trouble

"This cannot be right. It's illegal !"

"I'm going to ask you to leave, sir."

Draco's face turned red. Harry had accompanied him to Diagon Alley, pretending he had letters to mail. Really, he was a little tense about what the waiter had told him, and wasn't comfortable letting Draco alone in a public wizard place. His first instinct after getting out of prison had been to go to Gringotts. As he couldn't go back to the Manor and get his stuff, he had decided to buy some new. At least what he needed, some clothes, a toothbrush, a quill - though Harry wasn't sure who he was going to write to and couldn't figure out what else he could do with it. But he needed to access his bank account, having no money left on him. 

The building was still damaged from his last visit and Harry apprehended going in. He wasn't sure the goblins would let them. So he was carefully walking behind Malfoy, and they both tried not to draw attention. In public, Harry noticed that while he was definitely quieter than he used to, making an effort to be more discrete, he still had some of his old manners. He stood straight, chest out and looking down, avoiding to catch attention which didn't change anything to the aura around him. Some people stopped to observe them, which made Draco a bit nervous. 

When they had arrived at Gringotts, he had raised his chin and walked confidently to the booth. And now he was yelling. From what Harry understood, they wouldn't give him access to his vault. Apparently it was frozen too. 

"What is in that vault is mine. I am of age, and I have been cleared by the Ministry. That is an outrage, I demand that you let me to my vault." 

"We are not entitled to allow that, Mr Malfoy. I will ask you to leave one more time," the goblin answered as everyone in the bank started paying close attention to the scene, "otherwise I will call the security."

"This… This is outrageous."

"Malfoy, come on… Stop it we'll leave." 

Harry put all the money he had with him on the counter and asked the goblin if he could give him the change in muggle money.  

"Sorry for the inconvenience." He said, then he grabbed Draco by the arm and he dragged him out of there. 

"They have no right. No right ! If my father…" 

"You father what ? He's in prison, that's why they're freezing your family account. I mean you'd think someone like Lucius Malfoy would consider some sort of successoral planification... or even fraud."

Draco got out of Harry's grasp, infuriated. 

"Don't you think I know that ? I'm… You're… Arr !" 

"Come on, calm down. We'll find what you need somewhere else."  

Malfoy gave him a suspicious eye. 

"Where am I to go if I don't have any money ?"

"I'll lend you some, you'll pay me back when you get all this sorted out. But we're not staying here. It's not safe, and you drew way too much attention to yourself already."

"I'm not letting you give me money, I'm not a charity case."

"Yes you are ! Now let's go !" 

***

"I'm not going in there." 

"Please, don't be such a child." 

Malfoy followed Harry inside the shop with a dirty look. He was still very upset about their adventure in Gringotts. Harry, on his side, was curious. If someone had told him that one day he'd be shopping with a penniless Draco Malfoy in a muggle shop. Of course, he was dragging his feet, and Harry had to encourage him to get inside. 

"I'm not wearing this." 

"If you don't make an effort I'll just choose random stuff for you." 

Malfoy's tidiness reacted to this threat. Apparently, he thought worse than wearing muggle clothes to let Harry Potter pick muggle clothes for him. Back at Grimmauld Place, Harry went to the kitchen to make himself some tea. He wondered what Kreatcher had planned for dinner. 

"I'm going for a shower."

Draco shrugged. As Harry climbed the stairs, he remembered that the first time he ever saw Draco was in a tailors shop, in Diagon Alley, where they were buying their school uniforms. He took his shirt off and opened the water. It felt nice, letting the warm water run down his back. 

***

"Haha, you don't look so bad !"

"Of course I looked good in it, that's not the problem." Draco answered, with a grumpy face. 

Harry laughed, which made Draco smile. He was still complaining about wearing muggle clothes but you could tell he didn't even mind as much, he was just doing it out of old habits. He was wearing some gray sweatshirt and blue jeans. Extraordinarily neutral. 

"So…" He said while laying in one of the living room sofas "What do you do with your days in this dusty old house ?"

"I don't know. Wait for them to pass."

Draco raised an eyebrow. 

"Well that's depressing."

"Well I'm not really having the time of my life, am I."

"Yeah… Don't tell me…"

He put both his hands behind his head, lifting up the bottom of his sweatshirt a little bit. Looking at the ceiling, he seemed to be thinking. They stayed in silence, Harry sometimes throwing a glance at his guest. 

"I read the paper sometimes. But I'm not always in the mood."

"Yeah, just sitting here doing nothing is probably more exciting."

"I don't just sit here doing nothing. I clean a bit. I cook…" 

"You cook ?" 

"Yeah…" 

"How come ?"

Harry didn't really want to go into the details of why he would cook for his aunt and uncle. 

"Don't you cook ?" 

"Never tried. I mean, maybe like making sandwiches at Hogwarts."

"Making sandwiches is not cooking." 

"Then I never tried." 

"Merlin, you're so spoiled."

"You're just jealous."

"Jealous ?" Harry laughed. "Of not knowing how to cook anything but sandwiches at eighteen ?"

"Of never having needed to learn how to do it." 

"I'm sorry to tell you Malfoy, but I don't exactly dream of living alone in a huge and depressing house where everything is done for me and there isn't anything to do, not even cooking." 

"Ouch." 

Harry realized he might have been a little too sharp. He apologized. 

"I don't care. Look how that turned out for you anyway." 

"What would you do when you were a kid ? I mean you had no cibling you must have found something to do with your days."

"Most days I'd go flying in the garden" said Draco with a dreamy look. "Let a Snitch out and spend my day trying to catch it. Or fight bugglers."

"That seems nice. Wish I could go out flying."

"Bit difficult in London."

"Yeah."

They sighed. What would Harry have given to be on a broom. 

"We should go to the country, find a place to fly."

Harry raised his eyes on Malfoy, surprised. 

"What ?"

"Yeah, I'd like to do that. When I was in my cell, I'd try to imagine myself on a broom, to quiet down." His face darkened. "At some point I thought I'd not be able to do that for a very long time. Now that I'm out, might as well enjoy it."

"You won't try to make me fall off of my broom will you ?" asked Harry suspiciously. 

Draco laughed loudly. 

"I've been a real bitch to you haven't I."

"You have." 

But Harry couldn't help a smile stretching his lips. It didn't feel as weird as he would have expected, chatting with Malfoy. When he wasn't insulting him, or insulting his friends, he was actually not unpleasant to be around, Harry thought. And he had this little twinkle in his eye when he laughed, or said something funny ; little dimples Harry had never noticed... Yeah, it wasn't so bad. 

Suddenly, noise at the window. Hermione's owl. Harry let it come in and seized the letter at its feet. It was very short, a few words saying that she hoped he was well, wondering what Malfoy behaved like and assuring him she was waiting for an explanation in the shortest terms. He put in on the secretary, next to the others.