Ginny

Mum always said that we grew up so fast, and I could really relate to it right now.

James was three and a bit, Albus just under one and a half, and we had another child on the way.

Harry was still adamant that if it were a girl, she'd be called Lily Luna. I neither agreed nor disagreed; I wanted to name our children based off of what suited them rather than pre-order a birth certificate.

I looked up from the article I was writing for work when I saw a flash of James' hair.

"Merlin help me now." I muttered to myself, before standing up to see what the trouble-making child was up to this time.

It didn't take long to find out.

"James, why is Albus hanging from the ceiling?"

"I dunno."

"James..."

"I don't know! Why would I?"

"Fine, okay. Albus, what are you doing hanging from the ceiling?"

Albus looked from me to his brother.
"James. Help please."

"James, tell me exactly what you did. Or Santa won't be very happy with you, and you won't have any Christmas presents this year."

"It's June. Santa won't know."

"Yes he will. He knows if you've been bad or good, so-"

"But how?"

"What?"

"How does he know? There is lots of people being bad. How does he know?"

"He just does. Look, I'm tired and I can't be bothered with this right now. What did you do to Albus?"

"Glue."

"Oh no..."

"He wanted to. He wanted to be high like he was flying."

"Are you saying that your one year old brother, with limited vocabulary-"

"What does that mean?"

"Er... he doesn't know as many words. Anyway, are you telling me that he told you he wanted to be glued to the ceiling so that he could pretend to fly?"

"No."

"Then why is he up there?"

"He didn't say that he wanted to be glued. I asked if he wanted to pretend to fly 'nd he said yes. Not my fault."

"I'll talk to you about this later, when your dad's here. First, we need to get Albus down."

***

I heard the lock click, and the door swing open as Harry arrived home.

"Hi Gin, how was your day?" He asked, giving me a kiss on the cheek as he came into the living room.

"Look up and you'll find out."

He followed my instructions, and his eyebrows scrunched up in confusion.

"Why is the back of Albus' t-shirt on the ceiling? Where's the front?"

"Shouldn't you be more concerned as to "where's our son"?"

"Well there's that too..."

"Your other son decided to literally stick Albus up there. And guess what he used to do it?"

"What?"

I held up Harry's tube of super glue.
"This. Harry, can you read?"

"Yes..." He told me nervously.

"Can you comprehend the words "keep out of reach of children"?"

"Yes..."

"Then why, why on Earth, did you not heed the words of warning? I've tried several spells, but I can't get the fabric off. Because it's super glue."

"I... hang on, I did keep it out of reach of children!"

"Evidently not. Where was it?"

"In my sealed drawer, in the office that is locked, on the floor that is forbidden to James!"

"If you had a forbidden floor in your house, you'd go there."

"No I wouldn't."

"Did you go onto the third floor in your first year?"

He went silent.

"That's what I thought-"

"That was different though! It was an accident."

"Your life was an accident!" Came Sirius' portrait's yell. "I was there when James was shocked because no one was expecting it!"

"That's one way to make things awkward..."

"Hey, we have had our fair share of having to hear your conversations, and "bedroom activities". Don't complain." James added.

Harry and I were bright red.

"I would tell him off for encouraging Sirius, but it's true. No mother wants to hear that."

"Please stop." Harry muttered.

"That's what we're telling you to do. You can't just conjure some ear plugs out of thin air when you're a painting." Sirius replied.

"Moving on Harry, the point is that we all know he can break into your office. No one knows how, but he can. So he can get into your sealed drawer and super-glue his brother to the ceiling."

"One question... How did he even get Albus up there?"

"Why don't you ask him that?"

"James!" He called.

Within a few footsteps, the child in question was there, in the doorway, looking happy and proud.

"So Mister, I heard about what happened this afternoon." James looked down at the floor. "And I'm not very happy with you. You can't steal daddy's stuff, you can't go on the forbidden floor, and you most certainly can't glue your brother to the ceiling."

"Yes I can."

"No, you can't."

"But I did."

"How?"

That question threw James off.

"What?"

"How did you do it James? Jow fid you get your brother that high and stick him to the ceiling? The glue you used dries pretty much instantly."

"Stwlmmswnd."

"Pardon? Don't mumble."

"I stole mummy's wand."

I inwardly sighed a sigh of frustration.

Again?

"Are you supposed to steal mummy's wand?"

"No..."

"I didn't think so. And how did you get Albus up there?"

"I dunno. It happened."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes..." James paused, thinking. "It wasn't me."

"I thought you admitted to mummy that it was you, earlier on?"

"I was protecting him."

"Who?"

"The one who did it."

"Who did it James?"

"Er... the Invisible Man."

"Did you see him do it?"

"Yes. He used his magic wand and the glue and stuck Albus up there. Then he gave me mummy's wand and pretended it was me. He said I would have no hot chocolate at Granny's if I said it was him."

"Did he now?"

"Yes."

"I'll have to have a word with him then. Do you know where I can find him?"

"No! He's invisible. How would I see him?"

"Good question. How did you see him stick Albus into the ceiling?"

James paused, stumped by the question.

"I was invisible too."

Given that he had only ever experienced invisibility under the cloak, where invisible beings could see one another, it made sense to him.

"That's a shame." Harry told him.

"Why?"

"Because if you had told us how Albus got up there, you could have stayed up until six o'clock. I guess not..."

"I helped the Invisible Man, because Albus really, really wanted to go up there."

"How did you both do it?"

"We climbed."

"Really?"

James shook his head in response, saying no without actually speaking.
"I was tricking you!"

"So how did you actually do it?"

After numerous attempts of trying to get it out of him, Harry and I decided to use the last resort:

"If you don't tell us, we won't go to Grandma and Grandpa's next week."

"Albus wanted to fly, so I used mummy's wand." He told us in a dull manner.

"So why did you lie? It's not good James."

"Didn't want to get into trouble."

"Well you're in trouble for lying to us. It wasn't the Invisible Man, it wasn't Albus climbing up there, and it wasn't Spiderman. It was you using mummy's wand."

"Sorry."

"Your brother could have been really hurt."

"Sorry."

"Sorry isn't quite cutting it right now. Go on, go up to bed."

James did as he was told - for once - when he realised how serious Harry was being.

Once was gone, I turned to Harry.
"Don't bother letting me talk then."

"Hey, you didn't need to. You have authority already, both of them know not to mess with angry mummy."

"James still does it though."

"Think about his namesakes. Of course he's not going to toe the line. If I don't act a bit strict here and there though, all the of it children will grow up thinking that they can get away with anything, and I'll do nothing about it." He explained.

"It's fine. I was teasing you. I'm sorry though, by the way."

"What for?"

"Getting a bit annoyed with you about the whole glue thing."

"Gin, that's completely okay. I understand. You're the one who has to look after them whilst I'm at work, and I'm not making it any easier when James is able to get a hold of my super-glue."

"I was just a bit worked up, because it took ages to get Al down and everything. It wasn't fair of me to react like that."

In response, I got a hug and a kiss.
"You don't need to apologise."

This was a perfect example as to why I loved him.

A/N:

In case you haven't yet noticed, I write nonsense when I'm tired. Right now, I'm very tired. I've been traveling all day and there are some baby racoon dogs in my room, squeaking a lot.

So when the chapter is complete and utter nonsense (like this one), it'll be because I'm tired... probably...

A few more chapters of no Lily, then she'll be born, so there'll be some young Lily chapters. After that, it'll be all of them growing up.

I'm not sure how many chapters will be left exactly, but that's the basic outline.

-Alice xoxox

I thought I had already published this, but apparently not. :/