A/N: Everything except the stuff you don’t recognize belongs to JK Rowling and her utter genius. Many of these characters, however, are of my own creation.
*This is also a reminder that this disregards Deathly Hollows…along with the obvious. Long live Fred.
The Storm
The lake house was decorated with white crate paper and maroon and gold wedding related decorations. It looked cheery and happy; it spoke nothing of what was about to happen in the transformed space.
Medea was sitting between her parents on the swing on the back porch that looked over the lake. They hadn’t spoken for at least ten minutes; they were all waiting for the front door to open and admit the Potters and the Weasleys. The whole lot of them was scheduled to arrive at six o’clock, even Arthur and Molly were coming…the entire family was coming.
“Are you sure?” Medea whispered for the fifth time. As the time drew near, she began to doubt the wisdom of this plan, even though she knew it had to happen. It seemed a little backward, but she wanted to protect her parents from the harsh words and feelings she knew would be dispelled by Patrick’s family. “We could leave right now and they would never know the difference.”
Draco took her hand and squeezed it gently. “We’re sure, love, it’s the only way anything is going to change. I don’t care how they feel about me, trust me, but I do care how they treat you and Hermione. I’ve earned their loathing, you haven’t.”
It made her a little sad to hear her father speak like that; it made her realize that he had been a very different person at some point in time. Her mother had sometimes said things, in teasing, that indicated just how horrible he’d been, but she had always assumed that it was just that…teasing. Part of her didn’t want to know what he’d been like, but she somehow she knew today she was going to find out.
She sighed and sat back against the smooth wood. “Alright.”
Another few minutes elapsed in silence.
“How do you think Aunt Zofia is faring with Jarrett?” she asked even though she wasn’t really concerned.
Hermione smiled. “I’m sure she handling him just fine. She uses her, uh, gift so she knows when he’s brewing up trouble. Unfortunately, he gets that honestly from both sides,” she said, tongue in cheek.
Draco started to crack a guilty grin when the French doors opened and Patrick walked out with a strained smile. Even so, he looked like he was about to be sick. “They’re all here,” he whispered through a constricted throat.
Draco and Hermione stood in unison and reached out to each other. Medea watched as they stood hand in hand, presenting a united front. Patrick pulled her up from the swing and directly into his arms. “Come on, love,” he whispered. “It’ll be okay.”
It was a lie and they both knew it, but they led her parents through the French doors anyway, both couples hand in hand.
The room slowly went silent; this was it.
“What in the bloody hell are they doing here?” It was Ron; he was clearly furious.
“Ronald?” Gabrielle asked in her heavily accented English, her beautiful face looking at her husband with confusion and concern.
They really were all there. Hermione looked around the room at the faces that had once been so dear to her; now they looked at her with surprised and disgust. They were all older, as would be expected after twenty years, but none of them looked old”just older. Although Arthur and Molly were quite grey and Bill’s temples noticeably silver.
“Hermione…”
The whispered name drew her attention to the couple that really mattered in all of this. Harry and Ginny stood just inside the front door, staring at them. Harry looked as noble as ever, even with his wide eyes, and Ginny, whose lips were still parted from her whispered word, looked just as beautiful as she had the day she had officially become a Potter.
Hermione breathed a little easier when she realized that there wasn’t even anger in her blue eyes.
The air tangibly crackled with tension, yet Fred and George simultaneously cracked duplicate grins and approached the two offending couples.
“I assume from the decorations that you two are planning to tie the knot!” Fred said with an affability that seemed foreign in the tense environment and slapped Patrick on the shoulder.
“That’s the plan,” Patrick whispered and tried to smile unsuccessfully.
Fred moved onto Hermione. “Always knew you’d be part of the family somehow,” he told her quietly.
“How can you talk to them?” Ron shouted from across the room. “To her?”
Hermione watched the smile melt from his face and he slowly turned to face his family. “Because she’s a friend,” he whispered with feigned calm. “And I speak to my friends.”
“Friend?” he nearly spat the word. “How can you can you call that trollop a””
“Dad!” Odile gasped.
He turned on her with the same fire. “And you! Falling in with their spawn!”
“Ronald!” Gabrielle chastised from his side. “That’s terrible! How can you””
“Gabrielle!” Fleur said harshly from a few meters away, followed by a quick; “Tais-toi!”
She glared at her sister but remained silent.
“I’ll not have you talk about Medea that way,” Patrick said acidly to his uncle.
Hermione took a step forward. “I don’t care how you feel about me,” she lied. “But don’t you dare say anything like that about my daughter again.”
Medea looked around the room at the people that composed her new family. They were all edgy and staring her like she had two head that could eat them all simultaneously. “After two decades, this is really how you all act?” she asked as she looked around the room. “Just because she chose someone you didn’t approve of?”
“She chose the bloody enemy!” Ron yelled. “A Death Eater who killed Professor Dumbledore!”
“Damn it, Weasley, I didn’t have a choice!” Draco yelled. “And you know damn well that I didn’t kill him!”
“As good as””
“Ron,” Harry said firmly. “You know he didn’t.”
Ron glared at his best friend. “I don’t care, it doesn’t change anything. She betrayed us, Harry!”
Medea’s heart broke as she watched her mother’s head droop guiltily. Her father’s arms went around her protectively but neither of them said word.
“It was easy for you, wasn’t it?” Medea asked even as tears threatened to spill over onto her cheeks. “You chose exactly who you were meant to chose. Everyone wanted it, wished for it even, but because my mother did something different from what you expected, she betrayed you?”
“No,” Harry said. “She betrayed us because she did it behind our backs. She didn’t have the decency to tell us””
“What? That she’d fallen in love a Death Eater?” Draco retorted. “That would’ve gone over great! Even she thought I was trying to kill her!” Those words were still hard for him to speak, even though he knew it was the truth.
“I sort of knew,” Ginny whispered with her head down.
Silence fell over the room.
“Mum? You knew?” Patrick finally asked incredulously.
Ginny looked up at her husband then over at her brother. “I knew they were getting along anyway and she was happy about it. Zofia told me Draco kissed her.”
Ron’s mouth fell open as he stared at his sister. “Ginny, how could you?”
“Oh, get over it, Ron! You’re just mad he had her first!”
Gabrielle looked from her sister-in-law to her husband in wounded confusion. She clearly still had no idea what was going on.
Ron opened his mouth but he never got the chance to say whatever else was on his mind.
“Stop it!” Patrick yelled at his uncle. “This is ridiculous! I don’t know why you’re still so angry, but frankly I don’t care. Medea is part of this family now and I won’t allow you to treat her or her family this way!”
The silence that fell over the room was no longer tense but stunned.
“What do you mean she is part of the family?” Harry asked slowly.
Patrick suddenly couldn’t speak. He hadn’t meant to say that.
“We’re already married,” Medea whispered. She looked apologetically at her parents then her friends, hoping they would forgive them for their deception. “We got married a week after we got out of school.”
The silence continued.
She figured she might as well be completely honest. After a deep breath, she revealed an even bigger secret that only she knew. “And we’re going to have a baby.”
Jaws literally dropped, including her husband’s.
“It doesn’t matter how you all feel about each other, you’re all coming together as one.” Tears filled her as she continued. “The Potters and the Malfoys and Weasleys and the even the Grangers together…as it should be.”
Her softly spoken words hit harder than any previous shout or insult. After all the years of separation, they really were coming together as one.