hackthis_archive | HP – Politik - Ron/Neville/Harry/Draco

the_guesthouse. I do so heart Eric.

2.

switchknife was talking about dysfunction in HP relationships and I have to say that I think that's one of those things that are really subjective for the writer and the reader. Some people may think it's normal to hate the person you date. Other people may think that that's not terribly healthy. It’s certainly not the strangest thing I’ve ever heard of, but I tend to say ‘to each their own.’ After all, I know I don't tend to write very happy relationships, but I think they're realistic. And if realism is what makes things dysfunctional, well, in my opinion, then that's just life, because life is not all sunshine daisies and fluttering eyelashes.

Life, at its heart, is dysfunctional; that's what makes it so fucking great.

For example if I write Ron/Draco/Harry/Neville it might not sound very functional, but I’d like to think it could be pretty bloody accurate.

Politik

As long as Harry stays in the wizarding world he will never pass as someone else; he will never be able to run about incognito like those people on those Muggle telly show that Dudley is so fascinated by. Harry will always be That Bloody Harry Fecking Potter. Sometimes he hates his own name. Sometimes he wonders why his mum and dad couldn’t have named him something plain like Charlie or Joseph. Why did he have to be Harry; why couldn’t someone else be Harry Potter, Bound to Save the World That Poor Sod?

But no, it’s just him, plain old Harry, with that great big honking scar on his forehead and hair that has yet to succumb to a Glamour Charm. His appearance announces who he is before he can ever get a word in edgewise, and to him, that’s pretty fucking awful. He would give a lot to be just like every other sixteen year-old boy: wanking too much, worrying about spots and who to take the school dance, and wondering if he’ll ever get taller or grow bigger muscles or any of the other things that Dean and Seamus and Ron and even Neville seem to spend so much time worrying about. But that’s not Harry’s lot in life. His life will never be just like his mates. Things will never be simple. He will never be able to just snog someone because he fancies them and they fancy him back. He’ll always wonder if they want him for him, or Harry Potter, that other guy.

*

Ron snogs Neville because he wants to, not because he wants to snog Harry instead or because he wants to snog Malfoy and would sooner cut off his own tongue than admit it. Ron would sooner be Crucioed and thrown in Azkaban than have anything to do with an inbred, cheating prat like Malfoy, and Neville really is worth ten of Malfoy. Actually, he’s worth a thousand and one of Malfoy, because Malfoy’s not worth the air he’s breathing; and Ron snogs Neville because Neville is there and willing, and when Neville’s in the right light his eyes have this dim glow like fireflies in July at the Burrow.

Neville is not the boy in the prophecy or one of the hundreds or possibly thousands of witches and wizards who would give their wants just to be near Harry sodding Potter.

Neville will never use Ron. He will never kiss Ron back and expect him to be someone else.

*

Neville Longbottom will never be Harry Potter. He will never be graceful under pressure or particularly quick on the uptake. His hair doesn’t do that punk thing that seems to be all the rage these days, and most of the time, Neville can’t even keep his arms and legs in the correct order because they’re so effing long. He tends to think that he doesn’t have much to recommend him until his Uncle Algie takes a pair of muggle clippers to his head and shaves off all his hair by accident. Of course with his uncle, Neville doubts that anything he does is by accident and it’s not as though Uncle Algie is even in the room, holding the clippers at the time.

Nevertheless, Neville does what he can with his short hair, and the mirror in his gran’s bathroom seems quite keen on the change, as does the mirror on the train to Hogwarts, and when he bumps into Malfoy coming out of the toilet, he would swear that Malfoy blinks before scowling. At the Sorting, Neville thinks he catches the eye of Queenie Greengrass from Slytherin, and even Hermione and Lavender compliment him on this one wee change in his appearance. It’s pretty fucking amazing what one haircut can do, because he’s still the same bloke underneath it all.

It’s just hair, and he’s just him, and he’s never going to be anybody else, so when Ron snogs him next to the one-eyed witch after DA practise, Neville whispers this against his mouth, just to remind him.

*

When he was eight, Draco watched his father force a pair of house elves to Crucio each other because they had cooked his toast approximately sixteen seconds longer than he preferred it, and while Draco stared at their bodies, twisting and writhing on the floor, his father went back to reading the Daily Prophet.

The incident impressed upon Draco the importance of having his toast just the way he enjoyed it, but it also made him realise that he would never be as horrible as his father, no matter how hard he tried. At his most sadistic, Draco would require the house elves to shut their heads in a convenient open door, but nothing more. The Crucio thing seemed a bit much in light of Draco’s severe aversion to pain, and eight years on, Draco’s still got a few reservations about his tolerance, or intolerance, for such cruelty.

Hangnails cause him the utmost agony and parchment cuts are not to be born, but it’s something else entirely to watch other people suffer. There’s a reason he gets a kick out of ensuring that Longbottom always has detention with Professor Snape -- because Draco prides himself on his ability to sense other people’s discomfort and draw it out for as long as possible; and when he looks at Potter all he sees is someone who wants to hurt a little for a very long time.

Draco sees someone who could do well with a hex or two, and he thinks about what it would be like to have Potter writhing on the parquet floors of the breakfast room in agony, and he smiles to himself.

He may be kind to house elves, but he draws the line at Gryffindors; and he may not entirely be his father’s son, but if he plays his cards right, he may be close enough.

-end-

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