Author's Note: Enjoy!

Disclaimer: The following characters belong to J.K. Rowling, and this story derives from her original works, storylines, and world. Please do not sue me, I can barely pay tuition.

Warnings: NA

Stacked with: MC4A; Not Commonwealth; Shipping War; Hogwarts

Individual Challenge(s): Cracked Facade; Cuppa; Gryffindor MC; Summer Vacation; Seeds; Golden Times; Old Shoes; Themes & Things A (Reflection); Themes & Things B (Protection); Ethnic & Present; Rian-Russo Inversion (Y); Flags & Ribbons; In a Flash; Yellow Ribbon; Yellow Ribbon Redux

Representation(s): Muggleborn Dean Thomas

Bonus challenge(s): Second Verse (White Dress); Chorus (A Long Dog); Demo (White Dress; Ladylike; Spinning Plates; Civil Disobedience; Sweetest Burn; Surprise!; Soul-like; Hot Stuff)

Tertiary bonus challenge: NA

Word Count: 1725

Shipping Wars

Ship (Team): Dean Thomas/Seamus Finnegan (Boom Boys)

List (Prompt): Summer Micro 1 (Running/Jogging)

Hogwarts Submitting Info

House: Ravenclaw

Assignment: Assignment #1, Ancient Studies Task #3 Teamwork, Write about a Muggle and a wizard working together.

Trying to do Enough

Coming together is a beginning; keeping together is progress; working together is success.

-Edward Everett Hale

Seamus pushed the door open and stepped inside the coffee shop that he'd been invited to—a well-lit shop with round tables, metal chairs, and local art framed and hung on the wall. A big chalkboard hung over the counter, advertising prices and showcasing a thousand different ways to brew a cup of coffee. He saw Mrs. Thomas standing in line just as she saw him, and she waved him over. Seamus gulped and went to join her.

Mrs. Thomas was a Muggle lawyer and she looked like one in the blazer, skirt and functional heels that she was wearing. She had a big black purse slung over her shoulder and her hair fell in what must have been hundreds of tiny braids.

"Hello Seamus," she said. They got to the front of the line just then. "Good day. Could I get a double Americano, please, and I'll pay for whatever he'll have as well."

Seamus mumbled a thank you and also wished that he'd known that before spending all that time at a Muggle bank trying to get the right bills and coins out. Oh well.

"Just a vanilla latte, please," he said, hoping that the price difference wasn't too steep but also struggling to read the board. Mrs. Thomas seemed okay with it and they went to wait to the side, retrieved their orders, and found a booth in the back, in a quieter part of the shop.

Mrs. Thomas was polite and asked Seamus how his school year had been, like a total mom. Seamus lied and said it had gone alright even if it pretty much couldn't have been worse, what with…

"I know it didn't end well," Mrs. Thomas said.

"How much has Dean told you?" Seamus asked carefully, not wanting to overstep.

"Smart boy," Mrs. Thomas said, taking a drink. "He's said virtually nothing, but we received a letter from the Deputy Headmistress—that McGonagall woman who brought us to Diagon Alley for the first time—telling us that the headmaster had been killed."

Seamus nodded, chewing his lip. When he didn't add anything, Mrs. Thomas told him what she'd obviously come here to address.

"Dean is gone," Mrs. Thomas said.

Seamus sighed. "I… I thought that might be why you wanted to talk to me."

When Dean's owl, Riley, had appeared at Seamus' window, she'd seemed most unhappy with how the letter had been tied to her talons—loosely, clumsily… Seamus had suspected that Mrs. Thomas had done it herself. Why wouldn't have Dean interfered in his owl's favour if he'd been around?

"I don't understand," Mrs. Thomas said. Then, for the first time since he'd known her, Mrs. Thomas crumbled a bit. She pinched the bridge of her nose and took a deep, deep breath, shaking her head slightly.

"I raised Dean on my own for so, so long," she said. "When his father died, I didn't know how I would do it, but I graduated from law school with that baby propped onto my hip. During my internship, I would pick him up from my mother's and he would sleep in the office while I did paperwork after hours. I really thought I could do everything for him. But this wizard world… it's above my head, but it's part of him. Just like you are."

Seamus didn't know what to say to that. He knew Mrs. Thomas didn't like him—she'd always been decent to him, but she was colder to him. It was like he got the slightly lizard-like lawyer and never Dean's mom. But Dean had never been shy about holding hands during their summer visits, and the Thomas' open door policy had always felt more well-meaning than defensive, so he'd always wondered what it was. Maybe it had been the magic after all.

"I can't speak for Dean," Seamus said. "But knowing him, he probably didn't tell you because he wouldn't have wanted to worry you."

"That's his type," Mrs. Thomas said. "But I'm his mother, so I need to know what to do right now—how to protect him…"

"Right… Look, I can try to explain… It's complicated. It's a war, ma'am," Seamus sighed, his stomach tightening. "There's this guy, we don't say his name—we just call him You-Know-Who…"

He explained as best as he could, often having to go back and elaborate on some point before continuing his story and feeling very clumsy as he did. At some point, Mrs. Thomas took out a pad of yellow paper and started taking notes.

When he finished, Mrs. Thomas stared at her notes.

"This is… this is far worse than what Dean had notified me—or even what that letter from the school said," she said.

"It's really bad," Seamus said. "And Muggleborns—I mean, wizards from Muggle families… they were obviously going to be targeted."

"Did you know that Dean was going to run away?" Mrs. Thomas asked.

"I had a vague idea," Seamus admitted. "This is earlier than he expected. He wanted to at least see who was going to manage the school next year, because McGonagall might have been scary enough to pull this off and keep everyone safe. He must have heard something. I don't know."

Seamus' stomach churned at the thought. They had said their goodbyes already a thousand little times—at King's Cross, in the few letters they'd exchanged that summer, when Dean had Apparated to Cork in the middle of the night with little to say but… best not to think too much about that night with his mother-in-law across the table from him.

"What do I do to keep him safe?" Mrs. Thomas asked. "What do I do to help?"

Seamus hesitated, but ultimately decided to answer.

"They've just announced a new law today that'll force everyone to go to Hogwarts if you're on the school rolls. If Dean's not there, and tons of Muggleborns won't be, they'll come looking for him."

"Oh God," Mrs. Thomas said.

"Tell them that Dean left," Seamus said. "Tell them… tell them that you had a fight and he vanished, make them believe that he has no reason to come back and that you don't want him to."

Mrs. Thomas blinked and Seamus saw her lips trembling, but she jotted down a note for herself.

"Don't move; that'll be seen as an admission of guilt, and they'll send their worse after you," Seamus said. "Get rid of the things he left behind, as if you really don't want him around anymore. If you have family photos with him in it, don't… don't hang them up. If people who say they're from the school or the Ministry want to come inside, let them. Don't get in their way, talk to them as little as possible. Don't let them anywhere near the girls, either."

"Right," Mrs. Thomas said. "And what if Dean comes back?"

"He won't," Seamus said. "I really don't think he would. But if he does, you need to tell him to leave because you will probably all be under surveillance."

"Under surveillance? How?" Mrs. Thomas frowned.

"I don't know, Mrs. Thomas, this is just how You-Know-Who operates," Seamus said.

"Okay, okay," she said jotting down another note for herself.

Mrs. Thomas shook her head and leaned back in her seat, looking exhausted.

That's when Seamus decided he would do it: he reached into his pocket and pulled out the DA Galleons he had brought along—one was his, and one was Dean's. He had left it on Seamus' nightstand last time they'd seen each other, saying that he'd absolutely be tempted to use it if he held onto it. Seamus thought there was some kind of justice in it going back home with his mother.

"These are… well, Dean said they worked like Muggle pagers when we first got them for a—umm, a club," Seamus said. "You don't need to know magic to use them. Dean and I messed with ours a little bit when we started being in different classes—basically if you squeeze this one, this one will get warm. Try it."

Mrs. Thomas reached across the table suspiciously, handling the magical item as if it may burn, and squeezed it. Seamus' coin, resting on the table between them, glowed as it became warm.

"My goodness," Mrs. Thomas said. "How does that work?"

"Do you want me to explain the charmwork to you?" Seamus hesitated.

"I—Heavens, no," she said, shaking her head. "Why are you giving me this?"

"I want you to keep me updated, so that I know that you're okay," Seamus said. "At least once a week, send me a pulse so that I know your family's safe. If I hear any news that Dean is safe and… well, alive… I'll send two pulses. And if something happens on your end, squeeze it three times and I'll… I'll find a way to get a message out to you, or to send help."

Mrs. Thomas nodded.

"I don't know how to thank you for this," Mrs. Thomas said, tucking the coin into the breast pocket of her blazer.

"Don't, it's… it's nothing," Seamus said.

"Right," Mrs. Thomas said. "And this is the most that we can do to help Dean, then?"

"Yes," Seamus admitted.

"There's no other way to protect him?"

"No."

"This doesn't feel like enough," Mrs. Thomas said.

"I know," Seamus said. He swallowed, hard. "Believe me, I know… But it has to be."

"Right," Mrs. Thomas said, picking up her pen to write down their new code.

When she flipped the page of her notepad, the yellow page had been taken over by a dragon doodled in blue ballpoint pen, surrounded by a backdrop of flowers and Northern lights. Seamus knew instantly who had drawn it and why—because Dean had left surprise doodles all over his rolls of parchment and textbooks too.

Mrs. Thomas took a deep, deep breath. It occurred to Seamus that if they were to live in the kind of world where intentions mattered, Dean would be as protected as he could possibly be. And it also occurred to Seamus that maybe this, maybe reaching out to the family he'd left behind, was enough to help Dean survive this.

Seamus reached across the table, offering his hand. Mrs. Thomas took it and squeezed once.