title: dawn is coming, open your eyes
rating: k+
word count: 2,392
disclaimer: harry potter and its characters belong to jk rowling, not me. written for fun not profit.
a/n: i currently have three fics that i've started in the past six months that are in various stages of completion and this was the only one i've managed to finish. sorry it's not neater, or even properly beta'd, but, uh, at this point i want it done. song title is from stay alive by josé gonzález.
for where this is in the canon jily timeline, i'm thinking a week or so after they go into hiding. also, do wizards use baby monitors? this was a question i stressed about for far too long but couldn't think of any alternatives.
(additionally on ao3 under same pen name)
- dawn is coming, open your eyes -
James hated nights. Hated them.
In the day, it was easier for James to pretend that things were normal. It was easier to pretend that they were safe and happy. He would spend most of it with Harry—sprawled out on the floor with him, napping with him, teaching him how to walk. He would help Lily get them better situated, arranging furniture, dusting rooms, whatever else he could do to make everything better for her, if only for a moment. It was easier, in the light of day, to pretend they were normal.
It was around dusk that the delusion started to fade.
The entire ritual behind it caused a sinking in the pit of his stomach. The sun sank behind the trees and the sky dimmed and darkened, and he would dread the very moment they would tuck Harry into his crib. He would dread the entire ritual behind it—the climbing of the stairs, the goodnight kisses as the child was passed from his father to his mother, the checking of windows and drawing of the curtains. He hated when they would leave the nursery each night, leaving the door cracked open behind them.
Nights were dark, quiet. And these days things were always waiting in the quiet, patient, dark.
But it had not always been this way. He could remember a time, not all that long ago, when the night had never been something to dread. When he would look forward to getting home, back to his bed. He would crawl in next to Lily, the pair of them exhausted by things no one their age should have to deal with, and together they would drift into a peaceful, dreamless sleep.
But these days, sleep would not come.
This house was unfamiliar to him. Despite having been in his family for generations, the little house in Godric's Hollow was not a place he had spent much time in during childhood. The creaks in the stairs startled him, the tricky closet door near the entryway bested him every time… even the cat was becoming more of an expert at mapping the place out than he, finding nooks and crannies he never knew existed and disappearing for a while.
Though he had, for his credit, become extremely familiar with the vaulted ceiling of their upstairs bedroom. He knew how the shadows cast from the moon looked as they bounced off the exposed beams. He knew that if you titled your head just right the stain of the wood looked like a face. And he knew that no matter how hard he willed it to be so it was a sight he would be staring at every night for who knew how long.
This place did not feel like their home. And yet, it had to be.
Next to him Lily's breathing came evenly, as it always did. He ghosted a finger up the section of the comforter covering the shape of her arm. He hated the situation they were in. He hated that he couldn't do anything about it. He had always been a person of action—even in school he had hated sitting still, doing nothing. They were all like that, he thought. Him and the others. He hated most of all knowing that while he lay there, safe and useless, they were putting themselves in danger.
He missed how they used to be, desperately. He knew without a doubt that he would never, ever give up Harry for anything in the world—but when he thought of the time spent in the castle with his best friends a part of his heart ached. And Lily, who didn't have to spend her life hiding in a village from a murdering psychopath who wanted nothing more than to see her and her family murdered— he would leap at the chance to see her happy like that again. All of them; Lily, Sirius, Remus, Peter... they had lost so much in only a few short years. But they would make it out, wouldn't they? When this was over, they would all still be standing. They had to be.
Sirius had been so adamant the last time they talked. He had been so sure it would all be over soon, so sure that in a few weeks it would all go back to normal. James wasn't convinced he knew what normal looked like anymore. Their lives since school had only been composed of fighting and death and loss and fighting again. Rise and repeat. But Sirius insisted, hugging Lily tight, that it wouldn't be forever.
Though Remus might be having a worse time than he was. The last time they spoke he had looked grim, more worn than usual. James knew that he was usually assigned the more difficult tasks only someone like him could take on, but it was not something that had been discussed among them openly in recent weeks. Things were getting more secretive, more closed off. And maybe there wasn't anything that James could have said to make any of it better, but something within him deeply regretted not even trying.
Things were falling apart all over.
And Peter, he thought. Someone needed to check on Peter. The last time they had spoken something seemed different, off. Then again it was difficult for anyone to remain completely unaffected with what they have been through, and it was entirely possible that James had only been putting his own anxieties into the conversation. And guilt. James had never been completely comfortable with the idea of putting any of his friends in the position Dumbledore's plan required them to be. The idea to give the role to Peter had made sense, and even he had agreed to it, but James knew—despite his friend's best efforts— that the years of fighting were taking a toll. He hated the idea of making it worse. He would have to ask Sirius to give Peter a talk for him next time he comes around—
Then, from somewhere in the small house, a sound caused James' heart to seize.
His skin pricked. His ears strained. He waited in the darkness, breathing stilled.
It had been a small thud, hadn't it? Something that could be easily excusable to the cat, or the house's structure settling in its foundation, or the old muggle furnace groaning to life. That was what it was, right? Something normal. Something explainable.
But then…
He could not remember ever hearing that specific sound before. A fluttering started in his chest as his nerves sat on edge. Something wasn't right.
James waited, in the dark.
He waited until he wasn't even sure he had heard the sound at all.
Maybe that was it, he thought, the tension momentarily leaving him. Perhaps he had made it—
There.
He sat up in bed, ears strained hard against the dark. He heard it that time, he was sure of it. His pulse pounded in his ears making it harder to listen for it again, but it was there, he heard it, he felt it...
A smaller noise, quieter, so faint he might have imagined it. But he didn't, couldn't have.
Something was there.
Blankets shifted next to him, and then a hand, small and warm, gently pressed against his back. "James," Lily said, lowly, voice saturated in the sleep she had just left. "What's wrong?"
"I heard something."
"What?" Lily sounded more awake. "What was it?"
"I don't know, something—"
And there it was again, it had to be. A creak, or a small groaning, just as he had been talking. "There," he whispered urgently, not taking his eyes away from the door. "Did you hear that?"
Lily sat up next to him and was silent for a moment as she listened to the dark.
"No, I don't hear anything."
But he had been so sure.
"Was it Harry?" In the dark he could feel her look to the baby monitor on the nightstand behind her, but it had been and still was silent as the child in the room next door slept soundly.
"No," he said, "it wasn't him. He's still asleep. It was something else, I know it."
Lily didn't respond, but she straightened next to him. They sat together in the darkness, eyes on the door, listening.
Nothing happened. No noise could be heard.
(He had been so sure, so sure.)
His wand was still on his nightstand, right? James reached a hand out, slowly, as to keep focus on the hallway beyond the room. But eventually his fingers touched the grip of his wand and the slight sound of wood rolling against wood filled the tense silence. Lily stiffened at the sound.
"James," she whispered. "What's going on?"
He couldn't answer. His blood rushed in his ears. His skin pricked with nerves on high alert, adrenaline fueling every part of him. He couldn't even think clearly enough to figure out the answer to that question for himself. What was going on? Something was in the house. Probably. Possibly.
He decided seconds after the idea entered his head. "I'm going to go check," he said, beginning to get out of bed.
But Lily held fast to his arm. "James," she pleaded, "stop it. Let's think about this for a second."
"What if we don't have a second—"
"—none of the defensive charms are going off—"
"—I'm not going to sit here if there's something to be done—"
"—not to mention what that would mean in terms of Dumbledore's charm—"
"—Lily, please—"
"—and if someone was in the house they would be making far more noise—"
"Lily, let me go," he finally said over her, his whisper cutting harshly through the dark. But her grip did not loosen.
"James, there isn't anything there."
It was weird, because she said it and instantly he knew she was right. The nerves didn't give, but she was so earnest and sincere that it made sense. He sagged a little at the realization, and she used the opportunity to tug him back down to his previous sitting position.
"James," she started again, her chin coming to rest on his shoulder. He could feel her words through his skin as she spoke. "We're safe here. There's no way for anyone to find this place. But even if there was, none of the other alarms are going off—and no one could get in without at least managing that; it would be impossible. We would know. And then, even if they did, even if for whatever reason they got through all of that, we still would have heard them break a window or a pane on the door or do whatever else they needed to do to get in."
"Muffilato?" he tried, knowing he had already lost. "Or a cushioning charm, even." Lily shushed him, the sound drawn out and lulling.
"James, we're safe."
He felt himself slacken, exhaling a breath he was not fully aware he had been holding. She was right, of course.
Lily ran a hand through his hair, soothing him. The exhaustion that had been just present on the border of his consciousness began to catch up with him. They were safe. He believed her. He felt his eyes growing heavy. But a thought still lingered: "What about..."
"Harry?" she finished for him. "He's asleep, right next door. You said so yourself."
The adrenaline that coursed through him like a river only minutes ago vanished completely. "I thought..." he started, unable to finish the sentence.
"I know," she only said.
Gently, she pulled him back down to the pillows, her head coming to rest on his shoulder as if to hold him there.
"I love you," Lily said, "but I need you to get some sleep. You've been a mess for days."
James ran his fingers sluggishly through her hair. "It's this house, it's making me hear things. And..." his eyelids were drooping, his arm felt heavy, and it was in that moment where the frustration that had been building and brewing at the center of his chest bubbled to the surface. And he no longer had the energy to stop it from spilling over.
"Lily, I hate this," he admitted, voice a low whisper in the darkness of the room. "I hate being stuck here, hiding. I hate not being able to do anything. I hate feeling hopeless, and terrified, because I am. I'm terrified. And I'm tired—I'm so tired. I don't know what's going to happen to us, to any of us. And there isn't anything I can do about that but wait. It drives me crazy."
He felt Lily's finger wipe a tear he didn't even realize he expelled from the side of his face. She leaned upwards to kiss his throat, his jaw, and then his lips.
"James," she said, pulling back. "I'm scared, too, every moment of every day. I don't know what I would do if something were to happen to either of you. And I hate... everything about what we've had to do for the past few years. Except you," she kissed him again, quick, "and Harry. I can't sit here and tell you that everything is completely fine, because it isn't, and I can't tell you it will be okay in the end, because I don't know that. No one does. But what I do know is that tonight we're safe and together, and for right now it's enough."
For the second time that night, James knew she was right.
"Do you want me to bring Harry's crib in here tomorrow?" she asked against his skin. "Will that help you get some rest?"
James could not answer. Sleep, that had so easily evaded him before, came at him like a wave. His body felt spent, and his mind was in just as bad of shape. He thought of his son, asleep peacefully in his crib in the next room, blissfully unaware of everything that was happening. Unaware of where they were, why they were there, and what else James would be willing to sacrifice to keep him safe…
"I'm sorry I woke you," he eventually managed. "I love you." Lily kissed his shoulder.
"I know you do."
James drifted to sleep, clutching Lily to his side.