Harry Potter stood in his office at the Ministry of Magic, staring out the window at the swarms of Muggles on the busy London street. His forehead lightly pressed against the glass, the heat of his breath creating a cloud beneath his nose. In his left hand he slowly rotated a small glass vial. The liquid contents were beginning to warm up from the heat of his skin. His usually bright office was in total darkness. The moving shapes in the photographs and newspaper clippings dotted around his walls were barely decipherable. His children waved silently from the photo frames, upon broomsticks, hugging their redheaded mother, or clutching struggling pets too close to their chests. Criminal witches and wizards stared him down from their 'wanted' posters.
His best friend Ron Weasley's pensieve sat conspicuously in a dark corner of the large room. Though he knew it wasn't real, Harry felt as if a cold air rose from the hollow stone basin, inviting him to cool off. He slowly turned away from the window and took a few steps towards the pensieve. He placed the vial in his hand on the edge of the basin, and gripped both sides of the bowl, leaning forward into the whispering mist.
He took a few deep breaths, and smiled. Harry wondered what it would be like to see this memory. After discovering his father had left him a diary of sorts in the Department of Mysteries, documenting much of his life in extracted memories, Harry had been completely consumed by the thought of escaping into his father's boyhood excursions for a few moments each day. There were almost a hundred memories. Some lasted hours, others only moments.
It had taken Harry a full hour of analysing the various vial labels to decide which memory to view first. He had been apprehensive, and not foolishly so. His first experience of his father's misadventures had left him somewhat damaged. He had decided that this first chosen memory was appropriate. It was a look into a part of his father's life he had never known, not from Lupin nor Sirius nor any memories before.
With slightly shaking hands, he uncorked the vial on the edge of the basin labelled "Dad's death" and emptied the contents into the pensieve. He took a deep breath, and sank into the mist.
Harry felt the familiar whooping sensation in his stomach as he travelled, as if through apparition, back in time to his father's memory. He landed with a quiet thud onto the rug in front of the Gryffindor Common Room fireplace. Excitement and adrenaline instantly filled his veins as Harry cast his eyes around the room. He had flashbacks of Quidditch victory parties, homework nights with Ron and Hermione, talks through the fire with Sirius using Floo Powder. He felt a slight pang of jealousy for his sons and daughter, experiencing all of this for the first time.
Seventeen-year-old James Potter was sitting on the window ledge, staring out at the grounds in the direction of Hagrid's cabin as the rain battered down against the glass. His messy, jet-black hair was slightly wet, as were his clothes. He was not in uniform; Harry suspected it might have been a Hogsmeade weekend. He was wearing a v-neck white t-shirt and black jeans with black boots. With a half-smile, Harry admired his father's style. James was alone in the common room. By the looks of the sky from the window, it was very early morning, between four and six. Harry inched closer tentatively, despite knowing his presence would not be felt. James was not wearing his glasses. Instead, they were strewn across the floor beneath the ledge, along with his bag and jacket. He was holding his knees up to his chest, a sizable piece of parchment in his hands. Harry rounded to face his father head-on, and saw his hazel eyes were red and puffy. His breathing was irregular and he was shaking. It gave Harry a good idea of what the letter contained. He tipped his head to the side to get a better angle of the parchment. He imagined it was his grandmother's handwriting. It was vaguely similar to his own, he thought with a slight smile. Harry took another look at his adolescent father and felt a wave of pity. Being an orphan was all Harry had ever known. Becoming one must have been even worse, Harry thought.
James inhaled deeply before letting out a sudden series of sobs. He buried his head in his knees, and crumpled the letter as he pressed his hands to his head. He eventually dropped the letter on the floor, to run his hands through his hair. Harry winced at the movement. It was the first time he had seen his father make this trademark reflex of his out of stress, and not confidence or to attract attention.
As he watched his father weep, Harry vaguely wondered why he had chosen to show him this. It was harrowing, and concerned close family of Harry's, he supposed, but it was not particularly insightful. Before he had a chance to leave though, a noise came from the staircase across the common room. At the mouth of the entrance to the dorms, a beautiful girl was leaning against the stone wall. Her long, auburn hair was in a ponytail, revealing a porcelain face, and mesmerising almond-shaped green eyes. The penny dropped as Harry stared with adoration at his teenage mother. He would have blushed under her intense gaze, had he not known she was staring straight through him, to his tormented father on the window ledge.
Harry stepped back to get a view of both his parents as Lily Evans calmly and gracefully crossed the common room to her future husband. James stiffened as he felt the presence of another person, but did not turn to see who it was, until she softly spoke his name.
"Potter? Are you alright?" The softness of her voice was uncharacteristic for addressing his father, Harry knew. At this age they were still nemeses, at divides over his mother's relationship with Severus Snape. Nonetheless, James' head snapped up at the sound of her voice. His hands jumped to his face, in an attempt to wipe away the tears before she saw them.
"Um, I'm fine, Evans" James mumbled into his hands. He did not seem to question Lily's presence in the common room so early in the morning. Harry watched as a slight look of horror developed on Lily's face. Clearly, she had never seen James exuding any emotions other than confidence and glee. She bent down and slowly picked up the letter on the floor. She began to read it, when James suddenly stood up and snatched it from her hands with such force that she received a paper cut.
He froze as she gasped at the sight of her own blood. Lily looked up at James, with an element of fear in her eyes. She stood back to let him pass her and continue storming towards his dorm. Her look of apprehension shocked James. He took a step towards her, again wiping his eyes with his sleeve before sniffing and whispering, barely audibly, "Evans, I'm sorry." He took her bloody hand in his and pulled his wand from his pocket. He mouthed an incantation and they watched together as her skin painlessly resealed and the trickles of blood disappeared. Lily looked up at James as he continued to stare at their hands. Harry's heart began to beat with increased pace. He understood that this was probably the first remotely intimate moment his parents had ever shared, hence his father's desire for it to be documented, but still he felt like an intruder, as if he should look away for their privacy. He remained transfixed by the chemistry between the two teenagers in front of him, however. He watched as James' gaze eventually rose to meet Lily's. She took a half-step closer to him, and closed her newly-healed hand around his.
"James, is it your father," she whispered. She leaned her head slightly to the side, to get a better view of his eyes beneath his untidy fringe. The boy closed his eyes and nodded once, before biting down on his lip hard, in an attempt to conceal another burst of sobs. Lily sighed sympathetically, before taking both her hands up to James' cheeks. She stroked away his tears with her thumbs.
"I'm so sorry. So, so sorry," she said softly. She took another half-step towards James before wrapping her arms around his neck. He reciprocated by digging his head into her shoulder and hugging her waist tightly. They gripped one another so tightly in the embrace, Harry could have sworn he felt the physical heat between them radiate the few metres towards him.
Lily and James remained entwined in one another, with James' occasional convulsion of sobs, for what seemed like an eternity. Eventually, she broke it off, and took a step away to look at James. He seemed to be composing himself. He took a deep breath and gave her a sad half-smile.
"Thanks, Evans," he said, waving his hands between the two of them. He closed his eyes for a moment, and Harry suspected his father was mentally kicking himself for referring to Lily as "Evans" despite her addressing him by his forename for probably the first time ever. She smiled at him, and squeezed his elbow.
"You should go up to bed, get some sleep before your mother comes for you in the morning," she advised, but something in her tone told Harry she wasn't being so sincere. Harry looked at his father, who glanced in the direction of the staircase to the dorm, before taking a seat again on the window ledge. Out the window, it had stopped raining, and the sun was beginning to rise. James motioned to Lily for her to sit down beside him. She hesitated momentarily before taking a seat. Their knees knocked together and Lily exhaled before putting an arm around James' neck, and smiled, gazing at him.
"I promise that you'll be okay, Potter. Time is a healer, and you've got Black, and Remus and the others, and you've still got your mother," she said soothingly. Her words were so slow and sweet, Harry imagined how wonderful it would have been for that voice to have read him stories each night of his childhood. He felt a strong desire to close his eyes. James was apparently feeling similarly; he drooped his eyelids, and smiled softly. He then returned her gaze for a moment, mouthing a silent 'thank you' before his eyes moved to analyse the sparse freckles on her nose, the rosiness of her cheeks, the fullness of her lips. She was even more beautiful close up, and this was the closest James had ever been. They were close enough now to feel the heat of each other's breath. Lily watched as the boy drank in her features with his hazel eyes. Harry saw his mother gradually become lost in a trance, relaxing and leaning her body further into James', her eyes on his all the while, waiting for his gaze to meet hers once again.
James moved his hand around Lily's back; it crept up until it found a few strands from her ponytail. He toyed with her lovely red locks between his fingers before finally looking her in the eye again. His breathing increased. Time seemed to move at glacial pace as he inched towards Lily's lovely lips with his own. She never blinked, nor averted her stare. Their foreheads touched lightly, then Lily closed her eyes. James saw the corners of her mouth twitch upwards ever so slightly, and it seemed all the invitation he needed. He leaned the rest of the way in, placing a soft kiss on the side of her mouth, before closing his eyes as well. They both grinned widely before Lily leaned in to give James a return kiss. It lasted a few moments longer, and James let go of the strand of red hair he was coiling around his finger to put his hand right round her waist. Lily responded by putting one arm around his neck and a hand to James' cheek, stroking it ever so gently.
Harry stood up. He had enjoyed watching the tenderness of the moment unfold. He was glad for his parents that this had been their first kiss with one another, it seemed fitting. He moved back towards the end of the room he had come from, with a single backward glance to the lovestruck teenagers on the windowsill.
Harry Potter sighed for his parents as he returned to his office, wishing with all his heart they could have had a future beyond their five remaining years.