Adult-FanFiction.org : Harry Potter

Marathon	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 52456 -:- Recommendations : 2 -:- Currently Reading : 5
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. I am making no money from this fanfic.

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Thank you again for all the reviews!
Chapter Thirty-Seven—Reassurance
            “Hi, Harry. Have anything to drink?”
            Harry blinked. When Kreacher had told him someone else was in the fireplace, he hadn’t expected Ron.
            But there was no reason not to expect Ron, he thought. If he’d had a private conversation with Hermione about Draco, Ron would certainly think himself entitled to the same thing. A conversation about something else entirely in which Ron might have suspected that Harry and Draco would start dating soon wasn’t enough.
            “Sure,” Harry said, and stepped back, gesturing to the fireplace. “Firewhisky. Come through if that’s acceptable.”
            He heard Draco’s footsteps behind him, and then Draco came up and hooked an arm around his waist. No wonder Ron blinked when he stepped out and over the hearth. From his perspective, Draco had appeared from nowhere.
            Draco smiled at Ron, a grin that had a bunch of teeth in it, and asked, “Would you mind if we had some lunch along with the drinks? I feel like I need food in my stomach to absorb the Firewhisky if I’m going to have it.”
            “Sure,” Ron said blandly. “Or you can eat and Harry and I can drink. Either way is fine.” He gave Harry a broad wink, leaving Harry torn between dismay and laughter. He wasn’t sure whether Draco’s overprotectiveness or Ron’s determination to ignore it amused him more.
            “I think that Harry needs food, too,” Draco said, and tugged them all in the direction of the kitchen by tugging Harry around the waist. Ron followed as a matter of course. “He’s spent too much time subsisting on tea and biscuits while he works Auror cases, from what he tells me.” He shot Harry an arch look that Harry was sure he wouldn’t be getting if they were alone.
            “I’m not an Auror anymore, so I won’t be eating and drinking as much of that stuff,” Harry muttered, a little embarrassed, as Draco settled him at the kitchen table and went around to the counters and cabinets as if he was going to serve the food himself. Sure enough, Kreacher popped up between Draco and the counters a minute later to protect them. Draco raised his hands and sat down gracefully beside Harry, reaching out to grasp his hand.
            “Yes, but you could use the food.” Draco turned serenely to Ron. “Have you come to give me your blessing, Weasley?”
            “It looks like I’ll need to bless both of you, come to that.” Ron folded his elbows on the table and looked from one to the other of them. “I see what Hermione meant when she described you as radiant, mate.”
            Harry flushed and wished he had some food in front of him right now so he could toy with it. That was the kind of thing that got said to women on their wedding day, not to him.
            Although Draco had relaxed and was examining Ron with the kind of approval that he usually reserved for Harry’s more selfish actions. So maybe it was all right, as long as one of his friends was the one who said it.
            “Well, thanks,” Harry said, and shrugged a little. Kreacher was bustling around with the tea and food already. Maybe Draco had counted on that, since he didn’t seem inclined to move from Harry’s side. “You’re not upset about the divorce and Ginny, then?”
            Draco winced and cast him a reproving glance. He probably thought that Harry shouldn’t have made such a forthright statement. Harry shrugged unrepentantly at him. He and Ron were Gryffindors. Ron might be polite and everything, but he wouldn’t jump around the subject, if it really was the one he had come to discuss.
            “No,” Ron said, although he drew out the word in a way that made Harry wonder. “I mean, I wasn’t happy that you were divorcing. I thought we would always have our best friend as part of the family, you know?” He scratched the back of his neck in what Harry decided was embarrassment. “It was hard to find out that wasn’t happening.”
            Draco opened his mouth. Harry gripped his arm. Draco closed his mouth.
            “But I know now that you and Ginny are really different, and what you want and what she wants are two different things.” Ron’s eyes moved over to Draco, and Harry restrained himself from groaning. It was all too clear what Ron thought Harry wanted. At least Draco wasn’t likely to resent the implication, if he caught it. “I would rather that you go your different ways than be upset and resentful at each other forever.”
            Harry nodded. “Thanks.”
            Ron waved one hand. “I actually came over to discuss something else. Mum is having one of her things Sunday. Are you going to come?”
            Harry blinked. He knew that Molly had alternated invitations to him and Ginny to her Sunday afternoon parties, where she always baked enormous quantities of biscuits and cakes and other sweet things, since they had announced they were separating. “Isn’t this Ginny’s week to go?”
            Ron leaned forwards, his arms folded beneath him and his chin resting on them as he stared at Harry. “Yeah.”
            “Then I’m supposed to come next week, right?” Harry had the feeling there was something he was missing here, especially since Draco was grinning. It wasn’t fair when Draco was better at understanding his Gryffindor friends than Harry was.
            “Not necessarily,” Ron drawled out, and winked at him. “Mum thinks that we ought to plop everybody together and see what happens.”
            “An explosion,” Harry said flatly. He had had this happen before, when Molly wanted to repair a rift that she’d thought was growing in Hermione and Ron’s marriage years ago, and that had indeed been the result.
            Ron chuckled. “I don’t think Ginny’s ever going to be as good at Transfiguration as Hermione is. So you don’t have to worry about being changed into a goat.”
            “A goat?” Draco managed to put a world of asking for information into that one question.
            Harry didn’t say anything, because it was Ron’s story to tell if he wanted to, but Ron didn’t seem embarrassed about turning around and grinning. “Yeah. See, Hermione didn’t think I was being sensitive enough to things like her house-elf campaign. I kept nagging her to come home and do her half of the household chores when she was running this really big and sensitive case through the Wizengamot. I cooked, so I thought that was enough and she should be doing everything else.”
            Draco just stared at Ron. “And you lived with Granger?” he managed to whisper at last, in what sounded like almost an awed voice.
            Ron waved his hand. “We already had two kids by that point. Hell, yeah. I loved her.”
            “But you still nagged her,” Harry said, wanting to push the story along to its point. He was also vaguely alarmed at the thoughtful look on Draco’s face.
            Ron spread his arms. “I was being nice and accommodating and sensitive. I didn’t take account of how tired she was, but I’d always known her when she had so much energy that she looked for new things to spend it on. I thought she could come home and clean the house, too, that it would probably be a distraction from all the hours that she couldn’t use magic to convince those twits in the courtroom.”
            “I’m no longer surprised that she Transfigured you into a goat,” Draco said, in a voice that Harry could definitely hear the awe in, now. “I’m just amazed that she ever changed you back.”
            Ron waved his hand. “Well, it probably wouldn’t have got as far as the Transfiguration if we could have talked to each other at home. But that Sunday was one of Mum’s things, and so we had to dress up and go.”
            Draco slanted a glance sideways at Harry. “Do you have something suitable to wear?”
            “I have clothes other than Auror robes, you know.”
            Draco shook his head, as though to say that wasn’t what he meant, although Harry had no idea what he did mean, and turned back to Ron before Harry could complain. “I’m not surprised, but I’m curious. Why did she choose a goat? Instead of, say, a frog? Something small she could step on?”
            Ron snorted. “I’d complained about the smell of the dishes in the sink, and she said she was going to turn me into something that had a stink all its own.”
            “That wasn’t the only reason,” Harry said, grinning at Ron.
            Ron shot a wary glance at Draco. “Does he really know that story about Aberforth?”
            “Dumbledore’s brother?” Draco glanced between them. “The one that supposedly had a strange fondness for goats?”
            Harry nodded, glad that they wouldn’t have to explain. The joke, and the reason Hermione had chosen that Transfigured form for Ron, was funny if you already knew it. “She said that she knew Ron could always go and find someone who would cherish him if he felt that she didn’t do enough of that anymore.”
            Now Ron’s face was red. Draco laughed, but it wasn’t the malicious snicker that Harry remembered from Hogwarts, and Harry was glad of that. He might have known that Draco was laughing with rather than at Ron—well, mostly—even if Draco had snickered, but Ron might not have.
            Another joke that’s funnier when you understand it.
            “She turned me back at the end of the afternoon,” Ron muttered, looking like he was on the verge of sulking. He turned abruptly to Harry. “Anyway, Ginny will never be at Hermione’s level in Transfiguration, so you don’t need to worry.”
            “Right.” Harry cleared his throat. He had forgotten, somehow, that they were talking about a party he and Ginny were both invited to. “I don’t know, Ron. It might stir up a lot of bad feelings for the kids.” There was no doubt that Lily at least would be there, and the Hogwarts professors had sometimes agreed to let children in Al and Jamie’s situation, with divorcing parents, attend things like this as well. McGonagall had started the policy as far as Harry knew, mostly for Muggleborn students who found themselves caught between two parents they were equally distant from at Hogwarts. “And I don’t want to go without Draco.”
            “That’s all you would need,” Draco murmured, though whether he meant Harry being around his ex-wife and in-laws or Draco going with him, Harry wasn’t sure.
            “The invitation is for both of you,” Ron said, and then collapsed into his seat, laughing so hard that he nearly knocked Kreacher, who was coming up behind his chair, over. Kreacher gave him a frigid look. Ron didn’t appear to notice. “Your faces,” Ron gasped, when he could speak. “Oh my God, your faces.”
            “You’re joking,” Harry said flatly. He knew that Molly did and thought things he’d never been aware of—witness the way she had talked to him about Jamie, and mentioned all sorts of observations he had never known she had—but this time, she really had gone mad if she thought it was a good idea to have Harry and Draco and Ginny and the kids in the same room.
            “Nope.” Ron sat up, wiping his eyes and reaching for the Firewhisky that Kreacher handed him without even looking at the glass. Harry suppressed an irritated comment about what Hermione would make of his ease around house-elves. “She invited all of you, and she wants problems and conflicts out in the open, now. You have to admit that most of us are Gryffindors, and most of us can handle them that way.”
            “At least two people there will be Slytherins, if Harry’s second son attends,” Draco said quietly. He paused, then added, “Three, if Lily is also there.”
            Ron gaped at Draco a little. “You think Lily would be in Slytherin? It’s not like she usually hides her emotions, you know.”
            “There are other traits that are more important than that,” Draco said, and turned with a show of concern to Harry, as if daring Ron to comment on how openly Draco was showing his emotions. “It’s up to you, Harry. I’ll go with you if you wish. I think I want to protect you from some of the fireworks.”
            Harry cocked his head around Draco’s face so he could look one more time at Ron. “It really isn’t a joke, is it?”
            Ron took another gulp of his drink, smacked his lips, and shook his head.
            Harry shut his eyes. He was envisioning Ginny’s face the last time he had seen her, and his resolve to be civil with her for the good of their kids. He saw Al’s face, and heard his pained voice. Seeing Harry with Draco probably wouldn’t soothe either Al or Ginny.
            Then he thought he understood what Molly was about, and nearly groaned. She didn’t think things should be soothed. She thought everything should be put into a cauldron and blown up, because that way, there wouldn’t be unspoken feelings and secrets tearing the family apart for years. She had once told Harry of a cousin of hers whose family had all politely avoided speaking about their disdain for his wife, until the inevitable moment when someone lost their temper and the whole flood of filth had come pouring out.
            Her cousin had never spoken to that side of his family again, even his parents and his siblings. Molly would think that was the worst thing that could happen in her family, Harry knew.
            “I sometimes wondered where Fred and George got their talent for explosions,” Harry muttered, opening his eyes. “Now I know.”
            Ron was grinning. Maybe it was good entertainment to him because he had nothing really invested in either side of the situation, Harry thought, irritated. “Does that mean I can tell Mum that you’re coming?”
            Harry rolled his eyes. “I suppose so.” He did glance at Draco, one more time, to make sure that he wanted this. As uncomfortable as it would be in some respects for Harry, he knew that it would be worse for Draco.
            Draco was a little pale, but he gave Harry a game smile. “I’m not about to be frightened away from you.”
            “There would be other times and other gatherings you could come to,” Harry began. He could see why Molly wanted to do this, but that didn’t mean it was Draco’s place to be put on the spot. He wasn’t the one who had married into the Weasley family.
            “If it wasn’t this, it would be something else,” Draco cut in. His thoughts seemed to have been running parallel to Harry’s, even though he had never heard the story of Molly’s cousin. “We might as well go to a party that I know is planned in advance, and where I can mostly be sure that people won’t hurt me.” He paused to consider that, then added, “Much.”
            “Good man, Malfoy.” Ron drained his drink, while Harry reflected in silent amazement on what the Ron of their first year in Hogwarts would have done if he could have heard his future self saying that. Ron then stood up and reached across the table to press Harry’s hand. Harry met his eyes.
            “It’s really for the best,” Ron said softly. “You’ll see.” He winked once and then strode to the fireplace and vanished into the flames.
            Harry waited until Kreacher had settled the meal proper on the table and turned to Draco again. “You’re sure,” he said, although he made it a statement and not a question, so that Draco wouldn’t take so much offense.
            Draco rolled his eyes. “No, I only said it to make you feel better and not to insult your friend.”
            Harry blinked at him. Draco touched the back of his neck. “There’s a lot that I would say to make you feel better, and to keep on good terms with your friends,” he said. “Good enough terms that we’re not actually insulting each other, at least. This isn’t one of them. No, I can see the theory, and I think the fireworks might be a good thing.” He paused. “Did you ever think that I might not be the one actually getting insulted here?”
            Harry frowned. “What do you mean?”
            “You’re going to be in a close space with your ex-wife and the son who thinks that he wants someone else to be his dad,” Draco said. “The chances are good that you’ll insult one of them, or they’ll insult you. They might ignore me entirely.”
            “I am not going to insult my son,” Harry said irritably. He would have said the same thing about Ginny, but he decided that he wasn’t going to make promises that he couldn’t keep. Staying civil without provocation was one thing, but if she said something about Draco…
            Well, in that case he would just try to take the conversation to a private spot before it blew up, that was all.
            “How many Weasleys are there, anyway?” Draco finally asked. “What kind of swarm am I going to be stepping into?”
            Harry glanced curiously at him. “I assumed you would keep up with the birth announcements in the papers.” Most pure-blood families did, whether or not they liked the pure-blood family that was having the children. It increased the pool of potential marriage partners each time.
            “I noticed there were some,” Draco said. “But I was doing something else that much occupied me at the time.”
            “What was that?” Harry asked curiously. From the timeline, he supposed that that might have been when Draco was falling in love with Astoria.
            “Living my life.” Draco leaned forwards while Harry was still trying to find a suitable response. “Now. How many of them are there?”
            “Counting my kids, and Ginny?” Harry thought a second. He was used to thinking of them as part of the family, rather than in terms of sheer numbers. “And Molly, and Arthur…Twenty-four, if you count Hermione and all my other sisters-in-law and all the kids. Well, and Charlie. But he’s in Romania. But it’s still twenty-four because Teddy Lupin is engaged to Victoire. Bill and Fleur’s older girl,” he explained, because Draco was staring at him. “So he’ll be there.”
            Draco closed his eyes. “Right,” he said faintly. “You should start telling me names and ages, then.”
            “What?” That startled Harry a little. “Why?”
            Draco opened his eyes and gave him a steely look. “Because, you plebian, I am not about to offend my hosts by not knowing their family lines.”
            Harry bit his lip, hard, and thought pure thoughts for a bit until he was sure he wouldn’t laugh. Then he started explaining the family, beginning with Bill’s children. Draco listened with an intent, serious expression, absorbing every word.
            That made Harry want to laugh again, but he virtuously held onto his tongue, ate his lunch, and explained his once and future family.
*
SP777: Thank you!
Al is just being a bit short-sighted, I think, and kind of depending on Harry being able to soothe away the nightmares and frustrations of having a famous dad the way he’s soothed away everything else so far. He’ll need to learn that some things, Harry can’t do anything about.
I thought I had done a story like that already. At least, where Harry had former boyfriends who wanted him back.
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Marathon