Comfort in the Unthinkable
NOTE : There is a time jump to after the Third Task. Cedric has been killed.
As Harry opened his eyes, blinking the grogginess and dreamless sleep away, he found himself surrounded by the familiar comfort of his friends. There asleep at his right hand side, Ron with his head tucked onto Hermione’s shoulder. She was reading a book, socked feet balanced on Draco Malfoy’s lap. He too was asleep, sitting directly at Harry's eye level, face free of his usual sneer.
Harry blinked at this sight of casual affection and domesticity between people who were enemies not two weeks before. For a brief crazy second, he wondered if he’d fallen into an alternate dimension. Because in which universe would Draco Lucius Malfoy allow Hermione Granger to put her feet into his lap ?
But it seemed after Malfoy had given both Hermione and Ron stilted apologises about his general buffoonery, the pair had welcomed him easily—well Hermione had anyways. Ron was still adjusting, but was less hostile than Harry expected.
He shifted, and instantly Hermione’s eyes snapped up from the book.
“Shall I get Madam Pomfrey, Harry ? Are you in any pain ?”
He sat up slowly, reaching for his glasses at his bedside. “No. I’m alright 'Mione.”
She gave him an encouraging smile but did not prompt further, so unlike her usual self. Harry supposed all of them had changed from one flash of a Portkey to the next. Children forced into a position they had no place being in. His gaze shot to Malfoy again, wondering how he would take the news of his father being in that graveyard.
Would he forsake him ? Would he forsake Harry ? Would they stop being friends now that everything had changed ?
And though Harry had only been Malfoy’s friend for a grand total of two weeks, with them bickering and arguing as they always did, giving up that friendship now felt uncomfortably painful.
“He already knows.”
His gaze shot back to Hermione who was still watching him with a veiled sort of caution. “Dumbledore called us into his office while you were asleep, told us what happened.”
“How did he react ?” Harry asked, heart clenching for the blonde boy whose fate was as out of his control as Harry’s own. It wasn’t fair. None of it was fair.
“In typical Malfoy reaction, shoving it away.”
“But he chose us. He’s here.”
“He’s here and you’re here. When you appeared with Cedric, that—that was the most scared I've ever been in my entire life," Hermione shot forward to grip his hand, leaving Ron to the fate of gravity.
His best friend caught himself from falling with a slurred, “Wot ?”
Then sleep fading, he caught sight of Harry up in bed. “Harry! Are you alright, mate ? Stupid question, don’t bother answering.”
“It’s fine, Ron.”
Smiling slightly, the red head jolted forward and clasped his own hand around Harry’s and Hermione’s, "We're here."
It was that moment Malfoy chose to wake up.
“Why in the Devil, is everyone holding hands ?” he asked sounding far posher with sleep marring his voice. “Are you doing some sort of bonding exercise thing ?”
Against his better judgement, Harry felt his lips curling into a grin. “Never change, Malfoy.”
The git gave a little sniff. “I don’t intend to Potter, I’m quite perfect.”
“A perfect pain in the arse,” Ron muttered grumpily.
“Thinking about my arse are we, Weasleyby ?”
Ron flushed and began to sputter furiously.
Smiling, Harry reached out for the little pitcher of water at his bedside and three pairs of hands hastened to get it for him. Malfoy being closest to the nightstand beat the lot of them. He poured out a glass of water and handed it to Harry, as if it were perfectly natural. Harry supposed now that they were friends, it actually was natural.
“Careful I haven’t poisoned it, golden boy,” Malfoy snipped as he took a sip.
Definitely natural.
“Someone should get Dumbledore he wanted to talk to you again when you woke up,” Hermione said, tugging on Ron. “Come on Ronald.”
The pair of them went, conversing with each other in low whispers, leaving him alone with Malfoy.
“I’m sorry,” Harry said into the quiet silence, "about your father."
Malfoy glanced at him, eyes flaming silver. “Don’t, Potter. Father’s made his choices and be that as it may, I don’t feel any pity towards him. Anger and betrayal, yes. Pity, never. You know, before this year started, Mother sat him down and asked him about the rumours and he lied. He fucking lied and now someone's dead."
He nodded, wanting to reach toward him to offer some comfort but really what comfort would he be to someone who’d idealised and loved their father beyond measure to find out that he was a selfish, lying prick instead ?
There was no doubt that Lucius Malfoy loved his family, but he loved the power and wealth just as much. And he'd chosen one over the other. The wrong choice in Harry's opinion.
“He's probably housing the Dark Lord in our home, right now. I can't believe he would do this to us. We stayed for him and he—” Malfoy broke off with a shake of the head.
“What will you do now ? Surely not go back there ?”
“Dumbledore’s contacted Mother, she’ll be around to fetch me tomorrow. She wants to leave for France.”
“Oh,” Harry murmured, heart panging for a completely different reason now. “I’ll—we’ll miss you. Don’t forget to write, yeah ?”
Malfoy gave him an incredulous look. “I’m not leaving! I told Mother that she’ll have to go alone if she wants to go to France. And I must’ve been exceptionally convincing because, she’s asked her cousin Sirius if he could house us at Grimmauld. It’s some ancestoral Black house or the other.”
“So you aren’t leaving ?”
“No, are you deaf Potter ? Shall I be repeating myself throughout our entire friendship ? You shall have to develop your listening skills.”
Then Harry in a move unprecedented by anything he’d ever done his life, threw aside his glass and caught Malfoy up in a hug. The blonde went rigid in his arms.
Undeterred, he whispered. “I think you’re extraordinarily brave, Malfoy. Staying even though it's more difficult."
“I could live a hundred lifetimes and never even reach an inch of your bravery, Potter." This was said with a sort of raw, unbridled awe that Harry had never heard from Draco's mouth before.
At the sound of it, Harry squeezed the other boy tighter. Malfoy sort of melted against him, allowing the hug and Harry found himself blinking away tears. Throughout all of it, from the second Cedric had been struck, he’d been on edge, comfort a rare thing to find even from his best friends who seemed to be walking on eggshells around him. But here was Malfoy, Malfoy who barely knew him, giving it freely. Never giving any indication that any of it had been Harry’s fault.
Hugging Draco Malfoy felt like a rare, fragile peace.
The door to the infirmary banged open and Malfoy pulled back but not before he whispered, “It’ll be alright, I promise.”
And as Harry stared at him, barely acknowledging their Headmaster’s presence, he felt he could believe in this wild optimism.