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It’s a surprisingly easy fix, in the end. The Time Turner isn’t broken, after all, just a smidge out of alignment. You see? the Unspeakable murmurs, one eye closed as she holds it up between them, so that the winking Lumos-light picks up the runes scored along its edge. Just here. The metal’s warped. Her other hand’s still casting distractedly over and over in Draco’s direction, the air between them filled with unsettling little crackles, unseen fingers tugging at the hem of his shirt.
His presence has drawn a crowd down in Mysteries. There must be a dozen or more of them gathered round the examination plinth now, their faces blurred into anonymity, a growing hum of indecipherable speech echoing off the walls.
“Well,” Draco says loudly, directing his voice down towards the empty cloaks, without looking at the Time Turner. “I must say, this is all rather tiresome. I must have brought the blasted thing down here, I don’t know–” He forces a smile, blinking past the flashes of coloured light, “–ten times in the past three months? At least ten times.”
The Unspeakable pauses in her movements, though her quill keeps on scratching away, the parchment scroll unfurling and unfurling in the air beside them. She looks at Draco, and smiles – placid, but deliberate, with that face that’s not her own – and then she resumes casting, and Draco knows there’ll be no more discussion.
When she’s finished, and the calibration checked, she suggests a debrief. The crowd are hungry for it, of course, and for a few moments it doesn’t seem so much a question as a command. But Draco’s skin’s crawling from the residue of a hundred different detection charms, the air in the room thick with it, gritty. What he needs now is a shower, and a think, and not to spend the last of eighty-seven identically beautiful sunsets being interrogated in an underground chamber, so he declines the debrief and offers to return tomorrow morning instead.
Tomorrow morning. What a strange thought.
“And I’ll have these back now, thank you,” he tells the Unspeakable, grabbing his license from beneath the curled up pile of notes. The Time Turner is cool, sparkling serenely when she presses it into his waiting palm. He tucks it back in place, a comforting weight in his breast pocket.
***
When Draco wakes, it’s to unfamiliar birdsong from outside, an unfamiliar breeze licking at the curtains, throwing unfamiliar shadows across his bedroom wall, and he finds himself smiling before he even remembers why. He turns the Wireless on anyway, just to be sure, and sends Hermes out for eggs, since the carton’s finally empty. The Floo blazes high, spitting out a brand-new Prophet, and Draco – busy rearranging the contents of his cupboard – feels a little anticipatory thrill, a nervous sort of swoop in his stomach as he watches the bacon brown and curl in the pan.
Back at the Ministry, exactly five minutes past nine, Draco bumps into Potter. He’s deep in thought, trudging down the blue-flecked carpet in the direction of the DMLE, expression vacant and Monday-morning sleep-hazy. Draco’s steps falter at the sight of him, which jolts Potter out of his reverie, his eyes widening, growing bright and sharp as they land on Draco.
The news must be all around the Ministry by now.
“D’you know, Malfoy” Potter says slowly, in lieu of hello, or how are you, or indeed anything a normal person might say. “I’ve never met anyone who’s been stuck in a time loop.”
Draco smiles. “Well, now you have,” he says, pulse coming loud in his ears. “Met someone, I mean. Who was stuck.” He spreads his hands wide. “Hi.”
“Hi,” Potter returns, an edge of uncertainty to his voice. He moves towards Draco, the warm weight of his gaze trapping Draco in place. It’s strange, more dream-like than the time loop. If Potter reached out and touched him, would Draco wake up in his own bed again?
“What was it like?” Potter asks. “It must have been hard.”
Draco swallows. For the first time in eighty-seven days, of course, he won’t get a second chance at this. Nor a third, nor a—
Focus, he tells himself.
“Sort of,” he says, lightly. “I found ways to keep going. Set myself certain… objectives. So I wouldn’t lose hope.”
“Really?” says Potter, wonderfully eager. “What objectives?”
Inexplicably, Draco finds himself unprepared for this line of questioning. “Well,” he says, “I did a lot of reading.”
Potter looks dubious, shoving his hands into the pockets of his robes. “Reading?”
“About time loops, obviously,” says Draco casually, then leans back against the wall. “Trying to get out. I was lucky, you know, in the end. Mordred the Misplaced was trapped for fifty-four years in a winter storm, and by the time someone undid the spell that was keeping him there, he’d gone quite insane. Three months is nothing, really.”
“I suppose,” says Potter. He steps closer again, eyes flickering curiously over Draco, lingering first on the Mark, then on the treacherous pinkness spreading over Draco’s collarbones. It’s not Draco’s fault; he’s wanted him for so very long, after all. “And what about you?” Potter asks. “Did you go insane?”
Draco blinks, unsteadied. “No,” he says, and laughs, which feels strange in his mouth after such a long time. “I – I don’t think so, anyway.”
A door slams, sparing him. “Morning brief, Potter! Get your arse in here!” calls a sharp voice, and Potter rolls his eyes but turns away, so Draco can exhale again.
“Hey, Potter,” he says quickly, so the words make it out before his nerve fails him. “I can tell you more about it, if you like?”
***
“You’re kidding,” says Potter, fork halfway to his mouth. “And you still used it?”
“I knew he’d sat on it,” Draco says, delighting in Potter’s focus, the amused glint of his eyes. “I didn’t realise it was bent.”
“Come on.”
“I honestly couldn’t tell! I only intended to go back half an hour, re-do a report I’d fucked up. How was I to know that McLaggen’s fat arse would end up costing me three months of my life?”
Potter laughs, mouth stretched wide around his double chicken burger. “Great choice, by the way,” he says. “Bloody love Nando’s.”
“Me too,” Draco agrees, taking a delicate bite of his fino pitta, tears stinging his eyes. He’s been back at the office for two days now; has spent most of them staring vacantly at the calendar above his desk, reminding his idiot colleagues that he didn’t see them last week, and trying to pretend he gives a shit about economic projections when just a few days ago long-term forecast had meant his dinner plans for that evening.
“Does it work like that, though?” Potter continues thoughtfully, licking the juice from his lips. “Did you actually lose three months? I mean, did you carry on ageing inside the time loop?”
Draco has no idea. “Is that a dig, Potter?”
“Well now you mention it, I do think your hairline might be receding.”
“Sod off,” says Draco. “Don’t you know I’ve been through a terrible trauma?”
“Of course,” says Potter, tilting his head in mock-sympathy. “Is that why?”
“Everything okay with the food?” asks the waitress brightly. “You need anything, or–?”
“Mmm,” says Draco, still working his way through the spicy rice. “Some more sauce, maybe?” He glances over at Potter. “Hot, I think?” Potter nods gratefully. “Hot, yes. Thanks.”
Draco takes a long, cooling, swig of water as he watches her walk away. Potter’s eyes are on him, he can feel them, can sense the way his body’s angled towards Draco, as though he’s interested. It’s going well, thinks Draco, suddenly giddy. You’re not going to fuck it up.
“Well, Malfoy. This has been… surprisingly alright,” Potter says, as though he’s reading Draco’s thoughts.
“Oh, cheers,” Draco says, really hoping he isn’t.
“I did think it might be a bit awkward,” Potter continues. “I don’t want to seem like I’m prying. I know you’ve spent most of the week down in Mysteries rehashing things, and I know we’re not exactly friends – I was just interested, that’s all.”
“Oh no,” says Draco, dabbing carefully at his tingling lips, “please. Lunch was my idea, remember? Honestly, it’s still a novelty to have a decent conversation, especially one that I know we’ll both still remember in the morning.”
“Right,” says Potter, nodding in a sympathetic sort of way, preoccupied with drowning his chips in an obscene amount of hot sauce. “Of course. Was it – was it very lonely, then?”
“Mostly,” says Draco, which is true. “I think the nights were the worst. Closing my eyes, knowing that when I opened them I’d have to do it all again. I thought staying up might work; even tried a Wakefulness potion, but it was all pointless.” He sighs. “I don’t – I don’t sleep well at the best of times.”
“Nightmares?”
“Of course,” says Draco. “Ever since that year, living with him. My bedroom was always safe, my mother made sure of that. Sometimes she’d come in and sleep with me, even, and that helped. But outside–” He pauses, swallowing hard. Potter’s watching him, eyes wide with sympathy. The truth’s a bitch, Draco thinks. Necessary, but a bitch. “I guess that whole thing really fucked me up. Oh, sorry,” he adds, to the mother who looks over disapprovingly from the next table. Potter snorts, trying and failing to hide a smile behind his half-drunk glass of Coke.
“It’s worse when I’m on my own,” Draco continues, ignoring him. “It’s like I can never relax.”
“I know exactly what you mean,” says Potter, turning his hand to inspect it, then licking a stray drop of hot sauce off the back. Draco wolfs down the rest of his pitta, hoping that Potter might attribute his flushed face to the food.
“Anyway, I’ve, er, been thinking of getting a pet,” Draco says, when he’s calmed himself down. “Something to keep me company.”
“Really?” asks Potter, delighted. “That’s a great idea, Malfoy. I’ve got a Crup, myself.” He fishes around in his pocket for his mobile, then “Dexter, he’s called. I got him right after the war, and he’s just amazing. Always seems to understand me too – you know, people say they don’t have their own magic, but I swear, he’s got like a sixth sense or something. You should come round to mine and meet him.” He flushes, then looks down at his chips.
“I’d love to,” Draco says firmly. “It’s just so nice to be able to talk about these things with someone who understands, don’t you think? Even if we’re not exactly friends. More sauce?”
He smiles, holding out the bottle, and wills Potter to smile back.
***
They shrink their brooms to get them up the stairwell, though the bristles still catch on the frame as they shove their way inside Harry’s flat.
“Guests first, surely,” Draco says, fingers still numb where they grip the handle of his old Nimbus. It’s turned cold this past week, though summer’s already a distant memory to Draco.
“Don’t think so,” Harry says, breathless, grinning over his shoulder at Draco. “Winners first.”
“That’s so unfair,” Draco says, kicking the door closed behind him. “You know I haven’t played Quidditch in–”
“Ah, ah. No excuses,” Harry tells him, already at the counter putting the kettle on, stuffing teabags into the two waiting mugs. Two sugars, Draco’s brain supplies. He stirs it counterclockwise. All these things had seemed important. “You’ve had more free time lately than literally anyone else in the entire world.”
“You think I should have spent three months chasing Snitches over London?”
“Nah, you’re right,” Harry agrees, mirthful eyes flicking back over to Draco for just a second. “That would have been a waste. Three years of practice might have helped, maybe.”
“Tosser,” says Draco, throwing his coat over the back of a chair, distracted by the appearance of Dexter, who bounds straight over, tongue lolling and grunting with excitement, tails whacking against the sideboard discordantly as he nudges his head against Draco’s legs.
“Hullo,” Harry says acerbically, watching as Draco bends down to scratch Dexter behind the ears. “Yes, I’m here too. Yes, me, the idiot who feeds you every day.” Dexter glances over for barely a second, before nuzzling back against Draco, slobbering into his palm. “Honestly,” Harry continues, “I’ve never seen him take to anyone like this. I swear, he’s normally a right grumpy bugger. Took months for him to stop growling at Ron.”
“Well, who can blame you for that, eh?” Draco asks Dexter, who responds to his silly voice with a dopey grin. “It’s probably just because we had Crups growing up.” Draco bends to retrieve the paper bag from his coat pocket, shooing away the insistent prodding of Dexter’s wet nose. “Not for you, gorgeous,” he tells the Crup, then unfolds the paper, smoothing down its greasy outside and presenting it to Harry.
“For you.”
“Flapjack?” Harry puts his nose to the bag, groans as he inhales the rich, sickly-sweet smell. “Oh god, amazing. How did you know they were my favourite?”
“Everyone loves a flapjack,” Draco says, pulling up a chair at the table. “Besides, you always had them at Hogwarts.”
“Did I?” Harry frowns, confused. “Funny you remember that, I don’t–” He pauses, distracted by Dexter, who’s now switched allegiance entirely, instantly half mad at the prospect of food. “Okay mister, you can have a corner. Give me a second. I know, I know.”
Bag between his teeth and a cup of tea in each hand, he kicks his Quidditch gear out of the way, coming to sit next to Draco at the table. “So,” he says, breaking off a sticky chunk of flapjack, and – Draco fights back a grimace – letting Dexter eat it off his hand. “You’ve still not really told me what you did get up to in the time loop. Once you realised what was going on, once you stopped trying to fix it. What did you even do with eighty-seven pointless days?”
Draco cups the mug in his hands to steady them. He has his answer, obviously, his boring, nothing-y answer, but he’s abruptly tired of the conversation. “Nothing interesting,” he says. Dexter’s under the table, nosing around for scraps, and Harry’s leaning in, warm, those lovely pink lips still working around the flapjack. Draco lets his eyes linger on them until the meaning’s unmistakable. “I thought a lot about my life,” he says, voice low. “My real life, outside the time loop. All the things that I’ve wanted. All the things I’ve been… denying myself.”
“Yeah?” says Harry, setting the flapjack down so that his fingers brush the outside of Draco’s wrist. Accidental, perhaps, plausibly deniable. But then he does it again, Draco’s heartbeat up in his throat now, and it’s definitely a question. Fuck it, Draco can’t wait any longer. “Well,” Harry says, breathy, “maybe you shouldn’t–”
Draco grabs his forearm, tugs him forward. Harry closes his eyes obligingly, like he’s been waiting for it, his lips soft and open from the off, tasting of caramel, and a little like victory.
***
Sex with Harry is everything Draco had known it would be. He’s confident, almost pushy, and brilliantly insistent in a way that has Draco pliant and squirming under the firm hold of his big hands. He’s also damn near insatiable, with an exhibitionist streak that drives Draco half mad with wanting, with the thrill of being wanted – needed – any time, all the time. Draco’s struggled in the past to find someone who wants him as much as he wants them. Now, though, with Harry, he can feel all that changing.
Harry can also get the two of them in anywhere with a smile and a wink, so they fuck in the in the executive box after the Magpies vs Wasps match, Harry bending Draco so far over the edge that all the blood rushes dizzily to his head, and in the toilets backstage at a Metric gig, Draco bracing himself on the tiny sink while Harry has him from behind, come dripping all down the inside of his jeans when Harry pulls out, shoving him around round so he can finish in Harry’s mouth with a choked-off shout that’s immediately swallowed up in the terrible screeching noise of the soundcheck. Harry doesn’t stay over as much as Draco would like, though he does visit him at Gringotts quite a bit. Once, he spends half an hour pleading desperately with Nagnok to let Draco take him down to the vaults, all, apparently, with the aim of getting Draco to suck him off in one of those awful rickety little carts. It’s insane, and Draco hates heights, but this is what Harry wants, he reminds himself, trying his best not to pass out from lack of oxygen each time they hurtle around a bend. Who else would do this for Harry?
“I bet you got laid so much in that time loop.” Harry says, one day, out of the blue. They’re in the Gringotts library, Draco on his knees again, his untouched cock fat with anticipation in his nice woollen work trousers. Harry’s in Draco’s chair, and somehow, annoyingly, all Draco’s work on house-elf loan conditions is scattered on the floor around them.
“Unh?” he manages, the best he can do given the circumstances. Hardly anyone uses the library, which Harry knows, so he’s made sure the door’s only almost closed. Fuck, Draco’s probably going to get fired.
“You know,” Harry says, “never having to worry about who it is you’re shagging, or like, stupid morning after stuff. It should have made you – god, Draco, right there–” He tosses his head back, addressing the pale limestone arches overhead “–reckless. It must have made you reckless.” He laughs. “Would explain why you’re so bloody good at taking it, if there was a different dick in this pretty mouth every night.”
The words are startlingly crass, and so grossly unfair that Draco goes cold, pulling off and swiping the back of hand across his mouth. “Is that what you’d have done?” he says, trying to rock back on his heels, but succeeding only in banging his head on the edge of the desk, sending another flurry of parchment to the floor.
“I dunno,” Harry says, frowning down at Draco in confusion. “Probably? Why not? You could have done anything you wanted, and no-one would have known. It’s kind of hot, you know?”
“What sort of things?” Draco demands.
“Things! Whatever,” Harry says, rolling the chair back away from Draco and throwing up his hands in disbelief. “Look, you can pretend as much as you like, but I know you weren’t just sitting down here doing research for three months solid. You’re supposed to be a Slytherin, aren’t you?”
It’s cruelly ironic that Harry still can’t see what’s in front of him: Draco, down on his fucking hands and knees on the dusty floor. I’d do anything for you, Draco wants to say. Don’t you know that by now?
It’s ready, the whole of it, the truth waiting right on the tip of his tongue, but – it’s not for now. Harry’s knees are still wide apart, his prick still more than half-hard, and, though his brows are knitted together in impatience, Draco knows he needs to pull this one back. There’s plenty of time, after all. One day, he’ll explain everything. They’ll laugh about it together, Draco’s sure.
He takes a deep, steadying breath, then kneels back up, looking up coyly through lowered lashes. “Alright, you caught me,” he tells Harry, beckoning him forward, his own unease settling as the frown lines smooth out, and a sly, knowing look blooms instead across that beloved face. Draco brings his hands up to smooth over the soft fuzz covering Harry’s thighs, then dips his head, lets his lips brush back and forth over Harry’s cock. He flicks his tongue across the head, teasing, then pressing down firmly on Harry’s legs to keep him in place when he jerks forward, back to hardness within seconds in the sanctuary of Draco’s mouth.
This is what Draco wanted, isn’t it? Isn’t this the happiest he’s ever been?
He pulls off for just a second, enjoying Harry’s muffled moan of frustration. “I was embarrassed,” he tells Harry, though he suspects he’s barely listening. “You’re right, though. I suppose all that practice did teach me a trick or two.”
***
Seventy-four days after the time loop, Harry gets back in from Quidditch and – apropos of nothing in particular – tells Draco it’s over. Draco has to ask him to repeat the words, partly because Dexter’s noisily slurping up his lunch – the lunch Draco’s just prepared – and partly because it’s so unexpected that Draco thinks it must be a joke.
Until Harry says it again.
“I – I don’t understand,” Draco croaks in reply, all the air punched out of his chest.
Harry just shrugs. “I’m sorry, alright?” he says, with an apologetic little grimace. “I don’t know what to tell you. It’s just how I feel. I need some space, that’s all.”
It’s not a good start: historically, Draco’s not done brilliantly with space. And so, bewildered, he trails around the flat after Harry, still clutching uselessly at the gift he’d picked up on the way home: a red velvet bow tie for Dexter. Merlin, he’d have looked just perfect at the New Year’s party Draco had planned for them to throw.
“But I thought things were going well,” he says, embarrassed at the pleading note in his voice. “I thought – I thought we had a connection. We have loads of stuff in common.”
Harry’s laugh is cruel: high-pitched and strange. “Do we?” he snaps. “What do you like, Draco? Do you even have hobbies? I don’t feel like I know anything about you.” He bends to pick up Dexter’s bowl, grasping it carelessly so that water sloshes down one side, and dumps it in the sink, then throws open a couple of cupboards, presumably searching for Draco’s tins of Crup food, or the biscuits, or the treat sticks. He won’t find them in there, of course, but before Draco can say as much, Harry makes a frustrated, guttural sound, and grabs for something at the front. “I can’t even–” he begins, turning around, waving the little bottle accusingly at Draco. “–it’s like – Draco, this is my fucking cupboard.”
“I’m sorry,” Draco says, twisting the bow tie so hard that his fingers ache. “I didn’t realise you had a monopoly on Tabasco sauce.”
Harry exhales through his teeth, then tosses the bottle onto the worktop. It bounces off the wall, then rolls back towards the edge. “It’s not just about the sauce. It’s everything. Every single little thing in this place is–”
The bottle hits the floor and shatters loudly, spattering orange all up the cabinets. Harry’s silent, his words still echoing cruelly in the air as they both watch a thick puddle of that horrible sauce seep into the cracks between Draco’s tiles.
“So I did a little shopping,” Draco says, quietly. “Forgive me for trying to make the flat more comfortable for when my boyfriend comes over.”
“Oh, for–” Harry begins, then pauses to compose himself. “Draco,” he says softly. “Boyfriends? We never agreed on that.”
Draco grits his teeth. “You fucked me on the Knight Bus last week, right up against the window in front of half of Muggle London. What would you call it?”
“I’d call it sex, Draco, not a bloody marriage proposal. We’ve only been shagging for two months – I haven’t even told my friends yet, for crying out loud – and you’ve practically moved me in here.” He sighs heavily, running a hand through his hair. “I’m not quite sure how it even happened.”
It’s that old wound unexpectedly reopened; it really does sting. “You haven’t told your friends?”
Harry shrugs, stubbornly silent, though at least he finally has the grace to look abashed. It’s clear from the set of his shoulders that his mind’s made up, and Draco finds himself abruptly exhausted. “Well,” he continues, defeated, groping for a chair and sinking down heavily at the kitchen table, “now you won’t have to, will you.”
Dexter trots over as soon as Draco sits, a goofy smile on his face, desperate for attention. Irritated, Draco tries to nudge him away, but he pushes back, eyes bright and eager, as though this is some exciting new game he’s trying to figure out. “Dexter, come here,” Harry says. Dexter ignores him, awaiting Draco’s next move. “Dexter, come here. And that’s another thing I can’t understand,” Harry tells Draco, striding over and grabbing Dexter by the collar. “Why does my fucking Crup suddenly like you more than me?”
“How – how is that a problem?”
“It’s…” Harry pauses, hand still buried in Dexter’s fur. “It’s weird. The whole thing. It’s all kind of… I don’t know. Creepy.”
Draco has the sudden feeling he might be sick. “What?” he gets out, vision going fuzzy at the edges.
“No, Draco.” Harry expression is regretful, though nowhere near regretful enough. “No, look,” he says, letting go of Dexter, who ducks under the table and flops down atop Draco’s feet, “I didn’t mean creepy. I don’t mean you’re creepy. That was unfair, I’m sorry. It’s just–” Harry’s eyes are on the Time Turner now, perfectly innocuous where it sits, warded, on the sideboard. “It’s me. You’ve been through so much lately, I wasn’t thinking. The truth is, Draco, I was just looking for some fun. I’m not ready for–”
What a fucking joke, Draco thinks, as Harry lays out all his pathetic excuses, then slinks around the apartment, gathering up the rest of his things. Draco can barely stomach it. The Crup bowls, the Quidditch figurines, the shirts from Tattings, even the toothbrush from Draco’s bathroom: every one of them carefully selected gifts, every one now lifted from their rightful homes, ready to be taken back to Harry’s dingy little Muggle flat, where the central heating never works properly and Draco’s warming charms accidentally defrost the freezer. Harry’s so bloody ungrateful, Draco wants to scream. If only he could see all the things Draco had done for him already; the lengths he’d gone to.
He’s still sat there at the table when Harry finally manages to drag a whining Dexter out into the hallway. He turns back for a second, perhaps to say something else, perhaps just meaning to close the door. His hands are full, though, and Draco can’t bear to hear any more, so he shuts the door for him, accidentally casting a Colloportus so strong that the whole place shakes, and a Spellotaped photo of Harry and Dexter slides off the fridge and sails across the floor towards him. He drops to his knees, snatching it off the floor and holding it up to the light, watching Harry breaking into laughter as he looks up at Draco, hugging Dexter over and over and over, until he can’t bear it anymore.
Eighty-seven days, he thinks, numbly, and it still wasn’t enough. Eighty-seven days of hard work, of crouching beneath tables, and behind trees; eighty-seven days of silence, and dirty looks, and Ministry holding cells, and countless nasty Crup bites. He’d been so sure, by the end. So certain, that final night, congratulating himself on his patience, on leaving no stone unturned, face aching from smiling, watching through a slit in the wardrobe doors as Harry settled down to sleep.
The peppery scent of that foul Muggle sauce irritates the back of Draco’s throat, and a sudden sharpness in his heel makes him grunt in pain as he stumbles across the kitchen, but once he’s holding his Time Turner again, none of that seems to matter.
It’ll probably take longer this time, he thinks with a sigh, winning Harry back over. He weighs the metal in his hand, examining the runes, testing that weak spot on its side with a nail. Tomorrow will be a better day, Draco’s sure of that now. And if it’s not – well, he can always do it again.