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Draco Malfoy entered his house from the Floo, and brushed off his robes to make sure they were perfect and dust free. He straightened his spine like he was taught to do and walked out of the fireplace, looking dignified. But then he felt silly. It was his own house, no one was there to say anything to him. He supposed it was a left over instinct from when he was a child, being told to stand up straight every time he accidentally slouched.
His life had been extra busy ever since he had been offered a job at the Ministry, after the fiasco with the time turner. He had almost refused, because he had wanted to spend more time with his son. But Scorpius had said he should take it, because it would be good for him. So Draco had decided to try it out, and it turned out that Scorpius was right, as usual. The job helped Draco distract himself from his loneliness when Scorpius wasn't around, and it was helping him slowly gain back a good reputation for the Malfoy name. It was slow but satisfying work. And it helped that the job was only part time, because Draco still wanted to spend time with Scorpius.
He had thought that he would hate it, because he had never wanted to have a Ministry job, but it was slowly helping him out of the shell he had built around himself since Astoria's death. He tried to ignore the pain that came with thinking about her. She was probably the only person who had known everything about him, flaws and all, and still loved him. She was also the first person who he had confided with all of his secrets, and instead of leaving him, she had held him and comforting him while he had cried. She was the only person who had ever done that for him. He missed her so much it physically hurt him. He remembered that after he had proposed to her, he had asked her if she was sure she wanted to marry him. The Malfoy name was considered evil, and if she married him, she would have it too. But she hadn't cared. She had insisted. And he wanted her back so badly now.
He knew that it had been hard for Scorpius after Astoria's passing as well. His precious son. The son with which he would never make the same mistakes his father had made with him. As much as he tried to make up for the loss, he knew he could never replace Astoria.
Draco walked into the kitchen and called out "Tiffy!" A female house elf walked in.
"Yes, Master Malfoy?" Tiffy asked, bowing her head so low it reached the floor. Draco couldn't help but smile. His father had always hated house elves, calling them filthy, but Draco had always been fascinated with the little creatures. But he had never understood Hermione's SPEW club at school. The house elves WANTED to be enslaved. Couldn't she see that? Any respectable pureblood would…
No, Draco told himself. It was hard to force himself to stop thinking the way his parents, especially his father, had drilled into him from the moment he could understand words. He tried not to dwell into thoughts of his childhood, and instead turned to Tiffy.
"Please call Scorpius down, and then get some dinner for both of us," Draco said uncomfortably. He tried to be polite to house elves now, but it was so strange for him.
Tiffy bowed again and said, "Yes, Master Malfoy." She snapped her fingers and with a loud crack, disapperated. Draco made his way into the sitting room and fell onto the couch. Although it was only 7, Draco felt exhausted and just wanted to sleep. He rubbed his eyes and waited for Scorpius to come down.
"Master! Master!" Draco jerked awake at the sound of Tiffy. He yawned and sat up on the couch. He hadn't even noticed when he had fallen asleep. "Yes Tiffy? What time is it?"
The house elf looked nervous. "It's 11:00 pm, sir." 11? He had been asleep for 4 hours!
"Has Scorpius eaten yet?" Draco felt a little betrayed that his son hadn't even bothered to wake him up. Tiffy's lip quivered, and she let out a wail, right next to Draco's ear. He flinched in surprise and jumped up.
"Tiffy is sorry! Tiffy doesn't know!" Tiffy wailed, and she grabbed the nearest object, which happened to be a lamp, and started hitting herself with it. Draco grabbed her arms.
"Stop!" Immediately, the elf froze and dropped the lamp, which shattered into pieces. Draco picked up his wand and pointed it at the lamp, which began repairing itself. Then he turned toward Tiffy, who looked terrified. Draco didn't want the house elves to be afraid of him, like they had been afraid of his father. He felt a little hurt that even after all these years of living with him, Tiffy still thought he would punish her the way his father had. But he had been horrible to her as a child, he thought guiltily.
"It's alright, Tiffy, just tell me what's wrong," Draco said as soothingly as he could.
"Master Scorpius is missing! Tiffy doesn't know where he is!" Tiffy fell to the ground, sobbing.
"What do you mean? He's gone?" Draco asked, panic flaring through his chest. Not again! This couldn't be happening. The last time his son had gone missing, he and Potter's son had almost brought back the Dark Lord! He really hoped that wasn't the case now. For a moment, he wondered if Scorpius had left the house. But he was grounded, and Draco knew that even though his son complained about his punishment, he wouldn't disobey Draco.
Draco looked down at the elf. "Are you sure you looked everywhere?" he asked urgently. Tiffy nodded.
Draco immediately turned to run up the stairs. "Scorpius!" he called. He looked through every room until he got to his own room. The door was slightly ajar, and Draco frowned. He always kept the door closed. Someone must have opened it without him knowing. His immediate thought was Tiffy, but he remembered ordering her to never go in there. She wouldn't be able to because he had forbade her. That left only one person.
Scorpius wouldn't go in there, Draco thought. He knew better than to do that. But he pushed open the door anyways.
The room used to be his study, but Draco had turned it into his room after Astoria's death. It had been too painful for him to sleep in the bed without her right beside him. They were many other empty rooms in the Manor, but all of those had been empty for years, even during his childhood. He didn't even know how long it had been since they had been used. He had used a couple of them as playrooms when he had been a child, and later for Scorpius, but now they were empty and lonely. It would've been strange for him to use them now. But even when this had been his study, Scorpius had always been forbidden from going in.
His room was as orderly as usual. Nothing was out of place, and Draco was glad about that. His room had items he would never want Scorpius to know about. And if Scorpius was here, there was only one reason he would've been: to read books. He hoped he wasn't right. He hoped that he and Astoria had taught their son better than to go snooping in other people's private places, especially his own father's.
Anger began to fill him, anger at his son for worrying him once again, for never caring about his father's feelings when he just disappeared. Draco had always strove to please his father, and cared too much about his feelings. In a way, Draco realized, he and Scorpius were complete opposites. Draco had tried to please his father, but always failed. His father's disappointment in him had only grown after he had married Astoria. He was pretty sure that his father wouldn't have even shown up at the wedding if his mother hadn't forced him.
On the other hand, Scorpius never listened to Draco and didn't seem to care about him. That also hurt Draco, because he was trying his best to be a better father than the one he had. Ever since his mother's death, Scorpius had become distant, doing things he never would've done when Astoria was alive. Admittedly, Draco had never been the most affectionate father. He could never figure out how to talk to his son. But Draco still loved Scorpius, more than anything.
He walked to the bookshelf and looked at it thoughtfully. There was something, he knew. Something that would've made Scorpius disappear. Then he remembered. The pensieve. Draco had made that sometime after the war, when he was being torn apart by memories of his childhood and of the war. He winced, remembering the hatred that everyone had for him, and how alone and worthless he had felt. How he still felt that way at times. There had been a time when he had even considered killing himself, feeling like no one in the world would miss him anyways.
He loved his parents, but they had never been the type of people he could go to with his problems. Especially his father. He probably would've gotten angry at Draco for being so weak. He knew that his mother would've been devastated if he had died, but his father probably would've been glad. Glad that his useless, pathetic excuse of a son was finally gone.
That had been a difficult time in his life, before he had met Astoria. He had read in a book that putting memories in a pensieve dulls them a little, and although they would still be in your mind, they would be harder to remember, and definitely much easier to cope with. So he had dumped all of his traumatic memories into the pensieve. He knew that was not the right way to heal himself from his experiences, but it was certainly easier. And Draco Malfoy always went for the easier way.
This was one of the only things he had not told Astoria. He had even told her about his father hurting him when he disappointed him. Astoria had been furious at his father and tried to convince him that he didn't deserve the "abuse", as she called it. Which he had never understood. There was a big difference between abuse and discipline, which was what his father had done. Although Draco would never dream of hurting his son in the way his father had done to him, he didn't see anything wrong with his idea of discipline. He now realized that the techniques used for parenting depended on the parent, and his father had done what he thought was right.
However, these memories were definitely not ones he would want a child to look at, especially his own son. Draco touched the book called A Study of Memories: How to Use a Pensieve. The pensieve came out, a large bowl with silvery liquid floating around in it. Draco looked at it. Did he really have the strength to experience his worst memories once again? He knew that once he entered the pensieve, all the memories would become clear in his head, and that he would be left to deal with his worst memories going from dull to completely clear. He would go back to being how he had been right after the war, broken down by the trauma.
He remembered waking up in the middle of the night from a nightmare, screaming into the darkness, with no one there to comfort him. Sometimes, his mother would come to comfort him. His father never came. But in the morning at breakfast, his father would give him strange looks, and Draco knew that he always heard the screams.
He shivered at the memory. Now, with Astoria gone and his parents living in a different house, there would be nobody at all. After he had met her, she had always been there to pull him close when he woke up, screaming like a child. She would hold his shivering, trembling body, whispering words of comfort into his ear. He would eventually calm down, listening to her heart beat rhythmically as he lay against her chest.
Draco knew that he was a coward, and that he would always run away from his problems. But Draco Malfoy would also do anything for his son, even if he was angry at him. And he knew that Scorpius would not be able to come out unless the memories ended, or the owner of the memories came to get him. He steeled himself, taking a deep breath, and put his head into the liquid. The world around him slowly fade away as he fell down, into whichever memory Scorpius happened to be in.