Take Me As I Am

X

TW: implied sexual content

Harry goes down to visit Ophion in the following week. He's tried his best to avoid the other boys, though Abraxas and Orion are alright company. Tom, on the other hand, has been acting strangely towards him. Hadrian will be coming out of the shower, or simply sitting at dinner, and he'll find Tom staring at him with intense fascination. It's honestly unnerving, seeing as the teenage boy in front of him has already committed two murders.

However, when he returns from the Chamber, he finds Tom sitting in the common room with his arms crossed and eyebrows raised.

"Peverell. Where were you?" he asks. It's more so a demand than a request, and Harry's too tired to pick a fight.

"Astronomy Tower," Harry answers, walking towards the stairs.

Tom stands as Harry starts up the staircase. "Doing what?"

Harry clenches his jaw. "Thinking. What, are you going to give me detention for breaking curfew, Mr. Prefect?"

Tom presses his lips together firmly before following Harry up the stairs silently.

As Harry's leg drags slightly, he can feel Tom staring at it from behind.

"What are you staring at?" Harry snaps, turning around abruptly.

Tom's eyes are still trained on Harry's bad leg. "Nothing." His gaze meet's Harry's. "Let's go. It's getting late."

Harry flushes, seething inside. Why is he being so nice? It's almost bearable, and for a moment Harry forgets that he's speaking to a psychopath.

Tom smirks at Harry's sudden flustering.

"What are you looking at?" Tom echoes Harry's words.

Harry turns back around and fights to keep the red out of his face. "Shut up."

For once, Tom doesn't escalate the situation. Harry's expecting him to lash out or hex him, seeing as he's done worse for less, but Tom simply looks amused and follows Harry into their dorm.

When they get to their dorm, Harry is mortified by the sight he is met with.

A shirtless Orion is straddling Abraxas, while Abraxas' uniform shirt is unbuttoned and hair is disheveled.

Bruises litter Abraxas' neck, and his cheeks are a deep pink when he locks eyes with Hadrian.

"What the fuck?" Harry blurts out.

Tom casts a quick Silencing charm around them, which Abraxas and Orion are grateful for.

Orion instantly gets off of Abraxas and grabs his t-shirt from the floor, scrambling to put it on.

"If you're going to be a homophobic dick, might as well get it over with," Orion says bitterly. He looks quite disappointed that this is Harry's reaction, though this is not at all Harry's intention.

"Wha—" Harry blinks, still processing. "Oh, um, that's not what I—"

"If you have a problem with us, we're quite happy to put in the dorm transfer request for you," Tom scowls. He's staring at Harry like he's thinking of the many ways he can disembowel him.

"I'm gay!" Harry yelps. Orion, Abraxas, and Tom instantly gawk at him. He blushes. It's the first time he's said it out loud... ever. Even Ron and Hermione never knew. Well, perhaps Hermione had guessed it, but she had never confronted him about it if she had known.

He's always found men attractive, though it may have felt like admiration or jealousy at the time. Looking back on it now, Harry knows that fluttering feeling in his stomach was just the urge to be snogged by said man.

When he actually realized it was when he met Cedric Diggory. At first, he'd been off put by all of the attention Cedric was getting from the girls, but Harry soon discovered it was jealousy. Why were girls going after Cedric? Girls who weren't Harry?

Harry thinks back to all of his past crushes. Oliver Wood, Cedric Diggory, that one 7th year Chaser from Hufflepuff, and regrettably... Draco in sixth year.

Fine. Maybe his obsession with Draco Malloy was a bit much. Maybe Harry was trying to cover up the fact that he wanted to shag him with accusations of Draco being a death eater. But Harry never expected those accusations to be true!

Still, the way Draco treated Harry in the cellar over the past two months, Harry wonders what could've been if he made it out. If Voldemort was defeated. Maybe they could've been friends, in another life.

There's no point dwelling on it now.

Orion's lips curl into a grin. "So we're all a bunch of fucking poofs!"

Harry glances at Tom in surprise. "All of us?"

Tom scowls. "Don't rope me in with you," he grumbles.

Abraxas rolls his eyes. "The man is so obviously queer. It's incredibly painful to watch."

Tom's cheeks have turned an alarmingly bright shade of pink as Harry feels the tension in the air relieve.

Orion turns back to Abraxas. "As I remember, we were quite busy."

Harry groans. "Use Silencing Charms. Please, I'm begging you."

Abraxas leans back into his pillow as Orion pulls the sheets over them both and draws the curtains. He yanks the t-shirt off over his head and begins to unzip his trousers. A faint pink settles on Abraxas' cheeks.

Harry sighs and disappears into the bathroom. "Protection!" he calls before shutting the door behind him.

Tom stares at the bathroom door blankly.

Hadrian is gay?
Hm.
This changes nothing.

The gears in Tom's brain begin to turn like clockwork.

No.
This changes everything.

Tom needs to find out everything he can about Hadrian, gain his trust, and possibly recruit him for the Knights of Walpurgis (working title).

And there's only one way that won't raise suspicion.

Tom needs Hadrian to fall in love with him.