Moments of Love

Chapter 14: Poor Baby!

Something was poking her on the back. Once, twice, three times.

'Hermione?'

Hermione brushed her eyes and turned her head. Ron's chin was resting on his shoulder, tickling her skin.

'What?' she said, trying not to sound too groggy. 'Ron, I only just fell asleep. Do you know how difficult it is with a belly the size of a mountain?'

'I know, I'm sorry,' Ron whispered. 'I have to tell you something.'

'What?' Hermione said with a yawn and repositioned her pillow.

'Just wanted to let you know that I'm going to suck as a father.'

Hermione smiled to herself and reached back to pat Ron's cheek.

'Nonsense. You'll be a wonderful father. Wildly overprotective and much too soft, of course, but that's about it. Now, go back to sleep.'

--x--x--

Hermione leaned back with a content sigh as the brush worked on her hair. It slid through her frizzes like a hot knife through butter, and not a single tangle stung on her scalp. The only negative thing was that her hair had grown so thick that she couldn't really keep it loose anymore.

'I wish I could have pregnancy hair every day,' she sighed and guided the brush back on the shelf.

'Great. Maybe that'll be a consolation when I've messed up our kid,' Ron muttered and buttoned his trousers. 'You ready?'

'Didn't you read that book I gave you?' Hermione asked and heaved herself up with a spell from her Pregnancy Spells Handbook.

'Charm Your Way into Fatherhood? Oh yeah, I read it till I was ready to puke at those fake pictures. Smiling fathers running in a meadow with their laughing kids. Hello? It won't be like that! I'm much more likely to drop the tot on its head, or sit on it, or scar it mentally before it even goes to school.'

'Why are you suddenly so concerned about your parenting abilities?' Hermione asked absent-mindedly and wiped a toothpaste stain from the sink.

'Your due date is in a week, which means I'm going to be a father in a week! An innocent soul is going to be trusted into my clumsy hands. A child full of questions like, "Dad, why are their evil people in the world? Dad, what's the meaning of life? Dad, what's a French effing kiss!"'

Hermione smiled modestly and straightened Ron's jumper.

'Ron, no offence, but I rather think our child would come to me with such questions. Oh look, your socks don't match.'

Ron looked at his feet. One of his socks had pale brown stripes, and the other one had dark brown stripes.

'Okay, so I'll be the eccentric Uncle Ron. That'll scar the kid less, right?'

--x--x--

'What's up with Ron?' Ginny asked. 'He's been moping by himself in that chair since you got here.'

'He's freaking out about being a father,' Hermione said and pushed her nose into baby James's tummy. 'Wook at this wittwe pwump bewwy and these wittwe toes! Who has the most perfect baby toes in the world? Why, James does! Yes, he does!'

'Harry freaked out, too,' Ginny said and tickled the sole of James's foot. 'It's a male thing. They think they're going to mess up the kid. It all comes from that powerful, buff male cheer. You know, "am man, must grunt". Then when they're about to become a father, they realise they will actually have to include sensitivity in the mix.'

Hermione laughed and raised baby James high. He let out a gurgle and a stream of spit, kicking his plump legs frantically.

'Sorry,' Ginny said and dabbed Hermione's moist dress with a cloth. 'Get ready to never be clean again.'

'Really?' Hermione said casually. 'Never clean again?'

'Oh yes,' Ginny said and took James. 'Always puke here, spit there, pee on your hands, poo on the floor...come on, sweetie, time to sleep.'

Harry rushed to help her up, and Hermione crossed her hands on her belly. Never clean again... She shifted uneasily on the sofa. Stains everywhere, eating their way through the fabric and the wood... She shook her head to banish the thought and looked at Ron. He was browsing through a photo album, and Hermione could hear James's baby gurgles from the photos. Gurgles...spit...puke...stains...sticky stains...none of that neat smell of a freshly cleaned house ever again...or that magnificent shine of a polished table...

'So, Hermione, how are things?' Harry sat beside her and offered her a bowl of popcorn. 'Nervous?'

'A little,' Hermione said breathily and grabbed a handful of popcorn. Several fell on her dress, leaving tiny grease marks on it. She swallowed and balled her fist.

'Er, Harry. Say, how dirty is a baby exactly, you know, overall speaking?'

'Oh, they're little poo machines,' Harry said fondly, his eyes following Ginny, who was rocking James's cot on the other side of the room. 'But you won't even notice it because you'll be so engrossed with the baby.'

'Can I have that, please?' Hermione dropped her uneaten popcorns into the bowl and heaved herself up. 'Ron, we have to leave.'

Ron looked up from a photo of Harry holding James.

'Something wrong?'

'No, I'm just tired. Thanks for the dinner, Ginny. See you, Harry.'

She took Ron's hand and pulled him out of the room despite Ginny's and Harry's astonished looks. Ron shrugged apologetically and threw the album to Harry. Hermione apparated straight from the hall, shushing Ron's attempts at talking. When they reached their house, Ron opened his mouth once again, but Hermione pressed her finger on his lips.

'Forget that grunting male stuff, or whatever it is. We have an emergency here.'

'What grunting stuff?' Ron asked, but he was already being whirled into the bedroom. 'Don't tell me you're getting mushy again?'

'No, you twit. Look!' Hermione pulled out a drawer and pointed at the neatly folded baby clothes with her trembling hand. 'They're colour-co-ordinated and cross-referenced by size!'

'Yes, and I love you nevertheless. What's the matter?'

'The dirt, Ron! The dirt!' Hermione wailed and sat in the rocking chair her father had made for baby feeding sessions. 'The baby is going to be dirty! Nothing will ever be clean again!'

'Ah,' Ron said with a knowing smile. 'Freaking out there, are we, missus? Not so easy after all?'

'I'm not freaking out,' Hermione said peevishly. 'But we have to re-organise the baby stuff.' She kicked the chair so that she practically flew up, and wobbled to the drawer. 'This one has all the bibs, socks, sleepsuits, and T-shirts. We must first categorise them by colour, then size, then material, and finally by dirt resistance.' She held up a tiny white shirt. 'Look at this. How could I have bought something like this? This is a dirt magnet! It must go.'

'Hermione...' Ron seized her hand. 'You're not going to throw away a perfectly fine shirt. Didn't you honestly ever think about the dirt aspect before?'

'No!' Hermione said shrilly and pulled out a pile of socks. 'These are all wrong, look! The lacy ones you bought can't be next to the sensible ones I got. We must arrange them so that the fine ones can be accessed most easily when the baby is at its cleanest and the good ones when dirt is most likely to occur.'

'At least the dirt will go away when the tot hits puberty and starts primping him- or herself,' Ron said morosely and flopped on the bed. 'But the messed-up part will always be there. Years after the dirt, the tot will sit on a psychiatrist's sofa complaining about a loopy, emotionally distant father who would only grunt when confronted with the question of the purpose of life.'

'Tosh!' Hermione threw a pile of bibs at Ron. 'See which ones are made of the strongest material and put them in one pile. The flimsy ones will go to charity, and tomorrow we'll buy more of the sturdy ones. Also, we have to get that new Super Cleaning Spells book, and Mum has these plastic sofa covers in the attic. They'll be perfect -'

She ceased when she saw Ron biting his lip and staring at a pink velvet dress with crystals on the collar and five layers of lace in the hem. Their eyes met, and Hermione felt her mouth twitch.

'Oh Ron,' she said, half-chuckling and half-sighing, and sat beside him. 'We're a fine sight, aren't we?'

'Yes indeed, my little maniac.' Ron put his hand around her shoulder. 'Let's face it: we're going to mess up the kid anyway, so we might as well try to make the best of it.'

Hermione smoothed out a sleepsuit against her belly.

'Well, considering how well Harry turned out, I guess a slightly, um, high-maintenance mother -in the nicest way possible, of course- and a goofy father -'

'Only slightly, and in the nicest way possible,' Ron interjected.

'Naturally. Anyway, that kind of parents can't damage a child beyond repair. Right?'

'Absolutely not. Just a bit,' Ron said. 'Say it's a girl. So, I'll feed her sweets and keep the blokes away until she's thirty or so, and you'll lecture her about hard work, orderliness, and the rights of women into the bargain. If it's a boy, I'll put incredible pressure on him to play Quidditch and be a real, buff man, and you'll lecture him about sensitivity, the needs of women, and the importance of clean, matching socks. If we have more than one kid, we'll just repeat the process. Then we'll throw the kids out into the world and watch them mess up their own kids.'

Hermione grinned.

'And then we'll be the wickedest grandparents in the world.'