Saying Yes chapter 12
SAYING YES chapter 12
Summary: At 17, Andromeda Black thought being in love was everything. At 57, Andromeda Tonks knew better. Yet the first time Kingsley Shacklebolt asked her out, she surprised herself by saying yes.
Characters: Andromeda Tonks, Kingsley Shacklebolt, Teddy Lupin and ensemble (Harry! Ginny! Molly! Kingsley's kids! All the Potters and Weasleys!)
Warnings: None
Chapters: 15
Story:
CHAPTER TWELVE
She would have been loath to admit it, but Andromeda spent most of the next morning waiting by the fireplace.
Finally, Ginny put her head through and said, "I told him I'd send him through by Floo, but he insisted on Apparating. He should be there in a moment."
"Thank you, Ginny," Andromeda said. "Thank you for being there for him."
Ginny shrugged, as best she could with her head in the fire. "Of course. He and Harry had a bit of a heart to heart, too, this morning."
Andromeda heard the soft click of the unlocking charm on the front door and said, "I hear him now."
"Good luck," Ginny said, her voice sympathetic. "We'll see you soon." She disappeared from the fire.
Andromeda straightened up and started toward the front door; Teddy was just coming in. They met halfway, in the doorway to the sitting room.
To his credit, Teddy didn't try to avoid her. There was a moment's hesitation, then he looked her in the eye and said, "I'm sorry for what I said."
"I'm sorry, too," Andromeda told him. "I didn't mean what I said, Teddy. This is your home and you are always welcome here."
Now Teddy did glance away, embarrassed. "Yeah, I know," he said. Then, "Can I go upstairs now?"
"Yes, of course."
Andromeda watched him retreat up the stairs and took a long breath.
The next morning over porridge, Teddy asked, "So, can I have my books back?"
Andromeda reminded herself to pause before replying, to remain calm and neutral. "Yes, but I'd like if we could have a conversation about this before you do."
Teddy huffed with annoyance. "What do we need to have a conversation about? Either I'm allowed to have them or I'm not."
"I'd just like for us both to sit down and have a rational talk about this. I'd like to know more about your plans." She added silently, And whether you really understand what you're getting into.
"Oh, so now I have to defend myself to you?"
"You don't have to defend anything, but I want to be sure you understand what this entails."
"Oh, forget about it, forget about the books," Teddy snapped. He threw his spoon down into his bowl, pushed back his chair and stalked angrily away from the table.
Andromeda fought against instinct and decided this wasn't the time to remind Teddy of his table manners. She was going to have to pick her battles.
And so it continued through the summer: rows and spats with Teddy, sometimes over the smallest of things. It seemed all he did anymore was pick fights with her - and no matter how Andromeda tried to avoid the topics that would set him off, somehow she always managed to say the wrong thing.
She could swear Nymphadora had never been quite like this.
She gave Teddy back his books, of course she did, though not before the two of them had another unsatisfying conversation about his careers options. It was like trying to talk through a Silencio charm: Her words just didn't seem to get through. Even when Teddy nodded along, she knew he was only going to turn around and do the opposite of what she'd said.
Andromeda didn't realise how often she'd cancelled plans with Kingsley in order to deal with the Teddy Problem, as she'd come to think of it, until one day Kingsley asked, "Andromeda, are we ever going to have that dinner together? Or should I just stop asking?"
Andromeda looked at his face in her fire, his expression mild but eyes somehow accusing. She should have put him off in a placating way, but she was exhausted herself, more than half her attention on the ominous silence emanating from Teddy's room upstairs, which generally meant things were about to explode again - sometimes literally. So what she said instead was, "I've got my hands fairly full over here at the moment, if you hadn't noticed."
"In other words, I should stop asking."
"That's not what I said."
Kingsley sighed in a way that was unlike him. "Then what are you saying? Please spell it out clearly, because apparently I'm too dense to understand whatever subtext you've been communicating in lately."
"There is no subtext! I just haven't much time at the moment." There was a crash from upstairs. "Kingsley, I have to go."
"Will you call me when you have the time?"
"Yes, yes."
Kingsley's head disappeared from the fireplace, still looking dissatisfied, and Andromeda steeled herself to investigate upstairs.
- - - - -
Even when they did finally find time for a dinner together, Andromeda headed to Kingsley's house with her thoughts half elsewhere: Just beforehand, Teddy had slammed out of the house once again, brusquely informing her he was going to a friend's house and spending the night. At least this time he had told her where he was going. They'd had a terrific row about that after he'd again gone off somewhere without telling her, and now at least he knew that disappearing without a trace truly crossed the line.
She joined Kingsley in his kitchen - it was something she appreciated about Kingsley, that despite his far grander house, his family life too seemed to revolve around the cosiness of the kitchen - and Andromeda allowed herself a brief moment of envy: Kingsley's kitchen was warm and bright and happily cluttered, with Emmeline's drawings and experiments sprawled across the worktops and Alastor's Quidditch gear piled in one corner. Lately Andromeda's own kitchen felt like a warzone.
Apparently Andromeda was still talking about the Teddy Problem as they finished their dinner, because Kingsley said, "Do you think it might wise to give it a rest for a while? With Teddy, I mean. Just get off his case a bit?"
"I am not 'on his case'."
"Andromeda."
"He gives me cause to worry, all right?"
Kingsley sighed. "I know. The thing is, though, he's a teenager. They're always a little worrying."
Andromeda just frowned at him, because Alastor didn't behave the way Teddy did, so Kingsley didn't understand.
"You're still fighting him over becoming an Auror, aren't you?" Kingsley asked.
"No, I'm not."
"But you make very clear to him what you think."
"How can I not! Out of nowhere, he insists on doing the one thing I absolutely can't bear. I don't understand it. He never talked before about wanting to be an Auror. Not even with all the time he's spent around Harry and Ron."
"He's asked me about it, sometimes," Kingsley said.
"What? And you never saw fit to mention that?"
"He didn't ask for advice on how to secretly become an Auror behind your back, if that's what you're thinking! But he's sometimes asked me what the work was like and I've always tried to answer him honestly. I tried to give him a sense of what Tonks' day-to-day life was like, and I told him for whom Stor is named when Teddy asked. He wants to understand his history and I don't think that's a bad thing. You don't either, when you're being honest with yourself, Andromeda."
"Understanding history is one thing, repeating it is another!"
"Nothing says history is going to repeat here."
"How exactly is this not history repeating?"
"Andromeda, Teddy is not Nymphadora. He's going to be fine."
"Don't patronise me," Andromeda snapped. "I know very well that Nymphadora is not here, thank you."
"What I mean is, just because you lost her, it doesn't mean you're going to lose him."
"That's not a chance I'm willing to take! I won't lose another child. And if you can't understand that, well, then I feel sorry for you."
A note of weariness in his voice, Kingsley said, "Being an Auror isn't actually a death sentence, you know."
"I have access to Ministry files, too," Andromeda retorted. "I've read the statistics."
"Those statistics were from wartime! And I'm sorry to put this so bluntly, but how many people also died in the war who weren't Aurors? How many people died who weren't part of the Order or the Ministry, people who just happened to be in the wrong place at a time when the world was at war?"
"Your point?"
"My point is, let's say Teddy studies hard and gets the N.E.W.T.s he needs, he passes the entrance exam, goes through training, becomes an Auror. What are the chances, Andromeda, what are the absolute, statistical chances that that career path with ever put him in anything resembling mortal danger? Do you know how many Aurors have been killed in the line of duty in all the years since the war? You say you've checked the statistics. How many?"
"One," she whispered, throat tightening at the mere thought of it. "That poor young man in Brighton."
"Yes." Kingsley leaned forward over the table, gaze intent on her. "One man in seventeen years. And it was horrible. I'll never forget that funeral. But, thank Merlin, thank all the powers that be, it's been only one in all these years. And horrible, unexpected things can happen to anyone, it's unfortunately just the way it is. It's not limited to Aurors."
"So you're telling me I have an irrational prejudice against Aurors. All right, fine: Yes, I do. Satisfied?"
"No!" Kingsley shoved his chair back from the table in frustration, then took a deep breath and pulled it closer in again. "No, look, what I'm saying is that it's time for you to let Teddy figure out his own way."
"What does it matter to you, Kingsley?" Andromeda demanded. "This is not your battle. What do you care what I do or don't allow Teddy?"
Kingsley was quiet for too long and when Andromeda looked up to meet his gaze, she saw hurt in his eyes.
"Really?" he asked. "Is that how you see it?"
"What do you mean?"
"Of course it matters to me! I care about you, and I care about Teddy, and I don't honestly know how much longer I can stand to watch the two of you tear each other apart. This is consuming you, Andromeda. I never even see you anymore.”
“I’ve told you, if it seems I haven’t had much time lately, it’s because I have other things on my mind at the moment.”
“Yes, which is exactly what I’m saying!”
“So you want me just not to think about Teddy? Not to worry about what he’s doing?”
“No, Andromeda, obviously not. I’m just asking you to let up on him. Let it go, stop fighting against him.” Andromeda was about to retort, but Kingsley added, “Please.”
The pleading in his voice caught at her, and she answered much more mildly than she’d first intended, “It’s not as easy as just saying, ‘All right, I’ll let it go.’”
“I know,” Kingsley sighed. “I’m only asking you to try.”
Kingsley really did look weary, Andromeda thought - weary, and perhaps also resigned to her never putting him first.
As if he could read her thoughts, he added, "This isn't only about me, though. As hard as it probably is to tell if you’re the one inside the situation, I can see this is hurting Teddy, too. He really wants your approval, you know.”
“That’s a little hard to tell, when mostly what he does is shout that he doesn’t care what I think.”
“But it’s true all the same.”
“I believe you,” Andromeda said. Wanting at least to try to meet Kingsley halfway, she added, “What would you do, in my situation? How would you go about trying to repair things with Teddy?”
Kingsley gave her a considering look, then said, “Talk to him as an adult. Tell him you want to support him and it’s hard for you to do, but you’re trying. You can go ahead and tell him that you’re going to try not to fight him on his choices, but you can’t promise always to succeed.”
Andromeda sighed. Some part of her certainly knew Kingsley was right. A large part of her knew that, actually. "I'll try," she promised. "That's about all I can do, is try."
"That's all I'm asking," he said. "And for what it's worth, I'm a little sorry too that Teddy doesn't want, say, a nice, boring clerical job at the Ministry. But that's not who he is."
Andromeda tried to smile a little at that. "No, I can't really picture that." Then she sobered again. "I'll talk to him, Kingsley. I'll try."
- - - - -
When Andromeda returned home the next morning, she found Teddy already back from his friend's house and curled up, reading, in the big armchair in the sitting room. That chair had been a favourite haunt of his as a child, but Andromeda hadn't seen him sit in it for years. The sight made her want to go over and ruffle his hair as if he were still a small child. But she didn't.
He looked up warily when he heard her come in, Andromeda saw with sadness. Wariness wasn't what she wanted to see on Teddy's face when he looked at her.
Andromeda came over and leaned against the armchair opposite him, then realised she should put herself at the same level and sat instead.
"Teddy," she said, "there are a few things I'd like to say and I'd like for you to hear me through. I'm not going to criticise you, I just want you to understand how I feel. Can you promise me you'll listen?"
Teddy nodded and watched her obediently, one finger marking his spot in his book, but his shoulders stayed tense.
Andromeda sighed and searched for where to begin.
"I was so angry at your mother, for years, for getting herself killed," she said finally. "That isn't a nice thing, but there it is. I thought I'd finally truly forgiven her, but I suppose my work there isn't quite done. In the end, though, what I had to acknowledge was that I had taught her by my example, taught her with everything I did, that we have to stand up for what we believe in. Even if it means hurting the people you love.
"Your mother and father were fighters, and I don't only mean that they died in battle. I mean that they both fought all their lives for what they believed in. Nymphadora fought very hard to get Remus to accept her love, and Remus fought perhaps even harder to be able to meet her halfway.
"But they were also fighters because it was a time of war and because they cared too much to stand aside and let others do the work. If there's one thing I've always wanted for you, Teddy, it's that you wouldn't have to fight their war. But I can't be angry with you for standing up for what you believe. If I do that, you're absolutely within your rights to tell me I'm wrong."
Teddy nodded slowly, still wary.
"Just so we're clear," Andromeda said, "I'm not wild about the idea of you becoming an Auror, as I'm sure you've noticed. But if that's really what you want to do, we'll just have to manage somehow."
Teddy was quiet, looking thoughtful. Then he said, "Thanks, Gran."
Those two words, more than anything else he could have said, made the threat of tears prickle at Andromeda's eyes, but she blinked them back. For an instant, she wanted to grab Teddy and hug him to her as tightly as she could, but she didn't do that either.
Instead, she said, "I'll leave you to your reading," and settled for squeezing his shoulder as she stood and left the room.
- - - - -
( continue to chapter 13)
Summary: At 17, Andromeda Black thought being in love was everything. At 57, Andromeda Tonks knew better. Yet the first time Kingsley Shacklebolt asked her out, she surprised herself by saying yes.
Characters: Andromeda Tonks, Kingsley Shacklebolt, Teddy Lupin and ensemble (Harry! Ginny! Molly! Kingsley's kids! All the Potters and Weasleys!)
Warnings: None
Chapters: 15
Story:
CHAPTER TWELVE
She would have been loath to admit it, but Andromeda spent most of the next morning waiting by the fireplace.
Finally, Ginny put her head through and said, "I told him I'd send him through by Floo, but he insisted on Apparating. He should be there in a moment."
"Thank you, Ginny," Andromeda said. "Thank you for being there for him."
Ginny shrugged, as best she could with her head in the fire. "Of course. He and Harry had a bit of a heart to heart, too, this morning."
Andromeda heard the soft click of the unlocking charm on the front door and said, "I hear him now."
"Good luck," Ginny said, her voice sympathetic. "We'll see you soon." She disappeared from the fire.
Andromeda straightened up and started toward the front door; Teddy was just coming in. They met halfway, in the doorway to the sitting room.
To his credit, Teddy didn't try to avoid her. There was a moment's hesitation, then he looked her in the eye and said, "I'm sorry for what I said."
"I'm sorry, too," Andromeda told him. "I didn't mean what I said, Teddy. This is your home and you are always welcome here."
Now Teddy did glance away, embarrassed. "Yeah, I know," he said. Then, "Can I go upstairs now?"
"Yes, of course."
Andromeda watched him retreat up the stairs and took a long breath.
The next morning over porridge, Teddy asked, "So, can I have my books back?"
Andromeda reminded herself to pause before replying, to remain calm and neutral. "Yes, but I'd like if we could have a conversation about this before you do."
Teddy huffed with annoyance. "What do we need to have a conversation about? Either I'm allowed to have them or I'm not."
"I'd just like for us both to sit down and have a rational talk about this. I'd like to know more about your plans." She added silently, And whether you really understand what you're getting into.
"Oh, so now I have to defend myself to you?"
"You don't have to defend anything, but I want to be sure you understand what this entails."
"Oh, forget about it, forget about the books," Teddy snapped. He threw his spoon down into his bowl, pushed back his chair and stalked angrily away from the table.
Andromeda fought against instinct and decided this wasn't the time to remind Teddy of his table manners. She was going to have to pick her battles.
And so it continued through the summer: rows and spats with Teddy, sometimes over the smallest of things. It seemed all he did anymore was pick fights with her - and no matter how Andromeda tried to avoid the topics that would set him off, somehow she always managed to say the wrong thing.
She could swear Nymphadora had never been quite like this.
She gave Teddy back his books, of course she did, though not before the two of them had another unsatisfying conversation about his careers options. It was like trying to talk through a Silencio charm: Her words just didn't seem to get through. Even when Teddy nodded along, she knew he was only going to turn around and do the opposite of what she'd said.
Andromeda didn't realise how often she'd cancelled plans with Kingsley in order to deal with the Teddy Problem, as she'd come to think of it, until one day Kingsley asked, "Andromeda, are we ever going to have that dinner together? Or should I just stop asking?"
Andromeda looked at his face in her fire, his expression mild but eyes somehow accusing. She should have put him off in a placating way, but she was exhausted herself, more than half her attention on the ominous silence emanating from Teddy's room upstairs, which generally meant things were about to explode again - sometimes literally. So what she said instead was, "I've got my hands fairly full over here at the moment, if you hadn't noticed."
"In other words, I should stop asking."
"That's not what I said."
Kingsley sighed in a way that was unlike him. "Then what are you saying? Please spell it out clearly, because apparently I'm too dense to understand whatever subtext you've been communicating in lately."
"There is no subtext! I just haven't much time at the moment." There was a crash from upstairs. "Kingsley, I have to go."
"Will you call me when you have the time?"
"Yes, yes."
Kingsley's head disappeared from the fireplace, still looking dissatisfied, and Andromeda steeled herself to investigate upstairs.
- - - - -
Even when they did finally find time for a dinner together, Andromeda headed to Kingsley's house with her thoughts half elsewhere: Just beforehand, Teddy had slammed out of the house once again, brusquely informing her he was going to a friend's house and spending the night. At least this time he had told her where he was going. They'd had a terrific row about that after he'd again gone off somewhere without telling her, and now at least he knew that disappearing without a trace truly crossed the line.
She joined Kingsley in his kitchen - it was something she appreciated about Kingsley, that despite his far grander house, his family life too seemed to revolve around the cosiness of the kitchen - and Andromeda allowed herself a brief moment of envy: Kingsley's kitchen was warm and bright and happily cluttered, with Emmeline's drawings and experiments sprawled across the worktops and Alastor's Quidditch gear piled in one corner. Lately Andromeda's own kitchen felt like a warzone.
Apparently Andromeda was still talking about the Teddy Problem as they finished their dinner, because Kingsley said, "Do you think it might wise to give it a rest for a while? With Teddy, I mean. Just get off his case a bit?"
"I am not 'on his case'."
"Andromeda."
"He gives me cause to worry, all right?"
Kingsley sighed. "I know. The thing is, though, he's a teenager. They're always a little worrying."
Andromeda just frowned at him, because Alastor didn't behave the way Teddy did, so Kingsley didn't understand.
"You're still fighting him over becoming an Auror, aren't you?" Kingsley asked.
"No, I'm not."
"But you make very clear to him what you think."
"How can I not! Out of nowhere, he insists on doing the one thing I absolutely can't bear. I don't understand it. He never talked before about wanting to be an Auror. Not even with all the time he's spent around Harry and Ron."
"He's asked me about it, sometimes," Kingsley said.
"What? And you never saw fit to mention that?"
"He didn't ask for advice on how to secretly become an Auror behind your back, if that's what you're thinking! But he's sometimes asked me what the work was like and I've always tried to answer him honestly. I tried to give him a sense of what Tonks' day-to-day life was like, and I told him for whom Stor is named when Teddy asked. He wants to understand his history and I don't think that's a bad thing. You don't either, when you're being honest with yourself, Andromeda."
"Understanding history is one thing, repeating it is another!"
"Nothing says history is going to repeat here."
"How exactly is this not history repeating?"
"Andromeda, Teddy is not Nymphadora. He's going to be fine."
"Don't patronise me," Andromeda snapped. "I know very well that Nymphadora is not here, thank you."
"What I mean is, just because you lost her, it doesn't mean you're going to lose him."
"That's not a chance I'm willing to take! I won't lose another child. And if you can't understand that, well, then I feel sorry for you."
A note of weariness in his voice, Kingsley said, "Being an Auror isn't actually a death sentence, you know."
"I have access to Ministry files, too," Andromeda retorted. "I've read the statistics."
"Those statistics were from wartime! And I'm sorry to put this so bluntly, but how many people also died in the war who weren't Aurors? How many people died who weren't part of the Order or the Ministry, people who just happened to be in the wrong place at a time when the world was at war?"
"Your point?"
"My point is, let's say Teddy studies hard and gets the N.E.W.T.s he needs, he passes the entrance exam, goes through training, becomes an Auror. What are the chances, Andromeda, what are the absolute, statistical chances that that career path with ever put him in anything resembling mortal danger? Do you know how many Aurors have been killed in the line of duty in all the years since the war? You say you've checked the statistics. How many?"
"One," she whispered, throat tightening at the mere thought of it. "That poor young man in Brighton."
"Yes." Kingsley leaned forward over the table, gaze intent on her. "One man in seventeen years. And it was horrible. I'll never forget that funeral. But, thank Merlin, thank all the powers that be, it's been only one in all these years. And horrible, unexpected things can happen to anyone, it's unfortunately just the way it is. It's not limited to Aurors."
"So you're telling me I have an irrational prejudice against Aurors. All right, fine: Yes, I do. Satisfied?"
"No!" Kingsley shoved his chair back from the table in frustration, then took a deep breath and pulled it closer in again. "No, look, what I'm saying is that it's time for you to let Teddy figure out his own way."
"What does it matter to you, Kingsley?" Andromeda demanded. "This is not your battle. What do you care what I do or don't allow Teddy?"
Kingsley was quiet for too long and when Andromeda looked up to meet his gaze, she saw hurt in his eyes.
"Really?" he asked. "Is that how you see it?"
"What do you mean?"
"Of course it matters to me! I care about you, and I care about Teddy, and I don't honestly know how much longer I can stand to watch the two of you tear each other apart. This is consuming you, Andromeda. I never even see you anymore.”
“I’ve told you, if it seems I haven’t had much time lately, it’s because I have other things on my mind at the moment.”
“Yes, which is exactly what I’m saying!”
“So you want me just not to think about Teddy? Not to worry about what he’s doing?”
“No, Andromeda, obviously not. I’m just asking you to let up on him. Let it go, stop fighting against him.” Andromeda was about to retort, but Kingsley added, “Please.”
The pleading in his voice caught at her, and she answered much more mildly than she’d first intended, “It’s not as easy as just saying, ‘All right, I’ll let it go.’”
“I know,” Kingsley sighed. “I’m only asking you to try.”
Kingsley really did look weary, Andromeda thought - weary, and perhaps also resigned to her never putting him first.
As if he could read her thoughts, he added, "This isn't only about me, though. As hard as it probably is to tell if you’re the one inside the situation, I can see this is hurting Teddy, too. He really wants your approval, you know.”
“That’s a little hard to tell, when mostly what he does is shout that he doesn’t care what I think.”
“But it’s true all the same.”
“I believe you,” Andromeda said. Wanting at least to try to meet Kingsley halfway, she added, “What would you do, in my situation? How would you go about trying to repair things with Teddy?”
Kingsley gave her a considering look, then said, “Talk to him as an adult. Tell him you want to support him and it’s hard for you to do, but you’re trying. You can go ahead and tell him that you’re going to try not to fight him on his choices, but you can’t promise always to succeed.”
Andromeda sighed. Some part of her certainly knew Kingsley was right. A large part of her knew that, actually. "I'll try," she promised. "That's about all I can do, is try."
"That's all I'm asking," he said. "And for what it's worth, I'm a little sorry too that Teddy doesn't want, say, a nice, boring clerical job at the Ministry. But that's not who he is."
Andromeda tried to smile a little at that. "No, I can't really picture that." Then she sobered again. "I'll talk to him, Kingsley. I'll try."
- - - - -
When Andromeda returned home the next morning, she found Teddy already back from his friend's house and curled up, reading, in the big armchair in the sitting room. That chair had been a favourite haunt of his as a child, but Andromeda hadn't seen him sit in it for years. The sight made her want to go over and ruffle his hair as if he were still a small child. But she didn't.
He looked up warily when he heard her come in, Andromeda saw with sadness. Wariness wasn't what she wanted to see on Teddy's face when he looked at her.
Andromeda came over and leaned against the armchair opposite him, then realised she should put herself at the same level and sat instead.
"Teddy," she said, "there are a few things I'd like to say and I'd like for you to hear me through. I'm not going to criticise you, I just want you to understand how I feel. Can you promise me you'll listen?"
Teddy nodded and watched her obediently, one finger marking his spot in his book, but his shoulders stayed tense.
Andromeda sighed and searched for where to begin.
"I was so angry at your mother, for years, for getting herself killed," she said finally. "That isn't a nice thing, but there it is. I thought I'd finally truly forgiven her, but I suppose my work there isn't quite done. In the end, though, what I had to acknowledge was that I had taught her by my example, taught her with everything I did, that we have to stand up for what we believe in. Even if it means hurting the people you love.
"Your mother and father were fighters, and I don't only mean that they died in battle. I mean that they both fought all their lives for what they believed in. Nymphadora fought very hard to get Remus to accept her love, and Remus fought perhaps even harder to be able to meet her halfway.
"But they were also fighters because it was a time of war and because they cared too much to stand aside and let others do the work. If there's one thing I've always wanted for you, Teddy, it's that you wouldn't have to fight their war. But I can't be angry with you for standing up for what you believe. If I do that, you're absolutely within your rights to tell me I'm wrong."
Teddy nodded slowly, still wary.
"Just so we're clear," Andromeda said, "I'm not wild about the idea of you becoming an Auror, as I'm sure you've noticed. But if that's really what you want to do, we'll just have to manage somehow."
Teddy was quiet, looking thoughtful. Then he said, "Thanks, Gran."
Those two words, more than anything else he could have said, made the threat of tears prickle at Andromeda's eyes, but she blinked them back. For an instant, she wanted to grab Teddy and hug him to her as tightly as she could, but she didn't do that either.
Instead, she said, "I'll leave you to your reading," and settled for squeezing his shoulder as she stood and left the room.
- - - - -
( continue to chapter 13)