𝐖𝐀𝐍𝐃𝐋𝐄𝐒𝐒

Chapter 28

Harry and Draco awoke early in the morning, earlier than they had wanted, to the sound of loud knocking on the door.

"That's gotta be Ron," Harry grumbled as he began to disentangle himself from the very warm body of his boyfriend. His left arm was completely numb all the way down to his fingers, as Draco had been sleeping on it all night, so he ended up dropping his glasses when he went to pick them up from the floor. He shook his hand, clenching and unclenching his fingers to try and get the circulation moving again and relieve the sensation of pins and needles that was pricking along his skin.

"Get rid of him," Draco mumbled as he curled up under the blankets, not even bothering to open his eyes.

Harry cast Draco a disgruntled look at being ordered around, but put his trousers on and recovered his glasses, placing them on his face and blinking to wake himself up a bit more. 'Merlin, but a shower would be good right now,' the Gryffindor thought longingly as he trundled off to the door and the insistent knocking attempting to smooth down his unruly hair. He was not looking forward to Ron's disapproval. "I'm coming, I'm coming, hold your Thestrals."

It wasn't the red headed boy at the door when he opened it and Harry snapped fully awake as he stared at Rita Skeeter and her photographer Bozo.

"I thought this was where Draco Malfoy was staying," the Daily Prophet's reporter queried as her eyes scanned the shirtless Harry and the room behind him. The-Boy-Who-Lived was momentarily blinded from the flash of Bozo's camera.

Draco took that moment to grumpily yell from the bedroom before Harry could come up with a plausible lie. "Harry, tell him to get lost and come back to bed."

Rita grinned like a werewolf that had just found wounded prey. "Well, my, my. What's going on here now? Have I intruded onto a secret love nest?" The nosy woman had her quill out hovering over her notebook. "Care to make a comment?"

Harry finally gathered his wits about him and began to close the door when Draco walked into view with only the blanket from the bed wrapped around him, his hair mussed and with a look on his face that left no doubt in Rita's mind that he had been thoroughly shagged, and by the Boy Wonder, no less. One of the blonde's arms went up in front of his eyes defensively as the camera flashed again, the other hand grasping at the material of the blanket to try and keep it closed tightly about his naked body.

Harry pushed the woman and photographer back frantically and slammed the portrait door, turning to put his back against it as soon as it was closed, his eyes wide.

"That wasn't Ron," Draco said, the color completely drained from his face.

"Nope, not Ron," Harry reiterated, hanging his head in defeat. Why did shit like this always happen to him?

They listened silently for a few more moments as Rita continued to fire off questions from the other side of the door, trying to cajole the two into either making a comment about Draco's father's arrest or what The-Boy-Who-Lived was doing with his arch nemesis, The-Boy-Who-Was- (allegedly)-Abused with barely a stitch of clothing on. Finally, the woman left with her photographer in tow, not wanting to get caught after going to all the trouble to sneak into Hogwarts in the first place. They left two nervous teens trying to figure out what in the hell they were going to do for damage control.

Rita, meanwhile, had decided she was going to have the scoop of the century, whether the boys talked to her or not. She and Bozo transformed into the animagus forms and quickly scuttled away.

XXX

The next morning Harry woke with a start in his own bed, cold sweat dripping down his body. It was very early, the sky still dusky grey, just lightening slightly from the darkness of night. He had had a horrible dream.