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DISCLAIMER: Warning! I make no claim to any property of J.K. Rowling's, and am in no way profiting by this. I do offer her my sincerest thanks for allowing us this garden of the mind in which we play. Further Warning! This story...and likely any I ever write…are dominated by gay themes and characters. That's how it is, if this in any way makes you uncomfortable...do not read further.
A Complicated Person…by Samayel
Harry Potter’s boyfriend was infamous. Draco Malfoy, even after years of post war peace and prosperity, was still one of the people most feared for his vindictive nature and generally foul disposition. These were only matched by his near desperate desire to be the center of attention, and his penchant for causing public scenes. Only Harry Potter was reputed to be able to restrain him, and Harry’s uncanny patience and ability to co-exist peacefully with Draco was the subject of much rumor-mongering.
It wasn’t easily figured, and people still whispered derogatorily when Draco pitched fits in restaurants, shops or public events. He would throw tantrums over the seating arrangements at public dinners, hurl invective at shopkeepers regarding their shoddy wares, and send back meals in the hands of frightened waiters whenever he was dissatisfied with his meal…which was almost always. Only the immediate and nearby presence of Harry Potter transformed him, almost magically, into a quiet and kittenish spouse, with a small smile that played about his lips the entire while.
If it hadn’t been for Harry’s fame, Draco likely would have remained uninvited to significant events because of his unpredictable temper. However, Harry and Draco were a couple and one was almost always found with the other, so notables seeking Harry’s appearance at an event had to tolerate the risk of Draco’s outlandish behavior, or accept Harry’s refusal to attend. Such was life.
Draco Malfoy was phenomenally wealthy, and currying his favor for charities and other good causes required enormous patience. Impressing his lover, the much kinder hearted Mr. Potter, was a far simpler affair, and usually guaranteed an easier time in acquiring funds. The two men held an enormous influence over the wizarding world, and if they withdrew their support or made a single negative comment to the press, it could easily ruin the target of their wrath. There was also their influence at the Ministry, now staffed and led by war heroes that knew them both well.
It had been a strange time after war, with Harry emerging from the chaos victorious over Voldemort, and Draco Malfoy revealed as the spy that made Harry’s destruction of Voldemort’s last defenses possible. No one expected it, but they took over Malfoy manor immediately after the dust settled, combined their fortunes, and lived in isolated splendor, venturing out only to visit friends, dine and dance, and attend events in their honor or for charities and causes they felt were worthy of support. The wizarding world was turned on its ear as it endured spectacle after spectacle, quickly discovering that the spoiled and intemperate heir to the Malfoy fortune only conducted himself in civilized fashion when his lover was by his side.
Harry’s friends had been baffled, and his silence on the subject only fueled further rumors. Harry’s dear friends had survived and prospered after the war, and the five years since had seen many a happy day for the Weasleys, including Hermione, who had married Ron within weeks of the war’s end. Even they, as close as they were to Harry, remained baffled by Harry’s tolerance for Draco’s antics, and Draco’s complete shift of behavior when Harry was near. It was utterly beyond them to explain how such a couple could work, and work well, after all this time.
Hermione supposed that it was just true love, and that no matter how different they were, nothing could or would tear them apart, but she was given to flights of romantic fancy and no one took her completely seriously on that one.
Ron still claimed that Harry was the one person in the world who took no shit from Draco, and had the power to back up anything he threatened, and therefore Draco respected only Harry and no one else, and many agreed with him, but still couldn’t figure what Harry would see in Draco.
Luna Lovegood posited that perhaps Draco was afflicted with some as yet unknown magical condition that was temporarily cured by pheromones that only Harry possessed, but this was taken less seriously than even Hermione’s rosy imaginings.
Rumors reached a peak again just before the fifth anniversary of Harry and Draco’s relationship, primarily because the invitations were arriving in households around the wizarding world, and that put their names back on the tip of everybody’s tongues once again. They were hosting a hand-fasting, to formalize their relationship after five years of keeping the wizarding world on its toes. The party was expected to the source of legends, and Draco’s towering perfectionism and famous pickiness had reached epic proportions.
The first floral arranger was forced to Apparate home covered in conjured manure. The catering staff had repeatedly fled assaults by flying hors d’oeuvres and showers of wine that had been deemed unworthy. The tailor had been savagely hexed with a curse that left her feeling as though needles were constantly pricking her flesh everywhere at once, and only the promise of triple the usual pay kept anyone working. The stories coming out of Malfoy manor had never been more numerous, or less flattering of Draco. Harry couldn’t be everywhere at once, and each time he left the room or the manor, those employed to prepare the place felt sheer panic overwhelm them.
Few indeed were those who refused to attend the upcoming event, and those who did sent lavish gifts they hoped would mollify Draco’s outrage. The gardens were made ready for hundreds of guests and notables, and when the day finally came, it was attended with mingled pleasure and trepidation by all who could come.
Naturally, Ron and Hermione, along with the entire Weasley clan, had come, and Ron had been at Harry’s side the whole afternoon. Draco had been remarkably well behaved, if a bit stiff and formal throughout, greeting guests and accepting gifts and blessings. Ron had noticed over the years that Draco’s temper seemed to flare late in the day, rather than early, and that this rule of thumb held true even now. Why it was that Harry, of all people, could tolerate and even mitigate that famous temper, still confused him utterly.
“How is it, mate?”
“How is what?” Harry was genuinely curious. Ron had been pensive all day, made more than a little sober by the knowledge that five years really had gone by, and Harry and Draco were soon to be married.
“What you just did…just a minute ago while we were talking. Draco was summat like fifty feet away, pelting some poor wee helper chippie with her own flowers, and he was reaching for his wand like he was about to hex the daylights right out of her. You stared at him…just a for a second, and he turned and looked at you. Next thing, he’s picking up flowers and sending her on her way and acting all nice. How the hell is it you can do that? What is it about you that stops him raking the rest of us over the coals?”
Harry snorted mildly. “Trust me, mate…you don’t want the details.”
Ron answered quietly, and without the usual good-natured humor in his tone. “Really. I do. I can handle it. Been five years. You asked me to stand up with ya. I’m doing it. Best mates twelve years now. I know I used to flinch something awful back when you two first took up with each other, but I’m over all that now. We’re grown men and all. I have the nerve to ask it, and I’ve got the nerve to hear it. Give it up, mate…what gives between you and him? How is it you keep him in check like that?”
Harry listened quietly, then sighed, staring down the yard toward Draco, who was delivering flustered instructions to the people setting up the chairs on the lawn, his wand tucked safely in his back pocket. If Ron could really handle asking like this, then maybe his best mate had every right to hear it.
Harry’s eyes didn’t waver from Draco while he spoke, and Ron took in every word as if it had come down from some sacred mountain.
“You can’t ever tell. Understand, mate? It isn’t really mine to share. It’s between me and him…in the end. But you’re standing up with me today, so I guess you’ve got the right to ask. Can you keep your silence?”
“You’ve got my sworn word. On my wand, by Merlin’s Hidden Name. I swear it.”
“Alright then. He’s a complicated person, Ron. You know how he acts, you know what he puts people through, but you don’t really know him. No one does. I’m just a lot closer than anyone else. I understand the important parts of him. The parts that matter most.
He’s a very tense person, Ron. A lot of people don’t forgive the way he expresses it. They don’t know him at all or understand what he needs. Probably better that they don’t. That tension has to give sometimes…has to come out.
He isn’t a perfectionist because he’s spoiled rotten, though I admit it looks that way when I spoil him a bit. You can’t possibly imagine what makes him that way, and even what I’ll tell you is just a fraction of what went into it.
His Mum and Dad, Ron. They made the Dursleys look like angels of mercy. They demanded perfection. No one is perfect. No one can be. He tried…but he always fell short of the mark…and he paid for it when they were disappointed. I mean really paid. Those things…those things aren’t mine to tell you, so I ask you to take my word. His burden in this life is trying to unlearn all those things he was taught. I don’t mind that I have to do a little extra to help him along the way.
He has anxiety attacks. Nightmares and moments of panic. When he first came to Grimmauld Place I’d catch him washing his hands in water so hot that it could have parboiled a meal. He craves approval in a way you or I couldn’t conceive of in our wildest dreams. He pushes constantly not to be surrounded by flawed things or not to leave an impression of being tolerant of the substandard. That’s how he was trained, that’s how he used to cope.
Then along came me. All that time stuck together in Grimmauld Place took its little toll. I couldn’t figure him out. So contained and rigid. No one can keep that up all the time. I finally caught him with his guard down. One of the moments when he breaks down because he can’t control his environment and it drives him half scatty.
We got close, because I didn’t judge him one bit. I didn’t tease or blabber it about. I never told anyone what he’s like. It’s hard to see, especially when he’s nervous, like today, but he’s trying to be better. We have a therapist over on the sly, twice a week for the last three years. He’s coming along a step at a time…even when it scares the shit out of him. I’m proud to even know him.
But you see…he took to wanting my approval…when we got close. His parents are dead…he has no one…nothing to be his compass. Nothing to tell him when or how he did something right or wrong. I have to do that now. At least a little, enough to make him feel like he’s pleasing someone.
When he gets out of hand, and he’s at his worst at times like this, he looks for me, trying to figure out what to do. If I’m not handy, things don’t usually go to well. When I am, all I have to do is give him a look…one that approves or disapproves, and he knows what to do. The idea of my being upset with what he’s doing is horrifying to him. It stops him cold. I never yell at him. I don’t raise my voice or my hand or even my wand. I don’t need any of those, and if I used one of them, well…he’d be in St. Mungo’s for a week before he’d be fit to be seen in public. That’s how much he needs that security. It would hurt him worse than I can explain to take it away. I won’t do that to him. It took days to get him out of his room the first time I got worked up and yelled at him. He was like a whipped puppy, Ron. That was four years ago. I’ll never make that happen again.
So I give a look, and he gets his nerves back under control, and life goes on. Someday…someday he might be different. I believe it, and he’s already changed in a lot of small ways. Some people go into a relationship constantly wondering what the other person feels. Not knowing if they’re really needed or not. Not me. I know how he feels, and what he needs, and how very badly he needs it.”
“Bloody hell.”
“Yeah. There are days I wish Voldy hadn’t topped off Lucius and Narcissa. I’d have loved a crack at them myself. Just a couple hours with a blowtorch and some pliers. But it’s too late for that.”
“Aye. Okay. I get it now. Id no idea it was like that. I don’t know how you do it, mate, but I bloody well admire that you can do it at all. I’ll keep mum about it too, don’t you worry.”
“Thanks. I mean it. It’s good to finally get some of that off my chest. I’ve kept these things to myself for a long time already. It’s a comfort sometimes just to know that some one knows.”
Ron’s forehead wrinkled in confusion. “Oi? Just one thing.”
“Yeah?”
“How come he’s so much titchier near the end of the day? I never could figure that.”
Harry blushed furiously. “Uh…well…shite. In for a Knut, in for Galleon, right? I said he was tense…and it has to give sometimes. I kinda glossed over one of the ways it gives. It’s a sex thing, Ron. He has to burn off that stress somehow, give that energy a place to go. We pretty much start when we wake up, take our time, and then shower and breakfast before facing the world. Usually about noon.
On the days we have to attend a function or leave the house for a long time, we can’t do anything until we get done with the public and have some private time before we sleep. In worst case scenarios, I’ve had to sneak him off for a quick one and put him through the headboards before we Apparate back to the event. He’s at his worst when we haven’t shagged all day. ’Struth…we went through four beds before we found a powerful Reinforcement Charm.”
Ron clucked his tongue and nodded sagely. “Hah. And here you were looking all noble and altruistic for a minute there. Not quite such a terrible fate, being in a spot like that, is it?”
Harry nodded, smirking faintly, still staring across the lawn at the slender blond berating the staff over the placement of chairs for guests. Draco paused in mid tirade, and glanced back to Harry with a nervous, uncertain look of anxiety on his face. Harry shook his head calmly, keeping his face almost expressionless, but Draco looked faintly relieved and smiled just a little before delivering a series of calm, crisp orders regarding the chairs, wand still safely in his pocket instead of being brandished wildly.
“No. Not a terrible fate at all. In fact…I wouldn’t trade it for anything in the world.”
Ron watched closely as the day and evening progressed, seeing the little things he’d never seen before in a light that he couldn’t have grasped until now. It was more than a little confusing at moments, but it made a kind of sense out of things that had seemed utterly inexplicable before.
Draco and Harry were hand-fasted, and the celebration after was so overwhelming in scope that it overshadowed even Draco’s occasional spouts of venom. Always, Harry would drift back to his side, and Draco would calm and smile and politely engage the many guests. Only Ron could look and see beneath the surface of it all, knowing what really passed unspoken between Harry and his lover…newly spouses.
It was easy…to look back at moments like ’Weasley Is Our King’ and ’Potter Stinks’. To remember harsh words and stray spells. It wasn’t at all easy to look at someone you’d hated and see them as something entirely different than you’d ever imagined. Not easy…but it could be done.
As years passed, people often directed their comments and questions to Ron, rather than asking blunt and obviously sensitive questions of Harry, hoping that, since Ron’s dislike for Draco was once famous, he would give answers that Harry never would. Ron always gave the same comment regarding Draco, never elaborating, always smirking faintly.
“He’s a very complicated person…and I’m proud to even know him. And there’s nothing more to say than that.”
FIN