Home Away From Home

Chapter 2: Reunion Of Youth

As horrid as Grimmauld Place was during the holidays, Harry found himself longing to go back there. In the four full years he'd spent at Hogwarts, he never thought that there would be a place he wanted to be more than his home.

Umbridge threw a wrench into almost everything Harry knew or thought.

He'd never met a woman he'd disliked more than Petunia, until he met the wretch in pink. She honed in on Harry due to his position with Dumbledore against the Ministry, accusing him of lying at every opportunity and taking his silence as an offence. He couldn't speak up yet he couldn't keep quiet. He couldn't let her have the satisfaction, and besides: once Voldemort made his grand debut (probably at the end of the school year - he had a habit of waiting for Harry to finish his education) Harry would be proven right. He just had to sit tight.

But it certainly didn't help that she'd began assigning detentions everytime he even so much as breathed wrong. Normally that wouldn't be so bad, but when he came back to the Gryffindor tower with an aching and bleeding hand he discovered that things were only going to get worse.

His nightmares and part-visions left him with very little sleep and even less of a fuse for his anger. The ache in his hand only added to it, slowly becoming a background part of his day. Harry began to appreciate the days his hands were fine.

Occasionally Harry would get splitting headaches and phantom emotions. It felt like he was reacting to something he didn't even know was happening, as if he was watching and feeling from the other side of a thick sheet of glass. He had a sinking feeling that while his side of the glass was tinted - the other side was bared to show everything of him. A one way window.

He'd feel bouts of sadistic amusement, fits of anger and rumbles of tension that only kept building up until it exploded in pain.

Voldemort wasn't giving him any reason to feel good about this year. Lucius Malfoy was probably the one to coerce the minister into sending Umbridge, to keep everyone's heads down about Voldemort's uprising. Harry felt so angry all the time that it wasn't often that he was able to feel guilty for snapping at his friends more and more often. He could barely concentrate on school work and trying to sleep at night as it was, much less a social life.

It wasn't like Harry felt any safer with them around.

If anything, he felt he was putting them in danger just by being there. So he started shutting himself off, although unsuccessfully. Hermione, Ron and Ginny dragged him back from his self assigned isolation, begging him to talk to them.

He only started doing so after Snape began to teach him Occlumency. Or well, tried to teach him. The headaches he didn't get from Voldemort and Umbridge, he got from Snape's privacy invading, violating mind reading sessions. He was being thrown into the deep end and expected to swim, being scorned when he sunk like a rock.

This was how Harry found himself marching back and forth down an empty corridor in the dungeons. Tensions were high in the common room, he'd just yelled at his house mates, barely avoided yelling at his friends who'd defended him, he was having brief flashes of his most recent nightmare, and was dreading the session he was meant to have later that evening.

The cold air of the dungeons was refreshing on his skin, his blood was boiling and his breathing refused to regulate.

"Potter?"

Harry jumped, spinning around with his scowl still on his face. Draco Malfoy stood there, expression carefully blank but still showing a little concern.

"Malfoy." Harry replied. He tried to school his expression in a similar way, but - as it had been a while since he'd done it - he failed miserably.

Dra- Malfoy waved his wand briefly and a spell settled in the air. It was one Harry was familiar with, it was a silencing charm that had been used at Grimmauld during the Order meetings. "What's going on?" The blond boy asked.

Harry began curling in on himself, leaning against and sliding down the wall until he sat on the stone with his knees under his chin. There was no need to put up a front anymore. Malfoy had already seen him pathetically sobbing at the hands of his own muggle relatives.

Malfoy crouched in front of him while he waited for Harry's answer. It took a while for Harry to be able to gather his voice again. "Do you know Occlumency?" He asked.

Malfoy's eyebrow raised. "Of course. Why?"

"Snape's trying to teach me by chucking me in the deep end. I leave his office feeling sick, and on top of already being in pain from Umbridge's fucking detentions and extremely exhausted from my night terrors, and Dumbledore won't talk to me, and I keep feeling Voldemort's emotions like their mine, so I keep getting so angry and it hurts so much, and I feel like I'm not even safe in my own mind, which means I have to learn Occlumency but that means-"

"Woah, woah , woah, Potter." Draco gently put his hands on Harry's arms, as if physically holding him together. "Breath, okay? We'll face the issues one at a time, but for now you need to breath."

Harry felt mildly cool fingers rest against his forehead. Draco frowned. "You're burning up. When was the last time you had something to eat or drink?"

Harry rolled his eyes.

"Harry."

"I had dinner yesterday and a sip of water before last period."

Draco looked almost offended. If Harry weren't having a breakdown on top of killer migraine he'd have found it funny.

"We're going to the kitchens now, and you'll explain everything that you just said when you have some food and water in you." Draco ordered.

He cast a Notice Me Not charm over them, before pulling Harry up from the floor and leading him away. The walk to the kitchens was silent but not awkward. The two of them didn't encounter anyone, besides a couple of Hufflepuff stragglers, along the way, meaning they didn't have to worry about being seen.

Immediately upon entering, house elves surrounded them and Malfoy had to quickly dismiss them. He gave a couple of them orders to get Harry and himself some food and a hot drink, then proceeded to sit Harry down across from him at a small table.

Harry raised his eyebrows when his companion (were they friends at this point? Would they be?) did nothing more than stare at him. Was he waiting to see what Harry would say? The eye contact continued for another minute before it got uncomfortable but by that time the elves had already brought their food, giving them an excuse to look away.

"Thank you." Harry said to the house elf who brought him a plate that had a ham and cheese sandwich and a cup of tea. Draco looked like he wanted to say something but changed his mind, only giving a small nod to the elf that brought his own food.

Harry ignored the happy chattering of the house elf and returned to staring at the blond in front of him. Malfoy hesitantly met his curious gaze.

"I never used to thank the house elves." He said quietly. Before I knew what your life was like, went unsaid but heard regardless.

Discomfort welled in Harry's chest and he looked away. The silence stretched on for a little while longer before Draco cleared his throat.

"You were looking better on the train. I'm assuming you went to the Weasleys'?" He asked.

Thankful for the redirection of topic, Harry nodded. "Yeah. The day after you left they came to pick me up" He left out the part about the headquarters, he didn't completely  trust Malfoy after all.

"Oh." Draco sipped at his tea, now he  looked uncomfortable. It took a few moments for him to gather up his whispered words.

"Father introduced me to the Dark Lord the day after I left... He is living in the Manor now."

Posted: 13 March 2022