Fic - Quiet Corners - 1/1

[evandar]

Title: Quiet Corners
Author: Evandar
Fandom: Harry Potter
Rating: G
Genre: Romance/Fluff
Pairings: Theodore Nott/Harry Potter
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter and am making no profit from this story.
Summary: After the war, Harry seeks out quiet corners away from the other students. He didn't expect to come to appreciate Theodore Nott's special brand of near-silent companionship.
Author's Notes: So, I have a headcanon that Theo is asexual, so while this is officially pre-relationship fluff, it's also pretty much the exact kind of relationship I see Theo as having anyway.



Nott is there again. He shoots Harry a brief, wary look as he settles into his usual seat, but beyond sliding a stack of Arithmancy textbooks to the side to give Harry more room, he doesn’t react. Harry’s small smile – the only thanks he’ll give – is ignored.

He’s not sure he’s ever heard Nott speak. He certainly doesn’t talk to him now; Nott is the epitome of creepy weirdo and he’s probably one of Harry’s favourite people in the school at the moment, solely because the words Boy-Who-Lived-to-Conquer have never crossed his lips…at least, not where Harry could hear them. And he doesn’t think that he will hear them. Nott may be a creepy weirdo, but he carries himself with a strange, quiet dignity that’s oddly appealing. It sets him apart. It makes him – if not exactly memorable – pleasant enough company to spend a few hours with every day.

He can hear Nott’s breathing, the scratching of his quill on parchment as he scribbles equations and notations. The occasional soft huff of frustration. Nott is…for someone so quiet, he’s a very animated person. Harry glances at him under the pretence of reaching for his Transfiguration book, dragging it closer and flipping it open to a random page. Nott’s mouth is twisted oddly and his jaw is working; he’s chewing at the inside of his cheek. He does that a lot. He bites his lip, too, and his nails. He has even, white teeth and a full lower lip that, given how much he chews on it, looks perpetually red and swollen.

Harry looks away again. He looks down at his book, finds the right page, and picks up his quill.

…

“Potter. Potter!”

Harry blinks. He looks up, unsure. Nott is glowering at him. It’s a little unnerving. His eyes are so pale that Harry’s not actually sure what colour they are, and his pupils – wide in the low light of their secluded corner – are endlessly dark.

He swallows. “Er?”

He may have killed a Dark Lord, but he’s never been particularly eloquent. And in all the months that they’ve been studying in each other’s presence, Nott has barely said two words to him. Silence, their default, is comforting. The possibility of having an actual conversation with Nott is… It makes Harry shift awkwardly in his chair and glance towards the exit.

“The Defence assignment,” Nott says. “I’m…having a bit of trouble.”

It’s the most he’s ever heard Nott say. He has an accent – something that flattens his vowels and chops up his consonants and sounds just enough like Neville’s for him to hesitantly label it as “Northern”. It’s unexpected, and Harry feels his lips twitch slightly.

Nott’s frown deepens.

“What part are you struggling with?” he asks.

Nott doesn’t speak at first. His fingers, long and slender, tap nervously on the table top. It occurs to Harry then that he hasn’t ever actually seen Nott perform magic at all. Not the wand-waving kind: he’s only ever shared Care of Magical Creatures and Potions with the Slytherins, and wand-work is rare in those. It’s a strange thing to think about.

“The practical,” Nott says eventually. “I can’t –“

And just like that, Harry sobers. They’re learning the Patronus Charm – Professor Lupin had always said it was a NEWT-Level spell – and while he doubts that Nott is the only one struggling… There’s something that always stings when he hears about people struggling with it because he remembers too well what it’s like to know you don’t have a happy enough memory to fuel it.

He also knows that Nott’s father is a Death Eater. He’s one of the ones waiting in Azkaban for a trial. He was one of the ones in the graveyard. And. Well. He’d stood back and watched as a boy his son’s age was tortured, and Harry tries – really, really tries – not to think what that means for his Slytherin classmates, that they grew up with people like that. And Nott…well. He’s a creepy weirdo with strange eyes, but he’s got pretty hands and a pretty mouth and he’s wonderfully inoffensive in his usually silent companionship.

“Okay,” Harry says. “I mean, I can show you how to do it, if you want.”

Nott smiles at him. Almost. The corner of his mouth twitches upwards into something that might have been a smile if he hadn’t looked so surprised about it. Harry grins back.

…

Nott’s wand is long and spindly, much like he is - pale too – and he holds it between his fingertips as if he can barely stand to touch it. He keeps his movements to a minimum, as if he’s trying not to be noticed, but Harry, teaching him, gets to notice.

Nott is graceful in his conservation of movement. Every flick and swish is performed with absolute precision. Even the way he holds his wand is oddly endearing.

Everything about Nott is becoming endearing.

That should scare him, Harry thinks, but it doesn’t.

Everywhere he goes, there are people staring and pointing and – worst of all – gushing at him. Telling him how wonderful and brave he is, and how thankful they are, and they whisper behind his back about fate and destiny as if those things actually mean anything. He still doesn’t believe in prophecy; the fact that he’s killed anybody – even Voldemort, even though he didn’t have a choice – gives him nightmares.

Nott has never thanked him outside of accepting his presence. He’s not whispered behind his back, as far as Harry knows, and trying to imagine him saying “The Chosen One” with that accent is nothing short of surreal. Not that Nott is the type to take anything like Divination seriously.

From what Harry’s gathered, in the conversations they’ve had since Nott asked him for tutoring, is that Nott is a bit like Hermione. He studies too hard, and he works best with facts. He likes Arithmancy, he says, because it explains the nature of magic – renders it down to hard numbers. Makes it less fanciful.

Nott has very little imagination. Somehow, Harry thinks that helps him understand when he explains that you don’t need to be happy to cast a Patronus. That you don’t need to have ever been happy. That you just need to know that you can do it.

“Is that what you do?” Nott asks. He doesn’t have much of a sense of tact, for a Slytherin – the rest of that House seem to tangle themselves up in webs of words, while Nott, when he does talk, tends to do so in straight lines. Like his equations.

“Yeah,” Harry tells him. He doesn’t explain that, thanks to the TimeTurner, he really had known that he could do it. “I tried, at first, to think of something, but none of my memories were strong enough.”

Nott hums. He flicks his wand in a delicate movement and mutters under his breath. There’s a brief, flickering wisp of silver, and when he next looks up at Harry, his pale eyes are gleaming in something like triumph. That tiny glimmer of magic is more than he’s ever been able to produce before.

“You’re good at this, Potter,” he says.

“Thanks,” Harry whispers back. It sounds strange, he knows, but he very much doesn’t care. He doesn’t. Because Nott, when he looks like that, is startlingly attractive.

…

He starts taking note of Nott outside of their study sessions. He watches him from across the Great Hall at meal times, and tracks his movements through the halls. It’s not…it’s not like what happened with Malfoy in sixth year. He didn’t – and doesn’t – think the pointy little ferret is attractive; he doesn’t think that Nott is up to anything suspicious. He certainly doesn’t think that he’s trying to kill anyone. He just…wants to figure him out. Nott’s still a mystery and Harry likes mysteries when they aren’t trying to kill him.

He learns a few things. Nott is left-handed – something he really should have noticed before, given how many times he’s seen the other boy take notes; he always partners with Blaise Zabini in Potions and sits next to him at meals. They rarely seem to talk, but since Zabini isn’t exactly known for being conversational, Harry supposes they’re probably friends.

Nott has a friend. But he studies with Harry, in a quiet corner of the library. Harry wants to ask why, but he can’t bring himself to actually do it. The peace between them is a delicate thing, he thinks; Nott, for whatever reason, has chosen to tolerate him – perhaps even like him to an extent – and Harry doesn’t want to risk that by pushing at him too hard. So he keeps his mouth shut.

He keeps his mouth shut even when Ron and Hermione start questioning him.

“His father’s trial starts in a few weeks,” Hermione tells him over breakfast one morning. “You don’t think he’s planning anything to do with that, do you?”

She’s been more trusting of his hunches since sixth year. Both of them have. It’s nice, but a little late. He wouldn’t give up Ron and Hermione for the world, but he would have appreciated their trust more a couple of years ago.

He shakes his head at her and sips his tea. “I just realised I don’t know much about him,” he says. “I mean, we’ve had classes together for years and –“

“He’s a Slytherin,” Ron says around a mouthful of eggs. “Who cares?”

No one, apparently. No one except Harry.

…

In the end, it’s Nott who gives him the opportunity to ask. Harry is guiding him through some of the more complicated curses and counter-curses on their Defence syllabus; he’s taking the opportunity to touch the soft, pale skin on Nott’s wrist to shift the angle of his grip just so when Nott glances back at him over his shoulder.

“Howay, Potter, have out with it,” he says.

Harry just stares at him because he’s not entirely sure what that means and Nott’s skin is so smooth that it’s killed off his higher brain functions and –

“Huh?”

Nott rolls his eyes. This close, in this light, they almost look blue.

“You,” Nott says. “Have been watching me. Even Zabini noticed, and he’s so far up his own arse that he can lick his prostate. So. Why? You have something you want to ask –“

“Is Zabini your friend?” Harry asks.

Nott just shrugs. The line the Sorting Hat had pulled out at their Sorting all those years ago, about Slytherin being the place to make true friends, must have been something Nott took as a vague suggestion rather than the truth. His response of “I suppose” is less than heart-warming. “Why do you care?”

They’re standing so close together that Harry can feel Nott’s breath on his face. He could count his eyelashes, if he was so inclined, but he’s too busy trying to calm the wild pounding of his heart to try it. He licks his lips; he inhales slowly, breathing in Nott’s breath and the light, minty smell of his toothpaste.

“I want to know you,” he says quietly, and counts it as a miracle that his voice doesn’t shake.

Nott tilts his head to the side. His eyes narrow slightly, and Harry has the feeling that Nott’s scrutiny extends down to the bone. To his soul. Nott doesn’t ask him why. It’s as if he knows that Harry won’t be able to put his thoughts and feelings into a coherent sentence, and Harry can’t help but feel grateful for that.

“Okay, Potter,” Nott says quietly. “If you want.”

And that, as far as Nott’s concerned, is that. Apparently they’re friends now. Harry’s a little disquieted at first when he realises that nothing is actually going to change between them: they still study together, in their quiet corner of the library or in an abandoned classroom, and it’s usually done in silence. But Nott sits a little closer to him now. Occasionally, he mutters soft comments about their classes and their classmates, and every time he does, Harry’s head jerks up on instinct as he strains to listen.

Nott’s actually kind of funny, when he bothers to say things out loud.

He doesn’t say anything about the looming trial, though. Harry doesn’t press him, but the day afterwards – the day it’s announced that Theodotus Nott will be receiving the Kiss for his war crimes – he studies Nott more than his books. There are shadows like bruises under his pale eyes, bleeding even more colour from his irises and bleaching them to white. He’s not concentrating either; he hasn’t turned a page or written a single word for half an hour before Harry gives in and slides his hand across the table to wrap his fingers around Nott’s own.

He jumps slightly, and Harry feels a surge of irrational guilt for startling him. He opens his mouth to apologise, but then Nott flips his hand over and squeezes. He squeezes so hard that the bones in Harry’s hand grind together and his fingertips turn white from the pressure.

“He fucking deserves it, Potter,” Nott says, and it’s all he does say. He stays silent even when Harry gets up and joins him on his side of the table and winds his arm around Nott’s shoulders. It’s all he says until, when the bell rings and they start packing to go, Harry pauses.

“You can call me Harry, you know,” he says. It’s a stupid thing to say, but it makes Nott crack a smile, which makes Harry feel slightly better about it.

“Call me Theo, then,” he replies.

…

He joins Theo on the battlements the day after their final NEWT. They’ve spent the last few months sinking into each other’s lives and – Harry likes to think – hearts, until he’s sure that leaving Hogwarts and not seeing Theo every day would be like ripping his own arm off at the shoulder. He’s going to miss Theo’s quiet sarcasm, his ridiculous accent, his crooked little smile. He’s going to miss everything, right down to the way that Theo holds his wand.

They haven’t kissed. They haven’t so much as talked about kissing, but Harry has noticed that Theo is more physical with him than he is with anyone else. He lets Harry hold his hand. He lets Harry sling his arm over his shoulders and pull him close – he even leans into his touch most of the time, and that feels like it’s important somehow.

Theo smiles at him when Harry steps up to his side, and he lets Harry entwine their fingers together. He squeezes slightly, and Harry knows that his touch is welcome.

Beneath them, the giant squid suns itself close to the surface of the lake. Laughter rises into the summer air as groups of students take advantage of the bright sunlight to relax outside after their exams. The forest twists away into the distance towards the mountains, and the whole world is so peaceful that an ache settles behind Harry’s ribs.

He doesn’t know what he wants to do, but he’s pretty sure that Auror isn’t it. The thought of fighting again - ever again – is unbearable. He’s explained as much to Ron and Hermione; he’s seen their disappointment and their understanding, but with Theo he’s never had to explain. Theo knows, for all that he doesn’t ask.

“I’m going away,” Theo says. He says ‘going’ like ‘gannin’ and it took a while, after they started actually talking to each other, for Harry to understand everything that Theo was actually saying. He turns to look at him. Theo is watching him so closely that Harry thinks that he might be trying to memorise him.

“Where?” Harry asks.

Theo shrugs. “I was thinking Canada,” he says. “I like the cold.”

Theo suits the cold, Harry thinks, with his glacier eyes and pallid skin. He tightens his grip on Theo reflexively, unable to stop himself from imagining him vanishing into a blizzard somewhere far away. Theo clings back just as tight, as if he knows what Harry’s thinking.

“Come with me?” Theo asks. “If – if you want.”

It’s hardly some kind of love confession, but it makes Harry’s heart skip all the same. It’s a promise, he realises. A promise that something might come of the affection growing between them instead of the crippling absence Harry had begun to fear. The pain in his chest begins to ease, replaced with butterflies and an ache in his cheeks from the width of his smile.

“Yeah,” he breathes. “Yeah, alright.”

And Theo – quiet, creepy Theo, who Harry has come to love so much – is radiant in his happiness.

Comments

[blithelybonny.livejournal.com]

Fuck, this was so beautiful. Loved it.

[hikarievandar.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much! <3