History Repeats Itself

Authors Note: Many thanks to my beta Shannon

Chapter 7 Hindsight

The skies outside the castle matched my eyes, a deep overcast gray, but if you only paid attention to the magical sky in the Great Hall, you could pretend that it was a bright and sunny day, which was how I felt.

I’ve never been a particularly cheerful person, not even as a young child. I was never over exuberant, always calm and well mannered, I never even ran through the manor, not even once. It was something my mother always complimented me on.

But now, it was like I saw everything from a different light, I wanted to enjoy things; I wanted to discard my responsibilities and just spend every minute with Harry. It was so un-Slytherin, so un-Malfoy, yet it felt brilliant. Not that I would get my way, in fact since the night before the only thing I had seen of Harry was the back of his head, but that would change soon.

“So are you going to tell him?” Shannon asked beside me, pulling me from my wandering thoughts and my lingering gaze on a certain Gryffindor student.

“That you know?” I asked, and she nodded. “I should.”

“Do you think he’ll be mad?” she asked, poking at her lunch, which consisted of mashed potatoes and a meat pie that she looked very suspicious of.

I shrugged, taking a bite of my own meat pie. “I don’t see how he could be. I mean, you guessed before I really told you anything, and he’s already warned me that Granger is bound to find out soon enough.”

The though made me smile, and Shannon looked at me curiously. “What?”

“You’re more clever than Granger,” I announced with a self-satisfied grin.

“So,” Shannon scoffed. “She’s in Gryffindor, not Ravenclaw. No huge feat there.”

“Oh, but it is. She’s been hailed as the cleverest witch of her age,” I told her, suddenly thrilled that my friend was better than Potter’s. I had to be able to beat him at something after all.

“Well then, Yay Me,” she replied without the amount of enthusiasm it deserved, but I let it go.

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On our way from lunch I bumped into Harry roughly and slipped a bit of parchment in his pocket with a note to meet me after Transfigurations in the Room of Requirement. It would be amusing to see what popped up inside when we both wanted access.

“Watch it, ferret,” Harry spat, glaring at me in a way that anyone else would take as fury, but only I knew it meant so much more than that.

“You watch it, scarhead,” I shot back with my trademark sneer and slipped away with Shannon, who mumbled something about silly boys and I pretended to ignore her.

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I brought Shannon with me after Transfigurations and though she was reluctant to accompany me on my rendezvous with Potter, but I convinced her it would be better if she were there when I told Harry about her knowing.

I paced in front of the doorway three times chanting ‘I need Harry’ and the door appeared out of thin air, much to Shannon’s delight.

The room was all white, from the marble floors to the expansive cathedral ceilings, including the furniture, which was ornate and French in design.

“A bed?” Shannon chuckled beside me, and Harry turned around at the sound of her voice.

He had been lounging on a chaise in front of the fireplace, one leg thrown haphazardly over the arm, but now was suddenly on guard, wand drawn but not raised. “Tell me you didn’t set me up,” he demanded, looking hurt and furious.

“I would never,” I told him honestly.

“Then what is she doing here?” he asked defensively, pointing at Shannon.

“Remember how you told me that your friend was going to figure out that we’re together?” I asked him.

“Yes,” he replied slowly.

“Well my friend figured it out first,” I boasted to a unison of rolled eyes from both Shannon and Harry.

“So you know?” he asked Shannon directly, who nodded and went to lean against the bed.

“I confronted him over it last night, wanting to know if he was going to ask you to the upcoming dance,” she informed him.

“And I assume he told you that no one can know?” Harry asked impatiently.

Shannon nodded and folded he arms across her chest. “I’ll keep Draco’s secret,” she huffed. “I would have even kept yours if you weren’t such a prat,” she added.

I snickered and Harry winced at the comment. “I’m sorry I snubbed you yesterday,” Harry said at last. “I was jealous and out of line.”

“Jealous of me?” she asked incredulously, laughter threatening to bubble through her lips.

Harry nodded and ran a hand through his already unruly hair. “Yeah, it sounds ridiculous now, but I was. Sorry,” he offered again.

Shannon looked over at me, and must have seen how badly I wanted them to get along, because she extended her hand for Harry to shake, and this time Harry took it without hesitation and with that crooked grin I loved to see on his handsome face.

“So I guess I’ll be keeping your secret now, too,” she said at last.

“It really is the same secret,” I told her, not understanding what she meant.

“Yes and no,” she replied, her eyes still on Harry.

“You seem too nice to be in Slytherin,” Harry noted curiously.

Shannon laughed and let his hand drop. “Slytherin is in my blood, but blood doesn’t have to dictate how you treat others.”

“I like her,” Harry told me, and I smiled.

“Yeah. I think I’ll keep her,” I responded with a gentle nudge to Shannon’s ribs.

After all the heartwarming gooeyness I just wanted to snog Harry senseless, and my astute friend Shannon must have picked up on that fact because she squeezed my hand and smiled. “I’m going to leave you two alone, when you get back you have to help me write that letter to Jean Claude,” she ordered.

I nodded and grinned. “Of course. We’ll have him kissing your feet.”

She rolled her eyes and headed for the door. “I just want him to come to the dance. We’ll worry about feet kissing later.”

Harry laughed and as soon as the door shut, he was pulling me into a searing kiss.

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Harry and I lounged happily in the room of requirement, each of us basking in post coital bliss. Harry’s fingers whispered across my bare back and I smiled over at him. It had been two weeks since Shannon’s revelation and we hadn’t yet had sex, not really, but we often found time to sneak away for an hour or so and pleasure each other in other ways.

It made me wonder sometimes what we were waiting for, not that I wanted to rush things. I was scared; terrified in fact, to take it to the next level, and I was curious if Harry felt the same.

Otherwise I had no complaints. Harry was perfection, and we had found an easy balance between spending time together and avoidance of any topics regarding the war. I felt like I was his escape from all that, and maybe I was.

He would sometimes ask me about my family, and I would tell him mostly about my childhood and then he would tell me about his. We did homework together, we spent the nights together sometimes and we found it easier than anticipated to keep it all a secret.

Harry flipped me over and began placing searing kisses along my neck and chest, reaching down to rub his fingertips over my prick, easing it back into its more lively state. “Already?” I teased, savoring the feel of his hand.

“I can never seem to get enough of you,” he purred.

“You know, you’re so good at all of this that I’m beginning to wonder if you didn’t have practice,” I muttered with a smile.

Harry’s entire face paled except for his cheeks, which turned a vivid pink. My eyes went wide and I scrambled across the bed, putting space between us. “It was nothing serious,” he assured, as if that fact would make it any better. “It was just experiments and it was way before I knew you liked me.”

“Who?” I demanded. Was there more than one? Did he have feelings for any of them? Had they gone farther then Harry and I? I needed to know.

“Seamus and Neville,” Harry admitted at once.

I wanted to puke. “Longbottom? He’s barely even a wizard!” I shouted.

Harry’s face went from an embarrassed shade of red to a very angry hue instead. “Listen, I don’t talk about your friends, I even apologized to Shannon, you should show me the same respect.”

Rushing to get dressed I shot him a dirty look. “Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked, ignoring his demand to be nice to his friends.

“It’s not like you’ve disclosed your sexual past, Draco,” Harry huffed, making no move to cover himself, which was braver than I felt at the moment. Even with trousers on I felt exposed under his heavy green gaze. I wouldn’t have been able to fight with him in the nude; I would have felt far too vulnerable.

“That’s because I don’t have one,” I bit out grudgingly.

“Nonsense,” Harry replied, rolling his eyes.

I turned around, letting his penetrating stare fall on my back instead. I couldn’t look at him. I was angry that he had kept things from me, but at the moment I was far angrier with myself for having no experience to counter his own. Was that why we hadn’t gone further? Could he tell my lack of experience and knew I’d be a terrible lay?

“I’ve never gone past a fleeting kiss with Pansy in second year,” I admitted.

“Nothing?” Harry asked incredulously. “That’s hard to believe, Draco.”

“Why? Because, I seem like such a whore?” I spat, still not looking at him.

“No,” he replied with a sigh. “Because this has been so easy,”

“What?” I asked, whirling around to see his dejected face. “What part of this has been easy?”

Harry sighed again and leveled the full weight of his brilliant emerald eyes on mine. “I just mean you haven’t seemed to change your mind even once. The entire time we’ve been together you seem to take it as a given that you’re gay, I just assumed someone had taught you that fact the same way I learned,” he replied with a shrug.

“And how did you learn?” I asked, not really sure if I wanted to know the answer.

“Over a bottle of firewhiskey in the boy’s dorm one night,” Harry confessed. “I mean, I always knew I was attracted to other men, well, attracted to you anyway, but I was also attracted to women. Cho for instance,” he added. “How did you find out then, if not through trial and error?”

I couldn’t very well tell him about my time travel experience as the trigger, but before that I hadn’t given it thought either way really. I had known I wasn’t particularly attracted to any of the girls at school, but I had decided that was simply because they were all inferior in some way. “You,” I finally whispered. “I didn’t know until you.”

Which was mostly the truth.

“Really?” Harry asked, gaping slightly.

“Why is that so difficult to comprehend?” I asked, folding my arms across my chest, and glaring at him incredulously.

Harry crawled closer, sidling up next to where I was standing at the edge of the bed. “You’re just so delectable I can’t believe no one grabbed you up before me, even if it was just a fling.”

I rolled my eyes, but couldn’t completely contain my smile. Flattery really will get you everywhere with me. “No one else is good enough,” I informed him, and he smiled, leaning in as if to kiss me, but instead he just whispered against my lips.

“Can I be forgiven for indulging in my confusion? Not everyone can be as sure minded as you,” he added.

“I’m not,” I admitted. “I have no idea what I’m doing half the time, and the other half I spend wondering why I’ve changed so thoroughly since I met you.”

“Maybe this is just who you were always supposed to be,” Harry offered, a knowing look in his eye.

I would have been thrilled to think that there was a destiny or prophecy written about some transcendent love that we would share, but the fact was, I never really believed in any of that, not really. “Maybe you’re just contagious,” I countered and he laughed lightly and nodded.

“If that’s what you prefer, I can live with it,” he teased and I let him kiss me, his lips a soft reminder that I was quickly falling in love with the Gryffindor hero, the one who was supposed to save us all. But I didn’t want to share, so maybe I’d only let him save me.

“I love you,” Harry murmured before blushing deeply and looking deep into my eyes.

I’m sure if I could have seen me, my eyes would have been round silver saucers at his proclamation, and though I was thinking something very similar in the same moment, my mouth couldn’t seem to find the words to reciprocate. “I-“ I began, but nothing of substance slipped out.

Harry sighed and sat back on his heels, waiting for me to say something, anything.

“I have to go,” I blurted, and grabbed my robe, throwing it on and quickly escaping the room, escaping Harry’s broken smile and the sadness emanating from his eyes.

I ran all the way down to the dungeons before stopping and leaning against the wall. Unshed tears burned in my eyes, but I blinked them away. I didn’t deserve to cry, I didn’t deserve to be sad at all when it was me that ran away.

I turned to go back, almost running all the way up to the seventh floor once again, but I knew he wouldn’t have stayed, probably going back to his own common room. I would have left right away if it were me, and rightly so.

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As soon as I walked into the Great Hall for dinner, I scanned the Gryffindor table for Harry, but he didn’t show up at dinner that night. Shannon had been reluctantly putting up with my bad mood since I got back from the room of requirement and had thankfully not pressed me to know why she had to do so. I could have beaten my own face in for running out on Harry like I did, but it was done, and now all I could manage to do is wallow in self-pity.

Yet again I was stabbing at my meal and Shannon must have finally had enough, because she shot me the most scathing look and jerked me by my elbow and led me quickly from the Great Hall.

“What did you do?” she demanded as soon as we were in the empty common room.

“Why do you assume it was something I did?” I asked, already on the offensive. Sure it was something I did, but why did everyone have to take Harry’s side all the time?

“Because I know you, Draco Malfoy, and you’ve been looking guilty all evening,” she told me. “So spill.”

I crinkled my nose at her words, and sagged into our favorite sofa. “He told me he loved me,” I told her, sighing and waiting for her reaction.

“Ah. I see. What did you say? Obviously not something good,” she reasoned accurately.

“I left,” I informed her, not able to meet her gaze.

A sharp stinging hex landed square on my shoulder and made me wince and scowl at her. “Hey!” I shouted, to no avail.

“You deserve much worse,” she told me. “You never, ever just run out on someone when they confess something like that. You could have just told him that you needed more time to get to that point,” she chastised.

“But I do love him,” I confessed.

Another stinging hex hit me in the leg and I jumped up from the couch, trying to put more space between us.

“Then that just makes you more of an arse. Why couldn’t you just tell him that?” she shouted.

“I don’t know!” I shouted back, feeling ridiculous for fighting with my boyfriend and my best friend over the same thing.

“So then you’ll just apologize tomorrow and tell him you love him with all your icy cold heart and everything will be fine,” she instructed.

“My icy cold heart?” I asked with a raised eyebrow and amusement written clearly on my face.

“Yes. I can’t believe you, walking out that way,” she huffed.

“He took me off guard! I didn’t know what to say,” I amended.

“Just promise you’ll fix it tomorrow,” she ordered.

“I promise, so long as he’ll talk to me, I’ll tell him I love him and fix everything tomorrow,” I promised, and I would, because I hated hurting Harry and I hated being without him.

“Boys,” she muttered to herself, rolling her eyes.

“Are you sure you’re not deflecting?” I asked suddenly. “How did Jean Claude reply to your invitation?”

“This isn’t about me,” she replied defensively.

“How did he reply?” I repeated more firmly.

“He didn’t,” she huffed. “Happy now?”

“Of course I’m not happy, stop being ridiculous,” I chastised. “Would you like me to hex his face off?” I asked.

“Would you?” she replied, batting her eyelashes with a very damsel in distress look on her face.

“Anything for you,” I offered and pulled her into a hug. “Is he bigger than me?” I asked as an afterthought.

She just laughed and pulled away, taking her spot on the sofa and pulling our books out. “Homework.”

“I’d rather face Potter,” I moaned, but she rolled her eyes and passed me my Care for Magical Creatures book anyhow. Although I didn’t get much studying in, it gave me plenty of time to think of how I would approach Harry the next day.

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The following morning I had my apology being chanted as a mantra in my mind as I went down to breakfast. “I’m sorry, Harry. I do love you, I was just afraid,” I whispered to myself on the way to my seat in the Great Hall. He would certainly see how much those words cost me, and hopefully forgive me instantly---or at least with minimal groveling. A Malfoy rarely gets on his knees for anyone, but for Harry I would make an exception, I mean technically I had already.

Harry was there, but wouldn’t look up at me as I walked passed. He looked like he hadn’t slept at all and that theory made me feel even worse for running out on him the day before than I already felt. Shannon squeezed my arm in encouragement and I smiled at her, taking my seat at the Great Hall and trying to catch Harry’s eye to let him know that I wanted to talk.

I took a single bite of my blueberry muffin and it was the last thing I remembered doing before I saw it.

By it I meant my father’s pristine and well-trained eagle owl, Cygnus. It landed gracefully on the basket of fruit in front of me and Shannon attempted to pet the bird as I stared dumbly at it, but it evaded her hand each time.

Did my father find out about Potter and I, or were these just simple directions as to how I was supposed to spend the Christmas holiday, which was right around the corner?

“You’ll never know if you don’t open it,” Shannon told me, as if reading the concern on my face. “It’s not a howler anyhow,” she offered, not realizing that my father would never send me a howler. Unlike the Weasley’s, the Malfoy family kept their dirty laundry inside their tight knit family, not shouted about in the middle of the Great Hall.

I reluctantly removed the scroll and Cygnus flew away in the same instant, so I knew it was a direction of some sort, and not something that required an immediate response, not that this particular bit of information was even remotely helpful

“Would you like me to read it first?” she offered.

I gave her a weak smile, but shook my head, cracking the seal and feeling the identification magic waft over me.

After taking a deep breath. I unrolled the scroll and read it’s looping script once, and then twice more, not able to believe it.

“I should have paid attention, I should have learned from their mistakes, not made the same ones,” I muttered painfully, thinking of Orion and Edward.

“What does it say,” Shannon prodded.

I just shook my head and handed her the scroll, unable to say out loud the tragedy that was written upon it.

She scanned it quickly and frowned. “Oh Draco,” she sighed suddenly. “I’m so sorry.”

I nodded, feeling the knot in my chest tighten as my apology to Harry slipped away. What was I supposed to say now? ‘I love you, Harry, but I have to marry Astoria Greengrass in eight months time’ didn’t really seem to be a proper apology.

“I had known it was coming, I hadn’t thought about it for weeks now, but I knew this letter would be arriving this year and deep down I knew this thing with Harry could only be temporary. I don’t know why I let myself get so involved,” I berated myself.

“Draco, you’re in love, you can’t control these things,” she assured me. “Certainly your father would under-“ she began but I cut her off with a scowl and she rolled her eyes. “Okay, so he wouldn’t understand, but you’re an adult now Draco, you don’t have to listen to him.”

“What would you do if it were you? Your parents are both pureblood Slytherin’s, surely you’re going to have an arranged marriage of your own?” I asked her.

She shrugged lightly. “They’ll arrange it if I haven’t chosen someone of my own by twenty-one.”

“And what if you fall for someone they wouldn’t accept?” I pressed.

“Then I would have a difficult decision to make, as do you right now, but the pressures of a pureblood girl are different than those of a pureblood heir, especially when you’re an only child,” she conceded. “My parents have a boy to carry out their name, so they put much less scrutiny on me and whom I date. In fact, that’s the reason he was sent to Durmstrang, so that he wouldn’t even be tempted.”

“Why wouldn’t he be tempted there?” I asked, curiously.

“Most of the students are boys, and the few girls that do attend are…” her voice trailed off as she shuddered and grimaced, causing me to smile in spite of the awful letter.

“So what are you going to do?” she asked, breaking through my distraction.

That was the two thousand galleon question.

Do I make amends with Harry only to break his heart again in a few months, or do I just let him go now and save him the additional pain? I hated myself for falling into the same trap that Orion had, and even seeing first hand how badly it hurt to lose Harry, I still went for it. I still tried to create a loving relationship where there should have only existed bitter hatred.

I must be some sort of masochist, or at least England’s most dense Slytherin.

“The only thing I can do,” I told her. “I have to end things with Potter once and for all, which shouldn’t be too difficult because he already hates me from yesterday.”

I ignored her narrowed eyes and took another bite of my muffin as I ran through a new mantra in my head. “I don’t love you, Harry, and I never will,” I lied to even myself as I whispered the new line I would give to Harry, the words that might break him today, but will be better for him to hear in the long run.

Authors Note:Because of the move I'm falling slightly behind with my writing. I have no other chapters written after this, but so far the poll has this as one of the favorites right now, so I'll be focusing on trying to catch it up next week. The poll will be open on my yahoo group until Tuesday if anyone else would like to join and vote.