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Chapter Nine: A Family Christmas

-MP-

Harry began to thrash around on the chair throwing the blanket draped over him by the medi-witches promptly off, as he kicked his legs out in his sleep. He started to mumble as he threw himself around, head flitting back and forth as his whole body broke into a sweat.

In his dream he had received an owl that said Minerva was in trouble. He was at the Ministry working, yet he dropped his things where he stood and bolted for the fireplaces as fast he could. His chest rose up and down rapidly, painfully, as he tried to stuff them with as much air as he could muster. His feet thundering along with this heart, sliding himself towards the fireplaces as he screamed 'Griffin's Autumn' at the top of his voice taking him to Minerva's cottage with speed.

He scrambled across the living room, instinctively knowing that Minerva was in the bedroom, he flung the door open to reveal her crumpled body on the floor. He snatched her up and pulled her towards his chest holding tight, sobbing, screaming as he rocked her. No matter how fast he ran, how quick he reacted, he always got there too late and she would be gone.

"NOOOOOOOOO!" He screamed from his sleep. His arms lashing out into the darkness. "Minerva! Minerva! I'm sorry!"

He slipped off the chair and tumbled to the floor pulling him out of his nightmare. He must have hit his back on the way down as there was throbbing there, he stood up rubbing it and pulled his shirt away from his sticky chest.

Harry lifted his sleeve and wiped his brow, he hadn't quite reacquainted himself with the room when sounds from the bed caught his attention. His eyes darted up immediately towards Minerva.

Only to realise that her green eyes were looking back at him accompanied by a weak sounding voice coming from the bedsheets.

"H-Harry…" The weak voice said. Harry vaulted himself to her bedside and pulled the chair up beneath him.

"Min?" He answered, in his most gentle and quietest voice his throat would allow.

"Are… are…?" Minerva tried to reach out to hold Harry, but she had lost so much strength her arm could barely make it.

Harry scooped it up without thinking and answered her. "I'm sorry if I woke you Minerva. It was just a dream."

Minerva gave a slight nod, and pulled her body around to lay on her side towards Harry. The covers pulled tightly towards her chin.

"It was just a dream. I promise." Harry affirmed, not wanting to let Minerva know he was plagued with regular nightmares again.

The corner of her lips lifted slightly. "Okay."

"I'm tir-... tir…"

Harry held her even tighter, and stroked her hair behind her ears as he looked into her green and brown eyes. Still just as warm and inviting as he remembered. "Shhh… go back to sleep, Min."

He continued to gently stroke her hair until her eyelids fluttered closed, flickering open once or twice before she let sleep take her again.

Harry gave her a quick kiss, knowing he had to get back to Ginny before she would start to worry. A mixture of panic and anxiety left over from his nightmare mixing in with the absolute joy of speaking to Minerva again.

"I missed you." He whispered, softly into her ear before he left.

When Harry had finally arrived home that night he told Ginny about Elspeth and Minerva speaking to him, completely giddy with excitement, whereas Ginny looked as tense as ever.

She was glad to see some hope in his eyes but she deeply feared that it wouldn't last with Minerva as gravely ill as she was.

Nevertheless, the next day was Christmas and the pair had decided to bring the children to visit, so no matter what happened they could make peace with the situation and more importantly spend Christmas together. Before Minerva fell ill, both Ginny and Harry had planned an extravagant day between inviting Minerva over for dinner and visiting the Weasley clan as well. That had now been traded for a much calmer day, however it didn't matter as they would still be together, as a family.

Once the family had gotten ready that morning, they had planned to apparate to the designated point in Diagon Alley. Harry would side apparate Lily, Ginny would take Albus and James had recently got his license so he could apparate by himself.

Ginny spent extra time going over the apparition instructions with James who would cast annoyed glances at Harry who was doing nothing to prevent the situation, as he found his annoyance so amusing. Even his siblings noticed who were giggling away in the background. After Ginny had finished, they set off and with three loud, dull thuds the family had arrived at Diagon Alley successfully. Harry immediately turned and smiled at his eldest son who had landed only a foot away from his parents. "Well done James, you're getting good at it now!" He beamed.

James smiled widely back at his father. "Catching up to you?" He joked, flashing a characteristically cheeky look in his Dad's direction.

Harry chuckled too, sometimes he couldn't believe how much James was like himself at his age. Full of sarcasm and humour, but with a much sharper wit than himself of course.

They left Diagon Alley and made their way a few streets over to where the entrance of St Mungo's sat, and once inside the group made their way to Minerva's room, a route they knew by heart at this point. James held onto her present that was wrapped in bright scarlet wrapping paper, and Lily held a bunch of dark purple flowers with yellow centres, a type of primrose which was Minerva's favourite but she hardly told a soul about them.

When they got to Minerva's room Ginny stepped in front of her children blocking the door, looking at each of them sternly before reminding the group to be calm and quiet when they went inside. She had already had a conversation with them about Minerva's condition and what to expect, so hopefully they wouldn't find it too shocking.

Ginny moved aside whilst Harry creaked open the door, revealing that the medi-witch Ms Jenkins had prepared the room for them already. There were tartan streamers adorning the walls, a small Christmas tree in the corner with golden lights and five comfy chairs for them all to sit on.

The family all sat down and Harry focused his attention on his children. "Remember, just like me and your Mum talked about last night, you have all had your dragon pox potion when you were babies so you can touch her. You won't get sick. If you do want to get closer to her just remember to be gentle, okay?"

Three voices mumbled "Yes" in response. Harry relaxed into his own chair as they passed around the small gifts they had brought with them.

Albus looked between his family and Minerva, he was the only one of the children that hadn't started to unwrap his gift. Lily did so immediately to duck her face away from Minerva and James slowly fingered open the paper whilst glancing repeatedly toward the bed.

He didn't feel right not including his Aunty Minerva, and sitting back to watch her lie in that bed alone made his heart hurt. Without hesitating, he stood up and climbed into bed and tucked himself in next to her. He started to slowly unwrap his gift whilst he described what he was doing in a whisper to Minerva.

Harry and Ginny exchanged nervous looks, but both parents felt proud that their son was brave enough to try and connect with his aunty in such an overwhelming situation.

"Oh look Aunty Min. I think this is a remembrall." He continued in his hushed whisper, turning the glass ball over in his palm.

Unbeknownst to the family, Minerva's eyes had fluttered open again as she listened to Albus talk to her.

As she looked up at Albus's wide smiling face as he admired his new remembrall, she mustered all the gusto she had in her and whispered back. "Albus…."

Albus froze, as did Harry, Ginny and his siblings. He turned his head to look at her directly, not quite believing what he was hearing. Finding that Minerva was looking back up at him smiling weakly, her green eyes watching his blue ones.

She placed her hand gingerly on his knee and smiled a little stronger. "My little Slytherin."

Albus grinned instantly and flashed the same joyous expression at this family.

Harry, who wanted to grin just as widely himself, forced a stern expression onto his face and reminded Albus to keep calm.

Lily and James jumped up from their seats and rounded themselves to the other side of their bed. The three took turns in describing their gifts to Minerva, and then they moved onto their lives at Hogwarts. Each child, taking their time to speak gently to Minerva as to not overwhelm her but soaking up every second of their time with her. The love between all four of them was palpable, and if you were to walk in that room you would feel it too. Strong and fierce, a lioness with her cubs.

Harry heard a sniffle next to him, it was Ginny in her chair watching the scene in front of her wordlessly. Silent tears drifted down her cheeks as she quickly wiped them away. She reached out to Harry, who instinctively took her hand and squeezed it.

He felt the same way, his chest aching with the thought this could be the last time the family shared a moment like this. It was more than they could bear to think about.

The family's joy was to not to be had for long. As Harry and Ginny received an urgent owl from St Mungo's on the morning of boxing day, stating that Minerva had taken a turn for the worse and they should get there as quickly as they could.

Ginny had again packed the children off to her mother's house, Molly who had of course stepped into help looked much more solemn during this drop off. As Ginny passed her children's bags over after stepping off the floo, Molly looked at the grave expression of her daughter and son in law carefully. "It isn't good news, is it?" she swallowed.

Harry looked sorrowfully at his wife, who turned immediately to her mother. "No Mum. It isn't."

Molly dropped the bags and embraced her daughter tightly against her. "It's okay sweetie, we'll get through this."

She relinquished her hold on her daughter and pulled Harry into a hug too. "You too Harry."

He nodded silently against her, the pair wishing her goodbye as they took the floo to Diagon Alley and prepared to make yet another journey to St Mungo's.

Once they had arrived and made their way to Minerva's room they were greeted by Ms Jenkins again, but this time she had blocked their entry to Minerva's room which instantly caused panic to rise in Harry's chest.

"What are you doing? I want to see Minerva." He barked, but the medi-witch didn't flinch.

"Mr and Mrs Potter. There is something we need to discuss. Will you please follow me?"

The pair nodded solemnly, and followed Ms Jenkins further down the corridor until they had almost reached the end. Instead of going into a different patient room they instead went inside a smaller room with just chairs inside.

Ms Jenkins took the chair furthest to the back wall and prompted the pair to sit down which they did so tentatively, Ginny was the first to break the tension, asking why they were summoned to the hospital so suddenly.

Harry glanced between Ginny and Ms Jenkins, Ginny looked worried even though she was trying to sound assertive and more alarmingly, Ms Jenkins had a hint on sorrow on her face. He could tell she was attempting to mask it and act professional but she wasn't quite succeeding at the latter.

Ms Jenkins took a slow inhale of breath and rested her hands on her lap. "I asked the two of you to come in today to discuss Minerva's care, specifically in relation to what happened last night."

Harry immediately tensed up against the back of his chair. A horrible nervousness creeping into him.

Ms Jenkins continued, focusing on the pair before her. "As you know, in the last few days there has been improvement in Minerva's condition and she has been able to stay awake for short periods of time and communicate with us. This was unexpected, as you may remember I warned you both that her situation was very dire and she could have died. However, we no longer believe that to be the case."

"Okay…" Harry responded. "But what happened last night? That is why you have called us here, isn't it?"

Ms Jenkins nodded. "Yes, Mr Potter it is." She broke away from his gaze and picked Ginny's up instead, moving between them as she spoke. "Last night Minerva had a prolonged and severe seizure. We aren't sure why, but as I speak medi-witches are performing extensive tests to find out why. After the seizure, we discovered that Minerva is no longer in mortal danger but she is suffering from pronounced amnesia."

"Amnesia?" Harry repeated, much louder than he intended to, and unknown to him he had stood up as he stared wide-eyed at Ms Jenkins.

Ginny grabbed Harry's hand in support, but her eyes didn't waver from Ms Jenkins for a second. "What do you mean, amnesia?" She asked fiercely.

"I am very sorry Mr and Mrs Potter. But Minerva is suffering from severe retrograde amnesia and upon questioning she is struggling to recall much from her past."

Harry squeezed Ginny's hands tight, her fingers were being crushed into his but she didn't complain.

Swirling anger began to fuel his panic, and his voice grew louder again demanding answers from the medi-witch. "Tell me she can remember us?"

The medi-witch slowly shook her head in response. "I am very sorry that I have to give you this news."

"Minerva will be moved to the Janus Thickey Ward, and the mind healers and medi-wtiches there will be working with her and putting together a plan for her recovery."

"Janus Thickey? People don't come out of Janus Thickey!" Harry shouted again, sounding angrier with every word.

Ms Jenkins sighed and looked at them both.

"That isn't strictly true Mr Potter, but also, I will not lie to you. Minerva has a long way to go and I cannot make any guarantees on her recovery."

Harry let go of Ginny's hands, pacing around the room, grief overtaking his anger as his mind raced with a thousand thoughts. Would she ever recognise him or his family? Will she remember his children's names? Each question fleeting into his mind made learning about Minerva's amnesia more and more painful.

"You were supposed to heal her!"

He spun on his heels to face Ms Jenkins a final time. "She was awake. She was getting better. How could you let this happen?"

Ginny could swear she saw Ms Jenkins falter for just a second before plastering her professional expression back onto her face.

"Mr Potter. I promise you that every medi-witch here has been doing all they can for Ms McGonagall, many of us being taught by her in the past. This seizure was completely unforeseen, by any of us."

She reached out and touched Harry's arm gently, as if tentatively offering out her sympathies.

"Harry, I truly wish I could have given you better news. But, I beg you, please remember that she is alive. This could have been a much different conversation."