Chapter Text
Draco Malfoy almost knocks an entire shelf full of potions straight off of the wall when the bell on the door rings at nine o'clock in the morning and he turns to see none other than Harry Potter stumbling into his shop, his dark hair in an unspeakable state of disarray and his robes rumbled beyond belief. He looks awful, dark circles under his eyes and his face too thin, his skin too pale. Grey hairs stand out on his head, his green eyes are dull and almost lifeless and he looks like he hasn't smiled in years.
Draco stares at him for a moment too long then looks away, pretending to rearrange the phials of various potions on the front desk. He hasn't seen Potter since the Death Eater trials seventeen years ago, when he'd testified for Draco and his mother. He hasn't even read about him in the papers since he stopped reading the Daily Prophet around about that time.
In fact, the last Draco had even heard of Potter was probably almost three years ago now, when he'd heard the waitresses at his favourite tea shop gossiping with one another over the counter top about how he was married to the girl Weasel and they were having their third child. At the time, Draco had scowled and imagined a grinning young-looking Potter standing with two tiny ginger children and a beaming, pregnant Ginevra Weasley holding his hand and kissing his cheek. Evidently, his imagination must've been wrong. Now all he can see is the face of a miserable Harry Potter.
Back at the time of the trials, Potter had looked the same as ever. The Potter he knew was, whilst an annoying fucking piece of shit, a vaguely charismatic kid. Now, though... He just looks tired.
He certainly looks tired as he quite literally stumbles through the door of the shop, takes one look at Draco, sighs, then stalks off, disappearing between the isles of potions. For a moment, Draco closes his eyes and asks the universe "why me?" and then, he pulls himself together and continues to feign absolute concentration in his phial rearranging.
After the trials, Draco had struggled to find work in a wizarding world full of people who seemed to absolutely hate him. Of course, at Hogwarts, he'd planned on finding a job at the ministry, but that was near impossible with his father rotting in Azkaban and his family name rotting along with him. His mother wanted him to stay home with her at the manor, she told him that they were fine for money, because although the ministry had taken away half of the Malfoy fortune, they were still left with more than enough to live out their lives comfortably.
Though this was true, he couldn't imagine laying around in a house full of dark memories of the war without a job to keep him out of the house for most of the day. And, well, he looked everywhere for employment, even in the most minor of the ministry departments, but no one seemed to want him. So he thought "Hey, I'm good at potions," and now here he is, the owner of a tiny apothecary just off Diagon Ally named "Essential Brews", living in the average sized flat that was built above the shop. He gets by.
By the time Draco is finished with his internal reflection, the phials of potions on the front desk have been rearranged so much that they don't really look like they have a particular order anymore. He'll have to reorganise them once Potter has left and he can actually think again. Right now, he just has to focus on not keeling over from nostalgia.
"Malfoy."
Draco's breath catches and he forces himself to keep his neutral expression in tact as he turns away from his phial rearranging and faces Potter. The man meets his gaze with his dull and tired green eyes. Draco nods once. "Good morning."
Potter places the two phials of liquid onto the counter in front of him, stares expectantly until Draco picks them up. The label reads "Blemish Blitzer, three Galleons".
"Finally hit puberty then, Potter?"
Potter sighs. "They're for my son. He was too embarrassed to buy them himself."
"If you say so." says Draco, raising an eyebrow. "That'll be six Galleons, thanks. Bag?"
Fishing the money out of his pocket, Potter sighs once more when he drops the coins onto the counter. "No thanks." he says and takes the phials from the counter, tucking them into the pocket of his robes. "See you."
"Do come again soon, Potter." Draco says to Potter's back once he's turned and is making his way towards the door. Draco doesn't get a reply before the door slams shut behind him and the shop is silent once again.
This time, Draco is the one that sighs.
**
When Pansy quite rudely barges through the door into Draco's flat later that night, Draco is just dozing off on the couch with a glass of red wine in one hand and a book in the other, hovering in an odd state of half-dream-half-reality and feeling oddly relaxed for once. He always makes sure to take full advantage of moments like these, as they don't come often for him. Normally he just puts up with feeling on edge most of the time. He's kind of used to it by now. So a peaceful moment is a blessing, and Draco's enjoyment and contentedness is probably why the universe sent Pansy along to ruin it all. It wouldn't fucking surprise him, all things considered.
She comes bustling into the living room, heels clicking noisily on the floor, with a loud "Evening, darling!" and Draco, confused, quite literally jumps the fuck out of his skin, spilling red wine all over his pyjama shirt and the bottom right hand corner of the pages of his book.
"Pansy you- what the fuck are you doing here? I swear it's bloody nearly midnight!" He hisses, slamming his book and wine glass down on the coffee table in front of him. He glares mournfully at the dark red stain on the front of his brand new white pyjamas.
"I'll have you know it's only 9:30pm and I brought over some Chinese, as you most likely forgot to eat again tonight." She glares pointedly at him, setting down her purse and the two paper bags of take out on the coffee table. "Quite frankly I find it pitiful that your sitting here alone drinking-" Pansy pauses sniffs the bottle of wine he'd left on the side a few hours ago. She wrinkles her nose. "-cheap ass wine made in 2006 and reading Pride and Predjudi- hold on, isn't that a Muggle novel?"
Draco starts abruptly. Admittedly, since the war, he'd found reading wizarding literature a rather unpleasant, as the frequent references to the war unlocked corners of his mind that he never intended to revisit. Muggle books were the next best thing, to be honest. "So what if it is?"
Pansy hums and smiles an annoyingly knowing smile.
"What?!"
Pansy shrugs, knowing smile still present on her face.
"For fucks sake, Pansy! I cannot believe you have the nerve to march into my flat at this time of night-"
"-it's only half 9!"
"-and question my reading habits, then smile your annoying fucking I-know-something-you-don't smile at my perfectly neutral answer! You even made me spill my wine all over my pyjamas!"
"Oh, Draco, don't sulk. It's not like you don't have other pyjamas, Merlin."
"That's not the point."
"Speaking of pyjamas, you'd better go and change your shirt. I'll put the Chinese onto plates while you're at it." Pansy says, then she ushers Draco out of the room in the direction of his bedroom. Draco sighs and shakes his head, wondering why he was even still friends with Pansy, then he carts himself off down the hallway to change his top.
As much as he hates to admit it, Pansy was right, he has got plenty of other pyjamas. He changes into an identical shirt in a pastel shade of light blue. Then he sighs once more and joins Pansy in the kitchen for the Chinese that he will definitely be eating the leftovers of for the next week. Draco doesn't much want to spend his evening like this and, quite frankly, he'd rather be asleep on the sofa already, but, though he will deny it if asked at a later date, he vaguely enjoys Pansy's sometimes annoying company. It beats being alone.
They sit at the counter in the kitchen and talk about neutral things whilst eating their food, and Draco respectfully remembers Pansy's "no talking about sad things at the dinner table" rule and refrains from blurting out something about Potter being in his store today. Instead, he tries to focus on speaking about only Quidditch and also the weather. By the time they've finished, it's eleven in the evening and Draco is achingly tired, and Pansy, having probably seen the fatigue on his face, sends him to bed. He goes willingly and collapses onto his bed in a heap, falling asleep immediately.
**
Silence is a sound that Harry hears very frequently. He's sort of used to it, as sad as that may sound. Every day after the children have been put to bed, Ginny and he eat their dinner in silence, the only noise the scrape of their metal cutlery against the china of their plates. Harry's eyes droop as he eats his pasta, his face feels heavy and he can't wait to finally be able to go to bed once he's finished his food. He needs sleep.
Seeing Malfoy earlier on had taken a shit tonne of energy out of him, he was hit with odd memories that had been buried at the back of his mind for years. Although he doesn't read the Daily Prophet, Ginny does, so he has seen and heard of Malfoy a few times over the last few years. All he'd seen was mostly just news about his business and other rumours which were far too scandalous to be deemed true. Most of everyone didn't believe that any of the shit about Malfoy was legit. Even the most media-ridden idiots could tell that the Malfoy gossip was a load of codswallop.
But seeing him in person had been a shock to the system. Harry admits that he went to the apothecary fully aware that Draco Malfoy was the one who owned it. Afterwards, he'd wondered why he'd gone to that shop specifically, and not some other store that sold spot potions. Harry, having no reason to overthink it, has since decided to ignore this thought. He is currently sitting across from Ginny at the dinner table, illicitly making sure to not think about it.
Ginny sighs and puts her fork down, looking at him with dull and tired eyes. She looks at him for a few moments, considering something. Harry doesn't falter in his pasta-eating, he's actually in quite a hurry to get to bed.
"You went out today?" asks Ginny, flatly.
Harry narrows his eyes. "Uh, yes."
"Huh." she says.
"Er," Harry says, confused. "Why do you ask?"
"Oh, no reason." Ginny shrugs in a way that suggests that there is, in fact, a reason. A few seconds pass. "Except that you haven't been out in months and I'm curious as to what finally dragged you out of the house."
Harry pauses in his pasta-eating. "It hasn't been months, Ginny, just since I quit the-"
"Since you quit the Aurors, yes, which was months ago! Three months ago! And since then you haven't been out of the house aside from when you're taking the rubbish out. Where did you go?"
"Only to the apothecary!" Harry says, honestly. "James needed a few phials of Blemish Blitzer."
Ginny says nothing, just picks up her fork and begins to eat again.
After a few more seconds of silence, Harry sighs. "What's your problem? Isn't it good that I finally went out today after months of brooding?"
"Sure." Ginny says. She doesn't look at him. "It sure is good that you went to the apothecary. May I ask which apothecary you went to?"
Harry presses his lips together. "Essential Brews-"
"Essential Brews!" Ginny slams her fork down, splattering orange pasta sauce all over the tablecloth. "What a fucking surprise!"
"Gin-"
"You've been glancing nervously at the articles about Draco Malfoy in the Daily Prophet all month, Harry, it was only a matter of time." Harry gapes at Ginny whilst she rants. "You haven't seen him in years, clearly you were just itching to see pop over and visit. It's like you get withdrawal symptoms whenever you go too long without him, it's ridiculous."
Harry gapes at her some more. "That's- that's not true!"
"It is. You know it! You did the same thing for months before you insisted we went to that ministry fund raiser 3 years ago and Malfoy was there, and you spent the whole evening avoiding him, not being seen but also watching him like a hawk. Then, surprise surprise, after that, you were fine again."
"What- Ginny, what are you talking about?" Harry stammers. His head pounds with the stress of making sense.
"You know what I'm talking about."
They both stare at each other in absolute silence for a solid minute. Not one of them moves to resume eating, even though Harry wants to just eat and then go to bed. Instead, they stare at each other across the table, tensed and ready to react if the other pounces.
This happens for longer than Harry deems necessary, but he doesn't have the courage to break the silence until he can literally take no more of it.
"What do you want me to say, Ginny?" He blurts.
She stands with a heavy, dramatic scrape of her chair and says, "Do you know what, Harry Potter? I want you to take some time to seriously consider this question for me; Are you married to Draco Malfoy, or me?"
And with that, Ginny draws her wand, vanishes her plate along with her pasta, then turns and stomps down corridor, up the stairs and into their bedroom, slamming the door behind her. Harry is, at once, confused.
**
"Dad. Daddy." Says Lily the next day, waking him up from his afternoon nap. She looks at him with her wide green three year old eyes and clings to his wrist with one tiny spittle-covered hand, using her other to clutch the arm of the sofa next to her. The sounds of her brothers and her Mum talking in the kitchen are muffled by the door.
Harry hums, his eyes heavy and only half open. He'll need a while to wake up completely but he's fairly confident that he can handle toddler speak at this current moment in time. "Yes, Lily?"
"Are you and Mummy splitting up?"
Harry's eyes pop open abruptly and he splutters for a minute. Suddenly, he feels more awake than ever. "What- I, er- Lily, honey, what makes you say that?" He stammers, laughing nervously.
"I heard yelling yesterday. Well I heard Mummy yelling at you after we went to bed last night." Lily's eyes get impossibly wider and somehow more innocent. "Charlotte from play school said that when her mummy and daddy split up, they did a lot of yelling."
Harry sighs. He should have seen this coming. The kids are all old enough to think now and he should've realised that their little kiddie thoughts might head in the direction of divorces. "No, honey. Your Mum and I have no plans to split up right now." Harry assures her with a tired smile.
Lily presses her lips together in an expression that reminds him of Ginny and says nothing. Then she gets up and walks towards the door, heading to join her older brothers in the kitchen. Harry leans back on the sofa and frowns, confused. Fuck.