Chapter 36
Friends And Fame

(Hermione's PoV – May 16th, 2006 – 10:30AM)

Hermione had taken a short nap that morning, and had woken back up at half-past-ten. Ron was sitting at the nearby table and Rose was currently sleeping peacefully in her temporary crib. Hermione stretched and sat up.

"Need something?" Ron asked, turning in his chair.

"I just need to walk around a bit," Hermione said, as she stood up carefully.

She walked over to Ron and noticed that he was writing something on a piece of parchment.

"What's that?" she asked.

"Been writing announcement letters to some of our old friends and schoolmates from Hogwarts," Ron said. "Needed something to do while you took a nap. It's rather boring just sitting here."

"You didn't have to just sit here, you know," Hermione said. "You could have – I don't know – gone home for a while."

"I wanted to be here with you and Rose," Ron said. "Besides, if I went home, I'd be the only one there. Your mother's back at her house with your father. She's there until we go back home."

"Any idea when that will be?" Hermione asked.

"Actually, yes," Ron said. "I talked to Dr. Sterling about that a couple hours ago. He said if you and Rose have no complications between now and then, we'll be back home by this time tomorrow."

Hermione smiled appreciatively at the news. She then walked over to the crib and looked down at Rose.

"Any problems while I was asleep?" she asked, "With Rose I mean?"

"No," Ron said, "She slept as long as you did."

"She'll be sleeping a lot the first week," Hermione said, "The nurse called it nesting."

Ron opened his mouth to speak, but Hermione raised a hand toward him, quelling him when she noticed Rose's eyelids moving a little. Rose's blue eyes opened and she started to cry. When Hermione gently picked her up, and cuddled her, Rose stopped crying.

"Well, how about that?" Ron said. "She must love your touch."

"She's used to me," Hermione said, "Oh, look."

Rose's head moved slowly and Hermione could tell Rose was looking at her.

"She knows my voice," she said, "She must have recognized the tone after all that time I was talking to her when she was in my womb.

She walked back to her bed and carefully sat down as she cuddled Rose against her. Hermione heard a light tapping sound on the door across the room. Dr. Sterling was standing there.

"You have a couple of visitors," he said, "They'll be here shortly after they sign in. While you wait, I thought I'd see how you're doing."

Hermione smiled and Dr. Sterling walked over to her.

"Well, someone's awake," he said, chuckling.

"She was asleep until she heard my voice," Hermione said.

"She recognizes it," Dr. Sterling said, "I'm going to guess that you had some good conversations with her while she was in your womb."

"I thought they were one-sided," Hermione said, grinning, "But I guess she was listening."

Dr. Sterling smiled and put the small stethoscope to his ears. He put the end of it onto Rose's chest.

"Her heartbeat is wonderful," he said, smiling, "Would you like to hear it?"

"Sure," Hermione said.

Dr. Sterling handed the stethoscope to Hermione and she put the buds in her ears. He helped her with the end of the tool, and Hermione heard the heartbeat's echoes. She grinned at the sound.

"I hear it," she said, chuckling, "Wow."

She turned to Ron to ask him if he'd like to hear it, when she heard another tapping sound on the door. She looked toward the door and saw two very familiar faces: Luna Scamander, formerly Lovegood, and Neville Longbottom. Hermione grinned as they walked in.

"I'll just leave you guys alone," Dr. Sterling said.

Dr. Sterling walked past Luna and Neville. Luna's eyes brightened when she saw Rose.

"What a cutie," Luna said, chuckling.

"Luna, meet Rose," Hermione said, smiling as she turned a bit to show Rose to her friend.

"Very nice to meet you, Rose," Luna said, grinning.

Rose moved her head slightly at the sound of the new voice.

"She heard me," Luna said, grinning.

"Looks like she did," Hermione said, then looked back up at Luna, "I'm quite surprised to see you two actually. Did you invite them, Ron?"

"I was about to," Ron said, raising his eyebrows, "Since when did you become a Seer, Luna?"

"Harry wrote letters to us," Luna explained, "Actually it is a bit of a coincidence that Neville and I are here at the same time. I didn't expect him. I thought he'd still be at Hogwarts. The term isn't over, is it?"

"I took the afternoon off," Neville said. "I couldn't pass up the invitation to see your new daughter. I told the news to Minerva and the other Professors by the way. They send their best wishes to you."

"Tell them thank you," Hermione said.

"Daddy and Rolf wanted to come," Luna said, "But they're working on a new discovery. Daddy thinks he found a brand new species of magical creature. May be a cousin of the unicorn."

"And you could miss that to be here?" Ron asked.

"Some things are more important, Ron," Luna said, "Besides, I'm not doing too much work these days. Rolf and I are talking about trying to have a child ourselves, and some of the magical creatures we study have some interesting auras around them that are believed to prevent conception."

"Good to avoid those then," Ron said.

"Yes, I thought so too," Luna said.

While Hermione and Ron were talking with Neville and Luna, Rose became rather cranky. When Hermione put her back in her crib, it took a moment for her to quiet down, but she soon fell back to sleep.

"I better get back," Neville said, "I haven't told Hannah of the news yet. Congratulations again, you two."

"Thank you, Neville," Hermione said.

"Thanks, mate," Ron said.

Neville smiled and waved as he left the room.

"Oh, I almost forgot," Luna said.

She took her purse and opened it, then pulled out a small box.

"When I was born," Luna said, "My mother gave me something similar to this. It has magical properties that is supposed to give the baby good luck and fortune through their first year of life."

She opened the box and pulled out a small necklace. Hermione noticed a tiny vial of powder attached to the end of it.

"My mother never told me what the powder exactly is," Luna said, as she handed the necklace to Hermione, "But it kind of resembles the ash from a phoenix when they die and are reborn. If you hang it on Rose's crib, it should take affect."

"Oh, we couldn't take this, Luna," Hermione said, "You'll want it when you have a child."

"I have more," Luna said, "I don't mind."

Hermione smiled and nodded.

"Thank you," Hermione said, "That is very kind of you."

"I better get going," Luna said, "Congratulations. She's so beautiful."

Hermione smiled and hugged Luna.

"Good luck with your own family," Hermione said, "I hope you and Rolf find yourself in this position soon."

"I hope so too," Luna said, smiling.

She waved to Ron and walked out of the room. Shortly after Luna left and Hermione was leaning over Rose's crib watching her sleep, she heard another knock on the door.

"Come in," Hermione said.

The door opened and Hermione grinned when Christine walked into the room.

"Oh, I didn't hear the news until just a few minutes ago," Christine said, walking over to Hermione and hugging her, "or I would have been here sooner. Your Mum wrote a letter to me, but it went through the Muggle mail instead of owl post. I rarely get Muggle mail."

Christine looked into the crib with sparkling eyes.

"Oh, she adorable," Christine said, grinning.

Hermione smiled.

"Did it go well?" Christine asked, "The whole childbirth? Any problems?"

"She came a couple hours earlier than expected," Hermione said, "But the doctors keep telling us she's healthy. I'm rather peachy myself."

"Well, that is all that matters," Christine said, then looked at Ron, "How's the new daddy?"

"Happy beyond belief, Christine," Ron said, smiling up at her, "It is nice to see you."

"I couldn't miss this," Christine said, then looked back at Hermione, "So how's the whole breastfeeding thing. You getting used to that?"

"It's going to take a couple of days," Hermione said.

"I bet you find yourself tired after you feed her," Christine said.

"Haven't exactly thought about it," Hermione said. "First time I fed her was a few minutes after she was born, and of course I was exhausted then. Then next was in the middle of last night, so I was sleepy anyway."

"You fed her this morning, though," Ron said. "You took a nap an hour later."

"Yeah, so I guess I do get tired," Hermione said.

"It happens," Christine said, "Actually I found it the best way to fall asleep."

"Brilliant," Ron said, rolling his eyes, "One of these days I'll find you asleep in the rocking chair with your shirt off and her asleep in your arms."

Hermione glared at Ron.

-
(Ron's PoV – May 16th, 2006 – 4:30PM)

It turned out Christine's theories were right. During an early afternoon feeding, after Hermione had lunch herself, she had fallen asleep while Rose was in her arms. Ron had gently taken Rose from Hermione, and cuddled her for a while until she went back to sleep.

It was half-past-four, and Ron was in the middle of writing more announcement letters to some extended family and friends, when he heard a knock on the door. Ron looked over at Hermione, who was still asleep, to make sure the noise hadn't woken her up. After checking on Rose, he walked over to the door and opened it. Dr. Sterling was standing there. He walked inside.

"Sorry to bother you," Dr. Sterling said in a low voice, "I can see Hermione is asleep. But... well, you have a visitor Only they say they are from a newspaper of some sort. I've never heard of name of the paper. It's called the Daily Prophet?"

Ron raised his eyebrows. A reporter from the Daily Prophet had come to a Muggle hospital?

"Oh," he said, thinking quickly, "Er... yeah. Hermione and I are rather popular with that paper. They probably want to do news about Rose."

"He's standing right outside," Dr. Sterling said, "The security guard who had accompanied him didn't know what to do. He looked rather confused to be honest. Weird get-up the bloke is in too. Is the paper some sort of entertainment piece?"

"Sort of," Ron muttered, "Thanks, I'll take care of this."

"I'll be right out," Ron said, "Just going to do a quick routine check-up on Rose."

Ron nodded and walked out of the room. A man was sitting in a chair nearby. He was dressed in robes usually seen on the Daily Prophet reporters. A security guard was standing nearby, and Ron instantly recognized that he had been Confunded.

"I'm Ron Weasley," he said to the two men, "May I help you?"

"My name is Hank Dinkle," the man said, "I'm a reporter from the Daily Prophet. I'm here for a piece on the wonderful new addition to our wizard-"

"Please keep it down," Ron said, softly so only the wizard could hear, "For one, my wife is asleep in the room. For another... well, do you realize you are very close to crossing the Statute of Secrecy? You're in a Muggle hospital, you know. The Muggle doctor in there has no idea what the Daily Prophet is."

"I'm sorry, Mr. Weasley," Hank said, "I didn't think -"

"That is obvious," Ron said, rolling his eyes. "What do you want?"

"Well, as I said," Hank said, softly, "I'm here for an article on the birth of your daughter. News of the new family member of – well – one of the biggest families in our world, as well as to the parents of an Auror and the head of a department in the Ministry is pretty big news. Not to mention you two are two of the heroes of the Second War. This is a big piece."

Ron sighed. He hadn't even expected any publicity with this.

"Okay," he said, "I can give details, but I cannot allow you to take pictures or talk to my wife at the moment. Both my wife and daughter are very tired right now. Perhaps we can set up another day for that."

"Of course," Hank said.

He rummaged through his bag and pulled out a piece of parchment, and a quill that Ron recognized of the Quick-Quotes variety.

"So... the name of your new daughter?" Hank asked.

"Rose Marie Weasley," Ron said, then decided to give the details knowing that would be the wizard's next question, "She was born at seven-past-seven yesterday evening, and she is twenty-one inches and nine-and-a-half pounds. She's very healthy."

The Quick-Quotes quill started to write by itself, and Ron rolled his eyes. He looked around to see if anyone had noticed.

"Wonderful," Hank asked, "Any comments from you? Perhaps how you feel about this whole thing?"

"Both myself and my wife are very happy," Ron said. "As is our family. We wish that the wizarding world gives us our privacy in this time. Any owl post from possible well-wishers can be directed to the Auror department, where I will pick it up there. I do not need countless owls at all hours of the evening waking my daughter up."

"'Parents wish that their privacy be respected'," Hank muttered to the quill, "Good."

"Anything else?" Ron asked.

"No, I don't think so," Hank said, "We'll be in touch for possible pictures."

"Okay," Ron said. "Oh, one more thing."

"Of course, of course!" Hank said, looking excited.

"Any future usage of magic on innocent Muggles from you," Ron said, looking past Hank at the Confounded security guard, "And I will arrest you myself for breach of the Statute."

Hank's eyes widened.

"Yes, sir," he said, "Of course, sir."

"You may go," Ron said, "Good day."

"Good day," Hank said, "Congratulations to you and yours."

The reporter walked off down the hall. Ron sighed and walked back over to the door. He took his wand out and stealthily removed the spell from the security guard then stored his wand and walked back into the room.

"Everything checks out with your daughter," Dr. Sterling said.

"Thank you," Ron said, "You'll have no problems with that reporter anymore. I took care of it."

"Oh, it is no problem," Dr. Sterling said, "I've seen stranger."

Ron chuckled nervously. Dr. Sterling bowed slightly and walked out of the room. Ron walked over to the crib and checked on Rose, who was sleeping peacefully. Ron walked over to Hermione's bed, and kissed her softly on the forehead. Hermione murmured softly. Ron smiled when he noticed her eyes open.

"Everything okay?" she muttered sleepily, "With Rose?"

"Everything's fine, love," Ron said, "Rose is asleep in her crib."

"Mmm," Hermione said, "Okay. Love you."

"I love you too, beautiful," Ron smiled.

Hermione smiled and closed her eyes as she fell back to sleep. He decided not to inform her of the unexpected visitor yet. He'd take care of that when she was well-rested.

-
Shorter chapter than I thought it would be. I decided to wait for Rose's first day at home until the following chapter.