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i.
“You’re joking.”
Molly chews back her smile, shakes her head coyly. The house isn’t quiet, per say, but in a rare stroke of luck the twins' and Ronnie’s naps have aligned.
And he’s wedged around the bathroom sink with his wife, giggling like children over a potion that’s just changed color.
“A girl…”
The day she’s born, Fabian is there. Peers over the bassinet for so long, Arthur wonders if he too is counting ten perfect pink toes.
“Shit,” he says to Arthur over a cigar that night, after talking war, “this world will never be good enough for her.”
ii.
It’s his turn tonight, when they hear little feet across the kitchen floor. He’s not surprised it’s her, face still blotchy, hair sticking up everywhere from this afternoon’s tantrum that left her knackered.
She whips around in the pantry doorway, eyes like saucers. “I’m hungry.”
After leftover stew from her yellow paisley bowl, he lays in bed with her. Grants her request for a story on the condition she doesn’t suck her thumb.
“Once upon a time, there was a witch named Ginny who lived in a deep, dark wood…”
“No, Daddy,” she whispers, eyes nearly closed. “I’m a dragon.”
iii.
Molly tells him she cried the whole way home from King’s Cross. By early afternoon, he can still tell— the aftershocks seem to surprise her, those gasping little breaths.
“You know the best part of being the last one left,” he divulges over homemade strawberry ice cream that has yet to do the trick, “is that no one’s here to fight you for your pick of broomstick.”
The rest of her bowl melts on the porch swing. She’s out until it's dark in the orchard, comes back in for supper with leaves in her hair and the biggest jack-o-lantern grin.
iv.
The day they bring her back home, he carries her trunk upstairs and sits beside her on the bed. Apologizes for ever blaming her, even for a second.
She counters by saying something lifeless and self-loathing and broken. Eleven-year-old fingers pick at bruised nail beds— tiny, perfect hands. He still can’t fathom it.
That night, Molly brings her dinner and doesn’t come back down. When he heads up to bed, he sees they’ve clearly emptied all her shelves, stacked every novel and journal and textbook outside her door where they can’t hurt her.
He’s never been angrier in his life.
v.
Since this morning, he’s meant to tell her he’s sorry— sorry they couldn’t offer her anything better on her birthday than this condemnable house-turned-war room. Sorry for the second-hand leather satchel wrapped in faded Christmas paper, even though she wanted a broom; sorry everyone’s thoughts are on tomorrow’s hearing.
After dinner he finally says it, out of Molly’s earshot. Sitting on the stairs leading from the kitchen, plates of fudgy cake in hand.
“Don’t apologize.” She’s still smiling huge, bumps his shoulder. The Flatulence Fez the twins crowned her with slips down over one eye. “I really love the bag.”
vi.
It should’ve been the day that made them proudest as parents, marrying off their firstborn. It wasn’t.
This morning, they boxed up centerpieces and charger plates in the shed, repaired all the furniture, met with the Order. His ears still ring. The house is eerie without those three.
He finds them in her room. His wife is clutching their daughter as she sobs harder than he’s ever seen, inconsolable, wracking herself hoarse. He feels it like a sword to the chest.
In bed later, Molly shakes her head with that look he earns sometimes when he’s being thick. “She’s heartbroken.”
vii.
Friday before Easter, he changes from work robes into something Muggle and tweed and itchy. Platform 9¾ is packed with people avoiding eye contact, and the Express is late. It was late in December, too— arrived without Luna. He waits, terror tightening his throat.
He’s numb with relief when he sees her, one of the only kids lugging a trunk like he advised. She’s swimming in a jumper he’s sure is Ron’s, and that twinges a bit. There’s something different, he notices, walking to the entrance. Colder. Quiet. He doesn’t ask… can’t quite bear to.
Four days later, they flee.
viii.
She’s fighting him. Kicking, clawing.
He holds on with everything he has, arms clasped around her chest, and it’s like he can feel her breaking inside. But if he lets go, he’ll lose her, too. Like Fred.
Like the body they’re all staring at, lifeless at Hagrid’s feet.
Weeks later, when the Boy Who Lived finds him in the shed one night, hedging, guiltier than anyone he’s ever seen, he already knows. For a moment he considers letting the kid squirm, like the father ought to do.
But then he remembers her first year, and wordlessly hands over a screwdriver.
ix.
“One more,” she tells their waitress, pointing at a coaster she’s put in the middle. “For my sixth brother.”
The table falls quiet. But then George chuckles and they all take his cue, except Molly.
Snow collects on the windows as the bangers and pies and chips are served. She laments early-morning practices to them all, pretends she’s already bored of all the travel.
“Knock it off,” Charlie snickers, grinning. “Rookies can’t complain. We know you’re having a blast.”
At the end of the night she beats everyone to the bar, pays their tab. Arthur suspects it’s her whole paycheck.
x.
“I definitely saw you cry,” she accuses. She’s graceful even in smugness, grinning something wicked over her lipstick-stained champagne flute.
He pretends to grumble, but he knows she knows. “Hard not to, with the bloody groom getting all choked up.”
The band calls them up soon after, and he pulls her close. “It’s okay,” she murmurs as her face starts to blur again, inches away. “Just admit you’ve gone soft, Dad. I won’t tell.” He tugs on her hand to spin her, chuckling.
They cut cake, and Harry whispers something that makes her laugh, and she lights up the room.
xi.
Predictably, the stadium loses it when she flies out with a new surname on her kit. Ron rolls his eyes as she lands on the pitch with a bit of swagger.
She flies well today, but he reckons she could miss every shot and the commentators would still talk of nothing else. In the stands, Harry laughs when Arthur leans over to ask how it feels to play second fiddle.
“I’ll never be good enough for her,” he snorts over the rim of his pint. “But I’m sure you knew that.”
She scores twelve goals, and the Harpies clinch playoffs.
xii.
“I’d kill for a drink about now,” she mutters, leaning against the railing. He knows better than to say she probably shouldn’t be out here, either— the venue’s porch, serving as refuge for men who normally never smoke.
He takes a long drag as they watch her boys toddle after their dad on the lawn. “Nearly there, sweetheart.” Treading lightly with his words, lest he incur any of what Muriel’s other well-intended mourners did with their attempts at small talk ("Like a fucking whale, thanks for asking” ).
“Hey,” she smirks, “maybe you and Mum can buy a beach cottage now.”
xiii.
The mug Molly poured when they arrived is tepid now, sitting on the table. Shadows lengthen like ghosts beneath his daughter’s eyes; he suspects they’re five days old.
The kids are all asleep, Molly updates them.
Her jaw tightens. At her temple, he notices a couple of gray strands. “I can’t—” she whispers. Squeezes her eyes shut; nothing else comes out. “They need their dad. I’m not good enough on my own.”
“He’ll come home safe, darling. Always does.” And he makes her promise to never say that again.
He takes both of her hands in his, and they’re cold.
xiv.
They’re celebrating Ted and Vic beneath a canopy of fairy lights. Bill’s weepy toast prompts Fleur to frisk his brothers till she finds George’s flask.
She never realizes Ginny’s stowing the bottle.
His children outlast their kids and spouses. It’s one of those nights he can’t let himself miss, tired as he is.
His daughter points a wobbly finger. “Lils has a boyfriend, by the way. Doesn’t think we know. Harry’s going spare.”
He chuckles. “Now he gets it. Imagine trying to justify hating the Chosen One.”
She laughs, nearly tips her chair. “You should tell him that. Might help.”
xv.
It comes in waves. Feels like a lifetime has passed since yesterday; another before that. Molly— bless her— tried to prepare him for it. Tried to comfort him. Imagine.
It feels too big now, their little house on the beach. Perfect for two lives, cavernous with just one.
She finds him in the garden before sunset. Small, warm hands enclose his.
“Look, Dad.”
It’s a delicate, fluttering thing with blue wings, bobbing on the wind. Molly’s favorite.
“She’s found us again.”
He smiles and tucks a silver lock behind her ear, meeting her gaze— precisely the same shade of brown.