Sweet Emotion
Saturday, 19 September 1998
The week between Harry’s introduction into Necromancy and Hermione’s birthday passed quickly. Classes were going well, the castle felt safe, and Harry felt happy. There was some small part of his brain that kept telling him he needed to wait for the other shoe to drop, but the larger, less paranoid part of his brain told him he deserved to be happy.
Theo had slept in Harry’s room every night since Saturday. On Tuesday, Harry came upstairs from training to find Theo feeding Teddy his bottle while looking over his Charms notes and just like that they’d fallen into a routine.
For two boys who’d never really known the love of parents - Harry losing his parents as a baby, Theo losing his mother when he was 4, and Apollonius Nott being a rather sorry excuse for a father – they’d stepped into the role rather seamlessly. Harry had been doing it all summer, but Theo had only really been at it for a week and, if asked, probably wouldn’t yet admit that’s what he was doing. But it was clear that he loved that little boy with everything he had.
Now, it was Saturday morning and Harry was sitting in an abandoned classroom in the same hallway as the 8th Year Tower and Founders Tower that Susan and he had commandeered for plotting their government takeover. Harry had given up on telling Susan to stop calling it a government takeover when they were really just discussing how to go about systematically dismantling everything the Wizengamot had done in the last hundred … you know what, it was a government takeover.
With the help of the Hogwarts elves, they’d totally redone the room. What used to be a dusty space filled with broken desks and cobwebs was now a clean space with large windows that let in plenty of natural light. There was a conference room table at the center with enough seats for all the sitting Lords and Ladies in the castle as well as all of the primary heirs. There were several writing desks along the two walls with windows and the third wall, the one not occupied by the door and Susan’s giant bulletin board with a banner reading “1998 is the Year for Anarchy” pinned to the top, was covered in bookshelves holding copies of every law the Wizengamot had ever passed.
This morning, Harry was sitting there with Susan, Hermione, and Teddy. Hermione had no position on the Wizengamot, for now (Harry sure hoped she’d get one of the elected positions sooner rather than later, their Orders of Merlin First Class should certainly help), but she had an incredible political mind. Teddy was there because his godmother (Harry had named Neville and Hermione as Teddy’s godparents when he’d adopted him) had demanded that she get to spend as much time with her godson as possible on her birthday before he was sent away. Hermione really didn’t want to hear Harry’s argument that he wasn’t “sending Teddy away,” but had merely decided that a classic Gryffindor rager probably wasn’t the place for an infant.
Nonetheless, the group was sitting there discussing what they’d like to tackle first at the upcoming Wizengamot meeting. The meetings took place every month, except for August, on the night of the New Moon. So far, Harry and his friends had only attended the July session and they’d only really been able to announce which seats they were taking, and they hadn’t been able to announce everyone. Luna had been out of the country so the Rosier, Ollivander, and Ravenclaw seats remained unclaimed and Fred had still been unconscious from the injuries he’d sustained during the battle, so they hadn’t been able to announce Fred and George as the new Lords Prewett.
That was still a bit of an issue, but Harry had a plan. Granted, the plan included roping Ginny into sweettalking Muriel Prewett, something no one had achieved since Gideon and Fabian were, like, six … but it was still a plan.
“Alright,” Susan said, pulling Harry from his thoughts about how to survive an encounter with the only Dowager more imposing than Augusta Longbottom, “I think we have a plan, or at least a solid outline of one. It’s a nice day outside, Hermione go spend your birthday with your godson. I’ll see you lot tonight.”
She then exited the room with the type of purpose only Susan Bones was able to achieve.
“What would you like to do, birthday girl?” Harry asked.
Hermione just shrugged, smiling, “I really just want to spend time with Teddy. I haven’t gotten to see him much with classes and everything. I haven’t gotten to see you much either.”
“Alright,” Harry said, smiling back, “how about a walk around the lake?”
“Sounds perfect.”
The little trio spent the next couple of hours walking around the lake before Hermione shot off her Patronus to ask Ron to grab lunch and meet them down by the lake.
A half hour later, Ron arrived holding three sandwiches and a picnic blanket.
Harry called Mimi to bring a bottle for Teddy who, after finishing said bottle, immediately fell asleep, snoring softly.
Harry, Ron, and Hermione spent the next hour catching up, filling Ron in on everything Harry had told Hermione during their walk. After everything serious had been covered, they started to talk about Susan’s career in anarchy. Harry told Ron his plan to win over Muriel and he agreed it was about as good a plan as one could come up with.
Once it hit 4:00, Teddy started to stir, and Harry decided it was time to go inside. The group entered through the Heir’s entrance at the outside of the clock tower so Harry could show Ron and Hermione around the Tower, having realized on the walk over that he somehow hadn’t done that yet.
The trio kept chatting while Harry gave Teddy a bath and got him ready to spend the night with Andromeda and Narcissa
At 6:00, Harry called for Mimi and asked her to please take Teddy to Grimmauld Place.
Hermione’s party wasn’t scheduled to start until 8:00 so they could’ve gone down to the Great Hall for dinner but it had been so long since it was just the three of them that Harry decided to have one of the elves bring dinner up to his quarters. They spent the next hour eating and laughing together before they split off to get ready for the night.
After taking a quick shower, Harry went back into his room to get dressed and found Theo in the exact position he’d been in a week before.
Laughing, Harry said, “I don’t have time for a repeat of last week.”
“I know,” Theo said with a smile, “we can save that for later, I just wanted to see you and thought you might want help picking out clothes.”
“I’m always happy to see you, darling,” Harry said with a warm smile, “and sure, you can pick out my outfit.”
Grinning, Theo jumped off the bed and headed toward Harry’s wardrobe.
A few minutes later, Harry was dressed in the same light wash jeans he’d worn the week prior – he was starting to think they were Theo’s favorites – but instead of a t-shirt and a hoodie, Theo had thrown him a white button down and an emerald green jumper.
Harry looked at himself in the mirror and blew out a breath, “I look like my dad.”
“Which one?” Theo asked with a teasing grin.
“James,” Harry said, rolling his eyes, “I haven’t really thought I looked much like him since I started filling out, except for the hair, skin tone, and glasses, but look at that picture on the bookshelf of him with Sirius and Regulus, I look exactly like him.”
“You really do,” Theo said quietly before he narrowed his eyes at the picture, “except one thing.”
“What do you mean?”
“Did your dad have his ear pierced?”
“Yeah, he’s wearing that little gold hoop in most of the pictures of him after his 5th year,” Harry said, smiling, “according to his journals, he let Sirius pierce it over that summer.”
“You should pierce your ear.”
“What? Now?”
“Why not,” Theo said with a shrug, “what’re the odds Luna knows how.”
“Pretty high, it’s Luna, she knows everything.”
“I’m gonna go get her.”
“Theo are you being serious right now.”
“Yeah I think it’d look hot.”
“Alright,” Harry said, realizing putting up a fight would be futile.
2 minutes later, Theo returned with Luna who was holding her wand and a gold hoop and had a slightly off-putting grin on her face, “this shouldn’t hurt.”
“That’s what you said when you fixed my nose and that was a dirty filthy lie.”
Luna simply shrugged before pointing her wand at Harry’s ear and muttering a spell under her breath, a slight pinch was followed closely by the relief of a directed cooling charm, a second later, Harry felt Luna push a post through his ear and heard the slight click as she secured the post into the other side of the hoop.
“Done,” she said in her usual cheery voice.
“I was right,” Theo said, “you look hot.”
Rolling his eyes, Harry thanked his boyfriend before turning around to grab Hermione’s present, “let’s go, I don’t want to be late.”
“Wait just a moment,” Luna said as they reached her door, “I need to grab my gift as well.”
Once Luna had collected her package, the group made their way over to the 8th Year’s tower. The scene they walked into was a little more lively than the one they’d found last week, but it was nowhere near as rowdy as Harry knew it was going to get.
They sat around the room sipping on drinks while Hermione opened presents from her friends. As always, she got a bunch of books. People rarely knew what else to get her. Well, Neville had gotten her a plant, Luna had given her a hand-crafted dream catcher that was truly beautiful, and Ginny had given her a sweater Hermione had been eying the last time they’d gone shopping that summer.
Ron and Harry had certainly fallen victim to the book cliché over the years, but they’d gotten better. It was down to only their gifts now and Hermione looked between them trying to decide whose to open first, “please let her open mine last,” Harry asked Ron.
“Alright, mate,” Ron agreed easily.
Ron’s gift was beautiful, “I stole your insane shoebox full of pictures and had my mum teach me how to make them into a scrapbook, it’s charmed to always stay this size, but it automatically adds blank pages at the end.”
“Oh, Ron, it’s lovely,” Hermione said reaching over to hug her boyfriend, “thank you so much.”
“Great job, Ron,” Harry complimented, “it’s really well done.”
Blushing at the compliments, Ron pointed to Harry’s gift and said “last one, Mione.”
“Now,” Harry said before she could open it, “half of it is a gift just for you and the other half is yours but it’s also sort of a gift for all of us.”
Slightly confused, Hermione just shrugged and opened the gift. Inside, she found a lovely light brown bookbag like Harry’s. “Oh Harry,” she said, “this is perfect, thank you!”
“I’m glad you like it,” Harry said with a smile, “now open the other part and let’s get this party started.”
Slightly less confused now, remembering Harry’s comment from last week that he’d solved their music issue, she opened the other part of the gift.
“My mum charmed it,” Harry said with a soft smile, “I also found her notes on how she charmed it and how to renew the charms so you can experiment with other stuff. A lot of the tapes are ones I found in her vault, but I also went to that music store by Grimmauld and got tapes of most of the records we had in the tower and," he said with a giant grin, reaching into his pocket, “I made this!”
“No way,” Hermione said, grinning back.
“What’s that?” Pansy asked from across the room.
“A mixtape!” Hermione cheered.
“A what?”
“It’s time for a music education,” Harry responded, “I put a few Gryffindor party favorites and some of your favorites as well as a few other songs I found listening to my parents’ collection.”
“How long is it?” Hermione asked.
“It’s 90 a side, so about 3 hours.”
“Perfect,” Hermione said, grinning, “time to party!”
The Gryffindors apparently took that as a marching order, standing almost in unison to start shoving the furniture toward the walls while Ron and Neville moved all the food and drinks to one table on the far wall and Harry and Hermione got the boombox set up.
“What is happening right now?” Draco whispered.
“I haven’t the slightest fucking clue, mate,” Greg whispered back.
The next thing they knew, Ron and Neville were levitating shots over to the Gryffindors who were standing in a circle around Harry and Hermione, “Arriba, abajo, al centro, pa’ dentro!” they cheered in unison, moving their shot glasses around before tossing them back.
“Did I just enter an alternate dimension?” Draco asked just as Harry reached out and pressed play on the boom box.
A second later, music that none of them recognized but apparently all of the Gryffindors, Hufflepuffs, and most of the Ravenclaws knew by heart was blasting out of the corner of the room. Though no one was as into it as the lions.
As the music played, a few of them pulled out their wands and conjured hundreds of multicolored orbs of light and sent them to float around the room.
The Slytherins, to put it lightly, were gobsmacked.
It was like they’d rehearsed it. From the fact they’d all known where to put the furniture and the refreshments to the weird in-sync shots to the lights to the now literally choreographed dance several of them seemed to be doing.
“What is this music?” Draco asked, raising his voice slightly to be heard above the racket.
“It’s ABBA!” Harry yelled back, “get your arse up and dance!”
“How, exactly, does one dance to this Hades.”
Draco would learn rather quickly that asking that question was an incredibly bad idea. Harry all but apparated across the room, grabbed Draco by both hands, and yanked him onto the dance floor, pulling him between Hermione and himself.
Draco looked back over at his fellow Slytherins with fear in his eyes. The traitors all simply shrugged, letting him know without words that he’d chosen this fate now he just had to live with it.
Time passed, the Gryffindors somehow got rowdier, the Ravenclaws were getting crazier and crazier with each passing moment, and the Hufflepuffs had started to pass joints around. The Slytherins who hadn’t been dragged bodily onto the dance floor were sitting in a corner trying to figure out what the ever loving fuck was going on.
About an hour in, Ron came over to the group dragging Draco behind him, “I decided to show mercy.”
“How chivalrous, Weasley,” Pansy said with a smile, pulling Draco down to sit next to her on the couch, “care to explain what the bloody hell is happening?”
“Do you mean the music, the copious amounts of alcohol, or the illegal drugs?”
“Any of the above.”
“It’s muggle music, we all know it because we had that record player I mentioned last week up in Gryffindor Tower and over the past decade or so the muggleborn students have been adding to the library, it’s what we play at parties and Harry made this mixtape of a bunch of favorites, so everyone knows the words to most of the songs. I feel like the alcohol is pretty self-explanatory. As for the drugs, it’s just weed, or marijuana, Sprout has been turning a blind eye to what her Puffs grow in the old greenhouses forever.”
As Theo had been distracted listening to Ron, he hadn’t been watching Harry so when he looked up and saw Harry on top of a table dancing with Hermione, both of them wearing cowboy hats that had seemingly materialized out of thin air, he was rather confused.
Wondering why Theo was making that face, Ron turned around. Seeing his two best friends, he simply smiled and yelled “space cowboy?”
They both cheered and continued dancing, passing a blunt back and forth and scream-singing the lyrics, “I’m a joker, I’m a smoker, I’m a midnight toker.”
Ron simply nodded as if that explained everything.
“What the fuck are they doing?” Theo asked.
“What Nott said,” Blaise added, “also, are you really alright with your best mate dancing with your girlfriend like that? It’s rather … erotic.”
Ron just shrugged, “this is what Lavender meant last week when she said that anyone who saw them dancing together wouldn’t believe for a second they’d never had a thing.”
“That did not answer my question.”
“It’s fine,” Ron said, laughing, a genuine smile on his face, “there truly is nothing between them. They’re having fun, they both like dancing at parties, I really don’t, I have to be incredibly drunk before I join them and by the looks of it I might need to be the sober one tonight.”
Accepting that explanation, the group settled into comfortable conversation, sipping on drinks and listening to the strange new music.
A few minutes later, a song came on that Theo recognized, “what’s this one?” he asked, “it sounds familiar.”
After listening for a second, Ron responded, “Sweet Emotions by Aerosmith, it’s one of Harry’s favorites, he probably played it at Potter Manor over the summer. He goes a little feral dancing to this one.”
“How do you dance to this?” Draco asked, sounding genuinely confused.
“Like that,” Ron said, pointing over his shoulder with a laugh.
Theo looked over and saw Harry, still wearing a cowboy hat, though he’d lost the jumper and unbuttoned his shirt entirely sometime in the last 20 minutes. He’d rolled up his sleeves so the holsters with the Elder Wand and his basilisk fang were fully visible. With his shirt unbuttoned, his tanned and toned torso and stark white lightening scar were on full display. He had a joint held loosely between his fingers and a giant smile on his face.
He was still on top of the same table though now he was dancing between Hermione and Ginny rather than only with Hermione.
Theo was quite sure he’d forgotten how to breathe.
“Alright, Nott,” Ron said with a teasing grin.
Shaking his head like a dog, Theo rasped out something that was maybe “yes,” before he downed the rest of his drink and made his way across the room as if in a trance.
“Sweet Salazar,” Pansy said, “does he really think no one knows?”
“They don’t really care if people know,” Ron said, “they told family and decided anyone else could just ask.”
“You knew!” Pansy yelled, pointing an accusing finger at Draco.
“Of course, not only did they tell me, I also have eyes.” Draco answered gesturing back across the room where Theo had reached Harry.
“Theodore!” Harry called out, a giant smile on his face. Passing the blunt over to Hermione, he reached down to pull Theo up on the table with him.
Instead of doing that, because he still had a little bit of a self-preservation instinct, though most of it had been lost in the last 30 seconds, Theo pulled Harry down to the floor and directly into a searing kiss.
He smelled like smoke and sweat and whiskey and something distinctly Harry. His skin was warm, and his kiss was heaven.
Theo seemed to snap back to reality at the deafening cheer that went up around the common room.
Harry was apparently drunk enough to ignore the attention they were getting, “dance with me?” he asked Theo in a whisper.
And, really, how could Theo say no to him?
* * *
It took another hour and a half for the Gryffindors to wear themselves out. Theo had left the dance floor an hour ago to go join his fellow snakes on their couch in the corner. They were having quite a bit of fun, but it would take more than one party for them to be comfortable letting loose like their classmates.
Even after the Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws had joined the Slytherins on the couches around the room to simply drink, smoke, and chat, the Gryffindors were still going. Whenever someone asked what a song was, they’d either get a clear answer or just get the lyrics screamed even louder.
When the lions finally, finally tired out, they realized that most of the couches were full. With a shrug, Harry plopped himself down right in the middle of the floor and was quickly joined by the rest of his former housemates. Within a minute, they were all in a giant pile, laying on top of each other, and happily chatting or singing along to whatever song was playing now.
“What is wrong with them?” Blaise asked.
“They’re like a bunch of puppies.” Pansy observed.
“Oi!” Harry yelled, having somehow heard that comment across the room and over the music, “we are lions, not puppies, show some respect!”
“You are a golden retriever puppy, Potter-Black, you cannot tell me otherwise.”
Harry just shrugged, seemingly deciding there was no use arguing that point.
When it got to a point where it was clear the pile of Gryffindors was perfectly content to sleep in a pile on the floor, Ron decided it was time to play ‘dad.’
“Alright, you lot,” he said, in a great impersonation of his father, “time for bed. It’s nearly one, several of you have a hostile takeover to plan tomorrow, and you’ve all got too many weird joint issues after serving in a literal war to sleep on a stone floor all night.”
It was the last point that finally got them moving. The rest of the 8th years followed them up the stairs while Susan, Neville, Harry, Theo, Luna, and Ginny headed into the hall.
“I do not want to walk up to the tower,” Ginny grumbled.
“You can sleep on my couch,” Harry offered.
“Alright, thanks, Haz,” Ginny said with a grin that told Harry that was exactly what she was angling for.
Harry simply rolled his eyes and held out his arm for Ginny to tuck herself into his side.
“Anytime, Gin,” he said, leaning his head against hers.
“You’re my favorite big brother.”
“Please, oh please, say that in front of Charlie next time we see him.”
“Do you want to fight a dragon?”
“I’ve done it before, I’d do it again just to see the look on his face.”
“You’re a strange, strange man Harry James.”
Shaking his head, Harry just smiled as they followed the rest of their group up the stairs, bidding goodnight to Susan and Luna at their landing before continuing up the stairs.
“Night, all,” Neville said with a yawn.
Bidding him goodnight in return, Theo, Ginny, and Harry made their way into Harry’s quarters. Harry grabbed a jumper and sweatpants out of his wardrobe and handed them to Ginny, pointing her toward the bathroom before returning to the living room with a pillow and blanket for the couch. Theo followed him out with an odd look on his face.
“What’s up?” Harry asked.
“Didn’t you guys used to date?”
Laughing lightly, Harry answered “dating is a rather strong word. I think we kissed, like, twice. I’m almost certain I’ve kissed Neville more times than I’ve kissed Ginny. We discovered pretty quickly we didn’t actually like each other that way. She’s like my sister. The Weasleys have all but adopted me.”
“Alright,” Theo agreed easily, “need any help out here?”
“Nah,” Harry said, yawning, “I think it’s good. Merlin, I’m ready for bed.”
“I didn’t realize you lot partied like that.”
“Yeah,” Harry said with a smile, “we like to have fun.”
“I can tell,” Theo said, smiling back, “you’re a rather good dancer.”
“You think?” Harry asked with a smirk.
“I do.”
Before Harry could respond, Ginny came back into the room. She bid Theo goodnight before hugging Harry and promptly passing out face down on the couch.
Rolling his eyes, Harry grabbed the blanket, covered her up, and kissed her lightly on the top of the head.
After making sure the door was locked, Harry opened the door to Teddy’s room so Ginny could get into the bathroom if she needed before shutting off the lights and heading into his room.
Both Harry and Theo made quick work of getting undressed and getting ready for bed. When Theo emerged from the bathroom, Harry was fast asleep. Smiling, Theo brushed his curls back and kissed his forehead before setting an alarm and snuggling up under the covers.