Chapter Text
At first, there is nothing unusual about Draco's morning. He enters the atelier at a quarter to nine on a cold winter morning, walking with swift strides lengthened by the height of the heels on his boots. He taps the kettle once to fill it with fresh water, again to set it to boil, then sets about putting coffee to brew, because he doesn't know yet if it's a tea or coffee sort of business day. His assistant Elda arrives soon after with a box of scones he knows his fussy staff will pick at all day—fashion people are hard-pressed to ever admit they are hungry. He selects a scone studded with blueberries for himself, then heads into his office in the back to review his in-tray and discover which caffeine beverage he'll be having today before Pansy joins him in about an hour, if she's feeling punctual.
Even now, as he takes a careful bite of crumbly pastry, nothing is strange or amiss. The top of his tray is mostly invoices from suppliers for textiles, trims, and findings. There's an invoice from the repair service that fixed the sewing machine that had fired its central mechanism sideways across the room last week, and Draco snorts at the memory. There are client letters, ranging from heartfelt thanks for beautiful garments to annoying requests for major changes on nearly-finished products. Draco will be sure to charge them appropriately for the offense, though he'd never express such sentiment to a client's face. No, his atelier's reputation is more important than that. Still, this is looking like a tea sort of morning. He can already imagine the bergamot scent filling his nose.
And then his hand freezes, halfway through picking up the next item in the tray.
A new client request. An ordinary event at Atelier Malfoy, and surely not the only one he'll receive today; the client load these days justifies a staff of three other couturiers. But this one—well, there's nothing ordinary about the client.
Draco wonders if the request is even real. After all, Harry Potter hasn't been seen in the wizarding public in just shy of ten years.
"Harry Potter," he muses, shaking off the surprise and tapping the client request thoughtfully. Potter, or someone pretending to be him, has need of a full bespoke ensemble to wear to the upcoming Gala celebrating the 25th anniversary of the Battle of Hogwarts and the end of the war. More interestingly, he doesn't want to come to the atelier. He wishes for all discussions, fittings, and final delivery to occur at his home, the location of which will apparently remain undisclosed until the request is accepted.
Draco takes a vicious, messy bite of his scone and sets it down to make an oily spot on his desk so he can go fix himself a cup of coffee. One of the big mugs.
He has only ever been, since the day he arrived on this planet, a nosy git, a title he wears with pride. After all, no one can call you out on your nosiness if you beat them to it. His mother would prefer to call it "an intelligent sense of curiosity," but of course she would, because she's where he got all his nosiness from. What this means is that he absolutely must discover if this client request really is from Harry Potter, and the only way he's going to do that is to fully caffeinate and set out to that undisclosed location himself. He takes an enormous, scalding sip of coffee, then signs off on the maybe-Harry-Potter client request. Accepted. The document duplicates itself, and one copy vanishes.
"You look like you're about to vibrate out of your skin, darling," Pansy says as she arrives, thirty minutes later than she ought to. A cloud of tiny, translucent pink bats halo her pristine bob, though the clean lines of her black A-line dress and tights say she's ready to work. "What on earth is the matter with you? And—wait, are you leaving already?"
"I," Draco begins, pausing to whirl his cape onto his shoulders in typically dramatic fashion, "am going out to meet a client."
"You hate house calls," she says, as she whirls her cape right off in turn. Short capes are very in right now, thanks to Atelier Malfoy. "What are you really doing?"
"It's the truth, I'll have you know." He buttons the high collar of his cape up to his throat, and buckles the belt that cinches its front at his narrow waist. "This client is interesting."
"There's no such thing." She wanders over to the scones, predictably breaking off the tiniest corner she can manage. Draco polished off his scone ages ago. "Take your cape back off and help me figure out how to deal with that horrible Minchin woman's alterations. I refuse to start all over again, but she might as well have asked for an entirely different dress."
"You know what my answer is. Override her." Draco smooths his hands down his front and approaches one of many full-length mirrors in the atelier. His look is understated, he thinks; just fashionable enough to silently underscore his expertise to a client without intimidating them. The cloak splits at each shoulder, the better to let the front become form-fitting and sleek while the rest of the cape drapes to mid-calf, and the splits reveal the bishop sleeves of his white silk georgette shirt. Pansy thinks he's going to run the trend of sheer shirts into the ground, or so she's said, but in practice she's as onboard as he is. His boots don't quite meet the cropped hems of his slim black trousers, and the boots themselves have high, blocky heels and an angular swordfish toe that gives them interest without being stupid. Yes, this is just the look with which to show Potter he's a professional.
"She won't like it if I do." Pansy pours herself a cup of Earl Grey. "Draco, are we out of cream?" she asks as she checks the cold cabinet.
"If you want cream in this atelier, buy it yourself." Draco runs a hand over the shorn sides of his hair, then points his wand at the back of his head to replait his long braid. He couldn't stand the confusing blend of blond and grey as his age set in, so he spells his hair and trim beard snow-white down to the root, refreshing the charm every other week. "And please make Mrs. Minchin believe it was her idea all along to agree with whatever you want to put her in. She doesn't know what she should wear—you do."
Pansy pulls a face, wrinkling her pug nose. "If I must."
"You must," he agrees. He's quite sure his outfit is on point, but he turns to her anyway. "How do I look?"
She looks him up and down, taking in every stitch of his outfit. "Change the shirt, Draco. You won't want to keep the cape on if you stay in someone else's house for long, and your nipples will scare away business."
"You just want me to stop wearing so many sheer tops," he sniffs, as if he hadn't asked her opinion in the first place.
"You're 42. Keep your nipples to yourself."
"What a prude you've grown up to be, Pans." He sighs, though, because maybe-Harry-Potter is probably the one client he really shouldn't show his nipples to on a first outing. He slings away his cape with a practiced gesture, and summons a black silk poplin shirt with a dramatic pointed collar, said collar decorated with tonal embroidery of bats. "Better?" he asks, once he's nearly done buttoning up the new shirt; despite her stated feelings about his nipples, she doesn't even blink as he changes in front of her. Frequently topless models in the atelier have inured them both to most nudity.
Another careful look. "Yes," she says, slowly, tapping the side of her face with one finger. "You were fine before, really, but you only listen to me about what you should wear when something's afoot. Tell me who the client is."
"Oh, don't act as though it was a secret I was keeping from you," Draco snaps, yanking his cape back on and buckling it with hasty hands. "You just didn't ask."
"Then tell me now." She sips her tea with a smirk.
"Well." Another check of his hair, but it seems to have survived his outfit upheaval. "It might be Harry Potter." He holds up the tiny scroll containing the address to could-be-Harry-Potter's home; it had arrived by owl shortly before Pansy's arrival.
"No!" she gasps, with just the right amount of drama as she presses a hand to her collarbone. "I thought he hadn't been seen in years?"
"I'm off to see if it's a hoax," Draco says, setting his mouth in a grim line. "And if it's not—"
"All yours," Pansy says, putting her free hand up. "I wouldn't dare step between a Malfoy and the longtime object of his obsession."
"Oh, shut up, you colossal bitch," he mutters, and she grins. "I'm off, before you can say anything stupider." And he picks up his leather satchel to do just that.
Twelve Grimmauld Place, clawing its way out from between numbers Eleven and Thirteen as Draco recites from the parchment owled to him earlier. A familiar address, once he's thought about it long enough; one of the handful of London satellites of Pureblood ancestry he visited as a child. This one belongs—or belonged, he should say—to his mother's aunt. He wonders if Potter's kept up the taxidermied house elf heads he's pretty sure he remembers from those childhood visits, and a wry smirk twists his lips. Wouldn't that be something.
As he climbs the steps, Draco imagines what kind of Harry Potter he'll meet when the door opens. There's still a strong chance he's been summoned by a stranger, but Draco's never liked to hope for the mundane. In school, Potter was a collection of sticks tied together in a boy shape, until he became a pubescent athlete with a broad, muscled core from riding a broomstick a hundred feet in the air. In his twenties, before his long disappearance from the public, Potter had balanced out—fit and lean, tight hips leading to curving thighs. Draco, of course, only took note because he took note of everyone, the better to be petty.
Draco knocks on the intricately carved door—absolutely garish, in his opinion, like most old Pureblood decor—and runs his wand over his clothes as he waits, ridding himself of stray lint.
The door opens a fraction, but no sound issues from within, and Draco frowns in the middle of putting his wand away. Best to keep his wand out, then. "I'm here from Atelier Malfoy," he announces, feeling silly when there's no clear conversational partner to be had. "Is this your way of inviting me in, Potter?" Or whoever you are, he adds mentally.
Nothing.
Well, Draco is nothing if not a talented wizard, even if most of his talents lie in charming fabrics to trail glittering stars. He brandishes his wand anew and pushes the door open.
The old townhouse, on the inside, is a far cry from Draco's fuzzy childhood memories. The hardwood floors have been redone in warm tones that balance well against the soft teal paint on the wall, which hosts a watercolor portrait of a young couple he vaguely recognizes as Potter's parents. The pair give him a quizzical look, but not much else.
The air shimmers at the end of the front hall.
Draco pauses, gripping his wand tighter. It's been a long time since anyone's had anything to say to him about his Death Eater childhood, much less tried to lure him into some kind of a trap. "Come now," he says, as gamely as he can manage, "be sporting about it if you're going to attack me. Let me put a face to the mastermind."
The shimmering air shifts, and a very human sigh seems to emanate from it. "I'm not going to attack you, Malfoy. Put your wand down."
"Take down that very obvious Disillusionment Charm, then." Draco lowers his wand, but he refuses to holster it.
"No, not yet." The shimmer that might be Potter approaches. "How closely do you guard your clients' privacy, Malfoy?"
"Privacy?" Draco wrinkles his nose, pulling his upper lip into a sneer. Even into his forties, Potter is still obsessed with his own celebrity status. The only reason anyone cares about the name Harry Potter these days is because of his ongoing refusal to be seen in public; the most recent photo of him in known existence dates to his thirty-third birthday party, the scene of his disappearance from the public eye.
If this is Potter, Draco reminds himself. He clears his throat. "I'm a professional. If a client wishes full secrecy, then I grant it, outside of my business partner." Pansy, who could drag anything out of him even if they weren't in business together. "Let me guess—you don't want anyone to know you wear clothes?" Clothes that look like they cost more than a few spare Knuts, Draco manages not to add, because that would be unprofessional of him. He'll tell Pansy later, she'll like that.
"Something like that." The shimmering air seems to be pacing. "Would you be willing to put that promise of secrecy in writing?"
"Just in writing? Not an Unbreakable Vow?" Draco asks, voice as dry as his brow is arched. "Shoot for the stars, why don't you?"
"A Vow might backfire when I show up at the Anniversary Gala." A wry chuckle. "Will you put it in writing or not?"
"Yes. God, yes, fine. I bet you've got the documents drawn up already, haven't you?" Draco has every intention of reading whatever he's meant to sign to within an inch of its paper life, then blasting it with detection charms for good measure. "If that is you, Potter," he adds, for another good measure.
"On the table by the stairs." No reply to Draco's challenge to the shimmer's identity, which he doesn't like. "There's a pen."
Pansy calls Draco an old stuffed chair for preferring quills to pens, but the Muggle writing implement gives him hand cramps after enough writing, and he doesn't like how they dent and otherwise destroy perfectly lovely parchment. He keeps all this to himself and approaches the table by the stairs, as instructed, and starts his detailed inspection of the document.
There is absolutely nothing untoward about it, as it turns out. A standard legal document that looks like it was copied from a Ministry file, guaranteeing Mr. Draco Lucius Malfoy and Atelier Malfoy's promise of client confidentiality as pertains to the transaction between one Mr. Harry James Potter and Atelier Malfoy, blah blah blah. Yadda yadda, as Draco's favorite American client is wont to say.
"Here," Draco says, "look." He signs the document with a flourish, or as much of a flourish as a disgustingly mundane ballpoint pen will let him have.
The document vanishes behind the shimmering air with a rustle. "Alright." And the shimmer is no more.
Harry Potter stands before Draco, and Draco knows it's him because he recognizes that defiant expression, that certain nose, those green eyes, all of which he recognizes before he spots the lightning bolt scar under Potter's hairline. But—
"Don't," Potter says, holding up a hand. Or Harry. Draco can't even focus on what he means to call the man in his head.
The fact of the matter is that Harry, or Potter, or Harry Potter, has gained weight in his time away from the public. He cannot be described as simply chubby, or stout, or solid; he is fat, unmistakably so.
Draco realizes that his surprise must be painted all over his face, if Potter is already cutting him off, and he clears his throat as he smooths his features. "Don't what?" he says, the coolness of his voice at complete odds with the blaze of his racing mind.
Potter only looks at Draco, clasping his hands together in front of his chest, fingers kneading nervously. He takes a hesitant breath. "The Gala for the 25th anniversary of the end of the war is in a little less than four months. And I thought—or well, Hermione thought—this would be a good time for me to..." His fingers squeeze at the backs of his hands extra tightly. "To be seen."
Draco frowns, worrying his bottom lip between his teeth. "So after years of being a hermit, and now apparently being so ashamed of your appearance you can't even answer the door properly, you're just going to show up in Malfoy couture—clothes that are notably, may I say, attention-getting—in front of hundreds of people, and be photographed for thousands to see?" He realizes his wand is still out, and holsters it up his sleeve with a quick, practiced motion. "Is that about the size of it?"
A grimace on Potter's part. "That might be one way to put it."
Draco sighs. "Well, isn't that terribly Gryffindor of you? 25 years out of school and none of us can shake the pigeonholes a tatty old hat stuck us into." He picks up his satchel from where he dropped it by the stairs. "May we at least adjourn to a room with seating? Somewhere that isn't the foyer?"
Potter huffs, and walks up the hall toward Draco, nodding toward the doors to Draco's right. "The sitting room, then."
"Aren't you a gracious host," Draco mutters, taking a step back to let Potter enter the sitting room first. Nowhere proper to hang his outerwear, it seems.
"Calling me a host implies you're my guest," Potter says as Draco follows him in, which is just bitchy enough that Draco pauses the removal of his cape mid-twirl. He can't quite tell yet if he's offended or impressed, but he thinks he might actually be leaning toward the latter.
"Given I was invited," Draco points out as he chooses a seat in a Chesterfield armchair near the unlit fireplace, draping his cape over its back, "I rather think the implication is fair." Potter's posted himself on a matching Chesterfield sofa, catty-corner to Draco's seat and facing the fireplace. The whole room is kitted out in tufted leather seating, with dark paneled walls that match the walnut side tables. Draco's almost surprised Potter didn't make his dramatic appearance in a quilted Muggle house robe, puffing a pipe.
The face Potter makes is a pinched one, and Draco wonders what retort he's holding in, and if it's worth coaxing it out. But Potter sighs, and the moment's passed. "What do you need from me to start this whole process?"
Draco pulls his satchel into his lap, clicking it open to send a small sheaf of square parchment to his right with a flick of his wand. "Normally, clients have a fairly strong idea of what they want, and I refine it." Quill and inkpot make their exit from the satchel next, floating to Draco's left, and then a tap of Draco's wand turns the satchel into a very modest drafting table fitted over his lap, just large enough to accommodate his sketching supplies. The supplies in question arrange themselves neatly on the tiny table's surface. The maker called it a draftsman's satchel, and it's been one of Draco's favorite investments to date. He looks at Potter expectantly. "So what is it your heart desires, Potter? A three piece robe set? A Muggle tuxedo?" Draco considers Harry's current look. "A tracksuit, perhaps?"
"I don't know." Potter shrugs.
"I doubt that," Draco snorts, picking up his quill and dipping it with a flourish of his wrist. Some designers like the flashiness of sketching by wand, but Draco is a couturier, and he isn't here to dazzle clients with anything but his own obvious talent. Pansy would point out that he's tried wand sketching in the past and his croquis looked like sassy Inferi, and this is why Draco leaves her in the atelier. "Even the most fashionless have ideas of how they want to clothe themselves. Let's have it, Potter."
"I hired you to design an outfit. You're the most celebrated designer in wizarding Britain," Potter says, flinging his hand out as if gesturing to wizarding Britain itself. "So design something."
Draco sneers. "You're telling me you've no preference to how you look. You. The Boy Who Lived."
"I'm 42. Hardly a boy." A wave of Potter's hand, and the cabinet doors of a liquor bar in the corner swing open. "Whiskey, Malfoy?"
"It's not even noon." Draco watches as a rocks glass fills itself with three fingers of whiskey, neat, and flies gracefully across the room into Potter's grasp. "Don't avoid my question."
"Water for you, then, I suppose." Within seconds, a self-propelling Collins glass nearly sloshes water on Draco's parchment, and he snatches it only just in time for the spill to land on his trouser leg, instead.
"Potter. I'm on the clock." Draco sets the glass down with a firm clunk on the side table. "Pick a color, at least. For Merlin's sake."
"Can't, I'm colorblind," Potter says to his whiskey. "Throw a dart at a color wheel, if that's what you need."
Draco rolls his eyes. "You're not colorblind."
"No, I'm not."
When it's clear Draco is getting nothing else out of Potter, Draco clicks his tongue. "Fine. Here's what you'll wear," he says, quill scratching across the parchment in a hurry. "A Muggle-styled suit. Three pieces. Grey wool herringbone. " The design taking shape beneath his hand looks as lumpen as it is generic, but it's clear Potter only tapped him to be able to say he was wearing Malfoy.
What a trick. Harry Potter, wearing the designs of an exonerated former Death Eater? How newsworthy for the 25th anniversary of the end of the war. Of course Potter doesn't want art.
"There." Draco snatches the parchment from his drafting table, whipping it around so fiercely to face Potter that it creases in the process. "Will that suit His Majesty?"
Potter looks up from his whiskey at last, and his cool demeanor only lasts a second more, replaced by discomfort. Embarrassment, perhaps? "What on earth is that?"
"Clothing," Draco answers with a curl of his lip. "You may have heard of the concept while locked away in your tower. I believe the peons outside call this a suit."
"I could do better at Primark," Potter says, but it comes out a bit faint, his eyes still fixed on the drab little person Draco's put to parchment.
"Luckily for me, I haven't a clue what that is, so I'll thank you for the compliment and set about working, if you wouldn't mind approving the design." Draco begins tugging the relevant paperwork from the slim drawer attached to the drafting table; the drawer is the satchel's inner pocket.
"It doesn't look like anything I've seen you design before," Potter says, with just a tinge of desperation, but it's his words that stops Draco mid-huff. Draco fixes him with a sharp look.
"And what would you know of my designs?" Draco wants to know, letting the approval form rest over his sketch. Potter appears to shrink, frowning in a way that belies his blushing as he sinks into his seat.
"You're in the bloody paper enough, aren't you?" Potter grumbles. "Dressing the wizarding elites. 'If it's not Malfoy, it's not marvelous,' or whatever it is that one person said."
What floors Draco about that particular pull is that it's from 2015—several years ago by now, and the quote has dogged him since, to the point of annoyance on his part. "Melinda Hemlock," Draco mutters, rolling his eyes. More like Hamlock; everything she says sounds like scripted ad copy, and not by a particularly talented copywriter, either. She'd glittered so beautifully in her Malfoy Couture, though, so he's never told her he finds her stilted and corny to her face.
There's a pause, as awkward as any other moment Draco's had in this house today, and it's Draco's sigh that breaks it. "What is it you thought I'd do here, exactly? Hit you with a bit of Legilimency and draw up your perfect party outfit in one take?"
Potter shrugs. "Honestly? Something like that, yeah." He only barely looks bashful, the bastard.
"Unbelievable. Absolutely staggering." Draco runs his hand down his face, thumb and forefinger gliding down each side and pulling at the corners of his eyelids. "It will clearly surprise you to learn that I prefer not to sift through my clients' private memories for fashion inspiration, even if I were to gain prior consent."
"It'd save time, though, wouldn't it?" But Potter doesn't sound particularly adamant about it, drumming his fingers on the arm of the sofa. "I don't know what I'm supposed to say."
"You're being dense. I asked for a single color and you wouldn't even give me that." Nonetheless, Draco slips the approval form back into its drawer, and happily taps his wand to the first sketch with a wordless Incendio. "Even Gryffindor colors will do, as uninspired a choice as that might be."
"Well, now I don't want to choose them," Potter remarks with arched brows, finally sipping at his whiskey.
Draco stares at Potter, pushing down his tight-lipped indignation for the sake of professionalism. "You're a child," he snaps, failing quickly. "Red and gold are perfectly acceptable choices. I was making a joke."
Potter only looks uncomfortable, and Draco has to contend with the fact that while Potter may or may not be a child, Draco himself is certainly being a bitch. He clears his throat. "My apologies, Mr. Potter," he says, which immediately feels wrong in its formality. He should make a pact with himself to never interact with anyone he ever knew before hitting puberty. Correction, before reaching adulthood, period. He turns his attention to his fresh parchment before he can catch sight of Potter's reaction.
He busies himself sketching a new, more stylized suit, with an asymmetrical closure that leads to a tall Mandarin collar. The trousers are slim without being tight, fitted just right over low boots with intricate brogue detailing. Gold crested buttons march along the jacket's closure, and at the jacket's cuffs; he'll have them cast himself if he can't source any with dragons. He fills the jacket with interlocking drawings of various dragon breeds, at least those he can remember off the top of his head; these will be gold embroidery on a bordeaux silk taffeta that will make the whole thing gleam. Arcing over the croquis' head, he scribbles an impression of a Hungarian Horntail in flight. Pansy will make that incredible.
"That should do you better," Draco says, once he's sure he's satisfied, and presents the sketch to Potter with much more grace than his last. Potter leans forward to take it.
"It's very..." Potter looks over the sketch several times, until Draco wants to snatch it back. "It's sleek," he finishes, looking up at Draco with an expression Draco can't identify.
"Do you approve?"
Potter's contemplative silence is maddening. His eyes flick over the sketch over and over again, as if a man wearing a terrycloth bathrobe and baggy sweatpants has got any valuable criticism to offer. But this isn't a part of the process Draco will rush, even with the most annoying client, so he holds his tongue. (He succeeds, this time.)
"I don't know," Potter says at last. "How will it actually look?"
"I don't know what you mean by that." Draco gives the parchment a shake with a snap of his wrist. "It'll look like this."
"But I don't look like that."
"No, you're not ten heads tall, nobody is. It's a fashion sketch, Potter, not an anatomy study. But this is the design, it will look like this."
Potter chews his lip, setting his whiskey aside to twine his fingers together. "Maybe this was a mistake."
Here comes Draco's absolute fury again, threatening to topple any remaining semblance of his professionalism. A mistake? He can feel his temples throbbing, feel the rush of heat to his face that he hates because it always makes him look blotchy.
But he doesn't get a chance to tell Potter off. Instead, Potter holds up a swift hand, and says, "I realize I've never seen your designs on anyone who isn't—" Potter glances up, as if he'll find the word he's looking for on the ceiling. "You only design for the slender. I should have noticed."
And Draco has nothing to say. Because Potter is right, and Draco's designed a suit meant for yet another one of those slender people; he's never had to think of how to do otherwise.
"I'm happy to pay you for your time, of course," Potter says, and Draco realizes he's being dismissed. Dismissed politely, at that, which somehow feels worse. "And I appreciate your willingness to keep my secrecy."
"Now wait just one minute," Draco says, cutting Potter off before he can all but shoo him out the door with his words. "I can design for anybody. For any body."
Potter looks pointedly at the sketch.
"It was a warmup," Draco says with a flippant wave of his hand, which they both know is a lie. "I'm perfectly capable of designing for—" He sucks his lips between his teeth. "For anyone at all."
"Can you say it?" Potter asks, his eyes hooded in a way that makes Draco feel cornered.
"I don't know what you mean," Draco says, not for the first time during this rapidly-unraveling visit. "The point I'm making is that I can design a suit that works for you. Moreover, I can construct the damn thing, and it will fit you perfectly." Potter is still right in calling Draco out for never having made a thing for anyone more than two sizes past sample size, but Draco Malfoy—at least, as an adult—is nothing if not up to any challenge of skill. He just can't let Potter see that it's a challenge.
Potter doesn't look entirely convinced, but he's not thanking Draco for his time anymore, either. "You're sure?"
"I don't have to be sure," Draco sniffs. "You'll be the talk of the Gala, I promise, and not just because you're a hermit crawling out of your hut for the first time in ten years."
The way Potter rolls his lower lip beneath his teeth tells Draco that was too far, but he's lived his entire life going too far. Draco taps his drafting table with his wand, and it neatly refolds itself back into being a satchel, from which he extracts a Never-Ending measuring tape, as well as the approval form yet again. "If you'll sign this, we can get on with measurements and I can get to work."
"Measurements?" Potter's manifested another one of those ugly ballpoint pens, this one a bit chewed on the end, but he pauses as he takes the approval form, eyeing the measuring tape nervously.
"Commonly used to make clothing with an accurate and flattering fit, yes," Draco replies, voice dry. Potter wouldn't be the first client to react to the measuring tape as though it was an offer to learn the exact time and date of their death. "I won't say them out loud, if that's what you're worried about. And I'm hardly going to sell them to the Prophet, even if you hadn't made me sign that confidentiality agreement."
"And you have to take them now?"
"I can't do a thing without them." Draco immediately corrects himself, mentally—sourcing fabric and notions can certainly take time, and require no measurements. Pansy doesn't need the diameter of Potter's head to begin work on the Horntail halo charm. But Potter doesn't need to hear that.
"I'm, er." Potter pins the approval form to a side table to sign it, then straightens as he hands the parchment back to Draco. "I'm a bit tired now."
"It's not even—" Draco checks his pocket watch. "It's only barely after noon. And it won't take longer than a few minutes."
"My sleep schedule doesn't much adhere to most others," Potter says with a shrug. The yawn that follows seems a bit forced, but only a bit. "Sorry, Malfoy."
"Hmph." Draco tucks the signed form and his measuring tape back into his satchel, clicking it shut with more force than necessary before he begins striding out of the room. "Owl me when you're feeling more awake, then."
"I will," Potter promises, following Draco to the door. Draco turns to say a proper farewell—and Potter is already hidden behind his Disillusionment Charm, the door still several feet away. As if he can't even bear to be seen in snatches by wizarding passerby that might not even be there. "Goodbye, Malfoy," says the shimmering air that holds the door open.
Draco can't remember if he remembers to return the goodbye.
✂︎
"It was absolutely mad," Draco tells Pansy, stalking the short length of his office over and over again. The second he returned to the atelier, he had made a beeline for his office, motioning a thrilled Pansy along before shutting the door behind them both. "Hermit doesn't even begin to cover it."
"Is he a total nutter now?" Pansy wants to know, swinging her legs arrhythmically off the edge of Draco's desk where she's taken a seat. "Does he have a long, mangy beard? Hair going in all directions?" Her eyebrows bounce. "Did he have a haunted look?"
He thinks back to his visit to Twelve Grimmauld Place, and realizes that actually, no, none of that applied to Potter. His beard was neat, his hair was just a bit unkempt but with a healthy shine, and a word like haunted was one far too strong for what he saw in the other man's eyes. Maybe uncomfortable, or awkward.
Pansy leans forward, eyebrows now wiggling like a stadium audience waving their arms, and Draco decides immediately he will not share the news of Potter's weight gain. Not yet, anyway; it's not like she won't find his measurements once they're taken, or see the completed garment once it hangs on a Resizing Dress Form, patent pending. And she's well aware of the privacy agreement Draco signed, promising she wouldn't even talk to anyone else in the atelier about it. But telling Pansy now feels salacious in a way that makes him feel slimy, rather than the bitchy delight gossip usually brings him.
"He was shockingly put together, for a man so obsessed with his privacy," Draco snorts. "He's so averse to being seen outside he wouldn't see me to the door without a Disillusionment Charm, but somehow he's managed to keep his facial hair tidy. Though—ugh, my mistake, I nearly forgot he was wearing a bathrobe and..." Draco's upper lip curls so much it scrunches his nose. "Sweats."
"Sweats!" Pansy's melodramatic shriek, her hands flying to the sides of her face as if Draco had told her he'd found Potter dead in the parlor with his trousers round his ankles, tells Draco she doesn't suspect him. For now, he's successfully avoided further discussion of Potter's current appearance. Pansy reacts in all the best ways as Draco tells her about Potter's inability to choose something as basic as colors he likes, his audacity in comparing any sketch of Draco's to something implied to be cheap Muggle clothing (never mind that Draco knew it was far from his best work), the way Potter honestly thought Legilimency would be a normal part of a consult for custom garment work.
"Draco, how don't you know what Primark is?" Pansy asks, sliding off his desk at last as she looks at the clock. She clicks her tongue. "Look at the time. You're a horrible coworker, wasting my time like this with gossip."
"How do you know what Primark is?" Draco volleys back as Pansy opens his office door. "Pansy!"
"Because I'm not a Pureblood cryptkeeper," she says with a smirk, which doesn't tell Draco anything except that Pansy thinks he's out of touch.
"But what is it?" He gets no answer as Pansy heads back to her station, giving the dressform sporting the Minchin job a thoughtful spin.
"I don't need to know what Primark is," Draco mutters, punctuating the word Primark with an aggressive yank of his chair as he returns to his desk. "It sounds dreadful. Cheap. Disgusting."
"I can hear you creaking, you know," Pansy calls as she straps her pincushion to her wrist. Draco responds by slamming his office door shut with a tense swish of his wand.
Unfortunately for Draco and his nosy mind, Potter is not his only client, nor is Pansy the only other person working. It's also Monday, and Elda arrives soon after Draco's little Primark-related tantrum with the paperwork necessary to process payroll, which means he won't be walking the floor of the atelier to check on various projects for some time, and he'll be fucked for time if a single new client walks through the front door. All because he'd forgotten himself and whisked himself away for hours at the slightest mention of Harry James Potter.
I wouldn't dare step between a Malfoy and the longtime object of his obsession, Pansy had said, and he knows she was just trying to needle him. It's their favorite way of expressing affection toward each other. But even now, as a firmly middle-aged man, Draco finds it too easy to fall into exactly what Pansy named it. Obsession.
He enters the wrong numbers into his payroll calculations twice in a row, and theorizes wildly about why Potter might have gone into hiding. He looks over an invoice for fabric acquired by Wilda Bucket, who's working on another Gala garment—this one for a mid-level Ministry official with wealthy parentage—and he daydreams of exploring the rest of Twelve Grimmauld Place. He doesn't even realize he's doing it until his imaginary self is reaching for the doorknob of Potter's bedroom, and he looks down to see he's initialed the invoice H.P. Flushing horribly pink, Draco spells the ink away, leaving behind blots in his rush that he has to structure his D.M. around.
By the time Pansy bids their last employee a good evening, Draco's to-do list for the day is nowhere near checked off, and he steeples his hands over his nose and mouth in frustration and exhaustion. "You know," she says, entering his office with a perfunctory tap of her knuckles to his door, "you didn't even show me your preliminary sketch."
Draco slides the parchment wordlessly across his desktop, sighing. He hasn't decided yet if he's going to try to find an appropriate fabric, or get it made to order. He always gets so excited when he's sketching that he easily forgets how much he'll hate himself for designing a brocade he's never seen before. Getting it made to order will jack up the cost significantly, but—well, last he heard, Potter's good for it. And it'll save him the time of looking through fabric shops.
"Is that it?" Pansy flips the parchment over as if she expects the real design to be on the back.
"How dare you!" Draco gasps, and he's only half-joking. There's plenty of interest in his sketch, with fine fabrics and plenty of glamour.
"Well, it's—" She turns it back over, frowning at the croquis in its fitted little suit. "Darling, it's a bit bare, isn't it?"
"It's literally covered in metallic embroidery. It's got one of your dratted halos to match. It's got custom crest buttons. What on earth is bare about it?" Draco leans back in his chair, crossing his arms as he pouts.
"If you blot all those details out, this silhouette is as basic as basic gets. And the Mandarin collar with dragons and a—why did you do this?" she asks, poking the asymmetrical closure and all its golden buttons. "Is he supposed to be a general in a fantasy Chinese army?"
"I don't think you can say things like that," Draco mutters, glaring at the wall behind her.
"I can, because you committed the sin of Orientalism, not me," she says, prim as she holds the parchment back out to him. "Did you forget Potter's part Bengali? You can't put him in this. It's just weird."
"I think you're blowing it out of proportion," Draco says, snatching the parchment back, but her words have already put him off the collar. "I'll change it so I don't have to hear your mouth all day long over it."
"Of course, that's why you're changing it. Not because I'm right," she says, with the smile of a spider eyeing a hapless fly.
"Get out so I can fix it, then," Draco says, shooing her with one hand while he pulls his inkpot closer with the other. "You're distracting."
"I'm rightfully critical, is what I am, and that's why we're business partners," she corrects, holding up one finger.
"Yes, alright, alright," he says, rolling his eyes. "But do leave, won't you?"
Pansy sighs. "Don't stay too much longer, alright?"
"Or what, my non-existent cat will miss me?" Draco asks with a smirk.
"Or you'll be a horrible grump tomorrow, moreso than usual," she says, sniffing. "Good night, Draco."
"Night, Pans." Draco does his best to swallow his yawn, or at least hold it off until Pansy's good and gone.
All the design really needs, Draco thinks as he inks his quill, is to have the collar piece removed. Then perhaps he can play with the shape of the shirt collar beneath. Pansy might have a point about the silhouette being a bit plain, but that's menswear for you, really.
Except, of course, that's not how Draco dresses at all. He considers his style of dress masculine enough, and yet he loves playing with silhouettes in his clothing. He just—
"I don't think I know how to dress you, Potter," he finally admits, murmuring in the isolation of the empty atelier.
✂︎
According to Potter's owl, he has two days available for a fitting, and Draco wants to laugh. What's he doing the other five days of the week? Has Harry Potter been living a secret life outside of the wizarding world and only pretending to be a hermit for ten years?
Draco owls back that Thursday will work for him, keeping all his theories and jokes firmly to himself. He's got to save them for Pansy, anyway, he's pretty sure she'll laugh at the secret life thing.
Once again, Draco flings his cape over his shoulders, stepping out of the atelier in aggressively high-waisted trousers and pointed boots with a loud block heel that Potter will definitely hear coming. The tall waistband of the trousers is lightly boned, making sure he won't slouch, and his shirt—with a subtle semi-sheer tonal stripe in the lavender cotton, the only visible color in his ensemble—billows from the top, accented with a matching jabot Draco thinks looks fun. Pansy likes to tell him it's fussy, but he knows if she actually thought that she'd never let him leave the shop.
This is a nervous outfit. He knows it, as he knocks on Potter's door, but he can't imagine Potter will notice. He hopes Potter won't notice.
"And good morning to you, mysterious yet obvious patch of shimmering air," Draco says as he enters Twelve Grimmauld Place again. "You could just leave the door open, you know, instead of doing this every time. Merlin forbid the postman see you."
"That doesn't seem terribly safe," Potter remarks once he's far enough inside the building, his Disillusionment Charm falling away. Today's fashion choices include a hooded green sweatshirt and another pair of black sweats. They're clearly not a matched set, and Draco doesn't know if that's better or worse. The sweatshirt looks like it's made from particularly thick knit, and Draco frowns, forgetting whatever clever comeback he'd been about to fire off.
"I don't suppose you're planning on wearing that thing underneath your suit," Draco says, eyeing the offending shirt.
"What, my hoodie?" Potter asks, his hands flying to the knotted pulls of the hood. "No—no, of course not."
"Then don't plan on wearing it as I fit you," Draco says. "Now, again, where am I going that isn't the bloody hall, and this time, where might I hang up my cape?"
"I mean, this is what I'm wearing today," Potter says, completely ignoring the rest of Draco's words. The hood laces have been wrapped around his index fingers, pulling tight until his fingertips pale without blood flow.
"It was what you're wearing today. Now please, Potter." Draco removes his cape in a single flourish, its emerald lining flashing in the light. "Direct me to where I might hang my godforsaken outerwear, such as civilized people do, and then direct me to the place where I am to measure your equally godforsaken body while you go change into something less bulky."
In an instant, Draco knows he's fucked up. He lets his mouth run away with whatever combination of words is the most clever, the most acerbic, and in this case equally godforsaken body fit the bill. But to say Potter looks taken aback is an understatement; the man's physically taken a step back from him. Draco closes his eyes, taking in a deep, shuddering breath through his nostrils.
"Please let me hang up my coat, then tell me where I will be working while you—" Draco opens his eyes and regrets it, because Potter still looks unhappy. "While you change into something more suitable."
Potter opens a closet just past the staircase without a word, gesturing. Draco plucks a wooden hanger from inside, hanging up his cape with shame burning his face into patchy ruddiness. He's never like this with clients. He wants to blame Potter for being such a little baby about clothing, but it's always been too easy for him to want to blame Potter. If anyone is a little baby, it's Draco for not having outgrown this particular tendency.
There's just something about Potter that makes him act out. If he were alone, he'd knock his head to the wall a few times.
"What, um." Potter releases his hood laces, the color rushing back to his whitened fingertips. He won't look at Draco. "What's something more suitable."
Draco thinks of what he expect Potter might have. "An undershirt. Pants of some kind." He's seen hundreds of clients in their underclothes by now, with plenty feeling free to go topless in his presence. The blush begins to fade from his face. "Cover up as much as you want to, it just needs to be light so it doesn't add to my measurements and throw the whole operation off."
Potter nods stiffly. "There's a, er. A small room all the way in the back, there." He points in the direction of a cluster of doors in the far corner, and Draco can already feel he's going to have to open them all to figure out which Potter means. "A drawing room," Potter adds, as if he's only just remembered the term. It occurs to Draco that Potter must not know what to do with so much house.
Without time for Draco to ask which small room all the way in the back he means, Potter hurries up the stairs, leaving Draco to his guessing game. He encounters a second closet, a tiny lavatory with no more than a sink and a toilet, and a dining room as well before finding the "small room, a drawing room." Draco wonders what's so different about this room, or if Potter chose it at random because again, he's got fuck-all to do with any of these rooms.
It's at least a bit softer of a room. Instead of a fireplace, heavy curtains hang over French doors that seem to lead out onto a small deck, when Draco peeks behind them. Mauve velvet seating makes Draco feel cozy as he sets his satchel down, popping it open into drafting table form out of habit. The edited sketch is already atop it, the Mandarin collar swapped instead for epaulettes sporting the same crested buttons as featured on the front closure. He likes the added militaristic vibe without any lapels. Draco's been toying with the idea of adding spikes to the epaulettes—like the ridges on a Norwegian Ridgeback—but it might be pushing the envelope for the shrinking violet Potter's become. That, and perhaps the particular breed comparison is a little too personal for their history, he reminds himself, chewing his bottom lip. Now they're like the ridges on a Hebridean Black.
As Draco fidgets with his Never-Ending Measuring Tape, the door to the drawing room opens, and in comes Potter's Disillusionment Charm. Disillusionment is right. Draco sighs, trying so hard not to sneer. "I can't measure what I can barely see," he says, releasing the end of the measuring tape and letting it snap back into its fathomless little case.
The shimmer of the charm paces, closing the door on its way past it, then reopening it on a second pass, only to close the door again seconds later. "I know," Potter's voice says, nearly a minute delayed. There's enough distress in those two simple words that Draco chooses to put his measuring tape down, waiting silently for Potter to work out this particular anxiety.
Except he doesn't seem to be. Five minutes later, Draco's lost what little patience he has, and Salazar knows he's worked hard over the years to have even that much. "Potter. I have seen hundreds of bodies in my time working as a couturier. I have seen many of them topless, and some of them naked as well, even though I certainly didn't ask. You are paying me to be here." He drives his finger into the arm of high-backed chair he sits in, underscoring the word paying. "I'm a professional. So please."
"I'm not naked," Potter mutters, and Draco stifles his laughter. It's such a silly response to Draco's spiel. "Fine. You're a professional, and all." The charm melts away, though Draco thinks he's never seen a charm dissipate so slowly.
There Potter stands, in a ribbed white undershirt and loose red tartan boxers, and naught else. The undershirt is a little sheer from stretching across Potter's body, with more than a hint of the exact placement and size of Potter's nipples. The boxers have a Gryffindor crest on them, because why wouldn't they?
Far harder for Draco to professionally ignore are the swathes of stretch marks that sweep across Potter's upper arms, radiating from his chest through the armholes of his undershirt. They're not fresh, either, pale from having already healed into scar tissue. They echo Potter's famous scar, in a way, but Draco thinks they look more like underwater shadows.
"Right then," Draco says, snatching up his tape again as he gets to his feet. He opens the drawer of his drafting table, pulling out a notebook, quill and inkpot. A Dictaquill is so much more convenient, but he thinks saying every measurement aloud for the sake of an enchanted quill might be what kills Potter at last. "Let's get measuring."
Draco considers, in the two steps it takes to reach Potter, where to start. With any other client, he'd simply start with the chest measurement and move his way down, before coming back up for back and arm measurements. With any other client, he'd also likely take the bare minimum measurements, able to eyeball how a pattern ought to be drafted based on measurements he's seen so many times, with little variable. But Potter is new territory, at least in this regard.
"Come closer to where I've got my notebook," Draco says, beckoning Potter with a wave of his hand. "We'll start off easy."
"Easy?" Potter asks, but Draco has already nudged Potter's arm up so he can get the measuring tape around his bicep. He moves quickly, holding the tape only long enough to register the number before he whips it away to get the next measurement. It feels strange to handle Potter's living body, even just his arm, but if Draco doesn't look up, Potter's no more than a warm mannequin.
"Other side," Draco says as he finishes the sleeve length measurement, his voice coming out softer than he expects. "Turn around." Bicep, forearm, wrist—Potter's hands are trembling, Draco realizes. Sleeve length. Shoulder seam, collar to armhole. Potter's head is turned away so much that Draco can't even see his face.
"Face away from me." Potter is almost too quick to obey, and does a poor job of hiding the sigh that escapes him once he has. Draco pauses. Has he touched too much? Is he being weird? Why on earth is he preoccupied with whether he's touching "too much" while taking measurements? He puts the end of the measuring tape to where he instinctively knows Potter's armhole seam will be, and pulls the tape across his very broad shoulders.
Maybe he should have conducted all of this business out in the hall, actually, all jokes aside. There's something about the drawing room that makes it feel intimate as Draco presses the end of the measuring tape to the bony knob at the top of Potter's back, smoothing it along the gentle valley of his spine. It doesn't help that when his hand stops at the small of Potter's back, the man gasps, just enough to make Draco dizzy for a moment. When he tells Potter what he'll measure next, the words are hushed, like it might spoil the mood if he raises his voice above a murmur.
There is no mood. He's a professional. And he's going to take the rest of Potter's measurements now, while he's facing away from him, because he's a professional who takes his clients' comfort seriously, no matter who they are.
"Hold still, and remember I'm not trying to kill you," Draco says, trying to inject wryness into his voice.
"What do you—ah," Potter says, cutting himself off as the measuring tape snakes around his neck, chasing Draco's fingertips as they trace the circumference of it. Potter's stubble is damp with nervous sweat. When Draco pins the measuring tape in place, he has to wait for Potter's equally nervous swallowing to stop, because the bob of his Adam's apple is skewing the measurement.
"Is this usually how measurements are conducted?" Potter asks, as Draco adds the neck measurement to his running list. "From behind, like a hitman?"
"I think I'd bring a better implement than a measuring tape if I were here to kill you," Draco mutters, putting his quill down.
"I don't think you would, actually," Potter says, and Draco pauses, because these moments of being sassed by Potter come so intermittently that he's surprised every time.
"To answer your question," Draco says, rushing his words to override their imminent back-and-forth, "no, I usually face my clients, but you seem ill-inclined to face me, so." Draco pulls his measuring tape taut with a snap. "May I get on with it?"
Potter turns around so quickly he almost hits Draco with his shoulder. Draco quite literally bites his tongue to keep from saying some awful faux-flirtatious thing, as he might to Pansy or any of his other friends, but he can't keep the surprise off his face.
"I just, er. I realize I'll feel better being able to see what you're doing," Potter says, apparently unable to see the irony in saying so while still refusing to meet Draco's eyes. It's strange how Draco feels as though Potter's towering over him, despite Draco being the taller man.
"If you're so convinced this measuring tape is my weapon of choice," Draco says, with a shrug that fails abysmally at being casual. Oh, it would have been so much easier to get Potter's chest and waist measurements before Potter turned around. He wishes he'd lied.
There's no way around it now. He retracts the tape into its case, stepping in close to Potter with his head bowed. "Arms up," Draco says, almost a whisper, and Potter lifts them just enough to grant Draco access. A warm mannequin. Draco is here to work. But Potter's become broad enough that when Draco's fingertips finally do meet at his back, transferring the end of the measuring tape from one hand to the other, there's only a few inches between their chests, Draco's face angled away. Here, there's no escaping Potter's shaky breath, or the heat that radiates from his body, far from the warm mannequin Draco has been envisioning. For a second, he's simply embracing Potter.
Then Draco pulls the tape around, finally able to step back. He glances up as he retracts his measuring tape, because he can't help himself. He expects to find Potter glassy-eyed and stoic, soldiering through the experience like being touched by Draco is one of the worst things to happen to him. (And for Potter, that would be saying plenty.) Instead Draco finds himself meeting Potter's eyes, and it's so overwhelming—fear, loneliness, something else—that Draco looks away in an instant. He thinks Potter does the same, but he's not chancing another look. He takes his quill in hand, writes in a neat 60 for chest measurement.
Draco wants to say something sardonic to break the tension as he goes to repeat his embrace of Potter—he needs his waist measurement next—but that would require acknowledging the tension. Instead he tucks his chin over Potter's shoulder, because he has to, and pulls the tape around again. And again for Potter's hip measurement, doing his best to pretend he's not unsure of how to place the tape in relation to the bottom of Potter's belly. He will not make the mistake of looking at Potter again.
He does his best to be methodical again in his next measurements. Side seam, armhole to waist. Side seam, waist to hip. Center front, from Potter's collarbone to his waist. Chest, waist, hip again, measured simply from side seam to center front. All of those a second time, this to center back. He might be missing something, but his brain feels fuzzy. He fumbles for his wand, casts a small Cushioning Charm, and kneels on it in front of Potter because his knees are too old to touch the hard floor. Side seam, waist to floor. Draco moves toward the next measurement he'd naturally take, and—oh no.
"Potter," Draco sighs, coming out of his fugue state. "How attached are you to wearing trousers?"
"What?" Potter looks down sharply. "Fairly attached to not showing all of wizarding society my arse, yeah. Why do you ask?"
"Because I don't know if you've noticed," Draco says, waving at his surroundings, "but you've been going through this whole ordeal like you've been sent off to die in war." He instantly knows how poor his choice of words were, but there's no time to self-flagellate over it. "And this is the part where I need you to stand with your knees apart so I can get your inseam. And your front rise," Draco adds, in case Potter thinks it'll be over too quickly, "and your back rise."
"I don't even know what some of those words are." Potter frowns, his eyes darting to look at Draco's measuring tape with wariness.
"If you want to wear trousers in front of the other Gala guests, I'm going to have to measure the area trousers usually cover, and that includes between your accursed legs, is that a little clearer?"
Even with Potter's dark complexion, Draco knows he's blushing. "Trust you to put it like that," Potter mutters, and Draco rolls his eyes. All the strange intimacy from just a few minutes ago was probably just a product of the two of them being silent for once.
That doesn't stop Draco from feeling just as strange as he taps the insides of Potter's knees, then again because his thighs are still touching each other despite Potter having obeyed the first set of taps. If he thought Potter ran hot when he was all but hugging him for his chest and waist measurements, it's nothing in comparison to the absolute blaze that is Potter's inner thighs, just barely pulled apart from each other. Draco thinks his hand is melting a little as he holds the end of the measuring tape to the point where all four seams meet in Potter's boxers, pulling the tape down to the floor.
God, he should have not been such an excitable little busybody, and assigned this job to any one of his employees instead. A random employee of Atelier Malfoy wouldn't have the baggage of a personal history with the client who needed his front rise taken next. A random employee would probably be more polite, too, I've just got to measure your inseam now, Mr. Potter, I do apologize, and I'll just be a moment measuring for the front of your trousers, sir, I hope it's no trouble. Instead they're trapped together inside possibly the tiniest proper room of a massive house, and Draco doesn't doubt Potter wishes just as fervently that he'd been sent an underling.
He begs his brain to try to be methodical again as he measures, doing his level best to pretend he doesn't know where to put his hands and still get the measurement he needs. Draco asks Potter to turn around; back rise. At least he's out of Potter's line of sight now. Mid-thigh. The fullest point of his calf. His ankle, lastly. It gets easier the further down he goes.
"All done," Draco is happy to announce as he gets that final measurement, punctuated by the measuring tape snapping back into its case.
Potter doesn't say anything as Draco hauls himself up with a groan. His mother had warned him so many times in the past that Malfoy joints were no good; even with the Cushioning Charm, his knees hadn't much liked being that close to the floor. He ignores Potter to check over his measurements. They're rudimentary, but enough to apply to the Resizing Dress Form, so he doesn't think there's any need to torture Potter further.
"Anything else you need to do today?" Potter asks, finally speaking up as Draco puts his notebook and quill away. Draco looks up, and anxiety is painted across Potter's face, woven into his body language the way his fingers are weaving together.
"No," Draco says slowly, adding his measuring tape to the drawer of his drafting table before tapping it back into a satchel. "I believe I have everything I need, for the moment." The coffee he drank just before making his trip to Islington is catching up to him. "Might I make use of the facilities before I go?"
"Oh, er—" Potter blinks rapidly. "Of course. But—oh, not that one right there," he adds, as Draco picks up his satchel and makes his way to the door. "Better to use the one upstairs."
"Upstairs?" Draco parrots. "What, is the one right there haunted?"
"In its way," the other man mutters. "Come on, Malfoy." Before Draco can say otherwise, Potter's put a heavy hand on his shoulder, and Side-Alongs him.
"To get to the second floor?" Draco all but squawks, his satchel dropping from suddenly weak fingers. "Are you mad?"
"Fourth floor," Potter corrects, already walking away. Draco sees now that he is, in fact, standing at the very top of the stairwell. "Master bath is this way."
"I didn't need the master bath, I just needed a bloody toilet and a sink in the same room!" Draco presses a hand to his chest, his heart hammering from the shock of sudden Apparition.
"Well, I was going up here anyway to put some actual clothes on, so it just seemed easier." Potter is almost all the way down the hall now. "Over here."
Draco snatches his satchel from the floor, dusting it as he hurries after Potter. "Do you make a habit of Apparating all over your own house, you lazy sod?"
Potter only shrugs, maddeningly. He points at a door. "There."
Draco huffs again, very deliberately leaning his satchel against the wall before heading inside. He thinks he hears Potter chuckle right before he slams the door.
When he emerges, his satchel is on a hook on the wall he's quite sure wasn't there before, and he grabs his bag as though the hook personally insulted him. It feels like it has. Potter is nowhere to be seen, which feels like as much of a dismissal as an actual goodbye. Draco doesn't even know if he himself can Apparate in the house, but after what Potter pulled, he's not much interested in trying, and heads for the stairs.
And stops at the sound of Potter's voice.
Draco had assumed, when he'd gone into the master bath, that Potter had likewise gone into the master suite to clothe himself. Instead, at the other end of the landing, snatches of Potter's voice slip through the door of another room entirely, just barely ajar.
He should go. He should leave. He should thunder down these stairs so Potter knows he might be heard, so he knows Draco isn't listening. More importantly, he should do it so he doesn't stand a chance of actually overhearing anything.
So why is Draco sidling his way toward the door?
He admonishes himself firmly as he approaches the door, shoes quieted by the runner carpet. He orders himself to go fall down the stairs for the crime of taking shallower breaths as he finds just the right spot near the door, unseeable by anyone glancing from the other side, and just as unable to look himself, but perfectly able to hear. Draco feels himself traveling 30 years into the past as his ears strain to pick out Potter's exact words that he has no right to hear.
"You're an idiot," Potter's voice says, grim and harsh. "A real prat."
Alright, there's no way Draco's leaving now, not when there's the possibility there's been a third person in the house all along. Kreacher the house elf died before Potter even went into hiding, decrepit as he was.
"What did you expect?" Potter goes on. "You can barely function just—just calling your friends! When they can't even see you! Ugh! You—" His voice dissolves into more growling, and the floorboards creak, like he might be pacing.
"You can't be bloody normal. You never could, you know, but this is abysmal, even for you." Draco wants to shift, wants to peek so badly. Who on earth could Potter be chewing out so viciously? And for what, given—
"You thought you could just, what, invite over him and play it cool? You're an idiot, Harry. A right idiot. You looked like a prick."
Oh.
"What's going to happen when you go out there? As if—as if you haven't been—ugh!" He cuts himself off again, and the rhythmic creaking of his probably-pacing intensifies. "'Good lord, Harry, what's happened to you?'" Potter squawks, pitching his voice up. "They're all going to look! They're going to look at you, you stupid sod! You—"
Draco doesn't mean to shift his weight. He didn't think Potter would be able to hear it over the roar of his own words, as he'd gotten louder with each disparaging word, but suddenly everything is absolutely still, from the absolute silence in the room beyond Draco, to Draco's frozen body, breath held prisoner behind his ribs.
"It's not going to work," Potter whispers, after an eternity.
Draco finds the quietest way to the stairs, and makes his way down the very edges of the steps until he's safely out of earshot. He's got to hurry back to the atelier.
He's got a new design to sketch for Potter, after all.