#mild panicky reaction and an unkind healthcare professional are the worst it gets here

[rockingrobin69]

Snip of a Wip Sunday

TW for a mild panic.

The room was too cold, and smelled faintly of cabbage. The former was explained and apologised for profusely by the reception witch (the heating charms just don’t take in that part of the facility, something to do with magical core, and if they close the windows then the tenants start to complain, and, and, and). The latter—the cabbage-ness—probably came from lunch, or at least someone’s reaction to it. In his heart, Harry blamed the bald wizard in the corner of the room, swathed in three jumpers and slightly hiccoughing. In his head, he wasn’t quite so unfair. Hell, the cabbage very well might be him. He too had to suffer through the house’s Mystery Soup, as the nurses would not accept no for an answer. He had to eat, didn’t he, and it was getting late, wasn’t it, and just sit, Mr. Potter, here you go, good lad. Harry, as always when confronted with such treatment, squirmed, and caved. Now his belly ached, he was cold and overheated, and his witness would not come out of her room.

“She’ll come around eventually,” someone said behind his shoulder. A nurse waddled forward in soft banana-toned scrubs, dark hair braided around a shoulder. “If nothing else, he’ll get her.”

“He?” Harry asked, mostly because he was tired of sulking in silence. There were three reports and a Conversation waiting for him back at the office, and none of the endless patience this place seemed to require.

“Yeah. He’s her favourite. Don’t get why, but, well, some of these folks are pretty nutty.” When Harry scowled: “Gone ‘round the twist. Not entirely there.”

“I got it,” Harry gritted his teeth. “Thanks.”

The acerbic tone should have been enough. It wasn’t. Instead of dithering away, the nurse came to sit next to Harry.

“He’s the one who broke the heating charms, you know.”

“Is that right.”

“Is too. Management says he shouldn’t’ve been able to, what with the no-magic and all, but we know better. It’s him.”

Instead of replying, Harry sulked harder. The room did its level best to cheer him up, the colourful, plush sofas, the paintings on the wall. But it was cold, he had a headache, it smelled of cabbage, and the man in the corner kept singing to himself. Baldly and badly. Harry really wanted to get out of here. Even the office, with its reports and Conversations, seemed—although admittedly marginally—better.

The door opened, then closed. No one came through.

“D’you think you could arrest him for it?”

“For—breaking the charms?” Harry cracked his shoulder. The ache in it lingered, dull and distracting. “Not really a crime, sorry.”

“But it’s endangerment,” the nurse tried hopefully. “Vulnerable tenants, you know.”

Harry breathed in and out of his nose. “Tell you what. Why don’t you send the department your complaints, and someone would come look into it. If the man you think is responsible really is, then we might be able to reprimand him or something. Get the charms back.”

“Reprimand?” a big frown. “You’re gonna want to do a lot more than that, trust me. We all know how much—”

The door opened again, and this time, there was someone behind it. Harry’s whole life zoomed before his eyes as she walked in—she looked just like—but he swallowed it, wrenched control back through shaky, gritty fingers. Did the whole in-out-in-out thing his therapist was always droning about. Focused on the little details that weren’t her eyes or her hair or her face: her hand in the nurse’s hand, the soft banana fabric of his sleeve, the soothing thump of his simple black trainers. Harry, embarrassingly, couldn’t make himself look up.

“Oh,” said the braided nurse, a half-hearted sneer, and got up. “See you got her eventually.”

“Mrs. Bagshot is here to speak to the Aurors,” said a voice Harry knew and couldn’t place. It was soft and quiet and weird. Harry focused on the thin, long hand guiding Bathilda’s daughter to the seat. “Here, Madam. Now, would you rather have tea or juice?”

“Juice,” said Mrs. Bagshot with a frankly mischievous grin. “Roger, honey, why don’t you go get it for me?”

The nurse intent on pestering Harry nodded in a simpering, sickening way. “Of course, Mrs. Bagshot. Why don’t you take a—perfect. I’ll be right back.”

“Apple, please,” Bathilda junior said. When Roger disappeared: “He’ll never find it, we ran out this morning. Come, darling, sit, sit. You know I won’t do this without you.”

“Mrs. Bagshot,” admonished that voice. It itched up Harry’s throat, but he couldn’t make himself look at either of them. His whole chest was tight with it, a dark home, a giant serpent. Hermione in the other room. Danger, danger, blinking feral and hateful in red, red eyes. Fun, he thought, weakly, this was trauma. Stephen would be delighted.

Time did not pause, even if Harry sort of did. The familiar voice laughed, an unfamiliar sound, and said, “Oh, all right. But only for a moment. Potter, can I get you anything to drink?”

Harry mumbled something negatory to his left shoe. He realised he was still standing. The sofa creaked when he dropped down, disturbingly limp. He sort of wished Roger was back just to needle him some more. Harry was clearly not up to this task, no matter how much he swore up and down he could do this.

“What’s wrong with him?” asked Mrs. Bagshot in a very loud whisper.

“I’m not sure. Potter, are you quite all right?”

Concern sounded even less plausible on that voice. It was still soft, and just on the other side of recognisable. “No, yeah, I’m fine. Erm. Oh. There’s a file in my, just a second, let me…” he enlarged the folder from his pocket and shoved it forward without looking. A hand, long and pale, took it from his rather shaky one. “We need you to sign your statement and. Erm. Let us know if you saw anything else, anything at all.”

“Is that really why you came?” the familiarly unfamiliar voice asked in exasperation. Harry noticed without really grasping it that the room, previously reeking of cabbage, was awashed with a fresh, citrusy sort of smell. It was a nice change. Made it easier to breathe.

“Come on, dearie, read it to me, you know I don’t have my glasses.”

“Ah,” said the voice, a dry sort of humour to it, “so that’s why you insisted I was to come along.”

“Of course, of course, the only reason,” Mrs. Bagshot said quickly, and Harry decided it was safe after all to look up. Her S’s weren’t sibilant and she wasn’t actually her dead mother. And, also, Harry wasn’t scared of her, wasn’t scared at all. Wasn’t—

Sure what to do with the sudden clamminess of his hands at the sight. In banana yellow, holding Mrs. Bagshot’s hand like it was a natural thing for him to do, in black trainers on the edge of fraying, with his hair short and oddly mussed, working as a nurse in Bathilda Junior’s care home, was Draco Malfoy.

Harry—should have known this, actually.

He tried not to let anything show on his face. Was ensured, by both of those staring at him, that he failed miserably. Malfoy was here, was holding Harry’s witness with a completely unhinged show of care, and it might have tilted the world right out of order, or.

Or maybe not. Maybe it made sense that Malfoy was here, guiding the witness.

“You know,” Harry said in a grating voice that was nearly his normal, “your testimony is meant to be confidential.”

“Pish posh,” Mrs. Bagshot waved an imperious hand. “He’s here to help, Harry Potter. You’d do well to remember that.”

It sounded oddly chastising. Harry bit back at least three instinctive retorts.

“Perhaps—” it was Malfoy who said it, and who braved the double glare sent his way, “Mrs. Bagshot, perhaps he’s right. I’m sure I could find your glasses if you gave me a moment to look for them.”

“You’d think so, wouldn’t you.” Yeah, her grin was definitely mischievous. Harry thought quickly about Unforgivable curses, about Imperio, about its signs. The fact she presented none was meaningless in such a short interaction.

“Mrs. Bagshot,” Malfoy sighed. Harry wanted to laugh. He felt entirely, cabbagely, out of his element.

“You, boy, would not take that tone with me,” she said in a weird, weird, gentle way. Like it was a private joke between them, or an encouragement somehow. It worked, as Malfoy rolled his eyes, and seemed to perk up.

Harry—didn’t know what sort of alternate universe he’d fell into this morning. “Listen. There’s procedure and regulation for this kind of thing. Now, if Mrs. Bagshot here were in need of a translator, then—”

“Oui,” the devil of a woman said in French, “peut être si—”

“Mrs. Bagshot,” Malfoy laughed. The sound was so foreign, Harry felt it in his very bones. “No.” he got up and shook his head at her, so fondly it made Harry’s stomach clench. “Potter’s right. You should give your testimony yourself, and it won’t do to try and fight this, of all ridiculous things. If you hid your glasses that well, then the Auror present is probably able to read out loud for you, under his convenient privacy spells. I’ll be right here, fiend. Waiting to take you back to your room as promised. I won’t go anywhere.”

“Draco,” Mrs. Bagshot said, none of the playfulness in her voice now. “You know it isn’t you I’m worried about.”

“Who are you worried about?” Harry asked quietly, quill already in hand, but only got two mildly confused looks sent his way.

“They’re not going to do anything worse than before. It’s perfectly fine.”

“It’s not,” Mrs. Bagshot said, same time as Harry asked, “Who? Do what?”

“It’s fine,” Malfoy said even louder, and got to his feet. “Honestly. You’d do well to stop clacking, madam, as you are not actually a chicken.”

That got Harry baffled enough to shut up. Even more oddly, it made Mrs. Bagshot smile, a sad sort of turn of her lips.

Harry remembered why he was here. It felt like pulling teeth, or pulling out of a deep, sticky fog. “Is anyone threatening you? Trying to throw off the investigation? Has anyone approached you with intention to—”

Both of them, he realised, were laughing at him. Malfoy quietly, with his shoulders and his eyebrows, and Mrs. Bagshot out loud.

“Oh, he’s just as you said he’ll be,” she said to Malfoy adoringly. To Harry: “No, boy, nothing of the sort. Come now, let’s get this over with, for I will not be late for my bridge game this afternoon, and if Draco isn’t here to escort me to it, I will hold you personally responsible.”

Harry thought again about Imperio. Malfoy was rather good with it, wasn’t he. When Mrs. Bagshot’s sharp eyes turned to say something more to her favourite baby Death Eater, Harry took the chance to cast some diagnostic spells her way.

Found nothing. Well. There was still the possibility of a potion, or a something. Something.

“Well?” Mrs. Bagshot’s glare was back on him. “I thought we had important matters to discuss?”

“Yes,” Harry shook himself. He was only thrown off because it was her, because of the details of this specific case, because of the sudden presence of Malfoy in it. Malfoy in banana-yellow, one of the worst possible colours for him, pretending to—what exactly? Work here? By chance?

Harry jumped again when Mrs. Bagshot snapped her fingers inches away from his nose. “Well?”

“Yes. Yes. Let’s review your statement, and see if you have anything to add. We have reason to suspect that…”

“Yes, yes, let’s do get on with it,” Mrs. Bagshot said with a worried glance to the corner of the room, where Malfoy was crouching next to an old lady in a wheelchair. Harry, in his cabbagey-shock, didn’t miss it.

Malfoy was involved with the case, so much was clear. How, and to what end, Harry was about to find out. For now he released a tight breath and cleared his throat.

“Let’s go over the events of August nineteenth. According to your statement, you were alone in your house when…”

Across the room, Malfoy got down on his knees and tied the lady’s shoe laces.

Harry—carried on, professionally.

Thanks for the tag, @toxik-angel, and here is a snip from ANOTHER wip I’m excited about! In the past month my life has been dedicated to Imperfection, the whumpiest of all whumpy things I’ve ever written. Unfortunately I cannot share any snips from it (for SPOILERS), but this one is honestly so much fun. There’s whump, there’s mystery, there’s pining, there’s growth, there’s Draco in banana-yellow. What more could we ask for?