Forgotten Not Forgiven

Author’s Note: Many thanks to Laurel for her beta reading of this chapter. I’m rather fond of this story and all of its backward affection. Lol.

Chapter 12 Lessons Learned

For the first time in a long time, Harry felt confident, powerful and in control of his own destiny. The incident with Draco the night before had been unfortunate – he honestly was beyond attracted to the man and it had taken him no less than three cold showers to subdue the arousal created by their close proximity and falsely promised coupling – but something had to be done about his tendency to think Harry was inferior to him.

Whether the blond said it aloud or not, that was simply the only solution Harry could come to for Draco’s dysfunctional behavior. He saw Harry as a puppet and he the puppeteer; dangling his strings and making Harry do the dance of his choosing. That wasn’t how he wanted to live. He could withstand manipulation, even respect it to a degree – a matter for which he completely blamed on the side of him that the Sorting Hat saw fit to throw him into Slytherin over – but he couldn’t abide by it as the driving factor for his relationships.

After Ginny, Harry discovered that he wanted passion and fire; a pull from his other half that could never be denied. He wanted all the things he hadn’t had with her. He wanted children, he wanted to travel and see the world, he wanted more than the daily wreckage of events he’d found piling up around him to form his life. He couldn’t tell yet if Draco could fulfill any of those things, and while his pull to the man was undeniable, he was still too angry and wary of him to know for sure. After last night, some of that anger had drained away, and he no longer held concern that the blond would meddle in his affairs unless invited.

Maybe one day Harry would invite him, but today was not that day.

No, today was the day he finished out his caseload for the month so that he could sack his job with a clear conscience. This would be the first step in a series of first steps for Harry, and he was nearly giddy over the many new possibilities that lay sprawled ahead of him. Word had come from Minerva recently that there was a post available as Defense instructor at Hogwarts. He hadn’t given it much thought when he was with Ginny because he knew she had no desire to leave London, but perhaps it was just the change he needed in his life to set things on the right track at last.

He was enjoying his daydreams about walking the hallowed Hogwarts corridors in professor robes, leading students as he’d done back in fifth year, being looked up to for the right reasons instead of for the singular task of taking down a madman. He was so focused on daydreams of his new life, that he’d forgotten all about Hermione’s warning the day before until a knock on the frame of his door brought him out of his reverie and he looked up to meet a pair of piercing blue eyes he hadn’t seen in years.

“Allen.” The word was whispered through parted lips and a slight flush formed on his cheeks without Harry’s permission. Less quickly than he would have liked, Harry wiped the doe-eyed look from his face and returned to his normally stern demeanor. “I heard you were in town.”

“I wondered if you had plans for lunch,” Allen replied, his face forming the easy, familiar grin that Harry sometimes still dreamed about. He was uncommonly tan for standing in a British Ministry building, but Harry assumed that was what happened when relegated to Australia for any length of time. His hair was the same sandy blond that Harry remembered, though maybe made a bit lighter by the sun. Even with his standard edition Auror robes he was a sight for sore eyes, a stunning example of manly physique. It made Harry’s tongue feel too large in his mouth and he didn’t like that even after so many years apart, Allen could have this effect on him.

“I do, actually,” Harry replied curtly.

“Liar,” Allen accused playfully, the corner of his mouth pulling up in a half-smile. “You think I’d forget what a rubbish liar you were?”

“It’s been a long time, Allen. I think I’d find myself surprised if you remembered enough about me to equal anything important.” The fact of it was, Harry just didn’t want to be alone with the man. He’d just gotten his confidence back, he didn’t need this fine Australian to go and squash it again.

“I remember our kiss.” The words took Harry off-guard in a most extraordinary way and he looked up, eyes wide as saucers before he narrowed them sharply.

“Well, that’s convenient, since you didn’t before when it mattered,” Harry huffed. “Allen, I’m busy. Have a nice stay here in London and do let me know if any of the Aurors are being difficult with whatever you might need from our department.”

With that, Harry looked down at his stack of papers and pretended to ignore Allen as he blindly scanned the documents in his hands. “I’m not here to visit. I’ve moved back to London. Kingsley is giving me my old post back. I heard you’re making department Head, that’s brilliant, Harry. Congratulations.” The man was rambling, which Harry knew he only did when he was nervous. Furthermore, Harry hated that he remembered that fact so keenly and looked up with a tight-lipped smile.

“I wish I had been consulted, though I’m afraid it matters very little. I’ll be putting in my resignation by month’s end. I’m sure the rest of the team will be pleased you’re back.” It wasn’t at all what he wanted to say, but it wasn’t appropriate to have a temper tantrum in the middle of his office, so he refrained from pointing out that Harry could dismiss him just as readily as Kingsley could hire him back.

“You’re resigning because of me? Harry, I never-”

“Not everything is about you,” Harry hissed, slamming his stack of parchments impatiently on the desk. “My life has been turned on its end, but you’re only a fraction of my problem, Allen. A fraction.”

“I had the memories of our kiss extracted so that I could view them,” Allen blurted, causing Harry to stare up at him in confusion. “I know I was rotten over it, but I remember everything now, Harry. I remember how it felt to hold you, to kiss you…Harry, I think…I think I might have been in love with you and was too stupid and afraid to see it.”

Harry just stared for a long moment, not seeing anything really, but letting the words replay over and over again in his mind. Allen was still rambling on, but Harry couldn’t seem to process any of it. He heard the barrage of names Allen called himself, but outside of that, Harry only heard the memory of Draco’s frustrated sobs in his ears from the night before.

“Brilliant,” Harry sighed at last, probably cutting the other man off again, but he couldn’t bring himself to care. “Why can’t anyone undamaged be in love with me?” he muttered to himself before glancing back up at Allen.

“Dinner,” Allen offered. “That’s all I ask, one dinner.”

Was this it? Was this the way his life was supposed to turn out? If he started dating Allen, he’d never manage to resign his Auror position. Did he even want that? Allen was a complete tosser when Harry had confronted him about the kiss years ago. He’d married Ginny because of the failure of that moment, which wasn’t really Allen’s fault but it couldn’t be denied that it was a direct result of Allen breaking his heart. But if he went out with him now, all that hurt might fly out the window and he’d find himself lost in those mirthful blue eyes once more and unable to resist. Why did he have such a weakness for blonds?

“Sorry,” Harry replied briskly. “I’m dating someone.”

“But, Hermione said you and Ginny are getting divorced,” he replied, his eyes scrutinizing.

“We are.” Harry didn’t understand why Allen couldn’t simply take no as an answer. “I’ve recently started dating someone else and it’s getting serious,” he lied.

Allen narrowed his eyes and frowned. “Who?”

Harry should have expected that question but he hadn’t. He thought Allen would just take the rejection and move on to avoid further embarrassment because that’s what Harry would have done But no…of course, the practiced Auror would have to know who his competition was; the only problem was that Harry wasn’t actually dating anyone. “Draco Malfoy,” he blurted when nothing else came to mind.

“Isn’t he the one who ruined your marriage?” Allen asked, eyes wide.

“Hermione’s been gossiping, I see,” Harry grumbled. “Yes, well, turns out he did it all for me. Isn’t that sweet?” His given smile was false and he could tell by the gleam in Allen’s eyes that he recognized it as such.

Allen’s smile was stolen by a frown and Harry suspected that the man thought it was quite the opposite of sweet. “Actually, it sounds a bit creepy.”

“Yes,” Harry mused. “I thought that too at first, but what can I say, the man’s grown on me.” That statement was true enough. He’d grown like a weed through his heart, impossible to pluck out.

“Then maybe I could come out and have drinks with you both one evening,” he offered. His playful smile suggested that he thought Harry was lying, which he was, and hoped to call him on his bluff.

“Perhaps,” Harry replied with a casual wave of his hand, although his head was beating so fast he wasn’t sure if he managed to pull off the indifference he was aiming for. He hoped it looked to Allen as though he could take or leave the suggestion and be fine either way.

“Tomorrow night then,” he replied and winked at Harry. “I look forward to meeting this man of your dreams.”

Without waiting for Harry to reply, Allen was gone as quickly as he’d arrived, leaving Harry to sputter behind him. Harry felt a mild panic at the situation he found himself in now. Taking a deep breath, he paused and tried to convince himself that it was nothing. He’d simply feign having plans and cancel, although then Allen’s obvious suspicions that he was lying about his relationship with Malfoy would be confirmed, and Harry couldn’t have that. He didn’t want to date Allen for the simple reason that he so very much did want to date Allen. It was the very same thing that drove him away from Draco. He was so conflicted over the devious blond that it made his head spin. How could he both despise and adore the same person?

There was only one thing left to do, and it was bound to happen eventually, but Harry was loath to do it so soon.

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When the doorbell rang through Malfoy Manor, Draco looked up from his sullen position at his desk, staring at the image of him and Potter smiling amicably back at the camera. He’d already crashed it against the wall and repaired it several times that morning after being finally released from his binds by the hotel maid. The look on her face upon finding him there naked and bound might be funny one day, but it wasn’t funny yet. He came home to find his wand returned in a tiny red box. Potter had just left it on his doorstep like a discarded newspaper. It infuriated him when he thought how thoroughly he’d been tricked by the man he had hoped to court, but he had to offer at least a hint of Slytherin respect to the brunet, not that he would do so aloud or in the man’s presence.

A throat cleared in the hallway just outside his door and Draco looked up from the kind Harry in the portrait on his desk to the one lingering in his doorway and scowled. “Well, that was fast,” he mused. “Here to taunt me some more, you bloody cocktease?”

Harry blushed and stepped forward, leaning carefully on the back of the armchair in front of Malfoy’s desk. It made the wide lines of Harry’s shoulders stand out prominently and Draco hated the way it tightened things low in his body. “I’d apologize, but that would indicate that I was in some way sorry for what I did last night, and I’m not. You needed to be taught a lesson.”

Malfoy pursed his lips in a frown and leaned forward. “How very astute of you, Professor. And are you here now to finish what you started last night?”

“No,” Harry admitted. “But, I’ve come to ask you out for drinks.”

“I’m busy.” The reply was so similar to his own with Allen that Harry balked.

“I haven’t even told you when,” Harry pointed out.

“It doesn’t matter when,” Draco replied. “It could be this very moment or the forty-second of November, either way, I’m busy.”

“Look, Draco, I know last night was-”

“Humiliating,” Draco hissed, finishing the Auror’s sentence in an accurate fashion. “I’ve put my heart on my sleeve for you, Potter. I’ve endured horrible things for you, I’ve turned my life upside down for over a year trying to garner your attention, and what you did to me last night crushed the last bit of spirit I have.”

“You don’t seem very crushed to me,” Harry replied with a roll of his eyes. Draco was being overdramatic, which Harry occasionally found charming, but not when his words were outright lies. “You spent a year shagging my wife, forgive me if I don’t see that as some great trial.”

Draco growled and launched the framed photo of he and Harry across the room once more, relishing in the shattering sound of glass that echoed so much cleaner than the shattering sound his heart made. “You can’t just humiliate a Malfoy in such a way and then expect a favor the very next moment. Sorry, Harry, but I can’t oblige you.” He sounded both firm and conflicted over that statement, and Harry decided to appeal to the wavering quality of Draco’s voice, something he was very intimate with in himself.

“Draco,” he whispered, moving to lean against the edge of the desk instead of the chair. “I need you.”

Draco’s eyes glazed over for a singular moment and then he nodded curtly, tossing himself out of the emerald trance. “Yes, well, I realized that a long time ago, but you didn’t listen.”

“An old flame is back in town and he wants to have drinks with me,” Harry explained finally, trying to reason to Draco’s envy if nothing else would work.

“And you want me to what? Watch? Sit there like a silly lump while you snog some new man?” Draco scoffed.

“I want you to save me from it,” Harry replied, and he knew his words had sunk in when Draco’s eyelashes fluttered slightly. Two could play this manipulation game.

“You’d rather go out with me than him?” Draco asked and Harry nodded. He didn’t tell the blond that he picked him because he has more control over his feelings for Draco than for Allen, but fundamentally the statement was true, so he nodded.

“I told him you and I were getting serious and he wants to meet you,” Harry added.

“So, I’m simply your scapegoat,” he deduced wisely and Harry sighed.

“But, you do care for me, don’t you?” Harry asked. “You wouldn’t wish to see me in another unhappy relationship, would you?”

“I’m not interfering in your love life anymore,” Draco replied haughtily. “You taught me that lesson loud and clear last night.” The words were spat like venom from his mouth and Harry winced.

“Draco,” he tried to reason with him again, but the blond cut him off with a wave.

“Have fun on your date, Potter.” His words and tone were a clear dismissal and Harry sighed in defeat and left the Manor. He should have expected such a response, but somehow he hadn’t. It seemed he was just as clueless about how to manage his life now as he had been several years ago. With a heavy heart, he steeled himself for his date with Allen, hoping that he might have some semblance of resistance for the man who had hurt him so badly years earlier.

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“Dating Draco Malfoy, and serious about it?” Hermione demanded, her eyes wide and indignant. “Harry, how could you tell Allen such a thing?”

“It was the best I could come up with on such short notice, and since you apparently gave out all the intimate details of my current love life I wasn’t left with much truth,” he spat, calling her out for sharing information when it wasn’t hers to share.

“The fact that you’re getting a divorce is hardly an intimate detail, Harry. It’s public record, Allen would have learned of it eventually,” she huffed, attempting to defend herself.

“Even so, it’s good to know whose side you’re on,” he snapped and folded his arms across his chest, knowing that he looked like a petulant child, but not caring in the slightest.

She had come to his flat that evening when she’d heard – most likely from Allen – what had happened at the Ministry earlier that day. He’d mostly settled in to his new flat, magic was a brilliantly handy thing when moving, but there were still a few unopened boxes in the living room.

“I’m on your side of course,” she quipped. “As such, I’m trying to make sure you’re happy. I thought you liked Allen,” she reasoned, her voice growing softer when Harry sighed and gave up his angry stare.

“I do, but that’s the problem,” Harry sighed. “He hurt me too much already. I can’t be with him when I don’t trust that he won’t do that again. What if this is all an experiment for Allen? What if he’s only wanting to try out a relationship with a bloke because of a sour relationship back in Australia?”

“You’ll never find out why he’s back if you don’t talk to him.” Her hand was making soft twists in her long brown hair and she looked genuinely concerned for him. “Ron and I both like Allen, he could be good for you, certainly better than Malfoy,” she added with a distasteful scrunch to her nose.

“I don’t care if you and Ron like him. It’s my opinion of him that’s important,” he scoffed and Hermione gave him a conceding nod.

“That’s true, Harry, but Ron and I can look at things from an unbiased perspective that you might not see.” Harry laughed at that and Hermione blushed slightly. “Alright, well, mostly unbiased.”

“Well, it doesn’t matter much now anyway,” he huffed. “Draco and I are supposed to meet him for drinks tomorrow night but Draco won’t come. Allen will figure things out soon enough and discover I lied about dating someone. Once again I’ll look like a pathetic loser.”

“Oh, Harry,” she sighed and moved over to sit on the sofa with him, her arm around his shoulders. “No one thinks that.”

“You should have seen how angry he was today,” he whispered, burying his head into Hermione’s neck.

“Allen?” she asked curiously. She couldn’t imagine what the hunky Australian man would be upset over. He seemed rather confident that he would win Harry’s affections when they had spoken earlier that day.

“Draco,” Harry corrected. “He was so mad he probably would have been boiling to the touch.”

Silence drifted through the stilted conversation until Hermione kissed Harry on the forehead and pulled him back so that she could look at him properly. Her gaze went immediately to his eyes, as anyone’s did who knew Harry well. They all knew that no matter how much Auror training he underwent, his eyes were still as expressive as when he was eleven.

“You really care for him, don’t you?” she asked softly and watched as Harry’s eyes widened and shone.

“I think I do,” Harry whispered and looked away from her so that his soul could remain hidden. “I just don’t know what to do about it.”

Author’s Note: I sort of loved Draco's attitude here, and Harry’s failed attempt at a second manipulation. One of these days the boys are going to realize that is not the way to the other’s heart. Perhaps I’m wrong though and I’ll end the story with Harry running away and Draco in a white coat… *shrug (also, if you haven't already seen it, I posted a oneshot called 'Crush' on Friday) and don't forget to add me if you have a Twitter account. I'm doing daily updates about my writing schedule and it's one of the best ways to contact me these days. Sad but true.