When Your Parents Tell You Bedtime Stories

18

Never apologize for showing feeling. When you do so, you apologize for the truth.

~ Benjamin Disraeli

I like the fact that in ancient Chinese art the great painters always included a deliberate flaw in their work: human creation is never perfect.

~ Madeline L'Engle, A Circle of Quiet

Persephone pulled back not even a moment into the kiss. "What the fuck are you doing, Achernar?" was the first thing to come out of her mouth.

"I'm sorry," Mirach said, pulling away fast. "I don't know what came over me."

"Just...don't do that again. Ever!" Persephone said, leaning back against the wall as well, her mind boggling.

"Don't worry, I won't," Mirach reassured her, and himself, wiping the back of his hand across his mouth to make a point. Persephone didn't bother with the childish act.

"Are you going to say anything else about it?"

"What do you want me to say? I kissed the daughter of Harry Potter?" Mirach said sarcastically, both of them avoiding eye contact.

"Shut up," Persephone said bitterly. "That's just your stupid theory. I highly doubt it's correct too. I mean, Harry Potter is my dad's Auror partner and my mom's best friend; surely he would've mentioned it."

"You called him your dad," Mirach pointed out to prove the point of their earlier conversation. Persephone rolled her eyes. "Maybe he doesn't know."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, maybe he thinks you're Blaise Zabini's child like everyone else," Mirach put in staring at the far wall. "Wow, wouldn't that be a sight to see the look on his face when he finds out."

"He's not going to 'find out' anything. There's probably nothing to find out anyway. It's just your mind's stupid half-baked idea. You talk about my mother like a saint; why would she have slept with Harry Potter?"

Mirach shrugged. "No one's perfect, Granger."

*******

Malfoy ignored the man's laughing and looked wide-eyed at Potter whose expression was slightly pale and horrified. After a few tense moments, Harry was across to the couch and on Zabini so fast Malfoy had to blink.

"What did you say?" Harry growled.

"Geroff me, Potter," Blaise said, immediately calming down.

"Potter, bind him," Draco said finally finding words.

"What?" Harry asked looking up at his partner. Seeing the look on Malfoy's face he cast the charm, binding Blaise in place, and followed Draco out of the room. "What?"

"We need to find my daughter." Harry nodded at Draco's words. "Did you really...ahh...you know, with Hermione?"

"Do what?" Harry asked.

"You know, interact with Granger?"

"What, Malfoy?"

"Potter, stop playing games and answer the question."

"I would answer the question if you were asking the right one."

Malfoy sighed and rolled his eyes. "Fine. Did you fuck, shag, sleep with, have sex, intermingle, with Hermione Granger?"

Harry's eyes widened and he suppressed a chuckle. "That's all you had to say, Malfoy." Draco rolled his eyes again. "Yes, I did."

"What?!" Malfoy screeched, clearly not expecting that answer.

"Is it really that important, Malfoy?" Harry asked. "It's kind of what I was trying to tell you earlier, so you would have found out anyway...not that it really matters that much...."

"Potter, did you not hear what Zabini said? When did you...you know! Don't make me say it again...."

"About three weeks before Zabini raped her."

Malfoy just about choked on his own saliva. "Before?"

"You think she was moved on enough to do it after?"

"You know, you're quite the wisecrack when you could have possibly just fathered a child!"

"What are you on about, Malfoy?"

"You don't know?! Her best friend and you don't know that Hermione's baby was born three weeks premature." Harry's eyes widened. Oh god, he didn't know. "Or maybe Persephone was born right on time."

"That...but, I...we used...you know...protection!" Harry said. "It's entirely impossible that Persephone is mine!"

"Protection doesn't always work, Potter! Not when fate has a hand in it." Malfoy couldn't describe the emotions flooding through him for the life of him. Anger, hate, jealousy...jealousy? Of course, he'd just learned that his enemy probably fathered the child he's been wishing was really his his whole life. "Has everyone screwed Granger but me, then?"

Malfoy!" Harry said immediately outraged that he would talk about Hermione like that. "Nobody is perfect."

"Let's find my daughter, Potter," Malfoy growled. "Or maybe I should rephrase that, 'your daughter.'"

"Now you're just being immature."

"Nobody's perfect, Potter."