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He’s been sick since sixth year, if the rumor mill has it right, but only once the war is over does Draco get too sick to hide it anymore.

They’ve all returned to Hogwarts as the first-ever class of eighth years, Harry and most of the people he grew up with – the ones who survived and the ones who could face coming back, anyway. His circle is largely intact, and integrated seamlessly with the rest of the student body.

Somehow, though, the whispers don’t reach Harry’s ears. It’s not until he sees Draco cough the lily petals out of his lungs and onto his breakfast that it even occurs to him that something might be wrong with the git.

“Is it some kind of a curse?” Harry asks queasily. Draco primly dabs away the blood at the corner of his lips with a handkerchief – embroidered with his initials, Harry knows – and sweeps the petals off the table before picking up his fork as if nothing at all had happened.

A few others are staring at Draco, like Harry is, but mostly people avert their eyes with expressions ranging from pity to disgust.

Ron swallows hard around his mouthful of eggs, looking about as nauseated as Harry feels. “It’s bloody horrifying, is what it is.”

Harry’s face must betray his shock, because Ron flushes.

“What? My mum’s cousin had the same thing,” he mumbles. “We saw her at the hospital, and she looked….” He shudders a bit. “Gave me nightmares for weeks.”

“It’s not a curse,” says Hermione. “It’s a disease.”

“Oh,” Harry says. “I s’pose Madam Pomfrey will put him right, then.”

Ron and Hermione trade meaningful looks. Harry waits it out, all too accustomed to their silent exchanges by now, until Hermione comes out with: “There’s no cure.”

“No cure?” he says. “So, what, he vomits flowers for the rest of his life?”

“Yes, Harry,” says Hermione, as tentatively as if she were defusing a bomb. “But he won’t live very much longer. Hanahaki Disease is fatal.”

He hears that word, fatal, as if at a great distance. Is it possible Draco Malfoy survived a war only to die of disease? It seems so farfetched. So pedestrian. Harry is outraged, blindingly so, out of nowhere.

“That’s ridiculous,” he blusters, “that doesn’t make sense, how can there not be a cure—”

“There is a cure, sort of,” Ron interrupts. “He’s sick because he loves someone who doesn’t love him back. If he gets loved back, he gets better.”

Ron glances sidelong at Hermione, and his face goes from embarrassment to relief to something else, something Harry doesn’t feel right seeing, so he looks down at his untouched plate of food. Somehow he doesn’t think he’ll be finishing it.

“It’s quite sad, isn’t it,” Hermione says.

“No, it’s not,” Harry snaps. “This is his own bloody fault. If he wasn’t such a self-centered, bigoted prat, maybe someone other than his mum would love him.”

Even Ron looks shocked. The other Gryffindors, absolutely failing to pretend they weren’t eavesdropping, shift minutely away from him. Harry grabs a bread roll from a basket in the middle of the table and bites into it viciously, chewing like his NEWTs depend on it.

Ron launches into an impromptu Quidditch discussion a second later, and Neville jumps – as if a red-headed someone had kicked him under the table – and chimes in. Soon, half the table is overtaken by a rousing debate about who’ll win the next World Cup. Harry is an island of furious silence in the middle of it all. No one is fool enough to try and talk to him. Hermione gives him one of those injured looks of hers, the sort that doesn’t say you hurt me but rather seeing you hurt hurts me, which grates on him right now, because Harry is perfectly fine, and sometimes Hermione thinking he’s hurt is worse than actually being hurt.

His next mouthful of dry bread is painfully hard to swallow. He looks up, through the gap between Ron and Hermione’s shoulders. Draco chatters at his housemates, gesticulating passionately as he delivers a punchline, probably at someone else’s expense. It’s business as usual except that every so often he has to stop and turn away, gasping and sputtering as his mouth fills with petals so white even across the room it almost hurts Harry’s eyes to look at them. They fall into Draco’s lap like shards of frosted glass.

Dying of love? He thinks he’s never heard anything so pathetic; leave it to Malfoy to escalate a crush to such stunning heights of drama. He thinks, also, of what Dumbledore had always said about love being the most powerful magic of all. He keeps forgetting – or perhaps just doesn’t want to believe – that this particular magic can be destructive, too.

Most of all, though, Harry thinks: who is it?

#

You’d think Harry’s the one who’s sick, the way people are avoiding him. Like he’s catching and even eye contact will pass the symptoms on.

“It’s sixth year all over again,” Hermione chides him. “You’re obsessing.”

“I’m not obsessed,” he says, defensively. “I’m just interested, that’s all. I’ve never heard of this. Do Muggles get it?”

“No,” says Hermione, “and neither do Squibs. Unrequited love causes Hanahaki Disease, but it’s magic that makes the symptoms manifest the way they do. But listen, Harry, please,” she adds. She sounds impatient, which is unusual, because she never passes on a chance to impart knowledge, especially when Harry’s actually asking her for it. “You’re following Malfoy around. Brooding over the Marauder’s Map when you’re pretending to do homework. Eavesdropping on the Slytherins – don’t look so surprised, you’re no good at being sneaky, Harry, I don’t know why you think you are. There’s nothing you can do for Malfoy, and since we’ve been given a once-in-a-lifetime second chance to do our NEWTs, we should really focus on—”

“Who says I want to do anything for Malfoy?” Harry asks, incensed.

Hermione sighs.

He figures Hermione’s right about one thing, though, which is that he’s wasting his time eavesdropping on the Slytherins. He needs to actually talk to one, and it’s obvious which Slytherin he should start with.

The summer before they’d all returned for eighth year, Pansy Parkinson had owled him a very stilted letter congratulating him on his defeat of the Dark Lord, expressing her gratitude for his service to Wizardkind, and burying an apology under layers and layers of semantic posturing. Harry had rolled his eyes and responded with a note which read, in its entirety: “Thanks. -H”

On Fridays, Draco and Pansy fill their plates in the Hall and then take their lunch outside; he’s seen them in the courtyard. He knows that Draco and Pansy come from different classes – Draco from Astronomy; Harry doesn’t know what classes Pansy takes – and that Pansy always gets to the Great Hall before Draco.

Harry skulks outside the doors and waits for her. She doesn’t take a second look at him, almost passes him by, but he hisses her name and beckons her down the hallway.

“What’s this about, Potter?” she asks warily.

“I wanted to talk to you for a minute. It’ll be quick. Please,” he says. She looks around as if nervous to be seen with him and follows, just around a corner and into an empty classroom.

Pansy is one of those girls who hardly ever seems to look any older. Her sleek black hair is cut in a bob, the way she’s always worn it, with a green headband. Her thin lips are covered in a light pink gloss, which makes her look even younger, but she’s grown into her snub nose and doesn’t remind him so much of a pug anymore. She’s almost pretty.

Pretty enough for Draco? he wonders, and then banishes the thought. Pansy’s crush on Draco in third and fourth year had been common knowledge amongst the student body; even if she’d grown out of it, there was no way she wouldn’t give Draco a chance if he’d asked.

“Well?” she says, shutting the door behind her.

He has no idea what he wanted to say to her.

“Thank you for your letter,” he begins, awkwardly.

“You already said that,” she reminds him. He must look baffled, because she adds, “I got your note.”

Harry flushes, suddenly feeling very small and petty.

“Right, well, erm,” he says, “I wanted to say in person. That I appreciated it. And that I don’t… blame you.”

He doesn’t, either. He hasn’t thought much about Pansy either way in a long time, but he doesn’t hold it against her that she’d wanted to live.

“I wouldn’t care if you did,” she informs him. “That’s not why I wrote you.”

“Then why?”

“Common fucking sense, Potter,” she says. “The Wizarding World is small, and you’re probably going to be one of its influencers, even if you don’t make Minister of Magic one day. Why would I want to be your enemy?” She tosses her head a little, flicking a stray strand of hair off her cheek. “That doesn’t mean I want to be your friend, either. Disinterested but courteous acquaintances, that’s the sweet spot. I’m sure you agree.”

“Sure,” Harry says, entirely out of his depth. “Right. Glad that’s sorted, then.”

She nods once, sharply, and reaches for the door.

“I’m sorry about Malfoy,” he says in a rush, before she can open it. Her hand slides off the knob.

“Don’t be. He’s going to get better,” she says, in a tone that dares him to contradict her.

Harry bites the inside of his cheek. “Do you have any idea who…?”

“Yes.” She’s still facing the door.

“Well, who is it?” Harry asks, impatient and dropping all pretense of tact.

“That’s none of your business.”

“But— if it’s someone I know, maybe I can help. Bring them together, or something.” Harry cringes to hear himself. Is he offering to play matchmaker for Draco Malfoy? The thought sort of makes him want to throw up.

“No,” Pansy says.

“Why not?”

“Don’t you get it?” she shrills, whirling on him with her small, jeweled fists clenched. “You never speak the name of the victim’s beloved.”

“What? Why?” Harry stammers.

“It doesn’t do anyone any good,” she says, furiously. “You can’t make yourself love someone else, not even to save their life. Knowing would only make the beloved suffer. And if the victim finds out, having confirmation that their feelings aren’t returned makes their condition worse.”

“If he’s sick,” Harry argues, “then doesn’t he already know they’re not—”

“It’s the rejection, you dolt. Rejection makes death come faster.”

Harry’s hands ache to clench into fists, mimicking Pansy’s posture, but he shoves them into his pockets instead and affects a careless slouch.

“S’pose that makes sense,” he mumbles. “Sorry, okay? I’m not trying to make him sicker. I wouldn’t tell the person. I just—”

“For once, Potter,” Pansy says, “mind your own business.”

#

That weekend, Harry trudges into the library, expecting not to emerge for the next forty-eight hours. Though he’d never admit it to her face – that’s just asking for a lecture – Hermione wasn’t wrong about him falling behind on his studies. Now he’s got three separate papers due early next week, and between classes and his ongoing D.A. lessons, which are more popular than ever, his homework needs to get done now or not at all.

He rounds a bookshelf, finds the table he usually shares with Ron and Hermione, and stops dead in his tracks. Draco is leaning over the tabletop, scribbling something on a piece of parchment and nodding along while his companion rattles off what sounds like book titles. The companion in question is none other than Hermione.

She sees him before he can walk away. Draco follows the line of her sight to Harry, and grimaces. A flicker of his eyelashes and then his gaze drops as he shakes out his parchment to dry it. There are smudges of ink on his pale, spindly hands. Harry is close enough to make out the delicate ridges of his knuckles and the blue of the veins in his wrists.

He hasn’t been this close to Draco in weeks. Once it came out that Draco was dying, he’d stopped fighting with Harry. Stopped acknowledging him altogether. No more name-calling in the hallways; no more petty sabotage in potions class; no more sniping at one another when they crossed paths on their way to the Great Hall; and absolutely no more fistfights. This should have been a relief, but there is something alarming about this docile, faded version of Draco that leaves Harry feeling unbalanced, like he’d put his foot down expecting one more step on the staircase only to find he’d reached the top without noticing. Is this really how a seven-year rivalry ends? A fizzling out, and Draco nodding courteously and saying, “Potter,” with no inflection whatsoever as he sweeps past Harry on his way out of the library?

Draco is gone before Harry manages to get his jaw off the floor. He rounds on Hermione.

“When did you make friends with him?” he asks, trying and failing to sound offhand about it.

She rolls her eyes. “We’re hardly friends, Harry, but we’re civil. Our first week back at Hogwarts, he even apologized for calling me a Mudblood. Sometimes we trade Arithmancy notes.”

Harry slams his bag on the chair across from hers, but doesn’t sit. “What did he want?”

“He’s researching Hanahaki Disease. He’s done the basic reading but now he’s expanding his search, looking into other cases of physical deterioration linked to a wizard’s own magic turning on him, and he wanted to know if I’d read anything worth his time. I suggested a few titles.”

Hermione’s tone is light but her eyes watch Harry shrewdly.

“Is he looking for a cure?” he asks. He takes his time rummaging through his bag, pulling out some parchment and a quill and his books and then just standing there fiddling with the straps like a twit.

“He didn’t say so, but I think he must be,” she says. Well, that’s something; at least the git’s not just going to roll over and die.

“Right. Anyway,” Harry says, “I forgot something. Watch my things, will you?”

He doesn’t entirely know what he’s doing as he leaves Hermione sitting there. He clears the library’s doors and finds himself breaking into a run as soon as he’s out in the halls, racing down the route to the dungeons, skidding around a corner—

He almost collides with Draco, who leans against the wall with his back to Harry, a spray of lily petals at his feet and his hand squeezing his throat as he raggedly pants for breath.

“Er,” Harry says. “Alright there, Malfoy?”

“Fine, Potter,” Draco says tonelessly, wiping pink-tinged spittle off his lips with that pretentious monogrammed handkerchief and trying to keep his face turned away from Harry’s.

“Why, er, why are you bleeding, aren’t they just flowers—” Harry starts. Draco snorts and shoots him that disdainful look Harry knows all too well, and he feels the familiar hatred rearing up in his chest.

“Potter,” he says, somehow turning Harry’s own name into a weapon without even having to straighten up. “There are lilies blooming inside my lungs. There are roots wrapped around my heart and leaves rattling inside my ribcage and broken stems lining my throat and seeds in my bloodstream. I can taste the petals every time I swallow. The scent follows me into my dreams. Compared to that, is a little bit of internal bleeding really so shocking?”

Harry tears his gaze away from Draco’s lips, which are dry and cracked, and looks at his eyes, which are worse, haunted and desperate, a total betrayal of his coolly patronizing tone.

“The only shocking thing about this is that you’re capable of loving anything other than yourself,” Harry says, more instinct than anger.

Draco flinches, but he recovers fast. He puffs up, ready with a retort Harry can almost predict word-for-word; they lock eyes, glaring, feeding on each other’s fury. It flows back and forth between them like a living thing. One of Harry’s hands clenches on his wand; Draco’s lip curls into a sneer that sends a riff of triumph through Harry. Draco will say something awful, and Harry will shout at him, and all will be right in the world.

Except. Except something stops Draco. He sags back against the wall before the tension can boil over, breaking eye contact. A helpless little cough escapes his lips, followed by a stream of them. Harry gets to see up close how Draco’s chest heaves, and how he struggles to draw breath as his lungs expel the lilies – sometimes only the petals, like shreds of white silk, and sometimes entire flower heads, the soft filaments in their centers fluttering.

Draco gags around them but he can’t stop coughing, either, and Harry sees his silver-grey eyes well up with pained tears before he shuts them and turns away. A flash of panic hits Harry, suddenly; for all he knows, Draco could drop dead any second. Harry grabs on to him, supporting him with a hand on his shoulder and another one firm on the nape of his neck, and Draco shudders and gasps. After far too long, the flowers stop coming; he coughs a few more times, weakly, spraying drops of blood.

As soon as he’s able, he shakes Harry off, roughly.

“If you’ll excuse me,” he snaps, “I’d like to spend my final days doing something more pleasant than getting manhandled by a speccy Gryffindor brute.”

“Prat,” Harry says, automatically, and then he finishes processing the words. “Days?”

“Maybe. I don’t know. But I haven’t got long,” Draco says. “What’s wrong, Potter? Not got sick of playing Savior? Straining that tiny brain of yours for a way to be the hero one more time?”

“Far from it. This is the best thing that’s happened at Hogwarts in years,” Harry says, which of course is absurd, he flew through Fiendfyre to save this boy, of course he doesn’t want him dead— and somehow he’s still going. “If I knew who it was, I’d shake their hand.”

Draco smiles, then, but it’s an awful smile; it looks like it hurts more than the coughing did. Harry opens his mouth to apologize, to take it back – he’s finally gone too far, hasn’t he – but Draco says, “Not even you can have everything you want,” and walks away without a backward glance.

Harry stares at his back as he disappears around a corner and wonders how, as always happens with Draco, everything went out of his control so fast.

#

Draco skips dinner that evening.

Harry’s eyes scan the Slytherin table over and over, searching for him, but halfwary through dinner he has no choice but to conclude Draco’s not coming. It’s only the sight of Pansy, spooning salad onto her plate and seeming no more unhappy than usual, that sets him at ease.

Hermione nudges him. “Looking for someone?” she asks, brows raised.

He shakes his head and drops his eyes to his plate. He can’t exactly tell her that, after seeing Draco hack his insides out while Harry stood there uselessly, the sight of Draco still breathing would have been a relief.

“Well,” says Hermione, “if you were looking for someone, I’d advise you to check the hospital wing.”

Harry looks around at her, amazed, but she’s engrossed in a book she’s propped open in the spot where her plate should be; the plate is in her lap. Ron’s too busy arguing with Seamus and Dean to notice when Harry gets up; Ginny and Neville sneak glances at him but know better by now than to try and stop him. Hermione just sighs, a little, and turns a page with one hand while scooping a bite of shepherd’s pie onto her fork with the other.

Once he’s out of the Great Hall he breaks into a run, racing to his dorm to grab the invisibility cloak and throwing it on before doubling back down to the infirmary. He waits by the entrance for a few minutes, until he catches his breath, before nudging the door open and slipping inside.

Draco is the only patient. He lies in the cot farthest from the door, winged by two wizards dressed in the lime green robes of St. Mungo’s Healers. Madam Pomfrey and Professor McGonagall stand off to the side, watching as the Healers cast, in tandem, a spell that bathes Draco in shimmery white light. As Harry nears, he sees that the light hovers a few inches above Draco’s body, and seems to follow the outline of his silhouette, like a magical X-ray. It’s riddled with threads of black and red, which converge in masses over the places where Draco’s heart, lungs, throat, and stomach would be. Harry has a feeling the projection is not supposed to look like that.

The Healers finish their spell, and the light dissipates.

“Did it work?” Draco asks, propping himself up on his elbows.

“The results are quite clear, yes,” says one of the Healers.

“Mrs. Malfoy is on her way,” says Professor McGonagall. “Perhaps we should wait for her.”

Draco looks about to object, but the door swings open at that moment and Narcissa Malfoy sweeps into the room. She ignores everyone and bends over her son’s prone form on the bed. He sits up gingerly to kiss her cheek; she brushes his white-blond fringe out of his emaciated face and urges him back against the pillows. They don’t say a word to each other, but a single shared glance between them seems to communicate more than any number of words could. Mrs. Malfoy straightens and turns to the huddle at the foot of Draco’s bed.

Professor McGonagall introduces the two wizards as Healers Ross and Donovan, specialists in Hanahaki Disease.

“Well?” Mrs. Malfoy says, turning her penetrating stare on the Healers; for a chilling instant Harry is back in the Forbidden Forest and he can almost feel Narcissa’s breath on his face as she asks whether or not her son is dead.

Pull yourself together, mate, he thinks grimly. It’s got to take more than one syllable from the Malfoy matriarch to shake him.

Healer Ross clears his throat. “We were able to complete a full diagnostic exam, and I’m afraid the procedure is out of the question.”

Draco flinches. Harry glares at the back of the Healer’s head. The man could stand to work on his bedside manner, in Harry’s opinion. No call for that kind of bluntness in front of a dying boy, really.

As if thinking along the same lines, Healer Donovan intervenes.

“Out of the question is not entirely correct phrasing, madam,” he says. “If your son consents to the procedure, it would be our duty to abide by his wishes. That being said, I would not recommend it.”

Mrs. Malfoy’s stare is as arresting as a solid wall of ice. Draco’s eyes are downcast. These Healers are talking about him as if he’s not even there, and he seems checked out, though Harry is certain he’s picking up every word.

“And why is that?” Professor McGonagall steps in. The sterner she gets, the more pronounced her brogue. But Madam Pomfrey shakes her head somberly.

“I’ve never treated a case of Hanahaki, and I can’t pretend I know all the details of what those test results indicate,” she says, “but even I could tell that attempting the procedure would put Mr. Malfoy’s life at risk.”

“The proposed treatment is a brand-new experimental procedure that would involve surgically removing the disease,” says Healer Ross, at a clipped pace. “This means, mind you, that we would extract the flowers, roots, and seeds, but in doing so, we would also remove the emotional causes of the disease. That is, your son’s feelings for his beloved would be gone.”

“That was our hope, yes,” says Mrs. Malfoy woodenly, “otherwise, I can only assume, his symptoms would return.”

“Yes,” says Healer Donovan. “For patients coping with a new love, this route might be more viable and might pose less risk. That is not the case with Draco. When the roots of the flowers are so deeply entrenched— when the feelings of affection are a foundational part of the victim’s being— to rip them away would be disastrous. The body collapses much like a tree would if you hacked away at its trunk.”

“Speak plainly,” says Mrs. Malfoy, coolly. “Your lauded breakthrough treatment only works on patients who just got sick?”

Healer Donovan, to his credit, is not cowed.

“Certainly not, but a lasting love is much trickier to extract than, say, an infatuation, regardless of how fast the disease itself manifests or how quickly the symptoms advance to the final stages. Your son has probably loved the individual in question for quite a long time.” He addresses Draco at last. “How old were you when—?”

“Eleven,” Draco mutters.

“Ah,” says the Healer. “That explains it. Childhood affections which blossom into true love are the most difficult to shake. What you love as a child decides who you are, in many cases. In most, I would say.”

“But your symptoms didn’t start until you were sixteen. Less than two years go,” Mrs. Malfoy protests.

“Because that’s when I realized we’d never— that there was no hope,” he says. “There was a point when not even my wildest delusions could have made me believe we’d— it doesn’t matter.”

Mrs. Malfoy opens her mouth to argue, but Draco swings his legs over the side of the bed. His throat works as if he’s trying to hold back a cough, but it escapes him in a puff of air and petals before he bends down and grabs for a small bin someone had left beside the bed. When the flood subsides, the bin is nearly overflowing with lilies. Draco rests his forehead on his knee and takes in a rattling breath. His voice, when he speaks, is hoarse.

“We’re wasting our time,” he says quietly, looking at no one. “They’ve said they can’t do it.”

“I suppose you’re pleased,” Mrs. Malfoy says, with a mixture of anger and worry that makes her sound startlingly like Mrs. Weasley. “You were looking for a reason to say no.”

“I don’t want to talk about it anymore.” Draco scrubs his sleeve over his mouth. The robes are hanging off him, Harry realizes, and when he gets to his feet he tilts a little as if he might fall over any moment. Still, he lifts his pointy chin and straightens up his bony frame and hobbles out of the room with as much grace as he can manage while a monstrous garden lays siege to his innards.

Harry, in his dark corner under the relative safety of the cloak, is reeling. Draco Malfoy – the stupid, slimy bully who never let an easy target go untormented; the one who’d been both Snape’s and Umbridge’s pet; the one who’d gone and got a Dark Mark slapped on his arm – is in love.

No, more than that.

Draco Malfoy is so in love not even the most advanced medical magic the Wizarding World has to offer can do anything about it. Draco Malfoy is so in love his body would shut down and die if that love was taken from him. Draco Malfoy’s love for this mysterious individual is foundational to who he is.

Harry’s head spins. None of this makes any sense, not unless Draco is in love with some Death Eater locked up in Azkaban right now. The thought sends such a wave of disgust roiling through Harry that he must have made a sound, because Professor McGonagall looks – he would’ve sworn on Gryffindor’s grave – straight at him.

Harry holds his breath, but he is suddenly as certain as he’d ever been about anything that she knows he’s there. But she says nothing, and after a few moments, she turns away. He lets out the breath he’d been holding – softly – and starts shuffling to the door, not wanting to push his luck any longer.

“Gentlemen,” McGonagall tells the Healers. “Thank you for making the journey, and for examining my student. Although, I must confess, your diagnosis leaves me heavy-hearted.”

“Hanahaki is a complex affliction,” says Healer Ross. “There is still much we do not understand. Tell me, is there no chance the boy’s beloved returns his feelings?”

Obviously not, Harry thinks, already halfway through the door. Otherwise he wouldn’t be sick, would he?

But Professor McGonagall’s cryptic response follows him out the room: “If it is who I think it is,” she says, dryly, “not even the beloved, as you put it, likely knows the answer to that question.”

#

Harry doesn’t know what bothers him more: the idea that Draco is capable of feeling so strongly about someone… or the fact that Harry, in contrast, hasn’t felt much more than numb since the War ended. In fact, the times he feels the most alive nowadays are when he’s flying, or fighting with Draco. Except Draco can’t fight back anymore.

It takes him one night of fitful sleep – less than that, truthfully – to decide he has to help Draco. Harry saved his life and spoke at his trial even after all he’d done wrong, because he knew there was something good in him. This is that something good, Harry thinks. This love he feels has to be the good in Draco, the thing that had kept him from being swallowed up by the Dark Lord and by his father’s mistakes. He shouldn’t be punished for the one good thing about him.

The last time he’d spoken to Draco had been the disastrous encounter near the library. This time, Harry seeks him out, determined things will be different. Hermione’s voice in his head says savior complex and Ron does not look impressed when he sees Harry with his nose buried in the Marauder’s Map, but Harry can’t be bothered to care. He’s on a mission.

Draco never seems to stay in one place. He makes periodic trips to the library to change out his books, but as for where he settles in to get his research done – he’ll commandeer empty classrooms, the Room of Requirement, various spots around the lake, the shade beneath the Quidditch stands, the kitchens, the astronomy tower. Harry doesn’t want to let on he’s been keeping an eye on Draco’s whereabouts, so he waits for his dot on the Map to turn up at the library again, and catches Draco as he’s emerging with a stack of books.

“Here,” says Harry, holding out his hands, “let me get some of those.”

Draco’s eyes are the only part of his face visible over the teetering pile, and they are glaring.

“I’m not dead yet, Potter,” he snaps. “I can carry my own damn books.”

“I didn’t mean it that way,” says Harry, with a wince. “Look, I’m sorry about what I said before.”

Draco sneers. He hoists the books higher and swerves around Harry to keep walking.

“You could at least use a Hover Charm—”

“I’m aware of that, and I will use a charm if and only if I need one. Which I don’t.”

Harry trails along after him, empty-handed, as Draco makes a perilous trip, swaying, down two flights of steps into the dungeons. He chooses an empty classroom near the one where they take Potions, kicks it open, and finally sets the books down.

He’s out of breath and trying, very poorly, to hide it.

“You’re… still here… Potter?” Draco says, feigning surprise while trying visibly not to gasp for air. He’s flushed, and there’s a light sheen of sweat on his forehead; his too-large collar is askew, sliding almost all the way off one shoulder, and Harry can make out the tip of the Sectumsempra scar peeking out over the top of his shirt. He hates the sight of it, but it reminds him not to lose his temper when Draco adds, panting, “I see… nothing’s changed. Still… desperate for my attention… are you?”

He’s so pathetic I can’t even be angry, Harry thinks.

“Hermione told me you’re researching Hanahaki,” says Harry, “that you’re looking for a cure.”

“There is no cure,” Draco says. “I’m not looking for one. I’m going to make one.”

“How?” Harry asks.

“I’m working on that.”

“Ah.” Harry scuffs the toe of his shoe against the stone floor. “Bet it would go faster if you had someone to help you go through those books.”

“Are you offering?” Draco says, like he fully expects the answer to be no, but Harry nods. “Why would you do that?” He appears genuinely baffled, bordering on suspicious.

“Erm, well,” says Harry, “I’m worried about your mum.”

He hadn’t planned on saying that. It’s barely true.

“Excuse me?” says Draco, flatly.

“You heard what I said at her trial,” says Harry, deciding to stick with his story. “I would’ve died if not for her. She defied Voldemort for you. It would be beyond unfair for her to lose you now, like this.”

Draco’s expression is blank, his lips pressed thin, his eyes even and unblinking as they look at Harry. It’s the way he looks when he’s calculating or deep in thought, and doesn’t want to betray his emotions.

“If you’re going to stay,” Draco says at last, “you’ll need to follow my instructions carefully, so we don’t miss anything important.”

“You’ve been waiting all your life to boss me around, haven’t you?” Harry says cheerfully, and Draco almost smiles.

Researching with Draco is not at all like studying with his friends. Draco has Hermione’s stamina and unassailable focus when it comes to long hours of reading, but he likes to talk. In fact, he can’t help himself. That first afternoon together, Draco manages to maintain a chilly silence for all of ten minutes before he starts chattering.

He talks about… a lot of things. Mainly, he likes to use Harry as a sounding board for his ideas, all the theories he’s trying to work through in his head before he puts them to paper. Draco still migrates all over the castle to work, but with Harry present they spend less time holed up inside and more time wandering the grounds. There is one spot by the lake – under a bowed tree with branches that fan out expansively, casting a shadow over shore and water like the wide brim of a hat – which Harry starts to think of as “theirs.”

Distressingly enough, Harry also becomes Draco’s lab assistant when he wants to experiment on himself. “Anything can be cured with a potion,” he tells Harry firmly. “You just have to find the right one.”

And by “find” he means “invent.”

He keeps a clutch of bezoars on hand – “There are dozens here, how did you get so many—” “Money, Potter. Money is always the answer.” – but takes no other precautions.

“Erm,” Harry asks once, early on, “do Slughorn or Pomfrey know you’re doing this?”

“Of course not. They’d stop me,” Draco says, and chugs a lime green concoction that does not rid him of the flowers but leaves him puking out everything else in his stomach for the next few hours. Not even the bezoar stays down; his body stages a full-on mutiny and leaves Draco on his knees in the bathroom for most of the evening. Harry misses dinner to stand awkwardly outside his stall – Draco refuses to let him in.

“Do you need any more water?” he calls.

“Just go away, Potter,” Draco moans, piteously. Harry rolls his eyes. He can’t tell if Draco’s more upset about the vomiting, or the fact that there’s a witness.

“I’m not going to leave you like this,” Harry says. Draco’s silence, in response to that, has a startled quality that makes Harry want to blush harder than any number of singing valentines or love potion-spiked desserts ever could’ve done. He clears his throat. “Anyway, must be nice to throw up something other than flowers for once. Enjoy it while it lasts.”

“Eat shit, you bloody—” The words cut off into another violent retch. Harry sighs and sits down with his back against the door to wait Draco out.

Draco had given himself days to live, but he disproves his own prognosis. His condition plateaus. He doesn’t get any better, and his symptoms could take a turn for the worse without warning, but before Harry knows it, a week has passed, then two, and Draco’s still breathing. When Harry’s not in class or with the DA, he’s with Draco, and helping him is not the chore he thought it would be, not even when Draco rolls up his sleeves and Harry is confronted with the faded Dark Mark on his arm. This Draco is not the same boy who took that Mark. His insults have lost their cruel bite; it’s easy for Harry to snark back at him, or simply to laugh along. Their arguments are even – dare he say it – fun. In other ways, Draco is no different at all from the boy Harry grew up alongside. He still talks with his hands. He still exaggerates to the point of lying, if he thinks it’ll make for a better story. He still makes a drama out of everything, including the gossip he shares from Slytherin House, and he is careful only to share the gossip that casts his friends in a favorable light and is as unflattering as possible to those he dislikes.

Harry takes his every word with a grain of salt. But he’s never bored.

Sometimes, though, Draco is more subdued. He looks at Harry like he’s waiting for Harry to turn on him, waiting for the other shoe to drop. Harry’s not ready to tell Draco that won’t happen. That he’s come to like Draco’s company.

That he’s come to like Draco.

Hermione helps them research too, sometimes, though Draco insists she prioritize her NEWT preparations (even though they’re months away) and Harry doesn’t object because he’s found that he likes it when it’s just him and Draco. He’s funny when he’s not actively trying to drive Harry mad. He’s smarter than Harry ever gave him credit for – the only person with better marks is Hermione. When Harry’s in a mood, he seems to know when to let him be and when to needle him until Harry realizes what a wanker he’s being and snaps out of it. Sometimes, Harry loses long seconds staring at the curve of Draco’s jaw or neck, the dip of his collarbone, the line of his shoulders and spine, the angular grace of his hands. He’s striking to look at, that’s all, but if Hermione spent too much time with them she’d— she’d misunderstand.

But Hermione is still the person he goes to when he has questions he can’t ask Draco. Questions like:

What’s the longest someone has ever lived with Hanahaki Disease? (Not long.)

Or: Are there spells to stop someone from losing weight? (Yes, but none that would counteract the side effects of Hanahaki.)

Or: If we got the victim’s beloved to drink love potion, would that get rid of the symptoms? (“Harry!” “Only as a temporary—” “Are you mad?” “We’d ask them, of course, they’d consent—” “Run that by Malfoy and see what he says about it.” “…”)

Or: Why lilies?

That particular question doesn’t occur to him right away. At first, he’s too busy coming to terms with the concept of a person throwing up flowers to worry about what kind of flowers they are; later, he perhaps assumes – without ever consciously thinking about it – that it’s random, or linked in some obscure way to the victim’s personality.

“No,” says Hermione. “The lilies are significant, either to him or to his beloved. That’s how it usually works, with Hanahaki. It’s always a flower that has meaning to one or both of them.”

That sends the gears in Harry’s head spinning. He’s been trying to avoid speculating about who the “beloved” is. Draco doesn’t want him to know. Harry himself doesn’t think he wants to know, most of the time. But he can’t help it. Every clue he unearths is another crack in his facade of disinterest, and before long, he’s wracking his brains for an answer.

It’s someone Draco’s known since he was eleven, at least. Maybe a fellow Hogwarts student; that’s the obvious and most likely possibility. But it could be someone who doesn’t attend Hogwarts, a glamorous friend Draco sees during his family’s holidays in France. It could even be a teacher, which, eurgh.

It’s someone whom Draco associates with lilies, or for whom lilies have some kind of significance. Of course, as Hermione tells him, lilies are flowers of death and mourning, used in funeral services and memorials… and just about everyone Draco knows came of age in wartime. If lilies hold meaning to the beloved, that doesn’t narrow things down much at all.

It’s someone whose relationship with Draco changed, irrevocably, when Draco was sixteen. Maybe he’d had a falling out with the object of his affection. Or maybe that person had fallen in love with someone else. This event, whatever it was, triggered Draco’s disease.

Harry runs through a mental checklist of all the Slytherins and the odd Ravenclaw Draco used to be seen with regularly, but Draco had pushed away almost everyone during sixth year, for entirely unromantic reasons. Any of those people could’ve been the person. And Draco is bisexual, which doubles the pool of potential candidates.

Brooding on all the beautiful girls and boys that might have caught Draco’s eye is a tiring, frustrating exercise that leaves Harry wanting to shed his skin like an itchy sweater, or possibly break things.

Draco notices. Of course he does. Draco always notices the things Harry wishes he wouldn’t.

They’ve picked a shady spot in the courtyard to research. Draco is working as industriously as ever, but right now, reading about all the deaths and mutations and various other horrible fates people have endured proves too much for his nerves to handle. He doesn’t speak, he’d never complain, but something in his face or his body language must betray him.

Draco broaches the subject of Harry’s ill humor with characteristic tact.

“Who shoved a broomstick up your arse today, Potter?” he drawls.

Before, that would have been the start of a shouting match. Now, Harry brightens.

“Let’s do that,” he says. Draco raises one eyebrow, and smirks, and Harry rolls his eyes. “Go flying, I mean. I haven’t been in ages.”

Out of fairness to the other students, eighth years aren’t allowed on Quidditch teams. Harry misses it desperately, but not as much as Ron does, and he’s certain Draco’s right there with him. Sure enough, Draco doesn’t hesitate.

“Seeker match?” Draco asks.

“If you’re that eager to have your arse handed to you,” says Harry.

“We’ll see about that, Potter.”

They part ways to dump their books and bags in their dorms, and retrieve their brooms; Harry swings by the kitchens to grab a couple of sandwiches, which they scarf down on their way out to the pitch. Draco digs a Snitch out of the equipment locker and tosses it into the air while they mount their brooms.

Over the handles of their brooms, they meet each other’s eyes, and Harry feels as though he’s finally woken up after a long dream.

Without a word, they take off into the sky after the Snitch, perfectly in unison. When it’s two Seekers alone in the air, with no other players or balls to worry about or the din of a crowd to distract – and when the Seekers are almost evenly matched, the way Harry and Draco are – the game transforms into an adrenaline-pounding, blood-rushing, heart-racing whirlwind of a duel.

“Best out of five?” Draco calls, and Harry gives the affirmative, but they each catch the Snitch so quickly the game stretches into nine, fifteen rounds. They lose count. Neither of them has to pretend at courtesy or sportsmanship; this is pure competition, and from the moment they take off there’s never more than a yard or so of space between them. If Harry tries to shake Draco off, Draco matches his every loop and dive and roll with a careless, manic grin. If Draco tries to catch Harry off guard with dizzying, breakneck laps around the stadium – flying so low they nearly tear seats right out of the stands or so high Harry has trouble catching his breath – Harry anticipates his every move and follows without so much as a moment of hesitation. Half the time they forget the Snitch is there until one of them sees it and shouts; then it’s a no-holds-barred aerial sprint for the goal, weaving over and under one another, elbowing each other shamelessly as they get closer and closer to the Snitch. More than once, Harry or Draco reach out and snatch the other’s wrist by accident (Draco claims it’s an accident every time, at least), and the snitch escapes them both. Neither of them notices when the sky grows dark with forbidding grey plumes of cloud.

When the rain starts, Harry puts the Snitch away and rejoins Draco in the air, and they place bets on which of them can pull off the best feints or other, increasingly dangerous and foolhardy maneuvers, like a game of chicken designed to give Madam Hooch a heart attack. Luckily, no one is around to knock some sense into their heads, so the two of them keep going until their broomsticks get too slick to hold on to. Draco, flying upside down with his hands behind his back, thighs locked around his broom to keep it in place, laughs so hard he nearly falls off when Harry slips and knocks his forehead into his broom handle while attempting to flip it over. And then Harry says, “At least I don’t look like a goddamn albino bat, you utter berk,” and Draco laughs harder, and slips, and ends up dangling from his broom with one knee hooked around it keeping him from breaking his neck until Harry comes and gets him. Draco doesn’t even look scared. “Save me, Potter!” he calls in a high-pitched, girlish voice, putting the back of his hand against his forehead as if playing at a swoon while hanging upside-down more than fifty feet in the air. (Harry almost leaves him there.)

That’s about when they decide to call it quits; the rain is pouring down in sheets and Harry is pretty sure he’s soaked down to his underwear. They land on the pitch, which is essentially a pool of mud at this point, and immediately shove each other over. Harry swears Draco started it. Draco claims Harry tripped him.

(Harry might have tripped him, by accident. He was standing closer than necessary and couldn’t see his own feet.)

Harry has never seen Draco smile like this, artlessly and radiantly. He feels a little drunk. He doesn’t even mind being covered in mud; he hopes Draco will shove him again just so Harry can have Draco’s hands back on him.

“I’m sorry we didn’t get more done today,” Harry says, as they pause in the broomshed to catch their breath before making a mad dash through the rain back up to the castle. He’s only just realizing how late it’s gotten, that they wasted half a day – one of Draco’s final days – doing what basically amounted to nothing.

Draco shakes his head. “I’m not. I needed this,” he says. “I missed flying.” 

A number of responses come to Harry’s mind then: I missed flying with you, he almost says, or We can go again whenever you want, or You belong in the air, you were made for this, but some deeply buried self-preservation instinct kicks in, and holds the words back. Then Draco says, “Ready?” and Harry says, “Maybe if we wait it’ll clear up,” and Draco shoots back, “Scared, Potter?”

And Harry slams the door open and takes off without warning, leaving Draco to shout indignantly after him and follow. The moment is gone. But Harry’s still grinning by the time he makes it back to Gryffindor Tower.

He’s sure he looks a fool, windswept and muddy, dripping all over the place, glasses askew, smelling like sweat and broom polish – but not even Lavender and Parvati’s wrinkled noses or Hermione’s tight look of worry dampens his mood. And it’s not until after he’s showered, changed into his most comfortable pair of jeans and a sweater, and collapsed on his bed that he even realizes Ron is there in the dorm, lying in his bunk with a neglected Quidditch magazine in his hands and a very grim expression as he watches Harry. The last time Harry’d seen Ron look so serious, he’d been in mourning clothes.

“Hey,” Harry says.

“Gone out for a fly, then? In this weather?” Ron asks lightly.

“It sort of came up on us unexpectedly. I swear it was sunny earlier.”

Harry realizes his mistake too late.

“It was sunny about four hours ago. You’ve been out this whole time?” Ron says, and then, after a beat: “Us?”

“Erm, yes. Me and Malfoy,” Harry says. “We needed a break from all the research, so I thought….”

He hasn’t done anything wrong, Harry reminds himself. Defiantly, he sits up and grabs for his shoes. “I’m starved. Think I might go to the kitchens. Want anything?”

Ron sits up, too. “Hermione told me not to say anything to you.”

“Say… what?” Harry asks, his fingers slipping as he tries to knot his shoelaces. He looks up at Ron, who fidgets and tugs at the hem of his shirt and appears, all around, about as uncomfortable as Harry feels.

It’s just Ron, he tells himself. He and his best friend face each other across the gap between their beds. Ron exhales hard, making his bright red fringe – which is in serious need of a trim – flop out of his eyes.

“I get that you’re trying to help Malfoy,” Ron says, “but you’re too invested in this.”

“Too invested in saving someone’s life?” Harry says, astonished.

“That’s the thing. It’s not a matter of saving him. It’s like saying you want to save someone from… what’s that Muggle disease Hermione told us about?”

“Cancer,” Harry sighs.

“Right. It’s not something you can fight.”

“So, what? I give up on him? We all sit back and let him waste away to nothing?”

“No, but you just got done fighting a war, Harry. Do you really need more grief and suffering in your life?” Ron runs a hand through his hair, mussing it. “It would be one thing if your help could make a difference. But Hanahaki, it’s… trust me, I’ve seen what it can do. You can’t stop it. No one can stop it, really.”

Harry lets those words sink in, the way Ron wants. He allows them to have impact, to take up space in his mind. He turns them over and over and examines them from every angle.

No one can stop it, Ron says. But that’s not entirely true.

One person can, Harry thinks.

#

The next day, after class, he finds Draco at their usual spot by the lake. The sunset dyes the water gold, and the castle’s reflection juts darkly through its molten shine.

Draco lies on his stomach, a book propped open in front of him as he scrawls notes on a piece of parchment lined from being folded and refolded endlessly. That’s the sheet Draco uses when he finds something promising; something that could really help him, or maybe even lead him to a cure. Most of what’s on the list has already been scratched out, and today, Harry can’t bring himself to believe Draco is brilliant enough to turn one of these slivers of hope into a solution. Ron’s words are ringing in his head.

He drops down onto the grass beside Draco, who looks up with a smirk, the kind that used to rile Harry up but was undeniably handsome. Not anymore, on either count. It loses its impact when his face is so gaunt. Lying down makes the loose hang of his robes less obvious, but he’s lost a frightening amount of weight. Harry wonders if Draco might not starve to death before the disease ever gets around to killing him.

“What’s wrong, Potter? Didn’t get to sign any autographs today?” Draco snipes, without heat.

“I heard you’re thinking of going through with it,” Harry says. “The operation, I mean.”

The news had been all over the Great Hall; Harry couldn’t miss it, not even with his friends doing their best to maintain a Malfoy-free bubble on their end of the Gryffindor table.

Something in his tone must make it clear to Draco how little Harry would be able to handle a sarcastic response right now. Draco sits up, gingerly, to face him. 

“Only as a last resort,” Draco says. “Potter, look at me. I’m dying anyway. I’d rather die trying to live than wait for the disease to finish its work.”

“Careful. That’s dangerously close to a Gryffindor sentiment,” Harry says weakly.

“Come off it.” A hint of a smile tugs at Draco’s lips. Harry can’t bring himself to smile back.

“But it’s practically suicide,” Harry says. “The Healers— I mean, that’s what everyone says the Healers told you.”

“There’s no other way.” Draco drops his quill in disgust onto the ground. “We’ve been trying for days, and there’s nothing.”

“There is another way,” Harry says.

Draco frowns at him.

“What? Has Granger found something?”

“No,” says Harry. “The person you’re in love with. You have to tell them.”

Draco’s face changes completely. The openness Harry had become accustomed to, without even realizing, vanishes. Draco becomes Malfoy again, his face all hard angles, his eyes more steel than silver.

“Your ignorance astounds me, Potter,” he says, enunciating each word very clearly. “I am looking, in case you’ve forgotten, for a solution, not a way to die faster.”

“If you confess, at least you’ll know for sure. Maybe they love you back, or maybe they’re at least willing to try,” Harry says, desperately. “If not— I know the rejection will make you sicker, but then you can go ahead with the operation like you planned. You’d be no worse off than before.”

“Oh, it’s that easy, is it?” Draco snaps, face reddening dramatically. “I’m already in pain, so what’s a little more?”

“That’s not what I—”

Draco cuts him off. His expression has transformed into wide-eyed horror; something new and awful has evidently occurred to him.

“Did someone say something to you?” Draco demands.

“What?” Harry asks, bewildered.

“Is that why you’re telling me to—?” Draco cuts himself off. “Because you know who it is and you get some sort of sick pleasure out of watching me embarrass myself—”

“How can you think that?” Harry asks, trying to sound righteously angry but knowing he just sounds wounded. Because that’s how he feels. “I’ve been trying to help you. I’ve spent all this time—”

“Oh, yes, heavens forbid we waste Potter’s precious time,” Draco sneers. “I didn’t ask you to do this. I didn’t ask for your help. You’re the last person I ever would have gone to.”

Harry grabs blindly at the strap of his bag and shoots to his feet.

“You’re right. I don’t know why I thought I could help you,” he says, voice shaking. He is blazingly mad, and there is a dangerous lump in his throat, and he does not want to look directly at Draco for fear of what he’ll see on his face. His eyes land instead on Draco’s sagging collar, where he can just see the thready silver-white end of the sectumsempra scar, almost the same color as Draco’s hair. “But it’s ridiculous you’d think I’d go out of my way to make you sicker,” Harry continues, “when the truth is I don’t care whether you live or die. You don’t matter to me. At all.”

Harry spins around and gets about three paces away before he hears Draco choking behind him. He wavers, waiting one, two, three seconds to see if Draco will stop. But this is a bad one. He keeps coughing, harshly and with his whole body by the sound of it, and Harry can’t leave him like that.

He drops his bag and turns, but the sight of Draco makes him freeze where he stands. Draco is not just coughing. He is vomiting a steady stream of flowers, swallowing hard and gasping for breath every time he has a chance, only to sputter and cough out another wave of lilies as the disease fights him. Most of what he expels are whole flower heads, the rims of their petals and the tips of their inner filaments streaked with bright red blood. Draco is hunched almost in half, one hand flat on his chest where the scar Harry made is hidden under his robes and the other hand clutching his throat, and he is still not stopping, he’s not breathing, and Harry falls at last to his knees and latches on to Draco as if he could somehow hold him together.

His eyes fall from Draco’s open mouth and closed eyes – as though he were screaming – to the carpet of lilies forming around their knees. Somehow that’s what does it, the lilies, before he even gets around to remembering the look on Pansy’s face when Harry had asked her for a name, or McGonagall’s resigned, weary voice as he’d fled the hospital wing.

Harry had actually told Draco he didn’t care if he lived or died.

Harry will never forgive himself for being so stupid.

By the time he kisses Draco’s lips, they’re turning blue. Draco is taking a much-needed, too-shallow breath, his throat already working around another surge of blossoms. Harry pulls him up straight and gets his hands on that sharp, smooth jawline. His hands feel too big and clumsy against Draco’s delicate features, but Draco blinks watery eyes at him and Harry swipes his thumb over his lips, wiping off the blood as best he can, and covers that soft hurting mouth with his own. Everything within him attunes to the places where their bodies meet; everything sleeping sits up and pays attention; he is electrified from the inside out.

It lasts no more than a second or two. Draco fights him. Harry loses his head for an instant and tries to hold on, resisting when Draco’s hands push hard against his chest. Harry tastes blood and feels the silky texture of lily petals and his every instinct tells him to deepen the kiss—

And then he realizes what the hell he’s doing, and he lets Draco go.

Draco falls fully away from him, sprawling on the ground. The flowers have stopped coming, but Draco is still gasping, this time apparently from rage. Harry reaches for him but does not touch.

“Let me,” Harry begs.

“How dare you,” Draco says, voice shaking so hard Harry can barely make out the words. “I don’t want your pity. I’m not just another victim for you to save.”

“It’s not like that,” Harry says.

Draco claws his way to his feet, scoops up a handful of lilies and presents them in vicious, morbid triumph.

“I think it is.”

“It’s because you don’t believe me,” Harry says. “Draco. Please. I didn’t know before, I didn’t understand, but I want—”

“Fuck you,” Draco says, and then he picks up his bag and his book and is gone before Harry can make another move.

#

When Harry sinks down next to Hermione on the couch in front of the fireplace, she takes one look at him and does the unthinkable: puts down her quill and closes her book.

“Oh, Harry,” she says.

At the sound of her voice, he slumps. He props his elbows on his knees and his face in his hands. He can still taste Draco. He can still hear his voice, stripped raw, can still see the desperately fearful expression he’d worn as he’d shoved Harry away. 

Harry had done this to him.

“I know who Malfoy’s in love with,” Harry mumbles. “Did you know?”

“I suspected.”

“Is it possible—” Harry’s voice wavers; he has to clear his throat and start again. “Is it possible for the victim to stay sick even if their love is returned?”

“It depends on the person. But in a case like that,” Hermione says, gently, “either the love isn’t true or the victim doesn’t think it is.”

So either of us could be right, Harry thinks. Figures.

That night, Harry dreams he is sixteen again and slashing Draco’s chest open with a stolen spell. In the dream, unlike in his memory, he knows what the spell does and uses it anyway. He wakes over and over, sweating, but each time he falls back asleep the sight of Draco bleeding out on a bathroom floor is waiting for him. He wakes for the last time around dawn and pushes away from his bed as if it had wronged him.

Showering makes him feel incrementally better until he goes to the Great Hall for breakfast. Draco leans against Pansy, slumped, as if he can’t sit up without the support. Dark smudges of purple from lack of sleep underscore his eyes, and he coughs out petals before and after every mouthful of tea he manages to force down. He doesn’t eat. He doesn’t look at Harry or acknowledge his existence in any way. And when Harry approaches, he heaves himself to his feet and flees the Hall before Harry even gets close.

Harry moves to follow, but Pansy and Blaise Zabini block him from the doors.

“Don’t even think about it, Potter,” she spits. “You’ve done enough.”

“I’m trying to fix this,” he says.

“You can’t,” says Blaise, not harshly. “It’s too late. No, I’m not questioning your sincerity,” he adds, as Harry opens his mouth to argue. “Draco almost didn’t make it through the night.”

“What?” Harry croaks.

“He went to the infirmary at one in the morning and spent the whole night with Madam Pomfrey spelling air into his lungs so he wouldn’t suffocate,” Blaise tells him. “He’s a little better this morning, but the disease is in its final stages. His mother is outside, waiting to take him to St. Mungo’s, and he’s going to have the operation.”

“Today? Now?” Harry asks.

“That’s right,” says Pansy. The Great Hall is almost silent, but Harry can’t tell anyway over the roar in his ears. Every face is turned toward him and the two Slytherins; from the corner of his eye he sees Ron, on his feet, and Hermione holding him back with a hand on his arm. Everything is foggy except for Pansy, who tells him: “In a few hours, you won’t have anything to fix. Draco’s going to live. He won’t be sick anymore, and he won’t be in love with— someone he can’t have, either. He’ll finally be okay.”

There are furious tears in her eyes, daring Harry or anyone else to breathe a word of doubt into the air.

“But I—”

“I don’t care!” Pansy almost shrieks. “He told us what happened yesterday. What do you think you’re going to do now, Potter? Go out there and convince him of, of something you’re not even sure about— give him false hope and then send him crashing back down when you realize you had no idea what you were getting into?”

She shoves his shoulder, making him take another step back from the doors. Behind him, someone objects— a teacher, he guesses, maybe Professor McGonagall, warning Pansy about putting hands on other students. Ron and Hermione are making their way round the Gryffindor table, and the Slytherins are watching them warily.

All Harry can think is that Draco is getting farther and farther away from him.

“I am sure,” he tells her.

“You are about seven years too late for that,” she says, but Blaise looks at him consideringly. Harry’s throat is tight and there is a weight in his chest and his breathing comes in ragged spurts, and when he looks at Blaise, Blaise’s face changes, minutely. He twitches aside so casually there’s no way of telling if it was on purpose, and Harry takes it as his cue to lunge through the gap between him and Pansy, ignoring her outraged cries as he speeds through the doors and out the entrance hall into the crisp morning sunshine.

The cool, damp air soothes his throat, which is scratchy and aching as if he’s coming down with a cold. His eyes are drawn unerringly to the distant gates; he half expects to see a carriage trundling away down the road, and he’s ready, he’ll summon his broomstick and go after it if he has to— but then he realizes Draco is right there.

Draco stands, unsteadily, at the foot of the steps to the castle, his mother straightening his collar and smoothing back his hair. They both turn at the sight of him. And Draco’s eyes meet Harry’s.

The thing is— the thing is, nothing has changed. Draco looks at Harry the way he’s always looked at him: with his full, undivided attention. No matter what Harry has thought Draco did or didn’t feel for him over the years, no matter what happened between them, he has never once had to confront Draco’s indifference.

Draco might die today, and if he does not die, Draco might come back and never look at Harry like this again. It slams into him all at once. The thought of Draco’s gaze sweeping over Harry without pausing— the thought that Harry might meet Draco’s eyes and see nothing there at all, not even hatred— the thought of Draco not loving him back… is abominable, and makes a bottomless pain take root in his chest.

But the only words he has for this feeling are: “Don’t go.”

Narcissa Malfoy’s lips draw back in what might actually be a snarl. Draco pushes her hands away, gently, and watches as Harry takes the steps two at a time and staggers onto the grass a few feet from Draco.

“This again, Potter?” he asks tiredly.

Harry wishes Draco would’ve shouted at him. This exasperation, so close to outright dismissiveness, is very much worse, and Harry can’t take it right now.

He should be making some grandiose proclamation of his feelings, he’s sure. Instead, he does what he does best: he picks a fight.

“You’re doing this to yourself,” Harry tells him.

“Excuse me?” Draco says, his voice dangerously low. The spark of anger in his eyes goads Harry on.

“You don’t want to believe,” Harry says, fists clenched and face hot. “You’re scared of what that would mean. You don’t like things you can’t control. You’d— you’d rather die of pride than admit you were wrong about something!”

Harry’s voice climbs; he is distantly aware of people gathering at the open doors to the entrance hall and Narcissa’s hand tightening on her wand, but not aware enough to care.

“I’m not going to die!” Draco’s voice rises to match Harry’s, and now he is shouting. “I’m not going to die, but I’ll be free of this burden at last. That’s all this is— that’s all you are to me. A burden.”

That’s a lie, Harry thinks. No, he knows it’s a lie. Of course he knows. The lily petals trailing down the steps and ending at Draco’s feet are proof enough of that. But something in him doesn’t understand it’s a lie. Something in him howls with pain and fury. His eyes sting, humiliatingly; he opens his mouth to retort, but then his eyes are stinging for a different reason altogether as he starts to cough.

These are deep, wracking coughs from a seizing chest; the skin over his ribs is too tight, and something rustles in his lungs when he gasps for breath, and he falls to his knees more out of surprise than anything else. He covers his mouth instinctively with his elbow until the fit subsides. 

No one makes a sound, not Draco nor any of the witnesses Harry doesn’t dare look at right now. Instead, he looks down, blearily, at the dark spots on the grass, which - when his vision clears - turn out to be petals. Rose petals so red they’re nearly black. There’s a hot, coppery taste in his mouth and something sharp poking the back of his teeth; he spits out blood and a couple of thorns.

Horror claws its way up his spine. He tilts his face up at last, his gaze drawn magnetically to Draco.

Draco’s features are slack with shock; his eyes are wide and uncomprehending and fixed on Harry.

“You prat,” Harry tells him, climbing to his feet with the best attempt he can make at composure. “Should’ve told me you were contagious.”

“I’m not,” Draco says faintly.

“I know.”

Harry’s throat is closing up again and he feels another coughing fit coming on as Draco keeps watching him blankly.

The whispers at the top of the steps are reaching a crescendo. Narcissa pulls at Draco’s elbow, guiding him away toward the gates. Harry’s eyes cling to him, but there’s no room in his throat for his voice, no room to form words and call him back; he tastes roses in the back of his mouth. It’s not until Narcissa succeeds in turning Draco bodily around, and they lose eye contact, that he seems to wake from his stupor. He rips out of her grasp.

Harry is already reaching for him when Draco surges back up the path. He throws himself into Harry’s arms, a whirl of sensation: his bones crashing against Harry’s bones, the smell of lilies filling Harry’s nose, his hands strong against Harry’s back, his skin so warm Harry feels it from the inside first. Draco kisses him in full view of his mother and their friends and Merlin’s fucking ghost— and Harry—

Harry breathes.