THE DEVIL'S WHITE KNIGHT→h.p

chapter 8

We were thinking of having people over for your birthday. Let me know if that would be alright with you, and if there's anyone you'd like to have over. Talk soon- Dad x

Harry stared down at the parchment, then up at his dad's owl who looked like it had been told to wait for a reply. After a moment, he sighed, ripped a bit of the parchment off, and fumbled for a quill.

Just Ron and the twins, I think. And actually, maybe Hermione and Viktor Krum. I'm sure I can get time off, even if there's a game. Thanks. -H

He folded up the parchment and attached it to the owl's leg, giving him a fond stroke before it fluffed up, spread its wings, and took off out the window.

With a heavy sigh, Harry backed up, and looked at himself once more on the wall mirror. Luckily his other self had gone with one that was muggle, or at least had put a charm to keep it from making cheeky comments at his expense.

He didn't need it tonight.

He was preparing for a date with Draco Malfoy, and he was all nerves. No, actually he'd transcended being all nerves into what was a higher plane of worry and anxiety that had no name. He had become anxiety. Any time he tried to picture sitting at a table having a proper meal with Draco, he'd start to shake. It was ridiculous, really. He'd fucked Draco, had his cock in his mouth, had woken up next to him. He'd been taken in a sodding toilet stall, and yet...

Harry chalked it up to feelings, because feelings were always the worst. Shagging without caring was something he could handle, but the moment his heart began to flutter thinking about Draco's face, or his hands or his voice...

It was too much.

Harry very nearly cancelled on Draco eight or nine times that day, but somehow found himself freshly showered, dressed, his hair with a bit of product in it to make it—well not less messy considering no product on the planet existed for that—but like he meant it to have that just-shagged look.

Which, in hindsight might not be the best way to show up for a date with Draco since he was trying to avoid the whole shagging bit, but there it was.

Harry straightened his shirt, hoping that Draco had meant they'd be going somewhere muggle since he had shown up in a suit, and then headed to the lounge to wait. Twenty minutes before the agreed upon time—though agreed upon wasn't exactly the term he'd use. But either way, it was ticking down close rand closer, and Harry couldn't be sure that at the end of things, he wouldn't just panic and run.

He very nearly laughed at himself. "If my world could see the sodding boy-who-lived now. The teen who killed Voldemort, who's going spare over a fucking date." He then stopped to think for a minute what his Ron and Hermione would think of him shagging Malfoy. The thought made his stomach churn, which only got worse when he thought about what the Draco from his time would think.

Now that would have been a laugh, really. If Harry had to go back, he wondered if he could take that memory with him to taunt Malfoy with.

Shaking his head, he sat down on the sofa, then stood up again when he realised his nerves weren't going to allow him any peace. He started pacing again, desperate for a fag but wanting to refrain. He dragged his hand through his hair, mussing it up, but uncaring.

He paced by the wall with all of his photos, staring at the faces of people he knew, but were practically strangers. Neville was in a few as well, looking the same, though Harry had to wonder how he'd done without his parents having been tortured into insanity. In another sat Dean and Seamus, holding hands. He was unsurprised, considering a few of the nights he'd heard the pair and what they got up to, but they'd never gone public about it. Not in his time.