Unseen - EXTRA CHAPTERS

FROM EDEN

Anne's Pregnancy Announcement

1984 (2 years before the Epilogue)

The world was quiet.

There was no war raging outside of the door of the Potter Manor, there was no danger for the giggling Harry outside playing with Laurie under the watchful eyes of James and Mia, who were outside, drinking tea and complaining about Aurors since it was his day off.

With Anne having another twelve-hours off, she had planned on sleeping in since Regulus was with his manager the whole day, but would come home with Sirius and Remus for dinner. She had asked for the two to keep an eye on Laurie as well as she tried her best to rest. But she couldn't.

Lily was still working on the shop that she opened with Severus since their reconciliation. If she was correct (Peter Pettigrew had invested quite a bit of money, insisting that if Lily was involved, there was no way that Severus would be able to mess it all up), so she had no way to be sure.

But she could try.

She was sitting on the floor of the bathroom of her bedroom, trying not to shake as violently as she felt her insides shaking. She had an idea of what that Muggle stick would tell her in a minute, but there was a part of her that still liked to believe that she had time to prepare herself mentally - she didn't. The truth was right there for at least two months at that point, making her weak and tired all the time; it had been bad enough that she had fainted at work, she had literally begged her boss not to get word to Mia, whom she had some sort of friendship with. This needed to be done alone.

Regulus had always dreamed of being a father, and then Laurie came along and they were happy. Anne was happy that her body didn't need to do the whole work of a pregnancy for them to have a child, but now that there was no way of escaping. She knew before being was sure. She knew because there was no way that her mind was as scrambled as that without an explanation - so she was either sick or she was terribly, terribly ill-prepared for the child that she had inside of herself.

She reached.

The stick was on the sink counter above her head and the result was turned down.

She turned it.

Positive. 'Pregnant', it was written.

Perhaps, Anne should've listened to Mia about how her periods going back to skipping a month wasn't the same as it had been in her teenage years. She was a woman now, not a girl and she should've known her own body better. Mia, however, had become so busy with being the proud grandmother that she was, showing off her two grandchildren around Diagon Alley, Charity Balls and every event that she could that the conversation slipped both of their minds.

"Fuck," she complained in a whisper.

What to do? Who to tell?

The correct thing was to tell Regulus before everybody else, but her fear was choking her. She needed help and she needed help immediately. So, she did what all pregnant women do when they get scared: they go to their mum and to her best friend, because she didn't know where else to go.

Taking a moment, Anne took a deep breath before getting up from the ground and fixing her blue-coloured trousers on her hips, ignoring how her hands were shaking. She walked back into her bedroom and changed from the black shirt she had on to a warmer, long sleeved white shirt before walking out. She walked down the stairs and wandered to the back of the house doing her best to pretend everything was alright, even though her heart seemed to be beating on her throat.