Harry had a moment of vertigo as he apparated into the foyer of Grimmauld Place. He caught his balance shakily and realized that he had landed on the bottom step of the stairway leading to the upper levels.
"Whoops," he muttered. It was a few feet off the mark. He needed better deliberation next time. He was tired.
He heard the sound of female giggling from the sitting room, and hefted the shopping bag in his hand.
"Little git!" Ron bellowed.
"Ron," said Hermione in an attempt at a scolding tone that was ruined by Ginny's loud guffaws, and Hermione's own giggles. "He's only a baby. You should have covered him up."
"He's not a baby," growled Ron. "He's a little …"
Whatever Ron was about to say was cut off by Ron's howl. Ginny and Hermione howled as well, but laughing. Harry thought he heard something fall heavily.
"Why you…you little …my favorite shirt!" But Ron held amusement in his voice as well as inarticulate exasperation. Harry heard the soft bubbling of a baby's laugh.
"Oh my God!" said Ginny, panting.
"Cover him up! Cover him up!" squealed Hermione.
"I can't bloody well cover him up," roared Ron. "I knocked over the effing changing table."
Harry decided that the babysitting was not going too well after all…at least for Ron.
"Uh, hello?" said Harry as he began walking hurriedly down the hall.
"Harry!" exclaimed Ginny. "You have to see this!"
"What…" said Harry as he rounded the corner.
It was quite a sight. A small oak table was toppled over in the middle of the room. Diapers and baby wipes were strewn across the floor. Ginny was sitting on the coffee table holding her sides. Ron was standing in the middle of the room, holding a baby up in the air in front of him with both hands. Rage and hilarity vied for control of Ron's features as he spun in a helpless circle with little Teddy. Hermione was half bent over, a diaper in her hands, trying to hold it up in front of Teddy's privates as Ron rotated.
"What?" said Harry again, blinking.
"I'll tell you what!" yelled Ron. "Your bloody godson just pissed on me."
"Twice!" squeaked Hermione, red-faced from trying to keep up with Ron's pirouette.
Harry heard another thud as Ginny fell off the coffee table, gasping for breath.
After several minutes of general confusion, the changing table was righted, baby Teddy was properly changed and re-clothed. Ron had changed out of the Chudley Cannons t-shirt that had been on the receiving end of Teddy's disdain.
"So?" asked Ron, looking pointedly at Harry. Ron was sitting on the sofa. He had a baby bottle in one hand, and Teddy nestled in the crook of his other arm. The baby made greedy snorting noises as he sucked at the bottle. Despite his recent difficulty in changing Teddy, Ron was now handling the baby like an old pro. Hermione was sitting next to him on the sofa, her legs drawn up under her. She was looking at Teddy and making the ridiculous noises and faces that women tend to make around infants.
"So what?" asked Harry, reaching into the shopping bag sitting on the coffee table and withdrawing bottles of butterbeer and Muggle soft drinks.
"Come off it," said Ginny from the depths of the squashy red armchair that Harry had moved into Grimmauld Place the day before. "What did Kingsley say?"
"It went as we expected," said Harry. "I have to do some training tomorrow and a little bit every day all week. Just orientation, really. That has to be finished before we leave."
"That doesn't make much sense," said Ron. He was looking down at the baby in his arms and making a wide eyed funny face. "No it doesn't, does it, Teddy? No, no, it doesn't." The hint of Teddy's gummy smile appeared around the edges of the bottle nipple and the baby's hair began taking on shades of lavender. It did that when the little fellow was amused.
"It does make sense, Ron," said Hermione. Harry had a feeling that Ron would not be completely comfortable with the appraising and…approving way that Hermione was gazing at him as he fed Teddy. "Next Monday is the thirtieth day. Harry has to be a bona fide employee of the Ministry by that point in order to get the deferment."
"He's got the commission," said Ron, his voice becoming singsong. "Tell Auntie Hermione that Harry has the commission, Teddy! You tell her! Yes he does."
"Kingsley is just being thorough," said Ginny. She blessed Harry with a grateful smile as he handed her a Coke. She and Ron had really taken to the Muggle drink in the last few days.
Hermione took a butterbeer and grimaced as she looked at the red can in Ginny's hands. Her parents were dentists, and Harry reckoned that her prejudice against sugary drinks still held. Harry placed another Coke in front of Ron.
Harry twisted the cap off his own butterbeer and sat on the arm of the chair in which Ginny rested. "I think I'm just going to be going over some paperwork. Kingsley said that I should be finished by Thursday. We don't fly until Saturday. Plenty of time to pack up and get things sorted."
"'Fly'" said Ron with a shake if his head. "I still think it's mental that we don't take brooms."
Hermione rolled her eyes at Ron's repeated protest. "An airplane is much faster, Ron, and more comfortable."
Ron grimaced and mumbled under his breath.
"Too bad that Dad can't come," said Ginny. "I think he might explode if he actually took a ride on an airplane."
"I'm excited to fly myself," said Harry, smiling at the thought of Mr. Weasley's aeronautical excitement.
"You've never taken an aerial planey?" asked Ron.
"No, I haven't," said Harry.
"Never?" asked Hermione. "Not even on holiday, or...anything?"
Harry swallowed some butterbeer to cover his own grimace. "The Dursleys never took me on holiday. They always left me with someone."
"Horrible people," growled Ginny.
Harry patted Ginny's arm and smiled at her.
"We could take the international flu network. That's pretty quick," said Ron. "Got us to Egypt in two days a few years ago, right Gin?"
"Ugh. It took me two weeks to wash the soot out of my hair. I'd rather fly," replied Ginny. She pointed at little Teddy. "That bottles empty, Ron"
" Oh! Thanks," said Ron. He pulled the empty bottle out of Teddy's mouth with a faint pop. The baby gurgled in protest for a second, and then settled down into the satisfied half-sleep that usually followed a full belly.
"Look, 'Mione. Food coma," said Ron amusedly.
"Speaking of the Dursleys, are you still going to Little Whinging, Harry?" asked Hermione, eying Teddy distrustfully. The baby had a tendency to spit up.
"Kingsley said they were taken back home last week. I should probably check on them," replied Harry.
"Is that wise for them to go back so soon? There are still a lot of Death Eaters on the loose," said Ginny, taking a sip of her coke.
"The Dursleys have never been accused of being wise," said Harry with a shrug. "They insisted, apparently."
"Dedalus Diggle probably just wanted to get rid of them. He told Dad that your uncle was a nightmare all year," said Ron, placing Teddy on his shoulder and patting the baby on the back. He then began to recount an amusing problem that Harry's Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia had encountered with a toilet and an enchanted feather duster.
Hermione stood up and walked over to the changing table while Ron was talking. She rummaged around until she found a burp cloth and sat back on the sofa, handing it to Ron. Ron was smiling widely, caught up in his tale, as he absently took the burp cloth and laid it atop his leg. Teddy burped suspiciously.
"…it took Dudley three weeks to go to the privy without shivering," Ron guffawed to everyone's general hilarity.
"But you know Dedalus really seemed to like your cousin, Harry," observed Ginny. "He kept calling Dudley, 'that delightful Muggle boy.'"
"Delightful!" exclaimed Harry disbelievingly. "Well, whatever the reason, they're back, and I reckon that I'll stop in to see that they're alright."
"Are you barking?" asked Ron.
"They're his family, Ron," said Hermione in an understanding tone.
"Family that you're well shot of," said Ron.
"Yeah, well. I'm not going to move back in or anything. Still, I was going to go tonight after supper and after Teddy's grandmother came to get him."
"It's your funeral," shrugged Ron. Then he chuckled, mumbling, "A feather duster…"
"Want some company?" asked Ginny, looking at Harry. "I've never met them. I probably should, don't you think?"
"Sure," said Harry happily. He would be grateful for the company.
"Better to meet an insulted Hippogrif, if you ask me," said Ron with an elaborate shudder.
"Ron and I would come too, Harry," laughed Hermione. "But we promised Ron's parents that we would stop by for dinner tonight."
"You want to come, Harry? Best to face the Dursleys on a full stomach, I reckon," offered Ron.
"I reckon that I better not," said Harry with a sigh, imagining the wonderful smells that would permeate the Burrow as Mrs. Weasley exercised her culinary talents. "I've eaten there twice this week. Kreacher, well you know how cross he gets if he does not get equal time."
"Well if it's a choice between Kreacher and the Dursleys," said Ron, "I'd probably ditch them both and choose the feather …"
Ron's observation was interrupted by a terrible noise. It sounded a bit like Grawp with a toothache, or maybe like a troll with irritable bowel syndrome.
"What the bloody hell?" bellowed Ron, looking at Teddy in shocked horror. That's when Harry noticed the former contents of Teddy's bottle decorating Ron's second ruined shirt of the evening.
There was a third thud as Ginny hit the floor again.