“You look like Gilderoy Lockhart.”
Harry snorts. “That bad, then.”
He sighs, turning around and lying back down on his bed. His head’s throbbing. “How did you know?”
“Malfoy’s mum sent my mum an Owl. Said she’s worried about you.”
“That’s…awfully friendly.”
“I know. Mum couldn’t believe it at first yesterday, kept saying at the start that Mrs. Malfoy’s probably planning something, but Merlin, Harry, I think mum’s planning to bake a pie to send over. Blueberry pies. It sounds ridiculous, but I think worrying about you is making them closer.”
“That’s…Well, that’s good. I think.”
Ron glances down at Harry’s face, before sitting on the foot of the bed. “So. Malfoy’s back, huh?”
Harry recalls the image of Malfoy sobbing in his wheelchair and keeps his eyes firmly on the ceiling. “Yeah.”
“How is he?”
“Not good.”
“Mustn’t be, if you’re like this.”
Harry keeps quiet. Ron knows him best. Knows his obsession with Malfoy best, because he was the one who was so against it that he had to go through the process of trying to understand it. Harry doesn’t know what Ron concluded at the end of that process, but Ron must have concluded something for him to be so calm about it now.
Or maybe it’s because of the war.
The two of them are both quieter now, more introspective. It’s more obvious in Ron, who’s usually the first to blow up or give in to his more explosive emotions. They’ve fought over so many things during the war, that any of their remaining differences now just aren’t important enough to fight over anymore.
Ron looks at him. “He is the reason you’re like this, right?”
He takes Harry’s silence as a yes. He sighs, stares at the floor. “Man, I still don’t like him, but. I can’t say I’m happy about what happened to him.”
This time, Harry closes his eyes, and lets Malfoy’s trembling shoulders appear behind his eyelids. “Yeah.”
“D’you reckon he’ll come back to Hogwarts?”
“I don’t know. I think it…it depends.”
Ron nods, understands what he doesn’t say. “Mrs. Malfoy wrote for us to tell you that you can come back.”
Harry nods, shame making his cheeks burn at how he just simply turned tail and ran from the Manor. “Thanks, Ron.”
“You’re coming back, aren’t you?”
“Yeah.”
“Alright.” Ron looks like he still wants to say something, and he almost does. He’s still looking at the floor, eyebrows furrowed, teeth worrying his lower lip, and his hand in a loose fist, but Harry sees the exact moment when he decides not to. “Alright, Harry.
“Come on,” Ron says, and his smile doesn’t quite reach his eyes, because he still doesn’t agree about Harry’s obsession over Draco Malfoy, and Harry doesn’t like it himself either, but he’s still thankful that Ron’s trying.
Ron stands up, stretches, and gives him a little grin. “Aren’t you hungry?”
Harry isn’t, not really, but he goes and eats as if he is anyway.
Hermione’s in Australia, reacquainting her parents with the daughter they forgot they had.
Harry and Ron are worried. Her letters talk about things that are okay (her parents are in good health, they know who she is now), but avoids talking about the things that are not (why they haven’t come back to England yet, and how much do her parents know? How much of their memories were returned?). They know she’s purposefully keeping it from them, because they’re all going through something, and the last thing she wants to do is to add to that.
It has been three months since they last saw her, and it’s like something’s missing when she’s not here. They both want to see her, but Harry knows that Ron wants that in a way that’s different.
He knows that something happened during…well, during, and that’s what they talk about while eating Molly’s roast beef and mashed potatoes.
It’s been three months since the end of the war, since whatever happened between Ron and Hermione happened, but it’s the first time Harry has asked, mainly because it didn’t seem the right time then to talk about such things when Fred’s dead and Remus’ dead and they had to arrange all those funerals.
After, when Harry’s back in bed and Ron’s gone and Kreacher’s cleaned all the plates, Harry thinks to himself that maybe why Ron isn’t angry at him for busying himself with Malfoy so much is because he understands what it’s like for all your thoughts and attention to be consumed by one person.
Harry doesn’t know yet if he likes that parallel.
Ron and Hermione.
Him and…
He succumbs to sleep before he can finish verbalizing that thought.
Harry visits the next morning.
Malfoy’s gaze is blank again, and Harry expected that, but that still doesn’t stop the well of disappointment in the pit of his stomach.
“He comes and goes,” Narcissa says softly from beside him. Her gaze towards her son is sad. “It’s episodic. The healers say it’s a form of disassociation, his mind’s way of getting through the trauma of Azkaban and being so near the Dementors.”
Harry recalls what it feels like. The sinking feeling of dread and death, all the warmth seeping out from his fingertips, as if the blood in his veins is slowly turning to ice. He holds his breath, scared to ask. “Did they…”
Narcissa shakes her head firmly. “No, but I take it you’ve seen a Dementor before?”
Was almost Kissed by one, Harry thinks, but keeps it to himself. “Yes, I have.”
“Then you know what it feels like. And to go through it again and again, every day, for three months.”
Harry feels sick just thinking about it.
Letting out a soft sigh, Narcissa sits down on one chair and waves a hand for Harry to sit on the other.
He does, across from Draco, who’s awake, breathing, but his gaze is distant yet again. His white blond hair sways with the wind, and his hands are placed on top of each other on his lap. He looks almost…gentle.
Narcissa follows his gaze. “I apologize for the other night, Mr. Potter.”
“Harry,” Harry cuts in. Mister Potter is too formal, too reminiscent of their old relationship, especially in this house. “And no. You don’t have to apologize for that.”
