Author's note: Y'all… y'all have collectively reviewed this story 200 times. I'm so very touched that you enjoy my writing, I can't even explain it. But I can give you thank you fluff for taking the time and having the generosity to read and review. And when I mean fluff, I mean there ain't no plot here. Enjoy!

Disclaimer: J.K. Rowling owns the canon, world, and characters portrayed below and you can tell I'm not J.K. Rowling because #transrights

Content Warnings: NA

Twenty-Five Years

He kissed the back of Dora's ear as he'd been doing all morning, since she'd woken him up with kisses of her own.

"You look beautiful," he said, looking at their reflections in the mirror as if he needed any kind of proof. Watching Dora tinker with her Metamorphmagi tailoring as they'd gotten older had been both hilarious and endearing. Today, the handful of wrinkles she'd acquired over the years had been left to etch her face and she hadn't gone to the trouble of combing through her magenta hair to pick out the grey hairs and colour them too. She was wearing a sleeveless navy blue dress with a flowing midi skirt and a scooped neckline. He didn't remember where or when or why he'd gotten her the necklace she was wearing, but he remembered that he had at some point. He had vague memories of Sirius also being there, but he wasn't sure.

"And you look handsome," she said, turning to him and fiddling with the lapels of his jacket.

"I'm just thankful the full moon is still weeks away, or else I'd likely look like a corpse next to you," Remus said. She clucked her tongue and straightened his tie, but Remus knew he was right—the transformations were increasingly unkind and his recovery increasingly slow as he aged. But that was a problem for later; not today.

"What was Fleur's line about Bill—you know, way back when Greyback got him?" she asked him.

"That she'd be beautiful enough for the both of them."

"Fleur has some excellent ideas," Dora said. "And her husband listens."

Remus laughed and kissed her forehead.

"Shall we?" Remus said. "We wouldn't want to be late, Teddy would have a cow."

"If there ever was a time where it was acceptable to be late, it has to be to your own party."

"Your son likes punctuality."

"He's your son when he's like that," Dora said, which made him laugh again. He was in a laughing mood today and he was feeling indulgent about it, too.

So he and Dora left the flat, walked down to the park from which they liked to Apparate, and made their way to the Burrow—where most parties worth attending happened, really.

"Oh wow," Dora said when they faced the house. "Your son didn't hold back."

"Of course not," Remus said. "When that son of yours gets an idea in his head, he's as stubborn as a Hippogriff."

They'd seen balloons from the distance, but as they got closer they saw the extent to which the Burrow's garden had been decorated. Long tables with sky blue tablecloths had been set, another was laden with breakfast food and champagne which Dora zeroed-in on. Small, colourful flowers had been assembled into bouquets that spoke of late spring and early summer. Outdoor games had also been pitched and set up—Remus saw a badminton net, a chess board with giant unrolled on the grass, a basket filled with giant dominos, croquet hoops, all sorts of tossing games… Victoire was the first one who spotted them from where she sat, bouncing two-year-old Margo on her knee, and she beamed when she saw them.

"Happy anniversary!" she said, getting up to greet them. She said it loudly enough to draw attention from the other guests who'd arrived and a chant of 'happy anniversary!' erupted in the crowd along with a round of applause.

"Thank you, sweetheart," Dora said, giving Victoire a hug. Then she smiled at Margo and plucked her out of Victoire's arms. "Let me take that load off of you—hello, sugar baby…"

That meant that Remus got an even tighter hug from Victoire.

"Thank you, Victoire—this all looks beautiful," he said.

"Oh, none of that is me," Victoire said. "As much as I'd love to take credit. I was on babysitting duty while he worked. You'll have to talk to your son."

"And where is he?" Remus asked.

"In the kitchen, putting through the last batch of muffins," Victoire said. "I'm not allowed to let you into the kitchen, though; Teddy thinks you might try to be helpful and that's not at all allowed."

"I see," he said. "Well, thank you for laying down the rules. Let me see if I can steal my granddaughter from my wife."

"Good luck with that," Victoire said.

"Better men have tried, I know."

"I've tried," Victoire said, which made him laugh.

Eventually Dora let him have a turn and he got to swing Margo around and make her giggle. She wasn't really talking, but that giggle was the absolute best thing in the world. Victoire and Teddy had started showing her a very basic kind of sign language meant for children, and she was taking to that much more happily.

They went to say hello to Molly, who was sitting in her walker in a spot of sun, and thanked her for letting them use the Burrow.

"Oh, it's no trouble dears," she promised. Her eyes were swimming with cataracts so she wasn't looking quite at them, but she was smiling brightly and seemed happy to see her home full of people and activity again. Percy and his family had moved in with her, so that she wouldn't be alone in the house she adamantly refused to leave, but having four extra bodies to cook for was nothing in the grand scheme of Molly Weasley's culinary prowess.

Dora was soon ambushed by some of her Auror colleagues, and Remus drifted away slowly to escape the shop talk. Sirius came to find Remus soon after, bearing gifts of mimosas. His greying hair had been pulled back in a low bun and Kingsley had convinced him to dress up for the occasion and wear a shirt with buttons that could be tucked into his black jeans.

"Happy anniversary, Moony," he said. Their champagne flutes clinked together pleasantly. "Congratulations on being smart enough to marry that woman, and smart enough not to self-destruct."

"Cheers to that," Remus said before taking a sip. Sirius drained his flute.

"When we were kids, I never would have thought that you'd end up with a prettier woman than me," he mused.

"Because you didn't know you'd end up with a man, yet?" Remus asked.

"The best one," Sirius grinned. Remus rolled his eyes, not willing to dignify that.

He got to see just about everyone as family and friends trickled in. Harry and Ginny turned up with ruffled hair, as if they'd snuck away to fly around the apple orchard as if they were sixteen again, and Ginny looked smug enough that Remus was reasonably sure that there'd been some Quidditch involved in their day.

"Happy anniversary," Ginny said, going in for a hug.

"Thank you," Remus said. "Are all the kids here too?"

"Oh, even better," Ginny said. "A certain James Sirius Potter has decided to bring his boyfriend."

"Oh is that so?" Tonks grinned wickedly as Ginny wrapped her arms around her next. "And how are we dealing with having a son grown up enough to bring a boyfriend to a family event?"

"I rather be chasing Death Eaters through London's sewers again," Harry grumbled. "Stop changing the subject to torture me, Gin. Happy anniversary, you two."

They found James soon after and met his new boyfriend—a boy named Alec Zabini that must be one of the only wizarding teenagers in the United Kingdoms that Remus didn't know, as he was homeschooled. Al had brought their friend Scorpius, Lily Luna had flowers in her hair and her bowtruckle familiar tucked in her shirt pocket. They tracked down Victoire's siblings, to thank them for helping with decorations. The slew of Weasley children and grandchildren, Neville and some other fellow teachers from Hogwarts had come; as had Hagrid who promised not to break a chair this time. Andrew and Abigail and some other werewolf friends were doing their best to blend in but were clearly overwhelmed by the crowd—Remus tried to spend as much time with them as he could. They talked to Kingsley who looked decisively more relaxed now that he was only a consultant for the Ministry of Magic, Hermione who looked decisively less relaxed now that she was Minister of Magic but happy. Ron was busy helping Teddy with the food, since he'd surprisingly inherited Molly's talent in the kitchen once he'd given it a go. With all the people fluttering about, time passed by quickly until Teddy's magically amplified voice cut through the chatter.

"Excuse me, everyone," he said. His hair was a soft, pastel lavender colour that brought out the brightness of his blue eyes—the colour he wore most often to mimic Margo. "Hi, I'm going to make this quick so that we can get to all this food—but thank you for coming, and taking the time to celebrate my parents, Remus and Tonks, on their twenty-fifth wedding anniversary."

There were some cheers and claps and Remus turned to look at Dora, smiling as she held onto his arm just a little bit tighter.

"Like I said, I'm going to be quick because I'm also hungry," Teddy said with a smile. "And because I know my parents like parties, but not fuss. But twenty-five years is a very long time to be married. In those twenty-five years they've shown me that love doesn't have to be pretty to be beautiful, that it doesn't have to be perfect to work, and that if love is honest and true and joyful it can get you through just about anything. I see that every day when I look at them, at the family they've built, and the friends that surround them. So cheers."

"Cheers," the crowd said.

Dora rested her cheek against his arm as if she looked up at him.

"Your son's right," she said. "But just so you know, you're beautiful."

"You'd be the expert," Remus replied with a smile.

"Stop flirting with each other and go get some food so the rest of us can go too," Sirius called. The crowd cheered at that too, so off they went.

WC: 1681