Chapter Text
Draco unlocked the door, already hearing Harry's laughter in the living room. It sounded like he was watching another Muggle movie. Draco felt a little smile quirk his lips as he realized that he genuinely looked forward to coming home these days. Knowing that he had someone to talk to about his day - someone who would listen and crack jokes- made his life seem less dismal. Living with Harry was a weird twist of fate that seemed to be working out, against the odds.
Draco had found living alone almost unbearable after the divorce. He had never lived alone, and he wasn’t strong enough to start at this late date. He still had dreams about the war and they unsettled him. It wasn't that he needed a shoulder to cry on. But he liked to know that there was someone else around, just in case. With Astoria gone, and most of his other friends dead or in jail, he didn’t have anyone. At any rate, no one he could just call up at a moment's notice.
One night, several weeks after the documents finalizing the divorce had been signed, he had run into Potter in a pub. He and Potter had never been particular friends, but after the war, Harry had always gone out of his way to be polite to Draco, which he had appreciated more than he would ever say.
His split with Astoria had been all over the papers, and Draco did not handle the resultant stress well. One could even say he was cracking up, a bit. He had been several whiskeys into a bender when a low voice sounded somewhere above him and to the left. It seemed to be addressing him.
"Hey, buy you a drink?"
Draco looked up through a fog of alcohol, squinted and said, “Potter?" The blurry shape standing over him seemed familiar in a scruffy, bespectacled way.
"I hope so; I'm wearing his underwear,” the shape said. Draco tried to focus.
“Yeah, Malfoy,” Harry said, chuckling. “It's me. Potter. You look a bit plastered. Maybe we should get you some coffee?" He sat down next to Malfoy as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
"No, no, I'm fine for one more. What're you doing here? Where's the ... your friends?" He looked around warily, expecting to be ambushed by the other two-thirds of the Triumverate.
"They're on the honeymoon. They got married, Malfoy. Didn't you get the invitation?"
Draco was thoughtful for a moment. "Yeesssss.... I have a vague recollection of that...hm."
"Right, well, you didn't make an appearance but shockingly they decided to get married anyway. I've got the bouquet at home in case you're bitter you missed it."
Draco couldn't believe his ears - it sounded like Potter was using sarcasm. Would wonders never cease?
Draco snorted. "No, you can keep it. Thanks. Thanks for the drink too."
"So, where are you living now that Astoria’s split?" Potter didn't even seem to realize how gauche he was being. It must have been the alcohol that allowed Draco to accept this assumed intimacy with such grace.
"Same place. She moved out.” Draco's fingers curled around his glass. “Good riddance," he added.
"You sure about that?"
Draco rewarded Harry for his concern with a cold look.
"I'm doing fine, Potter."
"I'm sure." Potter took a sip of his drink. "So, that big house, all alone."
"Yes. It's quite cozy, for a house with 14 bedrooms. You'd be surprised."
Harry grinned and shook his head. "I've been there once, remember?"
"Can't say as how I do. When did my standards lapse so far as to invite the likes of you over?" Draco slitted his eyes at Harry, who smirked at his attempt to be offensive.
"Theodore Nott's bachelor party. Don't think I've forgotten your striptease."
"That was the drugs. I was tricked." Draco could feel a smile tugging at his lips.
"If you say so." Harry looked amused and dubious.
"I may have enjoyed the look on Weasley's face. But that's it," he added with an air of he-doth-protest-too-much. Truth was, Draco was a hopeless exhibitionist and he knew it.
"Well, Weasley's bachelor party was even worse than Nott's, let me tell you."
"Oh yes, tell me all about it!" Draco said, sarcastically. And thanks for inviting me, wanker, he didn’t add.
"I hired him a stripper," Harry continued. Apparently his new-found ability to use sarcasm didn't come with a corresponding ability to recognize it when it was directed at him.
"Very plebian."
"A male stripper."
"You didn't!" Draco burst into helpless laughter.
They'd talked until the wee hours, and Draco had gotten considerably drunker, and somewhere along the line Harry must have said something about wanting to give the new Mr. and Mrs. Weasley some breathing room and find another place, because when Draco woke up the next morning, he dimly remembered that they'd agreed that Potter should move in.
* * *
Harry continued to be the foolish Gryffindor he was, only now he was doing it in Draco's house. Laughing and cooking and drinking his terrible lager and being absurdly and needlessly frugal. He watched muggle movies and tried his hand at all manner of pastimes: playing guitar, sketching, joining pick-up Quidditch games. He was involved with life in a carefree, easy way, and Draco found it admirable. Apparently, getting rid of Voldemort had purged some of the darker aspects of Harry’s personality.
For Draco, things were not so easy. Most of the time he felt like a broken thing, taken apart and poorly put back together. Pieces were missing, or butting up against something they shouldn't, rasping and grating against each other. He drank a lot to mitigate the ache, but the drinking made him do things he wasn't proud of, and that tended to make the whole situation worse.
They never spent time together outside of the house they shared, but when they were both there, Draco found that he couldn't seem to tear himself away from Harry's side. Harry was always laughing at something or other - which was strange, as he'd always seemed so somber during the war.
The war had taken an enormous toll on him, and Draco knew that he too had trouble sleeping a lot of the time. But his laughter and his warm smiles didn't seem faked or forced. It was a mystery, one that absorbed Draco. Sometimes he found himself half-consciously picking at the threads of it, even when he thought he was thinking of something else.
* * *
He never could pinpoint the exact moment he'd first found Potter attractive. Intellectually he knew that Potter wasn't bad-looking, of course, but he was hardly Draco's type. Later, when he started to have fleeting moments of appreciation for Potter's face, or body, or mannerisms, he pushed them out of his head. He didn't dwell on them. It just wasn't the done thing, having a crush on your housemate. Besides, Potter was straight.
When Potter had casually told him, late one night in the kitchen, that he'd made out with a couple boys at Gryffindor dorm parties, Draco had again pushed aside the information as of no interest to him. An inappropriate and inconvenient topic of speculation. He didn't want to ruin a good thing. The only thing going for him at the moment, actually.
While he couldn't pinpoint the start of the attraction, he could well identify the moment when it became no longer something that could be pushed aside. It asserted itself center-stage in his life, in one overwhelming and unexpected moment.
* * *
Harry is looking pretty well put-together for a weeknight, Draco mused. His hair was as close to styled as it ever got, his shirt crisp and flattering to his broad shoulders, his shoes… Good lord, he wasn't even wearing trainers! Part of Draco's mind was admiring the way Harry's dark jeans molded to his arse, while the other part of his mind was calmly ignoring the observation as irrelevant.
“So, big plans tonight?” he drawled, knowing Harry would just say something about an Unspeakable function he hadn't been able to get out of.
“Yeah, for once.”
“Oh, really?” Probably playing wizarding poker with the Gryffindork Gang, he thought derisively, deflecting the slight twinge of jealousy that accompanied the knowledge that he would never be invited to a game.
“Yeah, really.” Harry turned and grinned at him. “You're not the only one who can pull, you know.”
“Um, what?” Draco genuinely believed he must have heard wrong.
“I’ve got a date. Met him at the market. Pretty cute, too, if I say so myself.” Harry sounded happy and excited.
Him. Everything became clear to Draco in a flash of understanding so blinding it momentarily made him feel as though he might faint or vomit.
Distantly, he heard his own voice say, “You've got a date? With a man?”
"Is that okay?" Harry asked warily as Draco stood there, thunderstruck.
"Y-yeah, it's fine." Draco shook himself, turned away to investigate some suddenly important piece of owl-mail. "Of course it is."
"I mean, you date men occasionally too, right?"
"Well, 'date' is hardly the right word. It would be more apt to say I fuck men occasionally." Draco knew he'd sounded harsh. He struggled for moment to find a way to play it off, but nothing came to mind.
Harry looked unsettled for a moment, then he smiled at Draco and said, "Yeah, well, I'm off. Wish me luck!"
Draco crossed his fingers behind his back and said, "Good luck," as brightly as he could manage. No sooner had Harry left than he felt stupid, and petty, and more importantly, stupid.
* * *
In the ensuing days, Draco endeavored to retain at least a tenuous hold on denial, that lifesaving psychological defense. This became all the more necessary the first time Harry brought someone home.
Draco had been sitting on the divan (Harry called it a couch, but Harry was a plebe), watching a film when they stumbled in, laughing. Pain stabbed Draco in his chest as he registered that a) Harry was enjoying himself with this bloke, and b) this bloke was fucking gorgeous. He scanned the man's face and body to see if it stirred any recollection, but he reluctantly concluded that he'd never fucked the man before, not in any of the clubs or bars he sometimes frequented.
"Hey, Draco!" Harry said. "Stephen, this is my housemate Draco. Draco, this is that guy I was telling you about."
"Ah." So, not a new guy. The same one. Bloody buggering fuck. "How do you do?"
"'How do you do,' that's so posh!" laughed Stephen. He either lacked manners completely or was more than a little drunk. Possibly both. "How do you do?" he said, clearly taking the piss.
"I do admirably. I was just enjoying a film, but I can take it to my room if you'd rather have the living room." Please, please, use the living room, he thought fervently.
"No, that's okay Draco, we'll just go to my bedroom."
Now the pain was stabbing through both his chest and his belly. Soon it would make incursions on his head. Hopefully it would leave his dick alone- he needed that to help him forget the way he was feeling just now.
"Actually - make yourselves at home; I believe I'll go out for a nightcap." And a blow job.
He probably slammed the door on his way out, but he doubted they could hear him over the frenzy of their wild animal sex.
* * *
The club was thumping with music Draco didn't like. He shrugged imperceptibly and scanned the room. He hadn't come here to dance anyway. He came here for a very specific purpose. Sometimes he'd let himself get pulled onto the dance floor, but it was all with one goal in mind- getting a blow job with no strings attached. If the fellow was very good or very hot, he might bestow the gift of a first-class reaming, back at his place. He usually used a Silencing Charm so as to avoid making Potter aware of what a slut he was, but perhaps tonight he'd go without.
He spotted someone leaning against the bar. Well. This might be one of those rare times he gave someone else a blow job - he ought to keep in practice, after all, and this man was a virtual Adonis. His stomach churned with the knowledge that no matter how hot the man was, he was no Harry. He told his stomach to fuck off.
A few drinks later, Draco approached the man. He knew he wasn't looking his best, but even on his off-days he outshone most blokes. He attempted to convey "I've just been shagged which is why I look this grotty, but I'm so insatiable and voracious that I need more; could you be the lucky man to satisfy me?"
Mr. Adonis gave him a sideways glance, smirked to himself and half-turned to Draco where he leaned casually against the bar, surveying the dancing bodies.
"See something you like?" The man was an American, but had a drawl on him that put most Brits to shame.
Draco pointedly stared out at the crowd for a second or two longer, before turning slowly to the man at his side.
He looked him subtly up and down and said, "Now I do."
The other man laughed, a bit derisively Draco thought, but turned fully towards him and said, "Me too. Let's go to the back."
Draco followed the man to the back room, which was more sweaty and crowded than usual. They made their way to the back, and the man leaned against the wall, looking through his eyelashes at Draco. "Well?" he said.
His arrogance would have been appalling on a less attractive, less composed man. As it was, he was just the type, the only type, that could possibly get Draco on his knees in this situation. Before Draco lowered himself to the ground, he leaned towards the man, to kiss him. The man snorted in contempt and turned his face so that Draco's lips met his cheek. Draco growled lightly in his throat, turning the man's face to his and kissing him. He met with mild resistance at first, but Draco had skills not possessed by the ordinary run of man.
He pulled away and the man looked unwillingly impressed. "Okay," he drawled with a smile on his face. "Now will you kindly get down on your knees?" He undid his trousers and began to push them down.
Draco grinned at him and finished pulling the man's trousers around his thighs. Now there was a thing worthy of putting in one's mouth. Draco knelt and nuzzled all around... ("What did you say your name was?" "I didn't." Draco gave him a look. The man smirked. "Brian.") Brian's cock. It smelled good, not quite ‘right’ but fairly arousing. Draco took it in hand and began working it over. Putting just the head in his mouth, he rolled his tongue all the way around the glans, noting with satisfaction the thrust of hips that greeted this assay.
This man was gorgeous, his cock was gorgeous, it felt good in his mouth, he liked the response he was getting. But it wasn't enough. He found that he was imagining it was Harry's cock in his mouth. He groaned in horror and arousal, knowing that it was wrong to think of Harry that way, that way madness lay, but he couldn't help it. It made him so hard. He moaned loudly as Brian came down his throat.
Brian helped him up to his feet and stared him down. "That was fucking great," he said. "I think, as a reward, I'd be willing to fuck you. Your place... or your place?"
Draco actually blushed. "That's usually my line, but..." His thoughts drifted back to Harry and Stephen. "Yeah, actually. My place it is."
* * *
The sex was fantastic and empty, like he'd known it would be. They both passed out immediately afterwards, but Draco awoke at four in the morning and couldn't get back to sleep. He lay there, brooding stoically, until Brian muttered, “Take a sleeping pill, for Christ's sake; you're keeping me awake with your fidgeting.”
Draco huffed and rolled further away from the warm, foreign body in his bed. He lay, listening to Brian's breathing, trying to convince himself that he shouldn't ask for advice from a stranger on holiday.
“What's on your mind, then?” Brian asked, resignedly. “I can tell you're still awake. Talk.”
“Have you ever …” Oh god, he did not want to put this into words. This would be the first time he'd talked about it. It was going to make it feel real.
“Dear Abby isn't going to wait all night, you know. Spit it out.” Though the words were harsh, Brian's voice actually sounded a bit tender. Draco figured it couldn't hurt to confide in this bloke. He'd never see him again anyway.
“I… rather fancy my housemate. It's driving me round the bend. I don't know what to do.”
“What to do? You don't do anything. House booty is bad booty. You're an adult; you should know that.”
Despite the gravity of the situation, Draco laughed. “House booty is bad booty? What kind of advice is that?”
“It's simple. You don't shit or fuck where you live. You should kick him out.”
“It's not that simple. He's my friend.”
“He used to be your friend. Now he's a ticking time bomb, precisely calibrated to fuck up your life.”
“I'd be alone.” Gross. He sounded so pathetic when he said that.
“Better alone than pining like some twink. Have some dignity.”
“You do have a point.”
“I've got more than a point," he said as he took Draco's hand and moved down to his engorged prick. "Take care of that for me, will you?” He smirked, and Draco had an epiphany that being smirked at all the time was rather irritating. Nevertheless, he felt his cock twitch in response. Early morning sex was usually the best, anyway.
He slid down the bed, muttering, “Only because I'll never see you again.”
Brian laughed.
“What's your last name, so I can be sure to avoid you if I ever visit America?”
“Ha,” said Brian derisively. “I highly doubt you'd visit the craphole I live in. It's Kinney.”
“Okay, then, Brian Kinney, to reward you for your callous advice I will now administer one, and only one, blow job.”