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Harry Potter, Virgin Extraordinaire	By : lordoberon Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male Views: 16229 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: Harry Potter is entirely the property of J.K. Rowling. I claim no ownership over it. I make no money in the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 8
- 9
- 10
HARRY POTTER, VIRGIN EXTRAORDINAIRE

by lordoberon

Chapter 9

He grabbed the newspaper and pumpkin juice that Ron handed him, and while gulping down the drink he looked over the newspaper. The pictures of himself made him extra angry; they always took them and put them in out-of-context articles. In this one, his smiling face blared from the covers, and the name Blaise Zabini shot from the paper into his mind and out of his mouth as a question: “Blaise Zabini?”

Ron laughed. “Yeah. That sod from Slytherin, same year as us, remember?”

Harry nodded, and scanned the article. It was all nonsense, of course – except that he and Blaise were shagging, were “friends (or more!)”, and Blaise had visited his flat.

But only one person had witnessed that.

Harry groaned. “They planted a spy on me? This is too much like Skeeter. Come on!”

He yanked on some clothes and dragged Ron down to the apartment below his. It had taken the papers a month to find him and harass him again. One month of peace, and now the woman living below him turned out to be a magical person living amongst Muggles, and a reporter. It was no coincidence, Harry was sure. She had been planted here to report on his activity.

“This is illegal. Plus, I’m an Auror. She shouldn’t have been able to come in this close to me without myself or someone from the Ministry finding out.”

And like an Auror, Harry used magic to sneak them into her apartment, only to find it empty. She wasn’t home. He scanned her desk, and found material on himself, as well as other unpleasantness on people who probably had been similarly speculated about by this “reporter.”

“I wonder how he’ll react,” Harry said under his breath, as he looked through the rough draft of the article written in a notebook. Would Baise be angry? Perhaps he would find it amusing. He’d probably be bothered that Harry and he now wouldn’t get much privacy during the Quidditch game tomorrow, if they should even still go at all.

Harry gathered the reporter’s materials and handed them to Ron.

“Here. Comb through these notebooks, will you? We’ll return them later. I want to know if there’s anything else she’s found out.”

“Found out?” Ron laughed. “But it’s all made up, anyway!”

Harry shook his head and rushed back up to his flat. He made breakfast hastily, sloppily, and ate it quickly. When he was done, he nodded to the cupboards, the floor, and the table. “Do you see this? It’s all clean. Do you think I did this myself? You know how horrid I am at cleaning spells.”

His heart was pounding in nervousness, but he decided he had to tell Ron. To get it out in the open. After all, it seemed pretty clear that Blaise and he wanted more to do with each other. It wasn’t quite what could be called dating, perhaps, but something close to it. Of course, Harry knew he still had a lot to get to know about Blaise, but it was a beginning.

And he did not want to lie and squirm. Nor did he want to wait or drop clues. He had spent time with Blaise, and he knew he’d be spending more time with Blaise. Ron and Hermione had found out, even if the papers had speculated and lied. Why hold it back any longer?

Plus, he was so sick of hearing about Ginny!

Ron tilted his head to one side. “Who helped you clean it?”

Harry tapped the small moving, smiling picture of Blaise in the paper. “Him.”

“But…I thought…they were lying…I mean, isn’t he a Death Eater? Ex-Death Eater?”

“No. I did a check on him,” Harry lied, “He’s clear.”

He did want to do a check on him. He had to, didn’t he? As part of his job, of course. And he just would have to keep it secret from Blaise, because Blaise wouldn’t like it…argh. That wouldn’t work. He’d have to talk to Blaise, because it was the only issue between them that had shown up so far – Blaise’s mother, her Dark Arts, and Blaise’s past which was most likely not shadowy at all. Harry hoped.

Ron’s face went ashen. Evidently some of Hermione had rubbed off on him, for he seemed to catch on awfully fast, for Ron.

“What else in that article is true?” He whispered.

Harry laughed. He sent their dishes to clean themselves, and leaning forward onto his hands, he stood up. “All of it,” he said, “Except for the part about the Dark Arts, of course.”

Ron’s face had gone even more ashen, if that were possible. He stood in the kitchen, while Harry cleaned off his Auror robes with whipping motions of his wand.

“Harry? Have you gone nutter? He’s a bloke. He’s a Slytherin. His mother kills people.”

“I know he’s a bloke.” Harry smiled with his new-found freedom. He was feeling as free now, in speaking honestly, as he did when he spent time with Blaise. Perhaps he could get a taste of the freedom and honesty and calm that Blaise and his life seemed full of. He just had to grab it for himself.

“I have personal evidence that he’s a bloke,” Harry said, watching Ron’s grey face turn red, “And I don’t care that he was in Slytherin House years ago. Nor that he attended Malfoy’s wedding on Saturday. And his mother…well, we’ve talked about her, a bit.”

Ron’s face was white now. “How…how long has this been going on?” He sounded like he just might faint.

Harry shimmied into his red robes and smiled sympathetically at Ron. “Not very long. But long enough that I know I like him and I’d like more of him in my life. Tell Hermione, will you? I’ve got to go take care of this tabloid nonsense now. See you later.”

“Wait!”

Ron grabbed Harry’s sleeve.

“What?”

“Um…” Ron shifted from foot to foot, and then grabbed Harry’s sleeve tighter. He looked straight at Harry and sighed. “What about Ginny?”

Not her again! “I’m tired of Ginny,” Harry grumbled, “Alright? We didn’t get along. We want different things. I’m sorry I hurt her, and everyone else, and especially you, but…you’ve just go to let it go.”

“But, Harry, please -”

Ron was going to start pleading, and Harry wasn’t going to stand for that. It would make guilt pinch harder, but it would not change his decision.

“Let it GO, Ron!”

Harry yanked his sleeve from Ron’s grip.

He Apparated straight into the Ministry, where he spoke briefly to his supervisor. Then it was a quick trip to visit a few friends who could help him out, and then it was to the offices of the main newspapers. Harry wasn’t one to hide behind walls and wait for some influential friends to work it all out for him. He liked to take care of things on his own.

He ignored the way that Apparation made him a little dizzy after every arrival, and the way he started getting sweaty. He had to catch this newspaper virus before it spread all over. And he wanted to go to the Quidditch game with Blaise, no matter what.

It felt really good to feel the cool air in the waiting room by the office of Mrs. Ellen Rudger, the head of the newspaper that had reported on him. It didn’t feel good having everyone stare at him, half of them from behind newspapers that had his face on it. What made up for that was her expression – her feathered hat askew, her lipstick a straight line - when he walked into her office, and saw the reporter who had “dished” on him there. Both of their faces went red, and the reporter practically ran from the room. Harry sat down across from Mrs. Rudger after sharing a firm handshake.

Rudger recovered quickly. “Mr. Potter. How very pleasant to see you on this fine day. Would you like some tea?”

Harry made sure to smile brightly. “No, thank you.”

“Coffee? Pumpkin juice? Orange juice? Milk? Something stronger?”

She smirked on the last one, and Harry did not take that bait – that test to see if he was upset over his “secrets being spilled” – and instead he smiled back.

“No, thank you,” he declined with a dip of his head. “I would like to get straight to the point. I wanted to congratulate your employee – Ms. Norton, is it? – on her excellent journalism. She slid in right under my nose, and the nose of the Ministry, in fact. They leave us Aurors to protect ourselves, of course, but they do take an interest if any of us feel seriously threatened or has a sudden suspicious presence move in nearby.”

There was a noticeable tick beneath Rudger’s left eye now. Harry continued, “Ms. Norton was so very expert in her gathering of information that I did not even notice her. And that’s saying something, Mrs. Rudger, because I’ve been trained to observe when things are amiss, even in my own home, and I have devices that can sense any intruders or presences nearby. And they sensed nothing.”

Rudger’s smile was looking awfully stretched across the face. Harry was reminded a little of Umbridge. “Mr. Potter, while I thank you for your praise, it almost sounds as if you are implying that my employee was lying, rather than reporting.”

Harry grinned now. His mouth was going to ache from this fake put-on later, but it was worth it. He actually quite enjoyed handling problems like this sometimes, especially when he felt energetic and excited – and he was quite excited about the Quidditch game tomorrow, and seeing Blaise again. Plus, this was letting out some of the steam of his anger with Ron and Hermione.

“Why Mrs. Rudger, you are quite astute. I am implying that. If she had done any reporting, I would know; but Ms. Norton did not ask me for any interview. Notice that not a single actual quote from my lips is in her article. I am going to give a personal interview with another newspaper – multiple newspapers, if need be - calling into question Ms. Norton’s reporting skills, her job, your paper, and indeed the quality of work you yourself do. For instance, what must your hiring system be, given that you happily hired a woman who would rather concoct a story than go out and find a real one herself?”

Rudger’s face was pale now, but she said firmly, with a smile, “Mr. Potter, I did not known you were so vicious when threatened. How do you even know that I approve of the article Ms. Norton wrote on you?”

Harry laughed. “You wouldn’t have let it run in your paper if you hadn’t.”

Rudger’s voice was snappish now. “Do you really think that people will listen to what you have to say, when what Mrs. Norton reported was such a good story, and they are already eating it up?”

Harry nodded, spreading his hands across her desk and leaning forward. “Thank you for admitting that your motivation was just to get a good story that the public would ‘eat up.’ And yes, I think they’ll be eager to hear from me. They were eager enough to ‘eat up’ the ‘news’ about me, weren’t they? Something from my own mouth will be even more exciting.”

Rudger leaned back in her chair. Her fingertips tapped the surface of her desk in a nervous fashion. “Mr. Potter, what are you planning to say? How will you defend your case?”

“Oh, that’s another thing. Thanks for the reminder. If you don’t get convinced to shut down your operation to sabotage my life by making false reports about me, I will bring you to court, and I assure you I will win. That’s after I file a report with the Ministry about Ms. Norton’s illegal spying. Or I can use other, more magical methods, of course.”

He let that imply whatever she wanted it to mean. It was enough. Harry didn’t have to mention friends in law or Hermione Granger or his clout with the Ministry or anything at all. The conviction he had within him came out in his voice. Clearly this final threat worked, for Mrs. Rudger clutched her throat in a protective gesture, as if Harry’s words were a knife in hand.

“Mr. Potter…How can I help you?”

Everything went up hill from there, except that there was one issue: Harry realized that, it wasn’t the report about him shagging Blaise that had bothered him. That part was true. And if the world knew it, maybe they would stop writing articles about when he would marry Ginevra Weasley. What bothered him was that they had said he was working on Dark Arts, and with Blaise.

Harry had to get down to bottom of it: Why was Blaise not a Dark Arts user, and why was it not widely known? Couldn’t he work to clear his name a little from the dark cloud his mother had drawn over it?

The rest of the day was spent on interviews, which came out immediately, where he discussed false journalism, his life at his new flat alone, and where he avoided the question of whether he was with someone, and said that no, he was not planning on getting back together with Ginny.

When he returned home at the end of a very long day, which had been half filled with paperwork, he was ready for another bath. A pounding headache pulsed between his eyebrows.

But when he arrived at his front door, someone was there.

He was a tall blonde man wearing all black, with grey eyes that needled Harry from the stairway landing and followed him to where he crossed his arms in front of the intruder. His gaze combed over Harry, unpleasant, scrutinizing, and when he smirked, Harry had no more doubts about who this was. It had been years since he had seen him, but there was no mistaking that smirk, since he had had to endure it for all of his six years at Hogwarts.

“Malfoy. Why, I’m charmed you would come all the way here from your honeymoon just for me. What is it?”

Malfoy stood up straighter, and said in an acerbic tone, “I didn’t return for you, Potter. I returned for business matters. And this.”

He waved the all-too-familiar newspaper article about Harry and Blaise in front of Harry’s face. “Tell me, what is this?”

Harry forced himself to smile. “Why don’t you ask him? He’s your friend.”

Malfoy dropped the article and dug the toe of his boot into it viciously. “He won’t be very much longer, if this is true. I never thought he could have such bad taste.” He wrinkled his nose.

Harry laughed. “Don’t you know him better than that? He’s not a practitioner of the Dark Arts.”

The Auror part of him whispered, As far as I know. Maybe if I talk to Malfoy, I’ll find out if he is or not.

Malfoy crossed his arms across his chest and leaned back to settle himself more comfortably against Harry’s front door. “So you’re saying that none of what they wrote about you two is true?”

Harry was getting tired of Malfoy’s interrogation. His headache was hurting him even more. He was used to being on the other end of these, not the one being pummeled with questions. “Look, Malfoy. I know it bothers you that he might like me, but if it’s true, is it all that bad? We’ll only have to tolerate each other occasionally.”

Wow. Where had that come from? He’d hoped to say something a little more pinching to retaliate against Malfoy.

Another voice, from the stairwell, echoed up to them. “You know he’s right, Draco, so shut your trap and stop nosing into my business.”

A familiar head of curly hair appeared at the top of the stairway, and Blaise reached Harry in seconds. He wrapped an arm firmly around Harry’s waist.

Harry flushed. He was shocked at how far Blaise seemed willing to commit to him. It felt good to have Blaise’s arm around his waist, possessive. It made his anger cool down a little. He smirked at Malfoy.

Malfoy’s face turned a brilliant shade of pink, and he rubbed at the pocket of his trousers as if he might grab his wand. Harry took his out, just in case.

Immediately Malfoy stopped the motion – coward as ever – and simply frowned at them. He turned to Blaise, and his voice became a whine as he said, “Is this really true?”

Blaise simply nodded. Malfoy huffed at that, and then drawled, “Blaise, since when have you had such terrible taste?”

Blaise smirked. “Remember when you took Pansy out to the Yule Ball in Fourth Year? I think I remember saying something similar then.”

Malfoy’s ears reddened. “That was then! You’re supposed to be intelligent, not fall for the Boy Who Lived in his stupid, gawky glasses. He’s still obnoxious, too.”

Harry began to smile at Malfoy’s obviously deflated attempts to deter Blaise. His arguments were getting more and more stupid. Blaise smiled, too. “I think you’re the one being obnoxious. I found Astoria much too snobbish, remember? But I didn’t tell you not to marry her. So don’t tell me what to do. And I know you; you wouldn’t really break off our friendship because of Harry.”

How long had Blaise been listening? Had he heard the whole conversation? Perhaps he’d followed Malfoy. Harry wondered why he hadn’t come in sooner. Maybe he had been wondering how much Harry was going to commit, too?

Malfoy was coming close to livid. His voice rose and he threw up his hands, saying, “I see there’s no arguing with you, Blaise. Forget my good counsel. Don’t listen. Have a fun time at your stupid Quidditch game. I hope the reporters eat you alive!”

He gave a quick look around, pulled himself from Harry’s door, and disappeared with a pop.

Blaise turned to Harry and gave him a beautiful smile. His hand ruffled through the hair at the back of Harry’s neck. “He’s all heat and no fire. How are you? You look exhausted.”

And just like that, the exhaustion flooded back into Harry. He smiled a little, and said, “Yes, I’ve been contesting against people all day. I’m ready to go to sleep for a long time…but I need a bath first.”

Blaise laughed. “Of course you do. Can I come in?”

“Sure.”

Blaise immediately went into the kitchen, where he made Harry something to eat regardless of Harry’s polite protests, and when Harry scarfed it down, Blaise laughed, saying, “See? I told you so.”

He followed Harry to the bathroom, and sat on the countertop as Harry sat on the rim waiting for the water.

Harry looked down at the floor, wondering how he was going to ask Blaise several important questions. Was Blaise a practitioner of the Dark Arts, secretly? Could Harry really, really trust him? How would Blaise’s mother take to Blaise being with Harry? How would the media take it if Harry was together with him and they thought Blaise an Ex-Death Eater or some such? And how to ask all of this without sounding terribly rude and making Blaise furious?

He decided to just plow in. “So, you aren’t mad about the news article?”

Blaise rolled his eyes. “That thing? No. I know it wasn’t your fault, why should I be mad at you? I am mad at that woman for concocting tales and invading our privacy. But you seem to have taken care of it pretty well. I’m already seeing some counter-attack type interviews with you coming out.”

Harry blurted the next question that was anxiously burning in him then. “If you’re so private, and my life is constantly being exposed to the public, how can we be together? Do you want to be together?”

Blaise’s eyes were dark and somber. “Tell me what you mean when you say ‘together.’ Do you mean, in love, because I wouldn’t say we are. If you mean doing things together, well we’re already doing that, and if you mean sex, we’ve done that. But by lobbing ‘together’ in, I think you mean something more. What is that ‘more’? What do you want?”

Harry pursed his lips together. He hadn’t expected Blaise to answer his question like this (and it wasn’t really an answer, answering a question with questions). It was more challenging and to the point than he’d expected. He wasn’t sure what he had expected, though. He decided he appreciated Blaise’s straightforwardness. But could he be as straightforward with himself?

Yes. He knew what he wanted. He wanted that tender side of Blaise to be his and his alone. He knew he drew it out, and that was what Blaise had basically admitted to him. Harry brought out a side in Blaise that Blaise wasn’t familiar with nurturing – the sweet side, that gave just to give, that enjoyed time with Harry without needing anything in return. Blaise enjoyed making Harry moan and curse, not because of his pride, but because he just liked Harry. He enjoyed making sure Harry had fun, like bringing him to dinner, and bringing him flying. And he obviously wanted more time with Harry, because he’d hinted at bringing Harry to future Quidditch games.

Plus, the level of satisfaction Harry had gotten in the last few days was more than he’d had in a long time. He wanted that in his life, for however long it could last.

Harry cleared his throat. “By ‘more’ I mean…you. I want you around me. I want us to be together, as in, like a couple. ‘Dating,’ or whatever you’d like to call it. We go out. We stay in. Together. And we don’t have to live together, either – we can keep our separate apartments. But…I want to spend more time with you, more than just, when we’re free, or bored, or when we just went clubbing and got tipsy. But…you didn’t answer my question. What do you want?”

Blaise stood up from the counter, and paused. For a moment Harry thought he might leave. Perhaps this was too much for Blaise. Maybe he didn’t want to commit after all. Maybe the fact that being with Harry would automatically deprive him of some privacy was too much of a hassle.

Harry looked down into the bath water, and waited for that pop of Apparation signaling Blaise had left.

But then a soft hand slid across his cheek.

“I want the same thing,” Blaise whispered, “You, just you…Harry…”

His soft mouth inched down from Harry’s forehead, over Harry’s eyelids, and finally down to his lips. His arms had gone around Harry now, and he looked at Harry deeply, drinking him in. Then he shut his eyes, and as they kissed, his arms tugged Harry closer in, up. His hands slid the red robes up and over Harry’s head, and then they were weaving shapes up and down Harry’s back, light and soothing on his skin.

Harry felt like he might have a heart attack, because his heart was going so quickly in excitement. It seemed like it would burst in happiness. He wanted to laugh, and he wanted to have Blaise hold him like this forever. He wanted to say something, but he didn’t know what to say. He wanted to tell Blaise about his argument with Ron, and he wanted to kiss Blaise everywhere, and he wanted to sleep in Blaise’s arms again.

He found himself undressing Blaise, too, automatically, like a spell, and when they were both naked before each other, they just stood back and looked at each other a moment.

“They can have Potter, month after month, week after week, day after day…Auror Potter, Boy Who Lived, whomever…and your friends, of course, there’s them…but the rest is mine, Harry. Promise?”

Harry swallowed, and nodded his head. “Promise. You can have me to yourself…Harry, without the Potter and the rest.”

Blaise watched as Harry slid into the bath, and he cast a spell to enlarge the tub before he slid in, too. “I’m not saying forget about your parents, Lily and James. Merlin knows I can’t ever seem to forget about mine. But there are parts of you that you don’t even show to your friends…things you wouldn’t say to them…how did they react to that article?”

Harry sighed. “I’ll tell you later. It involved me getting angrier than Ron, which was surprising…”

“You mean you told them it was true?” The surprise in Blaise’s voice forced Harry’s eyes open.

Harry nodded. “Well, yeah. Not the Dark Arts part, of course.”

Blaise smiled. “That part was the most entertaining of the whole article, I thought. I admit to trying my hand at certain spells at Hogwarts, but I never hurt anybody. And that demonstration in Fourth Year rattled me just as much as anyone else…especially Crucio…”

His voice got suddenly quiet. “I was lucky to be in the back, whereas Longbottom’s reaction was witnessed because he was in the front row.”

Harry licked his dry lips. “…How did you react?”

“Mine was worse than Longbottom’s,” Blaise said hoarsely. “Because I’d seen it happen to my dad…and other people. Not just by my mum, either. I was a visitor to the Malfoy household, before they hosted Voldemort at Malfoy Manor. I saw things I would not recount to anyone.”

He swallowed hard, and then smiled, recovering quickly. “But the only Dark Arts I really know are things like this…”

Wandless, smiling, he moved in towards Harry, and kissed Harry hard. His tongue squirmed in past Harry’s lips, and thrust in warm and good. His hand crept down over Harry’s wet belly, and down to grip his cock. He jerked his thumb over the head and teased the slit, and then, panting over Harry’s neck, he drew closer. With two hands, he took both of their hardening cocks in his hands, and began to rub them together.

Harry let his head fall back, moaning Blaise’s name. He grunted as Blaise’s hands began to move even quicker, and his wet, licking kisses moved up and down Harry’s neck. He was whispering Harry’s name in a desperate, hungry way, and his cock felt so hard and good against Harry’s…he took Harry’s hand, and forced it down to rub with him, and so Harry did, gripping Blaise’s cock hard, tugging it, pressing it against his own.

Blaise rubbed the heads together, groaning loudly, and as Harry came, he came too. Blaise cleaned the water with a spell, and then lay back against the opposite wall, looking at Harry.

“God,” Harry panted, “You’re endlessly full of ideas.”

Blaise chuckled. “See? A Dark Arts form of its own. Able to weaken the opponent in mere moments.”

He let Harry just lie there then, and then Harry began to scrub himself in earnest. It felt so good to get the grime of blood and dirt from around his fingernails, and to see his feet clean, and to feel the hard scrub of cloth all over his body. And when Harry was done with that, he put more bubbles in the bath, and just lay back with a sigh.

When he woke up some time later, he found his chin was almost in the water.

“Let’s get you out of there, Harry, before you turn into a raisin. I can see it now – ‘Boy Who Lived turns into raisin!’”

They laughed, and Harry got up to leave the tub – and suddenly the whole room swayed. Harry gasped, and almost fell, but Blaise caught his arm. Harry looked at his arm – it was the same he’d had the bones broken in, but now it had recovered. What was wrong? Maybe he was just tired?

Then he remembered how the Healer had told him to Floo rather than Apparate. For a couple days.

“Harry?”

Harry groaned. “I…I overdid it again…I wasn’t supposed to Apparate for a while and I’ve been doing it all day – lucky I didn’t splinch myself -”

And then he did fall over.

He woke up on his bed hours later. He was wrapped in a bathrobe and his head was pounding. He looked over to see Blaise sitting at his desk, feet up, nose in one of those dull Defense Against the Dark Arts books that Harry had never read but been gifted.

“Sorry about that,” Harry said.

Blaise looked up. He smiled, and put the book down. “Don’t be sorry. Just be more careful. Does this happen a lot?”

Harry nodded and lay back. “Yeah. Well, not the no-Apparation thing, but overdoing it, yeah. Ron and Hermione used to help me more, but they got busy with work, and Ginny got tired of it. She wanted me to quit. But I can’t.”

He waited for something well-meaning about how he could, he must, like he’d heard so many times. But instead Blaise said simply, “I wish I enjoyed my jobs that much. How do you feel?”

“Headache,” was all Harry could say as it came thrusting back into him. Blaise disappeared and Harry heard him tinkering in the kitchen, and then he returned with a steaming potion.

“Drink up.”

Harry obeyed, grimacing at the sharp flavor, and lay back again. He shut his eyes.

“Are we going tomorrow?” He whispered sleepily a minute or so later.

Blaise looked up from the book. “What? I only heard a mumble.”

Harry flushed. “The Quidditch game. Are we going?”

Blaise put the book down and walked to the foot of the bed, where he crawled up to lay by Harry and pulled him in close. “We are going,” he whispered, “Because I can’t resist the sparkle that’s in your eyes right now. It demands that we go. We can get there by Floo somehow.”

Harry frowned. Floo. Ugh. He’d have to ask Ron for a private fireplace near the stadium that he could get to. He couldn’t just barge in on any fireplace, after all. And Blaise would be with him. So Ron would see them together, there and then. Well, good! He’d have to get used to the sight. And Ginny could drink it in all she wanted.

It would be harder to avoid people if he went by Floo…

“You won’t mind…paparazzi and stuff?”

“I’m guessing ‘and stuff’ means your friends. Don’t worry, we can handle them all. This will be good practice for me.”

After sending the Floo request to Ron, Harry slept, and slept, and when he woke, he felt startlingly refreshed. He hadn’t realized how much he had run himself down.

Harry joined Blaise in the kitchen for breakfast. He was happy to read Ron’s short agreement to open a Floo by the stadium so Harry could get through. They ate silently – Harry was very hungry – and then while getting up he said quietly, “So Blaise. Um. Where’s your mum these days?”

Blaise turned around from where he’d been looking at Harry’s newspaper clippings on the refrigerator and raised both brows. “Harry James Potter, you have zero subtlety, you know that?”

“I’m sorry -”

“No, it’s alright.” Blaise grinned. “You’re lucky I don’t take offense easily. Don’t worry about her. She only cares about herself. She won’t come barging in yelling about her son’s welfare and aiming to kill you.”

Harry laughed in relief. “Good.” Then he paused. “Blaise…you’re her only son. Shouldn’t she…?”

“Care?” Blaise sighed. “She doesn’t work like that. I was an accident, really.”

Harry looked at Blaise to make sure he was okay, though Blaise had shown signs of being able to shrug things off easily. Blaise had that tender smile Harry loved on his face, and he reached a hand out to ruffle Harry’s hair and adjust his glasses.

“I think you’re the only one who cares enough to ask that sort of thing. Thank you. I’m fine.”

And he was. He laughed with Harry down the block it took to the nearest Floo, and ignored the stares they got from the witch’s flower shop employees. He held Harry close to him as they spun through the Floo, and when the spinning had stopped, Harry felt like he might be sick.

“Can you wait a moment,” he coughed.

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just a tad more...really, what's left is more of an epilogue...
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Harry Potter, Virgin Extraordinaire