Dad Says (Harry X Draco)

Chapter 13

Three days later, Draco was discharged from St Mungo's. Harry took him back to Grimmauld Place through the floo. It was difficult to manoeuvre because Draco had insisted on transfiguring the efficient wheelchair St Mungo's had provided for him (Draco was too weak to walk more than a few steps) into a more aesthetically pleasing, Victorian wicker contraption.

"If I'm going to be an invalid, I'm going to do it with style," he said.

He was certainly the most stylish invalid Harry had ever seen. Ron had brought him clothes from flat, so he was exquisitely dressed as always. Harry wheeled him out to the garden, because it was a miraculously sunny day for late November.

Draco turned his face up to the sun.

"I used to play here when I was little," he said.

"Is it weird to be back?"

"Unexpected."

Harry wanted to ask more, but Draco has closed his eyes and fallen asleep.

The first few days that Draco lived in Grimmauld Place were among the most peaceful of Harry's life. Ron came over and played a quiet game of chess with Draco. Draco read Harry passages from Thomas Hardy, his favourite muggle author. (Harry was disturbed to learn that the main reason for this was Draco's assertion that Hardy understood "what life was really like". As far as Harry could tell, Hardy's worldview was unremittingly bleak. But Draco told him it was beautiful, and honestly Harry didn't care too much what Draco read him, when his voice was so rich and lilting.) They drank copious cups of tea. Draco fell asleep constantly, in the middle of sentences, halfway through meals, or while Harry pushed him through the garden.

They kept touching each other. Little gestures, at first Draco tapped Harry's arm to get his attention. Harry brushed a strand of Draco's hair out of his eyes when he fell asleep. Draco rested head on Harry's shoulder when Hermione came to visit, and talked about the Reconciliation Act for forty-five minutes without pausing for breath. (It had been hard for Draco to see Hermione again, anyway. He did not apologise to her Harry noticed that he rarely apologised to anyone for his role in the war; Harry suspected because he did not want to be forgiven but he blanked out several times when she first arrived, and was so polite that he made everyone uncomfortable.)

Harry helped him in and out of his wheelchair. There was often a moment when they lingered in other's arms before Draco groped his way to or from the chair.

He was using it less and less, anyway, By the time he'd been at Grimmauld Place a week, he walked with a cane, and they only used the wheelchair if he got one of his headaches.

"I'm sorry I can't give you career advice," Draco said one day. They were sitting on the balcony overlooking the garden. Draco wore a thick, quilted dressing gown and shabby monogramed slippers. He clutched his cup of tea for warmth, He was always cold, since the attack.

"I didn't ask you for career advice," said Harry.

"I feel as if I ought to be able to say, Aha. I've got it, your true calling is... wand making!"

"Is it?"

"No. I don't think you have a true calling."

"I do. It was to kill Voldemort. I did it already," said Harry, emptily. He didn't know why they were talking about this.

"You barely even killed him. He killed himself."

"You should write my biographies. "Harry Potter and the Anti-climax."""

"Don't tempt me. No, listen, Potter. You haven't got a calling. Most people haven't. But you need to feel needed. Don't you?"

"So? What kind of job should I get, then? How can I be professionally needy?"