A/N This is a response to a prompt on instagram about what if McGonagall had refused to let Dumbledore give Harry to the Dursleys. Hope you enjoy it and please leave a review, it's indescribably encouraging to me as a writer when people take the time to give me feedback! This is going to be a two chapter fic if I can work out how to make it so, otherwise I will take it down and post it all in one chapter! Oh, and I don't own Harry Potter!

-MHMH-

When Minerva McGonagall became Harry James Potter's guardian, surrogate mother and 'Aunt Minnie', she was thinking of Harry and how utterly inappropriate parents the Dursleys would be. She was not thinking of the practicalities of raising a child.

At first it wasn't too bad. There was the initial shock of changes of course, getting used to looking after a one year old baby. A cot had to be put in her quarters, and she had to get bibs and Babygros and things like that. She didn't have to do it on her own though. The other Hogwarts professors helped of course. There was almost always someone free during every period, and where there wasn't they managed to rearrange the schedule so that someone was. Everyone babysat. Well, most people. Severus sniffed and stalked off when asked, and no-one thought it was a good idea to let Sybil babysit Harry, that was a disaster begging to happen.

Everyone else though; Filius entertained him with bright dancing lights in the air and dancing toys to toddle after, Pomona let him build mud castles and propped them up with spells so that he could build it big enough to enter, Charity took him for long walks around the grounds, Hagrid brought him to see the unicorns and play in his hut, Poppy let him cheer up the patients with non-infectious injuries once they were fixed up, and Albus, well, Albus did a hundred things that wowed the baby. The number of times Harry came back from Albus's office with blue hair and a sherbet lemon...

No, initially, there were some adjustments, but it was all managed perfectly fine. It was when he started growing up that the problems started. First there were the 'terrible twos' which Harry hit a little late, possibly due to the shock of his parents dying and everything changing. When he did hit them though, just before he turned three, he hit them rather thoroughly. There was the usual screaming and shouting and tantrums of course, but there was also the problems of all that in a castle. A magical castle.

Harry was a rather persistent child, and when he wished, a very quiet child. This meant that he somehow kept managing to slip his babysitters. He always came back, and he never seemed to get hurt, so most of the professors just let him toddle up and down the halls and play with the suits of armour. Until he started going further.

The castle looked after him of course. There was always a staircase that came when he called, and it always stayed when he asked it to. Unfortunately, it also moved when he asked it to. The castle rather liked having a small, cute child around, and it rather liked watching him play. No one really fully realised how problematic this was until Harry stranded a group of Ravenclaws on a landing, and then went off to play. Without any adult. And instructed all the stairs to move away from where they'd been before once he'd gone. Have you ever tried to catch a toddler when the very building is working against you?

And then, there were Harry's fours. Minerva had managed to block out most of that year. It had started by Rolanda giving him a toy broomstick for his birthday, and a four month rein of terror along the Hogwarts hallways, ending in a dive bombing of the great hall during breakfast after he somehow managed to remove the height restrictions. Minerva rather suspected a couple of the seventh year Griffindor's had a hand in that one. And then, he'd gotten chickenpox, and then mumps. Most of the year was a blur of panic and tiredness, and she did not intend to try to remember it.

When Harry was five, he discovered Peeves. Or more accurately, Peeves discovered Harry. The Hogwarts professors had thought that the marauders were trouble. Then there was five year old Harry teamed with Peeves without any classes or homework or quidditch practice or full moons or everything else to keep them busy. Mercifully, Harry couldn't do much magic then, and there was only so much chaos you could cause with Zonkos products. Unfortunately, it was quite a large amount of chaos. There was the silly string across all major corridors prank, and the handful of dungbombs he managed to mix into all the house hourglasses along with the gems that showed the points. There was the 23 fanged-risbees let loose at various places around the school, marked 1 to 25, with a couple of numbers skipped just to add stress. Then all Sybils teacups were replaced with the nose biting kind, and there were the hundreds of bottles of vanishing ink that they managed to swap for normal ink around school. And of course, who could forget the time when Harry managed to trick the house elves into putting sneezing potion into everyone's food. Minerva tried everything, from early bedtimes to grounding him, but finally, in desperation she offered him permission to sit in on classes if he stopped pranking. He didn't stop pranking, but he did significantly reduce it, and classes did keep him busy.

Minerva didn't think the faculty had ever been more relieved to have another student, even when he started handing in homework which had to be marked.

Then he turned six and Charlie Weasley became famous at Hogwarts for his flying, and suddenly Harry was begging to be allowed to fly again. And begging. And begging. And begging.

And begging.

And begging.

Minerva finally caved with the promise that he would keep both height and speed restrictions, and never fly without supervision. In retrospect, she probably should have specified adult supervision. And that he should keep the original height and speed restrictions. But at least it kept him busy, and whatever house he ended up in (which was going to be Gryffindor, McGonagall refused to accept any other possibility) he was going to be a brilliant seeker. Maybe they could finally win the quidditch cup then.

At least he only flew into the whomping willow once.

And fell into the lake twice.

And he did make an amazing quidditch commentator. He had all the enthusiasm of the most crazed quidditch fan, and distinctly less house bias, and no swear words, or at least none that he'd let Minerva hear.

By the time Harry was nine, he'd all but memorised the first year classes, and half the second year ones, and he was sitting in on the odd third year class. The faculty were already planning extra things they could have him do in class when he got bored. They had all learned that a bored Harry was a bad idea. They all remembered when Harry first met the Weasley twins and they pulled off their first prank together. The entire school remembered that. They'd covered every chair, bench and seat in the school with slightly warm toffee, charmed to mimic the colour of the seat and be vanish resistant. It had taken two days to sort out the chairs, and they'd all been sticky for weeks afterwards. That had been when they invited Harry into third year classes to relieve boredom.

Of course, there was still the holidays. No one was likely to forget the enchanted snowmen anytime soon. Or the time he taught every single portrait on the fourth floor to sing I know a song that will get on your nerves.

Despite all this however, and despite how much trouble her adopted son was undoubtedly going to get into when he officially started Hogwarts and started doing actual magic, Minerva never once regretted adopting Harry. There may have been tantrums and pranks and broomsticks (and the heart attack he'd almost given her when he did a somersault on one) , but there was also bedtime stories and little hands scratching in just the right spot under her animagus form's chin because he knew she liked it. There were handfuls of flowers collected from around the lake and "Happy birthday Aunt Minnie" even though it was four months off her birthday. There was bags of his favourite sweets shared just because, and drawings of 'Me and Aunty playing tag. There were warm evenings with crumpets and board games, and early mornings filled with boundless energy that somehow overflowed to her. There were amazed smiles at magical fireworks and delighted laughs at her stories of students. There were little hands on Saturday mornings dragging her away from marking and out into the sunshine and endless, endless hugs.

No, Minerva McGonagall had not known what she was getting into when she adopted little Harry, but she wouldn't have changed a thing. Not one thing. Harry Potter was her son in all but blood, and she would not have it any other way. Not ever.