Draco introduced himself as Professor Potter the next year.

Having two Professor Malfoy-Potters seemed like a bit of a mouthful for the students, so for school, Potter it was.

Either way, he thought wryly that his original sixth years would have all had heart attacks.

The students took to calling them Potions Potter and Defence Potter to differentiate, which Harry found incredibly amusing — although, admittedly, that was mostly because Draco found it so distasteful.

~*~

Around March, Harry and Draco decided to start looking into adoption.

It was a little trickier in the wizarding world, since it was such a small community, but the Ministry Of Magic kept track of all magical children, even Muggleborns, so in the event that one of them was orphaned, they would be one of the first to know.

It caused...a fair few arguments.

They certainly had talked about wanting children (one at first, and they could reassess from there), Harry had listened to Hermione and certainly wasn't going to make that mistake again, and they had talked about wanting to adopt, but they hadn't exactly considered the logistics of it all.

Unfortunately they were of two very different minds about it.

"I can't believe this!" Harry said hotly. "I thought you were past all the blood purity shite, but you're saying you couldn't love a non-magical child?!"

"I'm not saying that, Harry!" Draco shouted right back. "But think about what sort of life they're going to have! Of course I'd love them. But then what? They'd be excluded from everything, never able to play Quidditch or go to Hogwarts or do all the things their friends are doing. You have no idea what it's like for a squib! Why would you want to do that to a child when they could be a perfectly normal Muggle?!"

"What, do they not need a home and parents just because they're Muggle? Do you think Muggles treat orphans so well? That it'd be so much better?"

"Plenty of kids need homes, Harry," Draco said exasperatedly. "We can't adopt them all! I'm just saying to wait for one that has the best chance of being happy with us."

"So we should just sit around hoping for some kid's parents to die," Harry said flatly.

"No⁠— Well when you put it like that⁠—" Draco stumbled uncharacteristically over his words.

"That's what you're saying, though, isn't it?"

"Well waiting isn't going to change the outcome! So what?! So what if I wish it?! All the wishing in the world isn't going to murder them!"

"That's⁠— That's⁠—" Harry refused to look at him. "I'm going to Neville's room. Don't wait up."

"Oh come on⁠— Harry! It's not like I⁠—" Draco's voice died off as the pillar door slammed shut behind Harry.

~*~

It wasn't long before the students noticed the odd, tense air around Harry and Draco, and their frequent, unexplained absences as they went to the Ministry to coordinate with the adoption office.

Thankfully, however, just before school ended for the year, they finally got the news they'd been hoping for, met the baby, and finalised the adoption paperwork. And suddenly, they were parents.

Holy shite. They were parents! That still felt surreal for Harry to think, even as he held her in his arms.

Their arguments and stress over the adoption itself were quickly forgotten in favour of the stress and sleeplessness of suddenly caring for a baby. She wasn't yet a year old, which meant that she still woke them up several times a night for formula.

"There you go, Loons," Harry sang, bouncing her a little after changing her nappy and getting her dressed. He had never been more thankful for that extendable trunk of theirs than when they had realised how many things a baby needed, and how quickly she would be growing and needing new clothes. "I think it was a good decision naming her after Luna," he proclaimed, looking up at Draco.

"Mn. I like it." He came over to let her grab one of his fingers in a chubby little fist and wave it around. "Such a cute little Luna Lily you are. If you grow up to look like her, you'll be lucky."

"Nah," Harry said. "I thought she looked kind of like you at first with that white hair, but it's darker than Luna's now. It'll probably stay brown." He booped her cheek. "That's okay, though," he cooed. "Maybe you'll look like your Aunt Hermione."

"Me-nee-nee," she babbled.

"Mhm," Draco said. "Almost got it."

~*~

With the new school year, the students' questions only increased as Harry and Draco never seemed to show their faces in the Great Hall anymore, nor did either of their owls. None of the students had ever gotten any answers last year as to why the professors had been acting so odd, and most of them had forgotten about it entirely over the summer, but now it was hard not to notice.

Just what exactly was going on?

After a month of school, both of the teachers were looking simply dreadful. The bags under their eyes spoke of little sleep, yet they often showed up slightly late to classes or dismissed them early, and it was nearly impossible for students to find them outside of class hours.

After the fourth time Draco entered class late, quickly cleaning his robes of what looked like vomit with a spell, one of the students got up enough guts to ask.

"Professor Potter?" a Hufflepuff raised his hand.

"Yes, Mister Griffin?"

"Er... What's going on with you and the other Professor Potter?" he asked hesitantly. "You both look awful. I mean⁠—" he quickly added "⁠—not that⁠— I just meant⁠— You're always late and⁠—"

Draco held up a hand to stop him. "It's fine. Nothing you need to worry about. Now, open your books to—"

"Are you sure?" a Gryffindor cut him off. "You really do always look exhausted and annoyed."

Draco did, indeed, look annoyed at that moment.

"Yes, I'm happier than ever," he said sharply. "It's just tiring being a—"

He cut himself off and gave them a hard look for tricking him into talking.

"Get out your textbooks. We'll be going over sleeping draughts today."

~*~

Several months later, the same class was interrupted by the door crashing open mid-lesson.

"Draco! I think she's sick and I don't know what's wrong!" Harry babbled frantically, and Draco looked up alarmed, frozen in the middle of reaching for the chalk. "Poppy had to go out to St Mungo's for something, and you know I'm pants at medical spells, and Nev is with her right now, but I don't know what to do..."

Draco quickly rushed to the door before he could even finish his sentence.

However, when he reached it, he quickly whirled back around to address the class.

"All of you stay here and look over your notes or something," he said quickly, before grabbing Harry's arm and rushing down the corridor.

The students, of course, did nothing of the sort.

When Draco came back to his classroom half an hour later, it was in uproar.

His shoulders sagged in defeat, not feeling up to looking formidable and reprimanding them. He walked through the students, who quieted as he passed, to the front of the room where he slumped into the chair behind his desk.

"I am disappointed you did not manage to conduct yourselves properly in my absence," he said softly. "I will, however, let it go this once, because I'm too tired to properly scold you for it. Do not get used to it."

All of the students listened, and remained silent for the remainder of class as their teacher slumped in his chair, his head hung.

At the end of the lesson, one of the students hesitantly tried to approach him, only to discover that he'd actually fallen asleep at some point.

~*~

Rumours about what had happened in Potions class were spreading like Fiendfyre at lunch, and with the winter holidays just around the corner, the students were even more excitable than usual.

Of course both teachers were absent, as they had been the entire school year, but so was Professor Longbottom, and speculation was running rampant about what had happened earlier and how he was involved.

A few particularly curious fifth years left lunch early to investigate the hospital wing in hopes that there may be hints of what Defence Potter had been talking about. They had been in the interrupted class, so they had heard everything firsthand, and they were terribly curious.

As they ventured up the stairs, they heard a soft voice floating down the corridor, and, with looks at each other, they bravely crept forward down the hall until their Potions Master came into view.

He was holding a baby.

He paced back and forth in front of the infirmary doors, bouncing it gently and cooing to it. "Pretty, pretty, such a pretty Luna Lily you are, huh? You'll be nice and smart like me, won't you?"

The baby looked to only be perhaps a year old at most, and she babbled nonsense noises briefly before: "Papa."

"Mhmm," Draco answered the baby, still bouncing her on his hip and smiling.

"Where Dada?" she asked, making vague, reaching, grabby hands.

"In there!" he said, spinning and picking up her hand to point it at the door to the hospital wing. "Right through there, isn't he?" he repeated, bouncing her again and poking her little cheek. "He'll be back shortly, he's talking to Uncle Neville."

"Neb!" she said excitedly.

"Mhm. They're doing weird things with plants to find something to make you feel all better, but I certainly don't trust that around you." He leaned in closer and cooed at her again, "No I don't."

The infirmary doors swung open, and Harry emerged, with Neville following behind.

"I heard that, and you sound like an idiot," Harry told him. He grabbed little Luna's hand and waved it around a little. "Does Papa sound like an idiot?"

"Already trying to turn her against me," Draco sniffed. "Cruel, cruel man."

"Well you talk to her as if she can understand all of that," Harry said reasonably.

Draco looked up at him with the same soft eyes as always, even as he pretended to be offended. "I'll have you know she's the smartest baby in existence!" he said bravely. "Isn't that right, Loons? You're gonna be smart like me. Nothing like your silly daddy."

Neville cleared his throat. "I hate to break in, but, er..." He coughed awkwardly. "Students." He nodded toward the group down the corridor.

Harry and Draco turned to look at them.

"You have a baby!" one of the students blurted out inanely.

"Yes," Draco said dryly. "I would've thought that apparent."

"A-parent," Harry muttered to Neville. "Ha."

Draco shot a brief glare back at him.

"How on earth did you manage to hide an entire baby?" was all they could ask.

Draco scoffed. "We do know how to be discreet. It's just that most of the time we don't care. We wouldn't have even been so stubborn in the first place if not for every student deciding they were a bloody detective!"

"Draco," Harry warned.

"What?" Draco snapped back. "They're being nosey!"

"But⁠—" another student stuttered, ignoring the implicit warning in Draco's words "—but where do you even keep her?"

"We smuggled her in," Draco said flatly, and it was impossible to tell if he was being serious. "Usually we just leave her in a broom closet or at the edge of the forest for the beasts to deal with. What do you think?"

The last bit absolutely dripped with cutting sarcasm.

Harry sighed. "Draco, you can't talk to the students like that."

"Or what?" Draco challenged. "Are they going to tell Minnie?"

"Please don't tell Professor McGonagall," Harry asked the students quickly. "He's very tired. Madam Pomfrey looks after Luna whilst we're in classes, and the rest of the time she's in our room with us."

"Right. I think that's enough questions," Neville said, stepping forward to herd the curious fifth years off.

Harry turned to Draco. "Go get some sleep, love; I'll wake you up at the end of your free period."

Draco gave a very put-upon sigh, but only said, "Okay, thank you. Here, take Luna."

He handed her over, and gave Harry a grateful kiss.

~*~

After his free period, Harry woke Draco up gently by stroking his hair, and kissing his nose lightly so it tickled. Draco wrinkled it, and sniffed.

"You brought me tea?"

Harry had, indeed, come armed with a large mug full of strong English breakfast tea, as per Draco's preference. Draco smiled.

"You're my favourite person, you know that?"

"I believe I have heard that before, yes."

"Good." Draco took a slow sip of his tea. "I hope you know how happy having a family with you makes me."

"I do," Harry said, wrapping his arms around him and thinking of their little Luna's perfect little smile. "I really do."

"I love you. Time for class? Ugh, everybody's going to be asking about her."

"Time for class."