Book 1
“Draco, remember what I told you,”
“Yes Father, I remember. I must become friends with Harry Potter,”
“And?”
“And tell you everything that I learn about him,”
“Yes! Good. Now, get on the train, lest you be late,”
“Yes Father,” Draco bowed his head slightly, then climbed onto the train. At first, he sat with Blaise and Pansy. But, Draco grew restless, his nerves at an all time high. Who knew what his father might do if he failed to become friends with Potter.
Walking up and down the train, he tried to find Potter, but he wasn’t sure what the boy looked like.
“… Harry Potter!” Draco’s head shot up. In the train booth, there sat two boys and a girl. The girl meant nothing to Draco, she was not who he was looking for. Draco inspected the boys, trying to see who was Potter. He hoped it wasn’t the redhead, he looked like a mess. No, that boy must be a Weasley.
He looked closely at the other boy, dark unruly hair and round glasses that seemed to frame his face perfectly. The boy’s hair shifted to reveal what Draco was looking for, a lightening-shaped scar. Perfect, Draco had found Harry Potter.
He had already met that boy. At the clothing shop. Hopefully that should help him become friends with Potter easier. Draco ignored the fact that he thought Potter was the prettiest boy he had ever seen.
This was the moment, the moment that would define the rest of his life.
“Is it true? They’re saying all down the train that Harry Potter’s in this compartment. So, it’s you is it?” Draco lied effortlessly, looking at the boys beautiful green eyes.
“Yes,” Harry said, studying Draco’s form.
“My name’s Malfoy, Draco Malfoy,” Draco tried to say with grace. A giggle, coming from the Weasley boy.
“Think my name is funny, do you? No need to ask who you are. My father told me all Weasleys have red hair, freckles and more children than they can afford,” Draco said out of anger, without thinking. It was something his father taught him to do. Draco regretted it almost immediately after saying it.
Weasley just looked down. Draco had already messed up, shown a type of person he was. He might as well lean into it.
“You’ll soon find out some wizarding families are much better than others, Potter. You don’t want making friends with the wrong sort. I can help you there,” Draco reached out a hand, finally looking at the green eyes that glared back at him. Shit.
“I think I can tell the wrong sort for myself, thanks,” Harry replied, the coldness from his glare never fading.
Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit. Draco fucked it up. Two minutes in and he had fucked it up.
Draco didn’t show that. Instead, he huffed and walked to the bathroom on the train, where then he promptly cried.
Father was going to be so disappointed in him. How could Harry want to be friends with him after that? God, what was Father going to do to him? To Mother?
Draco’s tears quickly turned into heaving breaths as he started to panic. Oh god, he wasn’t going to be home to protect Mother anymore. If Father found out that Draco had ruined it minutes in, there's no telling how he would lash out, to him, to Mother, to anyone. Even Dobby.
Draco just needed to try harder to be Harry’s friend. He’d apologize to Weasley, try and get into the same house as Harry. Yeah, yeah that could work.
All was not lost.
---
No matter how close Draco tried to get to Harry, he seemed to be pushed around by the other students. And then, Draco was called up to the sorting hat. Before Harry.
Well shit. How could he make sure that they were in the same house?
Draco didn’t get a chance to even ask the Sorting Hat because it decided who he was before even sitting on his head. A Slytherin, just liked his father.
Splendid.
Of course Harry got Gryffindor with the Weasleys. The Slytherin’s bitter rivals.
Draco was doomed.
---
It wasn’t like Draco didn’t try to talk with them, the little trio that had formed. But, something must be wrong with Draco, because he never knew how to talk to them. Instead he followed them around like a weirdo, always watching.
Draco didn’t think they noticed. The most observant of them was the girl, who he learned was named Hermione Granger. Granger was definitely the most intelligent of the three. Draco thought, in another lifetime, they could have been really good friends.
Anyways, she never noticed him, which meant the other two definitely didn’t.
The only time that they knew he was following them was when they snuck out at night and he followed them to Hagrid’s cabin. As soon as they noticed him, he knew he couldn’t just pretend it never happened, so he told Professor McGonagall.
The detention afterword with the three was the most he had ever actually interacted with them. Being paired with Harry gave his heart a skip.
Whatever they saw in that forest scared the shit out of him. After about 5 minutes of running, is when I noticed that Harry was not with me.
The idiot. Draco ran and found Hagrid and Granger and told them where the monster was and where Harry was sure to still be.
Luckily Harry was safe, but Draco wanted to strangle him. Did the boy have a death wish?
---
Draco had been getting weekly letters from his father, asking for updates on Harry. At first, Draco has simply said they weren’t yet friends. After about 3 months of this is when the first howler came. Then the next, and the next, and the next.
The last one was especially scary, considering the things Father had said about what he would do to Mother if Draco did not give him what he wanted.
That’s when Draco decided to lie to his father for the first time ever. It was probably not a good idea, but Mother’s safety was in danger.
So, Draco lied his ass off. Talked all about how Harry suddenly invited him to watch a Quidditch match and that all week Harry had been talking to him in the halls. Hopefully the boy who lived was going to be spilling his secrets to Draco in no time at all!
To Draco, the letter seemed incredibly fake, but then he got a letter from his mother.
About how happy Father was. Mother seemed happy as well, and that was enough for Draco.
He continued to lie for the whole year, using snippets of conversation that he overheard between Harry and his friends to add some truth to the letters. They were useless gossip pieces but Father seemed overly happy over them.
Deep in the back of Draco’s mind, he felt giddy, exhilarated by the mere fact that he was disobeying Father for the first time. He tried to squash it down, but the more letters he wrote, the more confident he became. It was dangerous, he knew. But Draco couldn’t help it. It was so freeing.
---
When all three of Harry’s crew ended up in the Medical Wing, Draco got so worried that he himself got admitted to the Medical Wing because Professor Snape took one look at Draco’s pale skin actually turning green, and forced him to go to the Medical Wing.
Draco wasn’t quite sure why he was so worried about Harry. Sure, he had pretended he was friends with the boy and secretly watched him from afar, but that didn’t mean anything. Draco was supposed to do that, that’s what he needed to do for his father.
Right? Draco looked over to where Harry lay, just two beds away. His face was calm, eerily so. Draco was so used to the wide range of emotions that constantly graced the boys face, that it was unnatural to see it so calm.
It didn’t take too long for Madam Pomphrey to let him go. ‘I swear, I was just worried about a test. I don’t need anything,’
Maybe Draco was getting too good at lying. Besides, he wouldn’t be gone long.
A small card and an origami swan. It didn’t say who it was from, but Draco felt strange not getting anything for Harry. Draco ignored the feeling.
---
When Harry woke, and after Dumbledore assured him that everything was safe, Harry looked at all the presents that people had left him.
For some reason, a card and an origami swan stuck out the most to him. The card wasn’t signed, Harry wasn’t sure who it was from.
A smile grew on Harry’s face as he studied the carefully folded piece of paper.
Harry picked up the card, reading:
Dear Harry,
I hope you enjoy the swan. Feel better.