Stop All the Clocks (This Is the Last Time I'm Leaving Without You)

chapter 4

Harry cradles a mug of tea in both hands, his second favourite mug because his first favourite, the one with the blue stripes and the chip in the handle, is still sitting on the dining room table, right across from the black one with his face on it and the words 'I Choose the Chosen One!' emblazoned around the rim in bright green. Draco bought it as a joke, and the more Harry complains about it, the more Draco uses it just to irritate him. Now he never uses anything else, not even the green mug with the ceramic snake for a handle that had been his previous favourite, and it's been a presence in their household for so long that even Harry reaches for it automatically when he makes Draco tea. He grips his mug a little tighter and shifts slightly where he sits. He's perched up on the kitchen counter, the sharply-cornered edge digging painfully into the backs of his thighs, the bottom corner of the cabinets forcing him to hunch over a little. But he can't bring himself to move because the alternative is to go sit in the dining room, and Harry's pretty sure he can't handle that

He drums his heels against the cabinet door, then leans forward a bit more to see the table, and there are the mugs, steam still curling up from them, hovering motionless in midair. Draco's warming and stasis charms are both still holding strong, but then he's always been exceptionally good at charmwork. The sound of toast being ejected from the toaster catches Harry's attention and he pushes his brooding thoughts away as he slides off the counter and pads across the chilly tile floor to the toaster. Draco wouldn't want him to mope around contemplating mugs. Draco would want him to man up and get on with his fucking life. And for now, getting on with his fucking life means making breakfast.

That's a small enough goal. Reasonable. Harry can do this.

He takes out the toast and sets it on a plate, then cuts it in half corner to corner. Before Draco, Harry had always cut his toast in half right down the middle, but Draco always says that if you love someone, you cut their toast into triangles. It makes absolutely no sense, but every time Draco hands him a plate of toast triangles, Harry knows that Draco's really saying, 'I love you.' Harry stares down at his plate and waits for the sadness to hit him, but nothing comes so after a few moments he butters the triangles and opens the cabinet. Today feels like an orange marmalade sort of day.

But the orange marmalade is still on the table, left over from breakfast the day before, trapped under the stasis charm along with the teapot and the two mugs, and he thinks about getting it but he's afraid that if he does he might disturb Draco's spells. They'll be fragile now, maybe already starting to fade. His stomach twists at the thought, a frisson of nausea shooting through him, and Harry tips his toast into the rubbish bin, along with the plate and the knife and, after a moment's hesitation, the butter dish. He picks up his mug of tea and takes a sip, but it's gone cold, so he dumps it down the sink, doesn't look at the dining room table as he passes by, and goes to get dressed.

He pulls on a pair of jeans and a shirt and his warmest Weasley jumper, because it's unseasonably chilly for late spring. He takes his keys and his wallet, and after a moment's thought to where he'd like to end up, Harry Apparates out into the bright sunshine of a beautiful May morning.

Nothing good ever happened in May. Not much good ever happened in June, either. That long stretch of weeks between the second of May and the thirtieth of June was Harry's least favourite time of year, starting off with a Commemorative Gala for the Anniversary of the Battle of Hogwarts and ending with an event in remembrance of Dumbledore's death. And all those long weeks in the middle were crammed with ceremonies and speeches, galas and gatherings, memorials and observances and the unveiling of monuments and on and on and on until Harry wanted to tear at his hair and just scream because hadn't going through all those events the first time around been enough for them? Why would they make him relive those losses year after year?

It was like slogging through all the post-war funerals all over again. Not that Harry resented those who'd given their lives in the war being commemorated. He just resented being forced to put on stuffy formal robes and give speeches his heart wasn't in, and listen to more speeches by people who hadn't even been involved in the fighting. This wasn't the way he wanted to remember those he'd lost, and he didn't think this was what they'd have wanted, either.

He remembered Tonks when he caught sight of a little girl with a bright pink ribbon in her hair. He remembered Remus every time he cast a Patronus Charm. He remembered Sirius every time he saw a shaggy black dog. And every time Harry remembered, he smiled. That was how he wanted to remember, and how he thought they'd want to be remembered by him. In pleasant little flashes of memory that put a smile on his face, not bored to tears by some stuffy politician talking out of his arse.

This was dull and fake and as lifeless and depressing all those funerals after the war, too much black and too many speeches filled with fancy words that didn't actually mean anything. After attending so many of them, Harry had come to hate funerals, and could only hope that the next one he was forced to attend would be his own. At least that way no one could expect him to give a speech.

"All right, mate?" Ron muttered to him as the room broke into polite applause and some witch who hadn't even been there that horrible night four years ago stepped down from the podium set up at one end of the grand ballroom.

Harry nodded and drained the last of the whisky from his glass. "Yeah. Just going to get another one. Want one?"

Ron shook his head. "No thanks."

As Harry moved forward and the room spun slightly with each step, he thought maybe he should slow down. But when the next speaker started up, blathering on about duty and sacrifice and how noble it all was, Harry decided he needed to stay more or less trashed to get through the night, because it wasn't noble at all. The war was chaos and panic and blood and screams and gut-churning terror. Everyone talked about how honourable those deaths were, but death wasn't honourable. It was messy and complicated and undignified, and Harry resented anyone who told him otherwise.

He made it to the bar without incident and the bartender poured him another whisky without being told. Harry took it, nodded his thanks, and turned to go. He'd just taken a few steps toward where Ron was waiting on the other side of the room when he caught sight of a flash of blond vanishing through the doorway leading out to the balcony, and he followed along without thinking.

Harry shoved the back door open and tripped over the threshold. He caught himself awkwardly against the doorframe, and carefully stepped forward. He turned to find Malfoy leaning against the wall a little way down, just tugging a fresh cigarette free from the silver cigarette case he held, a ridiculously ostentatious thing etched with an intricate letter M.

He watched Harry carefully, tapping the end of the cigarette against the case, then slid it back inside and shut the case with a snap. He slipped it into a pocket of his robes. "Going to try to hit me again?" Malfoy asked as casually as if he were asking about the weather.

For a moment, Harry was tempted, because he was always tempted to hit Malfoy. But he was so tired, exhausted from event after event and the empty spaces left by so many people he never should have had to lose dragging at him. He wanted to forget about all of it, just for a while, and he didn't want to have to go through the pretence of fighting with Malfoy to get there. They'd gone home together four times so far, but it was always after an argument and usually after Harry tried to hit Malfoy. But tonight he just shook his head, then leaned in and pressed his mouth against Malfoy's, and hoped Malfoy wouldn't try to hit him instead.

Malfoy went rigid for a moment, then he fisted his hands in the front of Harry's robes and yanked him close.

Harry let his head drop back against the stone wall behind him as Malfoy bit his way down Harry's neck. "Come home with me," he said.

"Mmph," Malfoy replied against Harry's skin, and fuck it, Harry took that as assent.

He gripped Malfoy hard and twisted in place, and then they were in his bedroom, and with Malfoy's hot mouth on his and Malfoy's hot skin against his own and Malfoy's fingers pushing into his arse and Malfoy's cock hard and heavy against his leg, Harry took a deep breath and for the first time all week he felt himself relax.