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Chapter Fourteen

Internal Confusion

Harry had decided it once and for all; History of Magic III, his last class of the day, was by far the most boring thing to go through. Having been in school for six years, although usually an interested student, History of Magic was boring each year as well as each day, and he had been sick of it for a long time.

He had thought that fantasies of Draco would do the trick to zoning out from class. But the memories of things that had in reality happened between them and been good (though not perfect as his fantasies), were distracting. So instead he'd thought to spend the class time contentedly sneaking glances at Draco. But the fact that Draco was across the room, and paid no attention to Harry, was discouraging. The one time Draco had looked Harry's way in response was to give Harry a loathing, reproaching glare.

Harry now sat, sunken down on his desk, gloomily wondering how on earth Draco could tell when someone's eyes were on him, and if it had something to do with he being a Summoner. So absorbed was he in his gloom, that he almost missed the class dismissal until he felt a light touch on his arm. He looked up, still leaning on his arms, and barely remembered to stop the smile that threatened to loom up from the surface upon seeing Draco.

Getting into the role of familiar pretend hatred, Harry barked, "What do you want, Malfoy?" Although the Slytherin had excellent acting skills, Harry could see a tiny hint of the awkwardness Draco now felt towards him in the Slytherin's eyes. Only a person who watched Draco as closely as Harry did would notice that, though.

"We have detention, Potter. Get your skinny arse moving before I get the pleasure of crushing your specs, four eyes." Harry stood up, remembering that McGonagall had given them detention that morning for being late to class. The prospect of having this detention with Draco, however, pleased him. The two boys managed to keep the act up all the way to McGonagall's office, and outside to begin cleaning up the hippogriff stalls.

They were just at the gate to the stalls, however, when Draco stopped abruptly. Harry looked back to see Draco standing there, face twisted in disgust, holding a sleeve up to his nose. Harry walked back, and taking Draco's other hand forcefully, gave a few tugs to the Slytherin.

Draco refused to budge.

On the fifth tug, Draco exclaimed, "Potter! How can you stand that smell? Oh, god, don't tell me you can't smell it!" Harry sniffed. There was a faint odor of hippogriff sweat and manure in the air. All the more reason to clean the stalls and be done with it!

He nodded, and said, "Yeah, I can smell it. But it's only faint; a faded scent."

Draco was outraged. "Faded? Faded?! Are you insane, I can smell it just as badly as if I was in the stalls right now, with none of my body parts working other than my nose! I refuse to take a step nearer to that hellhole."

Harry stifled his mind's urge to imagine just what other body parts Draco might be implying. Staring, incredulous, at Draco, he sighed, saying, "What do we do, then?"

"We? WE? I refuse to do anything involving-involving-" Draco pointed viciously towards the stalls, "involving IT! YOU do it, if you actually give a damn. It's not my problem, Potter."

Harry was suddenly taken over by a surge of rage, the same kind of rage he sometimes felt at Draco whenever the boy insulted his friends, family, or was particularly obnoxious or unreasonable. It was the anger he'd felt in his first year every time he even saw Draco. Unable to control his rage, memories of past offenses done by and related to Draco flooding into his head, he grabbed the other's boy's collar, shouting, "Why do you always have to be so--so unbearable??"

Every image of sneering, annoying Draco popped into Harry's mind, every injustice the Slytherin had ever done to him, every nasty thing Lucius Malfoy had ever said or done, all rushed into Harry's mind like a tidal wave, and years of padlocked rage surged out of him in waves. Shoving Draco down to the ground and tumbling after him, Harry straddled the boy and was going to begin beating the living daylights out of Draco with his bare fists, when he stopped.

His hands dropped to his sides, and he was overcome by regret. He let his anger slip abruptly away, and felt like sobbing then and there with frustration. Calming down his flood of emotions, he looked down into Draco's gaze, whispering, "I'm sorry. I just...I can't...You need to help me! Not just this detention, but everything, all of it. I can't do it alone. Our scars are linked, we're linked, we have to live with that! And after everything we've gone through, although it's not serious and we're not even really friends...I don't think we can pretend hatred so much anymore..."

Draco lay there, unresponsive, his eyes closed. Harry wondered what it was he was thinking about. Then, getting off of the other boy and standing, he reached out a hand towards Draco, saying, "I'm sorry. C'mon, go sit up on the stable roof while I clean it out, alright?"

Draco opened his eyes, flicking Harry's hand away, and stood up himself, stepping a foot or two away from Harry. The cold Slytherin missed or ignored the hurt look in Harry's eyes. Harry was devastated. This was all going wrong.

Turning towards the stables, Draco repeated "I refuse to take a step nearer to that hellhole."

Harry sighed exasperatedly, running his hands through his hair, and then, taking a bottle from his pocket, said, "Here, use this. It's the stuff I use after Quidditch games, same brand as my shampoo. It'll fumigate the air around you while you sit on the stall roof. I tell you, it's a great view from up there, and that way if anyone comes around and asks where you are and why aren't you helping me, you can jump down from the roof and pretend you were just around the corner or something."

Harry handed Draco the small, triangular bottle, and turned around to walk towards the stables. He missed the elated look that passed through Draco's eyes as the boy, clutching the precious bottle, stared at it.

-----*-----

Harry had been thinking over everything as he went through the unpleasant process of cleaning out the hippogriff stables. It was all so tough, this attempt at a relationship with the one he loved. Harry was internally confused at every other second. First of all, he figured, he should have known that it would be hard for Draco to accept him. He'd come to conclusions just because of a potion-controlled act of lust by the Slytherin; he should have been smarter than to think it was real. There was always a catch.

But he'd been so amazed that he'd taken it all in, accepted the impossible because he'd longed for it. No, he refused to think about the locker room incident anymore. It hadn't been real, hadn't been truly felt between the both of them. Draco had been controlled by the libido potion. Harry wondered absentmindedly if Draco still had the potion in his blood or not.

His thoughts turned, and he wondered what a real kiss would be like, a kiss where both of them were attracted to each other on their own, not one of them controlled by an external or internal unnatural force. He wondered if Draco's real kisses were as passionate as they had been with the libido potion, or more gentle. He wondered if the Slytherin kissed slowly, or quick...He wondered how many times Draco had kissed someone and been kissed.

Blushing at his own curiousity at another person's business, Harry wiped the sweat from his brow, looking around the room. All smells and signs of manure were gone. However, the sweaty smell was still about. Grimly slipping on a pair of gloves, Harry set to work with the next task, determined to get it over with once and for all.

He wondered what Draco was up to up on the roof.