A Cup of Tea, Please

19 | Lovebug

Opposed to his expectations, work flew by and the next thing Harry knew, he was opening the door to Number 12, Grimmauld Place. Although he'd popped back into the kitchen a few hours ago to feed the kitten, Harry had completely forgotten about her after work was over. It almost gave him a heart attack when he stepped into the house and he was met with a fuzzy creature, hiding in the shadows.

"Oh, it's just you," laughed Harry, taking his hand off his racing heart and approaching the kitten.

She purred in response, presumably happy to see him from the way her tail gently waved from side to side.

As Harry bent down to stroke her fur, he realised that he should probably give her a name, just for now of course. Just so that he didn't always refer to her as 'you', which sounded rather rude and dehumanising. Not that she was a human, but it still sounded rude to Harry. The only concern with this was whether she'd get too used to the name and reject any name Draco tried to give her.

But as Harry locked eyes with the kitten, her eyes narrowed and something inside of Harry wanted to name her Viridis. He didn't know what it was or why—hell, it wasn't even a name he would consider for a kitten, but it suddenly sprung into his mind and it latched itself like a thirsty leech, refusing to let go until Harry uttered the name.

"Er, will it be okay if I call you Viridis? Just for now. It won't be——"

'Meow.'

Something about the way her emerald eyes twinkled up at him told Harry that she was more than happy with the name. Viridis it is, then.

"By the way, I was going to head somewhere for a couple of hours. I hope you don't mind."

Harry expected Viridis to tuck her tail underneath herself or hold her ears back, but her tail remained in the air, swaying from side to side (Hermione having taught him about cats' body language to help him better understand her). Harry tightly pressed his lips together—he didn't know whether she was genuinely unbothered by him spending so much time away from her or if she didn't understand. The latter would have been the glaringly obvious answer if she were bought from a Muggle pet shop, but she wasn't.

And then Harry realised something. Cat flaps. He pulled out his wand and pointed it towards the front door, mumbling an incantation under his breath.

"If you want to go out," Harry said, putting his wand back into his jean pocket, "you can walk straight through the door, but please come back, okay?"

Although nothing came out of Viridis' mouth this time, Harry had a feeling that she understood.

"If anything happens, come back home as soon as you can. I don't want you getting hurt." Though, Harry didn't know how a magical cat could get hurt. For all he knew, Viridis herself could be a witch—a cat witch, not an Animagus. Come to think of it, Harry didn't know how he'd react if Viridis turned out to be an Animagus, but that wasn't really something to worry about at the moment.

With that, Harry dashed upstairs to grab his copy of The Daily Prophet and left back out the front door. Of course not without giving Viridis a small kiss on her head. Harry wanted her to know that he cared, even if he did have to leave her at home for hours at a time.

*     *     *

When Harry stepped into Le Café de Carnation, he was hit with the usual scent of baked goods, but before he'd even opened the door, Harry heard festive music being blasted on speakers he didn't even remember being there. But despite how loud the music was, it was still drowned out by the customers' thriving chatter. Huh, the cafe seemed to get busier as it got closer to Christmas. Who would've known?