Living In The Moment (HP Next Gen)

The moment I - James Potter - took over

19: The moment when I - James Potter - took over

I remembered the first time I saw the little spitfire. She'd been standing next to the Hogwarts Express, a big and surly looking man next to her. Her mother stood in front of her, fussing about her hair and I remembered thinking how annoying I would've found that if my mum had decided to fuss so much. But the girl hadn't seemed bothered at all by it. She soaked the attention up with a brilliant smile that somehow captivated me. I had no idea how long I stared at the scene in front of me or if it was even creepy for me to do so. I could hear the whispers all around me. "That's James Potter?" "I wonder if he'll end up in Gryffindor as well?" "Do you think his father is around here somewhere?" "James Potter's sitting there." I had already lost count of how many times I heard my name outside of my safe compartment door. I looked at the family again. The brown haired girl gave her mother a brilliant smile and somewhat timidly said goodbye to her father.

The mother had tears in her eyes, but the father just kept looking on his watch obviously wanting to leave already. I wondered what it'd must be like, living in a normal family. Being part of something that was entirely yours without the wizarding world following your every move. I sat back as soon as the girl had moved out of view. I wondered if I'd be put in the same House as her and if so, would she talk to me as a normal human being? Or would she treat me as the son of the marvelous Harry Potter? I rolled my eyes. Who was I kidding, nobody was going to treat me for who I was.

I didn't even have my own name, for Merlin's sake. I got named after the brave and mischievous James Potter. I put my head against the window and watched people say goodbye to their loved ones.

I was drowning in other people's expectations of me and there was nobody anywhere teaching me how to swim.

**--**

I hadn't thought of the girl much in the following weeks thereafter. I had ended up in Gryffindor - naturally - and had made one other friend, besides cousin Fred. Oscar Wood was everything I could have hoped for. He was still somewhat awed by my presence, but as the weeks passed he seemed to slowly get over it well enough so I let things alone. I decided to follow in my grandfather's footsteps as the new prankster of the school. We were just putting our brilliant plan in motion during Potions when I noticed we had this class with the Hufflepuffs. Okay, okay, I know it was quite late for me to notice I had classes with the Hufflepuffs after a couple of weeks, but I had a lot on my mind back then okay?

Anyway she was just sitting there, right in front of me, and I just faltered. I put the bubbling bomb I was about to throw back down. If thrown the bomb would blow soap bells everywhere, capturing people in them so they had to walk around like a hamster in its running wheel. It was one of my uncle's latest inventions and I had been itching to test it out. That stupid bomb wasn't even really the point. The point was that the girl I had been unashamedly staring at on our first day of school was talking about me.

"Cassandra, honestly, you shouldn't ask him that," I heard her whisper furiously.

The blonde next to her shook her head. "And why not?" she asked, pulling her hair in a bun.

"Because that's just plain rude," she said.

"Rose," Cassandra said with an annoyed tone to her voice, "it's not rude if I ask it politely."

So her name was Rose? She shared the same name as my cousin, but for some reason I thought it suited her better.

"You cannot ask if he's got a lightening scar on his bum politely, Cassandra. For Merlin's sake leave the poor boy alone. I'm sure he's got enough of people treating him differently because of his name. He doesn't need your weird ass fetishes on top of that."