Act two, scene fifteen

HARRY AND GINNY POTTER’S HOUSE, KITCHEN

HARRY and DRACO sit far apart. GINNY stands between them.

DRACO: Sorry about your kitchen, Ginny.

GINNY: Oh, it’s not my kitchen. Harry does most of the cooking.

DRACO: I can’t talk to him either. Scorpius. Especially since — Astoria has gone. I can’t even talk about how losing her has affected him. As hard as I try, I can’t reach him. You can’t talk to Albus. I can’t talk to Scorpius. That’s what this is about. Not about my son being evil. Because as much as you might take the word of a haughty centaur, you know the power of friendship.

HARRY: Draco, whatever you may think...

DRACO: I always envied you them, you know — Weasley and Granger. I had —

GINNY: Crabbe and Goyle.

DRACO: Two lunks who wouldn’t know one end of a broomstick from another. You — the three of you — you shone, you know? You liked each other. You had fun. I envied you those friendships more than anything else.

GINNY: I envied them too.

HARRY looks at GINNY, surprised.

HARRY: I need to protect him —

DRACO: My father thought he was protecting me. Most of the time. I think you have to make a choice — at a certain point — of the man you want to be. And I tell you that at that time you need a parent or a friend. And if you’ve learnt to hate your parent by then and you have no friends... then you’re all alone. And being alone — that’s so hard. I was alone. And it sent me to a truly dark place. For a long time. Tom Riddle was also a lonely child. You may not understand that, Harry, but I do — and I think Ginny does too.

GINNY: He’s right.

DRACO: Tom Riddle didn’t emerge from his dark place. And so Tom Riddle became Lord Voldemort. Maybe the black cloud Bane saw was Albus’s loneliness. His pain. His hatred. Don’t lose the boy. You’ll regret it. And so will he. Because he needs you, and Scorpius, whether or not he now knows it.

HARRY looks at DRACO, he thinks.

He opens his mouth to speak. He thinks.

GINNY: Harry. Will you get the Floo powder or shall I?

HARRY looks up at his wife.