lomonaaeren | Part 3 of 'Company Manners'

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“Good work, Harry.” Kingsley studied the stack of reports in front of him, ornamented now with notes that he’d written down as Harry told him about his conversations at the Zabinis’ party last night, and finally smiled. “I think we’ve managed to prevent war for at least another week.” He signed one of the reports with a flourish and then leaned back, stretching his arms above his head.

Harry gave a small smile back. He and Kingsley had a strange relationship. Harry reported all he saw and said and overheard at parties and galas, weddings and funerals, directly to the Minister, since no one else could be trusted with the sensitive information. Kingsley used that information to make decisions—from where to send Harry next to who might need to be followed or contacted and invited to air their grievances to the Ministry. The decisions he had made had mostly been good, and Harry couldn’t say that he had a complaint about what his observations were used for.

At the same time, he couldn’t forget that Kingsley had originally got him into the intense training needed to make those observations because of guilt. He’d played on Harry’s guilt about not doing enough in the war, not doing enough since the war to help wizarding society, and getting several of his partners severely wounded—and one killed—when he was still trying to be a field Auror.

Harry knew he could stop being Kingsley’s tame gossip-hound if he wanted to. But then he would worry about the Minister’s decisions in the wake of his quitting. Besides, he didn’t think he would know what to do with himself now; he wasn’t made to sit around doing nothing in a secure house like most of the pure-bloods he knew.

And the guilt would come back. At least he could keep guilt and depression at bay when he was spying because he was too busy to feel them.

Harry shook his head. He’d had about enough of his internal monologue for one day, and he stood up and started to head out of the Minister’s office.

Then he paused and thought again about something that had troubled him since he heard Malfoy’s story last night. Of course Malfoy had only told that story for an ulterior motive, probably to manipulate Harry into feeling so sorry for him that he would agree to go on a date. And of course he wasn’t the only pure-blood to stare into Harry’s eyes desperately after repeating some sad story and hope for sympathy.

But Harry had got fairly good at telling absolute lies from smaller lies, at least. Malfoy’s story had the ring of truth.

“Kingsley,” he said, glancing over his shoulder. “I want to ask a favor.”

The Minister looked up. He evidently found Harry’s continual dedication to his job a cause for unease—maybe because he remembered clearly how difficult the training to do that job had been—and he looked forwards to any attempt to repay him. Or so his wide smile said, at least. “Yes, Harry?”

“There’s a potions brewer named Paul Breaker living in the States right now,” Harry said casually. “He hurt one of my—acquaintances. Someone who didn’t deserve to be hurt. A personal injury, not something that broke a law,” he added when Kingsley’s gaze sharpened, “unless breaking the common human code of decency is a crime, which it should be. But this person I know is still suffering under that injury. I’d like to arrange a bit of payback for Mr. Breaker.”

Kingsley smiled. “Do you know,” he remarked, apparently to thin air, “I’ve always found the American Aurors annoying, officious, and overly dogged when they start having a reason to suspect someone. Forever staring penetratingly, tracking and holding up shipments of rare potions ingredients, asking questions that are a devil to answer properly. It would be a shame if something like that happened to Mr. Breaker.”

“Such a shame,” Harry said gravely. “I hope it doesn’t.”

Kingsley shook his head. “Alas,” he intoned, as he turned towards the fireplace that Harry knew connected with the International Floo, “sometimes bad luck has a habit of fastening onto one person and continuing to happen. Very strange.”

Harry flipped Kingsley a salute and stepped out of the office, feeling happier than he had in a while.

Since last night, he realized with a start. Good God, I know that Malfoy was only telling that story to get close to me. That’s how I heard all about Pandora Nelson’s grandchildren and Pius Thicknesse’s diseases.

But it seemed that part of him was softer than he’d thought any part still could be, and believed Malfoy without reservation, and wanted to punish the man who had hurt him.

Malfoy would never know, of course. Harry doubted that he was still in contact with Breaker, and he had no reason to connect Harry with the harassment even if he heard about it. It would only seem like karma coming around.

As it should be, Harry thought, and then smiled. Now that he was done with his report to Kingsley, he could go home, throw off these uncomfortable, restrictive robes, and claim his bet from Ron. As usual, the Cannons hadn’t won.

Besides, Ron was always the most fun to tease when he had a hangover and Hermione was keeping the Hangover Potion out of reach “to teach him to behave himself.”

Whistling cheerfully—there were fewer people to think savage things about him in the Ministry than in the pure-bloods’ parties—Harry went to have lunch with his friends.

*

“Draco.” Blaise’s voice was gentle. “Don’t you think that you’re taking this a bit personally?”

Draco didn’t answer for long moments, too busy gazing in the mirror. He nodded. Finally, the dark robes he’d chosen hung on his shoulders the way he wanted them to, and he’d enchanted them to a shade that made him look intriguingly pale instead of washed-out. “Potter will eat his heart out,” he muttered. Then he turned a bright glance on Blaise and smiled. “I’m sorry, did you say something?”

Blaise sighed, stood up, and reached out to clasp Draco’s shoulders. Draco moved backwards in response. “Don’t touch,” he warned. “I just got my robes the way I want them, and if you make me have to arrange them again, then Astoria will need to send the house-elves looking for your teeth.”

Blaise looked faintly impressed for a moment before he shook his head. “It’s nothing personal, Draco. Potter always does this. People try to enchant or bribe him, and sometimes that includes appeals to his sympathy. He always listens enough to make them feel good and then slips away when they try to tighten the noose around his neck. That’s what he did with you.”

“But mine was different.” Draco could hear the vibrating tension in his voice, and he thought about concealing it, then decided he didn’t care. The things he said, both to Potter and to Blaise, were true, He would make them recognize that if it took him years. “I told him what really happened, something I didn’t even tell you or my parents, and he flung it in my face.”

“What would you have done if he’d believed you?” Blaise asked.

Draco snorted. “I asked your wife to seat me together with Potter at that party, and you still don’t know what I want?”

“Wrong question, then.” Blaise leaned on the wall and stared up at the ceiling, a technique that Draco had seen him use many times to control his temper. “All right. If Potter had accepted everything you said from the beginning and offered you all the sympathy you wanted, what would you have felt?”

Draco paused. Then he turned away and looked into the mirror once more, smoothing his hand down the front of his robes and pointedly ignoring Blaise.

“Draco.” Blaise paused, seemed to see not much good coming from that, and then began to recite in a singsong voice. “Draco. Draco. Draco. Draco. Draco. Dr—”

He spun back, his wand drawn, and cast a Silencing Charm. Blaise closed his mouth at once and looked smug. Draco spent a few moments persuading himself that Blaise’s looks wouldn’t really be improved if Draco moved all his hair to his chin, and then shook his head.

“Yes, all right, you’ve made your point,” he muttered. “I would have felt contempt for him for believing me so quickly and easily. I might also have been embarrassed. Any lover I take has to be clever enough to distinguish traps from reality.” He glared at Blaise. “But it’s unnatural for him to feel nothing.”

Blaise reversed the Silencing Charm with a bit of nonverbal magic. “Why, Draco? You would have felt nothing before Breaker. You would have felt nothing if you’d spent the last five years in England, the way you should have, and led the same kind of life Potter has during that time. I’m worried about you because I don’t think that you really know what you want. A perceptive lover who gives you the benefit of the doubt, but also doubts you, because that’s what someone intelligent would do? That’s impossible.”

Draco frowned and spent a few moments considering. The substance of Blaise’s complaints was nonsense; Draco knew why he had been so affected when Potter pushed him away after listening to his story. But the suggestion that he didn’t know what he really wanted from Potter was probably true.

And what do I want?

Someone who will do what Paul couldn’t. Someone who will make me feel at home and listen to me, respect me, and give me the sympathy he couldn’t. Someone who will care for my pleasure as well as his own in bed. Someone beautiful, so that I don’t have to be ashamed of being with him.

But what makes me think that I’ll find that person in Potter?

Draco relaxed and attempted to sigh out most of his frustration. He had latched onto the first person he saw and tried to sculpt that person into the image of the man he wanted. It was exactly the same thing he had done with Paul: he was so eager to find someone who would love him unreservedly that he chose bad candidates. He didn’t want to wait.

And he still didn’t see why he should have to wait. But it appeared that the universe did not want to be just to Draco.

“You’re right,” he told Blaise, who looked suitably baffled by the compliment. It wasn’t often that Draco made a mistake. “Potter acted exactly like any proper pure-blood would—which means he isn’t the man I need. I’ll give up chasing him quite so hard.”

But I still want to have my revenge on him. I took a risk, and it only failed because Potter had to be so proper. He’ll learn better, and I’ll leave him stinging and smarting when I move on to find my perfect man.

“I’m proud of you, Draco,” Blaise said, while looking at him if as if he’d announced a passion for Weasleys. “Forgiveness is a rare virtue.” And not yours, said the loud silence between them.

Draco smiled serenely and faced the mirror, once again adjusting the hang of his robes. “Thank you,” he told his reflection. He added a few subtle glamour charms, then began tuning them. He’d been in close enough contact with Potter now that he could use magic to catch and hold his attention, even if against his will, though the glamours weren’t strong enough to make Potter think him beautiful or fall hopelessly in love with him.

A few stumbles in the dance. A longing look on his face as he realizes what he can never have. An erection or two in inappropriate places. Any of that would be enough for me.

He knew he was lying as he thought it. He could no longer be satisfied with such mundane punishments, not when his pride was still recovering from Paul’s injury to it.

But it sounded like a good place to begin.

*

He’s using magic, the little git.

Harry found his eyes wandering to Malfoy again, leaving the face of the woman, Emma Lansby, he was whirling around the dance floor. He nearly tripped over his robe, and righted himself only with a slightly too enthusiastic swing to the left. Lansby frowned at him. She was the sort of pure-blood who tended to judge on superficialities and assume that any mistake was a harbinger of more to come. And Kingsley had told Harry that impressing her was of the first importance, since, while on the surface this was a party to celebrate the betrothal of two young pure-bloods, it was an open secret that some of the more rigorous blood purists were meeting here. Lansby was to be Harry’s ticket into the party beneath the party.

Malfoy, of course, moved around the floor at the moment with Astoria Zabini, his back to Harry, but that didn’t matter. Even his shoulders could be smug.

Harry turned back to Lansby, smiled gently into her eyes, and placed one of his hands over his heart in a short bow. Not incidentally, that brought his hand near the wand housed in his left sleeve. He murmured an apology at the same moment as he cast the Finite that would break whatever charm or glamour Malfoy had on him.

The magic melted away, and broke an invisible tension in the air. Harry let his smile at Lansby acquire a touch more reality. “My lady,” he murmured, “I was most interested in the presentation that you gave at the Minister’s lunch a fortnight ago.”

The title “my lady” was ridiculously flattering, but of course Lansby swallowed it. She smiled back for the first time and began to expand on the subject of the speech, which was the “duty” of wizards to “breed with their own kind.”

Harry listened with interest that she probably misread as eagerness to know more about the subject. On the surface, it was “only” Lansby and her group saying that wizards shouldn’t marry Muggles, but Harry knew exactly where that led.

It didn’t matter, though. He got paid to comb through the shite so that other people didn’t have to. He could entertain himself by thinking about the expression Lansby’s face would wear if she ever realized the use to which her information was being put.

*

He broke the charm.

Draco slid into the chair next to Astoria and swallowed to keep his fuming silent. He had expected to have a good time at this party. He was escorting Astoria due to her wanting to attend and Blaise needing to work late at the Ministry, and she was an elegant and amusing companion. Besides, he’d already seen Potter stumble twice as he escorted his dance partner.

But Potter wasn’t looking at him now; instead, he was talking intently to a witch several seats down as if he cared about her empty-headed notions. Draco had designed the glamours to strengthen throughout the evening, so by now Potter should have been leaning around his neighbors to peer at Draco. The only explanation could be that he’d broken the spells.

Draco smiled viciously as he remembered another of his schemes for revenge. It took a moment of careful maneuvering under the table; he didn’t want to aim his wand at the wrong person. But at last he found the angle and murmured, “Salax.”

Potter’s lips thinned, and his eyes bulged for a moment as though someone had pinched him on the arse. Then he half-closed his eyes as a bright red flush stained his cheeks. Draco chuckled. He would have an erection rising between his legs at the moment, and no way to deal with it subtly, given how close he was seating to his table partners. He tucked his wand into his sleeve and leaned back to enjoy the show.

“Are you all right, Mr. Potter?” the woman seated beside him asked. Draco identified her after a moment as Emma Lansby. He could have laughed aloud with delight. Trust her to notice something wrong and confront him about it. Already Lansby was puffing herself up like a pigeon, ready to seek out something that could offend her. Potter’s right hand was next to her, too, and he would have to move his wand openly to counteract the spell. It was perfect.

Potter bent over Lansby, a faint smile on his lips. Draco almost missed the small movements of his left hand and the easing in his face a moment later. He canceled my spell again, Draco thought in stupefaction. And with his left hand, no less. “I know that I can trust you,” Potter whispered. “I actually have an allergy to—”

Draco didn’t hear what kind of food Potter claimed was responsible for his condition, but whichever one it was, Lansby believed him. Her face smoothed out; her eyes gleamed with interest. No doubt she thought she knew something incriminating about Potter now. When she tried to follow up her “advantage,” of course, it would turn out to be illusory.

Draco ground his teeth. Nothing is going the way it should.

“I’ve often found,” Astoria remarked out of nowhere, “that those who continue foolish pursuits are the ones who end up caught, rather than their prey.”

Draco turned to her. The address almost meant he had to, reluctant as he was to take his eyes away from Potter. “Pardon?”

“Branson and I were discussing hunting,” Astoria said, with a slight gesture to the wizard seated on the other side of her. She picked up her wineglass and took a sip, her eyes bright and sharp as glass. “He remarked that a foolish pursuit happens when one knows the prey has the power to turn and rend one—and one does not have adequate defenses prepared in case that happens. I remarked that it was indeed the most foolish pursuit I could think of.” She leaned closer and lowered her voice into a hiss. “Well, perhaps one is more foolish, but surely no one I know would engage in it.”

Draco drove his fingers into his palm. That was permissible since his hands were beneath the surface of the table. Above, he kept his face expressionless and nodded in response to Astoria’s words. “Stupid, indeed.”

Branson demanded to know what they were talking about. Draco left Astoria to deal with him, as he knew she would, effectually, and turned back to his interrupted meal. His mind burned with humiliation, and he did not look at Potter again.

Potter soared untouched through Draco’s attempts to trap him as well as interest him. Draco knew he should have been the one to have such perfection by this point in his life, on the cusp of thirty, and he would have possessed it if not for Paul.

And Potter.

Draco nodded and smiled in response to something Astoria had said, but his eyes were fastened on Potter again, and this time he was making a promise to himself, something that would allow him to avoid the foolish pursuit Astoria had talked about, so he saw no need to apologize. I am going to make him pay.

But not here.

*

Harry flung himself into his favorite chair and sighed in relief, reaching for the glass of butterbeer that stood ready on a nearby table. He swished a mouthful of it around, washing out the taste that the wine had left behind. It had been especially bad tonight; apparently the Arrows or Westerlands, whichever family had been responsible for catering the party, had palates like leather. The bad taste wasn’t helped by Lansby’s teasing hints, either. She hadn’t got him into the inner circle of pure-bloods this time, but sometime soon…

He took a satisfied glance around his home, strengthening his sense of himself by the opposition of everything he could see to the houses where he normally spent his time. A Gryffindor banner, red and gold, hung above the fireplace, surrounded by Quidditch brooms that had been gifts from companies hoping to curry his favor. Harry couldn’t ride one of them without offending the other companies, so he hung them up and he and his friends made fun of their more ridiculous features. The walls were red and gold in that part of the room, white in most other places, with a comfortable brown carpet that made Harry feel as if he were sinking his toes into grass. Chairs and couches in various states of disrepair stood around the room. Harry had taken most of them from the Black house, and refused to allow Hermione or Kreacher to touch them, though he had banished the smell of mildew and mold that hung around some of them. He liked the thought that these were the exact same pieces of furniture Sirius had sat on when he was young and flung himself on and off of. Probably he’d picked some of the stuffing through its holes when he was bored of listening to his parents rant on about blood purity.

Hermione tried to get him to change the color scheme of the main room each time she came, and she found his bedroom, where Harry had mixed every strong color he could think of in various patches on the walls, horrifying. Harry didn’t care. He knew the pure-bloods he associated with would also find it horrifying.

That was rather the point.

Harry propped up his feet on the small shaggy stool and shut his eyes as he took another sip of butterbeer. A wizarding detective novel waited for him on the same table where the cup had been, tempting him to dip into the adventures of Wentworth the Elder, who had lost five whole years of his life to a Memory Charm and who continually won beautiful women only to lose them to burly Quidditch players, but Harry didn’t feel like it tonight.

He sat there and let the tension coil out of his muscles instead, running old Quidditch plays over in his memory. Slowly, his mind worked its way back into balance and he lowered his defenses the way he never could when he was showing people his fake self.

Then one of his wards blared.

Harry spun to his feet, his wand dropping automatically into his hand. Not all the assassination attempts had stopped when he dropped out of the Aurors. He strode to the front door, where he could get a good glimpse of the intruder through a magically concealed peephole.

Blond hair flashed near the window. Someone stood there and was peering inside in fascination. He must have been standing at a distance at first, and only moved closer in the last minute to trigger the wards.

Malfoy.

And Harry hadn’t drawn the curtains.

He stood still for a long moment, his defenses swinging back up, his mind spinning in place. He would have to do something to keep Malfoy from spreading stories, of course. It was one thing to choose to reveal his sloppy lifestyle as a weapon or during a final mission to break free of pure-blood society altogether; it was another thing to have someone spy it out and rush off to tell people.

Especially someone who had a grudge against him because he apparently expected Harry to fall into his arms crying with pity.

Harry finished the minute of standing still and decided on the mask to use. Then he opened the door and went to Malfoy.

*

Draco had been startled first by the small size of the house that Potter lived in. He would have pictured him taking over a manor where he could hang mirrors in every corner and glance at himself admiringly, or at least practice expressions for the game that he still couldn’t be very good at.

You know exactly how good he is, his memory whispered. Good enough to make you look a fool.

Draco snarled silently and moved around the house, keeping at a careful distance so as not to trigger the wards. Not to worry. He would make Potter look a fool in turn, and that would repay the debt. Draco could spend the rest of his life magnificently ignoring him, if he wanted.

The house was surrounded by a forest of wards, all of which turned threateningly towards Draco as he tried to work his way in. He frowned and stood back, shaking his head. He reckoned people might still want to kill Potter, but it made his own task inconvenient. He would have to find a hole in them, or take the chance of Transfiguring or conjuring another intruder for the wards to pay attention to—

Then he realized that a window on the ground floor didn’t have the curtains drawn over it. He could get a good look without breaching the wards after all.

Chuckling at Potter’s carelessness, Draco drifted closer. He craned his neck, searching for a sign of glass that he could smash over Potter’s head, expensive silver he could tarnish, priceless heirlooms he could animate to dash themselves to pieces. Or maybe a long-term Dirtying Charm would be best. Potter was probably too virtuous to keep a house-elf, and it was astonishing how much mess someone’s house could make when one enchanted it to do its very best.

But the only thing visible through the window was—plainness. Homeliness, even, given the ugly gold and red color Draco could just make out splashed on one wall. A Muggle telly sat in one corner, and there were random flowers in vases, and Potter had his Quidditch gear arranged on a rack of ordinary wood near the door.

Potter, at home, appeared to live like one of the lower classes.

Draco remembered what Astoria had said about Potter never truly accepting the values and standards of the people he made his living among. Draco had assumed that meant Potter kept his disdain for blood purity firmly in place.

But—not this.

Potter was living two separate lives, and so successfully that he could apparently manage to keep his ordinary friends and not chase them off with snobby pure-blood ways, while at the same time never betraying to a class of extremely competent observers that he didn’t maintain those same courtesies in his private life. Draco swallowed. That argued better for Potter’s intelligence and perceptiveness than anything had so far.

Which only irritated him further. Potter ought to have been able to see that Draco was sincere in the story he told him, rather than only angling for a prize. Draco wanted to punish him for having the gall to be a good match, someone Draco could have relied on to watch out for his best interest and appreciate his true worth, unlike Paul.

“Malfoy.”

Potter’s voice carried the same polished tone Draco had heard in it all evening, but this time he wasn’t controlling his expression. He stood on his front step, aiming his wand. Draco knew there was no chance that he would be able to draw his own before Potter would cast some spell.

There was no choice for it but to try placation, and Draco was in a slightly better mood after seeing Potter’s home. At least he knew that everyone in his social circles was being fooled together, not only him. He held out his hands slowly and said, “Potter. Quite a difference between this haunt and your usual ones.”

Potter didn’t smile. “I reckon you wanted to know a secret of mine, eh, Malfoy, in return for giving up one of your own? Well, you know it now. This is where I live, and yes, I live rather like a pig. Satisfied?”

Draco turned to glance through the window again. “Not like a pig,” he said. “I’ve seen pigs.” Paul would leave dirty dishes on the floor, stacked to waist-height, and drop any newspaper in the chair where he finished it, and never scrub his potions vials. It was a miracle he’d made as many discoveries as he had. “You’re neat. Just—less ostentatious than you should be.”

“Should be.” Potter smiled now, but without humor. “Yes, of course you would think that. What you don’t understand, Malfoy, is that this is where my real self lives, unlike the mask I present to people like you.” He murmured several quick Latin words under his breath, and Draco felt a tight band of magic settle around him.

“What did you do?” Draco demanded. Potter might not be an Auror, but he had trained as one for a while, and he was a powerful wizard, and he was irritated at Draco at the moment. Draco didn’t want to think about all the nasty possibilities that Potter could have just inflicted him with.

“Cast a spell to ensure that you can’t talk about this secret to anyone else.” Potter shrugged. “I didn’t have a choice about revealing it, while you did, but this doesn’t hurt me as much as showing yours hurt you. We ought to be even now.” He started to turn away.

“And that’s all you’re going to say?” Draco demanded in disbelief. He took several steps forwards and reached out to touch Potter’s shoulder.

Potter ducked under his hold and cast another spell Draco didn’t know, one that built an invisible wall in the air between them. Draco found that out when he reached again and bruised his knuckles on nothing. He cradled his hand and frowned at Potter. “You knew that I was revealing something heartfelt, and you chose to ignore it?”

Potter’s face worked for a moment, as if he were deciding whether to tell Draco something. Then he shook his head. “You don’t understand,” he said, with the same cutting patience he’d used two nights ago. “I could tell it was real, but lots of people tell me things that are real. That doesn’t mean they get to manipulate my reactions as a consequence.”

“The only thing,” Draco said, “that I wanted from you was some attention, some sympathy, and maybe a date.”

Potter’s eyes widened. Then he said, “It sounds like you’re telling the truth.” His voice was full of wonder.

Draco took a deep breath. His pride still urged him to have nothing more to do with Potter, unless he could make him look like a fool in public, but he was tired of acting according to the dictates of his pride. It was his pride that had kept him with Paul for so long, because it seemed better to stay than admit he’d made a mistake.

What do I want? That’s the question Blaise would ask me, and it’s still a wise one.

The answer is that I want Potter, if I could be sure that he would be the kind of man I see glimpses of.

“I am,” he said. “Please, will you come on a date with me?” The “please” hurt his throat, but he still said it. He stepped forwards, found the invisible wall gone, and brushed his fingers across Potter’s wrist, which made Potter’s eyelashes flutter. “As you said, we both know a secret now. I’d like to speak to you where others can’t overhear, where you’ll feel free to be honest.”

Potter gazed at him steadily for a long moment. Then he shook his head and said, “I wish I could.”

“What’s keeping you from doing so?” Draco demanded. He was seeing honest emotions in Potter’s eyes now, and they made his face more beautiful than ever. He took another step forwards. “I don’t think you have a lover right now.” Potter was the sort who would have made a space for his lover in his own house.

“I don’t date pure-bloods,” Potter said calmly. “Or anyone involved in that kind of scene, really.” He turned away and started walking towards his front door again.

Draco stepped in front of him this time. Potter stopped walking and rolled his eyes upwards. At least that was some reaction. Draco found himself passionately wanting to force Potter’s emotions from him, as much as he ever had during his time at Hogwarts.

“Rather prejudiced of you, don’t you think?” Draco asked, and let his face tighten with anger.

“It has nothing to do with that!”

There it is. Draco breathed in as if Potter’s rage was a scent he could smell, though he knew that was ridiculous. I knew he could still feel. And look at the way his anger lights his eyes.

“How in the world can I take a lover I can’t trust?” Potter snarled, leaning towards him. “Some of you lie so perfectly that I can’t tell lies from truth. Or you use the truth but for your own ends, the way I thought you were doing at the Zabinis’ party. I could never accept that a pure-blood really loved me; the words might be a trick or a ploy to gain something else. I don’t want to play games twenty-four hours a day! I don’t want to play games in bed! That’s not me, the self that I show to you! I do it because I have to, and for no other reasons! I want to be my real self when I walk away from you, the real Harry Potter. And you think I’d take one of you into my house? As well take Voldemort!”

Draco blinked in the face of the words, and searched himself for an honest and simple reaction, instead of the host of reasons he wanted to give. Potter would suspect sophistication.

“The self you show me and people like me is your real self, as much as this one,” he said. “You’re too good at it to really be playing a role.”

He started to go on, to explain that he wouldn’t demand perfect control of the emotions twenty-four hours a day, but he found himself facing an expression of such fury that he shut up. Potter was breathing hoarsely, his eyes wide and showing mostly the whites, his wand making warning creaking noises in his hand. His voice emerged a few degrees shy of a growl.

“I’m not like that. I’m not. I’m not one of you.”

The whites of his eyes showed even more. Draco stared, fascinated. He fears becoming like us. That has to be the reason a simple suggestion can make him so angry.

And then Potter turned away from him as if realizing what he’d revealed, said in a low, threatening tone, “You’ll stay away from me if you know what’s good for you, Malfoy,” and slammed back into the house.

Draco stared after him and licked his lips. He would need to go away again, and think in more detail about what he wanted.

But he thought it might be Potter.

Passionate, capable of appreciating the truth when it’s shoved in his face, and so certain that no pure-blood will ever capture him…

He’s at the very least an irresistible target. And perhaps he will teach me to stop wanting what I cannot have.

*

Harry closed his eyes and leaned against the door he’d shut behind him. He envisioned the pure-blood world Malfoy represented—the smirking, swaggering, laughing, staring world—and hoped he could shut it out the same way.

Malfoy couldn’t have known how much Harry feared turning into the uncaring bastard he played. It was a lucky guess. He was speaking from what he wished was true, and that was why his words had sounded so convincing.

I’m not like them. I’m not really mannered and polite and a good observer and a witty conversationalist. I’m not.

Because then I would have to be interested in superficialities and cynical and detached from life, as well. And I refuse to be that.

Part Four.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

jtsbbsps-dk.livejournal.com

Doh! Stupid Harry... you can be mannered and polite and a good observer and a witty conversationalist WITHOUT being interested in superficialities and cynical and detached from life! You've just seen them together so much you have trouble imagining them separate!

This chapter is AWESOME! :D
I'm really looking forward to what Draco will do now ^_^
Thank you so much for posting now - just what I needed! ♥

From:

jtsbbsps-dk.livejournal.com

And YAY first comment! That is soo difficult with your chapters xb *dances*

From:

Part 3 of 'Company Manners'

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