CHAPTER 23..:::::.. Boiled Fish and a Baby
Disclaimer: Right. Let's spice things up a bit. Iceberg! Dead ahead! I'm kidding. Or am I?
A/N: Hi everyone, I'm so sad, I've seen Pirates like, 5 times at the cinema. Yes, the shame. But ah, the Johnny. Anyways … this is about Lily and James! Sorry! Yes, drawing to a close I am afraid … soon the time shall come … but not yet. SO don't you dare stop reviewing!
Drops of winter: Yes, I'm afraid that they are! Keep reviewing!
Quidditch Queen: I totally agree on the Colin Farrell front. But, I have to say that I'm a bit confused by your review; what do you mean, you better fix James? I'm sorry if you don't like my characterisation, but what has happened to James is really very simple. He is growing up. Or has grown up in fact. I'm sorry if you don't like the way that I have done this, but it has to happen some time or another.
Miabubble: Lol, yes you guess right. They did! Lol. You may act like a ten year old. I have no reservations. Thanks for commenting on the jokes in the exam parts; oh and I would have put firewhisky if I could remember it! I knew there was another strong drink in the magical world, but my mum had stolen the book again so I couldn't check! Sorry!
Aroses: Um … right now! Enjoy!
Szhismine: Wo, questions to be answered! Ok, here goes. First of all, yes, he will, secondly, yes she will, thirdly, sadly not as they have to die at some point! Fourthly, um not in this story but perhaps I'll write another little fic with that as a subject, sixthly, some will some won't. Hope that answers all of your questions! I used to like Orlando Bloom loads and loads, but now I come to think about it, Johnny Depp is a real man … lol.
Tomoe: You have never reviewed? Since June? Ah! *Looks scandalized*. Oh well, you can redeem yourself now by giving me nice long reviews. Lol. Thanks.
Lady Rebecca: The best chapter? Out of them all? Wehey! Thanks!
Cara-meLissa: Uh, yeah I think it'll be quite dramatic. I hope it will! And it really depends on how emotional I get when writing it. I'm gonna need a box of tissues so it's up to you whether you think you can stomach it!!!
Sunny chika: Uh yeah, text is kind of preferable in reviews. Lol. But what you said was indeed meaningful. So thank you.
Calimora: Uh, sorry I think you are mistaken if you are implying that James is a Chaser. In book 5, JK clearly accentuates his SEEKER reflexes and Sirius has at least once made reference to the fact that James was also a seeker. In book 1, Harry sees the shield in the Trophy room and it says under the team, James Potter. Seeker. Sorry.
Alana: Wahoo! Somebody commenting on my disclaimers! Thank you so much!
*HITS PLAY*.
"I – I don't … I don't understand," James said in a panicked fashion. "What do you mean, pregnant?"
Lily held up her hands in a flustered way, clearly irritated by her husband being so slow off the mark. "How many other ways can I mean I'm pregnant?"
James opened and closed his mouth at least six times before being able to form coherent speech. "B – but … I … are you sure?"
Lily rolled her eyes. "Of course I'm sure. I'm positive."
"Positive?" James repeated. "But … but we were careful!" he said, as though there was no possible way that what had actually happened could have happened.
"I know we were! But … obviously we weren't careful enough!" Lily breathed out, shakily. James was looking stunned and flabbergasted.
"Then why the hell do they sell those things if they don't work?" James said frowning. "I should have known better than to trust that stupid Muggle stuff!"
Lily sighed. "Well, they're 90% safe or something like that."
James raised his eyebrows and spoke in a disbelieving fashion. "90% safe! Well, what about the other 10% then, eh? What do they have to say about that?"
"Well, the result, funnily enough, Sherlock, is this," said Lily matter-of-factly.
James looked down breathing heavily. Finally he said, "Pregnant? Are you sure?" he repeated, almost pleadingly, his hazel eyes searching hers.
"James!" Lily said in a raised voice, trying to bring him to his senses.
James's eyes came back into focus.
"We need to think about this!" she said.
There was a long pause as this sentence fell. James squinted his eyes. "Well, what's there to think about?" he said simply.
Lily looked at him as though she had misheard him. "W – what do you mean?" she asked.
James shrugged. "Well, you do want a baby, don't you?" he said.
Lily blinked furiously. "W – well … y – yes, of course I do, but I just … thought that you …"
"What?"
"Well, I do … definitely, but … isn't it a bit soon? For us?" she said apprehensively.
James shifted his weight. "Don't you mean, for me?" he said in a low voice.
Lily looked uncomfortable. "Of course not. No, it's just … I mean I thought that we would – you know … eventually … and I really want this baby … but what about –"
" – What about what?"
Lily looked down. "The Order?"
James chuckled nervously. "I think we can swap chores of saving the world with someone else for a few months! Don't you?"
Lily's eyes were suddenly wide. "So … this is it, then? You're sure?"
James's expression matched her own; almost childish excitement. It was more; it was ecstatic. "Yes, I'm sure! Are you?"
"I said I was! We're really going to do this!"
They moved forwards quickly, and Lily hugged him, burying her face into his neck as emotion took over her. She was pregnant.
"We're going to have a baby!" said James through her hair. "We're going to have a baby!"
They began to jump up and down, new possibilities coming quickly to them, unseen memories and a new lease of life. The neighbours next door wondered faintly what all the commotion was about before returning to their washing.
(*)(*)(*)
It was time soon, Magnus could feel it in his heart. Perhaps now, finally, the Dark Lord would let him rest. The Prophecy would be made soon … he could feel it. Perhaps now, finally, he could be rid of the Dark Lord. He gathered up his tools and set off for the Dark and unplottable Headquarters to inform him of this news.
(*)(*)(*)
"She's WHAT?" yelled Sirius when James and Lily told him and Remus in their kitchen. "SHE'S WHAT?"
"Will you keep your voice down?" said James. "We've already had complaints about the noise."
Sirius and Lupin exchanged smirks and muffled silent laughter.
"I – I didn't mean that kind of … noise … I meant when we found out!" James said crossly.
"Yes. Yes I'm sure you did."
Lily scowled. "I am standing right here, you know!" she said.
Remus shook his head. "Well I don't know what to say. Congratulations, both of you," and he kissed Lily on the cheek and shook James's hand.
Sirius scowled. "Will you have to … change its nappies?"
James put his finger to his temple. "Uh, yes. And that "it" is my son, Mr Black."
Lily looked at James. "You don't know it's a boy!" she said.
"Sure I do. It's got to be," he said dismissively.
Lily sighed exasperated. "This is the future father."
Peter was delivered the news via telephone as he was still sulking about the whole Dumbledore incident. He said very unconvincingly that he wasn't in the least cross with any of them, and it was Dumbledore who should have decided before hand whether or not he was going to be part of the Order, claiming that being half in the Order was worse than not at all.
He was not as excited about the news as James had anticipated. "Oh wow! That's … that's great, James," he said in a voice that James knew only too well as fake. When he had pointed this out to Sirius earlier, he shrugged and said that Wormtail was probably still sulking.
They had a bottle of Champaign to celebrate the news and drank all of it very quickly. Soon they were all hiccupping, bar Lily who kept shooting James contemptuous glances.
"It's in your stomach! Not hic! mine!" he said.
Upon leaving, Sirius shook his hand once again as Remus said goodbye to Lily and whispered in his ear, "Well done again, mate. I always thought you'd be infertile. Dunno why …"
*^*^*^*
The vast majority of child-loving women imagine before hand that it must be a wonderful thing to be pregnant. Lily was one of these people. She had always had perfect visions of her fantastic white wedding, which was exactly as she had imagined it, living with the man she loved, and a child growing inside her. Upon finding she was pregnant, Lily and James's exhilaration had lasted three whole weeks. That was, until Lily began to experience morning sickness.
"Are … are you all right? Lils?" James called tentatively from their bedroom as he heard retching sounds from the bathroom. He spoke kindly as Lily was frequently liable toe explode these days.
"Do I sound like I'm all right, darling?" Lily had snapped back. James raised his eyebrows and let her get on with it.
Then there were the cravings. These did not seem to bother Lily so much, but they certainly affected James to the extent that he thought Lily was just doing it to get him back for not having to go through morning sickness.
One such time was three in the morning. They were asleep, naturally, James with his arm around Lily's waist, until she turned around and faced him with an apologetic look on her face.
"James?" she whispered.
"Hmmph," he muttered sleepily, not opening his eyes.
"Can I have some boiled fish, please?" she said indifferently.
James opened his eyes and stared at her. "Are you serious?"
"I'm completely serious."
James surveyed her for a second and then closed his eyes again. She lifted a finger and prodded him in the chest.
"James," she repeated.
"Hmmph," he answered in the same sleepy tone.
"Are you going to get me that boiled fish?"
James opened his eyes again. "Did you just ask me for boiled fish?" he asked, brown furrowing. "I was dreaming about salmon."
"Yes," Lily said. "Twice."
"You really want fish?"
"Yes."
James had sighed and sat up, swinging his legs over the side of the bed. He had to contain himself when he came back upstairs, the house now smelling strongly of fish, and found Lily asleep.
"One lump of boiled fish," he said.
She turned, sleepy eyed and looked at him strangely. "Why did you get that?"
"You wanted boiled fish!" he said.
"No, I didn't! You're acting bizarrely, James. Perhaps you'd better stop being like that when the baby's born." And she rolled over and went back to sleep. James mouthed wordlessly before deciding there was nothing that he could do about her behaviour, and sat on the edge of the bed, eating the boiled fish. He decided to ignore her next comment.
"James …"
"Hmm …"
" – Have we got any swede?"
* * *
Although Lily and James had not wanted to know the sex of the baby, James was still convinced it was a boy.
"That's my little Malcolm," he said to her stomach whilst they ate breakfast.
"We can't call our child Malcolm!" she said.
"And why not? My grandfather was called Malcolm, I'll have you know."
"Yes but … well. It's just … no. We're not calling it Malcolm."
"Well, Malcolm's better than Carly. What a common name," he said. "Not that I have a problem with common people," he added hastily.
Sirius had explicitly viewed his thoughts on what they should call the child.
"Well, I think you should call it Benvolio."
Lily and James cast him odd looks, as if fearing his sanity. He raised his eyebrows.
"It's a name in that Muggle Play! That Shakespeare dude. I … I thought it was a cool name. And anyway, then he'd be cultural."
"No," they said simultaneously. "We may as well as call it Josephine. Wait a second …"
"Hey! I really like that name," said Lily suddenly.
James frowned. "Yeah, me too. But I had a scary Aunt called Josephine. Painful memories. Besides, you can't call a boy Josephine."
"You don't know it's a boy …"
Sirius laughed. "You may as well call it Harold if you're gonna call it that!"
"Haha," laughed James. "Or even Harry … Harry. That's got a nice ring to it."
"Harry …" Lily repeated. "You know, I think it has."
"Harry means ruler of the army," said Sirius.
They turned and looked at him, shocked. "How'd you know that?"
Sirius blushed. "My … my uncle was called Harry."
Lily and James tried to stop chuckling at Sirius private indignation on being cultural. "How very … literate of you, Padfoot."
"I'll have you know I am a very intellectual person."
Lily and James exchanged more serious looks. "Yes, we know," said Lily. "And actually, continuing on that note, there's something that James and I have been discussing."
Sirius looked up. "Oh Merlin, you're not getting a divorce, are you?"
"No!" said Lily hurriedly. "It's to do with the baby."
Sirius blanched. "I knew this was coming. You're not the father, are you?" he said, motioning to James.
Lily cried out. "Oh! Excuse me!"
James cleared his throat. "Padfoot, we want you to be Godfather."
Sirius blinked. "Me?" he said. "Me, as in … me?"
"Yes, you as in you," repeated Lily.
Sirius's eyes popped. "But … but … I'm irresponsible! I'm a … I'm a lunatic!"
"So you'd like to think," said Lily.
James smirked. "Look, you're my best friend. And we can't think of anyone else we'd trust more with the baby than you."
Sirius looked as if he thought they were joking. "But surely … someone more responsible … what about Remus?"
James shook his head. "He's got enough on his plate. And he is probably the other best friend I've ever had, but it's always been you that's helped me out with … everything. It's always been you who's been there for me first. If it weren't for you then … well. Lily and me probably would never have gotten our acts together. So yes, you as in you. Because even if you don't think you're reliable … we know we can trust you."
Sirius nodded and couldn't speak, but they understood.
* * *
But when the day came when the came that their child would be born, Lily and James wished more often and not that it wasn't happening. Lily frequently screamed that she didn't want to do it any more, and James felt awful at not being able to do anything to ease Lily's pain. Sirius, Lupin and Wormtail were not that much use either. Sirius was talking to the many nurses to try and make himself feel better, Lupin was pacing like James, and Wormtail kept offering Lily stupid advice like, "Try putting a charm on your stomach!" Lily had screamed at him and told the Healers to throw him out of the room.
When at last it had happened, when James thought that it was he who couldn't take anymore, let alone Lily, his hand was red raw from where Lily's nails had dug into them.
"Congratulations," said the Nurse. "It's a baby boy."
James smirked and stroked Lily's brow. "Told you," he whispered in his ear.
"Hello, Harry," she said to the squirming pink ball in her arms, and leaned up to kiss James.
^*^*
Baby Harry, it seemed, was a very quiet baby. James had been listening to many of Sirius's horror stories involving only an hour's sleep every night compared to his usual four, (an Auror on the clock had it's downfalls) but amazingly, this wasn't the case. Small, black haired and very quiet, Harry was loved by almost everyone. As most of the Order came around to Lily and James's house to inform them of recent goings on, Harry was seen by almost everybody.
Dumbledore, it seemed, was very taken with him. "I have a feeling that he will be almost identical to you, James. Except his eyes … he has your eyes, Lily."
It was true; unlike James's hazel eyes, Harry's were emerald green, indistinguishable from Lily's.
"Spitting image, mate," said Sirius when he frequently saw Harry, who seemed very taken with him. He would gurgle whenever Sirius appeared; something he did not do very often. It was too early for him to from any kind of specific or coherent noise, but Sirius was fairly certain what it meant.
"He likes me, obviously. I'm the … the fun uncle. If you like."
Remus laughed at this when he was around informing James of some Death Eater movements that evening. "So what am I then?"
Sirius screwed up his face in a concentrated frown. "Well, you're the responsible uncle. I'll be the one to lead him into mischief, and you can get him out of it."
"And does James figure in this at all?"
"Well, James will help me teach him mischief, of course."
Remus laughed. "I'll bet Lily will have a say in that. If we're the two uncles, what's Peter?"
Sirius hesitated. "The other one."
And they both laughed.
(%)(%)
But someone else was also close to laughter. Magnus Forelingdon was on his way back from Voldemort's Headquarters. He had just told the Dark Lord something that he knew would be of interest to him, something that would perhaps get Magnus off the hook. How exactly he had gotten on to that hook, he did not know.
The only flaw in his little plan for finally getting his life back on track was that he had not heard what Voldemort had said to Rookwood the moment the door had been closed shut.
There had been a pause as Voldemort had watched Magnus walk down the track out of the window before turning to Rookwood and whispering, "Kill him."
"K – kill him, my Lord? Could he not prove useful …"
"No. He has done his job. He now knows too much. Kill him."
Magnus heard footsteps and turned abruptly around, only to see the faint rustle of leaves. When he turned around again, he was face to face with Rookwood.
"What?" he asked. "Is there something else? I told the Dark Lord everything I knew."
Rookwood smiled cruelly. "Yes. That's the problem, Magnus."
Magnus's eyes widened but he had not the power to speak or even move his mouth before the deadly curse was whispered.
"Avada Kedavra!"
_"! _"_!"_
On one rare occasion, Dumbledore was bored. He was sitting in the Hogshead, somewhere he would rather not be, but that was not for him to decide. The woman he was supposed to be seeing was late. Sybil Trelawney, great granddaughter of the great Seer, Cassandra Trelawney, was coming for the position of Divination. Dumbledore was in two minds whether or not to allow this subject to continue, but it was only common courtesy to meet her. If she showed up, that is.
At last, she strode in the door, weird earrings hanging from her ears and many shawls wrapped around her, glasses hugely magnifying her tiny eyes.
"Ah, Professor Dumbledore, so sorry I am late … I foresaw that I should be late due to a problem with my chickens … no matter."
"Quite all right, Miss Trelawney. The barman has allowed us to use a room at the back, as I am afraid the noise has escalated in here since I have been sitting."
She smiled and followed him through to the back. The meeting went on and on … and on … and on. It seemed very apparent to Dumbledore that Trelawney had not a trace of the talent of her great grandmother. She spoke in a mystical tone that had no one convinced and waved her hands emphatically at some intervals. He had risen after what seemed like an age.
"Well, it was very nice to meet you, my dear, and I will bear you in mind when I make my decision."
Trelawney had a faint frown on her face at his words but this soon vanished as her mouth went slack and her head lolled forwards. Dumbledore started. It looked like she was about to have a seizure. But when she spoke, it was not in the timid voice or strangled cry that he had imagined. It was harsh and low. Dumbledore knew what was happening. A real prediction.
She was not looking at him, her eyes were not focussed. "The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches … born to those who have thrice defied him … born as the seventh month dies … and the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, but he will have power the Dark Lord knows not …and either must die at the hands of the other, for neither can live while the other survives … the one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord will be born as the seventh month dies …"
There was a scuffle outside and Dumbledore roughly tore his head away from Trelawney, whose eyes had begun to focus. The barman came in very quickly looking flustered and sporting a bleeding lip.
"Dumbledore," he said breathlessly. "I've just found someone eavesdroppin' on your conversation!"
Dumbledore's heart contracted in his throat. He had just heard possibly the most important thing of the century and now there was a chance that Voldemort had heard it too.
"When! When did they hear it, Brendan?" he said quickly.
"What d'you mean?"
"When did you get to them!"
"Well, I dunno, just after she started speaking, I suppose."
"Just after? How long after? Did you hear what she said?"
"A few seconds I suppose, no I dint hear anything."
Dumbledore's heart loosened slightly. Perhaps they were all right … perhaps not. There was no time to lose. He sped past Brendan the barman without a backward glance, saying as he went, "Please escort Sybil Trelawney home and do not mention any of this to anybody. Thank you, Brendan," and he was gone, leaving Trelawney very confused. She did not, of course, remember anything.
*(*(
"My Lord, I have heard … something …" muttered Antonin Dolohov. "I went as you instructed, when and where we were informed by that Seer, and I heard … before I was discovered."
Voldemort sneered. "You were discovered? I pray for your sake that this story has a better ending, Antonin … according to my resources, this Prophecy will be the most important thing in my quest for power."
"I did hear, my Lord … something. The woman said, as Forelingdon described she would … the one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches … born to those who have thrice defied him, born as the seventh month dies …"
Voldemort's face was alight.
"And then I was discovered."
There was a pause, and then an unpleasant sneer played across his lips. "Exceptional," he whispered. "Exceptional indeed."
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* ~*~*~*~A/N:
All done. Sorry this one was a little shorter, but I had to do it like that so it would fit with the other chapters. Yes, only a couple left. Well, REVIEW!!!!!!!