Disclaimer: As always we'll own nothing but the original characters and the situations all characters find themselves in.

Gift of Bonding

Neither Albus nor Scorpius were feeling at all in the mood to shop after nearly losing their son to the countless horrors parents imagine waited behind every corner to gobble up their offspring. Not that either of them really enjoyed shopping to begin with, but the debate of what to do next once they'd bid Teddy goodbye was short and led to a mutual agreement that they'd spent enough time in Diagon Alley for the day. They'd come back tomorrow, they decided, after arranging for Phoenix to stay with someone so that they wouldn't have to worry about losing him in a crowd or forgetting him when their attentions were elsewhere. It wasn't like finding a babysitter for Phoenix was a hard thing to do, they'd ask Tomo if she was available when they got home. For now they just wanted to do nothing but reassure themselves that Phoenix was none the worse for his little adventure, and that the only damage done was the huge amount of guilt now resting solidly on their teenage shoulders.

But, they both reassured each other, they could each remember times when their parents had misplaced them when they were kids, or at least heard about it after the fact, so if anyone, particularly said parents, decided to throw what had happened in their faces they would be able to say that they couldn't throw stones either. And at least his parents would find out, Albus was sure, since Domi would tell everyone in the family all about how her new 'boyfriend' had saved Phoenix from being lost on the winter streets. Both boys winced hard at the thought of what stories Domi might be concocting at that very moment to tell everyone over the holidays. The Christmas gatherings with Albus's side were suddenly looking far more fraught with peril than Scorpius had previously expected.

Lapsing into silence as they dreaded what was in store for them, each boy thoughts turned back to the earlier instances they'd told the other about. For the first time Albus knew what it was like to have been in his parents' shoes when he or one of his siblings had wandered off, while Scorpius was remembering the time his father had thought he'd been kidnapped when he'd gone missing in a clothing shop. His father had gotten into an argument less than an hour before that with someone who'd lost the majority of their family in the war, and so his father assumed the worse when his son had disappeared. Apparently he'd gone chasing after the shop owner's cat, he didn't remember that part, but Scorpius did remember how tightly his father had held him when he found him, and that his father had kept him close for the rest of that week.

There were no words, both thought to themselves, to describe what it was like not to know that your baby was alright.

As a direct result the two teenagers were very subdued when they finally returned to Grimmauld Place, Tomo greeting them in the front hallway with big smiles, which quickly faded into a look of concern as she asked what was wrong.

Setting Phoenix down on the floor so that the boy could run over to the house elf, Albus worked up a smile for her. "It's okay. We just didn't have a great shopping trip."

Having crouched down to start undoing Phoenix's snowsuit Tomo smiled again as she glanced around the boy's sturdy torso. "Men don't like shopping, Tomo has noticed."

"He wandered away from us while we were talking to Teddy, about gave us bleeding heart attacks." Shaking his head Albus finished unwrapping his scarf and stuffed it into the sleeve of his coat. "He's fine, obviously, but Scorpius and I will need a bit more time to recover."

"Oh no, Tomo's poor little master." Immediately giving Phoenix a thorough looking over just to be on the safe side, Tomo breathed a sign of relief over the fact that there wasn't any harm done. After giving his chubby little cheeks kisses of relieved affection Tomo finished helping him out of his snowsuit before turning her attention back to the teenagers. "If little Phoenix ever goes missing again Masters should call for Tomo. Phoenix is Tomo's master too so Tomo will find him right away for you."

"Oh thank Merlin, she's right." Having finished putting away his winter gear Scorpius gave Tomo a very grateful look.

"We'll both sleep better tonight, that's for sure." Walking over Albus knelt down on one knee so that he was closer to Tomo's height as he gave her a warm pat on the shoulder. "You know, Tomo, you're constantly giving us reasons to be thankful you were assigned to look after this place for us. I really hope you stay here forever, because I don't know what we'd do otherwise."

"Albus, we were going to ask her for Christmas!"

"Oops."

"Tomo...masters want Tomo to stay...work here always? As just your house elf?" Eyes going as wide as they could go, which was saying something considering how big her eyes were to begin with, Tomo looked back and forth between Albus and Scorpius questioningly.

After another apologetic look in Scorpius's direction for ruining the Christmas surprise Albus nodded his head, explaining that he and Scorpius had intended to ask her to become their permanent house elf once school was over, as part of her Christmas present. Though she didn't have to if she'd rather stay with her agency, they'd figure out a way to get along with just having her part time, since there wasn't another elf they wanted for the job.

"Tomo-Masters want Tomo as their house elf. Masters want Tomo as their very own. Tomo can stay with them and little Phoenix for forever!"

Neither teenager was quite sure what to do when Tomo started sobbing at the very idea, but thankfully Phoenix did, the little boy throwing his arms around her to give her a great big hug. She in turn hugged him right back, clutching him close like a teddy bear until she'd calmed down long enough to say that yes, yes there was nothing in the whole wide world she wanted more than to be their house elf. To be the house elf of the Potter-Malfoy family.

Very glad to hear that, especially after she'd stopped crying except for the occasional sniffle, Scorpius and Albus assured her that they both felt that she was the only elf for the job.

)

An hour after the emotional homecoming Albus and Scorpius were seated on the floor with wrapping paper and the trimmings that went on the presents, as well as the presents they'd bought that morning neatly beside them to be wrapped. Phoenix, who had resisted their cuddlings, hugs, and over-affection after a while because he wanted to be free to play and run around, currently sat nearby with a red bow stuck in his hair and a now empty wrapping paper tube in his hand, brandishing it around in time with the music currently playing for his amusement. Tomo was in the kitchen, she'd been making bread when they'd arrived and was finishing up that now, wanting to show them what a good house elf she was going to be for them. Since she'd obviously wanted some time alone to absorb their request neither Scorpius nor Albus had argued with her about the bread needing to be seen to rather than just hanging out with them.

And as it had become clear pretty quick to Scorpius that Albus had no wrapping talent whatsoever, the Slytherin had put himself in charge of the actually wrapping while Albus broke off pieces of tape and held the flaps down for his boyfriend when asked.

"My mum's going to be so surprised when she sees this." Admiring the perfectly balanced, ruler straight folds Scorpius was producing so easily, Albus had to grin, imagining the 'wrapped' presents he had given his mum in the past. "Of course she'll probably know on sight that you did it."

"And when she comments you'll be able to tell her that you helped."

"In a manner of speaking." Moving his finger once the fold was expertly tapped down, Albus asked if Scorpius was one of those people who carefully undid each fold of a present, preserving the wrappings as best he could for some mysterious reason.

"I don't tear into them the way you do, no."

"And how would you know I do that?" Though he did do that. He was always too eager to see what was inside his packages to take the time to even really notice what sort of paper they'd come in until after the fact. If he noticed at all.

"I've seen you when the owls bring the mail. And with the things Phoenix was sent." Looking over at their son Scorpius smirked as he commented that Phoenix at least admired the wrappings if they were a pretty color before wanting to get to the main event.

"Well our boy's all about color, now isn't he." They'd had to let Phoenix inspect all the rolls of wrapping paper first before they could get started, the toddler loving the shiny paper and the ones where the patterns moved in particular.

"True enough. I often wonder what we look like to him, what the colors he sees look like and are they in layers or bursts or swirled all together. It would be so useful too, to be able to look at someone and know what was in their hearts. It's so easy to lie with words, to believe something because you want it to be true. But Phoenix will always know...do you think that will make him happy? I mean we all wish for things, but even when you get them they aren't always what you thought they were or come with strings attached that you can't cut no matter how much you try. What will he see if he meets my grandparents? Will he even meet them even though this is Christmas and-and I'm rambling, sorry."

Leaning over Albus brushed their lips together. "Whether you see them or not, it's on them, Scorpius, not either of us. Your mum said she told your grandmother that she'd set up a meeting if she wanted to meet Phoenix and so far she declined. What your grandparents do, it's always been their choice and their mistakes to make, no offence."

"None taken." A pause. "But it's a cycle too, isn't it? It broke with me because, well, the last cycle broke my father and his world to pieces. I wasn't raised to be a Malfoy so much as raised to be a Greengrass, with my grandfather trying to turn me into a Malfoy on the side without any real luck. But if they-my father's parents-would just let go of being what a 'Malfoy' and 'Black' are supposed to be...I wonder what sort of people they'd be."

"Well...she did buy Phoenix incredibly adorable clothes, so I'd say your grandmother at least does know how to think outside the Black box so to speak." Even though his godbrother was actually named Teddy Albus was pretty sure that Andromeda had never once dressed her grandson up in teddy bear themed clothes. He was pretty sure it wouldn't have occurred to that particular Black.

Chuckling as Albus had intended, Scorpius agreed that his grandmother's love of cute clothes for children was an anomaly in her Black, Slytherin nature.

"I'll have to ask your mum to show me pictures of what she put you in when you were little."

Given his already pale skin Scorpius couldn't really get much paler at the idea, but he gave it his best shot as he imagined the horrors of his boyfriend seeing his mother's collection of embarrassing, sometimes truly mortifying childhood pictures. Thankfully his Slytherin's training saved him just in time.

"You ask to see those photos and I'll get your embarrassing pictures from your mother too."

Rather than pale or look embarrassed Albus just grinned. "Want to see how adorable I was as a boy, do you?"

"Please, like I don't know that already. The Prophet always had pictures of you and Lily and James when they could find an excuse. I think most every witch and wizard in the United Kingdom watched you grow up in that paper."

"True enough. But they were mostly planned shots, my mum's got all the best ones of me."

Shaking his head over the fact that the idea of people seeing his photographs didn't bother his boyfriend in the least, though Albus was ridiculously photogenic so really he shouldn't be surprised, Scorpius smiled at him and then looked over at Phoenix. "I wonder if he'll be embarrassed by the pictures we have of him when he's a teenager."

"My Gran's always said that trying to predict the mind of a teenager is like trying to reason with the weather. It's fairly impossible to do most of the time."

"That sounds fairly accurate."

A devious look coming into his eyes, Albus leaned in again for a much longer and deeper kiss before pulling back with an even more devious smile. "So what do you think I'm thinking about right now?"

Cheeks reddening, though not as much as they would have at the start of their relationship, Scorpius smiled just a little as he answered.

"The same thing I'm thinking about."

"Well isn't that just perfect then?" And moving in the two went back to kissing until Phoenix came over to break up the snogging to make them aware that the music had stopped playing, and that just wouldn't do at all.

Rather than argue with Phoenix, not that they were very good at that even when they were in the mood to spoil Phoenix rotten out of guilt for their latest parental screw-up, Albus got up and put on a new record for Phoenix to listen to, Scorpius focusing on cutting up paper for the next present when Albus returned to his earlier spot while their son danced nearby.

"Later?"

Looking up for a moment Scorpius smiled and nodded. "Later."

)

Whether it was because Tomo had sensed the rise in hormone levels, or simply understood that as a couple they would want some alone time, the house elf announced just before supper that earlier on she'd taken the liberty of converting the sitting room that was attached to the main bedroom they'd been using into a room for Phoenix. The boy was already used to having his own room after all, and so long as they locked the sitting room's front door Phoenix would have to go into the main bedroom in order to get to the rest of the house. That way Phoenix would have a space for all his things and have a room to play in that was all his own.

Regardless of her motivations Albus gave the top of her bald head a smacking kiss in thanks, which made her blush and stammer for a good ten minutes before she remembered that supper hadn't been served yet and immediately threw herself into that task while her wizards let her do her thing with indulgent smiles on their faces.

Of course thanks to the events of that day both teenagers felt more than a little guilty all during supper and into the evening about being eager to put their son to bed and spend some quality time alone together, but they were young enough to bounce back almost as well as Phoenix had. No harm had been done, Phoenix didn't want to be coddled or put into a protective bubble, and once he was asleep it wasn't like their son needed them hovering around him like creepy poltergeists. Or so they told themselves often up until the point where the boy was finally starting to nod off on them and they could justify heading upstairs, Phoenix serenading them sleepily with another one of the songs Davey had taught him for Christmas, this one involving a hula hoop of all things.

By the time they'd entered the bedroom the song had switched to one about teeth, oddly enough, and at that point Albus held Phoenix out to Scorpius and asked him if he wouldn't mind putting him to bed by himself. There was something he wanted to do before they turned in for the night.

"Sure." Taking Phoenix Scorpius gave the Gryffindor a suspicious look, but didn't question him as he headed for the door that led into the previously unused sitting room.

It really wasn't decorated for a child, Tomo hadn't felt it her place to go that far without permission, but it was a good size and all of Phoenix's things were there waiting for him. Setting the boy down on the floor Scorpius went through the chest of drawers that had been moved in until he found the pyjamas he'd been looking for, wanting to make sure that Phoenix stayed nice and warm during the night. The house was a little on the drafty side at times, and Phoenix sometimes kicked off his covers while he was sleeping.

"Here we go, you'll stay nice and warm in this and your blankies. And if you don't then you can come find your mummy and me in the other room and we'll sort things out for you in no time, alright?"

"Ogay." Nodding his head Phoenix was in a cooperative mood, not making a peep of protest as he was bundled up and given his birdie to cuddle with in his bed.

"There you are, snug as a bug in a rug." Peppering the boy's face with kisses to make him giggle, Scorpius smiled, double checked the tuck in, and then started scanning the room for anything Black family related that he wouldn't want in his son's vicinity. Not that he didn't have faith that Tomo had made sure that the room was perfectly safe before moving Phoenix's things into it, but he felt the need to double check anyway, just for his own sake.

Check completed Scorpius called over one last good night and then turned off the main light, a lamp by the door providing enough light for Phoenix to see by if he needed to.

And with everything son related taken care of Scorpius headed out to see just what Albus had gotten up to in his absence. Oddly enough Albus wasn't in their bedroom, but the bathroom door was wide open and he could take a hint. So heading in that direction Scorpius knocked on the jamb just in case, asking if he was to enter.

"You are. So get your lovely arse in here."