Chapter 19: Christmas '98

"Go! Go! Go, go!"

The hard, guttural, almost accented emphasis on the 'Guh!' syllable tumbled across the countryside ahead of its utterer – a little tyke of only eight months, who now crawled up the small dirt path on his way to meet his godparents. Strolling blithely just ahead of Harry, Hermione's chestnut curls bounced to a halt under her beanie cap as she now drew both hands to her mouth to hold in an astonished, elated gasp.

"Oh…. Merlin! Harry! Can you believe it?! His first word!"

Drawing up to his best mate's side, Harry chuckled with a mix of incredulity and pride, while stooping down to greet little Teddy. "Bloody hell! Isn't that something?"

Hermione frantically shushed him. "Harry! It's bad enough that Ron is such an influence on you. You're going to have to watch what you say! Or are there any other choice words you wish to teach our godson?"

Harry cringed sheepishly, yearning but refraining to pick up the child, who perhaps was trying to communicate that very aim with the reaching and clenching of his grubby little fists. Even then, the new godfather in Harry was uncertain about what his place was in even just holding the boy.

"We've been working on using our words…!" Andromeda Tonks chuckled, bustling up to lift her grandson from the ground; Harry tried to ignore the pang of disappointment when the aging lady placed the baby in Hermione's arms. Andromeda seemed pleased when the beautiful brunette witch's first instinct was to mind Teddy's head. "You're a natural already, dearie….!"

Hermione smiled weakly, upturning her lips into a bright, wide and beaming smile as she attempted to teach Teddy how to wave. She shifted the infant onto her other hip with a slight grunt. "I can't believe he's only eight months old and already crawling! And talking!"

Andromeda smiled. "I'd say that's pretty normal, dear. Why, my Nymphadora was talking even earlier than him!"

Harry barked out a chuckle. "That, I can believe!"

"Besides, most magical babies tend to pick up things faster than their Muggle counterparts anyway. Least, that's how my late Ted figured it." Andromeda glanced between Harry and Hermione. "I bet even you two were reaching milestones much earlier, even though you were raised by Muggles. It's the magic in your blood."

Hermione flushed prettily, the color in her cheeks helped along by the chill of the newly falling snow flurries around them. "Mum and Dad say I was reading when I wasn't even a year…"

Andromeda's eyes expanded, impressed. Harry snickered, and whispered to her, "Again, that I can believe."

"And what about you, Harry, my lad?"

"What? Me?" Harry blinked at the question, snorting bitterly. "I doubt Aunt Petunia would have marked a milestone like that, and especially not if I was beating Dudley to it!" The older woman smiled in sympathy.

"Are you sure you'll be OK for a night without him?" Hermione asked, beginning to turn away for the return journey.

"Of course!" Andromeda smiled fondly. "Godparents need a night with their little one too, you know." Harry and Hermione chuckled before waving goodbye and proceeding with Teddy up the path.

It was a short-to-moderate walk from the Tonks' place to the Burrow, and yet Harry kept an earnest spring in his step, intent on beating the cold. He tried not to glance over at the little pond, now frozen over, where he and Hagrid had crash-landed the giant's motorbike nearly a year and a half ago now.

"Do you think Teddy's gran reckons we're together?"

The question blurted out by Hermione caught Harry by surprise. "Nah!" he nearly guffawed, then fought to keep the mirth in his voice light, lest he somehow offend her. "Why would you think that?"

Hermione shrugged. "She does seem like the sort of person who would play matchmaker."

"No one's more of a matchmaker than Molly!" Harry pointed out. "Short of brewing love potion, that is. Besides, Andromeda knows it would have been harder for us to be granted joint guardianship if we were a couple – you said so yourself, back in the summer."

"So I did," Hermione smiled softly at the memory, ignoring for the moment how Teddy was batting at the chestnut curls sticking out from under her beanie. The landscape around them was silent as the grave for a time, except for the whistling of the wind. Hermione was now biting her lip.

"Hey," Harry peered at her. "What's the matter?"

She lifted her head to him, and Harry was shocked to see tears glistening against the reflecting white of the snow. "Do you remember where we were? A year ago tonight?"

Harry froze for a beat, and then nodded grimly. "Godric's Hollow."

She nodded. "Godric's Hollow." Her timbre itself was hollow, matching the desertedness of Harry's birthplace. It had been a still, quiet night much like this one a year ago winter. Harry let out a hiss and ducked his head, pausing briefly as grey spots, followed by a flash of green light and the image of a snake, danced behind his vision before the moment passed. Opening his eyes, he could feel Hermione watching him in concern. It was only small comfort to know that….

"My scar doesn't bother me. Not anymore. Not the way that it used to. But….. still…. there are moments when I get….."

She laced her fingers, from the hand that was not balancing Teddy, through his. "I understand."

They continued on for a time in silence.

"Hermione?"

"Yeah?"

"Have…. has Ron talked to you, about what happened while he was away? Or right when he came back?"

She tucked an errant curl behind her ear. "We were able to clear the air, discuss a few things, when we were away in Australia. I….. I forgave him for leaving us."

Harry pursed his lips through a cocked eyebrow. "That was very big of you."

Hermione shrugged. "Well…. I love him. And I can't let something hurtful that, in some ways, I understand now was not entirely his fault get in the way of that. Ron and I have worked too hard, through too much, to be together for…." She wiped at her eyes emotionally; in her arms, Teddy squirmed with disquiet, almost sensing his godmother's distress.

Harry nodded slowly. "Well, I'm glad to hear that." A beat and then: "You can say it's not my business, but…."

"…. are he and I sleeping together?" Hermione smirked knowingly.

Harry flushed beet red. "Er…. no, actually I was going to ask if he talked to you specifically about what happened that night, when he returned."

"He's told me that you boys destroyed the locket Horcrux," Hermione admitted. "But as to how, he's kept it vague. I haven't pushed him; I think there's something that happened which has left him shaken, even now."

Harry nodded. "There is." They swung open the gate leading into the Burrow's front garden. "Ask him again at some point. I'm sure, knowing Ron, he'll tell you when he's ready."

Hermione nodded, as she and Teddy drifted closer to the lights and sounds of the house. "Oh, and for the record, Ronald and I are waiting till marriage before we…."

"Fine, great," Harry cut across her awkwardly before throwing open the door into the Weasleys' front kitchen, to shouts and greetings of good cheers.

"Hi…." Hermione breathed, leaning in to graze a kiss along her boyfriend's cheek, which he returned. Glancing over Ron's shoulder, her deep brown eyes flickered with concern. "Have they even moved?"

"Not a blooming inch," Ron reported grimly. Over by the table, David and Jean Granger were standing conspicuously amidst the carousing Weasleys, looking as out of place as tourists lost on the beach. They apparently had been like that for nearly the entirety of the twenty minutes it had taken Harry and Hermione to fetch Teddy.

Hermione sighed. "Thanks, darling. Not to worry – I'll sort it!" She shifted, passing Teddy over to Harry. "Take him, will you?"

Seeing Fleur and Audrey scampering over, their eyes on the baby like heat-seeking missiles, Harry was only too quick and happy to oblige, lest some of the womenfolk get into a tussle over the tyke like he was a Muggle football. He opted to take his godson on a tour of the house.

"And here, my little man, is where Granny Weasley keeps the broom cup – OI!" Harry opened the door, only for several cleaning supplies to tumble from the broom cupboard; along with them fell Neville Longbottom and Luna Lovegood, caught in a passionate embrace and snogging heatedly. The kiss didn't even break upon the copulating couple hitting the floor; Luna's silver eyes, dazed, lifted to Harry from where Neville was slathering the pulse point of her creamy neck.

"Oh, hullo, Harry," the barmy Ravenclaw murmured dreamily, even as Neville began to groan and thrust his clothed hips along Luna's center, clamped tightly between where his lover appeared to have hiked her long thigh up and over his pelvis and torso. "Have you tried the eggnog? – it makes the Nargles put the most wonderfully mad thoughts in your head!"

Harry grimaced. "Er….. I thought Wrackspurts were the ones who…." He mercifully didn't get to finish his sentence as Luna let out a breathless, "OHHHHH!" and began to rock her hips back in time to Neville's lustful grinding. The Boy Who Lived quickly turned away and all but sprinted back to the kitchen. Halfway there, he bumped into Ron, who caught a sight of the mating Neville and Luna over his friend's shoulder.

"Bloody hell!" Ron winced. "Our Neville's displaying a right good show, inn'it he?"

"It'll be Luna who's showing before long if they're not bloody careful!" Harry harrumphed. "Do any of us really want to see a baby Longbottom rolling around here in nine months?"

Ron turned pale. "Right, good point. Want me to sort them?"

"Let someone else handle it. Like Fleur. Besides, Christmas supper's nearly on the table!" The boys stalked back for the table and squeezed into chairs, Harry setting Teddy atop the chipped wood. The Boy Who Lived was relieved to see Ron hovering over the little baby, perhaps afraid Teddy might accidentally roll off. Confident that his best mate could keep an eye on his godson, Harry pulled out a Christmas card and some reams of parchment from under his coat; Transfiguring a spoon into a quill and inkwell, he put tip to paper.

Ron peered over his shoulder. When he saw to whom Harry was writing, his jaw dropped.

"You're writing Christmas card letters to those tossers?!"

"We agreed on keeping contact that way, for now," Harry stated flatly, not wanting to get into it even as he lifted up the Christmas card he'd received from Petunia and Dudley, by way of Pigwidgeon, just that morning.

"For now?!" Ron ogled him. "Mate, you don't owe them a bloody thing!"

"Too right," Ginny sniffed, sticking her nose in the air as she passed behind her boyfriend's chair. "That's what I told the noble git. But he wants to be magnanimous to some bigoted, nasty little cun-"

"Language," Harry cut her off. "Both of you. There's a baby present! If Hermione hears you teaching that kind of profanity to her godson, she'll have a right conniption!"

He inwardly groaned at how Ginny's eyes gleamed devilishly. "Oh, but there are loads of words I can teach him. Can't I, my little man?" And she scooped Teddy up off of the table and whisked away towards the far end before Harry could protest, plunking into a seat with the baby balanced on her lap.

Ron chuckled. "Best not to fight it, mate. At least with her, you know you won't risk pulling a Neville and Luna - leastwise, not for a while." Harry chewed on his bottom lip, not wanting to get into it with Ron about how he and Ginny were intimate, and had been for months. The only difference was that he was certain he and Ginny were far more careful than Neville and Luna were being, shacking up in a broom cupboard.

Ron was going on. "…. It's Fleur you need to worry about – the one time I wish she would just stick to speaking French is when she's knackered and going on and on about her ovaries. I thought Bill was going pop a blood vessel from embarrassment!"

Mr. Weasley called the family and all assembled guests to the table minutes later. As everyone took their seats, Ron elbowed Harry in the arm.

"There's old George without his lady friend…." He mused, tone low. "What's that about, do ya reckon?"

"I don't know, and I don't care," Harry clipped.

"Come off it!" Ron gawped. "Unless… do you think we ought to confront him? About Angelina?"

"Ron, first of all: if you're ever going to be a good Auror, you've got to learn subtlety! Second of all, why would we confront him? It's none of our business whether he's ready to bring Angelina home or not! Do you see anyone here confronting you about getting together with Hermione?"

"Yeah, I actually ruddy well do – it's the bloke seated at ten o'clock who's called her father!" Ron quipped. Across from the boys and down the row, David Granger was keeping a hawk-like watch as to where the youngest Weasley boy was seated relative to his only daughter.

Mrs. Weasley volunteered to lead a prayer blessing the meal. "Merciful Merlin, we give you thanks that you have brought us to the safety of this night, to a good place filled with good family and friends, for which we need never hunger." Harry heard the hitch in the matriarch's voice before he saw it. "Please be sure that you watch out for….. those whom we miss on this Christmas Eve, especially our…. little Freddie…" It was nevertheless still abrupt, how Molly burst into tears and suddenly fled from the room. George almost immediately followed, bolting from his place at the table as if burned.

"Mum….!" There was choked-off emotion in the surviving twin's timbre. Further down from Harry and Ron, and with Teddy still perched in her lap, Ginny was biting on her lip hard enough to bleed, and even looking like she wanted to go after her mother and brother both. Her father stopped her.

"Don't…." he shook his head. "Let them both be….."

There was a strange pallor on the group's mood for the rest of the meal. Harry fished about his bangers and mash numbly, glumly. Grief could rear its ugly head at the most inopportune times, and none more so than at Christmas. He should have been bracing himself for how the first holidays without Fred would be hard, and how in people like George and Molly, there would be a relapse into the pain, however brief. He hoped for their sakes it would be brief. George seemed to be genuinely on the mend. And though Molly had been a sporadic sight in recent months, at least along the first floor of the house, she nonetheless had appeared able to function, helping the girls with some of the household chores.

The group finally moved into the living room for songs and games. Hermione was back to holding Teddy, bouncing the little boy along her hip and engaging with him in between calls of greeting and hugs.

"Mummy!" Hermione cried, weaving around Bill and Charlie for a hug with her mother. "Happy Christmas!"

Teddy waved his fat little fist at Mrs. Granger before hollering in a baby's garble, "Happy TIT-MAS!"

Gasps went out that sucked the remaining air and noise out of the room. Everyone sent scant, awkward looks at each other. Most of the women, including Fleur and Ginny, were flushing. Hermione, for her part, appeared mortified.

Harry tried to diffuse the tension by summoning his inner George. He turned to Percy. "Oi! – Think you can get your wife to flash the room again…? – OW!" He yelped like a beaten dog as Audrey lividly kicked her sister-in-law's boyfriend in the shins.

Ron was more suave in redirecting everyone away from the awkward moment. "It's Christmas, not TITHE-mas, you cheeky little bugger!" he laughed tightly, laying a lisp on thick and turning back to the crowd at large as he drifted into Hermione. "Clever little devil thinks we're all going to pass the plate at evening Mass!"

"Oooooh!" Fleur pointed. "Look who eez under ze mistletoe….!"

Ron and Hermione both glanced up to spot a sprig hanging in the rafters; Ron flushed as red as his hair.

Smiling brightly, Hermione threw back her head and laughed before reaching a free hand up around Ron's neck and pulling his mouth down onto hers in a deep and earnest kiss. Whoops and wolf whistles went up, and when the couple dreamily broke apart, Ron appeared much like he had after their first snog, as though he had been hit in the back of the head with a Bludger. Smushed between them, a gleeful and beaming Teddy squealed and promptly turned his turquoise hair to match the fiery auburn shade of Ron's locks.

Ginny clapped her hands, enraptured. "Oh, my Godric! You lot look so cute with a baby!"

Ron and Hermione glanced down at the little lad who now could be mistaken for their own child before sharing shy smiles. The thought of Hermione as a mother left him disquieted in a protective big brother sort of way, enough that Harry leerily averted his eyes from the sight, only for them to land on Mr. Granger. Hermione's father was so tight with enraged, father bear tension that the stem of his champagne flute shattered in his clenched fist. Shocked cries went up at the sight of burgundy liquid spilling all over the carpet.

Audrey meekly raised her hand. "I'll get the mop." She bustled for the broom cupboard. Too late, Harry thought to call out a warning. A sudden, startled scream could be now heard, followed by shouts and then smacks, until a half-dressed Neville and thoroughly ravished looking Luna were driven by an outraged Audrey into the sitting room.

From where Hermione was still nestled at rest in his arms, Ron winced. "So much for eggnog."