The train back to London was different this year.
Not noisier or more subdued exactly — just different. There was a quality to the compartments that hadn't been there before. People leaned together in small groups and talked quietly. Some of the older students sat with their faces turned toward the window and didn't talk at all.
The Tournament was over. Voldemort was back. Fudge was calling it a lie.
The world outside those windows was not the world they'd boarded in September.
Sirius rode with them this time. He seemed to take up more space than his frame required — all restless energy and sharp edges — but he sat reasonably still and pressed two scraps of paper into Kevin's and Hermione's hands near the outskirts of London.
Kevin read the address: 12 Grimmauld Place.
The paper burned itself out between his fingers, leaving no ash.
Sirius explained the Fidelius Charm — Dumbledore as Secret Keeper this time, which Sirius said with the particular tone of a man who had learned a very expensive lesson about the alternative. Only someone who'd been told the address could perceive it. The charm was airtight.
They'd come to the Order a month into the holidays. Kevin and Hermione would tell the Grangers it was a school club — an after-hours group that met over break to prepare for next year.
Harry pointed out, once, that Draco had been to Kevin's house. Kevin explained he'd adjusted the relevant memories. Harry let it go.
They said their goodbyes at the barrier at King's Cross — Ron heading north to the Burrow, Harry heading to Grimmauld Place with Sirius, the twins vanishing with some scheme half-formed already on their faces.
Kevin and Hermione walked out together into the muggle afternoon.
The Grangers were waiting by the car. Mr. Granger had his arms crossed. Mrs. Granger had her hand up to shade her eyes, scanning the crowd.
She found them.
Then she stopped. Because her daughter — who had been coming home from school since she was eleven, who always burst through the barrier first and sprinted straight to her parents — was walking at an ordinary pace. Shoulder-to-shoulder with Kevin. Their fingers woven together, held tight.
Not the casual grip of two people navigating a crowd.
"Mum. Dad." Hermione's voice was pink at the edges. "We're back."
Mrs. Granger's expression underwent several rapid transformations before settling somewhere warm and sparkling and entirely knowing.
Kevin cleared his throat. "Uncle— that is, Mr. Granger — Hermione and I, our relationship has, um—"
He stopped. There was no graceful way to finish the sentence. They'd lived next door to each other for two years. They'd spent most of three Hogwarts years effectively inseparable. The category they were currently upgrading to felt both momentous and absurdly overdue.
Hermione stared at the pavement and said nothing, which was uncharacteristic.
Mrs. Granger pulled them both into a hug. She held on long enough to make the point without requiring anyone to make a speech.
"You're family already, Kevin," she said simply, into the top of his head. "You have been for a while."
He exhaled. His shoulders dropped about two inches.
"No he isn't! Not yet!" Mr. Granger appeared from behind his wife with the expression of a man who had been carefully setting up this objection for some time. "He hasn't proposed, he hasn't asked permission, he's still 'Uncle' until there's a ring and a ceremony and—"
Mrs. Granger's hand found her husband's ear.
"If you can't be decent," she said cheerfully, "you can be quiet. Kevin, you call me Mum from now on. And him—" she indicated her husband with a serene nod— "he's Uncle."
She took Kevin and Hermione by the arm and walked them toward the car, leaving Mr. Granger alone on the pavement.
He stood there a moment, looking at the space where his family had been.
When did I become the outsider?
Mrs. Granger disappeared upstairs with Hermione almost immediately after they got home, trailing some very specific questions about the timeline of events Kevin wasn't privy to.
Kevin sat in the living room with Mr. Granger.
The silence lasted approximately forty seconds before it became actively painful.
He's not threatening enough to duel. He's not friendly enough to chat casually with. He's Hermione's father who just watched me announce that his daughter and I are official, and now I have to sit here until rescued.
"Kevin. Get me some water."
Mr. Granger delivered this as though it were a command from on high.
Kevin flicked his hand. The kettle floated over from the kitchen, filled a glass from the tap, and set it down beside Mr. Granger's chair in one smooth motion.
"..."
"This water is cold."
Kevin flicked his hand again. The glass warmed to perfect drinking temperature.
Mr. Granger looked at the glass. He looked at Kevin.
Maybe I'll just wish for her happiness and call it done, he thought, with the profound resignation of a man who has understood that he cannot win.
He drank the water.
They sat in silence until Hermione and Mrs. Granger came back downstairs, found them in their respective chairs staring at the wall, and burst into simultaneous laughter.
Hermione dropped onto the sofa next to Kevin. She eyed her father.
"You're not giving him trouble, are you, Dad?"
Kevin nodded with solemn conviction.
Mr. Granger opened his mouth. Mrs. Granger's hand appeared on his ear with the efficiency of long practice, and he was towed upstairs before he could form a rebuttal.
"You believe him just because he nods?!" came the fading protest from the landing.
Kevin and Hermione looked at each other and laughed until the sound of it filled the whole house.
"He might get you back for that," Hermione warned.
"Mum'll protect me next time."
The blush that crossed Hermione's face at Mum was immediate and thorough.
Kevin's grin widened. "What did you two talk about up there? You've been pink since you came downstairs."
"Secret."
"That's not reassuring."
"It wasn't meant to be." She pinched his waist. Hard.
Kevin winced.
Upstairs, the quiet argument of a long and comfortable marriage continued. Downstairs, two teenagers sat close together in the evening light and did not say anything for a while, because sometimes that was enough.
---
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