It was one day in potions class that I first discovered I had a fondness for Lily Evans. In an effort to avoid paying attention to whatever Prof. Slughorn was rambling on about, I peered through the side window and saw terrible black clouds and incessant rain beating against the glass. Peter Pettigrew and I were stuck as brewing partners for the semester (I had no choice in the matter), and he had taken to sloppily sloshing liquids into our dwarfed cauldron, poking me with delight whenever the solution bubbled or lit up. I, of course, didn't pitch in at all; instead, I turned around and wondered if there was a spell that could render Hestia Jones' skirt invisible. I was blindly smitten with her, but it was all superficial. That's really all I had experience with: superficial relationships. And I had plenty of them through the seven years at Hogwarts.
I was soon pulled away from my fantasies by a nudge from Peter so hard that I almost tumbled out of my seat. I shoved him back, and he did fall out of his chair. While he was on the floor, I heard a giggle from somewhere. I thought it was Peter, but he was already back in action awkwardly mixing and stirring. I surveyed the room until I found the source of the laughing: a lean, rather insignificant red-head who hitherto then I'd never paid much attention to. She had spilled her and her partner's, greasy-haired Severus Snape's, potion and it was quickly eating through the knee of Severus's pants. He, on the other hand, was trying very hard not to cause a scene, but Slughorn had (after surrendering to a short laughing spell himself) taken to covering the poor boy's steadily vanishing pants with his own body and leading him out of the room; where they awkwardly tottered off to (and how much of Snape's pants remained when they got there) is still a mystery to me.
I'd never had a special attraction to red-heads, nor was she what I would've considered particularly ravishing at the time. But there was something about her that grabbed my attention and held it like a dueling wizard to his wand, pardon the cliché. It might not have even been attraction; maybe it was her way of arbitrarily leaving buttons unbuttoned on her black Hogwarts vest, or the small squint in her left eye when she smiled. All I know is that I was staring fixatedly at her when suddenly Peter, having skipped the usual poke to my shoulder, leapt straight to shoving the cauldron into my face. I gasped and consequently breathed in the vapors from the potion. I don't know what it was that Peter had produced (his style of brewing would've made even a mad scientist sit back and accept defeat), but all of a sudden I couldn't take my eyes off of Lily Evans.
From that day on (and at the time to Hestia's dismay) I tried to let on as subtly as I could that I was interested in Lily: constant flirtation. It didn't take long for me to identify Severus Snape as an obstruction to our love, so, next to Lily, he was my number-one focus. It pains me to look back on how ruthless I was to the pitiable kid; whenever an opportunity to humiliate him presented itself I took it full-on. I was merciless at times; I even 'pantsed' him in front of the student body once. (Little known fact: he was actually the onset to my reputation of being a loud-mouthed jackass; before he'd come along I'd kept my slacker attitude [mostly] to myself.) I did whatever it took to win Lily's coveted heart. And the strange thing was that I eventually did. It doesn't make much sense, considering that each loudmouthed tease I directed toward Snape made her more and more intolerant of me. Perhaps Peter's inadvertent 'love potion' kick-started not only my infatuation with her, but her's for me as well. In the end it was all for the best; she ended up contributing to the formation of my now humble, courteous personality; if she hadn't asked me on a date that morning in the hospital wing after the battle of '76, I would probably still be an outright jerk.
But here we are in the middle of July, 1980, now married and with a baby on the way. Lily is eight and a half months pregnant (you wouldn't recognize her as anything but a blimp now), so we're taking it day by day. I would never have viewed myself as fitting the 'father' persona, even after turning over a new leaf in my attitude. But when I first heard the news, there was no doubt in my mind that I would be the best damned father this side of England. And still, there is no doubt in my mind. I'll make sure our child has the very best life of anybody and is constantly pampered and loved by its parents. I'll be there for him or her, always, no matter what.