Harry was woken up by a scream. The high pitched scream of Lily. He groaned. Not again. This has happened far too many times. He shook himself awake and turned over to look at the time: 3:00 am. He turned to look at Ginny. She was beautiful. Her hair was in a scruff from tossing and turning, her eyes were closed shut and her mouth twisted in a slight frown as if she was getting angry in her dream. Harry didn't want to wake her. He heaved himself out of bed and trudged over to the door.
In the Potter household, this had been a regular routine. Ginny would be out doing Quidditch practice on Sunday night and so Harry would have to put the kids to bed by himself. He would say a long goodnight to each one of them. He would say goodnight to Lily first since she was the youngest out of all the Potters. She would often plead for her to have a pack on Canary Creams from The Weasley Wizard Wheezes shop. He would smile and say maybe, if she was good. He would read her a story (her favourite story was Babbity Rabbity and the Cackling Stump) and after that he would tuck her in and kiss her goodnight. Then he would say goodnight to Albus, who would suddenly ask him about puberty and worry about if he did his homework right. Harry remembers it vaguely. It went something like this:
"Dad? Ted said that I'm going to get grumpy and moody. I don't get it. Why did he say that?"
"Well what I think he means is that when you grow up, you sometimes feel suddenly angry, grumpy and sometimes even sad."
"That's not nice! I don't want to grow up..."
(In the wizarding world, not many young wizards know much about growing up because usually Muggles only get taught this.)
By the time he gets to James, James is fast asleep.
But something strange has been happening to Lily lately. She wakes up screaming from nightmares she's sometimes too terrified to explain. It happens almost every night at 3:00 am and he has no idea why she keeps on having them.
He went down the corridor and turned right to open Lily's door. She was still screaming. He heard James voice two rooms down.
"Can you tell her to shut up?! I can't get to sleep!"
Then Albus chipped in,
"Me neither!"
"I'm calming her down just go to sleep." Harry said wearily. He was too tired to answer back properly.
He opened her door and walked quickly towards her bed. He shook her gently but firmly.
"Hey sweetie! Wake up. It's just a nightmare."
She opened her eyes, gave out a small cry, and wept into Harry's pyjama top.
"It was terrible dad! I was at Hogwarts and I was just walking to my next lesson and then two kids grabbed me, I didn't recognise them but one of them grabbed me and the other held out his hands and rope shot out of his fingers! And it wound round and round and round me until I couldn't see anything and I couldn't breathe!" tears streamed down her cheeks.
Harry hugged her tight and said,
"It was just a dream. A nasty dream."
"It was so scary!" she sobbed.
"I know. But you're starting Hogwarts on Tuesday and you need to try and stop having these nightmares ok? You're not going to get the sleep you need if you keep on waking up like this all the time."
"I try dad I really do!" she started shivering violently. Harry felt her forehead.
"You've got fever!" he said shocked.
"I don't feel so good..." then she pulled away from Harrys top and sprinted to the bathroom. Harry ran after her.
For five minutes he was rubbing her back while she threw up in the loo. He was tired and hated seeing his baby girl being sick like this.
Ginny came sprinting when she heard the cries of her child after each vomit attack.
When she saw Lily leaning over the toilet, vomiting she gasped.
"Oh my poor girl!" she exclaimed.
She started to rub her back and Lily vomited one more time in the loo then fell back and cried into Ginnys dressing gown.
"What does she have?" Ginny asked.
"Fever." Harry answered simply.
"What's that?"
Harry remembered that even though he grew up with muggles, Ginny did not.
"It's a muggle disease where their temperature goes up and they can throw up."
"Do we have any medicine to cure this?" she asked worried.
"I don't think you can cure fever. You just have to wait for the temperature to cool down, by putting a cold flannel or towel on their forehead."
"Oh!"
"Accio flannel!" Harry said. And soon enough a flannel came zooming from upstairs into Harry's hand. "Ginny. I need you to take Lily into our room, she can sleep there tonight. If she wants."
Lily gave a groan as if to say yes.
"Ok that settles that then." Ginny said as she scooped up Lily and carried her to their room. But just as she was about to enter, she stopped, turned and said.
"I love you Harry."
"I love you too."
The door closed quietly behind them.
