Note: This is a Beta fic that I started years ago. I never really intended to publish it, but after some curious readers off Harmony & Co. asked, I've decided to put it online. I have no idea if I ever plan to finish it, but it's sitting at 75 pages right now, so at the very least, you'll enjoy the beginning of it. This story was born out of that "Parenting Class" trope with a heavy focus on babies. I was annoyed about the representation of some writers and how they wrote young children. I'm no expert, but I have a fair bit of experience with young kids of all ages - and was a teacher for a time as well. Anyway, it got on my nerves and this fic happened. I hope you enjoy it!
Warnings: sex... and that's about it. It's pretty wholesome.
Chapter 1: Family Planning 101
"So how are we going to do this?" Harry asked Hermione from the bed as he aimlessly flipped through a book on childcare and development. The room they'd been assigned was small. Just enough room for their double bed, a small kitchenette, and an ensuite bath. McGonagall had gone alphabetically by the male's last name, and no one had been surprised to find that the compatibility tests both magical and personality had put Harry and Hermione together.
"What do you mean?" She had a pamphlet in her hand that Harry thought might have been about breastfeeding.
"I mean us."
"Us?" She finally looked up from the pamphlet.
Harry stood and walked towards her by the kitchenette where she leaned against the small counter space. "Yes, Hermione, us." It was on breastfeeding, Harry observed. "We're… in a few hours when our kid arrives, we're going to be… technically, married. That's an 'us.'" The temporary marriage contract that would be created between them for the second half of the school year would be embodied in the form of a magically constructed child - their child.
"Temporarily," Hermione pointed out. "And the child's not real, Harry." It had all been set up for their stupid 'Family Planning' class that the Ministry thought was a good idea, which instantly spelled all kinds of trouble. Especially in the light of the Ministry's Marriage Law, which had only just missed affecting the of-age students still in school.
"Isn't it?" Harry insisted. "It's going to really be here. Really be from both of our magic and our genetics and if we neglect it, it will really die."
Hermione's brows drew together and she swallowed nervously. "What does that have to do with us?"
Knowing he was walking into dangerous territory, Harry licked his lips before tentatively saying, "McGonagall said the temporary bond might have us develop feelings for our partner. So… if that happens… are we going to ignore it or just go with it?"
Hermione clutched the pamphlet in her hand like a lifeline. "What do you think?" she questioned hesitantly. She had, technically, just broken up with Ron less than three hours ago due to this class. She wouldn't be able to be with him while the temporary contracts were in place and though some couples had decided to figure out ways around it, Hermione had ended it. Ron had been displeased and not unjustly. It had been obvious Hermione was using the contract as an out on their dying relationship. It had been a cowardly move on her part and she felt sick to her stomach about it.
Hermione searched Harry's eyes nervously. Her relationship with one best friend had not gone well and now here she was being thrust into another relationship with her other best friend. Today was not Hermione Granger's day.
"I think," Harry said at length, "this will be my first real shot at a family that's totally mine." Hermione's breath caught in her throat. She hadn't thought about it that way. Of course, Harry would see the situation like that. "And I think I want all of that, whatever it will be."
Hermione nodded once. "So, we go with it. Whatever it is."
"Yeah."
"And the baby stuff?"
Harry ran a hand through his hair and shrugged. "Guess we'll have to wait for the kid to show up." And with that, the two got ready for bed. They moved around each other seamlessly. Sharing a living space with one another was not new to the two of them. They'd gotten over any problems in that area in the Final Year. The war had been brutal and difficult. But they'd gotten through it together. Hermione curled into a ball on her side and stared at Harry's dark silhouette in the night.
"Why didn't you tell me?" Harry whispered. He turned to stare at Hermione's own silhouette. "About you and Ron having problems. Why didn't you say?"
Hermione sighed. "I didn't want to disappoint you." All Harry had wanted at the end of the war was for those who'd lived to be happy. He'd sat back and waited, watching the world heal and letting the change heal him as well.
"Hermione," Harry breathed. His fingers reached out and tangled with hers on top of the bedspread, "you could never disappoint me." Hermione squeezed his hand once before slowly drifting off to sleep.
/\
They awoke to a high pitched screaming.
Harry and Hermione instantly rolled out of bed, wands at the ready. It took them a moment to register that the crying was a baby and it was coming from a crib opposite the foot of their bed.
Hermione recovered first. She moved silently across the room and peered into the white and blue crib. Behind her, Harry cast a silencing charm on the room so no one else would hear the baby's cries through the stone walls of the castle. He then quickly relit the candles.
Hermione leaned over the edge of the crib and gently pulled the crying babe into her arms. Her breath caught at just how tiny the baby was. Having more than a little experience with infants, she quickly began rocking the baby as she shushed loudly over the wails.
Harry eyed the crying infant warily before turning to the kitchenette. He found a tub of baby formula and some whole milk which he quickly pulled together by following the instructions. He gave the bottle to Hermione who frowned in slight annoyance.
"You need to warm it," she explained over the baby's cries. She gently maneuvered the baby so his now pink face was pressed against the skin of her chest and collarbone. The contact would calm the baby faster, she hoped. "Room temperature," she instructed Harry. He quickly cast a light warming spell on the glass bottle.
Hermione continued to soothe the babe until the cries finally settled down. The baby continued to wriggle and whine but was no longer crying. Satisfied, Hermione settled down into a wood rocking chair beside the crib and gestured to a pillow on the bed. Harry grabbed it and put it in her lap. Hermione rested the squirming baby's head into the crook of her arm, the body on the pillow so it pressed against her chest. Harry put the bottle in her waiting hand and she put the nipple in the baby's mouth.
The room instantly grew quiet, filled only with the sound of the infant's gentle sucking and loud breathing. Harry breathed out in silent astonishment as he sat down at Hermione's feet. The two watched the baby eat.
Harry grinned up at her. "You really know how to do everything, don't you?"
Hermione smiled and rolled her eyes. "I was the neighbourhood babysitter over the summers. I've picked up a thing or two from it."
"Thank Merlin for that." The baby stopped feeding and Hermione slowly sat it up against her body, she held the back of his head so his face rested against her upper chest again. "He's already done?" Harry looked at the mostly full bottle of formula in his hand.
"He's a newborn, Harry." She frowned. "Or her. Anyways, newborns eat very small portions, they just do it several times a day and night. Do you want to burp the baby?"
"What?" Harry looked terrified and Hermione tried very hard not to laugh.
"Honestly, Harry. It's not like I'm going to do everything."
"But—"
"Grab a cloth." Knowing better than to argue with that tone, Harry wandlessly accioed a cloth from the kitchenette. "Right, put it over your shoulder, yes like that. Now take the baby. Mind his head." Hermione easily led Harry into the proper hold before instructing him on the slow, gentle circles he had to rub against the baby's back. "Feel free to walk a bit."
Harry did. He paced around the room, body tense as he waited for some kind of signal from Hermione that he was doing well. Hermione, however, had moved back to the kitchenette. She had a potion in her hand.
"What's that?"
Hermione looked up and held Harry's gaze. "Breastfeeding potion. If I take it, I'll be able to breastfeed the baby."
Harry read the look on Hermione's face. He shook his head. "Hermione, I'm not going to tell you what to do. It's your body." Just as he said the last word, the baby burped. Harry smiled widely. "I did it!" He looked down at the tiny infant with sparse black curls at the top of its head. "That's my baby," he praised, a happy smile on his face. "Such a good… baby," he finished with a lack of a better pronoun. He chuckled. "Now what? Does he need a change?"
Hermione came over and ducked her head to smell the baby's bum. Harry laughed out a shocked exclamation. She smiled. "Diapers fine. We should probably get the baby back to sleep though." After a silent argument, Hermione sighed and took the infant back into her arms. She made her way back to the rocking chair and hummed the babe to sleep.
Harry looked over to the kitchenette where a small potion phial sat innocently empty. He looked back to Hermione. She lifted up a shoulder in a half shrug. "In for a penny, in for a pound?"
Harry let out a breath through his lips, not entirely sure how he felt about Hermione's decision. At the end of the day, it was her body and she could make any decision she wanted about it. She put the sleeping baby back in its crib and the two climbed back into bed.
He released a long sigh. "And this year was going so smoothly. The rest of the year isn't going to be normal at all, is it?" Harry whispered as he wandlessly shut off the lights.
"No, Harry. I don't think it is."
"They're planning something."
Hermione didn't need to ask for clarification. She knew he meant the Ministry. They'd orchestrated a Marriage Law for all of-age witches and wizards to jumpstart the baby-boom they were hoping to get post-war. Originally, it'd seemed like they wanted the students that qualified by age to be involved in their little law, but many a witch and wizard had protested that.
The fact that students wouldn't be affected by the law was in part why so many from Harry and Hermione's year had elected to return and retake their final year. No one wanted to be under the Ministry's thumb like a Marriage Law would have them. Yet here they were, taking the Ministry's pre-approved Family Planning class.
"Yes." Hermione finally said to Harry's comment. "They are." The Ministry was always planning something.
Harry reached across the bed. His hand curled around her waist and he gently pulled her closer until his lips rested against the crown of her head. "Whatever it is, you've got me."
"And you, me."
Together, they drifted off to sleep again.