The article had been in the morning edition of the Prophet on Friday, June 26th. That morning, Harry was already in the west wing working on the dorms when Pansy showed up at precisely 9am.

“Hello Savior.” A coy smile touched her full mouth, then it was gone, leaving him to wonder if his pounding head and lack of sleep was causing him to see things.

He squinted at her and Harry’s stomach dropped a little. The merry gleam in her eye was simply too suspicious.“Parkinson.” He replied and moved cautiously to his work.

She remained where she was, “Hungover?”

“Bite me.”   How does she know?  Harry gave his collar a sniff. Not even a hint of the strong firewhisky he had been drinking the night before.

“Oh no, Potter, not your clothes. Do you happen to read the Prophet ?”

“Merlin, no.” He was disgusted at the very thought.

Pansy's eyes glittered with anticipation, she gave him an unkind smirk, "There was an article about you this morning."

Harry felt his shoulders tense and the room grew suddenly hot. There were always articles about him, something atrocious must have come out for Pansy to be this excited to throw it in his face. True, they had built something of a truce over the last month, bordering on a friendship, but even as a true friend of a Slytherin you were always in danger of blackmail or good old-fashioned humiliation.

Harry swallowed and said, "Er… Ok?"

Pansy smiled again, "It was very interesting. I had no idea you and I had so much in common," she said with a wink. "Went into the perfect amount of detail too, about your time at the club last night."

Fuck.

Harry groaned, "Oh no." Fuck fuck fuck.

"Oh yes," Pansy said, "We read it a few times. Do you want me to share some of my favorite parts?"

Harry put his face in his hands, "We?" he asked, the question coming out muffled.

"Indeed!" Pansy replied, full-blown joy lacing her words, "I was at Blaise's with Draco for breakfast when the owls came in. Draco did a dramatic reading for us."

Fuck my life, of course he did.

"Were there pictures?" he asked weakly.

"Mmhmm. And an interview."

"With Tim?"

Pansy laughed, "Tom actually. I take it that means you're not exclusive with him?"

"That bastard. I knew something was off when he wanted to lick my scar."

Pansy abruptly stopped laughing, "That's disgusting Potter," she said. Then after a moment, "I'm sad that wasn't in the interview," and started to laugh again.

Harry turned to the wall he had been working on and thunked his head against it. "How do they not have better things to report on?"

"If you didn't want anyone to know then you should have gone to a muggle club, obviously," Pansy said. "If you go out often then I'm surprised it's taken this long for you to be outed."

Harry sighed and leaned more of his body against the wall. "Normally I do go to muggle clubs but I was out with Hermione and Ginny last night and it was late when they went home, so I went to a wizard club because it's faster."

"You were with Ginny?" Pansy asked, sounding far to interested.

Harry turned and stared at her.

Pansy cleared her throat and looked down, "The Weaslette," she corrected.

Harry's eyes narrowed again, but before he could say anything Pansy asked another question.

"What do you mean it's faster at a wizard club?"

"It's- people are more eager," Harry felt his cheeks heat up, "No. I'm not answering that. We are not talking about this anymore." He turned the wireless on and they both started working. Later, Harry would wonder why she had let it go so easily.

They finished building out all of the rooms with attached bath except for one and decided to stop there for the day. Harry looked over the plans they had made then said to her, "Do you think they would let us pick our rooms early since we built the place?"

"Have they ever stopped you from doing whatever you want?" she asked with a smirk.

Harry gave her a dirty look, "That's so far from the truth-"

"Stop," she said, cutting him off. "I fully plan to utilize your chosen status to my advantage. I know you don't like special treatment but I do and I'm going to make sure you ask them to let me pick my room."

He huffed, annoyed, and asked, "Is that all you're planning to use me for?"

Pansy gave him a measured look and said, "Just like you've been using me, in the same way, all month to keep yourself hidden from the other students."

Harry considered that "Fair enough."

Pansy smiled, "And no, I plan to use your Savior status as much as possible until school starts."

"What happens when school starts?"

Pansy shrugged and looked back down at the plans, "Your friends come back, and we won't have a project to work on. It'll just be different."

"Yeah, I guess you're right. It will be different," he said. Then reluctantly added, "I'm not going to be here next week. I have," he ran his hand over the back of his neck, "some stuff to do."

Pansy stilled, taking a deep breath. A tense silence fell between them until she met his eye, "Are you-"

"I'm not allowed to talk about it. But," Harry paused, breaking eye contact, "I'm not testifying against everyone."

Pansy's eyes were bright when he looked back at her and he could feel a lump in his throat that he swallowed through before leaving for the night.

In an attempt to avoid thinking about the trials Harry spent Friday and Saturday nights at a muggle club in Brixton district, London. He let alcohol and the hands of a few strangers distract him completely. By Sunday he was thoroughly exhausted and slept through most of the day, then went to the Burrow for dinner.

Tuesday he spent in interviews with the Wizengamot and testified against over half of the people he was scheduled to, he provided pensieve memory for everyone he was asked to provide for and went home, exhausted. Wednesday morning he met Ron and Hermione at the private floo in Robard’s office and they sat through three meetings before breaking to eat.

Ron threatened to force a calming draught potion down Harry’s throat if he didn’t stop fidgeting until Hermione reminded him that any potion could be considered tampering with a witness.

She turned to Harry, “Go for a walk and get your nerves under control,” Hermione said. She offered a worn smile, “We are almost through this Harry.”

Harry sighed, they were right, he needed to calm down. “Yeah. All right, I’ll be back before the next set,” he said, and gave Hermione a brief shoulder squeeze before he left. 

He wandered through the hallways trying to settle his spinning thoughts. He wanted the next trial to never come, and yet be done and over with all at once. He wanted to just go home, drink Dreamless Sleep, and pass out for days. Harry’s thoughts were interrupted as he turned a corner and a group of people stood staring at him wide-eyed.

No. No, not right now. Please. He thought.

The group was five people, two young boys, one middle-aged woman, and two teenage girls. One of the girls burst into tears and whispered, “Oh my goodness, it’s really you.”

Harry tried to back away but the group of them broke into a run and crashed into him, a rush of thank you’s and hands pulling at his clothes, touching his hair and his scar. He tried to keep his head, not wanting to get aggressive but they were hurting him now and he felt his robes tear at the seem and his glasses pulled off his face. Right as he felt his resolve start to snap he heard two voices behind him call out, “Petrificus totalus!”

Everyone except Harry froze and then all of them toppled against him dragging him down to the floor as well. He felt the weight of two people lifted off of him and then he could see a fuzzy figure standing above him. “Thank you,” he croaked out.

A firm soft hand grabbed his and hauled him to his feet while another took his other hand and placed his glasses in it. He quickly put his glasses on and found himself staring into the silver eyes of Draco Malfoy. Harry’s breath stopped coming as every emotion he could process thundered through him until Draco scowled at him and pulled back his hand.

“I have to say Scarhead, I thought you were exaggerating about your fans,” Pansy said, pulling Harry’s attention.

Harry was pleased to note that Pansy’s face didn’t trap air the same way. He ran a hand through his hair, looking at the floor to take a steady breath. He looked back at Draco, “Thanks for your help,” then looked at Pansy again, “both of you.”

Draco looked down at his wand, “Yes well,” he resheathed it, “I owed you... for the fire.”

Harry felt heat spread through his chest and up his face as he watched Draco’s movements. He cleared his throat and looked down at his fans, attackers, whatever. “Yeah, I guess we’re even,” he supplied weakly.

“Well Potter,” Pansy said, resheathing her own wand, “You’ve never saved me, so I guess this means you owe me now.”

Harry gave her a brief smile, thankful she was attempting to break some of the tension, and said, “Yeah, that sounds right. I’ll try to make good on it.” He looked back to Draco, taking in the dark circles under his eyes, he looked exhausted. Harry briefly wondered if his eyes were any better.

“Don’t worry, I’ll let you know when I want to cash in the favor,” Pansy said. She pulled on Draco’s sleeve, leading him away.

Draco turned back and looked over Harry’s robes and then up to his face, “Go fix your robes Potter, you’re up in front of some very influential wizards soon.” Then they left around the corner.

Harry leaned against the wall taking several deep breaths before returning to the room with Hermione and Ron.