Promises are Promises
Bill could still remember the first time Molly’s stomach started to swell and at the ripe age of two, swept up onto her knee for the first in a very long line of promises.
“Now Bill, I have a very important task for you and I need you to be a big boy for me in the coming months. Can you do that?” The prospect of being a big boy and helping his mum was awe inspiring. He thought his head might just fall right off his neck and bounce along the floor like his favorite ball with the strength of him agreeing.
Molly’s gentle hand caressed her first son’s back as a joyful smile took over her face. “Oh my sweet boy, I wish you’d just stay like this forever. Now that I know that you can help me, you are going to be a big brother soon! Isn’t that nice?” Confusion overwhelmed Bill for a moment before he looked around the living room with a watchful eye. “How can I be a big brother? No one else is here?”
“Well, that would be because they are in my tummy right now,” Molly said with a beaming smile, drumming her fingers on her larger than normal stomach. “I need you to promise that you’ll help mummy as the big brother and big boy I know you are. Can you promise me that?” Bill, who had been staring at Molly’s stomach since she said a baby was inside, gained a very serious expression and nodded as if the matter was life or death.
“I promise Mum! I’ll be the best big brother!”
~~~~~
Charles Septimius Weasley was born healthy and calm on the misty morning of December 12th, 1972. Two hours later, Bill is scrambling up the birthing bed to the shocked delight of the midwife by his mum’s side.
“There you are! Here to meet your baby brother?” Molly asked tiredly as Bill buried himself in her side. “Yes!”
“Now Bill, don’t you think we should leave Mum to rest?” Arthur looked more exhausted than his wife and it hurt her heart to see the after product of not being by her side.
“Nonsense Arthur, now come meet your second son.” The unbridled joy that lit up both of Molly’s boys made her glow in the perfection of this moment. Soon her brothers would come barreling into the bedroom and demand to meet their newest nephew, but right now is all that matters. The gentle peace of a growing family in the eye of a storm.
Molly’s fingers were joined by Arthur’s as they traced the baby boy's face. A quietness enveloped the red heads until, “It’s a potato.” The randomness of the statement caught Molly and Arthur off guard so heavily that all they could do was laugh. Bill just looked up at his parents confusedly, his sentence was serious.
Just as the adults started to calm down from their half sleep deprived hysteria, Bill yet again announced, “Potato!” Which sent them right back into roaring laughter that only stopped when the shrill cry of a newborn filled the room.