Naming The Baby
by Am-Chau Yarkona

 

"Charlotte, we can't just call the boy John! My mother will have a fit."

"Don't shout, Pallas, you'll wake him, and the last thing I need right now is a crying baby."

Pallas Lupin shut the nursery door gently and steered his wife into their bedroom. "I know, love. All I'm saying is that he needs a wizard's name."

"And a Muggle's too. We can't be sure he's not a Squib," Charlotte replied, sitting down on the bed and starting to take her stockings off.

"He needs both, then," Pallas said. "Something classical is always good. Romulas? Claudius?"

"You might just as well call the poor child Gandalf," Charlotte sniffed, and Pallas had the good sense to let the subject rest for the night.

* * * 

"He's definitely going to be a John," Charlotte announced over breakfast. "John something-wizardly, I don’t care what, but definitely John."

"Why John?" Pallas enquired mildly, pouring himself a glass of pumpkin juice and his wife orange juice. "Perfectly good Muggle name, I agree, but why John and not Peter or Luke, or for that matter Michael or James?"

"Because—" Charlotte began, but turned away when the baby made a soft noise. He was just gurgling at the cat, though, and she went on as if she's never paused. "—I have a feeling about it. John was the name of my favourite grandfather, and is the name of my favourite Gospel. And it's about as ordinary as you can get."

Pallas nodded diplomatically, discarded two questions concerning the wisdom of reusing the names of one's deceased ancestors or important names from one's religion, and settled for asking, "Why is it so important that he has an ordinary name? Isn't he unique, our special boy?"

"Of course he's unique—pass the salt—but sometimes it can be handy to pretend you're not, without actually lying about your name. I don't use my middle name as a witch, but in the Muggle world I've been known to sign Mary instead of Charlotte: it is me, and I answer to it, but it attracts less attention."

Pallas passed the salt for Charlotte's hard-boiled egg, privately vowing to give the boy a proper name as well as "John".

* * * 

"How about Julius?" Pallas suggested, delicately changing the baby's nappy while Charlotte looked on. She shook her head.

"Meneloas?" he tried. "Lucius? Ursa?"

She giggled. "Much too girly."

"Cassius? Mercutio? Remus?"

Charlotte was, he saw, beginning to get bored with the game. He closed the nappy with a final spell-word, and passed her the baby.

"Well—why not Remus?" he pushed. "It's a good name, as these things go."

She rocked the boy in her arms, trying it out. "John Remus Lupin. It's not bad."

Pallas nodded, then risked saying, "It might sound better the other way round. Remus John Lupin." Charlotte started to wrinkle her nose, so he added quickly, " If we're to avoid all Tolkien references, it'd better be R.J. Lupin, rather than J.R."

She grinned down at the baby. "Remus John Lupin. It…" Her voice softened and her eyes unfocused a little, as if she was seeing something beyond the normal three dimensions. "In a funny way I think it suits him. Remus John it is."

Pallas smiled. He'd never been as good at Divination as his wife, but it felt right to him, too. 

- End -

 

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