Work Text:
Of all the students that Harry could have been stuck with for creative writing, he supposed Theodore Nott wasn’t the worst. Hermione looked like she was getting nowhere trying to break the ice with Pansy Parkinson, and Ron had seemed ready to throw himself into the Black Lake as a willing sacrifice for the giant squid once class let out and he could escape the chair next to Draco Malfoy.
Theo, though… well, he wasn’t all that bad. He had a head of curly brown hair that was always flopping into his bright green eyes, and dimples that popped up at the most unexpected moments.
He also seemed to be an absolute enigma when it came to the writing assignments they had been working on for their delayed eight-year classes.
Coming back to Hogwarts after the war had been interesting, to say the least. Even once Harry got to a point where he could walk through the halls without being flooded by memories of the friends he had lost without falling to his knees on the flagstone, he was surprised to find that returning to the school hadn’t afforded him the same sense of belonging and comfort that it once had.
Much of that sentiment seemed to lie in the reorganization of the student body. Even though the returning students still identified with the Houses they’d been assigned all those years ago, Headmistress McGonagall had abolished them once classes had resumed, citing a need for “cohesiveness” and “coming together” over “separation” and “competition.”
Now, the students were sorted based on interests and academics via a matching effort by the professors. Except for the eight years, whose return to school had been optional and therefore had a much smaller class size.
Harry couldn’t understand why the Headmistress refused to recognize that none of it mattered. The students who had sat beneath the Sorting Hat would always see themselves as the House they had been assigned. Harry would always be a Gryffindor at heart. And Theodore Nott would always be a Slytherin.
However, the whole movement towards unity was the reason the creative writing students had been paired up the way they had. The Houses might have been written into history, but their legacy was still being contended with, no matter how hard McGonagall pretended it had been easily erased.
Harry was currently wishing a bat-bogey hex upon every professor who had signed on to this unnecessary push for coexistence and thus saddled Harry with the befuddling task of trying to interpret what Theo was trying to write.
They were in the library - on a bloody Sunday, no less - because they had both procrastinated working together until the very last minute. But now their assignments were due the next day, and procrastinating was no longer an option if either of them wanted to get a good grade.
Harry, despite not being the best student, still wanted to pass the class. Theo, it seemed, did not.
“So let me get this straight,” Harry said, twirling his quill around his knuckles as he scanned Theo’s assignment, laid out before him. Theo sat across the table, dragonhide shoes propped up on the table, decidedly not editing Harry’s own story as he was supposed to be doing. “You’re calling this fanfiction?”
Theo rolled his eyes. “Yes. It’s a muggle term, Potter. I’m surprised you haven’t heard of it.”
“Not a big fan of the muggles in my life,” Harry huffed back. “It’s been a while since I last saw them.”
Theo looked almost sympathetic. “Right,” he said. “Well, yes, it’s a muggle trend. You take characters from books, comics, television shows… and then you write the stories the way you want to read them.”
“Isn’t that plagiarism?”
Theo shrugged. “I’m not making money off it, Potter.” He smiled, showing bright white teeth… and those damn dimples. “I’m just having fun.”
Harry turned back to the scribble in front of him, the ink messy and half-illegible on the parchment. “So, this Magneto and Professor Xavier. They’re from what?”
“X-Men! Merlin, Potter, you really need to get out more. It’s an excellent comic.”
Harry frowned. “And they’re superheroes?”
“Yes. The muggles apparently got tired of writing about magical wizards and witches like us, so they started writing about superhumans that can see through walls, move metal, and control the weather. So… still basically wizards, but without the wands. I suppose that’s why I identify with the subject matter.”
“And Magneto and Professor Xavier are… friends?” Harry nibbled on the tip of his quill, unwilling to proceed until he knew what he was supposed to be reading.
“Oh no, not in the source material. More like sworn enemies, each with their own groups of superheroes who like to quarrel against each other.”
“But from what little I’ve read of this fanfiction you’ve written… they’re friendly with each other?”
“Oh yes.” Theo gave Harry a devious smirk and removed his shoes from the table, leaning closer across the table, his voice dropping low. “And in the next installment… I’m going to make them fuck.”
Harry was certain he turned as red as the Gryffindor hoodie he still kept tucked in his trunk at the foot of his bed. “What?” he choked out. “Why?”
Theo spread his arms wide, his boyish grin returning. “Because it’s fun, Potter, like I said.” He raised an eyebrow. “You do remember how to have fun, right?”
Harry rolled his eyes and tuned out the infuriating wizard across the table, focusing on the messy page in front of him. He muttered a charm to turn his quill ink red and began making notes in the margins as he read.
The story was interesting, Harry had to admit. Theo had built up good chemistry between the characters, and his dialogue was mostly fun banter that seemed very natural to read. But in his haste, it seemed Theo had left out nearly every comma that should have existed, leading to numerous run-on sentences. He also seemed to have a propensity for mixing up words.
Harry decided to start with a particularly perplexing error. “You wrote here that the character’s voice ‘wombled.’ What did you actually mean? Trembled? Warbled?”
Theo shrugged. “What’s the context of the word?”
“You wrote it!” Harry said incredulously. “Do you need me to read your entire story back to you?”
“If you’d be so kind,” Theo drawled. “It has been an awfully long time since I wrote this.”
“That’s because you’ve been putting off getting together for exactly this purpose!” Harry couldn’t help it, he was getting a little shrill.
Theo, meanwhile, was unperturbed. “We’ve both been naughty little procrastinators,” he said, examining his cuticles. “If it’s the quote I think it is, the correct word would be ‘wavered’.”
Harry crossed out wombled and wrote wavered in red ink. That worked.
“Okay, next matter of business. ‘The sun was starting to sweat’? Honestly, Nott, what on earth are you trying to say?”
“Hmm.” Theo’s brows knit together. “I truly have no idea. Tough one, that.” He kicked back in his chair again, leaving Harry to stare at the soles of his shoes.
Harry sighed so hard the parchment rustled beneath the onslaught of his exasperated huff. He read the surrounding sentences. “I think you meant to say ‘the sun was starting to make him sweat’, but I'm not certain.”
“Excellent, sounds perfect.” Theo waved an unbothered hand at him. “Write that down.” He moved on to picking invisible pieces of lint off his robes.
“Magneto flushed… ‘garlic’? Come on now, Nott, what the hell is that word supposed to be?” The errors were getting more egregious. Had Theo been drunk on elvish wine when he wrote this?
“Ooh, I actually know what that was supposed to be.” He leaned out to peer around his shoes and gave Harry a wink. A bloody wink!! “Scarlet. Your favourite colour. It looks quite good on you, really.”
Harry felt another blush bloom across his cheeks, stronger than the last. What the hell was the matter with him? “Old habits die hard,” he mumbled, embarrassed. “I just can’t toss my old Gryffindor jumper, no matter how hard I try.”
“Oh, I wasn’t talking about your jumper, Potter,” Theo said quietly, his green eyes suddenly turning serious. “I was thinking of the colour your cheeks turn when I flirt with you.”
Harry’s mouth opened and closed for a moment, unable to find any words. Theo just stared at him until he finally found his voice again.
“Flirting? You call this flirting? Making mistakes on your writing assignment so that I have to spend my Sunday sitting in the library with you while you ignore me and let me right all your wrongs? Seems like a shite way to flirt.”
“You’re right. A horrific miscalculation on my part.” Theo lowered his feet again and propped his elbows on the desk. “I should have started by asking you out on a date to Hogsmeade, instead. Would you like to go to Hogsmeade, Potter?” He cast a tempus. “We could have a few hours if we leave now.”
“Hogsmeade? A date? Now?” Harry sputtered. “Nott, we’ve got schoolwork to do! That’s due tomorrow.”
“Are you saying you’d go on a date with me if our work was complete?”
Harry blew out a long breath as he sat back in his chair. Would he? He found Theo attractive and wickedly witty, but for Godric’s sake, he was a Slytherin.
Still, it was an appealing idea. Harry had the sudden urge to know what it felt like when Theo’s long, elegant fingers clasped his own as they walked down the path to Hogsmeade. And really, it didn’t even matter, because they still had work to do. What was the harm in being honest about wanting something he knew wouldn’t happen?
“I would,” he said slowly, “but our work isn’t–”
“Oh, but it is.” Theo reached into the satchel beside his chair and pulled out a piece of parchment, sliding it across the table at Harry. The handwriting was neat, the ink unsplattered.
“Here’s my edited piece. I’ve given it a few run-throughs myself, but I’m sure it could use a quick read-through by your grammatically-inclined eyes.” Theo gestured at the paper. “If you’d be so kind. Clock’s ticking, Potter.”
Harry didn’t know what to say, so he took the new piece of parchment Theo had given him and scanned through the writing, which was much more legible. But more than that, every missing comma he’d noted previously was now present, every misspelling corrected. ‘Garlic’ had become ‘scarlet’, ‘wombled’ had become ‘wavered’, and the sun was making Professor Xavier sweat versus becoming sweaty itself.
Every error had been fixed.
Harry lifted his eyes back up to Theo, who was watching him quietly, his face free of the usual mischief and teasing spark it normally held. Now, he simply looked hopeful.
“So,” Theo tried tentatively, a dimple just barely beginning to show on the left side of his mouth. “Hogsmeade? There’s a new coffee shop called Bewitching Brews, and they make this incredible caramel apple latte with oat milk that I could probably drink every single day, and… what?”
Harry cradled his forehead in his hands, his mind reeling. Theodore Nott was asking him, Harry Potter, out to Hogsmeade? On a date?!
“Is there a problem?” Theo asked, leaning forward further across the table. Harry caught the scent of fresh, clean skin and a hint of spearmint, fresh and biting. “Salazar, it’s not like it’s a proposal, Potter. I’m far too young and fit to lock myself down so early.” When Harry looked up, he winked again, both dimples flashing.
“Even assuming I would go on a date with you,” Harry sputtered, “we still have work to do. You haven’t even begun to edit my assignment.”
“Wrong again.” Theo reached into the satchel a second time and retrieved a different piece of parchment. Harry recognized his own handwriting, as well as a few neat, red-inked comments in the margins.
He wouldn’t lie - in that moment, he was a bit turned on by Theo’s laissez-faire attitude apparently being a cover for some serious competency when it came to school work.
“A very effective, dry-as-burned-biscuits story about good triumphing over evil, that,” Theo mused, pointing at Harry’s assignment after sliding it across the table. “And so talented, as well. You obviously don’t know anything about being a hero and saving the world, but you seem to have done a lot of research. I’m impressed.”
Harry rolled his eyes. “At least writing what I know is better than writing about two imaginary superheroes fucking.”
Theo’s smile turned wolfish. “You should try it sometime, Potter. It’s dreadfully fun. Now–” He stood from the table and slung his satchel over his shoulder, “–is the work completed sufficiently? Because I’d really like to get one of those lattes, and on the way, I think I’ll take the covered bridge and check on the bird’s nest I found the other day with a whole bunch of unhatched eggs, and I’d really be pleased as punch if you’d come along with me.”
Harry looked down at his edited story, considering. Theo hadn’t made many notes, and it was perfectly reasonable that he could rewrite what needed to be changed later that night before bed. When his eyes raised back to Theo, he found him waiting expectantly for an answer, green eyes still hopeful. “Well?”
Theo held out a palm, long fingers reaching, and before he even knew what he was doing, Harry placed his hand in it, their warm skin sliding together as if it was the most natural thing in the world.
Theo’s smile turned so bright and big that Harry nearly lost himself in its blinding intensity. “All right, Potter,” he said quietly. “Let’s have a bit of fun, yeah?”