𝐌𝐎𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐑 𝐊𝐍𝐎𝐖𝐒 𝐁𝐄𝐒𝐓

Chapter 19

Previously...

With the help of a certain "sleep aid", Harry was able to let go of his secrets and tell Draco of his life before Hogwarts, an exciting teenage romance that inevitably caused Cedric Diggory's self-destruction.

Mother Knows Best

Chapter Nineteen

Resistance Is Futile

Harry continued with his narrative as if on autopilot, his fingers running idly through Draco's silky hair and down his back, petting the blonde thoughtlessly as though he were a house pet. By then, Draco was curled around him like a boa, his head pillowed in the juncture where Harry's neck met his shoulder, practically cradled in the raven's lap and more comfortable than he could ever remember being. Secure. Pampered in a way that felt like a guilty pleasure and appealed greatly to his hedonistic side.

Harry hadn't said more than two words to anybody up until the day of Cedric's funeral, hadn't eaten, hadn't slept, so of course this had to be the day the universe decided to punish him. That was when the cops showed up at the Dursleys', and after spending that entire day at the police station, going over and over his account of what happened until he was yelling it in frustration, they finally had to release him from questioning.

Being interrogated, while not the absolute worstexperience of his life, nevertheless had to have ranked high up on the scale. Stuck for endless hours in a tiny room with interchangeable cops (actors when they had to be) who would do anything, say anything, ask absolutely anything, no matter how degrading or heartless, to get him to say what they wanted to hear and thought they knew for certain, without a doubt, that he was a murderer -or just really didn't care as long as they got the confession they were aiming for, it was definitely one of the most nerve-racking situations Harry'd ever been in. It was at the very end, when the police had no choice but to let him go, that they told him -whispering like it was to be kept a secret- why they knew he was the perpetrator.

Cedric had a phobia of needles. This was what made it impossible for anyone to suspect him of accidental overdose or suicide. Harry had known Cedric didn't like needles, but there was no way he could've known it was that serious. The former-quarterback couldn't possibly have shot himself up with the meth that was found in his system. Someone else obviously had to have done it for him, and since Harry was there the night it happened, since Harry was the closest person to him, since Harry's parents were dead and thus he absolutely had to be completely messed up and apparently looked exactly the type to take the rich, church-going son of two respectable doctors and turn him into a sexually active teenage drug user, the cops found Harry the most likely suspect.

Sirius probably would've been a suspect as well if he hadn't forced the man to leave with his entourage in tow. They were gone minutes before the paramedics arrived, emotionlessly loading Cedric onto the gurney from the polyester motel bedspread that Harry'd pulled him onto and into the ambulance like a limp mannequin instead of the corpse that he was. Sirius had wanted to stay, of course, but Harry had known even then, even in a trembling state of panic, that if Sirius stayed with him just to be with him, to be his shoulder to cry on, his moral support, his godfather would've been taken into questioning along with him. The fact that Sirius was there, which Harry allowed no one to know, coupled with the bogus drug charge he obtained from all those years ago, the same drug that killed Cedric, Sirius would've been back in jail for another crime he didn't commit. Hell would've had to freeze over before Harry let that happen again.

Sirius had come back the second after the smoke cleared, however, to see how Harry was holding up. Couldn't stay very long, though, because the cops were still sniffing around, asking questions and looking for clues they wouldn't find. Couldn't take Harry with him, either, because that would be as good as a confession after being told not to leave town.