Draco

It took a while, but they finally found that place that Harry wanted, the one full of light.

It’s not a house, technically. It’s a cottage, halfway between Luna’s rebuilt house and the Burrow, perched right in the middle of the sea of grain and corn. If you stand out on the porch, you can look out and see everything, practically—Luna’s out to the left and the Burrow to the right and that apple orchard where the Weasleys play Quidditch, not to mention the whole muggle town, and even though Draco thought it was nice mostly because of how pretty it was, he also knew that it would make Harry feel better, having the higher ground. No one can sneak up on you when all you have to do is look out the window and see everything around you in one glance.

“What do you think?” Draco asks because he has to, but he can already tell from the look on Harry’s face that he had done good. It had been Draco who was scouring the ads in the paper every morning, Draco who finally broke down and enlisted the help of a realtor, and Draco who came to look at this place first, walking through the empty rooms as dust motes circled around in a stream of sunlight and thought yes, this, this is the one. He couldn’t help but be proud of himself.

“I think I love it.” Harry breathes out, running his fingers over the smooth oak mantle above the fireplace before pushing away and circling through the rest of the rooms—the dining room with the big overhead skylight, the two bedrooms upstairs, the winding stair case and the tiny kitchen, finally pushing through the screen door and standing out on the porch, facing towards the Burrow with a big grin on his face.

Draco gives him a moment, and then follows. He doesn’t have to say anything, because the screen doors squeals and squeaks, announcing his presence. It was the only door, at the moment. Draco had thought that would make Harry feel better, the knowledge that someone could not sneak in without some real effort.

“There are more buildings thate with the property, if you want to look at them.” Draco waves his hand to epass the area behind them, towards the cellar and the shed and greenhouse, apparently everything that one could need for proper country life. It isn’t really his style, but Draco could get used to it. Was already getting used to it, if he was being honest. “Or we could just let them go, tear them down, it doesn’t matter once we buy them.”

He does not think twice about the we. If this is where Harry wanted, it was where Draco would go.

“I don’t have to look, I already know it’s perfect,” Harry says, and it could have been perfect for Draco, too, if he would have just stopped talking. “Of course, you have to look at places, too. We need to find someplace that you want to be at,” and suddenly, Draco could not breathe, because the idea of going somewhere that Harry was not was not in the plans.

But plans change.

Draco should be used to that by now.

“Right,” He says, and the smile does not even slip from his face, that is how good he has be at pretending. “Of course.”

The words follow him through the afternoon and most of the night, until Harry was gone to bed to catch up on missed sleep and Draco finds himself alone in front of the fire place, watching the flames leap and whither, wishing he wasn’t so much of a coward, wishing he could go up and crawl into bed beside him without second guessing his place there, just this once.

There was a picture of the two of them on the mantle, arms wrapped around each other, right in between all the other pictures of people that Harry had deemed important—of Harry and Ron and Hermione, family pictures of the Weasleys, his mother, his father, Remus and Tonks, a bunch of baby Teddy, even some of a man that Draco now knows to be Sirius Black, back when he was young and the dementors had not yet found their way to him. Back before he was ruined.

That was his picture. And over there, on the bookshelf, were his books. And on the table beside him was his favorite mug, and a blanket Hermione had knitted him was thrown over the chair, and there, even, back by the hallway was an old sweater thrown over a pair of shoes that he had abandoned. Pieces of him were everywhere. He belonged here. He lived here. This, here, with Harry, was his home.

He didn’t mean it like you’re thinking, Draco thinks, trying to calm himself down, thinking that he really should just go up and lay down with Harry just so he could quiet the doubt creeping up inside him. How could he? You’re together, always, he said so.

It makes sense, what he’s telling himself, but so does the doubt.

They go back to the cottage the next day, this time with an agent, who has them talk about it one last time to make sure that they are certain that this is the place for them (she’s a little miffed, Draco thinks, that she has two extremely wealthy clients right in front of her and this is what they end up buying) and shows them where to sign. Quill in hand, Harry looks happier than he had in a while, like he is finally being freed.

“There.” He dots his initials down on the very last line and smiles up at Draco, ignoring the realtor and her attempts to dissuade him one more time, show him a few of the mansions and town houses, still not getting this man and his sentiment. “All good, yeah?”

All good, is what Draco wants to say, but the words cannot quite clear his throat because they do not seem all that true, because to really be all good he would have to ask Harry the question that has been burning up, he would have to know for sure that he had a place here.

“Perfect, Harry.” Draco reaches out to take his hand and Harry lets him, stands up to meet him for a kiss, the first kiss in this new house, realtor be damned. “Absolutely perfect.”

They spend a lot of time in the house that day,bing through it, checking what needs to be done and what can stay, deciding how many of their things from Grimmauld Place shoulde with them.

“None.” Harry decides it for the both of them, looking around the empty rooms and shaking dust off the abandoned curtains. “It’s going to be a new start, Draco. An entirely new home.”

Draco agrees, but really, as much as he hated it in the beginning, he would miss Grimmauld Place. It’s a dreary old thing, but he could not hate it, not when it was the only thing that had spared him from a prison cell, and not when it was where he and Harry found their way to each other. He knows that you have to move on to move forward, but he does not want to scrub it out of their lives just yet, just when things were going so good.

The two of them take a tour together, and Harry babbles on, about letting Draco choose the art work to go on the walls through the hallways, and how they could put picture frames up on the wall along the stairs. He talks about expanding the dining room so all the Weasleys can fit, because now that he has a real home he wants to have them over, and goes out into the greenhouse with the broken roof and rotting support beams, talks about planning to mend it, says that he might take up gardening.

The entire house is a project, something to keep Harry’s mind off things, keep him moving forward while he figures all the unanswered aspects of his life out. Draco tries not to worry about that, about what happens when he runs out of things to fix.

“And here,” Harry swings the door to the shed open, which is magically enhanced on the inside to be as large as a full scale garage. “Can be a potions workshop for you, once we fix it up. Put in some shelves, a fireplace, a work table, some cupboards, a presto—” He moves his hand in a sweeping motion and the picturees, unbidden, of Draco out in this shed during the day and Harry out fixing something in the house, the two of theming back to meet together for dinner, maybe popping over to the Weasley’s just for a moment, and then spending quiet nights at home over and over and over again. “It’s a space fit for a king. Or a potions master, whichever.”

He is smiling at him, softly, sweetly, like he is so desperately trying to make this work, to keep Draco happy. It chases the doubt around and around in his eyes, makes it clear out to make more room for the good stuff.

And yet.

“I love it.” Draco squared his shoulders back and made a show of inspecting things, making plans, giving Harry murmuredpliments about the shed while he makes plans of his own. “Truly, Harry, I do.”

The papers are still piled up on the bedside table, which is really what gives Draco the idea.

He calls Angie, the realtor, who is a squib but does have a knack for getting extraordinary deals on magical homes. She picks up on the first ring.

“Hello?” She’s in a bad mood, he can tell from the biting in her voice.

“Angie?” Nothing from the other line. “It’s me, Draco.”

He keeps his eye on the door while he speaks, straining his ears to make sure the water from the shower was still running. It would not do to have Harry bursting in during this particular conversation. “No, the cottage was fine. This isn’t about Harry.” It feels like betrayal, what he’s doing. Draco isn’t sure how to think of it. It wasn’t good, but it was necessary, in a way. “This is about me. I need a house, too, as it happens. ot to mention it earlier.”

He can feel the stunned silenceing from the other end of the line and it hurts, because she, too, had assumed that he and Harry were a package deal. He doesn’t have the heart to tell her that there have been all kinds of such disappointments today.

“Of course, Mr. Malfoy.” He didn’t like to hear that name. It made him feel like something he wasn’t, something he never wanted to be. “I’m sure we can find just the thing we’re looking for.”

“I’m sure you do,” Draco murmurs, and hangs up just as soon as Harry pops his head in through the door, a towel wrapped around his waist, and when Harry asks who he was talking to, he barely feels guilty when he tells him that Angie had called just to make sure that all the paperwork had been sent over to the ministry.

It wasn’t final, after all. It’s not like he was planning to move out right this very moment.

It’s only preemptive. Draco thinks, watching Harry dress, still trying to figure it out, because while Harry hadn’t ever done anything to suggest that he was unwee toe with him to his new home, he really hadn’t done anything to suggest that he was, either. Just in case.

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