After dinner on Harry’s second day teaching, he sat in his office trying to figure out why he was so exhausted when there was a hesitant knock on the door. Sighing, he called out, “Come in.” The door swung open, and a small crowd of students poured into the little room.
“Er, hello,” Harry said uncertainly. He had already had all of these students in class, and they hadn’t mentioned needing to talk to him about anything then. He vaguely wondered why they would ambush him like this.
“Hello, Professor,” said a tall girl with silvery blond hair. She was very pretty, and obviously the oldest of the group. Harry guessed that she had been elected spokesperson.
“Hello, Miss Weasley,” Harry said stiffly.
The girl sighed dramatically. “Things are going to get awfully confusing if you insist on calling us by our last names,” she commented. “I mean, I’m Miss Weasley, but so is Linda, although she’s in first year and I’m in sixth.” She nodded toward a small girl with reddish-brown hair and bright blue eyes.
“Of course, there’s a pair of Mr. Weasleys as well,” the girl continued. Harry took a moment to remember her name. Angelique! That was it. Her mother, Fleur had named her.
“In case you didn’t remember from class, this is my brother, Philippe,” Angelique said, nodding toward the boy on her right who was easily distinguished by his rather unique hair: it was orange, and not because it had been dyed or charmed. “He’s in third year. Joshua, the other Mr. Weasley with the bright red hair, is in front of him; he’s a first-year like Linda. And then there’s John Lupin, who might as well be another cousin of ours.” She nodded toward the last boy, whose hair was the same shade of brown that Remus Lupin’s had been in his youth.
“Alright, I see your point,” Harry chuckled. “What can I do for you, Angelique?”
Angelique looked faintly surprised. “You remembered my name,” she said. “I’m impressed.”
Harry smiled back at her and didn’t mention the fact that he probably wouldn’t have remembered any of the others’ names if she hadn’t told him. The only reason he had remembered her name was because he had known her as a baby.
After a moment, Angelique cleared her throat. “We were wondering what’s going on, Professor. I mean, I was a year old when you disappeared, and the rest of this lot hadn’t even been thought of. Now you’re suddenly back with no warning at all? With no explanation?”
Harry shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “I guess I hadn’t quite thought of it like that,” he said lamely. “What do you want to know?”
Angelique’s eyes widened. “That’s it?” she asked, clearly surprised. “You’re just going to tell us? You’re not going to say we’re too young and feed us all that other rubbish like our parents do?”
Harry shook his head. “I don’t believe in hiding the truth unless there’s a very good reason,” he said firmly. “And I’ve never thought a person’s age was a particularly good reason.”
“In that case, we’d like to know where you’ve been all this time, and why you didn’t tell us or our parents when you came back,” Angelique requested. “And I, for one, would like to hear it from my Uncle Harry, not from Professor Potter.” Harry started slightly at hearing himself referred to as ‘Uncle Harry,’ but quickly realized that he really didn’t mind the title.
“Deal,” he said, “as long as you promise not to call me Uncle Harry in class.” The children all laughed and nodded their agreement, and he conjured chairs for all of them. There wasn’t a lot of room to move around, but they weren’t overly crowded, either.
“Would somebody be willing to go get Lily and Brian?” Harry asked before they could get too settled in. “They have a right to hear the whole story too, but things were so busy during those last weeks of summer that we never really discussed it. Well, that and Brian refused to stay in the same room with me,” he added in a slightly bitter tone.
“They knew you were back, then?” Philippe asked.
“Yeah; I’m actually surprised you didn’t know, Joshua. We were at the Burrow at the same time once, but you stayed outside in the garden.”
Joshua groaned and slapped himself across the forehead, and Philippe volunteered to go invite Lily and Brian. While they waited, Harry decided to try and get to know the others a little better.
“Alright, we’re going to be talking all about me in just a few minutes, so why don’t you tell me a little about yourselves while we wait?” he suggested. “Angelique, I remember you as a baby, so I know your parents are Bill and Fleur. Joshua, I remember from this summer that yours are Ron and Hermione, is that right?”
Joshua nodded.
“So who are your parents, Linda?” he asked kindly.
“Charlie and Katerina,” she answered timidly. “You wouldn’t know my mum, though. She didn’t meet Dad until after you disappeared.”
Harry nodded in understanding. “So Fred, George, and Percy don’t have any children, then?”
“They all do, actually,” Angelique answered, “only none of them are eleven yet.”
“Then I guess that just leaves you, John,” Harry said. “I assume Remus Lupin is your father?”
“Yes sir,” John replied in a slightly nervous voice.
“No ‘sirs’ here, John,” Harry said with a small smile. “Save that for the classroom. You know, our dads were pretty much best mates in school.”
“Yeah, I know,” John replied, smiling broadly. “Dad told me.”
“Good for him. So, who’s your mum then?” Harry had a pretty good idea based on the way things were looking before he had disappeared, but he didn’t want to assume and turn out to be wrong.
“Her real name’s Nymphadora, but don’t tell her I told you that!” John whispered. “She hates that name; goes by her maiden name, Tonks, instead.”
Harry laughed aloud. “I always thought those two would end up getting married,” he chuckled. “She was good for him. I imagine she still is.”
“They’re good for each other,” John corrected with a grin.
“I’ll bet they are,” Harry smiled.
Before he had a chance to ask any more questions, Philippe and Lily rushed into the room, grinning and breathing heavily.
“Hi, Dad,” Lily panted as Harry conjured her a chair and Philippe dropped back into the one he had vacated. It was still more than a little odd for Harry to hear her call him that, but he forced himself not to react adversely; if he ever wanted to be a part of this family, he would need to begin by acting the part.
“Good to see you, Lily,” Harry responded. “Let me guess, Brian tried to hex you for agreeing to come?”
Lily laughed. “No, he’s not that stupid. He just glared at us for a moment and then stuck his nose in a book. Philippe told me that you’re going to tell us everything about yourself; is that true?”
“I don’t know about everything,” Harry chuckled. “I’ll try to answer your questions as best I can, though. Your mum and I discussed this a couple of days ago, and we decided that I should be as truthful as possible with all of you. The main reason you probably don’t know all that much about me, other than a few stories here and there, is because my ‘death’ was always a sensitive subject - especially with Ginny, Ron, and Hermione, and they were the ones who knew me best. It’s enough to give a bloke a big head, really.” That drew a laugh from everyone.
“Anyhow, we decided that since that was the main reason nobody’s told you much about me, it would be alright if I answered your questions. Plus, your parents should all be so happy that I’m not dead, they ought to give me a free pass on this one. So, what do you want to know?”
There was silence for a moment as the children all looked at each other before Angelique finally spoke up. “Lily, he’s your dad; you should get to ask the first question.”
“Er, okay,” Lily said, suddenly looking nervous. “I guess the first thing to ask is, how come you didn’t tell me and Brian much of anything during the last part of the summer holiday?”
Harry gave his head a slight shake before answering. “Well, for one thing, your mum and I hadn’t really discussed it yet. Plus, everything was just too new; I needed some time to sort a few things out myself first.”
Lily nodded in understanding. “Okay, so where have you been all this time?”
“Fair question,” said Harry. “You all know that back before I disappeared the Wizarding world was in the middle of a war, right?” There were nods all around. “Well, I was at the center of that war. You see, there was a prophecy made before I was born that basically said I would have the power to defeat Voldemort, and one of us would end up killing the other.” He noted with satisfaction that there was not one shudder or gasp at the mention of Voldemort’s name.
“Voldemort had spent most of his life trying to make himself immortal, and I spent several years undoing all of that and training to fight him,” Harry continued. “The problem was, I found out that I can’t cast the Killing Curse.”
“But everybody says you’re really powerful,” Joshua protested.
“Well I’m no slouch,” Harry said with a small smile, “but it takes more than power to successfully cast the Killing Curse. If you’re going to use Avada Kedavra, you have to enjoy killing; you have to think it’s fun. I couldn’t do that, not even to kill Voldemort. Luckily, Hermione came up with a different plan, which ended up working. We lured Voldemort to a room we used to call the Death Chamber - I have no idea if that’s the real name or not, but it’s in the Department of Mysteries at the Ministry of Magic. There’s an old stone archway there that’s actually a portal to the afterlife.
“Voldemort came, just like we had planned. He had a few of his Death Eaters with him, which we had also expected, and there was a long, hard battle. By the end of it, I was able to break Voldemort’s wand and push him through the archway, but as soon as I did, one of the Death Eaters hit me from behind with a powerful Memory Charm and then turned my robe into a Portkey. I disappeared, and my memory was totally gone.
“An old Muggle farmer found me in the middle of his field the next morning, bawling like a baby, since that’s basically what I was. I was raised as a ward of the Muggle government until I was able to get a job as a police officer. A couple of years later, I got a different job that led me to the Burrow.”
“If you were Obliviated, how come you remember me as a baby?” asked Angelique.
“Because your Aunt Hermione managed to get me a Memory Restoring Potion from the Department of Mysteries, even though it wasn’t supposed to be released to the public yet,” Harry answered.
“Why didn’t you tell anyone you were back?” asked Linda. Harry shifted uncomfortably. He had known this question would come back up, but that didn’t mean he particularly wanted to answer it.
“I did tell a few people,” he hedged. “I mean, Lily and Brian knew, and Ginny, Ron, Hermione-”
“They knew and they didn’t tell me?” Joshua yelled. “Oh, they’re getting a Howler tomorrow!”
“Relax,” Harry chuckled. “It’s my fault you didn’t know, not theirs. I was still trying to adjust to my new life - or my old life, depending on how you look at it - and I just wasn’t ready to face everyone. Plus, if the Wizarding press had found out I was there, the Burrow would’ve been swarming with reporters and nobody wanted to deal with that. I actually feel bad about it now, but at the time it seemed like the best thing to do.”
There was a short pause, and then Harry asked if they had any more questions for him. Joshua was the first to speak up. “My dad once said something about how if you could kill a Basilisk for Aunt Ginny, you’d have already come back to her if you were still alive. Was he just ranting, or did you really kill a Basilisk?”
Harry spent the rest of the evening telling them stories from his school days that their parents either didn’t know about or hadn’t told them because they had been too painful to talk about. No one left the office until curfew, and before they headed back to their common room, Harry and Lily had set up a time to get together just the two of them every week.
As the weeks passed, Harry became more and more accustomed to life as a Hogwarts professor. Just as Ginny had promised, she had only needed a week to help him become comfortable enough with defensive magic to begin doing demonstrations in class. They continued their nightly dueling practice, however, as Harry insisted that he needed to be in top form before he could really start teaching his older students to duel.
As they squared off one night a week before Halloween, Harry watched Ginny with a determined glint in his eye. Up until now, she had always been the one on the offensive in these little practice sessions, but he was determined to change that tonight. Tonight, he would draw his wand quickly enough to attack, rather than just barely in time to block.
“Ready, Harry?” Ginny asked in a playful tone. “I wouldn’t want to hurt you or anything.”
Harry chuckled. “As if you could. One.”
“Two,” said Ginny.
“Three!” they shouted together. They wrenched their wands from their pockets and aimed them, yelling in unison, “Rictusempra!” Neither had a chance to block, and an instant later they were both collapsed on the floor, roaring with laughter as invisible hands mercilessly tickled their ribs.
After a moment, Harry finally got control enough to point his wand at himself and gasp, “Finite.” He sat up, grinning at the sound of Ginny’s squealing laughter as she writhed on the floor in front of him. Her red hair was fanned out around her head and tears of mirth were streaming down her face, and Harry suddenly felt a swooping sensation in his stomach that he hadn’t felt in a very long time. He blinked once and pointed his wand at Ginny, whispering, “Finite.”
Ginny lay panting on the ground, still laughing quietly to herself. The sight of her looking so happy and yet so vulnerable at the same time caused Harry’s stomach to flip again. He felt a sudden urge to brush away her tears and kiss that mouth that had just been making the room echo with such a wonderful sound. He rose from the floor and stepped toward her, wondering if he should tell her what he had just felt.
No, he couldn’t do that; it would only get her hopes up, and he definitely wasn’t ready to really think of her as his wife. Still, the fact that he was undeniably attracted to her was definitely a good sign.
As Harry arrived at Ginny’s side, she looked up at him with laughter still dancing in her dark brown eyes. He smiled slightly and was about to offer to help her up when he heard running footsteps and a shouting voice out in the corridor.
“Mum! Hey Mum! What are yo-” Brian Potter stopped cold in the doorway, a look of shocked fury on his face. Before Harry even realized what he was doing, Brian had drawn his wand and was shouting, “Expelliarmus!”
Thankfully, Harry’s wand was still in his hand, and he was able to yell, “Protego!” in time to block the Disarming Charm.
“Brian Potter, what do you think you’re doing?” Ginny demanded from where she sat on the floor.
“What am I doing? What’s he doing?” Brian retorted. “It’s a good thing I showed up when I did. It’s not hard to see what happened: he attacked you! Merlin only knows what else he was about to do to you when I got here.”
Ginny quirked an eyebrow at her son and got to her feet. “Brian, come here,” she said in a tone that was frustrated but not unkind. “Your father and I-”
“He’s not my father,” Brian snapped.
Ginny gritted her teeth and began again. “Your father and I have been practicing dueling every evening since the start of term. Tonight, he hit me with a Tickling Charm, and I ended up rolling around on the ground before he could cancel it. Then, just when he was about to help me up, you came barging in and attacked him.”
Brian had the decency to look sheepish. “Sorry,” he muttered to his mother.
“Brian, you need to apologize to your father as well,” she said gently.
Brian’s eyes flashed dangerously. “Take me to the cemetery, then, because my father is dead.”
Ginny looked ready to slap the boy, so Harry decided that it was finally time for him to intervene. “What do you have against me, Brian?” he asked quietly.
“You won’t let my dad rest in peace,” Brian snapped.
Harry sighed and absentmindedly ran his fingers through his hair. “Do you really believe I’m not your father?” he asked after a moment.
Brian hesitated just long enough to let Harry know that the answer to his question was ‘No.’ Then he opened his mouth and closed it again without responding.
Harry nodded. “That’s what I thought. Look, Brian, I’ll make you a deal. We both know you’ve got a problem with me, but we also both know that you’ve got to stop being so ridiculously hostile. So I’ll tell you what. You remember this week’s Quote of the Week?”
“Yeah,” Brian said, his tone still belligerent. “CONSTANT VIGILANCE! Alastor ‘Mad-Eye’ Moody.”
“Good,” said Harry, “because you and I are going to play the Constant Vigilance Game.”
Brian rolled his eyes.
“Just hear me out and I think you’ll like it,” Harry said as he winked at Ginny, who was listening curiously. “Here’s how we play. Whenever you see me in the corridors or the Great Hall, or out on the grounds - anywhere but in class - you try to jinx me, and I try to do the same to you. Nothing malicious, of course - just simple, harmless jinxes and hexes. But you’re the only one allowed to do it - no help from your friends, or even your sister, and don’t think I wouldn’t find out.”
Brian frowned. “Won’t I get detention for hexing a teacher in the corridors?”
“Nah,” said Harry, shaking his head. “I’ll clear it with McGonagall. So what do you say?”
Brian looked thoughtful for a moment. “Tarantallegra!” he shouted suddenly, and ran from the room as Harry began doing a ridiculous tap-dance.
“Where did that come from?” asked a shocked Ginny as she released Harry from the jinx.
Harry shrugged. “I figure it’s more productive than having him keep glaring at me and pretending I’m dead.”
“Yeah, but do you really think McGonagall will go along with it?”
“Trust me, she’ll love the idea. She was telling me just last week what a shame it is that Brian refuses to accept me the way Lily has. Did you know we’ve been getting together to play chess every Thursday afternoon?”
“Yeah, she gives me an update every Friday before class. Have you been letting her win, or are you really still that bad?” Ginny asked with a smirk.
Harry gave her a playful shove but didn’t answer. “So... back to dueling practice?”
Ginny nodded, and they both stowed their wands and prepared to count down.
“I’m thinking of going to Ollivander’s for a spare wand,” Harry told Ginny as he looked out over the decorated Great Hall at the Halloween feast. Live bats circled and dove through the large room, darting between Hagrid’s giant pumpkins.
Ginny frowned. “How come? Is something wrong with your wand?”
“No, but I think it might be a good idea to go back to keeping a wand strapped to my arm, you know? I was planning on teaching the N.E.W.T. students how to do it.”
“Liar,” Ginny laughed. “You just want to make it easier to defend yourself against Brian.”
“Well, the boy is pretty devious. I never get a moment’s - Protego! - rest. See what I mean?”
“And whose fault is that?” Ginny asked, blinking innocently at him.
“Okay, so it’s mine, but when I suggested this game I didn’t know that you’d given him my Invisibility Cloak and the Marauder’s Map. He’s got a ridiculous advantage, and I’m sick of having to check my hair color every five seconds. I’m looking in the mirror so often that I’m starting to remind myself of Lockhart.”
Ginny laughed. “Okay, okay, you can go to Diagon Alley tomorrow. I’ll even come along if you like.” She smiled at him, and Harry felt the now-familiar fluttering in his stomach.
“I think I’d like that.”
They continued their playful banter as the feast went on, although Harry had to keep his wand in his hand and one eye on Brian at all times just to avoid getting jinxed. As the feast began winding down, however, he finally got a chance for payback. Brian made the mistake of trying to leave the Great Hall by himself, meaning that Harry was free to jinx him without fear of hitting another student. He flicked his wand at his son’s retreating back and smiled smugly when Brian’s robes turned Chudley Canons orange. Ginny stifled a giggle and covered her mouth with her napkin so that her son wouldn’t see her laughing. Brian just turned around very slowly, pulled a face of exaggerated disgust at Harry, and hurried out of the Hall.
“Wow,” Ginny commented. “He didn’t even glare at you.”
“Yeah, no rude hand gestures, either,” Harry remarked. “I think I might be getting through to him.”
“I think you might,” Ginny agreed with a small smile. Harry returned her smile, but faltered as he saw a bit of sadness flicker across her expression. He opened his mouth to ask her what was wrong, but immediately closed it again as he realized what she must be thinking. She knew how well he was getting along with Lily, and now Brian seemed to be coming around too, but Harry was still keeping his distance from his wife.
Harry was quiet for the rest of the evening as he pondered this realization. After all, he had always wanted a family, but now that he had one, it turned out that things weren’t that simple. It was easier with the children, somehow, because he didn’t remember them from before and they didn’t remember him, so there weren’t really any expectations. With Ginny, however, everything was so complicated that it made his head spin if he thought about it long enough. A part of him was deeply in love with a younger version of her, while another part of him still saw her as a rather new friend. Still, he was confident that his confusion could eventually be overcome, especially since he felt himself starting to fall for her all over again. The problem was figuring out how to get closer to her without giving her false hopes.