Smokin' Hot

*

Harry was slowly learning more and more about Draco the more time he spent with him. They had finally begun their English project and that Tuesday afternoon found them sitting in the library at a table, surrounded by notes, lit books, poetry books and other resources.

Harry sighed and set down his pen, looking around the library. The librarian was busy reshelving some books while glaring at a pair of students who were giggling in the corner. Harry was pretty sure she didn’t approve of such noise.

He turned to Draco, who was reading something in one of the books.

“Can we take a break?” he asked. They’d been sitting there for the last hours without much speaking and Harry was getting bored.

Draco looked up from the book and glanced at his watch. “We’ve barely even started.”

“But she’s so boring,” Harry sighed, picking up a biography.

Draco raised an eyebrow at Harry. “How do you manage your homework, Potter, if you don’t even do it?”

“Well, Hermione usually helps…” he said, trailing away. He hadn’t spoken to Hermione in over a week and didn’t really want to think about her.

“What do you plan on doing once Granger isn’t around?”

Harry paused. “I can do it, she just helps.”

“You are going to the University, right, Potter?” Draco asked suddenly, setting down his pen.

Harry was happy that he’d succeeded in distracting Draco. Now, though, he had to answer his questions. “I want to, but it’s really expensive.”

“What are you going to study?”

“I thought maybe criminal justice,” Harry said, feeling awkward. He’d never really talked to anyone about what he wanted to do after school. The Dursleys had no interest in it. Their only interest was getting him out of their house.

“So law? You’re going to be a big, bad, heartless lawyer, then?”

“Not heartless, I hope,” Harry said with a small laugh. He looked at Draco, who was leaning back in his chair casually, the front legs off the ground. “What about you?”

“Me?” Draco sounded surprised.

“Yeah, what are you going to do?”

“I’m going to the University. My father wouldn’t have it any other way. He wants me to study business, but I’m not going to. I’d rather do clothes design.”

“Be a designer?” Harry could definitely see Draco as a designer. He had the look down, at least. The brooding, artist type. Harry repressed a laugh at that thought.

“Maybe, maybe not. I’m not really sure.”

“So, your dad,” Harry said carefully. “He wants you to study business, why?”

Draco laughed derisively but quieted at the look from the librarian. “He wants someone to take over after he dies. He owns a bunch of banks in Europe. He doesn’t think anyone not in the family should have it. I plan on taking it and then giving it to Blaise. Blaise is planning on studying business. He’ll be much better at it.”

Harry was silent for a moment. He and Draco hadn’t really talked like this before. It felt comfortable. He knew he was learning things that most people didn’t get to know. He wondered why Draco was opening up to him like this.

“You’ve been friends with Blaise for a long time, then?”

“Since I was young,” Draco replied, picking up his pen and doodling on a piece of paper. “He’s better than most people think.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, he’s not the slut he’s made out to be. Just because he hangs out with me doesn’t make him one,” Draco drawled coldly, as though angry at the people who thought that. “People also think he’s my bitch, which isn’t true. Blaise has plenty other friends and other options when it comes to sex. I mean, have you seen him?”

Harry was staring at Draco as he talked. He’d never heard him talk about anyone like that, like he actually cared. This gave Harry a spark of hope. Perhaps it was possible that Draco cared for him.

Draco caught him staring and gave him a quizzical look. “What?”

“Nothing,” Harry said quickly, jerking back. “Why doesn’t he date anyone, then?” He wanted to keep the subject to lighter matters and Blaise was safe at this point. He also wanted to learn more about what Draco thought.

“Look around, Potter, how many people at this school are good enough for him? He had a boyfriend for a while, but the guy was a bastard.”

Harry was surprised to hear Draco talking like that, so disdainfully about someone a friend had dated.

“But you date guys here,” he said slowly.

“Correction, Potter, I don’t date them, I fuck them. There’s a big difference. Blaise just wants more than I do.”

Harry felt slightly deflated at Draco’s statement. “So you’ve never had a real relationship?”

“I tried a few times,” Draco said, shrugging noncommittally. “But, I don’t know, they just get boring after a while.”

“Oh,” Harry said quietly.

He could feel Draco’s gaze on him and so changed the subject. “We should… get back to work.”

He glanced at Draco, only to see that he was receiving a suspicious look. He looked away and grabbed a book, settling down to read. After a few moments, he saw Draco, out of the corner of his eye, grab a book and open it.

**

“Lend a girl a smoke?”

Draco looked over and gave Eva an appraising look as she sauntered through his room and to the balcony.

“You shouldn’t smoke. It’s bad for you.”

“Look who’s talking,” she scoffed, reaching out and grabbing Draco’s pack of cigarettes from his hand. She took one out and waited for Draco to light it for her.

“So Blaise tells me you wanted to kill me?” she asked conversationally, settling down in the low chair and throwing her legs up to rest on the balcony railing.

Draco sighed and turned his back to the railing, leaning against it and taking a slow drag of his cigarette. “I’m not sure yet.”

Eva raised an eyebrow. “You’re not sure yet? What, pray tell, does that mean?”

“You remember that brilliant suggestion you had of giving Potter what he wanted?”

Eva smirked. “Yes.”

“I think it’s backfired.”

“How so?”

Draco took another drag of the cigarette then tapped the end, watching the ash flutter to the ground, almost touching it before being swept away by a light breeze. He looked back at Eva, who was lounging comfortably in the low chair, her skirt barely reaching her thighs.

“All it’s done is made him happier.”

“Uh huh…” Eva said slowly, watching him carefully. “And you don’t want him to be happy?”

“No,” Draco said, exasperated. She wasn’t getting it. “He’s not supposed to be liking this. He’s not supposed to stay. He’s supposed to get tired of my inordinate demands! He’s supposed to quit! But he’s not doing any of that.”

Eva was silent for a moment. She took a slow drag of her cigarette. “What have you made him do?”

“Sex in a public place, sex in school, sex on his favorite teacher’s desk, new clothes, an eyebrow piercing...” Draco ticked them off on his fingers, then took another drag of the cigarette.

“A piercing?” Eva asked interestedly. “How does that look?”

“Fucking amazing,” Draco said, “but that’s not the point.” He sighed and stared at the cigarette between his fingers. “What the hell am I supposed to do? If I had gone with my original plan, none of this would have happened. I blame you.”

Eva just laughed and stood up from the chair, tossing her cigarette over the edge of the balcony and into the pond below. “It’s not my fault you’re falling for him.”

Draco stopped with his cigarette halfway to his mouth. His expression was disbelieving. “How the hell could I fall for him? I barely know him. He’s just a good fuck.”

“Okay,” she amended, “so maybe not love, but you can’t deny he isn’t having an effect.”

“He is not,” Draco replied stubbornly.

Eva raised an eyebrow and fixed him with a look. “Just admit it and save yourself the trouble. It’s nothing to be ashamed of, you know. Lots of normal people have real relationships. It’s not that uncommon.”

Draco merely scowled. This wasn’t exactly what he’d wanted to hear. “You’re not much of a help, you know that?” he asked snidely.

Eva just smirked at him. “I know.”

He rolled his eyes, taking a last drag of his cigarette before crushing it in the ashtray. His parents had finally accepted the fact that he wasn’t going to quit smoking, so instead of ignoring it, his mother had sneaked into his room with an ashtray. Her reasoning was that at least this way, he would stop killing the fish in the pond below his balcony. It sort of worked.

“Well, I have some work to do,” Draco said coldly, not at all pleased at the outcome of this meeting.

Eva followed him through his room, but before she left, she turned, smirking. “So, Draco, after all the fucking, how do you feel? Do you want him to stay? Or can you not wait to get to your next fuck?”

Draco scowled and opened the door, pushing her out it. He heard her laugh as he shut the door behind her, then went back to the balcony for another cigarette.


~~**~~

A/N: My Christmas present to you all, an update of everything! Please review!