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When they had been young, it had started as roughhousing, gooses, wedgies, playful thwaps to the back of the head. It had progressed to dares and show me yours and I'll show you mine, and then to fumbling gropes and chaste, hot-as-little-dollops-of-fire kisses.
Their first real fight about it happened after they got caught skinny-dipping in the lake.
Percy was sure that his parents would toss him out onto the street, that they would be expelled, that his life would be over. Oliver disagreed, but he didn't have as many siblings, or as little money, as Percy and his family, and he had already decided, although he hadn't told him yet, that he was in love. Since Percy's last growth spurt, Oliver hadn't wanted to admit that he kind of enjoyed having to tip his head up just a titch as they kissed, either, so he kept his mouth shut and let Percy decide how to hide their affections, even after all they got was detention, and not even a letter home to their parents.
They didn't really talk about it much, once Percy's rules about when and where were laid out, and they decided that no one could know what was happening between them. The only words they had to describe their feelings were overheard from insults, or odd muggle terms that sounded more stilted than Binns' history lectures, anyway.
Those rascal Weasley twins were not the only ones with knowledge of secret rooms and passageways at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, nor were they the only ones with secrets of their own. Percy and Oliver found secret places and secret times. Percy was very careful to mind his grades, and Oliver found his niche on the Quidditch team.
That was really when the broom jock and the goodie kiss-up roles solidified, even though they were sneaking off for half-naked snogging sessions practically every time Percy was supposed to be tutoring Oliver, so he could keep up with his classwork and still train hard enough to help try to salvage Gryffindor's reputation on the pitch.
It was hotter and hotter each time they got together. Hands fumbling as jumpers were pulled up over their heads and shirt buttons undone; shoes toed off with the laces still tied; lips hungrily seeking, pressing, claiming; mouths opening, sucking, tongues clashing; fingers tangling in hair and scratching over skin; pricks caught in fabric between them, heating friction as they tumbled about, clinging to each other like ivy and moonflower vine.
When Oliver finally confessed that he loved Percy, they had their second fight.
Percy was sure that Oliver was going to bring him flowers and write him poetry and generally give their secret away, merely by looking at him across the hazy Potions classroom. Oliver thought that was ridiculous, and said so. Percy informed him that the stakes were simply too high, and when Oliver hesitated to agree, flounced off in a huff.
Oliver quietly tried to apologize, and brought sweets from Honeydukes, which promptly sent Percy into an angry silence. He managed to avoid Oliver except for classes, and sat with the first-years talking about what to expect on the upcoming exams rather than sitting anywhere near Oliver at dinner.
Oliver wasn't even sure what Percy had done with the sweets, but began to suspect the worst when Percy began walking Penelope Clearwater to all of her classes a few days later. He was angry, and hurt, but he didn't talk about it, instead practicing harder than ever on his Quidditch. His grades went up a bit, because he was actually spending more time on his work, despite the long hours flying in all weather.
Even the twins noticed that he wasn't quite himself, but he sidetracked them by asking about their latest inventions, and they didn't press him for further information.
Right before the end of term, Percy caught him by the elbow after Charms and whispered, low and close to his ear, "Meet me after Potions. Third portrait to the right from the snoring widow."
Oliver was still furious, especially since cheery talk of Penelope and Percy's romance had spread through the students and they were now one of the respectable couples of their class. But he went anyway, tapping the edge of the portrait frame just under the seventh whorl of gilt with his wand, and slipping quietly into the room which was only revealed when the painting swung silently outward from the wall.
He didn't even get a word out into the dusty dimness before hands grabbed either side of his face and Percy's familiar lips found his own.
When they came up for air, Percy said, simply, "I've solved the problem. Everyone knows I'm with Penelope now, so they won't ask any questions about us. I forgive you, do you forgive me? Because I've sent an owl to Mum and she says you can come visit us for a few weeks this summer. We could camp out under the stars a few nights, if you like. I want to see you by moonlight."
Oliver could only blink, and nod. He didn't like hiding, but he did love Percy.
They finally fucked that summer, years of foreplay and buildup exploding in passion that left them both breathless until they gathered their energy to have each other again. Clothed only in summer starlight, they were oblivious to the sounds of crickets and grumpily grumbling gnomes wandering back through the hedges to the Weasleys' yard after midnight.
Percy told him he loved him. And as promised, Oliver kept the secret.
Percy made him swear to keep the secret once again that fall, when he made Prefect and Oliver made Quidditch captain. He nervously maintained that it was especially important for their future prospects that their reputations stay separate from their secret lives, even though some people might be able to forgive youthful indiscretions should they, heaven forbid, ever be found out.
Oliver didn't disagree, even when it was gut-wrenchingly difficult to ask someone else to the school dances, and to try not to watch as Percy kissed Penelope tenderly right there in plain view during the sweeping, romantic songs.
He called extra Quidditch practice sessions to cope with the turmoil of feelings he did not speak of, to anyone. He and the team trained earlier, harder, and longer on the pitch, when really, first thing in the morning, Oliver craved Percy harder and longer.
Oliver took what stolen secret moments he could get with his love, and tried not to think about anything else Percy might be doing with Penelope to keep up public appearances and earn her cooperation. He was sure that Percy had not told Penelope that he was only with her to keep up appearances. Though Oliver was glad for the relative security that perfect Percy and perfect Penelope's perfectly public social status provided, he could never envision himself asking that of any of the girls, even the two or three whom he suspected were the ones meeting secretly a few times a week in the shed and not quite leaving everything as it should have been there. They had their own secrets.
He told himself that he was holding out for the time when Percy would be on his own, out of his parents' house, out of Hogwarts, safe from whatever repercussions Percy envisioned and expected while they were still teenagers if their secret was not scrupulously kept.
When Percy first applied for the job at the Ministry, Oliver asked him about it, asked when they might be able to be less careful, less secretive, if Percy was going to work in public service. His own family was starting to worry that he was too much of a loner, even though he was outwardly happy and healthy and did have friends, and his prospects were good thanks to his long hours on the Quidditch pitch and burying his nose in strategy and tactics books rather than dating.
Percy didn't really answer, putting off the discussion until he really got the job, a chancy prospect which he seemed to doubt, despite his scores on the O.W.Ls and N.E.W.Ts and the recommendation letters from Hogwarts.
When he came over to Oliver's small apartment to tell him that he had gotten the job, Oliver brought up his questions again. Percy snapped shut like a clam and didn't want to talk about it. He said he'd know more when he'd had time to figure out the intricacies of office politics, and prejudices his boss might have... but he took his clothes off and rolled over on Oliver's thin mattress and ran his hands over his own beautiful skin, and Oliver shook his head and said that it was all right, and then Percy held him and then reached over into his bag and gave him the present he'd bought for them from his very first paycheck, a matched set of iridescent butt plugs which were charmed to twitch in the same sequence of sensations.
Oliver didn't ask how Percy had managed to get them without endangering the secret. He let Percy put one up inside him, and after they took turns sucking each other off, Percy let Oliver fuck him senseless, until they both came a second time.
Oliver woke up alone the next morning. There was a note saying something about the office, and it wasn't signed.
They didn't really fight about the continued secrecy. "I know you don't like being a secret, Oliver, but there's no other way."
Oliver didn't feel confrontational as long as Percy pampered him in private. They just couldn't go out, or gaze into each other's eyes across a room, and Percy didn't come to his matches. Oliver had never been to Percy's office at the Ministry, nor had he been back to the Burrow since that one summer.
Percy didn't let Oliver give him any gifts. Oliver didn't particularly notice at first that all of the few gifts Percy presented to him were intended for use in the bedroom.
He did notice when the twins told him, laughingly, about how ikkle Ronnie and his friend Harry had been caught smooching when Harry had gone to stay with the Weasleys for a few weeks.
Mutual friends told him that the twins had decided that if their little brother was a faggot, then anyone who didn't like it would just have to go through them to get to him. That apparently explained why intolerant asses who made public insults about Ron or Harry were subsequently the recipients of vindictive pranks which left little traceable evidence but always were quite public and thoroughly embarrassing.
He did notice when Ginny became yet another young Weasley Quidditch prodigy, and kept up with news of her through his teammates and friends.
He specifically noticed when she announced to the Gryffindor team that she was bisexual, and that since Tom Riddle had been such a jerk and Harry had turned out to be interested more in her brother than her, she didn't particularly want any dates with boys, thank you very much all the same. She took a female classmate to the dance that year, although she was rumored to still keep the poster of Viktor Krumm in her cubby.
And he did especially notice that none of them had been kicked out of school, or had been disowned, or that their lives were over. They were obviously facing some challenges, but they were facing them openly, and their family and real friends had stood by them, and continued to stand by them.
After a few of the Slytherin Quidditch players had given Ginny a particularly hard time, Charlie Weasley took a sabbatical and began working with Hagrid on some new project on the school grounds, and attended every practice and every game to watch his baby sister fly. His scars from studying dragons put him in quite high esteem with the students.
Oliver began to suspect that he and Percy had been too good at keeping secrets.
Finally Oliver confronted Percy about all of it, and Percy had trouble meeting his eyes. He said he'd been too busy with official Ministry business to keep track of his family, and that most of them weren't being sensible about official matters in the political sphere, and why did Oliver care what was happening with all of the Weasleys, anyway?
This time it was Oliver who stood silent. When Percy tried to kiss him, he pressed his lips into a thin line, and turned his head away.
When Oliver asked for the spare key to his apartment back, Percy gave it to him, a strange, haunted look in his eyes, and Oliver saw him to the door in silence. When Percy turned back, Oliver shook his head. "I'm completely done keeping secrets, Percy. Goodbye."