Chapter Text
Listen, when I broke into Harry's office, I didn't think I would find anything good in there.
I did it on a dare from Victoire Weasley, a good friend of mine who's two years younger than I am and in Ravenclaw. We grew up together. Harry and her father, Bill, were equally clueless when it came to parenting, so Victoire and I had playdates every day that Fleur, Victoire's mother, was at work. Safe to say we saw quite a lot of each in those early days. I think she might have a slight crush on me, but that's beside the point. What is the point, is that I am not one to back down from a challenge. Especially from someone who will hold it in my face every Weasley family dinner from now until the end of time.
I waited until the adults began pouring their second or third glasses of wine before I excused myself. Technically, at 17, I am old enough to sit and enjoy alcohol and conversation with the older folks, but frankly, I've never enjoyed the taste of wine. It leaves an odd, bitter aftertaste in my mouth that I have never gotten used to. The same's true with most alcohol. I've yet to find a beverage of that variety that enjoyed enough to get smashed with.
Anyway, I kissed my official unofficial grandmother, Molly Weasley, on the cheek before slipping up the stairs of 12 Grimmauld Place. In the back of my mind, I can recall when these stairs were twisted and falling apart. Half the steps were broken, and the other half would disappear as soon as you tried to step on them. It had made me cry when I had first come here, the day of my grandmother's funeral. I don't remember much about Andromeda Tonks, but I remember that she was a good woman and that she hated this house. It was only right that Harry completely redid the place. Within two months of my moving in, the whole building was unrecognizable.
Harry's office was on the second floor. Harry was never strict raising me, but he did make sure to lay down some ground rules, one of which was that I was never to enter his office unsupervised.
"There's a lot of dangerous things in there, Teddy," Harry had said to me when I sat whimpering on the ground over a cut I had inflicted upon myself with his letter opener. "I want you to promise me that you'll never go in there without me knowing, alright?" I nodded. Harry and I had both known that that wasn't going to last forever.
I put my hand on the door and it swung open with no resistance. I’m not surprised, but then again, Harry should know better than to leave doors unlocked if he doesn’t want people going in. It’s not like I’d ever let a locked door stop me, but it’s certainly a deterrent. I walked through the door and felt the tingle of wards going off, notifying Harry of my location.
"So that's why you left it unlocked, then," I grumbled to myself. I ignored the sound of Harry and his pregnant wife, Ginny, coming up the stairs. They already knew I was in there. There was no reason to freak out and leave when I'd been caught either way.
"Teddy, what did I say about going in there alone?" Harry called from a floor below. He had been injured on the job as an Auror, causing him to lose one leg. The limb had been replaced with a magical prosthetic that was nearly as functional as his real leg, but it still slowed him down. I had a minute before he'd make it up here, and Ginny wasn't going to run ahead. I wandered around the office.
There wasn't anything very interesting. The drawers were filled with old paperwork. Harry had quit his job when he got injured, which was two years ago. Nothing new had come in here since then. Harry had a lot of money from being Lord of both the House of Potter and the House of Black and Ginny was still earning a lot from being a successful professional Quidditch player. The Women's English National Team had won for the first time when she played for them. Safe to say she would be raking in sponsorship money until the day she died. Then my eye caught on something shiny hidden in the back of Harry's shelf.
I am like a niffler when it comes to shiny stuff, I'm telling you. Once something that sparkles catches my eye, I'm drawn to it like a moth to a flame. Harry was nearby now, I could hear him coming, so I scrambled over to the shelf. I pulled the thing down just as Harry reached the doorway. It was a Time Turner.
"Teddy, come on. Really?" Harry didn't sound mad, just like he's done with all my bullshit. I don't blame him. He'd been called to Headmistress McGonagall's office so many times I lost count after my first year.
"Victoire dared me to. You know I couldn't just do nothing." From behind him, Ginny laughed, hand on her swollen belly.
"Gin, you're supposed to back me up!" Harry looked over his shoulder, shooting Ginny a fake look of betrayal.
"I know, love. It's just that you would have said the same thing when you were his age," Ginny says with a smirk.
"No, I wouldn't have. I was too busy saving the world!" Harry smiled knowingly when Ginny and I both groaned. He uses the "I Saved the World at 17" card so many times it wasn't even funny anymore.
"Well, you definitely would have said it in 6th year. That much I know." Harry rolled his eyes at his wife and entered his office.
"Listen, Teddy, I'm not mad. That rule was set a long time ago, and it doesn't make sense anymore. Even so, you shouldn't just break rules for no reason." Ginny laughed again and called her husband a hypocrite. Harry used the "I Saved the World at 17" card again and Ginny banged her head against the wall.
"Merlin's underpants, Harry! I'm going back downstairs. This is dumb and I'm missing out on Pie and Gossip Hour with George and Angelina." Ginny walked off, throwing a dismissive wave over her shoulder.
I examined the Time Turner. It had sat ignored in my palm through that whole conversation, and it had grown warm to the touch. Harry caught my eye when I looked up and shook his head.
"That might be one of the last dangerous things left in here," he said, nodding to the Time Turner. "They destroyed most of them after Kingsley was elected Minister. The ones remaining are in storage at the Department of Mysteries. That one had a crack in it, though, and they wanted Hermione and I to examine it. Not sure why they trusted the two of us over the Unspeakables, but they paid overtime for it, so I didn't ask." He laughed lightly at himself. "I guess I never gave it back after I quit." He shook his head. "Come on, Teddy. Let's go back downstairs. We missed George and Angelina's portion of gossip hour, but we might be able to catch the Ron and Hermione section if we hurry." I laughed and nodded. I had accomplished my mission, I didn't get in trouble, and there was no reason to stick around. I would have called it a 100% success.
But then the Time Turner began leaking sand.
"Um, Harry. Is that bad?" I asked, trying to tilt the Time Turner in a direction where it would stop leaking. No matter which way I turned it, sand continued to fall to the ground. It was defying gravity, managing to escape the glass of the Time Turner even when the crack faced away from the ground. "Oh, that's definitely bad. Normal, not dangerous sand doesn't just defy the laws of physics for no reason."
"What?" Harry asked, turning around. He was already halfway out of the office. Had he kept walking, he would have escaped the effects of the Time Turner. Instead, he walked back towards me. He sucked a breath in through his teeth when his eyes caught on the sand.
"Ok, Teddy," he said, his voice deadly calm. "You need to put the Time Turner down and step away. If you-" he doesn't get to finish his sentence. I practically launched the Time Turner at the ground. The sand begins glowing and swirling around the office. The last thing I hear before we are whisked away is Harry let out a soft, "Oh, fuck."