Disclaimer: Harry Potter isn't mine.

Chapter 5 P. S. I love you

Draco,

I'm sorry about Christmas. I'd never want you to do anything you aren't comfortable with. But it's been three weeks.

Anyway, you have to come to St. Mungo's. I'm having the baby, and I don't want to have the C-section without you.

Katherine

P. S. I love you.

Draco stared at the letter for a long time. Three weeks. He had barely gotten out of bed in that time and hadn't realized. She must have canceled her appointment. Her cesarean was scheduled for a few days after the New Year.

He wasn't angry with her. Or Mother. Or Black, who she blamed. He was angry at himself for almost getting caught up in the moment.

That night, he thought about kissing Katherine, what it would be like, if she wanted to kiss him, what would happen after the kiss. He couldn't do that to Astoria.

P. S. I love you. So now what? Draco fiddled with his wedding ring. He wasn't ready to take it off. And his wedding portrait was above the fireplace in his room. He never wanted to remove it. Could he really have a life with another woman with it in his room? He tried to imagine Katherine sleeping soundly in bed next to him, and Astoria smiling down on him from the portrait. It was wrong.

Draco forced himself out of bed. He couldn't think about that now. He had to go meet his son.

"I'm sorry."

Katherine wouldn't take her eyes off the machine monitoring the baby's heartrate. She was hyperventilating, but Draco wasn't sure if it was from nerves or the pain. "I-I n-n-need to get him out. He's going to die!"

"No, he's not," Draco said as quietly as he could over her panting.

"He's going to die," she sobbed. Her heartrate was skyrocketing. "Because I didn't have the C-section two weeks ago!"

Draco put his arms around her shoulders and kissed her temple. At the intimate gesture, she ceased her wheezing and stared at him. "They're going to prep you if you calm down. It's safer if you're stable."

"Your mum doesn't want me to do it," she cried.

"My mum is an idiot," he said flatly. That finally earned him a smile. "Calm down?"

She nodded and cried to herself for a little bit. After a few minutes, she leaned into his chest and was reduced to sniffles. "You ignored my letter for two hours."

He slept through the owl pecking on his window for that long? Now he really felt bad for spending an hour at home before finding the courage to go. "Idiocy is hereditary, I'm afraid."

Katherine sighed, sounding exhausted before the real fun even began. He didn't to let her go until a mediwitch offered her a potion. It was time.

"I'm sorry, about before." Now that she was numb and about to be cut open, Katherine was back to her old self. Who would have thought?

Draco ran his hand through her hair, smiling slightly when she closed her eyes and leaned into his touch. He tried not to look at Lovegood, who had just pranced by with the scalpel. "I've been thinking. About his name. While you were getting prepped."

"Hmmm…" She made a face but didn't open her eyes. He looked over the sheet and then quickly looked away. She had to be at least feeling the pressure.

"Scorpius," he said quietly. "After the tattoo you got with Astoria."

Katherine opened her eyes, and he waited for her to laugh at him. With an odd look on her face, she laced her fingers with his. "I'd like that."

"Really?" he said in disbelief. He expected her to laugh in his face.

But she was smiling, and happy tears filled her beautiful green eyes. "Can I tell you a story about Astoria?"

Kat grinned as she got one last look at her tattoo before the artist put a protective bandage over it. "I look so bad ass! Like a professional killer who has a tragic backstory."

Astoria laughed, a light twinkling sound that Kat could still hear as clear as day. "You can tell Teddy that. He needs someone to go to his show and tell. I can't go. I don't know why he thinks I'm so interesting."

"Someone who wants to be friends with me is pretty interesting." Kat hopped off the chair and handed the tattoo artist her credit card. "Do you want to get some ice cream or do you have to go home?"

"I have to go home," Astoria said regretfully. Kat remembered wondering why she didn't want to eat with them anymore. Now she knew. "But before I go, there's something I wanted to ask you."

Kat raised her eyebrows as the artist handed her her card with the receipt, and they started to head out. "Charlie doesn't mean anything. He's just smitten."

"Huh?" She hadn't realized that Charlie had a crush on her. "No… Before-before the illness, my husband and I were trying to have a baby. We even froze about a dozen embryos before-before he got sick."

"Oh." Kat didn't like to talk about babies, which was why she had been distancing herself from Ron and Hermione lately. They were trying.

Astoria's beautiful blue eyes shimmered. "I-It was me. I couldn't carry. It would mean the world if you could for me."

"Oh." Kat couldn't ever imagine getting pregnant again. In fact, she was looking into fostering or adopting. The only problem was that magical children rarely needed homes. Therefore, single mums didn't stand a chance.

"Think about it?" Astoria practically pleaded. "We'd raise him together. I just need a piece of my husband and me to live on."

Kat shrugged, and Astoria shoved her hands in her pockets so she couldn't nervously fiddle with them. They walked in silence for a while, and Kat tried to picture herself having another baby. She'd love to do it but…

"I have to go," Astoria said weakly. "You don't have to. I know it's a lot and—"

"I'll do it." She didn't know how she managed to sound so confident. Inside, she was a nervous wreck.

Astoria hugged her so fiercely that Kat almost toppled over. Within a few months, they were having a baby.

Draco was brought back to reality with a fierce, high pitched cry. Their son was finally here.

"I could smell you from down the hall," Draco told Scorpius a few months later. The baby gave him a gummy smile and cooed. He was finally sleeping in his room by himself. Katherine used to wake up every hour and put a mirror under his nose to make sure he was still breathing. "You don't even eat that much…"

Draco jumped backwards when he was rewarded with a squirt of urine that sprayed his robe. Scorpius laughed evilly. Sometimes, for just a moment, he forgot that the boy wasn't Katherine's biological son. This was one of those times. "Damn it…"

He knew Mother put stain remover somewhere in here, but Draco wasn't entirely sure where. It was four in the bloody morning! Not to mention the shit the house elves were cleaning out of his crib. Nappy explosions, Katherine called them. Scorpius didn't seem all that fazed. Draco opened the cabinet underneath the changing table to search. He hit his head on the changing table when the tips of his fingers touched parchment. Scorpius laughed again.

Draco,

I'm hoping you're the one to find this. But I'm also hoping that Kat is at the Manor. And I know she'll read it if she finds it first.

Do you know why I became friends with Kat? I joined that group to try to come to terms with my own passing, but… Even though she was so broken, she was so kind and funny and…

I could see her being your wife.

Don't get me wrong. I'm your wife, and I always will be. But I can't stand the thought of you in so much pain. I know it's normal and healthy, but I want you to be happy. I want you to have all the things I couldn't give you, and I saw that with Kat.

Please give this new life I rashly set up for you a chance.

Astoria

P.S. I love you.

"Ha! Ah! Ha!" Scorpius kicked his feet over Draco's head and smiled when his father finally stood up after reading the letter half a dozen times. The house elves magically put a new nappy on the baby while he was reading, and Draco had long forgotten about the mess on his silk robe.

"Let's go see Mummy," he said hoarsely. Scorpius lit up at the word and promptly shoved his fingers in Draco's mouth.

"Is he hungry?" Katherine asked sleepily as she struggled to open her eyes. "I smell piss."

"No." Before Draco could back out, he leaned in and kissed her. Katherine automatically kissed him back, smiling into his lips, and was rewarded with a hair pull from their son.

She finally opened her eyes to see Scorpius laughing. "I was going to say… not in front of the baby, Draco."

"I love you," he whispered in her ear. His tears must be soaking her hair. "I'm sorry. For everything."

"You have nothing to be sorry for." Katherine kissed him again. "I love you too."

Four years later…

He substituted at Hogwarts once or twice a week. When Scorpius turned one, they moved into Katherine's house in Cokesworth and got married a year after that. She homeschooled him now, and life couldn't be more perfect.

"Daddy!" Scorpius yelled as he stepped through the floo. The boy, who was his image with Astoria's personality, ran to him while waving a book in the air. "Look what I readed today!"

"What did you read?" he asked excitedly. Katherine leaned in the doorway with a small smile. Draco could faintly smell dinner burning as he scooped his son up. Within a few moments, she yelled and ran for the kitchen. Smoke was starting to billow out.

Scorpius showed him a book with a grumpy looking dragon on it. "Mummy said Mama gives it to me."

Astoria had a Gringotts vault full of books, birthday presents, and letters for up until Scorpius turned seventeen. There was even a letter left for the boy's wedding day. Draco was reluctant to give him the later letters. The handwriting was becoming shaky as her health deteriorated, but Katherine figured he'd understand at the age they were due for.

"Really? I don't think I've read this one." Draco swallowed at the lump in his throat. More than five years had gone by, and the grief still occasionally hit him. "You'll have to read it to me after dinner."

Katherine emerged from the kitchen, looking very disappointed. "We're ordering pizza."

"Yay!" Scorpius jumped out of his arms and ran off to go get the phone.

Katherine pointed an index finger in the air. "I saved the cake though."

"I'm sure you did," Draco said dryly.

"Is that a fat joke?" she asked, but she was smiling. She occasionally halfheartedly said she needed to lose a stone, but no effort was ever made. "Welcome home. What did you teach today?"

She hugged him, and Draco kissed the top of her head. "Potions again. I think the professor is having a break down."

Katherine snuggled into his chest as Scorpius ran back into the living room with the phone, proclaiming that he wanted his pizza to have everything on it, even though Draco knew he would end up picking everything off and eating it plain. They needed to get a dog.

"Are you going to call them?" Katherine asked.

"No!" Scorpius yelled. He had a shy side.

"Why not?" she asked with false outrage.

"Mummy!"

Katherine picked him up and smothered him with kisses until his laughs turned into pleas for help and exclamations that he had to "use the potty." Then, she finally ordered the pizza. Draco sighed happily and went to go clean up the mess she made in the kitchen.

That night, Katherine snuggled up to him in bed. Ever since he kissed her all those years ago, she hadn't wanted to let him go. Draco stared sleepily at their wedding portrait, which hung above the fireplace in their bedroom. On his nightstand was a picture of his wedding day with Astoria. On hers was the picture of her and Astoria the day they did the in vitro fertilization. Next to it was a picture of himself, her, and Scorpius the day he was born.

"I want to start looking at houses," she announced out of the blue. "I think if Scorpius went to kindergarten, he might not be so shy. But I want him to go to a good school."

This was her mother's childhood home. Draco didn't think she would want to move out ever since they moved back in. "Really?"

"And…" She rested her chin on his chest and smiled shyly. "I was thinking."

"Don't to that," Draco said automatically, causing her to swat at him playfully.

"Astoria said you guys had a few more embryos." She looked at him hopefully.

Draco's eyebrows practically shot up to his hairline. She wanted to have another baby with him and Astoria. He wondered what his first wife would say to that. And she left all the gifts and letters for one baby, not two.

And what if Katherine got anxiety again? He didn't want Scorpius to see her like that. But once she was on medication, she was fine… Luna would be more than willing to treat her again. And there was something else that automatically came to mind.

"I don't want to have another baby with Astoria." As he said it, that painful lump formed in his throat, and his wife's face fell. "I want to have one with you."

Katherine lit up and practically jumped on him.

September 1st, 2017

"Mummy!" little Astoria wailed. "I wanna go with Scorp!"

"And leave me?" Kat asked, trying her best to sound offended. Her daughter looked just like her but was every bit Draco in personality. At least, that's what she told herself when the six year old acted up.

"YES!"

They were at the train station, and Kat tried to watch lovingly as Draco helped Scorpius load up his trunk. How was she going to last until Christmas without him?

"Not to worry." Teddy scooped Astoria up and tucked her under his arm. Her little girl shot her arms out as if she were flying like Superman. "I need an assistant."

"YAY!"

Kat frowned as Teddy started walking away with Astoria. "Hagrid's assistant needs an assistant?"

Teddy blinked as if it were obvious. "What else am I going to feed to the blasted ended shrewts?"

"MUMMY!"

"I'm sorry." Kat shrugged as if to say, It's out of my hands. "Aunt Daphne's Charms professor. Maybe she can save you."

"MUMMY!"

"She's not coming, is she?" Scorpius asked worriedly as Kat pulled him into a hug.

"No." Kat didn't want to let him go. "I'll keep her for another week or so."

"Mum," Scorpius somehow managed to gasp. "I can't breathe."

Kat finally let go, although she was pouting. "Write to me tonight, okay?"

Scorpius rolled his eyes. "Yes, Mum."

Draco clapped him on the shoulder, looking misty eyed. Then, he took one of Astoria's letters out of his breast pocket. "Here."

Scorpius took the letter slowly and then clung to it for dear life. "Thanks, Dad."

Draco nodded numbly, and as soon as the train whistle went off, he grabbed Scorpius and hugged him just as tightly as Kat just did. He only let go as the train started to move, meaning Scorpius had to run and jump, grabbing Teddy's outstretched hand. Teddy charmed Astoria's shoes, making her bounce off the train. Her melodramatic wails filled the crowded station.

"Alright, c'mon. We'll go get ice cream." Kat smirked when Astoria immediately stopped crying.

Draco kissed her cheek and wrapped an arm around her waist. "I love you."

Kat grinned. It was hard to believe they were once rivals. "I love you more."

Thank you for the reviews for the last chapter myafroatemydog, Ern Estine 13624, Nataly SkyPot, Padfootette, and Rose Lily Potter!

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Happy Mother's Day!