‘He made less noise than the dead leaves slithering along the pavement as he drew level with the dark hedge and stared over it... They hadn’t even drawn the curtains...’
- J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.
‘James, it’s nearly time for Harry to go to bed!’ James Potter heard his wife, Lily, call from the kitchen at the back of the house.
James sighed as he shifted himself from the sofa, from where he had been watching his one year-old son, to the floor, where the toddler was sitting on the rug in front of the fireplace, carefully shredding the threads and not looking the least bit tired.
‘Got time for a few more games before bed, eh?’ James grinned as Harry abandoned his destruction of the carpet and scooted off away from him to the corner of the room, where his toy broomstick lay.
‘Oh no, not that one!’ James laughed, crawling after him to intercept his route. ‘Not now anyway, your mother will have a fit.’
He scooped Harry up and swung him into the air, dangling him high above his head, making faces as he did so. The small boy laughed at his father, and reached out his hands to try and grab him, gurgling as he did so.
‘James, please try not to get him too excited!’ Lily’s exasperated voice sounded from the back of the house again as she heard the toddler laughing.
‘I’m just trying to wear him out a bit!’ James called back cheekily. ‘Don’t want him crying again all night, like yesterday.’
Lily’s head suddenly appeared around the doorframe. She too was smiling mischievously.
‘Neither do we want him jumping around in his cot and squealing all night like an overactive Puffskein, like he did after you and Padfoot wound him up the other day!’
James grinned sheepishly at her by means of an apology as he remembered the event and Lily’s anger as Harry continued to rattle the bars of his cot, demanding to be let out and resume the game that he had been enjoying.
‘Ten more minutes,’ she compromised, disappearing again.
James turned back to Harry, whom he had lowered to his hip.
‘Alright then, what can we do in that time?’ he asked the toddler, jiggling him around.
‘Make a lot of mess, probably!’ Lily called from down the hall.
James grinned.
‘Would I do that?’
Lily’s head popped round the door again.
‘I wouldn’t put it past you, Potter,’ she said with playful grin, before ducking back again.
James laughed.
‘Mummy thinks we’re going to make a lot of mess,’ he cooed at Harry. ‘Let’s prove her wrong, shall we?’
He swung Harry up in the air again, and Harry squeaked and gurgled in delight at the ride.
‘Like that, do you?’ James smiled. ‘Again?’
Harry laughed as his father swung him in the air again and again. Apparently, however, this game was not exciting enough for the young boy, and after a while, he demanded to be let down, where he shuffled back to the rug and began picking at the fabric again.
‘Don’t go ruining that too much.’ James warned as he sat wearily down on the sofa, picking up his wand. ‘Mummy will never forgive me.’
He sat for a while, twiddling the wand between his fingers and absent-mindedly watching his son in the middle of the room. He began beating out a rhythm with the wand on his knees, and as he did so, a puff of purple smoke erupted from the end.
Harry looked up for the source of this new and mysterious thing as the smoke drifted over to him.
James smiled, and another puff of smoke emitted from his wand.
Harry laughed, and pulled himself over to James, who sent more clouds of brightly coloured smoke at the toddler. He watched with amusement as Harry attempted to grab and clutch at the smoke with his small fists, dispersing them into colourless air.
‘Time for bed, Harry!’ Lily said, coming back into the room.
With a sigh, James bent down, picked his son up, and handed him to Lily.
‘Aww, he was having fun there, weren’t you?’ James laughed as Harry was deposited in his mother’s arms.
‘Well, it’s a game he can continue tomorrow.’ Lily said, tapping Harry on the nose. ‘I’ll be back down soon, I’ll just get him settled,’ she added to James.
James stretched and yawned. Entertaining Harry was hard work, he thought as he cast his wand aside.
Suddenly, there was a great bang, and the front door burst open; Lily was barely at the living room door.
‘Lily!’ he shouted. ‘It’s him!’
Her face turned to a look of pure horror.
‘Take Harry and go!’ he shouted at her, making for the door. ‘I’ll hold him off...’
A Stone From the Riverbank by Sapphire at Dawn
Chapter Notes: Thanks very much to harrypotter627 and katie616 for beat reading this. The quote at the beginning is taken from Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (British edition) page 280.
Chapter Endnotes: Thanks for reading, please leave a review and tell me what you think.