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“Father, I…um…I have something to tell you.”
Draco watches Lucius lower the newspaper, twists his napkin between his hands in his lap. He’s planned this moment in great detail: the timing – after breakfast, Lucius is at his most mellow after his morning green tea (not that it counts for much, but Draco is willing to take any advantage he can get); the location – in the wicker chairs on the terrace, enjoying the calming view of this year’s wildly prodigious rose garden; the day – Saturday, so Lucius has to leave the house for his club and can’t linger should everything go tits up. Not that the planning has helped much. Draco’s spent even more time imagining all of the excruciating ways in which this could go wrong. Eventually Harry had kissed him to shut him up, then leant in close and said, “I know they’re your parents and the inheritance hangs in the balance and everything, but really, we’ve got wonderful friends and I’m wealthy enough to provide for us if they do cut you off.”
“I’ve always wanted to be a trophy wife,” Draco had sniped back, tightening his arms around Harry and hoping it said what he can’t. Harry’s right about the practicalities. They don’t matter, not really. What does matter is the relationship he’s been rebuilding with his parents, brick by dusty brick; what does matter is the fact that Draco is planning on putting an enormous stone through the metaphorical window that is all the work they’ve done to trust each other again in the aftermath of the war. But he can’t hide, not anymore. He doesn’t want to hide.
Harry had sighed and rested his forehead against Draco’s, one hand coming up to cup his cheek. “I love you; you know? I’m proud of you for wanting to do this.”
“Yeah,” Draco had said. “I know.”
“Yes,” Lucius prompts when Draco falters, raising a haughty platinum eyebrow. Draco is going to vomit. He is. He can’t do this. He can’t. He has to. He’s spent so many years of his life running and hiding; he’s not going to do it any longer. He’s going to be brave.
“Father, I have to tell you that…well, the reason that…I’m gay.”
There is a long silence in which Draco swears every molecule of breathable oxygen in the garden inconveniently disappears. He digs his nails hard into the palms of his hands.
“Draco, I’m very disappointed in you,” his father starts, and Draco’s stomach sinks like a Muggle trading ship in a monstrous hurricane. It’s going to be like he thought. He was a fool to expect anything different. He raises his chin, waits for the worst. Then, “for Merlin’s sake, boy, why didn’t you tell us sooner? All that effort your mother and I put into finding you a future wife at those garden parties when we should have been looking for a future husband!”
Draco blinks, winded. “Excuse me?”
“You heard me, don’t pretend your ears aren’t working,” Lucius snaps, dropping his newspaper onto the table. “Honestly. What do you have to say for yourself?”
“I…um, I’m sorry? I just didn’t think you’d…”
“What do you take me for, some uptight nineteenth-century warlock who cares only for tradition?”
“Um…”
“Of course, you will still need an heir but the technology has come in leaps and bounds, that shouldn’t be an issue. Well. No matter. We must go and find your mother and start planning at once. Come on.”
Lucius gets up and smooths down the front of his green silk lounging robes, and gestures abruptly at Draco before turning on his heel and marching back into the house. Draco, dazed, follows as his father strides down the corridors to his mother’s morning parlour, knocks and shoves the door open.
“Narcissa, the son’s gay,” he announces, loudly. Narcissa looks up from her own magazine, rises gracefully to her feet. Draco hovers in the doorway, unsure, but she meets his eyes and smiles.
“Really?”
“Really. I can’t believe he didn’t tell us. We could have had an arrangement with the Notts or the Shafiqs by now, I hear the second Shafiq son is of that persuasion though he might be spoken for. We might have to look further afield.”
“That might not be a bad thing,” Narcissa hums, patting Lucius on the shoulder. She crosses the room to Draco and opens her arms – mechanically he steps into them, lets her hug him. “I’m glad you told us before anything formal with Miss Parkinson was announced. Does she know, darling?”
“Pansy’s known for years,” Draco gets out.
“Typical,” Lucius rolls his eyes. “You’ve really left us on the back foot, Draco. Nevertheless, I will consult the library this afternoon and make some discreet enquiries amongst our friends. Narcissa, darling, you should plan another party so we can invite the right people to it this time…a couple of weeks should do the trick…”
“Of course,” Narcissa says, kissing Draco’s cheek and gliding back across the room to pick up her notebook. “What’s that emblem all the young gay people are using today? Miss Granger was explaining it to me at the last board meeting – a rainbow? Perhaps we should get one of those flags…encourage donations to a gay charity…”
“This is about finding him a husband, Narcissa.”
“Lucius. We talked about this. Supporting his community and finding him a partner are not mutually exclusive.”
His parents continue on in this baffling vein for a while, discussing potential people they think might be queer, until Draco finally remembers how words work. “I already have a boyfriend,” he says. “So, no matchmaking necessary.”
“What?”
“I already have a-”
“I heard you the first time,” Lucius says. “Who is it?”
Draco takes a deep breath, wondering if he has to be nervous. It’s one thing to come out as gay, it’s quite another to tell them that he’s dating the man who’d nearly brought the downfall of everything they’d held dear. “Harry. Harry Potter.”
There is a moment of awesome, thunderstruck silence. Both of his parents’ expressions have gone totally blank. Draco’s mouth goes dry. Then his father marches forward and claps him on the back, hard enough to hurt, “You marvellous…come here, son, come here.”
“You don’t mind?” Draco asks, tentatively returning his father’s embrace. He can’t remember the last time they’d hugged. This is beyond weird; his friends are going to have a field day.
“Darling,” Narcissa says, in a tone of voice that implies she terribly resents his lack of faith in them, “why would we mind, exactly? He’s a war hero.”
Lucius steps back, grasps Draco’s shoulders. “And the heir to the Black fortune.”
“And a lovely young man, I’m sure,” Narcissa adds.
“But…” Draco pauses. “Am I the only one who remembers the war? You…we…were on opposite sides!”
“Well evidently he’s got over it enough to be with you,” Lucius says. “And anyway, society loves a good reconciliation story. This is the trump card I’ve been waiting for. This is wonderful.”
Narcissa is nodding. “We’ll have him for dinner soon, and then perhaps the two of you can come and visit us when we go on holiday. Has Harry been to Rome yet, darling?”
“No, he hasn’t,” Draco says. “He’d like it.”
“Who doesn’t like Rome,” Narcissa agrees. “Anyway. We shall still throw the party in celebration, and of course we’ll start thinking about wedding planning, it’s never too early…”
*
Draco is standing at the stove in their apartment when he hears the door slam. Like clockwork, he can hear Harry’s boots hitting the skirting board where he always abandons them after a day at work as if they’re not very expensive dragonhide from the best cobbler in Europe. He puts the lasagne into the oven, turns just in time to see Harry come in through the door and shrug off his cloak. He’s in the formal Auror robes that look indecently good on him, and papers are spilling out of his bag. Draco levitates a glass of champagne over to him with a flick of his wand. Harry catches it, confused.
“Alcohol? Are we celebrating or commiserating?”
“I’m not quite sure,” Draco says. “It might be a mix of both.”
“What do you mean?” Harry asks, eyebrows crunching together.
“Don’t look at me like that, the parents are delighted. They’re also going to be utterly unbearable.”
Harry stares at him, evidently baffled. Delighted had definitely not been on Draco’s list of nightmare outcomes. “Delighted?”
“I’m as confused as you are. I had no idea they could be so accepting.” Draco tilts his nose up and does his best impression of his father’s voice, “It doesn’t matter that you’re gay, Draco, it matters that you make an eligible match. And Harry Potter is a very eligible match.”
Harry chokes on his mouthful of champange. “You’re actually joking.”
“I am not. My mother is already picking out colour schemes for the wedding. I told her we’re not even engaged yet but she is very good at not listening to things she doesn’t want to hear.”
“Oh Merlin,” Harry says, and Draco wishes he had a camera to capture the hilarious expression on Harry’s face, feels the smile invade his own.
“Don’t worry. I’ll head her off as long as possible. You might have to put up with an aggressively organised social calendar for the next few months whilst they get over their excitement.”
Harry rubs a hand across his eyes and then crosses the room to put his arms around Draco. Draco hugs him back, breathes in the smell of Harry’s orange-and-cinnamon shampoo, feels his heart beat steadily against Draco’s own.
“I can’t believe it, really,” he says after a while into Harry’s hair.
Harry looks up, goes on tiptoes so he can kiss Draco’s nose. “I can. They love you.”
“And the dynasty.”
“Yeah well, you are the dynasty, aren’t you?”
“You are too, now,” Draco tells him. “I hope you’re ready.”
“As long you’re with me,” Harry says, face very close, “I’m ready for anything.”