Ginny disapparated over an hour ago and Harry didn't expect her back until late. She took a great deal of care with her work. It was the reason she was considered one of the best sport journalists in Europe—the woman who almost single-handedly transformed the Prophet's sport section from a joke to the global standard. But her talents also meant Harry would be eating alone tonight with a very distraught Lily.
When Harry parked the car in front of their estate, Lily jumped out of her seat and sprinted inside. She locked herself in Albus' room and, when Harry approached the door, he could hear her crying softly. Lily was closer to James in temperament than Albus, but she still loved her middle brother dearly. After an hour or so, Harry's worries eased, however. He was sure he heard bouncing bed springs, which suggested Lily wasn't so upset as to resist jumping on her brother's bed.
Now early into a Saturday evening, Harry sat at the kitchen table looking through several files, occasionally bringing a cup of self-heating tea to his lips. While he tried to focus on his work, he was distracted.
His heart felt strangely hollow. Both his boys were gone.
James was like his late father in more than just name. He was preternaturally confident and reveled in being the center of attention. He had apparently already been involved with a number of girls at Hogwarts, perhaps by virtue of those bronzed eyes of his that always made him look like he was plotting something deliciously mischievous.
If James resembled his namesake in countenance and composure, Lily was a mixture of Harry and Ginny. Her hair was deep red, her eyes a soft gray. She had a slight lisp, which made her hesitant around strangers. Yet, she was like her mother—bold and strong-willed, never afraid to voice her opinion among family members and those she trusted. But, like her father later in life, she was cautious to make quick judgments.
And Albus…
The boy was scrawny with the same shock of jet-black hair and bottle-green eyes. Of all his children, and Harry hated to rank them, he knew Albus was the most intelligent. He resembled Hermione in the rapidity of his thoughts. Since he was five, Albus had devoured books with non-discriminating abandon: fiction and non-fiction, wizard and Muggle classics, news and Quidditch magazines. Harry was sure Albus would excel far beyond anything he had ever accomplished at Hogwarts.
Harry glanced at his watch. Half past seven. The students would be seated in the Great Hall now. Maybe Albus and Rose stood in the anteroom, terrified of marching in front of their peers to be Sorted. James would be with his posse of friends at the Gryffindor table, waiting to catch a glimpse of his brother and whisper some wisecrack. Deep down, he would be praying his brother ended up in Gryffindor…
Harry looked down at the blur of case reports and gave up. Getting to his feet, and careful not to hit his head on the chandelier above, he went to the icebox. Sighing at its near-empty state, he pulled out a catalog of Witch's Brew and conjured two chicken breasts, tomatoes, and pasta. He removed a pot from the hook above the stove, filled it with water, and placed it on the burner.
"Incendio," he droned.
The tomatoes went flying into a smaller pot and Harry lit a weaker flame beneath it. He was seasoning the chicken when he heard a distant thud and he turned on a pin. A moment later, Hermione and Hugo appeared.
"Oh," he said, lowering his wand, which he'd inadvertently raised in a half-attack stance. "Hi."
"Sorry to bother you," she said, contrite as she glanced at his sauce-spattered wand. "Hugo really wanted to see Lily. Doesn't want to be stuck at home with mum and dad, I reckon."
Harry looked at his nephew. The boy's mood was not much improved. Lily had dealt with the separation of one brother before, but Hugo was new to the departure of a sibling.
"Well, you can try, Hugo," said Harry. "Lily's locked herself in Albus' room, but maybe if you ask real nice she'll let you in."
Hugo didn't need further encouragement. He pulled his hand from Hermione's and dashed up the grand staircase, his feet making a surprising racket.
Hermione shook her head slightly and came up to him by the stove.
"What're you making?"
"Chicken and pasta. You and Hugo want to stay? I have enough pasta and can summon more chicken."
"What about Ginny?"
"All nighter with the Cannons report, I reckon," he said, attempting to sound nonchalant. "The Prophet keeps the sport office well-stocked. Makes it harder for them to leave. The hours they pull..."
Hermione laughed slightly, moving towards the table. He heard her pull out a chair.
"You're one to talk. You work unconscionable hours. What happened to the benefits of being Chief?"
Harry gave her an unimpressed look he usually reserved for rookie Aurors. "I could say the same about you," he countered, sliding the seasoned chicken into another pan. "Don't know how many times I've left the AD and seen your light on."
Hermione had the courtesy to look away. "Fair."
Harry chuckled, prodding the chicken. "I've got to keep better hours," he said more seriously. "I look around this place, you know, and see so much I want to do. The carpeting in James' room is disgusting. I don't want to know why. Lily's room is too small by half, but she doesn't want to move down the hall away from us. Our bedroom could use repainting and the downstairs library needs to be organized, re-shelved—"
"Ah, quite happy to help with that last one."
He smirked. "That's like asking a jewel thief to polish jewelry."
She rolled her eyes before saying, "I didn't know this was bothering you. Clymene Court is huge. What? Twenty-three rooms? You can't expect to maintain them all. You could hire people, of course…"
Harry wrinkled his brow distastefully. "Too much sensitive material. I'm not having strange people poke about in my own home. Plus the expense..."
She sighed, having heard this answer many times before, the latter reason being particularly ridiculous given Harry and Ginny's combined income. "Well, maybe around Christmas we can make a project of it. You, me, Ron, and Ginny. It'd be like the old days at Grimmauld Place."
He hissed through his teeth. "That's when I know it's bad. You're comparing it to Grimmauld Place."
Hermione's easy laugh rang out. "You know that's not true…"
Harry grinned and flicked his wand. The utensils shot from the drawers and skidded to a halt over the table. Hermione plucked them from the air and arranged them on the placemats below.
"So, you're staying?" he asked. "What about Ron?"
"Sure, we'll stay. Ron's watching the Bats match. I doubt I can pull him away," she sighed. "On the subject of remodeling, he'd suggest you upgrade to one of the film projectors he's been testing out. Until you do that, he won't be coming over during a match."
Harry had fallen miserably behind this Quidditch season. He felt a stirring of suitably manly jealousy imagining Ron watching the match with butterbeer in hand.
"That thing is great, though," said Harry, remembering the refurbished Muggle film projector Ron had shown him last month.
"It drives me mad. It's huge and makes such a racket. I don't know how he can even hear the commentary. Does Ginny want one? Seems they're all the rage now."
"Well, she usually attends in person," he said, draining the pasta. "She showed me one of the latest generation Omnioculars the Prophet purchased last month. You can rotate the action in three dimensions now and there are running stats along the edges. But the zoom was the best part. I could see what Langford Boggs had for lunch."
"Delightful," said Hermione. She did not care to know what food was stuck in Langford Boggs' beard.
Harry laughed again, spooning the sauce atop the steaming pasta. He levitated it to the table and patted Hermione's head as he passed.
"You really picked the wrong group of friends, didn't you?"
"More like the wrong country," she grumbled, directing her wand at the glassware in a high cupboard right of the sink. "Only Britain is this Quidditch-obsessed, honestly."
"And you think it'd be better if you were a Muggle?" he grinned. "They're the same about football. There's no avoiding mania over sport, Hermione. Like wizard, like Muggle."
Hermione smiled faintly, almost like a reflex. Like wizard, like Muggle. It was a saying after the war that had since fallen out of fashion.
In hindsight, it had been an odd time. When the full scale of Voldemort's atrocities came to light, the wizarding public—for the first time in centuries—developed an overt and strange fascination with the Muggle world and, by extension, Muggle-borns. As if to make amends for centuries of bigotry and discrimination, Muggle-borns were suddenly cast (whether willingly or not) as the new arbiters of "cool" due to their connection, however tenuous, to the Muggle world. Muggle literature, slang, fashion, cinema, music, drugs, and even religion were looked at with new eyes.
It was a mystifying, but ultimately short-lived, period in British magical history. Nearly two decades later, it was still Ministry policy to promote awareness and respect of Muggles among the magical public, a campaign Harry was often tangentially involved in as the head of the Auror Department.
Some years after Voldemort's fall, when Rose was still a baby, Hermione had been instrumental in the formation of a new Ministry division: the Office of Wizard-Muggle Exchange. It replaced the Misuse of Muggle Artifacts Office and was actually properly funded. Its primary function was to serve as a liaison between young or emigrated Muggle-borns and the magical world, helping them open bank accounts at Gringotts, set up tax and identification documentation, and so forth. The remainder of its resources were used to fund exchange programmes for both wizards and Muggles to experience life on the other side. So far there had been no need to obliviate any of the Muggles who participated in the programme. All had kept their word and the wizarding world was as safe as it ever was from exposure.
"Should I call them?" Harry asked.
Hermione nodded, removing a carton of mango juice from the icebox, Lily's favorite.
With a flick of his wrist, a silver stag erupted from his wand and charged out of the kitchen and up the staircase towards Albus' room.
Hermione sucked in a breath.
"What?" he said, bemused.
"That's always caught me off guard," she smiled. "That's when you know your house is too big: when you use a patronus to call your kids to dinner."
Harry laughed, passing a hand through his unruly hair. "I figure it's less startling than apparating in their…."
The patter of feet on the stairs echoed like a hard rain.
"Spaghetti!" Lily cried, rounding the corner, a giddy Hugo just behind her.
"Yes, yes," said Harry. "Wash your hands first."
His daughter skidded to a halt in front of the sink. "Daddy!"
Harry swished and flicked and Lily rose several inches off the ground. Her waiflike arms stretched out to reach the taps.
Harry watched curiously as Hermione waved her wand over Hugo's hands. A viscid, ice-blue blob appeared below the tip and Hugo stuck his hands inside, scrubbing his palms.
"What's that?"
"New spell," she said offhandedly. "I've been using it with the kids at the park. It's just a water spell, sanitation charm, and plasticity element together."
Harry raised a brow. This wasn't the first time Hermione had "invented" a spell. Technically speaking, spell creation was a licensed and registered affair at the Ministry. But, in this matter, Hermione didn't precisely follow regulations. Yet another thing that had changed after the war.
"Right," said Harry as he lowered Lily to the ground. "Teach it to me later."
There was not one mention of missing siblings at dinner, much to Harry's relief. Lily and Hugo chattered about school friends and new teachers and meaningless drabble. His food was complimented. By the time they finished, it was past nine and time for bed.
Harry was a loving father. But, in some ways, he was also very strict.
For example, Lily and Hugo cleaned their plates with soap and water when a simple Scourgify from him or Hermione would've worked just as well. He didn't want to make their lives harder, but he reckoned understanding the menial way of doing things was important. Soon they'd have use of a wand and things would become all too easy for them. It was one of the biggest problems the Ministry faced in communicating the difficulties of Muggle life to wizards. If he couldn't make his own children imagine a life without magic, how could he expect wizarding society to?
The kids never put up too much of a fight, though. They knew there were certain things Harry didn't budge on. Like the washing up. And talking to strangers. And conversing with enchanted objects. And using spells you just found handwritten in some book. And jumping on the backs of mountain trolls. That was it, really.
"Daddy? Story tonight?" Lily asked, pulling at his large hand with her small ones.
"Sure." He hid a smile, relieved Lily was so cheerful. "Go pick one out. I'll be up in a bit."
"Mum, can I hear the story too?" Hugo whined. "I like it when Uncle Harry reads the stories."
Hermione looked to Harry and he nodded.
"All right. Go upstairs and we'll be up in a few."
The pair careened out of the kitchen as quickly as they'd come. Harry and Hermione were left alone.
"Thanks for that," she said. "I think it's good if they don't dwell on the others' leaving. Being around Lily helps."
"Agreed," said Harry, rinsing his hands at the sink. "I guess the good thing is Albus is great at writing letters. It'll be good for them to build up a correspondence."
"I didn't get the chance to ask you," she said quietly. "How are you with Albus leaving?"
He started, surprised. "I—"
"Dad-deeeeee!" A high-pitched squeal that could raise Inferi.
"Coming, sweetie!" Harry yelled back. "This is why we have patronuses," he whispered to Hermione.
She laughed as he turned down the lights with a wave of his hand.
Lily picked one of Hermione's favorites: Peter Pan. This magical edition of Barrie's story was published after the war, so Peter and Wendy flew out the window on page seven, fairy dust glimmering on parchment, and the crocodile growled appreciatively on page twenty-five, satiated with his carryout Captain Hook.
Despite Lily's small room, her bed was quite roomy. Hugo and Lily snuggled together in the middle of the bedspread, and Harry stretched out next to Hugo while Lily nestled against Hermione's chest. Hermione absentmindedly braided Lily's hair as Harry read.
Harry was about to crow like a Lost Boy celebrating Peter's victory when Hermione touched his shoulder. Hugo and Lily were asleep. Harry loosened the book from Hugo's grasp and Hermione gently raised Lily off her chest and lowered her to the bed.
"We can leave them for a bit," Harry whispered in the hallway. "Drink before you go? I got some wine in yesterday."
Hermione sighed and cast a distracted glance down the corridor. "If I was smart, I'd go home and work on that Callahan brief. I hope Ron's fixed himself something…"
"I'm supposed to be looking over the quarterly review," said Harry, burrowing his shoe into the carpet. "They need my comments by Tuesday. Haven't read a page."
"Well, we're past the days when I could've covered for you," she smiled as they made their slow way towards the stairs, the lights dimming magically after them. She lingered on the landing, overlooking the grand foyer of Harry's home. "Who am I kidding?" she finally said. "I'd love some wine."
Harry chuckled. "Red or white?"
"Red."
"I've got a Malbec and a red Riesling. What d'you think?"
"Malbec. You?"
"Same."
Hermione settled in the library while Harry uncorked the wine, pouring the aromatic liquid into two stemless glasses. He found Hermione curled up on the récamier, her shoes kicked haphazardly aside. Wordlessly, he handed her a glass and seated himself across from her.
"I love this room," she sighed. Her eyes ran along the shelves like a lovestruck teenager.
"You can thank Sirius."
"Some way to thank him," she said, mischievous eyes now trained on him. "You inherit perhaps one of the most complete collections of English magical history and don't even bother to care for it."
Harry snorted. "Like Sirius would've given two shits. But I do try, you know. I just don't have the time. Neither does Ginny."
"I know. You both are so busy. We all are, really." She took a sip of wine.
Harry blinked and smiled slowly at her. "Yes, we're all busy. But we're not all up for promotion, are we?"
She started, wine running down her chin—a thin ribbon from reddened lips.
"Hermione Jean Granger," he said, smug. "Made senior counselor in three years. Deputy Director in another ten. What next? Director before the decade's out?"
She wiped at her chin, looking anywhere but him, her face approaching the color of the liquid in her glass.
"No one's supposed to know anything about that," she mumbled.
"I don't really know," he said, looking at her fondly. "But you know how rumors spread. The Ministry holds secrets as well as an unregulated cauldron bottom. So, what's the offer?"
If possible, she flushed deeper. "Nothing's been said officially, but John Lakey has approached me about making me Deputy Director. I told him I'd have to think about it."
He grinned. "Well, congratulations. I could feign surprise, but I doubt anyone would believe it. It doesn't take an arithmancer to know they've got a legal genius in their midst. I'm going to have to start saluting you when you become Minister."
Her face was practically radiating in the dimness. "This is great wine, by the way."
He laughed, a gravelly rumble she was used to hearing when he drank. "If I'm not feigning surprise, you don't have to feign modesty."
"I'm not being modest," she protested. "In all seriousness, I haven't decided what to do. Nothing's going to happen right away. I've got my current caseload to manage and then there's Hugo. He's got two years left with us before Hogwarts," she said, almost angry. "I'm not going to throw away the time I could've spent with him buried in my work. I never…I didn't imagine it would feel like everything is moving so fast. Everyone says that about children. I'm not sure I really believed it until today."
Harry nodded, face outwardly impassive as it often was in the years since he became Chief. "I felt the same way about James...and Albus."
She sat up a little straighter, watching him closely. "You didn't answer me before. About Albus."
"About his leaving?"
She nodded. He released a long breath. His expression didn't change, but his eyes came to rest on the glass in Hermione's hand.
"I felt like…I feel like I understand Albus," he said softly. "He's me, to some extent. At least some version of me if I'd had a different childhood."
Hermione nodded. She had always noticed the similarities. Not just in appearance, but in the incorporeal aspects of their characters. Albus was loyal. He was tender. He was strong-willed. But he could also be sacrificing, possessive, and self-critical to a fault. As though he gestated in a potent stew of his father's neuroses, rather than his mother's womb. He emerged a startling simulacrum of Harry Potter. All angular limbs, baby milk-white skin, and eyes as green as a Dark Mark. A proffered second chance to right the wrongs done to the Boy Who Lived.
"I think I understand him. Who knows if I really do," he said, "but just recently I started to wonder what if he doesn't know me?"
"What do you mean?"
"Well, you said it before. I wasn't around when they were little, before I was Chief," he replied, tone flat. "I could blame it on the work. There were still Death Eaters. There was talk of an insurgency. But you remember how I was then. I was so focused on making my way in the Department, I was rarely home. I didn't want to be home. I was addicted to the adrenaline of those days."
Hermione's toes curled into the carpet as if she longed to stand and go to him.
"The worst of it was when I first saw James," he continued, staring at his hands. "He was two weeks old. The second Ginny put him in my arms, he started crying. He wouldn't stop no matter what I did. I know I shouldn't put stock in what a baby does, but I still think about it." He laughed somewhat bitterly. "I think Ginny wanted me to feel that horrible. I deserved it, after all."
Harry fell quiet, so Hermione ventured a response. "Things were better once you were made Chief."
"They were better," he agreed. "But I was still working eighteen-hour shifts. I'd come home some days when the kids were eating breakfast. They were wonderful, kissing and hugging me like I was back from a war and not the office. Ginny told them I was working very hard for them.
"But that was their first education of who I was, wasn't it? I was some man who showed up too tired to read them stories or brush their hair. Who didn't know James wouldn't eat potatoes if they were touching eggs or Albus couldn't sleep if there were thunderstorms." He sat back in his chair, looking somehow older. "Whatever other education they got about me came from the press, I reckon. Or from the kids in their class who looked up when they heard their last name. I'm sure they noticed how all the teachers and parents treated me differently. Only you and Ron were the same."
Hermione waited. She watched for signs—the tension of his neck, the tick of his hands, the hunch of his shoulders.
"And I've come to realize the kids have different ways of dealing with me. James loved the Harry Potter bits. He'd ask if rumors were true. Did you really look at a basilisk and nothing happened? Did you cast a patronus when you were eleven? Were you really recruited by the Tornadoes? That sort of shit.
"Lily…Lily's pure," Harry smiled. "She doesn't care who I am or where I work. She only cares that I do 'dad' things with her. Read stories, buy her toys, teach her to fly. Maybe that'll change. I don't know…
"And then there's Albus…"
Hermione watched the veneer of impassivity fall away and, for the briefest moment, she saw the boy she first knew. He looked up and smiled at her.
"Maybe you'll think this odd, but I think I named Albus well. I know the papers hated it when they found out. But they didn't know. They didn't know Dumbledore. Al's got those same piercing eyes, the kind that go straight through you..." He glanced at his wine, smile fading. "So, I felt like Albus—unlike James and Lily—understood there was a famous, public version of me and a dad version. All he was trying to do was figure out who I really was. It's my own fault that I was never around enough or open enough for him to work it out. And now he's at Hogwarts."
He said the last word like a curse and Hermione's mouth slipped open. Was this the first time she'd heard him refer to their former school without a loving lilt in his voice?
Again, she watched. She studied the plane of his brow and cords of his neck as carefully as a she did a spellbook. Knowing all the while that Harry Potter never made cries for help. He telegraphed them from miles away, like pings from a black box at the bottom of the ocean. Save me. Don't save me. They were obfuscated, muddled, and strangled under calcified layers of pride and experience. There was a time in his life when no one had cared about him. And he still half-believed it.
Hermione stood and padded over to him. She lowered herself to the ottoman next to his chair.
"Listen to me," she said, touching his knee. "You are an exceptional father. James, Lily, Albus—they adore you. Not because you're famous but because you are theirs." She watched him closely. "They've got their whole lives to know you. A child's relationship to their parents…it always changes. It's not one way forever. If Albus feels disconnected from you now—even while I'm sure that's not true—there's no reason to believe it'll stay that way. Children grow, they mature. Parents do too, come to think of it."
Harry didn't reply. He had closed his eyes, whether to avoid meeting her gaze or the effect of drink, she wasn't sure. Her hand slipped from his knee and she tried a different tack.
"You're not alone in feeling this way," she said softly. "Rose is so bright. 'Just like me,' people always say. But since she was eight or so, she's always preferred Ron. And that hurts, it hurts all the time." Harry opened his eyes. "But she's my daughter. There'll be a time when she needs me again and when she does I'll try like hell to form a stronger bond with her. If she falls away again, I'll wait. All she has to know is she can come back whenever she's ready."
Harry released a soft breath and shook his head. Her eyes widened when he reached out and held the arc of her face in his palm.
"What?" she stammered.
"How did you get like this? How did you get to be you?" he murmured, voice marvel-tinged with a razor edge of envy beneath.
"Like what?" She was having trouble concentrating. His thumb was running along the curve of her cheek.
He smiled faintly, then dropped his hand. "Nothing," he said. "You're right, of course."
He leaned back as if to stand. Hermione blinked rapidly and held out an arm to stop him.
"You do hear me though, don't you? You're no worse a parent than me or anyone else," she said. "Raising kids—it's supposed to be hard. It's maddening. We'd hardly be human if we didn't second-guess ourselves. You understand that, right?"
"Of course," he said again in a tone that indicated he very much didn't. "I'm being dramatic—"
"But you're not! That's what I'm saying."
Harry smiled fondly at her, but not in a way she liked. It was a look that said she couldn't possibly understand what went on in the rank abattoir of his mind. Speaking of dramatic…
"I'm sorry," he said and he genuinely looked it. He covered her hand.
"There's no reason to apologize," she mumbled, looking at their hands on his knee. "It's been an emotional day."
He nodded and, after a moment, stood. Hermione followed suit, looking at the clock on the mantel.
"I'd better get Hugo home," she said. "Thank god it's Saturday. I've one more day to finish the brief, at least."
"Done with your wine?"
Hermione looked back at her glass, half-full and abandoned on the side table. She picked it up and threw it back in a single draught.
"Careful, Granger," he chuckled.
She rolled her eyes and handed it to him. Harry returned the glasses to the kitchen and followed Hermione up the grand staircase in easy silence.
"Have you talked to Ginny about this?" she asked when they reached the landing. "About you and the kids?"
"No." He stuffed his hands in his pockets. "I'm not…I'm not sure she'd understand. I mean…she understands, of course, but she's too close it. She knows firsthand how I wasn't there. Besides, she'd think I'm being ridiculous."
Hermione shook her head. "She wouldn't. You should tell her. She said goodbye to Albus too, you know. Maybe she's hoping you bring it up."
"Maybe," he said. "Have you told Ron about the job offer?"
She looked at the floor. "I haven't. I was hoping that bit of news would stay quiet until I made up my mind."
"You're going to take the job without asking him about it?"
"No, no," she said quickly. "I'll definitely consult him."
Harry laughed lightly.
"What?"
"'Consult?'"
She rolled her eyes again. "You know what I mean."
Lily and Hugo were just where they'd left them. Harry and Hermione smiled at one another and, not really understanding why, Harry leaned down and kissed her cheek. It was not something they always did. Not twice in one day. When her cheek brushed against his glasses, she could smell the wine in his breath against her neck.
"See you Wednesday?" he said, stepping back.
"Monday."
"Oh, right. Callahan," he said, face darkening. "Remind Hugo about his broom for Wednesday, though."
"Sure, sure," she said. "Thanks for suggesting it. It was exactly what he needed."
He shook his head, dismissing her thanks, and watched her go to the bed. Hugo woke up enough to put his arms around her neck and, a moment later, they were gone.