The Good War

by inwardtransience

Despite her best efforts, Elizabeth Potter is repeatedly drawn into situations she wants absolutely nothing to do with. People just refuse to leave her the hell alone. (fem!Harry, dark!independent!Harry, mentor!Snape, F/F, playing with tropes for fun and profit)

54. Fourth Year — XII

The morning of their return to Britain, Liz woke up with a hangover.

One thing she hadn't anticipated about this whole thing that she really probably should have was how much partying there would be going on. She had plenty of exposure to teenagers being teenagers back at Hogwarts, and parties were a pretty damn frequent occasion at school — more rare in Slytherin, usually only when there was some event they could use as an excuse, but practically every weekend in Hufflepuff. With all the chaperones and organisers and staff around there was actually more adult supervision here than at school, but for the most part they didn't seem inclined to do anything about it. Occasional reminders that they had duels tomorrow, so they might think about getting to bed at some point, but there weren't curfews or anything, and nobody seemed at all interested in where the alcohol was coming from.

And it wasn't just alcohol, there was other stuff too. Liz saw bunches of people smoking here and there — she assumed marijuana, but she never asked — and some potions, some made by the people themselves just beforehand and others clearly bought somewhere. Some the potion had been condensed into these funny little crystal things, easier to carry around than a bunch of glass bottles. Accepting a potion from someone else that she didn't know what it was or where it'd come from was one of the big red flags that Severus had talked about with her at some point — though that did seem like common sense, really, potions could be extremely dangerous. Since she'd never even considered touching them — for safety reasons, and also because playing with that stuff in a foreign country surrounded by a bunch of people she didn't know didn't sound like fun to her — she didn't know what those were, but she'd heard enough people talking or picked up enough thoughts to know the most popular one was some kind of upper. Something like a magical version of mandy, maybe? A different one really fucked people up, some kind of hallucinagen — like the henbane concoction her spirit-walking used, but formulated differently to get different effects.

You could probably make all kinds of crazy drugs with common potions ingredients, when she thought about it. A lot of things had mild psychoactive effects, and it theoretically wasn't difficult to isolate and magnify one property of a thing, if you knew what you were doing — depending on what other shite was in there, you might have to worry about the potion having other effects, so it would take some care, but theoretically easy to do. Liz would be worried about accidentally poisoning herself, but.

Anyway, throughout the entire week there'd been parties going on in the Curtea or various rooms practically every night, with a lot of chatter and sometimes loud music, people snogging here and there (because teenagers). From what Liz could tell from the little she saw of them, they weren't all the same people every time — if people were doing this shite every night and also duelling during the day, that sounded fucking exhausting — some of them way more chill than others, she guessed depending on who was there and what they felt like doing. She did show up to a couple, briefly, particularly the ones in people's rooms that happened to be near her team's, but she never stayed for very long. They tended to be loud, and when people were drunk or high or whatever their minds were even more messy and confusing, could make it kind of unsettling just to be around them.

There happened to be one of those smaller parties the night before, with a few people from the Hogwarts teams, some Irish and German kids, only a few doors down from their rooms. It was actually the second one of these she'd gone to in a row, after the one with the quidditch team and everyone the night before, but she'd actually stayed at this one longer — there were fewer people, less noisy and chaotic just in general, sitting around chatting and playing cards or whatever just to pass the time. Since it didn't chase her off as fast, naturally, she'd ended up getting kind of drunk. Not as bad as that time at the Greenwood, when she started having trouble paying attention to what was happening, getting lost in other people's heads, she cut herself off. In retrospect, she thought she kind of made an idiot of herself at times, but everyone was being a little stupid, so whatever. She'd left relatively early, when she noticed Adrian and Alex leaving — she was pretty sure they'd snuck off to have sex somewhere, but that wasn't her business — stumbling a bit through the hallways, it'd been unreasonably difficult to find the right door, she might have gone right past it if she hadn't gotten close enough to pick out Severus's mind. Katie hadn't stumbled back into their room until a couple hours later, semi-delirious and giggly, she must have been being annoying, because Liz vaguely remembered throwing a pillow at her for some reason?

So it wasn't really a surprise that she woke up with a hangover, her mouth and throat dry and sticky and gross and her head aching — though thankfully she wasn't particularly nauseous this time, so that was something. And it was today that she had to put up with the trip back, because of course it was. Stellar planning there, past-Liz, great job...

It didn't turn out that bad. Being the cruel bastard that he was, Severus hadn't provided hangover potions for the idiots he was saddled with; but, also being oddly thoughtful sometimes, by the time Liz woke up there was a table in the common room set up with water and coffee and salty snacks, and also these little headache potions. She noticed Cynfelyn's little glass trophy thing for 'winning' in singles was sitting on one of the side tables, the only award their team had gotten this time around. After an hour or so sitting in the common room, mostly ignoring the muted conversation going on around her and munching at pretzels, she was fine — not completely back to normal, but at least she wasn't miserable and wishing she was still unconscious. Some of the others were in much rougher shape than she was, and she was still looking forward to just being back home already, but it wasn't that bad.

It might have been a lot worse if they had to get going quickly. Since they had so many people to empty out of here and get back to wherever they came from, a time-table had been made for departures — like for arrivals, they were following the sun, so the Brits were right at the end of the list, their portkey scheduled for the same time as the Spanish and Portuguese. They had plenty of time to loaf around and recover, a slow morning hanging around in the common room, one or the other occasionally going back to their room to pack up their shite. Liz almost forgot her last batch of laundry — she'd sent it off yesterday, it'd slipped her mind — and she accidentally ended up with one of Katie's tops somehow, but they got it all straightened out. By the time the adults reminded them they needed to be ready soon, only Cass and Oz (both with pretty shitty hangovers) were still lagging behind, but even they were all packed up and ready to go when someone showed up at their door to lead them down.

The walk out of the place and back to the keyport was much more subdued than it'd been the other way around — as far as she could tell, anyway, she hadn't been paying much attention last time. It'd been a hell of a week, everyone was pretty much exhausted, from the partying if not the duelling itself, a few muted conversations going on here and there but generally quiet. Even the weather was subdued, the sky struck with deep clouds, the smell of rain on the wind. There was a thunderstorm coming in, looked like, but they'd be long gone by the time it hit.

Now that they were leaving it wasn't so terribly hot and sunny, of course.

The waiting room for outgoing portkeys was rather packed and noisy, if only because there were so bloody many people crammed into a relatively small space. The Spanish and Portuguese kids were also in here, and while they weren't being much more rowdy than the British and Irish, there were just a lot of them — add in the other travellers, and Liz didn't think the room had quite been designed with this many people in mind. Splitting up the departures the way they did had obviously been very necessary. Thankfully they didn't have to stay here for very long, Liz had enough time to sneak off to the toilets and take a sip of her calming potion, and then just enough time to get bored, before they were being waved into one of the portkey rooms.

Instead of going to the middle with the other new people, Liz just stuck near Katie and Severus...which then immediately backfired when she was put into a cell with Katie. She hadn't really been paying attention, but apparently the cells toward the middle were smaller, some of the bigger ones toward the outside they were putting multiple people in — one she saw nearby actually had three blokes in it, which seemed uncomfortable. If she had to be stuck with someone, she guessed Katie would do, but on top of being tied down to the bloody thing she doubted she'd be nearly so complacent without her potion.

As the attendant started counting down, Liz noticed those blokes were linking their arms together — which was kind of awkward to do with three of them, but they figured it out. To keep them from flailing and bumping into each other in transit, maybe? That was a good idea, actually, just as she was considering that Katie reached for her first. Liz winced a little at Katie's mind blaring in her ears and skittering over her skin — her hangover much worse than Liz's, Katie was obviously miserable, the feel of her mind was very unpleasant — she ignored it as well as she could, her toes tapping impatiently as the seconds tapped away.

Expecting it this time, Liz closed her eyes before the portkey activated. Without the disorienting swirling lights, it really wasn't that bad — the worst part was the magic latching onto her and holding her to the net, Katie jostling against her as they flew. Liz landed lightly enough on the other side, and was then nearly yanked right off her feet as Katie lost her balance. Dropping the net, the strap heavy around her wrist, Liz barely managed to keep Katie from falling over, the other girl groaning curses under her breath. Once she was more or less steady, Liz asked, "You okay?"

"Yeah, just..." She let out a long, heavy breath, shivering a little with the motion. "Give me a minute," she muttered, bending partly over, propping her hands on her knees. She looked too pale, sweat beading on her neck and her forehead.

Liz was very glad she'd had the presence of mind to cut herself off last night.

Once everyone had gotten themselves picked up — which took longer than the trip to Romania, too many people hungover and tired — they streamed out of the room, Liz and Katie's spot putting them toward the front of the pack. Liz had expected the same waiting room they'd hung around in for a bit last time, but there was actually just an open hall on the other side, no furniture or anything at all, with signs pointing off this way or that. They were led off without any pause, up a flight of stairs and into a chambre that was similar enough to the keyport in Lille for Liz to immediately peg it as customs — the materials were less modern, a lot of wood and Wizengamot-white marble tile, but it was recognisable enough. They didn't actually have to wait in line, though, a side hallway was opened up for them to stream past, narrow enough that they had to squish up a bit, took them some minutes for the whole group to get through.

While walking right past customs checks, it occurred to Liz that you could probably smuggle contraband into the country pretty easily if you could get an accomplice in one of these international student programmes. The magical world didn't have the same restrictions on people's movements as they did on the muggle side, the only reason they had these checks was to screen for restricted materials, inform people about local laws that might be relevant — like how residency and public services worked, banned classes of magic, things to do with personal property, law enforcement, that kind of stuff. You could still smuggle shite in without too much trouble if you just avoided official entry points, but doing so could get you in legal trouble if you ended up stopped for something else while in the country...especially if you happened to have contraband materials on you, the sentences were worse if you consciously avoided normal channels. But, slip something onto someone in one of these student groups, and they'd carry it right through, no problem. Their things hadn't been checked arriving in Romania either.

It probably didn't make that much of a difference — with the way magical transportation worked, the borders on this side were ridiculously porous. Also, standing here thinking about how you could theoretically get away with crimes was probably an odd thing to do.

Liz ended up lingering in the keyport far longer than she really needed to. Their whole huge bloody group filed up to the outgoing floos, where kids either met up with parents or flooed straight home on their own. She could just floo home at any time, but she hated the floo. She'd keyed Severus into her wards as a resident when he'd dropped by one day, so they would let him through, and he'd agreed he would apparate her home when they were done — she'd asked earlier in the morning, worried her hangover would still be shitty by then — but he was doing the responsible adult thing, and had to wait until all the other kids were gone, in case something came up. Which was slightly tedious, but fine, whatever. Liz wandered off to get a cup of coffee — she'd entirely forgotten she didn't have any goblin coins on her, but thankfully they took ducats (though she might have gotten a little ripped off) — just hung off to the side somewhere, waiting.

It took a bit for everyone to leave, but finally Severus was saying goodbye to Flitwick and Clíodhna and whatever the Oxford bloke's name was (she'd forgotten), started leading the way toward the exit. They couldn't apparate from in here, apparently, they had to go all the way through the main hall and up the stairs onto the street. While Old Town (and most magical enclaves) had wards to limit incoming apparation, outgoing apparation was perfectly fine — they stepped to the side of the stairs, out of the way, Severus held a hand out to her, and London disappeared in crushing blackness.

They appeared in the dining room, right in front of the hearth. This was the same room she'd arrived through the first time she'd seen the house, but it looked rather different than it had then — there was a dining table with chairs, a few shelves along the walls (filled with novels and history books and a few knickknacks from the lord's office at Clyde Rock), the windows blocked off with heavy red and black curtains. The lights were off, so the sun beyond set the rim of the curtains to glow a little, a chink of light let through the middle to slash across the floor. There was the faintest scent of wood polish on the air (from the furniture), old books, mostly overpowered by herby bread — Nilanse must have done some baking earlier today.

Liz felt a little odd for no apparent reason, tingly and unsteady, but she just brushed it off, stomped over to sling her bag over the back of one of the chairs. "Well," she said with a sign, "that was a thing." A tap of her wand on each boot loosened the laces, she leaned against the table to pull them off.

With a very Severus feeling of slanted amusement, he said, "Indeed." Well, there was no need to laugh at her, Severus... "It was a difficult start, but I assume you enjoyed yourself well enough in the end."

She shrugged. "Sure. Dealing with all the other people around could be a pain, and I don't like sharing a bedroom, but it was fun. I'll be staying on the team, if that's what you're asking — assuming the next captain wants me around, anyway, I didn't place very well, and if it's Cassius— Or, he'll be a sixth-year, so it won't be him. Do you have any idea who Flitwick will pick?"

"I have been given the impression it will be Mister Bletchley." Oh, that wasn't so bad, then — she and Gladwin weren't super friendly or anything, but they got on well enough, he shouldn't want to kick her out just because. Oz would have been better for Liz, but. "But I don't imagine you would have any cause to worry regardless. You did quite well for your first time, Elizabeth — your performance in the trio match against Beauxbatons in particular was quite impressive. Whoever Filius picks won't be so foolish as to expel you from the team."

Oh, well. "Thanks?" She was pretty sure that was what she was supposed to say right now, she didn't know, Liz was terrible at this shite.

By the low-simmering amusement in Severus's head, she must have fucked something up, but he didn't comment. "Did you have any plans for the rest of the summer I should know about?"

"Um, besides apparation lessons and the World Cup, not really. Oh, Hermione will be staying over starting in a couple weeks." Severus ticked up an eyebrow at her, she shrugged. "Her mum's going to be at the Greenwood — as a precaution against pregnancy complications, apparently — so Hermione was going to be home alone a lot, and I invited her over without really meaning to. It's fine, though, I don't mind — I've got more than enough space in here, you know. She still has to ask her parents, but. I guess I should probably tell Sirius to get a second set of tickets..."

"I will take care of it." There had been an odd, warm, bubbly feeling going on in there — hard to say, but she suspected he was pleased she'd impulsively invited Hermione to stay at her house, for mental health reasons — but at Liz's confusion it was struck through with cool amusement, Severus giving her a flat look. "Perhaps this has slipped your attention, but Sirius is hardly the most dependable of men. He may pay for your tickets if it will please him," said with an obvious note of condescension, "but I will be accompanying you, and will arrange lodging myself. I expect Miss Granger's parents will require reassurances that their daughter will be looked after while living here, and will likely offer to pay for the quidditch tickets, both of which I am better equipped to address than your unsettlingly gregarious oaf of a godfather."

...Fair enough. She guessed it did kind of make sense that Severus wanted to keep an eye on her — there were going to be a lot of people there, it'd be pretty easy for someone to try something, or even just for an accident to happen — it just hadn't occurred to her at the time. "Do you even like quidditch? And, I don't think I really need lodging or whatever, I was just going to apparate back home every night. Or use the floo, I guess, if I'm not good enough by then..."

"I don't particularly enjoy quidditch, no, but I don't find it so offensive I cannot tolerate it for a time." Uh-huh, sure. He was probably going to pull a Hermione and bring along something to read in the stands. "The wards on the site prevent the general public from apparating at will, as a safety measure, and there is no public floo in the vicinity — the Ministry is arranging a series of portkeys to transport people to and from the site. Returning home every night simply isn't practical."

Oh, well, that was stupid, but fine. "So, what, we're going to be tenting or something? You know I've never done that before." Also, sharing a tent with Severus would be extremely awkward...though he probably realised that, so she'd get her own. Still.

"Expansion charms, Elizabeth." Aaaannd Liz felt like an idiot, that should have been obvious. "I haven't one of my own, but I do have multiple contacts I may borrow one from. Though I imagine I will be forced to evade an invitation to join the Malfoys."

Liz shrugged. "If you can't get out of it, that's fine." Living with them for a few days might be bloody awkward, but they were all at least playing nice — for various reasons, depending on which Malfoy you were talking about — so it wouldn't be that bad.

"Miss Granger."

...Right, never mind. Narcissa would probably be polite about it, but Hermione and Draco did not get along, and who knows how the fuck Lucius would act. "Good point."

"Which matches were you planning to attend?"

"Ah, the quarterfinals on, probably — still haven't arranged it with Sirius, but I think we'll do that. The first one is on, um...the Thirteenth, I think. Maybe the Twelfth. We'd be there for about a week, I don't know if you'll have time for that..." He was absurdly busy most of the time, after all.

"I have interviews with new Potions professors and dorm supervisors over the next couple weeks, and this year I will have their assistance with the required brewing. I should be able to find the time." It'd somehow completely slipped past Liz that there being more Potions professors meant Severus wouldn't have to brew so much to keep the Hospital Wing supplied. Unless something went wrong, he might have a much easier time of it going forward, so, good? Bloke could definitely use the extra sleep... "Also, we have been invited to Consualia at the Yaxleys', on the Twenty-First of August."

"The hell is Consualia? And, aren't the Yaxleys a Death Eater family? Oh wait, that's probably why you were invited, wasn't it..."

Severus just ticked up another eyebrow at her, an odd cold lurch in his head. "The name is that of an old Roman harvest festival; certain conservative segments of magical society have adopted the name for their own, largely unrelated celebration. An excess of food and wine, bonfires, games — nothing particularly offensive. There will be a religious observance, but you may skip that if you prefer. Miss Granger may accompany you, but she will need to take care to stay close to one of the two of us at all times."

Just in case one of the ex- Death Eaters around got it into their head to fuck with the muggleborn wandering around, presumably. "Fine. I'm sure she'll want to come — she's always talking about there not being enough cultural stuff at Hogwarts, you know."

"That lack is by design, unfortunately." So muggleborns were mostly ignorant of the culture they were entering into by the time they graduated, he meant, kind of low-key sabotaging them — which, Liz hadn't known that before, but she wasn't surprised at all. "So. Our first apparation lesson the first weekend of August, Miss Granger arriving here for the rest of the summer soon after, the World Cup starting on the Twelfth or Thirteenth, and Consualia on the Twenty-First. Am I missing anything?"

"Don't think so."

"You haven't anything planned for your birthday this year?"

"Not really," Liz admitted with a shrug. "Don't worry about it, I don't care. Let's just call the quidditch stuff my birthday present and forget about it."

Severus seemed to accept that easily enough — if last year was any indication at all, he cared about her birthday more than she did (bloody hypocrite, he hadn't even told her about his) — and within a couple minutes he was gone, leaving her alone in the dining room. She immediately pulled her dress over her head, since she didn't really need it indoors, slung it over the same chair as her bag so she'd get to it later. Stockinged feet smooth on the tiles, she headed into the kitchen.

She hadn't expected to walk in to find a cup of coffee steaming on the counter, Nilanse sitting on the edge with her delicate little multi-jointed feet swinging in the air, but she wasn't exactly surprised either. Sly little shite must have put up a silencing so they couldn't hear the beans being ground from the dining room. "Welcome home, Liz!" she chirped, her mind bright and intense and tingly in a way Liz had learned to read as happiness.

"...Hey." Less enthusiastic of a response than Nilanse had probably been expecting, she just felt inexplicably weird all of a sudden. Taken aback, like — might be the home bit that was doing it, she still wasn't used to having one of those. "You didn't have to make the coffee, you know." Nilanse just grinned, unrepentant, because of course. "Do we still have some of those nut biscuits left?" She was having a lot of coffee this morning, but she hadn't actually eaten that much...

Nilanse snapped her fingers, a tight flicker of magic, one of the cabinets opened up and a plate started floating over. "These ones are fresh — I finished the old ones, and Nyśimi made more." Nilanse didn't use the elves' language around Liz very often, but she'd heard Nyśimi enough times to know she was talking about her mother. Liz suspected that Tisme sending over snacks from time to time was as much for Nilanse as it was for Liz, mum stuff and all that.

Slipping onto one of the stools and plucking one of the biscuits off the plate, Liz asked, "So, did I miss anything while I was gone?"

"Mm, no, nothing much." Nilanse also grabbed a biscuit, holding it with both hands and nibbling at the end, like a squirrel or something — honestly, why was this girl so cute, not fair. "A few people came by, trying to visit. None of them tried to leave a note, so it must not have been important, just being nosey like always."

Liz blinked — that seemed like an...off thing for an elf to say. She wasn't the expert, but, they didn't tend to be that direct with negative comments. It was possible Liz was a bad influence. Again, not an expert, but she'd read a bit about elves, in part as a result of Hermione's research project when she'd first learned about them, and— Well, it was complicated. Elves were connected to the magic in their environment unusually deeply, almost symbiotic...which had been ritually exploited by the goblins to enslave them in the first place, but. They needed to be bound to wards to survive, if they weren't they would literally go insane (and eventually die), which made the prospect of freeing them all...complicated.

There must be some solution, since house-elves were free in some neocommunalist countries, but Hermione had been very frustrated when she'd learned of it.

Anyway, people preferred to bind them to wards, but it was actually possible to bind them to a person too — any person would do, even a muggle (though that tended to have odd effects), so long as they weren't another elf. That was what Cediny had done with her and Nilanse during her first visit to Clyde Rock, nearly a year ago now. But, there were reasons it wasn't preferred by mages: being in such direct contact with someone's magic tended to have effects on the elf's personality. It was often described like they were absorbing traits from the human, but that wasn't really it — more like their mind was slowly reshaped by the bleed-off from the person they were bound to, just as a natural consequence of how elf magic worked. (Fae magic worked by different rules than human magic, it was weird and trippy and Liz didn't really get it.) It didn't hurt them at all, but it did tend to make their behaviour a bit unpredictable and sometimes disruptive — the authors Liz had read had mentioned a tendency toward back-talk and creative reinterpretations of orders — so people recommended against it, with exceptions for young children and people with serious health issues who might need to be found on short notice. That was why Cediny had done it, Liz suspected — the rest of the elves could hear her calling for them as long as she was within the family's wards, but only Nilanse could while she was outside of them.

Being openly exasperated with their neighbours might not seem like a big difference, but it was still noticeable. Nilanse was also a lot less shy and awkward than she'd been at first...but that could just be because she was more used to her now — and Liz honestly wasn't sure if Nilanse had ever seen a human before she and Severus had arrived at Clyde Rock, so. Maybe it wasn't much of a change yet, but it did seem possible that Liz was influencing her already, and it'd just get more noticeable as time went on.

...This was probably fine. Cediny must have known this would happen, being far more familiar with elf stuff than Liz was (obviously), so. It's not like it was hurting Nilanse, and, when Liz thought about it, she wasn't sure it was that different in principle from people influencing each other simply by spending a lot of time together — an odd, trippy, magical version of it, but elves were just like that. Maybe she should drop by Clyde Rock and ask Cediny about it later, but she thought this was fine.

Probably fine.

"Right, um. I guess being in Romania is a great excuse to not talk to them."

Nilanse giggled, her little feet kicking in the air. "Honish put some fencing in the garden, to draw up grapevines — he was wanting to ask you first, but I told Cediny to tell him to do it anyway. Is that being okay?"

"Oh sure, I don't mind." If they got thick enough, depending on where he'd put them they might even block nosey neighbours' line of sight, so, not a bad idea. "Just as long as he doesn't tend them too much — I want it to look wild, you know. Grapevines like grape grapevines?"

"Yep! He's wanting to put more food stuff out there. These can be eaten, but they are also wine grapes."

"Oh." Making your own wine seemed like it'd be a lot of work...though magic probably made that a lot easier...and she'd be able to keep the sugar levels as low as possible, and play around with berries and herbs and shite. She didn't know how many grapes went in a bottle of wine, so she had no idea how much they'd end up with every year even if it went perfectly, but she guessed she'd wait to see how it turned out. She had plenty of free time anyway, and definitely would after finishing school in however many years, so why not. "Sounds good, but, remind him not to get too creative with the garden. The whole reason I ripped out all the grass was so I didn't have to worry about it, it's kind of big for one person to take care of by themself." Liz poked about out there sometimes, but since taking out the grass and tossing a bunch of seeds around she'd mostly been leaving it to Honish, so.

"He is knowing, but I will remind him again." Liz suspected Nilanse liked bossing other elves around, exploiting her Liz told me to so ha privileges, it was honestly kind of funny. Besides, at least in this particular case it was to make sure Honish wasn't doing too much, so it didn't sound like something Liz had to worry about. "How was the tournament?"

"Fine. I didn't win in anything, but I did do pretty well in— Actually, do you have anything better to do this afternoon? We can watch my matches in the pensieve, if there are some spare potions phials I can start copying them out right now."

Apparently there were some spare phials, Nilanse — very excited at the prospect of watching her matches — popped away for a minute before popping back with a little case of them, Liz filling them one by one between biscuits. Sitting at the kitchen counter, the coffee strong and the biscuits pleasantly nutty and spicy (cinnamon and nutmeg?), the air smelling of coffee and herby bread and sausages (not a hint of the sting of bleach), half-listening to the excitable little elf babbling away about something to do with her relatives, Liz felt herself relax, a faint smile on her lips.

As fun as the trip to Romania had been, it was good to be home.

---

Dorea probably didn't need to check up on Mum as often as she did. Mum being pregnant always made her vaguely anxious — she couldn't say why, exactly, it just did.

The arrival of her third baby sibling was rapidly approaching now, and they'd mostly already gotten the preparation out of the way. Richard had used one of his days off to go around the whole house and do a safety check. Sam hadn't been that long ago, so there wasn't so much that needed to be done, but some of the outlet covers had been lost at some point, he'd quick plastered over a few corners — Ben had 'helped', making a mess, giggling as he got the stuff all over his hands, a streak across one cheek — and the gates for the stairs were back, though left open for now. (The boys were both annoyed about those, since Ben had trouble with the latch and Sam was still too short to reach, but that just meant they were less likely to leave them open.) Richard's sister Eleanor brought over the baby stuff from where it'd been stored away at their mother's house, some of it in Mum and Richard's room but the cot (still in pieces) and playpen (folded up) and the like were pushed to the side in the entryway. There'd been a few shopping trips to pick up all kinds of things — Dorea was left home with the boys, so she couldn't make a mental list of what all they'd gotten — the washtub for nappies had been retrieved (it still faintly smelled of bleach), the house just generally feeling that little bit more crowded with all the stuff around.

Dorea had overheard Mum and Richard talk about moving house. When they'd moved here, it'd just been the three of them, and having one extra bedroom had seemed like plenty — Sam had been moved into Ben's room not so long ago, they could probably share for a while without too much trouble, but with a fourth kid on the way it was starting to get pretty tight. They could maybe make do, convert one of the downstairs rooms to a bedroom, but they'd probably be moving in a couple years. It was slightly complicated, because while Richard could commute further to work if he really needed to, Ben was in school now, and by the time they were ready to move Sam would just be starting, and they didn't want to make them have to start all over again at a new school. Richard made pretty good money, so it wasn't a big problem — and if it really came down to it, they could always lean into the Black fortune, but Dorea suspected Richard would be uncomfortable accepting financial help from his stepdaughter — but the hassle wasn't something they could really deal with while also preparing for a new baby.

Of course, they didn't necessarily need to — Dorea could always just move to Ancient House, or they could expand into whichever Black property. They needed to keep the house, so the boys could stay in the local school and for Richard to get to work, but there was no reason they couldn't just floo someplace else overnight. Dorea had already looked into a few more modern houses the family had, that would be more familiar to the rest of the family, but she hadn't mentioned it yet. She'd bring it up when the baby was getting into toddler years and it was closer to time. It would take some convincing, definitely, but Mum and Richard did really like the house — it was their first and everything, after all — she thought having the option to keep it would make them more open to agreeing.

As chaotic as things had been recently, with all the preparations going on and the boys getting a bit noisy and rambunctious, responding to the excitement, the calm days felt almost eerie. Tense, in a way, like the calm before a storm. Richard and the boys weren't home at the moment, off at his mother's — it would be difficult to visit for a while after the baby came, so they were taking the opportunity while they still could. (Besides, with Richard's father gone she could use a little help around the house from time to time.) It'd perhaps been the quietest day Dorea had had since getting home from school, she'd spent most of the morning burning through some of the homework she still had piled up. More than she would usually have left to do at this point in the summer, since she preferred to get it out of the way early, but things had been busy. It would be a little calmer, with a lot of the preparations already done and the Romania trip out of the way, but she would also be going to the World Cup, and, yeah, she should try to finish this stuff as soon as possible.

Mum was downstairs, she could faintly hear the radio from her room. Mostly occupying herself with reading — fiction, for once. She'd be taking a break from university for a little while, she'd finished out the semester (which must have been pretty miserable) but wouldn't be going back until the baby was old enough. Which wasn't bad timing, actually, since she'd been considering switching programmes anyway, so. Dorea would go down for something every once in a while, water or tea or whatever, just so she could drop by the living room quick and check how Mum was doing. Probably not necessary, but, she was very pregnant, couldn't help it.

This time when Dorea came down, it was to find Mum sitting in an awkward-looking cross-legged position in Richard's armchair, using the cover of one of her textbooks to write what was presumably a letter. She was faintly singing along with the radio under her breath, but Dorea didn't recognise it — probably from some musical, Mum had plenty of tapes and CDs sitting around. She meant to just glance in quick, but before she could turn toward the kitchen Mum asked, "Could you do me a favour quick, lovie?"

"Sure, one second." Dorea dropped off her water glass in the kitchen, by the time she looped back around Mum was setting her book aside — moving to go to the toilet, most likely. "What is it?"

"Send this for me, please," she said, holding out an envelope. Curious, Dorea flipped it around. There wasn't an address or anything on the front, which wasn't a big surprise — she wouldn't have asked Dorea right this second if it were just going out through the muggle post — only a single name in Mum's loopy, feminine handwriting: Emma.

Dorea felt her eyebrows twitch — apparently her and Hermione's mums were writing each other. She was curious what that was about — they had met before, but Dorea hadn't realised they were keeping in contact — but it wasn't really her business, so she didn't ask. "This is Emma Granger, right?" she asked, just to be sure. She wasn't a hundred per cent confident how owl post worked, but she suspected it was more likely to reach the intended recipient if she actually knew who it was meant for.

"Yep. I was napping when her owl came in and the bloody thing flew off before I woke up."

And their owls were kept elsewhere and Mum wasn't supposed to use the floo at the moment, so she couldn't send it off herself, right, Dorea got that. She had asked one of the elves to keep an eye on Mum, but that was just supposed to be for emergencies, sending a letter didn't really count. "Right. Need anything else while I'm up?"

"No, no, I'm fine." Getting out of her chair looked like a little bit of a struggle, the nest of pillows she'd crammed in there...which was probably why she'd been sitting like that, Dorea guessed, so it was easier to get a foot under her. "Go on then, I want to talk to you about something when you get back."

Dorea could just call an elf to carry it for her, but it was no big deal to walk it down herself — besides, Mum would probably prefer Dorea not hovering while she was in the toilet. Grimmauld Place was only a short floo trip away, though the walk up to the owlery actually took rather longer, on a far corner of the top floor. If Sirius were around she'd probably have been delayed, but it was no real surprise he wasn't. Dorea's memories of Grimmauld Place were limited, and mostly involved Aunt Cassie or the Tonkses — all after Walburga's death, she'd refused to meet Dorea — but Sirius had lived here growing up, and did not like going back to it. It was a nice enough place, if rather sunless, not enough windows in this house. She thought Ancient House was actually closer to Oxford, but the owlery there was out on the grounds, it would have taken much longer for Dorea to get to it, and it wouldn't make that much of a difference to the owls, so.

By the time Dorea got back, Mum was settled in her chair again, a refilled water glass on the side table, the music noticeably quieter than it'd been before. She didn't sit right away, instead looping by the kitchen, fixing tea. While the water was on, she put together a plate of biscuits — these dense, bland shortbread things, very dry — giving each a dollop of hazelnut butter. And also a few bits of cheese, in case Mum was feeling particularly gross at the moment. Dorea had seen her make little sandwiches with these, hazelnut butter and cheddar and bresaola, which did not look appetising to her, but okay.

Mum's palette could be a bit odd to begin with, but when she was pregnant it got really really weird. Though it could be worse — some of the things Hermione said her mum did with pickled walnuts and gherkins and olives, ugh...

"Oh, thank you, lovie," Mum said as Dorea walked back in with the tray. "I didn't think of getting anything until after I sat down."

"I was thinking I'd make lunch in an hour or two — macaroni cheese, with tomatoes and some of the bresaola?" Macaroni cheese was a pretty frequent meal in this house, it was the boys' favourite, but they didn't tend to like anything extra in it, especially vegetables.

Mum grimaced. "Sounds wonderful, but how about mushrooms instead of tomatoes." It wasn't really a question.

"Sure, I can do that." Settled into the sofa, leaning against the armrest nearest to Mum with her tea cradled in her hands, Dorea asked, "Who you writing to?" nodding to the half-finished letter waiting on a textbook next to the tea tray.

Using the bits of cheese to spread around the hazelnut butter (ugh), Mum said, "Uncle Toby."

Toby wasn't really Dorea's uncle — he and Mum had been friends since at least Dorea's age, had gone into the same theatre programme in London way back when. He was one of a handful of Mum's friends she'd called Uncle (or Aunt) growing up, though she hadn't seen as much of them since moving to Maidstone. She did still see Toby sometimes, he dropped by now and then — he was still working as an actor, the occasional theatre show, minor roles on television and in advertisements. Dorea got the feeling Mum was faintly jealous, but she never said anything about it. "Ah, what's going on with him these days?"

"Nothing much new. He's between jobs at the moment, he and Nathan are planning a trip to Greece — it's turning out to be a bit of a hassle, I'm told, you know how they can be." Nathan was another of Mum's old friends, he and Toby had been roommates for longer than Dorea could remember. (It was slightly odd that they apparently went travelling on holiday together, but they were really close, she just shrugged it off.) And yes, she did know how they could be, she wasn't surprised the planning was turning into a mess. "Anyway, I was thinking earlier, but Liz's birthday is coming up next week, isn't it? What are your girls' plans this year?"

"I don't know, honestly. Liz doesn't much care for her birthday, I suspect she plans to just ignore it."

"Oh, well, that won't do, we'll have to..." Mum trailed off, blinking. "You suspect? You haven't asked her about it?"

...Did Mum not know about what was going on with them at the moment? Dorea guessed it was possible she didn't — it wasn't something Dorea herself was super likely to bring up, and things had been a bit hectic, with the baby and the trip to Romania and all. Oops? "Um, Liz and I are...kind of not speaking, at the moment. If she were planning something, I don't think she'd tell me about it." Hermione would tell her, if something was going on...unless Liz had specifically asked her not to. But if she had, Dorea was pretty sure Hermione would ask Dorea what was going on with them, so.

Her eyes wide, Mum audibly gasped, her hand actually going to chest her for a moment. Which was a bit over-dramatic, but Mum could be a bit over-dramatic at times — came with the territory, having been a theatre kid and all. "Oh no, Dove, what happened? Why didn't you say anything about it?"

Dorea shrugged, a bit awkwardly, her eyes dipping down to her tea. "I don't know, things have been busy around here lately, it just slipped my mind. And, I don't know what happened, really. I mean, she's angry with me, obviously, but I don't know why. It's pretty frustrating, honestly."

"Oh well, I'm sorry, love. Friendships can be complicated, especially around your age — the drama that went on with my friends when we were teenagers, it was a mess. Things are just like that sometimes." Taking a bite of one of her monstrosities, Mum let out a little hum, rushing to chew and swallow. "Not to say it can't be painful when it does, of course I'm not saying that. It's just, sometimes there's nothing you can do about it, and that's just the way it is. You know."

"Yeah, I get it." She was trying to say Dorea shouldn't beat herself up over it, obsess over what she did wrong, or whatever. Which was probably all she had, since she didn't know what'd happened and Dorea wasn't visibly broken up about it or anything. "It is pretty annoying, since I don't know what set her off, I wish she'd just tell me — but if she won't, there's nothing I can do about that, so."

"Mm. Do you know what happened? I mean, not necessarily why whatever it was angered her so badly, but when, you know."

"Um..." Obviously she did, she just didn't know if she wanted to be talking to Mum about it. Thinking about it gave her a squirming...not guilt, exactly. It was just uncomfortable, was all. "Yeah, it was really abrupt. We were talking one day, in the library, and she just got up and walked away, with no explanation."

"Oh, that is odd. What were you talking about?"

"Well. She found out I had a crush on a boy — it's not a big deal, or anything," Dorea scrambled to add. It hadn't occurred to her until just now that she'd never told her mother about her frustrating thing for Adrian, because it was bloody embarrassing and she didn't want to. "I don't plan to do anything about it, he's a sixth-year, you know, and even if he weren't I don't think I would anyway." She thought she'd be really nervous trying to date a boy, not ready for that yet. "He probably knows, because the last time we spoke I definitely embarrassed myself, but he pretends he doesn't. I'm guessing he has practice with that — he is annoyingly fanciable."

Mum, of course, just looked amused with her, sipping at her tea with a little curly smile on her face. "Oh Lord, to be a teenager again. I wrote poetry about my crushes when I was your age, they were terrible." Dorea couldn't help giggling a little — on the one hand, imagining Mum at Dorea's age scribbling out sappy poems in a notebook over some boy was kind of absurd, but on the other that sounded exactly like the sort of thing Mum would have done — but Mum clearly didn't mind, her smile just growing a little wider. "Yes, yes, I was ridiculous, I know. Theatre kid, remember?"

"Oh no, you didn't perform any of them, did you?"

"They were awful, that would be humiliating." She took a sip of her tea. "So of course I did."

Well obviously, Dorea shouldn't have expected anything else...

Mum waited for her to get it out of her system, munching at another of her biscuits — it was just so silly, the mental of image of Mum— She was ridiculous sometimes, that was all. "Yes, yes, I was an embarrassing teenager, I know. I long ago grew to accept my fate. Anyway, about you and Liz, I'm not sure I understand. Did you two have a fight over this boy or something?" There was a hint of a sceptical tone on her voice, probably assuming that couldn't possibly be it. Dorea would guess she thought the idea of Liz dating anyone was as weird to Mum as it'd been to her.

"No, nothing like that. Liz is friends with him already — he's on the quidditch and duelling teams — she actually seemed a little surprised that other people think he's handsome. Which is ridiculous, she's a bloody mind-reader, but whatever..." Though, she was a lesbian, apparently, so maybe that had something to do with it? Except Dorea was pretty sure even lesbians could tell when a man was objectively attractive...

Mum smirked. "Oh, so he's in the duelling team, is he?" It was obvious what she was suggesting.

"The schedule was really complicated over there, and we were mostly following Liz's events, so." Squirming in her seat a little, trying to ignore the warmth on her face, Dorea admitted, "I did catch a couple of his duels, though. He did pretty well — he was one of the finalists in singles, and his trio got into the championship rounds."

"Mm. Sounds like he's quite talented."

"Yeah, he's pretty close to the top of his year. Also, shut up."

Still smirking, Mum raised a defensive hand, brushing the subject off. "You can talk about these things with me, you know — if something does come up, I wouldn't want you to feel like you can't. I'm only teasing because you said you don't want to do anything about it. Which is definitely the right decision, by the way. Three years isn't much of an age difference when you're older — Richard is younger than me by more than that — but it is too much when you're fourteen."

Richard wasn't really that much younger than her, maybe only four or five years, but still, point taken. "I know. That I can talk to you if I need to I mean."

"Good. And, if you're too nervous or embarrassed to — Lord knows I never talked to my parents about these things — you can always go to Uncle Toby, or Aunt Sammy. Or Becca."

"...Right." If Dorea was too embarrassed to talk to Mum about boys stuff, she really couldn't imagine going to Toby instead — if only because she thought she'd be even more embarrassed trying to talk to a man about it. (Same reason she'd pick Mum over Richard, really, though she had known Toby longer.) Like Toby, Sammy wasn't really her aunt, but also like Toby she and Mum had known each other forever, she'd always been around. Rebecca had actually lived with them for a while — Dorea didn't know how long, she'd been really young at the time — and after she moved out she'd still come by now and then to bring Dorea out to a chippy or to get ice cream or catch a film or something. Less often since they moved to Maidstone, and with Dorea off at Hogwarts most of the year it'd been a while since she'd seen her, but. She got on with all three of them decently well, but if she really did need to talk to someone, she couldn't imagine picking one of them above Mum.

"Right," Mum echoed, nodding. Pausing for a quick sip of tea, then, "So. You and Liz."

"Yeah, um. Liz said something kind of funny at one point, and I asked— She, er, came out to me, I guess is how you say it."

Mum blinked. "Oh?"

"Yeah. She said she likes Daphne — you've met her, you know, we stayed with her people over the Solstice? I think they might be dating now, actually. In Romania, there was a day we all went out, and there were a few hours we were, just, wandering around the market, and they showed up at the restaurant together at the end. Hermione said their group split up, and Liz and Daphne went off alone and— I didn't know, they were acting a little...off. I think there is something going on there, but, nobody said anything..."

As Dorea talked, some of the warmth went out of Mum's face, her brow slowly dipping. A note on her voice Dorea couldn't quite pin down, she asked, "She didn't tell anyone else? About herself, or her and Daphne?"

"No, I don't think so. I mean, she might have told someone else, but if other people know nobody has said anything..." Dorea trailed off as she belatedly realised she was missing something — she didn't know what, but Mum was looking rather exasperated all of a sudden.

"Dorea, lovie," she said, the endearment softening the sharp note on her voice a little, "you shouldn't have told me this."

She frowned. "Why not?"

"You just outed your friend, Dorea."

...Oh. "I didn't think of it like that."

Her exasperation growing thicker, Mum said, "You just told me your friend is a lesbian, and you're the only one she's told. What else would you call that?"

Well, when Mum put it like that, that's obviously what she'd been doing. She just hadn't been thinking about that.

"Don't feel too badly about it — if you are going to be talking about it, with me in private is a fine place to do it. It's not as though I'm going to make trouble for the poor dear over it. But she told you something very private, in confidence, and here you are breaking that confidence. You have to be more careful about that, lovie. How would you feel if Liz went around gossiping about your crush on this boy?"

Pretty shitty, she expected. Especially since here she was failing to keep her mouth shut, while she was pretty sure Liz hadn't told anyone about Adrian. "I get it."

"Not only is it just rude, but this can be dangerous too. I know it's not as big of a problem with mages, but people like Liz still don't have a great time on their side either — with how mages can be about family, Sirius tells me it's very common for them to be pressured into marriages they don't want. Just with the threat of being disowned if they don't play along, but sometimes even with compulsions and love potions and the like. Liz will be fine, since she doesn't have anyone to do the pressuring, but it's still something you should keep in mind."

"I get it, Mum." Honestly, she got it almost the instant Mum pointed it out, she didn't need to rub it in. Dorea was a little surprised Mum was being so stern about it, but fine, yes, she got it.

"Good. I'm sorry for snapping at you, lovie, it's just, these things can be very serious." Mum hadn't really snapped at her, but okay. "But I'm not sure I understand. What happened that day in the library, I mean. Did she say something that made you uncomfortable?"

"Other than the gay thing, no, not really." Both of Mum's eyebrows shot up, Dorea added, "I don't know, nothing really happened, she just got up and left, and she's been avoiding me ever since."

Mum was silent a long moment, sitting in that awkward cross-legged position in her nest of pillows, just, staring at Dorea, expression wide-eyed but blank. After far too long of a pause, she said, "She is a mind-reader. Could she have picked up on something you didn't say aloud?"

"I don't know," Dorea muttered, with an awkward shrug, shuffling in her seat. "Maybe, I guess. It was just a little uncomfortable, you know."

"Uncomfortable how?"

"You know, it's just weird, is all."

"Oh dear." There was a clink, Dorea glanced over to see Mum had set aside her teacup. She'd looked away, facing more straight forward, one hand come up over her lips. Her face had gone mostly blank, as it often did when she was thinking about something — whatever was going on in there, it was impossible to tell from the outside. "Oh," she muttered again, flat and low.

Okay, this was bloody weird. "Mum? What is it?"

"Nothing, Dove, just..." She trailed off, her fingers lifting from her face to make a vague, swirling sort of gesture. Dorea noticed her other hand had moved to her belly, fingers idly tapping. "...having a moment. Mm."

"...What kind of moment?"

Mum didn't answer for some seconds, lowly humming at the edge of hearing. "Oh, you know. One of those ones that go, oh Abigail, what in the world do you think you're doing, you're a right horrible mother. Fun thoughts to have, especially when you're going on eight months pregnant, let me tell you..."

Okay, Dorea was very confused now. "Mum, what are you talking about? You're great, you always have been. Not perfect, everyone makes mistakes, but." Honestly, this was a weird moment going on right here, she didn't know what had brought this on.

But she didn't have to wait long to find out. Dropping the hand at her lips, Mum gave her an odd, sharp-but-unsteady look. "Well, I must have fucked up somewhere, because apparently I raised a homophobe." She turned away again, fingers coming back up to her lips, drew in and out a long, deep breath through her nose.

"What? No, I'm—" Dorea cut herself off, not entirely sure where that sentence was going. "It's not like that, Mum."

"Isn't it?"

"No. I mean," she said, shrugging, "it's just uncomfortable, is all."

Mum let out a little sharp breath. "Why?"

"We're friends and all, you know, it's just weird."

"Why?"

Trying to keep the frustration crawling up her chest out of her voice, Dorea snapped, "I don't know, it just is! How would you feel, if one day Rebecca told you she was—"

Dorea twitched with surprise, cutting herself off, as Mum laughed — a single harsh ha! sudden and sharp. Bent forward a little, leaning her face on her hands, she let out a few more low chuckles, spaced out between shaky breaths. While she worked to collect herself from whatever the hell this was about, Dorea just sat there, frowning, unsure if she should be offended or not.

Mostly, she was just confused. Dorea was definitely missing something. It was starting to make her feel odd, nerves crawling over her skin and her stomach twisting — she'd assumed Mum would be on her side here, unlike Hermione, but she couldn't help the feeling she was in trouble and just didn't know it yet.

Mum calmed down eventually but she didn't say anything right away, still leaning on her hands, back rising and falling a little as she breathed. "Hush you," she muttered, "we're okay, we're okay." Dorea was confused for a second before realised one of Mum's hands had dropped to her belly — the baby must be kicking. With a little sigh, Mum straightened again, both hands dropping to her sides and her eyes tipped up to the ceiling. "It's not always Bible-thumping, fire-and-brimstone crazies." Mum turned to look at her, Dorea winced a little at the hint of red in her eyes. "That feeling, that your friend being gay is weird, and it makes you uncomfortable? Dorea love, that is homophobia. Not the same kind, it's not as scary, but that's what it is."

...Dorea didn't know what she was supposed to say, here. It was kind of hard to meet Mum's eyes, honestly — she wouldn't have thought Mum would take this so personally, she was very confused. And kind of felt a little terrible, for causing Mum to have "a moment" when she was all, well...

"Dove. Lovie. Darling." She paused for a second, leaning over the arm of her chair a little. "I went to a performing arts school. I was big into theatre. I wanted to go into acting, all of my friends did. I listen to cast recordings of musicals for fun," she said, fingers flicking toward the radio. "Did you not realise how— Maybe I should have been more careful, more clear, but I really don't think some things should need to be explicitly spelled out..."

Dorea had no idea what she was talking about.

"You know your Uncle Toby."

"Yeah...?" Mum gave her a crooked, suggestive sort of look, one eyebrow gradually stretching further and further upward. It took her a few seconds to get it. "Oh! Um. So, he and Nathan are..."

"Yes, obviously — how many straight blokes do you know plan romantic trips to the islands of Greece together? Their tenth anniversary was just this April."

"...Oh." Dorea had had absolutely no idea, she'd thought they were just, you know, best friends, roommates. Though, thinking about it, she could believe Toby was gay, he was a bit, er, colourful, but. "Nathan used to bring me to football games."

"Yeah, Nathan follows football — he used to play himself, he dropped it in uni. But Toby is, you know, a theatre kid, like the rest of us. We're all geeks, when you get down to it. Having you along was a good excuse for Nathan to go to matches, because Toby would not enjoy getting dragged with instead," Mum finished in a bit of a drawl. She clearly thought that was funny, or adorable.

Dorea had no idea what she thought about it. She had thought their football days were fun — not for the football itself, that she could take or leave. Just, you know, getting terrible junk food and stuff, and Nathan was one of those adults who would actually talk to kids, and often in a silly and dramatic way, both more respectful than adults normally were — most adults didn't treat children like they were people at all — but also trying to be entertaining. It'd been pretty fun, most of the time. She didn't know how to feel about the revelation that she'd been being looked after by her mother's best male friend's boyfriend. That was just...kind of odd. "Letting Nathan take me out like that didn't worry you at all?"

Mum let out a harsh scoff. "Dorea love, that is an extremely offensive question, and if you can't see why we're going to have to have a long, serious talk about it one day."

...She guessed she could see it, after a moment of thought. It was just weird, to think. "No, I get it. I'm just...I don't know." She couldn't even say what she was thinking, exactly, her, her head buzzing and, just, she felt weird, that was all.

"Mm." Mum watched her for another moment, considering something, before she leaned a little further over the arm of her chair — which looked like a very awkward position to Dorea, but. "You know Becca?"

"Rebecca's gay too?" If she sounded rather surprised, well, Toby she could see in retrospect, but she never would have guessed about Rebecca, honestly. She was just so...girly.

For some reason, Mum seemed to think that was funny, fighting a flickery smirk. "How much do you remember about Becca, from when you were little? Before you started primary."

"Um, not much, honestly." She didn't remember much from when she was that young in general — to a degree, she was pretty sure that was just normal, but her brain trying to murder her hadn't helped. "I know she lived with us for what felt like a long time, but I don't know how long that was. I really don't remember much."

"It was about a year." Mum stopped there, Dorea didn't say anything right away because the tone Mum said it in suggested there was more coming, but then she just...waited. Like there was some kind of point, but Dorea didn't see what it was. With a little exasperated sigh, "Oh Dove. I didn't realise you didn't know, I thought... Well, I should have spelled it out, I guess. Maybe we could have avoided...all this. I just didn't think... I'll have to be more careful with the boys, and this little one..."

And now Dorea was feeling vaguely guilty, though she didn't really know why. She got that Mum was, um, not happy with Dorea being uncomfortable with this stuff — and she might have expected that if she'd sat down to think about it, but, honestly, she didn't have a problem with gay people existing, she, just, she just hadn't thought of it that way, it counting as homophobia, that's all — but she really hadn't expected Mum to take it this personally. Now that she knew about Toby and Rebecca, sure, but she was still confused. "Um. What did you not realise I don't know?" Dorea wasn't going to touch the being more careful with the boys part — it was a bit irritating, Mum saying she'd messed up with Dorea and was going to fix it with her baby siblings, but she could see why Mum felt that way, and she wasn't going to make a big deal about it.

Mum gave Dorea a delicate, fragile smile, sort of darkly amused. "Dove. Think about it. How many bedrooms did our flat in London have?"

"Um, well, there was mine, and— Oh! Oh." There had been two bedrooms, Dorea's and Mum's. Now that she was sitting here thinking about it, Dorea was positive Mum and Rebecca had shared the bed — but Dorea had been really little, the significance of that hadn't registered to her, and in the years since she'd just...never given it a second thought. Which, she felt like a bloody moron, in retrospect, she just hadn't realised Mum was like that, so it hadn't occurred to her as even a possibility. Just. "Um. You and Rebecca, er..."

"Yes, of course — I didn't realise you didn't know, it wasn't like we tried to hide it from you. You were really young at the time, I guess, but..." Mum sighed. "I never thought I needed to spell these things out, I thought it was obvious. I get now that I should have — basic stuff, if you're not taught something you'll just pick up hegemonic cultural attitudes, and our culture is deeply homophobic — but I thought just being around... I should have been more careful, this is my fault, I'm sorry."

Mum was staying externally calm, more or less — acting experience, Dorea assumed, she was generally pretty good at presenting the mood she wanted to — but there was still a note on her voice that made Dorea's stomach squirm. "No, Mum, don't be— It's not... I don't– I feel so stupid." And now it was really bloody obvious why Mum was taking this so personally, which was making Dorea feel kind of terrible, enough that she could feel it clawing at her throat, that Mum might— "It's not, um, I don't... Well, honestly, it still seems really weird. I don't know weird how, just a really vague...off-ness, you know. I don't think you're... I remember I loved Rebecca, I just...didn't think of it. I mean, with Sirius and Richard, I guess I just kind of assumed."

"Bisexual people exist," Mum said with a curl on her voice Dorea didn't know how to read. "I started liking girls first, even, I thought I was a lesbian from...oh, around your age, I suppose, a little younger. I thought there was something wrong with me, at first, I was... Well, it can be hard sometimes — with all the homophobia baked into how our society works, imagine how difficult it can be for kids just starting to figure things out. How my family could be about some things didn't make it any easier. Did you never wonder why me and Ethan don't get on?"

She hadn't, actually — Ethan was her actual uncle, Mum's elder brother, and Dorea was aware siblings could have issues sometimes. She'd just assumed it was normal family stuff. "Did he, um. Not approve?"

Mum huffed. "He outed me, in fact. He walked in on me with a girlfriend, and immediately told our parents, all of his friends, and pretty much everyone, really. A lot of people didn't take it well. My parents weren't that bad, at least, more just...disapproving and condescending about it, you know, like I was just acting out or something. But the neighbours and a lot of the kids at school were more... There are reasons I don't like going back to Hinckley — my last couple years there were miserable."

...Oh. Um.

"I thought I was a lesbian at first, but I think it was just a maturity thing — boys take longer than girls, you know. The first time I had a thing for a boy wasn't until near the end of secondary, didn't actually do anything with one until after I moved to London. Your grandparents were infuriatingly smug when I told them about Sirius, and they were terribly rude to Becca the one time they met." Her voice dropping to a mutter, "I still don't know why I bothered, honestly..."

Dorea was starting to understand why they didn't visit her grandparents very often. She'd assumed it was just the distance — Coventry wasn't that far away, but it did mean that if they wanted to visit they had to make a whole day of it — or that they hadn't been happy about paying for a private secondary school and then university only for Mum to get knocked up and let her acting career fizzle out before it'd hardly begun. Things could be kind of tense when they did visit, sometimes, so, she'd thought there was something to the latter. But this also made sense. "I'm sorry." She didn't know what she was apologising for, exactly, just seemed like the thing to say.

"Oh Dove, I..." Letting out another sigh, Mum held out a hand. Dorea shifted her (cooling) tea to one hand so she could take it. Mum's hand felt really warm — really it was just that Dorea's hands were often cold, she sometimes needed to wear gloves inside Hogwarts during the winters — gripping tight around hers. "I'm not angry with you, lovie. Myself, a bit. I assumed too many things when you were growing up, and that's on me. You're not responsible for me not telling you things. Okay?"

Dorea didn't buy that, honestly. Maybe if she'd paid attention for two seconds, and put together what'd been going on with Rebecca, or Toby and Nathan, maybe if she weren't a bloody idiot they could have had this conversation years ago, and it wouldn't be a problem. But, her eyes stinging and her throat itching, Mum's thumb lightly rubbing over the back of her knuckles, she didn't feel like arguing the point just now. (It's not like she wanted to talk Mum into thinking she was just a terrible self-centred bitch, after all.) "Okay."

"Okay. As much as I'm not angry with you about it, we can't just leave it. We'll have to... I don't know. Talk about this stuff more. And not just me — maybe you can stay with Toby and Nathan for a few days, before you leave for school. I would say Becca and Jo, but I don't want to have to tell her about this, it would break her heart. That woman loves you to pieces, you know — she about broke down every time you didn't recognise her after a seizure."

...Dorea didn't remember that, honestly. She tended to have trouble with people's faces for a while after waking up, so it was definitely believable, but there were a lot of blanks in her memory of the years her disease had been really bad. She did remember Rebecca used to come over to mind her sometimes, when Mum was shopping or talking to one doctor or another or just needed a break...or going out with Richard, which was kind of odd in retrospect, considering Rebecca was apparently her ex. Whatever, not her business. "Yeah, I don't want to... That's fine, Toby and Nathan are fine. And I don't think I know a Jo." Rebecca's girlfriend, from context, but...

"Mm, it's very likely you never met — you've been at school, and Becca normally comes to us. They've been together for nearly three years now, I think. Jo has a few children from a marriage — the eldest, Stefan, is about your age I think — maybe we can have them all over for dinner one day. Not here, we'd have to go out. But, the whole point I'm going for here is to be more open about being who we are, to talk about it, and I don't want to have to tell Becca why. Toby won't take it as hard."

Putting it that way made Dorea feel kind of terrible, really. Especially since, well, it was Rebecca, she'd basically always been around, and— Dorea just felt like such an arsehole, that was all. She didn't trust herself to speak at the moment, so she just nodded.

"It's okay, Dove, we— It'll be okay. But in the meantime, maybe it's better Liz isn't talking to you. She is a mindreader and all — I think you should leave her be until you can talk about this stuff without thinking it's just weird. She's had enough people telling her she's a freak already, she doesn't need it from her friends too."

Dorea felt herself wince — she was aware that was a thing the Dursleys had called her all the time, both from things Liz had let slip and that bloody Skeeter article. She suspected most of their friends thought Liz was weird in one way or another, so she wasn't sure how much of a difference it made, but. And the mind magic would still be an issue — she'd never been entirely comfortable with Liz being a mind mage, but it hadn't really bothered her until Liz had started getting perceptibly more dangerous — but that was a separate problem, not the time to bring it up. She was slightly annoyed that Mum was basically telling her to stay away from the girl who had been her best friend, for Liz's benefit, but she did have a point, so. "Okay, I can do that. But, with the World Cup and the study group and..."

"I'm not taking her side, lovie. It's not fair to her to have a friend who's uncomfortable with her, but it's not fair to you, either. It's better for the both of you to take a break for now." Dorea blinked at her, Mum smirked back. "Mum powers — Liz isn't the only one who can read your mind, you know."

That was not at all the same thing, and Mum knew it...but that had been kind of eerie, honestly, she had no idea how Mum had picked up on that. But there was really nothing to say to that, so she just rolled her eyes.

"About the World Cup, and your mutual friends at school, you don't have to avoid her completely. Just, give her space. If you're close enough that being reminded about her sexuality makes you uncomfortable, you're too close."

"...That makes sense, I guess. Okay, we can do all that. I mean, all of it, with Toby and—" Not really sure where she was going with that sentence, she cut herself off with a sigh. Well, she had kind of known where it was going, but she didn't want to admit that Mum and Toby and Rebecca and Nathan being the way they were made a difference to her, er, not wanting to be weird about gay people — it definitely did, she felt like such an arsehole, but that seemed kind of shallow. "And maybe it'll make things less awkward with Hannah and Susan too, so, yeah." There, that was a less embarrassing point.

"Hannah and Susan? your friends from school?"

"Yeah, they've been dating since winter break — I think they got together at the Greenwood, actually. I, er, accidentally spotted them snogging in the bushes, and, um, yeah." In retrospect, Dorea thought she might have kind of outed them, asking friends if they knew what was going on there, but Hannah and Susan hadn't made a point of hiding it at school, so it probably hadn't made a difference. Did it count as outing someone if they were never in the closet in the first place?

For some reason, Mum looked faintly exasperated, but she didn't say whatever she was thinking. "It was all rather intoxicating, I'm not surprised." Dorea was reminded her latest baby sibling had all but certainly been conceived on that same day, felt her face warm. "And, I don't want you to... It is okay if you and Liz can never be like you were before. I know the mind magic makes you uncomfortable too, and I admit, it can be a bit creepy."

"And you can't even feel her there." Dorea was pretty terrible at occlumency, but she could feel it when Liz went rummaging around — not passively looking, that was mostly unnoticeable, but when she actively did something, pulling up a memory or whatever to figure out what Dorea meant by something. Like little electric fingers tugging at her insides, it was very uncomfortable.

"I can, actually." At Dorea's surprise, Mum gave her a flat look. "Muggles can do basic mind magic, same as anyone who isn't a legilimens. We do have minds, you know."

...Well, apparently it was possible to feel even more like an idiot than she already had a second ago. She was pretty sure she'd heard that somewhere before, but it'd completely slipped her mind. But even so, "Um, I guess, but I didn't know anyone taught you."

"True. I guess I've just been around magic enough to kind of pick up on it. I can feel it when people are doing magic around me too, or if something is enchanted or not — I don't know how normal that is for muggles." Feeling magic didn't require actually doing magic, so it probably wasn't unusual, when Dorea thought about it. Just, with the Statute of Secrecy, muggles didn't tend to spend a whole lot of time around magic, so they weren't likely to recognise it for what it was. "If the mind magic makes you too uncomfortable to be close with her, that's understandable. It's not something she can help, but you can't help feeling vulnerable because of it either — if it puts too much of a strain on your friendship, then so be it, that's understandable. But the other thing, that we have to do something about."

"Yeah, I get that. I don't... Okay." Dorea definitely felt like she should be saying something, but she didn't know what — especially since Mum had just brushed off her apology earlier. Though, she wasn't sure what she'd be apologising for, exactly. She just felt terrible was all, and she, just, she didn't know.

"Okay." With a last squeeze of her hand, Mum let go, sitting up straight in her weird cross-legged pose again. By the little strained breath she let out, leaning over like that for so long must have been uncomfortable, she hadn't needed to do that... "We can talk about something else now, if you like, but first, is there anything else about this, you and Liz, that I should know about?"

Dorea shrugged, taking a sip of her tea — oh jeez, it'd cooled off quite a bit. And she'd left her wand upstairs, dammit... "Um, I don't think so."

"I am the first person you talked to about Liz being gay, right?" It wasn't really a question, the lightness of her tone suggesting Mum was pretty sure she was.

So when Dorea opened her mouth to answer, but then immediately froze, Mum noticed right away, her brow furrowing a little. "I, um. Did I mention, I think something happened with them, Liz and Daphne, in Romania?"

"You did. I'm very happy for Liz. What of it?" This time, there was a suspicious, cautious sort of edge to Mum's voice, worried Dorea was about to say something she wasn't going to like.

Dorea was a little taken aback for a second — honestly, the thought of being happy for Liz had never occurred to her, which seemed a little cold, when she thought about it — but then couldn't help wincing a little at the question. "Um. Back in the hotel room, when we were alone, I, um, asked Hermione about it. If she thought they were, you know, acting weird. I might have mentioned that conversation in the library."

Mum just stared at her. "Might have?"

"Did — I told her. It, um, she didn't really seem to be getting what I was trying to say, with Liz and Daphne, so, er...it seemed like the thing to do."

"Oh, Dove..." Mum let out a long sigh, rubbing at her forehead with one hand — Dorea shuffled awkwardly in her seat, trying not to feel too, she didn't know. That that maybe wasn't something she should be telling other people hadn't occurred to her at the time, she hadn't been thinking about it, but in retrospect it was obvious that she'd been kind of outing Liz to another of their friends, and that was maybe crossing a line, and she was an idiot. "What did she say about it?"

Dorea shrugged. "Nothing, really, she hardly reacted. I'm not even sure she believed me." More than anything else, Hermione had seemed confused over why they'd been having that conversation at all, and maybe a little irritated. Which could be for any reason, really — Hermione had never been much for gossip, and the irritation could just be because she wanted to get to bed — so it was hard to say what she'd been thinking.

"Well, that's something, I suppose, but I'm going to have to tell Liz that you told her. I was going to write her already, about all this, but now I really need to — it wouldn't do for her to be blindsided by it the next time she sees Hermione."

"She's staying at Liz's house for the last few weeks of break." Mum raised a questioning eyebrow at her. "Emma's having a hard time of it, you know, she's heading to the Greenwood early, just in case. Since she was going to be home alone most of the time anyway, Liz invited Hermione over to her place. We were talking about cooking at the time, I think Liz did it because Hermione said she couldn't cook, so she'd be living on takeout or whatever."

"Oh, how sweet." It was, sort of, it was always unexpected when Liz did things like that without prompting. "Did this happen before are after you talked to Hermione about her?"

"Before." Well, Dorea didn't know if it was a hundred per cent going to happen, Hermione hadn't talked to her parents about it yet, but if it did become a certainty that would have happened after their conversation, so.

"Then Liz absolutely needs to know. I should get started on that letter now," Mum said, reaching for where she'd set aside her textbook and papers. "Did you want to get started on lunch while I do that? Getting the biscuits was very thoughtful of you, but I'm probably going to be hungry again by the time the macaroni cheese is ready."

Not a surprise, Mum was eating a lot, pregnancy could be like that. "Okay, I can do that. I'm sorry, about telling Hermione, I wasn't thinking. And, you know, the other stuff."

Mum let out a long sigh, her eyes tipping up to the ceiling for a moment before flicking back to Dorea with an ambivalent sort of smile. "It's alright, Dorea. I'm not angry with you. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't...disappointed, but more with myself than you. It'll be okay, we'll make it okay. Okay?"

"Okay. I'll get started on lunch, then." Dorea stood up, a little more clumsily than usual, feeling tense and shaky — that conversation had gotten rather intense at points, so — started collecting things back onto the tea tray. Mum had somehow managed to polish off the biscuits pretty quick, even while talking, but Dorea hadn't even quite finished her tea.

Dorea was just turning around to leave when Mum grabbed her elbow — gently, but she had been moving, she nearly dropped the tray, cups rattling against saucers. "I love you, Dorea."

...That Mum apparently felt the need to make that clear just now was honestly making Dorea feel kind of terrible. It was obvious in retrospect why Mum had taken this so personally, and it— Dorea felt like such an arsehole, that was all. Shifting the tray over to balance on one arm, Dorea took her hand, skin soft and hot against hers. After taking a second to work the knot out of her throat, "I love you too, Mum."

Her other hand coming up, thumb rubbing against the back of Dorea's, Mum stared silently at their hand for a moment — her face mostly blank, in that way she got when she was thinking about something, lips occasionally twitching with unvoiced words. Finally, she let go, cleared her throat. With a little wave, "Go on, then. I'll catch up when I'm done with my letter."

Dorea left without a word, her chest tight and echoes from their talk turning over ceaselessly in her head. That hadn't gone anything like she'd expected, and... Well, it could have been worse. Mum wasn't angry with her, at least, so. That was something. She did still feel like an arsehole, but she was— Well, she'd just have to work on that, she guessed. She hadn't thought... Well.

Oh, she was not looking forward to her stay with Toby and Nathan — Mum had said she'd be telling them what was going on, and, that was just going to be so painfully awkward...

---

Uuuggghhhh. I hated this chapter — to be 100% fair, not quite so much on the proofread as I did while writing it — but tinkering with it is just going to frustrate me and not make it any better in the end anyway, so fuck the police, here it is. I think it's trash, but maybe that's just me. Seems like it often is.

Anyway, right, fine. Next chapter is the surprise I mentioned, it's finally here! Oooo, what could it be, it's a mystery! Heh, that rhymed...

Bye.