Chapter Seven
Draco lands on the pitch, face white with fury, shouting insults in Potter's direction. He stomps furiously after Potter, who is walking away to celebrate another Gryffindor victory.
"—Or perhaps," Draco is spitting, leering, "you can remember what your mother's house stank like, Potter, and Weasley's pigsty reminds you of it—"
Potter is whirling around, sprinting at him, and Draco is filled with adrenaline. Potter's face is twisted in rage, his wicked green eyes fiery with determination, fixed ferociously on Draco, finally.Potter's hands raise to attack—
And Draco is shoved onto the ground, Potter's body boxing him in, pinning him down against the grass. Potter is growling fiercely, teeth bared in front of Draco's face—Potter's hands are gripping him savagely, hungrily, and Draco's blood is rushing in his ears, there's a tapping noise in his head—Draco arches his hips up, viciously fists the front of Potter's uniform and pulls—
Draco's eyes flew open, and he winced. The morning sun was far too bright, the sharp tapping noise far too loud, his pyjama trousers far too snug—
Oh, fuck, no.
With a jolt of panic, he looked down at himself and let out an aggravated groan. He hadn't had a dream like that about Potter—shit, Harry, his current patient—in years, why did it have to be that one, again—honestly, what was wrong with him? What was he, fifteen? He refused to touch himself, in petty self-punishment—he wasn't about to reward bad behavior. You pathetic, horny imbecile. Unbelievable.
The incessant tapping noise was real, apparently, coming from his window, and getting louder by the second. Draco refused to leave the bed in his… state, however, so the aggressive owl would just have to wait.
After a couple of minutes of forcing himself to imagine Argus Filch in tartan bloomers, Draco deemed himself decent enough. He crawled reluctantly out of his nest of pillows and walked over to the window, where the persistent owl was still tapping angrily. He unlatched and opened it, and the vengeful little scops owl hit Draco's face with his wings on his way in. The bird dropped the roll of parchment he had clutched in his talons onto the floor, and landed on top of Draco's dresser, where he coughed up a disgusting pellet in revenge. Draco glared at him; the tiny owl simply glared back.
Grumbling, Draco bent over and retrieved the short note, frowning as he read it.
Malfoy,
We could really use your help with this investigation. Come round ours later tonight, about seven, if you've got the time.
R. Weasley
Draco flipped the parchment over—there were apparition coordinates on the back, a place not too far from his own house, in Devon. Interesting.
The grumpy little owl still sat on his dresser. Apparently, he was to wait for a reply. Draco summoned a biro and quickly penned an affirmative response on a small piece of notepaper. He was about to hand it over to the disgruntled bird, when he stopped himself—he didn't want the bird to report back negatively to Weasley. His reputation was at stake, so he summoned the pouch of owl treats from wherever it was in the house. A small thud hit his bedroom door, and he rolled his eyes at himself.
Draco retrieved the pouch of treats from the other side of his door, and held it out to the annoyed owl, who looked at it curiously before hopping onto Draco's hand and gorging himself on its contents. The sight reminded Draco of how Weasley had looked at many of the school's feasts, in the Great Hall, and he chuckled to himself.
The owl flew off looking much happier, and Draco felt satisfied that no one would suspect he had mistreated the bird at all.
Draco slipped his cold feet into the fuzzy green Grouch monstrosities and made his way into the kitchen, where he could smell that Timsy was brewing coffee and making breakfast. He froze in his tracks at the sight of his kitchen table.
On top of the smooth wood was a large, plastic muggle device, with a section of what looked like black mesh on either side, covered in buttons, which bore neither words nor explanations—only mysterious, simple symbols, certainly not anything Hogwarts had covered in Ancient Runes. What in Merlin's name…
Draco moved in for a closer look, and saw a small scroll of parchment tied to the handle on the top of it. He didn't touch it, but took out his wand and unrolled it with magic. He couldn't be too careful—he still got hate mail, occasionally, and some of it was cursed or covered in bubotuber pus—
But it was only from Pansy, succinct and biting, as always.
Here's the boombox. Enjoy your secret lover's mixtape, prat. Triangle to "play," square to "stop."
Draco grinned at her tone, then frowned again—secret lover? What was she thinking? It was just a cassette tape—wait a minute, didn't she say it was a cassette tape? Why was she now calling it a mixtape? Was it because it held numerous artists… Had Harry curated it himself?
Draco looked back at the boombox, examining it, and eventually spotted the triangle and square Pansy had mentioned. Simple enough. Should be a cinch.
He picked up the device by its handle, it was as heavy as it looked. Draco carried it out to the sitting room, walking awkwardly under its weight. He returned to the kitchen, where Timsy happily served him breakfast.
"Mistress Pansy is bringing the muggle device very early," Timsy croaked. "Mistress is knowing not to wake Master Draco before the sun."
"Smart woman," Draco smirked.
After breakfast, he spent about an hour perched on his sofa, fixated on the boombox and the "mixtape" which sat on the coffee table in front of him. Yes, he knew where the "play" and "stop" buttons were now, but he couldn't figure out how to get the tape inside the thing, and though Pansy had said it wasn't named for explosions, he still didn't trust all those buttons, and didn't want to risk pushing all of them willy nilly—what if Pansy simply hadn't pressed the right button, what if it did explode? That seemed like something a Wizarding invention might do, definitely something that would be sold at Weasley's Wizard Wheezes, and he knew better than to underestimate the muggles.
When Draco's face started to hurt from frowning so hard, he decided to give it up as a bad job, at least for now. Pansy was probably laughing her arse off, imagining him stumped by this stupid thing. He hauled the boombox over to the shelf with his records, rearranging things a bit to make space for the exasperating, cumbersome machine. He put on a record instead, because that, he knew how to do, and whiled away the hours of his day off humming to himself in his pyjamas, just because, while Timsy worked on the plants and gave Draco occasional disapproving looks.
"You know I'm such a fool for you
You got me wrapped around your finger
Do you have to let it linger?"
***