The Trouble With Harry

The Trouble with Harry

Chapter 7: The Mandatory Quidditch Chapter

Harry stared after Ron as the red head stormed off towards the castle. The sun had started to sink and twinges of dusk made their way down from the violet sky. He turned and jumped in surprise as a noise drew his attention somewhere to his left. Draco Malfoy stepped out from behind the trunk of the lone tree in the clearing. Harry's eyes went wide.

"So, what about me then Potter?" drawled the blond as he came to stand directly before Harry.

Harry narrowed his gaze at him. "Malfoy."

"Yes, that's my name. Nice to know you haven't experienced any brain damage from your little tête-à-tête with Weasley."

"What are you doing here? What did you see exactly?" Harry asked nervously as his brow furrowed.

Draco grinned maliciously, "Well that depends."

"On what?"

"Why on you. What's my silence worth to you Potter?"

A long groan escaped Harry's lips as he pinched the bridge of his nose and closed his eyes.

Draco watched him closely for a moment before taking a step closer. "Listen Harry, I'll make you a deal." Harry looked up and found himself barely half a foot away from the other boy. He swallowed. "If you want me to forget what I just saw. If you want me to wipe it from my mind. You'll agree to what I want."

"W-what do you want?"

Draco smiled sweetly at him. "All I want is a game of Quidditch. One on one. A Seekers' game."

Harry stepped back perplexed. "Huh?"

"Just you and me. No crowd, no housemates, no teachers," explained Draco.

"That's it? And you'll forget what you saw?"

"That's right."

Harry thought for a moment. Ron would be so mad if what happened got around the school. And Malfoy wasn't asking much, which, now that he thought about it, was somewhat surprising...and suspicious.

"What's the catch? You planning to curse me off my broom?"

"No catch. All fair play. Promise."

"I would be stupid to take a promise from you at face value, but then I guess I don't have much choice."

"I was about to say..."

"So you want to do this now? It's getting late."

"What's the matter Potter? Afraid to be alone in the dark with me are you?"

"No, of course not. Just, we might get in trouble."

"That's never stopped you before. If you don't want the whole school to know what I saw, then you'll meet me at the pitch in ten minutes."

"Fine."

***

Ron made his way up the flagstone path and the stone steps of Hogwarts with his fists clenched at his sides and a determined, slightly insane glint in eyes.

"What about Malfoy. What about Malfoy?!" He threw open the great oak doors causing them to bang loudly against the wall. Walking into the entrance hall, where everyone was exiting from dinner, he strode past his friends, completely deaf to Dean and Seamus yelling out to him. Knocking over a group of Ravenclaws obstructing his path, he proceeded towards the stairs as the sea of staring people parted for him.

"I'm going to kill him. I'll tear out his eyes so he can never look at Harry again. And then I'll pull his arms off so he can never touch him. And then, I'll tear his fucking lips off his pansy arse face so he can never ever kiss Harry." He reached the second floor swearing loudly as the paintings threw him disapproving looks. A throng of first years scrambled to get out of the way as he stormed by blindly towards one of the lower hallways.

"Then we'll see if Harry still wants that fucking pretty boy priss." He passed the stairs to the Gryffindor corridor and then the library. "We'll see if Harry still wants him after I'm done..."

Ron ran into someone causing them to drop their large stack of books all over the floor. He kept going without a second thought at apologizing but stopped and turned as he heard the person call out to him.

"Ron wait!"

"Oh. Hermione."

She quickly gathered her books from the floor and walked over to him.

"Ron, what's wrong? Where are you going?"

"Hermione have you seen Malfoy anywhere? I need to talk to him."

"Talk to him? You look like you're ready to release all the wrath of heaven and hell upon him. What did he do?"

"Nothing," he ground out through clenched teeth.

She looked at him with big worried eyes. "Ron, where's Harry?"

Ron scowled and turned to barrel off down the hallway.

"Wait Ron, come back! You'll get in trouble!" But Ron didn't look back as he disappeared around the corner at top speed.

Hermione sighed resignedly. "Oh dear."

***

Five minutes after Draco had left Harry had retrieved his broom and was waiting at the pitch. He was not kept long as the Slytherin came trotting up a minute later, broom in hand. He caught his breath for a moment and turned to Harry.

"Ok. Rules are the same as in a game. Except I get at least one hour...no catching the Snitch early. Got it? I want my silence's worth."

"And it's worth a lot considering how rare it is, isn't it?" Harry smiled at the blond who gave him a half scowl.

"I'd prefer it if we kept the insults to a minimum."

"That's a first."

"Well things change you know."

"Only too well," he gave Draco a scrutinizing look, "Say Malfoy, why do you want this exactly? I can think of a lot more terrible things to have me do."

"Oh can you? I'll keep that in mind for later."

Harry narrowed his eyes at the blond.

"However, I ask for this because it's what I want. Because you need to be taught a lesson Harry Potter and I'm the one to teach it to you. You can't go on thinking you're too good for everyone like you do, walking over everyone as if they were dirt under your feet. I'm going to win today Potter. You can count on it."

Harry scoffed, "We'll see about that. And I do not treat people like dirt! That's your job remember?"

Draco scowled at him once again. Harry ignored it and kicked off into the air.

Draco took the Snitch from his pocket as he stared after the midnight haired Gryffindor. He smiled. "Oh yes Harry. I will win today."

He too took off and met Harry in the middle of the pitch. He held his hand out in front of him. "OK, on the count of three. One, two...three!" He released the Snitch, which stuck around only long enough for the two Seekers to spot a flash of gold against the growing darkness, before it disappeared completely.

They took to opposite sides of the pitch at first scanning the ground near the stands and the goalposts, the usual lurking places of the Snitch. Soon it got boring. Harry sighed and flew over to where Draco was flying back and forth near the far left corner of the pitch.

"Hey Malfoy. Maybe we ought to go in. It's getting late."

"No. It'll show, just wait a bit."

"Why are you being so nice?"

"Huh?"

"You haven't insulted me once or tried to knock me off my broomstick since we got up here."

"Is that all you think of me? I'm not a machine Harry! I can't keep doing the same thing over and over for the rest of my life, can I? Besides, I don't want to hurt you, I just want to beat you."

"But why? You didn't think that way for the past six years."

"Like I said, things change. Look, when you defeated the Dark Lord, well I saw that it wasn't fake. That you weren't fake. That you deserved the things you got, the fame and everything. And when you were all modest about it...it was sort of admirable or something..." he trailed off vaguely.

"And that's why you want to, 'teach me a lesson.'"

"Oh no. That's personal." He looked up at Harry and sighed. "Harry do you think we would have been friends? You know if things had been different?"

Harry shrugged. "Different. You mean if I had taken your hand on the train? Maybe."

"Do you wish you had...sometimes?"

"Well when you're being as decent as you are right now, then maybe. Yeah. But not if it would have cost me Ron and Hermione."

Draco frowned for a moment.

"You know Harry you're my Gryffindor of choice. The rest are a bunch of brain-dead gits."

Harry looked at him in confusion, "Er...thanks, I guess." Thoughts of Ron were temporarily forgotten as he stared at the wispy blond hovering in front of him.

"What about you? Am I your Slytherin of choice?" he asked, his honeyed voice causing Harry to swallow hard.

"Umm...okay...yeah, sure."

"So you like me?"

"Well it's difficult to like you when you're calling my friends Mudbloods and baiting Ron all the time."

Draco rolled his eyes. Why does he have to keep bringing up his twit friends.

"But when you're being how you're being now, you aren't half bad."

Draco smiled widely. "Oh Bliss! Rapture! The Great Harry Potter has given me a compliment. I could die from happiness."

"That is until you say something stupid and then I have to wonder again."

Draco snorted. "Thank you my fair-weather friend."

Harry shook his head. "But really, why do you want to do this? I mean even if you win no one will be there to see us. I could just say you're lying and based on the record, I think they'd believe me."

"But you wouldn't do that Harry, would you."

"No, I guess not."

"See Harry, I trust you. It may be hard to believe, but I do."

"You trust me?"

"Implicitly."

Harry cocked an eyebrow at the blond as he took off to the other end of the field.

He watched Draco as he zipped around on his broom, the silky blond hairs of his head swept back in the breeze. Watching him here and now, Harry could quite understand what Ron might see in this boy. He was quite attractive. Beautiful even. Harry watched him a bit longer. Draco seemed to get bored of flying around, as Harry just hovered there, and flew over to him.

"Well? Have you seen it?"

Harry shook his head.

"I don't know where it's got to. Maybe we should have used one of the practice Snitches. We'll get in trouble if we loose the game Snitch."

Harry nodded.

"It's been nearly twenty minutes. Do you think it went into the woods?"

Harry shrugged.

Draco sighed and shook his head. "Are you just going to hover there saying nothing?"

"What else do you want me to do?"

I could name a few things, thought Draco with a sigh. "I don't know. Why don't we - "

Harry was off like a shot barely missing Draco as he dove towards the ground.

Draco realized only a moment later what was happening and pointed his broom handle down to chase after the Gryffindor. They were both plummeting towards the middle of the pitch where the Snitch had suddenly appeared as if out of thin air, hovering right above the chalk line of the center circle. Draco's view was blocked by the billowing of Harry's robes as he flew just behind him, but he could just make out the sparkling gold that indicated his target.

They were little more than six meters from the ground when Harry found himself distracted. Draco was right behind him, which was usually the case, but he couldn't help but think back to all the things that the Slytherin had said. And he could see the platinum hair glinting prettily in the moonlight from the corner of his eye. He'd never seen Draco in the moonlight like this before. Harry's thoughts were interrupted by the ground rushing up at him two meters away.

He for once, panicked and pulled up quickly. Draco didn't. Harry hovered close by watching wide eyed as the Slytherin plowed into the ground bringing up a deep divot, as clomps of grass surrounded him. The Snitch had disappeared from sight once again. Draco remained on the ground showing no signs of moving any time soon. Harry hopped off of his broom and ran to the boy.

"Malfoy, are you okay?"

"Mmrpfh," said Draco from where his face was buried in the ground. He lifted up his head and smiled widely at Harry. His hair was tousled about and smudges of mud smeared across his flushed cheeks. Some kind of joyous light danced there in his grey eyes as he looked up at the Gryffindor. Harry was mesmerized. It was like some kind of beautiful car wreck, he couldn't help but stop and stare at this battered, dirty boy before him.

Draco brought a pale hand up before Harry's face and for a moment the raven-haired boy thought the Slytherin was about to caress his cheek. He leaned forward a bit.

"Look Harry, I got the Snitch. Score. I win."

The Slytherin opened his palm in Harry's face. Harry started and flinched back as the Snitch took off from Draco's palm, fluttering near Harry's nose for a microsecond before shooting off to somewhere. Harry sat with his mouth open. And Draco couldn't resist.

He attacked the boy throwing himself at Harry and wrapping his arms around his neck bringing their lips together abruptly. The kiss was soft though, not at all like Harry had been expecting. Wait a second, he thought, I was expecting it?

At that point any thoughts fled from his mind as he felt Draco push him back against the grass, the boy's lips never leaving his. He had as good as warmed up earlier with Ron and he found himself moved to take a bit of initiative in unbuttoning Draco's robes as the blond ran his hands over Harry's neck and back.

Draco continued to kiss him sweetly, but Harry was getting fed up with his modesty. He ran his tongue over Draco's lower lip and shoved his hand into Draco's robes, causing the boy to gasp and relent under Harry's coaxing ministrations. Though it really didn't take all that much coaxing. Harry liked the taste of Draco's mouth. It wasn't something that he couldn't describe but it made him shiver with the sensation as he ran his tongue over the boy's perfect teeth.

Draco took no time at all to return Harry's forwardness as he pried open his robes, and then his shirt and then his undershirt until finally he felt the hot balmy skin that he sought against his fingertips. He ran his hand lightly over Harry's rapidly rising and falling chest, eliciting a shiver from the boy. Draco wrapped his arms around Harry's sides and brought them both upright again. Harry didn't mind as Draco trailed kisses along his jaw and down to his neck. Harry shut his eyes tightly as he felt Draco's mouth press against him soft and wet.

He grasped Draco's back as the blond moved higher to the spot just below his ear sucking gently. Harry's lips parted as his breath quickened and he wanted to feel Draco's lips on his again. Draco had made his way back down his neck, letting his tongue run over the hollow at his throat and down to his clavicle while his hands worked feverishly over Harry's chest and thigh.

Harry brought his hand from where it was buried in the soft platinum hair and lifted Draco's chin. He brought his lips down gently to meet Draco's once again and Draco clung to him, wrapping his legs tightly around his waist as he situated himself more comfortably in Harry's lap. They kissed like that for a bit longer until they were left breathless, forcing them to pull apart reluctantly.

Harry slowly opened his eyes to stare into Draco's soft gray ones reflecting silver in the moonlight. He reached a hand up to touch the boy's face, but paused midway as he heard a gasp off to his left. Draco and he both turned towards it.

It was difficult to see in the dark and the shadow of the stands but Harry could just make out a form standing there. His breath left him as he saw the form take off towards the castle, a brief coppery flash amongst all the darkness. Oh no.