Author's Note: Thanks to Liza for helping me work out a plot, and my whole team for their fabulous beta work. ;)
Written for...
Quidditch League Fanfiction Competition. Team/Position: Holyhead Harpies, Seeker Task: Write about a character forming a blossoming friendship with someone they wouldn't normally associate with.
Hogwarts Assignment #1. Lesson: Muggle Art Task: Write about a character distancing themselves emotionally from something else.
(Writing Club) Senior Citizens Day. Task: Write about a character old enough to be classed as such.
(Writing Club) Book Club. Prompts: Teddy, family genre, tourmaline
Better Man
1,898 words
"I'm not sure this is a good idea."
"Andie insisted you come tonight."
"But the boy will-"
"Yes, Teddy will be there."
Lucius wrinkled his nose. The boy had been named after a mud… He stopped himself from finishing that thought. His sister-in-law wouldn't be pleased if he casually insulted her late husband over dinner. Still, it was difficult to change his way of thinking.
Narcissa seemed to realize his internal struggle, placing a hand on his arm. "You promised you would try to get along with my family."
Lucius nodded. He remembered the conditions he'd agreed to, just to be let into his own wife's house. One mishap and he was out.
"We should go," he said, straightening his cloak. "We mustn't be late."
:-:
"Lucius, so lovely to see you again," Andromeda said. She glided toward him and placed a gentle kiss to his cheek, as if it had been a few months rather than forty years since they'd last spoken.
Lucius said a silent prayer hoping that things wouldn't be as awkward between them as he feared they could be. He used to find her rather charming before she ran off and got married.
A young man of about fourteen stepped forward hesitantly and reached out a hand to shake Lucius'. He looked nervous, eyes darting to his grandmother occasionally.
"It's nice to meet you, sir. I'm Teddy Lupin."
"Yes. I … I know."
Andromeda took this as a sign to move things along and began directing everyone into the dining room. "Shall we eat? We don't want our supper to grow cold."
:-:
The sisters dominated the dinner conversation, discussing matters of the various charities they volunteered at, and Narcissa heatedly going on about an inept co-worker. She spoke more in twenty minutes that she had all week, Lucius noted.
"How is school, Teddy? I haven't seen you since you got back," Narcissa asked, smiling lovingly at her nephew.
"It's fun. I started Care of Magical Creatures and I think it may be my favorite class."
Lucius decided he ought to make some effort at talking or risk angering Narcissa. Even still, socializing was difficult after fourteen years in Azkaban.
"How are your grades?" he asked the boy. The table seemed to go quiet for a moment.
Teddy shrugged. "Alright, I suppose. I get decent marks in Defense and Transfiguration."
"And what is it you plan to do after school? Do you have a career in mind?"
The teenager snorted. "I'm only fourteen. They don't make us think about jobs until next year."
"How careless of them. By your age I was expected to have my life plan-"
Narcissa cleared her throat loudly, silencing Lucius. Teddy only laughed.
"It's okay, Aunt Cissa. He was only trying to help." He grinned at Lucius. "I like your hair, by the way. It's really … shiny."
Lucius watched in confusion as Teddy's hair rapidly grew out past his shoulders and became the exact shade of blond as Lucius' own. He gawked at the boy, whose eyes were suddenly grey. He looked so much like a younger, more carefree Draco that Lucius couldn't help but laugh, as did Narcissa.
Andromeda didn't seem as pleased about the performance. "Edward. I asked you to behave tonight."
Teddy's smile fell and his hair immediately changed back to its original mousy brown color and short do.
"Please, don't stop on my account," Lucius said. "You have quite the talent, young man."
Teddy smiled shyly at him, but Andromeda said nothing more on the subject.
:-:
Lucius and Narcissa returned to the Tonks home later on in the week for a lunch date, and Lucius was surprised that his young nephew didn't join them for the meal.
"Is Teddy unwell?" he wondered.
Andromeda rolled her eyes. "He hasn't come out of his room for two days. He said he needs to concentrate on something."
"Would you mind if I looked in on him after lunch?" The women looked at him quizzically.
He wasn't quite sure why he was asking. The boy had been on his mind a lot since their meeting. Lucius hadn't been around a lot of children, even when Draco had been Teddy's age. Draco had acted like an adult, like Lucius had wanted him to. And now Draco wasn't speaking to him.
"I'm sure the two of you have plenty to talk about. You don't need me interrupting you."
"I suppose it'd be alright," Andromeda conceded uncertainly.
:-:
Lucius knocked politely on the boy's door, acutely aware of his wife and sister-in-law listening to him from the bottom of the stairs. No doubt they would find some way of surveying him once he was in the boy's room too.
"Who is it?"
"It's Lucius. I thought I might … say hello?"
The door opened slowly, and there Teddy stood with spiky electric blue hair and in a t-shirt and pajama bottoms. "Do you need something, sir?"
"No, no. Your grandmother mentioned you'd been working on something for quite some time now and I wondered if I might be of any help."
Teddy smiled. "Thanks, but I don't think so."
"No? Why don't you give me a chance?"
Rolling his eyes, the fourteen-year-old opened the door fully. "Alright, old man, I guess you can try."
Lucius scoffed, following the boy inside. "Who are you calling old?"
Teddy sat cross-legged on his bed and began shuffling a deck of cards.
"One of the guys in my dorm taught us this game, it's called poker."
Lucius nodded knowingly, sitting stiffly at the foot of the bed. "A muggle gambling game."
"Right, only we never play with money. Anyway, I wanted to get really good over the summer so I can surprise them when we go back."
"Hmm. You know, in my day-"
"Don't tell me you didn't have cards back then," the boy joked, dealing out the cards.
"Very funny." Lucius snatched the deck from Teddy's hands and reshuffled the cards. "I know a better game. What have you got to bet?"
Teddy looked around the room searchingly before reaching into his nightstand and pulling out a box of Bertie Botts. "Are you too old for candy?" he wondered.
"You think you're funny, don't you?"
"I'm hilarious. So what's this game you've got?"
"It's called Balso, and it's how I made money when I was your age."
Teddy looked up from dividing the jelly beans into two piles and quirked an eyebrow. "Weren't you born rich?"
Lucius really had to hand it to the kid, he was smarter than he looked with that ridiculous hair.
"When I'm finished here, your friends are going to forget all about poker."
Teddy shot him a skeptical look, but listened intently as Lucius explained the rules.
:-:
His almost daily Balso matches with his nephew quickly became Lucius' favorite pastime of the summer.
Teddy was lively and fun, and a welcome change from the silence of Narcissa's house that only served to remind Lucius of his wrongdoings. He'd had fourteen years of reminders, every morning waking up to steel bars; he couldn't bear any more.
At some point he noticed Narcissa and Andromeda had stopped questioning him when he asked to see Teddy, and they wouldn't follow him around any longer. It left the men of the family some private time to talk during their matches, generally about nothing in particular.
Teddy liked to talk about Hogwarts and his friends, and the extended family he had with his godfather. Lucius enjoyed listening to the boy talk and would more often just nod along. But on rare occasions, Teddy would get curious.
"Did you teach Draco Balso too?" he asked one day, catching Lucius off guard.
"Ah, no. I was much too busy for games when Draco was your age." He focused on his hand.
"Granny said that Draco is angry with you and that's why he hasn't visited this summer."
"He's entitled to his opinions."
"Does that mean you're mad at him too?"
Lucius narrowed his eyes. "Why are you asking?"
Teddy shrugged, playing a card. "You guys are family. I'm curious."
"Hmm. I'm not upset with Draco." He didn't mention that Draco probably had as much right to be angry with him as anyone did. He didn't want to think about it.
:-:
Autumn was lonely and boring without the matches to look forward to, but it did give Lucius time to work on his relationships with Narcissa and Draco, with added guidance and encouragement from Teddy's infrequent letters from school.
Things were looking up by Christmas, but Lucius still looked forward to seeing Teddy again. He jumped at the chance to visit the night after the boy's return, only to be disappointed when he arrived.
"Edward won't be joining us this evening," Andromeda told Lucius and Narcissa tiredly. "He's not allowed to leave his room until he goes back to school."
"What's he done?" Narcissa asked.
"He was caught trying to shoplift a necklace of all things. I don't know what's gotten into him lately. I never had this problem with Nymphadora."
Lucius didn't know how to respond to the news. Shoplifting seemed out of character for the young man he'd come to know.
"Can I see him?" Andromeda hesitated. "Please? I want to speak with him."
His sister-in-law sighed. "Fine. Maybe you can knock some sense into him."
He found Teddy lying face-down on his bed, his hair a pale grey that Lucius had never seen on him before. He silently crossed the room and took a seat at his nephew's desk, watching the boy's still form for a moment.
"Would you care to explain to me what in Merlin's name you were thinking?"
Teddy stirred, turning onto his side to face Lucius. "Not really," he answered nonchalantly.
"Really? I don't see you for three and a half months and suddenly you're a petty thief? This isn't like you, Teddy."
"Maybe it's the new me."
Lucius scowled. "No. I won't accept that."
"Why? I'm not your responsibility."
"And what about your grandmother? You don't think she's dealt with enough already? You want her to lose you to prison for stealing a cheap necklace?"
"It wasn't cheap, it was tourmaline. Laurie's birthstone."
"Ah, so this was about your new girlfriend. Trying to impress her, perhaps?"
Teddy averted his gaze. "No."
Lucius shook his head. "Teddy, you asked me once if I was upset at Draco. The truth is that he was justified in being angry with me. I let him down. I was his father, I was meant to protect him, and I failed. I forced him to follow my lead, and I won't let you make the same mistakes."
He had Teddy's undivided attention now.
"Did you think about James when you were trying to steal the necklace?"
"Why would I?"
"You're always talking about how much you love the Potter children. You've said more than once that you consider them your brothers and sister. So, when you were holding that necklace, did your impressionable young siblings cross your mind, and how their parents would have to explain to them that you were arrested?"
Teddy hung his head. "No. I didn't think of them. I was a fool."
"Yes, you were. And so was I." Lucius moved to sit at Teddy's bedside, patting the boy's shoulder. "You helped me become a better man, and I intend to return the favor."