rry tries to stop the hurt from creeping in. “It’s suffocating, Potter. Go bother somebody else with your goddamned heroplex. I’m sure there’s a lot who’d love to have your attention.”

It’s not working. Everything that Draco says still stings.

Harry looks away, unable to look at Draco’s sneer anymore, not when he’s gotten so used to his face without it. “Yes, Malfoy, I do want to be friends with you,” he mutters. He takes a deep breath to ease the tightness in his chest. “I…thought we already were.”

He stands up, ready to flee, ready to lick his wounds. “I guess not.”

And Draco crumples to the floor with a dull thud.

When Dracoes to, Harry’s too tired from the onslaught of emotions he’s been through for the day to explain why they’re sitting on the floor of thepartment, legs folded in awkward angles to fit the tight space, and arms pressed against each other.

“Wee back,” Harry says instead. “I fixed your face.”

Draco’s head is bent dangerously close to Harry’s shoulder. He doesn’t move it. “My face doesn’t need fixing. It’s impable.”

The smile is in Harry’s voice. “Mm-hmm.”

Minerva McGonagall, now Headmistress, wees all of them. After delivering a short but emotional speech, one that leaves many students dabbing at their eyes with their sleeves, the Sorting and the Weing Feast begins. Classes resume as usual, with the eighth years following the schedule of the seventh years.

But much is different, including the unusually quiet atmosphere of the school, made by the reduced student population and the grim, physical reminders of the war that had urred in these very halls just months ago.

Some areas are still blocked for repairs, with the promise that repairs are to beplete before Halloween.

The first month is the hardest of all: Students have lost their reservations at ambushing them left and right to ask for pictures and autographs. He finds that he can’t even relax in themon Room without someone sitting next to him and asking him how he ‘vanquished the Dark Lord’. Hermione’s taken to spending long hours in the library just to be able to study in peace, with a grumble of The next time somebody disturbs me in themon Room, I might actually hex their lips off.

Worst of all, adding to his budding irritation, he can’t even go near Draco anymore without being blocked by a doting fan, though, Harry thinks, this is probably a good thing. Draco never really retracted what he had said back in the Hogwarts Express, and his words have done a good job in convincing Harry to grit his teeth and ignore the urge to actively seek out blond hair and pale skin.

But even so, at night, with a sense of guilt gleefully lounging in his stomach, he can’t help but return to old habits:

Looking at the Marauders’ Map.

“Huh,” Hermionements one fine weekend morning.

“Huh?” Ron asks, looking up from the chicken pot pie that he had been devouring. “What’s huh?”

Hermione’s twirling her quill, and there is an open tome laid out beside her half-eaten plate of breakfast. Ron and Harry have tried and failed to get her to stop studying on the breakfast table. (“It’s too early for me to look at a book, 'Mione!”Ron had failingly pleaded.)

“Huh,” Hermione repeats, pointing with her quill to the other side of the room.

Ron looks at where she’s pointing, blinks, stares, and then also says, “Huh.”

Harry, who is sitting across from them and thus facing backwards from their source of curiosity, turns on impulse. “What are you guys looking at?”

He scans the Great Hall, but sees nothing out of the ordinary. It’s already late in the morning, and so the Great Hall is not as crowded as it usually is during meals. Students mill around and groups of friends cluster together in chitchat and laughter. He turns back to his own friends. “I don’t see it.”

Ron snorts, turning back to his beloved pie. “I’m surprised. You’re always the first to see him.”

Harry’s cheeks slowly colour as he realizes who they’re talking about. “I haven’t…I mean. Not lately.”

Ron rolls his eyes. “I see you with the Map at night, Harry.”

“I don’t use it to look for him!” Harry defends, blushing furiously, but he immediately knows that it’s a pathetic lie. Ron and Hermione’s eyebrows are both raised. “Not just him.”

“Bollocks,” Ron says. “You better start using it on Astoria Greengrass, too. They’re getting awfully touchy.”

It’s really taking a lot of self-control not to turn in his seat right now. There’s an ache in his heart, but he’s used to that, so he stubbornly ignores it. “Well, it’s not any of my business, is it?”

Hermione smiles at him sympathetically. “I guess not.”

Harry starts looking for Astoria Greengrass in the Marauders’ Map.

He’s dismayed to find that, over the course of the next few weeks, her name and Draco’s name are more often than not beside each other in the Slytherinmon Room.

But it’s not any of his business.

It doesn’t have anything to do with him.

Nothing at all.

He goes about his every day, studying for tests, avoiding photographs, and laughing with friends, resolutely pretending that it doesn’t hurt.

“Harry,” Ginny pleads, a day after all the Halloween festivities. It is late in the afternoon, and the sky is an overcast grey. In an hour, it will be dinnertime. They’re sitting together in one of the stone benches in the clock tower courtyard, where Ginny had cornered him in a last ditch effort. “The Ravenclaws are decimating us. We need you.”

Harry grins at her sheepishly. They’ve had this conversation before, numerous times in the Burrow, and he thinks Ginny’s still trying just for the sake of it. “I’m sorry, Ginny. I just don’t feel like it. I just want to finish the school year in peace.”

Ginny sighs exasperatedly, crossing her arms like a petulant child. “Don’t you miss flying?”

“I do,” Harry says, laughing at her reaction. “Just not the attention, I guess? Besides, you’re doing well. I watch all your matches and you haven’t let anyone score yet.”

Ginny preens at the praise. Then, she narrows her eyes at him. “Is it…because of…you know…”

Harry’s eyes widens, waving his hands, the denial immediately on his lips. “Oh, no! No, no, no. It’s fine, Gin, I’m not avoiding you, if that’s what you’re thinking. That’s not it at all.”

Ginny smiles, shoulders relaxing. “Okay. Good.” Then, she looks around the courtyard, sees no one else, and then leans in to whisper. “Well, is it because of…?”

“Of…?”

“Well, uhm.” She smiles, almost apologetically. “Malfoy?”

Harry’s gobsmacked expression just makes her laugh. “I’m sorry. Ron’s been telling me about it. I mean, he doesn’t mean bad, he’s just worried.”

Harry feels his face burning. It’s one thing to know that his friends know, and quite another to talk about it with them. He’s gotten used to it being this open secret, the big elephant in the room that nobody is allowed to talk about. “I know he is. And. No. It’s not about him. I think. I’m just really tired, I guess? I just want everyone to stop…I don’t know, treating me like I’m, err, Harry Potter.”

Ginny laughs, as she did before, before everything happened, as if she honestly finds him endearing. Her face is as bright as ever, her bright red hair flying as she throws her head back and laughs openly. Harry thinks he could fall in love with her again, if he tried. He thinks they could make it work.

“Okay, I’ll lay off.” She grins, eyes twinkling. “But could you maybe sit in on some practices? Beat some skills into our Seeker? He’s good, really good, but he just doesn’t have the same sense for the Snitch like you did.”

Harry grins back at her. “Why don’t you be the Seeker? Ravenclaw won’t stand a chance.”

And then, as always, he is the first to spot that blond hair.

Ginny sees him staring over her shoulder, turns around, and blinks. “Oh. Malfoy.”

At the end of the courtyard, Draco is descending the steps from the clock tower. His pallor is paler than usual, like he’s still sick, but his feet doesn’t slow down. He nods at them in polite greeting, passing by them without losing stride. “Terribly sorry for the disturbance. Carry on.”

Harry is up on his feet in a heartbeat. “Malfoy.”

He doesn’t know why it feels like he has just been caught doing something he isn’t supposed to do. He just feels that Draco’s gotten it all wrong somehow. Why that matters, he doesn’t know either, because Draco and Astoria are probably going out, so he doesn’t know why he feels the need to explain himself.

Draco doesn’t stop, of course. He enters the bridge that leads to the Stone Circle, not once looking back.

Ginny takes hold of his sleeve. Harry looks at her, surprised, and she nudges her head towards Draco’s direction.

To his surprise, she doesn’t look annoyed at Draco’s rudeness like he had expected her to be. In fact, she looks worried, and he is relieved and grateful all at the same time.

He thinks he could fall in love with her again.

But he knows that’s not what she deserves.

And not what he wants.

“Malfoy! Wait!”

They’re on the bridge, and the cold November wind slaps at their robes and bites their cheeks. Draco doesn’t stop, but Harry hadn’t really expected him to, and so he leaps forward and grabs Draco’s wrist.

Draco turns to him, glaring, but he still looks pale and tired and despite what a git Draco’s being, Harry can’t help but be worried.

“What do you want, Potter?”

“Wait, Malfoy, I just want to talk.”

“Well, I don’t, now go away. Go back to your girlfriend. I’m sure she’s waiting for you.”

Harry blinks in confusion. “Ginny? She’s not my girlfriend.”

“Well, I don’t really care who you choose to fuck. You do you.”

Harry frowns. He hasn’t let go of Draco’s wrist yet. There are so many things he doesn’t understand, why Draco’s looking like he’s about to pass out any minute, why he’s lashing out so much, and at the back of his mind, at the very back of his mind, there is a small voice whispering to him that it almost seems like Draco’s…jealous.

“Don’t talk about her like that,” he says, as calmly as he can to will away the irritation starting to itch under his skin.

Draco sneers, and suddenly, Harry is hit with a sense of sadness that it’s been such a long time since he’s seen Draco’s face honest and open, mouth curved into a smile, eyes shining under the bright, morning sun. He hates that Draco’s so guarded. Again. As if summer never happened. As if those banana pancakes shared together and walks in the garden didn’t exist.

He hates that he’s still holding on to them, like a lovesick idiot.

“You’re the one who wanted to talk, Potter.”

Harry drops his wrist, shaking his head. He glares back, scowling. “Merlin, Malfoy, what’s gotten into you? I just wanted to ask how you’re doing.”

“Great. Splendid. Now, will that be all?” Draco turns away, ready to leave.

“No, Malfoy—”

Draco turns his head back, eyes burning with anger, mouth curled into a snarl as he hisses: “Leave me alone. Go fuck Weasley already, if you’re so desperate for a shag—”

Harry slams his fist on the railing. The clang of metal rings loudly in the valley, and

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