The Brick Wall

He couldn't meet the other boy's eyes. The pale grey orbs were watching him intently he knew, but he just couldn't and for that, the green-eyed boy was damning himself.

"You are still trapped, aren't you?" the tone was drawled and carried a snide context, but it was normal and to all who heard it might have seemed mean-spited, but the other boy knew better. "Certainly, Potter, it isn't that hard to say."

"But it is," Harry glowered slightly and turned away. "You wouldn't understand. You can say it without thinking, but it's like I hit a brick wall every single time!"

Draco Malfoy pondered this as the dark haired Gryffindor growled under his breath, not at the Slytherin, but at his own shortcomings. He hated when Draco could do something so flawlessly and he could barely even gain a foothold in it. He knew that if the situation was reversed, Draco might be feeling the same frustration, but he couldn't ponder that for long.

All the seventeen-year-old wanted to know was why it was so hard for him!

"I will admit," Harry began from where he was staring off at nothing, a hand rested against the wall he faced, his voice slightly muffled, but not inaudible, "that at first, I thought you were lying."

He stopped leaning on the wall and turned to Draco, his seventh-year robes hanging loosely off him, his green eyes filled with clouds and his body just betraying undo fatigue and weariness. It was getting harder with each step, with each breath, and he felt that now he had no one to turn to. Not even Draco, who had told him something very simple only three months ago. "Then, I didn't know what to think and you gave me my space. You still treated me the same as always in front of others, but then sometimes it would just be us in the hallway, and then I thought that perhaps you hadn't been lying at all."

"I wasn't," Draco replied haughtily. It was just a part of his personality in the end. He wasn't a sweet and caring person, or at least, on the outside he couldn't be. It wasn't how he was raised; this was just Draco. He wouldn't be changed, he would always be this way, and to know that was to begin to understand something that could never be fully understood.

Harry visibly hesitated and Draco smirked. Before, Harry would have found it threatening and a slam to his person, but right now that didn't come across his mind.

"But I just can't say it!" Harry roared and punched his fist into the wall, drawing a very small amount of blood and most likely bruising the side of his right hand. "Something stops me each time, and it's not that I don't want to say it, it's just something keeps me from it! I couldn't even say it to other people! I can't say those words. I can say a variation, but I can't come out and say...say..." he growled and pushed himself away from the wall, "I just can't say...

"I just can't say those words," he finished quietly, looking very frustrated.

"You just need to try harder - "

"I AM TRYING!"

Draco blinked, then brushed his robes off, looking somewhat stuck up as he did so, "Yes, you are and I'm tired of it."

Harry paused and his eyes went wide for a moment. The words "tired of it" reverberated around him. If Draco thought that he was putting him off...

"Malfoy, I - "

"Don't say anything," Draco turned away, face dark. "I should have known better. I should have just said nothing because in the end it seems it means nothing at all."

Harry stared and his brain began to panic as the blonde turned away. He couldn't say it! Why couldn't he say those words!

He had to say them!

Draco moved down the hall and then heard the tapping of Hogwarts' shoes running towards him. It was most likely Pansy. She knew of his secret and had accepted it beautifully. They were just close friends now so it wouldn't surprise him if she could read his turmoil even from faraway.

"Draco - "

The Malfoy air turned at the voice, his face drawn in its normal, slightly bored expression, then he paused, his mind racing.

It was -

"Draco, I..." Harry panted slightly after he had finally caught up, his eyes betraying a bit of panic and possible fear or trepidation. Taking in a breath, he glanced up at Draco, his hands on his knees as he wished he hadn't waited so long to run after the boy and that he hadn't sprinted the long distance as fast as he could.

"I love you."

There was a pregnant silence then. Noise like a conch shell seemed to swirl about them and they both gazed at each other in their own way. Harry looked quite strange having run several yards to get to the other boy and Draco looked somewhat high and mighty, but he always did.

It was almost like a prince and a peasant, even if both had similar standings in society and wizard money.

Draco stared hard at Harry for a long time, but the Gryffindor didn't waiver.

Then the blonde's mouth flickered into a smirk and his eyes didn't sparkle, but there was something about him that made Harry wonder if they could, would they have sparkled.

"I know."

Harry rolled his eyes at the reply and stood up, his breathing becoming easier. His thinness gave the illusion that he was extremely athletic and naturally could have run the way he did without getting winded in the slightest, but Quidditch required a different type of stamina and Harry, despite his build didn't have much muscle or lung power to do what he had done. He wasn't a runner; he was a flier.

Finally recovering enough to function, Harry looked to Draco, then smiled. It was small at first, but it grew slightly larger and the fact that Draco stayed somewhat in character and didn't share it made Harry feel more at ease than anything else he had ever felt. Draco wasn't accommodating Harry's pain, but just showing him acceptance the way only Draco could. It wasn't going to be a fluffy love relationship but one that might just stand up to time and triumph in its own somewhat warped way.

Neither reached for the other's hand, nor went to hug or kiss. They didn't need that, or at least not yet. They both had made their decision and professed it and the fact that they both knew the other was sincere was enough for now.

THE END