#thebench

(really very late tbh) 100 Follower celebration fic!

Every summer, the Weasley/Potter family get together to see the kids off to Hogwarts. Every summer, Molly insists on taking a photograph of all the children. Seventeen years pass and she is still taking the photo.

Words: 1,666 Characters: literally ALL the kids (I wish I could draw fan art for this story but I can’t draw at all) Read it on AO3 

It all started the summer before Teddy set off for his first year at Hogwarts. The family had decided to have a big get together to see him off and it just sort of became an annual event. No one had ever said it was; everyone just knew that on the last weekend of the summer holidays, the whole Weasley/Potter family (plus Teddy) would descend on The Burrow.

Molly of course, loved it. Having her now slightly empty house bustling with so many children at once made her swell with pride at the grandchildren her children had given her. It was her who had first whipped out a camera and insisted on an entire group shot. In the end, she’d been backed all the way down the garden trying to fit everyone in so it was decided that just the children should gather for a photograph first.

James, who was only just five, sat proudly next to his favourite cousin Freddy, aged almost six. Three-year-old Albus sat next to his brother at the end of the bench, gazing at baby Lily who rested in James’ arms. James looked delighted at being allowed to hold his baby sister.

“Look, Fwed. Dis is my baby sister,” Albus explained proudly.

“Fwed knows that Al,” James said exasperatedly, patting Lily’s hair in what he obviously thought was a cute, older-brotherly way. “Fwed’s got a baby sister too.”

“My baby sister’s more bigger than a baby though,” Fred explained to the younger boys as Dominique (aged seven) sat on his other side. Four-year-old Roxanne was placed across both of their laps.

“I’m not a baby! I’m not am I Domi?” she whined.

“Not a baby,” said Dominique pointedly to Fred.

Rose sat down next, with her legs dangling from the bench, her one year old brother Hugo perched on her knee as Lily was perched on James. Victoire, who was nine, leant against the bench on Albus’ other side, struggling to hold her toddler brother Louis and grinning at eleven year old Teddy.

“Want me to hold Louis?” Teddy offered in his ‘mature’ voice, holding his arms out to take the squirming two-year-old.

“No Teddy, he’s my brother, I can do it.” Victoire retorted and Teddy smirked but stood a bit closer to her.

“Everybody say kneazles!” Grandma Molly ordered and there was an adorable chorus from most of the children, in which the adults watching could faintly hear a confused James shout ‘knees up!’.

From then on, it became a tradition that the picture be taken with near enough the same line up (with Percy’s two girls joining the group when they came along) and Grandma Molly had every single one arranged along her mantelpiece. It was amusing to look through them and see how much the kids had changed.

For example, in the photo taken in 2013, five-year-old Lily had refused to sit on James’ lap and insisted on sitting with Teddy instead. This wouldn’t have been a problem if she hadn’t decided this as the photo was being taken. Therefore that year’s picture shows Lily falling off James in her attempt to dive for Teddy while all the other kids smile, oblivious and Albus attempts to catch her.

Then the following year, Albus and James had had a falling out over whose turn it had been on their shared toy broomstick (Harry now wishes they had thought to bring both of their brooms to The Burrow). They are both glaring fiercely at each other in the photo, and Albus gives James a frustrated shove, slightly spoiling the serene smiles of their cousins.

Another year, Hugo had decided to display his first signs of magic by managing to turn his own hair blue. He wouldn’t allow his mother to fix it, insisting he was like Teddy and loved it. It eventually wore off but not before the annual photo had been taken depicting eight-year-old Hugo with bright blue hair; which slightly stole the focus from the rest of the picture. Harry and Ginny took some comfort from this as, for once, it hadn’t been one of their children.

But every single member of the family says their favourite is the one which was taken just before Lily and Hugo were about to go into their seventh year at Hogwarts. The kids had decided it would be fun to try and recreate exactly the original photo.

Al, James and Freddy squeezed onto the end of the bench they always took the photo on while Lily, laughing hysterically, balanced herself onto James’ lap.

“Oof, bloody hell Lily!” he complained, nursing his most recent Quidditch injury.

“Now you have to do the faces,” she insisted, still laughing. “James, you have to look really pleased to be holding me and Al, you have to look like you’ve never seen me before now.” There was no doubt that Lily had inherited her mother’s sass and she naturally took charge of the others. Her twenty-one-year-old brother looked bemused as he watched his little sister ordering everyone around from his lap.

“I always read my expression in that photo as more of a has my big brother James always had such scrawny arms?,” Albus replied with a smirk.

“Shut it, you,” James responded with a grin. “League-winning scrawny arms.”

“Still saved your goal in the final your seventh year,” Albus muttered, earning himself a kick from his older brother.

“Still didn’t put me on the team that year, captain,” Freddy added, with a playful expression.

“You were injured.” James was struggling to get his point across with Lily on top of him. “Are we still on this four years on?”

Dominique followed Lily’s order and took the remaining space on the bench with Roxanne on top of her, Dominique and Freddy deliberately making it clear that they had to peer round Roxanne’s head to be seen by the camera. Thirteen-year-old Molly, who hadn’t been there for the original photo, perched beside her.

“Technically, Molly shouldn’t be in the photo,” Lily began and Molly scowled. “But I like her, so we’ll make an exception. And I suppose, as she’s about to leave for Hogwarts, Lucy can too.” Realising there was no room left on the bench, Rose, joined by Lucy, sat gently on the arm of the bench.

Victoire followed their lead and sat on the opposite arm of the bench, beside Albus; Teddy was beaming on her other side with his arm round his wife. Until Lily told him off for not being authentic to the original picture and he reluctantly removed it, settling for standing beside her with a dopey expression the original eleven-year-old Teddy definitely hadn’t been showing Victoire. Albus shared a look with James and they both shook their heads at their surrogate brother’s soppiness.

“I don’t think I’ll be able to hold Louis in this one.” Victoire said, looking doubtfully at her eighteen-year-old brother. He and Hugo caught each others’ eyes and grinned, settling for standing next to their sisters rather than on top of them.

“Everyone say ‘Knees Up!” Lily commanded, laughing loudly as her grandmother took several pictures, tears of laughter running down her face. The adults all looked on fondly at their children, smiling proudly around at each other.

Then, before anyone knew what was happening, the bench leg closest to Rose and Hugo collapsed just as Grandma Molly clicked the shutter. After dusting themselves off and a lot of laughing, Molly presented them with the last photo she had taken, smiling broadly.

The family crowded round to see it and there were shouts of laughter as it was passed round.

In it, Rose was on the floor laughing where Hugo had managed to catch her. Lucy and Roxanne had simply stood up when the bench broke, leaving poor Dominique to slide down the now-diagonal bench to the grass below, Freddy right behind her. He had thrown an arm out to prevent himself crushing his cousin, who was in fits of laughter beneath him.

Albus had grabbed Victoire’s arm (the nearest thing presumably) and gripped it tightly, a shocked look on his face. Louis, unaffected because of his location, looked on at the scene laughing while Teddy instinctively pulled Victoire away.

But James and Lily were the funniest sight. Lily had sat bolt upright on top of James and grabbed her older brother round his neck, looking absolutely terrified and staring straight at the camera. James was also clinging to Lily, obviously unaware of his expression, which was a mixture of shock and fear. Compared to everyone else, who had managed to remain relatively calm, they looked as if they were deliberately being dramatic which James tried to insist for a bit before giving in.

The picture had been seen by everyone and Mrs Weasley had taken it back to show to the other adults. She glanced at it again fondly, noting as she did the giveaway behaviour of her eldest granddaughter and her husband. When the photo had been passed on, she sought them out and placed an arm around Victoire’s shoulders.

“How long have you known?” she said quietly into her ear, loud enough so the only person who could hear was Teddy, who gave her an incredulous look.

“How did you know?” he spluttered, placing a hand on the small of Victoire’s back.

“The photograph. You both went straight here.” She placed a hand gently over Victoire’s stomach. “I know that look.”

Her granddaughter smiled warmly and accepted the pair of arms her husband wrapped around her from behind. She held onto them while she spoke. “We only found out a few days ago, we want to wait before we tell everyone.” Teddy nodded behind her.

“I won’t tell,” Molly smiled kindly. “When?”

“March,” Teddy told her proudly. “The seventeenth if we’re being precise.”