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“That’s my scarf.”
Draco—eyes barely visible under the giant scarf that enveloped him—looked up at him, held his gaze for a whole two seconds, and then very pointedly looked back down at the case file sitting before him.
“Heating charms are a thing, you know,” Harry added, setting the coffee he’d brought Draco on the git’s side of the table and sitting heavily in his chair, squinting at the stack of paperwork that awaited him. “If you’re really that cold we can strengthen them a bit.”
Draco nuzzled the scarf and turned the page without a word. Harry huffed with a shake of his head. The git was still mad at him, he knew, but this was certainly a peculiar way to be mad at someone; especially since Draco was playing with the fringe of the scarf, his long fingers twining and twirling the soft strands of dark red wool. It seemed like a mindless gesture, but Harry wouldn’t put it past him to be doing it on purpose: after all, he knew very well what Harry thought of his fingers.
Harry didn’t even attempt to concentrate on the paperwork. He took a sip of his coffee and said, “Look, I’m an idiot, okay? Just give me a piece of your mind and be done with it, please?”
Draco turned another page. Glanced up at Harry for but a second.
“I’m certain I’ve no idea what you’re talking about,” he said, voice low. “Your scarf is merely the softest garment I’ve ever come across. I can never find scarves that don’t irritate the skin of my throat, you know.”
His fingers turned and twisted around the fringe. Harry sighed.
“I asked you to date me and you’re mad at me.”
“Wrong. You asked me to date you while we were buying Christmas-themed socks for Weasley and I’m rightfully mad at you.”
“It seemed like a good idea in the moment,” Harry said, sheepish.
Draco looked up at the ceiling, incredulity and exasperation painted all over his face.
“Of course it did, you heathen,” he murmured, talking to himself more than to Harry. “For the love of Merlin, Potter. I would’ve assumed you’d know by now I am a man of romance. One doesn’t simply bring up the possibility of a serious, long-term relationship with me while buying pieces of clothing that are going to warm Weasley’s smelly feet for years to come.”
Harry couldn’t help it—he snorted, burying his face in his hands. Draco was right: Ron’s feet reeked.
“And how, potentially,” Harry said after a moment, “would one interest you in a serious, long-term relationship to ensure you’d say yes?”
Draco pretended—rather dramatically, at that—to consider the question for a few seconds: humming aloud, scratching his chin under the scarf, staring vacantly.
“Homemade dinner with candles would be the bare minimum, I’d say. But if one wanted to be certain I’d say yes, some other details would have to be involved…”
“Like…?”
“Like nice robes,” Draco said, squinting at Harry’s old jumper and jeans. “Cologne would be appreciated too. Low, background music to compliment the low crackling of the hearth... I’d have to be notified in advance, of course, so I could dress accordingly, and a bottle of wine would certainly seal the deal.”
Harry just gaped at him.
“You’re unbelievable,” he said. “That has to be the poshest thing I’ve ever heard you say.”
“I did tell you I was a romantic, didn’t I?”
“You’re impossible, is what you are,” Harry declared. “Can I have my scarf back now, please?”
Draco smirked.
“Heating charms are a thing, you know?”
Draco didn’t look up from his paperwork when Harry walked into their office and closed the door behind him. The idiot was still wearing the scarf—he’d taken it home the previous evening and had walked into the department that morning with it draped around his neck for everyone to see—and was, once again, playing with it absent-mindedly while he worked.
Harry halted at the other side of the table, rummaging in his pocket. He pulled out the hearth-scented candle he’d bought that very morning a few streets away from the Ministry, set it down on the table, and lit it up with the tip of his wand.
Draco did look up, then.
“What’s this?”
Instead of answering, Harry rested a plastic bag on the desk and took out a glass container, opening it and placing it where Draco would see—and most importantly, smell—its contents.
“Potter, what…?” Draco inhaled—deeply, slowly—eyes falling closed for an instant before looking up incredulously at him. “Why?”
“Homemade samosas,” he said, gesturing at the pastries, still warm despite having been cooked the previous night. “Candle.” He pointed at the small flame. “And, lest I forget…” He removed his cardigan; he wasn’t wearing his fanciest robes—that would’ve been too out of place at work—but he’d put on the tight jeans he’d been wearing the first time he’d caught Draco staring at his thighs while out for a walk, as well as the jacket Draco had declared, a few months back, to be the most decent item in Harry’s wardrobe—his assessment having allegedly nothing to do with the excessive amount of buttons the thing had, even if it was the world’s worst kept secret that Draco had a passion for buttons.
He let Draco stare back and forth between him and the samosas for a few moments before saying—with a rise and fall of his shoulders, with a small shake to his voice despite his efforts— “I want to date you. A-And I know you want it too because you wouldn’t have worn my scarf in front of the entire Ministry staff if you didn’t want everyone to assume we were an item. So…there you go. Homemade samosas. Cheese, chicken, and spiced potatoes. I have no idea if you even like spiced potatoes, but you don’t have to eat them if you don’t—”
Draco stood, and Harry gulped, his voice dying.
Slowly, painfully slowly, Draco walked around the table and stood before him. He looked down at Harry’s clothes; raised a hand as if to touch the buttons of his jacket, then changed his mind and let it fall to his side again. He looked up at Harry’s face, then, and Harry held his breath, gaze drawn to a faint freckle underneath Draco’s right eye.
“I said candles, you know,” Draco breathed. “Plural.”
Harry blinked, not understanding.
“Does—does that mean...”
Draco’s thumb found his cheek, fingers tangling in the hair at Harry’s nape. Harry’s breath hitched. When had they gotten so close?
“It means,” Draco murmured, “that I must be very into you, because I’m not even slightly mad you’re asking me out at work, of all places.”
“Better than a clothes shop, isn’t it?”
“The bar was certainly low,” Draco agreed. “Plus, you cooked for me. I can’t overlook that.”
“Right.” The lower half of Draco’s face had poked out from under the scarf when he’d pointed with his head to the table, and Harry’s eyes fell to Draco’s lips.
Draco noticed, and wet his lips with the tip of his tongue. Said, voice rough, “I wouldn’t have chosen this jacket, though.”
Harry looked up, worry crawling through him. But all he found in Draco’s eyes was want so intense it made him shiver for an entirely different reason.
“The things I want to do to you when you’re wearing this…” His hand fell to the buttons: traced the shape of one of them almost reverently. “They shouldn’t even cross my mind while I’m at work.”
“Come to my place after work, then,” Harry said, feeling bold. Feeling breathless, and exhilarated, and way too hot inside his clothes all of a sudden. “I’ll put more candles up and light the fire. You can even go by your house to change into fancy clothes. Grab a bottle of wine, if you have it.”
“I always have wine.” Hands falling to Harry’s waist, Draco licked his lips again.
“Okay,” Harry breathed.
“And I want there to only be embers in the hearth by the end of the night.”
“You’ll have to stay a few hours for that to happen.”
“Good,” Draco said, eyes on Harry’s mouth, and Harry almost kissed him then and there, Draco’s standards about romance be damned—but then Draco took a step back, and another until his hip was resting by the table. He grabbed a samosa and bit into it: hummed, eyes falling closed. Crumbs falling onto Harry’s scarf as he savoured the pastry.
After swallowing, Draco grinned.
“I love spiced potatoes.”