SUMMARY: James Potter II thinks of Alice Longbottom II

It was interesting, sometimes even scary, James thought, that he didn't have any memory of his life where she wasn't included.

She had always been there. She was there when he was born, though he couldn't remember and neither could she, as she was only two months old.

She was there when he had showed his first signs of magic or, better, she was the cause of his first signs of magic as he wanted to impress her, even though James would have never admitted it.

She was there at all his birthdays, he could see her tiny figure clutching hands with her father. She was there almost every single day of his life, playing with him, teaching him to say 'thanks' and 'please', how Ginny remarked laughing.

She was there when Albus was born: there was a picture of the two of them looking with their eyes widned at the little bundle that Ginny had in her arms.

She was there when he was in a bad mood and didn't leave even when he purposely called her Allie, fully aware that she hated that nickname.

She was there during the sunny summers at the Burrow when they played together for the whole day and sometimes it would be only the two of them, and he would call her Li, just like he had done when he was a toddler and he was unable to pronounce her name.

She was there during the cold winters, when they spent their afternoons at her mother's pub, pretending that they were married (they didn't know that it was about at that time that James' uncle George had officialy opened the polls about them, just like he had done some years before for Teddy and Victoire).

She was there every 2nd of May, when they all went to Hogwarts for the Ceremony of the Fallen. They would sit close to each other and listen to their father's words, listening to the names of the people whose faces they had learnt to know and to love in a very special kind of way.

She was there when their parents remembered the war and their faces suddenly became sad and they stood quiet for the whole evening.

She was there when he tried to understand what had really happened during that war, how it had affected their parents' lives, how it still affected their lives. She was there, sometimes she had the answers, sometimes she hadn't, but she was there.

She was there the first day of Hogwarts, she was there to try to reassure him, telling him that Hogwarts was a great place and if they had had problems there there was her father anyway, wasn't he? She was the only one to know how much James had been scared.

She was there when he had problems with his homework, she was there when he was homesick, she was there when in his first year he didn't make in the Quidditch team and she was the one who stood up the whole night talking to him and convicing him that nothing had changed.

She was there when he told her that he was afraid that he wasn't good enough for his family's standards, that he didn't deserve to be a Potter: she was the one who persuaded him that he was perfect just the way he was.

She was there when sometimes he wanted to talk, she was there when he wanted to talk about the war, about their parents, about that James Potter whose name was inscribed on the War Memorial, that James Potter that at the same he felt so close to him and so far.

She was there when he told her that he was jelous of Albus sometimes because he looked so much like his father, she was there when his owl died and he cried all night and then made her promise that she wouldn't have told anyone.

She was there when he tried to act cool in public, though she knew how thoughtful he actually was.

She was there when Rose and Scorpius began dating, and she was the one who told him that no, he didn't have to kill Scorpius, that no, Scorpius wasn't a bad guy, that the fact that they were dating was the sign that something had really changed.

She was there when he talked of their parents' friendship, how special the bond they had was, how it had been made special by the war. She was there when he talked of their parents' scars, of his father's lightening-bolt one, of her father's signs on his face.

She was there to listen to him, to agree with him that them, the new generation, were so lucky and yet so torn between the past and the future, war and peace, their parent's legacy and their own lives.

She was there when he listened to her words and he suddenly realised that he had found the solution to all his problems and he kissed her gently, and for him in that kiss there was that connection between past and future that he had been looking for his whole life, with that kiss he finally understood what his father always said, the power of love.

She was there when he kissed her all night, thanked her for existing, telling her how he finally understood everything, how he finally understood the war, the deaths, the grief, his parents and all his family.

She was there and the fact that she always would be, no matter how many mistakes he could make, was what made of James Potter the man he was, the man that his parents loved and admired, the man he wanted to be.

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