Defining Love
“Love is when daddy lets mommy have the last Veela pastie even tough they’re his favorite” A five year-old Scorpius Malfoy told Albus Potter in a matter of fact way, taking his pumpkin juice and giving it to a toddler Lily Luna “there! Now you know Albus loves you baby Lily”
At age five Scorpius thought himself an expert at the subject. His parents had been a love match. To his toddler mind there was nothing complicated about love. Daddy loved his mommy and mommy loved his daddy and together their love was so big it spilled out and made a person.
Which was him: Scorpius.
Or at least that’s what Draco had said when he asked where babies came from.
To his innocent mind there was nothing to fear in the world because he had them and one day he would find a girl as wonderful as his mommy and love her too.
To him love was when Draco worked himself into a temper but reigned in all his foul mood as soon as he saw his Astoria and Scorpius.
Love was when Astoria butchered a song in the piano for hours and Draco still managed to tell her that her music was wonderful.
Love was going to visit the grandparents and resisting the urge to insult them because they were Draco’s family.
To Scorpius Malfoy, love was also not letting people get away with bad behavior.
Because Astoria never let Draco cast unsafe spells inside the house despite the fact that she loved him, and Draco never let Astoria plant carnivorous flowers in the garden despite the fact that he loved her.
They in turn, never let Scorpius have desert when he’d been rude to someone else. Despite the fact they loved him.
Love was tea parties with enormous cakes and jumping in mountains of freshly raked autumn leaves.
It was sitting in Draco’s lap as he read some boring account of a Malfoy ancestor and watching Astoria’s eyes drop as his voice soothed both Scorpius and her to sleep.
And these were things Scorp knew about love.
At age eight when he discovered that there were evil people in the world who would willingly hurt a child like him to make his father suffer, Scorpius added more things to the list.
When Draco pushed Astoria behind him and disarmed the strange witch that had grabbed Scorpius out of the blue in a public festival, Scorpius understood that love was also fear.
Love was when Astoria held Draco in her arms after a long day.
It was the forehead kiss Draco pressed on her head everytime he left to conduct business.
Love was putting eachother’s needs before their own when the other looked too tired.
Scorpius liked to think that his parents knew a lot, when they sat him down and talked about all that a little boy like him had to fear in this world, his parents didn’t disappoint him, they were honest.
They told him that most of his ancestors had done terrible things, that people would probably judge him for it forever, his family’s past had nothing to do with Scorpius, but that was how prejudice worked. They’d looked hopefully at Scorpius, with kind smiles that told the little boy he would always be their son no matter what he thought of them and this had cinched the issue in his head.
Love was not judging a person because of their past. Because if Astoria could look beyond Draco’s dark mark to the soul that was beneath and Draco could look beyond Astoria’s family name to see the sweet woman she was, then Scorpius wanted to be like them.
From then on Scorpius Malfoy decided that he would ignore the pasts of everyone as long as they were kind and if someone wasn’t willing to get to know him as himself despite all the bad things his parents told him people said about his family then…well…good riddance.
And these were things Scorp knew about love.
At age eleven Scorpius learned his first lesson in the complicated nature of love.
When Astoria hugged him like she didn’t want to let him go and Draco put his hand in Scorpius shoulder with warm pride, Scorpius realized that love also meant letting go.
He’d watched this happen every time Draco looked forlorn at the door whenever Astoria was in an overnight event with the Greengrass foundation.
Or when Draco had to partner his resources with businesses that required him to be away for days. Astoria would get that resigned air of melancholy about her.
It was the same when they saw him off at King Cross.
Scorpius figured that’s what separation felt like, wanting to hold on to someone forever yet loving them enough to let them grow.
They were setting him free despite how much it hurt them to be apart from Scorpius and that was also love.
In Hogwarts Scorpius learned much more about why love was considered complicated and most of it he didn’t learn about it from his mom and dad.
It wasn’t their fault really.
They were happy together and their love was as subtle as it was strong, their biggest outward shows of affection were usually reserved for Scorpius himself who was always on the receiving end of the messy kisses and crushing hugs.
He understood them…sort of, because he was a part of both of them, Astoria and Draco didn’t hold back from showering him with tickles and filling his world with playful laughter.
But as a couple, their love expressed itself in loving sighs and shared eyerolls from across the dinner table.
Flowers in his writing desk, warped eclairs in her vanity table. A shared look of affection every five minutes, a brush of a hands as they went on their daily routines.
If they fought they did it well away from Scorps hearing and if they felt cross with eachother they hid it too well for it to be seen plainly.
Unlike Albus and even Rose’s parents who reportedly enjoyed a good argument every once in a while and were active in expressing their affection towards the other, the love of Scorpius’ parents seemed almost. ..boring.
And because Scorpius had grown in such a sedate household, nothing prepared him for the first time a girl broke his heart.
At age fourteen he still thought that his parents were the best example of love he could find, he also wanted a girl to share inside jokes with, sigh into the distance and cut flowers for.
But Rose Weasley well, she wanted emotion, she wanted someone to argue with noisily and kiss in the middle of the great hall for all the world to see. His first love was bigger than life, Rosie was an explosion of fire and smarts that was almost too good to be true. And in the end she didn’t understand why Scorpius didn’t express his love the way she did.
Rose didn’t want subtlety, she wanted an extravaganza of passion and Scorpius just didn’t like being the centre of attention, not like Albus and Hugo.
And so that summer Scorpius returned home heartbroken. Asking his mother what he’d done wrong?.
Astoria and Draco hadn’t known what to do, they told Scorpius that truthfully neither of them had much romantic experiences before finding eachother and their own first loves had been footnotes in comparison to Voldemort’s shadow. Before Astoria Draco had been with Pansy for most of his life and he’d only dated her to appease his father.
And Astoria had only ever loved Draco since her fourth year in Hogwarts. Anybody before that hadn’t been real enough to call a crush.
Before the war their families had taught them both that love was a liability when one was a purebloood and until Draco and Astoria had fallen inlove they both had believed it was true.
So when Scrpius came to them for advice they only did the best they knew to do as parents and listened.
And that’s how Scorpius learned that love was painful….But it was also healing.
Watching his parents together Scorpius realized that love was also being okay with not having all the answers.
Because when Astoria didn’t know something she never blamed Draco if he didn’t come up with a solution, she simply nodded and took his hand in order to find it together.
And whenever Draco got frustrated because there were things out of his control that affected his family, he never took it out on Astoria, instead he talked it out with her. Found a way to see the light side of the situation for her sake.
With them love was a thousand conversations spoken with a single raised eyebrow and the quirk of coral lips.
And these were things Scorp knew about love.
Over the years Scorpius came to accept that his parents were not perfect. His mother was a bit manipulative and his father was oftentimes too prideful.Astoria’s sweet frailty lent fodder to Scorp’s fears and Draco’s increasing grouchiness as his hairline began receding was a constant cause of headaches for his only son.
But Scorpius never stopped seeing Draco’s eyes light up when Astoria entered the room. Or Astoria smile whenever Draco said she was beautiful.
There was always a hand in the small of Astoria’s back when they were in public, and a kiss in the back of her palm when they were not. Those hands got a bit more wrinkled as the years passed as did the lines in Astoria’s mouth and eyes, but they never moved from her back, no matter the need for a walking cane that came after Draco turned fifty two.
And while Astoria’s hair seemed to have a bigger smattering of grey highlights everytime Scorpius returned from Hogwarts, she never stopped kissing Draco’s cheek whenever he walked out the door. Her reading glasses came with menopause much like Draco’s cane, but her eyes never lost the sparkle of teasing laughter that always made Draco smile.
Then one day long after moving out from his parents house Scorpius Malfoy found himself cutting sunflowers and placing them absentmindely in the desk of a certain Daily Prophet correspondant. A girl with mischief in her smile who could telegraph her thoughts across the room with just one glance in his direction and who could make Scorpius laugh with silly caricatures of her eldest brothers.
Half imp, half rainstorm, she was a unstoppable mischief and boy did it drive Scorpius crazy to see her fluttering in and out of his life in a flurry of silk hair ribbons and ballet slippers. He almost didn’t notice when he stopped holding out his arms to break Lily Luna’s fall in case she broke a limb when she crashed down from whatever tree she was currently climbing. And when he started holding out his arms because he wanted to feel her close to him.
He didn’t notice when she stopped being “Al’s little sister” and became “Not again Lily!” With an affectionate huff. Or when he began looking forward to mutually teasing Albus over his career in the ministry.
Not until he attended his parent’s anniversary ball and his father of all people tapped his cane impatiently and with a sigh of frustration pulled Scorpius aside “So when are you planning to tell the Potter girl that you love her?” His father finally snapped “your mother and I would like to live to see our grandchildren, thank you very much” and with the finesse of the crochety old man he was, Draco stomped away from his very adult son grumbling about the stupidity of youth.
And despite disliking his father’s temper Scorpius learned one last thing about love from the old man and that was that one couldn’t really know how love worked unless one felt it.
So he joined Lily Luna at their table and smiled resolving to ask her to be his girlfriend as soon as possible, keeping his father’s words in mind. He loved her…of course he did. It was so obvious now.
He chanced a look at the middle of the ballroom where his parents glided around the room with the ease of professional dancers, thirty years married and Scorpius still didn’t doubt how much they loved eachother.
Maybe he would never stop learning from them, maybe he would always want what his parents had. And maybe he was close to getting it with Lily.
So he clapped as the orchesta finished their piece and raised his cup to toast to his parent’s marriage because these were the things Scorpius Malfoy knew about love.
An: this was my first Scorpius centric one shot, which I dont normally do because Scorpius is way too shippable I always fall of tangent when I write him in, and forget this is a Drastoria blog, I think that in the end its always our parents who teach us how to love. so I hope you liked it anon
