You're Such A Baby!
Chapter 4: Bathing
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Since lunch was already over, Lily went to the kitchen to get some food.
As soon as she entered the kitchen, she and James were swarmed with house-elves.
"What wants miss Evans?" A house-elf with huge blue eyes and a small nose asked as a lot of other house-elves came with trays full of all kinds of food imaginable.
"I would like some sandwiches please." She said as she was pushed to a chair. "What do you want to eat, squirt?" She asked James, who was gaping at the house-elves.
"Can I have anything I want?" James asked.
The house-elves all chattered at the same time, but it was obvious it was a yes.
"Pancakes." James said soundly, before exploring every corner of the kitchen.
"Wow, Lily!" He shouted from the other side of the room. "I've never-ever seen a room this big! Do you?"
"Yes, squirt, now get back here, your pancakes are ready!"
James ran over as fast as he could (it was amazing to see how fast the three-year-old could move), and plumped down on a seat across Lily and started wolfing down the pancakes. As Lily looked at him over her sandwich with ham and cheese, she was amazed at how many energy there seemed to be stored in the little boy.
Half an hour later, the two went outside again, after Lily had taken some cakes from the insisting house-elves. James was now eating some piece of pumpkin pie.
Between bites, he asked Lily: "What're we gonna do now? We could play hide-and-seek!"
"We can play that later. First, we'll go up to the Head-Boy and Girl dormitories to make sure you have a decent place to sleep tonight, then we'll see what we do alright?"
Lily led James through the hallways and up different stairs, untill they reached the portrait of the Fat Lady.
"Password?" She asked.
"I wanna say it! I wanna say it!" James said exitedly. "What is it?"
Lily whispered something in James' ear and he looked at her. "Really?"
"Yes, that's the password."
"Wow... Sugar Pancakes!"
The portrait swang forward and before Lily could make a move to help James climb into the round hole, he was already inside, and all Lily could do was follow.
Lily found the common room empty and walked over to a torch on the wall, said 'Hippogryph', and an archway to the small common room that was shared by the Head Boy and Girl opened.
After she conjured some toys for James to play with, Lily entered his dorm and was shocked.
She had expected to find a total mess, but James proved to be more tidy than she could have imagined. It wasn't Petunia-like tidy, but it wasn't everything all over the place either.
The first thing she did was shrinking part of his clothes to his current size. After that, she inspected the room closely, looking for anything a little child could get harmed with.
After she had fixed some sharp edges and the like, she noticed something on James' bedstand. Curious, she took a closer look. It was, like she had first thought, a picture. It was a picture taken when they were eight.
Lily sat down on the bed, thinking back to that day. It had been James' birthday, and they were playing when they were surprised by James' mother taking the picture. It was only weeks after that picture was taken that they had had that fight. Now she thought back, it had actually been because of some silly thing, she didn't even remember what it was, but it had damaged their friendship, and they had never made up. That was almost nine years ago...
She looked at the picture again. She had no idea James still had this picture, even had it on his bedstand... they looked so happy, so carefree.
CLATTER!
Lily immediately sprang up, putting the picture back on the bedstand, and ran out of the room to find...
A total disaster. A large part of the common room was covered in ash, covering the couch, the floor, one of the small desks and...
"James!" Lily rushed to the toddler that was almost completely black now, his small glasses were hard to see through. As Lily tried to brush most of the ashes off of him, she noticed what had went wrong. James had obviously inspected the heart, and had leaned on the small railing that was in front of the fireplace, and it had fallen forward, in the middle of the ashes that lay in there.
"Scourgify!" She said, waving her wand around the room, and it was instantly its normal clean self again. Unfortunately, the spell wasn't meant for little three-year-olds that had ash all over them.
"You've made a pretty big mess, didn't you? I think you've got to take a bath, squirt." Oh, Merlin! I don't wanna see - certain things, how am I going to do this? Lily thought hard. "You sure know how to keep me occupied, don't you. Well, come on, to the bathroom."
To Lily's relief, James didn't have a problem going into bath, judging by the happy toddler that came after her.
Lily, who had been a prefect too, had found out that the Head-Girl bathroom was even more luxuoury than the Prefects' one.
"Now, just wait a minute as I fill the bath." The bath was somewhat larger than the Prefects', but it's bottom could be lowered or heightened, so she didn't have to worry about James drowning in it.
As the bath was filled (and the edge covered with foam), Lily turned to James again, who was staring around the bathroom.
"'Tis really big!" Was all he said.
"Very. Now, have you ever washed yourself before?"
"No. I can put on my own clothes!" He said proudly.
"Good, well, why don't you put your clothes off, and get into the bath, while I go get some clean pyjamas."
"Okay!"
"Phew, that's a relief..." Lily muttered to herself.
Lily felt kind of strange searching through James' clothes, in search of some pyjamas. Apparently, James slept in only his boxershorts. After a while, she finally found a pair of pyjamas and she shrank them down, she got a pair of boxershorts and went back to the bathroom.
As she aproached the bathroom, she listened intently, and went in as she heard the splashing of water.
She aproached the bath and found James was on the other end of it.
"Come here, squirt, so I can wash you."
James splashed towards her with a big grin on his face.
Lily didn't really pay attention to the mischievous face of the toddler, untill he was right in front of her and suddenly threw a washing-glove in her face.
"James!" She shrieked, surprised. But then, she picked up the washing-glove and threw it right back.
It missed, and James picked it up again, but this time Lily was prepared and she ducked in time. She then went to the sink and poored a glass full of water, while picking up the washing-glove that had landed there.
She threw the washing-glove back again, and James managed to avoid it once again, ducking under water. In a quick step, Lily was by the edge of the bath, and as James resurfaced, she emptied the entire glass of cold water over James' head.
Soon, a full water-fight had ensued, and in no time, both Lily and the whole bathroom were dripping wet.
Finally, Lily remembered she was supposed to be seventeen and a Head-Girl.
"Alright squirt, let's wash that hair of yours."
A quarter of an hour later, James was washed, and now Lily faced another problem. How was she supposed to dry the boy?
Unconsciously, she pulled out her wand and dried herself and the bathroom with a spell and then it hit her.
"I'm clearly not in shape today." She muttered as she grabbed a towel.
"Alright, squirt, let's get you dressed." As James got out of the bath, Lily held the towel in front of him and then dried him with her spell: "Sicci."
She handed him his pyjamas and boxershorts. "Now, as you get dressed, I'll go see if Hallie, by any chance has dropped off my bag."
Lily left the bathroom and, indeed, found her bag in her room. She pulled out her books and placed them on her bookcase. Then she left her dorm again and sat on the couch and lit the fire, waiting for James.
No too long after that, the bundle of energy jumped on her lap, wairing his pyjamas with moving golden lions on the red velvet.
"Lily? Can we go eat now?"
Lily looked at her watch to see it was almost dinner time now.
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