Stars
Prologue
James Potter was an… odd child.
Anyone could see it; from the moment he was born there was something not quite right about the baby with the ink-black eyes who did not cry.
It unnerved people, especially the nurses of St. Mungo’s maternity ward, who were already so accustomed to his lively and completely ordinary mother.
Dr. Potter, to her credit, saw nothing wrong with James. She brushed off the nurses and delivery doctors' concerns with a gentle laugh, holding her son close to her chest and smiling down at him lovingly.
“He’ll cry.” She said calmly. “He’s just not used to living yet, that’s all.”
The nurses were a little more concerned— babies who refused to cry were normally at top of the list for every infantile illness and affliction— but to her credit, Dr. Potter’s prediction came true. James did indeed cry. And he laughed, and he screamed, and generally acted like a perfectly normal baby. The hospital went back to its normal routine, nurses and doctors going about their days saving lives, now with the addition of a curly-haired baby in their midst; playing in the daycare, eating lunch with his mother, and sitting in the receptionists’ laps drawing rainbows on the backs of used printer paper.
James was the brightest and bubbliest child anyone had ever met, a kind and patient boy with a soul like a thousand-watt light bulb. He lifted the spirits of everyone in the hospital, patient or doctor, and never ceased to amaze anyone with his zest for life.
Still, as normal as he was, the nurses never really got over James’ initial oddness. There was always an air of… something hanging around their favorite toddler. It wasn’t malicious, but it also never went away, no matter how often he smiled or laughed like a normal child. The hospital staff always had to be careful not to look to closely at James. Otherwise they might see one shadow too many, shaped in the form of that one patient they never really got over losing.
Normally, doctors and nurses never really had time for superstitions or ghost stories. They were far too busy keeping their patients on this side of the veil. But there were things that happened in the white and green walls of St. Mungo’s Hospital that made even the most skeptical sprout seedlings of doubt. And it always, somehow, found its way right back to James.
He was three years old the first time he called a patient’s time of death.
It was another ordinary day. Dr. Euphemia Potter was on call in the ICU. Little James was in the children’s room, playing with the kids in long-term care. The hospital was bustling but not bursting, the coffee was warm but not scalding, the antiseptic bothersome, but not sickening.
Euphemia had stopped a nurse in the hallway, a young thing, barely in her first months at St. Mungo's.
“Could you get James for me, dear? I want him to eat something. He should be in the children’s area.”
The nurse had smiled, somewhat in awe of the woman in front of her, and said, “Of course, Dr. Potter.”
Euphemia had smiled, called her a dear, and disappeared down the white hallways.
The nurse found James stacking blocks haphazardly, a hoard of colorful cubes sprawled around him like a rainbow.
“James, lunchtime,” the nurse called. James obliged immediately, leaping from his spot on the play carpet and latching on to her hand with his little brown fingers.
“How are you James?” She asked kindly.
James looked up at her, his dark eyes— no, not dark, black. Pitch-black, like the space in between the stars— reflecting the fluorescent lights above them.
“Good.” He said. “I played with blocks.”
They walked in relative silence, heading down the white hallways with nothing but James’s soft humming and the click of her nurse’s shoes.
“11:25.”
The nurse blinked and looked down at the boy walking next to her.
“What was that, dear?”
“11:25.” James repeated, as if parroting a voice only he could hear. He pointed down the hallway to their right, his chubby brown finger a stark contrast to the bright white tiles. It was the entrance to the ICU.
“Mr. Carrol. 11:25.” James looked up at her, as if he were telling her the sky were blue and not the most cryptic thing she had ever heard.
“That’s nice, dear.” The nurse said, pulling him along. Children really said the darnedest things.
She dropped the boy off with his mother, smiling when he immediately broke into a blinding smile and shot into her arms like a rocket, jabbering excitedly about ‘colors’ and ‘friends’ and ‘lunch.’”
The nurse shook her head and went back to her rounds.
It was only a short time later that that same nurse found herself rushing down the white hallways of the ICU— towards a code in room 412.
The man in 412 had been in and out of the hospital for various leg surgeries, with a delicate knee surgery being the latest thing to land him in the ICU.
The fact that his heart had stopped suddenly was something so unexpected, even the most experienced doctors were scratching their heads at the drastic turn.
The nurse had just set up her clipboard, ready to document the attempt at resuscitation, when her eyes had glanced across the top of the page.
Room 412. Patient Name: Carrol, M.
The nurse had frozen for exactly one second, before the voices of her coworkers had brought her back to her senses and she had brushed aside the coincidence. Little James Potter always went around blurting out random names like they were adjectives. It meant nothing. It was a coincidence.
A coincidence.
“Stop.”
The doctor held out a hand. His voice was tired. They were all tired. Try as they had, there was nothing more that could be done. Sometimes a person’s time was simply up. The nurse lowered her clipboard with heavy arms.
“Time of death?” The doctor asked.
“11:25.” The nurse said. Her coworkers looked at her, at her bare wrist, then at the broken clock on the wall that always showed 6:30. She swallowed nervously.
“11:25.” The doctor repeated, looking at his wristwatch. “We need to contact the family, get started on the paperwork...”
The nurse stayed in that room longer than she needed to, staring at the empty bed where only hours ago a living man had laid. Her clipboard hung at her side, the pen lines where she had written Carrol, M. Time of Death 11:25 am wobbly and uneven.
A noise startled her out of her thoughts, and she turned around to see a boy peeking around the door, his unruly black curls and warm brown skin half-hidden behind the cold gray metal.
The nurse felt unease brush down her spine despite herself, despite the fact that this was caring and kind Dr. Euphemia Potter’s son, despite the fact that James was the most gentle and patient three year-old she had ever met in her life.
Which, come to think of it, was not normal for three year-olds. Those years labeled the “Terrible Two’s” were not for producing gentle and patient three year-olds. They meant tantrums and “I want” and “No!”’s. They were meant to mean that.
“How did you know?” She whispered.
James just looked at her with those eyes of his— black eyes, so black she couldn’t even see the pupil, how much would it take to make that black bleed across everything, to consume his entire eyes, the darkness of the place stars go to die—
James blinked. “He told me.”
“...Who told you?”
Another blink. James pointed to the space in between them. “He did.”
The nurse resigned within the week.