Chapter 8
After Harry was soundly asleep, James and Lily carefully climbed off of the bed and walked over to the corner with Sirius. None of them knew quite what to say until Sirius broke the silence, saying, “Well, that is definitely something.”
Lily was visibly upset when she said, “He never even got to know us, I knew we died that night there, but it hurts more to hear it from him… Merlin, who raised him if it wasn’t there, I would assume it would have been you and Remus, but he hasn’t mentioned anything like that yet?”
After a moment, James got a rather sick look on his face and said, “Knowing Dumbledore with Voldemort still around, he probably would have used blood wards.”
Lily snapped her head around to look at James, exclaiming, “You don’t mean Petunia and Vernon. They hate magic; they would never willingly take in someone they knew was a wizard!”
Something clicked in Sirius’s head that the others had apparently not thought of yet, “I hate to mention it because I could be wrong, and I don’t want to worry you,” he cautiously began, “You said he had malnourishment and quite a few broken bones on his diagnostic scan right….”
An identical look of horror crossed both James and Lily’s faces.
“You don’t mean what I think you mean, do you?” the look in her eyes was that of a woman preparing for battle,
With a new look of understanding dawning with the horror on James’s face, he slowly turned to Sirius, whispering, “I thought at first it was just because he was in a strange place, but that’s not it; he reminds me of you at that age. It makes so much sense now, oh Merlin, no…….”
On that note, they gradually made their way back over to the bedside, each of them vowing to never let anything bad happen to their little boy again.
After sitting for a few hours, Lily said, “We have to tell him about Mark when he wakes up; if we don’t, he is going to think we were intentionally keeping it from him. Not to mention how excited Mark has been to meet him.”
With a sigh, James said, “You’re right; oh, I’m so nervous that he isn’t going to take it well. What if he thinks we replaced him?” James raked his hand through his hair, making it stand on end, which was a great indication of how stressed he truly was.
Sirius gave him a look, “Have you met this kid? He is not going to think you replaced him. The way he is acting so far, he is simply going to be happy that there is another person who cares about him. I mean, he seems so touch starved. It’s insane but scared to ask for anything. You saw the way he was grimacing with each movement earlier, but he ‘didn’t hurt at all.”
Lily grabbed onto James’s hand, saying, “we need to talk to him about that too….”
Sirius, who had just gotten comfortable with his head leaning against the wall, jerked up, startling everyone in the room with a loud “NO! You cannot mention this, he has to tell you on his own terms, or you’re never going to get anything out of him. You remember how I was as a kid. It took me years to admit what was going on.”
With nods of agreement, the three friends turned their attention back to the family member that had been missing for far too long.