Draco knew that it was silly, but he really didn’t have a better way to explain how he looked at Potter. Every day he spent together with Potter meant that he became less and less of the figure head for the war that Draco had once known him as, learning just how much Potter too resented the war and the fact that he had come to represent.
However, a part of Draco desperately needed Potter to still be the golden boy, desperately needed some kind of plausible deniability for the fact that he had spent a decade hidden away from the public eye, just out of fear for what they’d say. It wasn’t a baseless fear and that made it even harder for Draco to be able to let it go, wanting some part of them to still belong at Hogwarts, as if they were still kids.
This, of course, wasn’t something he knew how to articulate to Potter, or even if he should attempt to do so at all. Despite how the two of them had become closer in the time Potter had spent at the manor, Draco still kept himself guarded, not wanting to open up too much, in case Potter was going to end up using it against him later.
“The golden man doesn’t really have the same ring to it,” he simply stated, leaning back against the arm cushion of the couch, looking at Potter and realising that his hand was very close to him.
It made him think of just how cold it had been this morning in the kitchen and also made him wonder if it would be just as cold now. With alcohol in Potter’a system and being located in essentially the warmest room of the manor, it definitely should be warmer.
The curiosity got the better of Draco, as he reached out to briefly brush the back of his hand against Potter’s, attempting to be subtle but probably failing.
Potter was still unusually cold.

_________________

It was only because Malfoy had shifted, further forcing the two men to face one another, that Harry would even have noticed his attention waver. Malfoy’s eyes had dipped, and Harry’s followed them to his left hand, still lingering on the backrest between them.
Though it couldn’t have been long, Harry felt the weight of Malfoy’s eyes, too aware of the visibility of the script scarred into his skin. It made him wonder if Malfoy felt responsible, if only partially, something that made Harry want to speak on it, feeling like he had little right to hold Malfoy responsible for Umbridge’s actions.
Harry’s lips had parted when Malfoy reached out, brushing their hands together. It made Harry’s mind go blank, heart pummelling to the pit of his stomach with enough force to give him vertigo.
Immediately Harry’s attention returned onto Malfoy, desperate for any explanation. The other had already retracted his hand, making it appear as nothing more than a thoughtless impulse. The inherent tenderness of the touch, however, was impossible to shake, struggling to comprehend where it had come from.
It took Harry a moment for his mind to catch up, and when he did, he felt foolish for having thought it could be anything else.
"You’re really fixating on that, huh?" he challenged, grateful to hear a steadfast laugh seeping into his voice. It made him appear less bothered, especially given that his heartrate had elevated itself as his heart resettled in his chest.
Increasingly humoured on Malfoy’s behalf, Harry, in a moment of boldness, shifted forward. While Malfoy had barely brushed a discreet touch to Harry’s skin, Harry reached to brazenly take Malfoy’s in his.
There was a smile on Harry’s lips, the glass and a half visible in his gaze. "Is there anything I can say to convince you that this is normal for me?"

While Draco was well aware of the fact that he hadn’t exactly been sneaky in his attempt to figure out whether or not Potter was still cold, nothing could have prepared him for Potter taking his hand so abruptly. It felt weird, but whether it was because Draco was completely unable to remember the last time he had held anyone’s hand, or because Potter was so unbelievably cold was hard to say.
“No,” Draco admitted, knowing that he wasn’t very likely to let this go. He simply found it to be too unusual to not be even mildly related to the case, he simply refused to believe it and was utterly incapable of wrapping his head around it.
The sight of their hands wrapped together was an odd one, Draco concluded as he carefully held onto his wine with his free hand. They were in a weird situation and Draco wished that he could make more sense of anything, yet Potter’s temperature seemed like a good place to start to him.
“I wish I could tell you that if you want me to then I’ll let it go,” Draco stated, knowing that that just wasn’t an option.

_________________

“But you won’t,” Harry finished the sentiment with a smile, leaning back into the armrest and drawing his hand with him and out of Malfoy’s.
He still wondered if he could, though, speak a sense of shame into Malfoy’s persistence. He hadn’t been the first to question Harry’s unsettlingly low body temperature, and given time, Harry knew Malfoy would eventually stumble upon those exact speculations written down by his Healers. They weren’t exactly cheery, but they were, in fact, completely harmless.
For now, Harry held his peace, taking a drink; the topic was still more humorous than it was bothersome.
"Alright," he forfeited light heartedly.
He rested the wineglass atop of his thigh, fingers still curled around the stem as he watched Malfoy. One day he would have to tell him to stop wasting Ministry resources on nothingness, but not yet. "Is your interest medicinal or scientific?"

Just how easily Potter seemed to accept the fact that Draco was going on a tangent that he clearly didn’t believe in made him feel a wide array of things. More than anything, he was still struck by the intimacy of them having held hands, and now by the emptiness of said hand being gone again.
He didn’t want to think too much of it, not wanting to consider just how little physical contact he had had with another person for years, and how easy that contact seemed to be for Potter.
“Both, I guess,” he stated with a shrug.
He was a still convinced that Potter’s body temperature had something to do with the dark magic that was lodged in his chest, but even if it wasn’t, he would find it medically interesting to know exactly how Potter was this cold, and if maybe something could still be done about it.
“I have to take anything that even remotely looks like a lead to me. Might not be anything, but it will give me a clearer picture of what’s going on.”

_________________

Harry’s brows quirked over the rim of the glass, pleasantly surprised by the fact that Malfoy seemed aware of the fact that it might be a dead end. It was, however, apparent that he wouldn’t take Harry’s word for it, having to come to that conclusion on his own.
Harry thought that to be fair.
"I understand," he offered, reaching over to place the now empty glass on the side table.
When he resettled, he crossed his arms over his chest, but his expression remained opened and satiated.
"As always, let me know if there’s anything I can provide." Something in his easy smile changed, explicitly humoured. He reiterated, grinning. "If I can lend you a hand."

There was something disarming about the way that Potter always seemed to have a clever reply to just about anything that Draco had to say. It didn’t help that it was usually accompanied by that grin of his, something that made him look so much like the person that Draco had went to school with, but somehow set in an entirely new context.
“Thank you,” Draco said, unsure exactly which part of it he was thanking. More than anything else, he was just so deeply grateful that Potter trusted him so blindly with it all, despite how large the possibility of him being wrong was.
“I shall let you know.”

_________________

_____________

Today had, without comparison, been the longest day yet. Harry had barely left the study for anything, much less for lunch and dinner. Both had kindly been served by Coote at their desks, and Harry had worked through both breaks, deep in old case files. It had been past midnight when he finally got up with the intent to leave.
It was as if speaking his parting goodnight had underlined the fact that they had barely spoken a word to one another; Harry found that as soon as he had said one thing to Malfoy, another dozen things came up, making it hard to stop.
Harry had eventually taken a seat across from Malfoy, the lounger considerably more comfortable than his own wooden chair. The case-related considerations had eventually run up, but Harry hadn’t taken his leave. For the first time in two and a half weeks, the two talked to one another.
It had been an hour since Harry had said his goodnights.
"At fourteen? I can barely solve a riddle now," he said, head reasted in his hand. Through out the passing hour, Harry had slumped further and further into the armchair, right foot bobbing lazily over his left knee.
"I cheated through the entire thing," he admitted, grinning. Part of him felt certain it would only serve as material in Malfoy’s undoubtedly large archives of times Harry’d been let off easy, but Harry thought the Triwizard Tournament had been anything but easy. "I don’t even feel bad about it, I shouldn’t’ve been in it to begin with. Took a village to get me through the tasks."

Draco had sincerely wanted to keep working when Potter said his final good nights, still finding that the work was endless, which just meant that he wanted to keep diving into it. However, once Potter had started talking, even if it had just been to say goodnight, he seemed to be completely unable to stop.
Draco really had no idea how long it had been since Potter started talking, nor did he have idea idea as to when he had started actually answering in full sentences and given up on his work. It seemed to have been ages and yet also just in the blink of an eye.
“I always thought you did,” Draco stated with a soft smile, not intending to be mean about it, but it always struck him as unusual how Potter had been able to do as well in the triwizard tournament as he did.
“I saw you in class, even with Granger’s help there was just absolutely no way that you’d be able to make it through on your own.”

_________________

As Malfoy spoke, Harry pulled a face, entirely in agreement with him. There had been absolutely no way Harry would’ve figured it out on his own, and he wasn’t surprised that it showed. It was entirely impossible to take any offence in Malfoy’s words, even if they hadn’t been softened by a smile.
"It wasn’t even just Hermione," Harry corrected, the smile increasingly brighter on his lips. It had truly been a disastrous year in more ways than one, but the trouble had started in the preparation ahead of the first task.
His head left his hand, straightening his posture slightly.
"Hagrid and Charlie Weasley let me know about the dragons, sure, Hermione helped me practice my Accio for the first task – Cedric Diggory himself had to help me out for the second."
Harry had always thought fondly of Cedric, finding that his death had done a better job of solidifying the end of his childhood than anything else. For the years following the Triwizard Tournament, it had been a recurring theme to his nightmares. "I told him about the dragons, so he said he owed me, but frankly I think it was pity."
Relaxing back into the seat, Harry folded his hands across his lap instead, the chill of the evening creeping to his fingertips. His smile changed, the fond recollection turning inadvertently boyish. "We had to shower with them, you know? The eggs."

It was incredibly different to see this open and more relaxed side of Potter. It was a side that Draco had managed to catch glimpses of in the time they had spent together, but he felt certain that this was the clearest heh ad seen Potter since he got there.
He still mostly seemed like the loud and brash Gryffindor kid that Draco knew, yet he could also see why people were still flocking around him as an adult. There was no denying that he was charismatic, even though he clearly knew that and wasn’t shy to let the world know that as well.
“You showered with Cedric Diggory?” Draco asked, knowing that that probably wasn’t the thing that he had been supposed to take away from what Potter had just said, but it had been what had stood out the most to him.
It wasn’t like it had come as a surprise to Draco himself that he had spent a lot more time eyeing both Diggory and Krum than he had Delacour while the triwizard tournament was on. However, it had forced him to face that facts about his own sexuality that he hadn’t been willing to admit for a long time.
By now, the fact that he was gay really was the least of Draco’s issues.

_________________

Some surprise became visible in Harry’s expression, lips remained parted in an interrupted addition. Then, perfectly able to understand why Malfoy might have misinterpreted Harry’s poor phrasing, the corners of his mouth quirked upwards in a toothy smile.
"If only," he chuckled, the honesty lost in his laughed voice. His head had tipped back against the backrest, and he watched Malfoy through heavy lids. "I had to shower with Myrtle, it was traumatizing."

Draco couldn’t help it. Like every other kid at Hogwarts, he had of course encountered moaning Myrtle, someone he did not fancy sharing a shower with.
More than anything though, it was just how calmly Potter managed to explain his alleged trauma that made Draco incapable of stopping laughing. Said as it sounded, he genuinely couldn’t remember the last time he had laughed, at least not when it was just in a regular conversation like this. It felt freeing in a way, almost as if it had been something he had held onto for too long and now finally got to let go of.
“Can’t say I blame you,” he said with a soft shake off is head, laugh still present in his voice, as he tried to gather himself once more. “Though I must say that Krum was more my type.”

_________________

Harry couldn’t remember ever having heard Malfoy laugh. Not like that, at least; Malfoy had often sneered at him, barked sounds that could perhaps had been considered a laugh had they not been tainted with malice. In childhood, it had made Harry’s blood boil, and for years it was the worst sound Harry could think of.
This was completely different.
Over the course of the passing weeks, Harry had accumulated new memories that each subtlety but effectively dismantled his mental image of Malfoy. The laugh finally solidified it, the complete and utter separation from past to present.
The Malfoy that sat in front of Harry was entirely new. Bright and unrestrained, strands of blond hair in his face, and for the first time ever, Harry realized Draco Malfoy was beautiful.
It hit Harry like a ton of bricks, forcing him to straighten his posture. He barely heard what Malfoy had said, his own heartbeat suddenly too loud in his ears.
"I still think it’s one of the most violating things that happened that year," he attempted, not keen on acknowledging the way it had made his brain buffer. The joke came out less convincingly than before, even despite his crooked smile. "Myrtle seeing me in the bath, having to waltz in front of the entire school, and only then followed by the death of my innocence."

It didn’t take long for Draco’s laugh to soften out and die, still interested in what Potter had to say about the entire thing. A soft smile remained on his lips though, probably the longest he had been smiling in one continuous stretch ever since Potter got there.
Being alone at the Manor left very little reason to smile after all, and he hadn’t wanted to let down his guard around Potter. That was quickly becoming too late.
“So what was worse,” Draco asked, eyes bright and smile still present. It was the most relaxed that Draco had felt in weeks and he was surprised to find that he actually enjoyed spending his time together with Potter more and more.
“Dragon, merfolk or Myrtle?” He asked with a crooked grin, finding it impossible to stop smiling now that he had finally begun.

_________________

Harry didn’t fail to notice the courtesy in the phrasing of Malfoy’s question, making Harry’s smile tug wider if only for a moment. Every joke aside, the final task of the Tournament had been one of the worst things Harry had lived through, and he was grateful that Malfoy had had enough sense not to juxtapose it to the previous two.
Relaxing back into the seat, Harry made a face, theatrically considering the question.
"I didn’t enjoy the merfolk," he eventually admitted, his smile only returning because Malfoy was still sporting his. Harry once again rested his temple in his hand, watching Malfoy with new eyes.
It wasn’t that Harry had ever thought Malfoy was disinterested in him, but he had come to realize he probably hadn’t before held his full attention like this. It made Harry’s skin feel warm, doing better of combatting the cold than any warming charm he could think of.
"Is it true that the Slytherin common room had windows to the lake?" Harry asked, out of genuine interest. "Do you consider them to be friendly and good company?"

While Draco had always enjoyed the window seats to the lake, he had never encountered many merfolk while he sat there. They usually stuck to themselves and the few times Draco had encountered them, it had been a brief affair.
“They never caused me any trouble,” he stated with a shrug. He had thought very little of his life at Hogwarts since he left it, having seen no point in lingering on his glory days for any amount of time. In fact, he was starting to consider that even his time at Hogwarts wasn’t all that, even though it was by far and large the best time of his life so far.
“But yes, it is true,” he said with a soft smile still on his lips. It was strange to think that they honest didn’t know a lot about what the other houses’ common rooms looked like, but had felt so natural while they were at Hogwarts that Draco had never considered it before.
“We did have windows into the lake.”

_________________

Harry nodded at that, trying to reimagine his years at Hogwarts in a subaquatic common room. It was difficult even to know where to begin, some of the more vivid memories of his dorm room having been waking up and immediately getting a sense of the wind, ever eager to go for a fly.
Harry wasn't sure he would have enjoyed the Slytherin common room, but he did think it suited Malfoy, his skin so transparently pale he always seemed bathed in light filtered through water.
"Must've been quiet," he said, and though it was spoken objectively it was intended as a praise. It showed in his smile, gentle at the corners.
While it wouldn't have suited him in his teens, Harry thought Grimmauld to be equally quiet as he imaged the Slytherin dorms to be. Though that was in part sue to the heavy wards, no sounds ever travelling in from the neighbours, it should probably be attributed Harry living there alone. He could really appreciate that heavy silence, a weighted blanket over all senses.

That was something that Draco actually had to give thought, having never given the noise level much thought when he was a teen. Furthermore, the common room had always been filled with people, so it was impossible to tell if it was any louder or quieter than the other common rooms.
So instead, Draco simply shrugged, eyes still resting on Potter and the soft smile seeming to have become a more permanent feature on his face. It was a strange thing to consider, but apparently all it had taken was to start smiling at Potter to make him completely unable to stop.
“Well, it was usually full of people so I can’t speak on that,” he stated with a shrug, not sure if he had a lot more to say on that. In fact, it felt a little weird to him to even think about his time at Hogwarts; knowing that it was the only thing that truly tied them together, yet it felt like it was something that Draco had lived in a different life.
“How was the Gryffindor common room?”

_________________

Harry's expression brightened at the question. He was sure Malfoy had only asked to drive conversation, but it managed to strike a core that inevitably brought a smile to his lips.
"Perfect," he said, wearing a pure blissful smile at the recollection. Though his years at Hogwarts had entailed some of the worst trauma of his life, nothing would ever compare to the sense of security the Gryffindor canopy beds had given him. "The best room I've ever had."
Much of that was symbolical rather than practical. It was his first ever room and his first taste of real, unconditional friendship. The sound of the wind and rain against the tower roof had been previously unknown to him, packed away bellow the stairs at Privet Drive. He had often considered reclaiming the attic at Grimmauld for a bedroom, if only to move closer to those specific sounds. "I wish I hadn't missed out sleeping on the top floor."
Not wanting to linger on things that couldn't be explained without starkly changing the tone of the conversation, Harry eventually shifted, brushing a curl behind his ear before relaxing his cheek back into his hand.
"The Burrow was lovely, too," he recalled, but those memories had been washed over with a broad sense of regret. Harry had stayed in Ginny's bedroom, remembering her laugh that what was hers was his.
His smile had paled, though it did remain, barely visible at the corners of hu
Is mouth. The Burrow no longer stood the test of time, no longer as much home as Hogwarts continued to be. "I lived with the Weasleys the first year after the war, while I was in training and Ginny finished her 7th year."