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The banging on the door won’t stop. Draco finally drags himself out of bed, throws on a robe, and answers it.
He expects to see Margaret, his elderly next-door neighbor. She’s over almost every night asking him to grab something from her high shelves, or to find her cat where it’s hidden under her bed. He swears that woman is nocturnal.
He does not expect to see a bloody, beat-up Harry Potter outside his flat. Potter looks up at him and Draco can see bruises framing his face, tinged green in the dim light of the hallway.
Draco just stares, frozen in the doorway. “What- what are you doing here?” he asks quietly, all too aware that it’s nearly three in the morning.
“Can I come in?” Potter asks, polite despite the hoarseness of his voice.
“Why?”
“Please, Draco. I’ll explain inside.”
Draco looks out into the hallway, checking to see if anyone’s there. There’s no one.
“Fine. Get in.”
Potter looks grateful, squeezing past Draco and limping into the living room. He’s covered in dirt and grime, but Draco motions for him to sit. It’s going to be a long night. It’s a long night already.
Draco digs through his cabinets, looking for one of the salves he brewed last week. He brings it over to Potter, who looks like he’s about to pass out on the couch.
“Episkey,” Draco incants, healing Potter’s clearly broken nose. He screws open the lid on the salve, dipping his fingers in and rubbing them softly against the bruises on Potter’s face. “What happened?”
“They found out about the op.”
“What op?”
“Come on, Draco. Don’t pretend.”
Draco just sighs. “What’s the damage, then?”
“Richards is down. Johnson and Maynard got away, as far as I know. We’ll have to start from scratch on the case.”
“Where else are you hurt?”
“I’m fine, Draco. Can I just… crash here tonight?”
Eventually, Potter falls asleep. Draco sits in the chair across from him, not willing to leave him alone. Because even a year after Potter left him, he still can’t stop himself from caring.
When he wakes up the next morning, Potter is gone.