TWENTY-TWO
Those hours where night and morning blend together have always been when Harry does his best thinking, but it’s never been more true than in the last week. He’s taken to volunteering for all of James’ least convenient feedings — he’s used to operating on short, scattered kips rather than any real sleep — because he treasures the time with his son. Those quiet hours when the rest of the world is asleep are when Harry feels like they’re coming to know each other, forming that elusive father-son bond he never had remembered experience with. They have chats, him and James, at least to whatever extent a grown man can have a conversation with a nonverbal infant who spends most of this time together suckling on a rubber nipple. Still, James has proven to be a relatively good sounding board; he doesn’t chime in with an asinine opinion, like some of Harry’s colleagues might, and he doesn’t dismiss any ideas as foolish or paranoid, like some of his friends (i.e. mostly Hermione) would.
Sometimes, he talks to James about serious things, like his career. A common question is: “Would you mind if your dad was your professor at Hogwarts, Snitch?” Because now that he has a child, having a job that would allow him access to that child even when he was away at school is infinitely more appealing. And though Harry is sure Hogwarts has a perfectly capable Defense professor at the moment, he is equally certain that the job would be his if he asked McGonagall for it — absence of NEWTs notwithstanding.
Other times, he and James just chat about their days. Or, perhaps more accurately, Harry reviews the day ahead, and each day more or less looks the same. “I have to go to work after Healer Macdonald comes to see you in the morning,” Harry coos to James. “I don’t want to, but I have to do some exercises with the trainees. Rubbish that dads don’t get much leave, isn’t it? I promise I’ll be back before you know it, and in the meantime you’ll have your mummy and I think Uncle Ron is going to come over for a bit. That’ll be a laugh, won’t it?” James, of course, just continues gulping down his milk hungrily. The baby never seems to be able to get enough, which Healer Macdonald has told them is a good thing. It means he’s been gaining weight consistently, and is already over seven pounds. “Well, if you insist, love, I will do my very best to be back in time for your afternoon visit as well. How’s that?” James, of course, has no opinions on this. He’s a newborn. And yet, Harry can’t help but think he looks pleased at the promise.
“I know you like her, but I dunno if we’ll keep Healer Macdonald around once you don’t need monitoring anymore,” Harry muses. In response to this, James makes a face — one Harry immediately identifies as trapped gas from the bottle — and as he lifts the tiny boy over his shoulder for a burp he continues: “Don’t give me that face. She never tells us enough about how you’re doing and what it all means. It’s like I’d need veritaserum to get her to explain to me what’s going on with you. And she looks at me funny.” James belches. “Well, you’re right there, I suppose,” Harry chuckles, settling James back into the crook of his arm for the rest of his bottle. “People will always stare at me. And at you because you’re part me. Which is why we haven’t officially announced to the world that you’re here quite yet. I dunno, though. It feels like Healer Macdonald is, er, pained, let’s say, when she looks at me. Mummy thinks it, too; says she acts strange around us. Healer Harris never did that, so it just feels a bit unprofessional. Don’t you think?” James responds by continuing to be most interested in his meal, sucking at the bottle even once he’s swallowed the very last drop of milk. He falls asleep soon after that, Harry returning to bed where Ginny sleeps soundly. Still, the elder Potter in the house can only toss and turn until James next wakes up, puzzling over why he continues to allow someone who clearly feels so weird in his presence into their home in the first place.
The routine for the morning feeding involves Harry waking up with James and changing his nappy. Once James is clean and dry, he brings the baby into his and Ginny’s bedroom, where they wake Ginny and they snuggle as a family for a minute before Ginny attempts nursing. She’s still not very successful at it — though James grows much stronger every day, he does not much prefer having to work for his meal — so they follow that up with his bottle. The first morning feeding is Harry’s favorite time of day, because the three of them always do it together; it’s the moment in which Harry is reminded every single day that they’re a family and he has a family now, a real one all his own, and he cherishes it more than he can say.
That morning is a rare sunny spring day in London, and the sun streams through the curtains of their bedroom pleasantly, making Ginny’s coppery hair look even more vibrant and fiery than usual and casting a soft glow on James’ small form where he rests on Ginny’s breast, satisfied after a short nursing session and a much longer feed from a bottle. “It still doesn’t feel real,” Ginny marvels, grazing the soft black hair on James’ scalp with her fingertip.
“I know what you mean,” Harry breathes, voice full of awe. “That he’s already here and real and healthy — it’s mad. In the best possible way,” he amends quickly.
“It’s certainly mad,” Ginny agrees. She still is not confident whether it’s good-mad or bad-mad. Motherhood has included the highest of highs and the lowest of lows for her the last week. There are times where James is sweet and snuggly, looking so much like Harry that her love for both of them makes her chest hurt and her teeth ache with the sweetness of it; there are other times when he’s fussy and hungry, rejecting her breast and also the bottle she’s offering him, as if just to spite himself, and she thinks she just can’t do it, that what’s actually mad is that someone allowed her to take on this responsibility without getting some kind of qualification in it first. For Merlin’s sake, you need an OWL in charms to breathe in the wizarding world, practically; how does it make sense that there’s no instruction or test required to take care of a literal helpless infant?
She doesn’t know why, after keeping it all to herself for a week with little thought about an alternative, now is the time the metaphorical dam breaks, but before she knows it, she’s crying. It doesn’t matter that she’s holding James to her bare chest — he’ll need to be woken when the healer arrives for his morning check up, anyway — or that Harry is next to her with his vivid, penetrating stare undoubtedly seeing through her.
“Gin?” Harry’s voice is tenative with an undertone of fierce caring and palpable worry. “Are you all right, love?”
Ginny shakes her head, but finds it impossible to speak any words. Harry motions with his arms, offering to take James, but she can’t let the baby go either. She just pulls him closer to her chest. Somehow, his mother’s shaky, noisy sobs have yet to wake him up.
“Er,” Harry stammers awkwardly. “Do you need a minute? I can leave if you need some time with just him?”
Though she felt muted, as though under a silencing charm, only a moment before, the words escape before she can stop them. “No! Don’t leave, Harry. Please. Don’t leave me alone with him.”
Harry sighs, moving closer to her and draping an arm around her shoulder. “Is this about me going back to work?” It seems to him that it must be. He hadn’t wanted to return to work so soon following James’ birth, but the trainees won’t start their summer practical assignments until June; a week was the best the department could give him, given that James was out of hospital relatively quickly. Had he been a sicker preemie, Harry’s sure the other aurors would have covered for longer, but as it stands now, Harry has a job to do and he has to learn to balance work and fatherhood sooner or later.
Ginny shakes her head, her body trembling. “No.” But that’s not exactly true, because she feels better — stronger, more competent, more confident — when Harry is around. He’s a security blanket when she feels like she’s struggling and a safety net when she isn’t sure what to do. “Maybe?” The admission comes out so soft it’s nearly a whisper.
“I’m going to try to get back here early today,” he tries. Unlike Ginny, he’s confident about their parenting, but he still hasn’t learned how to feel comfortable navigating complex emotions. It’s not second nature for him; it’s awkward and forced. But he knows he wants to try and get better at it, to be supportive for Ginny, to be her rock. “You won’t even notice I’m gone.”
“I will,” she tells him, the words spilling out before she can stop them. “I can’t do it on my own, Harry. I can’t. James loves you more and he’s better for you and sometimes, he doesn’t want to eat or calm for me. I never know when it’s a hungry cry or a dirty nappy cry. I’m constantly scared. When I’m holding him, sometimes, I’ll have this flash of — I dunno — a vision or something, and I’ll see myself crushing him because he’s so tiny or getting clumsy and dropping him. Harry, I don’t want to hurt him, but I’m terrified that I will. And I feel that way all the time, Harry, but I know you won’t let me hurt him. I’m not ready for you to leave us.”
He’s always been bad at words, clumsy with them. But gestures, those are things he can do. So he pulls her to his shoulder, pats her head lightly so it falls into the crook of his neck. “Ginny,” he sighs, sounding pained. “I can’t stay here forever; just like you’ll eventually go back to practice and games, I have to go back to work today. I’m only sorry that I have to go back so much sooner than you. But, well, first off, James does not love me more. That’s ridiculous.” Harry believes that. Ginny is his mum — it’s Ginny’s heartbeat that calms him when he’s fussy and Ginny’s voice he follows before all others. Ginny’s body provides the baby nourishment, just as much as it gave him a safe place to grow. As far as Harry can tell, James has every reason to love Ginny more, to whatever extent a newborn can prefer one person to another.
“He’s more responsive with you,” Ginny pouts. James is still fast asleep, and Harry bites back a retort that their son isn’t particularly responsive to anyone at the moment. “And when you’re gone from morning to night, it’ll be special when you get back. Not like boring old mummy, who sits around all day trying to get him to suck on one of my bloody tits for long enough to eat a meal.”
Harry wishes he were the one who had Ginny’s tits shoved in his face multiple times a day, but saying that feels rather icky in context, so he keeps the thought to himself. “Maybe I approached that wrong,” he admits, wincing.
“It’s possible,” Ginny mumbles, though she’s sure anything her boyfriend could say would be equally likely to annoy her at the moment.
“I can try again.”
“Please,” she exhales, suddenly exhausted. She no longer feels like crying; she just feels drained.
“I think it’s normal to feel like you might be rubbish at this. I know I do sometimes,” he admits.
“But you’re so good at it! You’re a natural!”
Harry snorts. “I’m not, actually. I was locked in a cupboard for most of my childhood, in case you forgot. I didn’t really have a model of what a normal family unit looked like until I was twelve and came to The Burrow for the first time.” He raises an eyebrow at her. “So, really, the only part of this that’s natural to me is feeling love for him. Otherwise, I think I just have more practice, and I’ve always been good at looking like I know what I’m doing until I actually do.”
“Maybe,” Ginny relents. Harry can hear the hesitation in her tone — instinctively knows she does not really agree — but he’s not really sure what else he can say.
Then, he thinks of exactly one thing: “For what it’s worth, I think you’re doing incredibly well. Snitch is so lucky to have a mum who cares so much about getting it right.”
A weak, watery smile crosses her lips. She doesn’t quite believe it, but hearing it does mean something . In fact, it means quite a lot. She’s thinking about how to best elaborate on how she’s feeling when Kreacher appears in the room.
“Kreacher is so sorry, Mistress Ginny and Master Harry,” the old elf says, averting his eyes when he sees the baby laying on Ginny’s bare chest. “Kreacher only wanted to let you know that Healer Macdonald is here to see Master James.”
Harry sighs heavily, reluctantly removing himself from his place at Ginny’s side. “Thanks, Kreacher,” he mutters tersely, running over to the other side of the bed, already dressed enough for the visit. “Why don’t you let me take him?” He suggests to Ginny, gently scooping James from her arms before she can respond. “Have a shower, get dressed, and I can handle the check up, okay?” With a crack, Kreacher apparates, presumably back to their guest, satisfied that James will be with his visitor soon.
Knowing that Harry truly believes in the transformative power of showers — I didn’t feel like the war was over until I had a shower, he told her once with not even a trace of irony — she nods. It’ll make him feel better to know that she took the reset, even if she doubts it’ll do much for her. “Yeah, all right,” she agrees uneasily.
Healer Macdonald is, as usual, waiting for Harry and James in the sitting room, an infant exam table already conjured. More than once, Harry has considered asking to move the exam space to James’ nursery before deciding against it. Having her move into their living quarters really feels very familiar, which is not the tenor of this relationship at all. “H-Harry,” Healer Macdonald chirps in that melodic accent of hers. “Good morning.”
“And to you,” Harry agrees, always taken aback at how the healer can never quite manage to say his name on the first try; it’s at least better than the way she froze trying to call him Mr. Potter on the second day they did this.
“And good morning to you, sunshine,” the healer coos, reaching for James where he rests against his father’s shoulder. That’s another thing: Healer Macdonald never calls him James. She’ll call him sunshine or sweet boy or — when she absolutely must — Jamie, but never by his given name. “How’s he doing today?” This question is again directed to Harry.
“Good, good.” Without the baby to hold, Harry’s hands feel restless and anxious. He moves to shove them in his pockets, but his pajama bottoms inconveniently have none. Instead, he occupies them by running a hand through his hair and then cleaning his glasses on his t-shirt. Healer Macdonald looks away, eyes distant even as she’s supposedly focusing on the baby.
“Still eating well?”
“Er, yeah,” Harry nods. “Always excited at mealtimes, aren’t you mate?” James gurgles, as if in recognition, but more likely because of convenient timing. “Gets that from his mum’s family, I think.”
Healer Macdonald looks up, surprised, and cocks her head to the side curiously. “Not from yours?”
Harry blinks, unsure of what to say to that. It’s been ages since anyone — friend or stranger — dared to ask anything like that. “I, er, wouldn’t know,” he clears his throat. “I guess my cousin who I grew up with liked food,” he adds awkwardly.
“Right,” the healer shakes her head. “Of course.” She seems to want to say something, but she doesn’t. Instead she goes back to undressing James down to his nappy. “His jimjams are cute today,” she comments brightly, as if trying to clear the awkwardness. “The little snitches.”
Indeed, James was dressed in a pair of footed baby pajamas that Ron had given him the day they brought him home. Ron had been so pleased that he picked out the snitch-covered bodysuit all on his own. (“Get it? Because he’s Snitch!”)
“Er, yeah,” Harry chuckles. “I played seeker in school, and the first time Ginny felt him move, she wanted to explain it in a way I could understand — because I couldn’t feel yet, yeah? So she said it felt like the way a snitch’s wings flutter in your hand when you catch it. And then I could picture it perfectly. So we called him Snitch until he was born. Still do, actually.”
A rare, genuine smile crosses Healer Macdonald’s face, as if she’s enjoying a private joke. “Of course,” she chuckles almost to herself. “Naturally. James would love that.”
“Sorry?” Harry is genuinely confused; James is right in front of her, after all, and he hears them call him Snitch all the time.
Her eyes go wide, as if she’s snapping out of a trance. “Nothing,” she shrugs. “It’s cute. I might borrow it. How would you like that, Snitch?” She coos at the baby.
And he’s tired — exhausted, really, more tired than he could remember being at any point in his post-war life even if his sleeping patterns really haven’t changed much — but his auror senses start tingling. There must be much more to it than that, he’s sure of it. He just can’t quite place his finger on what it is.
When he shows Healer Macdonald out, she gives him a prim nod. “I’ll see you this afternoon, then.”
“Er, maybe not,” Harry tells her, adjusting James onto his shoulder. “I have to go back to work today. I’m going to try to make it back, but it may just be Ginny.” There’s an awkward pause, and he isn’t sure what compels him to say it but he does: “Ginny’s actually been, er, kind of…off since we brought him home. I thought that was probably normal, but today she talked to me about it and I, er, I’m a little worried it’s actually not normal. She’s just very, er, critical of herself and seems really stressed and overwhelmed and it seems to go deeper than — well, it kind of reminds me of myself, after the war. And I dunno what to do about it, but you deal with new parents a lot, right? So maybe you can let me know if you see it too and if you know how I can help her?”
Healer Macdonald’s careful facade breaks, as she frowns sympathetically. “Postnatal depression, maybe,” she sighs, voice filled with more emotion than Harry might have guessed she was capable of. “Might be too soon after birth to tell. It's very common, but breaks my heart every time all the same. I’ll start keeping an eye on it, and let Healer Harris know to check when she goes in for her postnatal check up.”
“I’d really appreciate that, Healer Macdonald. I wasn’t sure who else I could ask.”
She offers him a smile, one that’s almost nostalgic. “You are…you are so good. Your parents would be so proud.” And before Harry can say anything else to that, she walks out the front door of Grimmauld Place, apparating from the top step.
…
Depressed isn’t a word Ginny would use to describe herself. Stressed, maybe, and overwhelmed, definitely, but depressed ? That implies sadness, and Ginny doesn’t feel sad. In fact, she’s rather happy; for all the anxiety she feels about mucking it all up with James, she can’t help but smile at the way his eyelids flutter when he’s dreaming or giggle at the adorable little O his mouth makes when he yawns. She loves watching Harry and James together — it genuinely delights her, even if it also makes her feel strangely inadequate. So, no, she wouldn’t call herself depressed; the word would never even cross her mind.
When Healer Macdonald arrives for her afternoon visit, she asks Ginny all sorts of strange questions about herself in between the questions about James’ dirty nappies and taking notes on the newborn's vitals. Has she been able to laugh and see the funny side of things? She’s pretty sure she has laughed at least as much as she’s cried. Has she looked forward to things she enjoys? Well, she’s not yet permitted to do the things she enjoys most, like flying or having sex, but she’s looking forward to doing those things again, and that counts, doesn’t it? Still, some of the questions resonate; questions about whether she feels inexplicably worried or panicky, or if she’s been blaming herself for things that couldn’t possibly be her fault.
She’s feeling prickly about the whole thing when Harry arrives home that evening, arms laden with bags of takeaway curry — a peace offering for having not been home in time for the afternoon appointment. It was silly of him to even insinuate that he’d try , really; once he’s in the office and in his element teaching the trainees, time really does get away from him. “There she is,” Harry greets her, surprised to see her waiting for him in the kitchen. He unloads the bags onto the kitchen table, and swoops to plant a quick kiss on his girlfriend’s cheek. “James asleep?”
Ginny nods. “Ron came over and offered to get him down; now the two of them are having a kip together in the rocking chair in the nursery.”
At this, Harry laughs, a genuine roar that erupts from deep in his chest. “Please tell me you got a photo.”
“‘Course I did,” she scoffs, sounding much better than she had just that morning; she sounds light, jocular. “I want the dirt on my brother just as much as you want the memories.” And there’s the joke, one that’s so Ginny; they both know she wants the memories, too, but sentimentality has never been her thing. “Healer Macdonald said James is doing so well she thinks we can go to daily visits starting next week.” And that bit of news went a long way toward helping her mood, if she’s honest; not only is it concrete proof she's doing something right, it’ll feel more normal if she only has to accommodate a house call from her son’s nosy healer once a day.
Having carefully compartmentalized his interaction with the healer that morning, Harry experiences a bit of whiplash as it moves to the front of his mind. “I think she knew my parents,” he blurts without any preamble.
“Pardon?”
“Er, Healer Macdonald,” Harry gives a jerky nod and preoccupies himself with unloading the takeaway onto the kitchen table. “Remember when I said she looked familiar?” Ginny nods; he said that after Healer Macdonald left Grimmauld Place that first time, asked if Ginny saw it too. “I think it’s because she knew my parents.”
“Would you remember that?” The sentence escapes her lips before she can filter herself; no one needs to remind Harry that the only real memory he has of his parents is their death.
But he knows her, knows she doesn’t mean anything by it. So he laughs again, this one the kind of laugh that communicates that he actually sort of likes that she doesn’t tiptoe around him like other people might. “Er, no. She was in a picture that Sirius showed me once, I think. Of the original Order. And there were a couple of moments this morning. I told her about us calling James ‘Snitch’ and she said ‘oh, James would love that.’ So I thought well of course James loves that, his mummy and daddy call him that. But then when she left, she told me my parents would be so proud of me and I thought — maybe she hadn’t been talking about our James after all. She might’ve been talking about my dad.”
“Did you ask her?” Ginny asks, sounding more engaged than she has in at least a few days.
“Er, no,” Harry admits. “She apparated off just about the moment I’d actually processed what she said.” He winces. He really should have come home for the afternoon appointment; maybe he’d have gotten some answers.
Ginny nods; somehow, she feels completely in her element. Helping Harry through a crisis — if you can call it that, anyway — is well-trodden territory, unlike being a mum. “Well she will be back tomorrow. You can just ask her then.”
Without really meaning to, Harry snorts. “Oh yeah, I reckon that’ll go well. ‘Hello, James had six soiled nappies last night, and speaking of people named James, did you know my dead dad?’”
“Well you don’t say it like that.”
“How do I say it, then?”
Eyes flitting upward, Ginny inhales sharply. “I think — I think you just have to ask her if she knew your parents. And you can’t use that tone.”
“What tone?”
“That Harry tone,” Ginny scoffs. “I guess now it’s your auror tone, isn’t it? The one where you make it well known that you're suspicious and this is an interrogation, not a conversation?”
“That’s just my voice,” Harry protests, feeling a bit affronted.
But Ginny shakes her head. “It’s not. You have loads of different voices. You have the soft, sweet voice you use when we talk about the future. You have the low, gravelly voice you use when you’re turned on. You have the strong voice that’s full of conviction that you use to convince other people to do hard things — the one you used when I was giving birth, actually. And then there’s that honeyed, filled-with-love voice that you use to talk to Snitch. You have loads of different voices, Harry; don’t default to the one you use when you’re scared.”
There aren’t any words to respond to that, really. So, forgetting the curry that’s getting cold on the table, he approaches Ginny and kisses her fully on the mouth. The kiss deepens quickly, her hands raking through his hair; one of his hands is cradling the base of her head and the other, lightly cupping her hip. It occurs to him that they haven’t really kissed like this since James was born. She feels like she’s becoming herself again as she loses herself in the kiss. Something about Harry’s lips on hers has always brought her back to herself, made her remember everything she’d ever loved about life.
It’s not exactly clear how long they’ve been kissing like this — it can’t progress, it’s too soon after the birth, and something about removing the option of sex makes the time spent snogging fly by — when the sound of a throat clearing approaches from the edge of the kitchen. “Oi!” Ron barely waits to interject with words, too. James is curled against his chest, looking very comfortable with his uncle, but unsatisfied in a way that tells his parents that his uncle probably hasn’t changed his nappy. “There's a child present.”
“Wait until you find out that’s how you got here, James,” Harry chuckles. Ginny can’t help the giggle that erupts from her in response.
“No, no, the child is actually the six-foot-two ginger,” Ginny replies through a peal of laughter. “James is very mature.”
“Right to taking the mickey,” Ron grumbles. “No hello mate or thanks for letting my son kip on you, brother dear.”
“You were napping too, it hardly counts,” Ginny jokes. She’s reminded, briefly, of the questions Healer Macdonald asked her earlier. She can see the funny side of things, can’t she?
“You can have some curry,” Harry gestures to the takeaway that still hasn’t been touched. “I speak fluent Ron, so in case you don’t, that’s actually a few steps above a thank you.”
“I mean, I was going to go home, but if you insist…”
“Bollocks,” Harry snorts. “Hermione is in Paris, you were absolutely hoping we’d eat with you.” With great effort, he pulls himself away from his girlfriend and walks over to Ron, extending his hands to take James. “He needs his nappy changed. Important rule of being a godfather, mate, never return the baby to his dad with a soiled nappy.”
“How do you know it’s soiled?” Ron whines, though he makes no effort to stop Harry as he grabs the baby; instead, once James is safely with his father, Ron makes a beeline for the bags of takeaway.
Harry grimaces as he walks with James in the direction of the changing station they’ve set up downstairs. “Surprised you couldn’t smell it,” he comments drily.
When Harry is out of earshot, Ron turns his attention to Ginny. “You seem better.”
“Better? Didn’t realize I was worse,” she quips, crossing to a cabinet, from which she extracts plates. “Can you get forks and spoons from the drawer?”
Doing as he’s asked, he responds: “You just kind of seemed a little down earlier. Not that I blame you — can’t imagine being home alone with a baby all day myself.”
“Lucky you don’t have a baby, then,” Ginny retorts, laying out three white plates on the kitchen table.
“Trust me, I know,” Ron agrees. “Hermione and I are not at all ready. She travels too much for work and I can’t see her giving that up — not that I would want her to, mind. I love that she’s got goals. I just know I’d be the one really taking care of the kids, and if I can’t imagine doing that yet, I don’t reckon it’s a good time.” He winces, as if realizing for the first time that it’s not really a great time for his sister and best friend, either. “I love James, though,” he amends hastily. “Getting to spend time with him — it’s brilliant. Makes me realize that I really do want to be a dad someday."
Ginny smiles weakly. It’s a strange mix of emotions — pride at hearing her brother say he loves her son, a weird warmth in her chest at knowing that being James’ uncle makes Ron want to be a dad, but also annoyance that Ron has the luxury of waiting until he’s married and ready and settled because it feels a little braggadocious, if she’s honest. “Maybe change his nappy next time, and we can talk about how brilliant it is.”
“I didn’t know he needed to be changed,” Ron insists as Harry and James return to the room.
“He smelled like his nappy was dirty. Surely you know what poo smells like,” Harry responds to Ron as he settles James into a seat that’s charmed to swing softly from side to side; it’s the only way they’ll all get to eat at the same time.
“Mmm, make sure to mark it on the log,” Ginny reminds him.
“It’s in the nursery. I’ll do it later.”
“The log?” Ron asks incredulously as he tears off a piece of naan, stuffing it into his mouth.
“We have to write down how many nappies James goes through and what was in them,” Harry explains matter-of-factly.
Ron promptly spits out his bread onto his plate. “That’s disgusting.”
“Grow up, won’t you, Ronald?” Ginny rolls her eyes at him, spooning some curry over the rice on her plate. “Everyone poos.”
“Incredible that he’s the older sibling,” Harry deadpans to Ginny, as if his best mate isn’t sitting right there.
“I’ve been saying that for roughly 20 years,” Ginny agrees solemnly.
“But why do you need to write down his — er, you know?” Despite his evasiveness, Ron has clearly gotten over his disgust — at least enough to be shoveling his food into his mouth.
Harry shrugs. “For the healer. Who, by the way, knew my parents.”
“We don’t know that for sure,” Ginny reminds him.
“The evidence is compelling,” Harry counters. And then he launches into his explanation for Ron, carefully detailing the case he’s built for Healer Macdonald having been a friend of his parents.
“And you think they were friends?” Ron clarifies, once Harry is done explaining, eating yet another helping of curry. Harry realizes he hasn’t touched his food at all while he’s been talking; meanwhile, Ron has eaten a good third of the already-massive amount of takeaway Harry picked up.
At this, Harry looks confused. He slowly chews his first bite of dinner. “What do you mean?”
“Well they didn’t have to be friends, did they? If she was in the Order, they were probably colleagues of sorts, sure, and maybe they knew each other enough that she’d remember your dad’s hair or whatever. But that doesn’t mean they were mates.”
“You know I hate to give Ron any credit, but he’s got a point,” Ginny sighs.
“He does do that every once in a while,” Harry concurs. “Probably why I keep him around even though he eats all of my dinner while I talk.”
“Oi! There’s plenty of food left,” Ron scoffs defensively.
“In any case, I just need to ask her about it,” Harry concludes. “It’s just — I don’t know how .”
“‘Hi Healer, good to see you. James had a dirty nappy that I unfortunately told his godfather about in great detail. By the way, did you know my parents?’” Ron suggests helpfully. “Don’t overthink it.”
“Well, that’s rude, isn’t it?”
“Since when do you care?” Ron raises an eyebrow. He stands and heads over the cooling cabinet to search for a drink, returning to the table with a butterbeer.
“Ooh, get me one of those too, please!” Ginny chirps from the table.
“Can you have one of these?” Ron holds up the bottle in question, raising his eyebrow curiously.
“Yes,” she huffs in annoyance. “There’s barely any alcohol in it.”
“Harry?” Ron glances from Ginny to her boyfriend.
“Don’t ask him if I can have a butterbeer,” Ginny reprimands him. “Healer Harris told me it can help milk supply when I was in hospital.”
“I wasn’t asking his permission,” Ron rolls his eyes. “I was asking him if he wants one.”
“Oh.”
“Sure, mate, I’ll take one as well,” Harry agrees readily. Using an underhand toss, Ron throws the bottle toward his best mate, who catches it with a seeker's dexterity; he then grabs another two bottles and walks back to the table, depositing one with Ginny before uncapping his own.
“Anyway, like I was saying,” Ron continues after taking a long swig of his drink. “Just ask her. Don’t overthink it. If she did, she’ll probably be relieved that you asked about it. I reckon it’s a tough secret to keep.”
It’s a fact that Harry doesn’t often acknowledge, that Ron is easily the member of the original trio with the most emotional intelligence. Maybe he was dense when they were younger — Hermione hadn’t been completely wrong when she told him he had the emotional range of a teaspoon — but he’d always understood other people in a way that Harry and Hermione couldn’t. Maybe it was because Harry had grown up isolated and Hermione had grown up inside a book, but Ron is just better with people than they are. And in that way, Harry trusts this advice with everything.
After Ron leaves, of course, Ginny is quick to point out that she said the exact same thing, so Harry gives credit where it’s due there as well. The agreement of two Weasley siblings is nearly always better than the opinion of one of them, fundamentally speaking. As the two of them move through James’ bedtime routine — and isn’t it wild that they already have a routine that’s practically down to a science? — they try to talk about anything other than what Harry will say to the healer in the morning. Because he’s not supposed to be ruminating on it. Don’t overthink it, his two favorite Weasleys agreed.
Overthinking is what Harry does, though, so he leaves it for those morning hours, when it’s just him and James. With his infant son, he can overthink it all he wants, because James has no clue what he’s saying and so James can’t tell him to stop. James only wants to hear one of his favorite sounds: his dad’s voice.
“The last thing I want to do is scare her away,” Harry tells James. And he’s sure Ginny and Ron both know that’s his fear, but it’s also the first time he’s articulated it. That’s what it’s really about, isn’t it? He’s a new father — which has made him feel more connected to his own parents than he ever has before — but he still knows relatively little about the people who gave him life. If Healer Macdonald is a connection to them — friend, acquaintance, former colleague, whatever — he wants to know what it is she knows about the people they were; he can’t jeopardize that by handling the situation poorly.
James is already done eating by this point, but he’s not immediately falling to sleep like he usually would. His eyes — still grey, but starting to gain some flecks of gold around the irises, indicating they may become Ginny’s brown eyes or else maybe hazel — are wide open and curious, as though he’s hanging onto every word. Using his legs, Harry propels the rocking chair to sway the two of them and offers the baby one of his fingers, which James is now learning to grasp in his impossibly tiny fist.
“You’ll never need to know what this feels like, of course,” Harry tells James confidently. “Because I’m never going to do anything that could take me away from you. I can promise you, my days of taking stupid risks for the hell of it are over. You and your mum are too important to me. But it’s hard, being your dad without remembering anything about what my dad was really like. Almost anyone else who could tell me about him is gone. So if Healer Macdonald could help me learn even a little bit more…” James’ eyes flutter shut and Harry stops rocking; once the motion stops, the baby is immediately wide-eyed once more. “I just want to be the best dad for you, my little Snitch.”
Harry looks into James’ eyes and he knows that his son is too young to actually know what he’s saying. But then James’ eyes flutter shut once again, and this time they stay shut, so Harry spends a few more precious minutes watching the rise and fall of the baby’s tiny chest. He can’t explain how he knows it but, in that moment, it’s very clear to him that little James Sirius Potter trusts him to not leave him alone in the world. It was that feeling of trust that lulled the baby to sleep, he’s sure of it.