𝐃𝐑𝐀𝐑𝐑𝐘 𝐅𝐄𝐒𝐓 2008

Just Short of Peace

Author: dm_p
Title: Just Short of Peace
Pairing(s): Harry/Draco
Rating: PG-15
Summary: There were places that Harry hated to go, even after the hours of work put into trying to clean up the carnage left behind after the war.
Warnings (if any): It’s sort of dark, but otherwise, none.
Total word count: ~6000

There were places that Harry hated to go, even after the hours of work put into trying to clean up the carnage left behind after the war. He hated the Great Hall the most. He hated looking up at the Head Table and not seeing Dumbledore. He hated the fact that Snape wasn’t there to hate anymore. No matter how loud the chatter between the long tables got, which could never compare to the chatter between the students before the war had worn everyone thin, Harry could never forget the suffocating silence of devastation. Harry could still remember the huddled groups of people, some crying, some wailing and others, like the Malfoys, just sitting in stunned, trembling silence.

Before Harry realized it he found his eyes drawn to Malfoy’s shock of slightly unkempt blond hair at the Slytherin table. All at once he remembered the same blond hair plastered to Malfoy’s forehead with sweat as Harry reached out for him. Most days Harry could still feel the flames licking at his feet. Sometimes, when Malfoy’s worn gaze would slide across the students sitting around him like he wasn’t seeing them at all, Harry would wonder if Malfoy could still feel them too.

---

The Gryffindor common room was always terribly overcrowded. It seemed that the students weren’t quite comfortable with going back to normal. The hallways were deserted and everyone had silently decided to quarantine themselves to their common rooms any time between classes and meals. Harry tried to adhere to this self-inflicted imprisonment for a while but there was only so much quality time he could stand with his housemates.

Hermione had thrown herself into being Head Girl, making up for Ron’s lack of enthusiasm about his position. Ron never said it, but Harry knew he was bored. Every once in a while Harry would catch Ron looking at him like he was expecting Harry to suggest they start out on a quest to hunt down and kill every remaining Death Eater, when in all reality Harry could go the rest of his life and never face another battle.

He gave it two weeks. Those two weeks crawled by so slowly that Harry was sure he had gone insane. At three-fourteen on the fourteenth day Harry stood up, drawing the attention of everyone around him.

“I’m going for a walk,” he said, his voice sounding too-loud to his ears. Gazes started shifting away from him, accepting the explanation he didn’t owe anyone. Hermione told him to be careful and he almost laughed.

Harry left, more willing to go places he’d rather avoid than sit in the common room and make a feeble attempt at normalcy. He wandered the hallways for hours until he was convinced he was being followed. A few hours more and Harry decided he wasn’t being followed; Instead, he was following someone. He could hear the echoes of footsteps just ahead of him and a number of times he thought he saw robes whip around the corner. If he quickened his pace so did the person in front of him. He followed the path of the person he wasn’t even sure was there until his stomach growled and he finally gave up in favour of dinner in spite of his building frustration.

All through dinner he couldn’t stop thinking about the slip of robes around a darkened corner or the resounding click of footsteps just beyond his reach.

---

Harry never thought he would be grateful for Divination, but he was. The new professor, a soft-spoken woman who reminded him a bit of Luna Lovegood and insisted they call her by her first name, Celeste, seemed to have a different method for Divination. She would wave them into the tower, passing out pillows to each of the students with a cheery smile and a reminder to remove their shoes.