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‘Hermione, what’s your favourite word?'
She looked at the little boy, his legs swinging on the chair, his pencil pressed hard onto the parchment as he powered through the work she had set.
She did not particularly enjoy the days where the teaching rota fell onto her. It wasn’t that she didn’t like the children, of course, and there could be moments of enjoyment, like this, where she felt proud of their inquisitive nature, but on the whole there was always something she could be doing at work. Balancing out their ages was always difficult too - Teddy being the eldest, he always steamed ahead, leaving her searching for more and more work to give him, while Vic and Dom peppered her with questions and James, too young to really do any work, found some way to wreak havoc. Goodness knew how any of them would cope as more children were added to the fold, she thought as she rubbed a hand over her swollen stomach.
'Right now it’s erythrism,’ she said.
'What’s that mean?’ he asked.
'It’s when the colour red is found naturally in hair, skin, feathers, or eggshells. It’s quite rare.'
'No it’s not,’ said Teddy. 'Nearly everyone in the family has red hair.'
'But in the country as a whole not many people do, the Weasleys are just one family-’
'And what about foxes?’ asked Vic. 'They’re red.'
'Yeah, and robins, they’ve got red on 'em,’ said Dom.
'And squirrels, some of them,’ added Teddy.
'Yes,’ said Hermione impatiently, 'there are red animals, it’s just when you look at the bigger picture-’
'Daddy goes red when he’s in the sun too long,’ said Vic helpfully.
'So does Ginny-’
'Sunburn isn’t the same as-’ flustered Hermione, but she cut herself off with a huff. 'Let’s get back to to the maths, shall we? Is anyone stuck?'
'But why is it your favourite word?’ asked Teddy. 'It doesn’t sound nice to say.'
'It’s more that I find it interesting as a concept,’ Hermione told him. 'I suppose my favourite word to say is epiphany.'
He nodded, considering. 'That does sound nice. What does it mean?'
'When you have a sudden, really good idea.'
'How do you spell it?'
She told him, and he wrote it down in the back of his book. She looked over, and though she was across the table so it was all upside down, she could see a long list of different words.
'What’s that?’ she asked him.
'I’m finding good words,’ he said, with a slight shrug.
Something warm buzzed inside her, and she smiled. 'And what’s your favourite word?'
'I have two,’ he said. 'The first one is palimpsest, 'cos I like the way it sounds, and it means when you have parchment that’s had writing rubbed out or vanished or something, so then you can write on it again, but it also means when there’s a place and it’s had lots of history and stories there, all one on top of the other.'
Hermione blinked, and half-laughed. 'Where did you learn that?’ she asked, amazed.
'Nana has loads of boring books and one of them said that Godric’s Hollow is a palimpsest, and the word makes me think of plimpies but fancier, so then I wrote a story about a little plimpy town underwater and all the stories they have on top of one another because plimpies don’t live very long, so it wouldn’t take very long at all.'
'That’s… incredible, Teddy,’ she said, still smiling widely at him. 'And what’s your other favourite word?'
He snorted and giggled. 'Baboon,’ he said. 'It’s funny the way you have to say it. Bah-booon.'
Vic and Dom started giggling too. 'Baboon! Bah-boon!'
'Bah-boo!’ shouted James, raising his arms in excited glee.
And they were off, shouting the word at one another over and over again, quickly spiralling into doing their best impressions of baboons, and then Vic was shrieking hysterically about baboon’s bums, barely understandable through her laughter and rapid, gasping talking. It was quite impossible to refocus them onto learning how to do long division, and after several minutes of attempting redirection and bribery, she eventually resorted to snapping fiercely at them.
They fell back into quiet and went back to their work, though she could see them smirking at one another, and for a long while after there were occasional whispers of 'baboon’ and stifled giggles and barely suppressed snorts. She rubbed at her temples, torn between knowing that she had partly encouraged the wild tangent and being secretly relieved that Ron would be the one predominantly doing these lessons going forward.
Maybe once they were a little older, she thought. There had been something utterly charming about Teddy thinking so wonderfully about words, filling them with colour and letting them explode into his own little story. She moved around the table, under the pretence of looking over their work, but instead peered at Teddy’s list of words that was still laid out on the table.
Spelunking
Deluminator
Bubble
Ethereal
Bewitched
Aluminium
Quaffle
Palimpsest
Mermish
Discombobulate
Puddle
Baboon
Quiver
Niffler
Custard
Defenestrate
Wibble
Epiphany
They were written in different colours, and some were crossed out and rewritten, and some had little stars next to them, all of them built up over time from words he had heard adults say or words he had read or simply words he enjoyed saying. But she thought about what he had said about Andromeda’s books being boring (and now that she thought about it, she knew that Andromeda liked history - perhaps they were all non-fiction), and about how most of Harry and Ginny’s books were focused on Quidditch or defence, and that any fiction they had was probably a bit old for an eight year old.
'Teddy,’ she said quietly, 'would you like to see if you wanted to borrow any of my muggle books? There might be new words in them for you.'
He nodded eagerly, his hair rippling into an electric blue, and leapt down from his seat as he followed her into the living room. Her tall, cramped bookshelves towered above him, and he stared, wide-eyed.
'Take your pick,’ she said. 'As many as you like. All of this side is muggle, and all of this side is magic. These shelves are fiction.’ She conjured up a little ladder for him and, after brief consideration, waved her wand again so that soft cushions coated the floor around it.
She left him in there to devour the books. There were enough treasured classics and children’s fiction that she couldn’t bear to part with for him to peruse. He did not return to the kitchen to do any maths, but she found to her surprise that she didn’t mind. Teddy was well enough a head anyway.
When Harry came a few hours later to pick his boys up, Teddy had created a pile of books nearly as tall as himself. 'Just take a couple, Ted, you won’t be able to read them all by next week.'
'He doesn’t have to bring them back next week,’ Hermione assured him. 'I don’t mind. Which one are you going to start with, Teddy?'
Teddy, wobbling slightly with his chin on the top book, grinned. 'Lord of the Flies.'
'Good grief,’ said Harry, though he was smiling. 'All right then, mate, get in the floo. Ginny’s got a casserole waiting.’ As Teddy staggered away, Harry turned to Hermione. 'Can’t believe you’re trusting a child with your precious books,’ he teased.
'I’m not Madam Pince, Harry, books are meant to be read, I don’t mind if they get a bit dog-eared.’ She nodded at Teddy’s retreating back. 'He’s very talented.'
'I know he is,’ said Harry proudly. 'At what specifically though?'
She laughed. 'English. He loves words. It’s charming.'
'Oh, I know,’ said Harry. 'Asked me how to spell aluminium the other day, I’ve never felt under such pressure. The stories too - he could give Luna a run for her money, but at least he accepts they’re not true. I don’t know where he gets it from.’ He considered. 'Remus was quite articulate, I suppose.'
'His way with words combined with Tonks’s silliness?’ Hermione asked.
'Must be,’ said Harry still with that proud smile again. He looked down, and then spun in a circle. 'Shit, where did the other one go?'
Hermione looked around too. James had vanished. 'I’ll check upstairs,’ she said with a sigh.