Disclaimer: I don't own the Harry Potter universe, although I frequently wish that I did.

Scorpius was facing a dilemma. A horrible, horrible dilemma.

There was a part of him that missed his life back in London excruciatingly. First, he missed Rose. He missed the taste of her strawberry lips, her bouncing red curls, her passion for quidditch. Scorpius wasn't much of a quidditch player himself - something that he knew disappointed his father - but he loved laying underneath the vivid Hogwarts sun, watching Rose dip and soar through the sky on her broomstick, beating out all her cousins and friends on the quidditch pitch.

Rose was his everything. A wistful smile grew on Scorpius' face as he remembered the events following Albus stealing the time turner. Rose had been horrified when they told her everything, but slowly, she began to grow kinder towards Scorpius, realizing that maybe, just maybe, he wasn't the same kind of man his father used to be. Scorpius had been enamored with her back then, chasing her hopefully through the Hogwarts Express or the Great Hall, and she had barely given him an ounce of her attention. It had always stung. Yet something had changed when she saw him, broken and overwhelmed; when him and Albus finally admitted to the Potter and Granger-Weasley families how they felt when Minister Granger-Weasley invited them over for dinner. The Minister had said it was time for all families to make amends, and so amends they made.

Rose then took Scorpius upstairs to her room. The Granger-Weasley home was surprisingly humble, not because her parents couldn't afford it (after all, the Weasleys made significant profit off of the joke shop, and Rose's mum was the Minister for Magic), but because they wanted a simple life after all that they had experienced. In the Granger-Weasley home there was a bedroom for Rose, Hugo, Rose's parents, and then a few guest bedrooms, seeing as their home saw an abundance of guests. Being there for the first time, Scorpius had felt a wave of envy. Nobody visited Malfoy Manor.

In her room, which was covered from wall to floor with quidditch posters and birthday cards from friends and family photos with her cousins and uncles and aunts and grandparents, Rose gave Scorpius one last, evil stare-down. Then her angered face dissipated, and Rose Granger-Weasley, who almost never looked anything but confident, had a shy look on her face. She leaned in slowly. Scorpius couldn't believe what was happening …

And then they shared their first kiss. It was his first kiss. And it was blissful.

Since then, Rose and Scorpius had been inseparable. In the excitement of it all, they had planned a grand future together. It was only a few years after that first kiss that Scorpius had proposed at the Burrow, in front of Molly Weasley and the rest of her clan, and his own dad. Nearly everyone had jumped for joy and the Burrow, full of everyone that had ever loved the Potters, the Weasley's, and the Weasley-Grangers, came to life that night … except his dad. In his dad's grey eyes there was a strange look, not one of unacceptance, but one of sadness, loneliness, and perhaps envy.

Scorpius might have been naïve, but he wasn't a fool. Draco Malfoy was a master of occlumency, and yet it seemed since his mum's death, his dad's walls were crumbling. Everything Draco Malfoy had ever wanted, Scorpius was getting. He had a new, loving family in the Potters and Granger-Weasleys. He had a lover whose health was promised, not one destined to perish in a few years (though life was truly unpredictable. Who knew?). Most of all, despite the difficult years of being bullied and feeling isolated and so deeply un-Slytherin-like, Scorpius was finally going to have a happy future. But his dad's future was already written for him, and it was a gloomy one.

Hence his dilemma.

The Malfoys had been in muggle America, in Boston, for approximately a week. And Scorpius could see a visible difference in his father. It was as if being away from Malfoy Manor, from wizarding London, from Potter and the Granger-Weasleys, had completely relaxed his soul. His dad's wand remained at his bedside when he left his apartment … how was it, that after growing up with magic and believing magic was the mightiest power of all, his dad was able to simply leave his power behind and go for a stroll in what the Malfoys had been taught was a mundane life? How could he simply go off and walk by the river without his wand? Scorpius was flabbergasted. It seemed his dad's budding friendship with their neighbor, Farrah, was lifting his dad's spirits as well.

As much as it hurt to admit, it had been a very long time since his father had had a friend.

Scorpius in good conscience could not consider Ron or Hermione or Ginny or any of the above to be good friends to his father. While they went on new adventures together and certainly cared for each other, there was still that underlying animosity that made it hard for his father to be vulnerable against these people. Mr. Weasley (Ron) still did not like his dad after his dad grew up bullying Mrs Granger-Weasley. While Harry Potter was nicer, his wife Ginny still didn't like his dad as much. And most of all, even if they did like him, how could his dad be a part of their clique after their shared history? There was a reason Ron, Hermione, and Harry Potter were known as the "golden trio." There was something so exclusive, so untouchable about the way the three of them interacted. Scorpius could tell that even aunt Ginny felt excluded at times. It was the way she watched her husband and his best friends laugh with each other at the dinner table. No matter how hard she tried to smile, Scorpius could see the frustration in the way she leaned forward and tried to be a part of the conversation.

His father's deadline was about to finish. The deal was, in 24 hours, Scorpius would confront his father and tell him it was time for them to go back to London. Scorpius had a plan already: he would use his wand to confound Farrah, and have her tell them how to use an airplane, how to get tickets for it, or whatever else muggles did to travel across the ocean. But could he do that to his father? After all, they had only been here for a week and a half, and Scorpius had seen nothing yet of muggle technology or the muggle world. Narcissa and Lucius stayed in their rooms - hopefully not doing what Scorpius suspected they were doing - and had not seen anything yet. Their prejudices remained. But did Scorpius care? There was a wonderful woman waiting back for him in London, one he owed an explanation and wanted to spend the rest of his life with.

His grandparents' and father's choices had haunted his childhood. Maybe, just maybe, it was time to do things for himself.

"That's not how you do it!" Farrah giggled. She had invited Draco into her apartment to make breakfast, since Draco claimed he'd never had pancakes before (what was Draco supposed to say? She asked him if he wanted pancakes, and when he took too long to answer, she had assumed it meant he'd never heard of them. She was appalled, and so minutes later, he found himself in her apartment). Draco scrubbed at the blasted pan again with what Farrah had called a spatula, trying to flip the damn thing.

It flew over their heads and landed on the kitchen floor, covering the checkered beige tiles with pooling batter.

Farrah, who Draco had learned recently had some slight anger issues, turned to face Draco. Here comes the storm, Draco noted with a wry smirk. Instead, she burst into aggressive laughter.

"You idiot," she breathed through her second bout of giggles, "You've got batter all over your hair!"

His hands shot up immediately to reach for his beloved pale locks, and indeed, it was sticky with the pancake batter. Draco blanched and ran his fingers under the sink, feeling the cool water wash over the tips of his fingers. He would have to wash his hair when she wasn't looking with a series of charms. Not my hair, he groaned inwardly. And yet, Farrah did not stop laughing at his clearly distraught face, and then Draco realized that maybe it was a little bit funny. As a drop of batter plopped onto his crooked nose, falling from a single strand of hair like a dewdrop falling from a solitary piece of grass, Draco broke out into a smile. For the very first time in his life, Draco Malfoy understood what it was not to be laughed at or to laugh at others, but to actually laugh with somebody.

Minutes later, once they had calmed down, Farrah crouched onto the floor and began wiping away at the batter with a wipe. Without thinking, Draco kneeled down with her with a napkin he had stolen from the kitchen table, and began scraping the batter off the floor. When their hands met, Farrah glanced upwards, their eyes meeting. She was carrying a look of surprise that mirrored Draco's own emotions. A Malfoy never scrubbed a floor. It was a house elf's job. Yet there was something oddly peaceful about what he was doing, and who he was doing it with. The corners of his lips turned upwards, and a pretty blush graced Farrah's cheeks.

She broke the silence with a hurried cough. "Let's go," she said, running to her door and picking up a set of keys, "Since we don't have any good pancakes left, want to go to IHOP?"Of course, Draco had no idea what an IHOP even was. Still, his legs carried him to her side, and the two skipped down the steps until they reached her car in the basement below.

"This car is too small," Draco groaned as he shuffled within his seat. He was too tall for his own good, and his knees were pressed uncomfortably against what Farrah had called a dashboard in her explanation of the inside of a car (that day had been awkward. He had to explain to Farrah that his family didn't necessarily use technology, and she had bombarded him with questions. When she ultimately realized he didn't know what he was talking about, she let it go, as if she were too afraid to ask any more questions).

"It's not small," Farrah said kindly. "Your mom sat there last time, when we went clothes shopping. Remember? And usually Alice sits there, and, well … both your mom and Alice are kind of short. Let me adjust the seat for you."

Farrah was wearing a golden shirt with long, flaring sleeves, and a pair of dark-colored jeans (which Draco maintained were less comfortable than dress robes, but certainly more stylish, as they accentuated his best features). Slowly, all Draco saw was a flurry of golden sequins as she approached him. For a moment, Draco could hear nothing but his beating heart as she grew closer and closer. Her lips were coated with a glossy substance that Draco could almost smell, a pomegranate red that he thought would taste good in his mouth. There were barely three centimeters between the two of them.

I'm going to close the space between us.

Draco leaned forward … and she leaned back.

"There you go!" she smiled brightly. Draco was suddenly aware of three things: A) his seat was significantly further from the dashboard than it was earlier, B) she was completely unaware of how taken he was with her in that moment, and C) that his jeans were suddenly more uncomfortable.

"Perfect," Draco croaked. Farrah reached her painted nails towards the radio and blasted some song. As she sang - almost in tune - to a depressing song about a girl getting her "driver's license," whatever in Merlin's balls that meant, Draco stared out the window, feeling curiously deflated, and watched the bright Boston grass meet the crystal sky in a blurry haze.

Something was wrong with her son, and she didn't like it.

Narcissa Malfoy watched as her beloved Draco stumbled into their apartment, carrying a bag containing food he called pancakes, and then stormed off into his bedroom, leaving the rest of the Malfoys to eat wordlessly. Narcissa had grown accustomed to Draco's moods in the past - he was a dramatic boy - but this was unlike anything she had ever seen. Draco would not look at her. He would not talk to her. He did not acknowledge Lucius's existence, which he did not dare to do when entering a room. Instead, Draco had handed the bag to Scorpius, said, "pancakes," and left.

And Narcissa, again, did not like it.

She briefly ran through her mental list of things that could be potentially wrong with her son. He could be feeling upset about Astoria - her nose admittedly crinkled at the thought, as Astoria was a distasteful wife for him - or he could be tired of this horrid muggle place. Yes, that seemed like it. Narcissa messed with her delicate blouse subconsciously, only realizing when a piece of thread caught in her growing fingernails that she was still wearing muggle clothing, though they were not leaving the house. She let out an un-ladylike growl underneath her breath at the thought.

Narcissa felt Lucius' warm hand spread over her thigh in an act of comfort, and the warmth spread up to the deepest confines of her heart. Oh, how she loved this man. While Scorpius blabbed on and on about how delicious the pancakes were, Narcissa leaned into her husband's throat, her mouth hanging slightly over his right ear.

"Lucius, darling," she breathed. "We must have a chat."

"Enough, boy," Lucius said rudely to Scorpius, whose lips snapped shut. "Narcissa and I have some business to attend to." Narcissa stifled a chuckle as she watched the poor boy grow pale, looking eerily like her own son did when he was younger. Then the two of them stood up and walked into their bedroom, leaving Scorpius to moan about pancakes and being "left alone" by himself.

"Muffliato."

"Thank you, darling," Narcissa said as the door closed and the spell enveloped the room. She entered briefly into the loo to change into her dress robes, feeling once again like the elegant wizard she was. When she came back into the room, she found Lucius on the bed, dressed in … nothing.

"Lucius!" she hissed, feeling irritated, though she couldn't stop her eyes from roaming and the childish way in which her heart leapt. "I called you here to talk about Draco. This … this can wait," she finished weakly.

"Narcissa," Lucius drawled, "Draco is fine. He has not been the same since that girl passed. This should come as no surprise to you." He raised an eyebrow expectantly, waiting for Narcissa to crawl underneath the sheets to join him.

But she couldn't. Her mother's intuition squeezed her heart and she could not ignore it. "Something's wrong with Draco, my love." Narcissa leaned in towards her husband and planted a gentle kiss onto his frowning lips. "I must go see him."

Instead of stopping her, Lucius nodded. At heart, they both cared about their son above all else. It was why Narcissa had lied to Voldemort. It was why they had defected at the end at the final battle, why they had grabbed Draco and left. Something in their son was deeply broken, and Narcissa suspected that Lucius knew it too, no matter the mask he wore.

"Go, my darling."

It was another evening at the hospital. Another wonderful, blissful, adventurous evening. It had only been an hour at the emergency room, and yet Farrah had seen it all, once again: a thirty-year-old woman who had a cucumber stuck up her anus, a child who had swallowed a penny, a man who was ushered in after suffering a heart attack while exercising on his treadmill, and a twenty-something girl who had suffered a major panic attack and had been ushered to the ER after her friends' insistence.

The young girl ate a bite of the Twix bar that Farrah had bought for her, chewing slowly between her heavy breaths and the tears that fell off of her jaw. "Thanks," she murmured after she finished. Farrah pried the wrapper gently from her hands and threw it into the trash so the girl wouldn't have to stand up.

"Tracey," Farrah said softly, "Do you want to talk about it? If you need resources, I would be happy to direct you towards -"

Tracey's blonde hair with the grape-colored highlights flew violently around her as she shook her head. "Absolutely not. I don't want to talk to anyone."

Farrah sat on the edge of the bed and fiddled with her hands. "I understand your hesitation. But Tracey, I can't in good conscience let you leave unless I know that you're being taken care of." Then she paused. "You know, I see panic attacks more often than you think, in the ER. Some people feel like they're dying when they get them. Like they're having a heart attack, or that their appendix is bursting … the way we feel manifests heavily in the way our body feels too. So I see people dealing with the same issue a lot. What you're going through? It's nothing to be ashamed of. Life isn't easy. But … it can be made easier if you have the right people by your side. Your mental health matters too."

Tracey sniffled. "Okay. Yeah, some resources would be great." Farrah stood up and made her way to the shelf teeming with medical brochures. After spending a minute finding the right ones, she turned back to Tracey, who was staring at her with a strange expression.

"What is it?" Farrah asked as she placed the brochures by Tracey's side.

"You're the first doctor to show concern for me like this," Tracey replied with a watery smile. "Usually the doctors roll their eyes, like it's a waste of time for me to show up here at the ER. This has happened to me a couple times before."

Farrah couldn't help the way her heart burst with gratitude. "Aw, Tracey … I'm sorry you've had such negative experiences at the ER before. It shouldn't be that way. And I'm glad you feel that way about me. Mental health is important. It's never a waste of our time to take care of it - it's just that some people are better suited to taking care of mental health than others," Farrah winked. "And unfortunately, that's not our specialty here."

Tracey laughed and climbed off the bed, carrying the brochures with her. Farrah went through each brochure, telling her of her options for mental health resources, and made sure to detail how she could gain accessibility to these resources regardless of financial status. By the end of the last brochure, Farrah could tell Tracey was feeling better, though her heart sank with the thought that Tracey may not seek out the resources Farrah had provided. With mental health, it was almost a crapshoot. Some people sought to improve their mental health, and some people didn't, not that Farrah blamed anyone who didn't. There were many factors that contributed to whether somebody could or could not access mental health resources: finances, work schedules, stigmatization, fear of being hospitalized, the inability to physically seek out these resources due to depressive states, etc.

It was in those terrible moments, when Farrah was dealing with a mental health crisis, when she simply felt like her work as a physician wasn't enough. She didn't like giving people mental health crisis hotline numbers and then sending them off on their merry way. But she had another patient to deal with in another room - an adult who was electrocuted by sticking their finger into a socket - and so she had to go. Tracey pulled the flaps of her cardigan closer to herself as she trembled out of the room to meet her college-aged friends, who were huddled with worry. Watching them envelop her with hugs, Farrah felt that it was time for her to meet Alice in person, and apologize once and for all.

"There's nothing wrong, mother."

Narcissa watched as Draco kept his eyes unmoving on the balcony door. She had never dealt with Draco refusing to look at her! There he was, utterly pathetic in his jeans and muggle jumper, snuggled underneath the silk blanket that had come with this bedroom. And were those his shoes on the bed? Narcissa held back the urge to chastise him for such uncleanliness, and instead made her way to the side of the bed he faced so that she could catch a closer glimpse.

She was not prepared for what she saw. Her beloved Draco's eyes were marred with an aching red, as if he had been crying the entire morning. Draco never cried. Did he? His lips were set thin, like a line carved heavily into stone. His hair was unruly, and he … smelled. Her son, who made sure to shower every single morning and drown himself with the latest cologne from Diagon Alley, smelled.

"Draco," Narcissa tried again, "I can tell something is wrong. Talk to your mother." Narcissa hesitated, then drew the one word she rarely said but knew Draco needed to hear. "Please."

Draco stirred slowly, as if her pleading had brought some part of him back to life. He hoisted himself off his pillow to look at her, and as their eyes met, Narcissa's bones chilled. This was not her son. He was almost replaced by someone far crueler, colder.

"Mother," Draco said warningly, "This is not a conversation you would like to begin."

"Draco Lucius Malfoy, you do not talk to your mother that way. This is not how I raised you." Narcissa and Draco's heads snapped upwards to find Lucius standing at the doorway, Scorpius training awkwardly behind him, his blonde head bobbing up and down behind Lucius's great height. If it were not a serious conversation, Narcissa may have laughed.

A dry smile danced on Draco's mouth. "You want to know what's going on?" Draco sneered, sounding scarily like the way he did when he was fourteen, coming home from Hogwarts during the Christmas holidays to share the latest news on that 'mudblood Granger,' when he had no regard for the world around him, when he was not softened yet by the war or Astoria. Narcissa wasn't sure whether to feel relieved that her son was removed from those influences, or fearful that the darker side of her son that knew no compassion appeared to be making a comeback.

"Everything in my life, that I have ever been miserable about, is your fault."

Silence rang through the room as the remaining three Malfoys stared at Draco in shock. Narcissa's stomach dropped, and she longed to be whisked away by the wind she heard howling outside.

"You … you dare?" Narcissa whispered, her voice growing an octave higher with every beating second. "You dare blame the failures of your life on us? Me and your father, who have done everything in our power -"

"And what in the bloody fuck did you do, mother?" Draco shouted. Everyone else startled, especially Narcissa, at hearing his voice raise. Draco never yelled anymore. "You guys ruined everything!"

Draco pushed Narcissa aside, causing her to whimper in surprise, and then climbed off the edge of the bed to stand. He pointed his finger maniacally between herself and Lucius. "First of all, you had to get yourself in with the bloody Dark Lord! You had to teach us prejudice, prejudice that has done absolutely nothing but alienate me! And then father, you made your mistakes, landed yourself in bloody Azkaban, leaving me to kill Dumbledore so that mother wouldn't die! And then -"

"Draco," Lucius interrupted sternly. Narcissa peered over at her husband and noticed his hand wrapping tightly against his cane. Narcissa prayed silently that he wouldn't pull it apart and take out his wand. If Lucius drew his wand, Draco would likely duel. "Draco," Lucius repeated, "The war was years ago … decades ago … you knew that we did what was best -"

"Nobody asked you to join the fucking Death Eaters!" Draco screamed. "And I am marked because of you!" Draco lifted his left arm, and with flitting aggression, pulled down the sleeve of his black jumper to reveal the hideous, black swirling tattoo that lay on his pale skin. Narcissa heard Scorpius draw a breath, and she suddenly remembered that in all his life, Scorpius had never seen Draco's Dark Mark. It was Draco's great shame, and he had made sure to never let his son see it … until now. But Draco wasn't done, Narcissa could tell. Her son stepped towards Lucius, moving until he was dangerously close to his father's shadow.

"And just when I rebuilt my life, when I fell in love - which I thought was impossible for me - you killed Astoria. It was all your fault. You -" Draco sobbed, pointing his finger at Lucius accusingly - "you forced her to …"

"To have me."

Everyone looked at Scorpius, who stood at the doorway. His pale brows were furrowed in anger, and his eyes carried nothing but hatred. Draco, who seemed to have realized what he had said, looked desperately to his son.

"No, Scorp - you know I love you -"

Scorpius looked at each Malfoy slowly. He peered at Narcissa, and she withered under his glare. Then he stared at Lucius, who stared back unabashedly, and lastly, he looked at his father. He stared the longest at Draco, as if memorizing his father's face before a great departure. When neither man said nothing, Scorpius turned away. A sound of clanging broke the moment. Narcissa looked at the floor, and there it was: Scorpius' signet ring.

"Being a Malfoy has been the greatest curse of my life," Scorpius said boldly. "And I'm done."

With the crack of apparition, the youngest Malfoy was gone.

Author's notes:

Ahhh! Please don't hate me! I know it's a sad cliffhanger! If it's any consolation, this scene was so hard to write :( poor little Scorp! I promise, there will be Malfoy family consolation and redemption in the future, just ... not now. We need to feel all of their anger towards each other first. ;) that being said, I hope you enjoyed this chapter, and hopefully there'll be more chapters soon!

And many thanks and much love to my guest reviewer! I totally agree with you - I also swoon for Lucius and Narcissa, and we'll definitely see more of them soon! 3

please feel free to comment on this story! I really love receiving them as well as feedback! feedback helps ME be a better writer for YOU, so if there's something you'd like to see more of (or less of), or any questions you have that have remained unanswered until now, please please please let me know.

Thanks again, and I'll see you soon!

dreaminginsilver