Interview With An Umpire

Interview With an Umpire

"You're who?"

"Roberta Skeeter. And I'd like to interview you."

Ginerva Weasley Potter shifted the baby in her arms and looked at the pretty, fresh-faced girl in disbelief. "Don't you mean my husband?" She stared at the young woman who was standing on her front porch with a pad of paper and a Quick-Quotes Quill in one hand.

The girl shook her head, causing her dirty-blonde hair on both sides of her face to wave back and forth. "No, I want to talk to you. Everyone knows Harry Potter, Minister of Magic. Your husband is quoted everyday in an article somewhere. But hardly anyone has ever talked much to you. I'd like to change that." She bounced a bit on her feet, causing Ginny to notice that the girl was wearing Fleet-Foot Sneakers ("Guaranteed to get a witch to her destination in ten steps or less"). To pursue stories, no doubt.

"I'm hardly dressed for the occasion," Ginny said self-deprecatingly. "Percival," she said, nodding at the baby asleep on her shoulder, "has been fussing most of the day." She glanced at the dressing gown she still wore, and rolled her eyes at her untidy hair, and tried not to think about her plump body. "I'm hardly in a condition to receive company."

"I'm willing to wait," Roberta said, trying her best to look humble. "But I've got a deadline tonight, and you never returned any of my owls, so I thought I'd just come and ask you directly."

Ginny flushed. "The children keep me so busy, I'm afraid I haven't paid any attention to the posts. The house-elves collect them and bring them to me when I'm not minding the family, which isn't often."

"If it helps, I know what you mean. I was raised in a family of six."

The two women shared a moment, which didn't last long.

"Wait a minute!" Ginny said, her voice sharp with suspicion. "Skeeter! Are you related to--" and the girl held up a hand, as though stopping traffic.

"She's my auntie, and I don't like her anymore than you do. If anything, I hate her more than you do."

"I don't think that's possible," Ginny said, her eyes flat.

"Mrs. Potter, she's only pursued you and your family; I've had to live with her!" The girl reached into her purse and pulled out a piece of parchment. "This is a testament to the honesty of my mission. I think you'll recognize the language alone, but the signature should convince you that you can trust me." She waited patiently while Ginny read the note, and then felt herself relax when she other woman broke into an honest smile.

"Any friend of Luna Lovegood's is a friend of mine! Come in, please."

Dobby the house-elf shut the door behind the two women, then apparated to the kitchen.

Roberta Skeeter followed Mrs. Potter into a high-ceilinged living room, and sank gratefully into plush sofa. She glanced around at the mahogany walls, crowded with pictures of the extensive Potter and Weasley families, along with the plaques and certificates made out to the famous Harry Potter from academies, or other witches and wizards.

"If you'll excuse me for a moment." Ginny said, handing off the baby to Winky, who then apparated to the nursery. "I do want to make myself presentable."

"It's okay, Mum. We'll keep her entertained." Roberta whirled to see two freckly-faced twin boys with jet-black hair ogling her from a framed picture, their eyebrows waggling in a suggestive fashion.

"James and Sirius Potter, if I hear you two have been spouting off your dirty jokes behind my back...!" The pictured boys wilted under their mother's barrage. "We'll be good, Mum." James said.

Mrs. Potter looked at them suspiciously and then left the room.

Roberta Skeeter looked back at the two boys, shown standing side-by-side on the Quidditch field, their arms around each other, their other arms holding their brooms. A huge golden trophy sat on the grass in front of them. "This must have been painted after your team won the championship last year?"

"That's right," said the pictured Sirius Potter.

"She's bright, isn't she bro'?" James remarked.

"Why did you two have a oil portrait done of you at this point in your lives? Usually wizards wait until their old age to have one done."

"Why wait?" Sirius responded. "This was one of the high points of our lives."

"Yeah, except for graduation," piped up James. "But that's happening this year, so Dad will probably insist on another picture. Another great moment to preserve."

"Not that there aren't already a lot of great moments to see." Roberta looked about to find the new speaker, and found a picture of a girl of early adolescence, perched on a velvet-cushioned chair, a tome of magic in her lap. She wore a dress of pale rose, which accented her light red hair. "That's always been one of Daddy's great obsessions, you know? To have as many good times as possible; not just for him, but for all of us." A smug smile graced her lips, that of a child who knows she is loved.

"That's our sister, Lily." James said.

"And she's right, you know." Sirius said, chuckling. "Dad likes to be able come here and look at all of us, doing what we like best."

"Keeps him happy," said another picture, that of a much younger boy, holding a struggling turtle. "I'm Arthur, and I'm five!" he said proudly.

Roberta glanced at her Quick-Quotes quill, and saw that it was getting it all down. As she looked about, she could see that the children were right--all of the pictures spoke of many happy hours. One showed him holding the reins of two brown ponies on either side of him, his twin daughters mounted on each side of him. Another was of a family picnic. Then, Roberta's eyes fell on a framed newspaper clipping. Of course, one of the most famous pictures in magical history: Harry Potter taking the oath of office as Minister of Magic, his left hand resting on the volume of Arcana, held for him by his brother-in-law and former superior, Percy Weasley. Percy, of course, had left the Ministry to become Hogwarts Headmaster, although that tenure had been short, of course!

Dobby entered the room with a tea-tray which he deftly set on a low table. "Cream, miss?" Roberta nodded, and asked for two sugars. She had just begun to sip it when Mrs. Potter reentered the room, clad in a crisp green blouse and tan slacks.

"They didn't give you any trouble, did they?" she asked, looking suspiciously at the portrait of her two eldest boys. "I remember what trouble my twin brothers got into; little did I know that my own firstborn would be just like them!"

Roberta laughed. "They were perfect gentlemen."

Ginny Potter took tea from Dobby, who then left the room, his football shoes clacking down the stone hall leading to the rest of the house. "Now, tell me again, why do you want to interview me?"

Roberta Skeeter set down her teacup. "I'm doing a series on the spouses of public figures: Maxime Hagrid, wife of the current headmaster of Hogwarts; Violet Snape; Lancelot Barbary; Augustus Pince; and so on. In each case, I've found that the spouse has been the one who has actually held things together, and their own story is infinitely more interesting. Everyone knows your husband's story by heart: from his avoidance of death at infancy to his defeat of You-Know-Who. But you, on the other hand, are more mysterious."

Ginny laughed out loud, and leaned against the back of her wingback chair. "I'd hardly call my past mysterious! My father worked for years for the Ministry of Magic and did his best to support his family on a very meager salary. My brothers and I were brought up to be self-sufficient--all of us decided that as soon as we could, we'd help out our Mum and Dad with jobs of our own. I started tutoring fellow students for a few sickles an hour to help defray the cost of books before I was fifteen. Nothing mysterious about that."

Roberta nodded. "But what about your role in the Second War of Voldemort?"

"Mum was on the front lines!" Sirius interrupted.

"She was serving donuts and coffee to the troops." James added.

"Quiet you two, or I'll turn you around to face the wall!" She turned back to her guest. "Sorry about that."

Roberta was smiling. "You certainly do have spirited children."

"Sometimes I feel more like an umpire than a mother. Keeping track of twelve children is a full-time job."

"Let's start there, then. You came from a large family, and as you've said yourself, it was a household that had to stretch its budget quite a bit. Why did you and your husband opt for so many children of your own?"

Ginny Potter smiled. "My own roots were very modest, it's true, but there was a lot of love there, too. When my brother Ron talks about our childhood, he inevitably talks about wearing Percy's pajamas, or having Fred's old wand, and there's a disparaging tone in his voice. But what I remember is the love. At any given time I could walk into the living room, and no matter how busy my father was, or how tired he was, he'd still pull me up onto his lap and ask me what I had done that day. Mum would get up early in the morning to make our breakfast, and somehow there'd still be leftovers for sandwiches for lunch. She worked hard for us, and that was special.

"Years later when I got to Hogwarts, I could see that not everyone had that benefit. Do you remember the Malfoy family?"

Miss Skeeter shook her head. "Before my time, I'm afraid. I've read about them, of course. An old family, and very well respected, before they sided with the Apostate. Wasn't Lucius Malfoy killed in a duel with--?"

"Never mind that." Ginny waved a hand, dismissing the famous duel. "I was at school with his son. Draco Malfoy was always picking on my brother and me, making fun of our second-hand clothing, and talking about how much his own things had cost. It bothered my brother more than it did me. What I noticed were the welts on his arms, and the way his own father pushed him aside all the time. Maybe Draco was wealthy in money, but he was poor in spirit--there was no love in his life. At a very early age, I pitied him."

"Did he know? That you pitied him?"

"Not at first, but as time went on I noticed that he avoided me whenever possible. I could see through his snobbery and bravado. He was a very tortured soul, and we both knew it. He just couldn't be honest about it, much less saying it publicly. Towards the end, I think he was afraid of me."

"Do you think it played into his actions before his death in the war?"

"I've asked myself that same question a dozen times, but I don't think we'll ever truly know."

Roberta Skeeter wouldn't drop the issue; her eyes bored in. "But what do you think? For yourself?"

Ginny pondered for a moment. "I think that Draco had been so beaten, so badly kicked around by his father, by Voldemort, and certainly by the Order of the Phoenix that he had an epiphany. I think he realized that he would never measure up to his father, and that if he died in that battle, that he would never be remembered. He would just be a faceless corpse, to be buried or burned and ultimately forgotten." Ginny sipped her tea, and stared into the gold-trimmed cup. "I think that scared him. That's why he turned and attacked his own father, and bought our side the moment it needed." She smiled grimly. "Certainly seeing me in the ranks opposing him didn't encourage him very much."

"So after the war, you married Harry Potter." Roberta smoothly changed the subject.

"Not immediately. I traveled, saw Africa, briefly married another man, but eventually Harry and I found each other."

"Is it true you'd always been in love with him?"

Ginny smiled, "I think so. When I first saw him on the train platform when my brother Ron was going to Hogwarts in his first year, there was an immediate spark. Something clicked inside me when I looked at Harry. I wanted to see him up close, but my Mum wouldn't let me. I talked about him all that summer, asking Ronald question after question. I must have annoyed him something terrible."

"But you didn't date much?"

"Well, Harry had other things on his mind. He was terribly into himself--most children are at that age, after all. Struggling to find out who they are. He had it worse than most, of course. No parents to guide him."

"That's obviously spurred him to be a better parent to his own children, I imagine?"

"Absolutely! Harry's a wonderful father." All the children in the pictures on the walls were nodding fervently. Ginny set down her cup and stood up and began to point to various pictures. "That's the two of us at St. Mungo's just after James & Sirius were born." Tired mother and delighted father were each cradling a sleeping child. "During the birth I was crying in pain and Harry was crying in delight, and he shed more tears than I did! That first night he held the twins all night, I practically had to pry him away from them to get a turn." Ginny was smiling again.

"I was next, Mummy!" said Lily from her picture.

"Yes, dear, you were." Harry and two 2-year-old boys could be seen in another picture, looking at Ginny cradling the red-haired infant in her arms. "Lily could hardly wait to come out into the world! That was the shortest labor I've ever had, hardly more than an hour."

"Then came Albus, Brian, Molly," she counted off on her fingers, pointing out the pictures on the walls, "Emma & Charlotte, Kay, Arthur, Morgan, and of course baby Percival, asleep upstairs." Ginny sighed. "I've almost doubled my Mum's number of children. And like my Mum, each one of them have their own share of chores to do."

"You have house-elves," Roberta said. "I've seen them."

"Yes, but Harry agrees that it's good for the little ones to learn some responsibility." She sipped at her tea. "The house-elves do most of those chores now that half the children are away at Hogwarts, but they resume once they're home."

"And is there the love that you remembered from your own family? Your husband is the Minister of Magic, after all. There's not quite the same financial pressure that you experienced," Roberta Skeeter pointed out.

Ginny looked at the girl with a narrowed eye, "Perhaps you're more like your Auntie than I thought."

"I'm sorry! Perhaps I shouldn't have said that."

"No. No, it's a fair point." Ginny put her index finger against her lips, considering her answer. As she thought, she gestured with her wand at an album in a bookcase on the far side of the room. "Accio," she said, and caught the album in one hand. She seated herself on the sofa, and motioned for Roberta Skeeter to sit beside her. "This is a picture of us last Christmas. James & Sirius had just pulled one of their worst pranks ever: replaced the sand on the front walk with their uncle Fred's Slippo pellets." She glared at the portrait of her twin sons, and they both looked away, not speaking.

Roberta looked at the picture, showing the entire family crowded around their father who was lying sprawled in the snow. "That was terrible. Poor Harry had just come back from a horrible day at the Ministry and half the children ambushed him on the front walk with snowballs. He was laughing; running toward the house, steps on what he thinks is a sanded flagstone, and zip! Onto his back, but not before he lands badly and breaks his elbow. After that, it all goes from bad to worse: Albus tries to run inside to send an owl and he falls down and tears his chin open. Emma takes a spill and breaks her leg, Charlotte skins her hands, and one after another everyone's hurt. Finally, poor Winky runs next door and gets a neighbor to send for help. I think it's the first time St. Mungo's has ever seen all the Potters in there at once! But despite all the pain and suffering, do you know what Harry said?"

"No idea," Roberta answered, trying to think what she might have said about such an idiotic prank causing so much hurt.

"'I'd rather be in hospital with my family, than hale and hearty and alone.'" He had Dobby and the house-elves bring the tree, and everything else in, and we spent almost the whole holiday in hospital, sharing our gifts with everyone there."

Roberta found she was smiling. "That's love."

"Yes, it is." Ginny leafed through the album, pointing out pictures of Harry showing Albus how to mount a broom, or playing croquet on the back lawn with his daughters, performing a public ceremony with his family sitting in the background. Shots of simple domesticity like playing cards, or grander events like sitting together in a box at the Quidditch World Cup. Finally, at the rear of the album, was a picture of Harry and Ginny seated on a love-seat, with all their children grouped around them: James & Sirius standing behind the sofa, Lily, Albus, Brian, and Molly seated on the floor at the front, Emma & Charlotte flanking the sofa, Kay, Arthur, and Morgan filling the gaps on the sofa, and baby Percival held in Mrs. Potter's arms. "We'll probably get this one turned into a portrait, too. Harry wants to hang it up there," she gestured at one wall, conspicuously empty of pictures or memorabilia.

"You mentioned that sometimes you felt more like an umpire than a parent? I imagine when the children get rowdy, it can get a bit overwhelming."

"Sometimes, but I wouldn't change a thing," Ginny said. She plucked at her blouse and laughed, "I've gained a stone or two, and my time's not always my own, but this is the life I've always wanted."

"Always?" Roberta Skeeter pressed, her quill flashing on the page.

Mrs. Potter nodded. "Just before the beginning of the second war with Voldemort, Sibyl Trelawney made a prediction in my divination class at Hogwarts. She said Harry would become Minister of Magic, live to a ripe old age, and have twelve children. At that moment, I knew I wanted to be the one to share that life with him."

"And you did," said Roberta Skeeter.

"And there's still more of it to share. Someday my oldest boys will calm down, like Fred & George did before them, and then there will be grandchildren." Ginny smiled at the thought. "That will be golden...."

***

"Ginny," said Harry, as he looked at the Quibbler, "isn't this your picture?" He was laying on the living-room sofa, with his shoes off, briefcase on the floor beside him. His sons, Albus and Brian, were on the carpet nearby, playing with Marauders Action Figures.

"Yes, dear, it is." She sat in a chair nearby, reading a letter from their daughter, Molly, a Hogwarts First Year.

Harry went through the interview, and then proceeded to read the end aloud, "'...When he isn't being the Minister of Magic, Harry assumes a far more important role: that of a husband and father. Never having known his own parents, he works hard to ensure that he is always there for his own children, no matter the cost. It is at such times that I realize just how lucky I am to be his wife. His dedication to me and to our family is all the reward I need in this life, or the next.'" He looked up from the magazine and smiled at his wife, "I can think of a suitable reward."

She walked toward him, her face aglow. "And what might that be, Mr. Potter?"

Sons Brian and Albus looked at each other. "Yuck!" they exclaimed, and ran from the room as their parents began to kiss.