The year after her brother James graduates, Teddy Potter returns to Hogwarts for her final year. With the Marauders gone, it should be a quiet, peaceful year despite the mounting tensions in the world outside of school.
The problem, naturally, lies...
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The following week Teddy finds out that James and Sirius have not, in fact, forgotten about the stupid toenail thing.
A letter arrives at breakfast one morning midweek, and Teddy opens it absentmindedly as she tears into her toast. As she skims over the contents, she curses softly. "Oh, you have to be joking."
"What?" Mary, nosey as ever, plucks the letter right out of Teddy's fingers and reads it herself. Her mouth falls open and she starts to laugh before she gets even halfway through the letter. "Virgin toenails? He's asking you for virgin toenails?"
"Shut up." Teddy snatches the letter back, flushing. "He wants them for potions ingredients."
Alice looks back and forth between them over her tea, eyes wide. "Oh, you didn't tell him?"
"Of course she didn't tell him." Mary snorts, grinning at Teddy through a mouthful of sausage. "James would have gone mental-"
"There was nothing to tell." Teddy stuffs the letter into the pockets of her robes, her cheeks still glowing with embarrassment. "It- it was only once-"
"Once-?"
"Maybe twice!" Teddy sets down her fork a little too loudly. She glares at her friends as they start to giggle. "Oh, shut up! It wasn't like that!"
"Oh?" Mary crows, nudging Alice as they both giggle. "Well please, tell us what it was like! Tell us exactly what Remus was like-"
"Shut up!" Teddy lunges to cover Mary's mouth with her hand and nearly topples the both of them right off the bench. "Merlin, there's no need to tell the whole school!"
Alice laughs so hard she gives herself the hiccups and ends up covering her face as her whole body jolts. "Oh Teddy, please- hic!- tell us! You've never - hic!- told us anything about it!"
"Yeah!" Mary joins in immediately as she straightens herself out on the bench. "Are we not your best friends in the whole world?"
"Not right now, you're not."
"Cruel!"
"Please, Teddy!"
"No!" Teddy throws a quick look over each of her shoulders to make sure that no one is listening in. Once she's satisfied that everyone around them is sufficiently occupied with their breakfast, she lowers her voice so that only the girls can hear her. "It just- it just sort of happened! We've talked about it, and it's not going to happen again, alright! We were both just... figuring stuff out!"
"But what was he like!" insists Mary, like a bloody dog with a bone.
"He was very..." Teddy struggles for a moment to come up a word to describe the entire experience. "Er... considerate."
Alice starts squealing instantly, as though that's simply the most wonderful thing she's ever heard. "Oh, I knew he would be!"
"You've thought about it?" Teddy asks, laughing despite herself.
