The room was bathed in light for a few moments until the door closed again. James could hear footsteps coming towards the small cot that he and Lily were on.
"Lumos," he heard the voice whisper. A face was lit up, a man's face, but that was all that James could see. He couldn't make out who it was.
The man approached them, and placed James's hand on a small orb he was carrying. Before James could protest they were swept away, feeling the all too familiar hook-behind-the-navel feeling you get with portkeys.
James thought it was a portkey, but it was taking considerably longer to get to wherever it was they were going. Finally, they fell to the ground, in a very bright place.
James got up to make sure Lily was still breathing. She was, but very slowly, and she seemed to be having trouble.
"Who are you and where are we?" James said, getting up and pointing his wand at the strange man.
He looked around, they weren't really anywhere, it was very bright, that was all he could see. No distinct shapes, or any solid objects, just solid white. He looked back at the man, andthe man faded away.
The brightness quickly turned back to normal colors. There were people bustling around. And he was in a bed. Everything was blurry; his glasses had been taken off. He felt around until he found them and put them on, a bit crooked in his hurry.
There were nurses, and to James's surprise, doctors. A smiley doctor walked over to his bed. The man was very tall, and all of the nurses around seemed to swoon at the sight of him.
"How are you doing?" he asked.
"How's Lily?" James said, not even bothering to ask the doctor's question.
"So that would be the name of the lovely lady that was brought in with you," the doctor replied, also not answering the question.
"Where's Lily?" James asked, a little louder.
"She's up on the next floor in the OB/GYN," he replied, knowing that he was not going to get anywhere at this rate.
James got up, ripping bandages off of his arms, and taking tubes out.
"You can't leave!" the doctor shouted at him. James kept walking towards the elevator.
"Security!" he heard people yelling behind him. James walked faster, the elevator was getting closer, it was open, people were walking in. If only he could go a little faster.
"Hold the door!" he yelled ahead, as they started to close. The person nearest the door obliged.
James started to sprint towards it, and made it in before the security guards could stop him.
"Next floor," he said, panting. The other two people in the elevator nodded. They looked familiar; they looked a lot like Lily.
James ran his hand through his hair.
"Will this be your first child?" the woman asked.
James nodded, "How did you know?" he asked. The woman chuckled a bit.
"They're all like that at first," she replied. James smiled.
"It's not fatherhood I'm afraid of. I'm just worried for the health of my baby, and his mother. We were just in an… accident," he said.
"It'll turn out fine. Well I hope to see you soon…" she said, not knowing his name.
"James. James Potter," he supplied.
"I'm sure that everything will work out, James," her husband said. James had almost forgotten about him because of his silence.
The doors opened and James walked quickly to the nurse's station. They were all sitting around talking. They were also ignoring him. He stood there for a good five minutes before they asked him what he needed.
They finally, and reluctantly, gave him the number of Lily's room. He burst in, to find the couple from the elevator in there. They looked surprised.
Lily was lying on the bed, wincing and breathing hard. There were nurses and a doctor surrounding her. One noticed him.
"I'm going to need you to leave, sir," she said, ushering him out the door.
"But that's-" he started. The door shut behind him. He settled for the waiting room. Which was not at all a happy place.
The people who designed this room had obviously wanted to make it a cheery place, but it wasn't. James could hear all of the screams and moans from mothers to be and babies alike. The walls were a bright cream color, with those chairs that only hospitals get. They were an ugly purple color.
James had his head in his hands, and was very patiently waiting for someone to come and tell him that Lily was ok, and the baby was fine. Then to his surprise the woman from the elevator came in.
"James," she said quietly. His head shot up instantly.
"Lily, she's-" he started.
"She's doing fine for now, she wants you to come, they said that the baby is crowning," she replied quickly.
James leapt up from his chair and followed the woman back to Lily's room. He immediately was at her side. She smiled when she saw him. James bent over and kissed her quickly.
"You're doing great," he whispered quietly.
Lily smiled a bit as he said that. Even though she was smiling, she looked miserable. But even though she was miserable, she was still beautiful. Even though her hair was plastered to her head with sweat, she was still beautiful. Even though she looked tired and worn out she still looked beautiful. That is until she was hit with another contraction. Then she looked furious, her face contorted with pain. James felt so sorry for her at that time. He wished that there was some way he could help her.
"One more push should do it Lily," said the doctor. Lily apparently listened and she pushed with every ounce of power she could gather up.
"And you've got a little boy!" said one of the nurses happily, holding him up.
Lily looked relieved and fell back down into her pillow, breathing deeply, her eyes closed peacefully. All of the sudden they flew open.
"Why isn't he crying?" she asked quickly, sitting up. The nurses looked at her, as if they too had just realized this.
"He's not breathing!" called one of the nurses.
The doctor ran over to where they were cleaning up the baby.
"Bag him," he said. One of the nurses started attaching a mask over his mouth, and squeezing a little bag. Lily could see his little chest rising up and down.
"He's stable now," the doctor said as he uncovered the baby's mouth. Suddenly the room was filled with the cries of a little baby.
One of the nurses brought the baby over to Lily who held him hesitantly. Tears were running down her face.
"Oh James, look he's got your hair," she said quietly.
"I pity him," James replied, laughing. This woke the little baby up, and they could see his eyes for the first time.
"Oh," they said in unison. They were surprised. Babies were supposed to have blue eyes at birth, but theirs had Lily's eyes.
He closed his eyes and went back to sleep. Lily smiled and tried to shift over.
"James, something's wrong," she said, panic filling her voice.
"Lily it's ok. He's doing just fine," James replied, not quite knowing what she meant.
"No, James I-" she started but then fell back down into her pillow.
The monitors that she was hooked to started to beep. The nurses and doctors rushed back in. One took the baby from Lily's arms and placed him in a cradle on wheels.
"She's crashing!" he heard the doctor say.
"What's happening?" James asked.
"I'm sorry sir, but you're going to have to leave," said the doctor. James was once again ushered out the door.
He headed down to the nursery instead of the waiting room this time. He looked at the rows of babies, immediately he spotted his. He was wailing. He's a smart one.
The nurse in the room picked the tiny baby up, saw James and smiled, at the same time she motioned for him to come in.
James opened the door cautiously and closed it quietly, so as not to wake any of the other babies.
"This one's yours, right?" she asked. James nodded, as she handed him over to James.
"He's been crying ever since he was brought in, I'm glad you came, maybe you can calm him down," she said.
James smiled at his son. "He's crying because his mummy's not doing too well. All of the monitors are beeping like crazy and the doctors are all worried, aren't they?" he asked, knowing he wouldn't get any type of response from the baby.
"Well he's got a very good brain under all that hair then, he's certainly got the most hair I've ever seen on a baby," she said.
"Well, that hair gets worse as time goes by," James replied, smiling, "You wouldn't happen to have a phone I could use, would you?" he asked. The nurse nodded towards a phone over in the hall.
"Thanks," he said and headed out the door. Quickly he punched in Sirius's number. It was answered on the third ring.
"What do you want?" he yelled into the phone. There was music blaring in the background, James could hear people yelling also.
"Sirius, it's me, James. Listen, I'm at the hospital, Lily went into labor and-"
"WHAT?" Sirius yelled again.
"Can you just come down here; she's not...doing well. I need someone to here with me. They won't let me see her. Could you bring Remus and Peter down too?" he asked. He felt like he was going to cry. "We're on the fourth floor of that muggle hospital downtown. I'll be in the waiting room," James said. Sirius said he'd be down as soon as he possibly could.
Sirius pushed his way through the apartment. They were in the middle of a party, but right now James seemed a lot more important than getting laid.
"EVERYONE OUT NOW!" he bellowed once he was in the middle of the room.
Everyone groaned in protest. Remus came out of the crowd and up to Sirius, a girl on each arm.
"What do you think you're doing calling off the party? Everyone is going to hate us now!" he seethed.
"THERE'S BEEN A FAMILY EMERGENCY, EVERYONE OUT!" Sirius shouted again.
The two girls that were hanging on Remus left sullenly along with all of the other guests.
"What happened?" Remus asked.
"James called. He's been at the hospital the whole time with Lily. Apparently she went into labor and now she's having complications. He wants us to come down," Sirius replied, throwing on a more presentable shirt.
"PETER! COME ON!" he yelled. There was no reply from Peter.
"Well we'll just have to find him later," Remus said, also putting a more presentable shirt on. Their previous ones had had stains all over them from Merlin knows what.
Minutes later the two were on an elevator to the fourth floor of the hospital. They quickly ran for the waiting room. James was sitting there staring out of the window.
"How's Lily?" Sirius asked.
James shrugged. "I don't know, they're still working on her I guess. I haven't heard anything since they kicked me out," James replied monotonously.
"Have you heard anything about the baby?" Remus asked. James smiled.
"He's fine, would like to see him?" James replied, looking excited.
They nodded and followed James down the hall towards the nursery. This time he only stood in front of the window looking in. The nurse smiled and waved at him.
"Looks like you've made a new friend, James," Sirius said laughing.
"Guess which one he is," James said, grinning. Sirius and Remus looked at all of the babies for the longest time.
"That one," Remus said finally.
"Which one?" James asked. He wasn't able to tell where Remus was pointing.
"That one, third up and second to the left," Remus said, proud of his accomplishment.
"Yeah," James replied.
"How did you know that, Moony?" asked Sirius.
"It says on the little tag in front that he belongs to James Potter and Lily Evans," Remus said smugly.
"Oh," Sirius and James said in unison.
"What are you guys going to name him?" Remus asked.
"Oh I know what you should name him!" Sirius said excitedly.
"What's that, Padfoot?" Remus said, he knew where this was going.
"You should name him Sirius Remus Potter," he replied.
"No," James and Remus said in unison.
"It was just an idea," Sirius said, pouting.
"I need to go sit down, let's go back to the waiting room," James said, yawning.
Lily had no clue what was going on. She could see the doctors working on her, but she couldn't communicate with them at all. They were really hurting her, but she couldn't feel the lower half of her body. She was really scared, and all she wanted was James. She knew that he could make her feel better. But he wasn't in the room. Neither were her parents. She had no clue where they had gone.
Most of all she was scared for her baby. She didn't know whether he was alive right now or not. She didn't know how James was holding up. He was never able to cope well with trauma. She wondered how her parents were doing. She kept worrying until everything went black.
James was back in the waiting room when one of the doctors from Lily's room came in. James stood up.
"Is Lily going to be alright?" he asked. The doctor looked down.
"Can we sit?" he asked
James nodded and sat down. Sirius was on his right and Remus was on his left. The doctor pulled a chair up across from them.
"Miss Evans is not doing so well. She's stable for now, but we need to have her here for awhile. We think that she may be paralyzed from the waist down. We're not sure, there's still a chance she'll turn out just fine, but we just wanted you to know, so you're prepared for it," the doctor said, running a hand through his sandy blonde hair.
"Can I see her?" James asked eagerly.
The doctor nodded and James rushed out to Lily's room. Sirius got up to follow him, but Remus pushed him back down.
"Sit," he growled.
"I want to go see Lily too," Sirius whined.
"Let James have his time with her first," Remus replied, casually glancing through an Outdoorsman magazine. Sirius picked up a Glamour magazine and began to look through tips on how to shave his bikini line.
James cautiously entered the room not knowing quite what to expect. He could see Lily's shrunken form on the bed. It looked as if the monitors she was hooked up to before were breeding. There were many more than before. There were tubes running out of her arms, and there was another one stuck into her nose providing oxygen for her.
He walked into the room a little bit further and saw the couple from the elevator sitting next to her, the woman was in a chair weeping, and the man was standing behind her, his hand on her shoulder.
He turned around to leave and come back a little later but the older man saw him.
"We'll leave for a little while now, you can have your time with her," he said quietly, urging the woman to come with him.
"No, Harold, we have a right to be here now, we're her parents," she said, half sobbing.
"And he's the father of Lily's baby, he has just as much of a right to be here as we do. Let's go see our grandson now Rose," he replied in a firm voice. Rose got up and kissed Lily on her forehead, and pushed some hair out of her face.
"Take care of her, would you, James?" she asked as she left. James nodded and took the seat that she had previously occupied, picking up Lily's hand as he sat. He stroked it with his thumb. It felt very cold and clammy. Her eyes were closed, and her face was still shining with sweat. Her lips were a bright red color.
"Lily you have to be able to see our son," he whispered. There was no reaction. "He's the greatest thing that has happened to us," he went on. "You need to stay strong so he can grow up and have a mother; you know I won't be able to take care of him by myself. He'll grow up to be corrupted by Sirius if he doesn't have you around," he said.
Her eyes flickered open for a second. He squeezed her hand a little harder. Her hands were now shaking violently and soon the rest of her body followed.
"We need a doctor in here!" he yelled. For the third time that day, he was pushed out of the room.
Author's Note:I won't be doing review responses this chapter so I can get this up faster for you. Well, how was that? I'm sorry for the delay, I just haven't been up to writing due to the current events in my life. I hope you guys don't hate me. I will try to update this one at least one more time this week, but I might stop for another week on this one so I can get caught up on my other stories. Anyway things are better on this end. R/R please!