Making Breakfast

"So Harry, what's new with you this morning, son?" James paused. "No, I don't think this whole saying 'son' thing is going to work. What do you think?"

Harry giggled in his highchair and banged his toy snitch on the tray in front of him.

"Yeah, maybe I'll say it in fifteen years when you discover a new passageway out of Hogwarts and have been secretly using it all year." James said. "And I have to give you a sentimental talk about why it's wrong."

He flipped over the bacon he was making for breakfast.

"But then your mum will leave the room and we'll add it to the Marauder's Map."

James looked over at Harry, who blinked at him. James started to laugh. Harry started giggling again, not really knowing what was so funny, only that he liked the sound of his dad laughing.

"I can see you already…under my Invisibility Cloak, wandering around Hogwarts in the middle of the night…maybe to meet a girl in one of the corridors?" James raised his eyebrows at Harry, who giggled and stuffed the toy snitch into his mouth.

"Yeah, with all the good looks and charm you inherited from me, you should have no problem getting any girl you want." James said pertly, but then he frowned. "Well, unless she's like your mother, and is too stubborn to admit she's been hopelessly in love with you since the first time she laid eyes on you in first year, and turns you down one hundred thousand times before finally seeing the error of her ways and agrees to accompany you on a trip to Hogsmeade at Christmas, where she'll mercilessly trap you under some mistletoe with no intention of letting you escape. Not that I was planning to, though." James added, winking at Harry, who tried to wink back, but couldn't seem to close one eye while keeping the other one open at the same time.

"It might've taken seven years of persuasion and a little, ah, 'deflating of the ego' as your mother liked to call it, but hey, I got her in the end, didn't I?" James smiled. "Ha, she'd probably yell at me for saying that, say that she's the one that got me in the end, but really, either way is fine with me."

Harry smiled up at James, showing him all three of his teeth, and shrieked, "Edo! Edo!"

"Exactly. When it comes to the ladies a big ego is something you do not want to have. Although while I merely called it 'extra confidence', your mum had to get all technical and tell me I was being a 'conceited toe rag'." James sighed and rolled his eyes as he put some eggs on a plate. "And, as usual, she was right. Do you know how annoying it is when she's right?"

Harry sat there in his highchair for a moment, looking befuddled, then he giggled and waved his arms.

"That's my boy." said James, patting Harry's head and accidentally getting flour in his jet black hair.

"Whoops," James said, trying to brush the flour out of his hair, but only succeeding to make his hair whiter. James surveyed the breakfast he was making. Bacon. Eggs. Toast. "You know what? I'm not even sure why I have the flour out in the first place, or exactly how it got on my hands. Oh well, what's another bath going to hurt you?"

"No no!" Harry said, his green eyes getting big. He wasn't too keen on baths.

"Hmm…okay then, how about this, we'll make a deal." James said, taking the bag of flour from where it sat next to a loaf of bread. "If I give you more flour to play with, you take a bath later. Deal?"

Harry gazed at the bag of flour in his father's hands, as though wondering what he could do with it, and if it was worth a bath later. He seemed to think it was compromising, for he held his tiny hands out for it.

"So I guess it's a deal then." James said, giving Harry the half full bag of flour, which he quickly realized was not the smartest idea he'd ever had.

Harry promptly took the bag and shook it, sending a large puff of flour everywhere. When James rubbed his glasses free of flour, he turned to see Harry and half the kitchen under a thin layer of white powdery substance.

"Flo flo!" A completely white Harry shrieked happily.

James sighed.

"You know, after that time I left Sirius with that bag of Floo Powder, you'd think I'd know better." He said as Harry continued to play with the small pile of flour in front of him.

"And after the last time I left you two alone, you'd think I'd know better." said a voice from behind him.

James wheeled around to see Lily standing in the doorway, surveying her powdery white son and husband and the mess they'd made of the kitchen. Harry giggled behind him.

"The toast's burning by the way." Lily pointed behind him.

James turned to find two nicely burnt pieces of toast where there had previously been two pieces of bread pleasantly toasting.

"Oh, I think I know who's eating them." James said if a falsely stern manner, tossing a charred piece of toast onto the pile of flour before Harry, who took it and put it on his head, lost in a fit of laughter.

He turned back to Lily. "And what do you mean, 'the last time you left us alone'?"

Lily raised her eyebrows at him.

"Are you telling me you've forgotten the I-just-wanted-to-show-Harry-what-a-stag-looks-like incident?"

"Oh that," said James, waving his hand dismissively. "It wasn't that bad."

"Oh, so I guess you'd call putting holes in the wall and ceiling, breaking a rare enchanted vase, and almost murdering the cat 'not that bad'?"

"Yeah well, with a swish of my wand the wall and vase were fixed, and that cat had it in for himself after he scratched up my favorite cloak. Besides," James gestured to the kitchen. "It wasn't me this time, it was all yourson."

"Oh was it?" Lily said, stepping gingerly across the kitchen to avoid getting flour on herself. She looked at the powdered Harry and smiled a little. "Was it really all you Harry? Is daddy telling the truth?"

For a moment Harry looked rather guilty, but then he took a small handful of flour in his little hand and threw it at James.

"Hey!" said James.

"You're right James," Lily said, turning back to James, a small smile forming on her lips. "He really is my son."

James seemed to glare at them, but then a smirk appeared on his face.

"Oh really?" he said, raising his eyebrows. "Get her Harry!"

Harry took two little fistfuls of flour and threw them at his mother from behind. And as she turned around in surprise, he grabbed another small fistful and launched it right in her face.

Lily blew a small puff of flour out of her mouth and blinked it out of her eyes.

"You do know what this means, right?" she said quietly.

The kitchen was silent.

"Er-what?" James ventured to ask.

"This means," Lily said, walking around James to the cupboard that was behind him and reaching up into it. "War!"

Lily pulled out another bag of flour from the cupboard and dumped it on James's head. James grabbed handfuls of flour off the counter and flung them at her. Harry threw flour in every direction, shrieking with laughter.

Lily grabbed more handfuls of flour and threw them back at James, who lifted Harry from his highchair and held him in front of himself as a shield.

"I have a child! Cease fire, cease fire!" James shouted.

"No fair!" Lily yelled through her laughter as she gently tossed some flour at Harry.

"Hey, not at my son!" James said, placing Harry back into his highchair as Lily continued to throw flour at them.

As Lily, James, and Harry pelted flour at each other, they didn't notice that someone had appeared out of the fireplace in the sitting room, made his way down the hall toward the kitchen, and stick his head into the doorway.

"Hey what's going on in he-"

Before Sirius even had time to find cover, a rather large handful of flour hit him squarely in the face.

"Prongs! Is this for that time with the Floo Powder? I thought we were over that!"