Save The Date (A Drarry FanFiction)

Chapter Fifty Six (XVIII)

XVIII

Harry had never been kissed before. He found himself responding automatically, leaning into Draco's warm mouth, overwhelmed by the shivers that fluttered over his skin. He felt safe, and loved, and the abyss that had consumed his heart seemed to begin to fill.

As if sensing that change, he paused to open his eyes a crack, and realising that their environment had warped dramatically around him, he broke away with an unwelcome gasp.

The blackness had vanished. Instead of the sandy floor, they were now sat on a plush sofa in a circular room furnished with a number of other couches and armchairs. A fire crackled merrily in a hearth nestled into a stone wall to Harry's left, several windows showed the starry night sky beyond, and hanging from the walls were a number of banners and tapestries depicting the Gryffindor and Slytherin houses...

It was almost like they were in the joint Eighth Year common room...

Harry stumbled to his feet, practically tripping over a foot stool as he goggled at Malfoy, who was equally confused as to what had just happened.

But not, Harry suspect, and thrown as he was.

"What the hell!" he cried with a horror that just seemed to keep washing over him afresh every second or so as he pieced together what was going on.

He was Harry Potter. He had been beginning to enjoy a normal life back at school after a year chasing after Voldemort's Horcruxes and enduring the Battle of Hogwarts. He had followed Malfoy out after he had fled the Halloween feast, concerned about his wellbeing after once again becoming besotted with the damn fool.

He was also Harry Potter, elf of the Christmas Land workshop, who apparently had no trouble bursting into song, and telling every bugger who would listen that he was in love with Draco bloody Malfoy. "Merlin's Beard," he breathed, wanting to curse a lot more than that, but feeling unable to recall anything expletive enough at that precise moment. "What's happening Malfoy?"

He didn't really need to ask. He suddenly remembered everything; like a door had been opened and the light allowed to just flood right in. How could he have forgotten his real life? Eighteen whole years, almost wiped out in a blink of an eye. He felt sick.

Malfoy had told him, in the square in International Women's Land, but it had seemed so preposterous. His Christmas life had seemed so real. He had been so nearly taken in by a cruel trick...and Malfoy's kiss had snapped him out of it.

"Harry?" Malfoy asked tentatively, getting to his feet. "Do you...recognise me? Do you remember?"

Harry spluttered, more at the shock of hearing his first name from Malfoy's lips than anything else. "Yes – you're Draco bloody Malfoy, and I've spent the whole day in some kind of weird and wacky land of holidays thinking I'm an elf – an elf!"

Malfoy looked pained. "Yeah," he said softly. "That's about the gist of it."

Harry swallowed, not quite able to meet his eye, but doing a good job of staring just a few inches off of his right earlobe. "And you kissed me, and that snapped me out of it?"

Malfoy sighed. "It appears so," he mumbled dejectedly. "Look, Harry, this doesn't have to be a big deal, we can just go now and get out of this place, then talk about it later." He rubbed the back of his neck. "Or not, you know, whatever."

There is was again, that 'Harry' business. "You've been searching for me," Harry said, sifting through his thoughts aloud. "You could have left, but you came and found me instead."

"So?" Draco snapped, hugging himself. It was only then that Harry realised their clothes had shifted. They were both back in their school uniforms, minus the robes, which was a little odd as Eighth Years didn't wear uniforms. But there they were; grey trousers, white shirts and Gryffindor and Slytherin ties respectively. Harry lamented the loss of the pirate outfit Draco had been sporting previously...and at that he had to take a step back both physically and mentally.

He'd realised he wasn't exactly straight in the past couple of years, having had time to analyse a couple of certain crushes, but his groin actually clenched at the thought of Malfoy in those tight black trousers and his shirt hanging unapologetically undone halfway done his chest.

Without all his baggage dragging him down, Harry had woken up this morning unabashedly in love with his schoolboy nemeses. He was weak at the knees to think of him as a swashbuckling buccaneer, but even more so when he knew that he had fought his way through several lands, against the odds, to come and rescue him.

"So," said Harry quietly, his stomach churning as he took a step closer to him across the room. "I think we need to maybe talk."