Perhaps, Perhaps, Perhaps

Harry Potter stood in the potions doorway, wanting with all his heart to just shrivel up and die. He felt delighted in the forest when he realized he wasn't alone; he felt enchanted by a stolen midnight kiss; he even felt overwhelmed by an unexpected interruption, but this was just ridiculous. The agony that seized his mind when Draco rushed by him was unbearable. After their desperate confessions, their passionate looks, their encounter with pain from approaching footsteps the night before, Draco still managed to give Harry the coldest of shoulders.

Harry sighed slowly, not wanting to go back to his seat next to a certain blonde someone. If Draco keeps up this mind game, I don't know what will come of us, Harry thought. His skin crawled suddenly as he noticed Crabbe and Goyle seated a few seats behind Draco. Crabbe gripped his wand tightly in his fist and looked positively disgusted. The sneer he was sending Draco behind his back would make Voldemort’s skin crawl. Goyle sat nervously by his side, inching slowly away from his maddened friend. Poor Goyle, Harry thought as he directed his gaze away from the two boys, now isn’t the best time to sit next to Crabbe.

He started to slowly walk back to his seat, trying not to look at a certain Slytherin for fear of breaking out into . . .well, something. Things had been so stiff between them this morning; the tension in the air was practically tangible. During breakfast, their table had been unusually silent, and when Harry timidly tried to start a conversation, Crabbe only raised an eyebrow and looked the other way. It was so painful to have one of his few good friends so angry with him, so disgusted, it nearly drove him to tears.

Crying. The concept was as much a part of Slytherin as the colors green and silver. Echoes could always be heard late at night in the Slytherin dorms--a piercing wail, a muffled sob, a perpetual sniffle. It came from all over--girls and boys, first years to seventh. Their parents' persistent attempts to have them join the dark side were rather scarring, and if not your parents, it was your friends. Misery loves company, and miserable they were. They fell, one by one, and they took each other with them. Only the strong and the smart ones stayed away from Voldemort. Crabbe and Goyle had fallen--they got their marks at the end of the fourth year. Harry, however, still couldn't bring himself to join the forces that killed his parents, and that was enough to make Draco resist.

This flashed through Harry's mind as he sat down quickly onto his seat. His heart sank when Draco didn't say hello, but his hopes rose when Draco gave him a knowing glance, one that told him that it was just a front, showing eyes that longed to watch him, a nose that longed to memorize his scent, and lips that longed to caress his skin. And with that, he held on that much longer.

Just then, an excited looking house-elf burst into the room, running over to Snape's desk and handing him a roll of parchment. Snape unrolled it, and his eyes quickly scanned the paper. He sighed, standing up. "I must leave the room for a few minutes. It seems there's been a problem in Flitwick's class, and I have to run over a shrinking potion." He began walking towards the door, then paused and turned back. "Behave yourselves," he snapped, his eyes glaring daggers around the classroom.

A murmur rustled the room, and the two sides seemed to separate even more distinctly into Slytherin and Gryffindor. Harry was turning around to call over Pansy when he felt something wet hit him right below his ear. He looked for the source, only to see a sniggering Crabbe, wiping his mouth suspiciously.

"What was that?" Harry demanded loudly of the larger boy, turning completely around. "Was that spit?"

Crabbe stood up from his chair. "Yes, it was--although now I wonder why I wasted my own precious saliva on such a freak like you."

He said this so loud that all the Slytherins and half the Gryffindors looked up in puzzlement. “Crabbe, insulting Potter? Harry Potter?” murmured by everyone in seemingly every direction. “But I thought they were friends,” a few voices said. Harry joined Crabbe in standing up, each glaring the other, face-to-face.

"Didn't know you knew words that big, Crabbe." Harry retorted. "Maybe your brain is actually starting to show up."

Crabbe's face turned red. "Well . . . well . . ." He obviously couldn't think of a comeback, so he tried the next best thing: "I challenge you to a duel!"

Harry nodded and walked to the front of the classroom, with Crabbe behind him. The room was completely silent now, and everyone was watching them. Harry turned, put his hand on his wand, and nodded.

Draco’s eyes fixed on Harry as the boy whipped out his wand. There was a glare full of malice crossing Harry’s face, a darker side that Draco was sure he had never seen before, as he looked up at his opponent, and Crabbe returned the deadly gaze for a moment. Harry raised his wand quickly, but to everyone’s surprise, Crabbe was faster.

“Expelliarmus!” he grunted gravely, swishing his wand to the side and up. Harry was knocked off his feet, his wand flying swiftly to Crabbe’s outstretched hand. Harry hit Snape’s desk with a sickening crack, knocked unconscious too quickly to cry out in pain.

The room was silent. “You bastard . . .” Draco started, breaking the silence and trying to run towards Crabbe. Goyle shot out a chubby arm to hold Draco back.

“No, Draco, don’t get yourself into this!”

Draco shoved Goyle off his arm and drew back angrily. “Don’t you get it, Greg? I’m already into this. I’m more into this that any other conscious person in the room!”

His eyes burned into his confused classmates as he looked around the room. He shook his head as he began to pace. Letting out a small laugh, he began to speak. “Such a pansy-ass way to fight a duel, Crabbe." (A forgotten Pansy Parkinson in the corner turned bright red at the unintentional pun.) "Expelliarmus on the first blow. Should have known that you couldn’t think of anything else.” He walked over to Harry, almost flauntingly…temptingly. All eyes followed him; all ears heard only the sound of his hard, black shoes clicking against the dungeon floors, echoing off the walls.

He knelt next to Harry, stroking the bump that steadily grew on his forehead. “Your spitefulness, your prejudice—just leading up to hurting my…my lo…“ He took a deep breath. “My friend.”

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Harry's head was whirling. What happened? Oh yes, the duel with Crabbe . . . shortest duel I've seen in ages. Knowing Crabbe, I'm not surprised he couldn't do anything difficult. Where am I now? He frowned, looking around him. Damn. No help at all. He tried to move his arm up to feel his forehead, but he couldn't move. He quickly realized that he had no arm to move, which, quite frankly, explained a lot--how he'd felt neither pain, nor even slight annoyance or panic. His glasses were gone, yet he couldn't tell if his vision was clear or not. There was only whiteness--nothingness. It was somehow disturbing, yet oddly calming at the same time.

Suddenly, a familiar scene, something that had haunted his dreams for years, replaced the whiteness. Draco, Harry, Pansy, and another Slytherin from their year were cowering underneath Professor Snape's unusually large coffee table in his quarters. A stuttering Snape was trying to say something to an irate Voldemort, who would hear none of it.

"P-p-please, Voldemort--Lord Voldemort--no n-n-need to t-take the bo--"

"--Severus Snape!" the dark lord hissed. "Do not take me for a fool. I know damn well that you're close to that Potter boy. Do you really think I care whom you choose to invite to your little tea parties?" he spat, rolling his narrow eyes.

"H-he's more p-p-powerful th-than you'd--"

"Oh, give it up, you traitor," he snapped, "And stop stuttering like a fool. We all know what happened to the last man who stuttered like that."

With that, he raised his wand and flicked it lightly, muttering a curse under his breath. Before Snape had time to react, he clutched his wrist with a blood-curdling scream and fell to his knees, the hollow laugh of Voldemort mingling with his agonized shriek.

Harry tried to close his eyes, but he couldn't move at all. Even with no body, he felt the screaming professor's pain; it was how he felt it the first time he saw it, when he was crouching beneath that table.

He looked down at his younger self with an urge to protect himself, to shield himself from the tainting dark forces that were openly exposed to him.

The scene seemed to distort slightly, as if someone had pinched the middle and was trying to twist it in. It happened slowly at first, the sound beginning to dwindle, and then faster, until it sank into nothingness, and all was white again.

That was odd was all Harry could manage to think. Almost like that "pensieve" Draco keeps telling me about . . . but it couldn't be. No, it's only an illusion, a haunting memory flooding into my mind--so realistic, but a flashback nonetheless.

The whiteness had a quietness to it that made Harry rather uncomfortable. He was relieved when the white faded into Madame Pomfrey's pink, round face.

"Well, it's about time!" she chuckled, shoving a piece of chocolate into his open mouth. "You've been out for nearly half a week! And Professor Snape isn't too happy, mind you. His model student knocked out by a thug like Crabbe!"

She laughed outwardly now. "Oops! Maybe I shouldn't have said that." Harry tried not to laugh at how much she reminded him of the gamekeeper when he talked to their Care of Magical Creatures class. "Oh, by the way, there's a lad who's been coming down to see you just about all the time: Draco Malfoy, your blonde little partner in crime. You might want to talk to him sometime. He's been gushing on and on about how he's so ‘sorry’ about something--not too sure what. He's outside the door right now, I think….”

Harry finished the chocolate in his mouth as Madame Pomfrey bustled across the room. She opened the door and beckoned someone to come in.

A hopeful-looking Draco peeked his head through the door. He walked coolly across the room, trying to hide his excitement, but his eyes looked overjoyed. He sat down on the edge of Harry's bed, looking so goofily eager to speak to him that Harry was having a hard time containing his laughter. "Harry, you're awake!" he exclaimed. "Thank god," he added softly.

Harry weakly smiled, still feeling slightly dizzy. "Was Crabbe in trouble?"

Draco grinned, and nodded. "You should have seen Snape's face!" Sobering up a bit, he added, "He went a bit easier on you, but you're still not getting an easy way out."

Harry groaned, letting his head plop carelessly back onto the pillow. "Detention?" he asked.

"Two days," Draco sighed. “That means no time to--” he paused and swiveled his head around to make sure they were alone, "--to talk things over between us."

Harry's ears went pink. "Y-you mean between . . . " he slipped into a rather sultry voice, "us?"

Draco snickered, obviously amused at Harry's attempt to assure their topic. "Yes, about a few things regarding that, actually. First of all, about the last morning, you remember--I really didn't mean to give you the cold shoulder. I just--” He stopped, and pulled Harry into an upright position by his shoulders, "I just didn't know how to handle it. I've been wanting to apologize so much, I--"

"-shhhh!" Harry interrupted. "It's okay. Now, the second thing?"

"Yes, well--I wanted to know where this--where 'us'--is headed. We can't just go around snogging all the time without knowing what we're getting into!" Draco drawled raising an eyebrow.

Harry stared back at him blankly for a moment, and there was an awkward pause. "Alright, maybe we can, but what good will it do us?" Draco continued, clumsily spitting out his words in an unnaturally high voice.

Harry only replied with a grin. He pushed all grogginess aside and pounced forward, bringing his legs behind him and pinning Draco to the bed. He leaned forward and kissed him fiercely, pulling away just as Draco started getting into it.

Draco blinked a few times then smiled. "And people thought I was the aggressive one!" He pulled Harry back down and initiated a second kiss, this one slower and more passionate.

Harry pushed away again, all too soon, leaving Draco to squeal, "You tease!"

"Shhh!" Harry warned, climbing back to the head of the bed and tucking his legs back in the proper direction. "Someone's coming, I can hear it."

Harry lowered back down onto the bed and Draco sat up--just in the knick of time. The door opened, and Madame Pomfrey rushed in. "Harry, you're looking a little flushed," she crooned, stooping down to his face. "Are you doing alright?"

"Really, I'm doing quite alright. I think I'll be fine to go now," Harry suggested.

After a brief skeptical look, she waved him off with her hand. "Alright, alright. But take some chocolate before you go," she added, taking a large chunk out of her pocket and placing it in his hand. With that, she pulled him out of bed and gave him a scoot towards the door.

Draco and Harry exited, giving each other a knowing look as they walked out the door.