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James Potter had a problem: and she was five foot five (she had grown taller the last time he saw her) and had hickory brown hair, followed by cinnamon eyes.

In the Potter household, also known as Godric's Hollow for the usual Sunday dinner, the house was full. Around the dinner table, it consisted of many people including Remus Lupin, Sirius Black and Marlene McKinnon.

"What's taking James so long?" Sirius groaned, "I had a really funny joke I wanted to tell him, and now I've forgotten it!"

"He's trying to call Sarah again," Lily explained, with a sympathetic tone. "He wants to sort out something with Dawn task, a safety drill or something like that, he did it with Harry's-"

"God Lily, I don't know how you can do it," Marlene huffed, "If my husband was trying to ring another woman constantly, and always was going over to her house I would be so pissed-"

"It was a mistake. We weren't together at the time and I understand that. He made a mistake."

"Still, aren't you upset he had a daughter with another woman?"

Before the red haired woman could even respond, a large huff was heard and James came walking in and sat down.

"She won't answer my calls," he mumbles which makes Lily shift in her seat ignoring the look Marlene sent her. "I've tried like fifteen times now, and the other day I tried to go to her house and she wasn't home."

"That's called stalking."

" It's not stalking," James immediately says, " At this stage I think I'm going to have to find her work schedule, print it off and wait outside her office or something."

(Must be a Potter thing)

Sirius and Marlene coughed; "Stalker."

Remus speaks." I still can't believe you have a daughter. Like a literal human being who shares the same blood as you-"

"It is mental. She's fourteen! Fourteen years you didn't know her! Absolutely mental!" Sirius booms.

James shrugs and continues to eat the bowl of fruit below him.

"Exactly, I just don't want to wait any longer, I mean it's already hard enough as it is and at this stage I frankly don't care about keeping it a secret anymore. I've missed enough of her life."

"What happens if she does?"

James stops and took in her words. "I'm not sure but she can't be mad at me forever. Hopefully she'll understood. I'll explain it all to her. At this point I'm not even sure that she likes me as a person-"

"She does." Marlene states immediately, making everyone at the table look at her strangely especially James who went to ask what she meant by that only for her to speak, "The other day me and Mary were in Hogsmeade getting out nails done and we ran into her-"

"What did she say?" James interrupted.

"I was getting to that." Marlene interrupts, "She said that she thinks your a good father to Harry."

James grins. "I am."

"I like her," Marlene stats softly no sign of anything but the truth in her tone, "I mean she's a good kid, nice heart. Small hands."

" I wouldn't expect any less, she is a Potter after all." James replies, " All Potters are superior."

Marlene and Lily rolls their eyes. Sirius however looks as though he understood.

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Dawn was sitting at the fountain in Hogsmeade waiting for Drew and Colleen who were shopping for what felt like hours. She waited a few moments for them as she threw stones into the small pond surrounding the marble stone. She had hated shopping and everything about it.

She pouted as they hadn't returned yet.

Thankfully Merlin heard her prayers and the two emerged wearing thick scarves and gloves holding bags. They were laughing with one another it made Dawn eye the red glint on Drew's cheeks.

She stands up and places her hands back into her pockets ignoring what just happened. She eyes both of her friends as she blows out cold air.

"Can we go now?" she pleads, "I'm so sick of being here."

"We've been here fifteen minutes and we've only been in one shop." Colleen mentions.

"But I'm so bored! There is only shops here!"

" How about you go get your mum and Dave something for Christmas." Colleen suggests bringing an instant groan from Dawn who didn't like shopping one bit, " Or you can come dress shopping with me whilst this idiot sits there playing pac man."

Drew scoffs. "Pac Man is iconic."

" I would rather get my head chopped of than go shopping anywhere besides I already have my dress."

Dawn eyes go onto the quidditch store sign which was only a few minutes away. Perhaps, that would cheer her day up.

"Alright I'll go to the quidditch store for a total of twenty minutes, and then we meet back here and go back to Hogwarts." her words of declaration were ignored by the two as they shook their heads with two laughs.

The Quidditch store was newly opened and was packed with people (mostly boys), much to her disappointment. She quietly shut the door and was met with a smile from the blonde cashier which she sent back.

The messy haired brunette made her way around the store as she looks around at the items. Her fingers stopped as her eyes landed on a red and golden colored jersey. Dave didn't really like jerseys so she couldn't get him that but maybe she would get it for herself.

But her eyes casted behind the rack and she spotted James Potter.

Dawn grins and makes her way over. Once she reaches him she reaches up and taps his shoulder. He turns and she says, " Hey."

James Potter genuinely smiles. "Dawn- hi. What are doing here?"

"Can't a teenage girl be in a quidditch shop? Quidditch may be a male dominated sport but. ."

James was quick to say. "No no that's not what I meant! I'm so sorry! I never meant to offend you, I just didn't expect to see you here at this particular time-

Dawn sends him a cheeky smile. "James I'm kidding."

"Oh few," James holds his chest. "Thought I was after offending you or something."

"Don't worry. I don't get offended easily." she lied. "Have you been in here before?"

James was instant to nod. " Of corse! My father used to bring me to one just like this when I was younger and now I love coming to any quidditch shop. Brings me back to the day."

" The olden days." she teases.

James continues to walk forward with a grin and a laugh.

" Who taught you how to play?" he inquires.

" My step father actually-"

Suddenly James had tripped and fallen flat face on the ground. She didn't know how he tripped as there was no objects around them, the sound of his face planting against the ground made her instantly pull in a sharp gasp.

She kneeled down. " Oh my god, are you alright?"

He jumped to his feet almost knocking her to the ground:

"Nothing a little ice won't fix." he mentions with an unsteady laugh, he looks at her and with a sweet smile goes, "Your step father, you say. Is this. . . man new in your life?"

Please say yes.

"No actually he's been with me and my mum since I could remember," she informs him with a small at the mention, " He taught me everything I know about quidditch.

James continues to look at her with this unexplainable expression. He looked almost angry, she thought. " Wow. . that's just brilliant! And do you two get along?"

She instantly nods. " Yeah I know a lot of people don't get along with their step fathers but we get along great. Dave has always been really good to my mum and me. He's fantastic at quidditch as well."

( James eyes narrows at the mention of the man clearly taken the two things he cares about: Dawn and quidditch )

"So he plays quidditch and is an amazing father." he stats, rolling his tongue under his bottom lips, "That's. . just. . wow."

Dawn slowly nods.

"Wow, Dave really is it all isn't he?" she couldn't sense the sarcasm of his tone, "He's like Batman."

"I wouldn't go that far." she intercepts with a small laugh, " But I suppose you could say that. It's kind of the reason I'm here today, I'm getting him a present for Christmas."

"I'll help you find him something. I'm great at picking out presents for other people." James insisted. "That's only if you want me to, of corse."

"Thank you." Dawn remarks happily in his direction. "I don't really know what to get him. He's kinda picky."

" Listen I'm sure whatever you get him he'll be grateful considering he's not your actual father."

Dawn thinks for a moment about his words although his words sounded harsh, they were technically true. But then again, she liked Dave, Dave meant a lot to her. She didn't find the comment offensive, considering he probably didn't know what it was like to not have a father.

"He might as well be."

James mouth opens to respond but the slightly pouty eyed expression on her made him caved in and he gave her a half hearted smile and forced a nod.

"What about this? It's handy and you can put stuff in it." He stops at a box with quidditch players signings around it. She picks it up and admires the signatures surrounding the frames of the crusty, browned wood box.

"It's nice, but I want something personal."

James nods and then for another few minutes he shows her more things, that didn't quite meet what she was looking for: books, clothes, sets of bludgers....

...nothing that was very good though.

Then he had been looking at something for a few minutes and she found herself going over towards him.

"Find something?"

"Yeah actually."

It had been a snitch, a beautiful golden colored snitch which white marks across it, not messily but perfect. It wasn't too small nor too big and when she picked it up to examine it, it fit perfectly in her hands.

But what had made the gift so special was the small button at the side.

"You press this button and hold it for three seconds." he reads the instructions. "Think of someone you want to talk to and you should be able to through the snitch. And anyone with a snitch on them will be able to respond."

( Even James had liked this gift )

"So basically anyone with a snitch like this you can talk to whenever." she acknowledges. "It's awesome."

James admires it. "Yeah it's pretty cool."

She picks it up.

"I mean it I was your father and you got me this for Christmas I would be honored. I mean you're a good kid Dawn and any man who got the chance to be your step father is lucky."

Dawn continued to observe the snitch but couldn't help but smile half heartily at his comment.
Although with his comment she could help but wonder if so, why did her actual father leave?

(She ignored the thought, that she said never bothered her but did)

Dawn gently picked it up, and instantly she had thought it was a perfect present.

"I love it," she instantly grins up at him.

James tried not to think of who the gift was for and more about the gesture his daughter was doing. He found she was rather kind towards everyone and clearly she got that from him, he thought.

She held the snitch close herself as they made their ways to the countertop.

It had been so busy. Many people had stopped James and thanked him and his family for defeating the Dark Lord. She noticed a shallow, off-casted look washed upon his face every time someone said that.

Dawn remembered when she was ten, a boy told her about the Dark Lord and she found him incredibly terrifying.

She didn't even know what he looked like, but she had nightmares for months. Thankfully he wasn't coming back so she had nothing to worry about.

The line was incredibly long as they approached it. Dawn didn't fancy having to wait. Everyone, however, had moved and allowed them to skip the line. Even the elderly, just because it was James.

"We can't just skip the line like that." she trails off with wide eyes, still standing in her position. "That doesn't seem fair. They were all here before us."

James gestures to the long line. "But there's so much people. We can skip I-"

" All them people were here first." she intercepts, " I'm not going to just skip them, no matter how much I want to."

James doesn't reply for a moment and looks ahead to how long the line was. After a second he apologizes to everyone he skipped, and moved back beside her.

She looks at him and raises an eyebrow. "I'm surprised."

"Perhaps, you're having a good influence of me, Dawn."

"Perhaps."

James looked down at her with a proud grin, and she beamed up at him with a set of hopeful eyes.

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