Ten Days

Ten Days

Chapter Four: Realization

And yet to times in hope my verse shall stand,

Praising thy worth, despite his cruel hand.

Harry stopped dead in his tracks. Was Malfoy actually in front of him? Or was this the lack of sleep talking? The only thing he managed to say was, "What?"

"You, me, we need to talk, Potter." Draco's look wasn't welcoming. He looked like he was up all night, and just wanted to get whatever he was about to say over with.

"We have detention together, we'll have plenty of time then," Harry said as he tried to make his way past Draco. Draco just stepped in front of Harry, not letting him pass. "Honestly. Let me go."

"No, we need to talk now." Draco wasn't kidding.

Harry hesitated for a moment. "Well, then can we do it somewhere... less public?" He gestured to an open, abandoned classroom.

"For Merlin's sake, Potter, I need to speak with you. Not rape you or something..."

"Thanks for putting a thought in my head that wasn't there. See you later." Harry tried to edge his way pass Draco, but Draco wouldn't let Harry go. Harry was seconds away from shoving Draco out of the way, but he really didn't want to touch Draco. For obvious reasons.

"You're not going anywhere."

Harry was beginning to feel extremely uncomfortable. Draco was dangerously close to Harry, too close. Harry took a step back. "Spill it." Harry was hoping Draco would change his mind...

He didn't.

"Look, Potter, I remember that night." With every word, Draco seemed to become less and less confident about why he wanted to talk with Harry in the first place. He took a second's pause and continued, "It meant nothing, Potter. Understand? I don't know what kind of fantasy you've got going on in that demented head of yours, but it meant nothing to me."

"Demented... What?" Harry was... something. He couldn't explain it. Confused? Upset? Relieved? He didn't know. And here he was, listening to Draco Malfoy telling him he was demented. Harry wasn't demented. At least, he never thought of himself that way.

Draco didn't stop there. "I see the way you look at me, it meant something to you, I see it," he said, this time without that uncertainty he started with. He really meant this, well, he looked like he did. "And I'm telling you how it meant nothing, absolutely nothing to me. I can't even stand detention with you. So you can go drool over someone else."

"I don't drool over you, Malfoy."

"Oh really?" Cautiously, Draco backed Harry into a wall and moved closer. Their faces were barely an inch apart.

Get out of here, that was Harry's instinct. But, he couldn't, he was trapped. What was Draco up to? Pushing him against a wall like this. Just after he said how Harry was demented and meant nothing to him. But did Draco mean what he just said? Everything he said? Something told Harry that he didn't, and maybe Draco was a little less sincere than he let on. Harry couldn't get a single word out of his mouth. He just looked at Draco in silence as Draco looked back down on him.

"See!" Draco exclaimed. "That there, is drool." He took two steps back. His expression didn't change, he just stood there looking at Harry. Harry looked back at him. The two had nothing to say to each other.

Harry found himself, more than ever, ridiculously attracted to Draco right now. Draco was two feet away, staring at him, without that cold look or cruel grin on his face. Go for it, Harry instructed himself. He almost did.

Draco beat him to it. He inched his way back to Harry, slowly, and placed his hands on either side of the wall next to Harry. He began to lean in, bringing his face closer and closer to Harry's.

And stopped. "What the bloody hell am I doing?" With that, Draco was speeding down the hall.

***

What the hell did he just do? No, really, what the hell did he just do?

Draco Malfoy did not like boys. He didn't like Potter. So why did he just almost kiss the boy? What made him do that? He wasn't drunk the last time he checked. He wasn't intoxicated in any way, shape, or form. So why?

The most logical place to go to was the library, it would be quiet, no one will be there at this time of morning, it was perfect. Draco would have plenty of time to think. He rushed his way to the library.

He arrived to an, as expected, empty library. The school librarian, Madame Pince, was no where to be found. She usually was, and Draco took this as weird, but took a seat anyway.

Draco buried his face in his hands and let out a deep sigh. Did he really just almost kiss Harry Potter? He couldn't have. He just wanted this bad memory to go away. He wanted to find that Wishing Potion. Anyone else would have given up after a few weeks of searching, but Draco was determined to find this potion.

Professor Snape said it was real, so if he tried real hard, eventually Draco was bound to find it. He searched the library about a dozen times, up and down, left and right, with no luck. He checked every single part of the library.

Except for the restricted section. Draco took a glance at the section.

It was open. "Well, that's weird," Draco said to himself quietly. There was no one in sight, this was his chance. On the other hand, that would be too easy. There is no way that Madame Pince would leave the library unattended. Draco decided that there was no doubt that she was in the section herself.

But what if she wasn't? Draco didn't hear anything. He slowly got himself up and walked cautiously to that section of the library. The gate that was always closed, was now open. Wide open. Just begging for Draco to come in. If there was a Wishing Potion recipe in the school, besides in Snape's office, this is where it would be.

He pushed against the gate gently, opening it just a smidgen more and tiptoed in. He knew he didn't have long, maybe a minute or so. Draco took a good look around him, at the massive amounts of books. He suddenly lost hope in the potion at the sight of them all.

So, he curiously scanned a few row of books, until a forest green book with golden writing caught his eye. Not sure of what he was about to get into, Draco ran his finger down and up the spine of the book and pulled it out. Without even reading the cover, he flipped through the pages.

He finally hit the page he was looking for. He couldn't believe his luck, and he couldn't believe he found it like that. Draco didn't know what made him go to the book so confidently, without checking to see what the book was titled or anything. But here it was right in front of him.

"Votum Venenum... The Wishing Potion," he read out loud. Draco scanned the list of ingredients. It would be difficult gathering some of these ingredients, but it wouldn't be too hard. What would be difficult was getting this book out of the library...

Without warning, he heard a noise from inside the library. Draco panicked and immediately shoved the book back into a random spot hastily on the shelf. Then he quietly and swiftly ran out of the restricted section.

***

What the hell just happened?

Harry was pretty sure, that only two minutes ago, Draco Malfoy's face was two inches away from his... And the next minute Draco was out of sight. It didn't make sense. Harry could have sworn the two were about to kiss. He knew it. So what happened? One minute Draco was leaning in and then he was practically running down the hall.

Harry pulled himself together, shook everything off (or at least tried to) and began to walk back to his original destination.

***

That was close.

Draco sat himself down at one of the main tables in the library. The noise he heard earlier, wasn't more than the wind, but Madame Pince walked back into the library within minutes.

So the wishing potion was in Hogwarts, right under his nose this entire time. Well, he never checked the restricted section. He should have thought of that in the first place. Well, he did, but he never really checked it out. Now all he had to do was to get that book.

Which brought him to his next problem. "Shit," Draco muttered to himself, just realizing that he didn't even bother checking for the title. He just sort of glanced at the cover, and checked it out inside. Smooth move, he thought to himself. Now he was back to finding out what book it could have been. But really, he had no clue.

***

"What took you so long, Harry?" Ron said to Harry as he returned to the Quidditch Pitch, "You were gone for nearly a half an hour to go to the bathroom."

"Sorry, Ron," Harry replied. "Something popped up." Harry took notice that the team had stopped playing and were on the ground. "Why did everyone stop?"

"We were all waiting for you," Andrew Kirke responded, "We were going to come for you if you didn't return soon. We thought you might have died on the toilet bowl or something." He and a few other players laughed.

"Well, I'm not dead on a toilet so let us get back to practice, shall we?" Harry mounted his broom and flew off before they could even answer. Obediently, the team followed, and flew after Harry.

***

Harry took a seat at the Gryffindor table for lunch, next period he would be having Defence Against the Dark Arts with Professor Lupin. And then Potions. Lucky him, two classes with Draco in a row. After what just happened, there was nothing Harry couldn't have dreaded more.

So Draco had almost kissed him, why? Right after he just finished telling Harry how much he couldn't stand Harry "drooling" over him, and how that night they shared meant absolutely nothing to him. It made no sense, not to Harry at least. It seemed that the more this went on, the worse it got for Harry. Especially after what just happened. Did Draco like him? After that stunt, Harry didn't know for sure. What Draco said to him was cruel, but his actions were quite different.

Actions speaker louder than words.

Harry decided it would be best not to think about it. He grabbed an apple and waited till Ron came along with his food, which wasn't long. "Hey," he greeted his friend.

"Yeah, Harry, I almost forgot," Ron said as he took the seat right next to Harry, "How was detention last night? Draco didn't start anything, did he?"

Harry sighed, he should have known that somebody was going to mention Draco soon enough. "No, Ron, he didn't." He wanted to change the subject as soon as possible. "So, how was Quidditch Practice when I wasn't there?"

"We didn't do much, ten minutes after you left we started to wonder where you were."

"Ten minutes? That's not long at all. I thought you guys wanted to beat Slytherin, not slack off because the captain had to take a piss." Harry smiled and then took a bite out of his apple.

"What ever you say, Harry." Just then, Hermione came and took a seat next to Ron.

"Good morning, you two," she said. "How was detention last night, Harry?"

"I don't want to talk about it, Hermione," Harry said grimly.

"I thought you said that slimy git didn't start with you!" Ron said, "I swear if he did do anything and you don't want to talk about detention because of that I'll..."

"Ron!" Harry exclaimed, "Calm down! Draco didn't do anything!" Harry soon realised his mistake.

Ron was confused. "Draco?"

"Draco, Malfoy, what's the difference?" Harry nervously laughed and shrugged.

"You've been acting really weird, Harry," Hermione stated, "Is there something wrong? What is it?" She furrowed her brow.

"Nothing's wrong, you guys, don't worry about it." He put down his apple and poured himself some pumpkin juice. His friends didn't believe him. "Just drop it, there isn't anything wrong."

"Sure there isn't, Harry," Ron said, "Just like you made Professor Lupin release gas in front of the class."

Harry didn't say anything more, he didn't feel like talking about it.

***

Draco entered the great hall, ten minutes to the end of lunch. He had spent the first fifty minutes in the library, alone. He realised that he's been spending a lot of his time alone lately. He was usually flanked by Crabbe and Goyle, parading Hogwarts like he owned the place. Not recently, he was too haunted by the thoughts of that night... And he couldn't stop thinking about Potter.

But he didn't like the boy. He couldn't have, he's a boy himself. Boys do not like boys, and Draco didn't like Potter. Not one bit. To prove this point to himself and Potter, Draco tried to shoot a glare in the direction of the Gryffindor table where Harry was sitting. Harry was already looking up at him. Straight at him. And Draco couldn't shoot the glare, so he turned away.

I wish he would stop looking at me like that, Draco thought to himself. He really hated the way Harry did that though, he looked hurt and confused. And made Draco feel... Well, he made Draco feel bad about it, that's what he did.

Well, that doesn't matter. Draco took a seat at the end of the Slytherin table. He wasn't hungry, he hadn't been all that hungry for a while though. He also didn't want to die of starvation, as tempting as that was right then, so he grabbed an apple.

"Draco!" Pansy Parkinson called from down the table, as she got up to rush over to join him. This annoyed Draco more than anything, well, actually, Pansy annoyed Draco more than anything. One or two flings with a girl and they think you're there's for ever. Go figure. She got at the end, shoved the Slytherin that was sitting in front of him aside and sat down. "So how was detention?"

Draco thought about ignoring her for a minute, and even considered telling her to shut up. He decided to take the nicer route. "I'd rather not talk about it," he replied as he took a bite of his apple, winced at the taste and put it down.

"You sure? He didn't start with you? Did you throw any good insults?"

"I said I don't want to talk about detention or Potter." Or anything with you for that matter, he thought to himself, he grinned at the thought.

"So what's the grin for, then? Tell me! You know you can tell me anything." She wouldn't give in.

"Grin? What grin? There's no grin. Nothing absolutely noteworthy came up yesterday, and nothing will. And the conversation ends here." Without any argument from Pansy, not giving her a chance to, Draco got up from his seat and walked onto his next class.

***

"Well, I think that's enough for today. You all are dismissed," Professor Lupin said. "Malfoy, Potter, before you two leave I need to talk to you." The two boys weren't going to question him. As the rest of the class left they stayed behind and approached Lupin at his desk. "Well, you two, how was your detention?"

The boys looked at each other. Why does everyone have to ask me that? Harry thought to himself. It was true, why? He thought it was pretty obvious that detention with Draco Malfoy would be no tiptoe through the tulips, so why did they even bother asking?

"It was torture," Draco said. Well, that was very straightforward and to the point, Harry thought.

"Ditto," Harry commented. He might as well had said something, ditto seemed appropriate.

"Good." Professor Lupin smiled. "Now about tonight..." He paused. Harry wondered what he had in store for them that night. Would they have to do the same thing or what? Harry didn't have to wait long. "You two have to meet me here at nine PM.. I want you two to wear clothes that you won't mind getting dirty."

"Dirty?" Draco winced. "What will we be doing, may I ask?"

"You will be painting my office." Lupin smiled brightly. Painting his office? That mad no sense. Why would they need students to that?

Draco clearly did not want to go through with it. "Painting your office, Professor?" Lupin nodded. "But... Wizards don't need to paint things, we've got magic to that. Oh! We're going to do it with magic. Is that it?" Draco looked hopeful.

"No, you will be painting it just like a Muggle would. All the furniture will be cleared before you get there, so I wouldn't worry about that, boys." Lupin smiled again. "You two can go, I'll see you later."

"Yes, professor," the boys said together, and walked out of the room.

"Can you believe that?!" Draco exclaimed to Harry once out of the room. "He's making us do Muggle work! My father would never stand for it!" Why was Draco talking to him again? Harry just realized that he had the next class with Draco.

Harry shrugged.

"I reckon he's probably just going to get rid of the paint once we're done." So now Harry was walking with Draco to his next class. Wasn't this terrific. He wanted to say something about what happened that morning. Why shouldn't he?

"Draco..." Harry kept his gaze straight ahead of him, as they walked side by side.

"What?" Draco snapped, half knowing what was coming.

"About this morning..."

Harry didn't have to finish. "Never happened," Draco said coldly. Harry didn't bother to respond. They walked to their next class together, already late.

Professor Snape wasn't too happy with the boys being late. "How wonderful for you two to join us," he droned, "Mr. Potter, that would be ten points from Gryffindor."

"But Professor," Harry said, "Draco was late too!" A bunch of Gryffindors nodded.

"Yes, and I am sure he had a good reason to be. You on the other hand need to spend less time in the hall and more time in the classroom." Draco smirked and sat down.

"We got here at the same time, what does that tell you?" Harry mumbled to himself as he took a seat. Snape shot a glare at him.

"Make that fifteen points!"

Harry didn't speak for the rest of the period... Or the rest of the day for that matter. He still had detention with Draco to look forward to.

***

Clothes that he could work in? Where the hell did Professor Lupin expect him to get those? It was fifteen minutes to his detention and Draco still didn't have anything to wear. He really had no clue what he was going to do about that, either. He didn't really have an inexpensive clothes to waste. He was pretty sure that Potter did, maybe someone from his own house did too. Luckily, Crabbe was just walking into the room.

"Hey Crabbe," Draco said, "got anything I could wear to detention?" Crabbe turned around and just sat there with the usual blank stare. "Any day now..."

"Oh... um... no, no I don't," Crabbe said finally. He didn't even look, Draco thought to himself. Either way, Draco just began to ignore his friend and pull out a random pair of pajamas.

When Draco arrived outside of Lupin's classroom, Potter was no where to be found. So here he was, in his dark green silk pajamas, getting ready to paint. Paint. Malfoys didn't paint. Draco certainly didn't paint. He rapped lightly on Lupin's door.

"Come in!" said the Professor from inside. Draco opened the door to find that Potter was already inside, waiting at one of the desks. "To my office, then?" The boys nodded and followed Lupin up the stairs to his office.

There it was, a stone-walled office with the furniture covered by sheets. Lupin wasn't kidding, they were going to be painting tonight. "I take it you two know how to paint, the cans are over there." He pointed. "If you need help, I'll be just down there marking tests." Lupin smiled and left.

So once again, the two boys were alone. Harry was wearing a rundown t-shirt and a pair of old jeans, and here was Draco in silk pajamas. It was a comical site to see. If you weren't Draco Malfoy, of course.

***

Draco decided to wear silk pajamas? This made Harry want to burst out laughing. He knew where this was going, Draco was definitely going to get paint on him and start flipping just like a girl would. Harry smirked and said, "Nice choice in 'work clothes'."

"I don't have 'work clothes' unlike some other unfortunate people, Potter," Draco retorted. "So," his tone changed, "how do you paint, again?" So Malfoy didn't know how to paint, either. Harry had a strong feeling this is how every detention was going to be like, him showing Draco how to do things.

"You take the brush," Harry said, as if he was speaking to a child, and took up the paintbrush. "You dip it in the paint." He dipped the brush into the already-open can. "And you put it against the wall like this." He demonstrated painting the wall.

"I know how to paint, Potter," said Draco. "I was only joking." He rolled his eyes, and so did Harry, for a different reason. Harry knew that Draco really wasn't joking at all. The was Draco mimicked Harry's painting was sort of cute. He couldn't at all, and Harry just looked at him in amusement. "What are you staring at, Potter?"

"Nothing," Harry said with a small laugh. He shrugged and focused on the painting the wall with the ugly shade of green, other than Draco. "Ugly shade of green, isn't it?"

"Quit trying to change the subject, Potter. Stop looking at me like that, it bothers me."

Bothered him? "It didn't bother you much this morning when you practically leaned in to kiss me!" Harry said, sounding a little more angry than he intended.

"I didn't try to kiss you, Potter," Draco responded. He slapped the brush full of paint, quite hard against the wall, splattering the light green on his clothes. He let out a aggravated groan.

"So what would you call it?"

"Call what?"

"What happened this morning." Draco started to get on Harry's nerves.

"Nothing happened this morning," Draco spat.

Harry rolled his eyes. "You can say that again." The two boys found themselves silent again. They had nothing to say to each other, and they didn't need to have anything to say. Harry let Draco do the terrible paint job and Draco let Harry stare at him.

There was just something about Draco that drew Harry to him. Harry didn't know what and maybe if he did he would try to stop it. No one wanted to feel this way, no one in their right mind. He wanted to take Draco right then and there...

"Kiss me," Draco finally said, still looking at the wall he was painting.

Harry blinked. "What?"

"You heard me, Potter. Kiss me." The blond put his brush down on the floor.

"I'm not kissing you, Malfoy."

"Why not? You seemed so eager to kiss me before, and now you're not willing? Make up your mind."

Harry was not going to kiss Draco. What did he think he was playing at anyway? Just randomly asking him that. The nerve in that boy. Draco responded to Harry's silence with a shrug. "Oh well," he said carelessly, "your loss. Just remember that I asked you." Draco picked his paintbrush back up and went back to clumsily painting the room.

Harry looked at Draco with wonderment, Draco looked amazing in those pajamas. Harry started to wonder if he wore those one purpose. Of course he haven't, what was he thinking? But he did look good... "Wait..." Harry started.

"What?"

"Never mind."

Draco grinned. "If you say so, Potter."

***

Detention was over. Draco survived. He was walking back to his dorm now, in one piece, and he was not thinking about Potter.

Okay, so maybe he was. Did he really just ask the boy to kiss him? He couldn't have. He doesn't like boys, remember? So... why did he ask him, again? Because he was curious, that's all. He didn't like the kid. What if he said "okay"? That would have been the end. Good thing he didn't.

Stop it Draco, he thought to himself, you don't like Potter so get over it. But he couldn't, he couldn't stop thinking about Potter. No matter how hard he tried. He needed to find that Wishing Potion as soon as he could, that would change everything. All he had to do was find the book, make the potion and the make the wish.

Which was a lot harder than he thought it out to be at first. He didn't remember the book's name, which was problem number one. Gathering the ingredients would have been problem number two... it wasn't that big of a problem, but it was a problem. So there were only two problems, that wasn't that bad. Well, he was sure that the Wishing Potion was against school rules. No good school would allow the students to be making Wishing Potions left and right. Not saying that this was any sort of good school.

So Draco changed out of the paint-dirtied pajamas and jumped into his bed.

***

So Draco just asked Harry to kiss him. It didn't make sense, quite honestly, nothing lately has been making much sense to Harry. Well two detentions down, three more to go, Harry thought to himself. It was nearly one in the morning, on Friday, when Harry crawled into bed. He was playing Draco in Quidditch tomorrow. Lucky him.

At least he was lucky enough to only have one class with him today, Care of Magical Creatures. Although the teacher was stark raving mad when it came to the class, Harry did enjoy it. Too bad the person he wanted to see the least was in it. He would live, he would have to. Just for three more nights.

Harry closed his eyes and tried to go to sleep. Tried to.

***

It was three in the morning, Draco couldn't sleep. No matter how much he tossed and turned, regardless of the amount of Mooncalves he counted, he just couldn't sleep. And he knew why.

Draco couldn't get his mind off of Harry Potter.

He just couldn't get his mind off of him. It made no sense, he didn't like boys, remember? But here he was, thinking about one... In a not-so-straight way. Maybe he was starting to like the boy. Yes, that was it.

Draco Malfoy liked Harry Potter.