Three Things - Harry Potter
Title: Three Things
Fandom: Harry Potter
Summary: "As of this moment there are three that I officially hate: my name, being pregnant, and my stupid, self-deprecating idiot of a husband."
Characters: Remus, Tonks
Rating: PG
Pairings: Remus/Tonks
Word Count: 1900
Spoilers: Some DH spoilers.
Disclaimer: Not mine.
Notes: One shot. Takes place during Deathly Hallows.
Three Things
As of this moment there are three that I officially hate: my name, being pregnant, and my stupid, self-deprecating idiot of a husband.
Although if I had to pick between the three, I would say that I mostly hate my bloody husband at the moment. Because if it weren’t for him, my hair would be its usual bubble-gum pink color instead of the boring shade of brown that it currently is. And if it weren’t for him, I would not be sitting here at two in the morning eating a batch of cookie dough by myself. Although I suppose it’s possible that I am sitting here at two in the morning with a large bowl of cookie dough because I’m pregnant. But that’s Remus’s fault too. So, either way, he’s really the one to blame for everything at the moment.
“Stupid, bloody, idiot husband,” I muttered softly to myself as I shoved a large chunk of cookie dough into my mouth, relishing the little comfort that the cookie dough provided. I’m not sure if it was a pregnancy craving or one of those broken heart cravings that caused me to start eating the cookie dough. But I couldn’t sleep and it was already in the fridge. Mum would be mad tomorrow morning when she woke up and saw that it was gone, but I could deal with that then. The pregnancy card seems to be working fairly well for keeping me out of trouble, not that it stopped Remus from leaving. But it has worked well otherwise. So I took another bite.
“Dora, stop eating that.”
I heard the voice from behind me. His voice. His stupid, beautiful, idiotic voice. I instinctively grabbed my wand and turned around to face him. He better hope that he’s a Death Eater because I swear I will do so much worse if he actually is Remus.
“Don’t tell me what to do,” I replied, feeling slightly petulant. Of course, he comes back and the first thing he does it start ordering me around. Actually, he doesn’t usually order me around at all; I expect he’s mostly concerned about my health or the baby’s heath. But that doesn’t mean I’m still not angry with him. I used my free hand to put another spoonful of cookie dough in my mouth. I felt a satisfied smile overcome my face as he frowned at my behavior.
“Nymphadora -”
I hate it when he insists on calling me that.
“Don’t call me that, Remus! If you’re even him,” I yelled at him, reminding him that he still hadn’t proven who he was to me yet. He probably is though, only Remus would do something like call me Nymphadora at a time like this.
“You want proof?” he asked. I nodded my head. Stupid question really. I couldn’t hex some poor, unsuspecting Death Eater with the curses I was saving for my husband, could I?
“Fine,” he conceded. “I am Remus John Lupin, your husband, a werewolf. We met at an Order of the Phoenix meeting where I had to stop you from arresting Sirius because no one had told you he was innocent…”
I felt my face grow warm at the reminder of the embarrassing memory. This was most definitely Remus I decided as I raised my want and a cast a series of hexes at my husband who flew backwards several meters, hitting his head against the wall.
“Dora!” he yelled as he began rubbing the back of his head. “I’m not a Death Eater!”
“Oh, I know,” I replied casually. I walked over with the bowl of cookie dough in my hands and sat down beside him as I purposefully ate another spoonful of cookie dough.
“Nymphadora - ”
“Don’t call me that! I’m mad enough at you as it is!”
“I know you’re angry, Dora,” he said, emphasizing my nickname. It was progress anyway. And of course, I’m angry! The stupid prat left me alone, pregnant with his child, and with no promises of even coming back.
“Why would I be angry?” I asked sarcastically. “My husband of just over a month decides to leave me right after I tell him that I am pregnant with his child! With your child, Remus! Why would I be angry about that?!”
“I understand, Dora. I know that I made a mistake,” he told me calmly. I hate that calm voice of his. It makes me feel like I’m one of his students or something. I really hate it when he does that. He was looking at me expectantly now. He clearly expected me to say something in return. I defiantly took another large bite of cookie dough, refusing to say anything.
“Dora, that’s disgusting,” he scolded me as I swallowed the large chunk of cookie dough in my mouth.
“You’ve clearly never had it before,” I said as I tried to force a new spoonful into his mouth. He grimaced and turned his head away from me. I reluctantly gave up and ate it myself.
“Dora, you’ll be sick in the morning after eating all that.”
“I’m pregnant. It’s called morning sickness. Why did you even come back, Remus? Did you forget something?” I asked bitterly, not feeling particularly pleased with my husband at the moment. The bastard can’t just pop in and out of my life like this. He can’t just come back, apologize, and leave again. It doesn’t work like that.
“I’m sorry. I made a mistake. I shouldn’t have left -”
“You’re repeating yourself,” I cut him off. I wasn’t really in the mood to hear his usual self-pitying ‘I’m not good enough for people to like me’ speech.
“The point is that I’m sorry for the way I’ve acted. I just wanted what was best for you. And the baby,” he apologized turning his head to face me.
Idiot. Of course he had some stupid bizarre reason like that. Self-pitying prick. Of course he would think that leaving would be best. Of course he would think that I would be better off without a husband instead of having a husband like him. Remus Lupin happens to be one of the most infuriating men I have ever met.
“You’re what’s best for us, Remus,” I said softly.
“What if I pass my condition on to the baby?” he asked.
“Then you’ll have some company at the full moon.”
“What if it’s ashamed of me? Or if it hates me?”
“Well, it’ll be like every other normal child then. Ashamed and embarrassed of us, with the occasional bit of hatred thrown in,” I replied cheekily as he let out a small smile.
“Dora, be serious,” he told me as I wrapped my arms around him, leaning against his shoulder.
“I am being serious. Every child is ashamed of their parents at one point or another,” I comforted him. Or I attempted to. The words had sounded better in my head than when I spoke them aloud.
“So no matter what I do this child is going to be ashamed of me?”
“Yes. Just embrace it already. And he’ll be a little ashamed of me too. But mostly you because I’m going to be the fun-loving parent that our child and all his friends love. And I’ll let him or her do whatever they want. And I’ll have no boundaries or rules at all,” I said lightly watching Remus closely for his reaction.
“Whatever they want?” he repeated incredulously as he raised an eyebrow. He smiled a little. It was getting slightly harder to hate him at the moment.
“Yes. No authority figure or anything like that at all.”
“So if our child is going to have any sort of rules or boundaries in their life, then I’m going to have to be the one to set them?” he asked.
"Well, I can’t do it. I have to be the fun parent. I can’t have our child hating me. And he’s going to hate you anyway, according to what you say.”
“Maybe I should stay then, so the child has someone who won’t let them eat cookie dough at two in the morning.”
I felt my face break into a large smile at his words. It was the first time Remus suggested that he might actually be staying.
“That sounds like a good idea. I mean, you were a Hogwarts professor after all. You can just do what you would have done to your students who snuck out at two in the morning to eat cookie dough.”
“You want me to give our child detention?”
“Whatever you think is best, Professor Lupin. I’m just going to be the fun parent,” I said cheekily waiting for his response. Silence. That couldn’t be a good sign, could it?
“Well,” he began after a few minutes had passed. “It sounds like our child is really going to need someone other than a fun parent around then.”
My heart stopped for a second. Was he saying what I thought he was saying?
“You’ll stay then?” I asked hopefully.
“If it’s alright with you. I wouldn’t blame you if you didn’t want me to stay,” he said softly. I don’t care what any of those Weasley kids or Hermione or Harry say, there is no way Remus was the best Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher they ever had. He could be unbelievably thick at times. Of course I wanted him to stay!
“Well, I suppose I could tolerate you if…” I let the sentence trail off as I dug the spoon back into the large bowl of cookie dough. Remus made a face as I brought the spoon up to his lips.
“This is your condition?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“Fine,” he conceded as he took the spoon from me and ate the cookie dough.
“You like it, don’t you?” I prodded unable to read the expression on his face.
“Well, I can’t admit it now or you’d hold it over my head for the rest of our lives.”
Our lives. He just said our lives. That sounded nice. Very, very nice.
“Just for five or six years, Remus. You want more?”
“No. You can have it. You’re the one who is eating for two now,” he said as he placed his arms around me. One last bit of revenge and that’ll be it, I swear.
“Three, actually. We’re having twins,” I lied enjoying this last bit of revenge on my husband. I smiled as the color quickly drained out of his face. Serves him right after all he did to me.
“Twins?” he asked weakly looking very taken aback.
“No. I don’t think so, but I don’t think we’ll be able to tell for awhile anyway,” I added. So technically it wasn’t a lie. There’s a slight possibility that we could be having twins.
“Don’t scare me like that Dora.”
“Welcome home, Remus,” I whispered softly. I laughed softly as I buried my head into his shoulders. I closed my eyes, concentrating on changing my hair back to its usual spiky pink locks. At this particular moment, there were three things in this world that I loved more than anything else: my husband, our child, and cookie dough.