Looking aHead Girl

Ronald Weasley's presence is required in my office. Immediately.

Mr Weasley, if you see this, please come directly.

The rest of you, see to it that he receives this message without delay.

For your information: I've sent for the elves to set the common room to rights.

If you have belongings strewn about and don't wish them to be vanished, you'll move them immediately. Put them away, for Holda's sake!

Peakes, Bones, Mackrell, Chadwick: if you want these comics, you'll collect them asap. Otherwise, they're for the rubbish bin.

Antosha, do you have time this morning that we could speak? I have the fourth years at 11, but am making rounds until then. I was rousted from my workroom by one of the first-years, upset and thought I should keep an eye on the castle.

It's that... they're all whispering about it, and everyone's on edge.

Should I forbid them their journals? Or... I'm really not sure. But I don't like the way some of them are looking at me. At us. I just avoided the staff lounge because Professor Glozeman was there, and I don't wa know quite what I'd say if he starts on this.

Only, I'd like to have spoken with you first.

I know you wanted to wait a bit longer before telling our families. Only, it really was the right time to share it, with Abuelita looking so well. It made her very, very happy. You can't deny that, at least.

But I shouldn't have taken your head off, so I'm sorry.

I'm not sure about next weekend. We'll have to see. I do really have to make enormous progress between now and the end of term, and that includes submitting at least two more papers. I can't afford to have Antosha thinking that I'm not serious about my work. Or that I mean to give any of it up when- after.

I'm counting on your assuring Papa and Mama that it's what you want, as well. When they ask you. You know they will do.

Have woken Gryff contingent. HM put out over being excluded.

Five minutes. Yr office.

The analysis I was running when we talked last? It's finally come out positive! And I've re-checked the results by two alternate methods. Solid, definite, positive results!

Finally. You know, I'd begun to think it was never going to happen.

Sorry. The point, of course, is that now I can write it up, and I've managed a start this weekend. Would you be willing to read a draft when I've got something reasonably complete? I really want to get another piece or two accepted this spring, so Tosha knows his confidence in me was well placed.

I think we're nearly ready for tomorrow. Ned will be with the Council, I'll be in the Hogwarts contingent, of course, as Head of Gryffindor. (I know, I know.)

You must be regretting that you allowed yourself to be drawn onto that schools supervisory. Surely that doesn't mean you'll have to march along with platoons of children and their dreary teachers? (Can you believe what a bore Johns has turned out? She was at Melton's yesterday, paying an installment on something or other, and we'd scarcely anything to say to one another. She's not wearing a ring any longer, so that grocer she was seeing must have dropped her.)

Speaking of which... yours is gorgeous! Ned says the stone was in Fleischer's family? Nice! Who did the setting for you?

I'll have to show you the sparkles I got for Christmas--when we go to the powder room. Not for public view, if you take my meaning, and charmed for... well.

Anyway, we'll see you at Ganymede's. We're dining first at Monteith, and a good thing we got the table reserved early. Did you hear? There's a bit of a catering crisis tonight for the gala--Orion said he got a call yesterday from Philippa Spinx, wanting to know if Harrods couldn't supply game for tonight. As if he could conjure hundreds of pounds of venison, coney, and pheasant out of thin air. It's what they get for relying on the Savoy, of course, and Orion had to tell her that all his best fare's committed for Our Lord's feast tomorrow. Still, I think he was able to help her with a fish course and some sweets, but she was scrambling for a new menu. You weren't planning on eating there, were you?

If you get to GB's first, wait for us; we can put in a reasonable appearance there, and then take a carriage together to Horse Guards.

See you in a bit!

So Friday? You did tell Baddock you won't be available to be called in until Saturday afternoon at least. And, honestly, do you really still need to be running in there at all hours? I don't see why it should be either of you having to cover a graveyard shift. That's what you've got hirelings for, isn't it?

Anyway, Friday. I've got us booked for a carriage ride in Richmond. Just the two of us and warm lap robes and foot-warming charms and a carafe of spiked chocolate.

And we'll have supper in Twickenham at the Partridge and Pear. They're roasting suckling pig, and you know what everyone says about their pastries. So. How's that for romantic? You're in charge of brunch for the morning. I want to sleep in and be completely indolent. Won't that be lovely?

So, what I was telling you about Friday?

Gah. I hate to go on and on at you about it, but I have to tell someone, and, you know, it's just not the sort of thing- well, you understand. With everything still uncertain.

Yesterday was... so intense. I mean, he wants this so much. It's irresistible, really. How can I not want it, too?

And once you start thinking about it seriously, well. The idea? Of having a child you've made, who'll be part of you, so much like yourself, but mingled together with parts of him? That's...

And then to think which parts of him... his eyes? or that nose? I'm really a bit daft about his nose. And the way his lip curls. Seriously. On the left side.

He's completely mad about it. And it's putting a keen edge on everything between us. Being together has always been delicious, but now every minute is dear, and we don't waste any of the time we have. Yesterday, he was absolutely shimmering with desire when I got there. Glowing. I suppose it sounds like I'm exaggerating, but I don't know how else to describe it.

And I just-- I told him yes. I told him I'd work it out somehow, and I will. The Mastery, the department, all of it.

And then--there are spells, you know, to encourage fertility? Let me tell you: you've never felt anything like it. I never had. And you know we've tried some adventurous things! I still feel like I'm throbbing with the energy of it, buzzing with the magic. And I'm completely over the moon about the whole idea, where even on Thursday, I thought I might say no.

But now I've gone and said yes. I'm pinching myself, but I'm awake and it's real and I said it.

And what I really want to know is when can we try again? How soon?

Ha. I've no idea how I'm going to concentrate on lessons tomorrow! Can you imagine?

Thank you for coming up here tonight to hear Cuthbert. (He was much more engaging than I expected. I know, don't start, I'm not likely to ever care passionately about the fine points of broom design. Or Quidditch. Yes, yes. Puddlemere are brilliant, I'm sure, and I'll let you tell me all about them next time we go for a match.)

The point is, it meant a lot to me that you came because it's a way we can support Antosha. This has been a simply brutal week for him between the situation here in the school and all the external pressures--the letters from parents--and Other Things. And he's pulled so many different directions. He's teaching, and overseeing me, and then there are all the duties of Headmaster. He's got a string of projects for Our Lord that I know almost nothing about, except that they take him away from the school at least once a week, sometimes more than that, and demand extensive correspondence sometimes, not to mention the ink, sweat and wand oil of research.

But this business with the students- he's not accustomed to having them resist his authority, and he's certainly done nothing to earn this rebelliousness. As a teacher and as headmaster, he's nothing short of inspiring. Genial and brilliant at the same time. He spurs his pupils with playful, creative lessons that charm them into learning. He conjures the spark of thought even in the most hopeless dullards.

Oh, Ned. It's so unfair. And after the bus necessary business of Halloween, after we'd all stood witness to Our Lord's justice. What in Merlin's name could these students have been thinking? How could they possibly repay Antosha's care of them with- it was so far beyond foolishness, I can't even think what to call it. Except what it was. Treason. And they put him at risk with it! And kept at it. Defiant in the face of all appeals.

He did the only, only thing he could possibly have done that could protect them from the stark consequences they'd have faced. We would all have faced. (I can't even digest that. To be at the mercy of adolescent idiots! And, of course, that's exactly the straits we're in.) So, yes, of course he used a blunt measure to get the little beasts' attention. And, naturally, they'll whinge to their families and inflate even the gentlest corrections, so honestly if he'd rapped their knuckles, they'd have wailed about being Cruciated. No reason not to issue the punishment they'll claim to have faced; on the contrary, he'd the best reasons to use it. They're absolutely impervious to anything more subtle, and it's absolutely necessary that they stop. Nothing else will save their foolish skins.

But you can't know how much it cost him to do it. He hated it.

And I'm appalled that Honoria- I can't ever apologise enough to repair the damage she's done. For my own sister to have been among the traitors, to have shown him such disrespect, when he's been so entirely generous to me?


It's horrible. All of it.

So, thank you, really, for making time to come. Thank you for understanding why we needed you here. I know you had to rearrange your schedule, but it meant a great deal. He deserves our support, especially just now.