Family Reunion

Khaat was truly starting to enjoy her time away from St. Mungos. She had lost her anger at her father for tricking her into taking the medical leave that he had believed was so essential for her health and her baby's, and she was even planning on spending some time with her mother. She was also liking going into Sparks and not going there to work. She would go there often so Rob would cook for her. She liked Rob spoiling her, and he seemed to like doing it. She felt his watchful, protective eyes on her often, and it felt safe. Made her feel secure and loved, and she liked it. It wasn't a nuisance now. She appreciated his attentiveness and his deep devotion and love.

The serious thinnness she was dealing with that had almost caused her to miscarry her baby was fading slowly while Rob was finally in charge, and Khaat was letting him make all the choices, all the decisions. She had just decided she didn't want to be bothered doing it anymore--at least while she was carrying Abbey. She was even truly trying to cut back on her addiction to good, strong, no nonsense, black french roast coffee. She was only drinking half cups now. Never mind that when she got seriously stressed she just drank more of them than she knew she should.

Today, she was sitting at a table by herself, feeling more relaxed than usual, and was equipped with a muggle fashion magazine for pregnant women that she had purchased merely on a whim in a muggle bookstore, and she also had a copy of the Daily Prophet with her. She wasn't truly interested in the newspaper, though. She was flipping through the magazine, and sipping on her coffee and nibbling on a new orange scone that had a delightful orange glaze on it. Khaat was trying to decide if the new flavor was going to become her new favorite or not. The baby girl she was carrying had a definite sweet tooth, so anything sugary was fair game, although Khaat was still relentlessly harping on Rob to get some pistachio ice cream in to ease her cravings. Leave it to a man to not understand how important it is to address those stinking obsessive cravings, she thought, a trifle irked with him for not just putting down everything else he had to do and order the bloodly ice cream. He just didn't get it, apparently. And unless he could develop a pistachio cheesecake, her craving for pistachio was not likely to go away without the pistachio ice cream.

"Hello," Khaat said casually. Then, she found herself taking a doubletake at the young man. Her seer's powers were activated. She looked at him and it was almost as if she could see Remus in his face. She saw he had Tonk's hair, but he clearly had those gorgeous eyes of Remus's that she had looked into ten thousand times at least. She heard herself saying out loud before she caught herself, "Remus!" She rose and went over to him. "Excuse me, but I feel as if I know you from somewhere. I..know this is going to sound odd, but do we know each other, or should we? I'm Khaat. Khaat Lupin. Well, Khaat Lupin Dent. My uncle was Remus Lupin. Should I know you?"

"Ted?" Khaat was flabbergasted. "Ted Lupin? " Then she knew. It was undoubtedly Remus's son. The last she had seen Ted was when Tonks and Remus showed him off proudly to her and asked her to be Ted's godmother. That was first and last time she had seen him. "Oh my God, Ted! We've been looking for you since your parents were killed. I'm your cousin. My father is your uncle--Remus's older brother, Robert." She took a second to regain herself. "Welcome home, Ted. I cannot tell you what a relief it is to know you're alive. We've been hunting you for years."

"I--I recognized you right away. You have Tonk's hair, and you definately have your father's eyes. I looked into his eyes ten thousand times at least. I'd know those eyes anywhere. I was 16 when your parents were killed. I met you once, when you were a newborn. Tonks and Remus brought you to introduce you to us. And then--well, they...passed away, and you disappeared. We panicked wondering what had happened to you. We went to everyone we knew. Every place we looked, we were told you weren't there and nobody had seen you. After awhile, we wondered if somehow you hadn't survived either after Remus and Tonks were killed. Obviously, someone lied to us. I don't know. Maybe they felt they needed to hide you from everybody or something. I'm sure they had good reasons for not letting us know where you were. If you were happy and healthy, we had no need to interrupt that. But we did want you to know you had Lupins who certainly loved you.

"I didn't have the chance to get to know your mother very well, but, boy, did I ever know your father! I may have a lot of missing pieces for you, at least about Remus. I was closer to him than, well, probably anybody else--until he met your mother. We were still close after that, but he certainly loved her and you with all his heart. I have a lot to explain to you, I think.

"But first, lets all order and maybe then we can all talk a bit." She looked at Rob. "The smoothie is great. It really is. But I haven't had any coffee all day. Can I just have half a cup, please?" She was such a hopeless addict. She really was trying togive it up, but she didn't think she'd ever manage it. However, she hoped he would notice that she had cut her former constant diet of french roast back to just a few half cups, spread very sparsely throughout the day now. It hadn't been easy, but she really was giving it her best.

"I'm sorry. I know this is really pretty overwhelming for you," she said. "There is so much you dont' know. And so very, very much your father wanted you to know. When you're ready, I'd like to introduce you to my father and mother. When you're ready, I really want you to know the Lupin side of your family and to answer all the questions you probably never really had any answers for. " Then she smiled. "I have something I want you to try."

She rose and got a mug of tea--an herbal tea. It had always been Remus's favorite blend. It was flavored like a comforting cinnamon and vanilla cookie. Khaat had jars and jars of flavored tea blends in Sparks, all made by her father. But this tea was one of the first blends her father had learned to make because Remus had pestered him continuously about making more. She wondered if Ted would like it too. She made the tea and brought herself a half a cup of coffee, a server following her to the table to take orders.

"Try this, Ted. You might like this blend," she said. "What would the rest of you like?"