Chapter Text
“Well. First of all,” said Draco, his sharp posh accent dialed up a notch. Harry would have rolled his eyes in anticipation of the mini lecture on posh people habits or pure-blood customs that such a turn of phrase usually foretold, except Draco had a thin cappuccino foam mustache over his upper lip, of which he was adorably unaware, and Harry couldn’t focus on anything else.
They were sitting out on the patio of a muggle café. The late summer sun filtering through the trees danced a captivating pattern on Draco’s soft platinum blonde hair, carefully styled into a tousled, carefree look unlike the rigid slicked-back style he had favored during Hogwarts. With his long legs encased in perfectly tailored trousers, and his elegant fingers adorned with rings, Draco painted a pretty picture. Harry’s heart warmed knowing that he made an extra effort into looking sharp whenever they planned lunch dates to meet up during breaks from work at the Ministry. However, this was a fact that couldn’t be mentioned to Draco. Oh no. The one time he did ask if he’d gotten his hair cut specially for their date, Draco had become flustered and embarrassed and was very curt, as if trying to offset any notion that he, Draco Malfoy, ice queen extraordinaire, could be bothered to care enough to look his best for his new boyfriend, Harry Potter.
Harry snorted at the memory which only seemed to attract Draco’s annoyance in the present. “Well???” he was impatiently tapping his feet now, expression severe and utterly incongruent with the foamstache.
“Uhhhhh.” All Harry wanted was to grab him and lick it off his lips.
“Oh for Merlin’s sake! Did you hear a single word of what I said, Potter?” Draco raised his cup for another sip and the stache was now thicker. And absolutely irresistible.
Harry made some quick mental calculations on whether Draco’s ire at being manhandled publicly would be worth the pleasure of letting his intrusive thoughts win, and decided that yes it absolutely would be. “Could you come a little closer?” he asked.
“What? Why? No. I will not. You are not even listening to me.” The blonde sniffed a bit and his face was doing that half-way thing between sulking and looking angry, which only reminded Harry of little puffed up birds. And oh! Even saints have a limit to their patience, thought Harry, as he lunged across the table, and grabbing Draco by the lapels of his coat, proceeded to lick along his upper lips in a way that would no doubt be considered obscene in polite society.
Draco squawked and flailed his arms around a bit before the power of speech came back to him. He shoved a now laughing Harry off and sputtered “You… have you lost your mind? This is a public place. I won’t stand for such undignified behavior Potter. Just because this is a muggle area doesn’t mean we can slack off.”
“Relax” said Harry, rolling his eyes for real this time “and I won’t even try to decipher the psychology behind that last sentence. But I couldn’t help it. You looked adorable.”
“Adorable?” said Draco, squinting his eyes “Adorable? What is that supposed to mean?”
“You had a foam mustache” Harry pointed towards the general area on his own mouth when Draco seemed not to comprehend.
Draco gave him a blank stare, still pretending not to understand.“I mean you’re always adorable so it wasn’t just that.”
“I’m not adorable. I’m handsome” Draco said with a completely straight face. “And charming,” he added as an afterthought.
“Well, I wouldn’t be so confident about that charming bit.”
“No. You wouldn’t”
“Ugh stop,” said Harry, beginning to feel exasperated “You know what I meant, you git. And you can be handsome and adorable at the same time.”
“No, you cannot.” Draco sniffed a bit and stuck his nose in the air like he was often wont to do when trying to signal to Harry that as his boyfriend he should be gallantly offered the last word in any argument. “Adorable is what you call babies. And toddlers. And baby crups. Though it’s debatable in my opinion. Depends on the child. And the crup.”
“What about ferrets?” said Harry, laughing a bit. “I know a ferret who is really cute and adorable. He’s such a wee..”
Draco interrupted him before he could finish that thought. “Pygmy puffs are cute. Ferrets are dignified and noble creatures. I know you are not familiar with the traditional tales that wizarding children grow up with, but I’ll have you know that Merlin was once assisted in a quest by a noble ferret who was then given the title of Sir Beauberbottern and thereafter all his successors were-”
“What quest?” Harry smirked.
“What?”
“What was the quest that Sir Bubble Bottom assisted Merlin with?”
Draco glared at Harry before he replied with a sniff. “Beauberbottern. And it was an important quest.”
“Was it….was it collecting insects for dinner?” Harry burst into laughter as Draco flung a napkin at him. “Oh stop it, Draco. I’m not that naïve. I know there is no Sir Ferret, loyal friend to Merlin. You made that shit up. And I don’t know why. I love how cute you are as a ferret. All helpless and soft.”
“Help…helpless!” Draco sputtered.
“Well, you do always get bullied by other animals…”
“Really, Potter. The leaps and liberties you allow your thoughts to take. Bullied by animals! Never have I heard anything more ridiculous. I am fast and vicious in my Animagus form. Soft and helpless indeed! I bet you’d want me to be soft and helpless, but I am agile and….and…and sprightly.”
Harry had a sudden urge to crush Draco in his arms and hold him down and snog him and keep snogging him until he admitted that yes, he was a cute little soft adorable bean but after the fiasco with the foam licking, he figured he was on thin ice and settled for egging Draco on further. “What about Mr. Mumbles?”
“First of all Harry, I cannot believe you gave that beast a name. He is a psychopath. All other animals think so.”
By all other animals, Draco meant all other street animals that lurked in the alleyway behind The Honey Cauldron, Diagon’s latest bakery, on the lookout for scraps of their baked goods which they shouldn’t have been eating in the first place. And yes, his boyfriend was a part of the gaggle, having decided foraging for desserts to be the best use of time whilst in his Animagus form. Of course, he could just buy the same as a human, but Harry suspected he wasn’t mentally all there whilst a ferret, being more given to follow natural instincts. Not that Draco would have admitted to such behavior, but Harry had found him one too many times at the location to be completely unaware of the going ons.
“He’s just an alley cat and he’s kind of cute.” Harry held his hand up hearing Draco take an indignant gasp. “But yes, he does bully you.”
“He is a bloodthirsty creature. I have been trying to protect all the little animals from him. Without me, he would have eaten half of them by now.”
“Mr. Mumbles isn’t going to eat Mister Tamasin’s ancient crup or the brown hawk that’s always perching on the ledge. He’s a cat not an anaconda.”
“What about the squirrel?”
“Oh! You mean the squirrel that tries to bite your tail every chance it gets?”.
“He’s a baby. He’s just playful,” sulked Draco, but Harry had seen the said baby in action before, and it was second to Mr. Mumbles only on account of its lesser physical strength. The will to torture Draco was, if anything, more.
“The last time I found you in the alley, you were hanging on to a second story ledge, while Mr. Mumbles was swiping at you with his claws. Meanwhile, that squirrel was dangling on your tail with its teeth, while you were squealing pitifully. Honestly though, do you have trouble turning back? Because I don’t understand why you wouldn’t just do that.”
Draco slammed his coffee mug on the table. “You do not understand anything about the animal world Potter and don’t you dare insinuate that being a ferret makes me a target of bullying. I just told you ferrets are noble creatures. We don’t ‘squeal pitifully’. Also, there is nothing wrong with my prowess as an Animagus.” he straightened up and added with a mean smirk on his face “You’re just jealous because your dad was an Animagus and you wanted to be one but you’re not.”
Harry was dumbfounded for a second from the vicious turn that the silly banter had taken, but the very next moment he found himself vibrating with anger and a desperate desire to hurt Draco. “What the absolute hell? What is wrong with you?” he hissed “No wonder all the animals hate you. And enough with the noble ferret nonsense. Literally no one thinks that. You know what everyone does think? That a ferret is just a type of rat. Ergo, you’re a rat.”
Draco’s face dropped. He stared at Harry for a second or two, but before Harry had a chance to process anything, he disapparated with a loud crack.
“Fuck!” groaned Harry, rubbing his face and wondering what had just happened.