Draco in Darkness

De Nile

But love is blind, and lovers cannot see The pretty follies that themselves commit.

     -- Shakespeare (The Merchant of Venice)

"Transforma furca."

Harry watched as Draco worked to transfigure the sock into a fork.  They were practising their "unrelated transfigurations" - changing an item into something completely different in shape and purpose.

"Hmmm," Draco muttered, feeling over the resultant object with his fingers.  "It seems okay.  Definitely metal this time, with sharp prongs.  What am I missing?"  The Slytherin always insisted on determining for himself if the transfiguration had been complete, but acknowledged a working pair of eyes covered all the bases.

"Well, it's not a knit fork, like the previous one was.  But it's still argyle print," Harry grinned.

"Damn."  Draco reversed the spell with a wave of his wand, and prepared to try again.

Harry leaned back in his chair as the other boy practised his task.  It had been a good study session so far.  He was glad to get back to his routine with Draco, after being separated.  Strange how it had become more normal to study with the Slytherin than with his own housemates.

His eyes drifted to Draco's face; the eyes were relatively neutral, as usual, but his mouth was screwed up in concentration.  Harry remembered the previous night, when he had seen a smile on that face instead.  He'd been in the middle of explaining to a very confused Neville just how television worked, laughing over how his mistaken notions had come from a Muggle children's book, when, in one of his routine glances up at the Slytherin table, he'd noticed the smile.  Draco didn't smile often - or at least, not in a relaxed, genuine fashion like that.  He would often tease Harry with smirks, and there was occasional laughter, but any ordinary smiles often carried a hint of bitterness behind them.  This was a completely relaxed smile, and it had warmed Harry right across the Great Hall.

It had also unsettled him again.  He wasn't emotionally wound on Sunday the way he had been on Saturday, but that smile had affected him just the same.  Maybe it was just the rarity of seeing such a thing?  He was certainly glad Draco was feeling better, and that he had something to smile about, whatever it was.

"There."  Draco's voice broke into his reverie.  "This feels a bit weightier somehow.  Does that mean the colour is correct, too?"

Harry leaned in and took the fork from Draco's slim fingers.  "Yes, completely metal," he said, turning it over in his hands.  "Not a trace of argyle, tweed, or anything of the sort."

"Finally!" Draco groaned.  "Damn, this subject got so much harder after the accident.  I was about to resign myself to eating with patterned forks, and somehow convincing McGonagall that I knew it was like that, and that I wanted it that way."

Harry laughed as he turned to look at the other boy.  And then paused.  After cursing and struggling with this task,  on the Slytherin's face was a bright contrast.  Instead of a scowl, his lips curled into a light smile, with a touch of smirk for his joke. 

Leaning so close to Draco, Harry had a suddenly overwhelming urge to reach out and touch him again, congratulate him on his accomplishment, and hot on the heels of that thought came the desire to kiss him as well.  He sat back abruptly, the chair skidding a few inches across the stone.  Okayyy....  He wasn't sure what was going on, but distance suddenly seemed like a good idea.

Draco's head turned at the noise.  "You going somewhere?"

"What?  No, I just ... er ... lost my balance for a minute," Harry answered, still flustered.  "So ... um ... what shall we work on next?"