Anticipation had been welling up inside her for weeks until she couldn’t take it any longer. It was the longest he had gone without talking to her - not even a friendly hello from the other side of the hedge that separated their yards. His silence was much too loud for her liking, and she couldn’t help but wonder if her secret had finally been revealed.
Crying started to build from the next room, and Hermione was pulled out of her thoughts and back to reality. Acting quickly, like she always did, she rushed to the room down the hallway and pressed her hand to the door. The carefully placed wards dissolved at her touch; the office space melted away as she stepped through the doorway, and her son’s nursery was suddenly before her. She walked the few short steps to his crib and picked up her son, who’s cries were only just starting to become louder. He settled down once he was in her arms, but she got him a bottle anyway to prevent any further noise.
Brendan wasn’t a fussy baby; in fact, he was perfect in almost every way. He slept through the night early, he loved being held, and he was hitting all of his milestones ahead of schedule. Hermione carried him out of his room and into the living room where she sat on the couch to feed him. Realizing her front windows were open, she swished the curtains closed with a flick of her hand.
Her son was the missing piece of her life that she didn’t know she needed, but the only problem was that hardly anyone knew he existed. Her parents did, because she needed someone to watch him while she was at work and she knew he would be well-hidden in the muggle world, but none of her friends knew she had even been pregnant. Concealment charms had worked wonders in hiding her belly and now in transforming Brendan’s nursery into an office space when she had guests over.
Her fireplace roared to life with the telling green flames of a floo call, and Hermione quickly set Brendan down on the couch where he wouldn’t be seen and approached the mantle.
“Hello?” She called as she stuck her head into the fireplace. She could see Marcus’s head but not the familiar backdrop of his sitting room.
“Hi Hermione, how are you?” she heard the familiar, low timbre of his reply.
“I’m alright, but I haven’t heard from you in weeks. Are you okay?”
Marcus looked more tired than usual. Floo connectivity didn’t paint the clearest picture, but the bags under his eyes were heavy and she could tell he was anxious about something. Marcus was the closest thing she had to a best friend; she didn’t let herself get too close to anyone these days, especially since having Brendan, but Marcus never asked too many questions. They got along from the moment he moved in next door, so well enough that they had a brief fling as friends with benefits. When the feelings reared their head, Hermione had to cut that part of their relationship away. Except, she now carried a piece of Marcus with her no matter where she went.
“I‘m okay,” he answered tentatively. There was something he was holding back. “I’ve just been rather stressed at work and haven’t had much free time. I’m sorry I didn’t call sooner.”
“You don’t have to apologize, Marcus,” Hermione told him, sticking her head further into the floo, wishing she could reach out and hug him. “I’ve just been worried about you, that’s all. I haven’t even heard you in the garden.”
She could see his hand reach up to scratch the back of his neck, something he always did when he was nervous. “I know, I’ve just had a lot on my mind. Do you actually mind if I come through? I could use a drink.”
“Yeah of course, let me just,” but as she went to finish the remainder of her sentence, she was pushed backward from the fireplace until she was sitting in front of it.
The fireplace came alight with green flames again, and before she had a moment to react to what was happening, Marcus was walking through her fireplace and into her living room. Time felt frozen on the spot, and if she had been prepared for his arrival things would have gone differently. The nursery door wouldn’t be wide open with her son’s belongings strewn about the room, and he also wouldn’t be lying asleep on the couch behind her. In that moment she wished to find the words to explain herself, but when Marcus laid eyes on the baby who shared his exact nose and black hair she knew the damage was done.
Maybe he wouldn’t recognize the resemblance, but the fact that she kept something so important from her best friend would be painful enough. All she could do was watch him and try to gauge his reaction.
He was in the process of saying something when he stepped through the floo, but was immediately stopped in his tracks at the sight of Brendan asleep on the couch. His little hand was gripping the neck of his shirt, the same way she had seen Marcus sleep all of those times in their past.
His jaw didn’t drop, like shethought it would; he didn’t explode into an angry rage or burst into tears, instead he just stared at the son he didn’t know he had. He finally peeled his eyes away from the baby, and when he did Hermione was sad to find tears welling at the corners. What should have been a sweet moment was filling her instead with tremendous feelings of guilt for not telling him sooner.
“I reckon you aren’t babysitting?” He asked, his question cutting through the dead silence that previously filled the room.
Hermione shook her head and sat down next to Brendan on the couch, where she had been only moments before her entire world had begun to change.
He took a step closer to examine the baby, blinking away the tears all the while. It felt like an eternity passed while he stared at him - his expression cycling through sadness, wonderment, and confusion.
“He’s yours?” Marcus asked her, and Hermione simply nodded, wiping away her own tears. “Why didn’t you tell me? How did you hide him all this time? He has to be five or six months old by now.”
“I’m sorry for keeping it from you, I really am, but I couldn’t risk the publicity of being labeled an unwed mother by the Prophet. I’m so close to Minister for Magic and this,” she paused, looking at the sleeping baby that Marcus was now standing so close to.
“He threw a bit of a wrench in my life but,” she moved and picked Brendan up. He stirred and only briefly opened his eyes before closing them again. “He’s perfect, Marcus. I didn’t think I ever wanted kids and then I found out I was pregnant and I didn’t know what else to do. I didn’t know I needed him until he was here.”
Marcus sat down on the couch next to her and reached across her body to rub his thumb along the baby’s cheek. The moment they made contact, he knew, and the tears that had been gathering in his green eyes began to stream down his face.
The first time a witch or wizard holds their newborn, they can feel the magical signature from their shared DNA. It doesn’t hurt, it isn’t even remotely remarkable, but it’s a special moment every parent looks forward to.
Warmth spread across Marcus’s thumb and up his arm, and at the feeling of his father’s touch Brendan opened his eyes.
“He’s mine, isn’t he?” Marcus asked, not removing his thumb but instead continuing to caress his son’s cheek.
“He is,” Hermione said sadly, unable to fathom the amount of pain and betrayal Marcus was probably feeling.
But he wasn’t feeling any of that; the only feeling he would recall as the years went on was that of love.
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner, Marcus, I really am,” Hermione told him, knowing her words would only be able to do so much. “Do you want to hold him?”
“Of course I do,” he opened his arms and tried to mentally prepare himself to hold his son for the first time. “We’ll have time for apologies later. There will be long hours of talks and questions of how we got here, but at this moment I just want to meet my son.”
Hermione passed Brendan to him, and watched as her son opened his eyes to look at Marcus. She knew he could feel the connection to - the warmth that was surely spreading throughout his body from the first-contact with his father.
Arguments would come, but Marcus had a point. All she could do now was watch and relish in the forming connection between father and son.