The alarm beeped. No, not beeped. Screamed. It screamed at me to wake up. I reached out to beat it into cooperation with my need to sleep, but it did not bow down to my superior strength and shut the hell up. In fact, it made a peculiar "hrrumph!" sound of slightly passive irritation.

Then, I realised I had not assaulted the alarm clock, which by now had stopped screaming anyway of its own accord, but rather, my confused and mildly offended husband.

"Sorry, James," I mumbled tiredly.

"What'd I do?" He mumbled in response, still half asleep.

"You? Nothing. But the alarm clock had it coming."

"How dare it."

"Quite."

"It is right though. We ought to get up."

"Why? I like sleep."

"And I like lying in bed next to a beautiful woman. But we have a healer appointment, remember?"

"Oh. That," I recalled with disgust as it crossed my mind that I really had to go puke my guts out.

"Excuse me," I said faux-politely before stumbling out of bed with all the grace of a centaur in heels, and sprinting to the bathroom.

When I had finished spewing, I turned to find James' groggy but still anxious face watching me.

"It really is beginning to worry me," he said. "That's the fifth day in a row."

"It's probably just a bug," I said confidently, feeling much better now, if it weren't for the god-awful taste still lingering on my tongue. I picked up my toothbrush.

"Even if it is, it's still better that a healer check it out," James reasoned rationally as I brushed.

I mumbled something unintelligible around my toothbrush.

"Sorry?" James questioned with a smirk.

I spat and rinsed.

"I hate going to the healer's," I complained, comprehensibly, this time.

"Well, tough, because you're going. We're leaving in 45 minutes. Get ready," he ordered as he left the room.

"Urgh," I groaned. Merlin, I hated hospitals. Even if they were magical ones.

I started to detangle my hair. Gingers really did have the worst of it, didn't they? I think I had the toughest hair in the world. It was always tangled, it was unruly, it never did as it was told. This was why I was destined to be a witch. At least now, I could magically detangle it instead of almost ripping the hair out of my head with a brush.

After I had finished said magical detangling, I sorted out some particularly stubborn bright-red curls, and did my make-up. I couldn't be bothered though, really, so concealer and mascara it was.

Then I got dressed. When I saw myself in the mirror, though, I stopped – when had I gotten that fat? And when had my breasts swelled to that size? Man, I needed to lay off the treacle (blame on James' mother for continually feeding me it). Not that I minded the boob increase, though. But the belly, that had to go.

I finally got dressed in a pair of jeans and lime-green knitted jumper (which was a smidge on the tight side; I definitely had to lose weight) since it was bloody freezing, and went downstairs, to see that James had already made breakfast.

"Well," I said brightly, and he turned to face me, "now I love you."

"Yes, because when we got married you told me you'd only love me as long as I made you pancakes in the morning," he said sarcastically, but he chuckled happily nonetheless.

"Mmhmm," I smiled, rolling my eyes and digging in.

"Thank you," I told him after my first mouthful.

"No problem. I'm going to get dressed. Don't take too long," he instructed before giving me a quick peck on the lips.

Five minutes later, I was finished and he was dressed, and we apparated to St, Mungo's.

We made our way to wherever it is that you go just to be checked, I didn't pay much attention, and soon we were in a healer's office. I focused on my shoes the entire walk up. I so hated hospitals.

As the healer performed various spells to inspect various different parts of my body and/or anatomy, James told me he was going for coffee.

The healer finished while he was gone, smiling to herself.

"Well, Mrs Potter," she smiled, "it's not a bug. Good news: You're not sick at all."

"Oh, thank Merlin," I sighed. "So what is it?"

"Well, I guess there's no way to beat around the bush here, Mrs Potter. You're pregnant."

At this last part, the door swung open and James froze in the doorway, coffees in hand, as I froze in place myself, staring incredulously at the healer.

There was a momentary lapse in any sort of reaction or movement at all, before James repeated, "Pregnant?!"

"Pregnant," the healer happily confirmed.

"Pregnant," I stated again. "Like, there is a miniature person growing inside my womb."

"I believe that is the scientific definition, yes," the healer replied cheekily.

Then, a sudden change in attitude swept over us. An enormous grin broke out over my features and I laughed.

"Pregnant!" I repeated, this time excitedly.

James hastily set down our coffees and picked me up into his arms, laughing with me.

"Pregnant!" He repeated again.

I wrapped my arms even more tightly around him.

"Pregnant," I whispered once more, and then he kissed me. I could feel him smiling into the kiss, as our lips and tongues moved sweetly, lovingly, together, his arms still supporting my legs around his torso. He was deliriously happy. I was deliriously happy. The whole world, in that moment, was deliriously happy. For just a moment, the war and Voldemort and the Death Eaters and the whole blood issue just didn't exist. It was just me, James, and our child, our little baby that was – though yet unnamed, though still without properly working thoughts and organs, the baby that was, for all intents and purposes, still a foetus – that was already so loved, so much a part of our lives. We would do anything for that child. Our child.

So loved.

We finally – after what seemed like an eternity – broke away from the kiss, and James set me down.

"Thank you," James grinned at the healer as he led me out of St Mungo's, his fingers laced with mine.

"I love you, James," I breathed to him, tears of joy in my eyes, outside the door of the magical hospital on London-side.

"I love you, Lily," he whispered back, and he kissed me again.