'As Long As I'm Here, No One Can Hurt You.'

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A/N This one is angsty, crude, and raw (and smutty at times, though not explicit). It's a lot darker than usual (for me). Combined inspiration from a writing prompt ('I didn't know where else to go') and the lyrics in Billie Eilish's 'Everything I wanted'.

Warning: the story deals with poor mental health, physical assault, drugging, and attempted rape, please don't read if you'll find any of this triggering.

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Cold winter sunlight poured through the large window of Draco's London one-bed flat into the kitchen. As he sat at his small table, he took a bite of his triangle of toast and looked down at the picture of Potter on the front page of the Daily Prophet's Saturday editorial. Despite there being no one to observe him, his own expression revealed nothing beyond apparent boredom. His lack of visible response was twofold; mostly because it was nearly a daily occurrence that Potter's photograph was splashed across the front pages, even this long after the war, so it wasn't that extraordinary to see yet another photograph of the man. But Draco's schooled expression carefully hid the inner turmoil he felt every time he saw Potter's image, particularly of late. He repeatedly disregarded how his stomach scrunched painfully in bewildering and unwelcome worry. And he definitely studiously suppressed the unwelcome heat evoked by certain memories of his birthday six-months earlier.

Potter's intense gaze was unwavering from the photograph as he returned Draco's stare. The Press had adopted the use of Muggle cameras because Potter never stayed in the Magical pictures, always disappearing from sight the moment a paper was bought. Punters tended to complain when they only ever caught sight of his coattails; they all wanted a piece of their hero.

Sweet Salazar, Draco wants to sneer but finds he can't.

He took a sip of his tea as he studied the handsome man with his scar, his square jaw, and his easy, lazy smile; with his piercing green eyes behind his signature wire-framed glasses, unchanged from school, and his long black hair smoothed back into a low neat ponytail with only a hint of his natural tousles at the tail ends. Draco's grey eyes coolly roamed the picture; Potter was definitely maturing well as he eased past his mid-twenties. He wore his Auror uniform, but nothing new there, and it was smart and buttoned up tightly in a manner somewhat reminiscent of Severus Snape with a high-collar and buttoned cuffs. He always looked so unnaturally presentable these days; he was the paragon of respectability and success as he made his way up the Auror ranks. This latest headline announced his promotion to Head-Auror. Draco reckoned in another few years he'd be announced as the new Head of the DMLE at the Ministry, then it would be a neck-and-neck race between him and Granger to be the next Minister for Magic. The only complaint from the Press was that he remained woefully single and there were not yet hordes of Potter Jnrs to continue his mantle of supposed righteous morality that saved them all from the throes of evil, day in-day out.

Draco suppressed a shudder as he thought of hard muscles and heavily tattooed skin, of rough stubble, firm hands, and crude hoarse demands in his ear.

The night still haunts Draco, in all the wrong ways.

Six months ago. Six long torturous months. Mostly torturous, he hated to admit, because he was longing for a repeat. Though definitely under more savoury conditions. Still, that wasn't natural when it came to one's lifetime adversary. They didn't even speak, let alone on friendly terms, for fucks sake.

He'd told no one. Who would he tell? Who would believe him about their blessed Saviour? There was no one purer than the Chosen One—the Golden Boy—the Virtuous Boy Who Lived Twice! Nothing could be said to slander his perfect name. If anyone was even suspected of trying, the public turned on them like they were an uninvited Dementor at a summer garden party.

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