Chapter Two: Harry James
"I'm going to have a child with you?" Lily screamed, gathering the attention of the whole room. "I can't have a child with you, you're the most arrogant, irresponsible, big-headed—!"
"I thought I told you to make your predictions believable." Professor Ramla suddenly seemed to appear at the table, glaring down at James.
James gives the teacher an innocent face, gesturing towards the crystal ball. "Professor Ramla, I didn't make that up! I saw it—Lily Evans saw it—there was an image, like a movie, of her rocking a baby! A baby with my hair and her eyes!"
Professor Ramla looks down at James, as if deciding what to do with him. For a moment Lily thought the teacher was going to put James in detention, but didn't know what James could possibly have done that was against the rules.
"Continue," the teacher finally ordered in her soft voice. "But this time try not to distract the other students." Professor Ramla left Lily and James's table to scold Sirius, who was laughing silently and giving James a thumbs-up.
Boys… Lily thought, turning back to the crystal ball. What she saw there caused her to nearly jump from her seat, but instead she yanked on James's arm and urged him to look at what was happening inside the magical orb:
"He's so beautiful…" Lily said, rocking the little baby in her arms. She leaned back in the bed at St. Mungo's, causing James to pull away from where he had been looking into the infant's eyes over Lily's shoulder. "What should we name him?"
James looked thoughtfully down at his child—his son! A bubble of pride filled Lily's chest when she reminded herself that this was also her son… hers and James's. She could never be happier than she was at this moment.
"We could name him after you," James said, smiling mischievously at his wife. "I think we need another Lily Potter in the world, don't you?"
"Stop!" Lily said, laughing. She tried to swat at her husband but she disturbed the baby, who had just been drifting off to sleep. "He looks so much like you, James…"
James gave a small laugh. "Only when his eyes are closed!" he commented, leaning in again to put his hand gently on the infant's head.
"He does look like you, James," Lily insisted softly, holding the baby closer to her. "Let's name him after you."
James gave a disgusted look. "No; there's only enough room in the world for one James Potter. Besides," James smiled again, this time with a reminiscent expression. "I think the teachers at Hogwarts would faint if they found out James Potter was coming back to school!"
Lily laughed and suggested, "We could give him your name for his middle name."
James still looked reluctant, but nodded. Lily took that to be an affirmation, and smiled. She ran her fingers through the baby's thick black hair. "You're a hairy little baby, aren't you?" she cooed.
James snapped his fingers. "That's it!" he exclaimed. "That's what we'll call him!"
Lily looked doubtfully up at her husband. "We're going to name our firstborn child Hairy?"
James gave his wife an exasperated look, something that was usually passed TO James rather than from him. "You know what I mean."
"Harry James…" Lily looked thoughtfully down at the baby. "How about Harold James, and we can call him 'Harry' for short?"
James scoffed at this idea. "What sort of father names his son 'Harold'?" he asked Lily, looking offended. "We'll name him Harry; that's a good, proper name."
Lily laughed but assented. She looked down at her little baby, her Harry James. The baby looked up at her with bottle green eyes that matched her own. Lily ran fingers through hair that was just as messy and unruly as her husband's.
"So…" James began mischievously. "What's his first broom going to be? I think the perfect broom for a little Chaser is a Phoenix Flight 400, but then again—."
"What makes you think he's going to be a Chaser?" Lily asked, smiling at James from her bed. "He could be a Beater, or a Seeker, or even a Keeper. Or he might not even like Quidditch."
A gasp came from the doorway. "James Potter's son not like Quidditch?" Sirius Black asked as he walked into the room. "You've got to be kidding me."
"No son of mine is going to not like Quidditch!" James said. "He'll be the best Chaser at Hogwarts, just like his daddy."
"Sirius!" Moony entered the room, shortly followed by Wormtail. "We're supposed to wait for the healers to tell us it's okay to come in! You can't just barge into the hospital room!"
"Moony, don't tell me you didn't want to see the new Marauder for yourself!" Sirius countered. "Look at the little guy! He's a miniature James!"
Lupin came to look closer at the baby. He shook his head, smiling slightly. "No; his eyes are green, like Lily's." Lupin looked at Lily with a smile on his face. "What have you decided to name Hogwarts' next valedictorian?"
"Harry James," Lily answered at the same time James replied with, "Who says he'll be a bookworm like YOU?"
The whole room burst into laughter.
жжж
"Are you sure it was an actual premonition?" Amissa asked Lily at lunch.
Lily had run to the Great Hall directly after Divination class ended, making sure not to look James Potter in the face. Now, amongst the safety of her two best friends, Lily was able to discuss what she and James had both seen in the crystal ball.
"We both saw it!" Lily said. "How could it not be a premonition?"
Winola shook her head and speared a piece of turkey onto her fork. "I don't think it was," she said pensively. "Professor Ramla said it herself: only one in every thousand witches and wizards—if any—are actually able to see things in crystal balls and such. I think maybe you and Potter were just hungry and saw something in the mist that just wasn't there."
"So Potter and I had the exact same hallucination?" Lily asked skeptically.
Winola scowled at her turkey. "Well, not hallucination exactly… more like… I don't know. But whatever it was, it happened to both of you."
"You know what you should do?" Amissa asked Lily with a knowing look on her face. "You should go straight to the library and research premonitions."
Lily shook her head. "I don't have time, with all the homework I've been getting," she told her friends. "Even Divination, the class that even the teacher admits is stupid, I have homework in. 'Discuss the believability of the following premonition: It shall come to pass that a man shall wield awesome and terrible power; he shall cut short the lives of millions of people—magical and Muggles alike—before an infant with no extraordinary powers shall defeat him.'"
"Well, at least that one's easy," Winola said casually, smiling up at Lily. "An infant defeating a mass murderer? Yeah right!"
жжж
"You know what this means, don't you Prongs?" James looked up from his ham and cheese sandwich to look at Sirius, who was smiling victoriously at his best friend. "It means that you and Lily are going to get together! And not just get together: you're going to get married and have a kid!" Sirius clapped his friend on the back.
James smiled and looked down the Gryffindor table at Lily, who was having a rather distressed conversation with her two friends. She didn't look at all like she was happy about this premonition.
Well why isn't she? James thought to himself. What's not to like about me? I'm the best Quidditch player in Hogwarts—I score over three quarters of the goals for Gryffindor! I don't think I look all that bad. Every other girl in the school seems to like me; why does Lily seem to have such a problem with me? James mussed his hair distractedly, trying to think of a reason why Lily Evans would hate the idea of marrying a guy like him.
"What's up, James?" Lupin asked, following James's gaze. "Ah. Lovely Lily doesn't look too happy about the premonition."
"Why the hell not?" James asked, putting his sandwich down on his plate to sulk. "What's not to like about me?"
"Should we list the reasons?" Sirius asked with a smile, raising his eyebrows.
"Number one," Remus began, not waiting for James to decline the offer. "You are constantly cursing Snape, even though you know she hates it when you bully him."
"Number two," Sirius picked up with a grin. "You are always mussing your hair. You're such an untidy child!"
"Number three!" Peter exclaimed, not wanting to be left out. "You are always pulling pranks!"
"And number four," the three friends chorused while James tried to cover his ears. "You are always asking her out!"
James looked up at his friends, very aware that all of Gryffindor table was now looking at him. He stood on his chair and pointed at the Slytherin table to give everyone something else to look at, and yelled, "I'll see you all on the Quidditch pitch, Slytherins!"
The Slytherin captain promptly stood on his own chair and shouted back, "What makes you think you can beat us, Potter?"
James shrugged his shoulders exaggeratedly. "I dunno; maybe because I've scored three times as many goals than all of you Chasers combined? Maybe because Gryffindor always beats Slytherin?"
James sat down, not really caring to continue the shouting match. He'd only done that to give everyone something else to concentrate on besides him; he really didn't want the whole school focused in on him and his problems with the future. If James wanted the whole school to watch him, he'd go after Snivellus or a teacher and give them all a show…
At this thought, James looked back at Lily. Maybe I should lighten up on all of the pranks, James thought. Then he shook his head and grinned, turning back to the other three Marauders. There was no way he'd ever give up pranking!
But throughout the day, James kept remembering that premonition… how happy he and Lily had looked together… at their son, their little Harry James Potter.
