felt the man's arms wrap tightly around him - Draco's face turning and pressing into the side of his neck, his lips damp as they brushed lightly against his skin.

A/N :Well I must say I was very nervous about how you would all react to the last chapter, but I'm so glad you all didn't swear at me and throw things ;) Though for those of you who know my writing you probably knew something angsty was coming...can't seem to help writing a bit of sadness in all my stuff. So this chapter felt a bit like a connecting chapter more than anything but it was important and I really hope you all still enjoyed it!
Annecia89: Oh yay, I’m glad you enjoyed it!

Rainbow_Gablin: Thank you so much *Gives you a hug* I’m so happy to hear that your loving it J and thank you so much for pointing out the typos, I really appreciate it!

Victoria: Well…he didn’t really break his heart on purpose at least…

Hestia: thank you! I know the betrothal sucks but I’m happy to hear that you’re not cursing me out because of it ;)

Sun Junkie: Well, he did sign a magical contract and you’ll get to see over the next few chapters just what it up with Narcissa and the contract. Thanks for commenting!

SP777: Hahaha so true! Harry could never be a side chick, it would drive him mental and Draco knows it too. But Harry always been wonderfully determined hasn’t he? If there’s a loophole he’ll find it ;)
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Muggle Technology and Heroism