draco grows the hell up...sort of

Jan 16, 2008 01:36

Childhood Chews
H/D fluff of the de-aging variety. Hard G, because Draco's a bit arsey and they tell him so. Also, shades of wenchy, alcoholic Pansy, and where she's in a fic, it must be rated "Hard".
Still not mine, still beta'd by shadowsamurai, still giving props for Grr to Samayel.
part one is here. part two is here.

Of all the horrors waiting to greet him back to adulthood, clingy, sleeping Potter was the worst. He knew that because it felt too comfortable, this, like something he could do regularly, just being quiet and calm with Potter, and Merlin knew that wasn't bloody likely, so Draco scrambled to detach.

He had, he suspected, only moderate success.

"Are you here for Grr?" Draco froze, half out of bed already, and looked back to find Tiny Potter watching him, that big-eyed, tentative expression on his face again. Which, for some ridiculous reason, made him feel guilty about sneaking away in the dead of night. Then Tiny Potter held out the dragon, the boy's scarred, spec-less face screwed in resolve, and Draco's heart broke a bit. "Thank you for sharing him with me. He was very good."

Of the numerous arsehoods to which Draco willing consigned himself, stealing things from children wasn't yet on the list, so he waved off Tiny Potter's offer and said with all the dignity he could manage, because it seemed such a solemn thing for the boy, "No, it's all right, you take care of him for me, yeah?"

Tiny Potter frowned a bit. Looked away. "I'm sorry."

"Why? Don't you like him? You don't have to keep him if you don't want to."

"Whatever I did that made you not come for story time, I'm sorry." Tiny Potter's grip tightened on Grr, who'd seen far better days. Poor thing, Draco thought, and wasn't at all sure which of them he meant by it.

"You didn't do anything, pet, I'm sorry I was busy. I should have been there." Because yes, he remembered how that felt, waiting on a broken promise. His father hadn't broken many, but Draco thought it said something about them both that he still recalled each one.

"Where's Draco? Did he leave? I didn't get to say goodbye." Tiny Potter looked outright worried at that, fingers mangling Grr's fur something fierce in awkward twists. The boy's breathing was deep and panicked, but Merlin, how could anyone this controlled now possibly grow up to be as reckless as Draco knew him? Baffling, that.

And what the sod was Draco meant to say to that? "He'll be back." Which was sort of true. Mostly.

Hurt flared before Tiny Potter's face went stubborn. "If he left, you can just say. S'all right. I'm too bad for friends, Uncle Vernon says so."

Draco rather thought he could find a fourth Unforgivable for Uncle Vernon just then. "You'll see him again, I promise." Though Draco wasn't willing to make promises on how well that meeting would go, he wasn't fool enough to believe he could avoid Potter forever. Not after this.

"Uncle Dragon?" Teddy said from the next bed over, and Merlin, if they'd woken Teddy, it was only a matter of time before Little Longbottom woke, too. Draco didn't want this day to progress, not at all. He wanted to keep Tiny Potter just like this, sweet and innocent and friendly.

Because once he'd had that potion, Draco was under no delusion Potter would do anything but hex him senseless.

***

Granger stalked him to his lab, which was its own brand of oddity, really; he'd always considered his lab sacrosanct against visitors unless they'd been invited. And she hadn't, obviously, because he needed time to sort himself out. Bloody mess, wasn't he? Which, he supposed, was to be expected after something like this. Growing up hadn't been a day at Honeydukes the first time, not with wars and dead Headmasters and such. Doing it all again, condensed and potion-triggered and cuddling Scarhead in whatever form, was bound to be worse, right?

Still, Granger seemed intractable about conversation, despite Draco's poorly-hidden annoyance at the interruption.

"It works, then," he said, striving for professionalism he didn't feel. Nothing about this had been professional, had it? "Fantastic. I'll just finish up here and you can be on your merry way."

"Are you all right, Draco?" Granger asked, rather maternally for someone who'd loathed him not that long ago. Clearly, six years of insults and hexing paled in comparison to six hours of calling her 'Mum'. Something about Granger using his given name sat funny, squirmy discontent in a pit of uncertainty.

"I'm fine." He cursed himself for making a full set before he'd gone into testing, because Merlin, he could have used the solitude bought by brewing. Granger didn't move, not one sign she planned to leave, and he thought he might need to provoke her into it, which would be a shame, he supposed, as she'd turned out a bit of all right once you got behind the know-it-all demeanour. "Was there something you wanted, then?"

"Draco, you shrunk yourself to toddlerhood, then ballooned back twenty years in less than twelve hours. Both on experimental potions, might I add. Is it really unthinkable I'd actually be concerned about you after all that?"

"My potions," he corrected, and when she blinked and frowned at him, baffled sympathy, he continued his explanation despite himself. Didn't owe her a thing, did he? And yet there he was, explaining. "They might have been experimental, yeah, but they were mine. I tend not to ingest things I believe to be life-threatening."

"That hardly negates the fact that you've put yourself through a lot, physically, Draco."

It was, in retrospect, one "Draco" too many.

"Stop. That ridiculous thing you're doing, calling me 'Draco' and acting all concerned for my welfare, it's not necessary, so do save your breath."

"It's not ridiculous," she said, and she showed every sign of launching into some tirade or another, so Draco cut her off. The absolute last thing he intended to do was discuss this with a Gryffindor emissary.

"It bloody is, so shove off. You don't like me, I don't like you, everybody's happy. We express our mutual dislike through various methods, including disdainful use of surnames. It's the natural order of things. Now you've got what you came for and I have no reason to feign tolerance."

"But…" She squinted at him like concentration meant Legilimency. He Occluded like a mad thing and glared back until she gave up with a soft sigh. "Don't you remember?"

"I'm sure I don't know what you mean."

"You…Yesterday. Once you'd taken your Wheeze, I mean. Doesn't that count for anything?"

"Granger, don't make me get Muddy, I'm certain they'd sack me for it and I rather enjoy my job."

One point in Granger's favour, he supposed, was that she required no explanation on just how he'd meant to use "Muddy". Instead, she struggled to swallow some new realization, then said, "Fine then. We'll get them fixed up and be out of your hair, Malfoy."

Surely that hollow feeling was merely exhaustion. Too long near Gryffindors, even grown ones, was too bloody draining. "Lovely," he said. "Your phials are just there." He pointed at the cooling rack and turned away to busy himself with nothing, to kill time until she left. Merlin, he'd called her Mum. And she'd let him. What was he meant to do with that?

But she didn't leave. He heard glass clinking against wood, quiet footsteps and the brush of cloth in motion, but he didn't hear the door creak. Told himself he'd missed it in his random flipping of pages and nearly believed it until she said, "Well? Are you ready to go, then?"

"Go where?" He cursed himself for speaking. Best to leave her alone, likely, he was in no shape for another spar. "I trust you can find where you've left them, but if you can't, I'll call Moggy for you."

"But…you're coming with me, aren't you?"

"No, Granger, I'm not. I thought I'd made that clear. Take your antidotes and run along now. I've better things to do."

"You're joking." Granger stared like he'd cave under pressure, which went to show how little she'd paid attention over the years.

"I'm absolutely not joking," he said. He refused to do her the credit of joining in her little stare-off. "There's no need for me to be there. From a research perspective, I mean. I've already tested it and all, so I'm certain it works."

"And if there's a reaction you're not expecting?"

He shrugged. "It's not like you'll be alone, is it? You know where to find me if things go pear-shaped."

Granger growled. Honest-to-Merlin growled, which just went to show Gryffindors were mental. "But you've put in all this work, Draco, why wouldn't you want to see it through to the finish?"

How to answer that? He felt disarmingly uninspired. "Well, it's sure to be horribly awkward now, what with me having kissed Scarhead and such when we were tykes," he thought. "I'm certain they'll hex me as soon as they're all grown." No, no, equally disastrous.

"Do you really need me to spell this out for you, Granger? I. Don't. Want. To. See. Them." He had no eloquence for what Tiny Potter did to him, nor did he have the vocabulary to explain what seeing Tiny Potter's trust disappear into Scarhead's spite would do to him.

"Not even to say goodbye?" She looked rather like he'd slapped her. He felt all-too-monstrous.

"And who do I need to say goodbye to, I wonder? The ones who'll hate me as soon as they're right again, or the one who'll come visit next Thursday like normal?"

She seemed on the verge of asking who'd come visit him, and he wasn't sure whether it would slant more to the sympathetic or the cruel, so he made a production out of ducking back to his work as though it were important. As though there was anything there.

"You're being an arse about this. Did you know?"

He lifted his gaze. "Yes. Now get out of my lab. I've work to catch up on."

***

Too much to hope she'd leave it alone, he supposed, so when she returned not ten minutes later, Pansy in tow, he tried to take it philosophically.

"Granger tells me you're not planning to come upstairs." Pansy's eyes were Avada.

"No reason I should, is there?"

Her lips twitched in suppressed hex. Granger's arms folded across her chest. Only thing missing here was a peeved Weaselette glaring accusations at him from Pansy's left.

"Don't be stupid about this, Draco. I realize it's challenging for you, but do try to behave like an ordinary person. Someone with feelings, perhaps."

"I've done my part." He jabbed a finger at her. "Said I'd help you and I have. Put my whole life on hold to fix up yet another one of Harry bloody Potter's bloody mistakes, ventured into the heart of Weasleydom to do it and all. Hell, I've even had the lot running wild through my Manor, so I hardly think I've been bloody unfeeling about anything."

"Oh, it's no bloody use, he doesn't remember," Granger snapped. Pansy went Slytherin in survey.

"Give us a moment, could you, Hermione?" Pansy asked, and by some miracle, Granger went.

"Hermione now?" He lifted a brow as Granger shut the door behind herself. Pansy shrugged.

"When in Rome. We can't all be arseholes every second of every day."

Quiet with Pansy felt less revealing than quiet with Granger, so Draco allowed himself to relax after a bit.

"Look, I need to catch up on a few things down here." There. That was a perfectly reasonable explanation for why he needn't show himself above stairs for any length of time until well after they'd cleared out. When that didn't lead to imminent explosion, he said, "Actually, I was rather hoping you wouldn't mind taking Teddy for a few hours…"

Pansy looked rather amused about it all, which Draco wanted to believe boded well but secretly suspected meant something Slytherin afoot. "I've got plans," she said, voice as casual as a twirled wand. "You'll have to watch him yourself."

"Plans? You?" Which was possibly a tactical error, as she looked rather bloody about it. "With who, then?"

"Granger, if you must know. And Weasley."

"Aren't they rather small to be articulating a social calendar?" But really, was he surprised? Weasleys wrecking his plans were right as rain on a Hogsmeade weekend, once upon an education.

"The girl one." Pansy tipped her head and smiled horribly. "So as I say, you'll have to mind Teddy yourself. As you've a calendar barer than a Playwitch spread, that shouldn't be an issue, should it?"

So there went his blissful day of playing with toxins, then. Fantastic. "Fine. You're right." His gaze narrowed, all Slytherin ploy. "Teddy's been on about the Muggle zoo. Perhaps today we'll go, charm a few animals free in Lovegood's honour. Free the Nargles and such. Or the Muggle equivalent, whatever that is."

Granger would have been all over that one, he was sure, but Pansy shrugged like it didn't matter, him and Teddy freeing Muggle things. "Oh," she said as he hung his lab smock, "and you'll need to come get him."

***

"What, you're finished testing and such already?" The Weaselette glared. At Draco, at his potions, at something in that general direction, then at Granger, who took it in stride. "You're certain you've got it right, are you?"

"I told you, Girl Weasley, it wasn't that challenging. For someone who knows their way around a lab, that is. I've no doubt your gitty brothers would still be at it, but then, I am not your gitty brother. Thank Merlin."

She snarled. He snarled back, feeling like himself for the first time since this whole silly affair had begun; at least She-Weasel understood the importance of years of mutual antipathy. Granger cut them off with an aggrieved wave of a dismissing hand.

"Nothing else for it, then, Draco, you'll have to deliver it in person. Stay for the fallout, as it were." Honestly, Granger's smile was unholy. Yet one more reason - two more, really, if he was being honest - why he wasn't the witch sort.

And Pansy, who should have known better, said, "Too right," and swapped triumphant looks with Granger, and Draco mentally added one more reason to prefer blokes.

***

"Potions time, half-pint heathens," Pansy said, only a slight sashay as she carted the rack of phials like a tarty barmaid. Which, given her audience, was a bit ridiculous, and as she'd gone to the dark side of late, he felt practically obliged to scorn her antics, however familiar.

The Wee Weasleys took that as some manner of death sentence and began pantomiming such. George shoved a pair of fingers down his throat and doubled like he'd swallowed Puking Pastilles for an hour. Ron clutched his neck and staggered like he'd keel at any second. It was, alas, rather amusing, but for the implied slight on Draco's potions skills. Though he doubted at this age they'd had much beyond their mother's mixes, and if Mother Weasley brewed like she birthed, Draco thought they might be right to fear.

Little Longbottom and Tiny Potter exchanged looks, and Draco thought there was far too much look-swapping in this house of late, really, could no one simply be themselves without looking to others for approval? Teddy giggled like the Wee Weasleys were the greatest show ever, which started Little Longbottom laughing, and Tiny Potter buried his face in Grr, most likely to hide a smile.

Tiny Potter, he noticed, was still clutching Grr for dear life.

Then Teddy spotted him properly and barrelled away, arms out, yelling, "Uncle Dragon!" like the hellion hadn't seen him in years, and Draco had a split second to see Tiny Potter's face fall before he had an armful of clutching cousin and wobbly balance to correct.

It was Tiny Potter, though, so really, how much more than a split second of that did he need? Already felt like hell, Tiny Potter sad only made it worse. Fuck. He'd been right to stay away from this; he didn't need this at all.

"Where've you been, Uncle Dragon?" Teddy asked, and Merlin, Teddy was a bit of a climber, too, when had that started? "You've been gone for ages, were you working again?"

The room fell to chaos, the Weaselette scolding her brothers and trying to catch them in their attempts to escape imminent potions-taking, Luna having a rather patient discussion with Little Longbottom, Pansy lining the phials like being near the children might be something dread and catching. Which was Pansy all over, that last, no matter how much she tried with Teddy.

Granger, he noticed, kept silent sentry over them all.

"I'm all done now," Draco said, because Teddy was bouncing to tell him what he'd missed and Draco didn't think he wanted to hear those stories with Tiny Potter in the room. When he glanced up, over Teddy's shoulder, he found Tiny Potter staring. Squirming, and Draco thought of silly secret shuffles that had been impossibly awkward reluctance expressing itself. Thank Merlin he'd lacked that insight at five, then, or he might never have spoken to the boy at all.

He couldn't regret that bit, much as he wanted to. Tiny Potter destroyed him, still bloody was doing, but at least it hadn't been all bad, even if it had gone too far.

"Is that my potion?" Teddy asked, and before Draco could answer, Teddy was off in a ramble. "Isn't it too early still? Does it taste like Ice Mice again? I liked the Ice Mice, can I have it again next time? Can we go to Hummydukes? Can Nev come with us? Ask his Polly Gran, please, Uncle Dragon, I promise we'll be good - "

"Ice Mice?" Granger asked, and Draco said, "Wolfsbane," because that said enough, didn't it?

The Wee Weasley who'd nabbed his sister's wand stopped dead in his tracks, eyes wide in apparent awe of Teddy. "You're a wolf? Like a werewolf?"

Clearly, fear of dark creatures wasn't exactly common in Wee Weasleys, because it stopped the other one, too, and the Weaslette only looked a little grateful for the interruption. "Wicked," Other Wee Weasley said - Ron, maybe? Draco couldn't tell from this distance, they'd rather looked like blurs of ginger and freckles there, and he'd lost track of who'd run where.

"No, Ron, don't -" The Weaselette dove for the wandless Wee Weasley when he darted toward Teddy, which was all sorts of entertaining as wanded Wee Weasley hit her with a spark of spell that sent her tripping and cursing words not meant for children. Little Longbottom moved closer to Luna like the whole thing was disaster waiting to happen. Tiny Potter looked petrified. Had Grr been new to childhood crises, Draco doubted he'd have survived this moment intact.

So while the Weaselette harangued her brothers on why they weren't to jump on werewolves, even ones they'd played with yesterday, Lycanthropy Is Not A Joke, Ron Weasley, Get Back Here, George, Or I'll Hex You Something Fierce And Tell Mum And She'll Hex You, Too, and Granger and Luna talked Little Longbottom into drinking his spiked sippy cup, Draco explained to Teddy that no, no, it wasn't Wolfsbane time yet, this was a potion for the other boys.

Teddy asked did it taste like Ice Mice, because clearly that made all the difference, the tasting like things.

"Well, it might taste a bit like chocolate," Draco speculated. Couldn't really recall, actually.

Then Tiny Potter said, "When I take it, can I see Draco?" Like that was all separating them, just a potion away from best-friendship.

Which, Merlin, did him in.

"Well, as you've got this under control, I think it's time Teddy and I made ourselves scarce," Draco said, because he couldn't answer Potter, he had no words for that sort of thing. Teddy's jaw jutted far too much, Metamorphmagus in a Malfoy pout, and before he could bring up a trip to Honeydukes again, Draco said, "I rather thought we'd do the Muggle zoo today, if that's all right," and Teddy's stubborn melted as Draco stood up and took his hand.

The Weaselette had a brother in each hand, by the scruff of the neck, it looked like, and that Bat-Bogey temper raged in her eyes. Pansy looked like she'd been mentally at the Chianti all morning, even if she hadn't, and Draco suspected it was only a matter of time before she'd done it for real. Lovegood and Little Longbottom looked precisely as they should, he thought, sweet and peaceful, and when he thought about the real Little Longbottom involved, his gut twisted at how very right it all seemed for them, how bloody lucky Longbottom was, even if he'd been four for two days, he had this to grow up to.

And there was Granger's knowing look, the one that said she'd never call him anything but Draco now, the one that said she knew why he was running and even if she disapproved, she'd not say a word about it until it suited her, because if he meant to be an arse, she meant to let him suffer for it.

Draco didn't look back.

***

And if it hadn't been for Teddy, Draco rather thought the whole debacle might have ended there.

part four

fic, childhood chews, hd

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