Chapter Text
I. Victoire
14 December 2034
Have yourself a merry little Christmas.
Let your heart be light.
Victoire hummed under her breath, leaning back in her armchair and gently rubbing the small curve of her stomach. The Christmas tree in the corner of the large drawing room glowed fiercely, illuminating the faces of the four boys who slept soundly beneath it, reduced to a tangle of snores, small limbs, and rumpled tartan pajamas after an evening spent running amok at the Law Enforcement department's holiday party.
Ten-year-old Remus was snoring the loudest, his soft chin twitching. Jean, eight years old, lay spread-eagle on Remus's chest, while five-year-old Pierre was sprawled across Jean's legs. And tucked into the protective cocoon of his older brothers' arms, his mouth hanging open, was little Isaac, who had just turned three.
An exhausted sigh seeped out of Victoire, and she closed her eyes. The stillness of the late hour was punctuated only by the soft crackling of the fireplace and the distant sounds of Teddy preparing two mugs of hot cocoa in the basement kitchen.
Vaguely, she found herself starting to wonder what the fourteenth of December might have looked like here thirty-nine years ago, when their old townhouse was the headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix. It was an odd habit of hers, a product of her love for storytelling as a songwriter, Victoire supposed—something she'd caught herself doing often over the decade-and-a-half that had passed since she and Teddy had moved into Grimmauld Place. Her father always reminded her that the house had been gloomy and mold-ridden and desolate before Uncle Harry renovated it after the war—but somehow, however naive it was, Victoire liked to imagine that someone had still taken the time to put up a tree that year, that the Order had gathered around the careworn kitchen table downstairs for Christmas dinner.
She tried to picture Teddy's parents in the house, the smiling versions of them from those most treasured photographs. She wondered if they had fallen in love here, in this very drawing room, perhaps—if they could have ever conceived that their son would one day sit by the very same fireplace, poring over paperwork with a frown…that their grandchildren would grow up here, filling the drawing room with colorful toys and carefree laughter…
Hot tears stung the corners of her eyes, startling her; she hastily blinked them back.
"Vic?"
Victoire jumped. Teddy had emerged from the kitchen, bearing two steaming mugs and a worried expression.
She gave him a reassuring look. "Hormones," she said hoarsely.
Teddy handed her one of the mugs, bending down and kissing her forehead. Then, he sank into the armchair across from hers.
"Everybody loved you tonight," he beamed at her. "Hermione's asked me to tell you that you'll be singing at every holiday do from now on—even fucking Dawlish couldn't find anything to complain about."
Victoire snorted. "Well, you can let her know that I expect free babysitting in return." She glanced across the drawing room, shaking her head. "We're lucky they're still small—I can't imagine how we'd have gotten them home otherwise."
"Ah, well," Teddy grinned over his shoulder at the untidy, snoring heap under the tree, "they're sort of cute, aren't they?"
"Don't you go getting ideas, Lupin," Victoire rubbed her stomach again, her eyes narrowed. "You've done enough."
Teddy choked on his sip of hot chocolate, coughing out a sheepish, spluttering laugh.
Victoire turned to smile down at her own mug of cocoa. It was bright yellow and ceramic, clearly homemade, uneven and chipped in a few places—one of the mugs Teddy had nicked from his grandmother's kitchen, when he and Victoire had first moved to Islington all those years ago. Painted untidily across the surface, in purple capital letters, was the word 'DORA.'
For a long moment, she gazed down at the mug, gently tracing her fingers over the messy handwriting. She could picture it vividly—a little girl with bright purple hair, perhaps as small as Isaac, her face scrunched up in concentration as she smeared letters on clay with a too-big paintbrush. Victoire pressed her lips together against the lump that emerged in her throat. She knew, in her mind, that they had lived—she had seen the photos, the Order of Merlin medals, the gravestone in Hogsmeade, and she'd heard the nostalgic stories from her parents, aunts, and uncles—but to Victoire, they had always felt most real when she tried to picture the mundane parts of their lives. The life they could have lived.
It probably would have been a lot like hers.
Ignoring the emotion twisting farther up her throat, Victoire set the old mug down on the coffee table.
"Ted?" He looked at her, frowning. "I…know it's early to be discussing it—I know we talked about it, before Isaac, but…if the baby's a girl…" her voice faltered. "Are you sure you don't want to name her after your mum?"
Teddy's expression was inscrutable as he ran a hand through his dark green hair.
"You know how much she hated it, Vic," he murmured, with a smile that was more like a grimace. "You've heard the way they all joke about it—even Nan doesn't pretend anymore."
He said this all very steadily. Victoire supposed it was a testament to how well she knew him that she could hear the aching want that underlaid his words, nonetheless.
"I know," she said gently. "That's why I've been thinking…" She gestured to the yellow mug on the coffee table. "Dora."
Teddy's face froze as he stared at the mug. Victoire wondered if he was thinking the same thing she was—if he was experiencing the same moment of wonder, small yet somehow still profound, the same moment she had had with each of her children, when the little curve of her stomach became a human being in her mind for the first time.
She wondered if his heart was breaking in the same way hers did, every time she realized that his mother had died mere months after she'd had that same little moment of awe about him.
Victoire didn't know how it was possible to miss someone she'd never known, something she'd never witnessed, and yet, tears burned her eyes again as she watched Teddy's throat bob, his jaw work as he swallowed. The life Teddy had forged in the wake of his parents' deaths—the life he had forged with her—was by no means a replacement for the one he might have had, but as Victoire gazed over Teddy's shoulder at the four little boys under the tree, she felt the dull ache in her heart ease all the same.
"I know it was a special nickname," Victoire continued quietly, when Teddy had been silent for nearly a minute. "I understand if it feels wrong—or too personal—"
She broke off, watching her husband get up from his armchair and kneel down in front of hers, watched as he placed a trembling hand over her stomach.
"Dora," he whispered.
Victoire's tears spilled over. "Yeah, I think so, too." She snorted, swiping a hand under her nose. "Maybe it's wishful thinking—I have more respect for Gran every day."
Teddy's eyes shone, and his arms wrapped tightly around her, his next words tumbling out between little gasps of stunned laughter. "God, I love you," he said. "I love you—I love you."
Victoire beamed, resting her forehead against his.
"Happy Christmas, Ted."
Once again, as in olden days, happy golden days of yore,
Faithful friends, who are dear to us, will be near to us once more.
—Frank Sinatra