"You look like you need a drink, Hare."

Harry was where Malfoy had left him, and he felt so very weak, sitting there in the house that wasn't really his, but wasn't exactly not-his either. Everything felt like a nightmare, if not for the amount of people here who were living. Speaking of, he would finally get to meet his parents in the flesh. The thought didn't excite Harry as much as it should what with everything going on and most likely never seeing them again after this. It made the moment bittersweet.

"Thanks, Malfoy, but if I'm going to see my parents tonight for the first time -and last- without ghosts or magic mirrors. I want to be sober." As much as his reply was slightly humorous, he had to bite back the ending of how being married to a Malfoy definitely might have convinced him to have that drink anyways.

"Are you nervous?"

"A bit," Harry admitted hesitantly, looking at his husband with guarded expressions. No amount of auror training or encounters with Voldemort could have prepared him for looking into a stranger's eyes and finding love there behind them.

"It's so weird, you know?" It seemed that Malfoy had no problem not holding back. "All this nonsense, it's almost like you lost your memory. I suppose if you and Herm fix this, I'll have my Harry back in no time, though."
Then he shrugged, a rather misplaced action on a prideful Malfoy, but so was the awkward smile.

"I reckon," Harry said cautiously. "Do you mind if I ask you a few more questions?"

"No, go ahead." Malfoy bit his tongue at the affectionate name he nearly clipped off the end of his answer.

"How'd this happen?" Nearly choking on the question as it were, he pointed pathetically between them to indicate what he meant by this.

"September first, nineteen ninety-seven. The beginning of our seventh year at Hogwarts. We had a compartment to ourselves since you told Ron and Blaise to scram, and Hermione was worrying over her Head Girl duties. I remember that day clearly, because we had been flirting all summer, but you denied any fancy you had to me the moment someone would ask. I think your mum told you something ridiculously Lily of her before you got on the train and you just flat out asked me to be yours."

Harry laughed, wishing he understood what Malfoy meant about his parents... wishing he knew his parents at all. Gods, he was jealous of Draco bloody Malfoy (Potter) for knowing things he could only ever fathom, and wouldn't even need to know past this evening. He wanted to hate him for it, and for so many other things, but that wasn't exactly a civil way to conduct one's self.
Wanting nothing more than to skip straight to dinner, he figured the best way to move forward would be to stay calm and roll with whatever Malfoy told him to do, not to fight him on it. When he got back, Harry needed to remind himself to go pick a fight with his own Malfoy in hopes to cure the paradox of knowing this one.

"When did we get married?" The ring had only told him the year.

Malfoy seemed to be on the same wavelength as he pulled off his own ring jokingly and stared at it much too far away from his eyes to actually be able to read anything at all.

"We were bonded at exactly eleven in the morning on September first, two-thousand and one. A brilliant summer Saturday if there ever was one."

"We're sentimental blokes, aren't we?" Harry jested.

"You could say that." Malfoy smiled, laughing lightly with Harry, even if he looked quite the bit in pain.

There was guilt surfacing in him, wondering how exactly Malfoy was dealing with all of this knowing someone who looked exactly like his husband sat before him, but this version was off by a couple slices of time.

"Kids? I know personally I've always wanted them."

"Our own?" Malfoy joked, but it was lost on Harry who was very solemn in his demeanor. Clearing his throat, the blonde said, "Yes. We were going to adopt from a wizarding orphanage pretty soon, actually: we were quite ready."

Harry nearly choked.

"Well... I hope you can get back to that, and soon. I would hate to loiter in this Harry's life for too long."

Nodding, Draco stood and offered his hand out, adding, "We should get out of Kreacher's kitchen before he hangs us with the pots."

Harry nodded, knowing well enough not to cross Kreacher when cooking.

They both left, though Malfoy looked a lot more comfortable with the place than Harry was in that moment. Even if he'd been living there the past few years of his life, he couldn't imagine Malfoy doing the same... with him. Unfathomable things were tangible here, however, so it was best Harry attempt to blindly accept what was coming.

"Would you like to see some photographs? Just... to prepare you, maybe. I wouldn't want mum and dad to call us out right away and bring Hermione down with Severus too."

There was nothing else to do, he supposed, so he agreed to seeing some photographs of his different self, painfully ignoring the fact Malfoy called his parents mum and dad.

"I've got quite a few of the albums, they're a mix of muggle and magical pictures. You like the muggle ones because you grew up completely magical, but Lily had some from her childhood you found when you were fifteen which left you obsessed."

The first thing placed before Harry was a book that had two intertwined hands in the clear window carved into the cover.

"That's us," Malfoy seemed to answer his unspoken inquisition, "It was the first time we held hands, you took it with a Polaroid."

"We really are sentimental sods."

Without reply, though he did seem to catch the edge of a smile, Draco Malfoy pried open the album as it made a few crackling noises, the binding protesting its sudden use.

Two photographs lay on the first page, one on the next, as Harry saw that the first two were taken by respective partners, and the next was taken by a third party.

"I took this one of you while in a muggle park," the smiles were unwavering, definitely muggle, "And then you of me. We had literally no one with us that day because you'd bloody apparated us off the grounds with Lupin's help. I swear you were always his favorite no matter what he said... we were stranded."

"I doubt that, Malfoy," Harry said with a scoff, though amused his husband was not.

If anything, the blonde looked rather put off, shrinking into himself even if there was no physical sign of change.
"It's... Potter, now, but..." The rest of his words were unintelligible to Harry as he watched lithe fingers flipping to the next page.

"When was this?" He wondered as he pointed to another photo of them, seeming to be somewhere in Hogwarts....

"Hermione took it," the picture of them moved as they laughed together, arms touching enough to be recognized as wanting to be doing a little more than that. "She refused to let you take a picture of her when she realized you'd charmed the camera to take muggle and magical photos, so she snapped it from you and got this."

"When did she start seeing Snape?"

"Severus and her started seeing one-another a year plus a few months after we left Hogwarts. She was about twenty then. It was a big fight for him to finally let himself have her, they should've been together the end of summer after graduation. She went off on some summer program through the alps and came back all muscular and adult-witch. Even I was impressed. He just... didn't think it would ever be right, even having changed so much as she did. Ron got to her first though, it was this whole thing at the Weasley gala, but... it doesn't matter anymore, they're happy now."

Harry hummed as though he would ever understand.

"These ones?" His fingers pointed to the next page where there were lots of sweets involved, and way more candles than Hogwarts was ever known for having during normal times.

"All Hollow's Eve. You had a field day with half the school high on sugar, the other half looking sick to their stomachs."

"I recognize so many people and yet..."

"Yeah."

There were many faces Harry couldn't name, but one face was missing in the photos that seemed oddly suspicious.

"Where's Ginny?"

Malfoy sighed and looked at him with all the melancholy in the world.

"Ginny passed away in her fourth year. It was really hard for us all, especially for her parents, and my sister and Luna, but we persevered."

"What happened?" Harry wondered, frowning deeply at the mere thought of Ginny not being around. He would need to hug her tightly when he got back to his timeline, even if she was halfway through a quidditch match. Still, her being missing here stung something deep inside of him that he had suppressed, just like she had, when the war ended. They'd talked about reigniting the flames of their relationship, but with Fred's death waxing heavy on Mrs. Weasley, tears had doused such a thought.

"A muggle sickness, the medi-witches never really specified to us kids, and I don't think Molly wanted anyone to know anyways, it might have made it worse; knowing."

Harry nodded merely to form a reply, but he felt all words would have been useless anyways in temporary mourning of a girl he had loved at one point. And he had, loved her, loved Ginevra Weasley to a point of no return, yet nothing came of it. What came of it was a book that lead him being married to Malfoy, no Ginny Weasley in sight, and he had to reign his mind in before it circled back to anger and rounded on insanity.

"And your sister, she was horribly affected."

There were many things that Harry had heard over the past hour that had the boy-who-lived ready to sacrifice himself to Death once again, but nothing quite as earth-shattering as him having a sibling, let alone a sister.

"You didn't have a sister in your recollection, did you? Because of Voldemort."

Shaking his own head of unruly black hair, Harry proclaimed his answer most definitely.

A pale, guilty look made Harry quite uncomfortable as he shifted back to the albums and tried to take in the fact that he had a sister somewhere out there in the wizarding world, and he knew nothing about her. Again, almost tirelessly, the jealousy swept into Harry's mind at how Draco Malfoy knew about his family more than he did. He had a sister that he probably loved, who... bloody hell he couldn't even fathom what they were to one-another because he didn't know her. So many emotions attacked him, his magic in a deafening whirl about his head as he struggled to grasp just a sliver of what Malfoy told him.

"What's her name?"

"Iris Lily Potter."

Harry smiled, though knowing just her name didn't heal any of the hurt that was displayed blatantly on his face.

"Can you tell me about her?" He asked eagerly, knowing that Dinner was coming closer and closer, but he wanted to be familiar with his own bloody sister, at least a little bit, before time would take it away from him.

"She was two years below us in school. Smart when she wanted to be, a Gryffindor through and through. She was a chaser, didn't obtain the family lineage of Seeker. Red hair like her mum, if I didn't know Lily, I'd say James had nothing to do with making her since she's so utterly her. Besides her mischief, which is usually bearable. She plays pro Quidditch now, with the Hollyhead Harpies."

The information made Harry all the more queasy as he sat back, ignoring the photographs as he closed his eyes. There was just a lot to take in, and he wasn't quite sure how much new information he could handle after everything that had been thrown at him. One moment he was writing about the years he knew so well, the trials that had made him the man he was, and now none of that mattered. It was all for naught as he sat in a world where everything seemed a slant off of perfect... to an extent. He was sure besides Ginny and Narcissa's death, there were other things that would make this place just as equally overbearing as his other home had been. Call him crazy, but Harry even missed the way he and Malfoy avoided one-another like the plague.

"Eventually none of this will matter and I'll have you back, no matter how insane I sound to myself right now," Malfoy protested, smiling slightly.

There was a pause before he continued, one that was filled with tension and worry.

"This probably is as bad a time as any to say this, but..." Malfoy hesitated, putting a hand through his hair and swallowing down the words, "I love you, and bloody hell am I sure you feel the furthest thing from that for me in reply, but that doesn't matter. I have no intention of making you uncomfortable, but I'm here for you no matter what because you're still technically Harry. And I would do anything for any version of him."

Silence.

"Thanks," broke it, though Harry hardly meant it.
More silence.

"We better get ready for Dinner, I can hear Kreacher in the kitchens."

Harry heard nothing as he followed Malfoy to their room, the awkward tension not leaving either of them as he ended up in a room he normally didn't stay in on the fourth floor.

"How am I... with my parents, I mean?"

Startled, the wizard who was pulling their bedroom door open looked back and furrowed his brows.

"You love them a lot, but it's casual... like any adult with their parent it's more fun and wizarding talk, you know?" He opened the door as he explained, and Harry couldn't hold back a shudder at the sight of their bed, large and covered in black sheets.

"Right," Harry said, however tentatively he went about his words, prying his eyes from the scene of pure horror. Why it didn't occur to him they'd share a bed was beyond him.

"And my dad, he... Father thinks the world of you but wishes I would've married a woman. He'll give you the cold shoulder but doesn't mean it and no one really talks about it. Otherwise he's a very happy wizard."

"Got it," he muttered as a folded, green article of clothing was thrust his way.

"Here, wear this, it's your mum's favorite shirt. She'll tell you that you didn't have to wear it, but you always reply that you'd do anything to see her smile."

It sounded like Malfoy was reciting his favorite poetry or lines from Shakespeare as he told Harry the small banter that ensued with his mother, and it hit him again just how much this pitiful wizard loved him.

Taking the green shirt in his hands, Harry set it down on the bed, as he tugged his long-sleeve and peeled it off. When he reached for the new shirt, something caught his eye.

On the lower part of his right arm, mostly the forearm, there was a colorful tattoo that Harry knew he didn't have before. The thing was muggle, nothing was moving or sparkling, and this was probably the funniest difference about himself he could have found. After everything else, a tattoo was a welcome surprise. Harry pulled his arm closer and glanced over to Malfoy who's back was turned as he took off his own shirt, muscle leanly placed over him, a silver, silk button-down in his hands. He meant to ask about the tattoo, but the flash of attraction that came over him halted him in his tracks.
He needed to address him, to get them both out of this situation before Malfoy had to deal with him, not his husband but also not not his husband, ogling him like he'd never seen an attractive wizard before.

Harry let him get a couple buttons done before calling out. "Draco?"

It felt very wrong to say it, the name having rarely crossed his lips if ever, so he hoped Malfoy heard him.
Luckily enough, he turned, his matching toned chest showing until he covered it with the rest of his buttons.

"Yeah?"

"When on Earth did I get this?" He showed him his arm, and the blond's eyes went wide until a smirk took over.

"Two thousand. Your mum almost killed you, I think."
Harry laughed, looking at the undeniably Gryffindor tattoo on his arm. Merlin it almost made him want to make it a permanent thing.

"Were you there?" Harry asked, for some reason unknown to him.

"Yeah," Malfoy smiled fondly, "You took it well, though you were tearing up when you got home because it 'bloody well fucking hurt'."

They laughed together that time, but it didn't last long as Harry finally remembered why he'd seen it in the first place. Taking his shirt from the bed, he pulled the green fabric on and felt utterly Slytherin, cringing merely at the thought.

"Do you like it?" Malfoy asked him for little reason at all, but considering his eyes had been over Harry's body at least three times by then, he could see why the wizard had been compelled to ask.

"Yeah, why wouldn't I?"

"Dunno, just-" Malfoy was close then, his hand reaching for Harry's, but it fell short when he had to tip his head down slightly to look into Harry's eyes, "asking."

Harry swallowed hard, backing away from the warmth of another body, and nodded.

He couldn't blame him for wanting to get close but couldn't he wait until the man who he'd actually married came back? Right now it was just the shell, and Harry's head hurt as it was.

Then suddenly, Malfoy started laughing, as though this were all a joke, but one played on him that he'd just figured out.

"No... But if you still have your tattoo, then..." Suddenly pacing furiously, he pursed his lips, shaking his head all the while, "But that's a stretch, even for the wizarding world."

"What is going on?" Harry asked him, but the frustrated wizard seemed not to notice.

"It can't be," he muttered again, his footsteps quickening from the war in his mind.

"Draco," Harry said finally, grabbing his arm in hopes that one action or the other would calm him down. "What are you thinking?"

"It's an insane theory, even for wizards," Malfoy warned him, breaking from Harry's grasp. "It's asinine."

"What is?"

"Well, our Hermione... before your little mishap... well, she was pregnant. And, seeing that you have your tattoo and all, even though you're not my Harry, then," Malfoy let him imply the rest, tilting his head with a lopsided frown.

"Then that means my Hermione is pregnant too."