A fortnight later, it was time to leave Hogwarts for Easter Break.
This year, Harry was going to celebrate it in an unusual way- first thing being with his boyfriend, secondly, he was going to spend it in Hermione's house.
Hermione's parents, Laura and Donald, had invited all her friends over, mostly as a Thank You to the Weasleys for having given their daughter a place to stay on so many occasions.
Most of them had agreed to it, but Ginny and Luna had already made arrangements to spend it in Luna's house. Xenophilius had invited Ginny as he saw her as 'his daughter's most personal friend'.
It would be a great opportunity for the girls to come out as a couple to him.
The day the students had to take the Hogwarts express to King's Cross, Hermione wanted to make sure that everything was into place, before having her boyfriend and her friends step foot into her house.
"So, do you remember what I told you?" she asked them all.
They were walking in the hallway, making their way towards the Thestrals that would have taken them to the station. They had all used Locomotion Charm on their trunks, so they were flying behind them.
"That your grandma doesn't know that you're a witch, therefore we have to prevent strange things from happening." said Ron, reciting it like a line for theatrical purposes. He rolled his eyes after he finished.
"Thank you, baby." She said, as she climbed on the carriage. "I trust Harry on this, but Draco..." she gave her friend a look. Draco had never had anything to do with muggles, so he was a real beginner. She was worried that he would do something that would give them away.
"No worries," said Draco, as he sat opposite her, next to Harry. "Your friend here has taught me a few important guidelines to follow."
"Hoping you payed attention." said Harry.
"There will be no problems." He said to Hermione, ignoring his boyfriend.
"Oh, alright... I'm just stressed. Ron has never met my parents." said Hermione, sighing.
"Oh, I am more scared than you are." said Ron, shivering a little.
In the last days, when Harry and Draco slept in the same dormitory as Ron, he had been pestering them with his anxiety. 'What if they don't like me? What if they kick me out after two minutes?' was only a glimpse of his constant rambles of fear.
"Remember, we don't have much time. We also have to find that spare second to say goodbye to the girls." Hermione reminded them.
"Don't worry, we have hours to spend on the train." Draco informed.
"Yeah, but we have many things to do... You need to change into muggle clothes before my Gran can see us... she's coming to collect us in London. Did you pack everything in? Harry, did you put Viridis in the owlery? Did you all get Toothbrushes? My parents are dentists, they care about dental hygiene..." the only girl in the group babbled.
"Yes, mum!" The three boys said in unison, as they descended from the carriage.
"She's the apotheosis of anxiety." Draco whispered to his boyfriend.
"Believe me, this is nothing." Harry answered.
As they got off the train in nine and three-quarters, Hermione had already put her arms around Ginny and Luna to say goodbye to them. The latter still had one foot on the locomotive.
"Bye girls! Have fun!" the brunette said.
"You too!" said Ginny, trying to adjust herself in the embrace.
When the oldest of the three girls pulled away, everyone else pulled them into a group hug.
"Behave." Ginny said to her brother, while grinning. "Don't traumatize those muggles."
Not much later, after Ginny and Luna had been picked up by Xenophilius, Hermione saw her grandmother in the distance. "There she is!" she exclaimed, then she waved at her.
As soon as she saw her granddaughter, the old lady trotted to her happily. "Ah, my dear! You've gotten so beautiful." she said, wrapping her into a tight hug.
Hermione's Grandmother looked a lot like her, she had the same kind of bushy hair, just that hers was white. She was a frail woman, possibly in her eighties, her voice was slightly dreamy, kind of like Luna's.
"These are Draco and Harry." The girl said as she pulled away from her Grandma's grasp.
"Oh nice to meet you! Such good looking lads! My name is Rosemary Granger." Rosemary said. Her eyes lit up as she saw those two boys. By the looks of it, she found younger men attractive.
"Oh, Thank you." Draco said as he shook her hand.
"Pleasure." said Harry.
"...and this is Ronald, my boyfriend." Hermione said nervously.
Rosemary looked quite disappointed upon seeing that her boyfriend was not Harry, nor Draco.
Ron extended his hand for her to shake, but she simply stared at it in utter disgust.
After a bumpy ride in Rosemary Granger's old Panda Young- a ride that Draco and Ron found rather scary - they all arrived at the Granger household.
Draco was curious to see what a muggle house looked like as he had never seen one.
Harry had told him so many things about this special device called a 'television' - apparently, muggles used it as a pastime. It was like a box, Harry had described, and it displayed luminous moving images of people or animals, usually. It sounded a lot like something the Wizards could have used, he found it odd how muggles had more advanced technology than them.
"Laura, Don! We're here!" Rosemary said, banging on the door.
She was surely a fierce woman.
Not long after, the door swung open, revealing a smiling couple. Hermione's parents looked very clean and nice, their teeth were unbelievably white.
Rosemary hurried inside, complaining of a back ache.
They both embraced their daughter so warmly that Draco couldn't help feeling envious.
This was his second holiday of the year that he would spend without his own family and seeing his friends being happy and cute and cuddly with their parents was becoming more and more unbearable.
Not even Harry knew, but he was still in a great deal of pain when it came to his family situation.
During these past four months, he would hold his breath every time he saw an owl approach, hoping that it was some sort of apology letter from his parents, begging him to come back home, telling him that he was accepted.
But that wasn't the case. His parents had completely deleted him from their lives because he hadn't grown up according to plan.
"We heard so much about you!" Both parents said as they all came inside, and it didn't take them long before they hugged Ron, too.
Ron seemed to relax, he had been so anxious about meeting them and now he looked pretty content.
Naturally, seeing Laura and Donald as they met their daughter's boyfriend, all laughs and smiles, was a tough blow on Draco.
He would have never been able to get Lucius and Narcissa to greet Harry this way. He felt it was so unfair.
"And these are my friends, Harry and Draco." Hermione said, grinning and putting her arms around their shoulders.
"Ah, right, the gay couple!" Said Laura, not dropping her smile. "It's so good to meet you both. Hermione spoke very highly of you."
Draco was surprised at their open-mindedness, they were so fine with them being together.
They were his idyllic idea of parents, he was sure of it.
Later, Donald showed them where they would sleep.
They let Hermione and Ron sleep in Hermione's room, on the condition that they had to leave the door open.
Harry and Draco were treated the same, receiving the guest room.
On that night they were supposed to go out to eat a very special muggle food called Pizza.
Both Harry and Hermione had talked about it dreamily, so Ron and Draco were having high hopes on the dish.
Draco had to put up a fake smile, as he watched his boyfriend prepare himself for their double date. "Ok, shoot. What's wrong?" Asked Harry, all while putting on cologne.
His boyfriend was sitting on the bed, not dropping his fake smile.
"Nothing." Draco lied.
He had grown accustomed to lying to him, lately.
"Don't lie to me." Harry warned, raising a finger.
"It's nothing, I told you. I don't feel like spoiling our first night in the muggle world. "
Oh dear, Draco Malfoy was looking forward to a night out in a muggle city.
His father would have suffered a heart attack had he known that.
"You never spoil anything. We are not going until you tell me what's bothering you." Harry said with crossed arms. He proceeded to sit next to him and give him a look.
"It's just..." Draco took a breath.
"It's about your parents, isn't it?" Said Harry.
Once again, it was so hard to hide things from him.
"Yeah... This is yet another Holiday in which they completely ignored me." Draco let out.
"Honestly, why should you care now? You've been fine all these months, now all of a sudden you get sad. Screw them Draco, you're here with me, with your friends, why should you give them so much thought?" Harry asked.
"It's not just now. I never really got over my parents' rejection, babe." Draco sighed. "I've been hurting about it, mostly when I was alone."
"Why didn't you ever tell me about it? There should be no secrets between us." Said Harry, slightly upset.
What he said was true, the last time they had kept things from each other, they ended up not speaking for a week.
"I didn't want to ruin our happy moments." Draco explained.
Harry sighed, then he put a hand on Draco's thigh. "A relationship is not just happy moments, Draco. It's getting through things together."
"I'm sorry." Said Draco, meeting his gaze. "I just wish they weren't so obsessed with traditions and purebloods, you know? Why can't we have a civil relationship? No, we can only hate each other."
"The way I see it, they're not worth beating yourself up over. Honestly, your parents are... despicable. And I mean no offence." said Harry. "I mean... throwing you out of their lives because you like men? Not even a Christmas card. Sadly as it sounds, you need to try and learn to let them go." he looked down with sad eyes.
Harry knew what it felt like to lose someone he loved, having lost a bunch in the previous year alone.
To be fine, Draco had to treat them as if they were dead. It would take a while as it would be a grieving process, but, in the end, he would have gotten over it.
"I'm starting to think you're right about that..." Draco sighed.
When wasn't he right? Draco wondered.
"Well, now, we really need to get going." Harry said, as he sat up. "You coming?" He extended his hand for Draco to hold.
The Slytherin took it, giving him half a smile.
He chose not to waste his good times with his boyfriend and friends crying about his estranged parents.
He wasn't going to think about them, not for the whole duration of the Easter Break.
Ron and Draco learned that muggle restaurants had a paper menu instead of the drawn-in-the-air-one. They also had many waiters. No one would have their trays fly above their hards, they only carried them by hand.
Also, dirty dishes wouldn't just fly back to the kitchen.
The pizza place they were in belonged to a family friend of the Grangers, so he sat them in his best table and promised to reduce the final price.
At first glance, this famous Italian delicacy looked like a vinyl record, as it was flat and round.
For some reasons they had girl's names, like 'Margherita'.
Muggles were weird.
When the food arrived, Hermione and Harry smirked at each other, eager to see the reaction their boyfriends would have had upon tasting pizza for the first time.
"So, you grab a slice of pizza, like so..." Hermione instructed as she held a piece in her hand.
"And then you bite." Harry continued, biting his slice ferociously.
Oh, God. He had not eaten a pizza in ages. He would only eat it on rare occasions, as the Dursleys weren't really fond of him eating food that he liked. He had missed it.
Ron didn't look too convinced, he had never really loved things with tomato sauce.
However, the moment his taste buds felt the pizza, he realised that he had judged too soon, given his delighted expression.
Draco was reminded of the first time he'd tried burgers. This dish, too, had to be eaten with your hands. He reluctantly grabbed a slice, having some of the toppings fall from it, then he took a bite.
Suddenly, an explosion of flavour invaded his mouth. His eyes fluttered back as he took in the delicious taste of this simple muggle food.
How had he lived his entire life without trying it? There was nothing that tasted better, he was sure of it.
It was even better than the burger he had eaten on his first date with Harry.
This was living.
"You like it baby?" Harry asked, chortling.
Draco simply nodded.
Hermione laughed her heart out as her boyfriend was making a mess, getting the sauce all over his chin and hands.
Then, she cleaned him up with a napkin, still laughing.
She was very happy that her favourite people in the world were discovering her way of living - and liked it greatly.
After this marvelous gastronomical experience, Hermione dragged her friends to a pub.
It didn't look like one of the Hogsmeade bars, it was bigger, warmer and it smelled like alcohol.
Also, their choice of drinks sounded funny, too.
For one, they had Whiskeys without the fire bit and beers without the butter part.
When Ron tried the Whiskey, he grimaced. It burned his throat and it tasted too strong - stronger then the Wizard version.
Just as everyone was laughing at the face Ron was making, something strange happened.
An owl entered the place, flying through an open window.
The bird was holding a letter firmly into his beak, its envelope was red. There was no doubt as to what it was: a howler.
The barman and the customers all screamed and tried to chase it out of the room, but it wouldn't do it before delivering mail to the rightful recipient.
Draco recognised the owl upon seeing him. It was the Malfoy owl.
He held his breath as it flew towards him.
With shaking hands, he took the letter out of the animal's beak.
As he did, the bird flew away, without even greeting him.
As absurd as it sounded, it felt like it was mad at Draco, too.
"Is that... from your father?" Harry asked, aghast.
A/N: Mr Granger's name, too, is made up. His mother is yet another OC.