SEVEN
The morning of her next appointment with Healer Harris, Ginny wakes up under the fluffy white cloud of a duvet atop Harry’s bed. She fell asleep naked, but there are worse ways to fall asleep, especially when the sheets are this soft. She extends her arm out to the side, hoping to find Harry’s warm skin, but instead, she just finds cool sheets. She sighs, trying to mask her disappointment even from herself. In the last couple of weeks, it’s been rather nice to wake up to a cuddle most mornings.
She’s called out sick from practice today, and knows she’s short on time before she has to tell the team. She’d even told Harry, who’d grown rather anxious about her returning to practice with only a few protective charms she’d learned from a pamphlet Healer Harris gave her, that she’ll definitely tell team leadership about the baby tomorrow. Still, that’s meant to be Tomorrow Ginny’s problem. And if Harry had been next to her, like she’d hoped, she’d been able to have a cuddle and not stress about quidditch.
She gently disentangles herself from the duvet and begins to sit up, finding Harry entering the room. He’s dressed for the day but his hair is wet from the shower, a mug of tea cupped in his hands. She smiles lazily up at him, stretching her bare arms over her head. “Is that for me?” She asks, gesturing to the mug.
Harry flashes her a dopey, brilliant smile upon noticing she’s awake. “Uh, it wasn’t, actually. It’s still early, I was going to let you have a bit of a lie in before the healer, but if you want it,” he holds the mug out toward her.
She smiles. Harry’s tea is usually milkier than she’d prefer, and less sweet, but she wants to drink it anyway. So she sits up more and takes the mug from him, relishing the warmth of it against her hands.
They haven’t talked about what’s going on here — not so much as a word or a meaningful glance, even — but it’s suspiciously like the relationship they’re pretending to be in.
She tilts her head to the spot next to her in bed, and he obligingly climbs in next to her, rather than getting himself a fresh mug of tea. “Sleep well?” He asks her.
She passes the tea back to him so he can have a sip. It’s not strange for them to do this, share a cup of tea in his bed. “Right up until I realized I was alone,” she sighs. “Awfully cold to wake up like that.”
“You looked so peaceful,” he comments. “I didn’t want to wake you up.” He’d been up at five himself, one of his nightmares chasing the sleep away. He’d laid next to her, reassuring himself that she was safe — because she certainly hadn’t been in his dream — for half an hour before deciding to get ready for the day ahead. He passes the mug back to her.
“Mm,” she sighs in agreement as she takes another sip. She looks at the little clock on his nightstand. It’s half seven in the morning. “This is probably the correct time for me to start getting ready, I suppose.” She hands the mug back to him and pushes the duvet off herself entirely. She doesn’t miss the way his eyes rake over her body as if in awe. Her stomach protrudes just the smallest amount now, a new development over the last few days. It appeared to come out of nowhere and though certainly no one would suspect anything if they didn’t know to, even if they saw her naked as she is now, Harry can’t seem to get enough of looking at it.
That’s how she’d ended up naked here, after all. When she first noticed the beginnings of a bump, she’d owled Harry; she was so excited to finally have that proof, however small it was, and she found he was the person she wanted to tell. He’d apparently ditched dinner plans with Ron and Hermione to meet her at her flat to see it. She was told Ron had grumbled, asking why Ginny couldn’t just join them for dinner, and had said something to the effect of “should’ve known this would happen once you started shagging my sister again.” She and Harry had both laughed at that when Harry recounted it, so hard it hurt, because they were finally big enough to acknowledge that they’d never stopped shagging.
She’d started by rolling up her shirt and unbuttoning her slightly-too-tight jeans to show him the nearly imperceptible swell of her low belly. There had been a shared giggle and exchanged giddy expressions before Harry asked softly, hesitantly: “Can I…?” His hand hovered and she nodded her approval. He made contact, and expressed surprise at it being somewhat firm, even now. That night had been innocent, all light kisses to her abdomen and whispered affirmations and wondering aloud how quickly it’d get bigger now that it had appeared.
Last night had been more about passionate kisses between them and tender touches and not being able to get close enough, even once it was clear that they couldn’t get closer physically than they already were. There was a look that shadowed over Harry’s green eyes as he moved above her that was something like reverence, but there was more to it: pride. Ginny wanted to find that gross. After all, at least to some extent, it was a pride over the fact that he was the one who made her body change, a bizarre sense of ownership. But she didn’t find it gross, much as she knew she should. Perversely, she kind of liked it, feeling like she was his in that way.
Though she washes off the night in the shower, the memories play on an endless loop in her head. Merlin, she doesn’t know how she’s supposed to go to the healer feeling this randy, when she just wants to convince Harry to skive off, well, everything and spend the day in bed with her. It must be those pregnancy hormones she’s heard so much about, and if she can get Healer Harris alone at all during the appointment, she might even ask about it.
Harry made her breakfast while she was in the shower, and he spends breakfast peppering her with questions about what to expect at the appointment. The truth is, Ginny hardly has more experience than Harry does, so she just says that the office is nice and Healer Harris is nice and maybe she’ll let them hear the baby’s heartbeat again.
They floo directly into Healer Harris’ office where a charmed sign directs them to the correct exam room. “That’s how they can guarantee everything is confidential,” Ginny explains as she settles onto the exam table. Harry seems appropriately impressed by the system.
They don’t wait long for Healer Harris to enter the room, looking down at a stack of parchment containing Ginny’s chart as she walks in. When she looks up, her focus zeroes in on her patient. “Ginny,” she greets, flashing a bright smile. “How are you feeling?”
Ginny smiles back, feeling immediately at ease. “I’m all right!”
“All right?” Healer Harris raises an eyebrow, and draws her wand to begin her initial vital diagnostics, first tapping the chart so that it floats next to her, populating itself as the initial spells run. “How’s the nausea?”
“Getting better,” Ginny confirms. She motions to Harry, who has retreated to the side of the room, that he should join them. “Healer Harris, I want to introduce you to the baby’s father. This is Harry.”
Harry forces an uncomfortable smile, waiting for the moment when Ginny’s healer will inevitably realize who he is. There’s a guilt to it, that just the act of being himself can make something like a simple healer’s appointment awkward.
The Healer clearly recognizes him, but is thankfully too professional to say anything. “It’s very nice to meet you, Harry.” The greeting is merely perfunctory, for after acknowledging him, she immediately returns to her patient. “And the fatigue?”
Ginny nods. “I have a bit more energy.”
“Enough energy to play quidditch ,” Harry contributes before he can stop himself. It’s been concerning him, and Ginny knows that.
Healer Harris clucks, as though she is disappointed but not necessarily surprised. “I see. Have you been using the protective charms on your abdomen and lower body?”
“I have.”
“Does your team know about your pregnancy?”
“Not yet,” Ginny admits sheepishly. “I swear, I’m planning to talk to my coach and my captain tomorrow. I just wanted to wait until I knew how this appointment was going to go.”
Healer Harris nods, a long sigh communicating that she wants Ginny to get on with it. “Your vitals look fine. Blood pressure is good, breathing and heart rate are normal. I’d like to see you gaining a bit more weight, but hopefully it’ll come as the morning sickness subsides.” She looks over to Ginny, who nods in confirmation. “If you want to lay down, Ginny, we can do a quick scan, check in on the magical development and the heart.”
Ginny lays down and rolls up her shirt. Healer Harris waves her wand over Ginny’s lower abdomen and pelvis. “Look at that,” she comments supportively. “When did baby start making themselves known?”
“A few days ago,” Ginny grins, looking over to Harry. He appears to be relaxing now. There’s a chair next to the table and Ginny points to it: “Harry, why don’t you sit down? It’s about to be the fun bit.”
Obligingly, Harry sinks into the chair, waiting to find out exactly how the fun bit will present itself. He doesn’t have to wait long; a few moments later, the image of the baby appears above Ginny’s stomach. If it was amazing to look at the little picture she’d given him — which now sits on the mirror atop the dresser in his bedroom — it’s another to see it in person. The image at his house shows only a brief moment in time, but the realization that he’s watching their baby’s movements at this exact moment truly takes his breath away.
Healer Harris tells them that everything is progressing as normal, isolates the golden glow of the baby’s developing magic for them to see, and allows the sound of its heartbeat to fill the room. If Ginny described the sound as “bloody incredible”, the lump that forms in Harry’s throat confirms that her description couldn’t even begin to cover it.
Without thinking about it, he reaches over and squeezes Ginny’s hand. She squeezes back. When he turns to take in her expression, it’s one of pure joy, the kind he’d previously seen on her when they’d raced around on their broomsticks or the first time he told her he loved her. Inspired by her, a wide grin forms, so big it splits Harry’s face in two.
“Did you want to know the sex?” Healer Harris asks them. “There’s a spell we can do at this point in the pregnancy, now that there’s enough fetal DNA for us to pick up on.”
Ginny’s expression turns questioning as she turns to Harry, her heart drumming hard against her ribcage. “Well, I’d like to know,” she tells him. “But I’m happy to have it as a surprise, if you’ve changed your mind?”
Harry doesn’t need to think about it, not even for a moment. “‘Course I want to know.” He doesn’t think he has a preference on a boy versus a girl, but it’s another detail that will help him picture it. His grip on Ginny’s hand tightens. She’s pretty sure that means he’s excited.
Healer Harris mutters an incantation, and reads something on the scan, before smiling big. “Congratulations, you’re having a boy.”
When Fleur was pregnant with Victoire, she’d been overjoyed to find out they were having a girl. “Every muzzer wants a girl,” Fleur had told Ginny knowingly, while Molly nodded her agreement sagely in the background. At the time, becoming a mother had been so far from Ginny’s mind that she never considered if that would be what she wanted.
Now, hearing that she’s having a boy, Ginny finds her smile is so wide it’s painful. She grew up with six brothers — while she’d sometimes wished she had a sister growing up, she feels like she understands boys. She understands what they’re like while they grow up. She finds she isn’t disappointed at the prospect of a son; if anything, she’s actually relieved. Having a boy, she thinks, is the easier of the two outcomes, and this is a situation that will already be difficult.
As for Harry, he looks like a jack-o-lantern, lit up from the inside. “A boy?” His voice is an awed whisper.
“A boy,” Healer Harris confirms, generating new snapshots of their son for each of them.
…
Even when the appointment is long finished and Harry is sitting in his office at the auror department, he finds the word at the front of his mind: son. He and Ginny are having a boy, a son. It’s strange, really, that this is the closest to his parents that he’s ever felt.
He turned 23 in July — two years and somehow a lifetime older than they were when they died. Yet, on his birthday this year, he’d never felt further away from them. Not only had he now lived two more years than they ever would, but he couldn’t shake the nagging feeling that they’d squeezed more of the happy things in life into those years than he had at that point.
Harry hadn’t needed anyone to tell him that he wasn’t a planned baby, not once he’d gone through a war himself and understood just how terrifying a time that would have been for anyone to have a baby, let alone two barely-married 20 year olds. In some of his darkest moments, he felt guilty about his very existence, because his parents could still be alive with a big, happy family had their birth control been a bit more reliable.
But now — now Harry is set to become a father himself to a child who was very much unplanned. And, finally, Harry is pretty sure he gets it, because as unexpected as his son may be, the baby boy is far from unwanted or unloved. Harry already knows he’d die for this baby — though, he supposes, Ginny would tell him that’s not saying much seeing as he already laid down his life for the entirety of the wizarding world.
He can finally imagine how happy his parents must have been to learn they’d have a son, and how loved and cherished he must have been, even before the fateful July day he arrived. A feeling of peace washes over him. He just hopes his parents would be happy for him today, too.