Chapter Three – Harry
James and Lily stayed in their forest hideaway for the better part of a month, finding themselves to be perfectly hidden away from prying eyes in the small copse of trees they had come across. In fact, the only narrow encounter they had was with a large family of squirrels who had made the trees their home. By the time they left, it was around the time Harry was due to leave for Hogwarts. They packed up their belongings and apparated away from their campsite and moments later, found themselves in an alleyway not far from King's Cross station.
The road up ahead of them was busy with people walking to and fro, forcing James and Lily to retreat further into the shadows of the alleyway in fear of being seen and, worse, recognised. Clinging onto her husband's hand nervously, Lily looked up at him briefly before shaking her head and stepping away from him. James watched as she rearranged their bags, expanding one of them and placing the other inside of that one so that they wouldn't be too inconspicuous. When she was finished, she looked back at her husband and smiled, holding her hand out for him to take. "Are you ready to see our son?"
"Beyond ready, Lils. I've been waiting for this day since…back then." James said, grasping her hand and squeezing it gently. He tugged her forward toward the opening of the alleyway, pausing only for a second before plunging into the crowd of people. They stayed close together as they manoeuvred their way through the crowd, clinging onto each other's hands tightly so that they wouldn't be separated at any given time. When they made it to the station, they walked in, sighing with relief that at least some of the crowd had died down somewhat so that they could breathe easily again. They stood in the opening of the station, looking around the place, reminiscing about all the times they had come through this building in their school days. "So, should we head to the platform now or should we just hang out here and hope Harry hasn't already gone through the barrier?"
"We'll go through and wait for him there. Hopefully no one will recognise us." Lily replied, nervously looking around them for any familiar faces. Seeing none, she turned back to her husband and then headed over to the barrier to Platform Nine and Three Quarters with James following closely behind. People passed them as they made their way there, sometimes jostling into them slightly and disappearing down the platforms with a barely audible apology from each person. James and Lily thought nothing of it, barely remembering to apologise to those they happened to bump into. A few metres away from the barrier, however, Lily threw out her arm and grabbed James's arm to stop him from moving forward. "James! It's Harry!"
Sure enough, when James stopped looking around at everything else at King's Cross and looked toward the barrier entrance to the platform, he found a small family standing in front of the barrier and just behind them was an eleven-year-old boy who could only be their son, their Harry, due to the fact that, even from behind, he resembled James almost perfectly. James and Lily stared at their son in awe, standing a few metres away, in the middle of the platform and observing as he watched the red-haired family as they surreptitiously disappeared through the barrier to the platform. Muggles shoved and pushed past them as the both of them stood there, unaware of what was going on around them save for what they saw only metres in front of them. Three of the kids in the red-haired family had disappeared through the barrier, leaving only two more kids and their mother left, as well as Harry.
It was at that moment that the mother turned back to face the three kids behind her and, instead of locking her eyes with her remaining two children and the black-haired boy who seemed to be completely alone, her eyes caught the bright green eyes of a very pretty, dark red-haired woman standing a few metres away from her small group. Her gaze moved to the man standing beside the woman after a moment of looking into the woman's eyes and she blinked fast, her mouth opening the slightest bit in surprise. When the black-haired boy had approached them barely a moment earlier, she had assumed he was completely alone, but the two people behind her group proved her assumptions to be false. The couple were quite obviously the boy's parents, but Mrs Weasley could not fathom why he had approached her family if he was with his parents. Turning to the boy, she gave him a small smile.
"Hullo, dear. I do believe your parents are waiting for you over there. Shouldn't you be with them on this occasion?" She said, gesturing to the couple, who were staring at the boy as if it were the first time they had ever seen him. The boy, whom she realised that she didn't as yet know his name, just looked at her confusedly and, did she detect some sadness in his expression?
"My parents are dead." He said, frowning. Mrs Weasley blinked and looked to the couple again, noticing that they did look like they could be the boy's parents. But if the boy's parents were dead, then why did these people look so much like him, or rather, he look like them?
"But you're the splitting image of these people, the man in particular, and your eyes…they're the same as the woman's. I just assumed…" Mrs Weasley said, confusion lacing her tone. It was at this moment the boy decided to turn around to inspect these people himself and a second later, a distinctive gasp could be heard, despite the roar of the train station, coming from the boy as he stared at the couple beyond their group. The couple smiled happily and came forward, their gazes unwavering as they stopped in front of him. The woman raised her hands and cupped the kids face, a couple of tears falling from her eyes as she looked upon her son.
"Harry, my darling boy." The woman said, her hand smoothing down his messy black hair and touching his cheeks. Harry stared at the woman in confusion, wondering how she knew his name and why she had called him her 'darling boy'.
"Wh-who are you?" He asked. She smiled and touched his cheek again.
"I'm your mother."
