A Second Life
Chapter Twelve; The chapter without a title
The letters Jessica had found from James still laid untouched in the box at the back of Jessica's closet; she still hadn't opened a single one. Time ran fast while Harry stayed with Jessica at the Potter house. They had fun together; she showed Harry where she and James used to go onto the roof to jump into the pool. It was a small window on the second floor; from there you could jump into the pool.
But jumping into the pool weren't the only thing they did, they talked a lot, Jessica told many stories of her parents, James, Sirius, Remus and her other friends. She taught Harry small secrets when it came to baking, without magic.
These days Jessica's magic weren't exactly dependable, so that was why they used no magic. Jessica said to Harry that the magic problem was a side effect to her pregnancy, but it was nothing to worry about.
Harry's birthday came rather quietly; the presents from Harry's friend were waiting for him when he came down, Jessica made him a chocolate birthday cake and a special selected dinner for him. The day was wonderful and truly the best birthday Harry had ever experienced, the only problem was the birthday cake, Jessica had made it rather large, which meant that they had to eat birthday cake for breakfast several days in a row.
It was this night, Sunday, just a few minutes from midnight, the 23 of August that Harry laid in his bed thinking about this past month he had stayed with Jessica. It had been so fun, while getting to know Jessica he had learned things about his parents that he'd probably never know otherwise. His time with Jessica had felt like she wasn't quite his aunt, but more like a sister type, a close friend. Being in this house with Jessica made the world outside disappear, become unreal. Like the things that had happened in his life never happened, like they were just make believe, and now he realized how Jessica must feel about her 'earlier' life.
He felt tired but his eyes didn't close. So he rolled onto his back and thought of the upcoming Quidditch world cup the day after tomorrow. He and Jessica were to go to the Burrow tomorrow afternoon, and then Harry would stay the night there and come with them to the World Cup the morning after.
He continued to think about Quidditch and it didn't take long after that before he had fallen asleep, and dreamt about a very unpleasant meeting.
It wasn't until very early the next morning that Harry woke again, he woke with a start. He felt the sweat running down his fore head; he rolled over to his back and stared up the ceiling, he pressed his palm toward his scar trying to damp the pain, it felt as if someone had just pressed a white-hot wire to his skin. He tried to remember his dream; it was something about Voldemort... it seemed so real.
He turned on the lamp next to his bed and sat up. His scar hurting often meant that Voldemort was nearby, but he couldn't be nearby now? He started to feel slightly panicked and stood up, taking up his wand from the night table and held it with a tight grip. He walked out his door and over to Jessica's room further down the hall.
He knocked on the door and called Jessica's name. When he didn't hear anything he carefully opened the door, figuring that she was asleep. But when he opened the door he couldn't see her, the light were off and her bed looked as if she had just been there, but had left. He noticed that her wand lay on her bedside table, which concerned him.
He left the room, his heart started to beat faster and he wasn't surprised if it echoed though the silent hall. No, wait, the hall weren't completely silent, Harry tilted his head to the side and listened closely.
He heard a very tiny noise coming from downstairs. It sounded like hushed talking. Holding his wand ready to use, he slowly walked closer to the staircase down to the kitchen where the talking was coming from.
"So how far are you?" A male voice which Harry recognized said.
"18 weeks now..." Jessica's voice came.
Harry, who was standing halfway down the staircase, put away his wand and walked down.
"Harry." Jessica said smiling as she saw him. "What are you doing up?"
Harry had momentarily forgotten his dream. "I couldn't sleep." He said to Jessica. But Jessica weren't the only one in the kitchen, Remus was there as well, he sat on one of the chairs in front of the kitchen island. Which surprised Harry a little, according to his knowledge weren't he supposed to be here until three days from now, after the World Cup.
"Um... hi." Harry wasn't so sure what to call him, he wasn't a professor anymore.
"Hey." Remus answered.
"He showed up about two hours ago." Jessica explained.
"Just like that?"
"No." Jessica shook her head. "A letter came about half an hour after you went to bed. Saying that he'd come this morning."
"And why didn't I know?" Harry asked.
"You were already sleeping." Jessica explained. "Are you hungry?"
"No..." He shook his head. "I'm just going to go back up to my bed." And he turned around and walked back up to the next floor.
"I thought he said he couldn't sleep?" Remus said and looked after Harry.
"I know, something's up with him." Jessica said. "He was carrying his wand and seemed a bit distraught." She paused for a few seconds before continuing. "I'll be right back." She said and followed after Harry.
"What's up?" She asked Harry once she had walked in through his open door.
Harry had laid himself down on top of the bed. He didn't say anything.
"Did you have a bad dream? You seemed very... distraught down in the kitchen." Jessica said, leaning toward the doorframe.
"I..." Harry said, going over in his head whether he should tell her about the dream or not, then decided that he should tell her. "I had a dream about..." Before he continued he sat up in the bed, looking at Jessica. "Him, Voldemort."
Now Jessica understood why Harry had been the way he was, of course it must be disturbing to dream about the person who killed his parents. "Oh, do you... dream about him often?" She walked over to the bed and sat down.
"No, not like this." He explained. It felt good for a change to talk to somebody who he knew would take all of this in an adult and calm way. The reason why he'd often not tell Ron and Hermione because Hermione would really freak and urge him to tell Dumbledore, and Ron would start to act strange and look at him in a way that made him feel like a freak.
"The dreams I've had are... dream-like, you know." Harry continued. "Fantasy, this-will-never-happen-like."
"Yeah I get it." Jessica nodded. "It felt more realistic this time."
"Not just realistic, it felt as if I was there." He continued. "And when I woke up my scar hurt."
"Your scar hurt?" Jessica started to panic a little. Dumbledore had mentioned that he suspected that the scar might be a sort of connection to Voldemort. So possibly Harry was actually dreaming about Voldemort, having a reality dream, one of those dreams which came true.
"Yeah, the only time it ever happened before was because he was near." Harry continued. "But he can't be near, can he?"
"Of course not." Jessica shook her head. "And even if he were there's no way that he could get into this house without us knowing about it."
"So, are we still going to the Burrow tomorrow?" Harry asked.
"Yeah." She answered nodding. "With the pie we made."
Jessica didn't stay with Harry so much longer, she did feel a bit concerned by the fact that Harry's scar hurt, she reminded herself that she needed to take that up with Dumbledore later when school began. Harry had also told her what he remembered from the dream. This also disturbed Jessica as much as it had done to Harry.
When she came down to the kitchen and joined Remus he could see the concerned look on her face.
"Everything okay with Harry?" Remus asked.
"Yeah, he just... had a disturbing dream." She answered.
"So it had nothing to do with me being here?"
"Merlin you are paranoid." Jessica answered smiling, she couldn't help herself. "It had nothing to do with you; I think that he's happy that you are staying here."
"You really sure about that?" Remus asked, but without waiting for a response he continued. "18 weeks huh, that's about five month's?"
"Yeah, five months." Jessica smiled. She walked around the table and stood not so far away from Remus so that he could see the bump on her belly closer. "Mary says that I'm going to be a lot bigger within the next month. I'm about halfway through the whole thing."
"When is your due date?" He asked, not remembering whether she had told him already.
"Mary says that I should expect the baby in late January, but it might be a few days over since it's obviously my first pregnancy." Jessica walked back around the kitchen island so that she faced him. "During my last check up Mary gave me several magazines and two books about the pregnancy and what to do when the baby have arrived. Oh, this reminds me..." When she had said the latter she hurried out of the room like she had forgotten something, less than a minute later she came back carrying what seemed to be an envelope.
"Look at this..." She walked up to Remus and took out a moving picture out of the envelope. "Pretty isn't it?"
Her whole face was smiling, but Remus didn't seem to understand why she was smiling. "Why are you shoving me a picture of moving goo?" he asked.
Her face fell and she stared at him first for a few seconds. "That's my baby you're talking about!" She said to him.
"Oh." He suddenly realized what the picture was of. "It's an ultrasound picture."
"Yeah, baby's first picture." Jessica smiled again and put back the picture into the envelope.
"I'm really sorry; I didn't mean to call your baby goo." He apologized. "You seem happier about the baby than the last time I met you."
"I am..." She answered. "But I'm still not over this whole 'I can't believe this is happening to me' shock. But I am happy about the baby, one of the feelings I know for sure is that I do love him or her."
"Have you thought more about what to say to Sirius?" Remus asked the inevitable question Jessica would have preferred to been unsaid.
"I have been trying to write a letter to him about it... but the words don't seem right." She answered. "My baby's life is going to be so strange. Do you know what he, or she, can actually say? 'When I was born my dad was twice the age of my mum'." Jessica sighed and buried her face in her hands for a few seconds before continuing. "What if Sirius never gets to know this child, what am I supposed to answer it when it grows old enough and asks me who its dad is? Shall I say; 'Oh honey, your dad is just an escaped convict who doesn't even know about you because he's on the run, but don't worry... he's innocent', as you have noticed am I worrying quite a lot about the future."
"You have every right to worry about the future." Remus told her, he had been thinking about pretty much the same things.
"I want Sirius to be a part of this child's life, but no matter how I picture his involvement it's complicated, messed up." She continued, and sighed in desperation. "That is why I have stopped to think about the future and am only going to take one week at the time."
The next morning Harry was very excited and couldn't help himself from acting a bit bouncy. Jessica noticed this though.
"You excited?" She asked.
He nodded. "Yeah, I love Quidditch and have never actually seen professionals play before. I can't wait until tomorrow."
"Do you know what team you are supporting?" Jessica asked, starting to eat her third muffin this morning. "Ireland or Bulgaria?"
"I... Guess both." He answered. He was still on his first muffin, felt too excited to eat.
"You can't do that." Jessica answered aghast. "You can't come to the World cup and say that you are supporting both teams. Then will you be marked forever that you aren't interested in Quidditch." She continued explaining.
"Really?"
"Oh yeah, they'll even burn you at the stake you for it." Jessica joked. "No, I'm just kidding, they wouldn't do that. Just remember that you are supporting the Irish Team."
"Why am I, why do you support them?"
"I don't know; just think that they are nice." Jessica answered. "Back in my time was Ireland one of the biggest Quidditch teams Europe, they have always been strong, but so very often ended up in second place. They haven't gotten this far in the world cup since they had Junior Bourne playing for them."
"Junior Bourne?" Harry asked looking like a live question mark.
Jessica looked at him shocked. "You don't know who Junior Bourne is? You really have no idea who Junior Bourne is?"
"I really have no idea." He confessed.
"He's like THE best Quidditch player of the seventies. He's legendary." Jessica said with an enthusiastic smile. "I have a poster of him shirtless up in my closet, he is so gorgeous!"
Harry chuckled at Jessica's reaction, he found it quite amusing, and she was smiling like a school girl with a crush. Giving a strange reminder about how Hermione was acting around Lockhart in the beginning, which was before they found out that he was a joke and imposer.
The remaining of the day fell away quite quickly. It came as surprise when Harry looked at his watch and realized that it was almost four o'clock, and he and Jessica would leave at five o'clock. And soon enough was it five o'clock and both he and Jessica stood in front of the fire place ready to embark.
A/N; I'm sorry for the delay on the updates, but I have been really busy and such, and I'm not so sure when the next update will be, but hopefully soon.
A question; have you ever seen an ultrasound picture without knowing what it was? I have and I actually thought it was goo, I thought it would be fun to take that into the story. Um.... I hope that you are not too mad at me for the none-updating and review.