If there was one thing that Draco Malfoy couldn’t resist, it was a farmers market. So naturally, when Astoria Greengrass has taken him to a muggle Christmas market on their third date, he had fallen in love with a christmassy market, wandering around with the scent of cinnamon in the air, breath foggy on the chilly evening breeze and the dazzling Christmas lights that had melted away the ice cold defences he had put up around his heart, and as he danced to the upbeat muggle Christmas songs with the girl who was to be the love of his life, he had never felt so happy.
Every year, the Malfoy family made it their tradition to visit as many Christmas markets up and down the country. When Scorpius came along and they discovered he had his mother’s love for singing, they joined several muggle choirs and took him along to sing Christmas carols at the market, before rewarding him with a gingerbread hot chocolate. Draco would stand and listen as his wife and son practiced Christmas carols in the dining room before their first ‘gig’ of the year, a tear silently dampening his cheek, salty with the overwhelming love he felt for the little family they had built.
Scorpius raced down the hallway, almost skidding into one of the Malfoy's ancient family heirlooms. He loved his fluffy socks that his godmother Luna had given to him as a gift for his last birthday, but god were they impractical for the shiny manor floors, Scorpius spent most of his time in a state of excitement, slipping and sliding around, he had just finished his last lesson of homeschool for Christmas break, and was grabbing his scarf and bobble hat so they could take a family trip down to their first Christmas market of the year. Luna was coming along with them as she did most years, wanting to cheer on Scorpius and his mum as they sang.
The four of them apperated to a little village in the south of England. Scorpius pulled his scarf closer to him, the frost on the air attacking his cheeks to a shade of soft pink. They found the muggle carol singers without a problem, and Luna and Draco took their places in the growing crowd of people waiting to hear the merry songs signalling the start of the Christmas season.
Although Scorpius sung in carol concerts up and down the country throughout December, he still felt the nerves churning around in his stomach. Astoria could tell he was getting anxious, his foot tapping up and down on the wooden stage gave him away, and she grabbed his hand and gave it a reassuring squeeze.
The song started up and Scorpius closed his eyes and launched himself into it, it was one of his favourites ‘Silent night’
He got midway through the song when he dared to peek an eye open, and glance at the crowd of people they were singing to.
He spotted Luna and Draco instantly, Luna was in a world of her own, swaying out of time to the music, but thoroughly enjoying herself. Draco stood with a proud smile on his face, and sent Scorpius a big thumbs up when he made eye contact. His eyes scanned the rest of the crowd, and his heart fluttered and spun when his eyes locked onto the most beautiful pair of forest green eyes he’d ever seen.
Albus was incredibly pleased to have just finished his first term back at his sixth year at Hogwarts, he had spent the term yearning to be back in his room, sharing cuddles with his inky black cat Yoda, and painting whatever and whenever he wanted. However he had barely stepped into his house, before the Potter family were on the move again. Last summer, his elder brother James had fallen head over heels in love with a muggle girl called Evelyn who lived just down the street from them. He had been absolutely hopeless, spending every day getting up to mischief with her, baking her cookies and he had even joined the band she had created. Albus had never seen his brother so infatuated with someone. Typically James fell a little bit in love with someone new every single day, it was rather tiresome to Albus to have to watch the millions of girls he had been with’s hearts break after he had moved on within a day, but ever since meeting Evelyn his brother had shown no interest in anyone who wasn’t her. She didn’t know about any of the magic stuff, and Albus suspected that was one of the reasons his brother liked her so much, she was friends with him because of his Jamesness, not because of his dad, saviour of the wizarding world. James had spent most of this term writing letters back and forth with her, after explaining that he attends a ‘boarding’ school in Scotland, as part of a family tradition. James was completely in love with her. The only problem was that he hadn’t told her this yet.
James had excitedly announced that he would be playing in Evelyn’s band tonight at a Christmas market, so obviously the Potter clan had to come out and support him, they rushed out of the house into the cold evening, and Albus slightly regretted not wearing the scarf that his mum had tried to smother him in seconds before they left. Albus walked along with Lily, who was pointing out all the Christmas trees in windows down the street, and discussing which one was her favourite, which she had decided was the one that had a cat hiding amongst its branches, despite Albus telling her that since the cat wasn’t actually a decoration- shouldn’t have been the deciding factor on the favourite, but Lily was having none of it.
They arrived at the town centre where a stage had been set up, and some carol singers were preparing. Just before James rushed off to go join Evelyn waiting to go on stage, Albus pulled him into a hug and told him to break a leg.
All of a sudden, music broke out into the chilly evening. Albus looked up at the stage and his attention was instantly snatched by a lanky blonde boy, who looked his age and was nervously tapping his foot against the wooden floor of the stage, his eyes were scrunched closed but he was singing his heart out. Albus couldn’t bring himself to look away from the boy, he was beautiful, in a dorky sort of way.
And then the boys eyes opened, and Albus felt chills run down his neck. He had the most beautiful misty grey eyes, like a snowstorm was whirling about in amongst his irises.
Scorpius struggled to focus on the words of the carol, his mind was very much focused on the brown haired boy who hadn’t even glanced away from Scorpius for a second. Deciding it was best for the sake of the other carol singers, he scrunched his eyes closed and lost himself in the music.
Astoria guided him through the crowd to where Draco and Luna had been standing, and Scorpius was watching the band set up on the stage where he had just stood, when a blur of ginger hair ran and ambushed his godmother. Awkwardly tagging along behind the rush of ginger, was the boy that had caused Scorpius to fumble on his words and nearly muck up his first carol concert of the year, and right behind him, stood the man who was clearly his father, and then Scorpius’s heart dropped.
“It’s Harry PotTer.” Scorpius had thought but had accidentally squeaked out loud.
Scorpius had spent years reading about the heroic actions of the boy who lived, and desperately wishing he could get to Hogwarts and have a mate to get up to mayhem with just like all the stories he had heard about the chosen one and his friends. He was so desperate to go that he had checked the front cover of the Daily Prophet every single day to make sure he would still be able to attend.
His heart had broken when he saw the headline: Son of Voldemort, with a picture of him attached underneath. He had taken himself up to the library and cried and cried for hours, until his mother found him and managed to cheer him up with a packet of his favourite sweets: fizzing whizzbees.
Draco and Astoria had decided that if the Prophet was attacking an innocent eight year old with horrible rumours of his parentage, it wasn’t safe for him to attend Hogwarts, and the pair of them had gone to special evening classes to top up their teaching skills for their baby boy.
He blinked himself back to reality as Luna introduced him to the Potters. He noticed his dad awkwardly shaking Harry’s hand and remembered how they had once been childhood rivals, but for the most part seemed to be putting that behind them as they animatedly started discussing their favourite quidditch teams and the Christmas season.
Lily was hugging onto Luna and the older women were all engrossed in a conversation, leaving Scorpius alone with the brown haired boy, Albus.
“You were really great at singing up there.” Albus spoke quietly, voice full of admiration, until he quickly added “the whole eyes closed thing really completed the look.”
Scorpius laughed hard at this, the snowstorm of nerves at speaking to this gorgeous boy settling at the bottom of his stomach.
“Do you sing a lot then?” Albus asked.
“My mum used to sing Christmas songs all the time when I was little, and I used to want to do everything she did, so I obviously spent hours using my dads wand as an imaginary microphone dancing around the house pretending I was a singer, and that was when they decided to sign me and my mum up for a Christmas choir!”
Albus laughed at the mental image he had of a little blonde boy using a wand way too big for him as a microphone, and then remembered they were at a muggle Christmas market. “You might want to keep your voice down about the magic there.” He winked as he said it to reassure Scorpius it was fine, everybody was so distracted with all the Christmas lights and the buzz of holiday cheer that he doubted anyone was listening in to the boys as they chatted away.
“So how come you’re at our little towns Christmas market then?” Albus asked inquisitively. “It’s just, I’m sure I would have noticed someone with hair as blonde as that in our village! And I thought I’d know most magical children from Hogwarts!”
“Oh, I er, I don’t go to Hogwarts, you see, my parents homeschool me.” Scorpius could feel himself start to get sad, the way he always did when he thought about Hogwarts, so he quickly changed the subject, “My parents like to travel up and down England and attend as many Christmas markets as possible, it’s been a tradition of theirs for a long time now, and mum likes us to sing in the -“
Scorpius was cut off by the sound of the band starting up. “That’s my brothers band!” Albus informed him, and the two of them turned around to watch, shoulders accidentally brushing and sending a load of fireworks down Scorpius’s spine.
The band had started off with “Fairytale of New York” a song that Albus knew was Evelyn’s favourite, James was playing the drums with a huge grin on his face, and Albus knew instantly that something had finally happened between the pair of them and made a mental note to pester him about it later.
Throughout the set, Scorpius could feel Albus shivering next to him, and noticed his lack of warm clothing, so offered him to share his scarf, and wrapped the pair of them closer together, he didn’t know what had come over him, but there was something about Albus’s wide smile that made him feel like he truly was Malfoy the unanxious!
All too soon the last chord of the song rang out and Scorpius felt his heart sink as Albus detangled himself from the scarf. That was until Albus asked him if he wanted to accompany him around the market and his heart leaped out of his chest.
He had quickly ran and told his mum he was going to wander about with his new friend, and Astoria had smiled at the pair of them with a knowing twinkle in her eye as she waved them off.
The boys were enchanted by all the little stalls selling handcrafted goods or warm roasted chestnuts, and chatted away as they walked.
Scorpius learnt that Albus loved magical creatures, and was desperate to work with them when he left Hogwarts, he spent most of his spare time curled up at his desk in the Slytherin common room painting and sketching them all. He also had a massive soft spot for muggle animals and had made his parents take him to a muggle animal rescue shelter at the age of five and proudly picked out the tiny black cat, who was sitting alone in the back of the pen, rather than playing with the other cats. He and James had named him Yoda (they had gone through a bit of a Star Wars phase after Teddy had shown them the muggle movies when he was looking after them.)
Scorpius had found this absolutely hilarious, he adored anything to do with space or sci-fi, so Star Wars was a big yes for him, He and Draco had gotten really into it and had attended a midnight screening of ‘The Force awakens’ in a muggle cinema, it had been one of Scorpius’s favourite nights of his life, him and his dad went wild on the pick and mix, leading to a very hyper Scorpius.
They were looking at a stall full of delicately handmade decorations, when Scorpius found a little Yoda in a Santa hat bauble, and insisted on buying it for Albus, on the condition that Albus would send him a photo of Yoda the cat, with Yoda the bauble.
Scorpius’s feet had begun to tire, so when Albus suggested stopping and grabbing something to drink, he was very relived. Albus ordered a coffee, and Scorpius couldn’t help but order the most sugar filled gingerbread hot chocolate, with puffy clouds of whipped cream and sprinkles of cinnamon on top- he had a tradition to uphold after all! Scorpius laughed as he watched Albus fumble around with muggle money, he clearly didn’t have a clue what he was doing, but Scorpius thought he was incredibly cute as he tried and had a chat with the rather sweet old man who was running the stall.
They sat down on a bench, breath warm against the chilly evening air, Albus was laughing at the whipped cream that had somehow ended up on the tip of Scorpius’s nose.
In the distance, he saw James and Evelyn’s bodies pressed tightly together against the trunk of a tree. Albus felt giddy for his brother and in his joyous caffeine filled state found himself wiping the whipped cream off of Scorpius’s nose. The soft glow of the Christmas lights showed the blonde boy’s cheeks blush a pale shade of pink.
A drop of snow landed daintily on Scorpius’s eyelashes, and began falling thick and fast on the pair of them, and Albus pulled Scorpius’s scarf around his neck, pulling them closer together.
Albus was vaguely aware of his brother and his girlfriend walking past them, and James flashed him a huge grin as he sneakily flicked his wand in the boys direction. Scorpius looked up and saw the mistletoe creeping down above them.
“Do you, er, mind if I -“ Scorpius started, but Albus cut him off, pressing his warm lips against the blonde boys.
Scorpius tasted like gingerbread, the first snowflake of winter, and a warm open fire. Albus felt like he was completely at home and melted into the taller boy.
Time became meaningless to them, as they were safe in their own world for god knows how long, until a voice cut through and brought them crashing back to reality.
“Mistletoe is riddled with nargles you know.” Lunas delicate voice rang out.
“What’s a nargle?” Scorpius whispered.
“No idea!” Albus replied.