All together, at last, as it always should have been.

So unexpected yet beautifully endearing! I'm in love.

Oh, this is just lovely.  The repetition in the opening of your story - 'He watched...' - is just so simple and so powerful.  Particularly when we make it to "He watched his world settle down into its customary patterns, a little chastened but otherwise unchanged." Now THAT'S a statement - about how easily things fade into the background and how we take so much for granted. It's also poetry.

Ach, and a large ginger menace, a little piece of Hermione, can stay with him until she joins him again! This is just so tender and understated, and their last exchange? Perfect.

Very neat!

Wow.  Such a nice story!