DISCLAIMER: I had a dream that I was receiving the legal rights for Harry Potter, then, sadly, the dogs had to bark and snap me out of it and make me realize my hero – J. K. Rowling – Held it all in her hands.
Chapter One – Summer Draws to a Close
Baking hot rays of sun looked down upon the stone steps of a country home. It was a rather rich place, it seemed, while the paint glistened white and the windows reflected the sun's perfect smile. Two young children were sitting upon the steps, talking, joking, and playing.
One was a girl who appeared to be eleven years old, with what appeared to be a pale pink dress that sat on her shoulders like a set of robes. She had cropped red hair that turned in around her ears, and glowing hazel eyes that seemed to shine in the sunlight. The other was a boy, namely at least four years older than the girl, who had ruffled black hair and many features of a man who would grow to be a surprising height.
If an onlooker were to glance through the mansion gates that stood half a mile away from where they were sitting, the two would seem to be just children. Normal children. Nothing more and nothing else. But, as the two children sat, looking around at their home, they knew inside that they had a secret that no one else had. This was something that would disgust people beyond belief to think that two kids could be so disgusting and weird, but, their parents exposed them to the right world and told them that what special talents they held were just that – special.
The boy stood up and walked around to the back yard of their country home, and took hold of a brown broom. Once again, if some one where to see him, they would merely guess that he simply was going to sweep the little dust off the back porch. But, once again, they would be wrong.
As the boy mounted the broom, he glanced around and saw a nearly identical older version of himself smiling an arrogant smile at him. The older man took another broom off the porch and mounted it himself, and with a light force, shot up in the air. The younger boy followed suit.
They swerved around in the air and turned and glided and wandered around in the air, sitting upon their brooms. The girl with red hair wandered out to the back porch and glanced up. She smiled a very annoyed smile at the two people on the brooms, and pulled open the door into the house. A nearly identical woman to herself was drying her hands on a towel while looking out the window at the boys on the brooms. She gave a start when she found she wasn't alone. "Yes, what is it Kathleen?" the woman asked, looking at the girl.
"Oh, nothing, Mum, I just can't stand to watch Harry and Dad play Quidditch non-stop during the day."
The woman laughed and placed the hand towel on the counter. "Would you like something to eat?" she asked, looking intently at her daughter.
"Sure," she mumbled back, taking a place at one of the barstools opposite her mother. As she mumbled her response, her mother pulled a wooden stick out of her pocket and flicked it: a wand. Within a second there was a nice pile of cookies and sandwiches along with bottles of something yellowish. "Thanks, Mom," the girl said, digging in.
"No problem," she answered, and headed out the door that her daughter had come from. She, too, looked up at the sky and saw her husband and son flying about. "JAMES!" she yelled up at them, causing a halt in this "Quidditch" they were playing.
The older man, who looked to be in his early thirties, glanced down at his wife before gliding down to her and dismounting from his broom. He leaned in and kissed her lightly on the lips, then, "Yes, Lily, dear?"
Lily giggled and looked at her handsome husband. They were the same age; the birthdays were merely a couple months apart for the couple. "Can we have lunch before you drag Harry off into the sky to work on his practice?" she asked, looking at him sincerely.
"Do I hafta?" Most people would guess that that was their son, Harry, who asked, but, when Lily gave another giggle, people would notice that it was her husband who was asking such a childish question.
"Yes," she said firmly, and turned around, thinking to herself that she was indeed right about her husband a mere fifteen years ago. When she sat in St. Mungo's after having Harry, she thought to herself that he was going to have a terrible influence upon her son. But, in a way, after Harry turned two and could walk happily and talk a jumble of nice words, she was fairly certain that Harry, to her relief, would only carry a tiny bit of James along with him in his personality. But, there were years to come for Harry.
As Harry, James and Lily shuffled back into the kitchen, Lily took another flick of her wand and four plates of lunch appeared on the dining table. Kathleen glanced at her brother as he sat down opposite her, glaring in her direction with a smug look on his face.
"What's you're problem?" she asked sarcastically, biting into her sandwich.
"Nothing… just you have to wait a whole year before you can join the house team, unlike myself," Harry stated, smiling at his own achievement.
Kathleen glared at him; Harry knew full well she loved to play Quidditch but he wasn't one to let her forget that she'd have to wait a year – until she entered her second year – to even think about the house team.
"Eat your lunch, guys," Lily stated, snapping her kids out of their glaring war they were competing in from across the table. "And don't start a food fight – Merlin knows your father would love to join in," she said under her breath. She glanced up to see her husband smirking guiltily, confirming her suspicions.
Hours later, when the clock chimed eight thirty, James and Harry trudged up the stairs and towards their bedrooms.
When James entered, he saw Lily sitting propped up on her pillow, reading one of her many Charms books. She looked up at his dirty figure as he came in. "Can't ever manage to stay dirt-free when playing Quidditch, now can you?" she asked, getting up and peeling James's navy blue robes off him.
"Not exactly, no," James said, walking into the bathroom to wash his face. Lily followed him, leaning against the door frame as he cleaned up. She was already ready for bed, decked out in her pajamas and slippers. He finished washing his face and began to transfer into his pajamas. "You don't have to go into the office tomorrow, do you?" she asked, looking at James.
"No. We're almost 110 percent certain that they got the named culprits. So now for us Aurors, all we have to do is work on defensive magic, which is pretty much a stay-at-home job right now. How about you?"
"No, I don't think I need to," Lily said, turning off the bathroom light and going to sit on their bed. "I only go in if I have new findings. Its pretty much a stay-at-home job too," she added as an afterthought.
"So do you think we have the day off for an outing?" Lily asked after a moment of silence, dropping James's Quidditch book in his lap.
"What did you have in mind?" he asked, looking at her with a fake-suspicious look.
"I was thinking Diagon Alley; that way we can pick up some stuff down there. You and Harry can spend your life looking at Quidditch stuff, and Kathleen and I can do some new robe shopping. Does that sound like fun?" Lily glanced at James, holding her book, open, in her hands.
"Yeah, that sounds great. And I think we could use some new balls, too," he mumbled under his breath, and began to read his book.
The next day, after breakfast, the Potter family dressed in Witch and Wizard robes stepped up to their fireplace, ready to do some much-needed shopping. After using the Floo network, they all came to a stop outside Flourish and Blotts.
James pecked Lily on the lips, gave Kathleen a hug, and he and Harry set off towards the Quidditch shop. Lily looked down at her daughter, "Okay then, what would you like to do first?"
First, Kathleen and Lily set off to get new robes, seeing as they had a shopping craze like any other girl that you could happen to pass on a normal day. Second, they stopped by Flourish and Blotts to pick up many books for "reading material" and such. They stopped outside the Owlery, when Kathleen came to a sudden halt. She looked intently at the bird that was watching her, staring at her. She watched it stare and do nothing else. "What would you name him?" Lily whispered in her daughter's ear.
"Mr. Wicker," she answered, looking at him. He gave a hoot.
"Okay then." Lily held her arm out to the bird and he stepped dutifully onto it. They carried him into the store. "Can we purchase this owl?" she asked, placing him down on the counter.
"Certainly," replied the man. He rang up the owl, gathered a cage for it, and wished them luck with it. Lily handed the owl down to her daughter who looked happily at her new pet.
They continued down the shops and entered most of them, purchasing trinkets every couple shops. They met up with James and Harry for ice cream and lunch around noon, then went wandering around the streets together, James's fingers entwined with Lily's as Kathleen and Harry wandered merrily between shops.
After another couple hours of shopping, the day became a tad boring, and they retreated to their estate to calm down and have a quiet evening.
The next day was a day of rest and relaxation for James and Lily. Lily was planning on experimenting with some new Charms as James had to go into the office for a couple hours for meetings and such.
Harry departed for a friends house across the way, flying his broomstick over the backyards; Kathleen wandered up to her room to read about the latest fashion and stars in the Wizarding world. Lily sat back in her chair, tapping her quill anxiously on the parchment, thinking how exactly she managed to conjure the right materials for her last assignment.
Finally letting boredom overcome her, Lily dropped the quill onto the table and looked out the window.
James and Lily had fallen in love with the view from the house, when they were house-hunting a year after Harry was born. James had practically jumped up and down when he saw the interior and stated clearly to a dazed Lily that this was the house they were going to buy.
That was fourteen years ago and they were both still deeply in love with the house.
The house was on a grassy green hill, littered with many trees and flowers. Standing on the back porch you could see in plain sight the gorgeous view overlooking the distant lake on one side, and the beautiful city on the other.
There was, of course, a Quidditch pitch for James (and now their children – Sirius included) in the center of their two acre back yard. The second Harry was old enough to mount a broom, James brought in the professionals and had them build a miniature locker room to resemble the Hogwarts ones, complete with Captain Office and Gryffindor banners. Although Lily protested that he was getting Harry's hopes up, James went on anyway, placing his own Quidditch trophies rather arrogantly in the "trophy room" of the locker room.
The house was everything to Lily. She watched her children take their first steps and say their first words within these walls. It was rather depressing to know that they'd be off learning to grow up and not need her anymore in a few short weeks.
She sighed as she packed up her papers, ready to take a walk and meet up with Alice or something. Maybe Alice would understand. After all, she and Lily were practically in the same boat.
Summer was winding to a near end, apprehension settling over the Potter's estate with excitement and slight depression. This year both their children would be at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry and neither of them were all too ecstatic to see their children leave. True, there was an upside to it all; for instance neither of them would be in attendance to the muggle school down the block – both Lily and James were willing to admit that had many grievances.
Lily and James had some problems, explaining to the muggle teachers of just exactly how one minute the chalkboard was clean and the next second it was scribbled with rude comments (James was rather proud of Harry for doing this). They also faced explaining Kathleen's ability to finish her work the second the teacher placed it in front of her.
In less than two weeks, the letters would be arriving: one for Kathleen, the other for Harry. Harry's would, of course, be the usual letter reminding him that school started on September the first, along with his list of new books and other such things. Kathleen's would be slightly different, a congratulations letter of the sort, welcoming her into Hogwarts.
Lily and James spent increasing amounts of time with their kids, making sure to cram in as much fun as possible. There was, of course, Harry and Kathleen's witch and wizard friends that came over day after day, but none the less, Lily and James were happy to see their kids happy.