Characters: Arthur, Percy
Summary: "So… You mind explaining this one to me?"
Pairings: None
Author's Note: Here is the fourth installment of the 'Prodigal Son' series.
Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter.
Some things never changed, no matter how much time passed or how many life-changing and life-shattering events happened to someone, and alone, staring around the flat his son and daughter-in-law had shared, Arthur Weasley could see that Percy's compulsive tidiness had translated from his childhood in the otherwise decidedly disorderly Burrow to the London flat of his early adulthood. Nothing was out of place.
Percy had shown his father inside to the flat and then left again, walking down the hall at the sort of pace that someone would use trying to get to an important meeting down the hall that they were almost late for. Arthur had stood in the doorway until the tall, lanky young man disappeared into a Muggle elevator. Then, Arthur had retreated inside the flat and shut the door.
Arthur, standing in the small living room and kitchen of Percy's three-room flat, took a few minutes to drink in the sight of the place Percy had been staying since he absconded the Burrow a little over two years ago.
It was… small. Tiny. All in all, not entirely unusual for a London flat, at least not for the sort that two young people relying entirely on their own income come be expected to afford; if anything, Percy had done relatively well for himself.
The flat was bare too, austere in its lack of ornamentation; probably not where the two had been planning to spend the rest of their lives, at that. The walls were a smooth, pale beige (odd, considering how much Percy hated beige, at least so Arthur recalled from his memory of a seven-year-old Percy demanding to be allowed to paint the beige planks of his room blue), and totally unadorned. There were no pictures anywhere. Arthur attributed the lack of magical photos or paintings to the fact that Percy lived in a Muggle apartment complex (and how he managed to fit in successfully was beyond Arthur's comprehension; Penelope had probably helped with that), but even at that, surely he could have kept some Muggle photographs, at least.
Now came the waiting for Percy to come back.
Arthur had no idea what it was that had made Percy insist they return to London where he lived; personally, he wasn't sure he wanted to suspect. Whatever it was, Arthur hopes it was important enough to possibly make them late for meeting Kingsley, and just as possibly risk their lives if wizards from the Ministry came looking for the young Weasley who has decided to start firing curses at every Death Eater he saw during the coup. Knowing Percy, it probably was; he wasn't given to cutting corners without reason.
Arthur stared out the single window at the gray, rain-washed street several floors below. It had stopped raining in London, but the deepening afternoon was gloomily overcast, as if to reflect the mood of so many witches and wizards who had lost either loved ones or their own sense of security. He hoped Percy would be back soon; they couldn't afford to waste any more time here.
Percy didn't disappoint, quietly opening the door to his flat all of two minutes after his father was starting to wonder what was taking him so long. The door was shut with equal quiet; even under duress Percy had never had any great proclivity towards slamming doors.
"Well I was beginning to wonder…" Arthur turned around to face him, and when he laid eyes on Percy his voice trailed off, eyes widening. A moment was taken up by Arthur's wondering whether he should have his glasses cleaned; it had been a while. Then, he shook off that thought, and knew his eyes were not deceiving him.
The elder Weasley fixed his son in a gaze both half-exasperated and bewildered. The younger Weasley met his father's eyes squarely, even a little defiantly, refusing to be even remotely cowed; that slightly stiff look came over Percy's face once more. "So… Would you mind explaining this one to me?"
"I don't see that there's a great deal here that needs to be explained."
Arthur had changed his mind. Kingsley Shacklebolt was just going to have to wait.
-0-
While Percy busied himself in the next room Arthur sat on the couch in the living room, charged with watching that which Percy had brought back to the flat and trying once again to sort out what he was supposed to or wanted to think about the situation he now found himself confronted with. Becoming again involved in Percy's life had just become, if that was even possible, even more complicated than it already was.
Meanwhile, the baby that had regarded him with the wisdom of sleepy eyes when first given into his care had dropped off to deep, peaceful sleep again.
Arthur ran his thumb across the child's downy cheek, smiling slightly, before that smile died off of his face, to remember that the infant's mother was dead and that her father—Arthur hadn't been told if his grandchild was a he or a she; he could only assume gender from the slightly feminine cut of her clothes—was on the verge of joining a currently unlawful organization, to engage in activities that, even though they might eventually secure her safety, could potentially lead to Percy's death. Another war orphan this little one might become, if things went wrong.
More than that, it rankled that he was only finding out about this now; Arthur felt that he could be forgiven if he was just a little indignant over the matter. The little girl was tiny and unformed. She couldn't be more than a few months old, if that; her date of birth couldn't have been that long ago. No matter how estranged Percy was from the rest of his family, Arthur reasoned, there ought to have been some notification from Percy to his parents when his child was born.
But there hadn't been. Was this the price they had all paid then, that when newborn relatives sprang up, they would never be informed and never have a chance to meet them except in extremity? Arthur hadn't thought about this price before; he hadn't really been giving thought to such things when his mind had been full of incredulous anger and feelings of betrayal. He doubted Percy had been either.
It seemed like such a steep price to pay.
Percy emerged from the next room a few minutes later, a yellow bag tucked under one arm ("Baby bag," he explained tersely. His face colored. "Penny chose the color."), and, movements still awkward and jerky from the dull ache in his ribs, sat down on the couch, and held his arms out for his daughter.
As Arthur handed the baby back to Percy (all done carefully of course; their wives had impressed upon them both the need to handle a baby like it was made of glass), he wondered how Molly would react when she found out—because she would find out; now that Arthur himself knew that he had a granddaughter, he couldn't in clear conscience keep the news from his wife. She would either be overjoyed at the prospect of being a grandmother at last or break down crying upon realizing that she was only finding out about this now; possibly a mixture of both. Molly had always been ruled by her emotions, but if she was a little extra on-edge of late, she had very good reason to be.
Arthur's eyes narrowed as he watched Percy slowly shift the infant in the crook of his arms. When eyes fluttered open, all Percy did was murmur for the child to go back to sleep, managing a slight smile. Percy seemed just a little awkward in this role. Arthur could remember that time well; with Bill, he'd always been deathly afraid that he would drop him or hold him the wrong way and hurt him somehow. His confidence had grown in proportion to the number of children he had.
"Percy?" The time for silent observation was over. "How old is she?" Arthur asked gently, trying to start out small and keep himself from anger, even though anger had already died in his throat.
Percy, who had been staring on his sleeping child's face with a bemusement that was starting to melt into renewed grief, seemed to take this inquiry as welcome. "She was born on the fifth of June, so just a little over two months old."
Nodding seemed like the only thing to do in such a situation. "Ah, I see." Arthur took another stare out of the window before returning his attention to his son. "And… Why didn't you say anything?" That question was put to the air far more gently than Arthur had initially thought such a question would be asked.
"The first time I saw any of you afterwards was at Dumbledore's funeral." Percy wasn't meeting his eyes now. "It didn't seem an appropriate topic to bring up at a funeral. I hadn't seen any of you since then; I assumed that informing you via an owl wasn't appropriate either."
Arthur found himself biting back his irritation at this, in his view, utterly inadequate explanation. No, one didn't usually speak of such things at funerals, but a birth was more important than a death and even if Percy was relying on his sense of propriety to see him through he ought to have been able to overcome that overly rigid sense of decorum he had gotten from God knew where and told his parents that they were new grandparents. And, in all honesty, including such a thing in a letter was probably alright if there were no other means of saying so. And there had been; Percy could have just come up to him at work or stopped by the Burrow to say something. It still wasn't quite clicking with him how intolerable an option that was for Percy.
"You know, when Penny told me back last October that she was expecting, I really…" Percy swallowed hard, and quirked another smile that made Arthur sick to his stomach at the sight of it "…I really wasn't thinking that I'd be finding myself in… this position," he spat out with extreme difficulty.
Before Arthur could say anything, Percy seemed to get a hold on himself and straightened a bit, looking Arthur in the eyes again. "Penny had agreed to take her to Canada with the others on the portkey. What am I supposed to do?" A note of unwilling fear entered his voice. "What am I supposed to do now? I can't just take her with me."
The solution was so simple that Arthur was amazed that Percy hadn't thought of it—or maybe he just hadn't been willing to field such a solution. He clapped Percy's shoulder and smiled slightly. "Your mother, I think, will be happy to take her," Arthur asserted firmly. "Molly will know exactly what to do; if anything I think she'll be happy to have a new baby to look after to take her mind off things."
If Percy found anything wrong with this proposition, he apparently couldn't find any reason why he should say no.
It occurred to Arthur that he hadn't bothered to ask what Percy had named his daughter. I really must be getting absent-minded, he mused to himself.
Ah well. That didn't matter, considering it was a sure thing that Molly would ask Percy this among several other questions when they saw her.
Hope you all enjoyed it; this one was a little short. Next up is the long road home.