Ever since he found out about Hermione's baby, Harry had noticed himself feeling slightly... unsettled.

He'd brushed it off at first - a little weirdness was to be expected at fifteen when your friend is having a baby - but he was gradually realising that the adjective for what he was feeling wasn't just "weird", but closer to "broody".

Harry knew it was insane but he just couldn't keep his mind off the dream he'd had after she'd told him, the dream about him and Draco as parents. It had felt so real, and it didn't help that he and Draco seemed extra emotionally close and stable these days.

On top of the broodiness, Harry had been experiencing flashes of actual jealousy towards the potential parents Hermione was considering for the adoption. The intensity of this jealousy was a development that had particularly shocked him.

It had got to the point where he'd even devised a little game where recently he and Ron (and to a lesser extent Draco) would shut down all Hermione's suggestions on the matter and mock the prospective parents.

It was an uncharacteristically unkind joke of Harry's, as deep down he knew he was genuinely making the decision more difficult for Hermione in not being supportive, but he couldn't help himself.

Of course, the others didn't realise his real motives behind the game, which was to put off the inevitable - the day where Hermione would announce she'd found the perfect parents, and sealed the adoption deal - and Harry felt guilty for goading them into it.

But he couldn't stand that idea of the little baby in his mind being handed over to anyone else, even though he knew it was completely, utterly, ludicrously ridiculous.

You've never even seen this baby, he mentally admonished himself. You've got no claim to it. It's not even a baby yet, it's just a fragment in your imagination.

But it was no use. The original dream followed him everywhere, and soon broke into more frequent dreams of the same nature until Harry was seeing Draco and a baby almost every time he went to sleep.

Sometimes the baby in his dreams even had Draco's gorgeous blonde hair and liquid grey eyes, which was insane, as Harry was well aware that it was impossible for the baby to look anything like Draco.

It was Hermione's baby. Hermione's body. Hermione's decision what to do with those things.

And Harry was fifteen. Still in full-time education. And with no idea how to take care of a baby.

So why was he so fixated by the concept of fatherhood?

It was getting so far as to be genuinely distracting in classes; every time Harry looked at his boyfriend he pictured him with a little bundle in his arms.

He'd had to stay behind in Potions to brew a batch of Befuddlement Draught four times the other day before Draco, top of the class, had taken pity on him and snuck in to finish it.

Harry had blamed his distractedness on the fumes from the potion, but he knew that wasn't really it, and Draco didn't buy into the excuse either.

"You're very preoccupied recently, Harry," he'd noted the following Saturday morning, as the pair were getting ready for their respective Quidditch practices. "And we haven't had sex in like a week now. That's the longest break we've ever had during term time. Are you feeling ok?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," Harry had replied. "Just got various things on my mind, I guess."

He was glad he hadn't opted for, "I'm obsessed with the insane idea of you and me adopting Hermione's baby and raising it at school". That would've sounded way less mysterious and certainly a lot more worrying. And more embarrassing! He felt like Draco would certainly mock him if he shared his true feelings.

No more was said on the matter until the last day of school before the winter holidays. Harry had chosen to stay at Hogwarts, as he often did over Christmas, and Draco knew it would be in his best interests to stay too for many reasons.

Hermione obviously wanted to avoid her parents as well, whereas Ron couldn't find the right excuse to evade his, so Harry, Draco and Hermione formed an odd little Fifth year trio that Christmas in the castle.

Draco had taken up a permanent residence in Harry's bed by the third day of the holidays, and it was utterly blissful.

Harry and Hermione were the only Gryffindors in their year who remained at Hogwarts that Christmas, so the Common Room was all but devoid of students most of the time, but they'd still managed to make it festive. Fairy lights and gold garlands had been strung across each wall, and candy canes bedecked the fireplace, which was of course always glowing orange with heat.

The boys had even bought their own little Christmas tree to go in the corner of the room, and had decorated it liberally with red and green tinsel. Small wrapped gifts were beginning to accumulate under the branches; anything that arrived in the post for the trio went straight under there, and it was beginning to look very merry.

The whole thing was enough to make Harry feel very domestic with Draco, and one day as they were getting ready for a Christmas shopping trip to Hogsmeade, he couldn't hold back his feelings any longer.

"Draco, I want to raise Hermione's baby with you," he blurted out, straight to the point. Why sugarcoat it?

Draco whipped round from the wardrobe, where he was stood in just his boxers, helping himself to a pair of Harry's black cords. "You want what?" he asked, amazed.

"I think we should have the baby," Harry insisted.

"Potter, I think I'm having a stroke, are you suggesting we take on a baby at Hogwarts? A baby we didn't even help make?"

It wasn't often that Draco referred to his boyfriend as "Potter" when they were alone together, so Harry knew he'd shocked him.

He decided to change tactic. He made his green eyes innocent and wide behind his glasses and pouted slightly as he sidled up to his boyfriend. "You'd be such a hot dad, though," he breathed in Draco's ear. "A total DILF."

"Shut up, Potter. You bloody lunatic," Draco sighed.

There was a pause, and then, "But yes, of course I would. I'm always sexy so of course I'd be a sexy dad, and it's a sign of your good taste, Potter, that you agree. But that doesn't mean having a baby is a good idea."

"That's what you think," Harry said sleepily, and Draco didn't have the energy to correct him again, so instead he just chuckled and pulled his boyfriend in closer.

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a/n: thanks so much for reading once again!

leave a comment if you enjoyed this one, i read all of them and they really make my day 🤍🥰

~ paradisedraco