Hopes and Wishes

Chapter 16: Teaching Harry to Play

As Remus had predicted, a couple of cups of tea later and Sev was feeling much better. The calming fragrance of his favourite Earl Grey had soon restored Severus to his usual snarky self.

Remus, meanwhile, was not allowing himself even an ounce of self doubt. He realised that it was selfish of him, but he needed Harry; he needed a connection to James and Lily. Justified or not, Remus felt immense guilt for failing to recognise the traitor in their midst. He needed to be there for Harry as he had failed to be for James and Lily; he needed to repay the debt that he felt he owed to them. Remus was determined that Harry would never again experience the kind of pain and sadness that he had been exposed to since his parents’ deaths. Remus promised himself that he would put his own sadness and anger behind him and resolved to make a happy life for Harry.

His new plan came into effect as soon as Harry awoke from his nap. Remus bustled into the little boys’ room as soon as he heard the ping of the monitoring charm. He wasted no time in scooping the bleary-eyed child into his arms and cuddling him close. It may have seemed soppy and sentimental to others but Remus couldn’t wait to shower the tousle-haired boy with affection.

Once Harry had somewhat recovered his senses, he and Remus quickly unpacked his new clothes and chose an outfit for the afternoon. Finally ready, in blue jeans and a burgundy t-shirt (complete with roaring lion), Harry and Remus left the bedroom in search of Severus.

They finally located the potions master in his laboratory, putting the final touches to his potions. A raised eyebrow was the only outward sign that Sev had noticed the Gryffindorish apparel.

“Hey little man, did you enjoy your nap?” Sev asked.

“Me an’ Remy putted my clo’s away in ‘a’ cub’d.”

“We’re going to see Poppy for a check up and then we’re going to start playing with some of Harry’s new toys.” Remus informed him.

Harry smiled sweetly at Remus before he turned his attention to Severus and bashfully asked,

“D’you come p’ay wit’ us Sev’us?”

“I’ve got to finish my potions first poppet, but then I’d love to play with your new toys with you.” Sev replied softly; for once not having the heart to disappoint an eager child.

“Come on then cub, let’s go and visit with Poppy. We’ll see you later Sev.”


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Poppy was sitting in her office when Remus and Harry arrived in the Infirmary.

“And here are my two favourite boys!” Poppy exclaimed as Remus and Harry poked their heads around her office door.

“And what have you been up to today my darling?” Poppy asked as Remus settled Harry down carefully on to one of the empty beds in the ward.

In an unusual show of confidence, Harry began to expound upon his day.

“Sev’us an’ Remy taked me to…” he looked at Remus uncertainly as he said “Di’gon Awey an’ I seed a alien an’ we went in a yittle box an’ it go’ed fast an’ den I eated I’cream wiv Dwaco an’ Remy buyed me clo’s an’ toys!”

“You saw an alien Harry?” Poppy questioned.

“Where was the alien Harry?” Remus seconded, clearly puzzled.

“In da big p’ace. I find da paper for da alien an’ he be mean to me! Den Dwaco say aliens be is’cable den ano’va alien taked us in da yittle box den we go eat I’cream.” Harry responded earnestly, his face creased in seriousness.

“Oh Harry!” Remus chuckled “They weren’t aliens poppet, they were goblins; the goblins look after all of the money in the wizarding world. That’s why we went in the box, the cart, with one of the goblins, to get some money from my vault to buy your new clothes and toys with.”

“Gob’ins?” Harry queried

“Yes Harry, goblins. They are a bit mean sometimes but you don’t have to worry about them; we don’t go to Gringotts very often.”

“Dey not aliens like Q Pootle?”

“I don’t know who Q Pootle is cub but they are definitely goblins.” Remus smiled.

“I think I recognise that name.” Poppy mused, “Harry, is Q Pootle a little alien with big ears and a big nose?”

“U’huh. Dugley got a story book.”

“My niece has that book. It’s by a British muggle author. I can’t remember his name but he’s very popular; my niece has lots of his books.” Poppy explained to Remus. Returning her attention to Harry, Poppy continued “Well you’ve certainly had a busy day haven’t you Harry? You must be very tired.”

“Me an’ Teddy alwedy had a sleep. We no tired, we gona go p’ay wit’ new toys nex’ Poppy.” He looked thoughtfully at the mediwitch, watching her face firm in concentration as she waved her wand sporadically. “Poppy p’ay wit’ us too?” he asked softly.

“Oh sweetie I’d love to but I can’t today. I’ve got to finish getting everything ready for when the other children come back. Can I come and play tomorrow instead?” Poppy answered regretfully.

“Odder chiwdr’n?” Harry asked, latching on to the most important part of Poppy’s answer. “Dwaco come here?” he queried.

“No cub, Draco isn’t coming here yet. Big children come here to school, like the ones you saw at dinner last night.”

Harry’s face crumpled at that and his lower lip began to tremble.

“Big chiwdr’n like Dugley comes here?” he asked tremulously. “Big chiwdr’n hurt boy like Dugley?”

“No darling!” “No Harry!” the two adults exclaimed at once.

“Sweetheart, Remus and Severus will never let them hurt you.” Poppy reassured the trembling toddler. “They are nice children Harry, kind children and if they ever do anything mean to you then Sev, Remy and I will sort them out.” She said, mock fiercely.

Harry looked slightly reassured and almost smiled at Poppy’s teasing but Remus still lifted the little boy back into his arms to offer him some physical comfort, in addition to Poppy’s verbal assurances.

Returning to the matter at hand, Poppy continued “Well Harry, you look much better now; Sev is very clever with his potions isn’t he, to have made you better so quickly? Remus, Harry will need to continue to take the nutrient supplements for the next several months and I would like to schedule an appointment for him to see an ocular specialist, he may need corrective treatment for his vision.”

“Okay Poppy, I’ll ask Sev to brew up another batch this week. Are you able to organise an appointment with the ophthalmologist at St Mungo’s or will Sev and I need to arrange it?”

“I have a friend who works in the ophthalmic department there and is very discrete, I’m sure she wouldn’t mind making a trip out to Hogwarts.”

“That would be fantastic Poppy if you don’t mind.” Remus hastily agreed “Just let us know when your friend is available. Now, Harry and I are going to see how much mischief we can get up to with his new toys.” Remus teased, winking at Harry and ruffling his already messy black hair.

“I’ll see you both later then.” Poppy said, kissing Harry’s cheek in farewell.

“Goodbye Poppy and thank you.” Remus replied, smiling at the witch.

“’bye Poppy an’ t’ank you.” Harry echoed, adding a little wave over Remus’ shoulder as the pair headed towards the Infirmary doors.

“Bye sweetpea, have fun with your toys.” Poppy called after them.

With that, Remus and Harry departed and proceeded back towards the dungeons.


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Half an hour later, Severus found Remus and Harry happily situated in the centre of the living room, surrounded by toys.

The pair were currently engrossed with a set of colourful blocks, well one of the pair. Remus was busily stacking them up before knocking them down again and laughing. Harry meanwhile, was watching Remus with a perplexed expression on his face.

Clearing his throat to make his presence known, Severus enquired coolly “What exactly are you doing Remy?”

Harry looked worriedly between the two adults, obviously unsure of Severus’ response to see him there with the toys.

“I’m constructing with blocks.” Remus explained the ‘Duh!’ unspoken and yet evident in his voice.

“Looks more like destructing to me.” Sev snarked back.

“It’s a bit of both.” Remus conceded “You build the tower up and then the fun is in knocking it down and watching the bricks fly everywhere. Now come and play with me, Harry won’t help!”

Sev reluctantly seated himself on the floor next to Harry and Remus and eyed their interaction thoughtfully for a few moments. Harry was seated next to the blocks but Severus had yet to see him actually make a move to touch them.

“Have you been playing long?” he asked Remus curiously.

“About 20 minutes. We’ve had a go with just about everything but nothing has caught our attention yet. In fact,” he added, nodding towards Harry “We haven’t actually touched anything at all.”

Severus thought for a moment or two before removing his wand and saying to Harry,

“Watch Harry, see what happens when you tap them with a wand.”

Severus proceeded to demonstrate for Harry, causing the blocks to chime different notes and change to a multitude of different colours.

“Why don’t you have a go with your wand Harry? All you have to do is tap the blocks.” Severus encouraged, pressing Harry’s wand into his hand. Harry looked dubiously first at the wand and then at Sev.

“Go on Harry, let’s try it.” He cajoled further as Harry just kept looking warily at him. Sev took Harry’s wand hand in his and helped him to tap the bricks nearest, whilst also tapping with his own wand against some. Catching on, Remus too began to tap the blocks and a little tune started to emerge.

Remus and Sev could almost see the cogs turning in Harry’s brain as he realised that he was allowed to play with the toys too and that this game could be fun.

Slowly Sev released his hold on Harry’s hand as the little boy became more confident to try for himself. Soon Harry was bashing away at the blocks, creating more noise than tune or rhythm, but finally letting lose. Sev could only be grateful that the blocks were charmed to only play harmonious notes as he was sure that a headache of epic proportions would have been close otherwise.

“That’s it Harry!” Remus encouraged “Sev and I are going to try and build the biggest towers now.”

Severus rolled his eyes but dutifully began stacking blocks together, flicking his wand regularly to change either the shape or colour. Harry continued to bang his blocks for a few minutes as Sev and Remy built their respective towers. After a couple of minutes, however, Harry became distracted by the squabbling going on next to him.

“You call that a tower?” Severus sneered at Remus’ simple stack of mismatched bricks.

“Of course this is a tower! Just because I’m not building an exact replica of the Hogwarts astronomy tower, doesn’t mean that it isn’t a tower at all.” Remus defended.

“I wouldn’t say it was exact,” Sev demurred “there is approximately a 98% accuracy rating. These blocks are fairly easy to transfigure but I wouldn’t expect a children’s toy to be capable of 100% accuracy, no matter what the skill of the wizard involved in the transformation.”

“98% accuracy rating? Skill of the wizard involved?” Remus mocked “Have you heard yourself? You sound like you’ve got a broomstick shoved up your…”

“Just because I take care and pride in my endeavours,” Sev interrupted “The stability and accuracy of my structure will allow it to support more blocks and therefore be much taller than your poor excuse…”

A quiet giggle brought the two men’s attention back to the little boy next to them. Harry had long since abandoned his musical enterprise and had instead begun to build his own tower.

The precarious pile looked so unsteady that there should have been no way that it could stay up. Severus was further bewildered by the fact that the tower reached far above Harry’s head. Sev’s mental question of ‘how?’ was no sooner answered than an even larger question had to be posed.

Harry pointed his toy wand at another brick and Remus and Sev looked on in disbelief as he levitated it to the top of the tower.

“You didn’t buy him a real wand by accident did you?” Sev queried after a few seconds of stunned silence.

“Nope, child’s wand, only capable of activating the charms in pre-charmed children’s toys. It can’t do magic like that!”

“Well from where I am sitting, it certainly seems that it can.” Severus contradicted acidly.

“Accidental magic?” Remus hesitated.

“It must be, but to be so controlled at such an early age… I can hardly believe it. There must be sticking charms as well as levitation ones; it’s impossible.”

They watched for a little longer as Harry levitated block after block on to the tower, it was now twice as tall as Harry himself.

“That’s an excellent tower you’ve built Harry.” Remus complemented.

His concentration momentarily distracted, Harry’s magic was interrupted and the tower collapsed, bricks flying in all directions. Sev and Remus were further entranced to notice that none of the blocks hit Harry, bouncing away as though hitting an invisible shield.

“Oh, I’m sorry Harry; I didn’t mean to disturb you. That was a fantastic tower though. You were very clever to get the blocks so high.”

“Me magic lyke Sev’us an’ Remy!” Harry confided quietly.

“Yes you are Harry; Remus and I are very proud of you.” Severus agreed, smiling at the chuffed little boy.

“Let’s see what else we can find to play with now.” Remus suggested, wanting Harry’s interest to continue and hoping for him to demonstrate some more accidental magic.

The three wizards whiled away the next two hours with a variety of games and demonstrations of magic. Remus reflected, as the afternoon wore on, that they may have been teaching Harry how to play but that Harry was well on the way to teaching them something fundamental about magic.


A/N

Just over a month, so slightly better this time. I hope that this chapter was okay; with the length of time between writing, I find myself losing direction somewhat. I seem to be getting bogged down in trivialities and nothing much seems to be happening, that’s my feeling anyway, you can disagree (or not) if you want.

I’m going to try and get back on track and introduce the long awaited revenge scene soon but then after that I may call it a day with this fic. I‘m considering the possibility of writing either a series of one shots or another longer story a few years down the line for our three boys. What do you guys think? Your input would be very much appreciated.

Review replies

Lady Laran – Thanks for the review. If you find anyone, let me know; my artistic capabilities are not that advanced unfortunately!

WarpedMinded – I’m glad you are enjoying the story. It won’t be a Harry/Draco fic, whilst I do quite like that pairing, the only one I can write is Harry/Lucius so if I get as far as Harry being old enough… Maybe? Not sure I will take it that far.

HarryVik – See above response re Harry/? I’m glad you like Sev, I’m afraid he may have come across as a bit soppy in this chapter; he actually smiled voluntarily, more than once! Grumpy Sev will be back though, definitely for revenge scene, we all have off days!

Qwerty – I’m glad you rediscovered too! Glad you’re enjoying it, hope you continue to do so.

Ladyedgecombe – Bless you, you always make me smile! :) I hope that your dinner wasn’t spoilt by stopping. I know what that’s like though; I seem to have forgotten to start mine tonight what with writing this and doing other computer related browsing. It’s 12.35 so I probably won’t bother now! I base my Harry speech on some children I know so I’m glad that it comes across well. I am determined to keep up with this now; updates may not be fast but they will definitely not be as long as 4 months.

Luna DW – Artistic license and imagination my dear! I could probably give you a good reason if I thought about it but it’s 12.40 now and I’m too tired! I ask that you suspend disbelief or imagine a scene with Petunia saying something scathing about Harry’s eyes being green and therefore Harry knowing that colour. Glad you are enjoying it though; hope my little plot holes haven’t stopped you getting to the end!

Thanks again to everyone who read, reviewed or rated; you rock!