What If? -Drarry

Part Two: Chapter Four

Chapter Four

Draco sat cross-legged on the ground opposite Harry in the Malfoy guest room and watched the potion turn dark green as he added fluxweed to the cauldron. Harry chucked in the knotgrass and waved his wand over the fizzing liquid, which sent up a puff of acrid blue smoke between them before bubbling down to a simmer. The two of them had been sitting there for the last half hour trying to perfect Part One, Step Twoof the polyjuice potion, having gone down to the room after dinner. It surprised Draco that Harry seemed to have almost found making the potion fun. But then again, a playfight with a blast-ended skrewt would be fun compared to what Harry had been going through at school recently, what with the anger he had faced from his fellow students ever since being chosen to compete in the Triwizard.

"Now what?" asked Harry.

Draco checked his watch. "We have to wait for sixty minutes, then we can do step two. We'll finish the final two steps tomorrow."

"Should we leave and come back in an hour?"

He shook his head. "You have to be really precise about the timing with this potion, and I don't want to risk being late. But if you want, you can go. There only needs to be one of us here to take the potion off the heat."

Harry considered for a minute, then surprised Draco when he said decidedly "I'll stay. Keep you company."

Draco was taken aback, unsure why Harry would want to be around someone he was barely even friends with, but smiled. "Thanks."

The silence began to stretch and become awkward as Draco grappled for something to say, now that he couldn't just concentrate on making the potion. Nothing came to mind. Luckily, Harry broke the silence before it became deafening.

"What do you think of Professor Moody's class?"

"Moody?" Draco shuddered a little. "He creeps me out! Remember the first class we had with him, where he talked about the unforgivable curses?" Harry nodded. "He made that spider jump on my head! It was horrible!" Draco felt a nervy, jumpy sensation in his stomach that had nothing to do with the memory of the spider as he watched Harry throw his head back and laugh loudly.

"I remember!" He said, grinning. "You had the funniest expression on your face!"

"Shut up, Potter!" Draco tried to sound angry, but he couldn't help grinning back at Harry. He had a very contagious laugh. "It scared the life out of me! I don't like his teaching methods at all,"

"Yeah, I can tell." Harry laughed again, and then pulled a very comically scared face. "Help, help me! Professor Moody's put a horrible monster on my head!" He cried in a stupidly high voice, "You wait 'till my father hears about this!"

"I do not sound like that!" Draco leant forwards over the cauldron to push Harry, and all of a sudden found them - for want of a better phrase - play fighting on the ground next to the cauldron. He went red, thinking how childish this was, but it was fun somehow and Draco was having trouble fighting Harry off because he was laughing so much. Then, despite his wriggling and struggling, he found himself pinned down with Harry holding his hands against the floor above his head, his knee pressing down on Draco's stomach, which performed that now-familiar leap as if it were trying to jump out of his body. Then, as they looked at each other, Draco saw Harry's face flush bright red. He quickly rolled off of Draco and went back to his original seat next to the potion, which had somehow stayed upright during all this. Draco pushed himself up and grinned. "You know I let you win, right?"