Chapter Fourteen
Since the first night Sirius and Remus went to bed with Harry, each one taking a turn in the middle. When Rems was in the middle, he slept on his back with his mates curled into his side like the first night. If it was Sirius in the middle then Remus plastered himself against his back and Harry curled into his front with Remus’ arm around them. If Harry was in the middle one of his mates became the little spoon or slept on their back with his leg on top of them and the other became the big spoon.
Sirius didn’t like to sleep without touching one of his mates, Remus had to be touching both of them, and Harry had to be able to smell their scents.
All in all it worked out just fine.
**
Monday morning, the day of the full moon, Sirius woke up not as warm as he gotten used to with two wolf mates in his bed who were personal furnaces. Despite the cooling charms on the comforter Sirius usually woke up on the side of too warm, but not yet sweating. Feeling the cold air against his bare shoulders, he rolled over and noticed Remus was on the opposite side of the bed where Harry had been last night.
Frowning, he sat up and looked around the room now noticing the comforter was different than what it had been when they fell asleep as well.
“Moony.” Sirius said pushing his hand into Remus to wake him, his husband grunted, but narrowed his eyes at him.
“What?” Remus grumbled
“Can you smell Harry?” Sirius asked, looking around noticing the bathroom door was closed, but no light was under the gap.
“What?” Remus asked again though he was more awake now as he sat up and looked around the room as well, “No, maybe he’s in the sitting room.” Just as he spoke the door opened and they turned to see James poking his head into the room.
“Harry said you two might wake up soon.” James said
“Is Harry okay?” Remus asked
“He had to leave about an hour ago, his heat was getting closer. Said something about not wanting to risk it coming during the Full Moon by staying around you two too much longer. He took like four comforters and ten pillows though. I think. I’m not sure I didn’t count, but it was a lot.”
“Did he seem okay when he left?” Sirius asked
“Yeah he was fine. I promised Henry I would stop by their place every day to check on Harry, but Harry says he’ll be fine. He’ll send a message when he starts his heat and when he gets over it. He also gave me a list of things to do like reschedule his NEWTs for next week and contact his school to get his work for him. He looked a little…overwhelmed and maybe a little sweaty, but he seemed okay otherwise.”
“You’ll check on him?” Remus asked
“Yes.”
“Every day?”
“Everyday.” Remus nodded though he didn’t look reassured at all, “he said you might react this way so instead of me being the middleman I gave him my mirror.”
“You gave him your mirror?” Sirius asked surprised as he tossed the comforter off and went to his satchel. Call it childish, but talking to James through the mirror while supervising detentions was their favorite pastime.
“With some ground rules.” James said, “I am taking your mirror and hiding it until Harry gives me the all clear message. I know you two wouldn’t intentionally contact him, but you might accidentally and Harry said he might try to contact you during his heat since it would likely be within reach.”
“Completely fair and understandable.” Remus said
“He’s probably sleeping, he looked pretty tired when he left after giving me a thirty minute lecture about nests and heats and why I shouldn’t try to find him and everything else I needed to know before he left. I’m going to catch a few more hours of sleep now that I’ve told you two what you needed to know, you should too. Full Moon tonight after all. Goodnight.”
“Night.” Remus and Sirius said, Sirius pulling out the mirror from his bag as James left, closing the door behind them. Sirius came to the bed and sat beside Remus against the headboard as he activated the mirror. It took only ten seconds, not that Remus was counting, before Harry answered. Harry was laying down when he answered, a small smile spreading his lips.
“I’m not surprised you woke up so soon. Honestly you guys slept longer than I thought you would.” Harry said in a way of greeting them.
“Sirius actually woke me up.” Remus said as he wrapped his arm around Sirius’ waist.
“I woke up cold and Remus was on the other side of the bed. I’m never cold in bed so I knew something was wrong.”
“Sorry. Heats on Full Moons are…different. I’ve had two of them during a Full Moon and…it’s hard to explain. I’ve heard Ruts are like that too, that the Moon changes it.” Harry said, clearly uncomfortable at the thought of his heat on the Full Moon, “And I wanted to get to my nest and make sure everything was stocked. Snacks, Water, Lube. You know the essentials.”
“Magically conjured lube exists, you know.” Sirius said but Harry shook his head.
“It um….it reacts with my scars and it also reacts with an Omega’s slick actually. So that isn’t an option for me.”
“That's…good to know for the future.” Sirius said
“How are you feeling?” Remus asked, steering the conversation away from that topic.
“Warm…a little lonely being by myself. I’m usually not alone during my heats….I mean I’m alone in my nest of course, but there’s always someone I can smell in the house. Makes me feel..safer I guess. More at ease. If an Omega doesn’t feel safe when their heat comes it can cause problems….make their heat into something different. But I’ll be fine. It’s not my first time being alone, it just doesn’t happen often.”
“Couldn’t you have spent your heat here at Hogwarts? Like Remus did his rut?” Sirius asked
“No…Omegas need a nest. A nest is private and hidden most of the time, that’s why it makes us feel so safe. There are temporary nests, usually made in a bed for when heats come on unexpectedly or when it’s an emergency, but the mates usually stay with the Omega for those. I have this nest and I’ll probably build one at the family manor too eventually, if I spend time there that is.”
“We can tell James to go to your place and sleep there.” Remus offered, but Harry shook his head
“No, I’m fine really.”
“If you’re sure. If you need anything let us know okay?” Harry nodded as he nuzzled into a pillow he was hugging, “Go to sleep you look tired.”
“I got used to sleeping beside my mates I guess. It’s why I took so many things with your scents on them, it’s helping, but it’s not like the real thing.”
“Well we’re right here. Just pretend we’re laying beside you.” Sirius said as he and Remus settled into bed together adjusting the mirror so it laid beside them, Harry smiled as he too adjusted his own mirror to lay beside him.
“Still not the same, but it’ll have to do.” Harry fell asleep first, they stayed on long enough to make sure he was in a deep sleep before they disconnected and laid the mirror down on the nightstand.
“I suppose we should move into our bedroom again now that Harry is gone.” Sirius said
“Yeah, But not right now. We have two hours before we have to wake up again, let’s just sleep while we can.”
**
“Charlie, stay after will you?” James asked as the class began to pack up, Charlie nodded and when the last student left the room he came over to the desk.
“How’s Remus?” Charlie asked
“He’s fine. That’s not why I asked you to stay behind. You asked me to tell you when Harry left and I wanted to tell you he left in the middle of the night. Like one or two this morning. Are you two…fighting about something?”
“No, of course not. Why?”
“Why did you want to know when he left?”
“Oh I wanted to talk to mom.”
“...And you couldn’t do that while he was here?” James asked confused
“I could.”
James waited for Charlie to elaborate, but when it became clear he wouldn’t he spoke again.
“I’m not following.”
“Don’t worry about it dad. I’ll see you later, okay?” James stared after Charlie as he left the room leaving James alone and confused. Shaking his head James decided to go ask Sirius if Charlie had said anything to him or Remus, but when he got to Sirius’ office he found his two best friends occupied with talking to the mirror and grading papers. Harry’s voice filled the room so instead James turned around and decided to ask them later.
**
“You guys go ahead without me. I want to talk to my mom.” Charlie said looking at Ron and Hermione who nodded.
“We’ll see you later, mate.” Ron said before walking out of the classroom with Hermione.
“What do you need, Charlie?” Lily asked with a soft smile as she looked over her son, “You feel up for lunch with your sister and I tomorrow?”
“Why? So you can not show up then too?” Charlie asked folding his arms, Lily stopped putting her papers into her bag for a second, tensing, but then she continued.
“Charlie I can explain.”
“I’m not really interested in an explanation that took you two weeks to think of.” Charlie snapped watching his mother straighten with a hard look on her face.
‘That is enough Charlie. I am your mother, you do not speak to me like that.”
“So I have to show you respect, but you don’t have to show us enough respect to tell us something came up or that you need to reschedule? You can just make us sit there for hours waiting for you before finally just giving up?”
“Something came up.”
“You mean Snape? Again? Let me guess something to do with a potion you both are working on and by working on you really mean you stand there and let him do all the work so you can use him as an excuse whenever it suits you.”
“I’ll have you know I do most of the theoretical work and I’m the one who contacts the werewolves. And it’s Professor Snape to you for one more year. These potions are important.”
“Yeah…I got that message loud and clear two weeks ago.” Charlie said bitterly, turning away from his mother to look at one of the posters on the wall about electricity.
“Charlie-”
“You know I defended you.” Charlie interrupted, turning to her, eyes shining, “I defended you in my head over the years, made up excuses, made dad seem like he was too emotional or overreacting at times. I made Sirius and Remus into the bad guys for giving you the cold shoulder when you forgot yours and dad’s anniversary dinner two years ago. I defended you over and over again. I believed that your potions were more important, that all of your excuses were more than just that. I defended you even as you were an hour late. Kept telling Harry you’d come, but you didn’t. You didn’t even try to see him these past two weeks. Why?”
Lily opened her mouth, but nothing came out as she stood there. Charlie stared at her for a minute, waiting.
“I told you-”
“I don’t want excuses.” Charlie said, “I want an explanation. Why? Why didn’t you just try?”
It was silent for a minute before Lily spoke in a soft voice that didn’t waver with emotion.
“I don’t know.”
Staring at her in a new light Charlie shook his head looking away.
“Well as far as I’m concerned until you actually make an effort with Harry, I’m not making an effort with you.” Charlie told her as he grabbed his things then he headed to the door, stopping as he pulled it open, “For the record, I saw Snape in Hogsmeade that day so I know you weren’t with him.”
“Charlie-”
He didn’t stay long enough to hear the rest, he could probably recite the apology speech word for word anyway. Instead he went back to the Common Room where he sat with his friends and started his homework to distract himself.
*****
A few days later, James was sitting in the wingback chair in Henry’s living room watching him as he changed the color of the sofa model.
“Just pick a color.” James said
“Just because you can’t tell the difference between a Hunter Green and a Forest Green does not mean I can’t.” Henry told him tilting his head
“What’s wrong with the couch that you have?”
“There’s a tear in one of the cushions.”
“So just flip the cushion.” James told him getting an incredulous look from Henry.
“Flip the cushion? No. Might as well just redecorate the entire living area while I have a reason to do so. You straights just don’t understand.” Henry turned away from James with a wave of his hand, “You know if I change the wood tones to a darker color and get the velvet tufted green sofa instead with those brown leather Lawson Chairs or Armchairs in the catalog-”
James laid his head against the chair with a groan. He didn’t even know how this came to be, he had come over to check on Harry since Henry hadn’t shown up yet only to find the man shirtless in the kitchen making breakfast. One thing led to another and James ended up eating breakfast with him and listening to his trip in Scandinavia. Then at some point interior design came up, completely Henry’s doing, and now here he was sitting in the rustic style living area with the fire going and a mug of the best tea James had ever tasted in his hand watching a man years older than him get couch models and changing the colors of them repeatedly.
“I think I want to try the velvet.” Henry said with a nod before he grabbed the catalog from the coffee table and flipped a few pages while he made the other sofa model disappear.
“I’m starting to think you’re nesting.” James said
“Alphas nest too…they nest for their mates. Not that I’m anything other than human, but it’s not only an Omega thing. I’m sure Remus will do it at some point.” Henry told him
“Oh please can we not talk about those two. They’ve been relentless. I was in charge of detention duty two nights ago and the second the detention was over Remus came in demanding I go check on Harry that very second. He’s put me on a schedule, Henry. A SCHEDULE.” Henry chuckled, grinning clearly, finding amusement where James didn’t.
“I think it’s cute.”
“I think it’s overbearing and controlling and…I don’t know what but it needs to stop.”
“You just need to stop thinking of them just as your best friends and start seeing them as your son’s mates or if it makes it easier, your son’s very permanent boyfriends.”
“But they are my best friends.” James argued, “Well at least they used to be.”
“Is someone feeling a little jealous and left out?” Henry cooed looking at James, “If it makes you feel any better I can invite you to mine and Frankie’s weekly hangouts? He wants to meet you anyway.”
“I might just take you up on that.” James said, staring at the man with his temple against his knuckles and his elbow on the arm of the chair. Henry returned his stare for a tense moment then he turned away with a small smirk playing on the edge of his lips.
“If you don’t have any plans lined up you’re welcome to stay over? It’s not a school night after all and I’ll dig out the good whiskey. I can tell you about Harry’s secret tea set collection.”
“Harry? That Harry?” James asked, pointing towards the stairs, Henry nodded, “Tea set collection?”
“He swears he doesn’t have a problem, but he does. He loves tea sets. I will show them to you after you help me pick out my couch color.” James groaned miserably, “Oh come on Potter just tell me which color you like more.”
“Fine, show them to me again.” James relented
“Hunter green or Forest Green.”
There was absolutely no difference.
“Forest Green.” James said just to make this new torture end.
“Hunter Green it is then.” James’ jaw dropped as he watched Henry grab the order form and write down the information, “Up. I need to decide on armchairs now.”
“You said-”
“Up.” James stood up with a glare, “So he can listen. Now go sit over there.” Henry pointed to the dark green velvet couch model.
“Your chairs are fine.”
“They clash with the couch.” James laid on the couch and reluctantly admitted to himself that the velvet couch was rather comfortable though completely unnecessary.
“I never knew rustic could look expensive.” James grumbled as he watched the wingback chairs get moved and shrunk so new light brown leather armchair models could replace them.
“Everything can look expensive if you know what you’re doing.”
“Pretty sure knowing the difference between Hunter and Forest Green has nothing to do with interior design.”
“It has everything to do with interior design. Now stop talking. I'm trying to concentrate and you’re distracting me.”
James stared at Henry, his eyes taking in the back of him. His red hair was pulled into a messy bun with random braids still in it. He had a scar on the back of his neck that traveled down into his gray shirt that hugged his broad shoulders. The shirt was a little loose around the waist and his black pants hugged his- James averted his eyes as Henry started to turn towards him.
“Which brown do you like? The light or the-are you okay?” James looked up wide eyed.
“What?”
“Are you warm? Your face is red…are you running a fever?” Henry asked, stepping towards him and placing the back of his hand to James’ forehead.
“Oh..no..I’m fine. Light Brown.”
“Dark Brown then.” Henry said after a moment as he turned away from James to look at the two chairs, “Or a medium brown color…you know there is another chair that looks like this one that comes in different..”
James released a breath he hadn’t known he had been holding until Henry’s attention had gone back to his furniture.
It took almost two hours for Henry to decide on a completely different brown leather chair that he found in a completely different furniture catalog. By the time Henry’s original furniture was back in its place and the order forms were sent off it was late afternoon, in time for an early dinner that they had in the sunroom as the rain fell down the glass walls.
After dinner Henry took James to a room with the walls lined with glass cabinets, some were empty, but most of them had different tea sets displayed.
“This one was Harry’s first tea set. He begged for one for Yule when he was five. That’s why his sixth birthday was a tea party.” Henry pointed to a metal tea set, “he was so careful with it for his birthday I got him his first ceramic one.” Next to the metal was a simple white ceramic tea set. Beside each tea set was a picture of Harry using it for the first time.
“I can not believe Harry has a tea set collection.” James said with a grin as he looked at the other collections, each had a picture with Harry using it or holding the set.
“He loves them, he has seasonal ones, special occasion ones, when he goes on his trips he likes to buy at least one tea set, but usually it’s a lot more. Oh and this is his first break. He cried for hours.” James looked at the simple baby blue porcelain tea set, two of the cups had a chip while another cup had a crack in it, “he was serving Frankie and I tea when he was nine and tripped, it broke my heart seeing how upset he was. It was only his third porcelain set. He was worried I wouldn’t buy him more, but I told him I’d only stop if he didn’t take care of them, not for accidents he couldn’t control. Frankie went out and bought him a replacement that very day.”
“It’s hard to imagine Harry, the one I’ve gotten to know at least, having such a….hobby. I pictured him as a debate member or a tutor, not a tea set collector.”
“There’s a lot you still don’t know about him.”
“It suits him I think.” James looked at a Bluebird china tea set with a picture of Harry probably fifteen grinning as he held up the set on the matching tray
“He loves that one. I think he says it’s one of his favorites.”
“What’s his top favorite?” James asked
“This one.” Henry pulled James to another cabinet where a glass set was with lopsided tea cups and teal and gold saucers and tray, “He loves this one.”
“I can see why.” James turned to Henry, catching him staring at him already, “You did great with him, you know? All Harry talks about is you and how great you are and how amazing his childhood was.”
“I tried.” Henry said leaning his shoulder against a cabinet, he folded his arms and crossed his ankles as he looked at one of the pictures for a moment before turning back to him, “I always wanted kids.”
“Did you always want to adopt?”
*****abotion talk*****
“No actually it just…ended up that way. My jobs, the traveling and the dangers, it was too risky for me to carry. Matteo had personal issues…he um…he grew up with homophobic parents and it took a lot for him and I to be together. I guess that’s one of the reasons I stayed with him for so long because of how much effort it took. But…he didn’t want to come off as the…bottom. He didn’t want anyone to see the evidence of him not being a man according to him so him carrying was off the table. The one time he got pregnant by accident he got an abortion. I never....held that against him. That was his choice to make, I just wished I would have been told he was making that decision so I could say goodbye too I guess.”
“Lily considered it with Ariel. I was…terrified, but I knew it wasn’t my choice. I told her whatever she decided I would be there for her, but it didn't make it any easier not knowing until she decided to tell me she wanted to keep the baby.”
*****adotion talk ends*****
“I was actually not going to do it, adopt, I was just going to not have kids. But something told me to just…try. I met Harry two weeks later and adopted him.”
“He is very lucky to have you.”
Henry stepped closer to James, his arms shifting a moment.
“How’s your divorce going?”
“It’s…going. Last signing is the first of May.”
“Good. That’s good. You deserve much better.” James held his stare swallowing thickly
“She wasn’t that bad.” James said softly
Henry licked his lips and took another step closer to James holding his stare intensely.
“Nothing you tell me will ever make me think she was a good wife to you, James Potter.” A second passed, Henry’s eyes darted to James’ mouth for a split second then he was holding James’ stare again, “I’ll go make sure the guest bed is made up, Harry sometimes steals the covers for his nest as a neutralizer for overwhelming scents. I’m sure you’re tired from the past month…month and a half. Sleep as long as you need to tomorrow, okay?” Before James could comprehend what had just happened Henry was leaving the room leaving James alone with his son’s tea set collection and an unexplainable erection pressing against his pants.
He didn’t even know why he was hard.