Blackberry Jam (A Drarry FanFiction)

Chapter Forty Two

   Lily Potter's disbelief was nothing compared to Harry's though.

"MUM!" he screamed, stumbling forwards, dropping his knees against the floor to thrust his arms around her.

"Ouch," she chuckled, patting his back, but he was completely oblivious as he sobbed into her chest. "Careful there sweetheart."

"You were dead!" he accused through his tears. "You were dead, Aunt Petunia said so!"

He felt his father crouch beside him and gently pull him a little away, and only then did he see how dreadful she truly looked. Her skin was so pale it was practically translucent, and the shadows under her eyes were purple and puffy. Her usually vibrant red hair was lank and scraped into a bun behind her head, and up close he realised several of the cuts still had stitches in them. Her lips were chapped and her nails were peeling but he didn't care because she was alive!

"Not dead," said his father thickly. "Missing. Your old mum was in a coma after the factory got hit, and only just woke up last week to tell the hospital who she was."

"Oi," she chided, her eyes half closed and her words lazy with exhaustion. "Less of the 'old'."

"I still don't-" Harry babbled. "I don't understand, Petunia said-"

"The hospital didn't have a telephone number for me until I got home," his father continued, rubbing Harry's back as he held onto his mother's nightgown, afraid of hurting her if he hugged her again. "And your mum was adamant they were to call me first, she didn't want Petty Pots muddling what was true and what was gossip. Luckily Mrs McGonagall left a note through the letter box, so it was the first thing I saw when I stepped through the door three days ago, and I raced straight to the Royal Chelsea."

"Still in his RAF blues," his mother said with a dreamy voice that suggested extremely strong pain killers. "All the nurses swooned."

"But," Harry said, feeling like his brain was moving pitifully slowly. "What happened? How did you survive?"

His mother lifted a hand that looked weaker than Treacle when he'd been no more than a bundle of fluff, and cupped his face. "You're not a boy anymore," she mused, tears in her green eyes as her cracked lips parted in a smile filled with such love. "Not my baby boy, my strong man, come home."

"They found her under a slab of concrete," his father supplied, his voice catching as he squeezed Harry's shoulder. "The fire crew reckoned she'd been there hours, and the ambulance drivers weren't sure she would make it through the night."

"James," his mother admonish with a scowl.

"But you did," his father laughed, and Harry didn't need to turn to see the tears that had edged over his eyelashes. "Your mother has always been the stubborn sort Harry. She'll never let me outlive her."

He gave a small sob at the last word, and took his wife's hand.

Harry felt them both. His father's shuddering chest at his back, and his mother's clavicles under his clasped fists, where his hands were still clutching to her nightie like an anchor. His family, his family. How, how could he be so lucky as to have them both here beside him, when a mere ten minutes ago he was convinced the only way he would be close to them again would be to visit their graves above empty coffins. He trembled, and took a deep breath. They were here, it was okay, it was okay.

"And who is this handsome fellow?" his mother rasped, breaking him from his reverie.

Harry's eyebrows shot up, and he spun on his knees to see Draco standing by the doorway, arms wrapped around his chest, eyes and face bright with a beautiful, unabashed smile.

Without thinking Harry leapt to his feet to shoot across the room and into Draco's arms, the two boys hugging and laughing and crying right there in Harry's living room, without a care in the world.

"I love you," Harry whispered, so overcome with emotion he wasn't sure he could have stopped himself saying the words if he tried. Because of course Draco would be there, firmly by his side, at the moment his life had seemingly fallen apart, and then again at the moment it had miraculously put itself back together.

"I love you too," Draco mumbled into the side of his neck as his hands tightened around his shirt.

And in that instant, Harry knew that whatever the future held, they would be okay. Because they had their families, and they had each other, and in a world that had only just scraped through the worst war it had ever seen, Harry felt truly in his bones, that you simply couldn't ask for any more than that.