Avalon crept down the stairs the next morning for breakfast after sleeping in for the first time in quite a while, finding her mother in front of the stove, dancing along to a song playing on the record player she'd installed next to the kitchen table when they renovated the house a few years ago.
The song that played was one by One Direction, She's Not Afraid, if Avalon heard correctly, and she found herself laughing at how ridiculous her mother was being.
This was the side of Amelia Weasley that Avalon loved to be around—the silly, hilarious woman that once put dark hair dye in her husband's conditioner as a joke, not the one that kept information about a civil war from her children and was fiercely overprotective to the point of being suffocating.
But she loved her mother regardless, so when Amelia turned around and held the spatula in her hand to her daughter's mouth like a microphone, she sang along without hesitation.
She sang and danced around the kitchen with her mother, and by the time the song ended, she was laughing so hard that her stomach hurt.
When Avalon had finally stopped laughing, the pancakes Amelia had been cooking were one hundred percent burnt and inedible, but the grin on her face made it all worth it.
"So," Amelia said with a roll of her brown eyes. "No pancakes. What about cereal?"
Avalon smiled. "Cereal sounds great."
Her mother waved her wand, and cabinets, drawers, the fridge, and the pantry magically opened; a bowl and a spoon, milk, and a box of Harry-O's—the wizarding world's most popular cereal, named after Avalon's Uncle Harry—all came flying out, assembling themselves in front of Avalon on the kitchen island.
She ate her cereal in silence for a few moments before a question popped up in her head.
"Hey, where is everyone?" She asked.
Amelia glanced up from where she had been cleaning up her mess. "Oh, the boys are out in the garden with Isabel and Beth—playing quidditch, I think. I'm not really sure what they're doing out there. And your dad went into the shop with Uncle George to set up a new product." She replied.
"You let me sleep through a quidditch game?" Avalon was already getting up from her seat, dumping her bowl in the sink and running for the stairs so she could change out of her pajamas and into something more fitting.
Her mother caught her wrist. "Av. Relax." She sat Avalon back down on the stool. "I let you sleep in because I wouldn't have had a chance to talk to you, one-on-one, otherwise."
Avalon allowed her mother to guide her back to her seat, eyeing her suspiciously. It was rare for Amelia to keep anything "one-on-one", unless it was something incredibly important or embarrassing.
"What do you want to talk about?"
Amelia sat down next to her daughter. "Have I been making a mistake, letting Teddy Lupin sleep in my home for the last few years?" She asked bluntly.
Avalon's cheeks reddened. "What are you talking about?"
There was no possible way that her mother found out about the kiss between Avalon and Teddy in the twelve hours since it had happened. Unless Amelia was a seer—she wasn't, and the only person in the Weasley family who could come close to seeing the future or predict things with relative certainty was Avalon herself, with the help of divination—Teddy must have said something.
Amelia smiled knowingly. "Avalon, I see the way you look at him. Your father used to look at me the same way—still does, he just used to be even more of a sappy git than he is now."
"Gross."
"Not the point. But anyway, you like him, don't you?"
Avalon didn't think it was possible to blush even more than she already was, but apparently anything was possible, for her face burned like she was sitting in front of a fire.
Luckily, she was saved from further interrogation when her brothers, sister, best friend, and Teddy walked in through the kitchen door.
Teddy's nose was red from being outside in the middle of winter, and as he removed his hat and rid himself of his jacket, he gave Avalon a warm smile that held a little more flirtatiousness behind the eyes than usual.
"Morning, Ava." He said simply, hanging up his coat.
She did her best to smile casually in return. "Good morning, Teddy." She winced as her voice squeaked a bit, but otherwise she sounded perfectly normal.
Amelia rolled her eyes at the awkward interaction, leaning over to whisper in her daughter's ear.
"We'll continue this conversation later."