Harry Potter and the Battle of the Sexes

The boys had won. The girls had failed to prank them back after three whole weeks! Of course, it wasn't for lack of trying, but rather for an increased sense of caution. The boys had potion-tested their drinks and food at every meal. They kept track of all the females of the houses, to watch for meetings that might alert the boys to some activity on the part of their adversaries. Thanks to Justin's sudden blast of brilliance-- quite unusual for the popular but rather stupid Hufflepuff --they had even found a spell to magic-proof the boys' dorm rooms. No magic could be performed in any of the boys' dorm rooms in any house. This meant that the boys had to do all their homework out of the dorm, but most of them did this anyway, so it was really quite convenient.

No, they were taken care of this time, Harry was certain. The girls had already tried a couple of pranks, and had failed miserably. They had tried using Confundus spells, to make the boys disoriented for the rest of the day, but of course they couldn't cast the spells. They had also tried getting a potion into the boys' drinks which would make them think they were some kind of pop star for a day-- an invention of Pansy Parkinson's, oddly enough. Fortunately the drinks had been tested and only Vincent Crabbe had taken a sip, and he ran around thinking he was Ringo Starr and singing "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" for the rest of the evening. It wore off after about an hour, since he hadn't taken the full dose.

After this event, three uneventful weeks had passed.

Harry lay in his bed and grinned, glad that the battle was over and that-- yet again --he had been on the winning side. Of course, if he was honest with himself, he was a little sad to see the war end, as it had been a great deal of fun. Oh well, at least Hermione would help him with his homework again. That had been the worst part of the whole thing, Harry thought. The tension between the males and females at Hogwarts had been ridiculous. Even among the teachers! Professors Snape and Lupin (who was back teaching Defense against the Dark Arts and quite fond of Harry, in the same way Snape was fond of Draco) were always willing to give the boys any help for their pranks without asking questions. It was from Snape that Draco got the idea of enchanting the mirrors, actually. He had casually mentioned in class how talking mirrors were made with a certain type of potion, and Harry could have sworn he had winked at Draco. He shuddered to even think of it. Of course, the female professors had gotten in on the act as well. McGonagall and Trelawney of all people were the staunchest supporters, although Madame Hooch had also been a bit extra harsh on the boys in Quidditch, which put teams that had girls at an advantage over teams that didn't (i.e. Slytherin, who Gryffindor had beat, 220-10).

But it wasn't watching his professors argue that Harry liked best about the prank war. No, what he liked was the fact that for once, he got to work with people without the infamous House Pride getting in the way-- especially Draco. He'd learned more about Draco in the past month than he'd known in 4 years of going to school with the boy. Harry had always assumed that the boy was simply the black to his own white; a black hat, the boy who hates everyone and everything except himself. Oh, he never thought this consciously, he knew that Draco had to have something inside him, but he'd never really thought about it before. At this opportunity to work with the blonde Slytherin, Harry had found out that first off, he was really, really funny. He knew it was sort of hypocritical, but when he wasn't the one at the butt of Draco's jokes, they WERE a lot funnier. Draco was particularly good at impressions. He had good ones of all the teachers, even ones that Harry hadn't met before. During the late-night planning sessions, which usually involved only Draco and Harry, since Justin and Terry were no good at sneaking, it was all Harry could do to keep from laughing and blowing their cover at times.

Of course, it had taken a week or two for them to get used to the idea of working together. Draco would sneer, Harry would sneer back, Draco would say something scathing, Harry would respond. Or sometimes it would be the other way around. It made Harry feel guilty, knowing that he had started as many of their conflicts as Draco had. One particular argument stuck with him, from that first week when they were planning on the list. They'd been sitting in the library after hours, Harry writing the final (legible) copy of the list and Draco looking up the spell to make a bunch of copies of parchment.

* * *

Harry paused in his writing. "Biggest slut? Are you sure you want to have that category, Malfoy? I mean, you know girls take that differently than boys would. I mean, maybe you don't care if the girls hate you for the rest of your life, but some of us are straight." Harry hadn't meant to say that, though. He'd meant to stop after "girls take that differently than boys would," but something forced the rest of it out of him and (as if it wasn't bad enough), made him smirk, too.

Draco had widened his eyes briefly before narrowing them. "Maybe SOME of you are, Potter, but I'm fairly sure you're not one of them. But really, can't you think of anything more witty to call me than queer? Homosexuality jokes are so first year!" Harry had flushed. Malfoy was right. He hated it when Malfoy was right. It was really juvenile and he'd had no reason to say it anyway. He was about to apologize, but Draco cut him off. "Though it would be kind of funny, you know. The Boy who Lived an Alternate Lifestyle, hmm?"

Harry couldn't help but chuckle (he just wished his chuckle didn't sound so damn much like a giggle). He figured if he wasn't going to be allowed to apologize, then he'd let Malfoy's insult slide. "More like the Boy who Lived a Crappy Lifestyle," he muttered as he finished off the list with Hermione's name (that vote had surprised him, but he supposed that if there was any girl whose style in bed was unknown, it would be Hermione's).

At this, though, Malfoy had slammed his book shut. Loudly. Harry winced at the sound and looked around to see if Filch was coming, but before he had time to be relieved, Malfoy was hissing at him. "Oh yes, poor Potter with his horrid muggle relatives and his stupid bloody scar that hurts, poor paparazzi-chased pet Potter with the wizarding world at his bloody stupid feet!" Malfoy paused and breathed deeply, staring straight down at the closed book, "Spells for Busy Businesses." Harry sat deathly still for what felt like hours, too scared to move, too worried about hurting this blonde boy in front of him to say anything. Finally, Draco's body relaxed and he gathered his things. He turned to leave the library. Harry grabbed the sleeve of his robe, beginning to apologize again, but Draco yanked his arm away. Without looking back, the Slytherin said quietly, "You may think it's difficult growing up and being expected to save the world as we know it, Potter...but let me tell you that it's worse being expected to destroy it."

With that, Draco Malfoy left the library.

* * *

Harry caught up with him the next day, under the pretense of giving him the list to be copied (since they'd left the library before completing that task). He apologized profusely. Draco was taken aback, thanked him after a pause, took the list, and left. They'd never broached the topic of that evening, and they didn't stop fighting exactly, but their battles never escalated above insult-throwing after that. And after a fashion, the boys had become friends. Even Ron admitted that, when he wasn't working for the glory of the Slytherin house or the defamation of Gryffindor (which amounts to the same thing), Draco wasn't so bad.

For as long as the battle continued, Harry could call Draco his friend, and for that he was glad. With this conclusion reached, Harry rolled over and went to sleep.

* * *

Harry awoke that morning to the sounds of Ron yelling something from the bathroom. Sitting up in bed, Harry noticed that he'd slept in. Class was starting in twenty minutes-- no time for breakfast. Cursing to himself, Harry got up and saw that Neville was also still asleep. Had his alarm not gone off, too? That was unusual. Harry woke the forgetful boy up and started walking to the boys' bathroom for a quick shower, but Seamus grabbed his arm before he could open the door.

"I wouldn't go in there, mate, it's NOT a pretty sight." Seamus's face looked so grim that Harry started to feel panicked.

"What happened? Did someone die or something? Did Vol--"

"No, no, nothing like THAT. Geez. The girls came in and turned off all our alarms, AND the hot water, AND they stole our towels! So in other words, if you go into the showers, you'll see Ron and Dean completely naked right after taking a cold shower. Not that it wouldn't be a funny sight or anything-- if it was up to me I'd go in and take pictures --but Ron would never forgive us."

Suddenly Neville squeaked. "They took our robes too! The only robes left in here are dress robes!"

Harry groaned. Damn women. Damn them all.