The Heart of the Matter (Harry/Draco)

Chapter Four

A/N: this chapter was originally written AGES before JKR stated Tonks had been in Hufflepuff.

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When teatime finally rolled around, Draco had long migrated back into his room, lest he find himself in a kitchen full of very unfriendly freckles and glares. Tonks had gone with him, tripping over half the steps and carrying a pile of her spare clothes—he'd found out the clothes he'd been borrowing were hers.

She talked a lot, and it reminded him much of himself back at school before the war. He wondered for a while how anyone could still be so happy; she'd told him she was going to be twenty-six that August, but she acted much like Pansy Parkinson had at the Yule Ball after ingesting far too much cake—like a hyperactive six-year-old. He found it refreshing and, more importantly, distracting, and he was grateful for her company.

When she'd told him she was a Metamorphmagus, he'd been incredibly jealous. He knew it had run in the Black family, but was still incredibly rare. Why couldn't he have been born one? Oh, the chaos he would have caused. She then amused him fully by, albeit a bit slurrishly, describing how she had done just that during her years at Hogwarts. Her favourite had been in her sixth year, when she discovered that impersonating Professor McGonagall and then attempting to teach first-years Transfiguration was a very, very bad idea and grounds to get one's self expelled. Dumbledore had apparently found the whole ordeal highly amusing and let her off, as long as she promised to ask permission next time, because impersonating people without asking could come off as a bit rude.

Draco felt like he hadn't laughed in years.

She was currently sitting cross-legged on the bed across from him and doing a very accurate imitation of McGonagall reprimanding a student. It looked rather silly because she'd morphed herself into a disturbingly accurate image of himself, despite the fact that she was a girl. When he pointed it out, she'd told him he was an easy boy to impersonate, because she had small breasts and they had the same cheekbones.

'I honestly don't have to do much, except for the hair and the nose,' she explained. 'You could probably get away with being a girl, if you put socks down your front. Small socks, mind.'

'I could not,' Draco said, mildly insulted.

Anyway, he didn't think her breasts were that small—but then he reminded himself that this girl was supposedly his cousin, not to mention ten years older than he was, no matter how pretty she was.

Also, he still technically had a girlfriend.

'It's not an insult,' she insisted. 'It's just a Black thing. Blacks always were very pretty. Like your mum,' she went on, looking at him fondly. 'My mum says Narcissa always was the prettiest of the lot.'

Draco smiled faintly but did not answer. She was right, of course; he'd seen pictures of his aunts, and met Bellatrix last year in person. His mother had made them all look rather unfortunate.

Someone thundered down the stairs just then, banging on the walls, pausing briefly at the door to hammer on it and shout, 'OI!' before galumphing down the rest of the stairs. Tonks perked.

'Ooh, that means dinner's ready,' she said happily. Pinching her nose, she turned back into her pink-and-spiky self. She hopped off the bed and looked at him, perhaps wondering why he didn't look so enthusiastic. 'Aren't you coming?'

'No,' he said. 'I'm not hungry.'

'You will be when you smell Molly's cooking,' she assured with a sympathetic look. 'Oh, don't look at me like that. They won't bite. Well, Remus might, but it's not a full moon so you needn't worry.' She winked at him and offered a hand up. 'Come on.'