you raise me up || harry potter

chapter 10: sorry for stuff i haven't done yet

»»————-　song:　————-««

old college try

★ the mountain goats ★

❝ from the entrance to the exit
is longer than it looks from where we stand

i want to say i'm sorry
for stuff i haven't done yet

things will shortly get completely out of hand. ❞

♢ ♢ ♢

By the time the end of the week had come around, Harry and Draco managed to find their way to the Great Hall for breakfast without getting lost. Draco still could be pretentious and a prat, and sometimes Harry found himself not liking him at all. But in the end he couldn't deny that Draco was his only friend here, despite the loads of people lining up to take a good look at him in between classes.

"They're looking at me, Potter, me and my fabulous looks," Draco would drawl, striking a pose and making Harry laugh. Privately, Harry thought Draco was rather jealous. Harry didn't mind—if he could give Draco his fame, he would do it in a heartbeat.

And besides that, Harry had to appreciate at least one thing. When he came back from McGonagall's office and tentatively climbed the stairs that led to the boy's dormitory, Draco had simply cracked an eye open from his bed.

"Harry?" he had yawned. "What are you doing here?"

"I'm... not a girl," Harry had answered, not sure how else to put it.

"Oh." Draco gave him a sleepy smile. "You didn't need to tell me that. I knew." He then turned over and promptly went to sleep. 

It was then that Harry realized that here in the wizarding world, this was not all that uncommon. The most experience Harry had in the Muggle world was catching a glimpse of drag queens on television before Uncle Vernon switched the channel as he shouted curse words at the screen.

It was also then that Harry realized that Draco would stick by him. He'd gone to sleep relieved, relieved that Draco took Harry for who he was.

It was hard to remember that, though, when Draco reached over in Charms to correct Harry's wand grip and said things like, "Honestly, Potter, were you raised in a pigsty? Don't you know how to hold a wand, for Merlin's sake?" Harry would stick his tongue out in response.

And he definitely didn't appreciate Draco's attitude toward Muggleborns and half-bloods. He had learned that term during his time in Slytherin—they were awfully particular about things like that, and Harry thought it rather prudent to not mention his upbringing in a Muggle family, even though, according to books, his parents were both magical. He wouldn't have mentioned it anyway, since the Dursleys weren't exactly easy to bring up in conversation. And his mother, it turned out, was Muggleborn. He kept that fact to himself. 

Harry wondered what the big deal was. They were all witches and wizards, weren't they? All of them came to Hogwarts to learn magic. If Draco accepted the fact that Harry was a boy with such acceptance, why not people who were poor? Non-magical? Muggleborns? Not for the first time, Harry wished he could talk to Ron again. He seemed nicer than Draco. Less biased, less stuck up. 

Harry had plucked up his courage at the Great Hall to say "hi" to Ron the other day. But Ron had shifted uncomfortably in his seat, and then gave him a glare. "What do you want, Slytherin?" he had sneered. Hurt and confused, Harry backed away.