Author's Notes: So much more fluff... I hope you enjoy. I'm soaking it up as we're closing in on the end. Please leave a review! Consider following me on socials at Sarah Jaune and also for

Thank you Arnel for beta'ing!
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter

The reason Louis was driving Lena to Lily and Scorpius' house was convoluted, at best. He'd had James contact him earlier that morning to say that Caroline was in a bad place and couldn't go to the family dinner that day if she didn't have the dog, which would mean they'd have to drive, but James was extremely uncomfortable driving his family over to Lily's house because of how exposed they were with Crabbe.

Could Louis come pick up Rufus the dog and drive him over to Lily's place?

Yes, obviously he could. He'd asked why James hadn't just had Rick drive him over in James's car, but Rick had to work until four that day and wouldn't make it until later.

He had no idea what was up with Caroline, but there was something. He hadn't spoken to James in a few weeks, but just from his face through the two-way mirrors, Louis knew his cousin was stressed.

He'd thought about just popping over to James and Caroline's house and nicking James's car to take the dog, but James's car was a dad car with car seats and in any case, this gave him over an hour in the car with Lena as they drove out from her flat in London.

He had a very nice Audi that didn't actually have a back seat big enough to hold Rufus, but with a little magic, that had been taken care of in short order.

He glanced over at Lena's sharp profile and smiled. She'd started to really grow her black hair out and it was pulled back into a tail at the back of her head as she watched the scenery go by. "I appreciate you being flexible."

"It's fine," she assured him as she shifted in her seat. "I don't mind going for the dog and this way he has an Auror escort to ensure his safety."

Louis grinned at that. "I might need that same escort."

Lena shot him a look, but didn't comment. They fell into a companionable silence that lasted all the way through collecting the dog. It was like the magic of the dog seemed to work something out of Lena. That's what Louis would think later, because he felt totally at ease as soon as they were all settled back into the car and heading for his cousin's big house. Out of nowhere she said, "I don't know why I am included in the family dinners."

Louis frowned at the road and knew he should have more concern for what she was saying, but he couldn't manage it. "Why not?"

"I'm not family."

But you're going to be. That's what crossed his mind. "Rick isn't family."

"He's going to marry Honor at some point," Lena reminded him. "Besides, he was basically stranded here and he's only ever known America. Oh, and they figured out he'd distantly related to Nat."

Louis tapped his thumbs on the steering wheel and knew he should be nervous. He was about to confess everything to her, but there were no nerves… it would be fine. And if it wasn't fine, it would still be fine. He glanced into the rearview and saw the dog's eyes were fixed on him. He knew it was magic. He'd been around enough magical objects to know that the dog was changing how he'd otherwise behave. "This dog is unbelievable," he said to no one in particular.

Lena let out a long sigh. "Yeah, I've been wanting to say that to you since you started bringing me but I just couldn't work up the nerve. Then it popped right out."

He considered that and then said what he needed to say. "I want you to be part of my family."

That didn't sound quite right, but he couldn't think of how else to say it.

"Well, I don't know how that would happen," she told him slowly. "I'm not looking to be adopted."

Louis's hands gripped harder onto the steering wheel as he took in what she'd said. Maybe she was fishing, to try to get him to say it. If it was someone else, he'd have thought that was the case, but he didn't think it was with her. Lena was fairly straightforward and honest, even when it was painful… sometimes especially when she knew it was going to be painful. "You can't think of any way it could happen?"

She didn't respond right away and he would have been nervous if the dog wasn't letting him know it was okay to let things ride.

It was quite possibly a good thing he didn't have this dog around him often, or he might get addicted to this feeling.

"I don't know what you want from me," Lena finally said quietly. She sounded scared and that broke him.

Louis reached over with his hand, palm up and she hesitated for a moment before she put hers in him. Her hand was a little sweaty and her fingers were shaking. That was interesting. Was the dog just blasting Louis and only mildly influencing Lena?

How the hell did the dog do that?

But it didn't matter, because Lena was the focus and she was afraid of what he was going to say. "You are absolutely amazing," he told her.

Her fingers tightened for a moment before she relaxed. "I am not."

"Yeah, you are," he assured her. "Al showed me the memory of when you pulled me out of that bar… it was years ago. A guy grabbed your butt and you knocked him into the ground. I was blind drunk and you had so much patience."

She grinned then. "You were pretty funny, actually. I knew it was bad and you were hurting, but you were just convinced you were in love with someone in their sixties."

He thought about his troubles from then. "I didn't know what love was."

"No," she agreed as the trees speeding by gave testimony to their journey. "Do you know what it is now?"

"Yes," he answered without any hesitation. "I was in denial for the longest time, but when I was fighting to save your life after we'd been attacked, I knew. When I sat with Victoire and James in the hospital, waiting to hear if you'd made it, I knew then, too."

Her grip tightened and her lips pressed into a flat line. He was glad he didn't need to focus on the road because he didn't want to miss this. He needed to see her face. "Al told me I'm too pretty for you."

It was so surprising, that Louis let out a bark of a laugh and shook his head. "See, that's the thing… it doesn't matter what you look like. It's just you. You could look a million different ways and your brains, your steady way… all the kindness and your sense of humor… none of those have to do with your pretty face." He waited a beat, but when she didn't say anything else, he told her the real truth. "You're way too good for me." When she started to protest, he cut her off. "You are, but it's something I'm working on. I'm working on being better. I want you here with me and I hope you'll give me the time it takes to get to a place where I'm good for you, like you're good for me. I'm a recovering addict," he reminded her, although he didn't need to. She knew. "I'm still not ready yet. I still have days that are bad. Those days need to be fewer than they are now before I can start something. If you don't want to wait, I'll understand." He'd hate it, but he'd understand.

She let out an unsteady breath. "Do you really love me? Like, you're really in love with me?"

"Yes."

Lena's eyes flew to meet his and she held steady. "Well… I love you too. So, I'll wait."

His heart gave a giant leap in his chest as he grinned at her, but he didn't say more. They would talk some other time when he wasn't under the influence of Dog.

By the time they'd pulled up outside of Lily's place, Louis knew he'd found a sense of absolute peace.

But James was standing outside waiting without his coat in the blustery early-March air, and the moment they drove up, he was at the door to grab the dog. He didn't even say thanks, as he ushered the dog into the house.

Louis watched his best mate stride for the house and turned to Lena. They hadn't even made it out of the car yet. "What on earth is going on?" Louis asked her, although it was rhetorical at this point.

She shook her head helplessly. "Let's go see if we can figure it out."

~*~

The house was in utter chaos. Kids were running around screaming, dogs were going this way and that, and Ginny thought the noise just might break everyone.

They didn't even have everyone there yet. They were still waiting on Fred, Eva and their baby, Jonah who would be one in May, and Al, Nat and little Wyatt.

Ginny gave Louis and Lena a cursory wave before she headed off after Asher, who was making a beeline for the kitchen table, which he would then attempt to climb.

Asher had gone from barely walking to scaling tall furniture in a matter of two months and it was definitely something to see. With both of his parents being extreme and competitive athletes, it quite probably should have been anticipated, but Ginny could only reflect that at least James and Caroline's child was a happy kid.

"Nope," she said as she grabbed him and hauled him into her arms, kissing his cheek noisily. "Come with Gamma and we'll get some food."

He gave her a wide grin but didn't protest as she carried him over to the island where they had snacks lined up. She passed him a bit of orange, which he chewed happily, slopping juice all over his shirt.

"Here," Teddy said as he came by and handed Asher a sippy cup with water. "I have about a dozen of these made up for when one is inevitably lost."

"Do you have everything under control?" Ginny asked, as Teddy had been volunteered to help Teeny in the kitchen. Even as she asked, she glanced over to Caroline, who was sitting off to the side with James and Rufus, who was clearly trying to calm Caroline down. Ginny had not seen her daughter-in-law this upset in a very long time, and she had no clue whether she should let James handle it, or try to help them.

"Hey, Aunt Ginny," Louis said as he came over to her and plucked the sticky Asher from her arms. "I'll keep him from diving off the tables if you have something you need to do."

"Yeah," Ginny answered and she realized that Louis had seen what she'd seen. "I'm not sure if I could help, but keeping Asher distracted will be good. What happened to Lena?"

"Claire waylaid her to help with some game she is playing with Emma," Louis told her. "Come on, little dude," he told Asher as he took him over to a table to sit with others who were also snacking before the main meal.

"I'm going to check on Lorelei and then maybe check on Caroline," Ginny told Teddy just as Amelia sprinted over to him and banged off his legs.

"Daddy!" Amelia shrieked at the top of her lungs. A moment later, George came around the door, wiggling his fingers and growling as the little girl howled in delight.

"Am I supposed to save you from Uncle George?" Teddy asked as he scooped her up with a chuckle. "I don't know if I can."

"Yes!" Amelia giggled.

Ginny smiled at them, but she had to check on the others.

She found Lorelei sitting quietly with Ireland, both of them leaning on the newest dog in their pack, Poppy. Lily had found this colorful wooden cube with beads and knobs and all sorts of activities for babies and both girls thoroughly enjoyed the toy. They weren't playing together, not like bigger kids would, but they liked to sit next to each other and blessedly, Poppy was happy to snooze next to Lorelei all day, helping to keep her calm. Ginny didn't disturb them, knowing if she interfered, they might both decide they needed something and currently Victoire was passed out in an arm chair. She was only four months pregnant, but already looking about seven. She hadn't needed a feeding tube with this twin pregnancy, but she slept all the time. It was a good thing they had Teeny living with them because the elf was needed to keep their house going.

As it was, Ginny was splitting her time between Victoire's house and the others, but all of them had said she should devote more time to Victoire.

But maybe she hadn't been giving enough time and attention to Caroline and maybe it was starting to show. Caroline had Honor living with her, as well, but she knew that Caroline could slip backwards in her journey to recovery at any point. It wasn't as though healing was linear.

"Hey!" came the call from the living room and she turned to see that Al had arrived with Wyatt and then Nat stepped through and predictably fell, but was caught by Hugo.

She waved to her son but turned back to Caroline, who was now in tears, holding hard onto Rufus. "Oh, darling," she whispered as she came close and sat next to her, pulling her in for a hard hug, sandwiching her between herself and James. She pressed a kiss to Caroline's brow and waited a beat as she felt Caroline shaking. "What's up?"

"It's been a rough few days," James told her and it was only this close up that she could see the healing bruise that was nearly gone from his face.

It could have been from Quidditch. That was always possible, but somehow she didn't think so. "What do you need?" she asked them, but focused on James as she sensed Caroline was beyond asking for anything at that moment.

James shook his head. "I didn't think she'd want to come, but she said she did if we could bring the dog… but the second the dog was out of the house for Louis to drive him over here, she had a panic attack. Wait, where's Asher?"

"Louis has him," Ginny promised him. "He'll be fine. Maybe we should go to one of the quieter rooms."

"It's getting better with Rufus here," James said, but he ran a finger down Caroline's cheek. "Do you want to lay down for a bit with the dog? We can take you up to one of the guest rooms."

"No," Caroline whispered as she held on tighter to Rufus.

"Can you talk about it?" Ginny asked her.

She shook her head violently. "Just dreams… just awful, vivid dreams… I'm not sleeping."

If she wasn't sleeping, then this was not the place to be. The family was boisterous at the best of times and today they were hitting manic for levels of excitement. "Do you want Audrey to come talk to you?" Ginny asked her. She knew Caroline wouldn't take anything. She had a morbid fear of taking anything that might dull her senses or leave her helpless. She'd been refusing that all the way through, which was part of the reason why she'd had to be hospitalized for months on end when she'd been at Hogwarts. She hadn't slept then, either.

Caroline shrugged, but didn't say no, which Ginny took as a good sign. "I'll go get her."

Audrey hadn't made it past the living room and had missed the whole thing, which wasn't unexpected. The house was huge and if someone was caught by the front door, they'd have no idea what was happening in the rest of the house.

Audrey took one look at Caroline and said, "Up we go," in her no-nonsense Healer voice as she guided her up, having her secure her hand into Rufus' fur as she took her around to the back stairs and up to the second floor where Lily had several spare bedrooms. "Let's take a look at you," she said as she led Caroline over to the bed and had her lay down with Rufus right there, her hand always on him.

Ginny came in after James and shut the door, going to sit on the end of the bed, while James went around and climbed on behind her, running his fingers through her hair.

"What's happening?" Audrey asked her gently.

Caroline shot James a look and then she began to cry.

"It's been about five days now," James told his aunt. "She started having terrible dreams she can't wake up from. I have to force her to wake, which was fine for the first two nights, but now she won't fall asleep. She dozes off for a few minutes and then startles herself awake."

"She hit you during one of the dreams," Audrey noted, examining his face. When Caroline let out a sob, she clucked at her soothingly. "Don't worry, darling, James is a big, tough guy. He takes Bludgers to the face for a living. What was your tiny fist going to do to him?"

To both Ginny's, and clearly James's, relief, Caroline let out a watery chuckle.

"I'm fine," James assured Audrey. "I didn't duck fast enough and she was completely asleep. She had a meltdown just as we were supposed to leave today, but she needed the dog and Louis was already on the way here with Rufus, so we came anyway."

"Let's run some tests," Audrey said as she took out her wand and began running through the spells. Most of them Ginny had heard a few times, usually in checks on Nat, but some she didn't know. Whatever Audrey was seeing, she didn't reveal it.

But it was the pregnancy spell that had everyone on edge.

"No, I took the potion…" faded away from Caroline's lips as a baby appeared floating above her stomach.

James let out sound that was something like, "Ooof."

"Looks like you missed your potion last month," Audrey told her with a small smile. "You're about six weeks along, give or take."

"I…" she hesitated and shook her head. "Yeah, I forgot in the morning, but took it at night."

"That's all it takes," Audrey assured her. "It has to be on time, every time."

Caroline looked over to James and Ginny did as well, wondering what her son was going to say. James, however, was still staring at the baby, clearly transfixed. "It never gets old," he said with clear wonder. "I could just look at them forever."

"Jamie…" Caroline said his name quietly.

He looked over at her and grinned, but it slipped a bit. "Tell me what you need from me."

Her eyes teared up again. "I don't know!"

James lay down with her and pulled her in, kissing her brow and leaving his lips there. "I love you so much," he told her. "Tell me how to help you through this."

"We're having a baby?" she asked through her tears.

"Yes," Audrey agreed evenly. "You're due right around Halloween, but you're also exhausted and run down. Pregnancy can cause extremely vivid dreams. It's actually a known symptom. I'm going to give you something safe and very mild to help you sleep and you're going to take it. Sleep with the dog in the bed if you have to, but you need to sleep."

"I didn't feel like this with Asher," she told Audrey before turning back to James. "It wasn't like this."

"No," he agreed as he brushed the hair from her face.

"Well, maybe that means it's a girl," Audrey told her while Ginny tried to take in that there was yet another baby on the way.

They really were rotten at the birth control potion.

"Hey, a girl would be nice," James said with a kiss to the tip of Caroline's nose. "But so would another boy. Are you okay?"

Caroline took a couple of deep breaths, then she let go of Rufus and turned to Audrey. "Bad dreams are really a symptom of pregnancy?"

"They really are," Audrey promised her. "You've had a lot going on, so this isn't a surprise to me. You'll be just fine. This is totally normal, but I need you to eat some more, since you're still nursing Asher, and drink water. I need you to rest more when Asher naps."

"He's not really napping," James admitted ruefully.

Audrey patted Caroline's hand. "Honestly, I'd be more surprised if you weren't reacting this way. You're exhausted, sleep deprived, and dehydrated."

She burst into tears again. "I thought… I thought I was going crazy."

"Nope," Audrey assured her gently. "Just pregnant."