[potter wedding] if you can learn to do it [anthony]

the burrow // 19 july 2003

“Anthony!” It was how she had started her last three conversations -- not with saying Anthony specifically but it was more the tone (and volume) of voice -- complete with the wave of her free hand, her other occupied by her half-full (third) glass of wine. “‘Scuse me, sorry,” she said to the elbow blocking her way, moving around it and heading to where Anthony had been talking with someone seconds before. (She might have been waiting for him to have a free minute.)

She pulled him into a quick, one-armed hug before she took a step back, a wide smile stretched across her lips. “How are you?” She’d seen him two days ago but she couldn’t dive into her real question without some mingling first.

“Did I miss anything in the meeting yesterday?” She’d had to -- no, she had chosen to -- miss work the day before for obvious reasons -- as obvious a reason as Hermione in a bridesmaid dress might indicate -- and had been unsuccessful in moving the meeting a day earlier because apparently not everyone was prepped for their meetings days in advance. She switched which hand was holding her wine and had another sip.

Lowering her glass, she wrinkled her nose. “I’d imagine you took notes?” She knew that DMLE project management -- are the right people on the right cases, are there any resource gaps? -- wasn’t her long term career but that didn’t mean she wasn’t concerned with her job performance.

@Anthony Goldstein

He had to admit, Harry put on a good party. It was fun, seeing all these folks again, classmates and co-conspirators alike. A couple of surprises, too - Tony hadn't known Silverman was in the Order, for one, but there he was with the other Phoenix folks. Anthony had drifted over to schmooze a little bit there, but as the reception continued he retreated to the comfortable orbit of - who else? - Michael Corner. Not that they had anything new to discuss, beyond 'wow, you actually came', but there they were, anyway, feeling like fools in their formalwear.

In the slightly blurred periphery of his vision, Tony saw someone… looming, perhaps, at the edge of a round table with a glass of wine and in the bridesmaids colours. She had been there for a bit, but Anthony was busy talking to his best friend so whatever Granger was waiting for, she would be able to wait a moment longer.

Michael eventually excused himself - his new girlfriend seemed to be completely smashed and in need of assistance. It took approximately fifteen seconds for Hermione to swoop in, which seemed a little on the slow side for the Brightest Witch of Her Age. “Hi, Hermione,” Tony said, surprised by the hug but not opposed. She certainly wasn’t a hugger at work - Tipsy Hermione seemed a wee bit more fun already. He lifted his glass n- wine, real wine, not Manischitwitz or any of the kosher wine that Mum kept sending him - as if that was an answer. “I’m celebrating,” he clarified, “so I think I’m good. How are you?”

“Did I miss anything in the meeting yesterday?”

Tony had to resist the urge to roll his eyes. She really had not changed at all since school - it was amazing she took the day off yesterday at all, if this is what she was going to do at the reception of her best friends’ wedding. “Didn’t miss much, I’d say,” Anthony said, trying to remember what had been said at the meeting. Something about the house-elf legislation, something about a new case that Anthony had found exceedingly dull.

“Of course I took notes,” said Anthony in a high pitched squeal, almost offended that Hermione thought that perhaps he hadn’t. “I just didn’t bring them to a wedding.” He had even left work yesterday right at five o’clock to prepare, almost three hours earlier than he would usually leave the office. “I can bring them by your office Monday, but right now -“ Tony glanced between both of their glasses, almost empty - “more wine, less work.” He threw a hand over her shoulder and steered her toward the bar, placing both their glasses out for refills. “Do you ever take a break, Hermione? Have you ever taken a break in your life?”

She hadn’t missed much in the meeting yesterday, but Hermione couldn’t decide if she was worried or grateful. On the one hand, maybe there genuinely wasn’t anything important that had been said but on the other hand, maybe that meant no one had been able to focus enough to get to the important things that needed to be said.

But Anthony had taken ntes and Hermione visibly relaxed, her shoulders feeling just a bit less tense. She nodded into her glass before she took another sip. He thought she wanted the notes now, however, and she nearly choked on her wine, almost offended by the insinuation (though who could blame him for thinking so?). “‘Course not,” she countered, though she had to admit she might have been hoping for that--have something to look over on Sunday to prepare for Monday--but she didn’t think she’d be helping her case for saying as much. She wanted to ask him to bring them by first thing Monday as a last resort but he was talking about wine and Hermione knew enough to catch on that he was trying to change the subject. Reluctantly, she went along with it.

He steered her toward the bar (though she knew where it was considering she’d found herself two refills already) and she turned to face him properly as they waited for more wine. “We had mandatory nap time in primary school.” She managed to keep her face serious for half a second before she laughed, shrugging. “I think this counts as a break.” She motioned to the reception at large, then nodded toward her new wine as she picked up her glass again.

They moved a few steps away from the bar and Hermione glanced about as she sipped her wine. “It’s nice to see everyone,” she said after a minute, lost in thought as she tried to decide if it really was nice or if she was just saying that. It was nice to not be in a constant state of worry like she had been at her last Burrow wedding, but she’d managed to make it all day without mentioning that and wasn’t about to start now. Instead, she went with something a little more basic. “Nice wine, too.” She had another sip.

Hermione Granger's shoulders visibly fell, though Tony wasn't sure if it was in relief or disappointment. (But seriously, who brought work to a wedding?) She was covering for it, but Tony knew that air she was putting on - it was one of his favourites, the feigned nonchalance, the idea that of course, he wasn't that kind of person, how could you even say so, while hiding a legal brief in his sleeve. They were so much alike. In retrospect, it was almost funny he had a crush on her through school. It would have been like dating himself, with breasts. A horrid thought (dating himself, not the other thing).

We had mandatory nap time in primary school," Hermione said, and for a split second Tony's eyes went wide - then she laughed. Tony snorted, taking a quick swig to empty his glass and cover his response. Well. Touché, Granger.

New wine was poured quickly - Tony held his out to clink with hers before taking another gulp. There was a standing round table just a few steps from the bar - Tony took it upon himself to park there, leaning one forearm against the surface. "Hm, it is. D'you know who picked it?" He had a doubt it was Harry - could be Ginny, he supposed, or someone else in the wedding party. "My compliments to them."

His eyes ran up and down Hermione once, then drifted across the reception. Ron Weasley and the Weasley clan in dress robes, red hair resplendent. Thomas and Finnegan, thick as thieves as always. Others, across the room - almost all former child soldiers, he was realizing with a jolt, for those in their age range. A brief frown crossed his face just for a fleeting second as he considered this. "It's almost a school reunion," he offered after a moment, eyes sliding sideways to Hermione. A mild understatement. Tony turned slightly, opening his cagey body language to Hermione. "You know," he continued, "I was trying to compete with you. All through school. Seems silly now." 

They clinked glasses and Hermione took another sip. She’d been taking increasingly bigger sips, like she had never learned how to savor wine. (She hadn’t.)

Did she know who picked the wine? “I do,” she said, looking round for Fleur Weasley-- it’d been hers (and Bill’s) wedding gift, imparting Fleur’s French knowledge of wine (and champagne, which Hermione had started with, giving her toast; it’d been all win since, though) on the happy couple. She spotted them in the crowd of the dancefloor and pointed them out. “Ginny’s brother and sister-in-law.” He might have remembered Fleur from the Triwizard Tournament but it was easier not to get into explaining how they met; Hermione was only recently successful not calling her Phlegm at every turn.

Hermione watched Anthony frown and wondered for a fleeting second if he, too, was trying to decide if it was genuinely nice to see everyone or not. “Almost.” Truthfully, she wasn’t sure if Harry or Ginny knew everyone they had invited or if Ginny had some incredible way of making friends the past few years, that Hermione hadn’t really noticed because she’d been at work the whole time. (She thought Harry would have invited next to no one, if that had been an option.)

He started with you know and Hermione nodded because chances were fairly good she did know. But her eyebrows went up a hair; it seemed like the sort of thing she should feel bad about, not noticing, but for one reason or another she hadn’t ever really felt competition amongst her peers. There was plenty against herself, always her biggest critic, but this wasn’t really that sort of competition. The wine, the general atmosphere of the party, suggested it wasn’t. “You could have pulled ahead second year,” she said with a knowing smile. It’d been long enough--and so much else had happened since--that being petrified several weeks wasn’t the weirdest thing to talk about.

She had another sip of wine and shrugged, before she raised an eyebrow at him. “Are you saying you’re not competitive now?”

One eyebrow went up as Tony followed Hermione's pointed finger - the blonde on one of Ron's brother's arms dancing seemed familiar. It was a moment before he could place her. Of course. Anthony stifled a chuckle, raising his glass in her direction. Everyone had a crush on her during fourth year - everyone, that was, except for Anthony. Should have been a clue, looking back on it. And here she was, with the rest of them, now going by Fleur Weasley. When did that happen? "Ah, that explains it," he said with a good-natured nod.

Hermione seemed a little surprised by Tony's admission, which was a little offensive. Tony knew, vaguely, that Hermione had other stuff going on through school, generally, Harry Potter related, but it had never seemed to be enough to pull her from her studies. But truly not to notice the run he was giving her for top marks? If he had been sober, and it had been a few years ago, Tony would have huffed away right then. Instead, he laughed. "Second year I was trying to learn Hebrew on top of everything else going on. Wasted the head start you gave me on bar mitzvah prep." Hah, and he had been so upset Hermione hadn't gone to that, too. Second year had been, all things considered, fairly normal. You could care about stuff like who came to your birthday party.

Another sip, this one more contemplative. "I don't think so, no." At some point the competitiveness has been swallowed by anxiety and perfectionism. "Just with myself, these days. One day in law school, I was studying with these American exchange students - insufferable, really, and they were talking about grades and their essays on the impact of -" here he paused, eyes darting sideways to Hermione for a brief moment before continuing - "of 1997 on international wizarding law, and I thought - am I really competing with these schmucks?" He shrugged. "I know my work is good and I know what it cost for me to be able to do it. No point in being competitive about it any more." The corner of his mouth twitched up in a smile.

“Oh, right.” Hermione nodded, as if he were simply reminding her of something instead of her learning about it--him learning Hebrew--for the first time tonight. “Well,” she nodded again. “Don’t tell anyone, but I don’t know Hebrew.” In case he was still feeling a tiny bit competitive. His bar mitzvah invite had been the first invitation Hermione had received from anyone at Hogwarts (and possibly the first one that wasn’t an obvious invite-the-whole-class invite, as much of primary school had been in hindsight) and she had done a bit of reading up on it, naturally, even though the date had fallen right in the middle of her family’s holiday.

She thought she must have sent him something, surely, but she didn’t have an owl then so she couldn’t be so sure. It wouldn’t do to ask now.

He was competitive with himself and Hermione nodded again, knowing exactly what he meant. She grimaced at his tale of the American students but she nodded again before she had another sip of her wine. “Yeah, of course. Your work is good.” Law school sounded miserable; there wasn’t a week that went by that Hermione didn’t think she should have gone that direction, given her legislative work a bigger name to stand behind. Then again, word about her house elf legislation was due any day now and she was trying not to get her hopes up but she felt good about this latest version. But it was still Ginny’s wedding day, and Hermione had promised not to work. Thinking about it too much probably counted as working.

Hermione drank again and decided to tell him as much, because talking about not working didn’t count. “I’ve told Ginny I won’t talk about work, so—“ she paused and craned her neck for sight of the bride, looking back to Anthony when she couldn’t spot her, and tapping the side of her nose. 

Anthony snorted, then realized Hermione was being serious and mimed zipping his lips shut as a recovery. "It's not that different from Runes, I'm sure you could pick it up." A joke, or perhaps a lie. Tony smiled anyway, pleased that Hermione was at least indulging him. But, if any goyische witch or wizard did know Hebrew.... it would probably be Hermione Granger.

Hermione Granger sounded genuine when she praised his work, too. Tony let himself straighten up again, preening a little at the compliment. He didn't say thank you, but he did give Hermione a grateful little nod anyway. She'd noticed. It was stupid to let that go to his head. Maybe deep down he was still trying to compete with Granger, just a bit.

"Right, no work, then." Where did that actually leave them, conversation-wise? Tony took a long drink of wine to fill the silence as he contemplated Hermione, the wedding, the Weasleys, the world in which all of these people existed. He glanced sideways at Hermione - he half wanted to tell her about his wartime essay mill, but wasn't sure if Hermione would want to talk about that period of their schooling at all. That G-d forsaken year was always a bit touch and go.

Instead, he reached further back, eyes landing on Fleur again. "I was going to ask you to the Yule Ball, you know," he said, leaning into as gay an inflection in his voice as was physically possible. "Krum got there first of course."

“No work,” she agreed; she could hardly comply with the ‘no work talk’ rule at Christmas dinner; she didn’t know how successful she’d be here. Anthony was probably the wrong person to seek out to talk about not work--the only person more wrong for the job was Percy, but she knew he’d been given the same talking to--and she was at a loss for what to talk about. Hermione sipped at her wine as she mentally workshopped some possibilities.

He beat her to it, and for once she wasn’t upset with the loss. She was staring at him--and still sipping her wine--when he mentioned the Yule Ball, and asking her to go with him. She laughed into her glass, moving it away as she brought her other hand up to cover her mouth as she swallowed. “Sorry,” she said quickly, hoping she wasn’t being rude by being amused by it, assuming she was. He had said you know again, and Hermione shook her head because this time, she didn’t. Anthony hadn’t been on her radar for prospective dates, exactly; she looked over his shoulder briefly, seeking out Ron’s familiar face for a shot of comfort.

She wasn’t about to credit her quick thinking as Madam Pomfrey was shrinking her two front teeth as the reason why all those potential dates had crawled out of the woodwork, but it was hard not to wonder if she would have been quite as successful if they had returned to their original size. Based on how Anthony was bringing it up now--and making it sound--he probably still would have asked her.

“Would’ve helped with the ‘fraternizing with the enemy’--” she made the air quotes with her free hand-- “Anyway.” She grinned, able to laugh about it now, after everything else (and now that she was sure she wasn’t just the backup option).

She laughed! Hermione laughed. Tony wasn't sure if he should be miffed or not. On the one hand, it wasn't that far-fetched, for Tony to have what he thought was a crush on Hermione Granger in 1994, so, nu, how dare she laugh?

On the other -- Tony glanced down at his own wrist, hanging limp with one elbow on the countertop. On the other hand, how ridiculous would that have been? Hermione Granger with Anthony Goldstein, Ravenclaw's resident closet case?

He made up his mind and laughed along with her, a grin stretching over his own face slowly. She was looking away -- presumably for Ronald, and he felt a need to reassure her. "Obviously, it would have never worked out," Tony said, "what with you and Weasley being destined for each other." And me being a friend of Dorothy, Tony left unsaid.

Would’ve helped with the ‘fraternizing with the enemy-- Hermione said, and now Tony laughed genuinely. "Well, if I had known that was at stake," He paused, sipping his wine, "I still would have been a coward and waited until it was too late." Another laugh, an easy smile settling on his face. This was -- good, this was safe and not work and it was funny to look back at this, now, safe in the security of being five years from the war. They should stay on this topic.

"Nu, but I have to ask," Tony began, leaning forward more still on the table to look at Hermione. "How did you do it, third year? You were in every single one of my electives, and you were never late between them. I was always running from hall to hall." Childhood was safe, and he was curious.

“Something like that,” she said with another grin, deciding not to elaborate on how she hated that: destiny. As if she didn’t work hard for her relationship. She and Ron expressed love differently, words versus actions, and it required time and effort, not luck. But this was a happy joyous occasion, and getting down to brass tax about how relationships should be framed was best saved for a time when Hermione wasn’t deep into the cabernet.

Hermione laughed again as Anthony joined in, and she grinned before having another sip of her wine. “Alas.” Regardless of her date being Viktor or Anthony (or Neville), she would have ended the night being cross with Ron. She nearly snorted at the thought of destiny again. Hormones was more like it.

But he had to ask. Hermione leaned forward in turn, her eyebrows raised in anticipation of what he had to ask, figuring it was something still on the subject of Viktor Krum-- how did that happen? But her eyebrows went up a bit more as he asked his actual question; she hadn’t been expecting that. She knew where he was going with third year but he elaborated, and Hermione had another drink as he went on.

She was well practiced on avoiding the subject of timeturners, much like McGonagall had instructed her to when offering Hermione the option. But surely McGonagall’s ‘tell no one’ missive didn’t apply ten years on? So much had happened since that giving a fourteen-year-old the ability to bend time was trivial now.

“I.. had a time turner,” she said slowly, feeling much guiltier about it now than she had then. Then, it had been a way to go to all her classes when she couldn’t decide between artihmancy and divination. It hadn’t mattered that they hadn’t made special arrangements with the Ministry for any other student, or that they had trusted her with something like that, something that clearly belonged in the Department of Mysteries. “I gave it back after third year, though,” she said, as if that made everything alright.

"You had a what."

Tony nearly dropped his glass. He hadn't been expecting -- well, he hadn't known what he was expecting, frankly. They never had figured it out, the little Ravenclaw Trio, despite running numerous experiments on the weekends on the minimum time it took to get from Divination to Arithmancy and so forth. The experiments had been primarily making Terry run timed loops throughout the castle, but still. What had they concluded? Some sort of hidden passageway in the castle that opened only for Granger had been a top hypothesis, well before they had to know each of those by heart to survive. Some sort of astral projection had been on that list as well. Time travel hadn't been on there at all.

But -- it only made sense, didn't it? Because -- and Tony was sure he had taken note of this in more detail at the time but had forgotten until this moment -- hadn't third-year Introductory Arthimancy been at the same time as Divination, some days? He was drunk but still had half a mind to Apparate to Finchley, dig out his old timetables, and return to this spot, robes askew and head buzzing with new understanding.

He glanced over at the spot Michael had been occupying until recently, willing his best friend to reappear post-haste so Tony could share this absolutely mental new piece of information. "A timeturner," he repeated as if it would sound less insane coming out his own mouth. It did not. "You were fourteen and had a timeturner and you used it to take extra classes?"

I gave it back after third-year, though, Hermione added, the little bit of embarrassment leaving her voice. "You gave it back?" Tony said, his voice going a little shrill. Good Lord. He couldn't help but imagine what they -- the 1997 DA, the one without Granger, Weasley and Potter in it -- could have accomplished with a Timeturner, if only Hermione had held onto it for a few more years. How many fewer children would have had to spend nights alone in the dungeons? Would Neville et al have been able to get the Sword? Would Michael have been able to make it back out of the dungeons that night?

Tony took a long, long drink.

He couldn't articulate any of that, of course. They had no way of knowing what was coming for another year after she returned that highly restricted magical object, after all. It was completely unreasonable of him to put all the hell of 1997 onto Hermione giving up the power of time manipulation.

He set the glass down before Hermione could ambush him with any more revelations and said, weakly: "Well, was Divination worth it?"   

Hermione didn’t repeat herself; Anthony had heard her perfectly well. This made three people in ten years that she had told (again, after being expressly told not to tell, but Harry and Ron shouldn’t really count in that tally so technically, this was only the first person she had told). But he had heard her, that much was clear. She nodded when he said timeturner, continued nodding as he went on. She could see the gears turning in his brain, sure that his thoughts were headed in the same logical direction that hers had taken. Unfortunately.

She had been fourteen and had a timeturner to take extra classes, but that wasn’t the most absurd part: she gave it back. (And then the entire supply of timeturners had been destroyed during their fifth year--surely including the one she had used--effectively destroying some sort of opportunity--probably for the better--during the war, but maybe Anthony didn’t already know that.) She could tell from his tone his thoughts had dipped toward the war, too; that was not the direction she had wanted this conversation to go, that much was certain.

Anthony drank, and continued drinking, so Hermione drank, too.

She didn’t say anything else, letting Anthony speak first. “No, but Muggle Studies was,” she said with a small smile, the wine encouraging her poorly thought out joke more than the situation did. “But, no.” She looked pensive for a second before she shrugged.

(There were the unspoken things that had made everything worth it-- Sirius and Buckbeak, but the absence of Sirius--among others--was palpable at this wedding and the wine would probably backfire on her if she spent too much time thinking about anything.)

“That’s why I gave it back.” Even with her 320% exam score in Muggle Studies-- once she had dropped that and Divination, she had been able to manage a regular schedule.

But Muggle Studies was. Tony made a noise that could charitably be called a laugh, or, less charitably, a strangled bark. "Hah," he said, taking another sip of wine. What the hell did one say to that! Muggle Studies, known for being a joke of a class, was more worth the use of time-space breaking magic than Trelawney's Divination. Good lord. It was a joke, but it wasn't enough of a joke to not make Tony feel vaguely dizzy.

"Right," he said, for something to say, looking into his wine in case some sort of intelligent thing to say to that was buried in the liquid.

Because his brain had gone right to the war, and a glance at Hermione's face, the smile not quite reaching her eyes, told him that she was there too, imagining the what-could-have-beens like he was.

He had never been close enough to any of the Chosen Ones to ask what they had done, that night in the fifth year or the year before May 2nd, 1998. Never really gave it much thought at the time, nor since. Now his mind wandered, wondering what other regrets Hermione might have that Tony was never to be privy to. Maybe Michael would know, via the bride -- he cast about for a glimpse of him or Terry again, came up with nothing again.

"I assume this is not common gossip, then?" Maybe he shouldn't tell the boys. Or perhaps not yet, anyway.

Right, he said, and the corners of Hermione’s mouth tugged down in a slight frown. She wasn’t doing the subject justice. She probably shouldn’t have had so much wine; maybe then she could explain things better, and if not better, more eloquently. Succinctly. But without the wine, she probably wouldn’t have mentioned the timeturner at all, so it was a moot point. Besides, she was celebrating--Harry and Ginny were married--and didn’t she deserve to let loose once or twice? Where was she going with this-- Hermione’s eyebrows came together, looking much more like her usual thoughtful self, rather than the wine-soaked version that was having trouble following her own train of thought.

She was looking off into the distance when Anthony asked his next question and she waited half a second before looking at him. “Er, no.” The common gossip about her was usually untrue. “It’s not.” She swiped a finger across her lips then held it vertically to them in a quick and silent shh. It was a fairly innocuous thing, compared to some things of the past decade, but her having a timeturner could be connected back to a not-class reason, if anyone cared to investigate it. And even if Sirius Black’s name had been cleared, Hermione didn’t fancy being publicly connect to helping him escape from dementors the third--or fourth, if she counted the lake encounter twice, which she supposed she could--time.

“Would you mind…?” She trailed off, but she hoped her expression was clear enough, asking him not to tell, her lips pulled back in a slight grimace.