Permanent Scars

Chapter sixteen

It had been a week since Harry had been able to go to Draco's for supper.

Draco's helping Harry with his Potions had made his potions ability improve so much that Snape suspected he was somehow cheating.

He had forced Harry to work in a far corner, alone, to minimize the chances that he was getting help. When Harry still managed to brew the potions correctly, it only strengthened Snape's resolve to find out how he was managing to cheat.

They had had a Potions test on Friday, and when Harry brewed the potion perfectly, it was too much for Snape. Now convinced he was cheating, he sentenced Harry to a week's worth of detentions.

Harry protested his innocence, but it had no effect. He had been forced to spend every night this week disembowelling horned slugs.

It was the last night of the detention. Harry had finished the barrel of horned slugs, and was praying that Snape wouldn't think up something even worse for him to do.

Snape walked into the room, looked at Harry in disgust, and wrinkled his nose in disgust from the smell.

"Go clean yourself off, Potter, but don't think you've gotten away with anything. I don't know how you've been cheating but I intend to find out," Snape said vindictively.

Harry scurried out of the classroom, relieved to finally be done.

Once out of the room, he cast a cleaning spell on his robes and fingernails to remove the blood and muck. Then, noticing that it was still early, he decided to head over to Draco's room to let him know that he would be resuming his visits, starting on Monday.

Since he hadn't had time at night to do his homework, he had been forced to spend every spare moment during the day trying to keep up with it. He hadn't even had time to send Draco an owl to let him know why he hadn't stopped by.

He got to Draco's door and knocked, hoping that he was in. The door was answered, and there stood Draco, in his pyjamas.

"What are you doing here, Potter?" Draco asked, surprised.

Seeing Draco again after such a long time made Harry's heart begin to thump wildly. Blushing, he said, "I just wanted to explain why I haven't been here this past week. Can I come in?"

Draco opened the door wider, and allowed Harry to enter the room.

Once they were seated on the couch, Harry explained, "Because I'm doing so much better in Potions, Snape has gotten it into his head that somehow I'm cheating. Last Friday, we had a test and thanks to you, I made the potion perfectly. This annoyed Snape so much I have spent the last week in detention disembowelling horned slugs and it was absolutely disgusting."

At hearing that Harry had been in detention all week, and the reason for it, Draco started laughing so hard, tears were coming out of his eyes.

Once he regained control, he teased, "So, you've been serving detention all this week because Snape thinks you're cheating? If I would have known that helping you would get you stuck in detention, I would have done it a long time ago."

Harry was so annoyed that picked up a cushion and smacked Draco across the head with it. The cushion connected hard with Draco's head and knocked it against the back of the couch.

Draco immediately grabbed the cushion and forced Harry down onto the couch. Then straddling him, he used both of his hands to push the cushion over Harry's face.

Harry felt Draco press against him and didn't know whether to just enjoy the moment, or push Draco off before he was smothered. Self preservation took over, and he pushed the pillow off of his face.

Draco grabbed Harry's hands, and held them above his head; His face just a few inches away. He stared down at Harry. Then breathing heavily, he let go of Harry's hands and slowly eased himself off until he was next to Harry on the couch.

Harry sat up, his face flushed, and stammered that he had to be going.

"I'll see you on Monday," Harry called as he bolted out the door.

Draco watched Harry racing out the door. He was dumfounded at Harry's sudden departure. As he sat there on the couch, he tried to think of why Harry was acting so strangely all of a sudden.

Unable to think of why Harry had suddenly run away, he walked over to one of the chairs by the fire, picked up his book, and continued reading it. He couldn't concentrate, though. The questions just ran over and over in his mind...why WAS Harry acting so strange?