And All Over Again (Part 11)

Title: And All Over Again
Author: fathomlessspite
Fandom: Harry Potter
Characters: Harry Potter, Draco Malfoy and the rest of them
Warnings: (eventual) slash, DH SPOILERS, epilogue compliant :(
Rating: PG thus far
Summary: It's Lily Potter's first year at Hogwarts, it'll be the first year in thirteen since Ginny and Harry had the house to himself. But as Ginny has decided to take a course at a wizarding college in Egypt Harry accepts a teaching position at Hogwarts. With old friends and enemies surrounding him, questions about his slowly disintegrating marriage are hard to ignore.
Chapter Summary:  Harry has an honest conversation with James about Ginny.
A/N: So revision and uni have stopped me from writing for a while, but as ever, the closer i get to exam the more i procrastinate, so here's a short new part and the next is also almost completed and should be up soon :)

CATCH UP: --PROLOGUE-- , --PARTS 1&2--, --PART 3--, --PART 4--, --PART 5--, --PART 6A--, --PART 6B--, --PART 7--, --PART 8--, --PART 9--, --PART 10--,

( On to part 11................ )

 

The last Hogsmeade visit of the year, which Harry had been dreading at the beginning of term due to his pairing as chaperone with Draco, had turned out to be much more fun than he’d anticipated.

 

After wandering round the shops for a while and picking up a few last minute presents for their children, Harry and Draco had ended up in The Three Broomsticks.

 

“Are you looking forward to the holidays then?” Draco asked with a knowing smile.

 

“It’ll be nice to see everyone again,” Harry answered.

 

“Diplomatic answer,” Draco said with a short laugh. “Very good.”

 

Harry ‘hmm’d’ into his drink before asking, “How about you?”

 

“Yes I am, thank you. It’ll be nice to see Astoria again, and to be able to spend some time with Scorpius. And my mother,” he added.

 

“How is she?” Harry asked, aware of Narcissa’s failing health from the few passing comments Draco had made.

 

“She tells me that she’s fine,” Draco said.

 

“But you don’t think she’s being completely honest?” Harry asked, detecting the doubt in Draco’s tone.

 

“No, I don’t,” he said quietly, keeping his gaze locked on his drink. Harry reached out and gripped Draco’s hand that was lying on the table top briefly.

 

“She just doesn’t want you to worry,” he said.

 

“Dad!”

 

Harry dropped Draco’s hand and withdrew his to hold his drink as James came running towards their table.

 

“Mum says you’re not going to be home for Christmas,” James jumped straight in, ignoring Draco’s presence completely.

 

Harry glanced at Draco quickly before refocusing his attention on his son. “I’ll be there Christmas Eve and morning,” he explained.

 

“What about lunch?” James demanded.

 

“I can’t be there for lunch, I need to be back at Hogwarts so Professor Malfoy can go and spend some time with his family,” Harry explained.

 

James frowned at Draco. “Why can’t he stay at school so you can be home longer?” James asked.

 

Draco cleared his throat, “I’ll just go and get another drink,” he said and excused himself from the table.

 

“James, Professor Malfoy kindly offered to give up some of his holiday so that I could spend some time with you at Christmas. You can’t just demand him to give up the rest of it for me,” he reprimanded gently.

 

“But it won’t be the same if we’re not all there. We haven’t seen mum in ages and you can’t even be bothered to spend two days with us,” James complained. Harry looked him in the eye for a moment and saw the genuine concern behind the petulant child routine.

 

“James, I would love to spend more time with you, and your brother and sister, but I can’t. This is my job for now, I can’t pick and choose between those duties I want to fulfil and those I don’t,” he explained.

 

“What about mum?” he asked. Harry winced, hoping his son would have glossed over the lack of mention of Ginny in his last statement. When Harry didn’t respond straight away James continued, “Uncle Ron told Hugo-”

 

“I don’t care what Uncle Ron told Hugo,” Harry said quickly. “I don’t want you listening to anything anyone else tells you about your own family. I, we, would tell you if there was something important you needed to know.” In his head he heard Draco’s comment from before repeat itself. Diplomatic answer. An answer of sorts, but not really saying anything at all.

 

“Do you still love mum?” James asked quietly, sliding round into a seat next to Harry instead of opposite him.

 

“Of course I do, I always will. But sometimes, sometimes one type of love can change to another. And just because you love someone doesn’t mean there aren’t going to be problems.” Harry watched as James absorbed the information and formulated his next question.

 

“Are there? Problems?” he asked eventually. Harry sighed and decided to embrace his Gryffindor bravery rather than his Slytherin cunning, and answer the question head on.

 

“Some,” Harry acquiesced. “Mainly to do with the distance and not being able to talk about things.”

 

“But you’re going to try and fix them though?” he asked hopefully.

 

“Of course I am,” Harry answered and watched as James sagged with relief. A nagging feeling of guilt in his stomach prompted him to add, “Not everything can be fixed though James, but I’m going to try. I am.”

 

With a quick but hard hug, James darted off to find his friends leaving Harry alone for a moment, watching his son disappear into the crowd.

 

A few minutes later Draco sat back down silently opposite Harry, pushing a fresh glass of fire-whiskey in his direction.

Continues in Part 12 Here

Friends...

I offen wonder why people add me as a friend.  Is it because we have similar interests?  Did they watch one of my vids?  Or did they read one of my fics and want to stone me for it??

This line of thought was precipitated because I friended a few new people and I had a couple of new people friend me recently.

So new and old friends, why did you add me??

:)