The Thunder in My Heart

Late-night Bread Making

'Merlin, no wonder you've got arms to die for,' Draco drawled as he came back into the common room. He figuratively rolled his eyes at himself, Merlin's curses, he was bloody smitten and, worse, letting it show.

He had heard Harry leave his room some time earlier and guessed he was heading to the cooking area. When he heard the click of Hermione's door shut, he decided to brave Harry. Besides, somehow Hermione's scary cat had made it into his room and had been rubbing against him and purring loudly and generally not letting him read for the past ten minutes until he got up. And still the cat had not let him be. He felt like he'd been herded towards the door and then the cat just lay on the floor between Draco and the bed, staring at him fixedly with its demonic orange eyes and flicking the tip of its bushy tail. Draco had sighed and left his room.

Draco knew he needed to apologise for his behaviour earlier, it was utterly uncalled for and Harry had been right, why shouldn't the man mess around with his bestfriend, it certainly didn't mean they were sleeping together, especially as Harry had openly declared his homosexuality. He really didn't know what had got into him. He utterly ignored the little voice in his head that murmured jealousy, it was a most uncalled for observation.

Harry started; he'd been so absorbed in his work he hadn't even seen Draco wander back into the common room.

'You have a bit of flour...' Draco gestured to his face.

Harry tried to wipe it away with the back of his hand and Draco laughed. He walked around the counter, 'that's only made it worse ... here...' he swiped up a tea-towel on his way past and used it to gently brush away the flour from Harry's nose. 'You know, you're quite good at getting covered in flour, you were the other night too.'

Harry smiled at him, his emerald green eyes sparkling like gemstones in clear water. It seemed he had lost all the anger of earlier. Draco was transfixed, how could a man's eyes be so dramatically expressive.

'I get a bit wrapped up in what I'm doing sometimes, especially if its bread, I enjoy the physical exertion.'

'Hmmm...' Draco couldn't help smiling.

Harry's eyes hadn't left his and he felt his knees go a little weak to be under such an honest and open gaze.

Harry quirked a smile. He carried on kneading and Draco watched, fascinated by Harry's hands as they worked with such natural rhythm. He almost allowed himself to wonder what they might feel against his bare skin.

Harry then slammed the dough down firmly and slapped it roundly a couple of times, which made Draco positively shudder, before putting the dough into a bowl, covering it, and putting it into the proving oven.

'Whiskey?' Draco asked, trying to break his personal meditations about Harry's hands before he got carried away.

'Please.' Harry cleaned up quickly and put the timer on for an hour.

Draco had sat on one of the barstools again but Harry walked around to a sofa, signalling for him to follow. He threw a couple of logs on the fire to re-stoke it and settled back into the deep taupe-coloured sofa. Draco sat down opposite him, cursing Harry for wearing tight jeans.

'You okay, Draco?' he asked.

'Yes,' he paused. 'Look, I'm sorry about early, I shouldn't have...'

Harry waved his words away, '...it's not me you need to apologise to, Mione is more than Ron's ex, I was only standing up for that.'

'That's not what I was referring to...'

'I know, but I was giving you an easy route out.'

'Thank you.'