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Ted Tonks looked around Rosa's Tea Shop and slid his arm across Andromeda Black's shoulders with a satisfied sigh. "Remember our first date here? We sat right over there." He pointed with his free hand towards a table in the corner, currently occupied by an elderly woman wearing a wistful expression.
Andromeda glanced at the older woman and felt a pang in her heart. She leaned into Ted's affectionate embrace, but when she looked up at him her smile was more snarky than sweet. "I remember. You know, I only said yes to piss off my mother.”
Ted just chuckled. "Ouch, Dromeda. You get too much pleasure out of needling me."
She grinned for real at that, thinking of the days when he'd called her Andy, just like everyone else. Back when he’d just been her Ministry coworker, Edward – from Hufflepuff, of all the ridiculous houses. Andromeda may not have had the ambition or vengeful streak of the average Slytherin, but she had little interest in frivolity or being seen as nice. And she certainly never would've pictured herself with someone as genuine and kind as Ted Tonks from Hufflepuff.
And now it had been a year.
"You like my needling," she said matter-of-factly. "Otherwise you wouldn't have put up with me this past year." She burrowed into Ted's arms and allowed herself a moment of softness as she murmured, "And a wonderful year it's been."
"Yep." Ted gave her a squeeze. "We're great together, babe. Just like I told you we would be."
Andy re-summoned her more prickly self to guard against the wave of emotion threatening to drown her. Armor secured, she rolled her eyes and tutted softly. "That's only because you're a romantic," she said. "I bet every time you've asked a girl out you've told her she was something special."
"Nope." Ted's brown eyes were as steady as always. "Only you."
"Mmhmm." She pursed her lips against the smile trying to sneak out. "And next you'll be telling me we're going to live happily ever after with our two perfect children, and you'll coach junior-league Quidditch, and I'll discuss cleaning charms with the other mums and have the prettiest garden in the neighborhood."
Ted laughed. "You can have your cleaning charms, but you'll stay out of my garden if you know what's good for you, Black." He winked at her. Then, as quickly as it had started, his laughter died, and he withdrew his arm from around his girlfriend's shoulders. "I really wish I could promise you 'happily ever after,' Dromeda. But…I just don't know."
Andromeda drew her hands into her lap, suddenly feeling cold. "Ha. I was joking, Ted." She grabbed her teacup a little too aggressively, then tried to temper it by taking a dainty sip. Her tone was almost casual by the time she said, "I'm not sure I even want to be a mother, actually. I certainly don't have any good examples to follow."
"No, you'd be a brilliant mum, I'm sure of it." Ted shifted on the bench so that he was turned a bit more towards her and took one of her hands in his. "It's not about you, Dromeda. I promise you, 'Happily ever after' with you sounds like a dream. I'm just scared." He took a deep breath. "I wish I wasn't, but I am."
Despite her relief that she wasn't being thrown over, Andromeda's eyebrows pulled together in a frown. "Scared of what, darling?"
"You know this world is getting worse for people like me," Ted said quietly. The hand that wasn't holding hers gently fingered the wand resting next to him on the bench. "Your family would exterminate my kind if they could. And the people who agree with them are getting louder."
Andromeda sniffed. "Those people are ignorant and cowardly. You're a better man than anyone I know, and if people weren't so small-minded, they'd see that."
"But they are small-minded," Ted reminded her. "And they're not going to change. Things are only going to get worse."
He didn't sound defeated–Ted was too determined to give up so easily–but he did sound weary, and maybe even a bit resigned. Like he'd been carrying this burden for too long and didn't expect to rest any time soon.
It wasn't right.
"Edward Tonks." Andy all-but slammed her teacup down in front of her, then straightened her shoulders and clucked her tongue. "Is that pessimism I hear from you? Stop it, right now. I'm the cynic in this relationship. Now I feel I ought to cheer you up, and you know I don't know how to do that."
With a tiny flick from his wand, Ted sent a napkin whooshing across the table to wipe a bit of spilled tea. "Sure you do." His mouth twitched with a hint of a smile. "Just tell me that you want to be with me, even if things get harder. Tell me whatever comes next, we'll face it together."
Andromeda blinked, startled. "Of course we will! Silly man." As if she would let him shoulder that heavy burden alone! She used her own wand to siphon the remaining tea from around the bottom of her cup, shaking her head all the while. Ted really was hopeless at cleaning charms.
"Are you sure? You'd do that?" A fragile hope permeated every word, and Ted's fingers gripped hers like a lifeline. "You'd stand up in this world with a Muggle-born man by your side?"
"How can you even ask me that?" she demanded, her voice rising. "Of course I will. I do it every day already, and I'll do it every day until I die! Don't think you'll get away from my needling so easily, Ted. You're stuck with me." She poked him in the chest with her wand and met his gaze almost defiantly. But she lowered the wand quickly, her cheeks hot as she added, "If you want to be, of course."
"Merlin, Dromeda." Ted's voice shook, and his warm brown eyes were boring into hers. “Look," he began, "I don’t know if ‘soul mates’ exist. I don’t even know if true love exists.”
“Oh.” Andromeda swallowed hard. “Right.”
“No, no, I mean—” Ted grasped both her hands in his now “—I don’t know if it exists, but if it did, if it does, this must be it, right? Or maybe this is something even better.”
"Better?" Andy asked hoarsely.
His nod was emphatic. "Better. You're everything to me, Andromeda Black. And I want to stand by you every day until I die, too." He reached into his pocket and pulled something out. With a deep breath, he lifted the object between his thumb and forefinger and presented it to her. "Will you marry me?"
Andromeda gasped. A gorgeous purple stone sat atop a woven gold band, its many facets winking softly under the lamp hung over their table. "Ted!"
A tentative smile curved his lips. "It's alexandrite," he said. "It's got magical properties, or so says the wizard who sold it to me."
"It's beautiful," Andy whispered.
"It changes in the light, you know. Purple in a well-lit room like this, but more red under a candle, and aquamarine, almost a pale green in the sun. Reminds me of you…most people only get to see you in one way, I imagine. But I've seen you in different lights. Beautiful, fierce, brilliant, complicated …you're all of it and more, Andromeda. I love you so much."
"Ted," she said again. It was too much. He was too much. How can one moment be so perfect? "I love you, too."
His smile grew. "Then marry me."
"I will."
It had been a wonderful year. And she looked forward to many more wonderful years with her soft, strong Hufflepuff boy.