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Augusta had always known she would be a mother. She'd never seemed the sort, and there were a few moments here and there where she thought that she'd ignore the typical expectations of a pureblood upbringing and leave the babies and families to someone else. Like most women in that situation though, Augusta had changed her mind. She'd never regretted it. She fell in love, and she had a beautiful boy who sometimes drove her into threatening silencing charms or banishment, but she was endlessly and unalterably proud of him.

Two had always seemed a sensible sort of number to her. Not too far apart, close enough that they could be friends as well as siblings, the way she and Algie had never quite managed, though she was fond enough of him, and they'd gotten closer as they grew older, and Augusta had stopped envying him the freedom to do as he liked that she'd never quite been given. Fate had other plans in store though, and Frank was their only child. August had loved her husband, and her family, but she hadn't understood her depth and ferocity of love that came with a child until she held her own infant son in her arms. From that day on, Augusta had put all her faith and energy into her son. Perhaps every mother thinks their child the brightest, most talented - but Augusta had the luxury of it being true.

She'd never regretted her decision to marry and have a son. She'd done well enough in school, but a few failed Charms exams and a disinclination to spend every day with her nose in a book, studying, had meant that she likely wouldn't have ever come to any great glory, even if she'd struck out of the mold and never married. Augusta was a witch of no small skill, but hers were practical talents - she was good with defense and hexes and she liked the challenge of activity and striving to outdo someone else. She'd never had much patience for the flutter of a perfect wrist twist to set a Charm just the right way.

She raised her son, and saw him through his school years, through his marriage and the start of a war. She'd worried, as any mother would, when he became an Auror. But the part of her that had, once upon a time, harbored passing thoughts of doing something huge and meaningful couldn't help but be proud. She hadn't changed the wizarding world on her own, but she'd given the world Frank, who would do everything she might have, and more. So she waited during missions and assignments, through battles and Death Eater hunts, waiting for word from the Department, or from Dumbledore. Sometimes, Albus would come and sit for tea, and they would talk of nothing at all until a patronus streaked through her window and told her that her son was alive.

The day her grandson was born, Augusta had held him while Alice lay limp and worn out, a proud smile on her round face. She'd studied the red, round-cheeked little face, and she'd felt that same surge of unreasonable, instinctive love she'd felt for his father. But it was different. Tempered by time, and the knowledge that as beautiful a baby as he was, little Neville wasn't Frank, and wouldn't shine quite the same way.

For all her worrying and wariness though, the day Frank was attacked had still shocked her down to her core. There was no way to prepare for that. She'd sat by the bedsides of her daughter-in-law and her son, and watched the pale, pained faces, heard the vague, mad babble that eventually settled into an eerie silence that was somehow so much terrible.

She'd expected to be a mother. But Augusta had never expected to grieve for a son. It wasn't how the world ought to work. Men like Frank were what the world needed, and they were meant to live long, happy lives with perfect children to adore, who were always a little less than their father, but never realized that, because her son never would have realized, either.

She'd blamed everyone, at first. Dumbledore, for the Order and the way he moved people like puzzle pieces, building them into the shapes he saw in his mind. Alice, for not having protected him. The Auror department, for not having come soon enough. Even Neville, simply because he lived, and Frank didn't, not really. It would have been better, she would think in years to come, if he hadn't lived at all. Better death than a vacant life, all the light and love and courage snuffed out so that all that was left was a husk of the man her son had become. Every hospital visit broke her heart anew, and she had to shore it back up again, smear new mortar on the cracks and hope it held.

Augusta took the boy in anyway, and mourned her son while she cared for his child. She'd raised her child, and done it well, and never expected to have another, once the years where such things might have happened were passed. She wasn't used to the awkwardness of childhood, anymore. Her resentment faded quickly. Neville was all she had left of her son, and she loved him in his own right. But he was a quiet, shy child. So different from Frank that it was almost like starting anew without knowing at all what it meant to be a parent. Augusta sometimes thought that it would have been disrespectful to be the kind of parent the boy might have needed, though. He'd lost his father - and his mother - and no one could or should take their place.

Blame is a strange thing. Her anger over what had happened faded, in time. Frank and Alice were far from the only ones lost, and there were those she could share her grief with. She stopped blaming those around her, and in time her blame turned toward herself. Perhaps if she'd done something differently - pushed harder for Frank to excel, though he hadn't really needed it - Frank might still be there, and vital, and her world and her grandson might be a different place.

Neville took two years to begin asking about his parents. His questions were halting and soft, and he asked about strange things. What kind of biscuit Frank liked, and what flowers Alice had planted in the garden of the house they'd only had for six months, before the attack. Augusta could tell him every honor Frank had ever won at school, or with the Aurors. She could name the date of every winning Quidditch match, and the first time Frank had floated himself off the floor, when he was just a baby. But she didn't know the things Neville asked.

So Augusta taught him what she did know. She told him about his father's bravery, and sacrifice. About his quick mind and talent. She held Frank up as an ideal, and then pushed Neville to be even better, because in the end, she'd lost Frank, and she'd be damned if she'd let the same happen to Neville.

Neville was a different sort of boy, though. Uncertain and self-doubting. Slow enough to show magic that she thought at first he was a squib, and worried what to DO with a child who couldn't go to Hogwarts. She wished his mother was still aware, as she'd have known how to send him to school and what to dress him in and how to tell him that it was all right in a way he'd believe, even though Augusta couldn't help but be disappointed in him, and push that much harder to try to find some hidden well of strength that had to be there in Alice and Frank's child, squib or no. "He's just a bit of a slow bloom, is all. You'll see." Algie had told her, but Augusta couldn't help but doubt.

It'd been a relief when Neville was accepted to Hogwarts. Proof that he was wizard enough, after all, even if he'd yet to show much by way of magic, save a bounce when Algie dropped him. (Which she'd blistered her brother's oversized ears for.) She'd had to bustle out the door in the guise of a visit with a friend the day Algie brought Neville home, small hands gripping a toad. Neville had always looked more like his mother, to Augusta, but in that moment, she'd seen nothing but Frank, and past days spent chasing her son while he chased a toad, and the memories crept up to choke her until she took an hour to herself in an empty park and pushed old grief back down where it belonged.

She took Neville to see his parents, often. Augusta still had no patience for sitting still, and the sight of Alice and Frank always left her uneasy, and guilty, which she hid with impatience. Neville, though, was endlessly patient. He would sit by his mother's bedside, and talk, low-voiced and earnest. He'd tell her about plants and his blasted toad, and the neighbor's owl that was forever flying through the wrong window, the daft beast. It was nonsense, really, but Augusta always felt as if she were intruding on some private moment, and would take herself away to fuss over Frank, or argue with the nursing staff, who were long since used to her bluster. (Though once in a while a new intern would come through, which was always a bit fun. The young ones were always terrified.)

It was odd, but Augusta hadn't expected to be lonely, when Neville went off to school. Her husband was gone and her son as well, even if his heart still beat. Algie would drop by, now and then. "You need to get out of this house, love," he'd tell her. "It's too big for you these days anyway. Neville'll will only be here for holiday and summers, and then you'll have nothing to do but knock about here by yourself." Augusta had told him to mind where he put down his tea cup, and that someone could drag her out of her house the day she was dead and cold and not a tick before that. Her house was made up of memories. She knew each corner and cabinet, every ding and scrape. She could turn her head and see the shadow of Frank hovering in a doorway, stolen biscuit behind his back and a guileless smile on his face. She wouldn't leave that behind. Or take it away from Neville, even if he didn't remember his father's in these halls the way she did, she could still FEEL her son here, sometimes, and thought Neville must too.

She read Neville's letters home, full of Potter and Granger, and evasive mentions of his marks and classes. She owled Minerva, now and then, and usually got tart replies about how if there was a problem, Minerva would have told her, and to let the boy learn on his own. Augusta didn't appreciate Minerva's know-it-all attitude, but she was used to it. They never had gotten on well, though Augusta at least appreciated McGonagall's wit and forthrightness.

Still, unhelpful grandsons and their Professors or no, Augusta could read between the lines, and she had no trouble believing in the rise of Voldemort, the beginning of another war - or a continuance of one never really won, Augusta supposed. Neville was a Gryffindor, like his father and mother. He was friends with a Potter, just like Frank. But in every other way, he was different. Augusta told him over and over about Frank, about his marks in school, and his accomplishments. When Neville came home, summer after summer, getting taller, shedding baby fat and starting to look more like Frank, Augusta couldn't help but see every flaw, every weakness, because she was afraid that those things would just lead to a story that ended with another Longbottom dead, and another child lost.

The questions she didn't know the answers to came less and less often, over the years, and it wasn't until Neville was a fifth year that she noticed. He'd been changing. It was easy to see, since she only saw it months apart, when he came back home from school, and there was a little less innocence in his eyes, a little less softness in his face. It was a good thing, Augusta thought. It meant he'd likely toughen up. But part of her was still sad to see it.

She'd heard about the Department of Mysteries battle. Not from Neville, who even now tended to get tongue tied around her, but from some of the others. Little Ginny Weasley was quick enough to tell the story, when she'd seen her out with Molly when they took Neville to get his wand.

But really, she didn't notice enough. Not until they sat in Mungo's, Neville perched on the chair beside his mother's bed that he always used, and Augusta fluffed Frank's pillows. It was quiet. The soft flow of words from Neville wasn't there. He touched his nose, now and then, though the break was long since healed, and folded and unfolded one of the silly wrappers Alice always gave him, his head down. Augusta put the pillow down, straightening a wrinkle in the blankets, eyes evading the gauntness of her son's face. "Didn't you want to tell her you're going back to school next week?" It was their last visit. Usually Neville would have gone on about that, so she wouldn't expect him back until Christmas time. Augusta didn't think Alice noticed time passing the way Neville thought she did, but she'd never said anything about it.

Neville shrugged, and Augusta was left wondering just when his shoulders had gotten so broad, and why he hadn't gotten his hair cut, long and disreputable as it was starting to look. "I don't think it matters," he said quietly. He looked up suddenly. "Do you think he even notices? The pillows? You do that every time."

Augusta hadn't realized that she did, and she sank down, perching on the edge of the bed. "I notice," she finally said. His head bowed again, and Augusta frowned. "I suppose there's no way of knowing-"

"I don't really know her at all," Neville said abruptly, eyes blinking too fast and Augusta looked away, never comfortable with displays of emotion, even if she understood. "I come here, but I don't remember. Not really. Not enough. I don't know what. . . what she liked to eat for dinner best, or if she liked dogs, or her favorite color. I don't know if dad laughed at stupid jokes, or if he would have been disappointed, or happy about me. I don't know anything. I just know what they did, and what happened to them." He looked over at Alice, who wasn't watching him, eyes following a fluttering of shadows and sun from the curtains that swayed slightly with the cooling charms in the room. "I tell her about me, but she doesn't remember. And I'd tell her about HER, so maybe she'd. . . remember something about herself. But I don't even know anything to tell her. I don't know where they went on their first date, or if she had friends, or. . ."

"The Three Broomsticks," Augusta told him, blinking a little as a stray flash of memory from an old letter she wished she'd kept, now, came back to her. She'd never been the sentimental sort, but after Frank's attack, she had looked for every stray bit of memory she had, and mourned the ones she'd tossed out as rubbish because she hadn't known there wouldn't be more letters and notes and cards over the years. Every letter Neville sent she kept in a little box in the back of a cupboard now, even if she felt silly doing it. "Alice - your mother. She asked him, because Frank was. . . he was a bit awkward around your mother. She always said he saved up all his useless for when it came to flirting." Which Augusta had never quite liked hearing, since she'd never tolerated criticism well.

Neville's face brightened a bit. "Really? Did they have a good time?"

Augusta couldn't remember, and her fingers smoothed a nonexistent crease in the blankets. "They must have," she told her grandson. He looked away again, disappointment in his expression, and Augusta huffed out a small breath. "It was their sixth year, I think. But they were friends for ages. They met their first day of school." She hesitated, trying to sort through the long ago memory. "She liked toads, your mother. Frank had his the first day, and let it go, as usual, and she caught it and gave it back."

Neville's eyes went to his father's bed. "He had a toad? Really?"

Augusta couldn't remember, suddenly, why she hadn't told him any of this sooner. "He did. It was named. . . oh bother. . . something ridiculously common. I used to say he'd lose it and yell in the middle of the Great Hall and a dozen pets and children would come running. . ." She couldn't recall what it was, though.

"What did they say?" Neville asked eagerly, and Augusta couldn't recall anything but a stray scrap of sentences. It showed in her face, and Neville's mouth curved down in a frown that twisted her heart. She remembered that frown. It was the same one Frank had worn when his toad had died. He'd dug a little grave in the backyard and-

"Tony," she blurted suddenly. "Its name was Tony."

Neville gave her a small smile, and Augusta stood, telling him she'd just have a chat with the Healer and they'd be on their way. She rushed into the vacant room next door and breathed in slow and steady through her nose, fighting back the wetness in her eyes.

She couldn't remember. Augusta wondered how many other little details she'd forgotten, how many moments she'd lost that Neville might have liked to hear about. Maybe it really would have mattered to Alice, too, to hear them. Though she doubted it. Alice was out of reach, just like Frank.

Neville retreated to his room as soon as they got back, and Augusta went to put on a tea kettle. She took it right back off again though, making her way into her room instead, sitting at the desk that had been her husband's and writing a letter, sending it off a few minutes later. Augusta didn't ask for favors often, but she figured that Albus owed her at least this much. The answer didn't come until the next day, but the package the owl dropped with it was worth the wait.

It took a bit of doing really. She'd never used one before, and they were trickier than Albus' note implied, but Augusta was clever, and she managed. She made her way up to Neville's room, knocking at his door, feeling strangely nervous and out of place. She rarely went to his room, he usually came down if she needed him. The uncertainty on his face when he opened the door said that he was thinking much the same thing, and for a moment, Augusta wondered if maybe she hadn't done things very wrong with Neville, though she dismissed the idea quickly. No point in wondering and worrying over what was already done, after all. She'd done the best by her grandson that she knew how. She was an old woman now, she couldn't be expected to change.

"I'd like to show you something," she told Neville, and led him downstairs. The Pensieve sat on the sturdy kitchen table with its scarred legs and burnt patch from when Frank had been practicing a scouring charm instead of just wiping up his spilled milk, like she'd told him to. Augusta took Neville's hand, and told him to touch. A moment later, they were both tumbling, whirling into a memory Augusta had almost forgotten, but that the Pensieve had helped make clear again.

They arrived at King's Cross Station, Platform 9¾ bustling with students in black school robes, the style slightly more old-fashioned looking than the ones Neville was used to, but it was just a subtle difference. The hairstyles of the children were stranger, none of the faces that familiar. But otherwise, it could have been a scene from Neville's own experience. It wasn't, though.

Augusta nodded to where a younger version of herself, looking taller and wearing a slimmer version of the hat she still sported. (Augusta had always been a woman who found what she liked and stuck with it. She'd always enjoyed standing out.) The younger Augusta was holding tight to the hand of a young boy who looked much like Neville had, at that age, if a little taller and less round-cheeked. Augusta's throat tightened, watching Frank haul the pair of them toward the train, chattering excitedly. "This was when your parents' first met," she told Neville quietly.

Neville was silent and dazed next to her, and he looked around hopefully. Augusta pointed toward where a young girl stood. Alice's hair half hid her face, and she looked as if she were trying to shrink into her own shoes and disappear as a pair of older girls spoke to her, one's familiar face set in a sneer. Neville tensed beside her. "That's-"

"The Lestranges never did like your mother. Or your father. Andromeda was the only good egg in the bunch, of course," Augusta told him. Bellatrix was sneering, disdain and hatred in the expression, but without the naked malice that Augusta would see in her when she was older, and more twisted up inside. She hesitated and then touched his arm. "It's just a memory, Neville. That wasn't what I thought you might like to see."

She watched as Alice walked toward the train, the little girl easy to pick out with her muggle skirt and coat, the outfit making her stand out amidst all the children in their uniforms.

Alice bent, picking up a toad, and Neville drifts closer to watch, a small smile replacing the tense scowl. ""Mum, I've lost my toad." Frank didn't look anxious about it, and Augusta could see the way her younger self rolled her eyes. She remembered that fond frustration. She remembered now, too, how tightly she'd held Frank's hand. How hard it had been to let him go, and how she'd worked so hard to hide it, and then gone home and sat in his room for hours until her husband came home. She wished she'd let him see a bit more, now. Thought it would have done little good, she supposed. Frank had been a child, he wouldn't have understood how hard it was to let go.

"Scuse me. Is this yours?" Alice's voice was small and piping, and she pointed to the toad, eyes on the creature until Frank had scooped him up, as if making sure he didn't escape again.

"Tony! Thanks. He's always getting away," Frank told him.

Augusta snorted as her younger self did the same, looking Alice over carefully. "He lost that creature more than he held on to him. He chased it into the lake at school, not two weeks after he got to school," she told Neville as her younger self spoke to Alice. Neville's eyes were glued to his parents, but he smiled a little. "You are quite a bit like him. Sometimes," she added, and Neville gave her a surprised glance.

"Thanks," he muttered.

"Yes well, don't think it means you don't need to work harder to honor them," Augusta blustered quickly, watching the scene. Frank's fingernails were bitten, and she remembered the summer she'd started making him give her a knut every time she caught him biting.

"You'll be fine here. It's a good school. Why don't you keep an eye on Frank here, stop him losing all his things before he even gets there? And Frank, you keep an eye on - what's your name, dear?" her memory was saying to Alice, and Augusta listened to the exchange for a moment as Alice gave her name. She'd liked the little girl, she remembered. She'd tried to talk Frank out of getting married so young, of course, and the part of her that was a mother with a son she adored had always suspected Frank could do better. But then, she'd have thought that of just about any girl he brought home. And she'd come to care for Alice a great deal. Alice had been sweet and kind and giving and tough as nails. She'd never been shy about telling Augusta what she thought, and Augusta had respected her for that; where a weaker girl Augusta would, admittedly, have run all over. "Keep an eye on Alice. I think you'd better let her change into robes as soon as possible. Welcome to our world. Frank, have a good term, dear, and do try not to lose your wand. I'll see you at Christmas."

Augusta watched as her memory of herself kissed Frank's cheek, and then swirled away with the sort of dramatic flourish that she'd given up about the time her knees started to ache when it rained. Unseen to the two children in front of them, she hid behind a pillar, watching for a moment as Frank beamed a smile at Alice, and followed her onto the train, her eyes a little reddened.

Neville stood beside her as the train started to move, and a moment later they were tumbling back into reality, the dream fading away.

Augusta drew a shaky breath. That really was a bit jarring. Neville stood stock still, and he breathed in through his nose in a way Augusta was all too familiar with. "They were friends right from them on. Frank's letters home were always full of Alice this and Alice that. I think I knew he fancied her even before he did."

Neville's eyes were large and liquid and he reached out, giving her a rare, hard hug. Augusta hugged back, and then let go, stepping away and straightening her hat self-consciously. "Thank you," he told her.

"You needn't thank me. You can thank Albus, when you return to school. I borrowed the Pensieve from him. They're a pricey bit of magic, you know," Augusta told him, averting her eyes from the naked gratitude and wistful longing in her grandson's eyes.

"Did he lose his wand?" Neville asked.

Augusta rolled her eyes. "Twice, before school was out. Alice found it, the first time. The second he managed to lose it entirely, and we had to replace it. He was scatterbrained when it came to his belongings until his sixth year."

"So he wasn't perfect?" Neville asked.

Augusta suspected from the slight twinkle in still-teary eyes that she was being teased. She couldn't decide if she was pleased or surprised. Both, most likely. "No. I suppose not, to anyone but me." She was a bit flustered by the conversation, and she lifted her chin, adding with just enough disapproval to usually make Neville's eyes drop. "But scattered or no, he still managed to be at the top of his class, nearly. So don't think you don't need to work hard and bring up your marks and manage to get through the rest of your schooling."

Neville was still smiling, though. "I know, gran," he promised. "I will."

"Good. You do that." Augusta hesitated and then added. "You'll be careful this year, won't you?"

"I'm always careful."

Not enough that he hadn't gotten hurt, and rushed into danger. But then, she wouldn't expect - or want - any less from Frank and Alice's son. Or her own grandson. "See that you are. Now go and put on a pot for dinner while I wrap this up to send back to Albus."

Neville smiled again, and leaned in to bus her cheek. He was nearly as tall as she was, now, and Augusta wondered how long it'd be before he was taller. She watched him walk over to the stove, and from the back, it could have been her son standing there, the summer after his fifth year, laughing while she fussed at him for letting the pot boil over.

Augusta shut her eyes, not pushing the memory away, but just sinking into it, for just a moment. She wouldn't wallow. But she didn't want to forget the little moments anymore, either.

Just a few seconds, time enough to mull over the sound of Frank's laugh and the way his tiny hand had felt in hers, that day at the train, when she'd let him go for the first time, and then Augusta was picking up the Pensieve and taking it back to her room to owl away again. She'd have to remember on her own, from now on.