Title Pending

Title Pending

Prologue: Amnesty

Saturday

October 31, 1981

James would protect him, like he failed to do for her.

James lay the crying baby boy down next to its dead mother and the crying ceased. The boy frantically grabbed at its mother, reaching with short baby arms to clasp an arm, reaching out towards its mother's face.

The baby, Harry, was calm and content knowing nothing, fearing nothing.

James' shoulder's shook as he looked down at his completely incomplete family. They continued to shake with dry sobs echoing through his soul, tears not yet sprung but waiting on the verge.

The house lay in ruin around him.

He watched the wind toss her hair around her face and a few delicate red locks slither into Harry's mouth. He looked into her eyes, still vacant, still open. He wanted to reach out and close them, but could not relish the thought of never seeing them open again.

A door fell over from its perch against the wall, sliding down to the ground and creating a loud noise startling both James and Harry. James fell next to his dead wife tears clogging his vision, sobs wracking his soul. Baby Harry began to cry as well, the door falling and his father crying had startled him and he knew few instincts better than to cry.

James squinted his eyes, haloes of white light flashing in front of him. He wanted imagine his Lily again, in front of him, whether in spirit or better yet, alive. He wanted to reach out and touch her, kiss her, hold her. He wanted to say he loved her, that he needed her. He wanted to say what he didn't get the chance to say, good bye.

He heard the sound of pages rustling next to his ear and he turned his head away from his wife to see the book she coveted above all other books.

Cannery Row

He would never quite understand why she loved it so. The old paperback book was worn; edges ripped and frayed, the spine was in bad condition as well, but Lily would never tire of reading it. John Steinbeck, she claimed, was a genius. He could just not see it, the book had no plot, it revolved stupidly, in his opinion, around stupid people.

But Lily had fallen in love with the characters, Mr. Chong the shopkeeper, Doc the proprietor of Western Biological Laboratory, and Mack and the boys, a rambunctious few that drove the inhabitants of Cannery Row wild with aberration.

Lily often confided in James (as if telling him often enough would make it come true) that she had dreamt of going to Monterey, California since she had read the book as a teenager. She dreamt of walking down Cannery Row, imagine the fictitious characters in their splendor, and dreamt of buying a pack of spearmint in Mr. Chong's shop.

And yet, at age twenty-two she was dead, her life not even half lead and her dreams helplessly shattered. Her requests and dreams never got too extravagant, she kept as simple as she was raised, never needing expensive clothing or a big house(all of which James could easily have provided). She instead reveled in the small things, her husband and for the last year and a half, her wonderful baby boy.

James felt the proverbial last straw break inside himself as he stood up, stuffing the book savagely into the back pocket of his faded jeans. He lifted his wife into his arms before re-arranging his grasp so that he may hold her frame up with a single arm. The other arm reached out to grab Harry (who had begun to crawl away) around the middle, seating him on his lap.

He held his wand in his right hand and concentrated very hard, imagining the ocean spray, the salty smell, the rolling hills, sandy beaches and wonderfully green cypress trees that had been described to him by his wife many times. It took nearly every ounce of concentration and energy he possessed to apparate not only himself, but his dead wife and living child nearly half way across the world.

He landed with a loud thud in a crowded wood. Strewn leaves softened the blow but the back of his head connected with hard ground and his vision swam several times in and out. He felt (as if far away) his son stand and start to waddle away from him into the line of trees.

He grumbled, feeling extremely weak, and crumpled back into the leaves after several failed attempts at getting up. He cried out in frustration but even that was half put as only soft sputtering and failed tears came out. He was too weak to save his wife, to weak to apparate so far and now he would be too weak to save his son.

He blacked out.

***

James awoke to the gentle crying of a baby. Harry had made his way back to his mother and was anxiously trying to peal away her shirt to suckle at her breast and feed. It broke James' heart to see this sight, but then in the pit of his heart, he felt rectified. It was the baby's just punishment, to die in the hills of Monterey alongside his mother. It was just punishment for James to walk away from the woman he loved, his wife and their child because that child had killed its own mother.

It was just punishment.

And then the burdens of remorse swept through him and he stood up and grabbed the baby boy, startling it. He held on to the boy as he sobbed into the mop of pristine black hair he so possessed. He wept into the light green t-shirt the baby held on its fragile little shoulders as James' own shoulders wracked up and down. He fell again, to his knees.

He would make a life for them two. He would continue on raising the child like he knew Lily would want him to. He would hold nothing back to make this child, this boy, their child, the best there was.

And yet.

And yet...he couldn't bring him back to the wizard world from which James himself grew up. The world he hoped to rear his family from on the ancestral lawns of the Potter family estate.

There would be followers, massing in courts to bring their leader back. They would come up with one solid solution for their trials, one answer to answer the book of questions they held.

They would kill the boy.

They would kill his son and Lily's son. The son that she loved and died for. The son that killed its mother without remorse but with complete innocence.

He would not bring his son into the harrows of a world bent on killing him. He would shield him from all evils, magic included.

James let go of his child allowing it to sit back on it's bottom in the forest floor. James stood up again, reached into his robe pocket for a wand and set to work.

He would create a world for his son and himself.

He would live in this muggle world; torture himself in this infernally primitive world; survive this travesty for his son and for his lost love.

James Potter ceased to be James Potter.