Chapter Fifty-Six of 'Marathon'- Al
Chapter Fifty-Five.
Title: Marathon (56/57)
Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.
Warnings: Angst, some mild violence, epilogue-compliant
Pairings: Harry/Draco, past Harry/Ginny and Draco/Astoria
Rating: R
Summary: Harry’s life has become an endurance run, through the remnants of his stressful divorce, his strained relationships with his children, and his increasingly complicated job. Yet it seems what’s going to complicate it most is saving Scorpius Malfoy’s life. Since Scorpius is underage, Draco assumes the debt-and he is determined to pay Harry back. Now if only he could find something Harry actually wanted.
Author’s Notes: This story began life as a one-shot idea, which means it won’t be that long. Though the summary suggests angst, I also intend for this story to have some humor.
Chapter One.
Thank you again for all the reviews!
Chapter Fifty-Six-Al
“You can talk to me about anything you need to, you know that,” Harry said, and moved away from Draco, giving him a chance to decide how he wanted to respond to this. “Do you need to come through? Or do you want me to come to Hogwarts?”
He heard Draco’s warning hiss behind him, but he couldn’t tell which choice Draco thought he should actually be making, so he ignored that for now. He kept his eyes on Al’s pale little face in the fire instead, and saw the moment when it twisted into an agony of indecision.
“I don’t know what I should do,” Al whispered. “But you can’t leave things like this, Dad. You can’t.”
“I agree,” said Harry, and he said it despite the tugging hand he could feel on his shoulder. “I don’t like the way things are between us. We should talk it out and make sure that you feel comfortable with both Draco and me.” He didn’t say anything about Ginny, and he had already decided that he wouldn’t. How Ginny wanted to work out things with Al was up to her.
“I don’t want to feel comfortable with Mr. Malfoy.”
Harry sighed. “Then things are going to stay the way they are, because I’m dating him, Al. I’m sorry that you don’t feel comfortable with him. Maybe that’s what we should talk about? Do you want me to come through to Hogwarts?”
Al wavered some more, and then said, “No. Too many people here could eavesdrop. And don’t try to tell me they wouldn’t. They would. I’m the famous Harry Potter’s son. They always want to know what I’m doing.”
Apparently Harry and Draco were even more in tune than Harry had thought, because he could feel Draco rolling his eyes without looking. He ignored it for the moment. What was important here was Al’s perception, more than reality. “Fine. I’ll open up the connection, and you can come through.”
Al nodded, and his face vanished. Harry tapped the fireplace with his wand, and Draco sighed behind him. “Do you want me to leave?”
Harry glanced back at Draco and made himself smile. “How can he get comfortable with you if you’re always scuttling out of the room when he comes over?”
Draco sniffed, probably to object to the word “scuttling,” but he stayed in one place. There was a brief flash of a revolving body, and Al tumbled out into the room a second later, standing up and dashing soot and dust from his Slytherin robes with a firm shake. He stared at Draco.
“I don’t like Scorpius’s dad dating mine,” he said. Harry couldn’t really tell which one of them he was talking to.
“Noted,” said Draco, in so dry a tone that Harry wasn’t surprised when Al’s face fired up and he immediately snapped back.
“Don’t my dad’s kids get a say in who he dates?” Al turned to Harry, stretching out one hand. “Dad, I really want you to get back together with Mum. Will you?”
Harry just blinked a little, surprised that Al could even ask that after what he had witnessed between Harry and Ginny at the Weasley party. But he had to shake his head, because whether he really believed it or not, Al went on staring at him with his hand out, and that level of asking deserved an answer.
“No,” he said. “Sorry, Al. But your mum and I are never getting back together. I hope that we’ll get along better in the future, and not make a scene in public like we did at your grandparents’ party. But we’re not going to date again, and we’re not going to get married again. Our divorce is final.”
Al had been growing paler with every single one of Harry’s words, until now he swayed and Harry thought he would fall. Harry started forwards, ready to catch him. Al retreated a step and braced himself with his arms on the couch, though. His lungs puffed in and out like a dragon’s. His eyes never left Harry’s face.
“All I ever wanted was a normal life,” he whispered. “You can’t even give me that.”
Harry didn’t look sideways at Draco, because he thought it would be a mistake, and make Al think that Harry didn’t do anything without Draco’s approval. He kept his eyes on Al’s face instead, and said slowly and clearly, “Your life hasn’t been normal for a long time, Al, from what you told me. Even before the divorce. People liked you or hated you because you were Harry Potter’s son. I can’t change that.”
Al squeezed his eyes shut. Tears were welling out from beneath them. Harry winced. He had thought he was helpless in the face of Lily’s tears. This was worse, in a way, because he had some idea of how to help Lily now. He had no idea what would soothe Al.
“But that makes it even more important that you and Mum stay married,” Al whispered. “So that we could have one thing that was normal.”
“Thank you so very much for saying that my son’s life as the only child of a divorced father is abnormal,” Draco murmured, words sweet and icy.
Al started and glared at him. “That’s not what I meant,” he said. “It’s fine for Scorpius. He was four or five when you got divorced from his mum. But my dad and my mum just got divorced, and it’s hard.”
“It’s hard,” Draco conceded, his face so smooth that it was hard for Harry to tell what he was really feeling at the moment. “But it’s not the end of the world, and it wouldn’t make you more normal if they got back together, and it’s not your right to try and force your father back together with your mother.”
Al glared at Draco with an even more frozen face. Draco just looked back at him.
“I don’t imagine,” Draco added then, only his shoulders telling Harry how tense he really felt at the moment, “that your moping and brooding has made you very popular in your House.”
Harry turned to Draco, but Draco held up a hand, and Harry managed to bite his lip and be quiet. If Draco could know how to handle Harry’s Slytherin daughter, he might know how to handle Harry’s Slytherin son. At least, Harry wouldn’t object until he knew for sure where Draco was heading with this.
Al’s face grew warm with passion. He leaned forwards as though he was going to jump on Draco and wanted to make sure that he saw what was coming. “How dare you,” he hissed. “How dare you talk about the way I am in my House!” He took a few stiff-legged steps, and reached for his wand. “I don’t care what Scorpius told you, I am a real Slytherin. And he knew it after a few days!”
“Yes, I know all about the pranks you played on him,” Draco murmured, eyes wide and alert. Harry hid his surprise with an effort. He hadn’t known about them. “That doesn’t mean that I’m going to excuse this kind of nonsense. You and I can try to get along civilly, or even more than that. But civility is the very least we’re going to attempt. I think that ignoring me and chiding your father to get back together with your mother is an unproductive use of your time.”
“Oh, do you?” began Al, sounding so angry Harry thought he would have to step between them.
Draco nodded. “And I’m asking you to consider whether you’re angrier at the people in Hogwarts and other places who won’t let you be anything but famous Harry Potter’s son, or if you are really angry at your father. You don’t have the normal life that you wanted. Fine. But you were content with the abnormal one that you had until now.”
Al glanced quickly at Harry, who still didn’t really know what Draco was doing, and then back at Draco. “I had one thing in my life that was normal.”
“And so your Weasley family doesn’t count?” Draco’s voice was soft and understanding. Harry knew from experience how dangerous it would be to believe Draco when he was like that. “The love they have for you? Your brother and sister? Your House? Your magic? The peace that you live in, instead of the wartime your parents grew up during? None of those things matter next to your father’s fame?”
Al was still staring at Draco as though they were communicating in some kind of secret Slytherin code. Again Harry stayed quiet. He did notice that Al’s fists had unclenched and he wasn’t trembling as hard now.
“I think things could be better,” Al suddenly muttered. “If my dad wasn’t famous. If he and my mum didn’t fight all the time.”
Draco smiled, a complicated expression. “But you’re going to travel back in time and make your dad not famous? Or make your parents not fight all the time?”
“Don’t be stupid,” said Al, which made Harry want to intervene, but he had to hold back and trust that Draco knew what he was doing, the way he had with Lily and Jamie. “They broke all the Time-Turners a long time ago.”
“They,” said Draco. “Your father was involved in that as well, I recall. Do you resent him for that? Because this way you can’t go back and change history?”
Al blinked at Harry, who kept silent, fascinated. By now, he really wanted to know where this was going, more than he wanted to intervene.
“I don’t expect him to know anything about it,” said Al. “He probably thought I would have a good life as his son. Not that I would want to change things.”
Draco nodded, slowly enough that Harry could see all the soft twitches alongside his lips. “Because you were brought up in peace, and with parents who loved you, and securely in the wizarding world? Not with Muggles, the way your father had to live? You wouldn’t have wanted to grow up without magic.”
Al’s face wavered for a second. “Well. No. I mean. But I could have done without all these people knowing my name.”
“And you would have wanted to be born,” Draco said, as softly as though he was considering the best way to move a piece on a chessboard. “Not never born because your father died during the war.”
“I never said that I wanted him dead.” Al glanced at the floor now. “Just less famous.”
“One is as futile as the other,” Draco whispered. “Because the way he had to survive was to kill a monster that wanted to kill him, and there was no way that he wasn’t going to be famous after that.”
Al hesitated, as though he had never considered that before. Harry never had, either, or at least he hadn’t thought of presenting it in those words to Al. He wondered if it was only the House Draco shared with Al and Lily that made him so good with words like that.
Or maybe, just maybe, he’d had to give explanations to Scorpius like this in the past. Maybe Scorpius had raged about the Malfoy name being tarnished, or their family not having as much money and fame as they had in the past. The Scorpius Harry thought he knew probably wouldn’t do that, but it couldn’t have come naturally to him to have divorced parents when almost no one else in pure-blood circles did.
“Fine,” said Al. “I accept that-that maybe he didn’t want his fame any more than I wanted to be famous.” Harry gave a fervent nod, but he wasn’t sure that Al saw it. “But it’s still hard to be famous.”
“Yes,” Draco said. “And I think the best one to talk to about that would be your father.”
Al waited a long time before he turned to face Harry. Harry tried to keep his face open and welcoming. Draco put a hand on Al’s shoulder and sent Harry a warning glance: he had done so much to open up this opportunity for Harry, Harry had better not fuck it up.
Harry took a deep breath. “What hurts you the most about being famous, Al?”
Al hesitated long enough that Harry thought he might retreat back through the fireplace. He certainly sent a few longing glances in its direction. But finally he said, “The fact that I’m not famous for something I did. I could live with it if that was true. I would have chosen to be famous, wouldn’t I? But it’s you, and all anyone wants to know about is you and how you act and how you live.”
Harry smiled a little. “Even Scorpius? Even the other people you know in Slytherin who aren’t the children of people who were ever impressed by me?”
Draco’s eyes half-lidded in satisfaction. Al paused again. Then he said, “Not Scorpius, and not all of them. But some of the Slytherins tease me too, because they weren’t too impressed with you. I mean, you said it,” he added hastily, as though he was worried that Harry would get angry at him for saying it. “That’s just the way they are.”
“Life can’t always be easy for you,” Harry said softly. “I’m sorry for that. But life isn’t easy for Jamie in Gryffindor, either. People kept expecting him to be like me for the first year he was at Hogwarts, until they saw how different he was and realized that was futile.”
“But I’m different, too!” Al bristled.
Harry nodded. “But you look like me, and you wear glasses like I do, and you’re on the Quidditch team, even if it’s the Slytherin Quidditch team and not the Gryffindor one. It’s not fair that people will think you should be more like me. But that’s an extra challenge you’ll have to overcome, and I think you can.”
Al sucked in a sharp breath. Harry thought for a second that that would trigger another yelling session, and he was already bracing himself for it. But then he caught Draco’s eye, and what he saw there made him hold back from defending himself right away.
“A challenge,” Al whispered. “That was one reason the Hat Sorted me into Slytherin. Because it said that it saw the challenges I would have to overcome, and that I burned to overcome them. And I could be great, and Slytherin would help me on the way to greatness.”
Harry gave a little exclamation despite himself, and Al looked at him warily. Well, Harry couldn’t blame him for that.
For a minute, he wondered if he should really tell Al. He might resent it more if he knew that even his Sorting made him more like his father.
But Harry had a way to get past that. He thought. “The Hat said the same thing to me,” he told Al. “That Slytherin could help me on the way to greatness, that I could be great if I wanted to.”
“Yeah?” Al’s body was taut.
“But I didn’t want to be great enough to go into Slytherin,” Harry said, and his eyes met Draco’s over his son’s head. “I had just met someone I thought was a right git, and I talked myself out of going to Slytherin. But you didn’t, and that makes you different from me. You made a choice that I think is right for you. I made a choice based on friendship and what I thought was right for me. But because the war is over, you have your own choices. That’s part of what I fought for.”
Al hesitated, then leaned forwards and grabbed Harry around the waist. “Thank you,” he mumbled, “thank you.”
Harry gently patted his shoulder, and they remained in silence for long seconds, until Draco softly cleared his throat. “Do you still mind me dating your father quite as much as you did?” he asked.
“Huh? No.” Al straightened back up and shook his head. Harry didn’t think it was his imagination that Al was standing a little taller than he had recently, and that the smile he gave Harry was as much one of amused tolerance as anything else. “That’s different from me. It might make some people point and stare, but Scorpius and I will tell them to shut up.”
He looked searchingly at his father one more time, and said, “That doesn’t mean that this is suddenly all right, you know. Just that it’s better.”
“I know,” said Harry, and squeezed Al’s shoulder again. “But you can come and talk to me, and all I wanted was for it to be better. I know that it’s not going to be perfect.”
Al nodded, apparently reassured, and they talked for a few minutes more before he went back through the fireplace. Harry turned to Draco, about to ask if he thought Harry had done well for parenting a Slytherin.
Draco met him with a kiss like soft fire, first on his lips and then all over his cheeks and neck, and held Harry against the wall for a moment as he smiled at him.
“You’re a good father, and you’re trying to be better, and you’re hot,” he said. “I think we can leave all discussion of children behind for a while, don’t you?”
Harry did.
Chapter Fifty-Seven.
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