Sacrifice

"Tell me a story.”

"“What would you like to hear?”

 “Tell me how you fell in love with Daddy.”

 Harry glanced down at his daughter with a bemused smile on his face. “Again? You know it so well.”

 “Only because it’s the best. Please?” Cynthia’s grey eyes looked up at him from beneath a tangle of wild black curls.

 “All right.” Harry sat down on the edge of the bed after tucking the covers tightly around his daughter, making sure that all her stuffed animals were nearby.

 “Once upon a time, thirty years ago in fact, there was a boy named Harry Potter who lived in a cupboard under the stairs. He didn’t have a happy childhood because he was always doing chores for his aunt and uncle who took care of him when his parents died.”

 “Like Cinderella? You did the chores: the laundry, the gardening, the cooking. What happened? You don’t do any of those chores anymore.”

 “Who told you about Cinderella?”

 “Aunt Hermione. She let me borrow a book once.”

 “Oh, did she? Then don’t tell her we have a house elf or she’ll never forgive me,” Cynthia grinned. She knew Aunt Hermione’s stance on house elves, but Daddy insisted that he couldn’t function without one.

 “The first eleven years of his life were pretty much the same. Until one night a letter arrived for him via owl.”

 “Your Hogwarts letter!” Cynthia cried out.

 Harry smoothed the hair away from her face. “Yes, but I didn’t know that. All I saw was my Uncle Vernon trying to get rid of the letters. Everywhere we went, there were more letters. Even Dudley became scared.”

 “Uncle Dudley, scared? But he’s a professional boxer. He can beat up anyone. He showed me all his medals last month.”

 Harry grinned at his daughter’s comment. “But back then Dudley only knew how to beat me up.”

 “Oh.”

 “Yeah. So one night we slept in a shack in the middle of the sea. It was a dark and stormy night—“

 “Such a cliché,” Cynthia interrupted.

 “Can’t argue with what’s true,” Harry reminded her. “At the stroke of midnight, a huge pounding took off the door to the shack. I looked up from where I lay and there stood a giant with my letter in one hand and a pink umbrella in the other.”

 “Weren’t you frightened?” Cynthia asked, eyes wide as she hugged her purple unicorn closer.

 “I was more curious. Here was someone who wanted to talk to me, Harry, a person who didn’t have a thing in the world to call his own. Then the giant told me the strangest thing: I was a wizard and had magic inside of me.”

 “I can’t wait until I can do magic.” She grinned at him, hopeful. Harry picked up his wand and a few sparks flew out, tiny fireworks that lit up the room. They watched the array of colors until they fizzled out in the darkness.

 “Yes, the Wizarding World was exquisite. I learned so much about myself and my magic and I loved it at Hogwarts. It was the first place I called home. I met and became friends with Uncle Ron and Aunt Hermione. I took Charms, Transfiguration, and many other classes. I rode my first broom, learned how to play Quidditch, and became the youngest Seeker in a century. I was the best Gryffindor there. In which house do you want to be sorted?”