The baby is tiny. He's pink, with a scrunched up nose and cloudy blue eyes and wisps of dark hair and small hands clenched in fists. When James dangles his hand over the cot, one of the fists uncurls and reaches for his fingers with the reflexes of a Quidditch great.
And he holds on tightly.
Hours later, James cradles his son in his arms, transfixed. The baby has a name, but he seems too small for it right now. James also has a new name. He is Dad. That name speaks a thousand things to James: it speaks of first broomsticks and letters home and words of wisdom, things he will share with this child in his arms, the small boy who is his only living blood relation. To this person, James is not a son or a friend or a husband, all the things he is now; he is not even James. He is Dad. He is Dad, with a heart so swollen it feels as though it might burst at any moment, as though it cannot hold the sheer amount of love that he feels towards the tiny baby boy he holds close to it.
The Potters used to be glorious, pictured forever in portraits hanging in grand manors. Now all that remains of the Potters is two almost-teenagers and a baby, a baby who could become anything and anyone. For now, though, he is Harry James Potter, and that is more than enough.
In honour of the new baby Cambridge, born as the seventh month dies!