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mini_fest2019-12-24 12:30 pm
mini_fest_mod) wrote in mini_fest2019-12-24 12:30 pm
Entry tags:
FIC: Lost and Found (Harry/Draco - 3930 - PG-13)
Title: Lost and Found
Author/Artist: ???
Pairing(s): Harry Potter/ Draco Malfoy
Prompt: Harry hires a prostitute to treat himself on Christmas
Word Count: 3930
Rating: PG-13
Contains (Highlight to view): *Prostitution, Alone at Christmas, Hopefulness, New beginnings*
Disclaimer: Harry Potter characters are the property of J.K. Rowling and Bloomsbury/Scholastic. No profit is being made, and no copyright infringement is intended.
Notes: Thanks so much to D and T for your lovely words and for your poking to make this better.
Summary: Draco is a prostitute. Guess who’s door he gets called to on Christmas Day?
READ ON AO3
I hate working on Christmas Day. The johns always want one of two things. To use me hard and make themselves feel superior. To pretend for one day that they're not sad, pathetic and alone. Or to play house with and make themselves feel loved, as though they can convince themselves they're not sad, pathetic and alone.
Funnily enough, both options just seem to entrench that feeling in me.
New Year's? New Year's is fun. I get taken out, wined and dined and shown a hell of a party. Or I can cruise by myself. Make a week's pay in a night if I hit the right place.
I'll take New Year's over Christmas any time. Yet here I am, walking up to the door of another man's apartment. They're all the same by now. I couldn't even count the number of strangers' doors I've walked through, the numbers of strangers' hands I've had on my body.
This time when I knock, the door isn't opened by a sneering or simpering face. Instead, there's a faint shout from within.
'It's open.'
This is going to be one of the shit ones. I can just tell. I know the exact sort of prick who can't even be bothered to get up and open the door to the hooker he's pre-booked.
I go in anyway. It's not like I have a choice. I was requested specifically; this one must have some connection to one of my past clients.
The passage that faces me is dimly lit. There are a few pieces of tinsel stuck to the wall, sagging and half-fallen off in spots.
I don't even consider taking off my Cons or hanging my trench-coat up. For one, it's bloody cold in here, like he hasn't got the heater on. For another, I prefer to see what sort of interaction this is going to be, before I make myself at home.
I follow the passage in and it opens to a small living room. There's a sad-looking tree in one corner. In the other sits the man who booked me for the afternoon slot.
I freeze, shock slamming through me as I take him in—shaggy black hair, bright green eyes, that coiled energy as though, even sitting, he's ready to unleash hell on the nearest perp... on people like me.
He doesn't seem surprised to see me. That's the only thing I need to know.
I take a step backwards, towards the door. It's involuntary. So much of what Potter has always made me do is involuntary, an instinctive reaction. Once, the reaction would have been to fight, to hex and curse and punch. But that was five years ago, before a war that broke more than just my wand.
Potter sees my movement and waves his hand, almost lazily. I flinch slightly as I hear the lock slide shut on the door.
Nonverbal and wandless, the fucker. The motion makes my pulse race. From fear, mainly. I've been locked inside a room with a john more than once, and Potter is no ordinary john. I drop my hand to brush against the can of mace in my pocket, knowing as I do that this time, it won't help me. I choose not to examine the part of my reaction that's not fear. That part can fuck right off.
'Hello, David,' Potter says to me, and his lip curls into a knowing smile. The bastard is enjoying this. I feel anger, bitter and hot, chased by shame, as it winds its way through me. I let them burn through the fear. If I'm going to have any hope of getting out of this I need to be the Draco Malfoy I used to be, the one who could match wits with Potter in his sleep and come out on top any time.
I let that thought settle me, pulling it over me like a mantle. I'm good at pretending. A professional, you might say.
'Potter,' I return, forcing my voice into a smooth, unimpressed drawl. 'Is this some kind of joke?'
'I could ask you the same thing,' Potter says with a humourless laugh. He's splayed out in that chair of his, legs spread, a glass of something amber in his hand. I can smell the booze in the room, now that I take a second. He's been drinking for a while. I've learned to spot the signs.
He's wearing ripped jeans and a leather jacket over a t-shirt so tight I can see every one of his abs. He looks hot as fuck, a far cry from the men I often see on Christmas, with their sad divorce stories and receding hairlines. Dangerous, I remind myself.
'There is absolutely nothing funny about you luring me here under false pretences,' I say, as though he's the whore and I'm some innocent he's trying to lead astray.
Potter snorts. 'Give off, Malfoy. If anyone's operating under false pretences, it's you. I saw you the other night, at the Lion. What did you have on that bloke? What's with the hooker act?'
The question confuses me, but I try not to let that show on my face. The Golden Lion was one of the pubs on my monthly circuit. Muggle, of course. I'd picked up twice last weekend, but I hadn't seen any sign of—
'You were glamoured,' I accuse, remembering intense blue eyes watching me. I'd tried it on him, the fucker. I'd actually tried to pick Potter up. The idea of it, that he'd been laughing at me as I'd done it, sends fury surging through me. This is over. There is not a single reason I want to stand here in Potter's house while he lords it over me and rubs in how fucking high above me he is.
'Unlock your doors,' I say flatly.
Potter frowns, and for a moment his expression looks genuinely confused, as though he truly thinks I could break his spell if I wanted to. Oh, how charmed are the lives of the lucky few. I wonder how it feels to never have to think about how other people's lives ended up after you left them behind.
'Why don't you?' Potter asks, that faint confusion still in his voice.
He's going to make me say it. The absolute arsehole is going to make me say it. I swallow my pride, what little scraps of it I've managed to salvage over the years.
'I can't,' I grit out, feeling the familiar old shame wash through me.
His confusion doesn't clear, so I elaborate. The sooner he's sick of whatever twisted reason make him call up and ask for me, the sooner I can leave.
'Did you forget the part where the Wizengamot snapped my wand in half at the end of my trial, took all my money, and threw me out?'
If anything, Potter's frown deepens. It sets the burn of the injustice stirring inside me, the one I'd thought long buried.
'That was years ago,' he says, as though a punishment of that magnitude was supposed to be a fleeting thing, a stumbling block on the road to eventual success and happiness. Who knows, maybe for the likes of him, it would have been.
'Can I go now?' I ask, suddenly tired of it, tired of his questions and his judgement and his fingers stirring into my past, picking apart things that were long ago set in stone.
Potter shakes his head, as though he's trying to shake something into place. 'So you're actually doing this?' he asks. 'Prostitution?' As though it's not abundantly clear that was what he meant from the fact that he called my fucking pimp to hook up this little social call.
'Why did you bring me here?' I ask, suddenly, thinking of my initial musings about pathetic men at Christmas, as I'd walked in the door. It's time to turn the tables. I might be stuck here, but that doesn't mean I have to roll over and take whatever judgement the precious Golden Boy wants to slather on me.
Potter, for the first time, hesitates just for a second. It's enough for me to see there's weakness there.
'I saw you cruising, a few weeks ago, in a Muggle bar. It was the first time I'd seen you in years.'
He says it like that's the answer, like that's enough. I'm sick of him being the only one with the right to answers.
'It's Christmas Day, Potter,' I saw, letting judgement into my own tone. 'What the fuck are you doing sitting at home, calling a hooker into your house?'
I look around, a thought occurring to me. 'Is this actually your apartment? It's tiny and this area is fully Muggle. Whose place have you stolen?'
Potter hesitates again, his eyes sliding to the side. He takes a deep gulp of his drink, letting the now-empty tumbler slip to the tips of his fingers as he dangles his hand over the edge of the chair.
'It's my apartment,' he says. 'I bought it six months ago, after... after Ginny and I broke up.'
I raise an eyebrow, crossing my arms as I consider him. There's something more to that. I can read it all over his body. It's the particular kind of lie that goes with infidelity.
'Who cheated on who?' I ask, not bothering to soften my words. I don't stop to think how strange this is, to be speaking to Potter again, after so many years, let alone to be grilling him on his relationship breakdown.
Potter winces and guilt flashes across his face. Ah, there it is.
'One of your horde of screaming witches finally proved too tempting?' I'm making it up, I'm so out of touch with the Wizarding World. Potter is the first non-Muggle I've talked to in at least two years. But it's Potter, I highly doubt the hype of "Our Saviour" has died an inch.
The guilt disappears and Potter tilts his chin up. 'It was a man, actually,' he says, meeting my eyes directly, and now there's no shame. I can see the evidence of a battle fought and won, something he refuses to be shamed by. I don't let the tiny bit of solidarity that makes me feel take root. So Potter's into men. So what.
I ignore the little tendril of though that worms its way into my mind, the idea that maybe Potter called me here for more than just mockery. There's not a chance in hell I'm sleeping with him.
'It was in a bar much like the one I saw you in a week ago. Certain things have... always seemed pre-planned for me.' He shrugs one shoulder in that tight, black v-neck and I can't help the way my eyes drop to his collarbones and the tanned skin on show there.
I let his words wash over me. I know all about a predestined life. I know all about the freedom of getting to choose, as well, to define who you are for yourself. My choices might be shit ones, but at least they're mine.
'Why are you alone on Christmas?' I ask, coming back to my original question. I have no interest in getting all deep and meaningful with Potter. I need to piss him off enough that he decides he wants me out of his house and unlocks his damned doors.
He looks down at his drink and frowns at the fact that it's empty, before wandlessly Acciong his bottle of Scotch and another glass from the kitchen. Fucker.
'Want a drink?' he asks, pouring me one and holding it out.
'I don't drink on the job,' I say automatically.
He raises one eyebrow, a hint of a quirk to his lips and I realise what I just said. This is not a job. I reinforce my earlier thought. There's no way I'm going to sleep with Potter. Mother fuck.
I take two steps forward and grab the glass out of his hand. He gestures to the armchair opposite him, and I hesitate only a moment before sitting. This whole thing is putting me on edge. I need to push the right buttons to finish it, but I have no idea what to expect from him. There's no universe in which I had imagined I might ever sit down with Potter for a drink and a chat after he saw me working one night.
I hate not being able to read people. Usually it's easy, a look in their eyes, something quick and dirty. Half the time I barely speak, except to moan meaningless encouragement.
Bloody Potter has never been easy.
'The whole Weasley-Granger extended family is in Romania this year,' he says, taking another deep drink, draining half his glass. I don't watch the way his throat works as he swallows.
'Things with Ginny are still... tense. I didn't want to intrude,' Potter says, as he puts his hands in his lap, cradling the glass between them and hunching his shoulders.
There's something very sad about the way Potter looks right now, like a little boy who's just lost a whole lot of things that mean the world to him. I try very hard not to see myself in him. This is Potter. I have not, and will never, feel sorry for Potter. I refuse to.
'So you called me up to, what? Make yourself feel better about the fact that while you might be a cheating bastard with a sexuality crisis, at least you're not me?' I make my voice sharp, cruel, accusatory. I need this feeling of vulnerability that's beating its tiny wings in the air between us to go away.
Potter looks up sharply and shakes his head. 'No, I— I just,' he frowns and drinks again. 'I just saw you and then I couldn't get you out of my head and I just wanted to know what you were doing, and I didn't think it was actually this,' he says, gesturing to me, my trench-coat that's opened as I sit, showing jeans so tight they might be painted on and a light blue silk shirt that feels like magic when it rubs against my skin.
I feel his words cut into me like the strikes of a lash and I flinch under them.
He sees my reaction and he leans forward. 'I'm sorry, that— that wasn't what I meant. I shouldn't... I have no right to judge anyone. I'm sorry.'
I stare at him, the shock of his words running through me. I don't think I've ever even heard Potter say the word 'sorry', let alone to me.
He rubs a hand over his face and all of a sudden he looks tired, and the sadness is back, draping across him like a mantle.
'You should eat something,' I say, eyeing the nearly empty glass in his hand. As soon as the words are out of my mouth, I want to take them back. What do I care if Potter eats or if he drinks himself into a stinking mess on the floor?
But he's alone. And it's Christmas. Fuck.
Potter shrugs. 'I don't think I have much left in the way of food.'
I look at him, and wonder how the fuck the Saviour of the Wizarding World came to this.
'Are you paying me to be here?' I ask and Potter looks up, something undefinable blooming in his eyes. Slowly, he nods.
'Fine,' I say, as I finish my drink and stand. I shrug out of my coat and lay it over the back of my chair. 'I may as well be earning my money.'
Potter widens his legs just a fraction and I feel something interested curl to life inside me. I ignore it and ignore his movement.
'I assume the kitchen is through here?' I ask as I make my way towards it. I don't need Potter's confirmation as I enter the room. It's small and pokey, like the rest of the apartment. There's no sign of any care or life in any part of the room. I move to the refrigerator and open it, curling my lip at the sour smell of off-food that floats from it. I pick gingerly through the contents for a moment before pulling a few things out. The ham at least smells fresh.
It's as I'm bent over searching for a frying pan that I realise Potter has followed me and is standing in the doorway of the kitchen, watching me.
'There are other ways you could earn your money,' Potter says and damn him if his voice doesn't sound husky, like he's already half in this.
'You're drunk,' I say flatly, locating the frying pan and straightening. I refuse to entertain the thought. It's ludicrous. Potter is off his face, that's all. That's probably the only reason he asked for me to start with.
'Where's your bread?' I ask, forcing myself to look him in the eye, as though nothing about this situation is absolutely insane.
Instead of telling me, he moves forward into the kitchen and damn him, he might be drunk but he moves like a hunting cat, all coiled power and grace. He comes closer to me and I back up unconsciously until I feel the countertop against my arse. Potter puts a hand on the counter behind me and leans in.
I freeze, my breath catching as he comes closer. I can feel the heat of his body, he's that close, although there isn't a single touch between us. His eyes are so bright, vivid and intense. I know, rationally, that I should push him away, that I should attempt to leave, bang the door down or something, but every part of me has frozen. Every part of me except the curl of heat inside me, that feeling I haven't had in so, so long. That feeling of maybe wanting to be touched, wanting to feel lips against mine.
Potter reaches up. I expect to feel his hand on my face or in my hair, but instead he reaches behind me to tug a cupboard open. There's a rustle of plastic and then he steps back, handing me a loaf of bread.
I let my breath out in an unsteady rush and Potter's eyes flick to my mouth for just an instant, just long enough that I know he's registered that he had an effect on me. Prick. I'm better than this. I decide exactly how my body responds. I decide who gets what from me.
'I've unlocked the door,' Potter says, his gaze intense on me.
I turn away from him, ignoring his words as I put the pan on the hob and make up the ham and cheese toasted sandwiches. Leaving after he pulled that little move would look like running away. I've never run away from Potter and I'm not about to start now.
By the time the toasties are cooked, Potter is sitting at the chipped table behind me and I've got myself in hand again. Magnanimous, I decide. That is how I will behave. He's the one who's been dumped by his whole family, who cheated on his girlfriend, who had to chase down his former school rival so that he wasn't alone on Christmas.
'Merry Christmas,' I say, putting the toastie in front of him as I sit opposite him, one on my own plate. A free meal is one I don't have to budget for, after all.
He looks surprised for a moment but then he smiles and there's genuine warmth in it. I feel something catch in my chest. He's taken the leather jacket off, what a stupid thing to wear inside your own house. I don't know who he was trying to impress with it. Though he did look alright in it, I suppose, in a grungy sort of way.
'Merry Christmas,' he says in return, interrupting the spiralling flow of my thoughts. His smile widens as he bites into the toastie.
I look away. I spent so many years watching that smile be directed at everyone except me. I have no interest in seeing it now.
I roll my sleeves up. I don't know if Potter's cast a warming charm, or if the room is just naturally getting warmer, but all of a sudden I feel hot.
'You have tattoos,' Potter says, and his voice is surprised.
I tilt my arm, so that he can see the Mosmordre that still claims my forearm, proclaiming my hate to the world.
'Yes,' I say simply.
Potter, to my infinite surprise, reaches out across the table, running gentle fingers over my skin. He doesn't touch the Mark, but he doesn't shy from it either. Instead he lets his fingertips run over phoenix feathers and unicorn horns, quills and the words of a hundred spells. His fingers trace the life that was taken from me, and I don't pull away, or make some casual joke about magic, the way I would with a client who wanted to talk about them.
Instead I sit there and let him touch me, and I have no idea why.
'They're Muggle,' Potter says after a moment, after he draws his hand back. He looks surprised, whether at the fact that the tattoos hadn't moved under his touch or at the fact that I would stoop so low as to have Muggle art engraved upon my skin.
'So am I,' I say, and look down at my plate.
Potter makes a humming, noncommittal noise and busies himself with his toastie.
'You're nothing like I thought you were,' he says, as he finishes, having basically inhaled the food. He sits back, considering me across the small table.
I freeze, my own toastie half way to my mouth. I have no idea what he means by that, no idea if it's bad or good.
'Do you have to be working today?' he asks, and there's nothing of his earlier judgement in his voice.
'I have to eat,' I say, my standard response when someone asks me why I can't just come out, just as friends, nothing more.
Potter looks down at my hands, wrapped around the toastie still, and then looks back at me, his gaze slow and obvious.
I frown and he smiles again, this time there's a hint of playfulness in it.
'Some parts are still the same,' he says. 'You're still very prickly.'
'Only around you,' I snap, and something in his face looks pleased at that response. I don't know why I said it. Except that it's true. I can't remember the last time I felt so much like myself, so much like I could choose what happened next.
'Want to watch a film?' he asks and I feel myself spin around again, thrown off balance by just how little I can tell what Potter is thinking. I don't think I've ever even been in the same room as a client for this long without being fucked.
But Potter's not a client, is he? Not really.
Do you have to be working today?
'What film?' I ask, unsure as I do so just why I'm entertaining the thought, except that a part of me wants to, and it's been so long since I've done something I want to. 'It better not be a shit one.'
Potter smiles and I feel the nudge of his foot against mine under the table.
'You can choose.'
Author/Artist: ???
Pairing(s): Harry Potter/ Draco Malfoy
Prompt: Harry hires a prostitute to treat himself on Christmas
Word Count: 3930
Rating: PG-13
Contains (Highlight to view): *Prostitution, Alone at Christmas, Hopefulness, New beginnings*
Disclaimer: Harry Potter characters are the property of J.K. Rowling and Bloomsbury/Scholastic. No profit is being made, and no copyright infringement is intended.
Notes: Thanks so much to D and T for your lovely words and for your poking to make this better.
Summary: Draco is a prostitute. Guess who’s door he gets called to on Christmas Day?
READ ON AO3
I hate working on Christmas Day. The johns always want one of two things. To use me hard and make themselves feel superior. To pretend for one day that they're not sad, pathetic and alone. Or to play house with and make themselves feel loved, as though they can convince themselves they're not sad, pathetic and alone.
Funnily enough, both options just seem to entrench that feeling in me.
New Year's? New Year's is fun. I get taken out, wined and dined and shown a hell of a party. Or I can cruise by myself. Make a week's pay in a night if I hit the right place.
I'll take New Year's over Christmas any time. Yet here I am, walking up to the door of another man's apartment. They're all the same by now. I couldn't even count the number of strangers' doors I've walked through, the numbers of strangers' hands I've had on my body.
This time when I knock, the door isn't opened by a sneering or simpering face. Instead, there's a faint shout from within.
'It's open.'
This is going to be one of the shit ones. I can just tell. I know the exact sort of prick who can't even be bothered to get up and open the door to the hooker he's pre-booked.
I go in anyway. It's not like I have a choice. I was requested specifically; this one must have some connection to one of my past clients.
The passage that faces me is dimly lit. There are a few pieces of tinsel stuck to the wall, sagging and half-fallen off in spots.
I don't even consider taking off my Cons or hanging my trench-coat up. For one, it's bloody cold in here, like he hasn't got the heater on. For another, I prefer to see what sort of interaction this is going to be, before I make myself at home.
I follow the passage in and it opens to a small living room. There's a sad-looking tree in one corner. In the other sits the man who booked me for the afternoon slot.
I freeze, shock slamming through me as I take him in—shaggy black hair, bright green eyes, that coiled energy as though, even sitting, he's ready to unleash hell on the nearest perp... on people like me.
He doesn't seem surprised to see me. That's the only thing I need to know.
I take a step backwards, towards the door. It's involuntary. So much of what Potter has always made me do is involuntary, an instinctive reaction. Once, the reaction would have been to fight, to hex and curse and punch. But that was five years ago, before a war that broke more than just my wand.
Potter sees my movement and waves his hand, almost lazily. I flinch slightly as I hear the lock slide shut on the door.
Nonverbal and wandless, the fucker. The motion makes my pulse race. From fear, mainly. I've been locked inside a room with a john more than once, and Potter is no ordinary john. I drop my hand to brush against the can of mace in my pocket, knowing as I do that this time, it won't help me. I choose not to examine the part of my reaction that's not fear. That part can fuck right off.
'Hello, David,' Potter says to me, and his lip curls into a knowing smile. The bastard is enjoying this. I feel anger, bitter and hot, chased by shame, as it winds its way through me. I let them burn through the fear. If I'm going to have any hope of getting out of this I need to be the Draco Malfoy I used to be, the one who could match wits with Potter in his sleep and come out on top any time.
I let that thought settle me, pulling it over me like a mantle. I'm good at pretending. A professional, you might say.
'Potter,' I return, forcing my voice into a smooth, unimpressed drawl. 'Is this some kind of joke?'
'I could ask you the same thing,' Potter says with a humourless laugh. He's splayed out in that chair of his, legs spread, a glass of something amber in his hand. I can smell the booze in the room, now that I take a second. He's been drinking for a while. I've learned to spot the signs.
He's wearing ripped jeans and a leather jacket over a t-shirt so tight I can see every one of his abs. He looks hot as fuck, a far cry from the men I often see on Christmas, with their sad divorce stories and receding hairlines. Dangerous, I remind myself.
'There is absolutely nothing funny about you luring me here under false pretences,' I say, as though he's the whore and I'm some innocent he's trying to lead astray.
Potter snorts. 'Give off, Malfoy. If anyone's operating under false pretences, it's you. I saw you the other night, at the Lion. What did you have on that bloke? What's with the hooker act?'
The question confuses me, but I try not to let that show on my face. The Golden Lion was one of the pubs on my monthly circuit. Muggle, of course. I'd picked up twice last weekend, but I hadn't seen any sign of—
'You were glamoured,' I accuse, remembering intense blue eyes watching me. I'd tried it on him, the fucker. I'd actually tried to pick Potter up. The idea of it, that he'd been laughing at me as I'd done it, sends fury surging through me. This is over. There is not a single reason I want to stand here in Potter's house while he lords it over me and rubs in how fucking high above me he is.
'Unlock your doors,' I say flatly.
Potter frowns, and for a moment his expression looks genuinely confused, as though he truly thinks I could break his spell if I wanted to. Oh, how charmed are the lives of the lucky few. I wonder how it feels to never have to think about how other people's lives ended up after you left them behind.
'Why don't you?' Potter asks, that faint confusion still in his voice.
He's going to make me say it. The absolute arsehole is going to make me say it. I swallow my pride, what little scraps of it I've managed to salvage over the years.
'I can't,' I grit out, feeling the familiar old shame wash through me.
His confusion doesn't clear, so I elaborate. The sooner he's sick of whatever twisted reason make him call up and ask for me, the sooner I can leave.
'Did you forget the part where the Wizengamot snapped my wand in half at the end of my trial, took all my money, and threw me out?'
If anything, Potter's frown deepens. It sets the burn of the injustice stirring inside me, the one I'd thought long buried.
'That was years ago,' he says, as though a punishment of that magnitude was supposed to be a fleeting thing, a stumbling block on the road to eventual success and happiness. Who knows, maybe for the likes of him, it would have been.
'Can I go now?' I ask, suddenly tired of it, tired of his questions and his judgement and his fingers stirring into my past, picking apart things that were long ago set in stone.
Potter shakes his head, as though he's trying to shake something into place. 'So you're actually doing this?' he asks. 'Prostitution?' As though it's not abundantly clear that was what he meant from the fact that he called my fucking pimp to hook up this little social call.
'Why did you bring me here?' I ask, suddenly, thinking of my initial musings about pathetic men at Christmas, as I'd walked in the door. It's time to turn the tables. I might be stuck here, but that doesn't mean I have to roll over and take whatever judgement the precious Golden Boy wants to slather on me.
Potter, for the first time, hesitates just for a second. It's enough for me to see there's weakness there.
'I saw you cruising, a few weeks ago, in a Muggle bar. It was the first time I'd seen you in years.'
He says it like that's the answer, like that's enough. I'm sick of him being the only one with the right to answers.
'It's Christmas Day, Potter,' I saw, letting judgement into my own tone. 'What the fuck are you doing sitting at home, calling a hooker into your house?'
I look around, a thought occurring to me. 'Is this actually your apartment? It's tiny and this area is fully Muggle. Whose place have you stolen?'
Potter hesitates again, his eyes sliding to the side. He takes a deep gulp of his drink, letting the now-empty tumbler slip to the tips of his fingers as he dangles his hand over the edge of the chair.
'It's my apartment,' he says. 'I bought it six months ago, after... after Ginny and I broke up.'
I raise an eyebrow, crossing my arms as I consider him. There's something more to that. I can read it all over his body. It's the particular kind of lie that goes with infidelity.
'Who cheated on who?' I ask, not bothering to soften my words. I don't stop to think how strange this is, to be speaking to Potter again, after so many years, let alone to be grilling him on his relationship breakdown.
Potter winces and guilt flashes across his face. Ah, there it is.
'One of your horde of screaming witches finally proved too tempting?' I'm making it up, I'm so out of touch with the Wizarding World. Potter is the first non-Muggle I've talked to in at least two years. But it's Potter, I highly doubt the hype of "Our Saviour" has died an inch.
The guilt disappears and Potter tilts his chin up. 'It was a man, actually,' he says, meeting my eyes directly, and now there's no shame. I can see the evidence of a battle fought and won, something he refuses to be shamed by. I don't let the tiny bit of solidarity that makes me feel take root. So Potter's into men. So what.
I ignore the little tendril of though that worms its way into my mind, the idea that maybe Potter called me here for more than just mockery. There's not a chance in hell I'm sleeping with him.
'It was in a bar much like the one I saw you in a week ago. Certain things have... always seemed pre-planned for me.' He shrugs one shoulder in that tight, black v-neck and I can't help the way my eyes drop to his collarbones and the tanned skin on show there.
I let his words wash over me. I know all about a predestined life. I know all about the freedom of getting to choose, as well, to define who you are for yourself. My choices might be shit ones, but at least they're mine.
'Why are you alone on Christmas?' I ask, coming back to my original question. I have no interest in getting all deep and meaningful with Potter. I need to piss him off enough that he decides he wants me out of his house and unlocks his damned doors.
He looks down at his drink and frowns at the fact that it's empty, before wandlessly Acciong his bottle of Scotch and another glass from the kitchen. Fucker.
'Want a drink?' he asks, pouring me one and holding it out.
'I don't drink on the job,' I say automatically.
He raises one eyebrow, a hint of a quirk to his lips and I realise what I just said. This is not a job. I reinforce my earlier thought. There's no way I'm going to sleep with Potter. Mother fuck.
I take two steps forward and grab the glass out of his hand. He gestures to the armchair opposite him, and I hesitate only a moment before sitting. This whole thing is putting me on edge. I need to push the right buttons to finish it, but I have no idea what to expect from him. There's no universe in which I had imagined I might ever sit down with Potter for a drink and a chat after he saw me working one night.
I hate not being able to read people. Usually it's easy, a look in their eyes, something quick and dirty. Half the time I barely speak, except to moan meaningless encouragement.
Bloody Potter has never been easy.
'The whole Weasley-Granger extended family is in Romania this year,' he says, taking another deep drink, draining half his glass. I don't watch the way his throat works as he swallows.
'Things with Ginny are still... tense. I didn't want to intrude,' Potter says, as he puts his hands in his lap, cradling the glass between them and hunching his shoulders.
There's something very sad about the way Potter looks right now, like a little boy who's just lost a whole lot of things that mean the world to him. I try very hard not to see myself in him. This is Potter. I have not, and will never, feel sorry for Potter. I refuse to.
'So you called me up to, what? Make yourself feel better about the fact that while you might be a cheating bastard with a sexuality crisis, at least you're not me?' I make my voice sharp, cruel, accusatory. I need this feeling of vulnerability that's beating its tiny wings in the air between us to go away.
Potter looks up sharply and shakes his head. 'No, I— I just,' he frowns and drinks again. 'I just saw you and then I couldn't get you out of my head and I just wanted to know what you were doing, and I didn't think it was actually this,' he says, gesturing to me, my trench-coat that's opened as I sit, showing jeans so tight they might be painted on and a light blue silk shirt that feels like magic when it rubs against my skin.
I feel his words cut into me like the strikes of a lash and I flinch under them.
He sees my reaction and he leans forward. 'I'm sorry, that— that wasn't what I meant. I shouldn't... I have no right to judge anyone. I'm sorry.'
I stare at him, the shock of his words running through me. I don't think I've ever even heard Potter say the word 'sorry', let alone to me.
He rubs a hand over his face and all of a sudden he looks tired, and the sadness is back, draping across him like a mantle.
'You should eat something,' I say, eyeing the nearly empty glass in his hand. As soon as the words are out of my mouth, I want to take them back. What do I care if Potter eats or if he drinks himself into a stinking mess on the floor?
But he's alone. And it's Christmas. Fuck.
Potter shrugs. 'I don't think I have much left in the way of food.'
I look at him, and wonder how the fuck the Saviour of the Wizarding World came to this.
'Are you paying me to be here?' I ask and Potter looks up, something undefinable blooming in his eyes. Slowly, he nods.
'Fine,' I say, as I finish my drink and stand. I shrug out of my coat and lay it over the back of my chair. 'I may as well be earning my money.'
Potter widens his legs just a fraction and I feel something interested curl to life inside me. I ignore it and ignore his movement.
'I assume the kitchen is through here?' I ask as I make my way towards it. I don't need Potter's confirmation as I enter the room. It's small and pokey, like the rest of the apartment. There's no sign of any care or life in any part of the room. I move to the refrigerator and open it, curling my lip at the sour smell of off-food that floats from it. I pick gingerly through the contents for a moment before pulling a few things out. The ham at least smells fresh.
It's as I'm bent over searching for a frying pan that I realise Potter has followed me and is standing in the doorway of the kitchen, watching me.
'There are other ways you could earn your money,' Potter says and damn him if his voice doesn't sound husky, like he's already half in this.
'You're drunk,' I say flatly, locating the frying pan and straightening. I refuse to entertain the thought. It's ludicrous. Potter is off his face, that's all. That's probably the only reason he asked for me to start with.
'Where's your bread?' I ask, forcing myself to look him in the eye, as though nothing about this situation is absolutely insane.
Instead of telling me, he moves forward into the kitchen and damn him, he might be drunk but he moves like a hunting cat, all coiled power and grace. He comes closer to me and I back up unconsciously until I feel the countertop against my arse. Potter puts a hand on the counter behind me and leans in.
I freeze, my breath catching as he comes closer. I can feel the heat of his body, he's that close, although there isn't a single touch between us. His eyes are so bright, vivid and intense. I know, rationally, that I should push him away, that I should attempt to leave, bang the door down or something, but every part of me has frozen. Every part of me except the curl of heat inside me, that feeling I haven't had in so, so long. That feeling of maybe wanting to be touched, wanting to feel lips against mine.
Potter reaches up. I expect to feel his hand on my face or in my hair, but instead he reaches behind me to tug a cupboard open. There's a rustle of plastic and then he steps back, handing me a loaf of bread.
I let my breath out in an unsteady rush and Potter's eyes flick to my mouth for just an instant, just long enough that I know he's registered that he had an effect on me. Prick. I'm better than this. I decide exactly how my body responds. I decide who gets what from me.
'I've unlocked the door,' Potter says, his gaze intense on me.
I turn away from him, ignoring his words as I put the pan on the hob and make up the ham and cheese toasted sandwiches. Leaving after he pulled that little move would look like running away. I've never run away from Potter and I'm not about to start now.
By the time the toasties are cooked, Potter is sitting at the chipped table behind me and I've got myself in hand again. Magnanimous, I decide. That is how I will behave. He's the one who's been dumped by his whole family, who cheated on his girlfriend, who had to chase down his former school rival so that he wasn't alone on Christmas.
'Merry Christmas,' I say, putting the toastie in front of him as I sit opposite him, one on my own plate. A free meal is one I don't have to budget for, after all.
He looks surprised for a moment but then he smiles and there's genuine warmth in it. I feel something catch in my chest. He's taken the leather jacket off, what a stupid thing to wear inside your own house. I don't know who he was trying to impress with it. Though he did look alright in it, I suppose, in a grungy sort of way.
'Merry Christmas,' he says in return, interrupting the spiralling flow of my thoughts. His smile widens as he bites into the toastie.
I look away. I spent so many years watching that smile be directed at everyone except me. I have no interest in seeing it now.
I roll my sleeves up. I don't know if Potter's cast a warming charm, or if the room is just naturally getting warmer, but all of a sudden I feel hot.
'You have tattoos,' Potter says, and his voice is surprised.
I tilt my arm, so that he can see the Mosmordre that still claims my forearm, proclaiming my hate to the world.
'Yes,' I say simply.
Potter, to my infinite surprise, reaches out across the table, running gentle fingers over my skin. He doesn't touch the Mark, but he doesn't shy from it either. Instead he lets his fingertips run over phoenix feathers and unicorn horns, quills and the words of a hundred spells. His fingers trace the life that was taken from me, and I don't pull away, or make some casual joke about magic, the way I would with a client who wanted to talk about them.
Instead I sit there and let him touch me, and I have no idea why.
'They're Muggle,' Potter says after a moment, after he draws his hand back. He looks surprised, whether at the fact that the tattoos hadn't moved under his touch or at the fact that I would stoop so low as to have Muggle art engraved upon my skin.
'So am I,' I say, and look down at my plate.
Potter makes a humming, noncommittal noise and busies himself with his toastie.
'You're nothing like I thought you were,' he says, as he finishes, having basically inhaled the food. He sits back, considering me across the small table.
I freeze, my own toastie half way to my mouth. I have no idea what he means by that, no idea if it's bad or good.
'Do you have to be working today?' he asks, and there's nothing of his earlier judgement in his voice.
'I have to eat,' I say, my standard response when someone asks me why I can't just come out, just as friends, nothing more.
Potter looks down at my hands, wrapped around the toastie still, and then looks back at me, his gaze slow and obvious.
I frown and he smiles again, this time there's a hint of playfulness in it.
'Some parts are still the same,' he says. 'You're still very prickly.'
'Only around you,' I snap, and something in his face looks pleased at that response. I don't know why I said it. Except that it's true. I can't remember the last time I felt so much like myself, so much like I could choose what happened next.
'Want to watch a film?' he asks and I feel myself spin around again, thrown off balance by just how little I can tell what Potter is thinking. I don't think I've ever even been in the same room as a client for this long without being fucked.
But Potter's not a client, is he? Not really.
Do you have to be working today?
'What film?' I ask, unsure as I do so just why I'm entertaining the thought, except that a part of me wants to, and it's been so long since I've done something I want to. 'It better not be a shit one.'
Potter smiles and I feel the nudge of his foot against mine under the table.
'You can choose.'
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this is kinda cute and a bit sweet as well
but yes they totally are themselves around each other, they simply have the best chemestry together!
well done
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