At 75, Zach still puts gel in his hair every day. He’s not as young as he once was, and his knees are getting worse, but he still has style.
Joe used to say that Zach set the bar for masculine grooming. He even let Zach wax his eyebrows once, but that ended badly. Joe’s been gone almost 10 years now, and Zach’s so afraid he’ll forget the sound of his brother’s voice.
When he was 62, Zach beat prostate cancer. Nothing fuels a body like vengeance, and Zach had plenty of it. Then again, nothing was going to bring Chris back.
I will never forgive them for cutting out this scene.
Tumblr app doesn’t show this gif set but I already know what it is. No need to hesitate to reblog.
And he did this just before a road trip, stuck in the car with his parents asking what he was thinking.
The look of utter defiance Dudley gives Vernon as he steps over the fence though
And how he does it really slowly as well as if to say “What you gonna do about it huh?”
The phone rings. It was an absurd wedding gift from his father in-law, and one which much to Harry’s surprise, had actually worked when he’d plugged it into the landline. Arthur had taken to phoning him on it, just for the pure novelty of the thing—though how they’d managed to get a BT engineer out to the Burrow without causing an incident, Harry doesn’t know. He’s not sure he wants to.
“Hello?”
“Uhm,, is this…is this the Potter residence?”
There’s a beat of silence as Harry adjusts the receiver against his ear, not quite sure he’s heard who he thinks he has. “…Dudley?”
“Yea…uhm, Harry?”
“Dudley.” Harry repeats numbly, turning to look at Ginny who is looking at him expectantly, eyebrows raised. “Uh…Christ, Dudley, hi how did…how did you find this number?”
There’s another beat of silence and the crackle of static that might have been a sigh or simply just the line breaking up. “Hi, sorry I know you probably…sorry this was stupid. I uh, I put your name in the computer and this was the only thing that came up.”
“Oh.” Harry breathes, still trying to recover his equilibrium. Ten minutes ago he’d been using his wand to clear away dinner, he’d been getting ready to sit down and read through some reports before putting the kids to bed, and now somehow, he’s talking to his muggle cousin who he hasn’t seen since… “How, how are you?”
“Good, yea” Dudley replies, seeming to rally, “You?”
“Yea, uh, doing well…”
The conversation lasts maybe a half hour, faltering and awkward. But they’re going for a coffee at the end of the week and Harry supposes…that’s…that’s a thing that is happening.
*
“Harry…”
Harry turns and looks up, and looks up some more at the looming figure blocking out the light.
“Dudley,” he says, standing up and hoping the pang of something awful doesn’t show on his face. For a moment he thought he’d been looking at Vernon. “It’s good to see you.”
Dudley gives him a look that says he clearly knows Harry is lying, but is thankful for being humored. “You too, you’re looking good…”
They pass the first few minutes with awkward pleasantries and even more awkward silences. But it’s…nice would be too strong a word, but it’s not bad either. He even manages to get a smile out of him when he calls him Big D, the other man shaking his head with a self depreciating eye roll.
“Dad died,” Dudley says after a while, and Harry feels an icy hot flash go down his spine, curdling in his gut.
“Oh,” he says, not quite sure how he’s supposed to feel about that, “I’m sorry to hear that.”
Dudley snorts into his coffee. “Somehow I doubt it.” and it’s not accusing, but Harry still can’t help but feel like he should defend himself. The words they locked me in a cupboard are on the cusp of his tongue but Dudley gets there before him. “There’s a lot of things…looking back…lot of things…” and it’s not an apology, not really. “Took me a long time to realize certain things weren’t right…too long.”
Harry nods at that, because yes, it had also taken him a long time too to understand the full of extent of what had gone on in 4 Privet Drive. He still doesn’t like tight spaces.
“You realize things though, when you have kids,” Dudley carries on, shaking his head, “Like they’re just kids, how can you do that to a kid? They need you for everything.”
And Harry can relate to that too. Lily is three and Ginny is pregnant again and James already has an alarming alacrity for finding trouble and with or without magic Harry doesn’t have enough hands to deal with it all. But he loves it, and he loves them, and the thought of anyone ever treating his children the way he remembers his first eleven years of life is enough to make the electric lights over their head flicker.
“You’ve got kids?”
“Two,” Harry says, “third one on the way. You?”
“Nice. Just the one, so far.” He hands over his phone, the image of a bright young girl with dark skin and tight ringlet curls staring back at him from the grasp of Dudley’s arms. “Effie.” He smiles ruefully at Harry’s obvious surprise. “Dad wasn’t too happy about that either.”
“She’s gorgeous.” Harry says, handing the phone back and pulling out his own wallet to reveal the moving pictures inside.
Dudley flinches a bit at that, but he guffaws broadly when he spies James. “Cor, he don’t half look like you. No glasses though.”
“No,” Harry says, pushing his own glasses back up his nose. “He’s got his mother’s eyes, thankfully.”
“Actually, Harry, there was something I was hoping we could…talk about.”
And ah, there it is. “What about?”
“It’s…it’s about Effie…”
And when he’s done talking Harry just wants to lean back and laugh and laugh and laugh, because of course Vernon Dudley’s granddaughter is a witch, of course she is. But he doesn’t, because Dudley is doing the one thing he can think of to try and help his child, and Harry can’t fault him for that.
*
They keep in touch after that. Christmas cards, postcards—gifts for the kids on birthdays. The year Effie turns eleven—the same as James—Harry drops a casually long thought out text into the familial void.
“Diagon A this weekend, if you’re up for it?”
The text comes back quickly, a little too quickly for the way Dudders pecks at his phone whenever Harry has seen him typing. “Snds gd, 1st pint on u 😉 – Big D 🍺🍺🍺👌👍”
It’ll be painfully awkward, it always is. But it’s something.
I’ll be in the corner crying brb
@thebibliosphere This is very, very nice. How long had you been thinking of it, before you started actually writing it?
@sighinastorm Uhm…about ten minutes? I mean Ive had HP headcanons for years but that particular idea struck while I was scrolling on mobile and I liked it enough to start tapping it out. (Give me time to procrastinate or linger on an idea and it’ll die, let me follow a thought and you’ve got a story) It was also my first piece of hp fanfic so yea, glad people enjoyed it 🙂
Because R2-D2 is so iconic as Luke’s Droid™, and even in Clone Wars and RotS as Anakin’s Droid™ that I think it’s easy to forget that Artoo is Padmé’s.
I mean the little guy was cheeky and confident and saving his mistress’ life before she even met him. And that’s not to say he doesn’t bond with Anakin right away in Phantom Menace, but the thing is he stays with Padmé
for the next…ten years? Eight years at absolute minimum.
And the thing is Artoo was assigned to the royal cruiser, almost certainly property of the Crown–by rights, Jamillia should own him by this point. And yet there he is with Senator Amidala. Did he just decide to stay with her and no one questioned it? Did she buy him? Was he a gift? No matter how it happened, by the time they run into Anakin again Artoo and Padmé are almost literally inseparable.
Artoo stays with her when she’s posing as a fighter pilot. Artoo–an astromech droid, not a specialized security unit–is the one who guards her while she sleeps.
Artoo accompanies her when she’s undercover, for no apparent reason. Why do you need an R2 unit at Varykino? What possible benefit could he be? If anything he draws unwanted attention. He’s there because Padmé
wants him there. (And, I suspect, because he refused to stay behind.)
Artoo saves her life. Artoo is at her wedding. Artoo takes care of her husband for her (and yes, despite shipping Padmé with Sabé with the passion of a thousand suns, I think it’s adorable that she and Anakin assign their respective most trusted droids to take care of each other.) Artoo is there for the birth of her children. Artoo watches herdie. And Artoo spends Leia’s entire life as the only person in the universe who knows everything. And he has to carry that knowledge by himself, because Threepio doesn’t remember. And yet over the decade-and-then-some between series, he manages to keep them together. Because they’re married Artoo is Padmé’s, and Threepio is Anakin’s, and they’re supposed to do this together.
Fast forward to ANH and we find Artoo exactly where he’s always been, protecting his mistress. He takes care of the Skywalker kids exactly as fiercely as he ever took care of their mother. (”I found her! She’s here, she’s here, she’s here!” ”Do you think he likes me?”)
He crossed half the galaxy to find Leia, who wasn’t even his owner; because she was Padmé‘s daughter and he had a duty to fulfill. And just as an added bonus he found Luke, too.
And he never once leaves them.
And the fact is it all started because Padmé’s best friend wanted to play a trick on her.
It’s hot in San Diego. When the plane touches down and everyone steps off, Chris can feel the humidity seeping into his skin. It’s not unpleasant, he’s always loved the California heat, but tonight his skin feels stretched too tight and his head aches. When he turns his head to the side he sees Zach over Sofia’s head and he gives him a small, private smile. He has to look away. It’s only been a little over a week, but Sydney feels light years away and so do the lingering touches and the lighthearted laughs shared over a glass of wine on a soft hotel bed.
It’s not like Chris hasn’t had to deal with Miles in the past, but it feels different this time. It feels a lot harder to have to keep his distance. He intends to keep his promise though. He’d allow Zach the space he needed to sort out whatever his relationship with Miles had deteriorated to. It was hanging on by a thread, but a part of Chris was terrified that this was a thread that wasn’t going to break.
Next to him Sofia touches her forehead to Chris’ shoulder and reaches down to take his hand in hers. He appreciates the touch, pressing his lips to the top of her head for a quick kiss and then he lets her lead the way, guiding him through the crowd of people until he can detach from her and work his way over to Karl and John. They provide steady shoulders for him to lean on and he manages to have fun and forget for just a little while that he can’t reach out for Zach the way he’s grown accustomed to.
They lock eyes a few times. It’s unavoidable when they’re constantly seeking each other out. Each time he has to tear his gaze away, it’s like tunnel vision and he almost forgets himself every time it happens. The last time it happens Miles is sliding over and wrapping an arm around Zach and Chris has to excuse himself, locking himself away in the bathroom and pressing his forehead to the mirror in an attempt to steady himself. It’s never been this hard before and part of him wants to throw the towel in and call it a night. They would all understand if he said he couldn’t be there.
The door to the bathroom opens and Chris stands up, trying to straighten up and pull himself together, but when he looks up in the mirror it’s Zach standing there. Whatever mask he’s been wearing slips and he looks about as miserable as Chris feels.
Zach steps forward, taking each step slowly until he’s standing in front of Chris. He reaches down and laces their fingers together, head dropping just a little bit to press his forehead against Chris’. Neither of them say anything at first and Chris breathes in deeply watching the way that Zach’s chest rises and falls with each breath.
“Are you okay?” Zach asks him, squeezing his fingers and tipping his head up just enough that their noses brush.
“I don’t think I can do this” Chris tells him honestly, “I wasn’t ready for it to be this bad”
He hates that his voice shakes when he exhales and Zach moves his hands from Chris’ up to pull him in a tight embrace. So tight it makes it hard to breathe, but Chris doesn’t ever want him to let go.
“You can’t give up now” Zach tells him, trying to go for something teasing and light hearted, but he ends up sounding vulnerable and scared.
Chris can’t have him sounding like that. “I know, I know. You said you needed time and I’m willing to wait. Just…. Before we go back out there-”
He doesn’t have to finish that sentence, Zach touches his index fingers to Chris’ chin and lifts his head, pressing their lips together and silently promising him that this isn’t the last time.
Ato's Fandom Blog 