SWIP Snip
I’ve already shared one this week, but my brain’s buzzing something rotten and darling @crazybutgood tagged me and just. I’ve been writing this fic since June, keep coming back to it, by far the longest I have (at currently 8 chapters). Featuring thieving Scorpius, grieving Draco and Harry who is... looking. For his way. For them, I guess.
Harry only remembered it five steps from his door: peppers. He never got peppers. He was going to make goulash for Ron, which meant he spent the last few days telling himself: peppers, peppers, you need a lot of peppers, paprika means pepper in Hungarian, don't forget about the peppers, you always forget something, don’t let it be the peppers. And here, living to see yet another prophecy fulfilled, the boy who blew it. Three cartons of oats milk and not even one pepper to spare.
He stood there for a moment, thinking—no, wallowing—no, beating himself, because really. Really. Really, and just now, with the company thing and Teddy’s eleventh looming, now he had to go and do this. Harry laid the bags on the pavement and rubbed his eyes. Ron and Hermione would be here soon. He still had to take a shower, tidy up a bit. Cook the damn goulash, which he’s promised Ron he would ages ago. Give himself the never-ending pep talk he stole from that TV series, the one about things being not the end of the world, fancy that. And then Ron and Hermione would come over, and it’d be nice, it always is. They’ll say nice things about his food and he’ll remember how much he loves them. It’ll be nice.
So Harry went back with his tail between his legs. Just for the peppers, just because Ron made such a big deal about finally trying his Famous Goulash, just because Harry was a pathetic baby who needed constant coddling. Always such a baby. Which was also why, when he first heard the voice, he ignored it.
It happened, like any major drama, in the produce section. A voice coming from behind a huge bin of potatoes. Something he hasn’t heard in years, and also sort of never heard at all. Still he froze, glued to his spot down by the tomatoes. Felt his heart racing, unreasonable in his chest. And just when he stood there long enough, when he managed to convince himself it was nothing, nothing, actually nothing, the voice spoke again. Even worse, laughed, deep and warm: “Darling! Hey! Come back here!”
On the one hand, it couldn’t be him, because this was Harry’s Tesco’s and a random evening in November and no one’s seen him in years. On the other hand, who would say something like that, darling in that tone, in the middle of a supermarket, if it wasn’t—
The scene unfolded before his eyes, stuck as he was on the spot. Tiny lump of a human, blond-blond in a very telling way, practically all smile, running his way. Following: lean, far taller than he had any right to be. Hair down to his ears, messy, like that made sense. A bit paler than he has been, tighter around the mouth, but his eyes all lit up.
“Darling! Give me the—I’m sorry, Sir. It’s yours if you still want it.” He caught up with the toddler and grabbed what seemed to be a potato, handing it back to an amused-looking old man. “That was terribly rude, love. What would… we don’t steal from other people’s baskets. Apologise to this gentleman.”
“It’s all right,” the man waved a hand, “he can keep it, it’s not really—”
“Please, Sir. Scorpius, come here.”
But he just smiled, with a cheeky chuckle that made Harry remember he was there too. Something like a cough tore through him, a sudden oh, right, and then all the people in the shop turned to him. Or at least: the old man with the potato, the tiny boy, and Malfoy.
The world was silent for a long, thick moment. All four of them seemed stuck in this shared gasp. Then Malfoy blinked, three times in a row, picked up the boy, and turned his back on Harry.
“Awfully sorry,” he said, and left. Harry still stood by the tomatoes, unable to lift a finger.
Tagging anyone who wants to share with the class! Literally you! If you want to! YOU!
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