Little Harry was warm and sleepy where he was sprawled across his daddy's lap; head resting against his tall man's chest as he listened to his bedtime story rumble against his ear.

"And they lived happily ever after," his daddy concluded in a soft voice, stroking his hair gently.

"Forev'r and ev'r?" Little Harry whispered around his thumb, not bothering to open his eyes.

"Yes, child," his daddy confirmed, still stroking his hair.

"Dat's good," he sighed, finally drifting off to sleep.

. . .

Sometimes at the end of the day, after all of Harry's toys had been put away, after bath time and after story time, Severus would sit down beside his son's bed and watch him sleep.

A sleeping Harry was nearly as active as his waking counterpart. He scooted, rolled and generally wriggled his way up and down the bed for most of the night. In contrast, when he slept next to Severus in his big bed, the little boy stayed completely still.

"A peculiarity to be sure," Severus muttered to himself from his seat next to the child's bed.

The other thing that amused him was that Harry also somehow managed to keep a hold on his teddy bear, Captain the entire time as well. If Severus hadn't known better, then he would have sworn his son was using his accidental magic to stick the bear's soft body to his hands, but it wasn't so (he had checked).

Harry still had nightmares; something that Severus would be blaming on the Dursleys for years to come, considering they were most often the centre of them. However, he had learned over time that if he waited for the little boy to fall deeper into sleep before leaving his side, then the likelihood of his son having those dreams was greatly diminished.

Severus checked the time and then laid his hand on the child's head as he whispered, "Goodnight son. I will be here if you need me."

He stood up and exited the room, leaving the door open a crack as he went.

. . .

Harry awoke with a gasp, his arms already around his knees as he instinctively burrowed himself into the smallest, most inconspicuous spot in the bed.

His nightmares that revolved around Uncle Vernon and Dudley almost always caused him to wake up screaming, because in them they were always hurting him—or about to.

But other dreams weren't as straightforward as that, dreams like the one that he had just woken up from.

Idly he ran a hand over his face, wiping the tears off his cheeks before they had a chance to roll into his ears anymore. As he moved his hand, he felt the soft presence of Captain lying beside him, and even in his shaky unhappiness, he still managed to smile a little at his discovery.

"What happened?" He imagined Captain asking him.

He reached out and pulled Captain to his chest and buried his face in his friend's familiar and furry tummy.

"She didn't wan' me," he managed to say, his lip trembling mightily as he remembered the feelings associated with the dream.

"Who?"

"My aun—Petunia," he answered, correcting himself automatically. Daddy had said that as his son, he didn't have to be related to her anymore!

The Petunia dreams were somehow the worst of the Dursley dreams. She never physically hurt him in those dreams, but what she did was worse somehow. He would say something and she would ignore him. He would cry out and she would ignore him. And then, something bad would happen, something would catch on fire and he'd really need help, and suddenly she'd be there swooping down on him. She always grabbed him by the ear and threw him against the wall, her eyes blazing frighteningly and he would shrink and try to get away and she would follow him, screaming.

"We don't want you! Little nasty orphan boy! Wicked! Horrible! I hate you! I wish you would do us a favour and die, you little vile ragamuffin!"

And she would kick out at him, but in the dream her kicks didn't touch him, but her words felt like punches to the stomach, making him nauseated and terrified as she continued to berate him. When he woke up, the loneliness would settle in his stomach and he'd grip himself like he was now, riding out the waves of misery until he remembered that he didn't have to be alone.

Daddy!

"Come on Capt'n, we gotta go to Daddy," he whispered, pulling his little pink friend out of the bed with him.

His pyjama covered feet would pad softly across the carpet, and he would go through the bathroom towards his daddy's room, moving confidently through the near darkness. He didn't use his eyes in the dark, but instead relied on his other senses and his memory of the layout of the rooms to help him move silently and carefully.

He could smell his toothbrush as he passed it, and the so-called unscented toilet paper that the house elves stocked all of the bathrooms with. And then he was in his daddy's room and he could smell his Tall Man. An unconscious smile lit up his face, and he imagined that Captain's face held a similar such look.

He resisted the urge to jump into his daddy's arms, no matter how much he wanted to, because he didn't actually want to wake him up. He just wanted to be close to his daddy, close enough to tuck himself into his Tall Man's arms and know that he was wanted.

"And loved," he imagined Captain adding silently in his head.

He nodded in agreement, and then he carefully made his way under his daddy's soft covers, finding his daddy's arms and moving them around his body as he pushed himself back first into the man's chest.

He smiled again as his daddy's arms squeezed around his middle gently, even though his Tall Man was still completely asleep.

"Better?" Captain asked him quietly.

"Yeah," he whispered, snuggling up to his father comfortably, his eyelids already heavy again.