Author's Note: This one is dedicated to my Dad. His parents divorced when he was a kid and he grew up with less fatherly presence than he deserved, yet even when things got tough for him and my Mom he never gave up, but he's his own worst critic. The phrase, "I've forgotten more than you've ever known," comes to mind, except he's the one remembering it all while I'm the one who forgets. He did his best and that was a hell of a lot more than he'll ever be willing to admit.
That said, I would never have gotten even this far if it were not for the support of many people over on the Harry/Fleur Discord server, the link to which is in my profile. There will also be a fanfic recommendation at the end of the chapter. Thanks to DaveAthenai, Gearheadbsnist, Charlennette, and x102reddragon in particular for inspiring me and encouraging me to write these stories. If you enjoy the story please leave a comment telling me what you liked and how you think I could improve. I always read them and they bring a smile to my face every time.
Catch
"What's that?"
"Hmm?"
She looked up from her notes to see Aimeé standing by her desk, her thoughts taking a moment to catch up with her ears.
"Oh, just something for Moreau. She is working on a theory of transfigured consciousness and asked me to look over her spell structures."
"Oh? Go on…"
"It is nothing so exciting," Fleur said, a faint smile crossing her lips at Aimeé's enthusiasm. "Carol-Anne is researching the distinction between animagus transformations and human-to-animal transfiguration. She found in her testing that an Animagus who is transfigured into their animal form by another wizard through conventional spell-casting does not display the same level of cognizance that they retain when using their own transformative abilities."
"Of course not, they're entirely different magics," she replied immediately. "The Animagus transformation is rooted in Alchemy, and draws on both body and mind transforming both, compared to ordinary transfiguration derived from the convergence of illusory divination and elementalism."
Fleur's brows raised of their own accord and her eyes widened slightly.
"I did not realise I was in the presence of a historian."
Aimeé blushed, but her smile remained confident and strong.
"Well, after everything that happened with Charles, I realised that I still had a lot to learn," She answered, her expression shifting from simple pride to a mix of earnestness and curiosity. "Charms are as good a specialty as any, but they're rather modern in comparison to the other branches of magic, a sort of mixture of all the bits and pieces that didn't quite fit in the other categories that came together over the past six centuries rather than being discovered in nature outright."
"True enough," Fleur said after a moment's consideration, though her head remained tilted at a fixedly curious angle. "But I would think that would prompt a disconnect from the history of wizardry, and witchcraft especially, rather than an emphasis on it."
"It did!" She said, her eyes going wide as she leaned, her hands coming up to gesticulate passionately while her stance shifted to lock-knee'd position that Fleur recognized from many a young academic.
She'd learn to keep herself moving eventually, once she hit thirty at the very least. There was a good reason why so many professors and lecturers chose to wander their stages rather than stay in one spot and it wasn't just to keep their listeners engaged. Witches and wizards might age slower than muggles once their bodies stopped developing, but the creaking joints of the third decade arrived just at the start of that process.
Aimeé was still in her twenties, but soon enough she would discover in no uncertain terms that her body was no longer inclined to humour her youthful ambivalence. Fleur's own back had recently chosen to remind her of that very fact, the added cushioning charms on her desk-chair and the bottle muscle-relaxing salve in her nightstand testament to the passing time.
"All through my time at Beauxbatons I mostly ignored history," She was saying. "Just enough to pass my assignments and get 'Acceptables' on my examinations, but after learning about how the amplification array—"
She stuttered to a sudden halt, seeming to suddenly remembering just how personal Fleur's involvement with that particular bit of magic had been.
"It is alright, no need to restrain your curiosity on my account," Fleur said, glad to find herself meaning what she said.
"Well, eugh, after learning about how it was supposed to work, I realised just how broad the connections between the branches of magic really were, how often they twisted and turned and looped back around on themselves, and found that I wanted to know more. Know how those paths had been charted and where they might yet lead."
"It is certainly more fascinating than memorizing the leaders of the revolutions."
Aimeé nodded with a sigh, her face flickering with exhaustion in an associative response to the mere mention of the never-ending tangle of names and dates and internal disputes.
"But enough about me, you said Carol-Anne was looking for the line between Animagi and human transfiguration?"
"Oui," Fleur said, her eyes snapping back down to her papers, forgotten for the moment, and she turned back to her desk slightly. "You are correct that, though they both converge under the umbrella of transfiguration, general transfiguration, including human-to-animal transfiguration, is derived from entirely different sources than the Animagus transformation. However, Carol-Anne recently found that Animagi transfigured conventionally into their own animal forms are notably more intelligent than others transfigured thusly, and more so than when animagi are transfigured into other animals."
"I thought you said they didn't retain their cognizance?"
"They do not. They do not display any greater degree of aware consciousness than any other transfigured person does, but within the bounds of that consciousness they do display markedly more intelligence."
"Interesting…" she murmured, her eyes glazing slightly as she began to lose herself in thought. "Would that mean that conventional transfiguration might be able to expand the limits of the animagus transformation?"
"That is Carol-Anne's hope," Fleur said, shuffling her papers to find her place once again. "And also why she asked me to compare the spells for structural differences that she might synthesize."
Aimeé's mouth was slightly open as she stared at nothing in particular, her eyes wide as she pondered the potential implications.
"But that is not why you came to me, is there anything I can do for you?"
"Oh!" she said with a start, her eyes snapping back into focus as she leaned forward eagerly. "Do you like Quidditch?"
"... What?"
"Eugh, sorry, let me explain." Aimeé's blush had returned and she stammered over her words, every third one backtracking further as she tried to get to the root of the non-sequitur.
"I wanted to give you and your family tickets to a game, I won them in a raffle at a pub, my brother is visiting so we were going out, and I won the raffle but I can't use them, I don't follow Quidditch, and when I was wondering what to do with them I thought of you straight away, I remember at New Years that your friends said that Harry used to like Quidditch, so I wanted to offer you the tickets but, before I could do that, I had to find out if you like Quidditch, so…"
She trailed off, her face entirely red as she shut her jaw tight and nodded awkwardly.
"I see," Fleur said after a moment's processing and translation. "Unfortunately I am not much of a quidditch fan myself, and I don't recall Harry ever mentioning wanting to go to a game though he is an excellent player himself. So, unless you have enough tickets for our entire family, then I am afraid—"
"I do!"
"Excuse me?"
"I do have enough tickets," she said, her blush fading to be replaced by earnestness once more. "The raffle was for four seats in the public box below the commentator." She paused, a hint of red returning to her cheeks, "Did I forget to mention that?"
Fleur simply looked at her for a long moment, her mouth slightly open and her cheeks lifted in the usual hint of a smile that appeared as if by magic any time she had the chance to speak with her younger colleague.
"Yes, I believe you did. And thank you, Aimeé, very much. I would be delighted to accept."
She beamed at her and Fleur chuckled, a vague curiosity drifting through her mind as Aimeé pulled an ordinary letter sized envelope from her breast pocket, notable only for the 'Le Repos du Basilic' stamped across the front, and she resolved to ask just as Aimeé was turning away.
"You said your brother is visiting?"
"Yeah?" She replied, pausing mid turn and balancing on the ball of her back foot. Glancing at the awkward angle of her leg, Fleur was once again reminded of the cushioning charms.
"Does he not follow Quidditch either?"
"Oh no, he's obsessed. In fact, him raving all the time was what turned me off. The tickets are actually to his favorite team."
She frowned.
"Why not give them to him then, or make it an outing between the two of you? Surely you don't have to use all four tickets?"
Aimeé grinned.
"You know how I said he was visiting?"
"Oui?"
"Well, he lives in Germany and his job there keeps his schedule constantly full."
"And?"
Aimeé's grin broadened to a caricature of glee that only those who have had to endure the tender company of a sibling can truly understand.
"His Portkey leaves one minute after the match begins."
~{}~
"So, what was it wanted to tell me?"
Fleur glanced over her shoulder at Harry then turned back to the vanity as she spoke, continuing to brush out her freshly dried hair.
"Aimeé gave us a gift today," she said, nodding toward the envelope lying on the bed. They are tickets to a Quidditch game this weekend, four seats in the public box, she won them in a raffle."
"And she gave them to us?" he asked curiously, opening the envelope and revealing the tickets within.
"She said she does not follow Quidditch and thought we would make better use of them. I thought we might make it a family outing."
"Huh, I suppose we could."
She turned to look at him, pausing for the moment with her brushing.
"Yeah," he said, his expression brightening, "I think that'd be a great idea. It's been a while since I've seen a game in any case."
That much was true. In fact, she couldn't recall them ever attending a match together at all, as a family or otherwise.
"Shall I pass on our thanks tomorrow?" she asked, smiling to see him doing the same.
"I think so," he said with a grin, sliding the tickets back into the envelope and placing it on the headboard as he sat down on the bed and sliding under the blankets. She joined him, bringing the hairbrush with her and handing it to him as she slid in in front of him. Harry took it, pulling her up against his chest as he set to work.
"Should we tell them at breakfast, do you think, or wait until the evening?"
"Breakfast," he replied absently, focusing on gently coaxing out a particularly stubborn tangle. "They'll be too excited if we tell them just before bed."
She hummed an agreement, her eyes drifting closed under the soothing pleasures of the brush and Harry's hands.
"And what about you, Fleur, are you excited?"
"As long as you are not the one playing," she answered with a grin, her eyes closed.
"I'm not that bad."
"A certain Hungarian Horntail would beg to differ."
He huffed good-naturedly, and she let herself drift away.
~{}~
Harry had been exactly right about James and Isabelle's reactions.
Both children had begun to practically vibrate with excited energy as soon as they told them about the game the next day. He had been quick to capitalise on that resource too, rallying the two of them and pointing them in the direction of the radishes that had only recently readied for harvest.
Child-wrangling complete, he walked with her partway down the front path, just past the point where it split off from the gardens to the front gate.
"I love you," she said, leaning in for a quick kiss.
"I love you too," he answered once they parted, "and remember to give Aimeé our thanks for tomorrow."
"Of course," she said, smiling wide. "It is our first game as a family, after all."
Harry paused, his head tilting slightly as he thought, and then his eyes went wide.
"It is," he murmured.
"Harry?"
"It's nothing, I just hadn't realised. Give her my thanks, and have a great day."
She searched his face for any sign that something was amiss but, finding nothing, simply leaned in for another quick kiss instead.
"You'll be late soon."
"It would be worth it."
He grinned, that uniquely 'Harry' grin that only ever appeared when she said something of that sort, and Fleur smiled back as her heart jumped victoriously at making it appear.
She indulged herself with one last half-hug then turned to go, Harry staying in the spot and watching her until just before she disappeared behind the olive trees, turning himself to follow the path to where James and Isabelle were already busy with the soil and the radishes therein.
She shut the gate behind her with a creak and a thud and, with a twirl and a soft pop, disappeared.
~{}~
"Are you alright?"
She had been thinking about it all day, the brief moment refusing to leave her thoughts, only to find her nebulous worries seemingly confirmed when she arrived back home to find Harry oddly nervous, and more so as the evening wore on.
"I'm—" he stopped, cutting off the habitual response and turning to look at her concerned expression. "I'm a bit tense," he said at last.
"So I see."
She gestured to the bed, sitting down on her side and pulling her legs up under her as she waited for Harry to sit down and get comfortable.
"It started this morning, when I was about to leave. Is it about tomorrow?"
He nodded tiredly, sinking back into the pillows and closing his eyes.
"Do you want to cancel?"
"No," he said almost instantly, eyes opening once more and falling into a deep frown as he collected himself.
She waited for him to finish.
"I never went to a quidditch match with my father," he said after a minute's pause. "My parents never watched me ride a broom, and I never got to tell them that I made the House team or won the school cup. The only professional match I ever got to see was the World Cup, just before the war, and I attended with my friend's family because I didn't have my own."
He sighed.
"The closest thing I ever had to any of this was when Sirius attended one of my games in Third Year, and at the time I not only didn't know he was my Godfather but I thought, thanks to Trelawney, that he was a Grim sent to prophecy my doom."
He slumped, his head thudding back against the pillows as he looked up the ceiling, tired.
"I just- I really want tomorrow to go well."
She leaned in, wrapping her arms around his shoulders as she pulled him close and held him.
"It will," she whispered, feeling him shift and turn into her as he pulled the covers over them both. "I promise."
~{}~
They missed the first pitch.
They had arrived early to the modest stadium playing host to a number of amateur teams in addition to the professional league and had immediately been confronted with a line of disgruntled attendees backed nearly out the entrance as the lone ticketeer tried in vain to calm a frustrated and very clearly inebriated man at the front of the line. A witch in pale blue robes had eventually appeared and escorted the man off the premises and another employee of the venue had conjured a table opposite the main booth to try and process the line more quickly, but even so the match had been about to start by the time the Potters had made it to the front of the queue.
They still might have made it to their box before the match began, but they turned left instead of right.
The ordinary stadium seating had been arranged from left to right with the lower-numbered sections on the left progressing to the other end of the stadium but, in true wizarding fashion, the boxes higher up had been arranged in precisely the opposite manner and it wasn't until they had arrived on the exact opposite side of the stadium that they realised their mistake.
The referee's whistle blew mere moments before they rounded the last corner leading up the stairs.
They found their seats mid-play, four on the front row of the premium, public box just below the private box with the game's commentator, and settled in just in time to witness the lead chaser of the Castellane Cygnes dodge an opposing pincer with a swooping roll and hurl an open shot to the right hoop only to be blocked by the very tips of the fingers of Bayonne Bastilles' keeper.
The game went on much like that, the two professional teams seemingly evenly matched as they fought over each and every one of the precious few goals scored, and all the while the teams' seekers darted around the play as they searched in vain for a snitch that seemed all too reluctant to appear.
They were an hour into the match when the first timeout was called, the captains of both teams meeting in the centre of the pitch and shaking on a fifteen minute respite. All around them people were getting to their feet, nearly half of the stadium engaging in a mass exodus down to the foodstands on the first level, and it was at that moment that James stomach decided to let out a particularly exuberant growl.
"Snacks, anyone?" asked Harry with an amused grin, his mood having mostly recovered from the mishaps of the hour previous.
James and Isabelle nodded eagerly, their excitement for the food almost as strong as for the game itself.
"Can we get Tartiflettes?" James asked at once, Isabelle nodding along eagerly.
Fleur felt her appetite diminish slightly at the thought of heavy dish of crispy potatoes, bacon, and cheese, but she waved off Harry's questioning look.
"Of course," she said, smiling wide at the looks of excitement on their faces.
"Should I get you anything?"
"I saw a stall selling roasted nuts on the way around, some chestnuts or almonds would be fine."
"Right then, I'm off," said Harry, standing and brushing off his knees as he joined the flow of bodies heading down the steps and into the vendor's hall. She watched him go, her gaze trailing behind him until he vanished down the steps, then turned to face their children once more.
"Well, how is it so far?" she asked.
"It's great!" piped Isabelle.
"Fantastic," said James.
Fleur smiled, nodding in satisfaction as their attention was grabbed once more by something on the pitch.
She hadn't been paying the actual match that much attention, to be honest, only really focusing on it when the noise of the crowd and the shouts of the commentator presaged a goal, and instead devoted the bulk of her attention to watching James, Isabelle, and Harry.
She frowned.
Harry had been particularly nervous that morning, understandably so, and had seemed as close to bursting with frustration as she had ever seen in the midst of their earlier delays. Not unwarranted, of course, she knew how important this was to him, but even so she had been immensely relieved when he had begun to relax properly five minutes in.
A whistle blasted just then and she looked up in surprise, craning her neck to see the players returning to the field, but saw nothing. Only one of the referees was floating in the middle of the pitch and holding up one hand splayed, followed shortly by the commentator announcing five minutes until play resumed.
People began returning to the stands.
The tide reversed and the audience flowed back into their seats at ever increasing rate as a timer appeared on the giant blackboards keeping the score, the chalk arms of the watch ticking steadily down to zero in the apparently regularly anticipated first-hour timeout, and still Harry did not reappear.
Neither James nor Isabelle seemed at all concerned, the two children having apparently picked up a game of trying to spot increasingly odd-looking looking spectators in the stands below, one-upping each other with increasingly decreasing levels of plausibility, yet Fleur began to become somewhat anxious herself as a thought occurred to her.
Her husband was the Harry Potter.
They hadn't thought to take precautions as to Harry's identity, it had been twelve years since the end of the war and Harry had hardly ever appeared in public since then. No one had any reason to think that he would be at the match today, yet what if he had been recognised and waylaid?
Her stomach twisted at the thought, certain nothing could possibly spoil the day for him more effectively than being stopped from getting back to them by his own notoriety and missing even a single moment of the match and their children's reactions to it.
Harry may have been paying more attention to the match than she was but he was still primarily focused on James and Isabelle, using his own surprisingly un-atrophied knowledge of the sport to guide their focus and make sure that they got, "Every last drop from it."
She'd asked him about it that morning as he paced back and forth across their room, lost in thoughts of plans for how to make the day as perfect as possible, already ready to leave hours before the match and before either she had finished getting dressed or the children had even gotten out of bed.
"Hermione," he'd said.
"Come again?"
"She used to hate Quidditch. Only ever showed up to support me and Ron and had about the same response to my flying as you do. She'd go on and on about all the ways it was a terrible sport and Ron would argue right back. To be honest, I think she just liked the chance to get into a thorough conversation with him."
"And that will help you how?"
"I'll just think up all the things she didn't like about it and get them to focus on everything else."
It had worked well enough in the first hour, Harry's narration aligning fairly well with the actual commentators running remarks, though they diverged significantly at several points, and even Fleur had found herself being somewhat drawn in at times by his presentation of the fairly ordinary, if competently played, game.
Yet it was hard to think of that, or much of anything else, as the thread of anxiety grew with each passing second on the watch counting down until the five minutes ended.
Most people were back in their seats already, the steady flow of returning spectators dwindling to a trickle.
Maybe he'd been caught in a crowd and just couldn't cut through to the comparatively small entry leading up to the box seats?
There was a minute left now and hardly anyone was not already sitting down.
She glanced over at James and Isabelle, their faces lit up with excitement and anticipation as the teams took their places on the field. It was almost like the match was starting all over again.
Thirty seconds.
Harry appeared, his face tight and a carton and small bag clutched in his hands as he made his way over to them. She felt her heart sink as he approached, certain he'd been recognised, and then…
"They, er, didn't have any Tartiflette, I got you Frites instead."
"Okay!"
She blinked in confusion as the whistle blew and play resumed, James and Isabelle taking the carton of fries and planting it between them, reaching blindly down to grab a handful every so often, their eyes glued to the players darting back and forth across the field.
"Here you are."
She started, taking the bag Harry was offering her. It was warm, and a quick glance at the label revealed it to be full of fresh roasted chestnuts. She looked over to thank him, but instead paused as she saw that he wasn't holding anything of his own.
"You did not get anything of your own?"
"Didn't have time."
She extended her arm automatically but he waved her off.
"Not hungry."
Fleur frowned once more. The corners of Harry's eyes were still tense, but now that he was here again she found the idea of him being waylaid less likely.
If he had been recognised they wouldn't have stopped at the stairs.
Harry had resumed his commentary at James and Isabelle's insistence. It was just as insightful as before but it had lost some of its colour and, in time, she thought she might have figured out why. Harry's gaze kept flicking every so often to the bench between James and Isabelle, just where the carton of Frites, not Tartiflette, sat being innocently devoured by the hungry nine and ten year-olds.
His smile brightened again as the match wore on but the tightness never left his eyes, even when James and Isabelle forgot about the Frites entirely in favour of just watching the match, and Fleur found herself no longer being drawn in to the occasional moment of exceptional play.
Harry spotted the snitch before either of the seekers did, though not by much.
It was hovering above one of the box seats one the other side of the pitch, blending in with the gold on the gold and green of the Castellane Cygnes home colours. The Bayonne Bastilles' seeker noticed it mere moments after Harry did and immediately began to give chase from by the goalposts, but the Cygne's seeker had been slightly closer on a circuit around their side of the pitch and shot forward as well.
The two advantages cancelled each other out, and time seemed to slow as every breath in the stadium was held as one.
The Bastilles' seeker threw himself forward at the last second, his broom clutched between his legs as he leaned out fully ahead of the handle, and the blue and red sections of the stands exploded with cheers as he pulled out of a controlled dive that had very nearly been a fall, fist in the air, fluttering snitch clutched between his fingers.
~{}~
"Can I get a scarf?"
"Papa, I want a hat!"
They were in the vendor's hall once more, circling round the stadium past the many food stalls and memorabilia stands on their way back to the entrance and the portal to the muggle world.
Harry was tense.
He was still smiling, still doing his best to indulge James and Isabelle's enthusiasm, but it was strained.
"Absolutely," he was saying, steering them through the swell of bodies toward the largest of the open air stalls just by the entrance.
A muffling charm fell over them the moment they entered the shop space proper, the equal din of celebration and commiseration from the crowd outside fading away as James and Isabelle darted between the shelves, identical looks of wonder on their faces.
"Are you alright?"
"Fine."
Isabelle had found a novelty hat, a giant swan's head with golden eyes and bill, and green feathers, the top of her own messy blonde head just barely visible through the opening in the mouth that was supposed to be at eye-level.
Meanwhile James had made good on his intent to find a scarf to ward off the chill, and then another scarf, and then another, and was now in the process of looping a fifth such novelty scarf around his shoulders, the broad stripes and patterns celebrating the Castellane Cygnes in myriad ways while also causing him to bear a passing resemblance to multi-coloured lollipop that had sprouted legs.
The sights were enough to pierce through Fleur's concern, and even the corners of Harry's eyes softened as they looked on the continued delight of their children.
Isabelle had just discovered the giant foam fingers when she heard it.
"Est-ce que c'est Harry Potter ?"
Harry stiffened beside her and she felt her stomach drop.
"Bien sûr que non."
A half-glance over her shoulder revealed the source of the whispering to be a pair of older women, bedecked in matching Cygne's colours, standing just outside the shop but evidently within the bounds of the muffling charm.
"Il ressemble exactement à celui dans le journal."
She looked at Harry, words dying on her tongue as she saw the veritable storm of defeated frustration brewing behind his eyes.
"Que ferait Harry Potter ici ?"
He paused just long enough to glance at James and Isabelle, still happily browsing without the slightest notion of the impending interruption, then gave a jerky nod toward the exit of the stadium. She nodded quickly and felt her face fall as he slipped out through a gap in the shelves, disappearing almost instantly into the crowd to the evident disappointment of their two observers who crazed their necks to try and see where he had gone.
"Where's Papa?"
"He had to use the restroom, we will meet him outside once we are done here, okay?"
"Okay!"
She sighed as James hurried away, returning to the important task of limiting his selection of scarves enough to be able to carry them, and strode over to the young woman operating the register.
"Était-ce..."
"Non."
The young woman blushed at her short response, hurriedly adding up the costs of their various souvenirs, and Fleur forced herself to relax and breathe.
Harry was indeed waiting for them outside, in a dim corner just before the portal out of the magically manipulated space of the Stadium, and she did her best to put on a warm smile as Isabelle darted ahead of her to hug her Papa around the middle, staring up through the Swan's mouth and chattering away as they turned to leave.
~{}~
James and Isabelle still hadn't stopped buzzing with energy.
They were sprinting around the house pretending to be riding brooms, reenacting their favorite moments from the match under Fleur's watchful eyes while Harry made dinner downstairs.
He hadn't said much since they got home.
His face kept flickering through her mind; a tight smile here, a clenched jaw there, Harry's stare fixed unerringly on a half-empty box of forgotten frites.
"…I promise."
Dinner was a quiet affair.
The children were exhausted, thoroughly spent but still more than happy to gulp down their bowls of onion soup and fresh bread before stumbling to bed with yawned, "Goodnight"s and sleepy smiles.
She found him in the kitchen.
He was standing over the sink and scrubbing the pot he'd used for the soup, a large copper piece coated on the inside with shining tin, a gift from Molly. He wasn't using magic.
"Harry?"
He looked up and, now that James and Isabelle had gone to sleep, she saw what he had finally allowed himself to express.
Harry looked defeated.
"Hey, Fleur."
She wrapped her arms around him from behind, her chin resting in the crook of his neck as she held him and felt him go limp in her arms, the pot forgotten.
"They had a great time today."
He tensed, and she pulled back to face him properly, pulling gently to spin him around to her, his face half-hidden in the flickering light of the lamps on the wall.
"…"
I know today did not go as you wanted it to, but they still enjoyed it."
"…"
"There will be other games."
"No, there won't."
"Harry?"
He sighed, raking a hand through his hair as his brow tightened and he struggled to find the words.
"Not like this, anyway. It was the first time, the first game we ever had as a family. The first— That can never come again."
She bit her lip, debating whether or not to speak.
"Does it matter?"
"Of course it matters!"
She let the silence fall as it may, loud and ringing after the sudden burst of noise, then reached out with both hands and pulled him gently into her arms.
"What do you think they will remember about today?"
He frowned.
"Will it be drunkards in the queue, snack preferences unfulfilled, nosy women in the gift shop?"
He looked away.
"Or…" she continued, "Will it be the roar of the crowd, the skill and excitement of the players, and the sound of their father's voice—" his jaw clenched, "narrating each and every moment of it all directly into their memories?"
He drew in a long, shaking breath.
"It was never going to be perfect," she admitted at last, feeling a stab of pain go through her as his shoulders slumped at the words. "So it is a good thing, then," she continued, taking his chin in her hand and lifting, "that it did not need to be."
He stared at her, expression lost and confused, eyes wet with the beginning of tears.
"The reality of the moment could never have been perfect. But the memory, as long as we were in it, will be."
She smiled.
"For them, today was the most perfect day there has ever been."
He seized her in a fierce embrace, shaking with occasional heaving breaths as tears soaked into her shoulder and formed a damp spot on her blouse, and she closed her eyes and held him as her heart broke for all things that could have been.
AN: Thank you for reading. If you liked the story, please leave a comment telling me what worked and what didn't. I see and read every single one, even long after the stories are posted, and I appreciate them all!
Harry/Fleur Discord Server: Link in my bio
Fanfic Recommendation: Kingdom of Ashes by DJKopper, also known as Jay, an ongoing Harry/Fleur time travel story that updates fairly regularly.