Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

The pillows his mother used to warm for him to curl around as a child were never so soothing as the one in Draco’s arms.

Nor did they move as much.

Draco orders the pillow to stop it in a slurred mumble, peeking one eye open to check the light; it’s early, the faded blue of the morning barely drifting into the amber of sunrise. He closes his eyes again and twitches his face to the side; the hair in his face tickles.

“Malfoy,” Potter says.

“I’m tired,” Draco moans, snuggling him closer. His body is like a furnace.

“I’m naked,” Potter counters drily. Draco’s eyes shoot open; he releases Potter and scrambles away while Potter grabs for the chenille throw resting in a mussed drape at the foot of Draco’s bed. He scoots into a sitting position, side-eyeing Draco. “Why am I naked?”

“How would I know?” Draco huffs, cringing. “This is my bed.”

“I guess it is.” He falls silent, and when Draco ventures another peek at him, his face is phoenix red. “Do I do this a lot?”

“Sleep naked into my bed?” Draco clarifies hopefully, searching for a way to lie; now that the moment’s unavoidable, he might not feel horrible… avoiding it, a little longer. Potter purses his lips, swiveling his head but not quite facing Draco, whose breath stutters. His shoulders sag. “Weasley told me to let you.”

“Let me what?” Potter asks incredulously, eyes darting up to finally look at him directly.

Feeling at a distinct disadvantage, Draco sits as well, pulling his knees up and his feet close to his body. “Just… not to wake you,” he admits miserably, talking to his knees. “I’m sorry.”

“For…?”

The question hangs in the room troublingly.

“Everything?” Draco tries. He attempts a smile that feels too much like a grimace to be as winsome as he hopes.

“You think this is… is your fault?” Potter asks, gesturing between them. If Draco knew anything about diagnostic magic, he’d check for symptoms of a stroke, just based on the colour of Potter’s face. It’s gone eggplant. “What do I do?”

“Talk, mostly,” Draco says.

“So then, like the other nights?” Potter hesitates; frowns. “But if you don’t want to go further, why—”

“Not...exactly,” Draco hedges. He blinks. “Wait, what?

“Why am I naked?” Potter asks again, as though the world isn’t tilting on its axis. Draco casts a suspicious look around to see if Father Christmas himself might be hiding near one of the trees.

“You like to wank,” Draco says flatly, “but what did you mean I ‘don’t want to go further’?”

“I— What the fuck, I thought those were dreams!” Potter scrambles out of the bed, dropping the throw blanket twice in his haste. Draco stares at him, unmoved by the sight of Potter’s nudity for once. He opens his mouth to ask about the other thing again, but Potter — swiftly tying the corners of the blanket around his waist — interrupts him before he has the chance. “I’ve wanked in front of you?”

“On occasion,” Draco says drily, the words coming easier than he thought they would now that… Well, something. “You really did dream of wanking in front of me, then?”

Potter looks at him, eyes huge, then suddenly darts to his own side of the room to grab his glasses and a discarded pair of jeans.

“I’ll see you later!” he yelps, mid-flight, as the door slams shut behind him. The edge of the blanket catches in it, and he hears Potter bellow, “Fuck!” before a frantic tugging releases the fine material from the grip of the door.

Draco sits in his rumpled uniform, piecing together several tidbits of information from his flabbergasted state of mind: one, Potter’s near-kiss from yesterday; two, their frequent outings. Five or six — Draco’s not sure which — Potter has some insipid idea that sleeping naked in his bed is alright but nothing...further… Ten or eleven, he often spends his time talking to Draco while awake, telling him things on those nights, about growing up Muggle or the last Battle, or his favorite thing about Defence spellwork.

Fifty or sixty, the way Potter always seems to touch him: a hand brushing Draco’s hip as they walk, the way he’d rubbed brisk palms over Draco’s biceps instead of casting a simple warming charm immediately when Draco complained of the cold after flying. A thousand: Potter’s infuriating friends seem to have adopted him.

Which makes them his friends too, Draco thinks, grimacing even as it occurs to him what he has to do.

And he’d thought it couldn’t get any more uncomfortable.

“Ron. Hermione.”

The two look at him from where their heads are bent close together over an open book, as though it’s not obvious that Granger’s — Hermione’s — hand is moving beneath the desk. She looks flustered; her shoulder stills. Ron bites his lip, then stares at him unwelcomingly.

“Ferret. We’re studying; go away.”

“I just hope you never slap me again,” Draco says smoothly to Hermione, taking a seat instead. “Not with the workout you’re giving the muscles in that hand. Or where it’s been, for that matter.”

“I— We—!” Her hand comes up from below the edge of the table to brush back the bushel of hair that’s fallen in her face.

”Go away, Malfoy,” Ron says again, scowling. He shifts in his seat, giving a sad blink to Hermione, who rolls her eyes and sits back in her chair, crossing her arms even though her dusky complexion has darkened quite a bit.

Draco waves a hand. “I’ll let you get back to it in a minute,” he says, although Hermione’s face doesn’t bode well for that. Well, good. She interrupted him and Potter last night. “I need to ask you something about… About Harry,” he forces out.

Though he’s been using their first names, Potter’s tripping off his tongue seems to surprise them both; they exchange a glance. “Is he okay?” Hermione asks.

“Fine.”

“So he’s finally done it, then,” Ron muses, sounding appalled and oddly gleeful.

“Done what?” Draco demands, frustrated.

“You’re calling him Harry,” Ron says, screwing up his face in confusion.

“Merlin’s sake, how the three of you won the bloody war, I’ll never know,” Draco says. “Not if you insisted on talking in riddles then, too.”

Hermione sighs. “What is it, Malfoy?”

“Harry and I…” Confidence floundering — really, he should never follow through on a plan of action before parsing down a thousand pieces of information into the two or three most relevant — Draco watches his fingers drumming against the scarred desktop for a moment before sucking in a breath and addressing Ron. “You said Harry’s my…”

“Roommate, I know,” Ron says, smirking. “If that’s what you’re calling it.”

“What were you calling it?”

“Well, I dunno,” Ron says, perplexed. He turns to Hermione. “When it’s two blokes, it’s still boyfriends, right? Bill just used to call them ‘dates,’ but I don’t think he really got serious about anyone before Fleur.” She nods, and Ron looks back at him. “Boyfriends, then, I guess. Right? Even if you’ve got all these weird—”

“Ron,” Hermione says quietly, tone gently censorious. “Don’t make fun of someone’s family practices, if they’re not hurting anyone.”

Ron snickers. “Oh, I bet a part of Harry is aching, actually,” he says, and she smacks his forearm, but bites her lip in an attempt to hide her smile.

“What are you two going on about?” Draco asks when their absurd little exchange is done. “Boyfriends? Family practices?”

“Is there a traditional way of saying it?” Hermione asks seriously. “Paramours? Or is that only if you’ve reached a level of…”

“We’re not boyfriends,” Draco snaps, shivering lightly. “I— I just wanted to know if you thought we were… If Harry and I were… If those times we’d gone out had been…”

“Dates?” Ron supplies disbelievingly. “You honestly didn’t know?”

“I. Well. I.” For some reason he can’t divine, his hands are shaking. He knots them into fists, pressing the knuckles into his thighs to steady himself. “I thought. Uh.”

He has literally no way of finishing that sentence, he realises with a numb sort of panic.

Ron and Hermione stare at him and then, in unison, start laughing with such delight that Draco automatically slips his wand from the sleeve of his robes, glaring.

“Then wh-why did you tell h-him you want t-to take things slowly?” Hermione gets out through giggles, sobering only a little when Madam Pince sends an unamused Patronus to inform them that they can be heard in the front of the library.

“I didn’t!” Draco objects after Pince’s glowing, hissing badger dissipates.

“Well, Harry thinks you did, so if you’re not snogging yet, it’s your own damned fault,” Ron snorts, and Draco sneers at him, deciding to call him Weasley again. Twat. Weasley twat.

“So then he— we—” Again, Draco searches for a way to phrase his question, but ends up simply staring at them in consternation for a long minute, weighing his options, before abruptly standing. “Okay, thank you.”

“For what?” Weasley snorts. Hermione rolls her eyes at him and nods to Draco, her face soft and understanding.

“You should talk to Harry.”

“He had to run out this morning,” he says coolly. “I’ll speak to him later.”

He hopes, at least.

“You, ah, got started without me.”

Draco doesn’t turn, mostly because the arsehole has been gone all bloody day and doesn’t deserve it. “Are we dating, Potter?” he sneers at the tree, winding a frosted red ribbon around the end of a branch and deftly tying it into a bow.

Heavy silence greets his question, then Draco hears the rustle of shoes being kicked off and the creak of Harry’s mattress as he sits. Draco gestures to his antique Pensieve, set up unobtrusively next to his bed. He’s never had an occasion to use it before and has long resented his mother’s insistence that he bring it to school every term — it weighs down his trunk, and takes up an appalling amount of space, even with extension charms — but hopes he can finally get some use out of the damned thing.

“They’re in order, oldest on the inside of the row,” Draco says flatly. “I left some out, for time constraints.” The most recent, for instance; he wants to keep that one to himself for a little while longer.

Harry sucks in a deep breath. “We could just talk. You don’t have to—”

“I know,” Draco says, voice brisk. He chooses a long, shimmering blue ribbon with floating stars over the material and casts his wand at it so it loops attractively around the branches. “Go ahead.”

Another beat passes; Harry sighs, then heads over to the Pensieve, carelessly dumping the first memories — Weasley talking to Draco in the library, and the first few nights — into the stone bowl. Draco cranes his head to look, only to find Harry looking back at him sort of unhappily before turning back and bending to dip his face into the bowl. There’s silence for a time, but he knows when Harry gets to the moment Draco began to contribute — Harry’s hand tight on his wrist as he’d pulled Draco closer to cup his cock; the way Draco had come untouched, from bare friction and sheer want — because he starts to shift uneasily; his back starts to heave, shallow and light.

He lifts his head and gives Draco an inscrutable look while he gathers and stoppers the memories back into their vials before tipping in several more in order: Harry’s invitations out, the first time Harry’d touched his cock, their long walks together down to Hogsmeade, the frozen earth crunching beneath their feet. Draco continues fastening ribbons with careful deliberation, even though he knows that Harry can not only see what happened but — because of the nature of the charms on his family Pensieve — can also get a sense of how Draco felt about those interactions, which is… horrifying, but strangely exhilarating, too.

At least he doesn’t have to keep secrets, anymore. Blowing up the castle, be damned.

He’s finished before Harry is, and he settles uneasily on the edge of his bed, waiting for Harry’s head to come up. When it does, his face his flushed and his eyes are bright.

“Yes,” he says and, bewildered, Draco tries to remember if he’d asked a question in his last memory — decorating the tree together, the previous night — but it’s a little fuzzy, his clearest memory being inside the Pensieve and all.

“Yes, what?”

“Yes, we’re dating,” Harry says simply. He licks his lips, then comes forward, nudging Draco’s knees apart to stand between them. Draco’s hands find themselves on Harry’s hips as he stares up at him, incredulous. He wants to ask how, or -- maybe more importantly -- why me?, but the questions die in his throat, fear rising in him at the possible answers.

“That’s what you got from that?” he sputters instead, accessing outrage. “I… took advantage!”

“I told you not to tell me,” Harry says heatedly. “I avoided it every time you tried. If anyone took advantage, it's me.”

“But I wanked!” Draco says, outraged at the slow grin that spreads over Harry’s face, at the impish twinkle that appears in his eyes. “With you! While you were asleep!”

“Oh, I know,” Harry says, raising one eyebrow, voice going low. He smooths a hand up Draco’s suddenly shallowly-heaving chest and rests his hands on his shoulders; his thumbs stroke the outside of Draco’s neck. “I mean, I wish I hadn’t got it in my head that you’d wanted to take things slow, or I’d’ve been doing that with you while we were awake, too, but…”

“Take things slow,” Draco echoes, voice husky. “Why did you think that?”

“That memory of yours; the first night. You tried to kick me out of your bed by telling me that,” Harry snorts. He bends suddenly, tilting Draco’s chin up to catch his mouth in a light kiss that Draco feels all the way down to his toes, before cruelly straightening again. “I guess it stuck with me.”

“How stupid of sleeping-you,” Draco breathes, massively sceptical of his own luck. But not enough to not slide one hand up from Harry’s hip to twist in the cotton of his t-shirt over his stomach. “Which is not much of a surprise. But awake-me should have known better.”

“Draco,” Harry says, fingers light on his jaw as they look at each other.

“Harry,” Draco counters, and pulls him down.

Harry groans as he covers Draco, their mouths meeting clumsily and then with more calculation. Draco rolls them so he’s on top, Harry slotted between his straddling thighs, their kisses greedy and slick. He grips Draco, hands roving searchingly over his body, enthusiastic and aware of what he’s doing as he tugs out Draco’s shirttails from his trousers and slides a hot palm up over his back. Draco presses into it, then back into Harry, somehow managing to twist his spine in two ways until Harry’s palm flattens them against each other and he doesn’t have to choose between sensations. His eyes remain partially open, like Draco’s, a soft slip of green peeking through thick dark lashes as they risk glances at each other in the middle of their snogging, leaving Draco breathless and more than a little giddy. He pulls away, gasping, when he feels the swell of Harry’s prick against his arse.

“Wait, no—” Harry reaches for him again and though Draco means to ask him more about the dating thing, he goes unsteadily back into Harry’s arms; lets Harry roll him again so he’s on top. Draco’s knees come up, ankles hooking high behind Harry’s back; he shudders as Harry rocks into him, pressing biting little kisses over his mouth and jaw and throat. He licks each spot he’s bitten, and Draco tilts his head to bare his throat further whilst simultaneously catching Harry’s earlobe in his mouth and grazing his teeth over it hard. Harry moans — a soft, almost sweet sound — and thrusts against him, scooting higher on his knees until Draco can feel the hard shapes of their cocks press each other, and the lack of this — this!, Draco thinks with a blurry sort of thrill, understanding falling into place like pieces of a puzzle — is what accounted for the emptiness he felt, the uncertainty. All of those nights of wanting Harry, of being wanted by him but not knowing if it was real, all of those nights of talking, being seen but not touched, boxed by the nights when he’d been touched and not seen, Harry’s hands detached from the deep, fervent enthusiasm he’s always shown doing anything that means something real to him—

He moans Draco’s name and Draco wriggles, using his ankles around Harry’s back as leverage to roll his hips up and continue the delightful friction; he thinks about prying his arms from around Harry’s shoulders but then doesn’t have to because Harry’s hands shove between them, working over Draco’s flies quickly and then his own. “Merlin,” Draco mutters, gulping in short breaths, “Merlin.”

“Yeah,” Harry says distractedly, pressing another open-mouthed kiss to Draco’s lips. “I want to— awake.” He slides his hand into Draco’s gaping trousers, fingertips brushing the head of Draco’s prick. “Okay?”

That’s such a bloody brilliant word that Draco repeats it on another groan, nodding as Harry tugs his boxers down to hook them beneath Draco’s balls. There’s a pause where Draco tries not to whimper as Harry’s hand leaves him, and then Harry’s cock is touching his, Harry’s hand wrapping as tight as it can around the two of them together. It’s strange and fucking amazing — the swollen, hot touch of Harry’s erection against his own as Harry starts to stroke them together with awkwardly positioned pulls.

“Wait, nnngghh, Harry,” Draco mumbles out against Harry’s neck, for some reason unable to stop sucking at it. “Lift up, I want to—”

Without pulling his neck away, Harry’s chest and belly arch away from his; immediately the stroking of his hand over their cocks becomes smoother, Draco’s foreskin dragging against Harry’s as he pulls them back in tandem, then down to cover the leaking heads. The space also allows Draco to fit his hand between them and he shivers into Harry’s fist but finally does what he’s been wanting to for weeks — months; years— and slips his hand over the head of Harry’s prick, index finger and thumb twisting over it. Harry bucks involuntarily, his hand faltering over their shafts before resuming its pulls, faster and more frantic, his breath hot and damp against Draco’s jaw and then mouth.

“I like you,” Harry whispers.

“Should have told you,” Draco breathes back against the flood of dangerous happiness threatening to overwhelm. “I should have said—”

“I, yeah, but, no, I—” Harry loses track of his words, eyes finally closing tight as he grips their cocks and pulls over them swiftly, his thumb pressing them firm together, shocks of pleasure from it snaking from Draco’s prick to shiver throughout his body. Draco moves his hand lower to cup Harry’s balls, drawn up snug between his thighs, just as Harry flicks his wrist fast over them both. His hand clamps over Harry’s balls as he comes, intense and surprising, cock pulsing messily over Harry’s hand and between them. Harry gasps, lips pursed and swollen, eyes pinched shut while Draco loosens his hold and manages to keep his mind enough to roll Harry’s balls in his palm, still groaning out his release, head tossed to the side. He feels Harry’s mouth against his neck once more, Harry’s hair tickling his ear, and then feels Harry’s cock twitching rhythmically against his, feels the spread of wet mingling with his own release, smearing between them onto his belly and groin.

“So when,” Draco finally gets out, chest still heaving after several months of Harry lying limply on top of him, “did we begin dating? Exactly? Were we dating when you started wanking? Because if so, I’ll feel a lot less guilty about getting off on that.”

“No.” Harry mumbles it into his neck, a smile in his voice. He’s starting to get heavy and Draco nudges him but he doesn’t take the hint, choosing instead to burrow even closer, suffocating Draco with his weight, but Draco knows for a fact there are scarier ways one could die so he decides he’s alright with this one. “Not then. Feel very guilty; you took advantage.”

Draco scowls as though Harry can see it, but his hands caress Harry’s surprisingly silky hair, that tumble of improbably combined waves and curls and cowlicks that would look ridiculous on anyone else. He wonders idly what it would look like if it were long enough for him to brush long strokes through, to braid or scrape into a bun, and if Harry would let him; his scowl at Harry’s teasing fades, of its own accord, and turns into a smirk. “When, then? When you watched me get undressed?”

Their Hogsmeade trip that day — after Harry returned, blushing, from the showers — had been wary and somewhat wooden, but Harry had not only paid for the food and drinks, but another hitwizard thriller he insisted Draco might like for when he was done with his own, and a box of crackling toffee. When they walked back to the castle, their shoulders kept brushing through thick layers of wool, and Draco had watched the way the crystalline puffs of their breaths had mingled in the cold.

“Really,” he insists, falling back into his rigid structure of propriety when Harry remains silent. “I’ll need to know, anyway, for getting you a gift next—”

Harry’s head comes up just as Draco breaks off, wishing for one of those rare seconds-resetting Time Turners. But then Harry brushes a kiss over his mouth, more soft and lovely than someone known for his power and brawn should be able to give, and sighs. His smile is small, but somehow… everything.

It’s so much, that Draco wants to withdraw, wants to look away for fear that Harry will see too much in his eyes; he’s already revealed the ridiculous idea that keeps circulating in his mind that this will last. As if he can sense what Draco is thinking, Harry’s hands tighten on him.

“November 14th,” he says simply. “That was our first date.”

Draco tugs his head down and Harry comes, pressing him into a fierce kiss that lasts and lasts until Draco’s cock starts to fill out again, between their tacky-wet stomachs. With no little effort — Harry seems to like being atop him — Draco rolls them over until he’s spread out over Harry in a tightly gripping straddle. Apparently, snogging Harry has the same element of wrestling that doing anything with him does, but that’s good too; it makes the whole thing feel like them, rather than one of those implausibly sentimental dreams he’ll never admit to having had in fifth year, that were all rose petal-covered beds and elf-wine, Harry in a silk Slytherin dressing robe and matching ascot. He pins Harry’s wrists to the mattress and though Harry could surely get out of it, he just smiles slyly and waggles his eyebrows.

“That,” Draco points out, “was the day you watched me get undressed.”

It’s not like he needs the confirmation, really; he’d put together that much already, at least. But he can’t deny the thrill that shivers through his veins when Harry’s smile widens and he confirms, “That was the day I watched you get undressed. Although,” he says with a considering air, “I did ask you before that.”

“What does that mean?” Draco demands roughly. Harry presses his lips together, biting down on a smile, and refuses to answer, so Draco says, “I’ll send you back to your bed.”

“Can this be my bed?” Harry asks, smile breaking free despite his best — though resoundingly bad — efforts.

“Did you wank, thinking of that?” Draco asks breathlessly, the energy building to charged again between them, like the low burning hum of static electricity. “Thinking of me?”

“I’m pretty sure you’d know that better than I would at this point,” Harry says with a low, rumbly laugh, eyes dancing up at him.

“When you were awake,” Draco says. He presses harder against the deceptively frail bones on the insides of Harry’s wrists and rocks his hips a little. The visible amusement on Harry’s face fades, but not the twinkle in his gaze. “Did you? Were you a voyeuristic little pervert?” he demands, deliberately omitting the word too.

“Yeah. Yeah, I might’ve been,” Harry says, licking his lips. His cock has gone half-stiff again because of the kissing or the rolling around still selectively unclothed, or maybe just because of Draco’s face, perhaps reflecting the predatory hunger he feels. “What’re you going to do about it, Malfoy?”

Draco grins into the rough kiss he bestows on Harry, and then promptly shows him.

Now that he knows they’re actually dating — whatever that really means — Draco stops letting Harry treat him all the time; he can be generous too, if he wants. When he tells Harry that, Harry only laughs and shrugs and says he really doesn’t care, that he doesn’t want for much now that he’s got his friends and a future, which strikes Draco as ineffably stark, made worse by the way Harry really doesn’t need to be spoiled with material goods. He was appropriately grateful when they went out to eat and Draco reached for galleon purse first when the cheque appeared, and he smiled and kissed Draco in the middle of Hogsmeade, ignoring the gaping of the surrounding passers-by, when Draco bought him a box of peppermint fudge — but then, he seemed just as happy when Draco finished his novel and passed it over as promised, without thinking. That had earned Draco a look so startlingly hot that he’d taken a step back, Harry dropping the book on his bed and stalking forward with clear intent in his eyes.

It had also earned him his first blowjob five minutes later, standing next to his bed and gripping the bedpost to stay upright though his legs wanted to collapse under the tremendous pleasure of Harry on his knees, sucking his cock with quickly improving skill.

In the short two weeks — near month, Harry insists — that they’ve been dating, such things have been happening with increasing regularity: while studying on the third night Harry decided to undo his flies and perch on top of his desk, and was Draco not supposed to try his luck at sucking him off, then? Or later on in the showers? Or let Harry return the favour before they went to sleep that night, one calloused, tanned hand reaching up to roll Draco’s nipple between his fingers, the other ringed tight around the base of his prick as he bobbed his mouth wetly over the rest of it? Frankly, Harry’s bed has been all but abandoned in favour of Draco’s, despite how often Draco threatens to make him return to his own.

Even nearly toppling Draco’s tree when they got distracted applying the ornaments charmed with magical creatures — a Veela that entranced the observer with her eyes to leave them with a pleasant, tingling feeling in their fingertips when they finally let go; a unicorn stomping her hoof and tossing her glowing mane; a dragon spitting a mist of orange-blue fire and flying around the inside of the the glass orb as though caged — hadn’t been enough to put them off exploration of each other’s bodies. What began as an oddly domestic kiss when Draco simply handed Harry an ornament — filled with a lavender haze that revealed a team of fluttering fairies — turned into an urgent snog and breathless argument over who could get undressed the fastest, right before Draco knocked Harry into the wall, one of his legs curling around Draco’s calf as they’d rubbed themselves off on one another. Harry’s body draws him like a lodestone and, much to Draco’s fascinated disbelief, the reverse seems to be true, as well.

Perhaps due of the sheer physical exhaustion they’ve been subjecting each other to, Harry has only sleep wanked twice in the last week, waking up in Draco’s bed the following mornings to demand a demonstration of what had transpired — both of which were promptly interrupted by Harry’s impatience, and both of which made them late for class. Still, Draco finds he doesn’t mind losing out on sleep at all, now that he can be sure Harry likes it when he watches, can know that it’s a fantasy of his. Harry’s participation still wasn’t the same as when he was awake — he was still distant and vague in that slightly unnerving way, even as they wanked each other — but the fact that he smiled when he woke up nearly-naked and curled around Draco as if he’d sprouted tentacles in his sleep, did a lot to assuage any lingering guilt Draco felt.

And Draco knows it’s all going too fast to indicate something other than a swift, tempestuous burn and faster burnout. They’re racing ahead at reckless, breakneck speeds, determined to devour and explore and do, and sometimes Draco thinks he should slow down, thinks he should tell Harry to, but he’s spent years worried about ‘should.’ His whole life, really, and that those dictates are largely what formed the choices that have left him near anchorless, and disdained by most of the wizarding world, probably says something. Now that he’s gotten something he wants, now that he’s happy — for however long — propriety can fuck off.

He would perhaps be slightly less uneasy about his luck if Harry had any real idea of how a pureblood relationship went but Draco’s life has changed, anyway, and he doesn’t mind relaxing the rigorous standards of gift-giving in traditional courtship. Harry seems to like it when Draco just does something with no forethought, just because Harry is on his mind.

But.

Draco likes Christmas, and as the hols get nearer and students begin packing to leave for home, he begins to panic; he’s never not found the right gift to give, before.

When he’s near the point of giving up, he seeks out Weasley and Hermione — who are no help, whatsoever, as usual.

“What d’you mean, ‘what will Harry like’?” Weasley says when Draco corners them in the common room. Hermione’s socked feet rest in his lap as they sit on the couch and Weasley cups them with his freakishly large hands, almost encompassing them past the toes. “Harry likes everything.”

Draco waves an impatient hand. “That’s precisely my point. He likes everything, and has enough gold to buy what he wants for himself, and settles on novels and those art book stories and the occasional upkeep to his Firebolt.”

“Art books?” Hermione says, perking up.

“He’s shown me; they’re called comics,” Weasley says to her seriously. He pats her thigh when she looks at him, face twisting oddly. “I’ll explain later.”

She looks at him a second longer, snorts, and turns back to Draco. “Which means you can get him anything he doesn’t get for himself?”

“Yes, but if he can afford it, and doesn’t like it enough to get it, what’s the point of me getting it for him?” Draco Summons a nearby cushioned footstool and sits on it, trying not to look hopeless. He looks at Weasley. “Does he have a Wizarding chess set?”

“Yeah, o’course.” He scratches his head. “I mean, I haven’t actually seen it in a while? He liked to use his Muggle one over the summer, when he wanted to play in his sleep, but—”

Draco rolls his eyes, shaking his head to cut him off. To Hermione — marginally more observant — Draco asks, “What are the favourite gifts he’s gotten since you’ve known him?”

“Well, he seemed really pleased with the quills I got him last—” Hermione glances at Weasley, frowning, when he nudges her and rolls his eyes. She huffs. “He likes the Weasley jumpers Molly makes, and the watch the Weasleys gave him. He likes the album of his parents that Hagrid made for him, so perhaps homemade things, or things with a story; really, anything that makes him feel… Hm.” She goes quiet for a moment, her face soft with reflection in the common room firelight. Her breath trembles, just slightly, as she exhales. “He likes things that are personal; intimate. That make him feel connected to something,” she says.

And, just like that, Draco has ideas on what to get Harry for Christmas.

He stands up, catching both lips between his teeth to bite back a smug smile as he gives her a nod. “Thank you.”

She nods at him, eyes large, and Draco leaves. Behind him, he can hear furious whispering, and then Weasley suddenly groans openly, but Draco doesn’t have time to look back.

He’s got things to plan.

“What are these ones?” Harry asks, looking down at the tiny, dully glimmering glass ornaments nestled within the velvet padding of the box that rests in his lap. There are eight of them, all of varying sizes but all small, the largest no bigger than the stone of a peach.

“Ah.” Draco reaches out and hooks his finger into the silver ribbon tied to the stem of one. He lifts it out gently, watching it spin and settle, feeling the slow spill of warmth for what’s rapidly become his favourite time of the day — decorating his Christmas tree with Harry, before bed. “These are magic.”

Harry laughs — that deep, quiet rumble that makes Draco’s insides flip over. “Aren’t they all?”

“Actual magic,” Draco explains, standing. He finds a spot next to a wintering ribbon and hangs it carefully. He touches it lightly with the pad of his finger once it’s secured. “Preserved magic. Like the memories.”

Curious, Harry comes over to watch as the sparks of gold begin zipping around the inside of the glass in an array of explosions. His voice is barely a breath. “Spells?”

Pleased, Draco nods. “Charms. When someone in my direct line develops an original spell, they preserve it in an ornament for display,” he says. “Since a lot of them have gone out of fashion to be replaced with potions or a newer version of the charm, we’ll always know what the original looked like. That,” he says, gesturing to the bright, shimmering display occurring in the ornament, “is what eventually turned into Felix Felicis.” He grimaces slightly. “But as I understand it, the spell itself was highly addictive, and also tended to drive wizards quite mad within days, so.”

“It’s really pretty,” Harry says as he studies it. The charm fades after a time and Harry lifts out another one. He hangs it on a lower branch and glances at Draco as if for permission before skimming his fingers against it. Draco smiles when it lights up in a shower of yellow-green sparkles.

“To recall a pleasant childhood memory you’ve forgotten,” he says when Potter gives him a questioning look. “But it had the side-effect on occasion of suspending the user when the spell took them too far back, and I suppose people complained about being stuck in a memory of themselves in filthy nappies.”

Harry snorts another laugh. “Still. These are cool.”

“I know,” Draco says, heart doing something warm and strange and twisty in his chest. He doesn’t mention the other box, the one he’d destroyed in a fit of fear when the Dark Lord was staying at the Manor; the one that held the Dark spells. They’d never displayed those anymore, anyway, and when his mother had gone to get the decorations during seventh year, he assumed she understood what had happened from the scorch marks on the floor of the attic; she simply gave him a very level look, her Occlumens up high even as her mouth twitched in an almost invisible smile. “Harry?”

“Yeah?” Harry looks away from the glimmer of spring colours, a lopsided grin on his face. He starts to lift out another one. “Can I?”

“Of course,” Draco says. He pauses for a moment as Harry examines the choices. “Do you remember seeing yourself offer to let me read your diary?”

“Hmm?” Harry picks one with a bright red ribbon. “Oh, your memories; yeah. Why? Do you want to now?”

“Could I?” Draco asks, relieved at not having to make a case now that Harry’s awake. Harry touches the newest ornament after he fits it onto a branch, his glasses reflecting the rich reds that swirl around like tiny starbursts, his face splitting in a wide smile that Draco can’t help but mirror. “A seasonal charm, to effect the elements for the day. Causes massive storms when done wrong, though.”

“Sure, of course. It’s mainly some of my ideas for, you know, articles,” Harry tells him, after a second, sounding faintly embarrassed. They tend to talk like this, in fits and starts, having two conversations at once when the topics sometimes sting. Draco likes it; it takes some of the pressure off. “Some personal thoughts about...the way things are,” he adds, sounding just uncomfortable enough to pique Draco’s curiosity. But, much to his disappointment, Harry doesn’t elaborate, and the long silence stretches until he finally looks away from the seasonal charm, his eyes growing faintly wicked. “Other personal thoughts, too.”

Draco taps him warningly on the shoulder. He takes an ornament and hangs it. “Thanks. I need to check something from it.”

A warm hand slides around Draco’s hip and he frowns reprovingly, though not enough that he’ll actually discourage. Harry sidles closer, pressing into his side; he sounds amused. “For Christmas presents, right?”

Vaguely resentful at the guess — he can admit to liking Harry now, but that doesn’t always make it any easier to be confronted with the fact that he’s not the total moron Draco’d thought him for years — Draco nudges him with his hip. “Maybe. You’re getting three.” He touches the ornament to test it and sighs when pale blue bubbles start floating in it, popping and reforming intermittently. Harry makes a curious sound against him, mouth on Draco’s throat, and Draco says, “Beauty Glamour. Left you with horrible pock marks for a month after it faded.” Harry chuckles, and Draco elbows him in the side — but again, not enough to discourage. “It’s tradition to open one on Christmas Eve.”

“I see.” Harry’s mouth slowly traverses the cords of Draco’s throat as Draco lifts out another ornament from the box and shakily applies it to the tree. “I’d like that. I’ve got you only two things, but I think you’ll like them.”

“I’m sure I will,” Draco says, not letting his head drop to the side like it wants. His stomach flutters at the idea that Harry would think to get him gifts, at all. Harry tilts his chin up to catch the shell of Draco’s ear with his teeth and flicks his tongue out, and Draco shudders in the act of touching the dangling ornament; it grows massively bright inside with a twirl of gold and silver entwining ribbons. He swallows and turns suddenly in Harry’s arms, plucking off his glasses as he does and dropping them on a side chair, unable to stand it anymore. And then they’re kissing, Harry managing by a thread to put down the box carefully before wrapping his arms around Draco’s waist. He’s just a bit shorter than Draco, but it doesn’t seem unnatural at all for him to lift Draco slightly, so that Draco’s toes drag on the floor when Harry stumbles them back to the bed.

They fall onto it, hands already working each other’s pyjamas off — Draco refuses to sleep naked; it’s too fucking cold, and the heating charms always fade before sunup — until they’re bare and gasping, both on their sides, Draco’s leg slung high over Harry’s hip as he grinds his cock into Harry’s. There are so many things he wants to do; with their clothing peeled away and the scent of Harry’s soap and sweat against him, Draco can’t decide if he wants them to touch each other, or wants Harry to suck his cock, or wants to suck Harry’s, or what. He feels a hard kernel of desire pitting in his stomach, with every brush of Harry’s stiff prick against his own, and if he doesn’t make a decision quick, they’ll end up finishing like this. Which would be grand, of course, but—

“Suck me,” Draco blurts out, voice high and light. Though Harry seems to love doing it, it still feels strange to simply ask for something like that and actually entertain the possibility that it may happen. “Suck my cock.”

Will happen, he amends mentally when Harry pulls away from tonguing the pulse point at the hollow of Draco’s collarbone to look up. His eyes are hooded and dark, a strange and beautiful counterpoint to the sweet eagerness of his smile.

“Yeah,” he breathes, then presses a swift kiss to Draco’s mouth before slithering down his body.

Draco rolls onto his back, pressing his hand over his eyes as Harry’s mouth travels over his stomach, causing the muscles to jump in response. Harry whispers moist little kisses down the slender line of hair from Draco’s belly button — after licking it, which makes Draco startle and Harry chuckle against his skin — all the way to his groin, wrapping two fingers around the root of Draco’s risen prick; lightly, just to keep it in place. He kisses around his fingers, flicking his tongue out to tease, and Draco widens his knees in response to allow Harry to situate himself between them. Harry groans, inhaling sharply, nose buried in Draco’s pubic hair — and if it’s a little embarrassing, still, to find that sort of thing a turn on, Draco finds he’s alright with it.

“Please,” he says, feathering a hand over Harry’s hair, hips bumping up. He feels the warm breath of another laugh over the side of his cock, and then Harry is licking along the length of him with long, warm laps. His fingers squeeze the base of Draco’s cock tighter to angle it to the side as his mouth roves over it like it had over Draco’s stomach; open and slick and hot. He sucks along the line of it rather than taking it in his mouth, from the crown to the root. Draco’s fingers grow so tight over his eyelids, as he attempts not to beg, that he can see the pinpoint of stars. But the hand on Harry’s head tightens into a fist without his permission, and though surely it’s got to hurt, he can feel Harry’s hips rolling against the mattress as if he likes the sensation.

Harry opens his mouth wider as he works his way back down to the crown of Draco’s cock, then starts licking the foreskin back; slow and steady, his tongue working underneath it to push it back and reveal more of the head. Draco’s cock spurts a thick slick of precome, as he lifts his hips higher in entreaty.

“I like the way you taste,” Harry mumbles against him.

“Then taste me, you bastard,” Draco snaps weakly, a humiliating squeak escaping his throat when Harry does just that and sips away the droplets of fluid collected at Draco’s slit. He doesn’t open his lips wide, just enough to spread them around the crown, but his tongue moves in light little swirls around the glans, sweeping over the swollen ridge up top and the sensitive underside again and again until Draco starts to grow desperate and applies pressure to Harry’s head with his gripping hand. Harry pulls back with a snort and goes lower to nuzzle his balls and the crease of his thigh. He releases Draco’s cock from his hand and Draco’s so hard it takes a moment to drop; when it does, it hits his stomach, then bobs preposterously. He’d be irritated if what Harry was doing didn’t feel so indescribably good, using his fingers to pull at the thin skin of his balls and lashing his tongue out over them too. “Harry…”

“Can I—” Harry gets out, muffled, one of Draco’s balls almost entirely in his mouth. Draco writhes helplessly, wanting to touch himself and also not wanting to, because it’s so good and he wants it to last.

“Anything,” he says on a sharp gasp, pretty sure he means it. He’s thought a lot of about what “anything” could entail, and though he’s nervous, they haven’t hurt each other once since this started — not in any way that didn’t also feel good. Harry hums, sucking lightly, and then leaves off with a soft graze of teeth against his sac that makes Draco arch, makes him dig his heels into the mattress, toes curling. Harry shoulders his thighs wider and, distracted by the throb of pleasure that seems too confused to settle either in his balls or his jerking prick, Draco lets him press them outward until he’s splayed wide, but then Harry just… stays there. Draco removes his hand from his eyes and lifts up his head with some effort. “Are we going to…”

“I dunno,” Harry says, voice gone thick. Draco realises what he’s staring at, his body flushing red in an instant, and starts to close his thighs around Harry’s head, but Harry says, “Can I—?” again, and it comes out so ragged and hungry that he finds his legs going lax, eyes travelling up to the bed hangings as Harry’s meaning becomes clear. He doesn’t know why his cock leaks again at the idea of— of—

But Merlin, it does.

“Yeah,” he says, choking slightly on the word. He’s let Harry put his fingers in him, a couple of times — after Harry let him try it first, and seemed to like it — and it it feels bloody good with enough lube, but… “Yeah. Yes,” Draco says. With a surge of boldness, he adds, “Do it, Potter,” feeling a swell of desire and pride when Harry moans and rocks his hips hard over the duvet.

Harry doesn’t hesitate; he leans forward and licks a long stripe up Draco’s crease. Draco’s whole lower half twists, and he doesn’t know if he’s trying to get away or not, but it gives Harry the opportunity to bring both hands underneath him, to cup his arse and tug Draco’s hips closer, teeth nipping over his arshole and tongue pressing flat against it in fast, long strokes. Draco doesn’t know if his technique is good or not — truthfully, he’s no longer even sure of his own name, or that of the obviously imagined entity lying between his spread thighs doing unspeakable things with his obviously imagined magical tongue — but in the distant corner of his mind still able to process rational thought, he supposes that it doesn’t matter, not it if it feels so extraordinary. He curls his shoulders up to reach Harry’s hair better, then threads his fingers through it again to drag Harry’s face even closer so he can rock against him, heels slipping for purchase to gain leverage. Harry makes another one of those muffled moans, only this time it vibrates against his rim and Draco gasps, wanting… wanting…

Then, even that distant corner of his brain shuts down, because Harry latches his lips hard around his hole and starts sucking, and worms his tongue inside. Draco feels it in his fucking toes, in his balls and cock and spine and chest; it spreads through him in hot demanding waves of pleasure, and, and, “Oh my god I’m going to come. I’m going to come, fuck, don’t stop, Potter, eat me, I’m so—”

A low growl is his response, and wet, sloppy sounds, and Harry’s fingers digging into his buttocks, thumbs keeping them pried apart though Draco’s arse tries to clench with overwhelming pleasure. His response is that tongue moving deeper into him — that tongue fucking him; Harry’s tongue. He reaches up with one hand to place his hand flat over Draco’s cock, finding it without looking, and Draco howls out a sob when he squeezes it, shuddering and fisting his hands ruthlessly in Harry’s hair as a strange brightness grows in his periphery; his cock rises and jerks against Harry’s clasp, spurting out come all over his belly. He feels his arse clamp rhythmically around Harry’s still-moving tongue, but he’s too astonished by the force of his climax to do anything but ride it out until the pleasure starts to ease off and even become too much. Going limp, he forces himself to loosen his hands and drag them from Harry’s head, gulping and resting them on his messy stomach as he stares blankly above himself, trying to catch his breath and recapture some semblance of sanity.

Harry Potter just... ate his arsehole.

Harry Potter is his boyfriend, and just ate his arsehole.

His mind suddenly conjures the odd memory of being six years old and telling his mother to wake him when Father Christmas arrived. He remembers throwing a strop when she apologised and reminded him that the kindly wizard wasn’t able to visit children older than five, that parents took over then, to give joy and and begin training a proper wizard how to make sure his wishes came true.

He feels justified for that strop, now, with Harry’s saliva dripping from his fluttering arse. Because there’s no way he could have orchestrated this miracle without the help of Father Christmas. Who still must be fond enough of Draco to visit a few days early.

It’s the only logical explanation, really.

“Draco,” Harry says pleadingly; the rocking of the bed grows harder — it creaks a little, under them — and Draco gets the sense it’s not the first time Harry’s said his name in the last few moments. He smiles, urgency muted but still skittering along his nerve endings.

“Come here,” he tries, raspily; he licks his lips and clears his throat a little and says it again, “Come here. Come on, Harry.”

Harry rises above him, crawling over him to pause in a straddle over his hips, closing his eyes when Draco reaches for him, then promptly letting them fly open when Draco curls a hand around his hip and urges him to shuffle higher, onto his chest. Harry obeys, confused but willing; his swollen cock drags and bounces against Draco’s abdomen and over his chest as he scoots up and then settles, bent knees tucked into Draco’s armpits, arse warm and firm against his skin. Draco crooks his elbow and stuffs one hand under his head, smiling lazily, and says, “I’m going to suck you off, and then you’ll come on my face, like before.”

“I’m going to—? Wait, when—?”

He breaks off with a low grunt when Draco opens his mouth and sucks his prick in. He likes doing it, likes the way it makes Harry tremble, likes the weight of Harry’s cock heavy on his tongue. He even likes the way his jaw sort of hurts afterward, a little ache reminding him — when he hinges it from side to side to loosen it later — of what they recently did. Mostly, though, he likes the sounds Harry makes, little deep groans and higher-pitched gasps; mumbled words that Draco thinks might be dirty talk if Harry had enough accessible synapses to enunciate. Harry reaches out with one hand to steady himself against the headboard, canting his hips forward to press deeper into Draco’s mouth.

Harry’s already so wet at the tip, his foreskin dampened by his ruts against the mattress as he’d licked into Draco, and Draco laps over the moisture on every draw-back of Harry’s hips. He’s always so careful not to go too deep, but that’s not what Draco wants tonight; he wants Harry to lose as much control as he had, so he curls his fingers to cup Harry’s arse cheek and guides him into a better rhythm, a better depth of force. He does what he can to relax his throat, Harry finally getting the idea with a soft, wondering sound of pleasure and thrusting with more abandon — long, sweet slides of his prick that nudge past Draco’s gag reflex until it’s almost easy to take Harry in so far, to suck him down so deep, if he remembers to time his breathing through his nose. Harry’s foreskin bunches and smooths under Draco’s slipping tongue and against his soft palate, and he huffs with frantic, increasingly broken breaths; Draco can feel his balls tighten against chin, can feel the increasing tension in the thighs trembling around him and the muscles under his hand. He slides his hand inward, fingers questing, and locates Harry’s hole; not having any way of conjuring lube — and fuck if he’s going to stop Harry to slick his fingers with saliva — he simply rubs over the furrowed spot with his middle and index fingers, circling and tracing it; pressing against it lightly.

Making a sharp, surprised sound above him, Harry jerks and gasps, knocking the headboard he’s grasping into the wall. And as much as Draco wants him to come like this, there’s time for that later, he thinks. He pulls his hand away from Harry’s arse and gives the front of Harry’s hipbone a nudge — then a harder one, because it’s already a split second too late; Harry’s cock is throbbing against his tongue even as he pulls out of Draco’s mouth with a whimper, leaving his first stripe of spunk in Draco’s mouth. He strokes himself off for the rest of it, eyes bottomless and almost stark as he stares down at the way his come paints Draco’s lips and chin. “Oh fuck, oh fuck,” he groans, hand fast and tight on his prick.

When it’s over, he stays there for a few moments, risen on his knees and looking downward, unblinking. Then he swings his leg up and over, and slides down in a strange, heaping configuration of limbs that somehow resembles a puddle. Draco grins, smug and pleased; he darts out a tongue over a dribble of come on his lip.

“Jesus,” Harry mumbles, finding the strength to resituate himself and lean in. He kisses Draco, tongue licking off his own come on Draco’s lips, before plunging inside for a long, devastatingly good kiss. Draco turns onto his side to get more of it, to get more of him, and they breathe quietly into each other for a time, snogging, before Harry finally pulls away. His eyes are drowsy and satiated and warm. “I’d imagined doing that; you have no idea.”

“Obviously, I do,” Draco drawls, then slants Harry a smile when he snorts and rises up on his elbow, propping his head up with his fist. There’s no logical reason for him to blush at this point, but he feels a renewed warmth in his face when he says, “I liked it, too.”

“‘Like before,’ you said,” Harry mutters, looking at him quite hard.

“Oh. Well…” Draco looks at him. “Bugger.”

Blank, Harry shakes his head for a moment, then pauses — then starts shaking it harder. “I didn’t.”

“...Of course not.”

“You wouldn’t have let me!” Harry says, astonished, ignoring him.

Then why ask? Draco wonders, managing not to roll his eyes.

“Of course I wouldn’t have,” he says drily. “Do I really seem the type?” He reaches up calmly to swipe off a streak of come on his cheekbone with his thumb and starts to lick it off; Harry laughs, face flushed and dampened with sweat, eyes bright and amazed. He grabs Draco’s wrist and brings it to his mouth instead, sucking the thumb in to the knuckle and licking away the leavings of his own climax, and Draco’s breath catches; he doesn’t know where this thing between them is going, but the improbable answer seems to be… somewhere.

He smiles when Harry releases his thumb and starts to lean toward him for another kiss, but Harry murmurs, “You ornament is still all lit up.”

“That’s one way of putting it,” Draco snorts, but turns to see what Harry means, eyes widening. The last ornament he’d hung, the ribbons inside twirling around each other as he and Harry’d fallen into bed, has gotten brighter and brighter in the meantime, almost pulsing out great waves of energetic glow in silvery-gold.

“What magic’s in that one?” Harry asks, too innocently for the way Draco’s heart skips several beats in a row. Draco considers lying, but Harry has a soft, affectionate fascination on his face as he looks from Draco to the ornament — which, finally, is beginning to dim — and back, and really, he doesn’t see the point; may as well be upfront and see what happens.

Merlin, he’s turning into a bloody Gryffindor.

“Bonding charm,” he explains, a little stiffly. “It identifies and measures compatibility in a pair; physical, mental, emotional. Their goals, et cetera. The brighter it gets, the better chance a pairing has of succeeding.” He swallows. “It’s a short lived charm, too; the longer it lasts, the more compatible a pairing is.”

Far from looking displeased or scared of what that may mean, Harry looks thoughtful; he dances his fingers over Draco’s stomach absently, studying the weakening show of light emanating from the ornament. “What went wrong with it?”

“What?” Draco knits his brow.

“All of the others,” Harry says. “Face boils and nappies.”

“Pock marks,” Draco corrects automatically. Then, slowly, “Nothing.” He looks over at it again, swallowing. “It’s just beautiful, so it was preserved. It’s the same spell that Matched and eventually Bonded my parents. The glow of their Match only lasted for fourteen minutes, before their betrothal.” Draco doesn’t need to look at the clock to know it’s been at least twice that long since hanging the damned thing.

“It’s beautiful,” Harry says, low. “What happens if one of the ornaments breaks?”

“It latches on to the nearest person,” Draco says, “or whomever it’s been directed at.”

“But you know the spell?”

Draco’s heart stutters again; that cannot be remotely healthy, so why he smiles, he’s at a loss to explain. He nods. “I know the spell,” he says, disturbed, forcing away the image of Harry, handsome in formal white robes, standing straight and tall and sure with him under an arch of candles.

They’re eighteen, for fuck’s sake. And have been dating for a month — sort of — after years of rancor.

Harry doesn’t look disturbed at all. Nor about to drop on bended knee, and Draco tries to decide why he feels both relieved and deflated. But then Harry gives that thoughtful hum again, kisses Draco, and simply says “Good.”

And, somehow, it is.

Draco spends the next few days wrapped up in Harry, now that classes have ceased for the term. The Weasleys have plans, apparently, to visit the dragon tamer this Christmas in Romania, understandably feeling the need for distance this year from previous holidays, the way his mother had. Harry tells him that they have a portkey out on Christmas morning, so Weasley and Hermione linger until then, popping back and forth between Hogwarts and the Weasley home via the headmistress's Floo. Occasionally Harry joins them — he’s elected to stay at Hogwarts for the whole of the hols this year, for some reason — and tentatively invites Draco to join, but Draco’s mind flashes to the scars he’d seen on the eldest one’s face, and his answer is such a firm no, that Harry doesn’t ask again.

Still, the Weasley matriarch sends back little things — for you, Harry insists — like homemade treats with flavours that rival those made in Paris’s finest pâtisseries, and an oddly lumpy gift wrapped in shiny green paper, that gets placed beneath his tree. They eat the sweets in bed, or while they talk in mumbles in the near-empty common room, legs slung over each other’s on the sofa, almost comfortably. They go for walks every day down to the freezing lake — once catching Hagrid having what looked to be a strangely private conversation with one of the Giant Squid’s tentacles, if the fast-rising blush beneath his beard was anything to go by — and Hermione and Weasley accompany them, neither of them raising an eyebrow when Harry takes Draco’s gloved hand, with no clue what it does to his heart.

And when Harry’s gone, Draco reads his diary intently, not sure how to feel about the more personal tidbits or the scrawl of Draco’s name with several question marks after it in the beginning. Mentions of him are littered throughout in small asides, things like, Told Ron and Hermione he’d be fine with the sleepwalking if I have to go off the potions. He seems like he’s trying really hard this year, and — as if that weren’t bad enough — Overheard Malfoy apologize to a second year the Carrows forced him to punish last spring. I don’t think he knows how much I saw. Doesn’t want to talk about it. Neither do I, but… Harry mentions things in passing, like having had dreams about Draco for years and not really knowing why, and Draco doesn’t know what to think when he reads Harry’s description of him as smart, and I think sort of sensitive, perhaps. Nicer, I mean. I think maybe his dad told him that wasn’t allowed. He’s still a bit of an arshole, but I think it’s got to be hard to come to grips with the fact that you were wrong about so many things, but I can tell he’s working on it. It makes Draco’s throat ache and his eyes prickle, and he pretends to be busy with an extra credit project for two hours after Harry returns to Hogwarts, just so he doesn’t have to look at him.

In between those are bits of writing that are so surprising and impressive, Draco’s breath catches; a loosely constructed article on why so many corrupted officials haven’t been ousted from the Ministry yet; excerpts of an in-progress piece about the way the wizarding and Muggle worlds treat and raise orphans and other outliers, using his own life as an example. He stops reading when he gets to the part where Harry writes about waking up sure he’d sleep walked — Malfoy looked at me funny, this morning, and I feel rather blurry and tired. Pretty sure I said something to him in my sleep, dammit. I thought I was done with this — mostly because he doesn’t want any of his own memories to be possibly changed by what Harry thought. But a new insight, a new thread of possibility tangles deeper into him by what he does read, and when he hands Harry’s diary back to him, Harry gives him a small smile and tucks it away without comment.

Christmas Eve dawns crisp and clear after a few days of light snow flurries that leave the ground a frozen white, the barest hints of packed brown earth peeking through. Draco is woken up with a lazy kiss and an even lazier handjob, to which he promptly reciprocates, not even cringing that Harry hasn’t used a breath charm yet as he wanks him with slow, sure strokes, Harry’s hips undulating into Draco’s fist and mouth going slack against his when he comes. They have breakfast together, and then he spends the rest of the day in the quiet of the castle after Harry and his friends leave; he Floo calls his mother and Pansy, then sends off owls laden with their gifts, dutifully writes to his father. And, with great relief, receives his own owl early in the evening, giving him the opportunity to wrap its contents and Harry’s other gifts and place them under Harry’s bright Muggle tree.

Harry shows up later than expected, well after dinner, but with such a sly look in his eyes that Draco kisses him back anyway.

“What.” He stares at Harry, pressing his lips together to show a total lack of amusement, despite the way Harry grins at him like a wizard drinking the the upper-shelf potions. “What did you do.”

Pulling out a little box from his cloak, Harry displays it with another wicked look. “I got you another present. Last minute addition.”

“Oh.” Draco takes the perfect square of a box; it’s light in his hands, though it looks heavy, the size of a pomegranate and decorated in sparkling glass melted over cedar. He coughs a laugh, shaking his head when Harry frowns, some of his excitement melting away. “I mean, thank you,” he says wryly, then nods to Harry’s tree. “It’s just…”

Harry turns to look, face startled when he spies the two perfect, square, pomegranate-sized boxes with a sharp lacquer of melted glass resting there next to his other gifts from various friends, along with a flat, rectangular gift wrapped in gleaming red. After lighting up for a brief moment, his face falls, and he glances at Draco with an odd combination of confusion and disappointment.

“What?”

Smiling ruefully, Harry shakes his head. “Nothing. Just— there are three from you.”

“Well, yes,” Draco looks at them, bewildered. “I’d said.”

“Right, but I thought—” Breaking off with a snort, he shakes his head again. Draco narrows his eyes, examining him closely and noting the high flush that starts to bleed over his cheekbones. Harry’s face smooths out after a second and he gives a brief chuckle, looking at the gift in Draco’s hands. “So we got each other ornaments? That’s fun—”

“Harry,” Draco says, cutting him off quietly. He clears his throat and passes his present back, then reaches up to tug his tie loose; his hands remain steady somehow, though his heart is suddenly racing. “Go put that under my tree.”

Harry stares at him for a long moment, gaze resting on Draco’s hands, nimbly pulling his tie free of his collar. Draco reaches down and grips the edges of his jumper, pulling it off with one smooth motion that leaves his hair ruffled. He smooths it back, mouth quirking up to one side when Harry’s lips part, then starts swiftly on the buttons of his shirt, and this finally seems to startle Harry into action; he scurries quickly to Draco’s tree and sets the box in the front near his two others with a careful bend at the waist, then turns around. His eyes widen when Draco pulls his shirttails free, no matter that they’ve seen each other naked dozens and dozens of times at this point.

“Draco,” he says, strained, able to read the tension in the room and Draco’s deliberation how Draco wants him to, “I didn’t mean that we had to—”

Draco stops in the act of toeing off his shoes, his hands resting on his zipper. He smiles, feeling his face warm. “You thought we’d have sex,” he says, managing to make it sound simple even though his mouth is dry.

Suddenly awkward — for the first time since waking up naked in Draco’s bed — Harry stills, then gives a jerky nod. His Adam’s apple bobs. “Hermione said what she’d told you about, um.” He swallows. “About gifts. Sorry. I got the wrong idea.”

“You really, really did,” Draco says, smirking. He finishes unzipping his flies and sits on the edge of his bed to bend and peel off his socks — there’s no real graceful way to do it — before standing again to strip his trousers and pants off. His pulse flutters in his throat, because… because… “You thought your Christmas Eve gift would to shag me,” he says, just to clarify.

“Yeah. Sorry,” Harry says again, looking as though he’s not sure how to proceed. Draco can see the tenting of his trousers, and he lets his smile widen. He’s more than half-hard and damp already as he stands naked before Harry, and his cock stiffens a bit more when Harry’s eyes drop to it.

“I’d have done it with you that first night, I think,” Draco says quietly. The words make him feel exposed, but for once he doesn’t have to force them from his throat; they just come out, as bizarrely easy as this whole thing between them has been. “At the very least when you… You know,” he says, scrubbing his palm over his face with a disjointed laugh, then running his hand through his hair. “A few days ago. I already said; anything. I’d like to,” he adds, in history’s most massive understatement, ever.

Harry takes a halting step forward, as though he can’t believe his luck, which is improbably hilarious. He unpins his cloak at the throat, then strips off his jumper and t-shirt, turning them inside out together. He removes his glasses and tosses them on his own bed, eyes dark. But his voice is grating and low when he says, “You haven’t been with anyone else—”

“Should I have been?” Draco asks archly. “You haven't.” He brings his hand to his cock and he gives it a few strokes.

“I might’ve, if I’d had the time. That must mean something.” Harry pauses in the act of disrobing, uncertain. “Shouldn’t it be special for you?”

Draco clears his throat and looks away. “It shouldn’t have to be, you know. But.” He swallows, electing not to point out that he’d never let someone else come on his face before, either. Instead, softly, he says, “It will be.”

And that’s true, he finds. Harry Potter — his unlikely boyfriend for however long, who kisses him and touches him and laughs with him and… and is his friend — thought of sleeping with Draco, of having him, as a gift he’d receive.

A gift.

For a moment, Harry looking at him, intent and serious, Draco feels like one.

“It will be for me, too” Harry says, then. Draco nods absently, waiting for Harry to finish undressing so—

“Wait, what?” His hand falls off his cock, and he sits up straighter.

Harry unbuttons and unzips his jeans, and makes short work of removing them along with his shoes and socks, explaining as he goes. “I mean, opportunities or no, I’m glad it’s with you.” Left shoe, right shoe. “I...noticed you. Even when I didn’t like you.” Left sock, right sock. “And now I really, really like you,” he says with a soft, embarrassed cough. “I just didn’t want to assume that you...” He licks his lips. “That we were, y’know, ready. It’s been fast,” he says. Jeans, pants.

Draco nods faintly. “It has been.” Sort of.

Sort of not.

“But I, yeah.” Harry walks up to him, and if not for the slight tremor in his voice and swollen cock revealing his nerves and excitement, he’d seem perfectly steady. He presses the latter against Draco’s abdomen and tilts Draco’s chin up with one finger to look at him. “I thought you should know,” he says, and dips his head.

Draco halts Harry with a hand on his chest, and this is not what he imagined his first full shag being like — the moments before filled with awkward emotional confessions and deliberate undressing; especially not for them — but his own voice catches with his breath when he says, “What do you want, Potter?”

Harry’s eyes crinkle around the corners even as they grow sharp and fierce; up this close, the green’s shot through with pale amber flecks. “I want to live my own life now.”

Taking a deep breath, Draco says, “You never told me why you were taking the sleeping potions. Why you stopped, if sleepwalking was such a risk.”

“Oh. Yeah.” Harry looks at him for a moment, then straightens, frowning. “Healer Wilkins said I’d reached the limit I could take before developing a dependency. And I’ve been in… You know, therapy. For—” He waves a hand, again dismissing the whole of the war before saying, “—what happened with Voldemort. Riddle. The stuff I told you about. She said that I was only sleepwalking because I needed to work things out, and that once I did, it’d likely stop.”

Draco pauses. “You haven’t sleep-walked in almost two weeks.” He hitches his shoulders a touch. “At least, not that I’m aware.”

“No, I haven’t.”

“I suppose you’re all well and healed then, from the war?” he asks, doubtfully.

“No.” Harry sighs. “But I can talk about that stuff now, instead of just letting it live in my head. For a couple of months, I couldn’t even talk about it to Ron and Hermione, let alone Wilkins.” He hesitates. “But, er, talking while I was asleep I guess helped?”

“And your accidental magic, blowing out the windows of the Weasley house?”

Harry scratches his scar with a grimace and Draco’s eyes are drawn to the way it becomes misshapen as his forehead crinkles. “It’s why I practice wandless in my sleep, she thinks. I never could, before. Before the— The battle.” He looks at Draco, one dark eyebrow hooking up as Draco processes that silently. “Anymore questions, or can I kiss you now? We don’t have to—”

“Why the wanking?” Draco blurts. “I’m assuming — that is, I hope,” he adds snidely, “that you didn’t do that with Weasley.”

A new blush flares over Harry’s cheekbones and Draco studies him, intrigued. “Another thing I was working out,” he says, then meets Draco’s eyes. “About you. The things I wanted.”

“To wank in my face?” Draco says, cock jumping a little, unsure if he should laugh, sneer, or drag Harry down and be done with it.

Harry nods with pseudo gravity, lips twitching again. “That’s one way of putting it.” He crosses his arms in front of him, suddenly looking strangely vulnerable, then says, “Finding I liked you, this year. That I could look at you differently, after—”

“Me too,” Draco interrupts. Harry looks at him, confused, and Draco lets his gaze skim down Harry’s body, naked before him. He’s done with talking; he has more than enough answers. He looks back up, and when he speaks, his voice is hoarse. “I want to live my life, too.”

Harry bends again and kisses him without hesitation. He traces the inside of Draco’s lower lip with his tongue before pressing it deeper and stroking Draco’s own, like he’s thought about how this should go, that it should be different from their tumbles before. Only, as Draco starts to pant, Harry lowering his mouth to string soft kisses against his neck, it doesn’t feel that different. A new sort of awareness is there, but so is Harry,, his mouth and his smell; his hands coming up to press Draco back onto the mattress. Draco groans when Harry plants his knees outside of Draco’s thighs and grinds his cock against him; he reaches up and grips handfuls of Harry’s hair, pulling him deeper into a kiss that feels at once clumsier and better than any they’ve had before; more exhilarating.

“How are we—?” Harry starts to ask in a shaky mumble against Draco’s mouth.

“How do you want?” Draco asks, feeling more confident. Harry rocks against him, skimming their pricks together between their stomachs, and already sounds a little unhinged.

“I’d like to— I’m mean, either way, but…”

“You,” Draco says, nipping at his jaw, “should put your cock in me tonight.” And when Harry shudders and nods, forehead falling to Draco’s shoulder, it seems exactly right — though Harry does laugh a bit brokenly when Draco adds, “We’ll do it the other way some other time,” lest he get the wrong idea.

“Yeah.” Harry raises his head, licking his own lips, then flicking his tongue out over Draco’s. “All of it; we’ll do all of it.” He lays flat over Draco for a second, bringing his legs in, and nudges Draco’s thighs open with one knee. Draco shivers, skimming his hands down Harry’s back and feeling the muscles shift subtly under his warm skin as he allows Harry to settle into the cradle of his hips. He summons the lube from his nightstand that they’ve already used for fingers, pressing an eager kiss to Draco’s mouth and popping the tube open without hesitation. He rises between Draco’s legs and sits back on his heels and Draco thinks abstractly that Harry’s cock might look comical jutting out as it does if it didn’t also make him dizzy with wanting to touch it. Draco heaves himself up too, balancing on one hand with his thighs still spread wide as he reaches for it.

Harry pauses, casting him a look that’s half-smile, half-warning. “I’m, uh.” He squirts some of the lubricant over his fingers, looks, and then adds a little more. “I’d like to try to— before—”

Grinning, Draco keeps his touch light and loose; he traces the length of Harry’s prick, stroking over it with one finger and letting his thumb press against the opposite side in a gentle hold. “Then don’t come yet,” he says, stifling a snicker.

“Wanker,” Harry mutters, the corner of his mouth lifting.

“You’re one to tal—” Draco starts to scoff, but Harry grips his hip and leans in to kiss him, hard and fervent, his free hand moving between Draco’s legs. He gives Draco’s cock a slippery stroke in his grip and Draco yelps, hips rising off the bed for a second before coming down hard as Harry’s hand releases him and moves lower, slipping between his buttocks. Draco’s ability to tease dries up; he scoots a bit and scoops his back so that he’s positioned more on his tailbone than his arse, widening his legs just a touch more. His eyes fall shut as Harry finds his hole and massages it with slick fingers, slipping one inside and then out, then again and again until Draco barely realises what’s happening, his sphincter is twitching with so many nerves coming to life as it’s repeatedly stimulated. He falls onto his back again, muscles going wobbly and cock dribbling out a small string of precome, and hears Harry’s breath leave him with a whoosh. His hand pauses.

“Keep going,” Draco says hoarsely. “Feels good. Keep going.”

Harry drags his eyes up; he swallows and nods, this time pushing two fingers in and doing the same thing. Draco palms his cock, trapping it between the hard line of his hipbone and hand, careful not to apply too much pressure. He cants his hips up and hears himself whinge softly.

“I want—” Harry slips his fingers deeper, then drags them out to the tips, pushing further with each slide in. His dark brows knit close, lip sucked between his teeth, and Draco wants to help, but all he can do is push back against Harry’s hand to facilitate the ease of entry, too mindless with the sensations swamping him. He notices blankly that Harry’s breath is ragged, that his eyes are nearly black as he continues to finger Draco open, using his hand to soften the resistant clench of Draco’s muscles into a cling for long minutes as Draco writhes beneath him, legs moving restlessly.

“A-another,” Draco says, breathless, cock leaking steadily. He feels the pleasure like little pinpricks all over his body, stemming from where Harry’s fingers tease their way in and out of him.

“Draco,” he chokes out, in what sounds like a denial. But then he pulls his fingers out and adds a third, more than they’ve done yet. Draco feels a surge of euphoria at the burn of it as his arse stretches steadily around the girth of Harry’s fingers with every pump because it manages to feel just as good; even the discomfort is thrilling, tweaking the knowledge that his body is accommodating Harry, allowing him in. Then Harry groans, his eyes glinting darkly as he flashes them back to Draco’s face, and he suddenly covers him again, mouth desperate on Draco’s throat. He presses damp, frantic kisses there, and rubs his cock against the crease of Draco’s thigh, moistening him there too. “Please,” he gasps out, almost too quietly to hear. “Please, let me.”

Draco gulps in a bit of air, forcing his mind back enough at Harry’s entreaty to nod. “Yeah.” He turns his head and bites at Harry’s earlobe a little too hard when Harry’s fingers brush over that tantalising bundle of nerves inside him. “On your back.”

“My—”

“Your back, Potter, fuck,” Draco says, stomach tightening as he presses up against Harry and curls a leg around his hip to urge him over. Harry goes, flipping over with him and removing his fingers as he does, smearing them hurriedly over his cock, then scrabbling for purchase on Draco’s waist. Draco leaves off his own cock and pushes Harry’s shoulders into the bedding, breathing fast, dazed and hungry for he’s not sure what. His arse feels a little tender, a little strange, but sensitive — it’s weird to be so aware of one’s own arsehole, he thinks, but his prick seems to like it, twitching with every shift he makes; he’s already so close.

Harry digs one hand into the muscle at Draco’s waist and the other onto his tensed thigh, and Draco straddles him. He considers a moment, then rises up and grasps Harry’s cock, angling it until he can feel the rounded head of it press into the right spot. Harry stares up at him, almost frozen but for his hands, which clench repetitively against him as Draco sucks in a breath and starts lowering down, gritting his teeth.

“Malf—” Harry breaks off, face twisted, and Draco wiggles his hips, allowing gravity to help. He hisses with the anticipation of pain when the head of Harry’s cock almost pops inside, startling and almost unexpected. But it doesn’t hurt, not like he thought it would. He sinks down lower, jaw loosening, and a small, breathy “oh” escapes him with each inch more Harry slides inside. There’s discomfort, yes, a burning, stretching sensation different than Harry’s fingers; Harry’s cock is solid and thick and full. But it’s that very fullness that feels so good, obliterating any underlying pain — Draco can feel the thick ridge of Harry’s cock, can feel the way it jerks. He settles, arse pressing flush with Harry’s hips, and breathes, Harry lodged fully inside him.

“Shit,” he mutters under his breath, adjusting to the newness of it. He rocks tentatively, then harder with a low moan, feeling dizzy and lightheaded as he works his hips back and forth with slow rolls, rising up to take Harry more shallowly, so his prick fits against the right spot, then starts to move with more intent, getting quickly lost in it, letting his eyes drift shut. He can feel his prick bounce intermittently against Harry’s stomach and the two sensations are so perfectly matched, feel so good, that he arches forward a bit to drag his prick against Harry’s skin. He hears his name — first, last — but can’t quite make himself open his eyes and break his focus, until a fast, deep thrust upward of Harry’s hips drags him back.

Harry stares upward, jaw hard and mouth flat with a desperate sort of restraint; his fingers bite hard into Draco’s skin, and his brow is beaded with sweat, his shaggy hair in disarray all over the pillow. “Malfoy,” he says, voice breaking in the middle, “faster. God. More.”

Draco shivers, and lowers himself over Harry, planting his hands on the mattress. “You can move too, you know,” he says with what should come out a smirk but feels more like a smile. Harry exhales shakily, eyes bright. He raises his head to kiss Draco, simultaneously gripping both of his hips hard to yank their bodies together just as he thrusts up again. Draco’s smile vanishes, the dreamy-hot sensation of riding Harry’s prick slowly replaced with a streak of such need that he hears a growl break free from his throat— louder when Harry does it again. Harry’s eyes are locked on his, narrow and challenging; he licks his lips, and Draco tenses his thighs, rising when Harry relaxes for a second into the bed and then bouncing hard down against him to meet him in the middle when Harry pumps back up. “Like— like that, yeah,” Draco says voice gone a little higher, sinking onto his forearms. The movement wedges their rocking bodies together, his cock slipping between between them. His balls are tight and drawn up between his thighs, and he can feel the shift of Harry’s coarse pubic hair against them each time he shimmies his hips, can feel Harry’s breath against him as their mouths collide in little, open-mouthed half-kisses.

“I’m going to come,” Harry whispers against him. Their fucking has become a fast grind, Harry barely pulling out at all before pushing deeper, Draco shimmying his hips rather than raising them. He feels lit up from the inside, where they’re connected, little shocks of pleasure sparking outward.

“I want you to,” Draco whispers back, chest aching. It’s such an odd thing to notice amongst everything else; he chalks it up to the way he can feel the frantic knocking of Harry’s heart against him. Then Harry levers himself up, propping himself with one hand behind him again, and curls a tight arm around Draco’s waist to keep them clamped together. His knees crook up, too, sliding Draco closer against him, and then his hips are pumping into him relentlessly, eyes squeezing shut and breath wheezing. He barely cries out when he comes — just makes a quiet, shuddery noise that sounds like pain, turning his face so his cheek rests against the curve of Draco’s shoulder. Draco feels that noise in his bones, feels Potter’s sharp pleasure as if it’s his own, like an ache he’s carried for so very long, finally being relieved. He feels the wetness spread in him, warm and pulsing as Harry’s cock throbs over and over, and he gives a low, frustrated cry because everything feels too good, but he can’t— can’t quite—

Harry’s eyes blink open; he lifts his head, that tightness still etched over his face. He fits a hand into the absence of space between them and finds Draco’s cock, curling his fist around it. He presses his thumb against the flat underside of the glans and rolls his hips more methodically, eyes hot on Draco’s face as he executes a series of tiny squeezes and a small pull. Draco gasps and comes, wriggling down on Harry’s hips to get more of his still-hard cock as his own shoots out long stripes between them, over Harry’s hand and against his chest. He kisses Harry blindly — ear, temple, jaw — as pleasure crashes over him, his arms slung tight around Harry’s shoulders, whole body shaking with release.

They sit like that for long minutes as their breath dies down and their sweat begins to dissipate. Long after it starts to become uncomfortable, after Harry’s cock softens and starts to slip from him, Harry holds him tight, breathing against his throat in soft, warm puffs. Draco blinks the blur from his eyes and finally pries his head up, heart still hammering. Harry smiles and tilts his head up to kiss him, and Draco’s arms tighten again fractionally until he pulls away.

“I think it’s Christmas,” Harry murmurs.

Draco blinks and nods, carefully sliding off him and glancing at his desk clock. With a small wince at the different twinges in his body — it turns out that shagging actually uses more muscles than flying, something he hadn’t thought possible — he reaches for his wand and casts a quick freshness charm over his bedding, then a cleaning spell over Harry and himself. He briefly debates summoning his pyjamas and a muscle relaxation potion, knowing he’s going to feel this in the morning, but refrains with a yawn and slips under the covers next to Harry, who’s already made himself comfortable against the pillows.

“You can open your other gifts in the morning,” Draco says drily, spelling off the lights.

“Think there might be another one like this?” Harry asks, mouth tilting up at one corner. Draco rolls his eyes, not allowing the thrill that rips through his body to show on his face.

“Not til I get a turn,” he says.

“That can be arranged,” Harry says, mirroring his yawn. He edges subtly closer and Draco gives in with a sigh, turning on his side and letting Harry curl against him in the position they so often wake up in. Harry’s arm winds around his ribcage and he hoists one leg over Draco’s, his cock soft against the top of Draco’s buttocks, and Draco feels a weak thrum of lust shimmer through him, though he’s way too tired and sore to do anything about it. He looks at his tree, his blinks getting slower and longer as he studies the faint gleam of the crystal ornaments, lit up only by the reflection of Harry’s twinkling decorations.

“Oh,” he says sleepily. “It’s Christmas.” He snags his wand again and points it at his tree, mumbling the spell; he smiles when Harry’s head pops up at the renewed brightness in the room. Draco cranes his neck to look at Harry’s face.

“I thought you had to touch them,” he breathes, staring wide-eyed at the ornaments come to life at once, all light and movement, each telling a different story.

“Not on Christmas,” Draco says, feeling like a helpless fool for smiling again when Harry presses a distracted kiss against his neck. He forces a frown. “Go to sleep, it’ll be there in the morning.”

Harry snorts, but grudgingly settles again. “Don’t pretend you didn’t put that up to impress me.”

“Is that all it would have taken?” Draco asks quietly, after a few beats.

The silence feels loaded, but then Harry kisses the nape of his neck, lips brushing just under his fall of hair, and that seems to... say something, loud and clear.

“Draco.” His shoulder jostles, a warm hand prodding him. “Draco.”

Draco groans, turning to bury his face in the pillow, voice coming out grainy and muffled. “Just wank on my back, Potter. I’m tired.”

Harry snorts, then shoves his shoulder harder. “Maybe later. It’s Christmas.”

“Sure,” Draco mutters, “you get shagged for a gift and I get a wank over my back. Just because you saved the world...”

“Just wake up,” Harry says, frustrated enough to convince Draco he’s actually awake.

Laboriously, Draco lifts his head up, peering at Harry’s face with slitted eyes. He crouches by Draco’s side of the bed, between him and the tree, and looks amused and impatient, eyes vibrant behind his glasses. “It’s still dark out.” He drops his head back down. “‘m cold.”

“You are not,” Harry says with a huff. “You’re being lazy.”

“Let me hear you say that after you spend some time with my cock up your—”

“Oh my god,” Harry says. Draco peeks at him with one eye, smirking at the exasperation on his face. He lets his eye slide shut again, and then hears, “Fine; I’ll open my presents and talk to you about them later.”

Draco fumbles blindly for his wand again; finding it, he lifts his head and shoots Harry a pointed glare, then casts at both his tree and Harry’s, summoning the six wrapped parcels to the bed in a jumble, shoving them unceremoniously under the covers. “Get back in bed and you can have your bloody presents.”

“Why are you in such a bad mood?” Harry wonders aloud, climbing in — over him, but careful not to crush the small pile of presents between the bedspread. Draco shakes his head.

“Because I haven’t gotten a full night’s sleep in months, you daft prick!” he barks, finally rolling over, pushing the hair out of his face and continuing to grumble under his breath, though his eyes stray to the firm curve of Harry’s arse and flash of his cock as he wiggles under the covers. “I barely slept at all last year, and then I get paired with you, and get wanked on all the time, and start having sex, and, and—”

Harry’s laughter cuts off his complaint. “You’re funny,” he says, shaking his head ruefully. Draco rolls his eyes and sighs, heaving himself up to a sit, back pressing into the headboard. Harry absently reaches out and adjusts Draco’s pillow so it’s not bunched under his tailbone, and a smile sneaks over Draco’s face before he can help it. He sighs again and rubs his eyes.

“What time is it?”

Vaguely sheepish, Harry mumbles, “Five. Almost.”

“Harry!”

Harry ducks his head, lips twitching, and Draco tries to stay irritated, but every twitch of Harry’s lips feels like a direct tug against his heart. He looks away, sliding his knees up under the blankets toward his chest and contemplates their trees for a moment; his has a ridiculous amount of presents beneath it — mostly from his mother, who always overdoes, as well as Pansy — and Harry’s far less, just what the Weasleys have sent along, and the odd gift from a few in his circle. (Lovegood’s is a badly disguised pineapple, the thorns popping out of the gold paper; even the leaves have been individually wrapped.) He’s rerouted the numerous, present-bearing owls he gets, once they’ve been checked, to nearby charities, because that’s who he is.

The Boy Who Lived is the boy in his bed. Draco shifts and, for a moment, feels at a loss for what to do next.

“Sorry,” Harry says, and when Draco looks back over, he looks apologetic. “I should have waited.”

“No, don’t be,” Draco says. He folds his arms over his knees and rests his cheek on them, looking at Harry for a moment, then gives a tiny nod. “Open one.”

With a quick, winsome smile, Harry grabs one of the flat, square parcels, looking at Draco for a long moment before tearing the paper open. He looks down at the sheaf of parchment, the soft rustling of paper sounding as he flips through it, then starts reading in a hollow voice.

“Dear Mr James,

We are pleased to accept your contribution for publication. Your piece, A New Ministry Rises? was engaging and sharply written, and will no doubt make an impact in the wake of the war. As per your instructions, I am writing this immediately upon reviewing the article with the understanding that your scroll has confidentiality charms preventing me or others from making copies or remembering it in enough detail to rewrite—”

Harry looks up quizzically, and Draco shrugs. “It seemed wise, considering,” he gets in before Harry starts reading again.

“—and that you are highly protective of your identity as well. The attached contract guarantees protection of your personal privacy, and credit to your article to any pseudonym you choose; furthermore, upon validation of the sources quoted, a transfer of one hundred Galleons will be made to the vault number you facilitate us with. Please have your solicitor look it over, and send a (non-charmed) scroll with any questions you have, to set up a meeting in person — which I would much prefer.

To answer your other question, regarding permanent employment: we can currently (happily) offer you a paid internship/apprenticeship, with the likely opportunity for further publication. On-staff positions are offered after a year of training. The second contract outlines requirements, salary, and benefits.

I look forward to meeting you, and thank you for your submission.

Sincerely,

Esmeralda Castlewhite
Editor-In-Chief
Wizarding World Monthly”

Harry sets the stack of paper onto Draco’s other nightstand, nudging it further away with his fingertip as though it’s a curse that will explode if jostled too carelessly. A pit of wariness forms in Draco’s stomach; he can’t read Harry’s expression.

“It’s just another option,” he says anxiously when the silence goes on too long, searching Harry’s profile. “Just in case. Because. You know, your writing is not as monstrously bad as I once might have assumed — your penmanship is, but not your writing, once I’d figured out a good enough translation charm — and if you’ve decided you’d actually like to go into Auror training—”

“Thank you,” Harry says.

“—then of course you should, but. Oh.” Draco swallows back the rest of his ramble and cautiously ventures, “You’re welcome?”

Harry sighs and turns to him, rubbing his scar with the heel of his palm for a moment, as if to remind himself of its existence. But his expression his soft, and his eyes flicker to Draco’s, looking for something. “Even Ron and Hermione don’t know yet that I’ve… doubted things,” he admits. “I don’t know if I can end up doing this, but thank you. Yeah. Draco, it’s almost,” his throat works silently for a second, “too much. Having the option to do something different. I don’t know what to say.”

“You could let me open one of my presents,” Draco suggests after a pause. Harry gives a wet-sounding laugh, and waves a hand.

“Just pitch-side season tickets for Puddlemere United,” he says, as if they’re not as extravagant as a new Firebolt 2000. “And since I know you like playing more than watching, I’m also shooting an advert for the British League under the condition that I can bring someone else to play, so. We get to play a ‘game’ with Pudd U and the Falcons. I dunno which team they’ll put you as the Seeker for, though. It’s not like what you did for me.”

“What the—” Draco tears the wrapping off the small flat boxes, unable to believe his eyes. He looks up at Harry, then down at the tickets in his hands, then back up and back down. His voice is weak. “These aren’t pitch-side. It’s with the players.”

“Same thing, practically,” Harry says.

Draco scoffs. “Even my father wouldn’t have been able to get—” He bites his lip, stealing a glance at Harry’s face. Confusingly, he perks up.

“Oh! I did, ah, get you something else, I guess,” Harry says. “‘S’not wrapped; but hang on, I want to open my ornaments.”

Still reeling, Draco automatically reaches to block him. “We’re playing with the teams?”

Harry laughs cheerfully. “It’s the red present. I just wrapped last year’s advert and charmed our faces onto it,” he says as he flips the little latches of the square boxes in unison.

“Stop telling me my presents before I’ve the chance to open them!” Draco growls, starting in on the red present. He opens his mouth to tear into Harry but stops at Harry’s silence and looks up; he stills as Harry lifts out both ornaments at once: the universe ornament that’s been in Draco’s family for generations, which Harry had been so fascinated with — he’d never asked, when they were putting up the astronomy ornaments two days prior where it had gone, and thank Merlin for that — and another, brand new one. Both of them are already lit up, though Harry holds them by their ribbons; apparently Draco’s activation charm extended to them as well.

“Draco…”

“The, um, universe is antique, please remember,” he says haltingly, cheeks burning. “So be careful with it. And I apologise for the hazy quality of the memories in the other; it turns out that McGonagall got,” he coughs into his fist, “‘rather sauced,’ she told me, at your parent’s wedding reception. And Hagrid’s might look a little distorted, because of his...heritage,” Draco adds, uneasy; he’s still so unsure, sometimes, how not to offend. But at least Harry never seems to mind, as long as he shows he’s trying. “So—”

Harry stares fiercely at the spinning ornament; in it Lily is wearing a cream, ankle-length bohemian style dress, pinched in at the waist and draping to the floor. It’s embroidered with pale gold daisies at the hem and neck, and she has a matching crown of flowers over her flowing dark red hair as she walks down the tiny aisle with a bouquet of wildflowers in her hands, toward where Harry’s father stands waiting with Sirius Black.

In this, Draco knows without a doubt, despite the dampness in Harry’s eyes, he’s done well. He touches Harry’s wrist, then looks away when Harry rapidly begins blinking, and talks to give Harry a chance to steady himself. “It’s fine if you don’t want the Malfoy ornament on your tree; you simply seemed to like it, and I couldn’t find one that belonged to your family. But every tree should have an antique ornament on it, come Christmas. For tidings of good fortune. I imagine even the Weasleys have one or two.”

“They do,” Harry says at last. Draco looks back over to him; the tightness around his eyes, that ache of tears trying to be held back, has eased. He places the ornaments gently back in their boxes, then looks up. “I’m not in love with you, Draco—”

“That’s fine,” Draco says, nodding evenly over the throb of pain in his midsection; it doesn’t matter, really, though stating it so plainly wasn’t necessary, he thinks. “I didn’t get those for you, thinking you were.”

“—but I think I will be soon,” Harry says. “I’m getting there, at least, and—”

“Wait, what?” Draco’s head comes up. “Because of the presents?”

Harry gives a tiny shrug, a small laugh. “No. Just am.”

“Why?” Draco asks. Harry opens his mouth, then startles as their door opens and Weasley and Granger come striding in, arguing quietly.

“Their light is on,” Weasley says practically. “Mum wanted us there early, so why not—”

“It’s rude, Ron,” Hermione says, obviously not realising she and Weasley have already completely entered the room and are standing in the middle of it debating whether or not they should come in without knocking. Draco stares at them, tugging the blankets higher around his hips as the mattress starts shaking with Harry’s silent laughter. “You don’t just— oh my goodness!” She buries her face in her mittened hands when she notices them, clearly naked under the covers together, one of Harry’s legs uncovered almost to the hip. “We’re so sorry!”

“Why?” Weasley says, giving her a strange look. “They’re awake, see?”

“Ron,” she moans, peeking out of her mittens, then covering her face again. “They’re—”

“Already opening presents!” Weasley, who Draco promptly decides to call Ron again, darts a casual gaze over his and Harry’s close positioning in bed and doesn’t even bat an eye this time. He sits on the foot of it, and Draco glares at him half-heartedly even while Harry starts making a wheezing sound next to him.

“R-Ron, m-maybe this isn’t th-the right time,” he gets out through heaving laughter.

“It’s Christmas!” Ron objects.

Hermione — Granger, Draco thinks derisively, because she was meant to have far more fortitude than Ron — makes a strangled noise and twirls, dashing out of the room and calling out a high, “Happy Christmas!” behind her, managing to miss the door frame by a miraculous inch, considering she’s still covering her eyes.

“Ron,” Draco says carefully when he’s sure he won’t dissolve into the same laughter that’s taken hold of Harry, “we’re naked.”

“Oh.” He Summons a piece of peppermint fudge from the open box on Draco’s desk. “You want to get dressed?”

“Go,” Harry finally says. “For fuck’s sake, Ron!”

Ron snickers, then rises. He opens the rucksack in his hands and pulls out two gifts, placing them on the foot of the bed. “From me and ‘Mione.”

“Thanks,” Harry says, rolling his eyes. Ron winks and tosses them each a tiny piece of wrapped peppermint fudge and they both snatch them out of the air in an oddly synchronised motion, then exchange a look of such understanding, that Draco can’t help the smile that plays over his face.

“One of ‘em’s for Draco,” Ron says, heading out. Draco’s heart skips. “Owl us later!” He shuts the door behind him, leaving Draco with the awful choice of either finding out immediately what Ron and Granger have gotten him, or—

“Why? Why me?” Draco asks, only feeling then — as he says it — just how hard it’s been pressing on him, all this time.

“Lots of reasons,” Harry says, picking up the thread of their conversation easily. The lingering smile on his face from Ron and Granger’s visit softens. “I like that you’re… A romantic, even after…”

“I am not,” Draco says sharply, affronted, “romantic.”

“Not romantic; a romantic,” Harry says, like there’s a difference. He looks at the ornament again, resting in its box. “Although—”

“I’m simply adept at giving gifts,” he sniffs. “Part of my upbringing.”

“Malfoy—” Harry scratches the back of his neck, a gesture Draco’s come to recognise as a stalling tactic. “You’re that, too. But, I mean. Ron loves his parents a lot, and he never memorised whatever bonding spell they used, or the specifications of their match.”

Draco’s face turns hot. “That’s not abnormal. I learned a lot of things, growing up: I speak Latin, and French and even some Mermish and Goblin; I know how to host a gala with a thousand attendees; I can even play Chopin’s Nocturne in F minor — without a charm!” he adds triumphantly, though he hadn’t been able to until he was fifteen. “Purebloods have a very well-rounded education outside of Hogwarts, thank you.”

“But which of those things did you learn because you…” Harry hesitates for a second, “needed to? Because you wanted what you saw?”

“All of them,” Draco says, confused, and Harry rumbles a rueful laugh.

“No, I mean, which thing that you learned was something you chose? Something not shoved in front of you by a tutor?”

Draco swallows, then twitches his head in a nod to concede the point. “So?”

Harry shrugs. “So I like it,” he says. “I like that about you.”

“That I wanted to be like my parents?” Draco says in disbelief, leaning away to get a better look at Harry and make sure he’s not Polyjuiced. “Have you forgotten what they were? What I...?”

Suddenly, Harry looks at him fiercely; he reaches out and captures Draco’s forearm, the fingers of his opposite hand tracing it roughly; nothing like the gentle, curious touch from that night so many weeks ago, Harry asleep and placid as he’d investigated it. Now, Harry’s face twists into a hard frown, jaw bunching when he looks at it. Draco tries to pull away automatically but Harry levels a glare at him and tightens his hand. He’s seen it so many times at this point, Draco doesn’t know what the point is, if Harry’s reconsidering everything simply because Draco couldn’t keep his mouth shut.

“This,” Harry says, quietly, “is not what you are. You wanted to be this because your parents were different with you, different in front of you, and they showed you something you admired. Why wouldn’t you listen to them?” His voice turns grating as he forces the words out. “I learned things, too, that I grew up thinking were… right, or wrong,” he says. “And I didn’t even look up to my family; they weren’t even nice to me.” He sighs. “I’m not excusing what happened — what they did or what you did — but you know it was wrong, so I don’t have to even try… Which is another part of the ‘why’ you keep asking about.”

Draco stares at him silently, then looks down at Harry’s hand, warm palm now covering a great portion of it. He lets the words work on a loop in his mind, the preposterous idea that Harry might/could possibly feel certain things slowly sinking in. He licks his lips. “Forgive me if I don’t believe you,” he says, then blinks at how that sounds. He opens his mouth to try again, but Harry nods as if he understood it.

“I know. Sometimes that stuff is hard to believe.” He slants Draco a look, eyes softening. “But keep trying, okay?”

Draco huffs a little and tries to lighten the mood. “You like me,” he says, carefully staying away from the other word, “because I’m— Because I’m...” He snorts, nodding wordlessly for a moment. “Because I’m a romantic prawn who likes Christmas? And to think, you don’t even care about me speaking Mermish.”

Harry looks blank for a moment, then gives him a lopsided grin. “I guess not. Those romantic prawns get me every time.” He laughs at Draco’s return grin, squeezing the inside of his forearm once more before releasing it. “I got you something else.”

“I know,” Draco says, relieved to have escaped the potentially awkward moment. He picks up the last square gift and smirks. “I wonder what on earth it could be.”

To his surprise, Harry grabs for it, face reddening. “No, not that. That’s not really it. There’s nothing in there, I mean, that was just for— for show. A placeholder,” he says, words spilling so fast there’s no doubt he’s lying. Draco keeps his face mild and nods, allowing Harry to wind down, and setting the gift casually between them.

“Okay. What is it then?”

Sighing, Harry glances once more at the square box with barely-concealed panic and Draco can practically hear his thoughts: if he grabs for it again, he’ll practically be screaming that there’s something inside he doesn’t want Draco to see. He leans back, his pose one of badly-studied casualness, and then swallows. A little smile curls his mouth.

“Visitation rights.”

“What?” Draco frowns, mind still on the mystery ornament. “For wh— Harry.” Numb with shock, Draco understands all at once, the implications slamming into him with the force of a Bludger. “How?”

“Don’t get too excited,” Harry says uneasily, looking chagrined. “They’re just for your mum, and not until the new year. They won’t let you in until his visitation ban is fully lifted in a couple of years, with—”

“My Mark, I know,” Draco says breathlessly. “But—”

“Yeah, I should have said that first; sorry, I just—”

Draco covers Harry’s mouth with one hand, halting his speech. “Don’t apologise,” he says, “not for this.” He drops his hand, and fuck if he’s not close to tears again. Goddamn Harry and his stupidly huge sense of...whatever this is, he thinks. “My mother can see him?”

“Twice a week,” Harry confirms, watching him closely.

“Thank you,” Draco says belatedly, rubbing the aching prickle from his eyes. He’s rocked to his core by the enormity of it — who the hell is he, to get so smug over finding the perfect gift? — his chin soft and wobbly. His words go down to a mumble, “That’s not enough; I know that’s not enough, but… Thank you. I know you hate him, you’ve every right to hate him—”

“So?” Harry says, clipped. “I don’t have to see him,” he adds, and Draco gurgles out a wet laugh, shaking his head.

“No, never,” he promises. “Even if—”

“Even if what?” Harry asks slyly, a gleam in his eyes when Draco breaks off. “Even if we’re still… When he gets out?”

Which won’t be for five years, and how Draco can be so helplessly charmed, touched, and irritated by the same person, he’ll probably never understand. The arsehole drives him from the brink of emotion to a near-throttle on a twice daily basis, at least. “I didn’t say that.”

“You didn’t not say it,” Harry points out.

“Shut up.”

“You shut up,” Harry says, snorting.

Draco rolls his eyes and gives him a half-hearted shove; then, when Harry laughs harder and closes his eyes, snatches the gift from between them in a flash and rips it open; Harry scrambles but, Draco thinks smugly as he lifts out the ornament, he’s too late.

“Malfoy!” Harry barks weakly, reaching futility for it. Draco knocks his hand away, staring; stunned. “Really,” Harry says, plaintive and apologetic, “It was— I didn’t know you’d be getting me such... thoughtful gifts, things I’d really—”

“Oh, this is thoughtful,” Draco says faintly, eyes fixed — possibly permanently — onto the images moving within the crystal. “What the fuck, Potter?”

“It was a joke,” Harry tries miserably, burying his face in his hands and finally giving Draco leave to absolutely lose it.

He starts laughing incredulously, shouldering Harry back when he tries to grab the ornament again, then finally driving a solid elbow into Harry’s ribs; there’s no fucking way Harry’s winning this one. Not only will it be the perfect material to guilt him with later on, Draco’s eyes are going dry and he starts to wonder if he’ll ever be able to blink again.

And he’s definitely getting ready for his turn.

Because inside the ornament is the two of them; a memory, along the same line as his own gift. Only it’s not a simple wedding, hidden under starlight, or two brand new parents smiling at their squalling infant with identical expressions of infinite love. No, instead it’s Harry, wanking fervently over Draco’s face; Draco stares up at him with slick, swollen lips, his cheeks and mouth catching the long spurts of Harry’s spunk as he comes.

Draco finally figures out how to blink through his laughter as the scene starts over again and Harry pulls his prick out of Draco’s mouth, already climaxing. Thank Salazar; he thinks his eyeballs would have fallen out soon.

“Draco,” Harry practically moans, phoenix-red and squirming beside him. “Get rid of it; I’m sorry—”

“Seriously, Potter, what the absolute fuck?” Draco manages to croak out again, still laughing. “Happy fucking Christmas?”

Harry groans. “God, fine, I’m sorry, I don’t know what I was thinking.” He rubs his hands over his face and finally looks at Draco when his wheezy chortling dies down. For a time, there’s silence as Draco contemplates the ornament in continued, comical shock, spinning it to see from every angle of Harry’s memory. Then Harry touches his thigh and Draco looks over to see him grimacing, sheepishly repentant. “Should I go back to my bed, then?” he asks, at least partly joking.

“Goddamnit, Potter, you complete wanker,” Draco says, setting down the ornament in his lap when Harry winces, rueful. He looks at it for another moment, deciding to put it on the tree later, then turns back to Harry and finally lets himself believe. That Harry cares; that this could last. He meets Harry’s eyes, grinning, and when he continues, his voice is hopelessly, recklessly fond. “This is your bed.”