Favoring The Brave {Drarry}

~ x ~

As much as Draco thought it was going to be, dinner is actually not an awkward affair.

He doesn't quite feel like an outsider even as Valeria and Harry have conversations with the boys and laugh at inside jokes while he sips at his own drink. He thinks about calling his mother. He hasn't spoken to her since James Lucius went into shock, and with father being home he thinks he should probably be calling a lot more often. For all three of their sakes. The last time he went to visit, they'd been staying on separate floors and she'd started referring to father as That Man. He rolled his eyes at the thought.

"Is that a no?" Harry says with a smirk from the end of the table.

"I'm sorry, love, what?" Draco asks blinking back into focus and setting his glass back onto the table. Harry furrows his eyebrows at him.

"Are you alright?"

"Yeah, sorry. Just thinking I should call Mother."

"Why? Did something happen?" Harry sets his own glass down and makes to stand as if he's ready to help at a moments notice (as always). Draco shakes his head and only speaks when he sits back down.

"Father's home."

"I didn't know he was out of Azkaban." Harry is speaking more to himself than to the man sitting in a seat across from him.

"Sentenced for 15 years. He got out last June."

"You never said."

"It never came up."

"I would have gone with you to visit if I'd known he was there with Narcissa. I'm coming with you next time." Harry twirled a bit of his pasta around his fork and slurped at it as if everything was decided.

"My mother and I can handle ourselves, Potter," Draco says, placing his own fork down with narrowed eyes.

James looks back and forth between them as if watching an explosive game of tennis. Teddy has even dragged his plate onto his lap and starts eating from there as if they were about to start throwing dishes at each other. Both of their dads' magic rattling whatever sits on the table. They're not worried and if Draco is being honest, the glimpse he catches of James looks slightly entertained as if he's heard this same talk before.

"I never said you couldn't, Malfoy. Just thought you'd appreciate some support. I know it couldn't have been fun sitting between them with the way everything is."

"Well, Pansy stopped by for tea and Blaise came by with a few of his Auror friends to rid the rest of the library of potentially dark or cursed objects. So no, it was a smashing time."

"Stop being a prat," Harry says bristling more at the attitude he's receiving, but bugger it all if Draco is going to be treated like this in front of his children and Potter's ex. "I never know if you want me to agree or disagree with you."

"I want you to stop babying me," Draco snaps and his eyes shoot to Val for less than a second, but it's enough for Harry to catch on and sit back in his seat from where they had been baring their teeth across the table.

"Force of habit," Harry says letting the fight ooze out of him, closing his mouth around another forkful of food.

"To treat me like a child?"

"To try and take care of you."

Draco throws a cloth napkin at him and it's enough to end the conversation there when the boys start laughing at the blush creeping up his cheeks. Harry still sends him a concerned look over the rim of his glass and Draco knows he hasn't ended anything, not really, and he thinks that it's okay. Especially if someone like Harry is on his side.