Days After Death

Ginny feels a deep bitterness the moment she awakes. In all her years, she’s never truly felt such a way, like she’s lost the day without having even started it. But with each coming morning, with each year that goes by, the feeling only gets worse and all she’d like to do is stay in bed for a few more moments and pretend the world outside her bedroom doesn’t exist.

But that wouldn’t be any good, because the world outside does exist, and it comes in the form of a tight fist knocking on the door. It reminds her that she’s got duties to uphold.

She shifts where she is in bed, her bleary eyes adjusting to the lightened room, when her daughter rushes in, a small, secret smile on her face, the same sort that means she believes this moment is special. But she smiles like this all the time. Her Lily Luna, who never takes anything for granted, who’s more humbly proud than any child she’s ever met before.

The bitterness thaws a little.

“Good morning, Mommy,” Lily greets in a whisper-shout, probably thinking she’s being responsibly quiet.

“G’morning, darling.”

Lily sits next to where Ginny lies in bed, brushing her vibrant red hair out of her face. It’s not an uncommon occurrence for Lily to wish Ginny good morning on the days where she wakes up earlier. She’s a complete early bird, which is at least something about her that Ginny can relate to. It’s the complete opposite of Al, who would sleep until midday if he could.

“It’s Jamie’s birthday today,” Lily says, clearly excited for her older brother.

“That’s right.”

“Are we going to bake him a cake?”

“We totally can, if we want to. But Grandma Molly’s already got that carrot cake with buttercream you kids go crazy for.”

“Oh, yes! I do love that cake!” Lily says, licking her dry lips.

Ginny decides now’s the time, more than ever. It isn’t that James is a late sleeper, but whatever time her eldest would wake up was unpredictable, and it seems only right that Ginny is up before he is.

So she sits up, pulling the multi-coloured quilts off her and cracking her back magnificently, and Lily giggles beside her as she stretches out her arms and legs.

“Mommy, you’re so old!” She exclaims cheekily.

Ginny flashes her a grin, reaching out to tossle and rough up her hair that sets her soft giggling to loud laughter. Ginny stops soon enough to make sure she doesn’t wake James just yet, and puts a finger to her lips for Lily to quiet down. Lily does so by slapping her hands over her mouth, her eyes wide but still alight with joy.

“Sorry,” she whisper-shouts, and Ginny leans down and kisses her forehead, because she loves her so much, and she’s feeling much better than she was moments ago when she was alone. Maybe today won’t be so bad.

“Go brush your teeth, Lily,” she tells her, and Lily hops off the bed to comply, mattress creaking.

When her youngest gets to the door, however, she freezes and turns back to her, a confused frown on her face. Then Ginny realises that Lily isn’t frowning at her, but she’s frowning at the room, looking around the place like it’s missing something.

“Where’s Daddy?”

And just like that, the weight is back on her, the bitterness configuring her expression to be made ugly and resentful. She can’t help it. She isn’t surprised that she’s feeling this way because of Harry. She would’ve figured it out quite soon, but her brain needed time to boot up properly. Most of the time, Ginny can always trace her initial stress back to her husband. Not that he would care how she felt, if he couldn’t care about his own kids on their birthdays.

It was James’s 11th. She wanted to make it good. The best birthday he’s ever had, because she’d lose him to school for the next nine or so months quite soon after, and every time she thought about it, it broke her heart more and more.

She has to be the bearer of bad news, that means, because Harry is too cowardly to do it himself, even though it’s his own actions that would be the cause of despair. She’s used to the role, as it isn’t the first time he’s skipped out on them to chase after some sick fantasy of heroism once more, but she will never be okay with it. Her kids are young, so she knew they all blamed her for his absences, as if she could’ve been the one to make him stay. Maybe it’s because she always seems capable of making anything happen. She had been a Quidditch star, and the sole person to nurture and encourage James’s hyperfixation on the sport too. She had written for the Daily Prophet and then was almost legally persecuted for hexing half the staff members for defamatory drafts about her family. She had teached her kids how to fight rough just in case any nosy wizards or witches approached them without her. She had singlehandedly dug out the Flobberworm that Al had grown attached to and named ‘Wes’ in their garden to cheer him up after he scraped his knee. She had caught Lily each time she stole Harry’s Invisibility cloak to steal toffee and other sugary desserts after meals. She had hand made James’s first broom after he broke his last one and couldn’t purchase a new one until next Quidditch season.

She can do all of this a thousand times, but can’t do something as simple as making Harry stay for his son’s birthday. It seems so pathetic, the more she thinks about it.

But Harry is as stubborn as she is, and perhaps she had loved that side of him once, as it made him as unstoppable as she. She just failed to expect what would come of it.

“He’s at work, darling,” Ginny says, unsure.

Lily’s face falls, and there’s a pout on her lips now.

“What do you mean? It’s Jamie’s birthday. He can’t be at work.”

“He is, Lily. But that’s okay. We’ll have just as much fun without him, don’t worry.”

Lily pauses, her eyes looking over the room, over the ticking clock on the mantle that shows it’s eight in the morning, the incense that Ginny lights sometimes to ease her headaches, the basket of laundry with her clothes on the floor that she can’t be bothered to put away. Then, after she looks at it all, her lovely hazel eyes lock back on her, despondently accusatory.

“No, we won’t,” she says, and shuts the door.

Ginny remembers the first time Harry skipped out on one of their child’s birthdays. It was also James’s. It was his eighth. It wasn’t him not making it for his birthday party, like he had done with Lily, or him arriving late, like he had done with Al. It was his first time skipping the entire day without seeing any of them. The worst part about it all, was that he hadn’t bothered to tell Ginny he wasn’t going to make it. In fact, he swore to her, swore to James, that he would eventually. But instead James spent the entire day asking when Harry was to come, and Ginny spent the entire day giving him empty promises on Harry’s behalf, secretly unsure herself. But she had believed in Harry, that he would prove himself a somewhat decent father as to show for him. It was all for naught.

She had a harder time believing him after that, and James had a harder time believing her.

Ginny had known of the ex-Death Eater, but she had forgotten the witch’s name by now. She had known that Harry was desperate to catch her, to arrest her. She had miscalculated how obsessed he was with finding her.

When Harry came back early the morning after, his eyes bloodshot, bags deep, pale as if he hadn’t eaten, Ginny felt no sympathy for him. She hated the way he sputtered apologies, she didn’t care if they were genuine. She had stayed up with James for hours waiting for Harry to return and he never showed. Her son had gone to sleep crying, worried that something bad had happened to his dad although she knew the truth.

He had forgotten.

What kind of father could do that?

And now here she is, with her three children at the breakfast table, Lily pouring too much syrup on her pancakes, Al waffling the plate down faster than she can blink, and James serving himself the pancakes that looked the fluffiest.

She will tell him now, when the day is fresh so he can have it out of the way without having to suspect. Or before Lily blurts to him first. She doesn’t know whether it is completely right of her, as it might as well ruin the entirety of his day, but it seems the most logical. James is so smart at such a young age. She doesn’t want him to see her as a liar moving forwards.

“James,” she starts, and her grave tone makes both James and Al look up at her, whereas Lily continues to focus on her breakfast, oblivious, “I want to talk to you about Dad.”

“Yeah, where is he even?” Al asks through a full mouth, his words muffled but decipherable enough. He looks around the house with its open lounge and cranes his head down the hallway to look down to where the front of the house is, as if Harry is purposefully hiding. He swallows roughly, and Ginny feels the urge to remind him to chew his food. “Is he still asleep?”

She cringes when the boys look at her. Lily is staring down at her breakfast, swishing the syrup around and letting the pancakes go soggy. Ginny doesn’t even have the heart to tell her to stop playing with her food.

“He’s not here,” she says, and she looks at James, hoping she can communicate what she means without having to say it aloud. It’s shameful.

James inhales deeply, and Ginny tries to read him. He lifts his glass of orange juice up, as if to sip some, but then puts it back down. He’s trying to digest the information, and so Ginny quietly lets him, trying to gauge how he’ll react the entire time. She’s grateful that Lily and Albus have silenced somewhat too, but that’s probably because when Lily gets sad she gets quiet, and Albus just seems confused but too engrossed in his meal to properly mull it over.

James’s face remains neutral, which unnerves her. Either he’s in denial, he didn’t understand what she meant, or he’s maturing much too fast.

“Is he at work?” James asks, cutting a bit of buttered pancake off and putting the soft piece in his mouth.

“Yes.”

“When will he be back?”

“I don’t know, Jamie. He told me he’d have a full day, so I don’t think you’ll see him today.”

Before James can answer, Albus beats him to it.

“WHAT?!” He roars, his shirt stained from how messy he is. “How can he do that? Doesn’t he know it’s Jamie’s birthday today? Did he forget? Did he put it in the calendar? He absolutely cannot forget if he put it in the calendar.”

“He remembered. But he couldn’t come today. He was busy.”

“That makes no sense! Right, Jamie? It makes no sense.”

James had been hysterical when Ginny had first told him a few years back that Harry may not show. It wasn’t like she was telling him he wouldn’t come, just broaching the idea. James had been adamant in knowing his Dad would come for him, but he didn’t and it broke his heart no matter how hard he tried to brave it. Ginny had screamed at him for hours the day after, and Harry had spent time with James after, saying he had made amends. Made promises. She never knew what those promises were, but she had an idea. And she had the idea that he had made more empty oaths after.

Now would be the time James sees how worthless they are, and she doesn’t know what he’s going to think or feel.

If it had been her at his age, she would have hurled things. Everyone knew of the blindsided Weasley rage she inherited from her mother.

But James is different, she knows. He isn’t like her, like Albus is. And he isn’t quite like Harry either, like Lily is.

“Al’s right, Mum,” James says, too breezily. “It doesn’t make much sense. Dad pinky swore yesterday he would be here.”

Stupid Harry and his stupid promises. She always tries to make sure her children don’t hold any resentment towards their Dad, not for his sake, but for theirs. She doesn’t want them growing up being spiteful. But it’s becoming more and more difficult with each passing day, each passing lie.

She doesn’t know what to say now.

“He can’t break a pinky swear,” Albus says.

She looks for any excuse she can use to make it better. It’s James’s birthday, she can’t let this stop him from having a fun time.

“He didn’t find out until way earlier today,” she says, wanting to shield James from the ugly truth of it all. He’s only ten. Only eleven. “He meant to stay, Jamie.”

James purses his lips, and then his attention focuses on his breakfast once more.

“Nah, he didn’t,” is what he says before resuming his breakfast.

Ginny is quiet, thinking there has to be more of it. There has to be the rage or the sadness she saw in him last time. But there’s nothing now and she doesn’t quite know how to proceed.

James does not say anything more, merely chews his food silently.

She almost expects Albus or Lily to voice up in protest for James, but strangely enough, they don’t. Lily looks worried. It’s a very odd expression when the person who bears it is a child so young. Ginny can’t possibly pick her mind for what she’s thinking at the moment. Maybe she’s worried about James. Maybe Harry. Maybe she’s worried she won’t get to see her favourite cousin today. Ginny feels inadequate for not knowing. Mother’s intuition is bollocks.

But as she looks to her youngest son, she thinks that maybe she doesn’t have the intrinsic sixth sense apparently embedded into all women the moment they pop a child out of them, but she does have some hunch of knowing, at least when she’s adorned the expression many times before. Anger. And on a nine year old’s face, it’s barely concealed. Rage. Confusion. It’s all there.

James remains blank. Placid. Accepting, but disappointed all the same.

A deep feeling of dread begins to settle in her bones.

It’s happening.

And it’s all happening because of Harry. It’s not her fault. She couldn’t have done anything to stop him. She’d already screamed her lungs out and her throat raw, begged him, even tried to strike some sort of bargain, tried to stifle her emotions long enough to try to rationalise him into staying. It didn’t work. And she hated it ever more because she had known it wouldn’t. There was nothing she could’ve done, nothing she hadn’t tried before, and yet, despite knowing all this, she still felt so useless. Her children are hurting, and it’s not her fault, but she will always feel like it is.

She hopes Harry hurts a hundred times worse than any of them. She hopes every time he heads to bed later than her, he hurts so badly he stays up and cries about it. She hopes that he suffers for this, because she knows he won’t change unless it’s too late. It’s bordering on much too late, at least with James. And James is enough.

She turns around quickly. Collects her breath. Big inhale. Clear thoughts. James’s eleventh. It’s his day.

She turns around, hating the plastered smile on her face, but hopes her children are still too young to notice. She knows James is starting to learn, so she pleads with the universe to help her out a little, make her look more natural at covering her emotions.

“James, it doesn’t matter that he won’t be here, it’s your birthday, and I swear we’re gonna have so much fun,” she says firmly and brightly as possible. “Now, after breakfast you can open your present, and then we’ll go see that Holly Harpies match you’ve been dying to go to so badly, and after we’ll come back for a bit and you can get more presents from the rest of the family that’ll drop by in the afternoon. We can do whatever you want today. Watch a movie, eat junk, a sleepover, whatever you want.”

A pause.

“Can Fred stay over tonight?” James asks.

“If Uncle George and Aunt Angelina allow it, I don’t see why not.”

She nearly laughs with relief when she sees her children’s eyes brighten as she explains their full day ahead. James practically crams the rest of his pancakes into his mouth, and Albus licks the plate. Lily shoves her plate of drowned waffles away and plays with her hair. She knows that soon, Albus will be begging for Rose to stay over and Lily would want Molly or Hugo, but for now she enjoys the peace.

Normally Ginny would have told Lily to finish her plate, and reprimanded her boys for their lack of table manners, but today was special and she will let them have this.

When James finds he got a new broom eligible to pack to Hogwarts, he laughs brightly. His eyes are twinkling, and he looks so beautiful and so full of life, Ginny feels commanded to lean down and smother him with kisses until his face is red and he’s trying to stifle his giggling to sheepishly push her away. He holds the broom like it’s a treasure gifted to him by Merlin himself, and Albus is egging him on to fly it, and Lily is begging him to hand it to her to try it even though he has barely touched it yet.

Ginny tells them not to fly in the house, and all four of them practically race outside.

When she sees her son gripping the broom so tightly his fists are white, mouth open as he floats higher with such ease and control, wind ruffling his hair, eyes wide and staring at all three of them as if he has fulfilled all his dreams, she knows this memory will be embedded in him forever. He surveys his family like a king from the height he’s at, and there’s only a slight worry that he’s drifting too far from her. It’s mostly stamped out by the overwhelming sense of pride she feels. Albus is whooping. Lily is hopping on her toes. Both of them are speechless, as if they’re feeling the exact same excitement as James is, living in this moment vicariously.

Being here with her children is like magic. She would not trade this for the world.

She doesn’t understand why her love isn’t here. Why doesn't he feel the same for their three little doves as she does? The more she gets caught up in her children’s lives, in their happiness, the more bitter and disconnected she feels with Harry. She remembers a time where they coincided in the same heartbeat, the same rope of attraction and understanding binding them together. She had loved him before she even knew what love was. It was perfect. They had been perfect. And they have the perfect babies.

Why wasn’t he here?

As James comes down once more, Ginny fears she’s made a mistake, as she always initially does. But maybe it was inevitable.

Because though James’s eyes are still alight and his cheeks are still flushed and his smile is still full, there’s a sense of melancholy to him, but she can’t exactly place where it shows on him. He seems a little less full than before. And suddenly this perfect memory turns bittersweet, and Ginny can’t ever do as she’s promised. She’s just as much of a liar as Harry is.

Maybe, she thinks, a mother’s intuition does exist, to some extent.