TWENTY-THREE
Courage is not a lengthy visitor, even for a Gryffindor. After a sleepless night, the single nerve Harry was counting on to power him through the morning appointment with Healer Macdonald is frayed beyond usefulness. It would be easy for him to keep putting it off, really. There are plenty of reasons not to ask about his parents — maybe even more reasons against asking than there are for it. But when James has finished his first meal of the day, Ginny leans back into Harry’s chest and says: “I’ll stay up here again today, yeah? Give you some space to talk to her?” She still has James in her arms, where the baby is skin to skin against her bare chest, so when he embraces her, he’s literally holding everything that’s precious and sacred to him in the world. How can he tell her that he’s lost his determination to do it?
So when Kreacher lets them know Healer Macdonald has arrived, he takes a deep inhale and spends twice as long exhaling it — a calming trick his lead instructor taught him the first week of auror training, which he now passes on to his trainees — before scooping up the baby. “Here goes,” he tells Ginny bracingly.
Healer Macdonald always undresses James to his nappy anyway, so Harry doesn’t bother giving him clean pajamas before he brings the baby downstairs. Instead, he casts a warming charm on the baby so that he doesn’t get chilly on the way. He’s half-hoping that maybe there’s someone new waiting for them today; Ginny’d have a conniption, but he’s at a point where he’d prefer that Cho be the healer waiting for him. Because Harry may be the Boy-Who-Lived — twice! — but it’s possible nothing has ever seemed more intimidating than asking the Woman-Who-Knew-His-Parents for more information.
Of course, he’s not so lucky. Healer Macdonald is waiting in the sitting room, her customary exam table conjured. “Someone looks sleepy,” she says in lieu of a greeting, reaching her hands out for the baby.
“Milk drunk, a bit,” Harry laughs. If she picks up on the hesitation before he makes the joke — the lack of Potter confidence she might expect from Harry — she doesn’t let on. You can do this, he tells himself. Don’t overthink it. “He, er, made a bit of mess of his pajamas this morning.” That’s an understatement, actually, but while Harry would gleefully describe the horrific scene in his son’s nappy to Ron, if only to make his best mate uncomfortable, he doesn’t feel he needs to elaborate for the healer.
Indeed, she doesn’t press him, and instead nods with understanding. “Do you normally wake up with him?”
“Er, yeah,” Harry nods. “I, er, don’t really sleep well, always been the kind of person who sleeps for short periods of time and wakes up sporadically. I used to be jealous of people like Ginny, who can sleep through the night, but it turns out that sort of sleep schedule is advantageous with a newborn.”
“I’m sure Ginny appreciates the extra rest,” the healer comments neutrally. “He’s up another 6 ounces from last week,” she tells Harry. Then she turns back to James, and singsongs: “You’re growing so much, Jamie.”
“You always call him that,” Harry points out, trying very hard to sound curious rather than accusatory. “Jamie, I mean.”
“It's a nicer nickname than Jimmy,” Healer Macdonald jokes.
“We always just thought we’d call him James,” Harry contributes awkwardly, wondering if he’s talked himself into a corner. “He’s named after my dad, and as far as I know my dad just went by James. So, I dunno, maybe that means he should have a nickname, actually.” He’s aware that he’s rambling, but he’s hoping that maybe she’ll take pity on him and offer more information.
“It can be an awfully big burden, being named after someone who’s died,” she tells him, more than a hint of grief weighing on her tone. “You look like him, and that’s a burden, too, of course. I’m sure you’ve had people in your life who expect you to be him.” It goes without saying who the him in question is.
“Er, sometimes, I suppose,” Harry admits, though the more emotional and less strategic side of him — the side that years of stealth and questioning training tamped down — wants to jump on the fact that she remarked on the resemblance. “And I’ve been told I am like him in some ways, but I dunno.” He looks up, catching the healer’s eyes with his own. “I don’t see it as a burden. I don’t — I didn’t know my parents. So when people tell me I’m like my dad, it makes me feel closer to him. Makes me feel like I did know him.”
She smiles sadly at him, and he knows she knows, then. She knows he’s figured it out. “I don’t know if anyone has ever told you this, Harry,” she tells him softly as her wand pauses where it hovers above his son’s tiny body. “But you’re a lot like your mum, too. It’s not just the eyes.”
She returns to her spellwork, and Harry lets her words sink in for a few moments. Her voice had been thick with emotion, and the last thing he wants is for her to cry while she’s mid-exam on his tiny, delicate, born-too-early infant son. Returning to her healer voice, she explains to Harry that she’d like to give James an injection of some vitamin or other, and Harry gives a single word of consent.
“I prefer to have parents hold the baby for this,” she tells him with a smile, beckoning him over. “Keeps them from squirming as much, and then they have someone to comfort them after.” He nods mutely again, and lifts his son from the table, holding him against his chest with one hand supporting the baby’s bum and the other his head. She goes to the side where James’ leg is not obstructed by Harry’s arm and cleans the area with her wand before giving an injection. James immediately wails.
“I know, love,” she murmurs. “But you were so brave. A true Gryffindor, you are.” She looks over at Harry. “I know I’ve seen you wearing a Gryffindor shirt but was Ginny —?”
“She was,” Harry answers. “A year below me. We initially got close for — well, a lot of reasons, but her brother is my best mate and her parents kind of, er, adopted me into the family. Since I don’t really have a family of my own. Or didn’t, anyway.” I do now is the part that goes unspoken.
“Your parents never wanted that for you,” Healer Macdonald tells him, though she still hasn’t explained who his parents are to her . “Your dad always wanted a big family, wanted to give you lots of brothers and sisters. He hated being an only child, James. Went and found himself a pack of brothers as soon as he could.”
“So you did?” Harry broaches carefully. “You knew them?”
Healer Macdonald sighs and nods. “Quite well, actually. We were all the same year in school. Your mum was one of my closest friends; I’m sure you know what that’s like, the bond you form with your dormmates at school.” She averts her gaze and immediately begins vanishing her tools and cleaning up her workstation, now that James has calmed down in his father’s arms.
“I…well, I always thought there was something a bit weird,” Harry admits, still swaying lightly, terrified that if he stops, James will start screaming and the moment will be lost forever. “But loads of people are weird around me. Yesterday, I realized you must have. Known them, I mean.”
“Wasn’t very subtle, I suppose.” She offers him a wan smile, that really might be more of a grimace depending on the light you see it in. “When Healer Larsson asked me if I would be the one to check in on…James,” she swallows thickly, and it’s obvious that calling the baby by his given name is incredibly difficult for her. “I didn’t hesitate before I said yes. I mean, all of us in pediatrics are fond of Healer Larsson, because she’s the only maternal health healer who cares this much about the babies, too, but I also — well, it felt like your parents might have wanted me to be the healer taking care of their grandson as well. It wasn’t until you came downstairs on that first visit that I realized how difficult it would be, emotionally. Sure, the baby is named James Sirius — which, you should know, is truly a mad name for a child — and has black hair, but it’s easy enough to call him Jamie or sunshine and continue on with my job. But then you were here, looking so much like James and having the same dry sense of humor as Lily and…” She rubs at her throat as if there’s a painful lump lodged there. “You’re a little older than they were when they had you, but it’s almost like watching the new parent experience they didn’t get to have.”
Harry doesn’t say anything to this. Part of him, of course, had considered that for all the fear that surely existed around his birth, it must have been just as happy for them as he feels with James. They were married, and they loved each other and him, and so that was most of the puzzle, wasn’t it? It didn’t occur to him what the abnormality of the situation might have robbed them of.
“There’s so much I’d like to tell you, Harry,” Healer Macdonald tells him softly. “But I've spent a lot of time, shall we say, repressing those memories. It’s…not an easy thing, bringing them back to the surface.”
“I understand,” Harry replies. And he does, because he’s spent many years repressing grief and painful memories of his own; it took two mindhealers and three years of work to even begin to access them. In hindsight, he realizes, it was foolish of him to think that they could have one conversation about this and have it be all he needed.
“Your mum wanted to be a healer, you know,” she tells Harry, and it’s a start. It’s something he never knew about her. “That was her plan. Even when she was little — before she knew she was a witch — she wanted to be a doctor. It was a no-brainer for her to adjust her ambition to the wizarding equivalent. She wanted to help defeat Voldemort first, and then she wanted to enter healer training. She would have been spectacular, and I think about that all the time. She was so empathetic and personable, in addition to her brilliance. Losing her was a loss on many levels, obviously, but the profession is worse off because she never got to enter it. I know that much for a fact.”
“I didn’t know that,” Harry admits, a pang of familiar loss filling his chest; its familiarity did nothing to soothe the sting of it. “I honestly don’t know much of anything about their…dreams, ambitions. Any of that.”
She smiles at him, this one a bit more genuine; it's a smile of fond nostalgia, of the kind of remembrance where time has soothed some of the sting and left you with mostly the happy bits. “Your dad wanted to play professional quidditch, and he also wanted to use some of his money to fund social services for wizarding youth. The situation with Sirius and his parents left…well, it left quite an impression on your dad. He thought it was profoundly unfair that if he and Sirius hadn’t been friends, Sirius would have been trapped in that home or, worse, still thrown out but lacking a place to go.”
“That home was this home, actually,” Harry admits, still bouncing James — though he’d readily admit that that’s likely more his anxiety than anything else at this point. “Sirius left this place to me when he died and I moved in a few years ago — only after making sure it barely resembled the place Sirius hated, mind.”
“Sirius never told you any of this?” She seems perplexed as Harry shakes his head. “Fascinating.”
“Our time together was limited,” Harry responds tightly. There’s still a sense of profound loss every time Sirius’ name is spoken, though he’s better able to quell it now. “Remus told me a bit more, but that too…” He trails off. “You might be one of the only people who left who can tell me about them.”
She sighs heavily, regretfully. “I reckon you’re right on that count, Harry. I wonder how anyone can think it was worth it.”
“Fighting?” Harry can’t help the prickle of anger that lights in his chest. All he has now is owed to the people who fought for him and, more profoundly, he is still dedicating his life to that fight. “Of course it was worth it, I’d do it again—”
“No, Harry,” she interrupts. “You misunderstand. You know as well as I do that those ideas — blood purity, all that rubbish — didn’t die with…him. There are still people who actively defend the role they played in the war, for the wrong side; I know that’s what you see as an auror. And I see things that are more subtle while I work every day. Parents who demand I coax accidental magic out of their child who isn’t old enough to reliably display it in the first place. Children whose parents want to know what their options are when they find themselves with a squib child, as if the child isn’t already a living, sentient human with rights and feelings. I think fighting was worth it, absolutely I do. What I don’t understand is the people who believed so deeply in the purity of magic that they were willing to spill an entire generation’s worth of magical blood and still say it was a worthwhile cause to pursue.”
“It was never about anything other than power,” Harry says, after a moment of consideration. “I’ve been thinking about this for more than half my life and that’s what it comes down to. It was never about blood purity or protecting magic, not really; it was about power, and Voldemort was willing to exploit any ideology he needed to get it.” Healer Macdonald bristles only slightly at the mention of the name; it’s a better reaction than Harry typically receives when he says it, even now.
Healer Macdonald chuckles humorlessly. “Wise beyond your years, you are.”
Harry shakes his head. “I’m really not. Sometimes, it feels like I’m still a dumb, scared seventeen year old kid,” he admits.
“Want to hear a secret?” Healer Macdonald raises an eyebrow at him; he chuckles and nods. “I’m in my forties, and sometimes I still feel like a dumb, scared seventeen year old, too.” She pauses, tilting her head to the side as she considers him. “But you’re not. You’re astute and you’re good. And you’re a wonderful partner to Ginny and an incredible father to this little boy already. I know that wherever your parents are, they are so proud of the man you grew up to be.”
Tears prickle at Harry’s eyes behind his glasses, but his arms and hands are occupied with the baby, so he can’t reach up to staunch them. Instead, he presses his lips to the top of James’ head and breathes in, letting the uniquely soothing smell that seems to be inherent to babies wash over him. “I wish you’d said something sooner,” he tells her.
Healer Macdonald nods with profound understanding. “I wish I had, too. I wish I hadn’t stayed away from you for so long. I’m sorry for that, Harry.”
There will be plenty more moments for Harry to ask her more questions, because he knows in that moment that Healer Macdonald — or Mary, as she now insists Harry calls her whenever she’s not actively caring for his son — isn’t going anywhere. She’s going to be James’ healer, but more importantly, she’s going to stay in Harry’s life as his remaining link to the people who gave it to him in the first place.
…
Though Harry is back at the office, training the next class of aurors five days a week, Ginny finds that she’s rarely home alone with James. Someone always seems to be dropping by to offer a hand — though whether it’s because they want to spend time with the smushy, tiny baby or because Harry set up an informal rotation to ensure she always has help, Ginny cannot be quite sure. If he’s making a schedule, it seems he’s rather good at it, because it doesn’t rely too heavily on her mum. Yes, Molly is there sometimes — Ginny’s not thick enough to think anyone could keep her mum away from her first grandson and only daughter — but her visits seem to be timed so that by the point where her comments might typically turn critical, yet another visitor has arrived to diffuse.
Usually, that visitor comes in the form of either Ron or George, who take turns watching the store while the other visits. Hermione would be a welcome change of pace, of course, but she’s always hard at work, and when she stops by, she usually arrives alongside Harry after work. Andromeda and Teddy, too, tend to visit only when Harry will be home — not that Ginny blames them, of course; Teddy deserves to spend time with Harry, too.
It probably shouldn’t surprise her as much as it does when one afternoon, when James is just about a month old, the doorbell rings and Kreacher announces that Fleur and Victoire have arrived for a visit. Fleur looks radiant, because of course pregnancy looks good on Fleur, and Victoire’s strawberry blonde hair is braided in two plaits on either side of her head. In Victoire’s arms is a stuffed bunny, and in Fleur’s, a box of fancy pastries from a nearby patisserie.
“Auntie Ginny,” the little girl squeals, running into the room. “Me an’ Maman goed to the store to get a toy for James and I picked Bunny,” she declares, proudly thrusting the stuffed toy toward her aunt. She then looks around. “Where is he?”
“Nana brought him upstairs to change his nappy,” Ginny tells the little girl, accepting the bunny with a smile. Soon after Teddy turns six, Victoire will turn four; Ginny can hardly imagine where the time’s gone. And she already feels sad, at the thought that it’s going to be that way with James, too. She’s barely enjoyed her time with him yet and almost a month has passed; will she even get to learn how to really enjoy being his mum before he’s off to Hogwarts?
“Ma chérie,” Fleur calls to her daughter in a soothing tone. “Why don’t you go upstairs and ‘elp Nana with your cousin? Tell her you need big seester practice.”
“Oui, Maman!” Victoire doesn’t need to be told twice before she bounds toward the stairs. Hadn’t it been only weeks ago that she’d been toddling on chubby, unstable legs?
Once Victoire’s footsteps indicate she’s heading toward the nursery, Fleur casts a muffliato around herself and Ginny and opens the box of pastries, selecting a pain au chocolat for herself before offering the open box to Ginny.
Ginny wrinkles her nose. Her first instinct is to refuse the offer. While some of the weight she gained during pregnancy came off with little effort on her part, she’s still far from fitting into her favorite jeans. She’s anxiously counting down the days until she’s able to even begin light workouts again, and doesn’t particularly feel she deserves a treat until then. Years of being a professional athlete have, in fact, warped her relationship with food, it would appear. Fleur, however, seems to read the dilemma on Ginny’s face and smiles kindly. “You must eat to make milk for James,” she tells her sister-in-law.
Easy for her to say, Ginny thinks to herself. Fleur barely had a bump left immediately after giving birth to Victoire, and was wearing her pre-pregnancy clothes within days. Still, the scent of the buttery pastries proves enticing, and she selects a kouign-amann, biting into it ferociously. “Thank you,” she mumbles.
“How are you doing, Ginny?” Fleur asks, eyes shining with kindness.
Ginny’s eyes flit down to her sister-in-law’s adorable baby bump. “I’m supposed to be asking you that, aren’t I?”
Ethereal blonde hair whips through the air as Fleur shakes her head and giggles. “Being pregnant ees ze easy part,” she sighs, taking a seat in one of the arm chairs. “Being a muzzer? Zat ees what ees difficult.”
It occurs to Ginny that she hasn’t had this yet, the opportunity to talk to someone closer to her own age who has already been through it — and recently. So although she has a hard time believing that Fleur ever felt so physically disgusting and wholly inadequate following Victoire’s birth, she decides to ask anyway. “Does it ever feel, I dunno, normal?”
Fleur tilts her head to the side, like a curious puppy. “What do you mean?”
Swallowing hard, Ginny continues. “You know, like I gave my body to James for — well it was supposed to be nine months, anyway. And now my body still belongs to James, because I make his food and spend my days caring for him and I can’t even do the things I like to do yet. And I’m still out of sorts; I’ve mostly stopped bleeding but I don’t look or feel like myself.”
Flakes of croissant sprinkle onto Fleur’s skirt as she chews a bite of her pastry thoughtfully, not bothering to brush them off; she’ll vanish them later, no doubt. “I theenk I felt like my body was — ‘ow did you say eet?”
“Normal?”
“Oui, normal,” Fleur agrees. “When Bill and I could make love again, zat ees when I felt normal.” Ginny wrinkles her nose reflexively, which makes Fleur giggle. “Don’t be a bégueule; you just ‘ad a baby, you and ‘Arry ‘ave made love, yes?”
“Well, obviously,” Ginny studiously averts her eyes. It’s not like she can deny it, or would want to if she could; still, there’s something strange about talking about it so openly with her brother’s wife — even if said sister-in-law is the person who pulled her aside the summer after the war to make sure she knew how to get a contraceptive potion in the first place.
“Eet brings you back to yourself, I theenk,” Fleur continues undeterred. “Reminds you zat your body belongs to you, zat it can give you pleasure and connect you to your lover, oui?”
A blush creeps up Ginny’s cheeks, though she wills it away. It’s moments like this where it is especially apparent that she is English and Fleur is very, very French. Ginny thinks nothing of being boisterous or using vulgar language among her peers, but hearing the word lover is enough to make her want to crawl into a hole and die; Fleur, on the other hand, casually speaks about the pleasures of the body as though it is the weather. “Well,” she hedges, swallowing and willing herself to be open with Fleur; it’s the first conversation she’s had in ages where she feels like the other person understands where she’s coming from. “I do think it would probably help. Sometimes we snog a bit, and it’s the closest I’ve felt to myself since before the healer banned sex in the first place.”
“The ‘ealer said no sex?” Fleur’s hand flies to her chest. Another example of Fleur being French: only the thought of no sex is enough to scandalize her. “Why would she say zat? I would find a new ‘ealer!”
Now Ginny knows she’s said too much, but she can’t close the can of worms now that she's opened it. She glances toward the door and then back to Fleur. “Well, the thing is, we actually knew there was a good chance James would come early,” she explains carefully. “Er, because I had so much Cruciatus exposure during the war. So in order to try to give us the, er, best chance, they started me on all these potions to help James develop more quickly, and restricted any activity that could bring about labor. And sex is one of those activities so we haven’t had sex since February.” There’s no use in trying to pretend she doesn’t know exactly how long it’s been.
At the revelation, Fleur literally gasps. “But eet ees April!” She wastes no time before her next offer: “After you see your ‘ealer and she says eet ees fine, Bill and I will take James for a day so you and ‘Arry can enjoy each ozzer.”
But the idea of Bill knowing exactly why he’s watching her son is positively mortifying to Ginny, who flushes vermillion. “Oh, Fleur, that's so kind of you, but I couldn’t impose..”
“Nonsense,” Fleur waves her off. “If it ees about your bruzzer, Bill knows zat you are a beeg girl. ‘E knows zat you have a baby. ‘E will not make a fuss and, I theenk, ‘e would love to spend time with ‘is nephew, anyway. I theenk zis baby will be anuzzer girl, so some male energy will do ‘im good.”
This distracts Ginny sufficiently enough that she asks: “Are you finding out for sure?”
Fleur shrugs. “Bill says zat ‘e wants eet to be a surprise, but a muzzer knows these theengs. You knew James was a boy before ze ‘ealer told you, oui?”
And the truth is Ginny hadn’t had a hunch at all before they found out — she’d barely wrapped her brain around having a baby before Healer Harris announced they’d have a son. “Not really? Sometimes, I feel like I am missing the mum part of my brain, actually. Like most women have a mum part and I’m just, I dunno, broken in that way.”
Veela-like fury brews behind Fleur’s eyes, and Ginny almost wonders what she did to make her sister-in-law so mad. But when she speaks, it’s with a fierce protective edge. “No, Ginny, you must not say zat! You are a wonderful muzzer to James! ‘E is so lucky to have you. No one knows what zey are doing at ze start, see. But I would tell you eef you were failing him and you are not.”
And Ginny knows that part is at least true. Fleur has never been shy with her opinions, even when they were hurtful.
“You will see,” Fleur continues. “Once the ‘ealer says you can, we will watch James so you and ‘Arry can get to know each ozzer again, oui? And zat will help. And eef it does not, your ‘ealer has potions to 'elp you, too.”
Ginny never does get to find out what kind of potions those are, though, because Victoire comes bounding back down the stairs, followed closely by Molly, who is holding James.
“Maman!” Victoire shrieks. “Why is the buzzy sound here? Is Auntie Ginny keepin’ secrets?” Ginny barely stifles a laugh. Of course her precocious niece knows that the only purpose of the muffliato charm is to keep prying ears from hearing something sensitive.
“Ginny and I are just ‘aving a chat,” Fleur tells Victoire after quickly canceling the charm.
“No,” Victoire shakes her head. “Auntie Ginny do not have a cat. She have a Harry and a James!” At this, Ginny does not bother trying to restrain her laughter: she guffaws at the adorableness of the bilingual misunderstanding. Ginny may not speak French, but she knows what chat means.
“Not chat en français, ma fille chérie,” Fleur explains with a giggle. “In English. A talk.”
“Oui, maman,” Victoire agrees, giggling, before launching into a rambling speech about how she practiced being a good big sister with James upstairs and how Nana helped her hold the baby. Victoire finds every event of the afternoon to be hilarious and novel, and spends the rest of her visit in a fit of laughter, recounting all of it in great detail.
Her mother leaves before Harry comes home, and Fleur lingers for a few minutes after Harry’s return. Harry and Fleur have always been fond of one another, thus enjoying the time spent catching up, and Victoire is excited for the opportunity to pepper Harry with questions about Teddy Lupin, whom she idolizes. As Fleur bids James and his parents farewell, she reminds Ginny — not at all subtly, because subtlety is not one of her strong suits — to make sure she’s making time for herself.
“What’s that about?” Harry asks Ginny curiously, fixing himself a plate of the food Molly brought over for them today. He doesn’t even bother casting a warming charm on it before he digs into the cold cottage pie. More than anything, he’d like to rectify his hunger quickly, so he can get to snuggling James, whom he misses acutely after a day at work.
Ginny, who is strapping James back into his swing so she can eat herself, snorts. “Fleur is determined to help us shag,” she deadpans without ever looking up from their child.
Harry, in some approximation of a response, chokes on his food. “I’m sorry?” It’s not that he doesn’t want to have sex with her — quite the opposite, actually. Shagging Ginny has been on his mind, both consciously and not, nearly constantly since he was sixteen; his desire for her has only grown, between sex being made off limits and watching her become a mother to their son — both of which turn him on a lot, though obviously not for the same reason. He’s simply not sure how this would have even come up as a topic for Fleur to concern herself with.
“Fleur seems to think that I will feel more like myself once you and I shag again,” Ginny explains with characteristic bluntness as she taps her wand to the swing, which begins to sway back and forth. “Apparently, she felt normal once she and Bill could ‘make love.’” Ginny mimes gagging, and Harry knows it’s less at the thought of her brother having sex as it is at Fleur’s usage of the phrase make love, which she has always thought of as a cheesy and overly-soppy description of a very base and animalistic act.
Harry shrugs. Now that the context of the suggestion is clear, he can’t say the same thought hasn’t occurred to him, if he’s honest. Ginny has always been a very sexual person — even before they ever did more than snog. Many things scare Ginny Weasley, of course, but her sexuality was never one of those things; in fact, it has always been central to her, her lack of fear instead helping sexuality become a thing from which she drew power. Losing touch with that part of herself would naturally lead to her feeling like she’d lost a part of herself. That is something Harry can empathize with. He doesn’t know who he is if he isn’t putting other people before himself, and an uncomfortable truth he’s still not fully confronted is that he lost a part of himself when the horcrux that lived in him died, as well. And maybe he tried to fill that hole with Ginny for a time, so maybe sex became a part of him, too (his own fears of intimacy notwithstanding). But he can’t follow that rabbit hole, not now, not when it’s Ginny who needs him.
After a few moments of her staring at him, willing him to speak, he clears his throat. “It’s not a, er, bad thought, exactly,” he says finally. “But, er, we’ve still got two weeks, right?” And then, realizing he shouldn’t seem too eager, he coughs. “That is, if you’re ready then, obviously. If you’re not ready, we can wait longer. I don’t really mind if we do.” He thinks he can survive on wanking for a while longer while yet, if that’s what Ginny needs. He’s always been willing to follow her lead and he’s not about to stop now.
A fond, distant sort of smile crosses her face. She loves how he trips over himself to make her comfortable, but more than that, she loves that his eagerness and desire for her are evident. He knows exactly how much longer they have to wait, she reckons, and that makes desire pool low in her belly, a familiar and entirely welcome feeling even if it’s one she can’t truly act upon in the moment. Maybe sex is what will bring her back to herself.
“No, you’re right,” she says finally, biting her lip in the way that’s always driven Harry crazy. “Two weeks. And, to be honest, I wish it were sooner,” she adds, lowering her voice. “Is that crazy?”
Harry swallows hard, shaking his head. She can see him beginning to get hard just by studying his eyes. It’s satisfying, really, to know she holds such power over him. “Er, no,” he chuckles, that low, turned on voice of his echoing around the kitchen. “I’m absolutely ready, I’m just not the person who, er, gave birth. So I’d understand if you weren’t.”
“But I am.” She cocks her head to the side curiously. “It almost makes me wonder what would happen if we didn’t wait.” It hadn’t ever occurred to her that she could go against healer’s orders until now, but the thought of it is almost exciting. Breaking the rules has always been something of a kink for both of them; the summer after the war, the hottest sex had always been around the Burrow, especially when it felt like they might get caught.
As for Harry, he swallows again; it’s clearly going to be an uphill battle to resist, but the noble git will manage it, of course. He always does. “It’s only a couple more weeks,” he tells her hoarsely. His throat is clearly dry. “We’ve made it this long.”
They’re staring at each other heatedly, food forgotten, and Ginny is sure she’s about to break him when James starts fussing. Ginny briefly wonders if this is a sign of things to come — James forever cockblocking his parents — and she forces the thought out of her mind with great guilt. She’s not supposed to be annoyed at the baby for interrupting her sexy banter with Harry, because that’s another thing someone with a working mum brain wouldn’t do.
Harry, of course, has a high-functioning dad brain, so he leaps over to the swing and pauses it with his wand, retrieving James, his food long abandoned on the table. “I don’t think it’s time for a bottle, Snitch.” He looks over at Ginny, and all of the heat that was in his green eyes only moments before seems to be gone. “We’ve still got an hour or so until he next eats, right?”
Ginny looks over at the clock, desperately trying to remember what time James last ate. She can’t know for sure — her mum fed him, and things tend to get off schedule where Molly is involved. She wrinkles her nose. “I can try to nurse,” she offers, weakly. She reaches toward Harry’s abandoned plate and quickly shovels the remains of his dinner into her mouth. “I’ll take him,” she mumbles, her mouth full.
“It’s all right,” Harry waves her off. “I’ll get him a clean nappy and rock him for a bit, see if I can hold off food and get him back on his routine. You can eat a proper meal,” he tells her, swaying the baby back and forth.
How is it that he only gets sexier when he’s caring for the baby? Is that something someone with a working mum brain would think? Ginny can’t stop the thoughts from racing through her head. What if she’s more of a randy teenager than someone’s responsible mum?
“To be continued, yeah?” Harry lowers his voice as he says it — back to his turned on voice — and suddenly the loud thoughts stop. Because Harry still wants her, and if he can desire her and be a good dad to James at the same time, she can do the same, can’t she?
“To be continued,” Ginny agrees with a smile.
Ginny and Fleur long ago forged a mutual respect and now even genuinely like each other, but Merlin, Ginny really does hate when she’s right.