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Harry alights from the Apparition point—an old outhouse marked as A Place of Historical Significance—and takes a moment to let his stomach settle. Two deep breaths later, he follows the leaf-littered stone path behind the quaint limestone building housing the Lover Post Office. Rounding the corner, he nearly collides with a Muggle teenage girl.
“Sorry!” she exclaims and hurries to join her giggling friends. In her arms, she cradles a massive bouquet. The ruby red roses match her lipstick and are laced with familiar, sweet-smelling magic. Harry’s pulse quickens, and he smiles.
The tag attached to the velvet ribbon cinching the rose stems is postmarked Lover—Courtesy of The Black Dahlia.
Leading away from the Post, a cobblestone high street, age-polished to a shine, winds amongst stone buildings capped with weathered shingles. Harry tilts his face up to the October sun. Fluffy clouds scud high across the thin denim-coloured sky. He already feels the tightness in his chest loosening.
A third deep exhale, and he steps off the kerb.
The street’s gentle incline carries Harry past storefronts. Worn wooden placards suspended from chains display shop names, and chalkboard pavement signs entice with curly scripts and cute autumn sketches.
There is much to love about Lover.
Especially today.
Market booths topped with green and white striped awnings line the pavements along both sides of the street. He stops at the stall in front of the coffee shop, The Bean Lover, and orders a black coffee and a pumpkin spice latte.
“Oh, love,” Hazel exclaims when she hands Harry his order. “There’s quite an egg kerfuffle in the market today.” She winks and nods. “That's why I keep my own chickens.”
Harry continues up the high street and into the town centre, where an oak tree towers above the main square. Branches thick with dusty orange leaves and heavy with acorns spread over a small pumpkin patch full of gourds of all shapes, sizes, and colours. A scarecrow grins in the hay bales.
Indeed, there is much to love about Lover on autumn market days.
But Harry only shows up for one stall, located across the street from the pumpkin patch.
The crowd is thick this morning, and Harry smells the flowers before he sees them—fiery red, burnt orange, and crackly brown mixed with faded pastels, creamy whites, and bold chartreuse. He elbows his way through the throng and past a baby blue moped parked beneath a large canvas sign strung up behind tables overflowing with flowers. Large letters on the sign spell out The Black Dahlia, arched over a logo of the pillowy flower of the same name.
“Harry,” Draco says matter-of-factly from behind a drooping batch of Love Lies Bleeding. “Where have you been? The egg drama continues!” He takes the pumpkin spice latte with greedy hands and sniffs the steam puffing from the lid. “Ah, manna from heaven. Hold on a mo, let me finish this order.”
He returns to his customer, a young pimply lad purchasing a rose bouquet. Whilst he runs a credit card through a small square device attached to his mobile, Harry takes the mo to give Draco a once-over.
He’s wearing faded jeans rolled at the ankle over Chelsea boots. On the lapel of his brightly-coloured floral shirt—it’s Liberty of London, Harry, for fucks sake, I am taking you shopping in Soho—he wears his trademark dahlia brooch.
Harry’s magic bubbles and threatens to spill from his fingertips. He’ll never get over Draco Malfoy in Muggle attire.
Draco graces the lad with a pleasant departing smile that turns mischievous when focussed on Harry. “Linette bought Mildred’s eggs again today, can you believe?”
“No.” Harry shakes his head, scandalised. “The audacity.”
“You scoff, but it’s practically a declaration of war.”
“Egg-based clique culture baffles me.”
“I’ll add it to the long list under Instagram App.” Draco sips his coffee, a beatific smile softening his face. “Oh, this is perfect.” His mischievous grin returns. “Hey, there’s your boyfriend.”
He indicates with a lift of his chin to a man as tall as he is wide. The man wears a loudly patterned fishing shirt buttoned up to the straining cord of his bucket hat cinched tight beneath sagging chins.
“The Tevas and socks are a nice touch,” Draco says.
“Black for autumn,” Harry defends. “He’s fashion aware, I’ll have you know.”
Three stalls down, a tall, bookish bloke manning a pastry booth—Brent, Brant, Bront, or whatever—clocks Draco laughing and hurries over.
Harry’s stomach twists. “And here’s your boyfriend.” He shields his grimace by sipping his coffee.
“I only want him for his pastry,” Draco says quickly, and then, “Brent, hi!”
“Mildred eggs!” Brent hisses at Draco. “Is Linette done with Agnes?”
“I know!” Draco exclaims. “Something has definitely transpired.”
The two chat animatedly about shifting egg loyalties whilst Harry looks on, waiting for the inevitable exchange: Brent hands Draco a bag with one pain au chocolat, and Draco hands him one yellow chrysanthemum. It’s a sort of courting ritual that Harry’s witnessed every market day since Draco opened his flower stall this time last year.
Harry sighs and drinks his coffee. He edges away across the crowded street and into the pumpkin patch. A crow squawks at him from the scarecrow’s shoulder. He’s taking another sip when something small and hard bonks him on the top of his head. He stoops to pick up the culprit—a heart-shaped acorn.
A woman passing by with an armload of bread exclaims, “Oh! You lucky duck! Lover lore says you’re marked for love.”
Harry snorts at the irony. Little does Lover know that being marked doesn’t end well for him.
In his booth, surrounded by blousy autumn flowers, Draco laughs at something Brent/Brant/Bront says.
Brent smiles, smitten.
Harry hates him with his whole heart.
In fact, Lover can fuck right off.
Harry pockets the acorn.
“We should have sent a Patronus,” Draco says.
He clutches a substantial bouquet of asters in one arm and a bottle of cabernet in the other. “We’re going to walk in on them in flagrante.”
“We won’t,” Harry insists. He unlocks the door to his shared flat with a tap of his wand and steps into stillness. He wavers. “I mean, odds are in our favour.” He ushers Draco inside and closes the door. “Besides, Hermione is cooking her special ‘breakfast for dinner.’ I requested extra bacon.”
“I like bacon.” Draco stands in the foyer and bites his lip. “Let’s proceed.”
In the kitchen, Hermione sits on the counter’s edge, trapped by Theo crowding between the vee of her legs. He scoops a spatula beneath her bum, and she laughs and squirms.
“Sorry!” Harry squeezes his eyes shut. He backs into Draco, accidentally trodding on his foot. “Fuck, sorry. Sorry.”
“Harry!” Hermione releases Theo and buttons her shirt, blushing. “You were meant to send a Patronus.”
Draco opens a cupboard and collects wine glasses. He pours Harry a glass. The arch of his pale brow says I told you so.
Hermione disentangles herself from Theo and hops off the counter. She reaches above the fridge for a vase, and Theo smacks her bum with the flat of the spatula. She yelps and squirts Theo with water from her wand, giggling at Theo’s drenched, scrunched expression. He grabs her and presses their foreheads together. It’s an intimate exchange, one of many that Harry’s accidentally witnessed in the months they’ve been dating.
“You two are sickly sweet together.” Draco takes the forgotten vase from Hermione’s hand and arranges the asters. “I hate that I love it.”
“'Allo!” Ginny calls out from the foyer. “Everyone put on clothes, we're coming in!”
“Of course, we're clothed,” Hermione says as Ginny and Luna enter the kitchen. She takes the wine Draco offers, pulls out the chair beside Harry, and sits. “We’re eating supper.”
“Breakfast for supper,” Theo announces.
He plates the sizzling bacon and joins them at the table. Hermione Summons plates from the cupboard and sets the toast, butter, and a platter of eggs to serve everyone.
“Buck naked breakfast.” Ginny reaches over Harry’s shoulder and grabs a rasher of bacon. “You should try it.”
“We very nearly witnessed it,” Draco says. He grins at Hermione’s blush.
Theo raises the spatula overhead. “Buck naked breakfast for all!”
“We already had one, thanks,” Luna says, offhand. She waves her wand in lazy loops, and a large rectangular wicker basket, lid closed by leather buckles, bobs into the kitchen.
“What’s all this?” Hermione asks.
“Molly’s seasonal blackberry jam. And…” Ginny flicks her wand. The basket opens, and six jars filled with an opaque orange substance levitate to stack into a neat pyramid on the table. “A sampling of something new.”
Harry twists the lid, pops the seal, then sniffs the contents. The thick preserve smells sweet and spicy. “Pumpkin. Yum.” He spreads a generous amount on his toast.
“I’m thinking I might sell it at the Lover Market. Draco, what do you think?”
“A market for lovers?” Theo grabs Hermione’s chair and slides her closer to nuzzle her ear. “We should check it out.”
“It’s a farmers market, you lush,” Ginny says around a piece of bacon hanging from her mouth. “You know, veg, and game, and shit.”
“And flowers,” Draco and Harry add in unison. They smile at each other, and Harry quickly lowers his gaze, inexplicably shy.
“The market isn’t for lovers,” Luna says. “But I expect my pumpkin lube to do quite well.”
Harry pauses with his toast halfway to his mouth. “Pumpkin…lube?”
Draco picks up the jar and reads the label. “Luna’s Libidinous Lubricant. Farm to vagina.”
Hermione spits out her wine. She hastily wipes her mouth with a napkin and inspects the jar, eyebrows rising. “Merlin’s beard.”
“It could lubricate any orifice, really,” Luna says.
“Luna’s Lubricant,” Ginny announces with flair. “To spread between your lover’s legs and on post-coital toast.”
“And there’s your pavement sign,” Draco says. “Luna, you’ll take the market by storm.”
Harry shrugs and takes another bite of his toast. Everyone stares at him. “What? It’s good.”
“Ron agrees,” Luna remarks. “I sent a sample to him in America. He’s going to stock it in the speciality market he’s opened inside his restaurant.”
Theo digs a finger into the jar and rubs a dollop between his fingers. Hermione locks eyes with him and bites her lip. Theo’s dark brow arches, and his smirk expands, bowing upwards.
“Ugh,” Ginny grimaces. “Honestly, Harry”—she gestures at the couple with her gnawed bacon—"how can you stand it?”
“Actually,” Harry says, “I’ve been looking at flats.”
It’s been weeks; Harry fears he’ll be stuck as a third wheel forever. And he loves Hermione dearly—they’ve been roommates six years, since the fucking Forest of Dean for Christ’s sake—but he’s lost count of the number of times he’s walked in on her mid-canoodle. It had been bad enough with Ron in the months after the war. And then after their breakup, Hermione’s string of blokes in what she calls her Boy Band Phase. Theo’s been around the longest, and Harry thinks she might keep him forever. He’s never seen her happier…or in so many compromising positions.
It’s definitely time to find his own place.
“Speaking of flats…” Hermione hands Harry a newspaper, and his stomach lurches.
The headline “Golden Boy Tarnished?” flashes above a rather unflattering photo of him exiting a club bracketed by a dark-haired bloke linked to one arm and a bird hanging on the other. He watches himself kiss the bloke and grope the woman’s arse in an endless loop.
“Oh, that’s all wrong,” Luna says. “Harry prefers blonds.”
“I’ve never seen—” Draco drains his glass in one gulp, cheeks pinking. “Not that I pay attention to that rag of a paper. But since when?”
“Oh,” Hermione smiles. “Since his regular visits to—”
“So let’s see what you’ve found!” Harry hastily picks up the paper and folds his face away into the crease. The adverts page looks like one of Hermione’s old Hogwarts study guides. Inks in all colours encircle prospective flats located in magical enclaves tucked away in various townships and boroughs.
“Chelsea, Bath,” Ginny reads. “Brighton is a bit of a stretch, yeah?”
“You could stay at the Manor,” Draco blurts. “I mean”—he twirls the wine stem in his fingers—“not the Manor proper. But Rose Cottage would suit.”
A hush blankets the table, save for Luna scraping a knife full of butter over her toast.
Harry chews his eggs carefully. He takes a bite of bacon and washes it down with a big gulp of wine. Alarm bells sound off in his brain. There are many reasons why living with Draco is a bad idea, first and foremost being his small crush, insignificant really. Although technically he wouldn’t be living with him, but nearby, almost on top of each other—
“Yes,” Harry says. “That’s…I’ll move into Rose Cottage. Thanks.”
A problem for Future Harry, then. He can feel Hermione’s eyes on him, and he ignores her.
“Well, that’s settled.” Ginny polishes off the bacon and says to Luna, “Come on, love. Time to exit. Hermione and Theo have things to do.” She nudges a jar of lube to Theo, leers, and stands to leave.
“Things as in doing each other,” Luna says to the room at large. “Using the lube,” she says. “To have sex.”
Hermione’s cheeks blush a violent pink. “Yes, Luna, that’s abundantly clear, thank you. God.”
“Oh!” Luna brightens, nonplussed. “And then post-coital toast!” She levitates everyone a jar and gleefully twirls. Her patchwork skirt twists around her legs. “I expect notes. Viscosity, taste, spreadability, everything. And testimonials for advertising.”
Hermione groans and drops her head to the table.
Harry presses his lips together in a closed-mouth smile for Draco.
“I’ll just collect my things.”
Draco’s moped is parked near the Lover Apparition point.
Harry braces himself against the side of the outhouse and gulps crisp evening air. “Fuck, I hate Apparating.”
“Our Saviour, vanquisher of Dark Lords, Master of Death—” Draco pouts his bottom lip. "Sensitive tum tum.”
Harry gives him two fingers.
Draco chuckles and gazes thoughtfully at the worn wooden structure. “I’ve always wondered whose shit was important enough to merit an historical landmark?”
“Maybe it’s not who’s doing the shitting”—Harry wiggles his eyebrows—“but the size of the turd itself.”
Draco laughs and mounts the bike, kicking the stand and waiting for Harry to hop on. Harry pauses, at yet another crossroads. He didn’t quite factor in the intimacy of riding a moped together, front to back. The bike is small; it’ll be a tight fit. Already, Current Harry regrets his decision—it took all of half an hour.
“Come on then,” Draco says. “Don’t be such a melt.”
Harry kicks a leg over the seat behind Draco, misses, tries again, and after an embarrassing moment of struggle, he settles in. “Ready.”
“You’ll…have to hold on to me.” Draco reaches back, grabs Harry by the wrists, and guides Harry’s arms around his waist so that Harry hugs Draco from behind.
Fuck, he smells amazing. Like flowers and starry autumn skies and…bacon. A small beauty mark peeks through the shorn blond hair at the nape of Draco’s neck. It makes Harry’s palms tingle, and he fists his hands.
Draco starts the engine and takes off, scooting them through town. The cold air whips Harry’s hair around his face, and he clutches Draco tightly, savouring the solidity of Draco’s body.
Too soon for Harry’s liking, they arrive at Malfoy Manor. The gates shimmer, and Draco drives through the protective veil. Harry’s magic thrums, synchronising with the Manor’s signature—a low-frequency hum, but deeper than what he senses when he encounters Draco’s magic alone. It’s old magic, tied to the land, infused by generations of Malfoys.
Surprisingly, Harry feels grounded here.
He suspects the man he’s pressed against, chest-to-crotch, has a lot to do with it.
Crushed gravel crunches under the moped’s tyres, and the Manor reveals itself bit by bit as they scoot up the sloping drive—slate roof, cylinder windows, double doors. The sheer size of the house itself is imposing, but the energy is not. At least, not any more.
And Harry knows the man in his arms has everything to do with that.
The house proper, however, isn’t their destination, and they continue around the drive to stop at a small maisonette covered in ivy and sat adjacent to the gardens.
“Is this yours?” Harry says. He dismounts the moped with only a small stumble and looks at the two-storey building. “Brilliant.”
“Mother’s always off abroad with her new cruise companions, and the Manor is too big for one, so…” Draco motions to an iron gate in the brick wall adjacent to the maisonette. “The cottage is this way.”
He leads them through the gate and down a narrow walkway to the gardens. The heart of the land, he says. Topiary canines jump and yip at their heels.
“Their names are Bark, Blossom, and Bud. The scraggly one is Harold.”
Harry pets Harold’s messy leaves. “Let me guess. Harry for short.”
Draco lifts a non-committal shoulder. Harold wags his bushy tail.
They pass through a leafy archway marked with a stamped metal plaque that reads Planted by Septimus Malfoy, 31st August, 1959 on his 90th Birthday and marks the beginning of a brick path. Another stamped plaque lying flush within the bricks reads Laid by hand by Draco Malfoy, Summer 1998 during his detainment.
Harry stops to read the plaque again. “You set these bricks by hand?” His gaze tracks the path into the distance until it disappears into the gardens ahead. “How long did it take?”
“All summer.”
“Bloody hell.”
“It so happened that my calendar was free of engagements.” Draco smiles softly and gestures ahead.
The path, and the low hawthorn hedge flanking it, snakes through the cutting gardens—the heart of my business, Draco says—and past three greenhouses sat in a row. Their glass walls and roofs reflect the Milky Way smeared across the night sky.
A set of shallow brick stairs descends, and they arrive, finally, at a squat, round cottage that looks like Molly’s lidded pepperpot.
“Welcome to Rose Cottage,” Draco announces.
The cottage is aptly named; roses grow from a metal urn decorated with snakes and small frolicking animals, one of which Harry swears is a ferret. The vines, covered in dark green leaves and fat blush-pink roses, climb up the stone exterior and arch over the door. Their scent is subtle yet intoxicating and reminds Harry of Draco’s magic. Harry can feel his magic surging in response and closes his eyes against the rush.
“Still squeamish?” Draco asks. He places a cool hand on Harry's forearm.
The roses flicker; their blush petals change to red. Draco releases Harry’s arm and taps his wand against the gnarled, thick main stem. The roses revert to pink, again.
“Magic roses,” he says, as a way of explanation. “They do that.”
Inside, the cottage is small but neat. A kitchenette blends into a cosy sitting room. The fireplace ignites, casting a warm glow over the room’s contents. Comfortable-looking armchairs sit in front of floor-to-ceiling bookshelves lined with books.
Draco opens a door off the sitting room. A large four-poster bed takes up most of the room.
“The bedroom, obviously,” he says. “For, er, sleeping and such.” He motions into the room. “Lavatory is beyond. Newly outfitted with a proper shower.” He clears his throat. “That’s about it. Ah, the kitchen isn’t connected to the Manor’s kitchens yet. I’ll remedy that in the morning.”
Harry loves it immediately. “It’s cosy.”
“It’s small,” says the portrait hanging over the mantle. “But tidy.” The man bears a remarkable resemblance to Draco. “Unlike your hair, young man.”
Harry laughs.
“I mean.” Draco watches Harry tamp down his windblown curls. “Where’s the lie?” His expression shifts. It’s subtle—an upward quirk of the corner of his mouth—and then the fire crackles, Harry blinks, and Draco’s smile is fixed.
“Harry, meet Nigel Malfoy. My cousin, thrice removed. Gardener extraordinaire—”
“And resident black sheep,” Nigel boasts. “Present company included.”
Draco bows his head. “Nigel is responsible for the cultivation of the Malfoy climbing roses. The ones gracing this cottage are the original strain.”
“The original blush roses”—Nigel cranes his neck to better look out the window—“that I see are now red—”
“Nigel’s notebooks,” Draco says emphatically, “are the ones I unearthed in the greenhouse during my house arrest.”
“Ah,” Harry says. “The infamous notebooks that set you on your floral trajectory.”
“Which merits me a place amongst the portraits in the Manor hall.” Nigel sniffs. “One would think.”
“The portraits are no longer hanging in the hall,” Draco says, rolling his eyes. “Be thankful you are in a room with a view and not in the dungeon with Uncle Alphard.”
Nigel shudders. “I visited him once. Ghastly. The dungeon, however, isn’t half bad.”
“Well, then.” Draco looks around the cottage and, satisfied, opens the front door to leave. He pauses beneath the now-pink roses, a peculiar expression on his face. “The wards only accommodate two people, so if you partake in another threesome—”
“No!” Harry says, maybe too loudly. His ears burn. “That was tequila…and, and, a one-off, erm, months ago.
“You’re a grown man, Harry.” Draco sweeps his gaze over Harry, and the roses blink red, then pink, then red again. “You can come and go as you please.” He changes the roses back to pink and takes his leave.
Nigel also exits, abandoning his painting to the Manor for a nightcap, though Harry suspects that he’s off to brag that Harry Potter is staying in his cottage.
A quiet settles in.
Harry walks once more around the cottage. The bed is comfortable, dressed in soft white cotton sheets, and the bathroom is exceptional. On the bookshelves, Muggle and magical knickknacks sit side by side. Harry particularly likes the small owl figurine guarding a socket wrench.
He takes the heart-shaped acorn from his jean pocket and places it on the shelf.
A squeak rouses Harry from the best sleep he’s had in weeks, months. Maybe ever.
The squeak belongs to a tiny house-elf wearing a Muggle graphic tee in eye-strain orange and a hat with cat ears fastened under her chin by an oversized bow. She paces and wrings her hands.
“Morning,” Harry yawns.
The elf yelps and bows low. “Sorry to awaken Harry Potter!” she exclaims. She straightens and shakes her head. Her ears flop from where they protrude out of holes cut behind the cat ears of her hat. “I didn’t know what to serve Harry Potter for breakfast. Master Draco only mentioned pumpkin on toast.”
Harry smiles.
She wrings her hands again. “I said, Trixie does not know of this pumpkin on toast. And Master Draco gave me this.” A jar of Luna’s lube pops out of the air into her palm.
Harry muffles a laugh with a fake yawn.
Trixie continues. “But I thought, Trixie. A strong champion like Harry Potter needs more than this pumpkin toast, and so”—she gestures to the kitchen—“I brought… everything."
Indeed, Trixie has brought everything. Dish upon dish of every imaginable breakfast fills the farmhouse table: eggs prepared at least five different ways, bangers and beans, pumpkin pasties, croissants, crumpets and cream, toast and jam, a towering pile of bacon…and pumpkin lube.
“Thank you, Trixie. It’s brilliant.”
Trixie beams, pleased, and bowing, pops away into the air.
Harry grabs a handful of bacon and dresses leisurely, taking a pause after putting on his jeans for bangers, beans, and more bacon. After his t-shirt and Weasley jumper, he eats the sweet pastries. He saves the eggs for after socks but before boots and finishes the feast with…more bacon. Finally, he puts on his heavy tartan jacket and exits the cottage, belly full. The roses open their blush petals wide to greet him.
The clouds ride low enough to snag the tops of firs populating the Manor’s western forest. The air is noticeably chillier. Harry buttons his jacket against the damp cold and ventures into the gardens.
By the light of day, and despite the season, the gardens thrive—a direct result of magical spells designed to maintain perfect growing conditions. The topiary dogs are excited to see him, especially Harold. They leap and hop, and Harold smears mud on his jeans.
Harry finds Draco in Greenhouse Number Two.
“Hi.” Draco smiles, and Harry’s heart wobbles.
He’s working at his enormous marble-topped table, the square footage larger than some of the prospective flats Harry had been viewing. On one side, a crystal vase stands empty, save for one white dahlia.
“You look nice today,” Harry says.
Nice, fit, perfect. Fuck.
Draco’s cream cable knit jumper is large enough to fit two, yet slouches perfectly over a pair of tweed trousers. The oversized neck exposes the hint of a clavicle, and the dahlia brooch cinches the hem on one side. Shiny brown boots have enough heel to lift him an inch.
“I look nice every day.” Draco picks up a stem of delicate violet flower clusters from one of the many piles scattered on the table and adds it to the vase. His fingertips barely peek out from under the long sleeves. It’s cute as fuck, and Harry aches. “But thank you.”
Harry unearths a wicker arched-back chair from beneath a pile of letters and books. He notices a parchment with the Hogwarts crest at the top.
“It’s from Neville,” Draco explains. He adds another flower to the growing arrangement. “He’s got cultivars at the school greenhouses that I want to hybridise with the Malfoy rose.”
Harry sits on the upholstered cushion and decides Greenhouse Number Two is his personal heaven.
Nestled amongst towering plants, he can watch Draco furrow his brow and rearrange flowers, removing stems and adding others. Draco handles each flower with a delicate touch, soft fingers pinching spent petals and coaxing baby buds. Harry thinks he’d handle everything he holds dear with the same care, softly stroking, caressing—
“Earth to Harry,” Draco sings.
“Hm?” Harry blinks himself back to the greenhouse.
“You’re very pensive.”
“It’s nothing.” Harry shifts in the chair. “I just…enjoy watching you work.”
“Boring!” Draco barks a laugh. “I’m not doing anything, really.”
“Looks like a lot of work to me.”
“It’s incredible, actually, how much time I spend in the garden”—Draco plucks out a flower and pokes it back in a different location—“walking around in a daze, deadheading the odd dahlia, pondering where I can squeeze in another Amaranthus.”
He steps back to admire the vase, now stuffed full of perfectly arranged flowers. “Voila! Now for the Instagram post.”
He taps the screen on his mobile and moves around to find the best angle, making disgruntled noises. Finally, he says, “Harry, here.” He levitates the bouquet out of the vase. “Hold this and don’t worry, I won’t get your face in.”
“What’s wrong with my face?”
“I mean. Your face is…fine.”
“You paused.” Harry holds the flowers awkwardly in his lap and hopes his hands are clean of breakfast. “Fine, that’s brilliant. Cheers.”
Draco scrunches his nose, snaps a photo, and checks the quality. “You do have nice nail beds, at least.”
Harry smiles, chuffed.
“Bacon grease is very moisturising.” Draco looks at the photo and clicks his tongue. “Luckily, I can edit out the dark knuckle hair. And the plebeian tartan is not the perfect backdrop.” He smirks.
Harry deflates.
Draco wields his wand in a check-like motion and changes Harry’s jumper to a pale blue button-up. Sweet, floral magic washes over Harry, as heady as the cloying scent of the Malfoy roses.
Draco takes photos and shifts closer to perch on the chair’s curved arm. He turns the phone to take a selfie. On the screen, only the top half of their faces are visible—half-eyes, all forehead, no chin. It’s the worst possible angle, but apparently, that’s the point. He’s enabled a filter that adds flower crowns. Harry’s close enough so that if he turns his head to the left, just a twist of his neck, his nose would be nuzzling Draco’s ear.
Harry’s magic hiccoughs in his chest, and he realises then, in Greenhouse Number Two, in a rickety wicker chair, amidst cut flowers and mulch, that he’s in love with Draco Malfoy.
“Your expression…” Draco says, frowning at his phone. A pink blush tints the top of his ears.
“You said no face pictures!”
“For my spam account.” Draco shrugs and concentrates on his phone.
Harry tries to calm his erratic heartbeat. Surely, it’s a fluke, some bizarre magical love pollen from some exotic plant trapped by greenhouse glass. Maybe he’s inhaled too much mulch. Harry simply needs another good night’s sleep, and everything will be back to normal. Or at least Harry’s normal, where he’s harbouring a teeny crush and not fully in love with Draco Malfoy.
Just to be sure, though, Harry decides he needs a good pull. He leaves Draco with his flowers, keeps on the blue button-up because it looks bloody brilliant, and immerses himself in London nightlife.
But the stench of stale beer and cigarettes nearly turns his stomach. The club is too bright, too loud.
And the fit blond he dances with is completely wrong.
The next day, when Harry enters Greenhouse Number Two, he’s still in love with Draco Malfoy.
Draco spends the better part of an hour in a heated debate with Nigel about the proper ratio of coffee grounds and Thestral manure for the Malfoy rose’s mulch mixture, and Harry is enamoured.
He’s still in love in the cutting garden the day after that, where Draco wears a big floppy hat whilst deadheading chrysanthemums and throwing sticks for the topiary dogs, insisting that it is indeed not some strange form of cannibalism.
On market day, not trusting himself to ride with Draco on the moped into Lover, he waves Draco off to make his Black Dahlia deliveries, basket filled with bouquets tied with velvet ribbon and postmarked Lover.
When Harry rounds the corner of the Lover Post, he spies Draco stopped at the kerb astride his scooter and chatting up Brent/Brant/Bront. He ducks behind a pumpkin topiary and watches, stomach churning, from Apparition, yes, but also what was it about this pastry bloke, anyway? Honestly, how hard could it be to make pain au chocolat? It’s a fucking chocolate croissant. Maybe he can send an owl to Ron asking for a recipe.
“And what little mission of mischief,” Hermione says, and Harry nearly jumps out of his skin, “has you spying from behind the pumpkins, hm?”
“Fucking hell!” Harry clutches his chest.
Draco putters up the high street, and Hermione gives Harry a withering look. Linking her arm with his, she says, “Buy me a cider, and let’s talk.”
The market has embraced autumn in full stride. Pumpkins spill out of the patch and are stacked all along the pavements and tabletops. Autumn flavours and pumpkin spice everything abounds. Harry senses Draco’s magical touch on stalls dressed in a show of dahlias and splendid marigolds and starry zinnias.
Hermione ambles amongst the booths. She stops at a booth peddling toffee apples and samples a fat slice covered in a thick toffee and white chocolate drizzle.
“So,” she says. “How are things?”
“Good, fine,” Harry lies. “Things are good.”
Hermione purchases a cello-wrapped toffee apple, and they continue walking in silence. Harry buys them cider from Hazel at The Bean Lover, and Hermione’s silence continues through to the town centre.
They pause at the oak tree pumpkin patch. In his flower booth across the street, Draco chats up customers. He’s wearing a charcoal corduroy jacket over a charcoal jumper. His dahlia pin glints from the chest pocket. He’d told Harry once he found the brooch on the day Lucius died, a year after freedom from house arrest, wandering this very market. A woman—a Muggle—gifted it to him, an unspeakable kindness. Lucius would have hated it, Draco had said.
He’s worn it every day since.
“I’m in love with him,” he blurts.
Hermione smiles. “It’s sweet that you think I don’t know this already.”
“Oh god. It’s bad, then.”
“Don’t be such a blouse. Go and tell him.”
“You sound like Ron.”
“It was pretty good, yeah.” Hermione sips her drink proudly. “It’s a direct quote, I’ll have you know, from his last letter. And we are in complete agreement. You. Should. Tell. Draco.”
“Ah, yeah, no. That would be worse.” Harry pauses. “Wait, you and Ron talk about me, about this?”
Hermione nods and cradles her cup with both hands. “We talk about everyone, but you feature quite frequently. All good things,” she adds hastily. “I mean, you talk to him, too.”
“Yeah, but not about feelings and shit! Mainly he sends me girly magazines from America and I send him Maltesers.”
Hermione rolls her eyes.
“Besides, there’s nothing much to say about me and Draco ”
At Draco’s booth, the customers thin out, and Brent approaches with the fucking pastry bag in hand. The stupid exchange occurs, pastry for flower, and Harry looks away. “Other than the fact that he’s got plenty of admirers.”
“You mean the pastry bloke?” Hermione hums thoughtfully into her cider. “He looks like friend material to me."
Draco catches Harry’s eye and waves. If what Hermione thinks is true, Harry is convinced that he and the pastry bloke are cut from the same cloth.
For a week, Harry manages to keep the absurd notion of being in love with Draco in check. It isn’t until the potting shed that he realises he is rightly and truly buggered.
Draco’s note arrives at Rose Cottage in the small hours.
Hogwarts cultivars arrived. Potting shed, Potter. You’ll feel right at home.
The shed is tucked away behind the greenhouses. Harry is thankful for the full moon’s blue light, otherwise he’d have missed the dirt path. Mushrooms dot the forest floor and emit little puffs of coloured smoke as Harry moves past, footsteps softened by decaying leaves.
The shed itself is rather dilapidated, and Harry wonders that Draco hasn’t repaired the half-rotted boards or replaced the rickety structure completely. He’s half-miffed at Draco’s snarky comment about feeling at home until he steps inside.
If the Manor was infused with old magic, the potting shed was graced with Ancient Magic.
Whilst still dank and kind of shabby, the interior is large and well-preserved. Gardening tools, primitive and modern, hang along one wall. Moss-crusted ceramic pots stack in teetering columns in the corners. Dust particles that very well could be the original primordial elements of the universe’s creation float lazily in shafts of moonlight slanting through grimy windows. In the hushed stillness, Harry can almost hear worms turning the earth.
As if the setting wasn’t unbelievable enough, Draco Malfoy stands in the middle of the room, surrounded by ancient stardust, decaying wood, and moonlight like some kind of fairy prince…wearing dungarees and a baseball cap that reads Higginbotham Farms.
And Harry’s heart surrenders completely.
“This is where the Magic happens,” Draco says, voice muted by the dirt floor and reverence. “According to Nigel, this potting shed only reveals itself to one Malfoy per generation. One deemed worthy.” Draco’s voice hints of school-age Malfoy pride, but his expression contains none of the sharp animosity.
Harry approaches the worn wooden potting table where fist-sized clumps of dirt sprouting tiny green commas float suspended in mid-air.
“Aren’t they beautiful?” Draco whispers.
He’s got dirt smudged on his cheek and caked under his fingernails. His fringe curls out from under the ballcap’s lid. His face holds awe and wonder.
“Beautiful,” Harry says, breathless.
Draco Summons dirt-filled pots from the shadows to stack in neat rows on the table. He grins. “You ready to get your hands dirty in the potting shed, Potter?”
Lewd and completely inappropriate images of Harry getting sufficiently dirty with Draco flash into Harry’s brain. “Erm, yeah.”
“Watch carefully…” Draco sticks his forefinger straight into the dirt and circles it to widen the hole’s diameter.
Heat blooms along Harry’s scalp and cascades down his body. Spreading warmth loosens his groin and simultaneously plumps his muscles.
Draco continues his lazy finger swirl. “The depth must measure 2.4 inches exactly.”
“That’s”—Harry’s voice cracks—“Erm, that’s precise.
He swallows the saliva pooling under his tongue and attempts to mimic Draco’s movements, pushing his fingertip into moist loam. Sweat beads on his top lip and he licks it away. The shed is too hot, too damp, and Draco is too close, too perfect.
“Your hole is not deep enough.” Draco places his hand over Harry’s and slots dirty fingertips in the valleys between his knuckles. Harry stifles a whimper. His blood expands, skin tingling and tightening.
He’s mortified to realise he’s fully hard.
Draco drags his pointer finger along the top of Harry’s and presses their joined fingers into the dirt, pushing deeper, pulling out, pushing deeper still. Harry judders his hips forward, yet resists the urge to grind his erection into the table’s edge. If he humps this table, he should just dig his own grave right here in this shed.
“Your hand is shaking.” Draco crowds closer, his body hot and solid, pressing into Harry’s side, and Harry’s losing his mind. He needs to leave, to remove himself from this magical—cursed!—place, from Draco, before he shoves him against the crusty, old table and dry humps him into the dirt.
He removes his hand from the pot and backs away. “I, erm, Apparated. Earlier. My stomach, you know?” His fingers still shake when he adjusts his glasses on his sweaty nose.
“Harry—”
“I gotta go.”
And Harry bolts, running down the path, leaving mushroom clouds in his wake.
The roses are vivid red when Harry stumbles into Rose Cottage.
He props his back against the closed door, chest heaving. A finger snap magically unbuttons his jeans, and he plunges his hand down the front of his pants, pressing his palm against his erection. His hopes that the crisp night air would dampen his lust had been for naught; the flowers, the stones, the fucking gardens themselves reek of Draco’s magic, acting as an accelerant to his desire.
A glance into the sitting room, and thankfully, Nigel’s painting is empty.
He takes his stiff cock out of his pants and is poised to slick up his palm, lubrication spell at the ready, when he spies Luna’s pumpkin lube sitting on the kitchen table next to a plate of toast. Trixie must have set out an evening snack.
Without hesitation, Harry Summons the jar and pops the lid. He scoops out two fingers full of the pumpkin goo and spreads it over his shaft. The lube warms up, melting, thinning to a slick viscosity, encasing his dick in a hot, wet warmth. Like a mouth. Luna’s words float into his desire-blunted brain. Or any orifice, really.
“Fucking hell,” he says, sucking air.
He fists his cock and strokes upward, squeezing his fingers closed to encase the tip, fingers smeared and caked with dirt. He can still see the tracks of Draco’s fingertips on his knuckles.
“Fucking. Hell.”
He closes his eyes and pumps his fist, lube squelching wetly with every stroke. The pumpkin scent blends with the roses—hot and sweet, spicy and floral—and Harry is overwhelmed. His magic builds, pressing tight against the inside of his skin, enhanced somehow by the lube, lifting him closer to release.
Harry’s feet lift a few inches off the ground, and he’s actually levitating, almost pulling himself upwards with each tug on his cock. Exactly 2.4 inches. He laughs, exalted, muscles buzzing—fuck—untethered by gravity, loose and open and free.
He pumps with an increased rhythm, thinking only of pale fingers tipped with dirt-crusted fingernails pushing—fuck—stroking—fuck—digging—
“Fuck!” His orgasm crests, and he comes so hard that pinpoints of strobing light explode inside his eyelids.
His vision clears only when his feet land with a thud on the ground.
The lorry Draco hires to transport his flowers to the Lover Market arrives early the next morning.
Harry has been up for hours already, obsessing. About Draco, yes, always, yes. But also about the fact that he used Luna’s pumpkin lube to wank himself blind thinking about Draco. Twice.
And once this morning before eating pumpkin lube on toast.
He hides in Greenhouse Number Two where he can watch Draco out the window under the cover of plants and flowers. He’s lurking, and it’s creepy, but he can’t help it.
Brent/Brant/Bront arrives with pastries, and Draco pauses loading his flowers to chat. Draco’s current ensemble—a skin-tight deep violet turtleneck and tan trousers that blouse at the ankle over high-heeled bottle-green boots—is easily Harry’s favourite. He looks fucking amazing, and he knows it.
And Brent knows it, too. Harry itches to hex him, just a small, little barb. He would think he’d been stung by a bee. Harry opts, instead, to distract his magic by twirling the heart-shaped acorn in his fingers. He’d picked it up off the cottage shelf in his midnight pacing and held on to it all morning.
“You should go out,” Nigel says. His painting is propped against bags of Thestral manure.
Harry should go out, like a normal human being, one who hasn’t wanked over his friend. Thrice. Outside, Draco hands Brent the customary yellow mum.
He sighs. “I wouldn’t want to interrupt.”
“Do you know floriography?”
“Erm.” Harry pauses to catch up to the change in subject. “No.”
“It’s the idea that flowers hold meanings. The concept has been around for thousands of years, but the Victorians perfected it. Used flowers to send coded messages. A floral language, if you will.”
“Uh, huh,” Harry says, half-listening. Outside, Brent flirts with Draco.
“For example,” Nigel continues. “I once sent a red rose to a woman I was desperately in love with. And she sent me back a yellow chrysanthemum.”
Harry gives Nigel his full attention.
“Now, yellow almost always means ‘friendship’—”
“Friendship material,” Harry says. He glances back at Brent twirling the yellow flower in his hand. Harry mirrors the gesture with the acorn. “And a yellow chrysanthemum?”
“Rejected love.”
A kernel of hope plants in Harry’s chest.
Nigel smiles and continues. “In cultivating the Malfoy rose, I took this flower language concept a step further and melded the rose’s colours to display a given emotion. Sort of a litmus test for feelings.”
“Like a mood ring, but with petals.”
Nigel frowns. “I don’t know what that is.”
“It’s not important.” Harry recalls the times he witnessed a change in the roses, from the very first moment he entered Rose Cottage. “You said you gave red roses to your love.” Harry’s chest aches, and the spark of hope dims.
“Of course. Red roses symbolise romance, desire, passion. And love.”
Romance, desire, passion, and love. Harry’s stomach drops, and he sinks into the wicker chair. “So this entire time I’ve been blatantly displaying my feelings to the man about whom I have those feelings. Great.” He taps the back of his head against the curved chair back. “Fuck, I’m an idiot.”
“I wouldn’t go that far. Unobservant, maybe. Smitten, definitely.”
Harry snorts.
“Unkempt also comes to mind.”
“Tell me something I don’t already know,” Harry mutters.
“Okay,” Nigel says brightly. “The roses only work on Malfoys.”
Harry alights from the Lover Apparition point, a bundle of nerves and nausea.
He rounds the post office building and nearly collides with an older couple.
“Sorry!” Harry exclaims, stepping aside to let them pass.
The man has his arm around the woman’s waist. She buries her smile in a bouquet of red roses almost exactly matching the one shrunken and stored in Harry’s pocket next to the heart-shaped acorn. The ribbon on Harry’s bouquet isn’t tied nearly as neatly as the Black Dahlia’s, but Nigel had graded him Acceptable.
Harry takes his time walking up the cobblestone high street. Overhead, the sun struggles to push rays through a blanket of grey clouds. He stops at The Bean Lover and picks up a pumpkin spice latte and a coffee.
“The market is quiet today,” Hazel remarks when she hands Harry his order. “Thanks to this weather. Although, Luna is drawing quite the crowd.” She gestures up the street.
Harry arrives at the crowded booth, and Ginny waves at him over the heads of customers.
“Hi!” she says, breathless with excitement when Harry pushes to the front. People grab jars of lube almost as fast as she places them on the table.
Luna pauses her ritualistic sage cleansing of the space. “All right, Harry?” She wafts smoke in his direction. “You look nearly as grey as the clouds.”
Harry assures her he’s fine. Great, even. As good as a bloke can be who is planning to confess his love with a bouquet of roses in the middle of a market. Actually, it’s a terrible plan. It’s the worst plan in the history of plans.
“Luna!” A stocky gentleman in a waistcoat waves from a large veg booth across the street. "You’ve arrived!”
Luna waves her sage overhead. “That’s my pumpkin pal,” she tells Harry. “He supplies me with pumpkins harvested during the Gibbous moon. It lends an extra silkiness to the pumpkin flesh.”
“Oh, it’s silky all right,” Harry mumbles.
“Oh, ho ho,” Ginny says. She accepts payment from a customer and nudges Harry’s side. “Have you sampled the wares?”
“Maybe.” Harry spares a glance across the empty square. Draco moves about his booth, watering flowers, picking spent buds—busy work for a slow day.
“Oh, twist my nipple!” Ginny’s mouth drops open, and she yanks Harry by the arm to the back of the booth. Coffee sloshes out of the cups Harry holds.
“Harry James Potter, you tell me right now. Did you use the lube with—”
“Only solo!” Harry says loudly. Several women standing nearby look over at him. One woman smirks and winks. He lowers his voice. “I had a private, well actually, several private moments. Alone.”
“And?” Luna asks, suddenly standing beside Harry’s elbow. “How was it?”
“Let’s just say it was uplifting."
Ginny whoops and shakes Harry’s arm. More coffee splashes out of the cups.
“You experienced levitation, too.” Luna nods her head knowingly. “Wow, Harry, you must have deep feelings for the blond you were thinking about whilst masturbating with my lube.”
Harry blushes and cringe-smiles at the now larger group of women standing nearby, all holding jars.
Ginny plants her hands on her hips. “You’d better go over there and do something, or I’ll never speak to you again.” She slides a jar of lube into Harry's jacket pocket and pushes him out of the booth. “You heard it, folks,” she calls out. “A first-hand testimonial. Luna’s Lube is uplifting!”
Harry ducks his head and makes a hasty retreat to the pumpkin patch. He lurks behind the scarecrow for a closer look at Draco. He’s still puttering around his booth, futzing with flowers. His blue moped is parked out front by a pavement sign advertising The Black Dahlia in curly chalk script.
Dahlias, according to Nigel, symbolise following your unique path and drawing upon inner strength to succeed. If dahlia flowers were a person, they would have a royal manner. And Draco certainly looks like a prince amongst the flowers.
But a black dahlia signifies betrayal—a tongue-in-cheek nod to Draco’s heritage, and past.
Harry didn’t think it was possible, but he’s fallen harder.
The oak drops another heart-shaped acorn on Harry’s head. “Okay, okay, I’m going!”
Inside the booth, Draco accepts his pumpkin spice latte with a heavy sigh. “It’s so boring today. There’s not even any egg drama. Oh wait, there’s your boyfriend,” he grouses.
The Tevas and socks man walks by, grinning broadly at a jar of pumpkin lube.
Draco pokes at a marshmallowy rose. “Maybe he can convince you to see a mediwitch about your stomach. You missed loading the lorry this morning.”
“I was chatting with Nigel.”
“Oh?”
“About the Malfoy rose.”
Draco pauses, then sips his coffee. “I’m sure he had loads to say.” He rolls his eyes and fluffs more roses.
“I found it very interesting, actually.”
“Yes, well, the roses are his brilliant invention.” Draco pinches off a dead leaf and flicks it to the ground.
“Did you know flowers can convey meaning?”
Draco stills, grey eyes widening. “I did,” he says. He slowly sets down his coffee.
Harry takes a deep stabilising breath and removes the shrunken bouquet from his jacket pocket. After a darting glance for safety, a mumbled reversal spell enlarges the flowers. He presents them to Draco.
Draco takes the flowers and stares.
The roses have wilted in Harry’s pocket. One bud is completely flattened, and the ink on the tag has smudged. A crushed petal floats to the ground.
“It’s, well, it’s a Lover bouquet, you know,” Harry explains weakly. “Of course you know, you make and deliver them.” Sweat pops out of his armpits. He’s thankful at least to be surrounded by buckets of aromatic flowers. “Red roses. They’re, erm, for you. From me. Oh, and this…”
He takes the heart-shaped acorn from his pocket and presses it into Draco’s palm.
Finally, after an eternity in which Harry has died a thousand little deaths, Draco lifts his eyes to meet Harry’s.
Harry smiles and shrugs. “Draco, I—”
Draco launches himself at Harry, toppling buckets of flowers, and knocking Harry’s glasses askew. Roses and zinnias and dahlias scatter everywhere. His arms wrap tightly around Harry’s neck, and he smashes their lips together.
Harry pulls back. “I wanted to say—”
Draco smothers Harry’s mouth with another press of firm lips, flattening Harry’s words against his teeth.
“Wait, I—”
His words are again lost to another kiss, but it's softer, sweeter, gentler. Draco’s lips linger against Harry’s. “Took you fucking long enough, you utter twat,” he says, tenderly.
Harry grins and, removing his glasses, hugs Draco close, pulling his body flush. They melt into a shared breath, a measured caress, that intensifies, emboldened by desire. Harry swipes his tongue into Draco’s eager mouth, and Draco moans. Flower petals scattered on the ground swirl around their feet in a whirlwind of sweet magic.
Harry breaks the kiss, to catch his breath, his wits, his magic.
“I wasn’t sure how this would go,” he says. “I mean, the Malfoy roses gave me hope.”
“Those fucking roses,” Draco says. He rests his arms on Harry’s shoulders and clasps the bouquet behind Harry’s head. “May as well broadcast my feelings with a Howler.”
“Well, thank fuck for those roses. How was I to know you felt…anything for me?”
“I was practically finger-fucking a pot of dirt, for fucks sake. And then you ran like a scalded Hippogriff. Not very Gryffindor of you.”
“Because I thought you wanted the pastry bloke,” Harry nuzzles Draco’s nose. “And I wanted to throw you down in the dirt and have my way with you.”
Draco’s eyes darken. “My rose only reddens for you, Harry Potter.” He laces their fingers together. “Let’s get out of here.”
He turns the chalkboard sign to closed and leads Harry to the moped. Shouts and whistles erupt from across the square, where Luna, Ginny, and an assembled crowd smile and wave. Harry catches Ginny’s eye and grins, pointing to Draco. Ginny gives him a mock salute.
Draco places his bouquet in the moped’s basket and climbs on, patting the seat behind him.
Harry leans in for a quick kiss because Draco looks perfect perched on his bike on a cloudy autumn day, dressed in Muggle attire at a market in Lover. And also, because he can.
“First stop,” Harry says. “The potting shed. And then…pumpkin on toast?” He takes Luna’s jar from his pocket and wiggles it.
And Draco kicks up his heel and laughs.
Digital art of Draco Malfoy sitting on a light blue moped, one leg resting up on the handle bars. He is wearing a purple turtleneck shirt, tan pants, and green high-heeled boots. There's a basket behind him on the moped that contains red roses. A note is tied to the flowers that reads Draco, Love, Harry