Chapter 3: April, 2014

After Melony and Al had shown Mr. and Mrs. Potter, Lily, and James to some of the spare rooms of the house so they could set up and get comfortable, Melony dragged Al downstairs and into the kitchen.

"Al, what is going on? What was all of that upstairs?"

Al started making coffee and avoiding Melony's gaze. "You want some?" he asked.

"Al!"

"You're right, I should make some tea too," he said, starting to dig around in his boxes for a tea pot.

"Albus Severus Potter, you stop what you are doing right now and tell me what is going on."

Al straightened and stood with his hands on his hips, not looking at Melony. "You won't believe me," he said quietly.

"Tell me anyway."

"I'm a wizard," he said, finally turning around, "and I am from a family of wizards that go back a long ways."

Melony blinked at him for a moment before saying, "Like, you're wicken? Your family are wicken?"

"No, no I mean we can do magic."

"You mean magic tricks. You guys are magicians. That fireplace trick was really cool, you'll have to tell me how you did that."

"No, actual magic," said Al, coming over to where Melony was standing at the counter that separated the breakfast nook from the rest of the kitchen, "with wands."

Melony stared at Al, her brain working overtime, trying to come up with a reasonable explanation. Then, it dawned on her.

"Oh, my gosh," she said, "your parents are named Harry and Ginny and they named their kids James, Albus, and Lily? Your family is trying to be Harry Potter! From those books!"

"You've read the Harry Potter books?"

"Of course I have, everyone my age has."

"Well, those books were based on my dad's life."

"No, they're not. Those are made up stories."

"I know this is hard to believe, but those books were not made up. The lady who wrote them is a friend of my Aunt Hermione's"

"Al, if this is a joke, please stop, it's not funny," said Melony, tears starting to form in the back of her eyes. "Just tell me what is actually going on."

Al gazed down at Melony, extreme love and sadness filling his eyes. He slowly bent down, undid the velcro on one of the bigger pockets in his cargo shorts that he always insisted on wearing, and pulled out a long, wooden wand. He pointed it at one of the coffee cups sitting on the counter and flicked his wrist. The cup changed into a mouse and started scurrying across the counter. Melony jumped back and squealed, but Al flicked his wrist again and the mouse changed back into a cup.

Melony stared at the cup, trying to understand. She looked back up at Al and was just about to ask him how he had been able to do it when he made a quarter turn and disappeared. A split second later, there was loud CRACK and Al reappeared across the room.

Melony teetered for a moment and had to sit on a nearby stool to steady herself. "How did you do that?" she asked.

Al crossed the room in three paces and grabbed Melony's hand. "Melony, you must believe me when I tell you that I know you and I love you and I would never do anything to hurt you. I swear that I am telling the truth."

Melony stared into Al's unblinking gaze and could see how earnest he was. She thought she knew him too...no, she told herself, she did know him, and he would never joke about something so serious.

"Okay," she said, taking a deep breath, "let's talk about this."

Al sat on the stool that was next to Melony's and nodded. "Okay," he said. "Ask me anything you want."

"The Harry Potter series that J.K. Rowling wrote is a true story."

"Yes."

"About your father."

"Yes."

"Does that mean that everything in those books actually happened?"

"Yes, for the most part. She set it a little later than it actually happened, and took some literary liberties with a few of the conversations, but everything else is true."

"So you are actually twenty-four."

"Yes. My father was born in '66 and the battle of Hogwarts happened in '83."

"Why did she change the dates?"

"I don't know, I've never actually met her."

"Why was she allowed to write the story and produce it in the real world?"

"You mean produce it to Muggles?"

"Sure."

"My dad is extraordinarily famous. After he killed Voldemort, it was hard for him to go anywhere or do anything without twenty people following him around, documenting his every move, or wanting an autograph, or asking for his life's story. On top of that, he married a famous quidditch player which made everything ten times worse. He refused to give out his story because he didn't trust anyone to tell it right, so they were being pestered by hundreds of journalists and authors constantly. When they had me, the press had a field day calling me 'the son of the chosen one' since I looked so much like him. They had been pretty bad with James, but with me they were downright dangerous, so my parents decided they had to do something. It was my Aunt Hermione who had the idea to sell it to a muggle. That way, my father could tell the press that he had sold the rights to his story to the muggle, and that they would have to talk to her if they wanted any part of it, all the while knowing that they would not be able to do so under the Muggle Secrecy Act."

"But wouldn't your dad get into trouble for breaking that same act?"

"By then Kingsley was Minister of Magic and he and my dad were pretty good friends so they allowed it as long as the book was published as a fictional novel in the Muggle world."

"So why was J.K. Rowling chosen to write the book?"

"She and my Aunt Hermione were really good friends back in primary school before my aunt found out she was a witch. They had kept in touch and my aunt knew that she was a good, solid writer. My aunt magically delayed a train ride Rowling was on one day so she could meet my dad and they could explain their idea to her. After that she and my dad would meet in various Muggle coffee shops with my dad under his invisibility cloak so no one from the wizarding world would find them and expose them before Rowling could get the book out."

"So all of that stuff Rowling said about changing some of the major plot points half-way through-like killing off Sirius Black instead of Mr. Weasley-were not true?"

Al nodded. "All made up. According to my dad, she is very smart and creative. He still speaks of her with admiration."

"What does your dad do now?"

Al hesitated for a brief moment. "He's the Minister of Magic."

"Really?"

"Yes. Stepped in during my final year at Hogwarts."

Melony stopped to think a moment, a thousand questions swirling around in her head. One last desperate part of her was still trying to come up with another, reasonable explanation, but that voice was growing more and more dim. She just couldn't see any other explanation for the fireplace, or the mouse, or the way Al had disappeared.

Once her brain started accepting the reality that this was indeed Harry Potter's son, other things in her life started making more sense, like how Al was able to visit her from across town so often, or how this apartment that they had just bought together looked way bigger on the inside than it did on the outside. It also explained some of the strange people who would stop them on the street to shake Al's hand. Melony had always assumed that they were people Al had encountered in his line of work (he was a police officer in New York City after all), but maybe….

"Oh, my gosh!" Melony said coming to another realization. "That lady we met yesterday, that wasn't Luna Lovegood was it?"

"Yeah, except it's Luna Newt now. She married a guy named Magizoologist Newt and they had twin boys. She's actually my godmother. My godfather is Neville Longbottom."

"And is he actually a teacher at Hogwarts?"

"Yep, still there. Married to a woman named Hannah Abbot."

"Any kids?"

"No."

"What about his parents?"

"Still alive, still at St. Mungo's"

"What about you?"

Al stopped short. Melony had slipped this question in on purpose. It was really where she had wanted to go in the first place. Sure, she was mildly curious about everybody else, but the only person she really cared about was Al, and the life he had hidden from her.

"What about me?" Al asked cautiously.

Melony seared him with a look before saying, "Why are you here, Al?"

"It just got to be too much," he said getting up and walking around the counter to pour himself a cup of coffee.

"What did?" asked Melony, swiveling around to face him.

"Everything," Al said shrugging. "The attention, the expectations; do you know how many times my father has said to me 'now remember, Albus, who you are named after. Two of the greatest wizards of all time. Make them proud.'"

Melony remained silent and watched as Al took a sip of his coffee and stared out of the window. Eventually, he looked back at her, set his cup down and leaned on the counter heavily.

"After I left Hogwarts, I was accepted into the auror program at the Ministry. It was what everyone expected. James had tried to get in the year before but "decided" to pursue a career as a professional quidditch player instead. I had the grades, the agility, and the lineage, and everyone expected me to follow in my father's footsteps. I quickly rose through the ranks and found that I actually liked the work, but the higher I rose, the more attention I got which made James rebel more and more causing my parents a lot of stress."

"Why was he acting out?" Melony asked as Al stopped to take a breath.

Al looked behind him to the kitchen door and then started to reach for his wand which was sitting next to his hand on the counter. He hesitated over it, then took his hand back and lowered his voice instead.

"My brother," he said almost whispering, "thrives on attention. Anytime I do anything remotely noteworthy he'll do something to make sure the attention goes back to him. Usually it's something destructive. He's the reason I quit quidditch my fifth year of school."

"You were on the quidditch team?"

Al nodded. "Got on my third year as seeker. James was already on as chaser."

"He felt threatened just because you made the team?"

"Well," said Al, smiling slightly, "I was pretty good. They started comparing me to dad, which is something James can't stand. He teases me about riding dad's coattails and being called 'Potter's Boy' but I know it's because he wants to be the one to carry on dad's legacy. It killed him when I made it into the auror program."

"Is that why you left?"

"It didn't help, but no. The reason I finally quit was Amelia Bones."

"That name sounds really familiar."

"You're probably thinking of her great aunt whom she's named after. Her mother is Susan Bones who is mentioned in the books a couple of times."

"That must be it. Who is Amelia?"

"Remember how I told you that before you I had had only one other significant girlfriend?"

"Yeah…."

"Well, that was her. Her mother and my Aunt Hermione work in the same department at the ministry and are really good friends. They kind of set us up. Right after school, Amelia got a job in the Department of Magical Law Enforcement and sort of became my aunt's protege. We were both rising stars in our respective fields and we are both from very famous, established families, so when we got together we became the new celebrity power couple. It took us only a couple of months to figure out that we were not right for each other, but we stayed together because we didn't want to disappoint our families and we knew our careers would suffer if we split. Finally, after a year we called it quits."

Al pauses to take a sip. Melony motions for him to pour her a cup which he does as he continues.

"The papers went after her hard. They blamed the whole breakup on her and claimed that she had used me to further her career and then had left me heartbroken. The whole thing probably set her back a whole year. Then, with all of this going on, James decides to lash out by publicly partying and drinking and in general making a complete ass of himself. To his credit it worked. For a whole month he was seen on the front page of the paper doing something idiotic."

"So you left," said Melony stirring sugar into her coffee.

"So I left," repeated Al. "left the wizarding world, left the country, left my family...left it all."

"How long had you been here by the time we first met?"

"A couple of days."

Melony fell silent. A nagging, depressing sensation was creeping into the back of her mind, but it was having trouble forming into a coherent thought. at the moment it was just a feeling. An uneasy feeling that made her feel small.

Al remained silent and watched her as she stared into her coffee and tried to process what she was feeling. That word "small" kept bouncing around in her head until finally it clicked into place.

She was a Muggle. She hadn't realized until just now how small Muggles seemed to be. How they seemed to come off as stupid and easily manipulated. She knew that Al would never manipulate her, but she was now worried why he was with her.

She looked up at him and could tell that he was concerned. She knew that she would need to bring this up now if she wanted to at all, but she didn't know how.

"Al," she started slowly, "why...why are you with me?"

Al's face quickly transformed from concern to confusion. "Because I love you," he said simply.

"It's just that," Melony said stumbling, "that Muggles seem to be, kind of, seen as...simple, I guess, and since I was the first one you met…."

"Are you serious?" Al asked indignantly. "You are not the first Muggle I met."

"You know what I meant, Al," said Melony matching his tone. "It's a legitimate concern."

"No it's not. Do you remember our first year together and how helpless I was? If it hadn't been for you, I wouldn't have made it in the Muggle world. Muggles are creative and complex and their technology is beyond some of the hardest spells I have ever had to learn. You are the smartest, kindest, most caring person I have ever met and for years I have been trying to catch up with you. I am constantly wondering why you are with me and I haven't been able to figure it out. And now," he said, his tone softening as his shoulders slumped, his whole body seeming to grow tired, "now, with all of this going on with my family showing up and finding out I'm a wizard, all you care about is whether we are still good."

Melony shrugged. "It's all I really care about," she said softly.

Al walked slowly around the counter that separated them and lifted Melony up and into his arms. All of her anxiety and doubts melted away and she embraced him, and it was just the two of them, twenty-four hours ago, getting married in three months, with nothing standing in their way.

Eventually they had to let go and face their new reality, but now Melony felt more confident, because at least now she knew what she was facing, and at least she still had Al.

"I think I'm going to go home and let you and your family catch up," said Melony as soon as they had separated. "Do you think they'll mind if I leave?"

"No, they'll be fine. You should go home and rest up for tomorrow. If I know my parents at all, my Aunt Hermione and my Uncle Ron are coming."