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Harry shouts in George's ear over the enthusiastic demolishing of Kids. Seamus is singing Kylie's parts, Luna Robbie’s. It’s both wonderful and terrible. And loud.
"You can tinker in real time, yeah?"
George gives him a wicked grin. Malfoy's up to sing next. The Magical Music karaoke machine, invented by WWW, is set up on shuffle, throwing up a mixture of Muggle and Wizarding music.
"Sure can. What you thinking?"
George has them all here so they can iron out the glitches. This is the first club to have them installed, Blaise is convinced it will rake him in the Galleons.
Harry still loves to rile Malfoy up. It has a different feel to it now. He's not sure he'd call it friendly, there's still too much of an edge to it for that. But it doesn't lead to duelling, and Harry has decided that Malfoy is his favourite person to piss off.
"Remember that Circe-awful song about me, about three years ago? The singer only ever did that one. It played out non-stop on the Wireless."
George sniggers. "I remember. Lee is an absolute bastard when he wants to be. He kept dedicating every play to you."
"That very one." Harry tilts his head at the machine, raises his eyebrows. George surreptitiously looses his wand and wordlessly fires a spell as Luna and Shay wind down to drunken whoops.
Malfoy looks uncomfortable as he walks up. It isn’t really his kind of thing, Harry supposes. He's often around now, at these group things. They have Ron of all people to thank for that. When they'd been thrown together at the Ministry they'd taken to playing chess to avoid having to make small talk. That had led very slowly from grudging admiration to outright friendship. He'd started turning up to pub nights about a year ago.
Malfoy glances at the screen. His head snaps up to glare at Harry and George. Harry, grinning back and raising his glass, expects him to cry foul. Instead a determined look comes over Malfoy’s face.
He slips his jacket off, removes his tie and pops open the top two buttons of his tailored shirt. Harry idly wonders what kind of physical training programme the Unspeakables have.
Fiddling around with the controls on the Magic Music machine he changes the genre to blues, shifts the key. It’s a nifty set of spellwork that George has built in. Malfoy confidently picks up the ‘mic’. It is actually a simple steel handle, charmed with an inbuilt Sonorous.
As he brings it up to his lips his voice is low. “This one goes out to all the heroes.”
Strolling back over to his table Malfoy picks up his shot of firewhiskey and knocks it back in one.
Harry suddenly thinks he’s made a very bad choice. His mind flickers back to that almost kiss a few weeks back. They’d both had a few, but not nearly enough to explain it away. He realises he hasn’t really seen him since then.
The music starts. It’s spare, just a few well placed notes on piano, a subtle undercurrent of double bass.
When Malfoy starts to sing Harry almost forgets how to breathe. His voice is low, clear, sweet. He gently draws out some of the notes, leaves them hanging.
He’s not looking at Harry, he almost seems in a world of his own.
“I see you,
No need to hide away“
The lyrics had felt stupid and overblown with their pop backing track.
“I wrap you up in silver smoke
Chase your ghosts away.”
Now he feels exposed.
“And when we meet,
We'll already know.”
Everyone has gone quiet. The others had been dicking around, but Malfoy was something else.
“I wrap you up in silver smoke,
And chase your ghosts away.”
When he listened to this song a thousand times before it had felt like an annoyance. Cliché idolisation. It’s a dominant theme in fan letters, ‘broken Harry who needs fixing’. It grew in intensity as details of his childhood were exposed, but it had always been there. It made people think they knew what he needed.
He’s never liked it.
The hero worship is almost better, it feels less invasive.
Malfoy looks up, locks eyes with him for the first time as the song comes to an end. His voice is warm and rich. Even in this busy room it feels like it is all for him.
“I see you,
No need to hide away.”
Luna whistles as Malfoy passes the mic off to Ron.
George looks at him wide eyed, “Fucking hell, Harry.” He makes for the bar as Malfoy approaches.
Malfoy looks uncomfortable again, like he’s been caught in a trap. He’s grabbed his jacket on his way, sliding it on as he reaches Harry. His voice is clipped. “Got whatever it was you wanted with that little stunt, Potter?” He’s got his Malfoy mask in place.
He turns, slips through the door, and Harry quickly follows.
“Not yet.”
Malfoy turns, questioning.
“But I think, maybe, if I’m very lucky...I might.”
Malfoy's lips curl into a satisfied smile. He turns away and keeps walking.
“See you on Friday, Potter. If you’re lucky.”