Fatherhood | drarry teen adoptive parents au

eighteen | cold feet

t/w: homophobic slur. if you choose to skip this chapter, message me and i can give you a clean summary, look after yourselves 🤍

***

As the term wore slowly on into early Spring, Draco found himself reflecting more and more on the past.

The idea of him becoming a father was somewhat terrifying, bearing in mind his only example of the role came from Lucius Malfoy, whose abuse was the reason Draco had grown so good at Occlumency.

He'd had to learn to protect his thoughts from early adolescence, particularly those relating to his sexuality, because his father appeared to enjoy nothing more than forcibly entering Draco's mind and using the contents of it to torture him.

"I... will.... not... have... a... perverted.... son!" Draco remembered Lucius saying calmly, in between lashings of his belt against Draco's body. "You are a fucking faggot, Draco, and I won't stand for it. You are an embarrassment to this family."

That was one of the scariest things about Draco's father - he never shouted, not ever. He was always icily calm and it terrified his son.

How the fuck could he raise a baby with Lucius as his only role model?

The continuing letters from his parents were also a source of increasing anxiety for Draco.

At Christmas, they'd sent him a heavy book on Dark Magic which Draco was pretty sure was banned in Wizarding libraries, and a strongly-worded letter about how they hoped he'd find the book useful, and would choose the path that would honour his family.

He hadn't written back to thank them.

The latest letter, dated three days ago on the 2nd of March, was from his mother, and the tone of it was even more desperate than her usual standard.

Lucius was evidently making her life difficult at the Manor; she was even considering leaving him, which would be a huge step bearing in mind it would leave her with no money and a ruined reputation.

Please, Draco, she'd written. I am begging you. Save me from your father's temper, you know best of all how he can be, and he's getting worse recently. Appease him, take the Mark, and we will be safe with him. I can't go on living like this. He is going to really hurt me.

Draco couldn't stop thinking about that last line; it chilled his blood to ice in his veins.

He'd never been incredibly close to his mother - her lack of a spine had caused a lot of resentment since childhood, when she'd simply watched him being tortured by her husband, hardly raising a finger to stop him.

But he was beginning to realise that maybe she was just as trapped as he was. His parents had married when Narcissa was only nineteen, perhaps she didn't know what she was getting herself into.

And in fairness, what power did she have against Lucius? He surpassed her in every possible way; physical strength, wand skill, societal power, and even financially since he'd taken full control of Narcissa's own family trust fund when they'd married. She was helpless, and relying on Draco to save her.

It was literally written in her letter, she couldn't have been any clearer. Save me, Draco. He's going to really hurt me. I'm begging you. Save me.

You didn't save me, Mother, he thought. What about me? You're trying to ruin my life at fifteen by marking my body forever, and turning me over to the Dark Lord like a piece of meat.

But it still tore him apart to think of his mother in pain, and Draco struggled to work out which was a more terrible thought - that, or taking the Mark.