"Genre!" Mary cried, enveloping me in her arms (and muted orange robes that billowed halfway across the room, it felt like).
"Mary!" I cried back, hugging her as tightly as I could. "You're back!"
"I am," Mary said, leaning back from me and wiping her eyes. Her teeth were entirely visible from her wide grin. Lily, just behind her, was also grinning. Apparently she had either forgotten her anger at me in the excitement, or she had decided to forgive me without mentioning it. Either way, I was happy for it.
"Get changed," Mary demanded, "we're going out to celebrate."
"Okay," I said immediately, dodging into my room to toss off my work clothes. It didn't occur to me to ask what we were celebrating - I just assumed it was her return to England or Lily's first day of training as an auror.
When I stepped out of my room in clean denim and a new-ish sweater (at least, it was less than a decade old), Mary groaned and smacked her face with her hand. It was then that I saw it: a gold band glittered beside a second ring with a small diamond on her finger.
"You're married!" I gasped.
"Change!" Mary said. "Turn back around and put on something nice, Genre!"
I turned around, back to my room, and managed to find a black blouse that hung from my shoulders in some sort of style I'd seen Mary and Lily both wear on different occasions. After a second's thought, I left my wooden charm hanging around my neck, clearly visible given the low neckline. This time when I exited the room, Mary didn't demand I change, though she and Lily did share an eye-roll.
We had dinner at a pub. I didn't even know where the pub was, since Mary had a portkey ready for us, but it was a lively place and the food (and drinks) were wonderful. Mary's husband - husband, I could hardly believe it! - was a lively man as well. He greeted us each with a solemn handshake, and then yanked us into hugs.
"Mary has told me everything!" he exclaimed. Mary, behind him, did not decry this statement. Instead, she smiled lovingly at him.
"I'm going to go collect the boys!" she said. "You lot get to know each other while I'm gone, will you?"
"Of course we will, love," her husband beamed at her. Mary picked up a napkin (her second portkey, I assumed), and checked her watch. Less than three seconds later, she was gone.
"So," Lily said to the giant man. "I'm Lily."
"I'm Radcliffe," he told her with his toothy grin. "It's a pleasure. And you must be Genre," he said to me.
"I must be," I agreed, stepping back before he could pull us into another hug. Some of the witches and wizards around us were staring.
"How did you meet Mary?" Lily asked, climbing up onto one of the high stools around the large table. I sat as well, but Radcliffe was much to animated and stayed standing.
"We met by accident!" he told us exuberantly. "Ran into each other at a pub just like this one! A muggle pub, at that. But in Belgium, you understand."
"We understand," Lily said with a grin. He spoke English quite well, I decided. If it weren't for the accent, which wasn't at all overwhelming, he could almost pass as a native speaker.
"And I knew then and there I must marry the beautiful girl!"
On cue, the beautiful girl spun back into existence with three others. Apparently she hadn't made them put on nice clothes, I mused, because Sirius looked as though he'd just tossed on the least-wrinkled shirt he owned, and James was wearing a quidditch shirt. Peter, at least, had combed his hair.
"Where is the fourth boy?" Radcliffe said, sounding devastated even as he shook hands with and hugged each of the startled boys. James made eyes at Lily over Radcliffe's shoulder, clearly weirded out.
"He's working," I said vaguely, trying not to let that painful void in me ruin the night.
Luckily, no one let me dwell on my missing half. Instead, we ordered fish and chips, and then more and more chips to soak up the amounts of liquor that had been consumed. As the night wore on, some musicians began playing live music. Radcliffe kept Mary on the dance floor for half the night, with Lily and James joining them on and off. Even I was on the dance floor for a while, letting Sirius spin me this way and that with his natural grace. Peter and I did a quick jig together, also.
On one of the few breaks, when all of us were back at the table, Mary told the story of the proposal.
"It's just - it's bad over there, you know? Death Eaters everywhere, and nothing like our Ministry to hold them back," Mary said. I clenched my teeth together to avoid saying anything. Our Ministry wasn't holding the Death Eaters back. They could barely turn left or right without running into some roadblock or corruption. "And then, Radcliffe…" she trailed off and beamed at him. "It was just right, you know?" she asked us. "With all the bad going on, we might have lost our chance to marry if we didn't do it right then."
I cast a sidelong glance at Sirius. He was busy studying his pint, tapping the side of the glass to knock some foam to the wayside. If he was broken up about Mary marrying someone, and so suddenly at that, he didn't say so.
At home that night, after everyone had returned to their respective places, I lay in bed and stared at the ceiling. Had Remus and I lost our chance to marry? I wasn't even sure I wanted to marry at all, and even if I did...would he have wanted to marry me? It just felt like we were so young, still. But if Mary and Radcliffe were right, and we were all losing our chance thanks to the bad in the world, then it was too late now anyway. Remus was off on his mission, and I was busy making a mess of my own place in the world without him.
The next day at work, Pavi and I sat down by mutual request to lay out our expectations of each other without yelling or snapping. It was a trial - for both of us. It seemed that snappishness had made itself a huge part of my life, and Pavi was always a bit testy.
In the end, we agreed that I would not purposefully put myself in harm's way except for the missions I had with the Order. These missions included my self-imposed ones, visiting the refugee camps (I had another trip planned this weekend) and spying on Death Eater meetings (two more this coming week), and the missions the Order had for me (delivering and receiving messages, which had sadly fallen to the wayside with Funke being watched so closely). When situations arose, because there would undoubtedly be more unexpected situations, he would have to trust my best judgement in how to act.
We also agreed that Pavi would not act like he knew what was best for me. It was one thing to try to protect me or offer advice, it was another thing entirely to become so furious that he yelled at me. He was not, I pointed out calmly, my father.
It was a fragile truce for now, but with time it would grow stronger again. I was beginning to think of Pavi like a cousin or an uncle or something. He was over-protective and overbearing, but at least he cared.
"Apparently my uncle was right," Pavi grumbled at the end of our talk.
"About what?" I asked curiously.
"Keeping you out of trouble is a fulltime job," Pavi explained, "I've had no time for my own trouble since I started working here." His tone said it was sort of a joke, but not entirely.
"You're welcome, then," I said deadpan. "Now shoo, we've wasted enough working hours."
Lily and I had a heart-to-heart that night, too. It was similar to the conversation I'd had with Pavi, except there were less pauses to get control of our tempers. Instead, I explained to Lily that I was sometimes going to be in bad situations but she had to trust that I could get out of them. It was the same thing that would be happening after she and James completed their training; I wouldn't want them to be in trouble, but they would be.
She promised to tone down her controlling behavior, and I promised to tone down my stupid and rash behavior. It was the best we could do, under the circumstances.
"Are we not going to talk about Mary getting married?" Lily asked out of the blue, once our promises were made.
"Merlin, how could we not?" I said.
"We didn't even get invited to the wedding!" Lily pointed out a little peevishly.
"It sounded rather last minute," I said, falling back on the arm of the couch Lily had very recently purchased. "But I would have taken a portkey or apparated."
"He seems like a good guy, though," Lily said thoughtfully.
"Quite an attractive bloke, too," I said. "Did you get a look at all those muscles?"
"A look?" Lily laughed. "I felt them first hand with the amount of hugging that man was into!"
We both giggled a little after that. After a moment, I asked her the question that was preying on my mind.
"Are you and James going to get married?"
Lily was quiet for a moment, chewing on her lip, before she looked over to me. "That got to you, too, did it? What Mary said about losing a chance if you don't make it quick?"
I lifted my head from the couch's arm to meet her eyes pointedly. In the lamp-light, they looked more olive than emerald for once.
Softer now, Lily answered me with, "I don't know."
"You both love each other," I said.
"More than anything," Lily told me.
"You've known each other forever."
"Years," Lily agreed.
I went back to staring at the wooden beams on the ceiling, tracing the whorls and grains with my eyes.
"You should ask him," I decided out loud. "Ask him to marry you."
At Lily's scared-sounding squeak, I lifted my head once more from the cushioned arm.
"If you want to marry him, I mean," I explained. "Not if you're not sure."
"What about you and Remus?" Lily demanded. "Are you going to ask him to marry you?"
"I don't know," I told her honestly. "I think...I think when he gets back, everything will have changed. Who knows if we'll even be the same people anymore?"
"You're not giving up, are you?" Lily asked.
"No!" I gasped in mock-outrage. Then, more seriously, I said it again: "No."
I wasn't giving up on me and Remus, and I knew deep down that he wasn't either. We would be different people, but that didn't mean we couldn't still love each other.
With everything that had happened, and the sudden surge of work (at the wand shop and through the Order), I forgot to tell Lily and the boys about Cadie and Richard breaking into the workshop. If I'm being honest with myself, I didn't really want to tell anyone. I suspected, and Pavi agreed, that they had been looking for confirmation that I worked there, but more importantly for my home address. They were busy trying to hunt me down, just like one of their dragons. The joke was on them. Nothing in that shop had my name on it. Not even the deed.
It was during one of the week's recruitment meetings that Peter and I were spying on that I caught wind of something that could change everything. Near the edge of the clearing, in easy hearing of my fox ears, two of the masked Death Eaters made the mistake of mentioning where they would be meeting with a smuggler and a mercenary to discuss money. I didn't know exactly what a smuggler and mercenary had in common (except apparently that both could be bought), but I burned the conversation into my mind.
That night, instead of returning home after Pavi transcribed all of Peter's and my notes regarding new Death Eater recruits, I turned back into a fox and trotted at a quick clip up the Hogsmeade road to Hogwarts. Whether he thought it was safe or not, Funke was going to have to meet with me.
Getting into the castle was much easier than expected. As if someone had been waiting for me, Sprout opened the door and stepped out, stretching into the night air. With a yawn and a wink, she held the door open just wide enough for me to dart in before she entered as well. To my great surprise, Sprout led me without a word to a door not far from the Great Hall and passed by two gargoyles. I followed.
Somehow, despite seven years at Hogwarts with at least two of them in the company of the Marauders, I had never realized there was a lounge for the professors. All the meetings I'd had with more than one professor had, after all, taken place in Dumbledore's office. Now, I stared up at the familiar faces of Dumbledore, McGonagall, Funke, Sprout, Tofty, and Flitwick. Notably absent was Slughorn and Wyandotte, as well as professors I hadn't worked as closely with.
"Miss Pokeby," McGonagall greeted me. "We've been waiting for you."
For the second time that night, I changed back to human and tried to ignore that uncomfortable tingling of too-sensitive skin.
"Waiting for me?" I gasped, once my vocal cords were human again. Then, I realized. "Pavi sent a patronus ahead?"
"He did," Dumbledore confirmed.
"Is it safe to talk here?" I asked.
"It is," Funke said gravely.
The professors were all sitting in mismatched chairs scattered about the room. I sank into one also, trying not to wince as my tired joints nearly gave out. Across the room from me, a free-standing wardrobe rattled a little. None of the professors paid it any heed, so I ignored it also.
"Someone is meeting with a mercenary and a smuggler," I told them. "They're meeting at that shifty pub in Diagon Alley. You know the one?"
Looking amused at my description of the place, the professors nodded.
"They're going to be talking money, from the sounds of it. With Aloys, Professor Funke, and Leticia all out of the picture for now, I wasn't sure who to tell."
I looked around at their faces. They all watched me.
"Well?" I demanded. "I can't very well go in there! I'd stick out like a sore thumb! And that's certainly not enough time to put together a polyjuice potion."
"Perhaps," McGonagall suggested, "we might ask a less illustrious person to go instead."
"Good," I said. "Who?"
And that is how, at two o'clock in the morning, I ended up banging on the door of Sirius's flat. Grumbling, and stinking a bit of firewhiskey and greasy foods, the man in question opened the door and blinked blearily out at me.
"Merlin, Genre," Sirius finally said, opening the door wider so I could step inside, "what are you doing here?"
Sirius went about making tea, and I assume sobering up a bit, while I glanced around the flat. It was smaller than the one Lily and I shared, which was no surprise really since it was in the heart of London. It was also messy. Not dirty, exactly, but there were shirts and pants hanging on several surfaces, and books left out on tables instead of put away on the shelf. Also, I tripped over two different pairs of shoes on my trek from the door to the table.
Plunking a steaming cuppa in front of my face, Sirius flopped down in the other chair.
"I assume everyone is alright," Sirius said seriously. "Otherwise you'd have had me put on clothes so we could leave."
"You could put on clothes anyway," I suggested. He was wearing loose pants and no shirt - clearly he'd fallen asleep like that. But my suggestion was merely that - just a suggestion. He was an attractive bloke. Probably, he always would be. But honestly? All I could think about was the way Remus had looked without a shirt, and the way he'd tensed and then relaxed as I traced my fingers over him.
"Prude," Sirius murmured, but reached out one long arm and snagged a shirt from the nearby counter. He pulled it over his head, shoving his arms into the sleeves, and then stared expectantly at me.
"It's backwards," I pointed out, but then launched into my explanation of why I would show up at his door unexpected and alone at two in the morning.
Sirius watched me with his steady gray eyes, rubbing at the day-old scruff along his jawline.
"You want me to go to a pub," he said.
"Yer," I nodded.
"And not get drunk," he said.
"Mmhm," I nodded again.
"So I can listen to people talk about illegal activities without them noticing?" Sirius continued.
"That's correct," I told him.
"So I can finally do something useful?"
"Exactly."
"I'm in. But this could have waited until a more godly hour."
"I wanted to give you time to prepare," I said with a wink at him.
"Two days?" Sirius asked with a raised eyebrow.
"Well, one and a half, now," I pointed out.
"Merlin," Sirius grumbled. "I am so glad Remus has to put up with you and not me."
"You couldn't handle it," I told him in as serious a voice as I could manage given the circumstance.
Sirius chuckled, and held the door open for me before presumably going back to bed. And me? I smiled to myself. For once, I did the right thing. I didn't decide to put myself into a dangerous situation, and I didn't cower when perhaps I should take action. It felt good. More than good, really. It felt right.