Title: The Camping Trip
The Houses Competition
Round: 3
House: Ravenclaw
Class: History of Magic
Category: Drabble
Prompts: [Positive or Romantic Pairing] Lucius Malfoy/Sirius Black
Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry
Hogwarts Assignment 5: survival studies, task 4
Prompt: write about going camping with…primitive facilities
Alphabetti Spaghetti: spell out your favourite family, M
Prompt: Muggle!AU
Build Your Own Adventure: enemy, the silence
Prompt: Muggle!AU
Flower Power: list 1, Chrysanthemum
Prompt: [object] tea kettle
Honeydukes Hoarder: liquorice, number 1
Prompt: [dialogue] "Are you planning to just stand there, or actually help?"
Just Friends: star beads, number 19
Prompt: [trope] single parent
Writing club: quotations, number 1; here for the year, number 10; fight club, number 1; Nifty & Swiftie, number 17; colour theory, number 3; Hogwarts library, number 1
Prompt: "I'm not crazy. My mother had me tested."; write about hanging out; [relationship] parent and child; [phrase] bent the truth, bonus prompt: midnight; [trait] vain, bonus prompt: Severus Snape; [weather] thunderstorm
Gather Your Party: druid number 2
Prompt: [dialogue] "Are you sure about this?"
Scamander's Case: Demiguise, female
Prompt: [word] cosy
Word count: 999
Betas: Bea, Mark, Sky
Warnings/Trigger warnings: Muggle!AU
A/N A recently widowed Lucius is talked into a camping trip by his friend
Lucius Malfoy was recently widowed. To say he was devastated was an understatement. To say that he had no idea how he was going to raise his son on his own was putting it mildly. Not that he had money worries, far from it, he was a multi-millionaire, but all the money in the world couldn't bring back his darling Narcissa. Had he been in his right state of mind then, he would never have agreed to go on this ridiculous camping trip with his best friend, Sirius Black. It seemed like a good idea at the time. Sirius was the guardian of his orphaned Godson, Harry, who was the same age as his son, Draco. So, Lucius, naively, thought that Sirius knew what he was doing raising a child on his own. To top it all off, their friend Severus Snape had agreed to join them, but judging by Severus' dour expression he was enjoying this as much as Lucius.
So here they were: three grown men and two eleven-year-old boys, in the middle of nowhere, trying to pitch a tent in the middle of a thunderstorm. Sirius looked like he was having the time of his life as he wrestled with tent poles and canvas. Lucius was desperately trying to shelter beneath an umbrella that was being blown every which way. His hair was going to be ruined in this abysmal weather.
"Are you sure about this?" Severus asked, trying to follow Sirius' direction on where to put the tent pole Sirius had handed him.
"Of course, I'm sure," Sirius stated confidently. "Now stick that pole where I told you!"
"I know where I would like to stick the pole," Severus glared at Sirius.
"What sort of example is that to set for the boys?" Sirius huffed, as Harry and Draco snickered.
"Why don't you boys go and collect some firewood for the campfire," Lucius suggested, wanting the boys out the way before Sirius and Severus started on their usual snide remarks at each other.
"You want them to get firewood?" Severus said dryly. "For a campfire? In a thunderstorm?"
"Well, it won't always be raining," Lucius snapped back. He detested getting wet.
Snickering at the grown-up's abominable attempt at erecting the tent, Harry and Draco slinked off towards the nearby forest to find some firewood, despite the futility of the exercise.
"Is this going to take much longer?" Lucius grumbled. "I'm getting soaked through."
"Are you planning to just stand there, or actually help?" Sirius huffed at his best friend.
"I was planning on standing here staying as dry as possible," Lucius replied.
"Well, if you helped, then we could be done a lot quicker and actually be dry," Sirius said, finally getting the poles together in the correct order.
"You know, inside the tent. Out of the rain," Severus said, rolling his eyes.
"But my hair–" Lucius began.
"Will not melt away in the rain," Severus quipped. "Now get your vain ass over here and help us with the canvas."
Lucius grudgingly put down his umbrella and came over to join his friends with the tent canvas.
"See, isn't this fun? All of us working together?" Sirius said, far too cheerfully. "The boys are going to have a great time."
"Are you crazy?" Lucius grumbled, as the heavy rain dripped down the back of his neck and off his nose.
"I'm not crazy. My mother had me tested," Sirius grinned.
"Must've done the wrong tests then," Severus said.
"I thought you said you knew what you were doing with a tent?" Lucius commented as Sirius struggled to figure out what way to put the canvas on the poles.
"Well, I may have bent the truth a little there," Sirius said, flashing a grin at his friend. "I've never actually been camping, you know. But we're doing okay. We've got the poles together."
Severus rolled his eyes.
It took them another fifteen minutes, but they finally had the tent up and got all their camping gear inside.
"There," Sirius said, once he had laid out their sleeping bags. "Isn't this cosy?"
"My house is cosier," Severus grumbled.
"Then why did you want to come?" Sirius grinned, as he set up the camping stove, fished out the tea kettle and filled it with some water.
"I've been wondering that since we got here."
With a burst of laughter, Harry and Draco came charging into the tent, carrying armfuls of firewood, utterly soaked and dripping everywhere.
"Did you go swimming in a lake?" Lucius asked, aghast.
"Go and get dried off and into some dry clothes, boys," Sirius said, as the tea kettle started to whistle. "Hand us the tea bags and mugs out, Snivvy."
Harry and Draco snickered again, as they watched Uncle Sev's jaw twitching while they rummaged in their bags for a towel and dry clothes.
Soon, everyone was dry and cosy. They all had a steaming mug of tea and Sirius made them all beans on toast for dinner, Lucius looked less than pleased at this dinner, but everyone else ate with gusto. They all played some card games after dinner and Lucius was actually starting to realise the camping trip was exactly what he and Draco needed after Narcissa's death. He hadn't seen his son smile so much since his mother passed.
It finally stopped raining about midnight, and with the boys' sound asleep in their sleeping bags, the grown ups moved their chairs outside. It was a beautiful night and Sirius pulled out a bottle of whisky and poured them all a dram.
"To friends," Sirius said, raising his mug. "And a great camping trip."
They all drained their mugs and Sirius poured them another dram. Lucius sighed, leaning back in his chair. Sirius might be a big overgrown kid at times, but he did know how to cheer his friends up. Lucius thought he might actually enjoy this primitive camping holiday.
Well…at least as long as the rain held off.