Chapter Text
Harry,
I hope you are doing well, I have sent three letters but have not heard back. I hope that does not mean your aunt and uncle have locked you in your room already.
I know you said to keep my elf from your house, but I can’t help but worry. So, I hope you do not mind that I am sending this letter to you with Dobby.
If you are able, I hope you may send a letter back with him so that I may know you are alright?
Draco
Draco,
I am not locked in my room, however, my aunt and uncle have locked up Hedwig so I am unable to send letters that way. Thank you for sending Dobby, I do not mind him here as long as he is not seen by my aunt and uncle. Thank you again for ensuring he does not steal my letters, since I was able to get yours, Ron’s, and Hermione’s.
It has only been four weeks and I already am missing school. I can’t help but feel immensely useless sitting here and not being able to do a thing to help with our research . I hope you have been able to find something useful at your home at least? If you are able to sneak out a book from your library that you think may be useful, I’d be happy to help in that way.
From the sound of things, you seem to be getting on better with your friends? How was the solstice party? I can’t say I have much interesting to share with you about my summer. I’ve spent most of it doing chores and yard work.
With this letter I’m sending one for Ron, Hermione, and Hagrid each, would you mind sending them? I can’t help but feel bad for being unable to reply to them all summer.
Thanks again for sending Dobby,
Harry
Harry,
I am relieved to hear you are alright. I will make sure to send my future letters with Dobby so that you can respond, and he’s been told not to be seen. I’ve also sent your letters to Granger, Weasley, and Hagrid.
I’ve sent Dobby with a book on runes you can look through if you’d like. See if you recognize any from the time-turner. Otherwise, I have been unable to find anything that may be of use. I’ve had much free time to look through the library as mother and father have been uncommonly busy this break. I believe Father has been busy dealing with the journal you spoke of. I hope you have a plan for that this year, I do not believe I would be able to do much before the school year has begun on that front.
I have been getting on better with my year mates. Pansy has expressed her desire to spend more time together over the break, so she, Blaise, Crabbe, and Goyle have been over to my home often to play quidditch. We used to play often in the grounds around the manor when we were younger, so this feels very much like when we were little. Pansy seems less angry with me this break as well, so maybe you are right about her missing me as her friend. As much as they are entertaining to play with, I cannot help but wish you were here as well. I hope to compete with you this year as seekers once again.
Yard work and chores sound dreadfully boring. Have you done nothing else? I hope you have started your homework at the very least.
Draco
Draco,
Thank you for the book, I will begin looking through it soon. I have been unable to do much else as my aunt and uncle have locked my belongings under the stairs. I’ll be doing my homework once I am able to leave here. Though, I cannot help but wonder if Ron will come to break me out now that I have sent him letters.
If I do not return, come and get me? Haha…
I think I have an idea regarding this year, but no promises on its viability. We shall see, I suppose. I can tell you in more detail when we see each other on the train. Hopefully, my plan will have worked.
I am happy to hear you and your friends are getting on again. I, too, wish I could be there to play a seeker’s game with you. The worst part of breaks is the lack of Quidditch. What I would not give to be able to go flying right now, maybe fly off and not return until next summer.
Harry
Harry,
I apologize for my lack of letters, my parents were not fond of my use of Dobby as a messenger. I have snuck off to send him with another letter, though, as they did not explicitly order him not to deliver for me anymore.
If they do not let you leave, or Weasley does not get you, I will make sure to send Dobby to retrieve you. I will not be attending an entire year without you. I have to make this letter quick as I do not have much time before my parents realize I am missing with our elf, but I hope you like the birthday cake I have sent with Dobby. I know it is a little early, but I was unsure if I would get another chance to send a letter. Also, I cannot say I have baked much, but I did learn to cook a little so hopefully it is edible.
Happy Birthday,
Draco
Harry stared down at the cake Dobby had dropped off just minutes before. He’d returned after waiting a moment for Harry to send him back with a letter. The cake had green icing and was slightly lop-sided, but when Harry dipped his finger into the icing to try, it was delicious. He felt a smile tug at his lips. It was the first birthday gift he had received this year – the only gift he would receive this year at all. He suddenly wished Draco was here more than he had all summer.
His moment of calm was quickly shattered by the sound of his aunt’s voice yelling for him downstairs to clean the blinds. Tomorrow would be the day of his uncle’s business deal. Harry hoped he’d be lucky enough this time around to not get the bars attached to his window. Dobby was told to stay away, so the probability that he’d be able to get through the night rather uneventfully was high.
That was the only thought that helped him stay positive through the hours of chores he was made to complete over the next 48 hours. He still had no idea how he was going to get back to Hogwarts this year. Sure, he could take the knight bus to Ron’s house, but he wasn’t even supposed to know where he lived yet and he still had no way to get to his trunk. He wished more than anything at the moment that he could perform magic outside of school.
The day of Uncle Vernon’s deal went rather uneventfully, though they did not seem to get the deal because Vernon spent the next three days moping about the house while Harry’s aunt gave him a chore list twice as long.
By day five Harry was feeling about as morose as everyone else in the house. He hadn’t been able to talk to Draco in almost a week, he couldn’t write to Ron or Hermione either and he had read the book Draco’d sent cover to cover three times and hadn’t found a thing.
Maybe he really wouldn’t be able to make it back to Hogwarts this school year. Or maybe Draco would have to come get him out. He let the funny thought of Draco bursting through the front door of his aunt and uncle’s home to get him out play through his head as he fell asleep.
The next time he woke was to a light tapping on his window. He almost rolled back over to go back to bed when the tapping got more insistent. The room was pitch black when he rolled over to look out the window, but the street lights backlit the car flying at his window and he was up in a flash to pull the window open.
“Ron?” He whispered incredulously.
“All right, Harry?” George asked from the passenger seat. Harry managed a weak nod in response.
“Malfoy sent me a letter telling me to come get you out, didn’t really believe him at first, but then you stopped responding to my letters. What’s been going on?”
Draco had told Ron to come get him? Harry found himself grinning despite the rush they were all in. “He owl-ed you to get me?”
“Yeah,” said Fred, “Sent Ron like five owls too, 'cause Ron didn’t want to believe him.”
“Recon Malfoy would’ve come to our house, himself next?” George said to Fred and the two of them snickered.
Ron rolled his eyes at the two of them, but turned to Harry, “Hurry and get your things, we’ve come to take you home with us.”
Harry hurried to comply, grabbing Hedwig first to pass to Ron. “All my Hogwarts stuff is locked up downstairs in the cupboard, and if the Dursleys wake, I’ll be dead.”
“We’ll get your trunk, hand Ron all the things you need from your room,” Fred said, climbing out of the car and George following.
“Watch out for the bottom stair, it creaks,” Harry called after them in a whisper as they made their way into the hall.
This time around, Harry had mostly packed his items up into a bag in hopes that he would still be picked up, and he was glad he had. He was able to shove it into the car to Ron and then hurry down the stairs to help Fred and George carry his trunk up the stairs.
The trunk felt as though it weighed a ton and Harry, once again, found himself wishing he could use magic to make it lighter. They were able to get it through the window and into the car, though, and the twins followed it, settling themselves back in the front.
At least one thing went easy for him this time, as he crawled into the back of the car with Ron, Uncle Vernon did not come running into his room. They were able to fly off into the night without a single mishap. Harry wished he could see their faces the next morning when they woke to find he had gone.
Harry let himself settle in and breathed a sigh of relief.
The ride to the Weasleys’ was the most relaxed he’d felt since summer had started. He let the conversation wash over him, let the voices of Ron, Fred, and George soothe him and remind him that he’d be back at Hogwarts in a few short weeks.
The sun was just coming up over the horizon as they reached the main road to their home. Ms. Weasley was just as mad this time around as she’d been the first time, but Harry still had to fight a smile as he listened to her chew her sons out. He’d missed her and this home and everything else. Before he’d been sent back in time, he was over every Saturday night for dinner, sometimes more. He hadn’t realized just how much he’d missed it until he was walking back through the door and being ushered to the dining table.
He sat there taking it all in as Ms. Weasley continued to alternate between cooking at the stovetop and lecturing her sons. He smiled as she dumped some sausages onto his plate, her cooking always tasted the best to him, even better than Hogwarts food sometimes. He was about to dig into his food when he caught sight of Ginny. She’d just entered the kitchen in her nightdress, but she didn’t stay long, quickly running back out with a squeak.
“That’s Ginny,” Ron said, sitting down on the chair next to him, “my little sister. She’s been talking about you non-stop all break.”
“Yeah, she’s probably gonna want your autograph,” Fred said with a snicker.
Harry was too busy reeling from seeing her again to pay much attention to them, though. Seeing her a year ago at the train station was a shock, but seeing her again a year later, still only 11, it felt like it was all hitting him again. He wished she’d gone back in time with him, too. He didn’t want to live the next year, again, with her being awkward around him after having spent the last better part of a year being her boyfriend. He missed her. It was hard reconciling his memory of her with the reality of who she was at the moment - an 11-year-old girl who knew nothing about him except what everyone else knew.
He was still brooding over it as they went to the yard to de-gnome the garden. He tried to find joy in tossing them over the fence – something he enjoyed even after doing it for years – but all he could think about was Ginny and how badly this year was going to suck with her so close all year, but just as far away.
“You’re a natural at that,” George complimented as he threw his next gnome. The leathery gnome flew several feet into the air before landing with a thud several feet away on the other side of the fence.
“Thanks,” Harry said, with probably not enough enthusiasm because then Ron was looking over at him.
“Yeah, de-gnoming sucks. Especially when they bite– ow!” The gnome he was holding bit down on Ron’s fingers and he dropped the thing like it was on fire. The gnome quickly ran from him, ducking back into the vegetation.
Fred and George quickly turned the chore into a competition after that, filling the sky with the fat, potato-looking creatures. The sight did manage to make him cheer up a bit.
Just as the last of the gnomes were exiting the garden, the sound of the front door slamming could be heard across the yard.
“Dad’s home!” George shouted, hurrying back toward the house, the other three following behind.
“What a night. Nine raids! Mundungus Fletcher tried to put a hex on me when I was not looking, too,” Mr. Weasley was saying as the four of them entered the kitchen and sat down at the table.
The word raid made Harry think back to his time as an auror, how many raids had been done on known death-eater homes right after the war, and just how many objects the ministry recovered from those raids. It didn’t seem Mr. Weasley’s raids were as productive for the Misuse of Muggle Artefacts Department, though. But, it didn’t seem like other departments were as unproductive…
“Have you ever seen any time turners during raids?” Harry found himself blurting out before he could think better of it.
“Time turners?” Mr. Weasley asked, seeming to finally notice Harry at the table.
“I–” he started to answer when Ms. Weasley burst into the kitchen brandishing a long poker.
“HOW ABOUT FLYING CARS?”
“C-cars, Molly, dear?” Mr. Weasley’s eyes were wide as he stared up at his angry wife.
“Yes, Arthur, cars,” she replied, her tone furious as she told him what their three sons had been up that night. The only thing of her rant that seemed to catch his attention, though, was the mention of Harry’s name, and suddenly he was the center of everyone’s focus once again.
Thankfully, it did not stay that way for long, as Ms. Weasley was not finished being angry at her husband. Though, her husband’s focus was once again not on her anger, but rather on how successful the car had been. This only led to Ms. Weasley’s anger growing and soon Ron was pulling Harry out of the room to take him to his bedroom.
He spotted Ginny once again as they climbed the stairs, looking at them from a crack in the door that quickly shut as they passed. Harry wasn’t able to ruminate on it for long, however, as he was soon thrown back in time by stepping into Ron’s room. The entire place was bright orange – the color of his favorite team, the Chudley Cannons – from his bedspread to the decorations, Ron’s room was completely overtaken by the team’s merchandise.
“Chudley Cannons,” Harry said as he ran his fingers across a poster by the door.
“You know them?” Ron asked, clearly excited.
“Yeah, ninth in the league right now, right?” Harry replied, and Ron was more than happy to launch into a conversation about his favorite team. Any of the embarrassment over his room from the first time around completely vanished, and Harry felt like he’d accomplished something at the very least.
By the time it was time to go to Diagon Alley to get the supplies, Harry was more than happy to get out of the house. As much as he loved being there, he was starting to feel a little jittery. All the awkwardness from Ginny was starting to grate on his nerves and seemed to be rubbing off on him, as well. His discomfort apparently was noticeable, too, because Fred and George had seemed to pick up on it. They knew of Ginny’s crush on him and had begun to give him looks every time the two of them were in a room. When the two of them managed to catch him alone – which thankfully wasn’t very often – they’d taken to teasing him as well. Most of it was little things like asking him if he’d given her his autograph yet or if she’d asked for it. Some of it, though, just left him confused. On one occasion they’d asked him if Draco knew he was becoming friends with Ginny and then walked off snickering when he gave them a look of confusion.
Ginny was hardly his friend, she wouldn’t even talk to him. So, really, he could only stare in confusion as they left.
When he’d gotten his letter with the list of books, he’d rolled his eyes at the long list of Gilderoy Lockhart books. Now, though, he’d take dealing with meeting him in the bookshop if it got him out of the house for a little bit. Maybe this time he could avoid being noticed by him?
Probably not with his luck.
This time he managed to not end up in Knockturn Alley, so he counted that as a win. He emerged in the Leaky Cauldron to find the rest of the Weasleys waiting for him. At Gringotts Bank, they meet up with Hermione and Mr. Weasley immediately begins talking her parents’ ears off.
“Dad really loves muggle stuff,” Ron says to Hermione when she greets them.
“We’ll meet you back here,” Harry says as Ms. Weasley finally manages to drag her husband away.
Harry eyes the vaults as they make their way down the tracks, thinking about how long it’ll be until he has to come back here to get that Horcrux. The reminder that he’d be dealing with one sooner rather than later makes him shudder a little. He should probably tell Draco about the Horcruxs soon. At the moment, all Draco knew was that the diary was how Voldemort was able to control Ginny, but not what it truly was.
Maybe that wasn’t the best idea, to not tell him, but Harry sometimes found himself hoping that maybe this all would be a dream or they’d be able to make it back to their own time, and he wouldn’t have to relieve it all. Wouldn’t have to think about it. And if he told Draco, it would be like admitting that would never happen.
However, even with his growing stress over the necessary conversation, all he could find himself thinking about was that Draco would be at the bookstore today. He would finally be able to see him again after weeks of only letters. It took everything in him to not make Ron and Hermione go to the bookshop early. He knew Draco wouldn’t be there just yet anyway.
By the time they reached Flourish and Blotts, he was practically buzzing with excitement and his friends were finally starting to take notice. “ Gilderoy Lockhart ,” Ron read the sign outside the shop, “ will be signing copies of his autobiograph y–”
“You like him too, Harry?” Hermione asked excitedly, completely misinterpreting his excitement.
“Nah, he’s a fraud,” Harry muttered without thinking, already making his way inside and pushing past middle-aged witches, “Draco’s supposed to be here.”
“Ah,” was all Hermione said and Ron followed behind, already grumbling about Draco.
Ron and Hermione grabbed copies of Break with a Banshee and Harry fumbled to grab one himself, still searching the crowded bookshop and hoping to catch sight of blond hair. They joined the Weasleys in the line and Harry only passingly took note of Ms. Weasley’s continual fixing of her hair before going back to search for Draco. He had to be here, right? Or did he arrive when Harry was already leaving? He couldn’t remember and it was driving him crazy.
“What’s up with Harry?” He heard Fred ask.
“He’s looking for Malfoy,” was Ron’s annoyed response. Then, Ron was getting shoved by an annoyed cameraman and Lockhart was noticing Harry and calling him up to the stage.
However, Harry didn’t hear any of it because he was catching sight of Draco up on the stairs to the loft above. He was moving towards Draco almost immediately, but he didn’t make it far because the next thing he knew, Lockhart was grabbing onto him and pulling him to the front. He would’ve fought the grip had he been paying any attention at all. As it was, it took him so off guard, he let himself be dragged up to stand next to Lockhart before he could even make sense of what was happening.
“It can’t be Harry Potter? Got somewhere more important to be?” he asked with his stupid laugh when Harry tried to find Draco again on the stairs. Draco was already looking at him – laughing at him – that git.
“Kind of,” he ground out, not caring if it was probably rude.
“Well I hope you can spare a moment of your time,” he said with a fake laugh, grabbing onto his hand to shake. “Now give them a nice big smile, won’t you?” he said, grinning towards the camera. “Together, you and I are worth the front page.”
The first time this had happened, he’d felt awkward and confused. This time around he just found himself annoyed. He turned that annoyance onto the cameras and not smiling in a fit of pettiness. Let the Daily Profit make up some stupid claims about him from that. Maybe they can start a couple years early.
When Lockhart let go of his hand, Harry immediately moved to step away. Lockhart was faster, though, throwing an arm over his shoulders and dragging him back in. Harry barely managed to suppress a glare.
“Ladies and gentlemen!” he proclaimed to the crowd, “How extraordinary this is! What a perfect time for me to make an announcement that I have been sitting on for some time!” From there, Harry did his best to not look as annoyed as he felt, and to ignore everything else that came out of Lockhart’s mouth.
When the crowd cheered and Lockhart finally dumped his stack of books into Harry’s arms, he hurried away as fast as he could. He was finally able to make it toward the stairs where Draco was standing, still laughing at him.
He could feel people still watching him, but he didn’t care. He dropped the books on a random shelf and threw his arms around Draco’s shoulders.
Draco was still laughing at him softly, but Harry didn’t much care. He tightened his grip around Draco’s shoulders and buried his face into Draco’s hair that had gotten longer over the summer. He smelled clean and like fresh laundry. “I missed you,” Harry said into his shoulder.
Draco, who’d wrapped his arms around Harry’s back, tightened his grip slightly. “I missed you, too.”
“Well,” a cool voice said, one that Harry recognized instantly. Draco stiffened, pulling back from Harry hurriedly. Harry dropped his own arms from Draco’s shoulders. “If it isn’t Harry Potter. From what I’ve heard, you’re close friends with Draco. Though, he hardly tells me these things himself. “Harry made to respond when he was cut off by Lucius Malfoy. “Arthur Weasley, too.”
“Lucius,” Mr. Weasley responded, just as curt.
“Busy time at the Ministry, I hear. All those raids… I hope they’re paying you overtime?” Ron, Hermione, and Ginny had now joined them and Malfoy reached into Ginny’s cauldron to pull out the beat-up copy of A Beginner’s Guide to Transfiguration . Harry’s eyes locked onto his hands, missing anything else that was said.
It seemed in his focus on retrieving the book from Ginny, he’d forgotten about the fistfight that had broken out between Malfoy and Mr. Weasley. One second he was watching Malfoy grab the book out of Ginny’s cauldron and the next he was getting hit by Mr. Weasley.
Harry stepped back, standing next to Draco who appeared to be biting back a laugh. Harry grinned at him and he grinned back.
Soon, Ms. Weasley, the twins, and Hagrid were joining them, trying to break up the fight– well, Ms. Weasly and Hagrid were, Fred and George were cheering and shouting suggestions on where to hit next.
When Hagrid finally managed to pull them off one another, Malfoy straightened up with as much dignity as one could have after rolling on the floor of a bookshop in a fight with another grown adult and brushed himself off. “Here, girl – take your book – it’s the best your father can give you.” And there it was, he was dropping Ginny’s book and the diary into her cauldron. His heart pounded and one look at Draco told him he’d noticed it too. Draco met his eyes, his look saying you better figure that one out . Then Malfoy was steering Draco back out of the shop.
Ms. Weasley was beside herself, lecturing her husband the whole way out the door.
“Here,” Harry said, grabbing both books out of Ginny’s cauldron and stacking the transfiguration one onto his stack of Lockhart’s books. He dropped the stack back into her cauldron and slipped the diary into one of his bags from a different store. “You keep them, I don’t want them anyway.”
With that, he followed the Weasleys out of the store and back to the Leaky Cauldron to floo home. He finally felt like he was able to change something for the better.