No birds in my wips, but here’s another Drarry headcanon!
• So we all know about the little bird that lost its life during their 6th year, when Draco had to fix the Vanishing Cabinet.
• What if… what if he doesn’t forget about this?
• What if, after the war, when he’s trying to better himself, he just can’t stop thinking about the life he took?
• And it’s silly, really. It was just a little bird. Surely everyone’s accidentally killed an animal once in their lives. But… but he put the bird in the cabinet. He heard it chirp. He said the words that made its heart stop beating.
• So it’s a Tuesday afternoon a few years later and he’s walking down a Muggle London street when he sees a woman crouched on the floor, leaning into a building wall.
• He approaches her, worried, and asks if she’s okay — if she needs help.
•“Please,” she says. “It’s a little bird. I think its wing is broken, but it won’t let me pick it up. Could you try while I call the animal emergency services?”
• Draco’s heart is racing. “Yes, of course,” he says quickly, crouching over the distressed animal as the woman stands up. Its wing is, indeed, hanging limp from its body, but still it cowers and tries to escape Draco’s hands.
• It takes him a moment, but he manages to gently hold the bird in the cup of his hands. Just then, the woman says, “Oh, no. I’ve run out of battery. I’m sorry I have to ask, but could you call them? I’m late for a meeting, and—”
• “I—” He doesn’t have a phone. “I don’t have my phone with me.” At the look of distress on the woman’s face, he adds, “Don’t worry, I can take care of it, I don’t have anywhere to be.”
•“Are you sure?” He nods. “Th-thank you, sir! I’m sorry, good luck with the bird!”
• Fuck. He has no idea what to do with the bird. It’s still chirping between his hands in distress, trying to run away, but he can’t just let it go. There’s no way it can survive like this.
• In a panic, he does the first and only thing that comes to his mind: he holds the bird close to his chest with a secure hand, walks into an alleyway, and Disapparates.
• He practically runs into the Ministry, and, ignoring the weird looks he’s getting, he rushes down the halls and into the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures, the bird chirping sharply in distress.
• When he asks a man behind a counter for help and shows him the bird, the man laughs.
• “Of all the weird things I’ve had to witness in this job!” he says, more to the woman sitting beside him than to Draco. Draco clears his throat, and the man waves a dismissive hand at him and tells him to “Take it to the Auror department — surely this is a crime they can actually solve. They’re gonna need a translator to interrogate the victim, though!”
• Draco is about to insult the man, to insist that he tell him where he can find a Creature Healer, when he hears a familiar voice talking behind him.
•“Victim? Wilson, what’s going on?”
• Draco turns around to none other than Harry fucking Potter, because that’s just his luck. And if that weren’t enough, Potter is dressed in his Auror robes, which have no business fitting him so well, and there’s a shade of a stubble making his face look just fierce enough to contrast the warmth of his eyes.
• Potter looks down at the bird in Draco’s hands, and for the first time in the afternoon Draco feels embarrassed. When Potter frowns, Draco raises his chin. “It’s hurt,” he snaps, feeling his cheeks burn. “Are you going to stand there and laugh like these morons or are you going to help me?”
• “Oh fuck off!” snaps Wilson, but Potter is smirking.
• “Sure,” he says. “Follow me, Malfoy.”
• Potter takes him to the main hall, then to one of the fireplaces. “Where are we going?” Draco asks, skeptical.
• Potter announces an address and disappears with a whoosh. Draco follows him close, and soon he and the distressed bird held against his chest are stumbling into a living room.
• “Shouldn’t we have—” Draco starts, but Potter signals at him to stay quiet, then points up at the ceiling. A long, snake-like magical creature Draco can’t identify is hanging from a metal bar, fast asleep.
• They find Luna in the garage. She seems to be bulding a wooden bed, but she stops as soon as she sees them. She gives Potter a hug and a kiss, then takes the bird from Draco’s hands without a word and deposits it on a table.
• “Its wing is broken,” she says after a moment. “I can help, but it’s going to take a while. Go grab something from the kitchen while I work if you want to!”
• And that’s how Draco ends up spending a good fourty minutes alone with Potter, sat on a small kitchen table and sipping a glass of water.
• “Bringing birds into the Ministry your hobby now?” Potter asks casually at some point.
• “Oh, shut up,” Draco mutters, flushing again.
• “And here I was thinking you were a terrible person,” Potter goes on. “No soul, no feelings. You know the kind. Turns out you were adorable all along!”
• “Don’t even try,” Potter cuts him, “I saw the distress on your face when that Wilson arsehole refused to help you. Besides, you’re blushing like a madman. So, it’s decided. You’re adorable. And I’m a stubborn man, so there’s no changing my mind about it.”
• Draco huffs. “That is not how being stubborn works, you git.”
• “No?” Potter cocks his head, amused. “Allow me to try again.” He clears his throat dramatically, then closes his eyes and takes a deep breath, all through a smile. “Draco Malfoy, Prince of Slytherin, Saviour of Birds, King of the Adorable…”
• “Will you go out on a date with me?”
• Draco’s heart skips a beat. His cheeks on fire, he splutters, “What?”
• “I’m free Friday at five. Or Saturday, if it suits you better.”
• That’s when Luna walks into the room and gravely announces the bird will live, but will not be able to fly again.
• “It won’t be able to live in the wild again. I can keep it here, I’ve got plenty of space, but if you…” She’s looking at Draco.
• “Yes,” Draco blurts out. “Yes, I’ll keep it. Just— I have to figure out where to—”
• Oh, I can give you a cage that’s appropriate for its size! I’ll show you what I have around, come with me!”
• He stands up, walks past Potter. The git stands up too and murmurs into his ear, “Owl me.”
• When Draco emerges from Luna’s garage while later, Potter is gone. There is, however, a charmed paper bird floating in the middle of the kitchen. It has Draco’s name written on it.
• Draco can’t help but scowl as he reads it, his heart hammering in his chest. Honestly, could Potter’s handwriting be any messier?
• Dinner at mine Friday? We can choose bird names together.
• And under the message, a signature:
