A/N: Hey! This chapter's kinda short again, but I've been going over something like this for a long time, so I figured I should just write it down. I hope you all enjoy it!

Snow swirled down over London, pouring out of the clouds as if someone had sliced a giant tear in the opaque ceiling. Christmas shoppers hurried from one store to the next, soaked from the snow in no time. The sky was already darkening, the long night falling quickly. Streetlights had already flared on in a burst of orange light, reminding the city to find a warm fireside soon.

Harry stood under an awning, out of the snow and the way of the bustling shoppers and their overflowing bags. He leaned against the cold glass window of the little toy store beside him, looking in at all the toys spread out in a luxurious display for Christmas, trying to interest the toddler in his arms in the brightly painted toy car or the big teddy bear. But Teddy was far more intrigued by his coat pocket, fumbling to unbutton it with clumsy, mittoned hands.

"Do you want a coat pocket for Chirstmas, Ted?" Harry asked, giving up on the toy display. No doubt the moment he moved away, something from the window would catch Teddy's eye and he'd squeal to go back and stare at it.

"Coat pocket," Teddy repeated, tugging at the lip of the pocket in frustration.

"Is that what I should tell Father Christmas to put in your stocking?" Harry asked, tugging Teddy's collar up to keep out the cold.

"Father Christmas," Teddy repeated, pronouncing 'th's like 'd's and skipping 'r's all together.

"That's right, Teddy. Do you know when Father Christmas comes?" Harry asked, playing along with the conversation nearly everybody had been going through with Teddy for weeks now, getting him excited for Christmas now that he was old enough to understand what was going on.

"Christmas Eve," Teddy answered absentmindedly, not taking his eyes off the coat pocket.

His green eyes, Harry noticed. Teddy had taken to imitating the features of whoever was giving him their attention. Now his eyes were bright, emerald green and the tufts of hair sticking out from the hat Mrs. Weasley had knitted for him were jet black. Harry was always torn between smiling and being sad when he saw Teddy doing this with him. Teddy should look like his parents, and he felt like he was replacing them, even in Teddy's appearance.

Harry turned back to the window and pointed out a train set, which finally seemed to grab Teddy's attention away from his pocket button.

On the other side of the street, another young man, so different from the one beside the toy shop it was startling, stopped in his tracks, forcing people to swerve around him. The woman who had been walking beside him took a few steps to realize her companion had stopped.

"What is it, darling?" she asked, tottering back to him under the weight of all her shopping.

The young man raised an arm (weighed down with as much as the woman was carrying, though he hardly seemed to notice the burden) and pointed across the street. They made an odd pair, the man young and giant, towering over the bony woman beside him, her hair streaked with gray and her face lined, but their pale eyes were both fixed on the dark-haired man holding the baby, and their expressions of shock and bewilderment were identical. But where the woman's quickly filled with apprehension and dismay, the man's almost looked pleased.

And before the woman could stop him or call him back, the man was barreling across the street, shouting, "Harry! Hey, Harry!"

Harry's insides clenched at the sound of his name being called. He had hoped no one would recognize him out in Muggle London. That was why he was waiting out here in the cold rather than inside the crowded Leaky Cauldron or in Diagon Alley. But when he turned to see who was shouting his name, he felt his jaw drop.

"Dudley?" he croaked incredulously as the hulking blond form of his cousin ground to a halt in front of him.

"Yeah," Dudley said, nodding. "It's me. And it's you. Weird, right?"

"Yeah, weird," Harry repeated faintly.

He had spotted the woman who was following Dudley and looking like she'd rather be headed anywhere else.

"Hello… Aunt Petunia," he muttered when she had caught up and was clutching her son's arm.

"Hello," she said rather jerkily, not looking at him.

An uncomfortable silence settled between them. Harry was suddenly swept up in the memories he'd seen of Petunia and his mother as children.

"It's been a long time," Dudley said at last.

"Yeah, three years," Harry nodded.

"So… what've you been up to? Besides, you know, like, winning wars and stuff?" Dudley asked, swinging his arms awkwardly.

Harry saw both his and his mother's eyes flick towards the green-eyed, dark-haired two-year-old he was holding. But his brain seemed to be jammed. Just last week he'd been able to think perfectly clearly while getting curses fired at him by a group of former Snatchers, but put the Dursleys in front of him and he could barely gather enough words for a sentence.

Harry shrugged. The answers that bubbled to his lips were 'burying people' 'rebuilding a world' 'getting married' 'taking care of a kid' but for some reason he couldn't force any of them out. The barrier that had always separated his life from theirs was too firmly in place. What would these people understand anyway?

"What… what've you been doing?" he asked instead.

"Got a job at Dad's company," Dudley told him. "Just delivering shipments of drills for now."

"Er, cool," Harry said, nodding.

"How old is he?"

Aunt Petunia's sharp voice startled Harry. He'd nearly forgot she was there, disappearing beside Dudley's bulk. Her eyes were fixed on Teddy, who was burrowing shyly into Harry's shoulder, sneaking peaks at these strangers out of the corners of his eyes.

Something about the snap in her voice cleared Harry's head.

"His name's Teddy," he told her coolly, "and he's two and a half."

He watched Aunt Petunia's lips draw together in a stiff line of scandal and disapproval.

"Mum," Dudley muttered uncomfortably.

"He's my godson," Harry explained, hoisting Teddy higher on his hip. "I was friends with his parents. They died in the war."

He saw Aunt Petunia's eyes widen slightly, her disapproving expression fold into one of uncertainty.

"I'm sorry," Dudley muttered, shuffling his feet.

"Me too," said Harry quietly.

Ginny spotted the uncomfortable little group from half a block away. Even from that distance she could see the tension in Harry's stance, his set shoulders. And the sight of who he was talking to released a rush of fury inside her. Harry had rarely spoken to anyone about the Dursleys, but what he had told her, what her brothers and Hermione had told her…

But she knew the very last thing Harry wanted was for her to storm over and start shrieking insults at his relatives, so she pasted a grin onto her face as she hurried across the street.

"Hello, love," she said breathlessly, arriving at the group in a swirl of foggy breath and snowflakes. She pecked Harry on the cheek and reached for the little boy in his arms. "Hey, Teddy-bear!"

Teddy smiled when he saw her familiar face and turned his hair to bright red as she lifted him above her head and blew a raspberry on his cheek.

Petunia Dursley's eyes widened even more at the sight of the visible ends of Teddy's hair changing from jet black to bright red before her eyes.

"You must be Harry's aunt and cousin," Ginny said, turning to the Dursleys. She cuddled Teddy close to her, allowing her eyes to drift coolly from one face to the next. "I've heard about you."

She turned away from them again, dropping a kiss on the top of Teddy's head as she handed him back to Harry.

"We'd better get going, love. The others are waiting for us," she told him.

"Right," Harry muttered. "Bye Dudley. It was… good to see you again…"

He nodded to Aunt Petunia, then put an arm around Ginny and walked away.

Petunia Dursley watched her nephew as he left. She distinctly saw the glitter of a diamond on the girl's left hand as she leaned around Harry to make a face at the little boy to make him laugh. Harry leaned down to kiss her as they walked and the little boy nestled his head in the crook of Harry's neck, his eyes, still that familiar green, peered curiously at her over the safety of Harry's shoulder.

She watched her nephew and his wife and the child he had taken in reach the little knot of people who had congregated on the pavement half a block away and had been watching their exchange curiously. A tall, red-haired man she recognized from King's Cross flung an arm around him. A girl with bushy brown hair scooped the baby out of his arms and spun him around. A girl with long blond hair stepped forward to hug Harry.

Petunia Dursley watched as the group swallowed up her nephew in the warm glow of a family, and darkness fell and snow swirled and a cold wind blew around her.

A/N: What do you think? Short and sweet? Anyway, thank you all so much for your feedback! It's wonderful!