Communication
Harry’s reaction when Tonks mentioned a week later that she sometimes was a wizard instead of a witch, and sometimes someone who was in-between, had been as kind and as heartwarming as it had been unsurprising. At least for Severus. Tonks, who felt like she had more to lose, had been very on edge the one time he had talked to her between her coming out to him and her coming out to Harry.
Severus had been a bit more worried about Harry’s reaction in regard to their possible dating. Mostly because he was Harry’s Warder and thus it was more likely than not that they would end up in some kind of romantically inclined relationship when Harry got older. Because of that, it might give Harry a pause that Severus wanted to date someone else now, and maybe he would worry that Severus wouldn’t want him later. But on top of that, Severus was the adult in charge of Harry’s life, something that was still new in any and every way for Harry. Severus didn’t want Harry to feel like Severus didn’t care about him or wasn’t ready to give Harry all the time and attention he needed or wanted. The teenager needed someone who was there for him, because no one had ever been before. And of course, he might be a bit worried about the fact that the person he wanted to date was Harry’s older sibling, one of the few adults that Harry seemed to trust almost implicitly.
So, no, Severus wasn’t worried about Tonks’ coming out, but he worried about enough things in relation to that, that he didn’t say one word about Tonks’ worry. Not that he would have said anything either way. Tonks had obviously had several, if not many, experiences that gave her reason to worry. He wasn’t about to mock her for her fear.
“So,” Tonks said and tried to straighten her already neat red Auror robes, as she had come directly from work to have dinner with them in Severus’ quarters, just for this talk. They had decided to talk first, to get the difficult parts out of the way and then have dinner to talk things over. “Harry, I wanted to tell you that I’m … I’m not always your older sister, sometimes I’m your older brother, and I wanted you to know that about me.” She swallowed hard.
Harry blinked. “Alright.” He nodded, then his eyes narrowed. “Wait, what are the rules for older brothers compared to older sisters?”
Tonks huffed out a laugh, clearly relieved. “For you, pipsqueak, nothing at all.” She ruffled his hair violently and messed up his half-bun.
“Hey!” Harry slapped her hand out of his hair. He removed the hair tie and put the bun up once more. “So, how do I know if you are my sister or my brother? I wouldn’t like it if someone called me a girl when I’m a boy, so I want to make sure I don’t do that to you, are there any obvious signs? I guess you are always Tonks, right?”
Tonks smiled. “There should be some very obvious signs,” she said while changing her body into her masculine form. “This is how I usually look if I’m a boy, some changes here and there happen, of course, but mostly like this.”
Harry nodded and took in Tonks’ new form. “Cool. Yeah, that should be obvious enough.”
“And I always prefer to go by Tonks. Also, sometimes I’m not … quite a girl or a boy, but somewhere in between. Then I might look something like this and prefer ‘they’ or ‘them’ pronouns, instead of ‘him’ or ’her’.”
He changed into a form Severus hadn’t seen so far, and it was a very nice amalgamation of the masculine and feminine shape. Sharp facial features, slender hips and long fingers blended with the more buxom chest, smaller height, bigger eyes and rosebud mouth. The mouth was something he was certain that he had not seen on Tonks before, and he realised that instead of a perfect blend of the two shapes he had seen to this date, this shape was very androgynous. Something he found both fascinating and surprisingly attractive.
“If you are ever uncertain if I go by ‘him’ or ‘her’ or ’they’, it’s never wrong to ask, Harry. Never. I will not be hurt by it, ever. Nor will I be hurt by it if you happen to use the wrong pronouns for me. Mistakes and a slip of the tongue happens to all of us.”
“Alright.” Harry said it as if he didn’t really believe it, but that was nothing new, unfortunately. Harry was always on guard for reasons that people could get angry at him.
“Besides, I’m your older sibling, the worst I will ever do is charm your hair pink. And that’s because it suits you!” Tonks giggled and did just that.
Harry looked at his hair, gasped and grabbed for his wand. Tonks laughed and evaded his colour changing spell.
“Not here you two, please!” Severus said loudly, and the two miscreants settled down again. Tonks was grinning unrepentantly while refusing to change Harry’s hair back.
Severus pinched the bridge of his nose. “Tonks, please change his hair. We have more to talk about, remember?”
“Oh, yes, sure.” Tonks changed Harry’s hair back.
“Thanks, Severus.”
“I was the one who dispelled it!”
“You were the one who changed it to begin with!”
“Oh yes, I can see the sibling rivalry loud and clear; hear it too,” Severus said drily, and Tonks blushed before they settled down, took a look at their hands and body and changed into his male form.
“What more did you want to talk about?” Harry asked.
“When Tonks and I were talking about the Yule Ball, Tonks mentioned that he would be happy to accompany me to the Ball, as a date, and possibly go on more dates too, after that. I said yes, and I wanted to know how you feel about that and if you have any questions?”
Harry frowned slightly and cocked his head. “I mean … What is going to change for me, if you two date? Should I stop coming down here unannounced or …?”
Once again, Severus realised that even if almost everyone, including himself, expected Harry and himself to end up in some kind of romantic relationship, as of yet, Harry was a fourteen-year-old that had yet to fall in love, or even be truly attracted to anyone. The questions and fears Severus had thought Harry might have, wasn’t the first thing Harry himself thought of.
“No, this is your home for as long as you want it, Harry, and you deserve to be able to come here whenever you please and know that you will always be welcome. That will never change. If this date turn into a relationship, how or where we find private time for ourselves will have no particular impact on you; not that it will never happen, but we will make certain that you are warned well in advance. Also, no matter what, you should always know that you may call on me for help. That will never, ever, change, for any reason.”
“Oh yes, absolutely!” Tonks nodded vigorously. “You are number one, kiddo. For both of us. An older sibling’s work is never done!” He pretended to swoon dramatically backward on the couch.
Harry held up his hands in a placating gesture. “Alright, alright!” He smiled. “Then I’m happy that you are going to try to date … and thank you for telling me. I’m … I’m quite used to being kept in the dark, even when something concerns me directly. It has happened again and again and again. It feels good to get to know what’s going on upfront, for once. Hum … not that this directly concerns me, of course.” He pulled on a lock of his hair and looked down.
“It kinda does, Harry,” Tonks said carefully. “It’s your guardian, Warder even, and your sibling who are thinking about dating. If that thought becomes reality, it does concern you, not personally, maybe, but still directly.”
Harry nodded slowly and Severus could almost see the true questions and uncertainties begin to swarm him. He looked at Tonks who jumped up with grin.
“I have some ingredients I found for our potion experiment, Severus, I will just put them in your lab, shall I?”
“Thank you, Tonks.”
He nodded and disappeared.
“Right now, Harry, we are talking about one date,” Severus said slowly. “Nothing more. But if you want it to be, it can be less. Tonks already told me that he would be happy to join me at the Ball as friends, and not as a date. He is extremely insistent on taking care of you and your feelings, and if I hadn’t suggested this meeting between all three of us at the first opportunity, he would have. And he would have refused taking no for an answer.”
Harry nodded and when Severus sat down, he leaned into him at once, as if he couldn’t stop himself. Severus put an arm around him and hugged him close.
“If you don’t want us to date, we won’t date, and there will be no ill feelings towards you, whatsoever. I give you my word as a Warder, your Warder.”
“Mine,” Harry whispered. “I don’t want to date now, not you nor anyone else. It’s just … not interesting?”
“That is fine.”
“And I don’t know if I want to date you, specifically, in the future. I have no idea. I mean … my friends talk about what they like in people, what they find pretty, Hermoine uses attractive … But I just … don’t see it? I like people, I like my friends a lot, but no one more than any other, so how can I know if I will like you like that in the future?” He almost whined.
“And that is completely fine, Harry,” Severus kissed his hair and Harry melted a little bit into him. “You don’t have to like me or anyone else as more than friends, if that is how it is. You should never try to force feelings. You have me in your life, no matter what, anyway.”
“You are certain?”
“You couldn’t get rid of me if you tried, little one,” Severus hummed and touched the black and silver scars on Harry’s shoulder. Their first bonding bite.
Harry shivered and melted a bit more into him.
“That’s good. I like that. So …” He stopped.
“How does that make you feel about Tonks and me dating then? Does it help to make it feel alright, or does it make it feel worse, like you can’t abide it?”
Harry thought about it. “I don’t want to date you, and might not want to for years or ever, I don’t know. I’m sorry.” The last he whispered.
“Don’t be. You are honest, more honest than I have any right to expect on such a subject at this point in time. I will never object to honesty and proper communication, no matter what you tell me.”
Harry nodded, but didn’t look up. “So, it doesn’t feel quite right to tell you that you can’t date anyone else, maybe never, because I might be interested in dating you at some point. That feels wrong. And Tonks is great.”
“If you would feel better, safer, with me not dating anyone, then I won’t. You come first.”
Harry nodded, and Severus knew that he tried to believe that, that some part of him, the Wyrd part, most likely did believe that, but not every part of him. Not yet. That would take time.
“If you and Tonks are happy dating, and later in a relationship, I don’t … I don’t think I would mind. I haven’t thought a lot about it, but I don’t think I would mind. It’s just …”
He went silent and remained that way for long moments.
“What is it, Harry?”
“What if I do want to date you, to be in a relationship, in the future? What happens then?”
“Then we talk, and we figure it out. If you want me, at some point, to end a possible relationship with Tonks, I will do so, and he knows that. It might hurt, both of us, but he knows it might happen, if this date becomes a relationship, and you want me for yourself at some point in the future.”
“That isn’t right!” Harry protested.
“Adults do strange things sometimes; take chances that might not make much sense to you. But it does to Tonks, and it does to me. When you have figured out something that you truly want, then you are willing to take the chance of becoming hurt at some later point, for the possibility for it to work out now. That’s true in any and all relationships. If you think it through properly, take precautions, and communicate appropriately with all parties, such chances are a part of adult life, and of relationships, even the more usual relationships that only have two people and no more.
“That said; Tonks mentioned not having any trouble with the notion that I could be in a relationship with both you and him. If that would be a workable solution, long term. And only, only, if that would be alright with you.”
Harry had stiffened. “That’s possible? Being more than two people in a relationship? Isn’t that … isn’t that … really freaky?”
“No, it’s absolutely not freaky. Uncommon, maybe, but not bad in any way. And relationships can be however the people in said relationship wants them to be, they just need to agree to it, communicate properly and put in some effort to make it work. There can be three people, or more, in a relationship. Or one person can be in a relationship with two different people. I believe that will be more likely, if something like this should happen, as Tonks is your sibling. Even if he might feel more like a close friend and less like an older sibling when you get older.”
“So … so if you are in a relationship with both Tonks and me, that wouldn’t be bad? Not because you are in a relationship with two people, nor because Tonks is my sibling?”
“It would only be bad if you didn’t know about it or agreed. If, at some point in the future, I am in a relationship with you and in another relationship with Tonks, and you both know about it and agreed that it is fine for me to be in two relationships, then no, that would not be bad. There is more to it, but ultimately, that is it.”
Harry mulled that over for quite some time. “And even if I wasn’t in a relationship with you, a romantic relationship, I mean, you would still be my Warder, right?”
“Always and forever, my little Wyrd, to the stars and beyond,” Severus crooned and felt the tension bleed out of Harry.
“Then I’m alright with you giving dating Tonks a chance.”
“Thank you. But Harry, both Tonks and I would like you to tell us if that changes, at any point. As he said; you are number one, for both of us. If our relationship makes you uncomfortable in any way, we would like to know. Either to talk about it and find a solution, or to end it if that is what is necessary to take proper care of you and your feelings. Also, as of right now, we are talking about one date, with the possibility for more. It might end up being ten or twenty dates, it might end up in a relationship that last a year or two, or it might end up being just that one date, before we figure out that while there is friendship and attraction, a romantic relationship is not the best relationship for us.”
“What will happen if you break up?”
Severus could only imagine what kind of relationship drama Harry had seen in the Gryffindor common room to make him sound so timid while asking.
“Then we break up, maybe use some time to lick our wounds, and then try our best to get back the friendship we have now. We are adults and we know each other well enough to know that we won’t hurt each other on purpose. A failed relationship will most likely still hurt, but it won’t happen because of cheating or anything that will end our friendship, long term. You will not ever have to choose between us.”
“That’s because I can’t leave you behind any more than you can leave me,” Harry said drily, and Severus laughed, both in good humour and because of the assurance that Harry knew, the Wyrd part of him truly knew, that Severus was Harry’s as much as Harry was Severus’. Harry hummed at the sound and rubbed his cheek against Severus’ shoulder.
“That is true, but I hope you understand my meaning too. You will not have to choose because we will make certain that we will remain at the very least cordial at all times.”
“Alright. I believe you. Thank you for taking the time to explain and answer my questions.”
“I will always take the time to do such, Harry.” Severus kissed his hair again and they sat in silence for a few moments until Harry’s stomach grumbled and Severus announced that it was time for dinner. After he had fetched Tonks from his lab and the elves had served them dinner, Harry smiled at Tonks and Severus and asked:
“So, anything more I should know right now?” Then he took a bite of his potatoes.
“No,” Severus said in the same moment Tonks brightened and said:
“Yes, actually!”
Both Severus and Harry looked questioningly at Tonks.
“Remus went by Grimmauld Place yesterday. He told me that the main part of the house, or castle, now is made safe from active cursed objects, animals and pests and anything else that can harm one directly. There might still be something there, something more passive, but the first round is done. And all the portraits in the entire place have been removed and it’s so much cleaner than when we went there that first time. Those elves of yours truly have worked wonders, Harry! So, if Severus agrees, Remus believes that it should be safe enough to take a peek at the place, the main part, mind you, nowhere else yet - the Curse Breakers still have much to do - during your upcoming holidays. Then you can get a better feel for how you want it when the refurbishing begins.”
Harry turned those big, luminous green eyes on Severus, and he could do nothing but sigh in defeat. “I will take a look first and you have to promise not to touch anything without someone checking it first, but if Tonks is right, we may go during your vacation.”
“Yes, thank you! It will be so great, getting to see it for the first time! Even if Sirius claims it to be a miserable place, I’m certain that we can make it better, make it into a proper home.” He grinned.
Later, after Harry had been popped by Sage to the Gryffindor common room to spend time with his friends, it was time for another serious conversation. Severus already felt a bit wrung out after the one with Harry, but Tonks deserved nothing less from him, so he decided to just begin. After all, he had been thinking about it since the evening where they decided to try that one date, with the possibility for more.
“Last time we talked, you asked a few questions that I at the time felt that I answered appropriately,” Severus began, leaning back in his chair with a glass of wine, it was his second and last for the night. “Later I realised you might want a longer answer, as it appears to me to have happened to you a lot. You asked if I would demand that you always keep the shape that I find attractive around myself.”
“Yeah, you did answer that,” Tonks said, now back to her female self and with bubble-gum pink hair down to her waist. She waved at her female body. “I understood the answer to be no.”
“And it, most emphatically, is. I simply feel the necessity to expound a bit on that, if you would permit me.”
“Sure.” She toasted him with her glass.
“I want to make sure that you understand that if one date becomes more, I’m not only dating you in your male shape and are just friends with you in your female shape. The fact that my body don’t react with any sexual interest for the female shape does not hinder my attraction for your mind, in any and all shapes. It was your intelligence and wit that made me want to try a friendship with you, and that now have made me want to give dating a chance, also.
“Your female shape will not hinder my wish for your company, in any way, it’s just the sexual component that will not, cannot, happen between us. If you are female at the Ball, or any other possible date, that is, and will always be, completely fine with me. As long as you don’t expect me to react with sexual attraction in those instances. I could not see myself in a romantic relationship with you without any kind of sexual attraction, and I still cannot do so. As that is a possibility now, when it was not before I knew of your fluidity, having dates, days or periods where we get to know each other better and possibly getting closer, even without the sexual component, is not a concern, for me at least. I will be dating you, as a whole person, not just a part of you.” He pinched the bridge of his nose and gave a sigh. “Does that make sense? Is that acceptable?”
“It does, Severus, don’t worry,” Tonks said, leaned forward and squeezed his knee lightly. “You did answer that question before, shortly but also to my satisfaction. I do appreciate that you expounded on it now, though, it makes it clearer. I will never, ever, blame you for being gay, trust me on that. I don’t have a sexual preference for any one gender, myself, but I do understand the concept nonetheless.” She gave a wry smile. “I have a subject of my own that I have been considering this last week, or, I had a lot of them, but I feel that I should mention this one specifically before the first date, and absolutely before one get the chance to become more.”
Severus smirked. “Look at us go; already professionals at communicating!”
Tonks chuckled. “All those hours with mind healing have to be good for something, yeah? But, that is a part of my attraction, to you I mean. That you are older, with more life experience and hopefully better at communication, and that you are calmer than someone my age often are. I know, I know, bubbly, crazy Tonks talking about calm people.” She gave a huff and met his eyes. “I like people, I truly do. I like talking, joking, flirting, rough housing, all of it. That has never been an exaggeration. But I also like my privacy and alone time, very, very much. The last years at Hogwarts was … close to torturous, having to spend so much time around people, having to share a dorm, having no place of my own to retreat to.
“Have I mentioned that I moved out as soon as I graduated? I never moved back to my parents after Hogwarts, but moved straight into my own little studio apartment. I spend time at my parents’ home, sure, but I haven’t lived with them for years. I preferred to move into a tiny, run down apartment in Muggle London, instead of into my roomy suite at my parents. That is how much I need my privacy.”
Severus nodded. He could understand her only too well.
“And this does not often go over well with people I date,” she admitted. “Suddenly there is a person, that I usually like, granted, that wants to be with me all the time, Severus. All. The. Fucking. Time!”
He smirked at her, and she scowled back.
“When I try to tell them that I want my alone time too, no matter how much I like them, they sulk, for days or weeks, and then try the same shit, the same nagging, again, and again. Even if I warned them of this peculiarity of mine early on. You do not seem like a person that is incapable of understanding my need for privacy and alone time, and you are busy with your students and with Harry, that should help. And you also seem like someone that understand the notion of being quiet together. Reading or something similar in the same room, either close by each other or not, and actually find some pleasure in that. Not having to interact the whole time, even when we are together. Merlin, sometimes I feel so old when I talk about this!” She tugged hard at her pink hair.
“I believe I understand you completely, Tonks,” Severus said quietly, because he recognised himself in her words.
“You do? Oh, that’s good to know.” She smiled a bit tiredly at him before meeting his eyes. “One more thing. I want to be someone special to someone, I know that. I want much of what is usual in a relationship, and I probably want a family at some point, too. But Severus, being the one and only for someone, that sounds … exhausting. Even if I love them beyond anything. I don’t want to be the one and only for anyone, I don’t see how I can be, to be honest and I … I don’t want to try that again. The fact that I actually can’t be your one and only, the fact that Harry will always take a big place in your life and heart, no matter how he takes that place, that is … a plus in my book. So … so now you know that about me, too.”
Severus nodded slowly. “Thank you for telling me, Tonks, I appreciate it. And I appreciate the fact that people have made life difficult for you because of this, at earlier occasions. I cannot promise I will be able to be your one and only, either, but if that is your wish and if we both agree to continue dating, I will give it my best. Also, a family is, at this moment in time … hard to plan for, for my part. I cannot start a family before I know what Harry wants out of life, and I do not even know if Warders can procreate, or how that works, if it does.”
Tonks giggled. “That’s true. And I understand. As I said, I think I want a family, but I’m young and I do not know for certain yet, either way.”
He nodded. “I never thought I would want a family, myself, because of my own childhood. But given more time and a partner, or two, who would like to have a family with me, maybe that will change.”
“We will just have to see, then,” Tonks stated. “We haven’t even had our first date yet.”
“That’s true. Now, should I toss you out for the night or should we try the beginning stages of our potion experiment again?”
Tonks eyed her empty glass and obviously judged her inebriation. “I’m good to go. Let’s try again!” She jumped up and strode towards the lab. “Third time is the charm!”
Severus shook his head and followed.