Becoming

Draco spent the next few hours scrubbing his kitchen and doing laundry. The mundane tasks of parenthood filled his precious few quiet hours. Having spent most of his free weekend with Hermione, he tried to get two days worth of tasks done in three hours. With magic, he accomplished most things and was writing out a shopping list for their next market trip when his Floo chimed.

Hermione stood in his sitting room, looking exhausted. It was only just past three, which didn't bode well. Draco led her into the kitchen and put the kettle on.

"What happened?" Draco asked as he pulled some tea from the cabinet.

"Harry and Ginny took it quite well. They're excited for us. I got passed around all the Weasley women for a while, and was given far too much advice and heard far too many birthing stories. Most of the Weasleys don't seem to care that you're her father, frankly."

"But?" He knew there had to be a but.

"Ron showed up partway through the party. He wasn't supposed to be there, initially, as he was running the shop. It didn't take him long to notice, though." Hermione's hair had been taken down from its loose plait at some point, and she dragged her fingers through it tiredly.

"He was shocked, which made sense. Everyone else was, too -- but the Weasleys are very understanding of my need for privacy, especially with Ron around. And I don't trust Ron enough to tell him about you just yet, so he got quite angry and said some incredibly nasty things about my character."

Draco felt a coil of anger start in his chest. He knew exactly what sort of hurtful words Weasley would have chosen to throw around.

"I asked everyone else to not share your identity with Ron yet, because of his actions in the past, and it made him even angrier that no one else would tell him."

Draco watched Hermione closely as she recounted the reaction.

"He said some rude things about my previous relationships, and then Ginny hit him with a curse. His wife took him home shortly after, but the damage was done."

"I hope the curse was a good one."

"Ginny's Bat Bogey is a force to be reckoned with." Hermione's lips twitched in the first sign of amusement. "If you've never seen a handful of kids chasing a grown man who has enormous, painful, slimy snot-bats hanging out of his nose around a rooftop garden, you haven't really lived."

"Remind me to send her flowers," he remarked drily as he slid a cup of tea in front of Hermione.

"It's her speciality for a reason. But by and large, everyone else reacted quite positively. Molly and Arthur are excited for me, but they're quite suspicious about your identity."

"Why didn't you tell them?"

"They would have told Ron," she said simply. She sipped at her tea before continuing. "Molly and Arthur are part of the generation where children out of wedlock are a really negative thing, so they're concerned for my reputation. But it will be its own sort of difficult conversation with them because of their history with your family."

Well, Draco appreciated her bluntness, at least.

"I can hardly fault them for that."

Hermione levelled him with a sharp gaze. "You're not your parents, Draco. You've quite proven yourself to be a totally different person over the last decade. If they won't trust my decisions based on their past interactions with people who are literally not involved in our relationship and are, in fact, not even currently living, then that's on them -- not you."

"I didn't want to come between you and your family, Granger," Draco said quietly. He nervously fiddled with his own cup of tea.

"They're not much of a family if they can't get over their own prejudices and see you the way I do." Hermione's voice was hot with anger.

A beat of silence followed.

"Would -- would it be helpful if I were to come with you to tell them?" Draco cringed at the uncertain tone of his own question.

Hermione's shocked look was hard to decipher.

"I couldn't ask you to do that, Draco."

"Why not? I'll need to face them eventually -- they're your family, and Scorpius will want to know them, too."

Hermione's face softened at the mention of Scorpius. She chewed on her lip as she thought about it.

"Let's just get through tonight, and we'll talk about it later," she said after a while.

Draco nodded his understanding, and they dropped the subject. A glance at the clock above the stove told him it was a quarter to four.

"I'll be heading to the Greengrasses shortly."

"Would you like me to come back later?"

"Stay. Scorp will be thrilled to see you when we come back through."

Hermione nodded, a crooked smile appearing on her tense face.

"Make yourself comfortable in the sitting room. I just need to grab something from my office before I leave."

Draco led Hermione to the sitting room and put her tea down on the side table before he slipped into his office across the entry hall.

The letter he had written for the Greengrasses was sealed on his desk, along with a separate missive of thanks for Daphne. Scorp's grandparents, while doting on him, were not overly fond of Draco and often did not come to see Scorp off. He hoped this would work in his favour today and he'd be able to hand off the letters to Daphne alone. Perhaps it was the easy way out, relying on Daphne, but Draco couldn't bring himself to care much.

When he returned to the sitting room, Hermione had curled herself into a ball on the couch, and she was reading a random book pulled from his shelves. She looked exhausted, and Draco's heart wrenched again at the thought of the Weasley who had done this to her.

Without giving himself time to overthink, he crossed the room and stood in front of her. Startled, Hermione raised her head to look at him. He leaned down and pressed a kiss to her forehead, and when he pulled away, he was pleased to see a lazy smile on her face.

"I'll be back shortly," he promised.

There was no one in the room when Draco arrived at the Greengrass estate, but Scorpius came running through soon enough. He was trailed closely by Daphne, who was holding his overnight bag. Both gave him genuine smiles as they saw him.

"Dad! I'm hungry!"

Draco snatched Scorpius up and sat him on his hip, chuckling.

"I'm not surprised, Scorp. I think you might be going through a growth spurt."

"He's been eating everything in sight all day," Daphne said with a laugh. She handed Scorp's bag over, and Draco slung it over his shoulder.

"Did you have a good time?"

Scorp nodded enthusiastically. "I got to play with Auntie Daph's new Cruppy. Francis is afraid of it."

"An early Yule gift from their father," sighed Daphne. "She’s a terror."

Draco grinned at the look of consternation on her face. "Good luck," he offered lightly.

"Her name is Fork," Scorpius said proudly.

"That's… a very nice name." Draco barely choked back the laugh. "Where are your grandparents?"

Scorpius only shrugged.

"Having tea with the Parkinsons," Daphne answered.

"Hey, Scorp, why don't you go double-check your room and make sure you have everything? I need to talk to Auntie Daph for a minute."

Scorp wiggled down off his hip, and Draco watched him run out. Once he was out of earshot, Draco dug the letters out of his pocket.

"I can sense some new developments since we spoke yesterday." Daphne took the letters and tucked them into the pocket of her robes.

"Quite a few."

"The love bite on your neck merely being one of them."

Draco cleared his throat nervously. Daphne smirked.

"You could say that," Draco muttered. "We're sending a statement to the Prophet for their Friday issue."

"I will intercept any interview inquiries that arrive," Daphne interrupted.

"I appreciate that. If you're comfortable providing a quote to appease the rabid wolves at the papers, that letter for you has the details we've worked out so far. I'll leave that to your discretion, though."

"Excellent. I'll provide the letter to my parents this evening."

"I'm also setting up new wards at home. I'll be limiting Floo signatures and owls, and yours will be permitted. I'm blocking them for the time being, so if they're unreasonable, please reach out to me and I can schedule tea with them for one day to discuss their concerns."

"Frankly, Draco, I'm looking forward to this confrontation. This reckoning has been a long time coming for them." Daphne's smile was undeniably wicked.

Draco nodded at her, the corners of his eyes crinkled with amusement.

"Will you be informing Scorpius this week?"

"Granger's waiting," Draco jerked his head to indicate the Floo. "We're having dinner and sitting down with him this evening."

Daphne nodded her approval, but Draco could sense some hesitancy in her silence.

"What is it, Daph?"

"I know it's not my place to request an audience with Granger, but I'd quite like the opportunity to meet with her at some point."

"Oh?"

"I've always admired her intelligence and passion, even if I've not always seen eye to eye with her. The few times we worked together at Hogwarts were quite pleasant. She's clearly going to be part of Scorpius' life, and I'd like to offer my support to her directly, and get to know her now that we're both adults."

Scorpius came running into the room just then. A reddish puppy with a forked tail was on his heels, yipping and jumping around him.

"Dad, it's Fork!" Scorpius cried gleefully.

Draco met Daphne's eyes and nodded firmly. He would speak with Hermione about Daphne's interest.

Redirecting his attention to Scorp, he dropped to one knee to greet the rambunctious pup. "Pleasure to meet you, Fork," Draco said seriously. He held his hand out for the Crup pup to sniff, and it did so excitedly.

"Can we get one?" Scorpius asked breathlessly.

"I'm not sure about a Crup, Scorp. We can talk about pets another time, though. Maybe after the holidays. But we've got to get home -- Hermione's waiting for you."

Scorpius started jumping up and down, and rushed over to wrap Daphne's legs in an excited hug. She laughed and bent down to scoop him up into a proper hug, kissing him soundly on the cheek.

"Go on then, you two. Have a good dinner."

"It's spasketti night!" Scorp added. He started dragging Draco back toward the hearth.

"Thanks, Daph," he said seriously. She offered a warm smile in return.

"Bye, Auntie Daph!"

The Floo trip was quick - Scorpius was well-used to tucking himself tightly to Draco's legs as they began spinning. Today, instead of stepping calmly out of the fireplace with Draco, Scorpius tumbled out quickly and rounded on Hermione.

"Mia! Hi! It's spasketti night!"

"Is it now?" Hermione set her book down on the sofa as Scorp went barrelling toward her. He launched himself at her, clambering onto her lap to wrap his arms around her neck.

Hermione returned the hug enthusiastically. Scorpius wasn't large for his age, so he fit quite well on her shrinking lap.

Draco left them to catch up and headed for the stairs. As he made his way to Scorp's room to put his overnight bag away, he could hear him excitedly telling Hermione about Fork. The sound of her giggle followed him up the stairs.

When he returned to the sitting room, Scorpius was still cuddled on Hermione's lap.

"-- was Crookshanks, and he had a face that looked kind of squished. He was incredibly fluffy and ginger."

"I've never met a cat before," Scorp said, his four-year-old face screwed up with thought.

"Crookshanks was a very special cat. He was part Kneazle, and Kneazles are very smart. He could understand you when you talked to him, and he could sense magic. He lived with me at school."

"You can have pets at school?"

"At Hogwarts, you can."

"Any pet?"

"Some pets," Hermione corrected. "You can have cats, owls, rats, or toads."

"Dad, did you have a pet?"

"I didn't, but your Auntie Daph and your mum had an owl they shared." Draco sat on the sofa next to them.

"What was its name? What colour was it?"

"I don't know what its name was, but it was a brown owl. You'll have to ask Auntie Daph next time you see her."

Scorp nodded happily. "I like owls, but they don't snuggle."

"No, they don't really like that, do they?"

"Do you have an owl, Mia?"

"I do. I think you might have met her last week. Her name is Gertrude."

"The yellow one, right?"

"She's kind of yellow, yes. She's what's called a tawny owl."

"Our owl is called Brutus."

"I know. He's a very big owl, too."

"His feathers are longer than my arm! Wait, I'll show you!" Scorpius launched himself off of her and raced up the stairs.

“He collects the wing feathers,” Draco explained. Hermione grinned.

“Every child should have a collection,” Hermione nodded.

“What did you collect?”

“Books.”

“Ah.” Draco felt his lips twitch, but he kept a straight face. Hermione nudged him with her elbow anyway.

“Did you collect anything?”

“When I was Scorp’s age, I collected rocks. My father destroyed them when I was seven – hit them with a Reducto right in front of me – but I have fond memories of hunting for the perfect specimens on the grounds of the Manor.”

Hermione sighed and stretched her hand out to brush his own where it rested on his knee. Before she could respond, Scorp came barrelling back into the room. He had several large, black feathers in his hand, and he brandished them at Hermione.

“These are quite beautiful,” Hermione said. “Does Brutus mind that you keep his feathers?”

Scorpius shrugged and looked at Draco. Draco responded. “He always makes sure to leave them where Scorp can find them. I think he’s rather chuffed about it.”

“That’s quite sweet. He must really like you, Scorp.”

“I like him, too.” Scorp counted out his feathers, placing them one-by-one on Hermione’s lap.

“Dad, can we have bread with the spasketti tonight?”

“Sure. I think we can do that. What vegetable do you want?”

Scorpius drew his lips up in a sneer that had Hermione choking back a laugh. She disguised it as a cough.

“Those long bean things.”

“Sounds great. Do you like pole beans, Granger?”

Hermione started to answer, but Scorp cut her off. “What’s a Granger?”

“That’s my surname,” Hermione answered smoothly.

“Why did Dad call you that?”

“It’s what he used to call me when we were in school together. I used to call him by his surname, too.”

“That’s weird.”

Draco chuckled. “I suppose it is. It was just something we did with people who weren’t our friends. I used to call her Granger because we weren’t friends in school, and it's still a habit now.”

“I used to call your uncle Theo by his last name, too,” Hermione added.

“But you and Dad are friends now?” Scorpius looked back and forth between the two of them suspiciously.

“We are,” Hermione stated firmly. “Sometimes people don’t get along with each other when they’re young, but as we grow older and our lives change, we find out we have more in common and we get along.”

“Is it like Ronin at school? Auntie Padma tells us we all have to be nice even if we aren’t friends. He says he doesn’t like me, but I want to be everyone’s friend.”

Draco was troubled by this news, and drew Scorpius up onto his lap.

“Is Ronin mean to you?”

“Not really,” Scorp answered. He picked at the feather in his hand. “He just doesn’t want to play with me during free time. He said that he wasn’t allowed.”

“Did you tell Auntie Padma?”

Scorp shook his head and shrugged. “I have lots of other friends. It’s okay if Ronin doesn’t want to play with me. Maybe we’ll be friends when we get bigger, like you and Mia.”

“Do you know what Ronin’s surname is?” Draco asked. He tried very hard to keep his tone lighthearted.

Scorpius shook his head. “He only comes to school sometimes. He’s not there every day.”

“I’ll talk to Auntie Padma, okay?”

Scorpius nodded, and slid out of Draco’s lap. “Can I put cheese on the bread?”

And just like that, seriousness went out the window in favour of food. Draco stood and offered his hand to Hermione. They followed Scorp as he skipped into the kitchen.

"Do you want to help cook tonight?" Draco asked Scorp lightly.

"I want to put the spasketti in."

"Spaghetti," Draco reminded.

"Spaghetti, right." Scorpius nodded solemnly.

"What can I do to help?" Hermione requested.

Draco dug around in the refrigerator for the pole beans. "These will need cleaned and snapped, if you'd like.

Hermione took the bowl and smiled at the colourful beans. "Of course."

They quickly busied themselves with preparations, and before long, the pasta water was coming to a boil and Scorp's favourite tomato sauce was heating up on the back of the hob. The pole beans were tossed with olive oil and set to roast in the oven alongside Scorp's cheesy bread (though his own slice seemed to be more cheese than bread). Draco had dressed his and Hermione's with some crushed garlic and pepper in addition to the soft cheese.

When it was time to put the spaghetti in, Scorp dragged his stool over to stand by the hob. Hermione looked on, bemused, as he dropped the noodles in by the handful.

"You're an excellent sous chef," she remarked as Scorpius stirred the pasta pot with a big wooden spoon.

"What's that?"

"It's like an assistant to the main chef."

"Cool."

"So did you have a good time with your grandparents?" Hermione asked, helping Scorpius down from his stool.

"Uh-huh. The puppy was fun. And my cousins played with me in the garden. We rode our brooms."

"That's very exciting. How many cousins do you have?"

"Three. Delilah and Michel are older, and Francis is a baby."

"Francis is almost two, Scorp," Draco corrected. "He's not quite a baby anymore."

"I liked him when he was a baby. He laughed a lot. Now he wants to play with my toys."

"Do you like playing with him?" Hermione asked.

"Yeah. He doesn't really talk yet, but I like him. Delilah and Michel play more together than they do with me, but Auntie Daph says it's because they grew up close together and are best friends."

"Sometimes siblings are like that," Hermione said evenly. "My friend Ginny had two older brothers who were twins, and they spent all their time together, so they didn't play with Ginny very much because she was too young."

"Twins?"

Draco fumbled with an explanation. "Sometimes instead of one baby, a family can have two that are the exact same age. That's called twins."

"Your Auntie Padma is a twin," Hermione added. "Her twin sister's name is Parvati, and they look almost exactly the same."

"That's cool. Auntie Padma has two kids, but they're older than me, too. Do you want babies, Mia?"

Draco felt as startled as Hermione looked, and exchanged a wide-eyed look with her.

"Actually, Scorp --" Draco began. He was interrupted by the timer on his wand going off.

"Spasketti's done, Dad!"

Draco took advantage of the distraction to direct the pasta over to the sink to drain. Hermione caught his eye and shrugged. Might as well. When he returned it to the stove and portioned out some for Scorp, he tried again.

"We actually have something we want to tell you about babies, Scorp." Draco tried to keep his tone light as he rushed to finish the pasta preparations.

"What?"

"You know how we've been talking about how you want more family?"

"Uh-huh."

"Well, Hermione and I are going to be having a baby together. She's pregnant, which means you're going to have a little sister soon."

Scorpius was quiet for a long moment, and Draco turned to see his face screwed up in confusion.

"But Mia's not my mum. How can I have a sister?"

Hermione stepped in. "Your mum and dad had you together, but your dad and I are also going to have a baby."

"Are you going to be my mum, instead?" Scorpius looked even more confused.

Hermione smiled gently at him. “Your mum was incredibly special, and she will always be your mum, even if she’s not here anymore. I’m not going to take that from her, or from you. She’s your family because you came from her and your dad. And because your dad is going to be my baby's dad, too, it means she'll technically be your half-sister because you both have the same dad but different mums. I’ll be your sister’s mum, but you don’t have to call me that. You can keep calling me Mia. You and I can choose to be family, though, if you want.”

“Like Auntie Padma?”

“Yes,” Draco added. “Auntie Daph is your auntie because your mum was her sister. Auntie Padma is your auntie because she loves you very much and we chose to be family.”

“Don’t grown-ups have to be married to have babies?”

“Nope,” Hermione said brightly. “Lots of people do get married before they get pregnant, though. Most of your friends’ parents probably got married before they had babies, but sometimes people have babies without being married. And sometimes people get married and then never have their own babies. Two of my very best friends are also having a baby soon, and they're not married either. The grown-ups just have to do something special to try and sometimes it works and they get pregnant.”

“How do you get pregnant?”

“After your dad and I became friends again, we did something really important with each other's bodies that older people can do. It's called sex, and we got lucky and it made a baby. Have you ever planted seeds in a garden?”

“We did that at school this summer. We planted flowers.” Scorpius nodded, and Hermione continued.

“What your dad and I did was kind of like planting flowers. When you planted seeds, you had to make sure to water them when they needed it, and made sure they got lots and lots of sun, right? And then they sprouted, and got bigger and bigger. Well, we took this tiny bit from my body that's almost like a seed, and your dad and I gave her everything from our bodies that she needed to start growing. And it worked and after a little while, she got bigger and bigger, just like those seeds that sprouted and started growing leaves. And when she’s done growing in me, I’ll go to the Healers and they’ll help me get her out. And then you’ll be able to meet her.”

Scorpius seemed to accept this explanation in stride, and he watched Hermione curiously as Hermione lifted her jumper to show him where his sister was held safely within her belly. Scorp leaned over the counter to poke at Hermione's skin, tracing a small finger over one of her stretch marks. Scorp looked up at Hermione thoughtfully and she grinned at him.

“What will she look like?”

“We don’t know exactly, because she’s not finished growing so we can only see parts of her with magic or with technology. But she’ll probably look a little bit like you and your dad, and a little bit like me. Her hair will probably be darker, and her skin will probably be a different colour than yours and your dad’s since mine is different.”

“When will she be done growing?”

“In a couple of months. You’ll get to meet her in January or February. She’ll probably be really little when she gets here though.”

“Is she really little now?”

Hermione took an apple from the bowl on the counter, and used her wand to enlarge it a little before handing it to Scorp. “She’s about this big right now, all curled up with lots of soft cushion in my body.”

“I’ve never seen a baby this little before!” Scorp exclaimed, his eyes wide.

Hermione smiled widely. “She’s still got a lot of growing to do, and she’s staying safe inside my belly till she gets bigger.”

Scorp turned the apple around in his hands, his face screwed up in concentration. He looked from the apple to Hermione, and back again.

“Do you want to know her name before we go eat dinner, Scorp?” Draco asked gently.

“Uh-huh,” he turned to Draco quickly.

“Her name is Sage.”

“Sage? That’s it?”

“Yep.”

“That’s so much easier to say than my name!” Scorpius spluttered disbelievingly.

Draco and Hermione both laughed, and Draco leaned down to scoop Scorpius up into a hug. “She’ll have a longer surname, though, since Hermione and I have different ones. She’ll have both of our surnames, so her name might be hard for her to learn to say, too.”

“What is it?”

“Sage Granger-Malfoy,” Hermione answered. “We don’t know if she’s going to have a middle name yet.”

“That’s a pretty long name, I guess.” Scorpius wiggled out of Draco’s arms, so Draco put him back on his feet. “Can we eat now?”

“Of course!”