Whenever I spent a lot of time with my daughter, I couldn’t help but feel a bit in awe. After everything I’d gone through at the age of seventeen, after all those days when I didn’t dare imagine what my adulthood would turn out to be like, she was a bit of a supernatural concept. She was me, but exceptionally prettier. She had the same manageable, straight hair as her Aunt Ginny, but in my shade. She had my eyes. She had Ron’s smile, thank goodness, as my original array of teeth earned me a reputation in school as ugly. She was witty, playful, and above all, had my love for books and schoolwork.
Now I was waiting for her to arrive at home, confused, her arm around my little boy, Hugo. Hugo was the spitting image of his father in personality and looks. I braced myself for my son’s arrival, wondering if I’d be able to spare an innocent first year from my upset. He needed his mother, especially when he received my news.
I turned away from the kitchen sink and reached for the bowl where I put my jewelry when I wanted to clean up the Muggle way. My charm bracelet, a wedding gift from Harry for years of friendship, the watch my children had pooled to get me for Christmas last year, and last but not least, the wedding ring. Ginny watched me slide it back onto my finger with a sigh.
“The kids should be here any minute,” she murmured, putting her hand on my shoulder as I drew level with her. James, Albus, and Lily would be arriving with Rose and Hugo. James had been told (he was a fifth year, he had a right) but the other four were completely oblivious. I regretted allowing Harry and Ginny to tell their eldest. Now he had to maintain composure in the present of his siblings and cousins, and, Ron being his favorite uncle, I could barely imagine the pain that ensued.
We heard the telltale sounds of the Knight Bus pulling up and went out. Hugo was the first off, and I only saw a blur of red hair as he flew into my arms. At eleven, he still behaved like a five year old when it came to being away from his parents. I stifled more pitiful tears and kissed the top of his sweet-smelling head. Then I raised my other arm by instinct, unsurprised when another warm body enveloped herself in it. The third year that I had a hard time remembering when she became a young teenager, my incredible daughter Rose. She grinned at me with that cocky grin so like her father’s. I shook off my grief and pulled both my children closer.
Ginny was disentangling herself from affectionate Lily’s embrace, while James stood back and searched for his father’s profile hopefully. I knew Harry regretted not being here to see his kids, but he was arranging a leave of absence at the Auror office. With him gone and Ron . . . more gone, they were shorthanded. James realized Harry wasn’t present and moved forward to kiss his mum on the cheek. Albus followed, then came to stand by Hugo. Honestly, I was staring at Harry and Ron as children again. Ginny saw this too, and I felt her hand on my shoulder again.
James helped us usher the younger four inside again, and Ginny went about bringing Honeyduke’s cocoa to the wind-kissed minors. I sat down and listened to Rose and Albus dish about third year Gryffindor drama, different teachers, and accuse each other of various bad grades or ridiculous love faux pas. I listened, occasionally grinning.
Then Ginny came back in, and the first and third years caught the negative tenor of the atmosphere. Ginny nodded at me, and I clutched Rose’s hand for strength. She glanced at my whitening knuckles in shock. “Mum . . . ?”
“Your father has been murdered,” I choked, and Rose threw herself into my embrace. Hugo followed, where I held them tightly, rocking back and forth, in that living room so reminiscient of my late husband, where family was the only way any of us would survive.
****
DINNER WITH THE POTTERS - POTTER MANOR
****
Ron was laughing. It was a joyful sound, but slightly obnoxious, too loud in my ears. God I was irritable this evening. Ginny’s food had a penetrating aroma, and the sounds of baby James’ crying occasionally was driving me nearly batty with irritation. I had no appetite for shepherd’s pie or chicken with curry, and although I loved my sister-in-law and long time best friend, they both were wrong to invite me tonight. I was ill and dangerously close to PMS.
“I feel bad for Neville, though, honestly. He could have done way better than Padma Patil,” Ron was saying, earning himself a knock on the arm from Ginny. She was pregnant again, she’d just told us at the beginning of the meal, and more hormonal than last time.
“Padma is wonderful for Neville. They both just got jobs at Hogwarts. They are expecting already. Padma loves old Mrs. Longbottom. They’re both sponsors of that new Quidditch team, the Yorkshire one, the Banshees or something. And they’ve both been through the mill,” Ginny argued, winking at me from across the table. Not many people knew about Padma’s secret affair with the long time Quidditch player, Oliver Wood, leading up to his sudden, well-publicized engagement to Katie Bell. Padma hadn’t known until Neville told her about it, knowing what Wood had shared with her. When she fell into a heartbroken dementia in Neville’s arms, he’d carried her to St. Mungo’s and remained steadfast at her bedside until she recovered three months later. The bond between them was too great to be ignored, and Padma had come to replace her passion for Oliver with a warm love for Neville. The wedding had been the previous summer.
“Fine, if you see it that way,” Ron muttered, filling his mouth with his sister’s cooking, glancing at me with a wink. I knew how many of Ginny’s leftovers were hidden in his cooler at work, protected with a Permanent Freezing Charm and an Alohomora-proof lock so Harry wouldn’t find out who the Potter Pantry Thief was. Ron had been skeptical to try Ginny’s food when we came to their house for supper the week after their wedding. Now, he was under the impression that it outshined Mum Weasley’s, stuffing himself with it even as I watched.
“Ah, well, Neville’s been through the mill, Ron, I think he deserves a bit of romance, even if Padma can be rather scarlet nowadays,” Harry sighed, tickling James’ nose. The baby was redheaded and freckle-skinned with Harry’s green eyes and untameable style. He could only be the product of Harry and Ginny, Ron and I had agreed.
“Well, Padma’s sister didn’t seem to pleased about it. I had no idea Parvati was that lovestruck for Neville, of all people. I was under the impression that she favored that Ravenclaw, Anthony Goldstein,” I offered, winking in Ginny’s direction at our pool of gossip. Dinners at Potter Manor always entailed such discussions.
“That’s all the past, Hermione. Parvati and Tony are engaged now, and there are rumors that Parvati is pregnant already. Just rumors, obviously, but I was in the Maternity Ward yesterday, visiting Luna and baby Xenophilius, and she said that Parvati had been in there,” Ginny added, sighing with a smile. “It seems incredible that Xenophilius, Jr, James, and Albus will be at school together, doesn’t it, Hermione?” She winked back, her soft red eyelashes laced with black mascara rising and falling as the pale membrane of her eyelid slid over the lucid hazel and back up again.
“Yes amazing, but Ginny, why do you wink at that?” I said aloud, much to her distaste. Oh my dear sister-in-law, get over it. The sensation of a mental grin shuddered through my brain.
“Do you have news for us, Hermione?” Harry goaded, watching me expectantly, his eyes flickering to my navel then back up to my face.
I was in utter confusion, as was Ron. We communicated this mutual confusion, our mouths wide and our eyes searching each other’s expressions for an answer. “No, Harry, I don’t. What are you going on about?” I spat back.
“Ginny, you said-”
“Yes, Harry, I know, I was guessing by the expression she’s worn all evening-”
“Wonderful, dear, now you’ve embarrassed us both,” Harry sighed, his face an apology as he smiled meekly at me.
“I was under the impression that you were, you know- expecting a visit from the stork,” Ginny murmured, so Ron and I had to lean in just to hear.
I blinked as I realized the implication, my mind whirring with shock and confusion and a frantic sprint back down memory lane. What had I done to suggest such a thing? Then I remembered - my oversensitivity to smell tonight, my sensitive hearing, my headache, my nausea this evening.
“Ron, St. Mungo’s, now,” I croaked, praying Ginny’s suspicions were true. Four years we’d been trying, the impatience of the idea plagueing our marriage to dangerous degrees. Ron grabbed my hand, waved to our extended family, and we Disapparated, appearing on the empty Muggle street before the mannikin. Ron hissed to it through clenched teeth, and we were in, and the receptionist was sending us to the Prenatal Office, and they were performing spells that sent shivers over my body, and I told them what the shivers felt like, what I’d been feeling all night, and what Ginny had assumed.
Then, within an instant and a few hurried answers, Ron and I were going to be parents in less than nine months.
Ron held me in his arms for what felt like several blissful hours, in our handsome flat near the Ministry. He was too happy to speak, our kisses enough as we both imagined our child. I imagined a little boy with Ron’s hair and my brains, playing with little James and unborn Albus. I sent a Patronus to tell Harry and Ginny, the latter of which I was sure would be telling this victory over and over for some time.
“What about Rose?” he sighed finally, pulling away.
“Rose?” That wasn’t a boy’s name.
“My little girl, Rose, with her mother’s perfect curls and extra smile, her mother’s brains and condescending intelligence, that loves you and me and Uncle Harry and Aunt Ginny and her cousins James and Albus .. .. Is Rose a good name for a girl?”
I hadn’t been expecting Ron to want a girl, but now that I imagined my perfect angel, in Hogwart’s robes, waving her hundred-and-twelve papers in my face with a proud smile, I didn’t miss the boy. I did still want a boy, but did that change my answer? No. “Yes.”
My Brave Face by grangergirl35
Chapter Notes: Rose and Hugo come to Hermione's side and must learn the truth of their mother's pain, and Hermione remembers the happiest moment of her past with Ron, when Ginny's intuition proved perfect.
Chapter Endnotes: I'm going to be simple. REVIEW. Have fun.