Back at the very start of fifth year, Draco arrived wearing embroidered silk gloves, fit snug against his fingers. If Harry hadn’t observed him every moment he was even in the near vicinity of his eye line, he wouldn’t have even noticed, the fabric was thin and looked soft to the touch and the embroidery was made with equally as thin thread and the exact same colour, hardly noticeable—unless, of course, you were one Harry James Potter, best Quidditch Seeker in years. Don’t let the glasses fool you, his eyesight is near perfect with them.
And, obviously, Draco had to have been up to something wearing them. Did he not want his prints on something? He wondered if the wizard police used prints for crimes or just magic then, train of thought derailed into what the wizard police—Aurors, he tried to remember—would use to solve crime and if finger prints were, indeed, a method used. But he’d shaken his head and got back on track, after a moment of trying to remember what track he was supposed to get back on.
Draco was always up to no good, that was no mystery. He was a Slytherin, for one, Lucius Malfoy and one of the infamous Black daughters were his parents, one of his aunts was locked in Azkaban, Merlin knows where the other went or what happened to her and Narcissa was a grade A manipulator—a gorgeous and sometimes kindly one at that, Harry wouldn’t deny, even if he’d only met her once at parents evening and saw her in Diagon Alley once with Draco when he was getting fitted for his uniform, she seemed nice enough.
Back on track he went. He spent half of his fifth year tracing after Draco and trying to get an excuse to pull his glove off. Just one, if he had one off, he could probably deduce what the other was hiding. He thought of maybe drugging Draco with veritaserum, but gave up when he neither won it nor knew how to make it, and he wasn’t asking Hermione, she’d tell him to get his nose out of others business. And Ron was no help either, he was barely scraping by in potions as is, there’s no way he knew how to make veritaserum.
Draco was one sly bastard, Harry determined by the beginning of the summer holiday. There was no other explanation, maybe he knew a spell that made it so he looked completely normal, but was actually doing something devious. Harry chuckled to himself at the word as he rode the Hogwarts Express back to Kings Cross Station, but he had needed to know what Draco was up to and why.
Those questions plagued him until their make-up year. Put into an entirely new tower, what was left of the seventh year houses had been squashed together and made to share dorms. It wasn’t too bad, Hermione got along well enough with the Slytherins that were left, though she hardly spoke to a word to Draco himself, only ever if he asked her through Pansy a question in their lessons together and even then, he avoided talking to her too. He made a vague apology to how he treated her and she accepted it, complaining to Harry that she knew his behaviour and that she wouldn’t get a proper apology, but at least he made an effort.
She still wasn’t happy with him though.
Harry didn’t push her about it though, it wasn’t his place to accept said apology and left her decision to her, not his to meddle with.
The new Headmistress McGonagall had made the Great Hall a little bigger than last year when they were rebuilding the castle during the summer holiday, just enough to fit a separate table for what little students had returned for their make-up years. Some students had stayed home, but came every now and the to collect work to take back, McGonagall allowed it, though she strictly told the other years they were not to try the same thing, as they wouldn’t get away with it. Besides, those visits from the students that hadn’t returned was a nice surprise for their friends still at school.
Harry always sat at the end closest to the staffs table in the Hall, Hermione and Ron sat opposite him as they argued about whatever stupid thing Ron had proposed or said. Hermione always ended up winning those arguments. Draco sat at the very end, Pansy alternated, her new friendship with Hermione meant they spoke often and she bounded between each end of the table to speak to both Hermione and Draco, but he didn’t move, even when Blaise almost knocked him off the bench to get his attention, he hardly said anything.
Harry barely heard what he said over the noise, but his senses had become attuned to listen for Draco, and he caught it. Just a pitiful mutter of “Sorry, I didn’t hear you, what?” Still in his posh voice, but it sounded just… Down, like he didn’t want to utter even a noise.
“Have you lot noticed Malfoy’s new gloves?” Ron leant forward on the table, knocking Harry in the shin to get his attention. He lifted his head, humming in acknowledgement. “What about them?” He asked, shoving his glasses back up to look at Ron clearly, feigning a confused expression as Ron sat back with a heavy sigh, as if relieved he’d found something out about Draco Harry hadn’t yet.
“They’re red,” he said then, “like… Gryffindor Quidditch robe red,” he scrunched his brows a bit at the comparison, but it was the only comparison he felt he could make. Harry leant forward, looking past the thirty make-up-year students to Draco at the far end. His hair was returned to its curly state, but that too was slowly depleting, he looked like he hadn’t spelt in days, even though he slept from right after lessons ended until an hour before they had to get up.
He was making more than just an effort to keep his hands from touching the food and Harry heard him say he didn’t want to get the expensive silk dirty, it was clearly a joke, as he only feigned an offended noise when Pansy wet them with the water-turned-rum Seamus offered her once he’d finally managed to make it. It was probably the first time he’d actually seen Draco smiled in months. Only ever with Pansy and Blaise, around everyone else, he was like a stone, face unmoving unless it was to scowl or sneer or scrunch it into disgust whenever a potion smelt gross.
He watched as Draco hid his hands under his cloak, re-emerging with a new pair of red gloves on, dry ones. Pansy forced a frown but she laughed anyway at Draco’s Barbie-like preparation for any situation, it seemed. He furrowed his brows, “He was wearing white ones before Christmas,” Hermione commented before she looked back to the book, “I’ll ask Pansy about it later, hopefully she’ll give me an answer if she manages to drag it out of Malfoy.”
*
He never sat too far from Draco during their lessons. They’d become mostly civil after coming from the holiday last year and now, in the new term, they spoke a bit every day, but Draco still avoided him if he could, using Blaise or Pansy as an excuse to get away. But now, in the new potions classroom, he was sat on the step right above Draco, and watched over those snow-white curls at the burgundy gloves as he moved them across the sticky tables and books, pinching his quill and scratching at his forehead or cheek or neck, occasionally moving the hair from his face.
Unfortunately for him, he was a bit to engrossed and Ron took advantage, thinking he was staring into space again. Ron had kicked his chair, perhaps a bit too hard as he admitted later, and sent Harry flying down the step. He hit his forehead on Draco’s table and offset the potion burning, sending it flying into the centre of the room as his hands retreated away from the red-hot cauldron immediately. His face scrunched in anger as he turned to look down at Harry, gloves squeezed tight around his fists, “An explanation, Potter—”
“Harry…”
“—I don’t expect you just fly from desks like a cursed broomstick.”
That brought back a strange memory but he rubbed his forehead as he sat, turning to glare at Ron, finding Hermione hitting him upside the head with a thick book. “Apologise,” she said harshly, kicking his shin. He winced, leaning forward and rubbing his leg, head against the table as he said his sorry. The new potions teacher asked what had happened when he finally spaced back in. “Ron pushed me off my chair, Sir, I knocked into Draco’s table and his potion went flying, sorry, Sir,” he explained. “Well, your foreheads bleeding, Mr Potter, you’d better go to see Madam Pomfrey before it gets worse.”
Harry nodded, muttering “right,” throwing another glare at Ron before he gathered his things, “I’m getting you back later.”
He did, at dinner that evening, he sent Ron’s bowl of soup straight into his face, soaking his hair and the front of his uniform, accidentally getting the side of Hermione’s face in the process. “Sorry, ‘Mione, collateral damage,” he shrugged, covering his mouth so he didn’t show the smile growing. From the corner of his eye, he could Draco had turned from the noise and stifled his own laughter when he saw had what happened. He looked elegant with the way his glove creased, fingers pressing to his lips to silence himself, head turned away. Neither Seamus nor Pansy had hid their laughter at the situation and even Dean let out a snort.
“Ha-ha, it’s all very funny,” Ron wiped his face when Hermione offered a dry part of her cloak, and opened his eyes, glaring at Harry. “I got an injury, mate, we’re even,” he put his hands up in surrender and Ron thought it over for a second before sighing. “I suppose we are even,” he shook his head, muttering under his breath before dinner was dismissed and they returned to their dorms.
It was common practice for them to play a game of cards or chess, on the rare occasion that Draco suggested something, though most the time, he sat on the sofa with a book he’d gotten Pansy to get from Hermione for him. Hermione didn’t mind as long as he returned them and he always did, leaving them on a shelf right beside the girls’ staircase. This book sharing had actually improved their relationship since the beginning of the year, and Draco was no longer as prone to running away from conversations with them, though he still tried eighty percent of the time.
Tonight, they were playing twenty-one bust, which Ron had no idea how to play and Luna wasn’t able to sneak into their dorms to explain it for him. Hermione hardly understood herself, she and her parents never really played card games, they had separate interests.
“Aren’t you playing, Draco?” Harry looked over his shoulder at Draco sat directly behind him, leaning against the arm of the sofa, “I don’t have an interest in any of your muggle games,” he said, looking back to his book, but Harry saw he wasn’t even reading it, his eyes didn’t move, either he found a word he didn’t know and was trying to decipher it or he did want to play but felt awkward to. “Come on,” Harry hadn’t refrained from getting physical with Draco, not fights, not anymore, but to get him to participate in things and it worked half the time. He reached back and grabbed Draco’s ankle, hauling it over his shoulder and pulling his off the sofa.
He grabbed at the sofa, dropping the book and shouting at Harry to put his ankle down before he dropped onto the carpet when Hermione shuffled over to make room for him. Harry brushed his ankle off his shoulder and got another two cards from Neville, handing them to Draco with a smile, as if he hadn’t done anything. “You’re rotten,” Draco whipped his head, moving the curls out of his face as he snatched the cards and sat on his feet, “I’ve no idea what you’re on about,” he looked back to his own cards. An ace and a queen. Which could either be exactly twenty-one or eleven.
Draco looked to his own cards, a little slippery to hold with silk on whatever the cards were coated with. A jack and a king. He didn’t know what that meant, he never played this before. If he and his mother did play cards, it was something akin to poker or blackjack, with magical additions, of course, he liked playing cards with her, but he never wanted to play whatever this game was before. Pursing his lips, he swallowed back the lump in this throat and the noise in his mind telling him not to ask as he turned to face Harry, “I don’t know what these cards mean.”
Harry looked down at his cards, deciding he and Draco could play together this round. “They’re both tens,” he said quietly, even though everyone else was as loud as the Great Hall itself, “Explain at least some of the rules to me, Potter,” Draco sighed. Harry almost rolled his eyes as he fixed his glasses and sat a bit closer, “Face cards, queen, king, jack, they’re worth ten, an ace is eleven or one, depending on what you want, and the numbered cards are the number they have.”
“The aim?”
“To not get over twenty-one, you’ve got twenty, so, you’d better skip.”
Draco glanced at Harry’s cards, “What’ve you got then?” He asked. “Ace and a queen,” he smiled. Draco went over the information that’d just been dumped on him and he nodded once he realised the number, “You’d better skip then as well, right?” He made a questioning face as he put his cards face down, pulling his gloves up. It was the first time Harry had seen him do it, he only just realised how tall the gloves were, reaching just past his elbows. But he nodded at what Draco had said.
“Everyone ready?” Dean asked, glancing from his cards to Seamus’, or tried to, Seamus had cast a secret spell on his and smiled devilishly as Dean slumped after several attempts to look at what he had. “No peeking,” Seamus said simply, shrugging. “Let’s start then,” Dean announced.
They began going round in circle, the others either skipped or chose and a few had busted over twenty-one already, setting their cards down to reveal thirty or twenty-two. It seems they were going for last one standing, Draco deduced, since it seemed no one really knew how to play. They’d all argued about the rules earlier and settled on a game that didn’t have personalised rules from anyone else’s houses. By the time it reached Harry, a quarter of the circle had busted. He pretended to think of a second, “Stand,” he said, leaning against the sofa behind him.
Eyes turned to Draco, he didn’t look back at Harry, trying to remember on his own what the card faces meant. “Stand,” he said anyway, remembering what Harry told him to do, but he couldn’t for the life of him remember what a jack and a king was.
The game went on for longer than either Harry or Draco hoped it would and when it reached Draco again, he just wanted out and chose to pick a card. Harry watched attentively as his fingers slid on the card on the top of the pile, graceful as he struggled to grab it. “I hate these gloves,” he muttered before Pansy grabbed it and handed it to him. It took him a second, but Harry realised that this was the most Draco had spoken in front of everyone since the start of the year and it was over a card game and him struggling to pick one up.
He busted over twenty-one and set his cards down with twenty-five, “Now, providing you don’t grab my ankle and force me into another game, may I go back to reading?” He glanced at Harry, but retreated back onto the sofa anyway, tucking his ankles out of reach as he found the page he was on twenty minutes ago.
Harry stared at him a second longer, eyes fixated on the gloves that slipped between the pages and moved them over, slim and graceful. He couldn’t believe Draco had found gloves that fit his hands so perfectly, though, knowing him, he’d probably had them tailored. He probably had a personal tailor for these sorts of things, he wouldn’t’ve been surprised if that was the case. Soon though, he forgot what number he had and busted at twenty-two. With the game out of the way, he pulled himself up to sit next to Draco, almost but not as close as they were sat on the floor.
He read a paragraph of the book over Draco’s shoulder, and Draco seemed to wait until he was done before turning the page. “What’s with the gloves?”
Draco turned his head, staring at him through white curls, “I’ve been wearing them for over a year, and you just know ask?” He made a face. “No, I mean, why the change of colour? They were white before, did you feel too much like a bride?” Harry jested, Draco scoffed, rolling his eyes as he looked back to the book, “It felt too uniform, decided to switch it up for a change.”
But Harry knew Draco better than that—once Draco got into a habit or pattern it was nigh impossible to make him break it, so how he suddenly went from white to red was still left unanswered and he knew that it had to have been a seriously good reason for him to change the colour so suddenly. And Draco loved uniformity, having to not think about what to wear every day made his life easier and his clothes were always hung matching anyway, uniformity was Draco’s thing, he wouldn’t change that for anything, no matter the reason.
He wanted to press, but he felt himself unable to form the words. He was unsure if it was his rationality telling him to not provoke Draco or if Draco had silenced him, but he decided he wouldn’t try anyway. Draco spoke again a second later, voice so quiet Harry almost missed it, “I’ll tell you when everyone else is asleep.”
Which was strange, because Draco would usually be asleep by now anyway. That was his routine this year, he’d wake up an hour before they had to get up and dressed and go to sleep as soon as classes ended and he was in the safety of either the common room or the dorm room. He nodded, “You better, I’ll hold you to that,” he tried to joke and he supposed it came off as such as Draco had let out the tiniest laugh he’d ever heard.
*
It was obvious Draco was making an effort to stay awake. It was Thursday, which meant not only was it one of the three days a week Draco showered, it was also apparently the communal day the whole make-up year showered. It wasn’t that many of them, only about thirteen or fourteen boys and the showers were divided by half walls anyway.
It was at least three hours past the time Draco usually was asleep by, and he was almost asleep by the time he reached the showers, only kept awake and conscious by Blaise constantly knocking his shoulder. “It’s only seven, Draco,” he said, “wake yourself up.” So, he tried to. Harry had no idea where Draco hid to get changed before he got into the shower, but he was always gone the moment they stepped into the room and always appeared in an empty stall after everyone else had gotten into their own stalls. At this point in the year, everyone has their own assigned stalls, with Ron on Harry’s right and Draco to his left.
That was pure coincidence.
As usual, soap had ended up being thrown everywhere. It started with Seamus, like it always did, and a failed spell, he tried to make it float so he could remotely scrub Dean’s back while he wasn’t looking, but it ended up making the whole bar go flying somewhere and him haphazardly covering himself before running off to find it. At Dean’s questioning look, Neville shrugged, holding his overgrown fringe out of his face as he washed the dirt out of his hair from crashing into a tree with Madam Hooch.
Harry glanced over the divider between he and Draco, he could only see as far as his hip, but he wasn’t focused on that. Under the steam of the way-too-hot shower Draco was stood beneath, he was picking at scabs drawn out in lines over a tattoo he knew all too well. He froze, staring at it, too many emotions running through him at once for him to settle on one for the moment, and he continued to stare as Draco continued to pick at the scabs and half-healed scars, ripping open the skin with a wince as he pulled it out from under the scalding water, squeezing his wrist and watching as the blood dripping from the tear.
He couldn’t believe it. Draco, actively ripping open his wrist, in what he assumed was an attempt to get rid of the tattoo. He realised why Draco wore red gloves now. Unthinking, he reached over, gripping Draco’s wrist in a tight fist, making the other boy wince at the sudden pressure his sore cuts were facing. Eyes trailing the brown skin, he looked up at Harry with mild horror in his eyes, but he played it off to Ron watching in confusion as anger as he moved his hair out of his face, “What do you think your doing? Your soap dropped by your feet, not mine, unless you want to borrow my shampoo, Merlin knows you could use it after going head first into a mud bank.”
At that, Harry crossed his eyes, looking up at the curls sticking to his forehead, all blurry without his glasses, but he dismissed it immediately, shaking his head. He let go of Draco’s wrist, turning his palm over, he looked at the watery blood running down his palm creases and into the drain. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“None of your business what I’m doing,” he rubbed over his wrist, digging his nail into the mark of ink still left on his white skin. But he swallowed, eyes averting to Harry’s collarbone and busying himself on wondering if he’s gained the scar there from his time with the Dursley’s, from the countless duels they had or from the Battle a year and a half ago. He wasn’t able to think about it much longer as Harry raised his hand and scratched at his jaw, blocking his view, “Well, you’ve just half ripped your own skin off—“
“We’re in the showers, they aren’t exactly private, Potter—“
“Harry.”
“—as I said, I’ll tell you later, when everyone else has fallen asleep.” He turned, joining the conversation Blaise was in after a question was aimed to him, something to do with Pansy and her fringe, how she got it so perfect or something, Harry didn’t know, he was staring at the red tinted water running down Draco’s stomach as he held his wrists tight to his abdomen.
The boys went through their regular routine of getting dressed into their pyjamas. Neville was recounting drama he’d heard from the girls the night before—Neville, Harry and Ron were the only boys permitted to join the girls, though it was usually only Ron and Neville that went every time they were invited. Harry only ever went if he was cold and stole Hermione’s bed for warmth. The Patil twins liked it when he came round, because they got free rein to do whatever they wanted with his hair until he had to go to his one dorm to sleep. Neville usually ended up with a braid in his hair from one of them.
Somehow, Seamus ended up singeing a hole through his trouser leg and was lucky enough that Dean—the ever loving, romantic prat—carried his second pair, which, when he handed them over, almost ended with a whole snogging session in front of the others from a kiss that started as a thank you. Draco rolled his eyes at them, they were used to the two of them, after all, they barely ever slept in their own beds because Seamus was always cold. It didn’t mean he was always in Dean’s bed, no, sometimes he shared with Harry or Ron, especially Ron, he had this innate warming ability that drew everyone to him like a personal radiator.
Even Draco sometimes, but he sat at least two feet away from him at all times.
They didn’t mind though, that extra bed meant that sometimes Luna or Ginny could come in if they wanted, and considering they both had relatives in the room, it meant they came over quite a bit. In fact, the make-up year gave Luna an opportunity to talk and re-establish her relationship with Draco, which was strangely sweet and a working one. Luna was the only one apart from Blaise and Pansy that he regularly talked to and sought out between classes.
Harry shook his head, as much as he loved Luna, he didn’t have time to think about her. He looked over to Draco. He’d hidden himself to dry off—and presumably heal the near tears on his arms—and returned in his expensive silk pyjamas, they were a wizard version of designer, Harry certainly could’ve afforded them if he pleased, but he didn’t want to, it felt wrong to spend money on things just for fun like that. But Draco had more than enough. Underneath his sleeves, he wore his gloves, a different pair, the red so dark it was almost black this time.
His arms were crossed as he stood by the bench, waiting for the others to dress before they all headed back up in their slippers. He glanced down at the cold stone before at Harry, watching as he dried his hair almost aggressively before Ron snatched the towel from him. “‘Mione’s already told you, your hairs gonna break if you dry it like that,” he said, shoving the towel back to his chest. “It doesn’t matter, I’m probably going to cut it soon enough anyway,” Harry felt the back of his head, hair almost reaching his shoulders, as he laughed, Ron shook his head with an amused smile as he dried his own hair and turned to talk with Neville.
He turned his head, looking to Draco, eyes glancing at his arms for a split second before meeting his eyes. Draco’s face went lax as he stared at Harry again, he inclined his head just a bit. Harry knew the boys would knock out in minutes when they got back to the dorm, they always did when they had flying, Neville would definitely be going to sleep early after spending half an hour prying himself out from a whomping willow, trying not to get too hurt. Poor Neville, it was always him getting caught by something.
*
Draco stayed awake, reading until almost ten, at which time the Seamus and Dean had conked out completely—of course, Seamus was spread like a starfish, half over Dean, who lay almost politely, hands tucked by his chin and one leg raised a little while he lay on his front. Harry shook his head at them, throwing a silencing spell since he knew Dean would end up snoring soon enough, then he drew their curtains. Neville had fell asleep ages ago, but he drew his own curtains and was, thankfully, a silent sleeper.
“Are you going to tell me now…? They’re asleep,” Harry said, glancing through the curtains at the end of his bed, looking to Draco as he stilled, bookmarking his page and setting it down on his thighs, “You already saw,” he answered, “though, you would’ve found it out eventually, you probably wouldn’t cornered me and pulled a glove off,” he shrugged, but something in his tone was off, an emotion so foreign from Draco, Harry could barely place it. He breathed in, “Why gloves though? Your uniform sleeves cover it just fine, and why keep picking at it? You can get it removed easily by another wizard.”
“You think anyone would want to willingly do that for me?” Draco made a face, his was tired, evident in the way his eyes had been to shake. But he tried to rub it away. “They’d see the mark and sneer, saying I should keep it to remind me of my crimes and whatnot…”
“You’ve tried before?”
“Emphasis on tried, the man who I went to told me I should wear it to be ashamed of forever,” Draco looking down to his silk trousers, sighing faintly. Harry asked again, “Why the gloves though…?” His voice was infinitely quieter, less… Accusing this time. “Because if I don’t, everything I touch becomes dirty, and then I can’t touch it because it’s dirty. Wearing gloves is easier, nothing becomes dirty that way and everyone feels much better if they don’t have any skin-to-skin contact with me.”
Harry wanted to ask about why he was continuously picking at the scars, the recent cuts, but Draco seemed to have read his mind. “A compulsive habit, we’ll call it, my cat scratched me and I kept picking at it… Scarred away my mark and then I couldn’t stop,” he admitted, surprisingly calm as he did so, “I tried to cut it away during the holiday last year, Mother stopped me, but I kept picking at those new scars. That’s why I have my shower so hot, when everyone else is there, the steam makes it so no one can see it…”
“You should see Madam Pomfrey, she’ll surely be able to get the mark out, or Headmistress McGonagall—“ Harry suggested, voice a little fast and panicked as he leant forward, brows tilted upward in concern. Draco stared at him, “Nice to know you care a little, Potter—“
“Harry.”
“—but I don’t want to just go and ask, it’s awkward and recently, I don’t know if it’s you rubbing off on me or not, but I can’t seem to find myself asking certain questions to certain people.”
“I think that’s your pride.”
Draco scoffed, “My pride left me when I got this thing,” he stared down at the gloves. “You don’t sleep with them, do you?” Harry asked, narrowing his eyes a bit, “No, I just make sure they’re under my pillow and that I can’t see my arm,” he began to pull the fingers of his gloves, sliding them off, clutching them tightly before he willed himself to put them down on the nightstand. The red was stark against the already dark oak making up the drawers, Harry couldn’t help but stare.
“But you started wearing them in fifth year, you didn’t get the mark until sixth, didn’t you?”
Draco nodded, “I was preparing myself,” he smiled weakly, “I never wanted it, but Father thought it’d protect me should he ever want me as a true servant to him… I felt the guilt right after I got it, according to Father, I threw a tantrum while it was being done, but I don’t remember,” he shrugged, smile fading as he felt the bumps on his skin through the thin fabric. “I’ve wanted it gone since I got it.”
Harry didn’t ask anything else and Draco didn’t say anything, he buried himself under the quilt and his hands under his pillow, snuffing out the lights, plunging the room into darkness. Though, Harry didn’t sleep for hours, even though he’d put his glasses on the drawers and drew his curtains completely, he couldn’t help but wonder more about the situation.
*
Draco didn’t take his gloves off. He never did around them. Those were first two times Harry ever saw him with them off. But after he opened up, probably more than he’d wanted to, he went out of his way to talk to Harry, Ron and Hermione, without using Pansy as a messenger or Blaise, considering he and Ron were becoming close from sharing a dorm.
When Harry asked Luna about Draco’s gloves, she said she knew already why, and that she was trying to find a spell to get rid of the mark, but ‘those darn Nifflers keep stealing all my books,’ even unintentional, she made a light in a bleak situation and it reminded him much of when she’d lost her shoes during the Yule Ball. It made him glad Draco had a light in his life like her. And it made sense as to why he liked to hang around with her, it was glaringly obvious now that Draco was much less depressed around her.
He questioned Draco about his clear favour toward her, and Draco simply shrugged, bluntly admitting that out of all the cousins he had, Luna was by far his favourite. “Her airheaded ability to make light of everything brings me joy and entertains me,” he said, tilting his head at Harry’s amused face, but he was dead serious, despite his weird wording.
Two weeks before Easter holiday, Draco had walked past his usual spot at the end of the table, nearest the door, and stood beside Harry, staring at the patterns in the oak before Harry finally clocked the hint and moved aside for him to sit. “Why down here all of a sudden?” He asked. “Pansy soaked my seat with Seamus’ rum,” he answered, he wasn’t lying, but he certainly wasn’t telling the whole truth either. He pulled his gloves up through his jumper and sleeves, holding his cloak around them as his hands settled in his lap. Ron made a face before he grabbed the plate in front of Draco and filled it, “I ain’t seen you eat in weeks, mate.”
“Are you finished with that book I leant you? The one for potions? I need to revise,” Hermione said, “The end of year exams aren’t for months, ‘Mione,” Harry and Ron laughed, but she only huffed, “I’d rather be ready now than study last second like you two, Malfoy understands,” she nodded at him, he didn’t return the nod but he did pull the book from his school bag and hand it over, “Thank you, for letting me borrow it, I know you like your books, sorry I kept it for so long.” He didn’t sound apologetic at all, but Hermione took it anyway and put the book in her own bag.
“I’ll give you the password if you ever want to get a book on your own, you don’t have to ask, I know you’ll return them now,” she looked to the one she was reading and dislodged herself from conversation.
“Go on,” Ron urged, “eat, breakfast is really good today,” he looked to Harry, who nodded once, “To be fair, it is nicer than the other days,” he said, turning his gaze to Draco, but he shook his head, hands shifting his lap, “I’ll eat at lunch “ he said. Ron sighed, “Your loss.”
Draco felt a little at ease. He felt a little out of place still, but as he watched Harry, Ron and Hermione play fun with each other, he found himself smiling, amused at their antics and Hermione’s scolding when Ron accidentally tipped his plate over, which sent an egg running down Harry’s shirt—which, in turn, meant that he sent his own egg at Ron’s face, and then ducked under the table and hid until Hermione made the two call a truce of their impending food fight.
It was an odd friendship trio, but a trio he would like to watch for his amusement.