"Mum," Rose said slowly, watching her mother, Hermione Granger-Weasley, read a legal brief. She was twisting a long strand of hair around a quill, her nose wrinkling the way it always did when she read something that annoyed her.
"Yes, darling?" her mum asked without looking up.
"I got a job offer," she said, figuring it would be best to blurt it out
"That's nice."
Rose sat, sipping her tea and waiting for her words to sink in. It took longer than expected for mum to drop the papers and stop twirling her hair. When it finally happened, mum burst into a grin, clapping her hands together.
"Rose! And it's something you want, then?"
"Yes," Rose said, staring down at the table. "I'm pretty sure I'm going to take it, actually."
"Well," her mum demanded, a smile erupting on her face. "Tell me everything!"
"There's not much I can tell you, actually?"
"Rose Weasley, surely you haven't considered a job without getting all of the facts and a - "
"Mum," Rose interrupted, rolling her eyes skywayrd. She'd learned long ago from her father that the trick was to butt in early enough to slow her mother's momentum ("Sometimes it's like being married to your Gran," her dad had once confided with a shudder).
"Sorry, sorry," her mum said just a little breathlessly.
"It's with the Department of Mysteries."
Her mother, like Scorpius, froze. Her eyes narrowed, and she slapped her hand on the worn wood of the kitchen table. "I'm going to jinx your Uncle into next week the first chance I get."
"Mum!"
"He didn't tell your father, did he? If he told Ron then - "
"Told Ron what?" her father asked, coming into the kitchen and heading, as always, straight for the cupboards. "Eggs, Rosie?"
"Sure, dad," Rose said, and the pang she felt at the familiar scene - her father tucking a kitchen towel into his jean pocket and toasting bread with his wand as her mother sat, arms crossed and brain whirring - made her want to give up the idea of being an Unspeakable all over again.
"Ronald," her mum said, "have you spoken to our former best friend lately?"
"What?" her dad asked around a mouthful of toast. "Course I did. Owled me this morning. And what's this about him being our former best friend?"
"Rose?" her mum prompted, and Rose buried her face in her hands.
"What's this got to do with Rosie?" her dad demanded, dropping his toast to the counter. "Is this about that Malfoy boy?"
"Dad! You like Scorpius."
"Like might be taking it a little too far," he mumbled, picking his toast back up. "Well, if they've not run off to elope, I don't see the problem."
"Scorpius is my friend!" Rose interjected, her face hot.
"Oh, yes. Your friend. I was your mother's friend once. Don't think I don't know exactly what ol' Scorpius is - "
"Dearheart," her mum interrupted with infuriating patience. "Perhaps you should let Rose and I finish our chat."
"I bloody well think not," her dad said, crossing his arms and giving them an expectant look.
"Thanks a lot, mum," Rose sighed.
"Well, you're going to have to tell him eventually."
"Tell. Me. What?"
Feeling rather cross about how the turn her carefully planned conversation had taken, she bit out, "I've been asked to join the Department of Mysteries."
Her father stared at her, mouth open before shaking his head and storming across to the fireplace that took up a corner of the kitchen. He reached into a pot on the mantle, pulled out a handful of floo powder and threw it into the flames. "Harry!" he bellowed. "Harry Potter, get your stupid arse in my fireplace right bloody now!"
Rose gave her mother a look, and when Hermione merely shrugged her shoulders Rose hunched down in her chair with a huff.
Within seconds, her uncle's messy hair appeared in the fireplace. He was still adjusting his glasses and blinking fast.
"Ron? Oh, hullo Hermione. Rose. What's wrong? Hugo just popped over."
"You bloody well know exactly what this about," her dad seethed.
Uncle Harry glanced her direction and Rose gave a helpless shake of her head. "Don't be a tosspot. They've been watching her progress for ages. Don't ask me how they know to bother, but they do. This is the first offer they've made in eleven years. They came to me, and I gave my endorsement. You'd have done the same."
"I ruddy well would not! What if it were Lily? Or Al?"
Uncle Harry snorted. "Al can no more keep a secret than you can. And Lily's too caught up in Quidditch to care about much of anything. She's driving Gin spare."
"She's only seventeen!"
"Oh, Ron," Hermione harumphed. "Think about what we were doing at seventeen."
"I did that so she wouldn't have to! We all did!"
"Merlin's beard!" Rose finally exclaimed. "I'm sitting right here!"
They all turned to look at her and she closed her eyes and counted to ten. "Uncle Harry, thanks for what you said. Just now and to…well, to whomever it was. But I think I need to talk to mum and dad."
"Right," he said quickly. "See you at the burrow later?"
"Not like I can help it," her dad muttered.
"Heard that. Cheers, Hermione!" And then Uncle Harry was gone.
"Dad. I want this. I want it so badly. I want it badly enough that I've finally convinced myself I can bear the eighteen months of training. I hope you can, too."
"Eighteen ruddy months," he sighed, collapsing into a chair. "Well, you're bloody well not getting any eggs now."
Her mum sat back in her chair and smiled across the table at dad. "Run along, dear, and let me talk to Rose."
"This isn't over, young lady," dad said, wagging a finger at Rose. "My office later."
She answered with a kiss to his cheek, and he patted her head and stood, stepping out of the kitchen.
Her mother waited and the door to her dad's study had shut before speaking. "Rose, I'm very proud of you."
"Thanks, mum," Rose said, fighting down a blush.
"You got all the best parts of your father and I and - "
"Hugo got the worst?"
"Very clever, but no. Your father's been worried about where you'd end up ever since he saw your OWLs"
"You got - "
"Not quite as many," her mum said, smiling at Rose fondly. "Truth be told, you remind me more of your Uncle than of your dad or me. I expect that's what scares dad most."
"I'm nothing like Uncle Harry," Rose said, wrinkling her nose.
Her mother just laughed. "You are more than you realize. He was always the best of the three of us. The bravest. The most loyal. The most selfless. The most driven. He still is, at that. I don't know how Ginny puts up with him."
"Saint Potter," Rose said. "That's what Scorpius calls him."
"Ah, yes," mum said, raising an eyebrow and sipping her tea innocently. "Scorpius."
"Oh sod it." Rose said, dropping her head to the table with a thud.
"Rose. You knew I'd be pleased as punch about your job. I'll miss you, of course, but you're an adult. I can't expect you to live at home forever. Logically, I can only assume you came to talk to me about the eighteen months away your father is currently despairing over in his office."
"Dad's right. You're insufferable."
"He's suffered me just fine for thirty years now."
"I don't even know where to start. I don't even know how I started at all."
Her mother's smile was sympathetic now, and she reached out and took Rose's hand. "That's how it is, I'm afraid. Sometimes it hits you like a freight train - well, that's how it was with your Uncle Harry, I think, but he's not exactly normal - and sometimes it comes on so slowly you don't even know it's happened until you're in over your head. Of course," she continued with a pointed glance toward her husband's office, "some people are just gits who can't see what's right in front of their stupid freckled faces."
"I had never even considered it," Rose said. "I've never considered it with anyone. I had to focus on school. I had to get top marks. I had to be head girl. But when I got that blasted letter my first thought was, 'Oh, what will Scorpius say,' and then he was all I could think about."
"Your father is going to love this."
"Real helpful, mum."
"I'm sorry. Sometimes I think that a lifetime of friendship with your father and uncle has ruined me for serious conversation."
"It had just never occurred to me," Rose said, wishing her voice didn't sound quite so desperate, quite so terrified. "He's been a part of my life since I got to Hogwarts. I can't imagine a life without him in it. At first I thought it was just because we're friends, but it's not the same as it is with Al, and I just don't know what to do. Why do I have to start feeling this now? Why couldn't my supposedly brilliant brain puzzle this together ages ago?"
"Because that's not how it works, darling. Look at your father and I. It took three years and a bloody war to get him up to snuff."
"Am I dad in this situation or you?" Rose asked, a little horrified.
"That depends. What does Scorpius say?"
Rose frowned into her now cold tea, thinking about the night she told him she might be an Unspeakable.
"Scorpius says he won't let me turn this down."
"I always knew I liked that boy."
"But mum. Eighteen months. And what if - "
"You have to decide if it's worth the risk. Or you could bugger all the sacrifices and handle it the Gryffindor way."
"What's that?"
"Show up at his house and blurt it all out."
"Mum!"
"I'm serious!" Her mum laughed, throwing her hands up in the air. "It's what your Aunt Ginny would do."
"Please," Rose said, rolling her eyes. "Lily never shuts up about how her mum loved her dad from the first moment she saw him blah blah blah."
"Yes, but as soon as she had the slightest inkling that Harry might reciprocate her feelings, well, grab the lion by the mane and all that."
"Gross," Rose groaned, but she couldn't hide her grin.
"I just want you to consider all your options, Rose"
"Right now I'm considering whether I can get a jinx in before you put up a shield charm."
"Unlikely," mum said, getting up magicking their teacups to the sink. "And I think you need to go talk to your father now before his feelings get hurt."