Not Your Usual Love Story

DISCLAIMER: I do not own anything from the Potter canon. Any OCs are mine, as is the story portrayed herein. Anything copyrighted to the name of JK Rowling or and of her publishers have simply been borrowed. I make no money from this story or any of my others.


It didn’t take Harry long to choose a sumptuous but plain black fabric for his day robes and a stunning thick green silk for his dress robes. He had both sets lined with a silvery fabric which rippled as it moved through his hands. He paid the assistant what he saw as a ridiculous amount of money and set off.

Harry’s next stop was at Flourish and Blotts, to collect the books he had ordered via their owl ordering system earlier in the summer. After a brief conversation with the shop assistant about the content of the two tomes he now had tucked under his arm, Harry moved on.

Looking in his wallet, he decided a quick trip to Gringotts was going to be necessary. He ran into Ron and Hermione outside the Goblin bank, but didn’t stop to chat for long, he had a date, no, not date, meeting with an old companion to get to. He managed to neatly avoid their probing questions about the exact nature or subject of this ‘urgent meeting’.

Harry had never been particularly keen on the Gringott’s carts, and today was no exception. He had almost been violently sick a fairly large number of times and was now feeling rather unsteady on his feet. He decided to go over to the Leaky Cauldron early so that he could have a drink and prepare to see Draco again. He figured he probably needed the Dutch courage. This was destined to be quite an ‘interesting’ encounter.

Sitting in the corner, Harry opened one of the books he had picked up earlier from Flourish and Blotts and began to flick through the pages. Tom came over and Harry ordered two pints of a muggle beer he had grown rather fond of over the summer. After a couple of sips from the neck of the dark glass bottle, Harry found it increasingly hard to concentrate on the book he was trying to read – ‘Magical curses and their alterations for daily use.’ It was one of the tomes which had been written after he had vanquished the Dark Lord with his own personal version of Avada Kedavra.

He suddenly felt eyes boring into him, and lifted his head from the book. He felt a jolt as his eyes met the silvery grey orbs of Draco Lucius Malfoy.

“Potter.” As earlier, Malfoy’s tones were infused with a strange kind of warmth that Harry was having a hard time placing.

“Malfoy.” Harry was equally as sweetly toned. He couldn’t help it, he smiled again.

“Do I have some kind of redeeming quality about me which makes you smile like a loon, Potter?” Harry bit his lip for a moment.

“No,” he replied quietly. “Everything to do with anything magical makes me smile right now.” He opened his jacket and showed Draco the t-shirt his friends had given him.

“Nice colour Potter,” smirked Draco. “Slytherin suits you.” He sat down opposite Harry, “This for me?” he asked, pointing at the fuller of the two bottles.

“Of course. All courtesy of the two thousand galleons reward from the ‘Prophet and the wage the Ministry pay me for doing not a lot in the Department of Defence.”

Now it was Draco’s turn to smile.

“My t-shirt is better than yours, Harry,” he said, pulling off his navy cashmere jumper. His t-shirt read “I’ve been hexed by the boy who vanquished the Dark Lord and all I got was this lousy T-Shirt.”

Harry, for a moment, thought that he was dreaming. How could this be Draco Lucius Malfoy – wearing that stupid shirt? However, he quickly realised that this was Draco all over. On the surface, he was all navy cashmere. Underneath, well, he was a black T-shirt adorned with a ridiculous slogan. After a moment’s stunned incredulity, Harry giggled. This, unsurprisingly, set Draco off.

It took Harry and Draco a good five minutes to stop laughing. Draco finally looked up, picked up his beer, and took a good long swig. Harry saw him, and did the same.

“What was that?” asked Harry, leaning back against his chair, and wobbling slightly as the front feet of his chair left the floor.

“Finally sharing a moment of comedy together rather than hating each other?” replied Draco affably.

“Maybe we waited too long.” Harry wondered to himself if he was overplaying his hand, laying too many cards on the dirty, sticky bar table, but he suddenly decided finding out what Draco thought of him was important.

“Maybe you’re right.” Draco was acquiescing to more than it sounded, and he knew it. What was forming between the pair was a hesitant kind of truce, and neither had a problem with it. Draco knew that trust between friends was one of the most important things you needed.

“Maybe I am.” Harry wasn’t sure what to say.

“Potter, can I ask you a question?” asked Draco.

“You just did, but sure. Go ahead.” Harry leaned back in his chair, this could be interesting.

“On the first day we met, why didn’t you tell me who you were?”

Harry felt himself colour once more. He had known that if he became closer to Draco, this would come out eventually. He didn’t want the young Malfoy to know how ignorant Harry had spent the first eleven years of his life.

“Don’t blush, Harry, spill!”

Harry bit his lip again. “I didn’t tell you because I didn’t know. And why are you calling me Harry all of a sudden?”

“Good work Potter, answering a question with a question and covering your embarrassment, subtle, but not subtle enough. I am a Malfoy after all,” jested the blonde.

“Well? Back to Potter again are we, Draco?” asked Harry.

“Seeing as we’ve known each other for the past six years, I think we can handle first names, maybe even more.”

Harry blushed darker than he had ever blushed before.

“Well, well, well, Harry. You learn something everyday. I was thinking of nicknames, but your filthy little Gryffindor mind obviously has other things to consider.” Draco was back to full on smirking now. He picked up his drink and drained it. “Another?”

“Make it two, save going to the bar again,” joked Harry. He couldn’t quite believe he had taken what Draco had said in such a literal way.

Harry sat for a moment, trying to figure some things out in his confused mind. He had known he was gay for two years, although he had never told anyone save the two boys he had been with. Both had been insignificant, and more importantly, muggle. It hadn’t meant anything to him, but it had sure as hell felt good. What Harry was having issues with was that Malfoy, no, Draco, was making him feel the same way. Was he, then, attracted to him? To this jokey, amusing, laughing, Malfoy? He was. Shit.

Draco returned to the table carrying four dark, slightly overflowing, bottles of beer.

“Two for you and two for me.” He pushed two across the table, and Harry took hold of one, not realising for a moment that Draco’s hand was still holding the neck of the bottle.

The frisson which went through Harry’s hand was almost electrifying. He made to pull his hand away, but felt his finger being very lightly caressed. He looked up, blushing bright red yet again, and met Draco’s silvery eyes.

“How obvious do I have to be Harry?” asked the blonde.

“More obvious than that.” Harry was teasing now, wanting to see what Draco would do.

Draco raised his hand from the bottle and ran the very tip of his finger down Harry’s scar. He paused for a moment, and then cupped Harry’s jaw in his hand.

“What now? You need more obvious?”

Harry could hardly speak with shock. Draco Malfoy was clearly, and in public, coming onto him.

“No. I need to go and meet Ron and Hermione.” The smirk on Harry’s face was a blatant copy of the trademark Malfoy smirk he had envied so many times in his life.
“See you on the train, Draco.” He stood and left the bar; heading for his room, where he knew Ron and Hermione would have left a note detailing what the Weasleys were doing for dinner.

Sure enough, there it was, shoved haphazardly under the door, with his name written across the front in Ron’s appalling handwriting.

Harry mate!
Dinner tonight in the Leaky Cauldron with my family, hooray! Spoke to the other guys, drinks first? Six for beer, seven thirty for dinner? Make sure you look nice, Ginny’ll be there, nudge nudge. Hope the ‘meeting’ went well mate,
See you later. H sends her love.
Ron

Harry smiled. His friend would never change. Why Ron hadn’t figured out Harry was gay was a mystery, but Harry didn’t want to be the one to tell him, not yet when he didn’t even have a boyfriend anyway. It would have been a waste of time.

Harry heard an insistent pecking at the window, a beautiful eagle owl. Shit, thought Harry, I recognise that owl. Sure enough, when he looked at the folded parchment, it bore the Malfoy seal in green wax, and ‘scar face’ in silver ink.

He opened it; sure he was going to get shouted at.

Harry. You seem to have me a little confused. I am a Malfoy, and what you do not do to a Malfoy is tease. So a taste of your own medicine. What could I do? Torture you and your buddies at your drinks party? At your ‘family’ dinner? Maybe now I’m an orphan I could join you. All the time with my hand on your thigh under the table. Prepare to suffer. I’m warning you.
Only joking. Draco x x


Harry decided as tonight was going to go this kind of way, he needed to wear some tighter trousers. Not only to make himself look more attractive, but to make it so that Draco had to work that much harder to get anywhere. Harry turned and surveyed himself in the mirror. Shit, as always, but nothing that couldn’t stay the way it was. He was changing for nobody.

Harry quickly changed into a pair of slim fit jeans and his new socks. He decided to leave the T-Shirt on, and pulled a black jacket on over the top. He looked again in the mirror. He took off his glasses. After the eye correction charm that Pomfrey had performed at the start of the war, his glasses were for show, and he wanted his eyes to look green and shiny tonight, unobstructed, not lost behind a layer of glass. To hell with it, thought Harry, and he folded the glasses, carefully placing them on the bedside table.

He ripped the bottom of Draco’s letter off, the empty parchment, and wrote

Draco, six in the bar, then. HJP.

Harry gave the letter to Hedwig and waved her out of the window. He checked the time, and seeing he was about five minutes late for drinks with his best mates, hurried downstairs.


Draco Malfoy stood in front of the mirror, listening to his breathing. He had sent the note to Harry on a complete whim, and after receiving such a terse reply, had begun to think he had made a huge mistake. He dressed swiftly, black trousers, black shirt, silver cloak. Draco was one of the only people he knew who liked wearing wizarding clothing over muggle clothes. It gave him an air of difference, and this was something he relished. As a last minute thought, Draco tied his favourite necklace around his alabaster throat. It was silver and emerald snake on a piece of fraying black cord. It struck him that the green of the snake’s eye was exactly the same green as that of Harry’s eyes. Draco caught himself just before he sighed. ‘For God’s sake, Malfoy. Get a grip’ screamed his subconscious.

Draco smoothed his platinum blonde hair into place with one hand and opened the door with the other. Time to wreak havoc on Potter and the clan, he said to himself, the trademark Malfoy smirk firmly fixed upon his face.

“HARRY!” All his friends stood to greet him as he joined their table in the corner of the bar at the Leaky Cauldron.

“How you doing mate? Get everything sorted out? Did you find Malfoy?” Neville was falling over himself to talk to Harry, a sure sign that the boy really and truly had missed his friend over the summer.

“Yes, thank you, Longbottom,” a cool, calm voice spoke from behind Harry. “Now we’ve fought a war, and you all know I’m not a Death Eater, how about I buy you all a drink and we get on for a while?” Malfoy was collected on the outside, terrified inside.

“I’m O.K. with it,” said Ron after a pause. “Harry? He’s your arch enemy, after all.”

“I vanquished my arch enemy. Malfoy was always just an…obstacle.” Harry smiled and moved up to let the blonde sit down.

Seamus pulled a pack of Exploding Snap from his pocket and no more was said of the stranger in their midst. Every so often either Harry or Draco would rise to buy another round of beers, being the richest around the table. A bitter sting to this was that it was only due to their being orphaned and thus collected a hefty inheritance at a young age.

The only thing which disrupted the game was the ever flowing conversation, not least between the Dark Lord vanquishing brunette and his platinum blonde companion. The sexual innuendo in their comments grew by the minute. It was only the violence of this particular packet of Exploding Snap cards (a possible side effect of them being played with in the Gryffindor common room so much) which diverted attention away from their flirting.

Half past seven came surprisingly quickly, and none of the boys wanted to get up. Harry the least, because after having Draco’s hand running slowly and tenderly up and down his thigh for an hour, he had what was possibly the biggest hard on of his life. As Harry went to stand, Draco’s hand moved to his crotch and squeezed. Harry gasped.

“Harry, mate, you alright?” enquired Ron.

Harry stayed seated, hunched over a little. “Yeah, sorry. Hit my knee on the table. Bloody hell… I’ll be along in a minute. Tell mum I’m coming.”

As Draco went to stand and leave, Harry grabbed his wrist. “Don’t even fucking think about it Malfoy,” he hissed.

Draco stayed seated, and once Harry was sure all the other boys had left the bar, he began to talk. However, Draco had other plans, and Harry didn’t get very far.

“What the hell is going on?” asked Harry.

“Whatever you want to be going on,” whispered Draco, face dangerously close to Harry’s.

“What about this?” asked Harry. He put his hand on Draco’s arm. Draco leant his forehead against Harry’s.

“One more inch and no going back, Harry.” Harry wasn’t sure if he was hearing Draco or simply feeling the words.

“No going back then.” Harry leant forwards half an inch.

Draco completed the gap and touched his lips against Harry’s in the tenderest kiss imaginable. Harry slipped an arm around Draco’s waist and deepened the kiss, still looking unwaveringly into Draco’s lust darkened silvery grey eyes.

A cough disturbed their moment. Ginny Weasley took one look at Harry and Draco and smiled broadly.

“Mum says you’re late, Harry. And Draco, would you like to come for dinner? And you two just won me six galleons.”


PLEASE REVIEW! This is my first story on AFF, so let me know how wonderful all you people on here are! (PS If you’re really nice, daily updates might be in order.) Leave an email address and you’ll know when I update.

Much Love, xxx Lily xxx

PS Love to and thanks to the best beta in the known universe, Tashasaphi. Her own fiction is superb.