Chapter 2: Hide and Seek

Lily came downstairs to see her husband and son having chocolate ice cream for breakfast. Normally this would have been cause for some scolding—Harry was too little to be having so much sugar so early in the day—but one look at James' face told her all she needed to know.

"Padfoot came by this morning," James said in greeting as she started on a fresh pot of coffee in the kitchen. It was going to be a five-cup day, she could feel it in her bones.

"The wand again?" Lily asked with a grimace.

Harry was babbling nonsense words between mouthfuls of ice cream. Lily made out the words 'da-da' and 'Sawwy' before James delivered a fresh spoonful of chocolate goodness into his mouth.

"Don't know how he does it," James joked. He set the spoon down carefully out of Harry's reach, then turned to face her with reluctance. "And, er, one more thing…"

Lily left the kettle to boil on the stove and looked at him. That tone did not bode well. "And?"

"We're going to have to use Sticking Charms when we put Harry down for the night."

There was a pause. Lily sighed as the implication sunk in. "Alright." She waited for the kettle to finish, then prepared two cups of coffee—one for her and one for James.

"Ma-ma?" Harry asked as he caught sight of her.

Lily smiled at her son and walked over to ruffle his hair. "You're causing quite the ruckus this morning, aren't you? Mummy and daddy just want to keep you safe and you're making that very difficult."

Harry beamed at her, his lips slightly smeared with chocolate, and Lily couldn't help but melt at the sight as she snatched up a napkin to wipe his mouth with.

"You need to stay in your crib," Lily told her son as she dabbed away the chocolate stains. "And try not to give your father grey hair before he hits thirty."

"I'm too handsome and vivacious to go grey," James protested. Then he had to scramble forward as Harry levitated the ice cream spoon high into the air.

Lily tsked in amusement and went back into the kitchen to pour some cereal.

Later that afternoon, Harry and Sally were curled up on the couch together after a very rambunctious playtime. Harry was halfway to falling asleep, judging by his drooping eyelids. Lily covered Harry's shoulders with a blanket before heading upstairs to fetch her book, Tuck Everlasting.

When she came back downstairs, the couch had only one occupant on it.

An occupant that was not her darling one-year-old son. After circling the living room twice, Lily came to the conclusion that Harry had not decided to engage in a surprise round of hide-and-seek and was, in fact, missing.

"James?" Lily called out. "James!"

James came barrelling into the living room, glasses askew, a look of terror on his face as he whirled around, wand at the ready.

"Not that," Lily said in a strangled voice. "Harry!"

James half-lowered his wand, then raised it again. "Where is he?" James asked cautiously. "Not on the ceiling again?"

"No," she answered anxiously. "He's missing!" Then the words sunk in and she stared at him. "What do you mean on the ceiling AGAIN?"

After running through the entire house like headless chickens and firing off dozens of location spells, they finally found Harry in the pantry with a package of soft-baked biscuits. He was partially tucked underneath James' invisibility cloak, which James swore up and down he had left locked up in his trunk in the master bedroom.

Lily believed James was telling the truth. Harry had already proven himself adept at both summoning and conjuring all sorts of things that he had no business having, Dumbledore's wand most prominent among them. It was child's play—ha—for their baby boy to fetch a cloak from a locked trunk.

"I can't believe we're going to have to put a leash on our son," James muttered as he picked Harry up and slung the giggling boy over his shoulder.

"We are not putting a leash on him," Lily said, but truthfully her protest was only half-hearted. Maybe they did need to put a leash on their one-year-old son. That thought was terrifying.

James handed her the cloak, which she folded neatly and draped over her arm where she could keep an eye on it.

"Why not?" James asked. "Next thing you know, he's summoned a Hungarian Horntail into our house!"

"Don't joke about that!" Lily said pointedly. She would have hit him if not for the fact that he was holding Harry in his arms. "What if he does that? What if he summons a dragon into the house?"

"Hungy," Harry said helpfully. "Hungy Horn."

Lily forced herself to smile. "Eat your biscuits, Harry." She plucked one out of the package Harry had stolen and handed it to him.

Harry put the biscuit into his mouth and sucked on it. Normally, Lily would have encouraged him to chew instead, but today was not a day for pushing limits.

"I was only saying it might happen—"

"Breathe another word and I will strangle you with your stupid invisibility cloak."

Harry gurgled around his biscuit and grinned at his parents. Lily smoothed the messy tuft of her boy's hair and decided that tonight she would burn all the picture books that had dragons in them, just to be safe.

Harry managed to nab the cloak and hide himself underneath it five more times that day. It seemed Harry wanted to play hide-and-seek after all. Each time they found him, it grew harder and harder to think of creative ways to keep the cloak out of reach.

Even if they gave the cloak to Sirius, both parents agreed it was likely that Harry would simply summon it back, just like he had with Dumbledore's wand. At least while it was in the house, they could use it to potentially keep Harry safe.

By the time evening rolled around and Harry was put down for bed, both James and Lily were completely exhausted.

"Being parents is exactly as hard as everyone makes it sound," Lily said with a soft note of despair in her voice. "Only it's because our son is an overpowered toddler. He hasn't even reached the terrible twos, James. What are we going to do?"

"We just do our best to keep him safe."

Lily sighed and slumped against her husband's shoulder. James wrapped an arm around her waist and tugged her close.

The two of them had placed several layers of spells all over the nursery. If Harry so much as twitched in his sleep, they would be made aware of it.

"Not that I want You-Know-Who anywhere near our son," James said after a moment of watching Harry drool on his pillow, "but sometimes I wish he'd hurry along so Harry could vanquish him already."

"But he looks so peaceful," Lily whispered. "When he's sleeping. It's hard to imagine he's going to stop You-Know-Who all on his own."

Harry might be the most powerful one year old in all of Britain, but he was still just a baby. He was still their son.

"Harry won't be on his own," James said quietly. He pressed a kiss to the side of her head. "He has us."

"He has us," she repeated. Hopefully that would be enough.

A/N:

ideas for future chapters are welcome 💖💖💖