Well, here you go, Chapter 2. I'm amazed that my muse is working so quickly. It must be the inspiration of all the new fanfics coming off of the fifth book, and the fifth book itself. I hope everyone enjoyed the first chapter, and I hope that you like this one even better. I don't know how long this will be, or whether or not there will be any sequels, but if anyone has any ideas, please write them in a review or E-mail to sirena192005@yahoo.com. Thanks and enjoy Chapter 2.
Hermione and Harry arrived at the Gryffindor common room several minutes after they left the Quidditch pitch. The four adult inhabitants of the room were talking in low tones, and Lily was sitting on Braden's lap, still very much awake. When Harry saw how much she really did look like him, his eyes widened slightly. He was also still reeling from her name. Lily. He assumed that the name had been chosen after his mother.
"Mommy!" Lily announced, scampering over. Hermione picked her up and looked at Braden.
"She wanted you to put her to bed. Uncle Braden wasn't good enough."
"Neither was Aunt Ginny." Ginny said wearily, eyeing the two of them with open curiosity. "Did you two get some things talked out?" she asked hopefully.
Harry nodded. "We yelled at each other for a while, and then talked. Everything will be fine." He said, not giving away Lily's parentage to his daughter, who still seemed blissfully oblivious to the tense situation. "And right now, I think Hermione and I should go put Lily to bed."
"No bed. I want to stay up with Mommy and Uncle Braden and Aunt Ginny and Uncle Ron and Aunt Lavender." Lily said stubbornly, amusing all the adults at her ability to immediately accept any of her mother's friends into her family as 'aunts and uncles'.
"Lily Alexandria, it is well past your bed time and you know you'll be grouchy in the morning if you don't get your usual amount of sleep."
"But I'm not tired, and you are all still up."
"We are all also much, much older than you."
"But Mom,"
"No buts about it." Hermione said firmly, heading toward the stairs with Harry on her heels. "We need to have a little talk with you, and then you are going to bed."
"Without a bed time story?" Lily looked at Harry scandalously, "My Mommy is evil." She stated firmly. Harry choked back laughter at the serious look she was giving him.
"Nah, she isn't evil."
"She's putting me to bed." Lily said, as if that explained it all.
Harry looked at the back of Hermione's head, "Shall I do the dastardly deed and save your reputation as a good mother?"
"I am evil several times a day. It's nothing new. And do you really want to start off your career by being classified as evil and mean?"
"That depends. Will she hold a grudge for long?"
"So far ten minutes is the longest grudge she's held against me, but I cook for her, and buy her toys, and let her play in the bathtub."
"And she won't get me a puppy!" Lily exclaimed, huffing once more as she laid her head on her mother's shoulder. "And you don't have to talk about me as if I'm not here!" she added for good measure as Hermione pulled back the covers on the bed that they were sharing and sat her daughter on the bed, perching next to her. Harry sat on the edge of the bed, wondering how the following conversation was going to go with his obviously very intelligent daughter.
"All right, Lily, I'm evil. Do you want me to let Harry handle bedtime?"
Lily shook her head and looked at Harry. "She's very good at tucking me in. Have you ever had her tuck you in?"
"No."
"You should try it sometime. Mommy, tuck Harry in tonight."
"We'll see. Now sweetie, Harry and I need to have a big person talk with you, okay?"
"How big are we talkin'?"
"Big."
"Okay, I'm ready."
Hermione looked back at Harry, and he could see in her cinnamon eyes that she was nervous. He patted her arm in reassurance. "Honey, do you remember what I told you when you asked me about your Daddy?"
"Yup. That he loves me and has to help other people and that's why I've never met him. And that maybe when I grow up I'll meet him."
"Well, sweetie, you don't have to wait until you grow up. I got a letter in the mail yesterday that said your Daddy was getting married. Uncle Braden and Gramma convinced me that he needed to meet you before he got married. And it turns out that he isn't getting married and someone put together a very complicated plan to get me, Harry and Ron here together so that we could be friends again. And also so you could meet your Daddy."
"He's here? Where is he?"
"I'm right here, Lily." Harry said, and suddenly had a very small six-year-old attached to his neck, occasional squeals of excitement being heard. Hermione watched the reunion through tear filled eyes, and Harry pulled her into an embrace with his free arm. She would her arms around Harry and their daughter and cried some more.
Soon the excitement put Lily to sleep and Harry gently tucked her into bed as Hermione stood by the doors and watched. "For the first time, I don't think she cares that she didn't get her bed time story." She commented as Harry stood and walked over to the door.
"Well, I'd like to think that I'm better than a bed time story." He said, his voice still think with emotion.
"You are. You have no idea how much she's always wanted a Dad. For a while she wanted me and Braden to get married so that she could call him Daddy."
"How long have you and Braden lived together?"
"Since I was six months pregnant. I remembered him from Hogwarts and when we met again at the office, he offered me a place to stay, and we became roommates."
"Where do you work?"
"At the Ministry of Magic. I'm in charge of all Auror assignments."
"Then how is it that we never saw each other?"
"I'm the person behind the research that you all get. I don't think I have ever personally met an Auror. I have your code names and that's how I do assignments. I don't even know who is who."
"Hermione, what is Lily's full name?"
Hermione smiled softly. "I gave her your last name. It seemed only right since I named her after your mother. But it's Lily Alexandria Potter. I just always like the name Alexandria, and it doesn't look like I'll have any more kids, so I killed two birds with one stone."
"Why wouldn't you have any more kids?"
"Well, no one wants to date a twenty four year old with a six-year-old daughter, and it's dangerous for me anyway. I had a lot of complications with the pregnancy."
"Like what?"
"Well, I was so sick that I had to go in the hospital for nearly a month, and I started going into premature labor in the fifth month, and had to stay in bed for the last six weeks. And then there was the extremely long labor and the fact that we almost lost her. Of course, some of those could have come from the fact that I was still seventeen. I turned eighteen in January and she was born in March."
Harry led her down the stairs. "I'm sorry 'Mione. For not being there with you."
"We've already covered all this and there's twelve more years until she turns eighteen that we have to cover everything else. We don't have to be in a rush. And I think I'm gonna go to bed early. I'll see you all tomorrow." Hermione told him, stopping halfway down the stairs. Harry turned around.
"Are you sure?"
"Yeah. It's been a stressful day and I need to stay with her. She has nightmares when she isn't in her bed."
"Okay. Do you want me to wake you up in the morning?"
"If you want to. Good night, Harry."
"Do you think we could cover one more thing tonight?"
"What?"
Harry leaned forward and gave her a light, chaste kiss on the lips. When she didn't move, he kissed her again, then stepped away. "Good night Hermione. Sweet dreams."
"You too." Hermione said, slowly walking back up the stairs, her mind swimming. She doubted that she'd be able to sleep with what Harry had just done and the night she'd had thus far. But she changed into her pyjamas, cheerleading shorts and a black tank tope, and crawled into bed with Lily, who instinctively curled closer to her mother. Hermione laid back against the pillows and let her mind wander back over the past hours and years.
Harry entered the common room by himself to the surprise of everyone there. He sat down in a chair and prayed that none of the students interrupted the conversation that he knew was going to take place. He braced himself for the questions that came shortly.
"How did it go?" Braden asked, leaning forward as if he were prepared to go check on Hermione.
"Fine. She just decided to turn in early. It's been stressful on her."
"How did Lily take finding out that you're her father?" Ginny wanted to know.
"She was excited. The good thing about six-year-olds is that they don't question good fortune or circumstances that older children would."
"Good. I'm glad it went well. So, what are you and Hermione going to do?" Ron asked, "Since I'm assuming that you never knew she was pregnant."
"No, I never knew. She wouldn't have been alone if I had known." He said, watching the way Braden tensed at the subtle insinuation that Harry would have done a better job over the past years. "But I told her that I have every intention of taking a part, a rather big part, in raising Lily from this point on. She didn't seem to have a problem with it. Where is it that you three are living, Braden?"
"London. On the outskirts of course, in the Queen Victoria apartment complex."
"I know that area, but I live in Cornwall. That could cause some difficulties."
"Well I doubt that she would want to move. We've made quite a home there over the last six years. And it's the only home Lily has ever known."
Braden's words didn't penetrate Harry's haze. He was already off and making plans. His apartment was too small for all of them, and he couldn't very well move since the Auror office had stationed him in Cornwall, as it was an epicenter for dark magic. But then again, he couldn't expect Hermione to leave her home and Braden. There would have to be a compromise, one that both could deal with. And then, there was the matter of his relationship with Hermione and what it was and would become. She had grown into a woman he didn't know, becoming a wonderful mother, and wise beyond her years, forced to grow up by circumstances outside her control. He had loved the Hermione he knew in school, loved her deeply, and cared about her more than he liked to admit because she had been dating his best friend. There had definitely been stirrings when she had entered the common room that evening. Anger at her for marrying Braden. That particular emotion had died away as it became apparent that someone had set up an elaborate scheme to get them all to Hogwarts at one. Amazement at the changes that seven years had made in her, and there had even been a feeling of love and lust for the woman she had become.
"I don't know." Harry said slowly, standing, "But I think I'll head up to bed too. Ron, ya comin'? We're sharing the Head Boy facilities."
"Sure." Ron said, still, after seven years, picking up on the fact that Harry didn't want to talk around Braden and Lavender. He stood and followed his childhood best friend up the stairs and watched in confusion as he entered the Head Girl rooms, but followed when Harry stuck his head out the door and said,
"Well are you coming or not?"
Hermione was sitting up in bed by that time, her straight, dark brown hair falling around her face and looking at them. "What are you guys doing here?" she asked in a low voice as Harry and Ron walked over to the bed.
"We need to talk." Harry told her, sitting on the bed. Ron sat in the chair beside the bed.
"About what?"
"Graduation." Ron said, picking up on what Harry wanted to talk about. It was a conversation they had been putting off for seven years. Hermione swallowed convulsively.
"What about it?"
"Our fight. We never talked things out, and it's something we need to do before we can move on."
"Okay. Who wants to start?" Hermione asked nervously.
"I suppose I should." Ron said, "I was the bloody idiot who caused the fight anyway. It was just a big shock coming up here and seeing Hermione coming out of your room in a sheet and you coming after her in the same thing. I blew up and it was a mistake. Hermione was right. We had talked and decided that after we left Hogwarts, we were going to start seeing other people, and take a break from one another. We loved each other, but we weren't in love, and we both knew it. If I could take it all back, I would."
"We all helped cause the fight," Hermione pointed out rationally. "Harry and I for what we did while we were still together, and you for blowing up about it when you knew we were over. So I think we should all just apologize and put it behind us. There's nothing we can do to change us, and I think we needed the break from one another. Not a seven year break, but we needed to become our own selves and stop being just the Three Musketeers."
"I hate it when you're logical." Harry told her, "Especially when your logistics are right. We did need a break. And although I still wish like Hell that you had told me about her, I understand why you didn't. I wasn't ready to be a father, and I probably would have made a very bad one. I was still recovering from the shock of discovering everything I did about my parents and how they died. I needed to stop being the Boy Who Lived and the Boy Who Defeated Voldemort and just be Harry Potter for while. And now that we've all said what we needed to, it brings me to the point of all this. I think that we should all move in together."
"Move in together?" Ron asked in disbelief, "Are you serious?"
"Dead serious. Unless you don't want to."
"I'm in." Hermione said. "I'm holding Braden back anyway. He's twenty five and ready to settle down and he won't because he's afraid of leaving me alone."
"Then I guess I'm in too." Ron said, shrugging, "But Lav will have to come too. We've been talking about moving in together and she'd be pissed if I moved without her."
"Fine. You should all come back with me and we can look for an apartment or house, whatever."
"You're still in Cornwall?" Ron asked, leaning back in his chair.
"Yup. The ministry won't let me leave because of the Dark Witches and Wizards there, so that kind of limits where we can look."
"That's fine. The only hard part will be telling Braden."
"What about Lily?"
"I'll appease Lily with a puppy. She'll be fine. Little kids don't care much about moving. It's an adventure to them. You know, painting a new room, exploring a new place, playing in a new front yard."
"So it's decided." Harry stated with finality. "This way we can all be a part of each others' life and I can get to know my daughter."
Hermione looked at Harry in wonder. "How is it that you can accept her and the situation in one night when it took me nine months to come to terms with her?"
Harry grinned. "Considering all the bad surprises that I've had in my life thus far, finding out that I have a daughter is a rather pleasant one. And the fact that I happen to love her mother very much helps too. I also think that I have fallen head over heels in love with our child, Hermione."
"She's hard not to love." Hermione agreed, stroking Lily's hair. "I think she got her personality from you as well as her looks. My mother asked me if I was sure she was mine too when she first saw her."
"She looks like you." Harry protested, "And she's smart and stubborn like a certain Granger I know."
"She seems to have gotten the best of both of us. Now you too need to scat so I can get some sleep. The kids get up at seven, and I'm sure we're supposed to get up with them. It's one already." She pointed out, casting a glance at her watch. Ron leaned over and kissed her forehead.
"Night Herms." He said, leaving the room.
Harry didn't move. "I meant it, you know."
"Meant what?"
"I do love you, 'Mione. I think I always have. Do you think we could maybe give us a chance?"
Hermione smiled. "I think we can give it a try. But I'm warning you. Nothing fast, or heavy, or intense. We need to get to know each other again, and find out if there is still anything between us."
"Well, I don't think a goodnight kiss is too much, do you?" Harry asked, leaning over and slowly kissing her. The kiss was light, but not chaste as his other one had been. After a few seconds he pulled away and stood up. "Goodnight again, Hermione. I'll see you and Lily tomorrow morning."
Hermione threw herself back on the pillows and listened for the door to close. When it did, she let out a frustrate sigh. "Oh why do I have to love that man so much? Five hours of being back at Hogwarts and I'm too hormonal to form a coherent thought when I'm around him."
End of Chapter 2. Chapter 3 will be up soon. Read and Review.