Ten Little Things

Summary: I love reading these, so I thought I'd try my own. Ten facts about some of the HP characters. Starting with next generation.

1. James

1. He and his siblings had discussed their names at one point, when they were younger. James no longer remembers exactly how they got onto the subject – in hindsight, it doesn't seem like a very interesting conversation. But he remembers what they said, and though it was never something he dwelled on, he never really forgot. Albus had admitted he didn't like his name, and would have preferred something "original" rather than being named after dead people. Lily had shrugged that she didn't really mind hers, though it was weird to see her own name on the war memorial, when they went to the memorial ceremony every year.

James, however, always liked his name, and liked that he'd been named after people who were important to his parents. Although he had to admit that he might feel different if his name was Albus Severus. James Potter and Sirius Black, after all, had been cool, and while he didn't doubt that Albus Dumbledore was a brilliant wizard, Severus Snape didn't sound cool at all...

2. When he was little (and when he was older, though he'd never admit it) he idolised Teddy Lupin. He knew that they weren't really brothers, but their parentage was a small detail to James, and he always thought of Teddy as a big brother. He was also amazed by Teddy's metamorphamagus abilities, and would sit and stare at his reflection for ages, willing his hair or eyes to change like Teddy's did, actually believing it would work.

When he was eight, Teddy found him, and explained exactly why James couldn't do it. James sort of, almost, a little bit, cried.

He denies - even to himself - that any of that ever happened, of course.

3. When he was about to start Hogwarts, he laughed when people said he wouldn't get into Gryffindor, and told everyone he was certain that would be his house. As if, he'd say in a loud, confident voice, the hat would put him anywhere else. Really, he wasn't so sure, and the second the sorting hat was placed on his head, he abandoned all pretence of confidence, and pleaded with the hat to put him in Gryffindor.

He'll never forget the sound of the hat - a hat, of all things - laughing at him, and telling him that Gryffindor was exactly where he'd belonged, and he'd seen so straight away.

4. He loves Quidditch. Always has done. And when he, Al, Lily, Rose and Hugo used to play Quidditch on their toy broomsticks when they were younger, he wanted to play seeker, like their dad, but so did Lily. And she was younger, and she was his little sister, and so...He let her, and always played chaser instead. He turned out to be a pretty good chaser, due to all the practice, and even when he joined his house team at Hogwarts, he tried out for chaser rather than seeker.

He doesn't, not for a minute, resent that. He turned out to be one of the best chasers Hogwarts had ever seen, made Captain in his fifth year, and went on to play Quidditch professionally after Hogwarts, playing Chaser.

5. He was always a little annoyed that, while Rose and Hugo were his favourite cousins, neither of them were his age. After all, Rose was Al's age, Hugo was Lily's. And Aunt Hermione and Uncle Ron were always coming over to their house, or they were going to theirs, and so they spent a lot of time together. And he knew that Rose and Al would be in the same year at school, as would Lily and Hugo. And it didn't seem fair that they'd have the security of a best friend at Hogwarts with them, and he wouldn't.

One time, he asked his aunt Hermione why they didn't have a kid his age. She'd hesitated for a moment, and then smiled and told him Ron wouldn't have been able to cope. He didn't really understand that until much later.

6. He loved all his family. All of them. They were, in his opinion, the best family in the whole entire world, wizard and muggle. And he loved the whole family get-togethers, even if it meant you could barely move, no matter what room you were in. But his Aunt Fleur – though he loved her, still, and never treated her any different - was always his least favourite aunt, for as long as he could remember. And, though he tried to come up with a reason for it, he never could figure out why. By fourteen, he decided to just assume it was one of those things, and kept it as his guilty secret.

7. He stole the marauder's map from his parents' room, during the Christmas holidays in his first year at Hogwarts. Not, of course, that he was a kleptomaniac in the making or anything. It was, and is, the only thing James has ever stolen. He had asked – since before he even got his Hogwarts letter – if he could have the map to take to school. He even swore he wouldn't use it to sneak out of the castle. But his dad wouldn't give him it. And since this, after everything his father had done, seemed hypocritical and unfair, James felt justified in taking it, especially since Teddy had had it during his school years. So James sneaked it out his father's desk, with help from his siblings and Rose and Hugo.

Harry pretends he doesn't know, and James pretends he doesn't know that Harry knows. It may seem odd to some people, but it works for them. The day he left Hogwarts, he handed the map to Al, who rolled his eyes and said something about it being about time, he was starting his last year in September, was so obviously grateful that he convinced no one.

8. James always acted as though nothing fazed him, from a young age. He was Harry Potter's son, he was Teddy's sort-of brother, he was a big brother himself and a Gryffindor. He couldn't be scared easy, couldn't be a nervous sort of person. He was the boy who never got scared. He was the boy who never flinched when someone jumped out at him. As far as everyone knew, he rarely even got nervous. But, though James wasn't scared sort of person, though James did have strong nerves, and though he did have some confidence, the rest of it was an act, and one he had to work on.

His biggest secret is that, when he was getting ready to do his O., he freaked out a little bit. He was convinced he'd fail miserably, and suddenly realised that he wanted to pass all of them, and pass them well, too. So he panicked. And it was Rose who found him in all his panicky glory, and calmed him down. He repaid her by never calling her "Rosie" again, and she kept his secret.

9. Lily is his little sister, and no matter how old she gets she'll always be his little sister, and he'll always be protective over her. They've both accepted this. He was protective over her from the moment she was born, old enough to be amazed by the tiny little baby that kept looking at him with wonder, and ordering anyone who held her to be careful. It never occurred to him that he shouldn't protect her. And so, in his last year of Hogwarts, when he saw Scorpius Malfoy looking at Lily one time, he stormed over and demanded to know why he was staring at his little sister. Because Lily was far too young to have boys looking at her like that. Scorpius blushed bright red and mumbled a reply James didn't hear; if Al hadn't pulled James away, he'd have hit the boy.

People said he was too protective of Lily. Often. He doesn't care - no one stares at his little sister like that, not even his brother's best friend. (Though this incident, and James's warning of "you better stay away from her, she's just a kid" didn't seem to be to effective in the long run – it was barely a year later that Scorpius and his sister became a couple.)

10. When he was about fourteen, he and Al and Lily were looking through some old pictures. Of their parents, and of their paternal grandparents. They didn't miss the fact that both their mother and paternal grandmother were redheaded, and Lily decided on the spot that since Harry and his father both married red-heads, James and Al were bound to do the same.

Scarily, it made sense to James, and he worried about that for a while, because the only red-heads he knew were ones he was related to, and that was gross.

Then he found one he wasn't related to, and knew Lily was right.