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From the second the door opened, Newt was under attack. A small but insistent set of arms had immediately entwined themselves around his legs, and his god-daughter was currently yelling ecstatically into his kneecaps.
“Hey,” Vanessa greeted from the doorway, her voice carrying over the racket, arms folded and eyebrows raised in amusement. Her hair and her smile looked bigger than ever, but Newt knew exhaustion when he saw it.
“Hi,” he grinned at them both, putting out one hand to steady himself on the wall, “how’s it going?”
“You’re here!” Hanna cried, by way of a response, her ever-confused accent muffled against the material of his jeans.
“Yeah, buddy!” Newt replied, equally as enthusiastic.
Hanna just squeezed tighter.
“Come on in,” Vanessa ushered, opening the door and flattening herself against the wall to allow him to shuffle into the small hallway with the little girl still attached. “Hey you,” she leaned over, planting one long kiss on his cheek, “he’s not going to say it out loud, so I will – you’re a saint.”
“At last, the recognition I deserve,” joked Newt, but he blushed. He always blushed with Vanessa.
“Newt!” said Hanna determinedly, detaching herself from his calf and sticking up a hand for Newt to hold instead. “We’ll see Daddy now!”
Hermann was sitting at the kitchen table, his own particular picture of Sunday afternoon serenity: one that was reading a monstrously sized scientific journal; a math-themed mug with something hot in it resting at his elbow, his glasses perched on the end of his nose.
“Newton,” he looked up at the sound of their entrance, blinking, surprised. “You’re on time.”
“It has been known to happen,” pouted Newt.
“Really,” said Hermann, pursing his lips.
“What? I’m not that bad.”
“Hm.”
“Daddy,” interrupted Hanna, breaking off from her godfather to tug on her father’s shirt sleeve instead. “Uncle Newt’s seeing fish with me. All kinds.”
“Really, darling?” said Hermann, his face softening immediately as he looked at her, one hand reaching out to rest on her abundance of curls.
“Yeah! We’re seeing crabs too,” she said, laying the side of her face against his thigh, sighing happily. “Crabs.”
“That’s wonderful,” said Hermann, taking off his glasses to look at Newt, pausing a moment, his expression still gentle. “Newton…”
“Hey, it’s no problem man,” said Newt, waving a hand, “you know I love it. I love her. Besides I, uh, I think you and Nessa kind of deserve some time off… You look kind of tired.”
“We are,” said Vanessa, striding through the doorway, passing a shoulder bag over to Newt before sitting herself down heavily on the seat next to her husband. “Essentials.”
“You’d think she’d have less shit to carry around now she’s not so tiny and vulnerable,” he said, testing its weight in his hand.
Vanessa raised an eyebrow and shrugged, smiling slightly.
“I guess you want her back for dinner?” he asked.
“That depends on how tired she is,” said Hermann.
“Call us,” said Nessa.
“No problem,” he nodded. “And she’s, uh, still avoiding dairy?”
“Yes,” they said loudly, simultaneously, glancing at each other.
“Just, please, don’t let her bully you into getting ice cream,” added Vanessa, with a tiny shake of her head. “I guarantee she will throw up on you.”
“Noted,” said Newt.
“Newt, lift me now,” requested Hanna, patting his leg with one hand and reaching up with the other.
“Sure,” he said, heaving her up into his arms with a little grunt. “You ready to go see the fish today?”
“Uh-huh,” she nodded, before leaning in to whisper conspiratorially: “Is there gonna be whales?”
“Nah buddy, I checked first. I don’t think it’s nice to keep such big things away from the ocean.”
“They get sad?”
“Yeah, that’s right. They get homesick.”
Hanna nodded again, very serious, until a giggle suddenly burst out of her mouth.
“Mum and Daddy staring at you,” she said, pointing.
“Huh?” Newt turned around, and sure enough – “What?” he said, slightly panicked. “What did I do?”
“It’s nothing, Newton,” Hermann smiled.
“Newt,” said Vanessa, leaning back in her chair, “you look like such a dad.”
***
“Let’s go!” Hanna cried, before Newt had even switched the engine off. She was wriggling in an attempt to reach for the clasp of her seatbelt. “Fish time!”
“Hold on, I’ve got you,” Newt said, taking his keys from the ignition before leaning over to set her free. “Wait until I’ve opened your door before you try and jump down or you’ll get trapped.”
“Not trapped,” Hanna said curtly, but stayed where she was anyway, long enough for Newt to get out of the car and help her down.
Safely on the sidewalk, hand in hand with her godfather, Hanna pulled herself up to her full three foot height, a huge grin plastered on her face, and began racing towards the entrance, pulling a laughing Newton along in her wake.
Once past the ticket barrier and into the aquarium, the rays were of immediate and particular interest. Hanna’s squeals of delight could not be contained – not that Newt would ever dare – as he carefully held her up to touch their sandpapery backs when they slipped above the water.
“Make sure you’re gentle,” he said encouragingly, “they’re not dangerous, but they’ve still got teeth, and you don’t want to make them scared.”
Hanna hardly heard him, but he didn’t need to worry. She was touching them with the kind of tenderness and reverence she usually reserved for her father and her favourite soft toys.
“They’re all rough!” she exclaimed.
“That’s right,” nodded Newt, “now try stroking them the other way.”
“Smooth,” gasped Hanna, awestruck. “Why they like that?”
“It’s the direction their placoid scales,” he answered. “It’s pretty cool, actually. All the ray’s scales are pointing towards its tail to reduce friction when it swims – so it can go fast in the water.”
“I like that one,” she pointed.
However much delight the ray room brought, the main tank surpassed it in every way. Newt’s mouth dropped open when they entered the walkway, and Hanna jumped excitedly at his side, hardly knowing where to look, gasping at every bright colour, pointing with particular urgency whenever a shark passed overhead.
“What’s that?”
“That’s an angelfish, a bluespotted one.”
“What’s that?”
“Those are blue dot groupers.”
“What are all those?”
“Yellow tang, I love those guys, you know in the wild they can live for like thirty years?”
“What’s that?”
“I don’t know, but it looks awesome.”
At the end of the walkway, the tanks grew several feet until they were the walls and ceiling of a spacious circular room – a circle of benches in its centre. The two of them sat down slowly side by side, transfixed, as hundreds of aquatic creatures swam past them on every side.
“Fish,” breathed Hanna, clutching at her godfather’s arm.
“Let’s just… stay here for a bit,” whispered Newt.
“Yeah,” said Hanna.
It was a full half an hour before they were roused from their dreamlike state, when a group of tourists burst into the room, their guide chatting animatedly. Newton had never heard Hanna go for so long without making a single noise before. And in truth he could probably say the same thing about himself.
“I guess we should move on,” he said quietly.
“I wanna stay,” Hanna pouted.
“Yeah, me too. But you know, if we don’t move now we might stay here forever,” shrugged Newt, pulling her into a cuddle.
“It’s a spell,” she mumbled, wrapping her arms around him.
“What?”
“A spell. But the good kind.”
Newt gazed around the room again, dark blue and alive, and sighed.
“Yeah,” he said. “I can definitely see where you’re coming from with that. Aren’t you tired though, kiddo? Do you want to get a snack?”
She thought for a moment, then a smile spread itself across her face, worryingly sly.
“Ice cream,” she said, nodding once.
“No way,” said Newt.
“Please Uncle Newt!” Another insistent tug on his shirtsleeve.
“Nope, I am not falling for that. Your mom gave me dire warning. But,” he raised a finger, “I’ll gladly assent to a popsicle. You want a popsicle?”
She thought again, scrunching her mouth up to one corner – a look he’d seen on a pensive Hermann a thousand times before.
“Can we come back here with popsicles?”
“You’ve got yourself a deal, young lady,” said Newt, holding out his hand for her to shake.
Hanna looked at her godfather’s hand for a moment, blinking, then patted it instead, before closing her little fingers around his own and hopping down from the bench.
“Awesome,” she said.