"I got another Merlin."

James peered up as Renata held up another one of the collectable cards that came packaged with the Chocolate Frogs. Since Harry had taken to wearing his glasses for the day so far after he had been promised tickles, they decided to further reward his time with the chocolate treat. When Renata claimed that she had never really experienced a chocolate frog for herself, James quickly unloaded them in the living room and demand that they open every single one. To Harry's delight, each time one of the packages was open, a frog made of mostly Croakoa would leap out and he would give chase to it around the living room.

So far, Renata had only opened about six herself and four of them had been the Merlin collectable card that she placed into one pile.

"Yeah, you'll end up getting a lot of repeats, unfortunately," James told her, as he sat with her in between his legs, " they need to start adding new faces to the batch."

"What does it take to be on one of them?" she asked him as she reached for another package to open. 

He gave a small shrug of his shoulders as he thought about it before pushing his glasses up that had slid down his nose earlier. 

"I'm not quite sure what the criteria are, but I'm fairly certain you have to be some renowned witch or wizard to get on there. Like Albus Dumbledore was made one after he defeated Gellert Grindelwald, discovering twelve uses for dragon's blood...um..."

"...and his work on alchemy with his partner, Nicolas Flamel," Renata read off the card in her hand. "It also says here that he enjoys chamber music and tenpin bowling."

James let out a small chuckle as Renata looked over her shoulder at him. "Yeah, that sounds about right after working with him."

"What about you?" she questioned as she turned in between his legs to completely face him. "Are you and Harry on any of the cards?"

Judging by the face, that James made, Renata could assume that the answer was going to be "no." But she didn't understand why they didn't have one if that was the case, after all, Harry was the Boy-Who-Lived, James had fought in the war and discovered the traitor amongst the group, bringing him to justice, how was that not means or grounds to have one's face on a Chocolate Frog card?

"What about your father?" Renata continued. "He created the Sleekeazy's Hair Potion, which is used worldwide still to this day."

She made a good point, but it seemed that the answer was still "no" leaving Renata with the bewildered expression and suddenly, she actually appeared upset as she held up some of the other cards from Harry's initial collection.

"So you mean to tell me, that they'll give one to Beatrix Bloxam that re-wrote a book that made children vomit constantly and was banned was given one? And some idiot named Derwent Shimpling who decided to eat a venomous tentacula on a bet was given one, but not you? Not Harry? And not your father?"

James didn't know how to respond because what he had initially believed to be a fun activity had certainly taken a different turn as Renata seemed outraged by the whole ordeal. She continued flipping through card after cards, some of them she readily agreed to be there, while others, she looked like she wanted to set on fire.

"Greta Catchlove?" she held up one of a plump, blonde witch. "She's an author of Charm Your Own Cheese, she get's a card?"

"In all fairness, I went to school with her," James interjected, " and she was really nice and she made cheeses out of dragon milk, which sounds revolting, but I heard it's actually quite good. You know, I would consider it to be very brave to experiment with dragon milk, so I will gladly give her one."

"I guess I just don't understand," Renata said with a slight frown, " all of you involved in the Order should have your own card. You, Remus, Sirius, Lily, I mean, why not praise the people that fought? Neville's parents?"

"We didn't do it for recognition, Ren," James informed her with a gentle smile as he reached his hand up and tucked some of her hair out of her face. "We never joined the Order with the anticipation of being recognised on Chocolate Frog cards. My father didn't create his potions for recognition, it was all to help people."

"I understand that," she said, " really I do. But if you're going to recognise witches and wizards, I would much rather children learn about people who did all these remarkable things, rather than..."

She lifted up another card and let out a heavy sigh.

"...Ethelred the Ever-Ready, famous for or taking offence for no reason and casting curses at innocent bystanders..."

James couldn't help but laugh at the face she made as she set the card down again and gave a shake of her head. He had to agree that not everyone on the Chocolate Cards would be considered a great role model, but the purpose of the cards wasn't to recognise every hero, just famous ones, even if their "accomplishments" were considered rather silly or stupid.

"They're all just for fun, Ren," he said, " children are usually the ones who collect them and they like the silly one. Sirius and I used to joke around when we were younger, pretending to be Ethelred. We would dress up in my dad's old robes and sit outside the house, one of us would take turns being an innocent bystander and the other pretended to be Ethelred. We would yell at each other until my mother came out to yell at us for using such language."

He could see the smile form on Renata's face as he did his best impression of Ethelred, covering his teeth with his lips to resemble an old man.

"Well, it certainly sounds like you two had a lot of fun when you were younger, you two still have that sort of fun now," Renata chuckled.

"Come on, you and Adelmo didn't have any silly games or stupid things you used to do together that made no sense?"

For a moment, it appeared as though she was really thinking about it and James wondered if he had struck another awkward chord within Renata's odd childhood where she didn't have any sort of memories such as that with Adelmo. After learning that she didn't get to share in the summer holidays or any other fun activities while growing up, James was beginning to think that they didn't have any fun childhood memories to share.

"Well, there was one game we liked playing," Renata admitted, bringing James to sigh in relief quietly. " It was when my mother and father were working and Adelmo and I were still too young to attend school, so we would stay at my nonnina's home during the day in Parma."

Renata leaned back against James' chest as she recalled the memories, watching as Harry lost one of the chocolate frogs to the fireplace but then had another hop across his path before he ran after it in the opposite direction.

"I can't remember which one of us came up with the idea, probably Adelmo since he always came up with things on the spot. We used to pretend that we had run away from home to join a circus at one point. One time, Adelmo tied one our bedsheets to connect the posts and we were tight-rope walking twins. And then, one day, there was an accident, and Adelmo fell from the great heights to his death down below."

"Did you two hold a funeral?" James asked.

"Yes, all of my toys and his toys were there in attendance and I sang a song that looking back on it, I could see why my grandmother always wished that her hearing was the first thing that failed her. And then I suggested that we hold a Norse Viking funeral in his honour, although I'm not sure why I probably read something about it at the time and couldn't resist myself."

"A Norse Viking funeral?"

"Yes, we found a piece of wood and Adelmo laid on it after because that was supposed to be his ship and then we set him on fire."

"You did what?!"

"Well, I didn't really light him on fire!" Renata exclaimed. "I just threw leaves on him until he was buried and out of sight. Then Adelmo rose from the dead and he was my dead tight-roping twin. And if all of that had been a true story, I guess it would be a safe bet that we would be on a Chocolate Frog card."

She could feel the embarrassment of looking back on it all rising to her face as she suddenly felt warm before she buried her face in her hands.

"Oh goodness, I was really a strange child."

"I wouldn't say you were strange," James told her, " you sound just as adorable back then as you are now. It sounds like you were having a good time and Adelmo was too."

Before she could respond, claiming that she wished she had other memories to share, Harry made his way over towards the two interrupting the conversation. He had his shirt halfway lifted up, exposing his little stomach as he greeted them with a grin.

"What do you have there, Harry?" James asked, only to have Harry lower his shirt right away where he dumped all the chocolate frogs he had collected onto them.

The frogs jumped all over the place causing James to yell out that it was every man for themselves before running off in one direction, while Renata ran off in the other. Harry didn't even know what direction to run in but he was kept in place by his laughter as he laughed so hard he nearly turned purple.

"Well, I know one of the gifts I'll have to get him for his birthday party," Renata said after she and James found shelter under the kitchen table as Harry was rounding up the frogs once more. "At least, I know they won't go to waste even if Neville doesn't show up."

"Why wouldn't Neville show up?"

Renata looked over at him, realising she had never informed him about the incident with Augusta.

"Oh, I guess I forgot to mention what happened," she said with a nervous glance, " when I dropped Neville off that day when we were going to Harry's eye appointment, we were all saying goodbye and well...Neville said goodbye to Harry and then he said goodbye to me. Only he called me "Mummy."

James' eyes widened for a few seconds and he didn't say anything which caused Renata to feel even worse about the situation.

"But why would he call you Mummy?" James questioned. "I mean, as unfortunate as it all is, he still visits his mother regularly at St Mungo's-"

"Well, not as of recently," Renata replied quietly, " you know, Augusta was thinking that it was a bit too much for him and thought about waiting until he was older to make the visits a regular thing. She's been visiting while he's here or she leaves him with his Uncle Algie."

"Still, I mean, I know Neville spends a decent amount of time around here and around you, but I would never expect him to call you "Mummy." He should know the difference of who people are. But I guess children slip sometimes, you know? I'm sure he doesn't see you as his mother, that would be like Harry walking about here, calling you Mummy."

If only James realised how much it pained Renata to hear such words coming from him. Maybe he didn't realise how hurtful his words were because she was attempting to remain as composed as possible at the time, however, it really did hurt. Because in his mind, James believed that Harry knew the difference between who his real mother was and who Renata was supposed to be to him. Which meant in her mind, that James never saw her as being a motherly figure to Harry or any of the boys for that matter.

And yet, maybe he failed to notice, but they were her boys, all of them.

Even if they had their mothers active in their lives like Ron or were in different scenarios like Harry and Neville, she always wanted to be a person that they could count on coming to if they needed anything.

She tried to give them motherly affection or what she thought was motherly affection, but maybe she was hitting nowhere near the mark.

If she thought about it, to others, her mother was no role model, which meant that maybe "real" mothers went above and beyond everything Renata did. Maybe she wasn't good enough to be considered a mother and that pained her because she thought she was doing enough. When Harry fell and split open his lip, the blood gushing out would have normally caused her to faint, but instead, she thought it was maternal instinct kicking in over her fear which brought her to remain strong for Harry.

"Did you correct him?" James asked her further as if she wasn't already feeling at her lowest.

"No," she said, " I didn't get a chance to, Augusta slammed the door in my face before I could even properly apologise."

"Well, I could see why she was upset-"

Suddenly, Renata pushed herself up, leaving the "safety" of the kitchen table to enter the war zone of the chocolate frogs. She didn't say anything to James as she made her way out of the kitchen, leaving James beyond confused as to what was wrong. As he stood up as well, he made his way to follow where she had disappeared to see her standing in the hall near the front door, putting on a light jacket as if she were leaving.

"Ren, where are you going?"

"Um..." came the shaky reply as she didn't even bring herself to look over at him, " I just realised that I have to do something that I completely forgot about and I have to leave right now to do it."

He heard her sniffle and saw her give a quick swipe of her sleeve under her eyes before she reached for the door.

"Ren-"

"I'll be back later, Mr Potter," she said quickly before opening up the door as fast as she could and heading out into the rain. She realised her own slip right away but ignored it as she wasn't about to go back inside to correct herself, within seconds she disapparated from the scene of the pavement right before James opened the door to call her back inside.

What Renata failed to understand, and ended up misunderstanding was James thinking that her being called Mummy had left her feeling uncomfortable. She had seemed upset about Neville calling her it, so he figured it was something she didn't want, which was why he claimed that it was probably a mistake. Because if there was a child that was going to call her by a motherly term it was probably going to be Harry because he spent the most time around her. But even he hadn't seen or heard Harry address her as such.

But James didn't understand why she had left so abruptly, wondering if it was something he said or if she was just upset because of how it went down with Augusta, perhaps that's where she was going to speak with Neville's grandmother about the situation. Yet, he didn't think that would bring her to cry, meaning there had to be more to it that he was failing to see at the time.

However, Renata's travels did not bring her to the doorstep of the Longbottom home as she knew Augusta wasn't ready to speak with her, simply because she wouldn't even respond to Renata's letters. Instead, Renata was seeking advice and she could only think of one place to go for her "motherly" dilemma as she found herself knocking on the door.

A few seconds later, Molly Weasley opened up the door, all of her children with the exception of Ginny seemed to trail behind her to catch a glimpse of who had come for a visit. Molly was just about to question as to what brought Renata to visit, especially without Harry in her arms, but seeing the distressed look on the younger woman's face, she knew exactly what to do.

"Bill," she called upon her eldest son, " take all of your brothers upstairs and go play."

"But I don't want to play with all of them!" Percy whined from the background.

"Go on, Percy!"

There was the sound of grumbling from Percy and giggling from the others as Bill and Charlie took Ron's hands and guided him along with the twins up the stairs. After they were all headed up the steps, Molly turned back to Renata before holding out her arms.

"Come on inside, dear," she said, " and tell me what's troubling you."

Renata was brought inside and sat down in the living room, where Ginny was contently playing with a small bear in her hands while enjoying some tummy-time play. When she saw Renata, she let out a shrill little giggle as her way of greeting before shoving the bear back into her mouth that caused a gurgling noise. Molly sat beside her on the sofa, offering Renata to start, even though it took a few moments to get her to actually speak.

"I'm not asking to be seen as their mother figure specifically," Renata said after explaining the entire ordeal to her, " but does it sound so far-fetch that I could be seen as one? I mean, he said that Harry knows the difference, which means that he thinks that Harry won't see me as a mother figure. But Harry has already called me his mother so many times, so does that mean that James doesn't see me as being mother material to Harry, so he thinks Harry couldn't see it? I don't know, maybe I'm reading into this too much-"

"Renata, before I go on any further about anything else," Molly began, " let me tell you that it doesn't matter what anyone else says. If Harry sees you as a mother-figure and if Neville sees you as a mother-figure, then you are more than mother material. It doesn't matter what happened under your mother's influence, it doesn't even matter what James has to say...as long as you make an impact on the lives of those boys, that's all that matters. Even children with mothers present and active in their lives can have other women who serve as motherly figures to them. The more the merrier."

"Really?"

"Of course! I am so thankful for you to be in Ron's life, helping to take care of him when he's over playing with Harry. He needs a bit more one on one time, especially when this entire crew is home and running about."

"Well, Augusta didn't really see it as such, she was furious-"

"She was probably not upset with you, but with the idea of Alice missing out on that opportunity. But she needs to understand that it is certainly not your fault and she should be thankful for everything that you do for Neville. And if she needs someone to wake her up to see that, I will gladly do it, you leave that to me."

Renata offered a small smile, always so appreciative of Molly's fiery attitude especially when it came to benefit children. However, the smile didn't last as Renata's mind drifted back to the original problem.

"But Harry keeps calling me "Mummy" even though he does it when James isn't around, I'm afraid he's going to do it in front of him and if I'm right, James is going to be so upset. I don't want that to happen, things have been going so smoothly and he was asking me if I corrected Neville, which means he's probably expecting me to correct Harry if he ever knew it happened, but I haven't been doing it-"

"And you shouldn't!" Molly shook her head. "Of course Harry calls you Mummy, you are his mother!"

The room grew silent as Renata nearly jumped and Ginny peered over, breaking away from her toy. Outside, Renata could hear the sound of the chickens being startled and racing away far from the home.

"You may not have given birth to him, Renata, but that doesn't make a mother a mother. Lily will hold the title as his birth mother and she did raise him for the first year of his life, but unfortunately, she's not here anymore. But you are and that's amazing. How you jumped into the role, you went above and beyond any sort of nanny I've come to know. You took on as his mother without question, that's maternal instinct and damn well makes you his mother. You shouldn't correct him when he calls you Mummy."