I think about James Potter a lot.
I 100% agree with the âMom Friendâ trope, I think itâs really cute and it fits because James is such a caring person, and heâs strong and considerate and brave and maybe he is a bored kid and wants a challenge, and befriending who he chooses to befriend is definitely a challenge.
But I also think that investing so much of your time, and thoughts, and help into someone (or more than one person) can be exhausting. Itâs draining to put the thoughts, and beliefs, and outbursts of two (not one. Two! Or three, even, if you consider Peter) people in front of your own. And maybe James grows up thinking that he doesnât deserve to be upset, or angry, or scared, because he has such a perfect life compared to that of his best friends. He grows up repressing his own emotion, because itâs more important that he pulls Sirius out of bed every day, or that he supports Remus when Remus is too exhausted to do so. He feels that writing the Charms essay Sirius completely disregarded is more important than writing his own, because Sirius needs it more than he does. He feels that meticulously studying becoming an Animagus for Remus is more important than studying for his own classes, because Remus needs it.Â
So his grades slip. Heâs tired all the time, but more often than not he has to smile and laugh with Sirius or Remus to take their minds off things. His mother falls ill in fourth year, but he doesnât tell anyone and canât even cry to himself in bed because Sirius has taken to burrowing in beside him. He just holds his aching eyes open and plasters on a smile and keeps pulling pranks to keep Sirius from really hurting anybody and keeps waking Remus up to come alongside them so that he doesnât think about the Full Moon in three days.Â
Maybe itâs the breaking point for him just before Christmas break in fifth year. He wants to go home, needs to see his mother because heâs worried that the inevitable is approaching, needs to talk to her and see her for what may be the last time.Â
But Sirius has skipped the previous two days of classes, instead opting to lie on his bed staring blankly at the ceiling, and Remus hasnât slept in days because nightmares the likes of which heâd never experienced are marring his nights. Sirius hasnât said much of anything, and Remus has slipped back into his old habits of tugging at his hair and picking at his scabs. Neither of them are going home, and neither of them want to go to Jamesâ, and James knows that he canât leave them there, alone. Not in the state theyâre in.Â
Itâs the night after a full moon, and James has been up all night. He usually is on those days, sitting on his bed and switching between reading harder than ever and stroking Siriusâ hair, who cries harder on those nights. His entire body aches on those nights, because if thereâs one thing James Potter hates itâs the feeling of not being able to do anything.
Heâs been up all night, and heâs never felt so helpless. He starts crying, slumped against the cold tile floor of the bathroom, the heels of his hands pressed against his eyes in an attempt to hold the tears in, maybe. Itâs the first time heâs cried in years.
He gets up after a while and tells Remus and Sirius that he loves them, but heâs going home to see his mother and he canât keep taking care of him like he has. Theyâre both take aback, but nod, and tell him itâs fine and they never wanted to put anything like that on him. They learn to lean on each other instead of him, lean on the person whoâs dealing with their own things, learn to lean on themselves eventually. Even though James would still do anything for them.
So. James Potter who has an inferiority complex. Who shoves his feelings under everything because they arenât important. Who knows heâs lucky and uses that as an excise to invest his entire being into the lives of two other people. Who cares for them in a way that neither of them have experienced, who is the best friend either of them will ever have.
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