Harry sensed trouble the moment the telephone rang. He raced down the stairs to get it before any of the Dursleys, but Uncle Vernon barred his way, scowling, and picked up the receiver.
“Hello?” he said.
“Good afternoon!” rang Draco’s voice from the other side, as loud as if he were right there with them. “Is that the Dursley residence?”
Uncle Vernon’s brows rose in appreciation of Draco’s haughty tone. “Why yes, yes it is.”
“I must be speaking with Mr Vernon Dursley, then. It’s an honor, sir. Harry has told me so much about you.”
“Harry?”
“Harry Potter, sir. I wonder if I may speak with him, if that’s all right with you, sir?”
Uncle Vernon was frowning now. “Who are you? How do you know Harry?”
“My name’s Draco Malfoy, sir. Harry and I are friends. From the uh… neighborhood.”
Harry sighed with relief. The worst thing Draco could do was mention school. The heavy emphasis made Harry picture Draco leaning over a Muggle Studies textbook and frowning at unfamiliar terms. But for all that, he wasn’t doing bad. Harry hopped from one foot to another with dread and hope. He hasn’t heard from any of his Slytherin friends the whole summer.
Uncle Vernon turned his suspicious gaze at Harry, who tried to look only casually curious. “Well,” he murmured. “All right, then.”
Harry couldn’t hold back a huge grin, but luckily, Uncle Vernon had already turned away, leaving the receiver on the shelf.
“Harry?” Draco’s voice rang from it, louder and louder. “Potter? Can you hear me?”
Harry hurried to pick up. “Draco!” he almost yelled himself.
“Ah, there you are, Potter. I was beginning to think this thing stopped working.”
“No, not at all! You don’t have to speak so loudly,” he added, lowering his own voice too. “I can hear you very well. How did you get a hold of a telephone?” Harry had given Draco his number on the train back from Hogwarts, but without much hope that Draco would have an opportunity to use it.
“Father brought me along to the Ministry, and used the back door on the way out. Apparently, this back door is a… let me see… a telephone booth. I recognized the device from your description and asked Father to let me wait for him here. He even gave me some Muggle gold to uh… make calls. Of course, he didn’t know I was about to call on you. I told him I wanted to harass Muggles.”
“Brilliant,” Harry said, hardly believing his good fortune and Draco’s resourcefulness.
“The summer’s been awfully dull,” Draco went on. “We spent two weeks in Bath, and the Bulstrodes were there, only Millicent wasn’t with them. She’s hardly the most riveting company, but still better than a bunch of boring adults. How have you been?”
“Uh… fine, for the most part.” Harry struggled to think of something to say. For how long he’d been hoping to get this call, his mind was strangely blank now that it finally happened. He was so used to being pointedly ignored that even the most ordinary questions like this had him at a loss. In truth, he’d be perfectly happy to stay silent while Draco talked. His drawl, which used to annoy Harry when they were first-years, now transported him to their time together at Hogwarts so vividly, a part of him wondered if there wasn’t magic involved. He turned his back to the hallway, burrowing into the corner so his voice wouldn’t carry, and whispered, “I miss school so much. I hate it here. They won’t even let me do my homework.”
“Not to worry, Potter. You can do most of it on the train, and the rest after we arrive. I’ll help you.”
“That would be great. Thanks.”
“Oh, I’m sure I can think of some way for you to repay me.” Draco’s audible smirk made Harry ache with longing.
“Sure,” he said, with an equally loud grin. “I’ll let you win the next time we race.”
“Dream on, Potter.” There was a pause. “I hope your fat Muggle cousin isn’t giving you any trouble.”
“Not too much, no,” Harry said, as his mind replayed the episode from last week when Dudley had kicked him in the back while climbing down the stairs behind him. Harry had split his lip on the very shelf he was squeezing with a sweaty hand right now. “I told him I don’t need my wand to do magic.”
“They took your wand?”
“Yeah.”
Draco snorted. “Barbaric. Really, Potter, what further evidence do you need that Muggles are like animals? Ignorant, uncouth and unworthy.”
“Not all of them are bad,” Harry said, uncomfortable, as always, with Draco’s hateful remarks. “And there’s plenty of pointless cruelty in the wizarding world too.” He thought of Gregory Goyle, and how he had twisted the neck of an injured pigeon under the Quidditch pitch stands. No one had believed he’d really do it. Even Vincent Crabbe had gone pale in the face. Draco had looked away, clinging to Harry’s shoulder for support, and later he admitted the sight of blood made him woozy, although there’d been no blood. “Anyway,” Harry started to change the subject, but just then the kitchen door opened behind him and Dudley stepped into the hallway.
Harry hurriedly covered the receiver with his hand, but Dudley bellowed so loudly Draco was sure to hear every word. “Who’s that you’re talking to? Your girlfriend? Mum!” he yelled. “Harry’s got a girlfriend!”
“Leave me alone,” Harry gritted, reddening.
“Leave me alone,” Dudley mimed at a high pitch. Even the way Harry stood pressed flat against the shelf with the telephone, there wasn’t enough room between him and the staircase for Dudley to pass without brushing Harry’s back with his meaty arm. He shoved for good measure, but there was nowhere for Harry to go, so it didn’t amount to much.
“Sorry about that,” he said into the receiver after he heard the door of Dudley’s bedroom close.
“Don’t let those pigs get a raise from you, Potter,” Draco said, as cool as the rain. Harry was instantly soothed. “Ah, there’s Father. I better uh… hang up now.”
“All right,” Harry said, though he felt like begging Draco to speak with him a little longer. “I’ll see you at King’s Cross, then.”
“Yes, I don’t suppose I’ll get another chance to call on you.”
There was a silence. Then, just as Harry was about to say goodbye, Draco spoke again. “Hey, Potter?”
“Yeah?”
“It was really good to hear you.”
Harry smiled. “You too, Malfoy.”
It was only after midnight that Harry realized Draco had forgotten Harry’s birthday. It stung a little, but he reminded himself that Draco was very precise, and it hadn’t been Harry’s birthday yet when they had spoken. And even if Draco had forgotten the birthday, at least he hadn’t forgotten all about Harry, and he’d gone through considerable trouble of fooling his father in order to make the telephone call. Still, Harry wished Draco had remembered. He was Harry’s best friend, after all, but it seemed not even he cared enough.
Harry was about to change into his pajamas when a large owl landed on his open window. Harry blinked in disbelief. He knew this owl. It delivered post to Draco all the time in Hogwarts.
“Hello, there, Oberon,” Harry said, approaching it carefully.
The owl hooted haughtily and stuck out its leg. A small parcel was attached to it. Harry took it off and offered the owl one of Hedwig’s biscuits as a treat, but the owl turned its beak up. “Sorry,” Harry said. “I don’t have anything better.”
The owl hooted once more, sounding offended, then launched itself out of the window and disappeared into the night.
Harry sat on his bed to inspect the package. There was a letter, and something wrapped in shimmering silver paper. His heart drummed against his ribs while he deliberated which to open first. He chose the letter.
“You thought I’d forgotten your birthday, didn’t you, Potter?” said Draco’s impeccable cursive. “Well, I didn’t. In fact, I planned to get you something much bigger (and better), but since owl post is the only way to reach you, this will have to suffice. Of course, it’s not something I would wish to get for my birthday, but you’re odd, so I hope you like it.
“Open the gift first, and only read the rest of the letter after, will you?
“D. M.”
Of course, Harry just went on reading.
“PS
“I hate to bring this up on your birthday, but the real reason I couldn’t get you what I wanted is that Father is still upset because of that business with Dobbie, and because of getting removed from the Hogwarts board of governors, which he also blames on you for some reason. He doesn’t want us to be friends anymore. He made me promise I’ll make your life miserable in school. Of course, I intend to do no such thing. I’m thirteen now, practically a grown man, and I won’t have my parents choose my friends for me. Still, I thought you should know how things stand because I may not be able to greet you before the train leaves the station.
“PPS
“Happy birthday!
“PPPS
“Darn, you’ll need your wand to resize the box. I hadn’t reckoned you’d be without it. If you can get your hands on it, tap the box twice and say, Extendo. Or just use your finger! Shouldn’t be a problem for the boy who defeated You-Know-Who as a toddler.” This was followed by an animated sketch of a face sticking its tongue out.
Harry’s mind spun in a whirlwind. Resize the box—what box? Surely the contents of the glittering parcel. And Mr Malfoy—that he tried to forbid Draco from being friends with Harry came as no surprise, but it made Harry feel uneasy. Should he tell Draco the whole truth about the role his father played in the opening of the Chamber of Secrets? Would Draco even believe him? They were best friends, but despite the rebellious words, Harry knew Draco was deeply attached to his parents and would not stand their image besmirched, no matter how true the accusations. He had tottered precariously between his loyalty to Harry and his family when Harry told him about freeing Dobbie, but this would be far worse. Harry would have to choose his words carefully and hide the resentment he felt for Draco’s father, and Harry wasn’t very good at either.
But the dark thoughts promptly vacated his head the moment he unwrapped his gift.
Inside the rosewood box with beautiful carvings as intricate as lace was an expensive looking, miniature potions kit. There was a set of gilded measuring cups, the largest the size of Harry’s thumb, a mortar and pestle made of dark green marble, slender golden shears and an incredibly fine, tiny mesh strainer. A row of delicate little vials, each in a different, exotic shape, held glowing humors of various colors, some of which bubbled, boiled, or swirled on their own. The labels were hand-written and too small to read. Everything was tucked neatly between divisions padded with lush green velvet and covered by a silk kerchief embroidered with the initials “H. J. P.” in one corner and the Slytherin coat of arms in the other. A pocket on the underside of the lid contained a leather-bound booklet with recipes, but all Harry could make out, squinting at the microscopic print, was that it was in French.
He sighed, a bit disappointed, and feeling guilty for it. He’d only received a handful of gifts in his whole life and this was by far the fanciest, the most beautiful and likely the most useful too. But Potions were Harry’s next-to-least favorite subject, after History, and Draco knew it. Draco also knew Harry couldn’t read French, which meant he hadn’t given much consideration to the gift at all, as long as it was costly. Still, Draco had thought about him, and Harry should be grateful, not—
Something else slipped out of the pocket as he moved to slide the booklet back inside. A piece of fine parchment, folded several times over, like a map. The title, written in Draco’s hand, said: “Since you can’t read.” Harry unfolded it carefully. Each section contained a miniature handwritten recipe with animated step-by-step illustrations.
Fierce devotion for Draco bloomed in Harry’s chest. He smiled so wide his glasses almost fell off, and there were tears in the corners of his eyes. Draco must’ve worked on this the whole summer. And to think, Harry had doubted him!
He picked up the letter from the bed and read it again, grinning from ear to ear all the while. Then he glanced at Hedwig, turned around so she couldn’t see what he was about to do, and touched his lips to Draco’s initials.
“Thank you.”
In Malfoy Manor, Draco started from shallow sleep and pressed a hand to his cheek, sure he’d find someone hovering over him, but he was alone.
He squinted at the clock hung over the mantelpiece. It was half past one. On the other side of his room, Oberon was in his cage, silhouetted against the open window, idly picking at his claws.
Draco smiled. “Happy birthday, Potter.”