One Question- Prompt: "They say it tastes like chicken." Title: One Question Author: ruby tuesday Pairing: Harry/Draco Word Count: 2000ish Rating: PG Summary: Harry and Albus take Draco and Scorpius out for dinner. Prompt: AWDT- “They say it tastes like chicken.” Beta: bewarethesmirk Disclaimer: not mine, i’m just having fun.
“Does it really have to be this restaurant, Al?” Harry asked incredulously as he scanned the menu Al had printed off the internet.
“I want Scorpius to be impressed! You know how snobby his family is,” Albus explained.
That much was true. Harry did indeed know how snobby the Malfoys were. In the short few months he dated Draco before he married Ginny, that bit of information was pounded into his head relentlessly. He could never be good enough.
But now, Albus and Scorpius had become great friends after both being sorted into Ravenclaw at Hogwarts. Harry and Al were taking Scorpius and his father out for dinner for the first time. It would be Harry’s first time talking with Draco since that strange meeting in a pub two years ago, the week after he and Ginny’s divorce was finalized.
For months, Harry hadn’t been able to get that image of Draco standing on the platform at King’s Cross out of his head.
Al had chosen a ridiculously high priced French restaurant for their meal.
“Al, don’t you think it would be easier for Scorpius to get to know us if we took him someplace we actually like?” Harry reasoned.
“No Dad, this is really important to me and you said we could take them anywhere I wanted and this is it. I’m sure of it. Scorpius goes to France every summer with his dad, so I’m sure he will like the food,” Al went on.
“And anyway, you want to impress Mr. Malfoy, don’t you? You said he was always trying to get the better of you when you two were at Hogwarts together. This is your chance to show him how sophisticated you have become,” Al explained
“But, Al, I’m not sophisticated. Not at all.”
“Oh that doesn’t matter, Dad. You just have to fake it,” Al said simply.
Later that night, as Harry tried unsuccessfully to fall asleep, he thought back that odd encounter with Malfoy two years earlier.
Harry hadn’t even been aware that anyone had sidled up next to him at the bar until Malfoy started speaking.
“Quidditch on the telly always feels like an abomination to me.”
Harry would never forget his shock as he looked up from his pint and saw Draco Malfoy sitting down next to him that autumn night.
Harry looked up to the flat screen where the Harpies/ Puddlemore United game was being shown on the Wizarding Wireless Broadcast Network. He sighed. He had no idea how to respond to Malfoy’s comment. He wasn’t sure if a response was even expected.
“How would you rather watch it then, Malfoy?” he asked, unsure as to why he was even entering into this absurd conversation.
“I always preferred watching live, I suppose. The radio would be the next best thing. I can always just close my eyes and imagine I’m there,” Malfoy mused.
Harry considered Malfoy for a moment. He hadn’t spoken to the man in almost twelve years. Not since before his wedding. In all those years, they had never managed to cross paths. Not even after Malfoy’s divorce from Astoria Greengrass a year earlier. What was Malfoy doing here, now?
“Did you want something Malfoy?” he asked, irritated.
“I suppose I just wanted to see for myself,” Malfoy answered quietly.
“See what?” Harry questioned.
“You,” Malfoy answered, his gaze piercing Harry.
“I just wanted to see you.”
“Well, you’ve seen me. Now, if you don’t mind, I’m not really up for conversation tonight,” Harry replied getting agitated. He didn’t like the way Malfoy was staring at him.
“Who said anything about conversation?” Malfoy replied. “Actually, Potter, I just have one question for you.”
“Oh really, Malfoy, just one? Better make it good, then,” Harry challenged.
Malfoy just continued to stare. As if now that he had the opportunity to ask, he had forgotten the question. Harry wouldn’t have that much luck.
“Potter, do you ever wonder if we made a mistake?”
That was it, that’s all Malfoy said.
Beginning to feel hostile now, Harry demanded, “What do you mean? What mistake? What are you on about?”
Malfoy sighed before explaining. “Listen, Potter. I’m not going to sit here and pretend like we’re strangers the way we’ve been doing for the last eleven years. I came looking for you tonight because I had to ask you this.” Draco paused to be sure he had Harry’s full attention. “Do you ever wonder if all of it was mistake- the wedding, the kids, the divorce, the house, the job, all the fucking responsibility? Do you ever think that maybe we fucked everything up all those years ago, and have just been paying for it ever since?”
Harry didn’t know what to think. Had Draco really come here tonight to talk about their short-lived, so-called relationship of thirteen years ago? And if so, did Harry really want to go there?
No, he didn’t, not at all. Harry was over that. Had been for a very long time. Whatever they had was ancient history. Over and done with.
“Of course, Malfoy, everyone wonders that sometimes. You wouldn’t be human if you didn’t look back and wonder if you’d made mistakes in your past.” Harry shrugged, trying to feign an air of nonchalance.
Malfoy stared again with that piercing gaze. It was like he was searching for something- anything in Harry’s eyes that would contradict the words he had spoken.
Finally, after what seemed like hours, he replied. “Ah, all right. That’s it then, huh? That’s where you stand. All right, well- I’ll leave you to it. Sorry I bothered you.”
And with that, Malfoy left. Just like that, he was gone. He’d never even ordered a drink. The whole conversation had lasted less than five minutes.
The Draco Malfoy that Harry was currently dining with was about as different from the one he’d met that night in the pub two years ago as any person could possibly get. So different, in fact, that Harry began to wonder if he had actually imagined the meeting.
Draco was as polite as one could be while still being terribly cold and distant. He had spoken as few words as possible since they met up at the restaurant, his facial expressions remaining impassive and indifferent. He was beginning to get a bit frustrated, however, as Scorpius and Albus were taking a very long time in deciding what to order.
So far, the only things on the table were glasses of water (Albus insisted the adults couldn’t order wine until they had ordered their meals, so they’d know what type of wine to have with their meat) and rolls with very cold, very hard, very unspreadable butter. The strained silence as the men waited for their sons to order was becoming a bit much to bear.
“Scorpius, have you decided yet what you want to eat?” Draco asked his son impatiently.
“I just don’t know, Dad. There are so many things on this menu that I’ve never even heard of.” Scorpius looked terribly bewildered as he scanned the menu, trying to find something an eleven-year-old would deem edible.
Albus was as brave and eager to impress as ever. “Scorp, how about the duck l’orange? I mean, it can’t be too bad right? Oranges are always good and duck is… well, duck is waterfowl- they say it tastes like chicken, right?”
Draco spit out the water he’d been drinking while Harry simultaneously almost choked on the roll he was nibbling.
“Scorpius, don’t listen to a word he says!” Draco exclaimed. “Duck tastes nothing like chicken!”
“It’s really gross, Al. You won’t like it” Harry chimed in. “It’s really gamey- chewy and rubbery and-
“Greasy,” Draco added.
“Oh” Al looked disappointed at this. “Well, I don’t know! I thought you guys would know what to order and I was just going to order the same thing!” he pouted.
After a few more moments of uncomfortable silence Draco spoke up. “You know what I would really like to eat?”
Harry raised an eyebrow at this. “What’s that, Malfoy? What would you really like to eat?”
“There’s no need for the attitude, Potter, as I know for certain that it’s something you enjoy also. Or at least, you used to enjoy it.”
Albus appeared mildly interested in this. Perhaps wondering how Mr. Malfoy would know what his father used to like when it was a well-known fact that the two had been rivals at school.
“Well?” Harry prompted.
“Pizza,” Draco said finally. “I could really go for some pizza right now.”
Al looked puzzled. “They don’t have pizza here.”
“Well, then perhaps here is not the best restaurant for this particular group of diners,” Draco reasoned. “Surely we can find a reasonably clean establishment willing to serve pizza to lovely bunch of gentlemen such as ourselves.”
“We don’t have a reservation,” Al said. “We might have to wait.”
“Well, how close are we to starving? Is that a risk we can take?” Draco asked
Harry wasn’t sure what to say. Albus seemed disappointed that his choice of restaurant was not being so well received. Scorpius just looked relieved.
“What do you say, Al? We can always come back here another time?” Harry suggested.
Al looked back and forth between Harry and Draco for a few moments. “All right, okay. That’s a good enough idea, Mr. Malfoy. We can go for pizza, but only as long as we can have ice cream for dessert.”
“It wouldn’t be a night out without ice cream for dessert!” Malfoy declared.
As the four of them exited the overpriced restaurant, Harry had to wonder out loud, “Do you suppose they make duck pizza?”
“I surely hope not.” Draco answered. The four laughed together at this as they headed off into the night in search of a more suitable eatery.
An owl from Potter really should not have surprised Draco as much as it did. He was surprised, though- more by the content of the letter than the fact that one had been sent. He expected perhaps it would be about the boys, considering how much fun they’d had together last night once they got out of that awful French restaurant. However, the note said nothing about that. It was about so much more than that.
Malfoy,
I was thinking last night when I got home, about that night when you came looking for me at the pub a few years ago. Maybe you’d rather not talk about it, but there’s something I need to say. I realized that I never honestly answered your question. One question, that’s all you asked… and I completely blew you off. I apologize for that.
I want to answer your question now. The truth is I have often wondered if I made a mistake marrying Ginny. I’ve never regretted it, though. I love my children more than life itself and could never think of them as a mistake. The only real regret I have is that I hurt someone that I loved by trying to be someone I was not.
The only thing I can do now is not make the same mistakes twice. I almost let my own son talk me into trying to be something that I was not-a connoisseur of French cuisine. I set a terrible example for him.
If I resolve to be a good example for my son then I must practice what I preach. Once upon a time, I tried to show you who I was. That didn’t go over so well, but that was a long time ago. I am not the same person I was then and I venture that neither are you. If you’ll let me, I would like to show you who I am now. I fear that passing up on that opportunity would be a mistake.