golden longings

XII

*****
Back in the dorm Draco heard Potter walk in behind him, whining some complaint. But he didn't turn around to look at Potter. He just went straight to his bed, climbed in through the hole in his curtains that he had left open when he left, and closed the curtains.
All without a single look at the bed across from him to see if the other boy was doing the same.

When he laid down, his whole body relaxed. Only then Draco realized how tense he must have been.
He figured that it probably was because he'd been talking to Potter so much. They had more conversations that day than possibly in all the years since they first met.
It irritated Draco how well they got along. Not a lot of people go from being arch enemies to snogging to having late night conversations in the halls.

He shoved those thoughts aside, deciding to settle with calling it a one-time-occurance. He'd just leave it and treat Potter as always. Just maybe a bit better, for the sake of the possibility of redeeming himself in the wizarding world. He still wanted to be a part of it, not feel out if place at every public location.
That still didn't make the saviour any less of a brat tho.

It was as if he felt relief by thinking of Potter as a brat. He was glad he still thought so. No nightly encounter in the hall would change that, he was hoping.
He repeated the term 'brat' in his mind as many times as he could while thinking of Potter. He'd have to burn the connection between the two into his mind permanently. Just like he had done during the war with the word 'enemy' while he imagined Potter.

Before, it had been for the sake of his own safety, as well as his family's. Thinking of Potter as the enemy had been crucial with the chance of the dark Lord raiding his mind at all times. Draco was just hoping that it would work just as well another time. Even if no one's life was depending on it.
It was a silent hope, like a quiet wish to the ghosts of all wizards that had ever lived. Because he knew that if he stopped thinking of Potter as his arch nemesis and a brat, he'd have lost control.
And Draco liked being in control.

That was the reason it annoyed him so much, that he had no control over certain parts of himself. The fact that there were things out there he couldn't control was scary, the fact that there were things about his own person that he couldn't control, even scarier.

It was rare that Draco admitted it, but he felt jealousy towards the people, that just lived with themselves.
Pansy was one of them. He admired, yet desired her ability to love with herself and her desires just as they were. If she wanted to get intimate with someone, she did. No matter who it was.
Draco wished dearly to be able to do the same and also damned himself for wishing so. Of course he felt the same things, but he didn't act on those feelings or wishes.

While Draco had managed to lock away his ability to feel for people as good as humanly possible, it was impossible to lock up his natural desires just as well. Even if he tried to conceal it, he felt drawn towards certain people once in a while. Or just drawn to simple acts of intimacy. And those desired scared him. Probably more than anything else, even more than professor McGonagall.

In an instant, his anxiously serious thoughts drifted off, became more and more abstract, until they were just a uncontrollable twirl of words and images in his mind that sucked him into a deep sleep, full of restless dreams

*****

A few hours later, Draco hesitantly blinked his eyes open. His sight was met by a soft morning light.
He already felt full awake and not at all tired, even if he didn't feel well-rested, either.
Still, he was awake, which was good enough for him.

His tongue slid over his dry lips and he immediately felt the need to put balm on them. Hydrating his lips was one of the few habits of self-care that Draco had stuck with after the war.
His formerly so extensive routine had shrunk to the bare minimum of care for his appearance. Which was, as Draco had had to notice one again, still a lot more than what the other boy's in his year did in term of hygiene.
Some of them, and it was no coincidence that he thought of Michael Corner right away, barley even washed their faces. He was sure of that.