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Chapter Eight

'Thanks the Gods they weren't insane enough to try to wake me!' Was the only thought Harry could manage through the pounding headache he had the next morning when he finally hit consciousness. The sun was shining through the drawn curtains and the clock said it was already 11:30 in the morning. With a quick thought he knew that his appearance lost the blue streaks, returning to his typical look.

Stumbling into the bathroom, tripping over last nights clothes on the way, Harry turned on only the cold tap while standing in front of the showerhead. The sudden blast of freezing cold water woke him up enough that he could make it to his first cup of coffee now. Biting back on the string of curses that wanted to come out Harry turned on the hot tap, allowing the temperature of the shower to reach something far more reasonable. Not bothering to take his time this morning but still moving somewhat sluggishly it was a good 7 or 8 minutes before he was through. What would he Australian's think of him for wasting so much water!

Deciding that it was too earlier to dress in whatever he was going to wear that night Harry threw on the same casual jeans as he wore yesterday, this time adding a simple black skin tight T-shirt. It only took a few minutes to dump last night's clothes in the hamper in the bathroom and ensure that the room looked clean. Not bothering to put on shoes he headed down stairs toward the coffee he hoped would be somewhere there.

When he found no one in either the family room or the dining room Harry decided to simply call for Cheni, the only House Elf he had yet to introduce himself too, and asked firstly for coffee and then where everyone was. She appeared with the typical House Elf pop right in front of him, far to full of energy in his non-coffee opinion.

"What can Cheni be doing for Young Master Snape today?" Oh demons in hell he could not deal with that right now… in fact he was pretty sure he would never want that name.

"Umm, please call me Harry. Really. And could I please have some coffee, lots of coffee, straight black please. And where is everyone?"

He had forgotten about the big deal House Elves tended to make about being asked to call wizards by their first names, and his hung over head really wished he hadn't as Cheni squealed in glee. "Oh Master Harry is sooo kind. Such a nice wizard! Cheni will be bringing you coffee right away she will and the family is all outside playing down by the lake."

Heading outside to where Harry had seen the lake yesterday Harry hoped the coffee would arrive soon. He could see them now; Cassi relaxing on a blanket while Snape helped Tainen play with his boats at the waters edge. None of them noticed his approach until Harry stepped up to the side of Cassi's blanket.

"Morning."

The shadow falling across her had been enough warning that she didn't jump at his voice. "Harry, good morning. Would you like to join me?" She indicated a spot beside her on the blanket and Harry gratefully sat, cursing whatever he had done last night to make every single muscle in his body ache this morning.

"Did you have a nice night with your friends last night?"

"Yea, it was great. I haven't seen Alex in a while, and he is a good friend. Oh, and thanks for letting me sleep in this morning."

"Oh, that was no problem. We figured that after the late night you had you probably didn't want to be up first thing. We were going to call you for lunch if you hadn't surfaced by then. We knew you had plans this afternoon."

Cheni popped in just then with Harry's coffee and he thanked her vehemently before practically inhaling the still scalding liquid in the cup. He refilled it quickly and was half way through his second before he looked up long enough to notice Cassi's amusement.

"I can't function without my coffee in the morning. Even when I'm not hung over, I need a serious shot of caffeine." He admitted sheepishly but with a smile.

"Lily was the same. Severus can't abide the stuff, but Lily could never hold a conversation before her first cup." Harry was shocked at this quiet statement.

"You knew my mother?" He couldn't keep the amazement from his voice. He got his coffee addiction from his mother. He wanted more, wanted to know everything. Especially stuff like this, the little quirky tide-bits.

"I knew her, I guess you'd more say we were acquaintances, I only met Lily a few times. But Severus still talks about her sometimes. That's how I know about the coffee thing; Severus mentioned it after how you drank your coffee yesterday."

Harry was amazed. He had been so focused on losing his father, and gaining an awkward situation that he hadn't really thought about the fact that he could gain a mother in this. While he had heard about James over the years, at least felt like he knew him a bit, he always felt like Lily was a stranger. A shadowy figure he knew existed in the same way he knew Ron had an uncle who was an accountant, existed but couldn't tell you a damn thing about them, existed but weren't real. Snape had been best friends with her, before everything had happened. He must have hundreds, no thousands, of stories. Ignore the fact that he lost James in a sense, Padfoot in an even realer sense (he often felt that maybe Padfoot only loved the link to James that was Harry), the fact that he gained such an awkward and uncomfortable situation; maybe he could finally gain a mother!

He knew he had been quiet a long time while he contemplated this but he didn't care, figured she probably understood. But now wasn't the time for that. Let's build up a little to such conversations.

"So, what have you guys been up to this morning?"

"Well after breakfast Tainen decided that he wanted to come feed the ducks. After that we played with his ball for a while and then he decided that his daddy should help him play with his new boat that Severus got him the other day." She didn't mention that Severus got him the boat after having had to be away for a few days brewing for the Dark Lord, didn't think this was the time for that talk either.

"Well, it has been an eventful morning then hasn't it."

Finishing his second cup and starting on a third, Cassi and Harry chatted about random things, just filling time and trying to get comfortable with each other.

Severus had eventually noticed Harry's presence out the corner of his eye but decided not to say anything, afraid to make the teen uncomfortable when Cassi seemed to be making some progress with him. Instead he played with Tainen, content that his whole family were together and enjoying each other's lazy company on this summer day.

An Elf Harry hadn't met but Cassi told him was named Kia announced lunch at 1 o'clock and they all headed back up to the patio where they had had lunched yesterday. Today they had pasta salad with bbq ribs, while Tainen had a ham sandwich with his pasta salad.

Greeting his son for the first time that day Severus and Harry took advantage of the calm setting, opting to focus on their surrounding instead of each other, keeping chit-chat calm and non-personal seemed to help and they managed to avoid making each other tense until the leisurely hour long lunch was done. Cassi had started to play patty cake with Tainen, quietly bowing mostly out of the conversation, hoping her husband and stepson wouldn't notice and would manage to continue their almost friendly chat.

It seemed to work, even surviving when the conversation got slightly more personal, asking Harry what time he was heading off. But when Severus asked whom Harry was going with, Harry tensed. She didn't know what about the question set Harry on edge, maybe it was just the parental nature of the question, but whatever it was Harry was tense when he answered.

"Umm… just some friends from the wizarding world" Cassi figured she should jump in before anything could happen that would undo the progress of the past hour.

"Oh do a lot of young wizards and witches listen to muggle bands these days? When I was at school the music seemed to remain pretty separate but I'm sure you said that you were going to see a muggle band." She was afraid it may have come out a bit rushed but she had got it in there. A nice question about cultural differences, how personal or touchy could that be?

Or so she thought. Until she could have sworn she saw what was maybe the beginnings of a blush in her stepson's cheeks. He seemed a little unsure and confused when he answered. "No, they're still pretty separate. My friends know that Linkin Park are my favorite and one of them remembered that they were touring so he got us tickets. But none of them really like the music."

"Well isn't that so nice. Going to see your favorite band with you for your birthday even if they don't really like them!"

Cassi could tell there was more to the story. Like maybe that question about whom he was going with hadn't caused him to tense earlier because it was parental but because it was a present from a 'special' boy (if the 'he' was anything to go by).

"So, are a lot of you going? Like a big birthday party type of thing or just a close circle of friends having a nice night out to celebrate your 16th?" She kept the question about the celebration, trying hard to avoid making it sound like she was questioning his plans.

"Umm, just 4 of us. So a close circle thing I guess." Oh he really didn't want to answer these questions and Cassi was more sure then ever of the reason. One of those other three was something special, and it was probably the person who remembered that it was his favorite bad, the one who got them all tickets. Maybe it was a non-date. Taking two other friends along but still a date. Or maybe it was a double date. That would work, she knew that Harry had 2 best friends who Severus assured her were made for each other. Maybe it was his best friends, him and his mystery person.

But she knew she couldn't ask. And hey, she supposed maybe she was wrong. Severus had seen him with several other people, and Harry didn't seem like the mass cheating type, everybody was allowed one slip, but serial cheating was so wrong.

Harry excused himself, pointing out that it was now after 2 o'clock and he needed to meet his friends at 3pm in London, a good 35 minutes by taxi from where the portkey would drop him.

Harry ran upstairs and in only 15 minutes had thrown clothes for the concert in his bag, to change into at the hotel where they were due to meet, and a set of casual clothes for tomorrow. Deciding to morph off his tattoos when he got to the park he decided that he'd just wear what he had on till when they got ready later. Throwing on his fav. boots, he slung his bag over his shoulder and headed down stairs to say a quick good bye to everyone.

They were still out back and he ducked out there, and Tainen decided to take a run at his legs again. Saying goodbye and reminding them that he wouldn't be home until lunch tomorrow, he tickled Tainen with one hand. They told him that they hoped he had a good night, and Tainen started to pout, wanting Harry to stay and play with him. Deciding that he didn't know how best to deal with that, Harry quickly hugged Tainen, told him that they'd play tomorrow and stepped away from Tainen to activate the portkey.

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