ALBUS: And pity’s good?
SCORPIUS: Pity is a start, my friend, a foundation on which to build a palace — a palace of love.
ALBUS: I honestly thought I’d be the first of us to get a girlfriend.
SCORPIUS: Oh, you will, undoubtedly, probably that new smoky-eyed Potions professor — she’s old enough for you, right?
ALBUS: I don’t have a thing about older women!
SCORPIUS: And you’ve got time — a lot of time — to seduce her. Because Rose is going to take years to persuade.
ALBUS: I admire your confidence.
ROSE comes past them on the stairs. She looks at them both.
ROSE: Hi.
Neither boy knows quite how to reply — she looks at SCORPIUS.
This is only going to be weird if you let it be weird.
SCORPIUS: Received and entirely understood.
ROSE: Okay. “Scorpion King.”
She walks off with a smile on her face. SCORPIUS and ALBUS look at each other. ALBUS grins and punches SCORPIUS on the arm.
ALBUS: Maybe you’re right — pity is a start.
SCORPIUS: Are you heading to Quidditch? Slytherin are playing Hufflepuff — it’s a big one —
ALBUS: I thought we hated Quidditch?
SCORPIUS: People can change. Besides, I’ve been practicing. I think I might make the team eventually. Come on.
ALBUS: I can’t. My dad’s arranged to come up —
SCORPIUS: He’s taking time away from the Ministry?
ALBUS: He wants to go on a walk — something to show me — share with me — something.
SCORPIUS: A walk?
ALBUS: I know, I think it’s a bonding thing or something similarly vomit-inducing. Still, you know, I think I’ll go.
SCORPIUS reaches in and hugs ALBUS.
What’s this? I thought we decided we don’t hug.
SCORPIUS: I wasn’t sure. Whether we should. In this new version of us — I had in my head.
ALBUS: Better ask Rose if it’s the right thing to do.
SCORPIUS: Ha! Yeah. Right.
The two boys dislocate and grin at each other.
ALBUS: I’ll see you at dinner.
ACT FOUR, SCENE FIFTEEN
A BEAUTIFUL HILL
HARRY and ALBUS walk up a hill on a beautiful summer’s day. They say nothing, enjoying the sun on their faces as they climb.
HARRY: So are you ready?
ALBUS: For what?
HARRY: Well, there’s the fourth-year exams — and then the fifth year — big year — in my fifth year I did —
He looks at ALBUS. He smiles. He talks quickly.
I did a lot of stuff. Some of it good. Some of it bad. A lot of it quite confusing.
ALBUS: Good to know.
HARRY smiles.
I got to watch them — you know — for a bit — your mum and dad. They were — you had fun together. Your dad used to love to do this smoke ring thing with you where you . . . well, you couldn’t stop giggling.
HARRY: Yes?
ALBUS: I think you’d have liked them. And I think me, Lily, and James would have liked them too.
HARRY nods. There’s a slightly uncomfortable silence. Both are trying to reach each other here, both are failing.
HARRY: You know, I thought I’d lost him — Voldemort — I thought I’d lost him — and then my scar started hurting again and I had dreams of him and I could even speak Parseltongue again and I started to feel like I’d not changed at all — that he’d never let me go —
ALBUS: And had he?
HARRY: The part of me that was Voldemort died a long time ago, but it wasn’t enough to be physically rid of him — I had to be mentally rid of him. And that — is a lot to learn for a forty-year-old man.
He looks at ALBUS.
That thing I said to you — it was unforgivable, and I can’t ask you to forget it but I can hope we move past it. I’m going to try to be a better dad for you, Albus. I am going to try and—be honest with you and . . .
ALBUS: Dad, you don’t need to —
HARRY: You told me you don’t think I’m scared of anything, and that — I mean, I’m scared of everything. I mean, I’m afraid of the dark, did you know that?
ALBUS: Harry Potter is afraid of the dark?
HARRY: I don’t like small spaces and — I’ve never told anyone this, but I don’t much like — (he hesitates before saying it) pigeons.
ALBUS: You don’t like pigeons?
HARRY (he scrunches up his face): Nasty, pecky, dirty things. They give me the creeps.
ALBUS: But pigeons are harmless!
HARRY: I know. But the thing that scares me most, Albus Severus Potter, is being a dad to you. Because I’m operating without wires here. Most people at least have a dad to base themselves on — and either try to be or try not to be. I’ve got nothing — or very little. So I’m learning, okay? And I’m going to try with everything I’ve got — to be a good dad for you.
ALBUS: And I’ll try and be a better son. I know I’m not James, Dad, I’ll never be like you two —
HARRY: James is nothing like me.
ALBUS: Isn’t he?
HARRY: Everything comes easy for James. My childhood was a constant struggle.
ALBUS: So was mine. So you’re saying — am I — like you?
HARRY smiles at ALBUS.
HARRY: Actually you’re more like your mum — bold, fierce, funny — which I like — which I think makes you a pretty great son.
ALBUS: I almost destroyed the world.
HARRY: Delphi wasn’t going anywhere, Albus — you brought her out into the light and you found a way for us to fight her. You may not see it now, but you saved us.
ALBUS: But shouldn’t I have done better?
HARRY: You don’t think I ask myself the same questions?
ALBUS (stomach sinking further, he knows this is not what his dad would do): And then — when we caught her — I wanted to kill her.
HARRY: You’d watched her murder Craig, you were angry, Albus, and that’s okay. And you wouldn’t have done it.
ALBUS: How do you know that? Maybe that’s my Slytherin side. Maybe that’s what the Sorting Hat saw in me.
HARRY: I don’t understand your head, Albus — actually, you know what, you’re a teenager, I shouldn’t be able to understand your head, but I do understand your heart. I didn’t — for a long time — but thanks to this — “escapade” — I know what you got in there. Slytherin, Gryffindor, whatever label you’ve been given — I know — know — that heart is a good one — yeah, whether you like it or not, you’re on your way to being some wizard.
ALBUS: Oh I’m not going to be a wizard, I’m going into pigeon racing. I’m quite excited about it.
HARRY grins.
HARRY: Those names you have — they shouldn’t be a burden. Albus Dumbledore had his trials too, you know — and Severus Snape, well, you know all about him —
ALBUS: They were good men.
HARRY: They were great men, with huge flaws, and you know what — those flaws almost made them greater.
ALBUS looks around himself.
ALBUS: Dad? Why are we here?
HARRY: This is where I often come.
ALBUS: But this is a graveyard . . .
HARRY: And here is Cedric’s grave.
ALBUS: Dad?
HARRY: The boy who was killed — Craig Bowker — how well did you know him?
ALBUS: Not well enough.
HARRY: I didn’t know Cedric well enough either. He could have played Quidditch for England. Or been a brilliant Auror. He could have been anything. And Amos is right — he was stolen. So I come here. Just to say sorry. When I can.
ALBUS: That’s a — good thing to do.