分卷阅读46（2 / 2）

“None.” Harry decides it for the both of them, looking around the empty rooms and shaking dust off the abandoned curtains. “It’s going to be a new start, Draco. An entirely new home.”

Draco agrees, but really, as much as he hated it in the beginning, he would miss Grimmauld Place. It’s a dreary old thing, but he could not hate it, not when it was the only thing that had spared him from a prison cell, and not when it was where he and Harry found their way to each other. He knows that you have to move on to move forward, but he does not want to scrub it out of their lives just yet, just when things were going so good.

The two of them take a tour together, and Harry babbles on, about letting Draco choose the art work to go on the walls through the hallways, and how they could put picture frames up on the wall along the stairs. He talks about expanding the dining room so all the Weasleys can fit, because now that he has a real home he wants to have them over, and goes out into the greenhouse with the broken roof and rotting support beams, talks about planning to mend it, says that he might take up gardening.

The entire house is a project, something to keep Harry’s mind off things, keep him moving forward while he figures all the unanswered aspects of his life out. Draco tries not to worry about that, about what happens when he runs out of things to fix.

“And here,” Harry swings the door to the shed open, which is magically enhanced on the inside to be as large as a full scale garage. “Can be a potions workshop for you, once we fix it up. Put in some shelves, a fireplace, a work table, some cupboards, a presto—” He moves his hand in a sweeping motion and the picture comes, unbidden, of Draco out in this shed during the day and Harry out fixing something in the house, the two of them coming back to meet together for dinner, maybe popping over to the Weasley’s just for a moment, and then spending quiet nights at home over and over and over again. “It’s a space fit for a king. Or a potions master, whichever.”

He is smiling at him, softly, sweetly, like he is so desperately trying to make this work, to keep Draco happy. It chases the doubt around and around in his eyes, makes it clear out to make more room for the good stuff.

And yet.

“I love it.” Draco squared his shoulders back and made a show of inspecting things, making plans, giving Harry murmured compliments about the shed while he makes plans of his own. “Truly, Harry, I do.”

The papers are still piled up on the bedside table, which is really what gives Draco the idea.

He calls Angie, the realtor, who is a squib but does have a knack for getting extraordinary deals on magical homes. She picks up on the first ring.

“Hello?” She’s in a bad mood, he can tell from the biting in her voice.

“Angie?” Nothing from the other line. “It’s me, Draco.”

He keeps his eye on the door while he speaks, straining his ears to make sure the water from the shower was still running. It would not do to have Harry bursting in during this particular conversation. “No, the cottage was fine. This isn’t about Harry.” It feels like betrayal, what he’s doing. Draco isn’t sure how to think of it. It wasn’t good, but it was necessary, in a way. “This is about me. I need a house, too, as it happens. Forgot to mention it earlier.”

He can feel the stunned silence coming from the other end of the line and it hurts, because she, too, had assumed that he and Harry were a package deal. He doesn’t have the heart to tell her that there have been all kinds of such disappointments today.

“Of course, Mr. Malfoy.” He didn’t like to hear that name. It made him feel like something he wasn’t, something he never wanted to be. “I’m sure we can find just the thing we’re looking for.”

“I’m sure you do,” Draco murmurs, and hangs up just as soon as Harry pops his head in through the door, a towel wrapped around his waist, and when Harry asks who he was talking to, he barely feels guilty when he tells him that Angie had called just to make sure that all the paperwork had been sent over to the ministry.

It wasn’t final, after all. It’s not like he was planning to move out right this very moment.

It’s only preemptive. Draco thinks, watching Harry dress, still trying to figure it out, because while Harry hadn’t ever done anything to suggest that he was unwelcome to come with him to his new home, he really hadn’t done anything to suggest that he was, either. Just in case.