Chapter 4
It took a few days for Harry to be able to leave St Mungo's. He had to go through intense physical therapy, because there was only so much that potions could do; he had to relearn how to walk, how to stand for long periods of time, how to carry heavy things,... and his magic, too, had weakened greatly. A simple accio left him exhausted the first couple of days. At least, the healers who were assigned to his care were very professional-he made sure of it. The last thing he needed was for the people who were constantly by his side to gape at him just because of his bad luck and fame.
There was one healer, Mirabelle Spritz, who was in charge of getting Harry up to speed with all he's missed in the past years. Harry suspects she was only assigned this role because, after meeting her for three minutes, he understood she was a ruthless gossip at heart. Harry could confidently say he know knew more about the personal lives of celebrities he hadn't even heard of before than he had ever wanted to know. And Mirabelle had so much energy, too. It was like Parvati Patil and Lavender Brown were combined into one loud, gossipy, but strangely competent healer.
It was after one of his daily walks around the hospital with Mirabelle that Harry saw James waiting for him outside his room, wearing a shirt with the Weasley's Wizard Wheezes logo on it and simple jeans. Harry turned to Mirabelle and tried, desperately, to beg her not to leave him with his eyes only. She laughed at the strange expression he must've been doing, patted his shoulder soothingly, and turned to leave. "I'll see you tomorrow for our last session, Mr. Potter. Have a good rest of your day!" She waved cheerfully and nodded at James, before speed-walking over to one of her colleagues.
"Yeah, see you tomorrow, Healer Spritz." Harry shoved his hands in his pockets-but, Merlin, he was so happy he convinced them all to give him jeans and a jumper instead of a hospital gown-and gave an awkward smile to James. "Good afternoon, James. Is your dad with you?"
"No, he doesn't know I'm here. I gave my best doe eyes to Professor McGonagall and she let me travel here from her personal floo channel to come see you. It's the weekend, anyway, so it's not like I'm skipping any school."
"Alright. Come in, James, come in. Merlin, I can't believe how much you've grown. You were in your school uniform last time I saw you, Gryffindor like me! Do you play Quidditch? Your dad and I loved it, we used to play against each other. I mostly won. Erm- I guess you already know that, don't you? I'm sorry, what did you come to see me for?" Harry internally cringed at the words that spilled out of his mouth as he opened the door to his room, and motioned for James to get in. He did, and stopped to stand in the middle of the room. Harry followed, but he knew he would have to go sit down in only a few minutes. Recovery was an annoying pain in his arse.
James rubbed the scruff of his neck awkwardly, not quite meeting his father's eyes, and Harry drank in the act like a man starved. He was desperate to learn everything about his son, from his personality to his physical tics, his hopes and his dreams, but also his fears and his worries. Harry was ready to jump head-first into his role as father again, but he did not have the first clue how.
Harry remembered himself as a sixteen years old, and an unpleasant shiver ran down his spine. He was moody, angry, sassy, horny, and a plethora of other unsavory emotions. In his defense, the world was against him. He was learning about Horcruxes, he was hiding from Voldemort (both physically and mentally), he was trying to uncover Draco's schemes and everyone around him were too busy snogging to do anything useful. At least, James didn't have any of that. Hopefully. Did a new dark lord emerge while he was out? No, Mirabelle would have told him. Probably.
"I just wanted to see you, I guess," James' voice brought Harry out of his head, and he reminded himself of the situation he was in. "I've heard so much about you from family and strangers, but I don't have a single memory of you, and barely any pictures."
"Well, if you have questions, I can answer them. I don't want to hide anything from you, but- are you sure your dad would approve of you being here? He's quite cross with me," and probably doesn't even see me as your father anymore, he thinks but does not say. "I don't want you to get in trouble for me."
James waved a hand dismissively, and snorted. "If he finds out, then it's you he's gonna be cross with, not me. And he's not going to find out, anyway! He'd have to, at this exact moment, reach out to Professor McGonagall to inquire about me at Hogwarts. And he's never done that in the six years I've been there, so." He shrugs, and looks into Harry's eyes. They're the same height. "Did you do it on purpose? The coma thing?"
"What?!" Harry recoiled from surprise. Of all the things James could've asked him... "Of course not! Why would I do that, I didn't even know I couldn't die from a killing curse. The first time was because my mom saved me, and the second time was because I became the Master of Death. I didn't think it would work a third time, and believe me I had no interest in trying. I'm an auror, it's was just an accident."
"H- dad... of course you're still the Master of Death. The person that becomes the Master of Death stays the Master of Death until someone else takes their place. Destroying the wand and then repairing it didn't strip you from the title." James was speaking with an expression on his face that simultaneously reminded Harry of Draco and Hermione when they talked to him. The kid had attitude!
"How do you know all this? Did Ron and Hermione already tell you everything about the war?"
"They told me a little," James explained. "Mostly the safe-for-kids version when I was younger, when I asked them to tell me about you. No, this is what we learn in History of Magic. We learn about you."
At this, Harry sat down on the edge of his bed. They were learning about him in History of Magic? "You're learning about me, specifically, or about the war in general?"
"The war," James replied while taking a chair and dropping it in front of Harry before sitting down in it, like Ron had done a few days ago. "But you were, like, the main character. Professor Patil says she was in your year in school, too, and she fought in the Battle of Hogwarts, so she knows what she's talking about."
Harry felt like he should be writing all of this down. "Professor Patil? It's not Binns anymore?"
"Who? No, our History of Magic professor is Padma Patil. Pa' says you went with her sister to the Yule Ball! He even found a picture and showed me, you looked so awkward!" James laughed happily, and Harry had the dreaded thought that James inherited a lot from his namesakes.
"Yeah, awkward's one way to put it..." Harry chuckled. "Your uncle Ron- er, do you call him that?" At James' nod, Harry continued. "Well, he went with Padma's twin sister. I don't even think they shared ten full words, because he was too focused on your aunt Hermione. She was absolutely stunning, but her date was Viktor Krum. You know, I never told them this, but right then and there I was ready to shove them into an abandoned classroom and lock them in until they confessed their feelings."
James laughed, delighted. "Well, why didn't you? Pops told me they only got together in '98, after school finished."
"Yeah, I didn't end up doing that," Harry sighed. "At the end of the day, I was too busy trying to survive and they were too busy helping me to really do anything about their feelings. Hermione talked to me about it in sixth year and- as a matter of fact, Ron told me, too. But I was sixteen and had only kissed one girl, so what was I supposed to do? I was too busy following your father around to think about anything else."
"No way, that's real? Did you follow him around in your invisibility cloak and everything? He told me about that, but I was certain he was lying! He was still your ennemi, why would you do that?" James was leaning forward on his chair, arms resting on his thighs. His eyes were shining brightly, and Harry was surprised by the attention James was giving him though he was not about to look a gift hippogriff in the mouth.
"Erm yes, unfortunately this is all true. My focus was constantly on Draco that year, I barely even paid attention to Quidditch. I mean, sure, it was because I thought he was a dea- uh..."
James shook his head and chuckled, "it's ok, dad, I already know about pops' history. I know he was a Death Eater and everything. It doesn't bother me, anyway, 'cause clearly he couldn't hurt anyone even if he wanted to. Except if they hurt me or Scorpius."
At the mention of Draco's other son, all of Harry's good mood evaporated. He tried to ignore it, for James' sake, but the look on his son's face told him it didn't work.
"Erm, dad, you know, papa still loves you. He really does. Even though that fight the other day was crazy. Clearly aunt Hermione was right when she said that you're both very emotional people."
Harry laughed weakly, to hide his ever-growing despair. "Why does everyone tell me he still loves me? He got another family without me, I feel like that speaks for itself. I wouldn't have done that. I would have waited for him to wake up, if our roles were reversed. Even if it took longer." He suddenly remembered he was talking to his son, who obviously did not need all of this thrown at him. "Hey, don't worry about it, kiddo. This is between Draco and I only. You don't have to try to defend him."
James huffed, straightening. He crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair, a small annoyed scowl on his face. "I'm not a child, Harry. Dad, whatever. You don't know what he went through, so stop acting like he did it on purpose to hurt you, or something like that. Astoria once asked me to call her mom, and you should've heard the fight she and papa had. He said he would leave with Scorpius if she tried to replace you again. I'm pretty sure he was just being dramatic, like always, but he still said it. He tries to hex every person that speaks bad of you, or that tries to tell him to let you go. He and Uncle Blaise don't really talk anymore, because he said you were good as dead and papa did not like that."
"Draco doesn't talk to Zabini anymore?" Harry furrowed his brows, perplexed. Draco and Blaise had been as close to best friends as purebloods could be, and he had played a big part in making Harry and Draco realize their feelings for each other. To learn they weren't on speaking terms at the moment, because of him, left a sour taste in his mouth. "Listen, I'm sorry kiddo. James, sorry. It's just that I still don't understand what's happening, and everyone just tells me to talk to him. But I tried that, and he just kept screaming at me and insulting me. So, that's not really promising, you understand."
"Yeah, you're right," James conceded. "My dad is a stubborn git -his words, not mine- and it can be really, really hard to get anything out of him when he's emotional. And, let's be real, he's always emotional. It's kind of his thing."
Harry could not believe he was getting dating advice from his own surprisingly mature son. "Alright, you win. I'm gonna send him an owl, see if we can meet."
James smiled winningly at him, and Harry vowed to himself to always try his hardest to put that smile there. Without a conscious thought, he reached forward and ruffled James' hair. James rolled his eyes good-naturedly, but did not move away. Instead, he exclaimed, "let me know when you do that, 'cause I wanna come, too!"
Well, so much for maturity. "In your dreams, mate. Now, get out of here, go enjoy the rest of your day with your friends. I'm going to right that letter now."
James stood up and put his hands in his pockets, grinning down at Harry. "Okay. Thanks for talking to me, dad. It was fun." But he didn't make a move to leave; he was just standing there, looking at Harry with hopeful eyes.
Harry got up off the edge of the bed and crossed the small distance to stand in front of his son. Slowly, he took James in his arms and held him tight. James' hands came up to fist the back of Harry's jumper and they stood there for a few seconds, breathing in sync. James was the first to pull away, giving his dad one last smile before leaving, softly humming to himself as he did.
Harry smiled, content as he's ever been since he first held his son in his arms. Talking with James had been eye-opening; he was going to talk to Draco, to try and work things out. And, if he was right and Draco did not love him anymore, he would at least fight tooth and nail to be able to stay in contact with James as much as he possibly could.
With this in mind, Harry turned around and laid down in his hospital bed. He would take one small nap, before writing a letter to Draco.