When James pushed through the last line of trees, he saw the entire family was there.
Bill, Charlie and George were manoeuvring a Quidditch goal post into place and shrinking it slightly so that it would mark the height that the players would be allowed to go to.
Percy was talking with his wife Audrey and sister-in-law Fleur, and their children Molly and Lucy, were playing with Bill and Fleur's children Victoire, Dominique and Louis. Fred, Hugo and Albus were hiding behind a tree watching Angelina and Ginny plate up food. Roxanne and Lily were making daisy chains next to where James and Harry emerged and were the first to see them arrive. Lily jumped to her feet and threw her arms around her brother.
"Happy Birthday Jamie!" She squealed in his ear.
"Calm down Lils, don't strangle the boy." Said Roxanne, putting a hand on the older girls arm. Roxanne came up to Hogwarts the year after Lily and became a Ravenclaw, the two girls were very close friends and were practically inseparable. Lily released her grip on James and smiled at him,
"You have no idea how stressed mum's been this morning! We had to send Kreatcher every half an hour to see if you were awake yet." Lily said, grabbing James' arm and pulling him into the clearing more, as Harry went over to Ginny, wrapped his arms around her from behind and whispered something. James watched them as his mother turned around, kissed his father on the cheek and smiled. She then tossed her hair over her shoulder and came over to James.
"Happy birthday my baby boy." She said, pulling him into a hug. She was just about to tell him something when Grandma Molly pulled James into a rib cracking hug.
"Oh, Jamie." She said in a strangled voice, "My baby's baby is growing up."
"Grandma," James said, trying to pull out of the hug, but giving up and allowed Grandma Weasley to squeeze him ever more tighter. When Grandma Weasley eventually let go and she had tears in her eyes.
"You're growing up just like your father, its spooky." She said, then used her wand to conjure a comb and try to flatten his hair.
"Yeah, he's his father in miniature and has his hair and trouble making skills to match, but, I can bet, no Quidditch skills." Charlie said, winking as he walked past them with a box of Quidditch balls.
"Your really going to let me play this year Grandma?" James asked. Molly pulled a strained expression, then smiled.
"They can be a bit boisterous, and I don't want you to get hurt." She said, looking into James green eyes.
"It's ok mum." George said coming to stand with them, "We won't bloody him up too bad."
Molly turned around and hit George with the comb she had conjured and George rubbed his head where it made contact. He then ran off to help Bill shrink the last goal post.
Grandad Weasley then appeared behind James, levitating a score board in front of him, and wearing black and white stripped robes, he always refereed the matches. He wasn't the best of fliers, but he was good at spotting fouls, because the Weasley/Potter games were full of fouls.
James changed into his Quidditch robes, and mounted his broom. No one was to fly higher than the middle hoop, because that's where the invisibility charm ran out, and it was about half the size of a normal goal hoop.
"Hey!" James shouted indignantly, as Albus flew to playing height next to his brother. "I wasn't allowed to play last year!"
"He's only playing because we need one more player with you playing." His mother said, flying over in her Holyhead Harpies uniform.
"But, Fred's next oldest after me!" James shouted at his mother's retreating figure, she turned and called,
"He didn't want to play!"
Technically, Fleur's children and Percy's children were older than James, but they never played. James then looked at his brother, "How much did you pay him?"
Albus put on a mock innocent look and said "Why my dear brother thinks that I bought my way on the team," he put his hand on his head and dropped a few feet in the air in mock fainting, "What is the world coming too?" he said, flying away and across the pitch to his end as Grandad came on the pitch, and blew the whistle to signal the captains to shake hands.
On team "Potter" was Harry, the team captain acting as Seeker. George as Beater. Ron as Keeper. Ginny and Albus as Chasers.
On team "Weasley" was Charlie, the team captain acting as Seeker. Bill as Beater. Percy as Keeper. James and Angelina as Chasers.
Being the good sportsmen that they are, Harry and Charlie attempted to break each other's hands during the handshake. Grandad blew the whistle again and Harry and Charlie rose above everyone else, waiting for the release of the snitch. Grandad released the snitch and it whizzed off. Grandma Weasley had charmed the Snitch to only go so far away from the crate so that it didn't fly off into the village of Ottery St. Catchpole. James watched his dad look at Charlie then to where the snitch went. It was scary watching his dad in what everyone calls game mode because he was always so focused, and it showed the man who was able to defeat Lord Voldemort at seventeen and then become Head of the Auror department at twenty.
Grandad then released the bludger, they only had one beater per team so they only used one bludger. It was, again, charmed to only go so far from the crate, and Bill sprang into action as it went flying at full pelt towards James.
"Close one there James!" Shouted Bill as he hit the bludger with the force that would move a mountain towards Ginny. James was about to call back, but Grandad released the quaffle and James went speeding after it. Angelina was the one who caught it. She sped off down the field towards Ron, who was bouncing nervously in front of centre hoop. She acted as it she was about to throw it, but dropped it so that James could catch it and throw it into the left hoop. Ginny came swooping in out of nowhere and caught it before it went anywhere near the hoop. James did a backflip and followed his mother back up the field. Albus had the quaffle at this point, but being a natural beater, he fumbled throwing it and Percy blocked it. James caught it as Percy kicked it in his direction and threw it to Angelina who caught it and rocketed off towards Ron. She acted to drop it again, and when Ginny moved into place to intercept it, she acted to throw it. Ginny then moved forwards, and James caught the sign Angelina gave to signal for him to move to her right. He did so, and she dropped it into his hands. He caught it and began to throw it to the right hoop, he then changed direction at the last-minute, avoiding a bludger from George, and threw it into centre hoop, straight past Ron. There was a cheer from the audience on the ground and they heard Hermione's magnified voice say;
"Score 10 to Team Weasley!"
James shouted "YES" but in the rush of wind, no one heard him.
Twenty minutes later, Charlie was very close to catching the snitch. He was just about to reach it, when George hit a well-aimed bludger at him and he had to turn upside down to miss it. It was a nice move, but it cost them.
"Another goal for Team Weasley!" Hermione bellowed, "That makes 120 to Team Weasley and 140 to Team Potter!"
James heart sank. They needed to keep Team Potter in easy range, or they would lose spectacularly.
It was another fifteen minutes before Harry came close to catching the snitch, and Charlie decided it was time to play dirty. Charlie reached out, and grabbed the end of Harrys broom tail and spun it over. Although Harry remained on his broom, it still counted as Blagging - trying to hinder or slow down a player by grabbing the back of the other player's broom. Grandad blew his whistle and called for a penalty to for Team Potter, which Ginny took. She scored and stretched the lead to 120 - 150.
Percy recovered the quaffle and threw it back into play. James caught it and did a back flip to turn around, and met a bludger. It hit him in the chest with full force and knocked the wind out of him. It threw him off-balance and made him wobbled for a bit. But, his balance gave in and he fell backwards off his broom.
"He'll be fine, Ginny." Said a familiar male voice.
"Yeah, Harry cracked his skull at his age, he took a bludger to the face." Said another.
"Ron, now's not the time compare Quidditch injuries!" Said a female voice.
James opened his eyes slowly and found that the light of the day, had vanished. He was inside the burrow, lying on the living room sofa, staring up at the ceiling.
"James!" Said his mother, stroking his forehead with the back of her hand, "You feel a little warm. Are you ok?"
James nodded, and as he did, he found the pain in the back of his head. He put a hand on it.
"I told you he's fine," his father said, laughing and sitting back in his chair, "Ron was right, I took a full on bludger to the head."
"Really," James asked, and his father nodded, "Who hit you?"
At this question, everyone laughed. "I had a little trouble finding a reasonable keeper after Ron landed himself in the hospital wing because he drank poison" James nodded, he had heard this story a million times about how Uncle Ron had taken an out of date love potion created by his brother George. Then once he took an antidote, he had drunk a goblet of Madam Rosmerta's Mead that contained poison. It was only due to his father's quick thinking of using a Bezoar that Ron was here today. Or, this was what he heard.
"Well, after that, I had to use the reserve keeper." Harry continued, "That meant using Cormac McLaggen. He's a good keeper, but he thought that he could do everyone's jobs better than they could." Harry smiled and took a sip of his Butterbeer. "That led to him wrestling a Beater's bat away from Jimmy Peakes and attempting to show him how to hit a Bludger, only to knock me off my broom and crack my skull."
James winced, "Ouch."
"Yeah." Ron said, "I could hear the commentary from Luna, she said something along the lines of, "Oh, Harry Potter was just hit in the face, I wonder if he's okay," and then everyone kinda realized what had happened..." Ron stopped laughing.
Grandma Weasley then bustled into the room, carrying a large tea-tray with food on it.
"You've been out all day." She said, placing the food on James' lap. "I was so worried, but your father seemed to think that the longer we let you sleep, the better."
"Well, with the amount of time he's spent unconscious, I thought he was on the right lines." Said his mother smiling slightly.
"You missed everything James!" Said Albus jumping up from his seat on the floor. "I did this amazing catch then when Uncle Percy wasn't looking, I threw it straight through centre hoop! It was amazing!"
"I was still watching you, but your brother falling from his broom was more important than you scoring a goal." Percy said, sitting up straighter from the sofa opposite.
"Still, it was an amazing shot." Albus said, more to himself than to anyone else.
James yawned, but tried to hide it. Unfortunately his mother saw him.
"Come on. I'm taking you home. You can go straight to bed, and do presents in the morning."
James groaned, but faltered under the gaze his mother gave him. He got to his feet and with his mother, they flooed back to their house in Godrics Hollow.
