Chapter Text
Harry Potter had been a flight attendant for exactly four months and, in that time, he’d learned three crucial truths:
- Turbulence didn’t scare him.
- Passenger complaints definitely did.
- And Captain Tom Riddle was both the prettiest and scariest man he had ever met.
It wasn’t fair. Nobody should be that tall, that broad-shouldered, that sharply beautiful. Nobody should look that good in a crisp white pilot’s shirt with the sleeves rolled up, veins out, forearms flexing while he adjusted engine controls.
Nobody should make Harry’s brain go soft and sparkly just by saying, “Check the cabin, Potter.”
And yet here he was. Living in that reality.
At the moment, Harry was halfway through wrapping up Flight 237 to New York when the captain’s door swung open and Tom Riddle himself stepped out, wearing the expression of a man personally offended by meteorology.
Which, frankly, he was.
“Potter.” Tom’s deep voice vibrated in Harry’s spine. “We have a problem.”
Harry gulped. “Did—did the engines fall off? Oh God, did the wi-fi break again? Please tell me it’s not the wi-fi, they yelled at me last time—”
Tom leveled a look at him. “Weather.”
“Oh.” Harry brightened. “That’s not so bad.”
Tom blinked at him like Harry had just declared gravity optional. “Severe thunderstorms. We’re grounded.”
Harry’s eyes widened.
They were… stuck in New York?
A city he’d dreamed of exploring?
A city Tom had been to “more times than I care to remember” (said with all the drama of a Victorian widow mourning her fifth husband)?
Harry squeaked. Actually squeaked.
Tom’s eye twitched.
Fifteen Minutes Later, Gate 12
Harry stared up at the monitor:
LAYOVER EXTENDED — HOTEL VOUCHERS PROVIDED
He clutched his bag, vibrating like an over-caffeinated chihuahua.
Tom stood next to him, arms crossed, jaw set, radiating “I hate inconvenience” like a furnace.
“This is great!” Harry said, bouncing on his feet. “I’ve always wanted to see New York. The skyline, the food, the—”
“We’re not sightseeing.”
Harry deflated. “Why not?”
Tom’s nostrils flared. “Because,” he hissed under his breath, “this city is dangerous. People get robbed. Pickpocketed. Lost. You’d get distracted by a hot dog cart and wander into traffic.”
Harry opened his mouth to protest, then closed it.
“…Okay maybe.”
Tom pinched the bridge of his nose with the weariness of a man who had aged forty years in the last twenty seconds.
“We go to the hotel,” Tom said firmly. “We stay in the hotel. And you—” his eyes narrowed at Harry’s bright excitement— “you do not wander.”
Harry scowled. “I’m not a puppy.”
“Debatable.”
Harry gasped. “You’re so rude to me.”
“And yet,” Tom said dryly, “you keep talking.”
The Hotel Desk
The agent smiled too brightly. “One room left! King bed.”
Harry blinked.
Tom froze.
“King?” Harry squeaked.
“King,” the receptionist said.
“Is there—another?” Tom attempted, through clenched teeth.
“Nope! Storm’s filled every hotel in Queens.”
Harry swallowed, suddenly hyperaware of how close Tom was standing. His pilot uniform was slightly rumpled now, a few top buttons undone, chest visible.
Harry had to look away before gravity failed him.
Tom exhaled slowly. “Fine. One room.”
Harry didn’t catch all of the muttering, but he was almost positive Tom whispered something like, kill me now.
Elevator, Floor 14
Harry: humming excitedly
Tom: glaring at the elevator doors like they insulted him
Harry: “I’m really glad it’s you I’m stuck with.”
Tom: visibly malfunctions
Harry: “You know. Because you’re safe. Reliable. And good at keeping your head.”
Tom: “…Potter.”
Harry: “Hmm?”
Tom: “Stop talking before I do something unprofessional.”
Harry: “Like what?”
Tom: “…”
Harry: “Tom—?”
Tom: “Nothing.”
His ears were pink.
Harry didn’t mention it. (He absolutely did. Later. In his head.)
The Hotel Room
One king bed. Fluffy. White. Enormous.
Harry stared at it.
Tom stared at Harry staring at it.
“I can take the floor,” Tom said brusquely.
“Absolutely not,” Harry said. “You’re like—six-foot-eight.”
“Six-four.”
“Same thing. That’d kill your spine.”
Tom looked—annoyed? Pleased? Murderous?
It was hard to tell with him.
“You’ll take the bed,” Tom said.
“We can share,” Harry blurted.
Silence.
Harry wished the floor would open and swallow him.
Tom’s jaw clenched. Hard. “Potter.”
“Yes?”
“Stop offering me things.”
“What things?”
Tom’s mouth tightened. “Things you don’t understand the implications of.”
Harry blinked, entirely lost.
Tom sighed a long, pained sigh. “Go shower before I lose the last of my restraint.”
Harry, face burning: “…Okay.”
Tom, under his breath, as the bathroom door closed: “Merlin help me.”