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Title: And All Over Again 13
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: It's Christmas Eve and Harry is lying low at the Weasleys. That is until someone unexpected stumbles through the fireplace.
CATCH UP: --PROLOGUE-- , --PARTS 1&2--, --PART 3--, --PART 4--, --PART 5--, --PART 6A--, --PART 6B--, --PART 7--, --PART 8--, --PART 9--, --PART 10--, --PART 11--, --PART 12--
Christmas Eve at the Weasley’s was as hectic as it was every year. People were coming and going, Mrs. Weasley had control of the kitchen and the children -as well as several of the adults- were continuously trudging snow into the house.
As usual, Harry did his best to stay out of the way. He’s annual Christmas routine of keeping the hell out of the way was serving him well in avoiding his wife without it looking too suspicious.
At the moment he was taking shelter in Ron’s old bedroom. This year Harry and Teddy had been delegated the task of camping in with the boys to keep an eye on them. Usually this was something all the adults complained about, but this year Harry was quite happy to do it. Although he had taken care to make his usual token protests.
Ron’s old battered desk, now housed Harry’s first year marking for the holidays. And his desk chair housed one very bored Harry Potter.
He wasn’t sure what was worse, marking on Christmas Eve, or being downstairs amongst the Weasleys and pretending everything was normal. Okay, so maybe the fact that he was still sitting in front of his pile of marking showed which he thought was the better option.
A gentle tapping at the window easily drew Harry away from the desk. He opened the window and retrieved a parcel from a intelligent looking eagle owl, which ruffled its feathers and took flight once again. Harry recognised the slant of the script that bore his name upon sight and allowed himself a brief grin.
Having taken the parcel back to the desk and sitting down, Harry pulled back the heavy brown paper it was wrapped in and was greeted with his own face grinning up at him.
On his photographic self’s left was Oliver Wood, a hand resting on Harry’s shoulder. Harry’s left arm was slung round Draco’s neck, who was uncharacteristically smiling genuinely at the camera. Draco’s right hand was wrapped round Neville Longbottom’s left wrist. Neville seemed to be making an attempt to escape but Draco’s grip never loosened.
In the background the Quiditch pitch was visible, and on the ground next to them were several flying brooms. Harry and Oliver occasionally glanced down at Neville and chuckled.
Harry ran his fingers round the plain silver frame and smiled. They never had managed to get Neville on a broom, but they had had fun trying.
He watched himself in the photo and wondered why he never looked that content when he looked at himself in the mirror in the morning. Feeling a warmth in the small of his back, Harry’s eyes followed the photo-Draco’s hand as it rested on photo-Harry in the same place.
A voice calling his name from somewhere downstairs broke his reverie. Harry gently placed the frame back down on the desk and left the room to go and investigate the state of lunch.
* * *
A weather charm on the area of the Burrow’s garden next to the house meant that all the family could be seated at one extended table for dinner, as no room in the Burrow itself could house a table large enough.
It was rather surreal to be sitting outside, being warm and the grass dry under your feet when not ten feet away the ground was inches deep with snow. Even after over twenty five years of living in and with the knowledge of the wizarding world, Harry was still sometimes amazed at the things magic could do.
One good thing with dining with all the Weasley’s at once, was that everyone was generally talking at once. So you could usually get away with just listening and nodding in the right places rather than participating. Occasionally this meant you missed questions asked directly to you.
"Harry!" Teddy called from where he sat directly across the table from Harry.
"Sorry," Harry replied, drawing his thoughts away from the gift laying upon the desk upstairs.
"I asked you who that photo was from that’s on the desk in our room," Teddy repeated.
"Early Christmas present Harry?" Hermione asked from Harry’s left.
"And he was allowed to open it?" Harry heard Ron grumble on Hermione’s other side, and saw her elbow him in the side to shut him up.
"Draco sent it," he said quietly, hoping to keep it to their end of the table.
"Malfoy?!" Charlie asked loudly from a few seats down, causing most everyone to pause in their meals.
Ginny’s smile from the other end of the table appeared rather catty. "Well that’s not surprising," she commented, having apparently acquired super hearing whilst in Egypt. "Interestingly, Harry seems to be friends with Malfoy now."
Harry wished she would stop using the word interesting to describe his friendship with Draco. It made them sound like something odd she’d found growing under the kitchen sink.
"I think that’s great Harry," someone finally commented after a few moments silence. Harry sent a thankful smile in Bill’s direction.
"Yes, it eez good you can leeve childhood grudges behind you," Fleur added.
Hermione gave a small smile as she kicked Ron swiftly under the table as a pre-emtive strike. Harry let himself smile briefly in response and returned to his dinner. He glanced briefly up at Teddy who gave him an apologetic look to which Harry responded with a shrug.
In the relative silence that had fallen a crash from inside the house carried well to the table just a moment before the bell sitting on the table in front of Mrs. Weasley rose from the table and rung once before sitting itself back down with a thud.
"The floo," she said and began to rise.
"Don’t worry Molly, I’ll go," Harry said with a smile, pushing his chair quickly away from the table and rising.
"Oh, well. Thank you, Harry," she said with a grateful smile.
Harry wandered up the garden to the house. He was sure he felt Ginny’s eyes on the back of his neck for a moment but when he glanced back she was deep in conversation with Victoire.
When he reached the kitchen and saw who was standing at the fireplace his first thought was that it was a good thing he had gone rather than any of the Weasleys. Even after all these years he didn’t think any of them would react well to a Malfoy in their home.
"Draco," he said, causing Draco to look up and pull himself up straight from where he’d been leaning heavily against the wall next to the fireplace.
One clear look at Draco’s face and Harry was across the kitchen and standing right in front of him. After a brief second of pause he layed a hand on Draco’s arm.
"What’s wrong?"
"I," Draco stopped and closed his eyes for a second, drawing himself up taller, but Harry felt him lean closer via added pressure on his hand. "I need you to cover me at Hogwarts," he said, opening his eyes and looking somewhere over Harry’s shoulder.
"Why?"
"I have to return to Malfoy Manor," he said, eyes flickering across Harry’s face before looking away again. "My mother passed this morning."
"Oh." Harry knew from experience that platitudes usually were not what he wanted when he had lost someone, and he suspected the same was true for Draco Malfoy. Nonetheless, he couldn’t seem to help himself from saying, "I’m sorry Draco."
"In that case we’re probably in the minority," Draco let out a small choked laugh. Harry pulled him gently into a hug, using his right hand to rest Draco’s head on his shoulder and securing his left around Draco’s waist.
"I am sorry," Harry repeated. He felt Draco snort into his shoulder. Harry shook his head, "If nothing else she loved you wholeheartedly and unconditionally, and I’m sorry that there’s one less person around to do that," he murmured into Draco’s ear.
Harry held him for a few minutes. Draco didn’t cry or shake, the only thing that was telling was his slightly erratic breathing. Harry was perfectly happy to be there to ground him though. The whys of this situation would be something he would analyse later.
"You could have just sent word with someone else," Harry said finally.
"I was going to, but then I found myself stepping through the floo," he said sounding slightly bemused at his own behaviour.
"Maybe you just needed a hug," Harry said with a grin.
"Maybe," Draco said quietly into Harry’s shoulder. Another minute or two passed before Draco sighed and stepped back out of Harry’s embrace. He smoothed down his hair and ran a hand across his face and eyes, even though he had looked as composed as ever.
"I should-"
"Harry, what’s taking so long?" Hermione asked, stepping into the kitchen. "Oh," she said upon seeing Draco, seemingly as struck by the thought of a Malfoy in the Burrow as he had been. She seemed to get over it quicker though, moving on to glancing between the two of them. "What’s going on?" she asked with a raised eyebrow.
It was only when Draco took a step back that Harry realised they’d still been in each other’s personal space.
"I have to go back to Hogwarts," Harry told her.
"Oh dear," she responded quietly.
"Well, I should be going," Draco said, stepping toward the floo. He hesitated for a moment, "Would it be okay if Albus visited the Manor later on in the holiday? Children grieve differently to adults, it might be easier for Scorpius if he had someone his own age to talk to."
"I’ll talk to Ginny," Harry said.
"Good luck," Draco responded with a half smile which Harry returned. "And Harry, thank you."
"Anytime," Harry smiled.
Draco looked at him speculatively, "Really?"
"‘Course. That’s what friends are for."
"Right," Draco nodded and offered a small smile before throwing some floo powder into the hearth, calling out ‘Malfoy Manor’ and stepping through.
He turned round to face Hermione who was looking at him enquiringly, "Harry, what’s going on?"
* * *
Read on with part fourteen
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I actually just noticed that myself and changed it! Thanks for pointing it out though, its that sort of thing that you tend to miss when you proof read yourself, because you know it so well you know what it's supposed to say so kinda glance over what it actually says!
Hopefully the next part will be up soon, just have to finish it off and give it a read through. Thanks again! :)