Draco should have known, when he heard the door slam, that something was wrong. He was in the middle of a chess game, however, and Neville's set was surprisingly clever, having managed to put him in check three times now. Draco was trying not to think about how he couldn't win against Neville even when Neville wasn't even there.

Even if he had missed the door slamming, his ears should have perked up at the clink of glassware that sounded remarkably like the tink of a whisky bottle against a tumbler. It was a Monday, and Neville usually reserved the harder alcohol for the weekends.

It wasn't until Neville had been home and hadn't said a word for half an hour that Draco looked up suddenly, in the middle of a second chess game in which he was being soundly trounced.

"All right, Neville?" he called down the stairs.

There was no response. Draco hesitantly descended, eventually finding Neville at the kitchen table, studying the amber liquid in the tumbler before him as though it held all the answers to the universe. He did not look up as Draco stopped next to the table.

"Bad day?" Draco ventured.

Neville's face stayed carefully expressionless. "Harry's first day back."

Draco slowly lowered himself into a chair, holding his breath, letting it out quietly when Neville didn't protest. "And that's bad?"

"Yes." Nothing else.

Draco sighed slowly through his nose. He was slightly astounded he was going to say this, but Neville clearly needed to get what was eating him up inside out into the open air. "I'll tell you mine if you tell me yours."

Neville brought his face up just slightly, one eyebrow crooked in question. "What do you mean?"

Draco swallowed and stared at his hands folded on the table. "Unless I miss my guess, and I'm fairly sure I don't, you've had... relations... with Potter. So have I. And seeing as how he's now in blissful matrimony with the Weasley girl, it obviously didn't end well for either of us. So. Let's share war stories, shall we?"

There was a very long silence, filled only by the ticking of the clock across the room on the mantel and the occasional sound of a car passing outside. Finally, Neville tossed back the whisky in the glass, looked directly at Draco, and nodded.

"You first," he said.

Draco shrugged. "It was my wedding day. Three, four days after Tori graduated Hogwarts. No need to waste time, we'd been betrothed since I was eleven. My mother invited Potter to be polite, and to be political. Having Potter at a Malfoy wedding would do a lot to improve our image here, possibly pave the way for them to come back one day... well. Beside the point, I guess.

"I don't know why he was staying at the manor. Maybe he'd had too much to drink and didn't feel up to Apparating. Whatever the reason, he was wandering in the gardens at around midnight, just like I was." Draco's mouth twisted sardonically. "As you might imagine, the wedding night hadn't gone well." Neville's lips twitched into the tiniest of smiles. "I stumbled across him. He was..." Draco trailed off. "I'm sure you know that look he gets when he's thinking." Neville nodded, a bit forlornly. "I got right up close to him before he noticed I was there. And then he just... smiled. Fucking beamed at me, like I was a best mate he'd not seen in months." Draco shook his head. "Threw me off a fair bit. It's hard to call someone a foul git when they're smiling like that at you."

"Oh. Yeah. That." Neville shook his head with a wistful grin. "He does that. When we're arguing. Right in the middle of a good row, he'll just grin like an idiot. That bloody smile's a weapon, I tell you."

"So you know exactly what I'm talking about." Draco leaned back in his chair, looking up at the ceiling. "He congratulated me. Acted like he was going to shake my hand, but pulled me into a hug - awkward, I'll tell you that. Smelled like a whisky shop, too." He shot a glance at Neville. "I'm not entirely positive our Mr Potter has a good grasp on impulse control."

"Believe me. Nine times of ten, my near death encounters have been because of him," Neville said wryly.

"Well. At any rate, I credit his poor impulse control, and the particularly fine Blackley Speyside we were serving, for his pulling my head down to snog me as though his life depended on it," Draco reminisced. "Surprised the hell out of me. Can't honestly say I minded, but if someone else had decided to take a moonlit stroll things might have got slightly embarrassing, so I suggested we take things inside, where there were walls and doors and locks."

"And beds?" Neville added shrewdly.

"Those too - but that wasn't what I was immediately thinking of at the moment. I don't like being exposed. Shut it," Draco said to Neville's juvenile smirk. "So we went inside. Into the drawing room, if you want to be precise. I'd love to say I had my way with him, but in the interest of being honest I'll admit - gladly - that it was the exact opposite." Draco wished he had a drink to take a swig of, to dramatically accentuate his pause. "I'm going to chalk that up to poor impulse control as well. On both our parts." He paused again; Neville looked like he was waiting for Draco to continue. "And unless you want an explicit recount of every twist and turn, that would be my story," he said pointedly. "I woke up and he was gone. I haven't seen him since. Which means that it's your turn now."

Neville's expression turned flat, and he studied the empty glass in his hand intently, turning it over and over, watching the reflection of the lamp warp across its curved surface. "Three times," he said after the lingering pause had stretched for nearly a minute. "The first the night after he killed Voldemort."

"I think I'm seeing a pattern. He got drunk off his tits that night, didn't he?" Draco asked.

"He did. And I sobered him up before I approached him about it."

Draco's jaw dropped. "You? Approached him?"

Neville raised an eyebrow. "You don't have to sound so surprised. I'd been carrying a torch for him for years - probably longer than you had been - and nearly died about three dozen times not a few hours before. You'd be amazed at what that does to bolster one's courage." He cleared his throat. "So that was the first time. Both of us sober, knowing full well what we were doing, and agreeing that it would never happen again."

"I'm sensing a 'but.'"

"But," Neville said obligingly, though his eyes were taking on a tight, drawn look. "It did happen again. Of course. A year later, at the party after the Holyhead Harpies won the Regionals." He rubbed his eyes, his voice muffled by his hands in front of his face. "Ginny had disappeared from the party. I found out later it was with one of the Beaters."

"Isn't the Harpies an all-ladies team?" Draco asked, knowing the answer. Neville nodded.

"Apparently, Ginny isn't picky," he said delicately. "It made Harry slightly... distraught, though I didn't know why he was out of sorts at the time, or why everyone was giving him such wide berth. So I went over to the corner where it seemed he was determined to find the bottom of every bottle in the room. And..." Neville swallowed. "He lives in a very creepy house," he said, trying in vain to speak in a light tone. "Before you ask, I drove him home before he pickled his own liver. This was not the first time I'd done this, and it wouldn't be the last, but it was the only one where I... borrowed some of Harry's poor impulse control." He lowered his face into his hands again. "I'm not particularly proud of myself for that night," he said heavily. "I apologised and left when... it was over. We didn't talk about it again."

Neville stayed quiet for a long while. Finally, Draco cleared his throat. "And the third time?"

He almost thought Neville was ignoring him, wasn't going to answer, but then, very quietly: "Five weeks ago. The night before his wedding."

"Shit," Draco said, slightly impressed.

"I was his best man. He was staying here that night. He and Ron and I opened a bottle of bourbon, celebrated heartily, and Ron passed out on the couch. I took Harry up to bed and was going to head downstairs to kip on a camp bed and he... asked for me." Neville's voice was thick, and Draco wondered if he was crying behind those hands. "Insistently. Said he didn't know if he could go through with the wedding, not when we had what we did between us. I tried to convince him there wasn't anything between us, but he... kept asking. Begging." Neville dropped his hands and looked pleadingly at Draco. "What would you have done, if he was right there in front of you, in your bed, begging for you?"

"I know what I'd have done," Draco said dismissively. "What did you do?"

Neville let out a slow breath, his eyes losing focus as he stared into the middle distance, as though watching a memory play before his eyes. "I shagged him senseless," he said in a quiet monotone, "And then I made him forget any of it ever happened."

Draco was not aware he'd clapped a hand to his mouth until he found himself having to lower it to speak. "You modified his memory?" he asked, his voice almost a whisper.

Neville nodded miserably. "Not on purpose. Not entirely. I was looking at him, and thinking, 'It's Ginny he loves, Ginny he's supposed to be with.'" He shook his head. "Not me. He was going to back out of the wedding! It would have killed her, and it would have killed him. And him remembering would have killed their marriage unless I completely stepped out of his life and I... couldn't do that."

"You don't think maybe that's a decision he had the right to make?" Draco asked incredulously. Neville's eyes grew flinty.

"Harry doesn't make decisions. He reacts. If he's ever thought something through to its end in his life, that's news to me. He's a good judge of character and I trust my life to his intuition every sodding day, but the man's decision-making skills are worse than his impulse control." Neville's voice was growing alarmingly heated as he stood to place the glass in his hands into the sink with slightly more force than necessary. "I'm the half of us that makes the plans, figures out what we should do, how we should handle things. He trusts me to make everything work out, to suss out all the details. It's what we've done for two years. This was a decision that I had to make or it wouldn't have been made at all." He licked his lips. "And... I thought I'd need a wand, to do something like that. I think that's why I... let myself go. Because I didn't think anything would actually happen."

"And did it occur to you that it might change things if it did work?" Draco asked, rising from his chair as well. "That it might change how he behaves toward you? That it might change that partnership you seem to value so highly you'll rape your friend's goddamn mind to keep it?"

"Shut up!" Neville bellowed, thumping his fist on the kitchen table. "I didn't even know what I'd done until it was too late!"

"That's convenient," Draco spat. "What an excellent way of shifting blame. I'll have to remember that, it could come in handy."

"I'm not shifting blame." The words sounded like a growl. "I'm making it into something I can live with. I know exactly what I did. If I had any decency I'd turn myself in. But seeing as how that results in me losing my job and my only friend hating me once it's all reversed, I thought I might try being a coward for a little while."

"Which explains your ridiculous gallantry that night in the alley." Draco sat back down heavily, glaring. "That couldn't have been more than three or four days after your bout of creative memory arrangement. What, did you think it would all wash out if you saved my life? That this was some kind of penance for what you'd done?"

"I did it because it was the right thing to do, not because I'm totting up my good and bad deeds and hoping it all comes out favourably," Neville replied forcefully. "And when I punish myself, I don't do it by playing nursemaid to old rivals that end up friends."

"We're not friends." Draco said it as flatly as he could manage. "And good thing, too, as being friends with you seems to come with hazards I'm not willing to accept."

Neville looked shocked. "Right then. You can get out of my flat."

Draco blinked, and instantly felt ashamed that his first thought was to protest that it wasn't safe and not that he'd apparently pushed Neville to the edge of his considerable tolerance.

"Brotherhood's done with you. I've seen to that." Neville's lips twisted and his next words dripped with acidic sincerity. "Go back to your political manipulation or high society seduction games or whatever it is you do when you're not being a right bother."

Draco set his jaw. "Right. Don't mind if I do."

His few belongings flew down the stairs in response to his wordless Summons and Draco caught them, shoving them under one arm as he stalked to the door. He paused with his hand on the knob.

"Go on then," Neville said from the kitchen behind him. "I'm done being useful to you. No reason for you to stay."

He was right. There wasn't any reason.

Draco yanked the door open and pulled it shut with a pettily satisfying slam behind him.

The first night he'd spent back in his flat was not worth remembering. Draco slept late, pretending it was because he'd missed his bed, not willing to admit that it was because he honestly couldn't think of what he'd do when he got out of it. After an appropriate amount of self-pity, he made himself presentable, and did the second-worst thing he could think of: Apparated to Malfoy Manor.

The house-elf's already-bulging eyes widened further when it answered the door. "Master Draco," it squeaked, bowing double. "Welcome home."

"Yes," Draco said vaguely as he tugged off his cloak. "Is Astoria about?" He hung the cloak on one of the hooks and looked expectantly at the house-elf.

"Mistress Astoria is out," it replied nervously. "Is Master wishing Bobbin to fetch...?"

So this one was Bobbin, then. Draco could never keep them straight. "No. Did she say when she would be back?"

Bobbin shook his head. "Mistress is not telling Bobbin, sir. Mistress is only asking for tea at noon in the library, sir."

Draco nodded curtly. Noon wasn't far off; he'd wait for her. "Bring me some tea, as well. I'll be waiting for her in the library. Let her know I'm there when she gets in."

"Right away, sir," Bobbin said, already rushing off to the kitchen.

The library, on the top floor of the manor to take full advantage of the illumination the windows offered, was exactly as Draco remembered it. There was already a tea tray set out, a Keeping charm distorting the air around it to keep the water warm. Draco resisting breaking the charm; Bobbin would appear with his tea in a few moments, and Tori always hated lukewarm tea. He instead perused the bookshelves, hoping a title would catch his eye so he would have something to do with his hands.

He'd pulled a book down from a shelf - one of his favourites, but signed by the author and thus never allowed to leave this room – when he heard the door click open quietly.

"Draco?"

Draco snapped the book shut as he looked up at the doorway. Astoria was doing a very good job of hiding her true emotions; instead of looking perturbed, as she always did when Draco appeared from nowhere, she looked almost pleased. "Tori," he said by way of greeting. He'd tried to make it sound warm, but by the way her eyes narrowed just the slightest degree perhaps it had not sounded very genuine.

Bobbin burst in from behind her with a second tea tray, trembling. "Mistress is home early, Bobbin was to tell Mistress that Master Draco was here -"

"It's all right, Bobbin. Twindle told me when I got in," Astoria said smoothly as she took the tea tray from him. "Would you be so good as to fetch us a light lunch?" Bobbin bowed so low his floppy ears nearly brushed the ground, then retreated from the library at an impressive speed.

"You're too soft on them," Draco said as Astoria put down the tea tray and settled onto a couch across from him.

"And you're too harsh," Astoria shot back. "Though at least a damn sight better than your father. My mother always taught me that a master should have the respect of his servants, not fear."

"Father was harsh," Draco admitted. The words felt like ashes, another tiny betrayal in a long list of similar crimes he'd committed against his family. "Though you should have seen how he treated our first one."

"You're not here to talk about house-elves," Astoria said in a clipped, businesslike tone. "I take it the... unpleasantness has been cleared up?"

Unbidden, the memory of Neville's voice played through his mind. Brotherhood's done with you. I've seen to that. "As much as it's going to be." He took another sip of tea.

"Good. I was actually going to write you when I got home; it's good that you're here." She set her teacup and saucer down on the table and brushed off her hands unnecessarily. "I've just come from the Healer. It would appear that your last visit stuck."

Draco stared blankly for a moment. Astoria arched an eyebrow at him in an expression not unlike the one he had been used to evoking from Neville, and that thought distracted him enough from the present conversation that Astoria sighed heavily. "I'm pregnant, and it's a boy. We have our heir."

The bottom seemed to drop out from Draco's stomach. "I thought you said you doubted it'd take."

"I was wrong," Astoria replied primly, picking up her cup and saucer again. "I'm nearly four months along and we're both ridiculously healthy."

"That's - that's marvellous," Draco stammered, eyes involuntarily flicking down to her abdomen. To be honest, he felt as though he'd been going very fast on a broomstick and it had braked suddenly, but he'd kept going.

Astoria smiled. Draco could tell it was supposed to be serene, but it had just a touch of smugness to it. "You don't seem all that excited."

"It's a lot to take in." Draco swallowed. "And you were just going to write me to tell me?"

Astoria shrugged. "I didn't know how long you were going to be where you were. I assumed you'd want to know as soon as it was certain."

"I suppose that's true." Draco shook his head to try and get it working again. He'd known, of course, that what they'd been doing had been for exactly one reason, but he'd never actually connected the act with its logical continuation. Or, rather, he had connected the two, but in a purely academic sense, a list of procedures to follow to an end result.

He was to be a father. Somehow, that concept had never factored in.

"I suppose I should move back to the Manor," he said slowly.

"Oh, that's up to you, I think," Astoria said blandly.

"That was always the plan," Draco said, more firmly. "Once we had our first child, I'd stop faffing about and assume my responsibilities."

"You've been very serious about your responsibilities, I should say," Astoria responded without a hint of sarcasm. Draco narrowed his eyes, trying to detect whether he was being mocked. Astoria met his eyes unblinkingly. "You've been out there, flailing about for the press, behaving exactly as the young heir to a sizable fortune is expected to. You've done a masterful job of distracting the public eye from the bruises on the family name until they could heal - by engaging in smaller but flashier scandals that are easily forgiven as a young man's debauchery."

"Is that what I've been doing?" Draco asked shrewdly.

Astoria raised a knowing eyebrow over her teacup. "That's what those who analyze every move in the dance of the pureblood houses think. Once word of my condition gets out, everyone will wait breathlessly to see how well you'll step up and take the world of polite society by storm, thus restoring the Malfoy name to its former pristine state." She chuckled. "There are some who are saying that your methods are remarkably transparent. I simply shrug and say I have no control over what my husband does."

"No, just over how everyone perceives what I do." Draco shook his head. He couldn't stop the grudging smile from spreading across his face. "Astoria, darling, I don't deserve you."

"Too right, you don't." There it was, the smug smile of self-assurance he knew so well. "Come home, or not. Either way, I can spin it as something that's necessary." There was a sudden, nearly imperceptible shadow to her eyes, a momentary downcast glance that made her look suddenly very vulnerable. "I will say that when I was growing up, I wished I still had a father around."

"There will be no doubt of that." Draco placed his cup in the saucer as Bobbin returned with a heavily-laden tray. "I'll be present." He met Astoria's eyes squarely. "I'll do right by you, and by our son. I promise you."

"Well, well," Astoria murmured. "Perhaps you'll surprise us all." She neatly ate a small wedge of cheese as Draco attempted to decipher that comment. "Speaking of surprises, I'm curious to know why you're here."

He stared for a moment. "I thought I'd let you know I wasn't in hiding anymore."

"You could have done so in a letter," Astoria pointed out. "In fact, I'd expected as much. You don't usually come round unless I've asked you to come or you need something."

"Is it so hard to believe that I just wanted to visit my wife?" Draco asked.

"Yes," Astoria replied bluntly. "It is. You've never wanted to 'just visit' me. I practically had to pull you here by the hair, kicking and screaming, to try and conceive. You're the most solitary person I've ever known, Draco. You don't 'just visit' anyone."

The strawberry he'd just eaten didn't seem as sweet anymore. He swallowed. "Maybe I've changed my mind. Maybe I've discovered how nice it is to have someone to talk to, about nothing at all."

Astoria pinned him with a calculating look that made him want to squirm. "You've had a falling-out with someone," she said after a moment. It was not a question. He could not decode the expression on her face; it looked to be something between shock and amusement. "And here I didn't think you had the emotional capacity to be lonely."

"I'm not certain whether that's an insult or a compliment," Draco said dryly. "I'm not lonely. And it wasn't an acquaintance I could afford to keep, anyway. Not if I'm to be the shining pillar of the Malfoy family."

"Ah," Astoria said, nodding. "Was he of... low quality?"

Draco snorted at her archaic term. "Of course not."

After a moment of study, Astoria put down her teacup. "You're not going to tell me who he is."

"No, I'm not," Draco replied, spreading preserves on a slice of bread. "I get the feeling he keeps his status close to his chest, and it's not my secret to tell."

"You're just full of surprises today." They ate silently for several minutes, and then Astoria brushed off her hands. "You ought to go back and rekindle the relationship."

Draco gaped. "I'll do no such thing." He glared when she raised an inquisitive eyebrow. "For starters, we didn't have a relationship. We didn't even have a friendship. There were no 'ships.' I don't even think there's a name for what little actually transpired. Secondly, I've already said it's a connection that won't do us any favours."

"Please," Astoria said, holding a hand up. "Unless he's an outright criminal or the worst sort of Mudblood -" Draco blinked at that; his wife did not often use rough language - "then I see no reason why his acquaintance should not bring additional esteem to this house."

"He has ties to the Ministry." He was giving away more than he should. "And Magical Law Enforcement." Far more than he should. If she couldn't puzzle it out from that then she was thicker than he'd ever believed.

Astoria shrugged. "So much the better. They have nothing on us. If you think I can't use those connections to our benefit, you grossly underestimate my abilities." He could almost see the thought processes ticking behind her eyes. "And it's Little, Bailey, Longbottom, or Cox. No, you don't have to tell me which one. Whichever one it is, you should go apologize to him."

"I'm not the one who owes the apology, and I've said three times now that it's over and done with." His tea was cold, and he didn't feel like rewarming it.

"Then swallow your pride and at least go tie up the loose ends, so they don't come unravelled later and dribble your past all over our future." Astoria laid a hand across her midriff in what looked to be an unconscious movement.

"The ends are well and truly tied," Draco said grimly. "Going back will only salt the wounds."

His wife shrugged and took an infuriatingly calm sip of her tea. "I'm sure you know best." She gave him another calculating look. "You probably have about a month before the news becomes well known. I suggest you spend that time sowing whatever wild oats you have left before coming back to settle down. If, of course, that's what you want to do."

Draco nodded and stood. It was always very odd to feel he had overstayed his welcome in the house in which he had grown up, but it was very clear that this was Astoria's home now, and that she was comfortable here. Too many corridors and doorways still made the hair on the back of his neck stand up for him to be truly at ease, which meant that the balance of power automatically went to Astoria. "I need to go rethink every aspect of my life now." He paused. "It was good to see you."

Astoria put her plate on a side table and rose as well to put her arms around Draco in a surprisingly warm embrace. "It was good to see you too. And talk with you." She held him at arm's length, studying him fondly. "I've missed this. You've been so cold and formal since our wedding."

"Well, that was when I stopped being your gay friend and was suddenly your husband," he pointed out.

Astoria shook her head as she stepped back and seated herself again. "You're still my friend, Draco. A very dear one. If you weren't, I wouldn't have married you, betrothal contract or no."

"Good to know. I'll let myself out." Draco left the library feeling both out of sorts and oddly comforted, the two emotions jangling alongside the knowledge that his wife was carrying his son and heir and he was going to be a father and -

He had been joking, but as he shrugged on his cloak, he realized that it had been completely true: he really did need to go rethink every single aspect of his life.