Weaslewood

Chapter 1: When Comfort Is Instinct

Oliver woke up with a scream, his heart beating far too rapidly within his chest. Within a few blinks, he'd forgotten whatever it was that had haunted his dreamscape. The fear, however, remained.

He took some deep breaths, putting his hands over his eyes so he didn't have to see how dark it was around him. His night vision was terrible, and despite the bright light of the nearly-full moon, he couldn't see anything that wasn't right in front of his face. Normally, it didn't bother him, but right after being so shaken up...

"Hmm?" a voice called sleepily from one of the other beds. "Wh'sss th' m'tt'r?" it slurred, and now Oliver could recognize its owner: Percy.

"Nothing, Perce," Oliver whispered, not wanting to wake up any more of his dormmates. "Just a nightmare."

It was silent for a moment, and Oliver assumed the other had gone back to sleep. Calmer now, Oliver decided to follow suit.

A blanket rustled, startling him. There was the sound of footsteps, and then Oliver felt his own blanket being lifted, a weight dipping down his mattress.

"Shhh," Percy's voice whispered. An arm wrapped around Oliver, and a warm form snuggled up against him. "'t's 'kay n'w. 've g't you. Sleep."

In the time it took Oliver's brain to boot back up enough to speak, it was too late — Percy's chest was rising and falling steadily, slowed breath telling Oliver that he had slipped back into unconsciousness.

This was... weird. Oliver knew it was weird, and had an inkling that Percy never would've done anything like this had he been even a bit more awake. He should have probably woken the other up and let him get back to his own bed, right?

But, well... Percy was a right grump when he didn't get enough sleep, and Oliver hadn't been held like this in maybe a bit too long, and he just felt so safe.

It's not like it would hurt anything to just go back to sleep with his best friend's arms wrapped tightly, protectively around him, right?

Right.

Percy grew up with two older brothers, four younger siblings, and rather loving parents. He had shared a bedroom until well into his Hogwarts years, and even after getting his own, he more often than not found himself sharing a bed with someone or other. The comforting power of a good snuggle after a nightmare or just a bad day was something on which he had lots of experience, both as comforter and comfortee.

All this is to say, when Percy awoke in someone else's bed and with said someone in his arms, he didn't immediately register anything wrong.

His first thought was that it was the weekend and he didn't have classes, so maybe he could just go back to bed. His second was that he couldn't listen to the first, as he had far too much studying to do. His third was whether Oliver would let him drag him to the library to do said studying, or if this would be one of the days where Oliver won out and he ended up doing his homework outside while the other practiced ridiculous tricks on his broom.

His fourth thought was I SLEPT IN OLIVER'S BED LAST NIGHT.

Percy's eyes shot open, properly taking in his surroundings for the first time that morning. He was on his side, his head resting on Oliver's shoulder and his arm thrown over his waist. Oliver, meanwhile, was laying on his back. To Percy's surprise, the arm belonging to the shoulder he was laying on was loosely curled around him, while Oliver's other arm held some sort of book. The book was too far away for Percy to see without his glasses, but he had no doubts it was something to do with Quidditch.

"Er... Good morning," Percy croaked, his voice hoarse with sleep and embarrassment.

Oliver turned to him, smiling. "Morning, sleepyhead."

There was, perhaps, the slightest tinge of mockery in Oliver's voice. Instead of getting annoyed, Percy found himself relaxing a little — Oliver found the situation amusing, which meant he couldn't be all that upset that Percy had invaded his private space like this.

A long, quiet moment passed as Percy tried to bring up the courage to speak again. But he was a Gryffindor, so eventually he managed to say, "Well, this is... awkward."

"Yeah, a little," Oliver agreed lightly, setting down his book. He grabbed his wand from under his pillow, using it to accio Percy's glasses for him. Percy took them gratefully, blinking the sleep out of his eyes as he sat up. "Didn't take you to be much of a cuddler, if I'm honest."

"I'm a Weasley; we're all cuddlers," Percy reminded him absently. Scowling, he glanced around the room. Luckily, he and Oliver were both early risers, and it didn't seem like any of the others were awake yet. He still had time to get to his own bed. Which he would definitely do soon. Any minute now... "I apologize, Wood. This was an unacceptable breach of boundaries, and I–"

He was cut off by Oliver's chuckle. "Shh, mate. It's fine, I'm not upset. You were barely awake. And besides..."

"Besides..?" Percy prompted after the other had trailed off for too long.

"I don't think I would've slept very well last night if it hadn't been for you," Oliver admitted, looking away. "Again, I know you weren't really thinking clearly and I shouldn't have let you do it — sorry for not waking you up, by the way — but I want to say thank you anyways."

"Oh. You're welcome, then," Percy answered stiffly, not entirely sure what else to say to that. Silence fell over them again. Oliver's arm, the one he'd been laying on, was still wrapped around him. They were both sitting up now, their sides pressed lightly together. Neither moved to widen the space between them. "Do you get nightmares often?" Percy asked, more to break the tension than anything else, though a part of him was curious.

"Nah, but when I do they're awful," Oliver answered with a small laugh. He didn't bother asking Percy the same; they both knew that failed tests and pranks-gone-wrong filled his dreams more often than not. "I almost never remember them."

"Hmm," Percy hummed. He shifted his body absentmindedly. Oliver, thinking he was trying to get up, started to move his arm. Without thinking, Percy locked their hands together to stop him, like he would with one of his family. He froze, blushing. "Uh, s-sorry. I should get back to my bed now, should've done it as soon as I woke up, I'll just..."

His attempts to get up, along with his rambling, were stopped by Oliver's hold on him tightening just slightly. "You don't have to," Oliver told him. "This is actually kinda nice. I've never really held someone like this."

Oliver was blushing from the admission, but Percy barely noticed. His brain was too caught up on what was, perhaps, entirely the wrong thing to focus on. "What do you mean you've never held someone? What about your parents?"

"I said I've never held someone like this," Oliver corrected. "I mean, I don't have any siblings and I was a lot smaller when I was young enough for my parents to hold me–"

Percy gasped. The concept of being too old to be held was not one that his family had ever taught him, and though he logically knew it was something some people believed, he had never thought about whether his friends' families were such people.

Percy Weasley was stuffy and arrogant and far too stuck-up on even the dumbest of rules. But he was also a Weasley and an older brother of four, and so he shoved aside his own reservations and immediately pulled his friend closer. In the back of his head, he made a note to ask the rest of his friends about the last time they'd been held.

"Um, Perce?" Oliver asked, surprised at suddenly being squished against the other.

"Shhh, it's okay now," Percy muttered, this time fully awake. "I've got you."

With a mental shrug, Oliver decided to not ask too many questions and just go along with it. That was usually the best tactic when it came to Percival Weasley, after all.

Besides, it really did feel rather nice. And it wasn't like cuddling with his best friend while both of them were fully awake could hurt more than doing so while one was pretty much still asleep and the other was recovering from a nightmare, right?

Right.

Chapter 2: When Did I Grow So Used To You?

Despite what many romance books would have you believe, most people don't have much of a recognizable smell. You could know someone for years, your whole life even, and not be able to remember what they smelled like. People smell like sweat, and perfume, and deodorant, and shampoo, and whatever strong scents are around them at the time. There isn't much to a person's smell, not really.

Some people, however, are an exception. Maybe they just happen to produce a stronger scent than normal. Maybe they are around something so often that they take on its smell, like a zookeeper that always smells vaguely of wet fur. Maybe it's a quirk of their magic, like how the Potters' hair refuses to be tamed.

Whatever causes it, some people do have a smell. Some special scent that instantly brings them to mind when one smells it, even if they haven't known them for very long.

Percy Weasley was one of those people; inexplicably, he almost always smelled like parchment and ink. The scent lingered on his clothes, on his bookbag, even on his skin and hair. It was one of the first things others noticed about him, though they tended to forget about it after a while. It was just something that was a part of him, like his Weasley-orange hair or his glasses or his name.

Oliver Wood had teased him about it once upon a time, during their first few weeks at Hogwarts together. But eventually he too grew used to his dormmate's smell and stopped thinking about it, and so the teasing stopped also. It was for the best, really, as Percy had been frighteningly close to becoming a stalker and an arsonist — Oliver never shut up about the broom collection he had at home and how unfair it was he couldn't bring it with him — in retaliation.

Oliver was a fanatic. So was Percy. Percy was intense and demanding. So was Oliver. For quite a while, their dormmates thought themselves to be in Hell and considered dropping out just to escape them. Soon enough, most of their House was considering the same thing. At least, those that weren't considering drop-kicking them into the lake for the squid to deal with, anyways.

Then something truly wondrous happened, at least as far as the poor Gryffindors were concerned — Percy and Oliver turned on each other.

Percy suddenly couldn't care less if the others left trash laying about, because he was too busy yelling at Oliver over his sweaty socks smelling up the dorm. Oliver didn't rant at them for not taking Quidditch seriously anymore, not ever since Percy revealed his distaste for the game and summoned down the athlete's wrath upon him. They were each so distracted by the other, they couldn't bother anyone else.

Stuck fighting each other, they stopped being the bane of Gryffindor House and instead became its main source of entertainment. For a while, at least.

For, as you see and as has been said before, people tend to grow used to the traits of others. Certain things that once were annoying can even, on occasion, become pleasant.

Percy did not like Quidditch. Listening to Oliver rant about the personal lives of famous players and rattle off statistics that were seemingly meaningless once drove him up the wall, distracting him from things he considered far more important than some silly game (Oliver's first successful hex was performed due to Percy saying such out loud). At some point, however, he grew used to it. It became a calming white noise that he would nod along to as he studied. It was comforting, even.

Oliver thought the other to be an arrogant, pompous prick for constantly scolding him over his cleanliness and homework and anything else he was supposedly doing wrong. Then he grew older and his workload grew bigger and he was entirely sure he would've ended up in the hospital wing at least once from fainting due to forgetting to sleep and eat if it hadn't been for Percy nagging him about self care all through Quidditch season.

By their Sixth Year, the two had gone from mortal enemies to unlikely friends. Well, actually, they had been friends for quite a while at that point.

Sixth Year was still a rather important milestone for them, however, due to that being the year they learned to brew a certain potion in particular.

Amortentia.

Oliver looked down at the potion in his cauldron, frowning at its mother-of-pearl sheen. He was sure he'd gotten it right. Percy had held his Quidditch books hostage all week to force him to study for Potions. He was sure he'd gotten it right. And yet...

It smelled like all his favorite things, just as it was supposed to. Like the wood of a broomstick, and the rubbery scent of the quaffle, and his favorite soup that his mother would make for him. But it also–

"Why the bloody hell does it smell like broomstick polish?!" Percy yelled, standing up to glare at his potion. Oliver didn't even flinch, used as he was to Percy's outbursts whenever he thought he'd gotten something wrong.

Besides, he was distracted trying to figure out why his own potion smelled of parchment and ink.

Percy did not like Quidditch. He didn't understand it, nor did he care to. What he did understand, however, was the intricacies of spellwork. In particular, he knew how to cast a Sonorous so powerful that his nasally voice could be heard even over a screaming crowd.

This proved useful when a stadium full of idiot jocks were cheering for a certain team and were making it difficult for Percy to cheer for the only player he actually cared anything about.

It also proved useful when he wanted to scream at said player for almost getting hit in the head with a bludger.

Oliver didn't mind the scolding. He would simply smile, shake his head, and get back to the game.

He was, after all, more than used to the other saying things like 'stop being reckless and take proper care of yourself, you bloody idiot'.

It was many years ago that he learned to recognize the words for what they were: a way to say 'I love you...'

'...you bloody idiot'.