Found, Never Lost

Chapter 2: Good to See You

Saturday, June 19, 2004
10:00 Berlin (9:00 London)

"Hello, Hermione."

Her heart skipped a beat at the sound of the voice she hadn't heard in so long and she sat down a little too hard, causing Lilian to kick her forcefully in protest.

"Harry?" she managed, feeling her voice shake a little bit, "is that you?"

Oh please no! Harry thought. Hermione sounded as if she would tear up, which made him slightly nervous.

"Er... last time I looked in the mirror it was," he said, trying to be silly in the hope that it would distract her from crying. He had never completely got over the Cho debacle in fifth year. Star didn't cry. Of course, Star had been a grown woman when they first met. As a matter of fact, he found it impossible to even imagine her as a girl. And she was the only female companion he had ever had; therefore, even the remote possibility of Hermione starting to cry brought back unpleasant memories and rendered him almost as helpless as Cho's tears had all those years ago. Marvellous! Dr. Crane would have a field day with this. It was good that she would never hear about it.

"Hermione, are you okay?" he asked, after a few moments of awkward silence.

"Yes," she said, sounding suspiciously as if she was stifling a sob, "yes, I'm fine. Sorry. Just a little surprised, that's all." She took a deep breath. "It's so good to hear your voice, Harry. How are you? And how did you get my phone number?"

Harry nervously ran a hand through his hair. God, he felt awful all of a sudden! He had been to hell and back with Hermione and Ron. More than once. They had stuck together through thick and thin, and then he had simply decided to... abandon them. And now he was talking to Hermione and she seemed happy - happy! - to hear from him instead of bombarding him with a volley of reproaches.

"Directory enquiries gave me the number. And I'm... good. I'm okay. Really..." He trailed off. "How did you find me?" he blurted out, cringing inwardly for saying some-thing so corny.

Hermione could have cared less how he sounded. She was glad Harry couldn't see her right now because her face felt like a red hot poker.

"I read The Cupboard Under the Stairs and I... er... have friends at the Institute. They wouldn't tell me anything, of course, but one of them accidentally dropped a hint," she said, hoping he would never find out that she had used somewhat... dubious methods to obtain his address. That she had tricked Dr. Crane's assistant Betty - well, let's be honest - she had basically broken into the girl's rolodex. Fortunately for her, the index cards listed the actual names and contact information of Dr. Crane's patients and research sub-jects. In Harry's case, this included the name "Star" and several crossed-out telephone numbers, as well as one that appeared to be current. It was obviously not a number in England, but it had been easy enough for her to find out what she needed to know.

To her relief, Harry seemed satisfied with this explanation because he didn't ask for details - or maybe he just wasn't paying much attention.

"Why did you send Draco after me?" He didn't think anything could have sounded tackier than his previous question, but there it was.

"Well, I would have come myself, but I couldn't. I'm due in a couple of weeks."

"What?"

Hermione couldn't suppress a giggle. Dear old Harry, still thick as a plank sometimes.

"I'm pregnant, you dolt! Ron and I are going to have a baby!"

"Oh...," was all he could manage, and suddenly she saw him in her mind's eye; opening and closing his mouth, green eyes wide, running a hand through his hair, blinking sheep-ishly, not knowing what to say, and it was all too much. She started laughing and tears started streaming down her face, and she was not sure if she was just crying or having a hysterical breakdown.

"God, Harry, we miss you so," she said, and now she was definitely sobbing, leaving Harry at an even greater loss for words. "I've been so worried since your last letter and then you stopped writing and... and we couldn't invite you to the wedding... and Ron's been beside himself and the Weasleys too... and now somebody else has to be Lilian's godfather..."

"Who? What?" Harry asked, puzzled. "Hermione, you're babbling."

"Yeah, well..." She snuffled and struggled to compose herself. "You try being eight months pregnant and see how you're holding up when your long-lost once-best friend calls after years and years and acts as if nothing's happened!"

"Thank you, but I'd rather not," he said dryly, remembering how he had almost fallen for Draco's story of wizards having babies... that day at the lookout point... Harry gulped and slammed a mental door in the face of an army of memories.

Much to his relief, his last remark elicited a giggle. "I can't blame you," she said. "I'll be glad when it's over. I hate feeling like a beached whale all the time."

And they laughed together and Harry felt better.

"Why didn't you just call me? Or write?"

"I... was afraid you'd be... angry with me for looking for you," she confessed, "and I was afraid you'd just... disappear..."

Harry felt deeply ashamed. Hermione, one of his oldest and best friends, had been afraid that he would sneak away from her like a bloody coward. What had he been thinking?! It made him wonder why the Sorting Hat hadn't put him in Hufflepuff. He swallowed.

"I... don't know what to say, Hermione. I am so sorry. I shouldn't have left like that. It's just..."

"It's okay, Harry, really. I understand," she interrupted, "all your friends do. And it's not like you haven't been in touch at all. I always told the others about your letters and they were happy to hear from you. We just wished we could write back, that's all."

He took a deep breath, recovering a little.

"So how is everybody?"

"Oh no, Harry James Potter! I refuse to answer any such questions over the telephone. You will kindly make the effort to visit and find out for yourself."

Harry smiled. This was more like the old Hermione. How well he remembered that tone - and the determined face that went with it.

"I will. I don't know when, but I promise I will. You know that I never meant to stay away forever. I just needed a break and time to think and then... things just kept happening."

"I know," she said softly, wondering briefly if Star was one of those "things" and why he had never mentioned her in his letters. She changed the subject.

"So have you talked to Malfoy yet?"

"No. I was at work when he came by. My... roommate took a message." He felt a stab of guilt at calling Star his roommate but he couldn't think of anything better to say. My girl-friend? Lover? Bedmate? The woman I live with? She was all and none of these things. There was no simple term for their relationship and he had yet to find the single word that came even remotely close to describing it.

"Are you going to, though?" she asked, finding it very hard not to ask him whether this roommate was the same person he had been living with when The Cupboard Under the Stairs was published.

Harry felt his face grow hot. "You still haven't told me why you sent him, of all people," he reminded her. "And how did you manage to, anyway?"

"Well, I couldn't very well ask people with families to go off on some wild-goose chase, now could I? And those of us who don't have families or are currently pregnant can't just take time off work out of the blue - if we can even be reached. Some of us happen to be residing on the other side of the globe these days."

She paused for a moment.

"Malfoy was the only one who was available on short notice. Plus he has the time and enough money to travel."

"That doesn't explain why he agreed to come, though. Come on, Hermione, we both know Draco. He wouldn't do something like that just out of kindheartedness."

Maybe not out of kindness, Hermione thought, but hopefully from his heart. She took a deep breath.

"Actually, he owled me not long after... you had left, asking if we could meet, and I was too curious to turn him down, so we met for dinner in London. He said he needed to get in touch with you and he seemed really stressed when I told him nobody knew where you had gone or what your plans were, so I said I would try to find out and let him know if I did." She chuckled. "From his reaction on Monday, I'd say he had pretty much given up on me by then. He definitely didn't expect to be sent after the goose, so to speak. Fortu-nately, he didn't put up too much resistance. I'm not very patient these days and if he had made a fuss, I might have tried one of Ginny's new hexes on him."

Harry laughed. "I bet that threat got him moving. Do you remember that one time on the train, when a whole bunch of us hit him and Crabbe and Goyle with all those spells? I almost felt sorry for them afterwards!"

Hermione felt her face burn, gladder by the minute that he could not see her.

"I... erm... didn't threaten him. I mean, I would have, but I didn't have to. He sounded... pleased when I asked him if he would go, once he had recovered from the initial shock. He argued a little, of course, but I could tell that his heart wasn't really in it. I think it was mostly because he's never been to the Muggle world and..."

But Harry had just caught onto something and interrupted her. "Wait a second! Are you telling me you contacted him last Monday, for the first time in years, and he shows up here on Friday?" He had difficulties digesting this.

"Well, yes. I owled him right after I got your address." She giggled again. "Don't be mad at me, but I couldn't resist... I just had to send Hedwig."

Harry didn't hear her last words. He took a deep breath and prepared to confess that he had actually tried to get a hold of Draco before he called her...

Berlin, 11:00 (10:00 London)

"About time you hung up, Granger. I've been trying to ring you for an hour and I haven't even had breakfast yet."

"And good morning to you too, Malfoy. How do you like Berlin?"

"How much do you think I could possibly have seen of the place between eight o'clock last night and eleven o'clock this morning?"

"You got me there," she admitted cheerfully. Right at this moment, she doubted that even the worst Malfoy sneer could put a dent in her good mood. She had heard from Harry and he was okay and he had agreed to visit and said he would think about being Lilian's god-father... Well, after she had sworn a holy oath that she really, really would not nag him to move back to England any time soon. But the important thing was that he had said he would think about it, which, if she still knew Harry, was more of a yes than a no.

"Have you talked to Harry yet?"

"No, Granger, I haven't, and if your line hadn't been engaged, I could have told you."

It was almost impossible for her to keep a straight face. "Well, first my mother called..." Oh, she was going to enjoy this! "And then I was on the phone with Harry."

There was a profound silence on the other end and she considered savouring - just for a few moments - the fact that she had rendered him speechless, but then she simply couldn't bring herself to make anybody suffer today, not even Draco Malfoy.

"He has tried to call you but the phone was busy," she managed, amidst a fit of giggles. "If I were you, I'd stay in my room and off the phone for the next thirty minutes. Do you have a piece of paper and a pen?"

"What?"

"Paper. And a pen."

"Why?"

"To write down a number."

"Number?"

"Harry's phone number, you twit! Just in case..."

Berlin, 11:15

Harry took a deep breath and dialled Draco's number again. This time he got a dial tone. Please put me out of my misery, he thought and swallowed. Pick up! His heart was pounding and he felt slightly ill.

A click indicated that the receiver on the other end was being lifted.

"Hello?"

Who would have thought that a voice could strike like lightning?

"Hello, Draco."

Had he known that he just did the same as an eight-months-pregnant, Muggle-born witch an hour ago, Draco might have made more of an effort to stay on his feet. As it was, he sat down on the nearest chair. And even the highest degree of denial would not let him blame the sudden weakness in his knees on the fact that he had missed breakfast.

"H... Potter. How nice of you to call."

Harry felt better immediately. He knew that haughty, clipped tone only too well. Draco was as nervous as he was. Which meant that he would get waspish and sarcastic if caught on the wrong foot. Which meant that he had to avoid a lengthy telephone conversation. Which meant that unexpected behavior was in order.

"I'll come pick you up for lunch. Meet me in the lobby at noon?"

Judging from the brief silence on the other end, he had struck the right note.

"Okay."

"Great! See you soon."

"Right."

As much as Draco hated to admit it, there was no way he would be able to eat anything now.

oOoOoOoOoOo

Harry stared at the kitchen table for a long moment, his hands on the tabletop, then closed his eyes and dropped his head onto his arms, listening to his heartbeat, waiting for his pulse to slow down. Until a few minutes ago, it still had seemed somewhat... unlikely, but now reality was sinking in: Draco was here. In Berlin. Thirty minutes away. And he had no idea how he felt about that. He inhaled deeply and sat back up. If he wanted to be on time, he needed to get going. He picked up his keys and wallet and walked out the door.

Berlin, Hotel Wilmersdorfer Hof, 12:00

The underground ride did little to calm his nerves. If anything, it gave him enough time to become annoyed with the butterflies in his stomach. And it awakened his old friend Impatience. He wanted to get the awkward first seconds over with and feel like a human being again.

This was lunch with Draco he was walking into, he told himself, not a Potions exam. Not that it was any less... unnerving, but at least he would not have to stay and struggle through anything unpleasant.

Such as brewing an anti-acne potion with the ridiculous name of Stopsspots. Under pressure of time. And have Snape breathing down his neck and looking thoroughly dis-pleased when the potion, for once, turned the right colour at the right moment. Harry remembered Snape's face that day with immense satisfaction - and suddenly found him-self in front of Draco's hotel. What was it the cartographers of old used to put on their maps to mark uncharted territory? "Hic sunt leonis"? Well, in his case it was "hic sunt draconis". And he'd be damned if he let that bother him! He drew himself up to his full - although not too impressive - height of 5'11'' and pushed through the revolving entrance door.

He spotted Draco immediately. No surprise there, he thought, a grin starting to spread across his face. When Draco wanted to be noticed, he made sure that nobody could miss him. He was sitting in the middle of the foyer, facing the door, a newspaper hiding most of him except the top of his white-blond head.

Harry had no doubt that Draco had seen him, so he would not do him the favour of hesi-tating. A few determined steps brought him in front of the person who, for a few months, had made his life as sweet as he had made it bitter for years.

He pushed his glasses up on his nose and tsk'd, grinning.

"Trust a Malfoy to turn up for a city tour wearing dress shoes."

"Thanks, Potter," came the familiar drawl from behind The Times before the newspaper was lowered. Light eyes looked Harry up and down. Settled on Harry's face. Expression neutrally polite. Unreadable. "You clean up nicely yourself."

And trust Draco to still be a brilliant actor, Harry thought, unable to suppress a smile.

"Hello, Draco. It's good to see you." He meant it.

Folding the paper and neatly placing it back on the side table gave Draco the few moments he needed to regain control over his slightly trembling legs. Thank Heaven, the worst was over! He stood up from his armchair and when he looked at Harry, he returned his smile.

"It's good to see you too, Harry," he said.