29Albus/Scorpius One-Shot #3: Meeting Mr. Malfoy
"I'm gonna fuck it up," moaned Albus into Scorpius's shoulder.
"No," said Scorpius, combing his fingers through his boyfriend's hair, "no, you're not. You can't screw this up if you can just be your normal self. Everyone likes you."
"Everyone who likes my dad likes me. Everyone who didn't stays far away from me for good reason. Now I'm having dinner with one of the latter." Albus pulled back from Scorpius's shoulder and grimaced. "I didn't mean to imply anything wrong with your dad. Just… he and my dad didn't get on, you know? I don't know how this is ever going to work."
"It's going to work because we're going to make it work," said Scorpius. "Because you love me and I love you and we love each other. I don't give a damn what your father thinks and you shouldn't about mine. Now let's go."
"I don't think I'm ready."
"But dinner is," insisted Scorpius. "Come on in."
He reached for the door, then he held an arm across Albus's body to block him.
"Stand up straight, though," said Scorpius. "When you walk. You know. Confidence and all."
"See?!" hissed Albus to his boyfriend. "See, we haven't even taken one step towards the room yet and I've already done something wrong! I'm going to do ten thousand things wrong and he'll hate me and he'll never let me see you again!"
"Like that's his decision," scoffed Scorpius. "Albus, I'm going to be honest with you. This isn't about whether or not my dad deciding whether or not he wants you to be a part of his family. This is you already being a part of the family, and my dad deciding whether or not he wants to be a part of mine."
Albus's eyes widened. "You really feel that way?"
"I do," said Scorpius. "Now get your stupid arse in there and show him why I love you so much."
Albus hugged Scorpius tightly, and then they exchanged a long conversation in a glance; once Scorpius had reassured Albus enough, he turned to the door, and he and Albus walked through it just as his mother Summoned the last food item in from the kitchen.
Scorpius kept a sideways eye at his boyfriend. He could see Albus's thought process working overdrive. Albus walked upright, then seemed to worry that he was walking too stiffly, and relaxed; then he worried he was slumping. He repeated this oscillation several times. Upon reaching the table, Albus pulled out his own chair—then remembered that Scorpius had recommended he pull out Scorpius's chair first, so he pushed his own chair back in—but cringed as he realized that was stupid, he didn't need to push his own chair back in if it was already out—he pulled it back out.
Scorpius looked up at his father, wide-eyed. Draco was staring at Albus, his face unreadable, with his clasped hands hovering in front of his mouth and one of his eyebrows arched high.
Scorpius slowly lowered himself into his chair. Albus scrambled into his own chair like a frantic ostrich and grabbed up his fork and knife. Then Albus looked at the meal that was floating towards him, with a serving fork in the pork and a serving spoon in the gravy, so he put his utensils back down so he could use the serving utensils. But he was slumping again. He straightened up quickly, but smashed his head against the back of the chair so painfully that he recoiled into a face-plant on his plate, which split in half.
He initially opted not to lift his head back up.
Scorpius cleared his throat.
Albus, finally realizing how stupid he looked with his head on the table, yanked his head back up, so quickly that his chair swung backwards towards the floor; he grabbed the table to try and stop his fall but ended up ripping the tablecloth from the table as he fell, nearly upending all the food.
He leapt aside from the chair, in a standing position which looked like it was about to turn into a running position.
His entire body grew red with embarrassment, and he began to sweat. Scorpius swallowed a lump in his throat, fists clenched in desperate hope that nothing else would go wrong and that this was just Albus accumulating as much good karma as possible in return for everything that had just happened.
Carefully, Albus reset his chair. He took out his wand to mend his dinner plate, slide the tablecloth back under the table, and move the food back to its rightful place. Relaxing, he straightened his stance to a proper and reasonable level, served himself a piece of pork and took the serving spoon to scoop himself some gravy onto it.
Scorpius looked around the table. Nobody had said anything for the entire dinner so far, and in fact no one seemed to have moved at all apart from Albus's spasms. For a fleeting moment, Scorpius had the desperate prayer that someone had messed with time and created a paradox that stopped time for everyone except him and Albus right at the moment Albus had done all that, but then he saw his father's eyebrow arch even further up than he'd ever thought it could go, and he realized he was not quite that lucky.
Albus was looking down at the tablecloth, nervously drumming his fingers on it. Scorpius leaned over; his friend needed some intervention.
"Calm. Down." Scorpius patted Albus's shoulder and whispered soothingly into his ear. "Just be yourself. Treat it like you're talking with our friends at school."
Albus nodded, and turned to Draco and Astoria.
"How are your classes going?" Albus asked Draco's parents.
Internalizing what he'd just said, Albus dropped his face onto the plate again… forgetting that it was now covered in food.
O
"That was literally the worst half hour I have ever had in my entire life," moaned Albus.
"Come off it," said Scorpius. "It wasn't that…"
After briefly reminiscing, Scorpius cut off his sentence to avoid blatantly lying.
"It was bad," admitted Scorpius. "But all first times meeting the parents are like that, I think."
"I probably took the title for the worst first impression ever, though," said Albus.
Albus's eyes filled up with tears, and Scorpius leaned over to hug him tightly. "Aw… don't… Albus, don't think like that… I'm not going anywhere, so you'll have plenty of time to make this up in their eyes. All they need to do is see how happy you make me. That's all they should, and will, care about. In the end. Okay?"
Albus shook his head, but he suddenly sat bolt upright, smacking into the back of Scorpius's head. Scorpius fell back onto the bed, cussing as he checked his nose for blood, and then sat straight upright as well when he realized why Albus had done that: Scorpius's father had just walked into the room.
"Did you enjoy dinner?" asked Draco flatly.
Scorpius looked at him, silently pleading with his eyes for his father not to revert to his typical nature and make Albus feel any worse than he already did.
"Don't worry," said Draco, smirking. "I threw up on the Greengrass's rug when I first met Astoria's folks."
Albus looked up, eyes wide at the way Draco was addressing him.
"Honestly, everyone always sees the Potters as this perfect little family," said Draco. "Perfect people, perfect house, perfect jobs, perfect kids. I am sincerely relieved to see that you, Albus Potter, are a human just like all the rest of us. And you've made it quite obvious that you're crazy, literally crazy, for my son."
Albus flushed.
"I've got three tickets to the next Ireland Quidditch game from work, but Astoria was never that much into the sport," said Draco. "You're welcome to join us if you'd like."
Albus opened his mouth.
Just say something intelligible, pleaded Scorpius. Any affirmative string of words. Just say something natural and coherent. And don't throw up.
"I'd love to go," said Albus softly, and Scorpius silently pumped a fist.
Draco nodded. "Then I'll see you again on Sunday at ten o'clock. We can take a Portkey. And Albus?"
Albus nodded to Draco.
"Relax," said Draco. "I'm not a professor. I'm not testing you. I don't even care if that's actually how you eat all of your meals. Just don't be an arse to my son like your brother, and we'll get along fine."
"I would never," said Albus. "I really like your brother."
"Son," said Scorpius. "He means your son. Me."
Draco laughed, and he stepped out of the room.
Albus collapsed against Scorpius, knocking him backwards onto the bed, with Albus's head falling onto Scorpius's lap.
"I'm never gonna get it right," mumbled Albus.
"You will," said Scorpius. "You know why? Because you'll have a lot of practice. You'll meet them more and get used to them. I plan on keeping you around for a while."
He leaned down and pressed his lips against Albus's gently. Albus sighed contentedly and kissed back enthusiastically.
"Look at it this way," laughed Scorpius, breaking away. "Their opinion of you can only improve after this."
Albus let a prolonged groan eke out of his lungs as he sank further into Scorpius's lap. Then, bucking back upwards, he turned away from Scorpius and promptly threw up.
O
"Dad," said Scorpius as they waited outside the Quidditch stadium for Albus to arrive. "I just wanted to say… I can't remember if I said… thank you. For being so good to Albus the other day, when he was completely freaking out. That was the gentlest I've ever seen you be with someone apart from Mum, and… I just really appreciate it. Thanks."
Draco nodded. "I fully understand. And, honestly, if he's going to be like that for a while… all the better. I'm enjoying it."
Scorpius cocked his head as he glanced sideways at his father. "You are?"
"Very much so," said Draco. "I tried for seven years to get a Potter to respect and fear me. I'll enjoy it while I can."
