#i like to think that draco would DIE behind complaining to the universe about harry facing any minor inconvenience | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

dracowars · 3 years

Note

Hi! I was wondering if I could request a Draco fic where he and Y/N are cuddling together when Y/N receives an owl from her parents in which they give her bad news or scold her or something like that. Then she completely freaks out/shuts down and Draco calms her down and comforts her. I'm just really craving fluff and I love caring and protective Draco and would love to read something like this. If you don't wanna write it tho, that's a-okay. Thank you!

cursed | draco malfoy

pairing: draco x greengrass!reader

word count: 1,4k

summary: where draco comforts y/n after receiving bad news

a/n: omg, i'm so so sorry that this took so long!!! :(

warnings: angst, mentions of death

universe: harry potter

“AHH! Draco, stop it, please!”, you beg him in the middle of your fit of laughter, your body writhing under his while trying to avoid his tickling attacks. Because of all the laughter, your stomach already hurts, and your breathing turned irregular. Draco, on the other hand, does not seem as exhausted as you and therefore he does not even think about stopping any time soon and shows no mercy as he continues to tickle you.

“Make me”, he gives you a slick grin when he stops briefly to give you a break and to position himself on top of you, his legs on either side of your upper body.

Again, you try to stop him and try to get a hold of his hands until you finally manage to catch one of his arms in a firm grip. Breathing hard, you look in each other’s eyes and you immediately know that you have no chance against him. Draco is much stronger than you and will be able to get out of your grip quickly.

He would have been able to if it had not been for a white snowy owl flying in through the open window, landing on the small bedside table next to your head and looking at you with big eyes when neither Draco nor you move an inch. A rolled-up letter is attached to its foot and your heartbeat quickens all of a sudden when you realize that this white owl belongs to your family, the pureblood family Greengrass.

And whenever you get a letter from home, it always means trouble.

Quietly clearing your throat after a few seconds have passed, Draco finally crawls off you so you can sit up and remove the parchment from the owl’s claw, but not without exchanging worried looks with Draco beforehand. Happy to have been relieved of its heavy load, the snowy owl rises back into the air before disappearing out the window into the bright sunshine.

You sit on the edge of Draco’s bed with the long letter in your hands, already shaking in fear from the uncertainty of what you may read in it. Draco knows this and also about your bad relationship with your parents, which is why he sits down next to you instantly and gently strokes up and down your back with his hand. The atmosphere in the room suddenly changes as tension fills the air, the joy from only a few seconds ago gone with the owl that delivered the letter.

“I am sure they just want to congratulate you on passing your OWL’s”, Draco tries to calm you down and lowers his head to be able to look into your face, which is now only covered by a blank expression. Putting his index finger under your chin, he lifts your head up and leads you to him, looking straight into your eyes, his own gray ones still radiating concern.

“You know my parents”, you sigh out loud and slowly remove your face from his grasp, focusing your gaze back on the letter that is still closed. You slightly run your thumb over the green wax seal, which shows the crest of your family. For a brief moment, you close your eyes, mentally preparing yourself for what is to come – at least you try – and finally open the envelope.

While your eyes fly over the lines and paragraphs, Draco keeps his distance, but also keeps an eye on you the whole time, trying to already get a clue about what your parents could have wrote through your expression. It would be nothing new if they would scold you again or complain about your insufficient performance in Hogwarts. Draco has seen all of this before, and he is used to this because he too is struggling with his parents’ high expectations.

Stunned, you lower the letter after you finished reading it, your hands now trembling even more and your eyes full of tears- Your face looks pale and all emotion in your face vanished all of a sudden. You go through the words one by one in your head, repeat them over and over again in order to be able to understand them.

While doing this, however, a tear has already found its way down your cheek, giving Draco the sign that he has given you enough time alone and that you now need him. He quickly moves closer to you again, still remaining careful to still give you the necessary distance you may need.

“Babe? What did they write?”, Draco asks carefully as he brushes a strand of hair from your face and behind your ear. You still do not move at his gentle touch, your gaze fixed straight ahead.

“Whatever they wrote, I am certain that they did not mean it”, Draco continues, only looking into your now sad face. “You are such a wonderful person and your parents-“

“My mother is going to die”, you interrupt him and as soon as the words leave your mouth, you can hardly believe them yourself. Even after everything you read in the letter, even now you still do not understand these words. A sudden silence arises until you blink your tears away and turn to Draco, who still looks at you with shock written all over his face.

“I-I am- I am so sorry”, Draco stutters, just as surprised by your statement as you are. However, not letting another second pass, he pulls you into a tight, loving and overall protective hug. A hug that has always given you more comfort than anyone else could.

Draco gently strokes your hair and lets you cry into his shoulder until you have calmed down a bit. Keeping you at arm’s length in front of him, he looks at you worried, still with big question marks over his head.

“Our- Our family has been cursed for generations already”, you utter while sobbing, wiping away a few of your tears while Draco listens attentively, his hand firmly clasped around yours. “W-With a blood curse.”

After saying this, Draco seems to have no words and you can see that he immediately wonders if you, like your mother, are also affected by this curse.

“I-I do not know if I will have it. I also can’t say whether if affects Daphne or Astoria. In some generations it has never appeared before and was passed onto the next generation nevertheless”, you explain as best you can since your parents never told you and your sisters much about it, after all until recently they assumed that their generation and the one from you and your sisters has been spared. “There is n-no cure. The curse weakens the body to such an extent that it is very likely to result in.. death.”

“Babe, I do not know what to say-“

“You do not have to say anything, Draco. I lied to you. We lied to everyone here. Nobody knows that our family had this deadly curse, otherwise we would- Otherwise the pureblood families would no longer accept us as one of them”, you sniff and try to force a smile onto your face while looking into Draco’s compassionate eyes. “I would like to say that I do not mind that my mother do has the curse after all, but-“

“But she is still your mother, Y/N. No matter how she treated you. You do not have to justify yourself for feeling this way”, Draco assures you and pulls you into his strong arms again, immediately making you feel much safer and more secure. Because of the sudden closeness, all dams break within you and this time you let all of your tears run free. Draco hold your trembling body in his arms and tries to give you the support you need right now. It pains him to see you like this and he can understand how torn you must feel in this situation. Your mother was always the one in particular who pushed you, even forced you, to have good grades in school, and now that you both know what fate she has, it still feels wrong to say that she deserves it.

At this moment, however, you are just glad that you are not alone, that you do not have to carry this burden alone. That you were finally able to tell Draco about your family’s biggest secret. You know that he and your sisters will always be by your side, no matter what the future holds for you.

“Everything will be alright.”

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llendrinall · 4 years

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Omg what if Draco was also a spy for Dumbledore? Like imagine him biting his tongue when everyone is hateful and cruel to him cuz he's gonna have the last laugh when it comes out he was a spy. And in this version Percy still fucks off. Draco stays behind cuz he wants to see everyones reactions (especially his asshole boss that made his life fucking hell) He could be a seer in this and secretly became friends with Harry during Hogwarts. Idk, add whatever you want ❤

Ha! I don’t know why that “Idk” at the end made me laugh.

I have different mental versions of Draco. I can see him more or less happy, more or less certain of what he wants to do or of his relationship to the wizarding world. Other things are fixed, they are the things that make him Draco and appear in all versions of him, like:

1.- He can draw. He might have more or less practice, but he can draw pretty well.

2.- He is smart in the sense of doing very well academically, being able to understand something instantly. He doesn’t need to put many study hours, so he doesn’t.

3.- He doesn’t like Dumbledore. Regardless of his relationship to his father and Voldemort, he just doesn’t like Dumbledore as a person. It has nothing to do with how Dumbledore treats people (although that certainly doesn’t help) it’s more visceral. Just like some people will look at an actor or celebrity and go “no, I do not find Jimmy Fallon funny and can’t tell you why”. This is the same.

So Draco would never become a spy for Dumbledore. Dumbledore’s spy, hell no.

However, at some point Draco looks at Voldemort’s white flabby face and thinks “oh, no, I’m not doing this.” He decides he is going to work against Voldemort, but with whom?

(Draco is very proud of knowing when to use “whom” and also lives in fear of getting it wrong).

Draco has to find someone who can be an actual challenge against Voldemort. The Ministry is out because they are stupid, incompetent and infiltrated to the brim. And who else is there? Potter? Draco goes to class with Potter. He has seen how he spells, meaning both his charm use (Potter knows one a half spells and that’s it) and his orthography. He simply can’t consider Potter a serious contender against Voldemort. Nothing against him, Draco actually, (secretly) kind of likes the guy, but Voldemort can read minds, knows all kind of ancient magic and performs incredibly complex curses and conjurations.

Draco has seen Potter lick ice-cream out of his t-shirt.

If Draco wants to get rid of Voldemort, there is only Dumbledore. Draco doesn’t spy for him. He does nothing regarding Dumbledore that involves the preposition ”for”.

But he shares information. There is a “to” in there. Give information to Dumbledore. He can do that. Draco is quite smart, so he is able to deduce Voldemort’s strategy from little clues. He knows about Voldemort’s quest for information (both for the prophecy and the elder wand) months in advance.

This does not happen in the same universe as Percy Ministry Spy, but Percy is acting as a spy nevertheless. This means that Dumbledore has a pretty easy run setting his plans in motion and ensuring Voldemort’s defeat. It also means that he suffers though some absolutely miserable months which probably have something to do with his enthusiasm for the let-Draco-kill-me plan.

Each and every interaction with Draco is a reeling experience. Draco is not handing the information for nothing. He wants Voldemort dead by next month and when Dumbledore doesn’t deliver, he complains. He complains (note the italics). Draco doesn’t ask for the manager because there isn’t one, but he actually asks if Dumbledore has any older siblings Draco could talk to. You could say Draco acts entitled, demanding and full of expectations, but those words mean nothing. Draco breathes past entitlement to land somewhere between “Angel of Vengeance” and “Greek fury”, only instead of a flaming sword or claws, he has attitude and an excellent command of grammar. What a horrible little child.

Meanwhile, Snape has developed the habit of twisting every conversation so he can say “pity you don’t have any other orphan available to sacrifice” and “oh, if only we had a child to endanger” and “yes, but how can we solve this by killing a child?”. It is very rich coming from him. Dumbledore is not amused. Apparently there is a line for Severus Snape and that line is drawn when sacrificing oneself for the greatest good.

(“Ah, but it is not yourself who will do the sacrifice, is it?” Snape says, and a week later Dumbledore tells Draco that of course he will let him kill him. Draco scoffs and rolls his eyes as if somehow that wasn’t enough).

And then, there is Percy Weasley. Neither Snape nor Draco are supposed to know about him, but they both know and it is unclear how. Probably Percy himself let them know (no, he didn’t). He would do something like that (no, he wouldn’t). Percy is a horrid nightmare (he… he may be). Dumbledore despises him (and how!). Snape will talk about Dumbledore not doing the greater sacrifice but Dumbledore honestly can’t think of anything worse than working with Percival Weasley.

(70% of Dumbledore’s dislike comes from the suspicion that Percy might be two or three points more intelligent than him. After almost a century used to being the most intelligent person in the room by far, Dumbledore does not like this new scenario. He misses Grindelwald.)

Dumbledore dies. Then so does Potter (briefly), followed quickly by Voldemort (permanently). Surprisingly, Snape also jumps into this dying fashion until he thinks better about it and survives, although severely wounded. Percy doesn’t die but as soon as the battle had ended and all Death Eaters are either dead or apprehended, he dissaparates right there from the Hogwarts grounds.

He sends a postcard to Draco a month later, which is kind of nice. There is also one for Snape and Draco props it next to the vase of flowers by his sickbed.

Thus begins the After-War.

By day two, Draco understands why Weasley left so quickly. It is a fucking disaster. Potter has to plant himself by Snape’s bed to stop the Ministry from arresting him. The man is barely coherent and barely alive and yet they wanted to interrogate him and transport him to a holding cell. The Ministry. The ones who allowed themselves to be infiltrated.

It is perhaps unsurprising that when the Ministry sends a hastily formed examining tribunal to Hogwarts, so students can sit their OWLs and NEWTs in August, the examining tribunal refuses Draco.

Draco doesn’t particularly care. He is rich enough that he doesn’t need to work and, in any case, once they finally start proper investigations and find Dumbledore’s trove of notes and testimonies in his sealed will, Draco will be exonerated and recognized as the hero he is. This insult or punishment, whatever you call the Tribunal’s unfair treatment of him, doesn’t hurt. Draco is immune to their attacks.

Soon after, he receives a letter from bloody Hermione Granger saying of course he can sit his exams, they expect him on Tuesday at ten. McGonagall will be there to put the fear of herself on the Tribunal and ensure they are fair.

And… he appreciates her intervention, he really does. Awfully nice of her. True moral backbone. It’s just that… Draco actually enjoyed the insult? He realizes now that he only attempted to sit the exams because he expected them to say no.

He sits the exams and aces them. They are particularly hard in the last one, the astronomy test. McGonagall coughs three times, rolls her eyes and finally says “bloody enough, don’t you think? He has shown he knows the material.” He sends her a handwritten thank-you letter just to be annoying.

Draco realizes that his behavior is very odd, but given that Weasley has fucked off to somewhere and that Snape refuses to heal so he won’t have to talk to people, Draco believes he is entitled to some oddities of his own. Thus, he begins collecting insults. From the low-brow and simple “Death-Eater scum” to the vitriolic “murderer”. The best, and the worst, are the ones that don’t come wrapped in words. Shunning and discrimination. Oh! He can’t explain it, but they taste tart and sweet.

He likes it. Not the dismissing, no, but the idea that they don’t know him and that their judgment of him is wrong. If that means they will also wrong him and treat him badly, so be it. It doesn’t change that he and Snape and Percy Weasley, are the heroes of the war.

He applies to a mediwizard program and is naturally denied. Then he tries a traineeship at the Wizengamot, also denied. Just for the fun of it, he applies to the Auror Office and receives a wonderful letter of rejection that has an actual dead spider inside the envelope.

It has been three months since the end of the war, now, and Weasley refuses to let himself be found. Snape barely manages to stay awake for three hours, and only with Draco. Evidently the stress of the war did a number on them, so it’s perfectly understandable if Draco keeps prodding and asking and applying to things knowing full well that he will get a resounding “no”.

You would think this was some sort of atonement for his past misbehavior and his admittedly awfully narrow views and even more abysmal manners regarding muggleborns. But Draco is quite sure he atoned for all of that when he lied to Voldemort’s face and, more terrifyingly, he lied to Aunt Bella’s face, stole their secrets and passed them to Dumbledore. He doesn’t need to punish himself any more.

No, it’s just… it’s just hard. He has spent three years with a carefully crafted lie as his only protection. It is not so easy to discard it. He liked that lie. It kept him alive.

And then, come October, the Ministry takes Malfoy Manor and all associated assets. Just like that. Puff. Seized. They haven’t even begun an official investigation on Draco, but they have taken his house as a precaution.

Now it’s personal.

It turns out that Draco is a vindictive asshole, who would have guessed? Probably everyone but him. Doesn’t matter. He will make them pay. The Ministry, the papers who ran the headline about Draco becoming homeless and the people who cut the page and framed it. They will regret it.

He moves into Snape’s ugly cottage because he has no other place to go and if Snape has any objections, he can say so when he pleases. Oh? He can’t talk? Too bad, then.

The Ministry has also seized his funds and Draco draws a line at using Snape’s meager savings (he assumes they are meager, he hasn’t actually checked) so he gets a job in the only place that would employ him: a seedy tea shop in the North side of Diagon Alley. The only reason the owner hired him was because the previous assistant tried to burn the place down and he was in a bit if a rush to find a replacement. After a week, Draco understands why someone would want to burn the place down, and that’s before his boss realizes that Draco is drawing a small crowd of people who like seeing him serving tables. From then on, he takes to screaming and insulting Draco for absolutely everything before turning to his customers with a smug smile.

Every time he or any of the customers complains, Draco smiles a cheap version of the smiles he used to give Voldemort and vows. Sometimes their words sting and sometimes they break against his armor. He lives in a weird state between immunity and pain.

Dumbledore’s actual true will, to be open by Hermione J. Granger (funny how he didn’t address it to Potter) is found in late December. Given the state of the Ministry, Draco expects that they will only get around summoning Granger by early February at best.

Weasley sends another postcard around Christmas. This one comes with an address, in case either he or Snape also want to drop everything and fuck off, he supposes. Draco writes back explaining he is bidding his time to exact just retribution over all those who wronged him and Snape is in no condition to travel. Weasley writes, well, he doesn’t write, he sends a third postcard with quite a nice drawing of a thumbs up.

Snape can now sit up and read the paper. He still can’t get a single sound out, but he can manage sighing in a very meaningful way. They receive another summon to have Snape declare before a Tribunal and he groans before passing out and staying unconscious the next two days.

All things considered, Draco is evidently the one coping better so he feels he can afford a little extravagant behavior like sitting in front of a mirror and practicing his own sighs of heroic suffering for when the vindication comes.

It comes in March.

The world goes absolutely insane. People knew that Snape had done… something, mostly because Potter had very obnoxiously advocated on his behalf.

(Potter is so obnoxious. He comes every Tuesday to Draco’s tea shop and asks for a cup of tea that he barely touches and stays there for an hour saying nothing).

But they had no idea of the extent Snape’s involvement. None. All the curses he surreptitiously knocked aside, all the misfired spells. It wasn’t just gaining Voldemort’s trust and acting on Dumbledore’s plans, he, Snape, personally saved two dozen lives with none the wiser. He was so good at acting covertly!

That should be enough to make any good newspaper editor foam in their mouth, but there is more. There is Weasley, going twenty steps ahead and being ridiculously clever and talented and just… knowing what to do. There is already a shrine to him in Coleraine because he did something very important there and the locals were merely waiting to find a name to put to it. Percy Weasley has been declared tax exempt in all of Ireland.

Draco merely has a meager thirteen lives saved on his ledger, but he also has three years of cleverly betraying Voldemort. It doesn’t look like much, but once details emerge of how he stole information and passed it to Dumbledore, the whole thing becomes charming. Double-o-Drac-o, is what the muggleborns are calling him. Snape assures him it’s a good thing, but he doesn’t elaborate because he is a bastard who pretends that writing tires him horribly.

Snape wasn’t planning on surviving the war and for the first time in years he is unprepared. He deals with it by trying to shut the world off. If he wasn’t so weak from his wounds, Draco is quite certain that he would have buggered off to wherever Weasley is now, to sit on the sun and be silent together. He certainly does not appreciate the wizarding world’s earnest interest in him. You would think that the fact that he can’t (or, at this point, won’t) speak would deter them a bit, but it only adds to Snape’s tragic charm. Some women and many young men are particularly attracted by it. Fortunately, Draco has only had to chase two of them out of the house because even though Snape can’t say a word, he remains very skilled at non-verbal magic so he hexes every journalist and deranged fan that has the misfortune of coming close to him. Meanwhile, Weasley doesn’t want to be found (“nooooo” says his last postcard, Draco is a bit worried at the lack of capitalization) and has a ten-month head start. He won’t be found.

This means there is only Draco. Shameful bronze medal in the saving-lives business, but with a delicious aura of cleverness and bravery, a whole year of suffering in silence during the post-war, and a face that was made to be dramatically lighted, photographed and printed in the front page.

Wil you answer our questions, Mister Malfoy? Oh, but he will, he will answer every one of their questions and give all details. No one has given so much, sacrificed so much, suffered so much as him.

“I literally died, Malfoy.”

“And I couldn’t afford dying, Potter. I had to survive. Now, get out, these people have some more questions.”

Potter has moved from coming every Tuesday to the stupid tea shop to visiting them at Snape’s cottage. Draco only lets him in because he might annoy Snape into talking. Plus, he is nimble, he can avoid all of Snape’s hexes and the extra exercise will do Snape good.

His relationship with Potter is… strange, but fittingly so. Everything else has been weird lately, why not this? Potter had always elicited interest, but once people learn that Dumbledore had more or less raised him for the slaughter and that when Potter found out he nevertheless went ahead and died, the press and the public in general goes even more rabid. You would think that with so many shocking stories the scandals would dull each other. But, far from that, the public is on fire, incensed, and each piece of news is kindling for the flames.

Potter, unfortunately, does not have a photogenic face (he tends to look like a sad lost deer in all pictures) and all the attention stresses him out. Draco offers him a mutually beneficial deal: Draco will take care of the press for him and Potter will stop the Ministry from returning the manor and his fortune.

“How is that beneficial?”

“I want to tell the press that they took it from me with no evidence before they have the chance to hand it back.”

“Ah, fair enough.” Potter says. He does not seem to be a big fan of the Ministry, which is a pity because this time the Minister is not attempting to kill him, use him, or run a smear campaign against him, unlike the previous ones. It seems that the odd behavior isn’t restricted to Weasley, Snape and him. The other Weasley (Ronald), Granger and Potter are also displaying oddities. Mostly, there is a lot of yelling at the Ministry (Granger) and at every single adult who ever interacted with Potter (Weasley, Ron). Potter isn’t doing any yelling, but he has taken to following Draco around and chatting at Snape.

(No, not “to” or “with”, “at”. He chats at Snape and Snape suffers in silence having accepted that Potter will deflect every hex thrown his way).

Draco doesn’t judge. He is still working at the horrible tea shop with the even more horrible and petty owner (who has no idea how to treat Draco now and spends every waking second alternating between insults and clumsy flattery) simply because he wants to lord over the Ministry that they took his house and money. If Potter feels like he has to follow Draco and harass Snape into making a full recovery, so be it.

There is, of course, the question of Weasley (Ronald) wanting to know where the only tolerable Weasley (Percy) is. Draco doesn’t tell, despite having his address on postcard number 2. That would be a betrayal bigger than anything he did to Voldemort. He could never do that to a person who managed to annoy Dumbledore so much.

What he does is sit down with two cups of tea and explain to Weasley (Ronald) what his brother did and what he went through and why he might not want to interact with any one he knows when, instead, he could be lying face down on a nudist beach in Spain. It helps. Weasley (Ronald) doesn’t track his brother down, but he manages to get him to reply to his letters. He is overjoyed.

The news about having lost his ancestral home and fortune come out and people are adequately irate. He enjoys it, but not as much as he expected. Some people squirm and blush and walk into doors with the embarrassment of how badly they judged him. Some even apologize to his face which is frankly disrespectful because then Draco has to be civil to them. Overall it is unsatisfying. He wants more, but he doesn’t know what he wants.

He almost accepts one of the multiple offers he keeps receiving to enter this or that prestigious program. He would make a good a lawyer. Fortunately, Weasley (the cool one) talks him out of it via postcard. The postcard has nothing written on it other than a smiley face (evidently the brother talks are going well) but it shakes something inside him.

This gives him the idea of apologizing to Longbottom (extremely uncomfortable for both of them) and Granger, who gets him in a number or boards and committees as punishment. Draco competes to be the most disliked person in each committee, which is hard because Granger is in some of them. She asks for immediate liberation of house-elves and a transition program for them and Draco finds himself demanding (just like he did with Dumbledore, full of bile and entitlement) historic reparations. Each blood-line who ever held a house-elf will contribute proportionally to the transition program. He gets death threats over it, it’s great.

Two years after the end of the war, Draco finds himself back in his manor, with most of his money (he doubled his contribution to the elf fund because then the families who want to wash their names would have to do the same) and, mysteriously, Harry Potter in his bed. He has no idea how that happened. He is quite certain he was too busy being a little shit to seduce anyone. Was he seduced when he wasn’t looking? How dare he?

He also has half a dozen very important postcards on his mantelpiece. The only thing he doesn’t have is an ex-Death Eater, ex-potion professor, living in his mansion because the old bastard finally got well enough to say “bugger off, both of you” and then fled to Ireland where the nice Weasley has got a nice little cottage of his own.

#asks #draco malfoy #verse: draco spy #Anonymous

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the-crooked-library · 7 years

Text

Drarry AU

My brain keeps returning to this idea -- what if, in POA (movie universe), Harry never realizes that the crane Malfoy sent him was a note (because I mean, who would)? Like he just stares at it, confused, then goes “okay” sets it down on his desk and goes back to ignoring Snape

I mean, Draco would be furious because how dare you not appreciate my bullying Potter and the next class they have together, he grabs another piece of paper, writes something along the lines of “You suck Potter”, folds another crane and blows it over -- only for it to be left sitting on Harry’s desk again after the lesson, and Harry didn’t even look inside, he didn’t do anything with this damn crane, and Draco is absolutely seething from this lack of attention

So he does it again. And again. And again.

First it’s insults (because of course he hates Potter, they’re archenemies, never mind the actual murderer stalking Harry at this very moment) -- “I hope you die Potter” “I wish I met Sirius Black I’d help him” “Your glasses are appalling why do you still have the same ones from first year your prescription can’t possibly be the same you moron” “Eat a bag of dicks Potter” -- but a month goes by and he’s running out of things to say and Potter never reads the notes anyway so Draco just starts ranting about everything else he finds annoying

Soon the cranes are just a way of venting -- talk about your day, fold a beautiful crane, send it to the person you definitely hate the most. He still tries to snark and generally antagonize every time he sees Potter, because it’s practically my duty to take the Golden Boy down a peg, Goyle -- but he can’t do it the same way anymore, so he takes a step back -- in everything except the cranes.

Every day, every class, and sometimes at breakfast, a crane will land next to Harry Potter’s elbow. Without fail. Harry will pick it up, stare at it, and set it back down. Or maybe slip it into his bag, and Draco’s stomach flips the first time he does that.

It’s almost like they’re friends. By now, Draco’s told him things he never even voiced to his friends -- that he’s actually terrified of the Dementors, that he keeps feeling like he’s not good enough, because no matter what he tries, there’s always somebody better than him at it -- that he still can’t understand why Harry didn’t want to be his friend that time on the train, seriously Potter what did I do? you didn’t even know me! -- and Potter didn’t crumple any of the cranes, so maybe he doesn’t hate him so much anymore?.. Draco knows Potter never reads these notes, but he likes to pretend that Harry knows all these things about him. And maybe even cares a little.

It’s stupid, and he really shouldn’t be putting any of such personal details in writing (honestly Lucius would be so disappointed, these cranes are perfect blackmail material and what the hell are you thinking Draco yells Draco’s inner voice) -- but he can’t stop. It’s become a habit, and Potter stared at him for fifteen minutes at lunch today, so he can’t stop. Draco keeps talking, and making Harry little doodles, and trying not to smile too obviously when another crane ends up in Harry’s pocket.

And meanwhile, Harry’s going nuts. He just doesn’t understand what Malfoy wants from him, or why he doesn’t run into him so often anymore -- and the cranes really seem to be just paper (Ron why does Malfoy know origami is this a general wizard thing or is it just him), and they’re delicate and elegant, and he feels bad about destroying them -- so he just leaves them.

Until, of course, he absentmindedly shoves one in his bag one day -- and finds it that evening. Sighs and sets it on his bedside table, because what else can he do?.. Even if he throws it out, he’ll just get a new one tomorrow. Or three.

He’s confused, because Malfoy isn’t even so loud or dramatic anymore, it’s almost as if he’s trying not to attract attention -- beyond the cranes -- but Harry’s eyes are glued to him anyway. He knows that Malfoy has to be up to something, because of course he is -- but he just can’t tell what, there’s no way to know, and holy shit Ron he just smiled at me what the hell is he planning -- and all this time, the pile of cranes on his bedside table keeps growing

He doesn’t lie awake at night, thinking of Malfoy’s smile. He doesn’t. Really.

The next day, when he gets his morning crane, he flashes Malfoy a brilliant smile, and laughs at his stunned expression like ha, two can play at this game! Gotcha now! and he’s still thinking that Malfoy’s messing with his mind -- except he can’t help but think that it would be nice if Draco was really like that. If he really just sent the cranes over to brighten Harry’s day. If there wasn’t something else behind this, because he’s starting to like it.

All this goes on until Hermione barges into their dormitory again, in the ungodly hours of the morning, like she usually does -- and stops dead, staring at the pile of cranes, Ron may have been complaining but she never imagined the true extent of this new, yet age-old obsession. And of course, Harry tries to protest, that it’s all for science, Hermione, I have to find out what he’s up to and this is the only source of information -- but the excuses run dry when she quizzes him a bit and finds out that none of the cranes are cursed, or charmed to yell insults, or anything, really

So she’s like “well have you tried to unfold one” and no he didn’t, who the heck writes notes inside a crane anyway, isn’t it an artwork?? But hey, that’s an idea, and that night the trio gets together, sitting on Harry’s bed with the crane he just got in Charms, bated breath and all, waiting for it to unleash something nasty (Harry finds himself really really hoping it won’t)

All kinds of security measures done, and they unfold it

Hermione’s like “oh. Oohh,” and Ron’s eyebrows fly away to roam the world

Because inside

there’s a shitty little drawing of Harry and Draco holding hands, with little hearts all around

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