8 months later, Charlie's 4th birthday:
' Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy birthday dear Charlie! HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU!' Remus sang as he woke up Charlie on his birthday. Charlie shot up, almost hitting Remus in the head as he did so. He hugged Remus and held his hand as Remus carried Charlie down the stairs to the kitchen, where Charlie's breakfast of choice was ready.
'Love you daddy!' Charlie said as he looked across the table to his daddy.
'Love you too cub' Remus replied, smiling at Charlie. Charlie smiled back, he loved his nickname and always wondered why he got that name in particular. Remus hadn't told Charlie yet about his problem, but he called Charlie cub anyway.
'Would you like to open your presents cub?' asked Remus.
'I have presents? Again?' Charlie replied, seemingly genuinely confused. That was what concerned Remus, the actual confusion surrounding presents, he knew that children at first didn't understand the whole concept but Charlie was four now! Blasted Durselys!
'Yes, it's your birthday cub! You get presents! Especially from daddy!'
'Cool, thanks daddy!' Charlie got down from his chair after Remus got up to take him to his presents.
When they walked in the room, Charlie saw three wrapped boxes on the floor, a large one, a small one and a medium but long one. Charlie looked up at Remus for permission to open his gifts, Remus smiled and nodded. Charlie smiled back and walked over to the nearest one. He tore off the wrapping paper excitedly! Inside the box was a selection of books Charlie had seen and liked in the bookshop nearby, some muggle, some wizard. Charlie ran over to Remus and hugged him whispering 'I love you!' in Remus' ear. He then walked over to the large one and opened it, inside was star globe that projected stars onto the ceiling when dark if on. Charlie carefully removed it from the box and gazed at it in awe! He loved it! He told Remus so too.
Then Charlie went to open the last present, the medium but long one. This was the present Remus had had the most fun choosing, it was-
'A broom! For me? I love it so much daddy! Thank you so much! I love you!' Charlie exclaimed and promptly ran over to Remus and hugged him!
Mission accomplished.
Remus' POV:
'Daddy, can you change your hair and stuff?' Charlie asked curiously. I started, was Charlie saying that he could do that? The only person I knew who could do that was Sirius' little cousin Nymphadora, but she was a metamorphagus.
'Not without using my wand or a potion I can't, why?'
'Because this morning I was thinking about what I would look like with blue hair and then my hair became BLUE!' he said excitedly. He changed his hair colour because he wanted to know what it looked like? So that's how he had purple and then green eyes when I saw him, and how he had blue hair when he snored the next day! I was confused by that a lot! I thought it was some weird accidental magic or something.
'You can change your hair? Can you do anything else? Like change your skin colour?' I asked trying to grasp the depth of his skills.
'I think so,' he said as he nodded. He scrunched up his little face and made his eyes amber like mine and his skin more tanned than it was already. He was a metamorphagus! My son was a metamorphagus!
'Wow! Cub, that's- incredible!' I gasped.
'Really?'
'YES!' I said excitedly, pulling him into a hug.
'I'm gonna look like you dad!' he said proudly, puffing out his chest.
'Oh really?' I said jokingly.
'Yes.' He said simply, he scrunched up his face once more and then became a perfect copy of me but in miniature. AH MINI ME! It would have been okay of it weren't that Charlie's body was tiny and my face was much older than the rest of him.
'Riiight. That is- slightly disconcerting.' Charlie just grinned.
'Can you look like this person?' I said, searching through my wallet to look for some photos of some friends which I always kept on me. I held out the photo to him. He scrunched up his face and I watched as slowly his hair became longer and messier, his nose became sharper and longer, his chin was pointier and his hair finally turned raven black, he opened his eyes to reveal eyes that I hadn't seen in a long time. Hazel eyes.
'You look just like him.' I whispered to myself.
'Who is he? I thought he was my dad, my first dad.' Charlie said quietly, I looked him in the eye and nodded.
'Cool!' he whispered excitedly, 'Wait! I want to see what I look like!' he said, running off into the hall to look in the mirror. He squealed and ran back into the sitting room, making me to look at the carbon copy of my best friend, one that I still couldn't quite get round the idea that he was dead. Oh why did you have to be the ones? Why not someone else? I shook my head, mentally slapping myself for wallowing in self-pity and for wishing it on someone else.
'Daddy, why are you upset?' Charlie said quietly.
I looked him straight in the eye and said slowly, 'You look just like my best friend, just like your dad. I was thinking about how much I miss him and that you are such a good son that I wanted to tell them that.' I censored out the whole self-pity and killing off of other people.
'Oh ok, well daddy needs a hug from his cub!' he said softly, climbing onto my lap and putting his small arms around my neck. Charlie then picked up a book from the coffee table and opened it, spinning round so we could both see the pictures, 'and daddy needs a story from his cub's book.' I nestled my face into his messy crop of hair and he started to read.
'Mr. Boppy was a wiz- ard, a wizard. He licked- liked, playing Quidditch,' I inwardly laughed at Charlie's ability to read long, hard words about what he was interested in, but his struggle over saying 'liked' first time, 'He was a chaser and played for his team…' the story went on for multiple pages of Mr. Boppy also likes chocolate and cakes and he did this and he did that, until Charlie reached the last page and said, 'and Mr. Boppy also loves his daddy called Remus because he is the best daddy ever!' Wait?! What?! That's not in the story! Hang on, did he just say what I thought he just said? He did!
'And his daddy called Remus loves his cub because he always cheers his daddy called Remus up!' I finished, whispering into his ear. Charlie turned around and kissed my nose before sliding off my lap and onto the floor. He picked up his near by broom that he got today and pulled me up and off the sofa and into the garden.
'Daddy? Can you throw some of those muggle tennis balls for me so I can catch them?' he grinned. Such a Slytherin! Cheering me up and then getting me to play a game with him!
'Yes I can, but first get used to the broom by doing five laps at a slow pace around the LAWN and then two laps at a slow pace around the trees and then five fast laps around the lawn and the trees!' I said, summoning the tennis balls. He did his laps, gracefully weaving in and out the trees, lap by lap picking up speed before he zoomed back and pulled to a sharp stop in front of me.
'Ready?!' I asked to the now mini-me.
'You got it captain!' he said, where had he learnt that?! I slowly threw the ball to a metre to the left, he caught it and threw it back, I then threw it quickly a metre to the right, the same happened. We gradually got faster and faster until Charlie was zooming back and forth collecting multiple balls at the same time. As it started getting dark, he landed and just as we were about to go inside,
'Monsieur! Monsieur Lupin et ton petit!' It was Madame LeNoir arrived at our gate, she was wearing a long robe and had her wand in hand, this was the perfect opportunity to start Charlie talking French to people who weren't me, I had been talking to him in French and English so he could talk to the other children in the near by village, his first introduction had been a disaster.
Flashback
'Bon jour Charlie, je m'appelle Papa,' I said, I had been saying phrases like this to him for the past week, so far, he had shown only a few signs of understanding.
'Bon jaw Papa,' he said,
'Non Charlie, comme moi, Bon jour!'
'Bon joar,' closer, he still said things in a very English way, something I was hoping to correct sooner rather than later.
'Bon jour, '
'Bon jour ! ' he said excitedly. FINALLY!
End Flashback
'Bon jour Madame,' Charlie said happily, 'Comment allez-vous?'
'Ca va bien merci, ton Francais est bon Monsieur!' she said warmly, she had taken a great interest in Charlie's French, ever since she had overheard an outdoor lesson.
'Merci Madame! Avez-vous eu une bonne journée?' at hearing the direction of the conversation, I went to finish the dinner and lay the table, out of the window I could see and hear their conversation.
'Oui merci, et vous?'
'Tres bon merci, j'ai joué Quidditch avec Papa!'
'Ah bon! C'est tres amusent, n'est-ce pas?'
'Oui, c'est magnifique!'
'Charlie, le repas est prêt!' I called from the kitchen.
'Je suis desolée Madame, mais j'ai besoin d'aller!' he said as the old witch shook his hand and turned round to wander back down the windy lane we lived on.
A/N: Kinda a filler, I know, but I just felt that I needed to bring back that they live in France... Read and Review (R&R) please!
If you don't speak French, the last line is meant to say ' Sorry Miss, but I've got to go,'