The Best, Worst Punishment Ever

The next evening found Harry sitting on one of the sofas in the library, deep in introspection. He just couldn't get passed the new thoughts he was having about his long-time-rival-short-time-friend. The difference in their relationship was astounding. Just weeks ago the mere thought of Draco had made Harry want to scowl and roll his eyes, but now whenever he thought about the blond all he really felt like doing was grinning dumbly. It was all very strange, and Harry wondered if Draco was having similar thoughts about their situation.

Soon enough however, it was time for Harry to head down to the dungeons for his detention with Snape. Detention. With Snape. On a Friday. What luck Harry had. His only reprieve was that Draco would most likely be there to share the detention with him.

'Damn it,' Harry thought as he climbed out of the portrait hole, 'There's that grin again.'

As Harry walked he thought about the lesson he'd had with Lupin and Draco the night before. It had gone well, with the boys practicing both their patroni, and continuing the work they had begun on the Munimentum spell they had started working on in their previous lesson. By the time Lupin had let them go they were both very worn out and Harry had headed straight for Gryffindor tower and his invitingly comfortable four-poster. He figured that this night's activities would be just as long as the previous nights had been, but very much less enjoyable.

Upon arriving at the dungeons classroom he entered it to find that Draco and Snape were already there. Draco was reading a book, and Snape appeared to be grading papers. As Harry entered both men looked up from what they were doing, though the reactions of the two were exceedingly different. When Draco saw that Harry had arrived he gave a small smile, and closed the book he had been reading. Snape however, contorted his face into a sneer, and stood up to cross the classroom.

"While I am overjoyed that you finally arrived, Mr. Potter, you are ten minutes late for this detention," Snape spoke in sarcastic monotone, "And this is not at all acceptable. Mr. Malfoy and yourself will remain in this classroom until all of the tables have been scrubbed clean by hand, without the use of magic. If you are unable to finish this task tonight, you will simply have to come back tomorrow night as well, and every night hereafter until the job is done, and done well. I've got better things to do than stay here and baby-sit you two, but I will be back in a while to observe your progress. The cleaning things are over there," he finished, motioning to some cleaning supplies in a corner of the room before sweeping out into the hallway and away from the classroom.

"Ugh," Draco said, voice dripping with disgust, "Manual labor. I loathe manual labor. It's so very demeaning, don't you think Harry?"

Harry was a bit surprised that Draco had called him by his first name, but more so that the boy had spoken to him at all. They were being friendlier to each other, but Harry hadn't expected for Draco to actually speak to him cordially and of his own accord. Harry was a bit apprehensive to answer though; he had a very different view of cleaning than Draco did.

"Actually, Draco," he began slowly, "I've been forced to do work like this all of my life. I'm the equivalent of a house-elf to my aunt and uncle," He paused to gauge Draco's reaction, "I'm so used to doing tasks like this that they're almost therapeutic." Harry hoped that revealing this to Draco wouldn't scare the boy off; he was simply stating a truth.

Harry's wish was granted, Draco just looked at him, dumbstruck. "So all those rumors about you being treated as some sort of servant are true? I'd have never thought that you of all people would allow yourself to be pushed around like that. You're probably the most stubborn person that I know, other than my father, but you're different... More positive I suppose."

Harry couldn't think of anything to say to this, so he just shrugged his shoulders and got his cleaning supplies from the corner of the room. In doing this he missed the blush that crept up the other boy's face as he too got his things and began to clean.

They had been working in silence for several minutes when Draco spoke again, this time with a question.

"Harry," He began, voice filled with a mix of curiosity and wonder, "If you were treated like that all through your childhood, how can you not hate muggles?"

Harry thought that Draco sounded genuinely curious, so he decided to answer as best he could. Harry said, "I don't hate muggles because I know that they're not all like that. Yes, there are the few that we could very well do without, but most muggles are decent people, just like you and me."

Draco seemed to accept this and the pair lapsed back into silence. As Harry worked he kept stealing glances at his companion, each time missing that Draco was sneaking looks at him too.

8-8-8-8-8

A week and a half later Harry was once again sitting with Ron and Hermione in front of the common room fire. Harry had been spending quite a bit of time with Draco since the detention the previous Friday, and he felt as if he had been neglecting his two best friends. The trio was situated on two old sofas and was talking about the party that the Gryffindors had planed for the upcoming Friday.

There wasn't any particular reason to be having a party, except the students wanting to have one. All fifth year and above Gryffindors were invited, and members of the other houses by invitation only. Harry had, of course, immediately invited Draco.

"Hey, mate, how many people do you reckon will be at the party Friday?" Ron asked, lying with his head in Hermione's lap on the sofa facing the fireplace.

Harry, who was lying upside down on the other sofa, legs and feet hanging over the back, head hanging down in front, replied with, "About forty or fifty I suppose... Twenty-five from Gryffindor, and about twenty or twenty-five from the other houses; I doubt there will be many here from Slytherin other than Draco."

Hermione began playing with Ron's violently red hair, "I know of at least six coming from Hufflepuff, and probably twelve or so from Ravenclaw. Who was it that was put in charge of food and drinks again?"

"Err... I think Dean and Seamus are in charge of drinks, and a couple of seventh years are doing food. Who's doing the music Harry?" Ron said, closing his eyes.

"Ginny and Luna are taking care of that, I think," Harry replied, rolling his eyes at the sight his two best friends were making, "Remind me talk to Dean later about making sure that Seamus doesn't spike all the drinks. There will be fifth years there, and McGonagal only agreed on letting us have this party if we were responsible about it."

Ron turned his head towards Harry and raised an eyebrow. "That was a very Hermione-like comment to make Harry, I think she might be rubbing off on you. I'd be careful if I were you."

Hermione whapped Ron playfully on his arm, and looked approvingly at Harry. She glanced up and saw that their very own blond Slytherin had come down from his room to join them. "Hello, Draco, why don't you sit down?" she said genially.

Draco smiled at her and sat down next to Harry. "You know, if you continue to sit like that all of your blood will pool in your head, which is quite large enough in its own right. Besides, it would be a pity for the savior of the world to die from something as trivial as that," he teased, smirking at the black haired boy lying upside-down beside him.

Harry snorted and tried very ungracefully to hit the newcomer, but because of his awkward position he only barely managed to hit Draco's upper leg. After a few tries Harry simply gave up and let his hand rest on the other boy's thigh.

Hermione watched the interaction between the two boys, just as she had been watching them since the blond had moved into Gryffindor tower, making notes in her head. She then turned to Draco and said to him, "We were just talking about the party Friday; did you invite anyone? No one will mind if you do."

Draco scoffed at this, "No, I didn't. It's not like there's anyone that I'd want to invite anyway. You three are basically the only people that I talk to these days... But that's perfectly alright with me; Slytherins are zealously loyal to those more powerful than them, but they can be supremely nauseating sometimes."

"You make them sound like Hufflepuffs," Harry commented, causing Hermione to scoff, Ron to snort, and Draco to choke on his own spit.

The three Gryffindors laughed uncontrollably at this, and the group eventually fell into a comfortable silence, occasionally breaking out in fits of giggles. A few minutes later Ron and Hermione excused themselves to go carry out some of their prefect's duties. Or at least, that was what they said they would be doing. Harry and Draco had their doubts.

Harry eventually turned over to lie on his stomach across the old sofa, feet still in the air, but with his head propped on one hand beside Draco's leg. Harry had discovered that the blond boy hardly ever lounged around like he himself liked to on the sofas, but rather always sat as though he was in polite company. Harry definitely preferred to sprawl out and be as comfortable as possible when he had the opportunity.

Draco looked at Harry and raised one of his elegant blond eyebrows.

'He really is beautiful,' Harry thought, without registering that he had thought it.

"Yes?" Draco questioned; it was obvious to him that Harry wanted to ask something.

Harry shook himself out of his reverie. He was unsure about how to go about asking about what he wanted to know. So, he decided to just ask. Subtlety had never been his thing.

"Draco," he said amiably, "We've known each other for a long time, right?"

"I guess you could call it that," Draco answered slowly; unsure of where the conversation was going.

"And you would say that we've gotten to know each other a lot better over the last two weeks or so?"

"I suppose."

"Well," Harry continued, finally getting to the point, "I was wondering whether or not you think you could tell me why you've become so much... less evil and git-like this year. I mean, only if you don't mind explaining, you know?"

Draco sighed. He had figured that this conversation would happen sooner or later, though he had hoped that it would happen later rather than sooner. He decided to answer Harry's question.

"Basically," the Slytherin began slowly, trying to ignore the fact that Harry had started doodling nonsensical pictures with his finger on his leg, "I was already having doubts about becoming a death eater last year, but when I met Voldemort for the first time this summer, I decided that there was no way that I wanted to follow a man like that."

Harry remained silent so Draco continued.

"Actually, I can't see myself following anybody, but that... that creature isn't fit to be in charge of a plant or a bug, much less the wizarding world. He's an obsessive compulsive lunatic. Besides, I might be malevolent, but I'm not cruel or evil. I don't think I could kill an innocent person.

"Mostly though, it was because of self preservation" Draco finished with a small smile, "I'm a Slytherin to the core, and I'm not going to be on the side that won't win. You heard what I said earlier about us Slytherins following the powerful, and your side is definitely more powerful."

Harry gave a quiet laugh at the end of Draco's speech. He took Draco's hand and gave it a little squeeze to show that he believed him, and trusted him. Then, Harry stood up and picked a book up off the table.

"Goodnight, Draco," Harry said, patting Draco's shoulder as he walked behind him on his way to the dormitories, "Pleasant dreams."

Draco replied with a, "You too, Harry," before standing up and following Harry up the stairs to his own room. He could still feel where Harry had squeezed his hand moments before.

Harry got ready for bed, and his last thoughts before sleep were of how Draco's eyes had seemed to turn the most beautiful shade of blue when Draco had been talking to him.

Harry did indeed have pleasant dreams that night.

8-8-8-8-8

Harry woke the next morning feeling more refreshed than he could remember feeling in a very long time. He slowly slipped into consciousness, rubbed his eyes, and grabbed his glasses from his bedside table, putting them onto his face. He stretched languorously and climbed out of bed, going over to his trunk to gather his things that he needed to take a shower.

"You're up entirely too early, Harry," he heard mumbled from the bed beside his. It was indeed half an hour before Harry usually awoke on a school day, but he hadn't noticed until Ron had made the comment.

Harry mentally shrugged and then replied, "Oh well. Just going to go take a shower. You go back to sleep since it's so early, and I'll wake you back up when I get done."

Harry heard something mumbled from Ron's bed that sounded quite like "Mergillph," which he took as an agreement, and left the dorm to head for the showers that were at the top of the stairs, just before Draco's bedroom.

No one appeared to be awake except for Harry, and he was looking forward to having some peace and quiet in the shower. Usually by the time that Harry got there in the morning the place was full of boys in a hurry to get ready for school. However, when he opened the door to the bathroom he discovered that someone else was indeed already up and in the showers, and that person happened to be Draco-the-early-riser-Malfoy, himself.

The shower in Draco's room had clogged up earlier that week, and it had yet to be repaired, so the blonde had been using the community showers. Harry had figured that the blonde must get up earlier than everyone else to shower, because he was almost always gone from Gryffindor tower by the time that Harry got up, but he hadn't known how early the boy rose in the morning.

Harry yawned and said, "Morning Draco," loud enough to be heard over the streaming water of the shower.

Draco twitched a bit in surprise, but recognizing Harry's voice he replied with an amiable "Hello Harry."

Silence reigned again as Harry stripped and began his own shower, not that he really minded; he had wanted peace and quiet in which to think, after all.

Now, however, Harry's thoughts turned to something that hadn't been planning to think about. When he had entered the bathroom Draco had been quite visible, and very, very naked. Harry had to admit to himself that aesthetically speaking, Draco was an Adonis. Quidditch had done him no wrong over the past few years; that, certainly, was true. Remembering the sight was getting Harry quite flustered.

He was quite upset with himself for allowing his mind to think these kinds of thoughts, but in the end he chalked it up to teenage hormones and finished his shower without further distraction.

8-8-8-8-8

The rest of the week passed quickly for Harry. Classes and his extra lessons, and the additional homework being given to the sixth years as preparation for seventh year's NEWTS (Hermione was very pleased that they were all going to be so well prepared for the tests; no one else Harry knew thought it was all that great.) took up so much of Harry's time that before he knew it, it was the Friday afternoon before the big party.

Everything was going smoothly. Harry, Hermione, Ron, and Draco were all relaxing on the lawn in front of the school, intent on resting as much as possible so they would have energy for the party later, when they saw Neville exit the school and head morosely towards the lake.

Hermione raised her eyebrow at Harry and Ron, obviously implying that they should go see what was wrong with the boy. So, each heaving a great sigh, the two stood and walked over to where Neville had sat by the edge of the lake, leaving Hermione and Draco to wait for their return.

"Hey Neville, are you alright?" Harry asked, sitting down by his gloomy looking friend.

"Yeah, you look a bit down, mate," Added Ron, sitting down on the boy's other side.

Neville glanced at the two boys beside him before stating simply, "I just broke up with Ginny."

Harry was surprised, and he and Ron both said "What?!?" at the same time.

"You heard me," he said, not looking up from the ground, "I had to break it off with her. I didn't want to, but she's refused to talk to me for days, and she's been so irritable and nasty to me and a lot of other people for longer that that. I couldn't take the change in her anymore."

Ron looked thoughtful for a moment before saying, "You know, mum owled me just this morning asking if anything was wrong with Ginny; apparently she hasn't written to mum in a really long time. I'll have to try to talk to her about it tomorrow after the party. Gosh, I'm sorry Neville, I don't know what's happened to her."

"Yes," Harry added, "That doesn't sound anything like the Ginny we all know. It's too bad though, you two made such a nice couple."

Ron glanced at his watch and said that they needed to go have a final look at the guest list. Harry and Ron gave Neville their last condolences and said that they would see him at the party that night.

Then the two boys headed back to the school to tell Draco and Hermione about what they had just learned.

Neither realized they were heading towards a night they would never forget.