Can't Be Beat
By Dimgwrthien
Disclaimer: I still own nothing relating to the Harry Potter series. And, because it's funny, if I did I would have them celebrate Remus' birthday every year, no matter what. Yeah. The books never mention his birthday, even though Harry, like, was learning about dementors on Remus' birthday in the third book. Really. Look at the Lexicon. March 10.
Author's Notes: Speaking of birthdays, A Teenage Werewolf requested a one-shot about Harry's first birthday with Remus. Oh course, who am I to reject such a great request. Hence, here's a nice little birthday from Remus to our dearest Harry Potter. This takes place on his ninth birthday.
It had been a warm night, Harry remembered as he woke, and Remus had been talking to him, reminding him of something. His bleary eyes were being rubbed as he thought about it. Something was happening. He reached out to get his glasses and placed them on the bridge of his nose, feeling the reassuring cold metal on his skin.
The sheets were thrown on the ground, he saw, and he picked them up, folding them neatly over the bed. Even in the early morning, the air was slightly stale and warm.
As the sun streamed into the room through the window over his bed, the young boy sat on his bed, guessing that Remus would be waking up soon. He found that the man woke as early as he did, which was curious. Harry was used to waking when his Aunt woke, hearing the sounds of her cleaning the house as usual. The only times Remus ever slept much longer than him were the days around the full moon.
Harry still felt wary about Remus being a werewolf, but he found it to be pleasant, in an obscure way. It was another connection to magic, which he found himself to be enjoying more and more.
It was only when he started getting dressed that he remembered the day - July thirty-first, his birthday! He smiled to himself, grateful that he was with Remus, who was sure to acknowledge the day. His Aunt and Uncle even remembered his birthday, though they never told him so. He could tell because on those days, he would occasionally find a gift consisting of a tissue or similar.
He walked into the front room where he knew Remus liked being in the mornings. There was the sound of dishes, and he smiled to himself. Of course, Remus would be cooking, which he seemed to enjoy doing.
Sure enough, the brown-haired man was cooking, tapping pans with his wands and heating them in a way that still amazed Harry. He turned and poured what looked like bacon onto a plate, then spotted Harry and placed it down.
"Harry! Happy birthday," he greeted, smiling at Harry and walking over. He scooped Harry into a hug, which Harry returned fully. Remus' hugs were warm and smelled like sweet soap, he had noticed a while back, and it still surfaced in his mind whenever he was close to him. They were nothing like Aunt Petunia's hugs, when she hugged Dudley, showing near no emotion and merely taking his beefy body into her thin arms.
"Thanks," Harry said to him. Remus motioned for him to sit down and waited until Remus came over with breakfast and sat across from him.
"I believe I have several people whom you would like to meet today," Remus told him, carefully cutting a pancake. Harry glanced up.
"Really?" He had only gotten to meet the children Remus tutored, and several people who lived near, but they were only a few people.
"At least one of them will be going to Hogwarts around the same time as you," Remus told him, nodding. "And then I have something for you."
Harry's grin was so wide he felt he could have dropped the entire plate into his mouth. "Thanks!" he said again.
Remus gave him a brief smile. "You'd think you'd never have a birthday, the way you're acting," he joked. Harry's expression faltered.
"I haven't had a proper birthday, really. That I remember, at least."
The expression that crossed Remus' face was sharp and almost angry, though it fell off his face quickly and he replaced it with a smile that Harry could tell was forced. "At least you can have one know," he said to Harry, fixed smile remaining on his face.
While they ate, Harry started trying to ask Remus a question he had wanted to know the answer to since the night before, but his voice kept dying in his throat as he tried not to seem stupid. Finally, he forced it out of himself before he could think about it more. "Did I ever have a birthday with my parents?" he asked, turning red and bowing his head over his plate.
Remus did not answer for a moment, and Harry was about to run out of the room to hide his embarrassment at the question, when Remus said, "Your first birthday. Sirius, Peter, and were there as the main guests. Professors Dumbledore and McGongall had come by near the end to give you their wishes."
"What happened?" Harry asked, hearing a trace of laughter in Remus' voice.
"Well, Lily and Peter baked the cake while the rest of us tried to keep you still for any amount of time. You were a hyper child, I'll give you that." Remus grinned. "By the time the cake was done, he managed to keep you still for more than ten minutes, but when you saw that cake, you were up like a shot. Gave us a hard time. Ran off, came back, jumped onto the cake."
"I jumped on the cake?" Harry asked, astounded and laughing.
"You certainly did. When we managed to find you, you were on the table, somehow, and sitting in the cake, eating right off your hands. That was when Professor Dumbledore came, and I think he was tempted to join you."
Harry remembered Dumbledore's strange sense of humor and had a fleeting image of the two of them, sitting in a white cake, liking their fingers clean.
When they finished eating, Remus disappeared from the room for several minutes, coming back with a rectangular object wrapped in paper with snitches flying over them, actually moving. Harry remembered when Remus and he attempted to have a discussion about Quidditch several days before.
He handed it to Harry and sat back down, waving his wand to make the dishes leave the table. Harry unwrapped it, seeing the corner of what looked like a book. When he had the paper off all the way, he saw that it was a journal. He opened to the front page and saw thin handwriting scrawled over the pages, every last one filled up from top to bottom. Under the first book was a second, and so on, until the seventh book.
"They were mine," he told Harry. "I wrote in them at Hogwarts. Each one is a year's worth. There should be plenty in there about your parents."
Harry stared at the handwriting, seeing words on there. Some registered in his mind while others were wiped out in his thoughts. 'James Potter, as it turned out his name was...' 'He's smitten with Lily, though I doubt he'll admit it anytime soon...' 'Sirius and I were the watch for it, making sure Slughorn didn't catch James cursing Snape..."
Glancing up at Remus, Harry started to open his mouth to thank him, but Remus cut over him. "Don't thank me. Really, they should be yours. You should have been able to ask them yourself about everything in there. They're your memories."
Harry decided that his ninth birthday couldn't be beat.