Thursday 27th September 1979

Potter Manor, 06:30

James lay back in his bed, just thinking about how surreal this was. He was married. Married. To Lily Evans. No, they were married so she was Lily Potter. Married. This wasn't even his bed; it was their bed. Lily was right there, lying beside him, sleeping soundly. She snored a bit. It was kind of cute. But everything about her was cute. No, attractive. Yes, that was a much better word. Everything about his wife was attractive.

But back to him being married and having a wife and being an adult. The surreal things. The weird things. Because it was such a weird feeling being all grown up. He still didn't feel like he was some days. Some days he still wanted to cause mischief and slack off but he couldn't. He had a job. A duty. There could be no slacking off on those. But that didn't mean he still couldn't have fun or at least try to.

It was getting harder to do that though. With the long days and the depressing news... sometimes it was difficult to smile never mind do something fun. Difficult but not impossible. Not impossible if you had a friend with a motorbike and friends willing to get up to antics with you, no matter how brief and fleeting they were. Or if you had a place where friends could gather for food and drinks, mostly more of the latter. Or if you had this amazing wife who was also an amazing friend and you just fit perfectly with her... That was the sort of thing that made him smile. He was lucky. Very lucky. Luckier than a lot of people.

"It's too early for whatever thinking you're doing," Lily mumbled, rolling over without opening his eyes.

"It's half six."

"Urgh, still too early. Our alarm is for seven."

"That's just half an hour away."

"Exactly, another half an hour for sleeping."

James chuckled and pressed a kiss to her head as she stubbornly kept her eyes shut.

James could probably get up and start his day. Get washed and dressed and then coffee, the newspaper and things like that. Of course, he would wait for Lily before eating breakfast. But he found that he didn't particularly want to move. At least, not yet.

He kind of liked just lying here next to Lily not doing anything and not expected to do anything except just be beside her. He liked being next to Lily. It just felt right.

She rolled over so her face was buried in his chest and wow, he liked that feeling as well. Warmth spread through him as he realised just how much he loved this feeling.

"Love you," he said softly, trailing his hands through her hair.

He would never get sick of saying that or doing that.

"Love you too," Lily mumbled, half asleep already.

Monday 1st October 1979

Knockturn Alley, 17:30

"Oof!"

Remus grabbed her before she hit the ground. That was the second time she had tripped over her own feet. She really was quite clumsy. He thought she would have outgrown it but apparently not.

Not that it was usually a bad thing. In fact, it was actually quite endearing. She wouldn't be Nymphadora Tonks without it.

"Woah, I have you."

"You always do," she said with a smile. "Thanks. I can't believe how clumsy I am."

"Does that affect your Auror Training?"

He would assume that it did. From what James and Sirius said, there was an awful lot of physical requirements but maybe she hadn't got to that part of her Training yet.

"Sometimes. I lurched forward when I put more power into my spell and fell flat on my face the other day."

"Ouch," Remus winced in sympathy.

"Yeah, it was no fun," she said, scrunching up her nose. "Pity you weren't there to catch me."

It was such a flippant remark but Remus couldn't help but wish he was always around to catch her. He rather liked the feeling of her in his arms and it wasn't like he was going to get her in them any other way.

"Knockturn Alley is so weird looking," she commented, looking briefly around her but knowing not to look to interested.

Remus just shrugged and steered them down a side street. He had been here so often that it's contrast to Diagon Alley didn't really register to him after all.

"It's different."

"Cool."

Of course, Tonks would find this sort of place cool. She wasn't exactly normal, after all. Even so, it was quite nice to spend time together with her again. He ways did enjoy her company and they hadn't exactly had a chance since they had all left school. Oh, sure, there were Order meetings and sometimes everyone seemed to end up either at his flat or at the Evans' home but those were infrequent now that everyone was working. So, this was nice even if they were technically working. It was for the Order but it was still work. His only work at the moment but that was beside the point.

"How easy do you think this is going to be?" She asked, thankfully yanking him out of his thoughts.

"I think you mean how hard is it going to be," Remus corrected her.

"I like to be optimistic."

"How about some realism?"

Realism was good. Realism was less likely to get you killed.

"No, how about thinking of worst- and best-case scenarios," Tonks countered. "And going off that?"

"Preparing for the worst-case scenario and being pleasantly surprised if it's the best?"

"Exactly."

Remus shook his head, vaguely impressed. He didn't know why, of course she would be good at this sort of thing - as silly and mischievous Tonks could be, she was very pragmatic and practical. It was such a contrast and more than a bit confusing at times but he didn't mind. Not really.

"Well, best case scenario is we actually manage to get people to talk."

A hard enough thing to do in Knockturn Alley. And unrealistic at the best of times. Even Moreso today because of Tonks' presence. She was a new face. Unknown. And these were the sorts of people who did not appreciate the unknown.

"It's not a simple task," he reminded her.

"I know that," she said dismissively. "But we shouldn't overcomplicate it either. That's where mistakes will creep in."

Remus opened his mouth and then closed it again. She had a point. The more detail they tried to put into a plan the more likely they were to deviate from it if something went even slightly different to what they planned for. And a detailed plan would just waste time. Time, they didn't really have.

"Right," he said determinedly. "What will we do first?"

Tonks looked down at herself and scrunched up her nose.

"Maybe make me a little bit more unassuming?"

"Huh?" Remus gave her a confused look.

But she wasn't paying attention, her eyes were closed and there was a look of concentration on her face.

And then Dora wasn't in front of him but a haggard looking woman of an indeterminate age. There were bags under her eyes and her skin was no longer smooth and flawless. Her hair was now straggly but not tangled or matted and it was a muted brown instead of the more vibrant pink he had become used to. She was taller than what she normally was (not that that made her tall as Dora was pretty short) and even her ears were a different shape.

"What do you think?" She asked in a voice that was definitely not her own.

It was harsher. Like she'd been smoking ten pack of cigarettes every day for ten years.

"Wow." He said, looking her up and down. "Impressive."

She beamed at him; it was still her smile - albeit missing two teeth. Huh. He wondered how she managed that.

"Thanks."

Oh, it was weird hearing that voice come from her.

"How do you get your voice like that?"

"I," then she brought her hand to her mouth and coughed. She continued in her normal voice. "I still haven't quite got it down but I wanted to show you."

"You shouldn't use it if you can't keep it up," Remus said worriedly.

The last thing he needed was for Dora to give herself away. Thankfully, she was nodding in agreement.

"Don't worry. I'm not going to. I just wanted to show you."

"It is very cool," he assured her, earning him another smile.

"Thanks." She looked down the street. "We better get going then, shouldn't we."

"Yes."

She looked down at herself critically. "Once I change my clothes to get more into character."

Saturday 6th October 1979

The Leaky Cauldron, 19:00

Peter tried not to seem too curious about this new person. He didn't want to look eager or anything, that would be weird. And he didn't want to be thought of as weird. No. Being weird was never good. He wanted to be normal. Yeah, normal was good. Especially when you were meeting someone new.

Well, it wasn't just him meeting someone new. Merton had told them all that there was someone else who was interested in join them for their meeting, social nights, whatever you wanted to call them.

A new person was ways fun and interesting because that meant that Peter was even further away from being the new person. Which meant that he was considered more to be part of the group. Which was a nice feeling. Peter liked to feel like he belonged. Like he was a part of something. Oh, sure, he was in the Order but they were all so intense and wanting to fight and change the world. With people like these he could just relax and go with the flow. There were no world shakers among them.

Merton opened the door and ushered the man through. Peter tried not to look too interested. How embarrassing would it be to be caught leaning forwards to try and see someone?

"This is Reginald Rosier."

Rosier. Rosier. That name was familiar. They were one of the more prominent pureblood families, weren't they? Very impressive. And he wanted to hang out with them?

"It's always nice to be around like-minded people." Rosier said.

The guy smiled charmingly at everyone and Peter couldn't help but smile back. He seemed nice, at least. That was always good.

Peter noticed that there was a spare seat next to him so he pointed to it and said, "There's a seat here."

Rosier looked over to him and smiled and actually took the seat.

Peter felt quite proud of the fact that the new guy was sitting next to him. Like he said, he was interesting and charming. Which hopefully meant that Peter was just a little bit more interesting to people. He didn't want to just be someone who hung around in the background. That was boring and no one ever seemed to know of you. Which kind of sucked.

Hopefully Rosier liked him. Wouldn't it be cool if a Rosier became his friend?

Wednesday 10th October 1979

Auror Training, 08:30

Tonks tried not to sigh too heavily as she went into Training today. Moody was taking them and that didn't exactly bode well for her. She got the impression that he just didn't like her. He was always going on at her, picking on her over stupid little things that he didn't say to anyone else. It was annoying and exhausting. But still, she couldn't complain. Shouldn't complaining. She was training to become an Auror, for Merlin's sake. It was her dream and it was Moody's job to help her achieve that. She just wished he'd be a bit nicer about it.

"Get that colour out of your hair, Tonks." He barked at her. "Do you want to be a beacon wherever you go?"

That got some of her fellow trainees tittering as she blushed. She knew that she couldn't have bright pink hair all the time and she would have changed it when they did the physical part of the day! She really would have!

So that's what she did. It was a bit harder to do so now that she felt really embarrassed. Changing her hair by choice was difficult when she was trying to change it from an involuntary colour but she managed it and Moody looked satisfied which was as good a reaction as she was going to get from that man.

Sunday 14th October 1979

McKinnon Farm, 11:00

"So, what about it, mum, dad?" Marlene asked expectantly.

She had given them a few minutes to think about it and digest what she had just asked them so surely, they had an answer.

The question being whether any of them wanted to join the Order. Though, she didn't explicitly say that, of course. It was a secret organisation, after all. One that was becoming a bit more desperate these days. They could only do so much and it was extremely evident that it wasn't enough. Dumbledore's request that they feel out new members was evidence of that. Marlene tried not to think too pessimistically about the reason they need more members. She had attended far more funerals than she ever thought she would. One was too many in her opinion. No, she was going to focus on persuading her parents and siblings to join.

Her parents exchanged looks before looking back at her. Did all married people do that weird talking to each other without actually talking? Marlene still thought it was creepy.

"It sounds like a magnificent group, Marly," her father regarding and Marlene nodded. "But I don't think I could join."

"We," her mother corrected.

Marlene stood there, jaw dropping. This is not what she expected at all. Like, not even a little bit.

"Why?" She demanded.

It was her mother who answered. "Because we have enough trouble in this war being bloodtraiters. We've had too many threats already and we can't afford to put bigger targets on ourselves."

Threats? What threats? This was the first she had heard of them.

"Threats?"

"You'd know about them if you actually came home once in a while," Patrick grumbled.

Marlene rolled her eyes at him. He still hadn't got used to the fact that she, Ciaran and Teagan had all moved out. Out of the country at that too.

"We can't all be good duellers," said her dad, very obviously trying to distract her from these threats. She would pry it out of one of her brothers later. "We have to accept that we won't be able to fight if we were viewed as more of a threat. We can't be seen as a bigger threat."

Bloodtraiters were always threats to these types of people and Marlene knew that. However, that didn't mean they couldn't fight back. Surely it meant that they should be fighting back? But she knew that look on her parents' faces. There was going to be no changing their minds. So, Marlene turned her gaze to her siblings. Surely, she would have some success there? But she feared she already knew what their answers were going to be.

Patrick was already shaking his head. "There's no way I'm putting Jackie or Aoife in any sort of danger."

Marlene sighed but nodded. "I know. I really didn't expect you to take me up on the offer. No one with young kids is in it." She turned to Kevin. "I guess you're a 'no' as well?"

Kevin nodded resolutely. "For my wee ones, I can't. I couldn't ever risk what I have and what I'm going to have."

Oonagh was about to pop any day now. Another McKinnon baby. So, yes, she understood why neither of her eldest brother would actively take part.

She then turned her pleading eyes on Teagan. "Please?"

But Teagan was shaking her head regretfully.

"I'll be no use what with me finalising all my training in America and then moving to Japan."

Teagan was flying through her training with the Wizarding Relations Department. She had several glowing reports. So glowing that her first assignment was going to be outside Europe. Which was far out of the reach of any Death Eater. Marlene supposed that she should be glad that one of her siblings would be far out of harm's way.

But all this left her with just one more sibling. Arguably the sibling she was closest to. Ciaran. Marlene bit her lip anxiously. He was the one person she really wanted to join.

"What you're saying," he began. "Is that you want us to help fight directly against You-Know-Who?"

"It's Voldemort," Marlene corrected absentmindedly, ignoring everyone's flinches.

Ciaran ignored her. "Isn't that the Aurors' job?"

"I am an Auror," Marlene interrupted impatiently. What was his point?

"Then why do you need us? Or anyone else for that matter?"

"Because we're actually doing something!"

They had stopped things from happening. Small things and with casualties but it were still more than the Aurors.

"By putting yourself in more danger?"

Marlene raised her chin stubbornly. "If that's what it takes, then yes."