Fourth Year
So Albus jumps off the train and Scorpius follows (to the end of the earth if need be) and then they tumble through time and live through horror and pain and fear they'd never imagined.
Scorpius isn't the only one with panic attacks and nightmares now, but it takes a while to know that because they're so exhausted from their classes and the detentions Professor McGonnagall has set. Detentions where she asks them questions nobody ever has before, and listens more closely to their answers, and to the things they don't say too.
Professor McGonnagall meets with Professor Longbottom, and comes away thin lipped with fire in her eyes. For the first time she has sharp words for the portrait of Albus Dumbledore in her office. She meets with Ginny and Harry and Draco and all four of them come away shaken at the bullying and cruelty occurring under their noses, that they've ignored or missed or inadvertently participated in.
Draco is the one who looks to the Muggle world to learn about mental health, remembering some of the books Astoria had introduced him to early in their relationship, and when they learned she was pregnant with Scorpius, and when she learned she would not live to see him grow up.
Draco and Neville Longbottom meet as well, and strike up an odd friendship. Draco thinks Neville is one of the bravest people he's ever met for the way he lived through the war and returned to teach the youngsters, and learned to be what he didn't have aside from Professor Lupin for a while. Neville thinks the love Draco has for his son and his drive to be better for Scorpius is the best thing he's ever seen. (The two read so much, they will later determine to pursue Muggle education in counseling and psychology, to see how they can benefit the wizarding world.)
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When the nightmares do start for Albus and Scorpius (again) they're bad... the other guys start to show signs of sleep loss as they can't quite muffle the screams or sobbing from the other side of the curtain, even if it blocks the light they always keep burning.
Albus' nightmares are mostly of Scorpius being tortured. Sometimes it's with the cruciatus curse, by Delphi or by Voldemort himself. Sometimes it's other ways, with fists or whips or knives. Sometimes Scorpius is dead and more than once Albus wakes from a dream where he's sitting in a pool of blood to find that it's his own sweat. He can't breathe until he sees Scorpius, touches him and knows that he's alive and safe. Sometimes he dreams of his grandparents, and sometimes of his parents or his sweet, fierce little sister or big, annoying, beloved brother or stupid, dear cousins, but mostly it begins and ends with Scorpius.
Scorpius' nightmares are of that dreadful Other Time when he was the Scorpion King and tortured screams filled the halls, or of his father pinning his head painfully to his desk, or of receiving the cruciatus curse. Sometimes Albus is one of the students being tortured in his dreams, and sometimes he's being killed while Scorpius receives the cruciatus. He can't stop crying until he sees Albus, feels his warmth and solidity.
More often than not they end the night in one bed even if they don't start it that way, wrapping around each other to take or give comfort and safety. It's the only thing that seems to help right now. It started with Albus. One night when Scorpius is screaming in his sleep, body locked in a painful spasm, Albus tries to wake him, tries to sit by him and rub his back as he has a hundred times, but Scorpius won't wake. Albus is terrified and can't stop crying himself as he wraps his whole body around his friend just like he used to do when Lily was small, just like James or his mother used to do for him. Scorpius is surprised to wake up surrounded by warmth and Albus' arms, but when he hears Albus crying the next night ("no, not Scorpius, no, I'll do anything") he timidly slips in and holds his friend. Albus wakes and holds him back so fiercely and protectively that Scorpius feels like his heart might burst, as starved for touch as he has been since his mother's death.
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When term ends, Professor McGonnagall is as good as her word and keeps Albus and Scorpius at Hogwarts. It isn't until she meets with them the first afternoon that they understand fully that her focus is no longer to punish them, but to protect them from whatever demons drove them to this point.
Professor McGonnagall sits them down and tells them that the Slytherin House Elves have an idea, to add a more permanent wall in their dorm room, so that they won't disrupt the other boys. She doesn't say so that it will save them embarrassment, though she knows it will. The House Elves are very fond of the boys, especially Scorpius, after the past three and a half years.
She also says that she will allow them to invite their parents for Christmas Day, for the feast in the Great Hall and for an evening in the common room where they are the only students staying for the holiday. She says that the choice is theirs, and some of her fears are laid to rest when both boys tentatively say that they'd like this.
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Harry cries when he reads the invitation from Albus, which reads "Dear Dad and Mum, Professor McGonnagall says that you can come join us for Christmas Day. It's okay if you don't want to, I know it would mess up the Weasley Family Christmas and take you away from Lily and James. I'm sorry. Maybe it's a bad idea. But maybe you could come for a little while, and then go back? I miss you, Albus". It's all Harry can do to write back calmly "Dear Albus, We'll be there. We miss you and love you. Dad" instead of going to the school immediately to hold his prickly, still broken, but dearly loved son.
Draco cries too, when he reads "Dear Dad, Please come for Christmas Day. Professor McGonnagall says you can and I miss you, Dad. I need you, and I need you not to be alone for Christmas. Please come." There are water spots on the parchment and a tiny "Love, Scorpius" in the corner that's so shaky he can barely read it. He writes back to say "Dear Scorpius, Of course I will come. I love you more than anything and I'm so glad you are my son. D" He feels awkward adding an xoxo but he knows it's what Astoria always did, so he does too. He doesn't know that Scorpius will keep it under his pillow for weeks and then on his desk, where he can see it when he wakes or when he studies, next to his picture of Astoria.
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Ginny and Harry and Draco all arrive early on Christmas day. They sit rather bemusedly in Professor McGonnagall's study with their sons, drinking tea and nibbling biscuits until the midday feast. Draco watches his son lean into Albus, seeming to soak up comfort. At the feast, Harry manages to forget his own memories and really watch his son, seeing how he flinches a little from the Gryffindor banners and tree and looks away from the long House tables as though he's afraid they may bite. Draco looks at how wistfully Scorpius gazes at the sparkling trees, how sweetly he smiles at the lights and the enchanted snow flurries. Both fathers are learning things they didn't know, or have forgotten.
After the feast, the Potters walk around the grounds, Ginny watching as her husband pays deep attention to the ways Albus' experiences DON'T mirror his own, maybe for the first time. She watches Harry really listen to his son, to how much he likes Potions and Herbology and how he wishes he could draw better. She sees Harry listening to what Albus doesn't say too - nothing about Quidditch, or parties, or friends other than Scorpius.
Draco and Scorpius go to the Slytherin Common Room. Over a game of chess, Draco listens to his son talk about his studies, and finally tells him how proud he is of the grades Scorpius is getting. Scorpius goes pink with pleasure and surprise in a way that shatters Draco's heart, and it's broken anew when he moves too quickly standing up to take a plate of cookies from a House Elf, and Scorpius flinches away from his hand. It takes some time but finally he gets Scorpius to explain exactly what that dark version of himself did to his son, how he hurt him. It ends with him holding Scorpius like a child, stroking his head and neck, promising never to do that. Scorpius curls into him like a cat, like he used to with his mother, and Draco finds that he doesn't mind rumpling his charcoal gray robes or having them soaked with tears one bit, as long as Scorpius is no longer looking at him with those haunted, frightened eyes.
The Potters join them in the common room later and they sit around the fire, toasting muffins and marshmallows and eating chocolate and Harry finally understands that his son loves these quiet times, the calm, the lack of teasing jokes. To Ginny's deep satisfaction she watches their son lean into his father's shoulder like a much younger child, and when he thanks them both for coming, apologizes for messing up their plans and their day, Harry holds him so close and tells him that they are both glad to be right where they are this year.
Both boys sleep soundly that night.
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The nightmares return, of course they do, but they're managing. Professor Longbottom has asked that they serve their remaining detention with him and if he happens to include them in some meditation exercises that he swears are good for the plants, well, that's ok. If he happens to mention his own nightmares after the Battle of Hogwarts, and how the breathing patterns could help him calm down, if he happens to mention a few books about the after effects of the cruciatus curse...
Strangely, the boys find that their adventure has brought some measure of respect if not friendship from at least the older students. While they both have nightmares and horror over Craig's senseless, needless death it seems that being targeted by an insane killer as the Hogwarts rumor mill would paint it isn't something other students find shameful. And while most students might not quite believe that those two could face Unforgivable Curses, they also don't quite disbelieve it, not when James and Lily Potter and Rose Granger-Weasley support the rumors.
So their fourth year passes, and they still haven't gone to Hogsmeade, and still don't have a lot of friends, but as they part for the summer they both think that maybe, maybe next year will finally be Their Year.