Anonymous Letters

That evening, an hour after everyone else had gone to bed, Harry, Ron, and Hermione were sat by the fire in the common room. It had taken Harry an hour to work up the courage to mention he had a secret. Hermione and Ron were sat on the edge of their seats, waiting for him to make his announcement.

"Come on Harry, you said you were ready..." Hermione coaxed. Harry nodded and fiddled with his fingers, looking around the common room, afraid someone could still be awake.

"We understand if you're not ready still... But no one's here but us, honestly," Ron said, reassuringly.

"Right, um, yeah, so..."

They all shuffled closer, as an extra precaution.

"Well, basically..." Harry started, sighing; "...I think I'm gay... Well no, I don't think I am, I'm 99 percent sure I am... The one percent is doubts of it just being a growing teen thing, but yeah..."

He looked up at Ron and Hermione, wondering what their reactions would be, hoping it'd be positive. Hermione was smiling, Ron looked like he didn't care too much.

"I thought so, told you Ron! I can't believe you were so afraid to tell us Harry! We don't care one bit, you're still you."

Harry glanced at Ron - who nodded - before grimacing; "well, I'm glad you're all happy for me and whatever, but, there's more..."

"You're seeing someone," Hermione asked, though it sounded more like a declaration. Harry nodded.

"Yeah, but, it's not good news really..."

Hermione and Ron shared uneasy glances.

"What do you mean?" Hermione asked. Harry took in a deep breath and looked anywhere but in the eyes of his friends.

"This guy I've been seeing, well, it's Malfoy..."

He shut his eyes tightly after hearing the gasps, knowing what was coming.

"M-Malfoy?" Ron demanded. Harry finally looked up, his friends didn't look at all impressed, especially Hermione.

"Really Harry? Out of everyone who could be gay, out of everyone you could have fallen for, you choose Malfoy?"

"I didn't choose, Hermione."

"Like it makes any difference! It's Malfoy! Did you expect us to be okay with this?"

"Well, no, but-"

"-You're gay, I don't care, what ever makes you happy Harry, but not Draco Malfoy. He's vile, possibly one of the worst human beings I've ever met-"

"-He's really not that bad Hermione, he's just, made bad choices, most weren't even his choice, and-"

"-Listen to her mate! Malfoy's not boyfriend material for anyone! Especially you! You're supposed to be enemies for Merlin's sake!" Ron interrupted.

"Said who though, we're supposed to be enemies, but why? My parents were killed by Voldemort, his parents are Voldemort's supporters. He's not, any opinion he has on Voldemort or what ever was put there by his father! Nature vs nurture and all that!"

"So you're defending a boy who regularly called me a mudblood? And who went out of his way to make your friends' lives miserable? Just because his father's as foul as he is?" Hermione asked, getting angrier by the minute.

"Well no, but, I don't know! He's not called you that for ages! And he's only done petty things just for appearances, he even calls you by your names when we talk."

Hermione scoffed; "how wonderful for you! He's only doing that so you'll like him more! Did you stop to think if you weren't friends with us he'd still be treating us like we're not even human?"

"Look Hermione, I get what you're saying, but this goes both ways, he likes me too!"

"No you look Harry, I never thought I'd do this, but I forbid you from seeing him! Break up with him! That is, if you want to keep your friends."

"What? Hermione-"

"-I mean it Harry! Is him or us! Come on Ronald!"

Hermione stood up, grabbed Ron's arm and dragged him over to the staircases, leaving Harry torn in two. He dropped his head in his hands. He didn't expect them to take it well, but he wasn't sure if it could have gone any worse. Sighing, he shuffled about on the chair, getting comfy, planning on sitting out of the night there, mulling over the situation Hermione had lumped him into.

The next morning, Harry hadn't slept at all, and had spent all night throwing balls of paper into the fire and talking to the house elves that came up to clean. Before anyone awoke, he went upstairs to the boys dorm, got washed and changed, and got ready for the day. He went down to the Great Hall, to get a head-start on drinking coffee before lessons. There was next to no one in the Hall, only a couple of teachers and one or two prefects. Looking around the Hall, Harry noticed Snape sat at the teachers table, glaring at the few people that were awake, especially at Harry.

"Shit!"

Harry hurried over to his table and pulled out his Potions homework, before pouring himself a cup of coffee. Luckily, the homework wasn't difficult, but it certainly needed doing, and it was just another thing adding to Harry's stress level, which was already pretty high. He sat working in peace, downing cups of coffee for just under an hour when his friends started joining him.

"What're you doing, Harry?" Dean asked, sitting next to him.

"Potions homework, why do I never do it when I have the time?"

Seamus laughed and poured himself some pumpkin juice; "you and me both Harry, I only did it last night because Dean reminded me."

"You couldn't help me could you? I haven't had any sleep, I'm stressed, I'm sure I'm doing this wrong!"

Dean took the parchment from him and looked over it, whilst Harry had another drink of coffee.

"You've not actually done that bad, only five is wrong."

Harry nodded and took it back, scribbling out his answer and starting again. He finally had it done by the time Hermione and Ron turned up. Hermione went and sat with the girls, glaring at Harry as she slid onto the bench. Ron awkwardly joined Harry, Dean, and Seamus, only mumbling "morning" before helping himself to food. Harry looked down at his empty plate, trying to think of reason to leave. He got up, grabbed his things and went to leave when Ron called him back.

"Where are you going?"

"...Toilet, why?"

Ron looked at him awkwardly; "um, meet me before lesson yeah? I want to talk to you..."

Harry nodded and eyed him suspiciously before leaving the Great Hall. He wandered up and down the corridors, wasting time until ten minutes before Potions. He wandered down to the dungeons to meet Ron. As he got closer tot the Potions classroom, he spotted his friend leaning against the wall, fiddling with the hem of his jumper.

"So, you wanted to talk?" Harry asked, leaning on the wall next to Ron.

"Yeah, uh look. I know you probably think we're being really harsh an' all that, but seriously Harry, you've got to look at it from our point of view... I mean, him, of all people! How?"

Harry shrugged; "I don't know... It started off all sort of, innocent... I just started off fancying him, kind of, then I got a letter from him, though it wasn't actually for me, the owl just got it wrong. He was going through the same problems as me, I wrote back pretending to be someone else, and it turned out he's not actually that bad..."

As Harry was telling his story, Ron shook his head, tutting occasionally. After he finished the tale of how he and Draco became an "item", he looked at Ron expectantly.

"...Still though, Harry. Malfoy, of all people. How do you know it's not some ruse or-"

"-I'm sure there's easier ways of getting to me."

"...Please Harry, just end it. There are important things for you to focus on, with you-know-who, and his dad is a Death Eater! It's only a matter of time until-"

"-No, Ron. He wouldn't! ...Not by choice anyway. He doesn't have much say in what he does."

Ron shrugged; "look, I see it's hard for you, but it's what's best."

Harry sighed; "...Fine."

That evening, Harry arranged to meet Draco in the trophy room. The two of them lounged into front of the fire, side-by-side. Draco occasionally glanced over at Harry, noticing something was up.

"Come on, spit it out," he said, elbowing the Gryffindor. Harry sighed.

"Right, well... I told Ron and Hermione."

"...And?"

"They think we should break up. Well, no, they ordered me to break up with you."

Draco looked at him anxiously; "and, are you?"

Harry shrugged and lay down; "I don't know. I don't want to... But they're my best friends-"

"-They're not very good friends if they'd make you choose between us and them."

"Well, in a way I get where they're coming from, but, they don't understand."

Draco nodded and lay next to him, reaching out to take his hand; "...So... What's going to happen?"

"...I don't know. What should we do?"

Draco sighed and looked up at the ceiling; "this might be the Slytherin coming out in me, but, why don't we pretend to break up?"

"What?"

"You know. You tell Granger and Weasley we've 'broken up', and then just, get together in secret. You know, because that's not what we've been doing anyway."

Harry smiled; "they'd find out eventually."

"No they won't. They wouldn't have figured us out if you hadn't told them... We'll just have to be very discrete!"

"I can't believe you're fighting for this."

Draco smiled; "why wouldn't I? I can't believe you're not."

"Well, I'm torn. Either way I lose... So, I'm just trying to figure out how to please both sides."

"You can't have your cake and eat it."

"But I want to!"

Draco chuckled and leant closer to Harry, resting his head on his shoulder; "just do what I said, it'll work out!"

Harry smiled and and went to kiss Draco's forehead but was interrupted by Draco forcing his lips to his. Before Harry could get drawn in to the kiss, Draco sat up and ran his fingers through his hair.

"We should go somewhere else, people come here you know..."

Harry nodded and pulled himself up; "well, where to?"

"I don't know... Somewhere in the castle, it's too cold to go outside, and I can not be bothered walking all the way up the astronomy tower, the dungeons are bloody freezing..."

Harry smiled, enjoying Draco's little rant about how badly heated the castle was.

"Maybe we should stick to meeting in the day when it's warm... It should get better over Christmas, most people will be going home."

"You're staying?"

Draco nodded; "yes, my parents are awful to be around lately. Mother's overbearing, and father, well, you know about him."

Harry nodded too and squeezed Draco's hand lovingly; "it'll get better."

Draco smiled meekly; "I hope so. If you ever do come head to head with the Dark Lord, please don't kill my father. He's not entirely a bad man..."

"Um, ok?"

Laughing nervously, the Slytherin waved his hand; "ignore me, I'm being stupid. Anyway, should we go? Otherwise your stupid friends might get the wrong idea."

Harry managed a laugh; "when don't they?"

They both helped each other up, embraced and shared a quick kiss before parting ways. On his way back to the common room, Harry planned what to say to Ron, planning on ignoring Hermione completely, for two reasons. Firstly, unlike Ron, she had no compassion for his and Draco's relationship, and secondly, by not talking to her he thought it'd make it seem more realistic that he'd broken up with Draco. He took a deep breath before storming into the common room, going to walk past everyone to the dorms.

"Did you do it?" Ron called out, scrambling to get up from the sofa.

"Yes," Harry replied, monotonously. He could hear Ron and Hermione follow him up the stairs to the dorms.

"How did it go?" Ron asked. Harry turned around and looked at his two friends.

"Oh you know, it was brilliant!"

"It's your fault for getting involved with him, Harry," Hermione said. Harry glared at her. Ron began to feel awkward, her knew Hermione was right, but Harry was his best friend.

"Look, Harry, I know it can't feel, well, great, but, Hermione's kind of right."

Harry shrugged; "well you don't have to worry any more, we're over. You know, even after telling him you ordered us to break up, he still didn't call you names! He was very mature about it, a damn side more than you were, anyway."

Hermione shrugged; "whatever Harry, I know I'm the bad guy in all of this. I only hope you'll be able to see I was right sooner rather than later."

Hermione glanced at Ron before storming out. Harry and Ron stood in an awkward silence for a few moments.

"I'm going to bed," Harry said. Ron nodded and shuffled towards the door before leaving. Harry sighed and flopped down onto his bed, wondering how long it would take for them to realise he was lying.