Written using prompts from Gringotts (A Very Potter Musical: (word) Frumpy / Various Prompts: (object) a crib / Hunchback of Notre Dom: (item) statue)
-oOo-
Snow fell around him in a beauty that was almost warm against his skin. The town that should have been his home was quiet that deep into the night, save for a church in the distance singing its usual Sunday night hymns. Burying his fists into his pockets, Harry shock off the tears which had frozen to his cheeks. The statue before him looked just the same as it had the last time he had made this trip. Only now, he could stand in the open unafraid that his life might end in the snow. A soft layer of snow had formed over the figures in stone. The little baby in its mother's arms reached out from its blanket, almost stretching for the falling snow. A man with untidy hair and the woman beside him looked down at the bundle with a smile on their faces.
They seemed so happy carved there in the granite. They could have been happier if given the chance to live. Turning from the statue which displayed his parents faces in chiseled elegance, Harry pushed his way out of the graveyard and through Godric's Hallow.
It wasn't a long walk before he found the cottage, the long ago broken Fidelius charm allowing him to see it. Harry touched the gate, watching the sign appear in the overgrown yard. The same text detailing the events of that night, and all the graffiti done in support of him were across the wooden sign. He smiled.
Harry opened the thick gate and stepped into the yard. The grass had long overgrown and there was a tree halfway up which had cracked and split from age. Wild hedges had overtaken the fence sometime in the years since it had last been tended to. A winding pathway of stones stood out grey against the crisp snow and wilting grass. He followed the pathway, picking his way across the stones.
He thought about how his parents must have walked this stones once upon a time. Had Lily skipped down them, laughing as she did so? Did James carry her over the porch the day they came to the home? How many times had Pettigrew come into that home before deciding to do as he did? How often had Remus and Sirius come into this house? Had a much younger, more naive, Harry walked these stones before that Halloween night?
Harry turned his eyes onto the cottage before him. Its second floor was missing a chunk of it. Other than that, the quant little home covered in snow looked like it was waiting for someone to come home to it.
The knob to the front door was cold under his hand. Harry turned it, freeing the rust which had found home there. The door gave way with a scrape against the wooden floor. He stepped in, testing the ground to ensure that the place was still stable. When he had stopped by a couple months ago to pay respects to his parent's graves, he had cast a spell over the building testing its structural support. It hadn't been touched in nearly seventeen years, but the cottage was still as sound as it had been when James and Lily had made it their home. It was almost like magic, Harry thought with a grin.
Stepping into the cottage, he looked around the living room. Everything was dark, covered with layer of forgotten dust. The couch sat facing a large fire place which had gone dormant. A second couch cornered that, a coffee table in the center. There was a desk and a television and Harry wanted to recall memories of his parents, sitting there with him watching Saturday morning cartoons. He couldn't think of any of them.
There were pictures on the walls; some moving, others not. A family of three smiled back at him. A much larger family, one which had pieced itself together over the years, was plastered in the frames. They all looked so happy. Almost every pictured sported a bouncing baby boy with hair as unkempt as his father's, and eyes that shown with the same emeralds as his mother's. Watching the faces smile under the dirt, Harry whipped the tears from the corner of his eyes.
A handful of crude drawings done by a child hung in the frames among the photos. There was a cat made of messy orange strokes. A family of three draw with sticks and circles, a slanted house painted in pink behind them. There were more, but Harry didn't want to look at them.
Stepping back, he looked around the place. His father had died in this living room. Facing a set of stairs, he thought of his mother running up them, him in her arms. He imagined Voldemort striding up the stairs, wand in hand and murder on his mind. Taking the hand rail, he wondered if Voldemort had touched it when he had been here.
Shaking all these thoughts from his mind, Harry climbed the stairs slowly. They creaked under him, but held his weight. The stair well was slim, and contained even more photographs. He kept his eyes away from the faces that smiled far too brightly for what they would have to later deal with.
Coming to the top of the stairs, he had a decision to make on which direction to go. A cold chill came from behind the door to his left. Testing the floorboards once more, Harry pushed the door open. The far wall was blown to pieces. Snow fell in easily, the floorboards long since rotten around it. A hint of mold clung to the air. It was the only room that seemed touched by anything greater than just dust.
He didn't go too far into the room, stopping as he came to stand beside a crib. It was a soft grey, a matted blue blanket bundled up in one corner of it. A few of the bars had busted off, either from weathering or from when the curse had back fired. Glancing around the room, Harry looked at all the toys and books that remained on the shelves and in a toy box. There was a toddlers broom toppled over by a set of balls. A rug was on the floor, a maze of roads waiting for toys cars to travel across. It was the room of a happy child.
Or at least it could have been.
His mother would have died right where he was standing. Touching the crib, Harry tried not to think of the horrors which had ended the family of this home. He couldn't get it from his mind. It had all come crashing down in this one little room. The life he could have had had been ripped from him by one simple spell. One mad man had taken his family from him before he had even gotten the chance to know them.
His throat grew tight the longer he stood there. A cold breeze brought a wind full of snow into the room. Placing a hand over his mouth, Harry backed out of the room as his eyes grew wet. Before he knew it, he was stumbling down the stairs. Eyes landing on the living room, he backed away from it. A kitchen sat with just as much dust over it. It was just another room that he didn't remember; another part of a house he hadn't been allowed to grow up in.
This had been a mistake. He didn't know what he had been thinking coming here like this.
Pushing his way out a door, he found himself in a backyard. The hedges had grown up just as much as they had out front. There was a tree at the center with a half built house in the branches. A swing set was looming over overgrown weeds.
Stepping through the weeds, Harry did what he could to get away from the house. He couldn't be in those halls any more. He couldn't deal with what had been lost there.
Dropping onto one of the swings, Harry frowned as it was too low to the ground for him to swing comfortably. Tears were welling in the corners of his eyes and he could no longer force them away. Dropping his head into his hands, he rocked slightly on the swing as he cried.
The tears were falling without remorse. Tracking a hand through his hair, he let his cries fall into the crisp November night. The hymns of the church in the distance were like whispers of angels among the snow. Drawing his cloak closer, Harry scrubbed the tears away before they had time to freeze against his cheeks.
A soft whisper touched the air. Calming his cries, Harry listened through the grass for it to come again. He was almost certain it was coming from the church bells down the road.
It came again; a soft whimper around his ankles. Standing, Harry fixed his cloak and listened to the sound. It came again. Harry followed the sound, coming up to a crumbled patio. Kneeling down, he lifted a rotten piece of plywood to appear under it.
A large brown cat lay still in a pile of dark snow. It didn't move and it didn't take much for Harry to realize that the cat had died due to the cold. Around him, lay a handful of kittens. Their bodies were stiff, and fur was matted with frozen droplets of snow.
Pressing a hand under his nose, Harry tried not to think about yet more bodies losing life on this property. Moving to stand, he stopped when he heard the sound again.
It was a soft meow, pleading and broken. One of the bodies moved slowly. It rose, a face of brown and orange. Wide eyes stared at him from among the dead. It meowed again, almost begging Harry for comfort.
Reaching in, careful as to not disturb the bodies, Harry slide his hand around the kitten's small form. Pulling it out, he cuddled him into the fabric of his cloak. The kitten meowed, much happier than prior. He seemed to snuggle up against Harry, searching for warmth. Looking at the kitten, Harry smiled at its plain and frumpy features.
Turning back to the pile of bodies, Harry drew his wand and carved a hole into the ground. Carefully levitating the bodies, he placed them into the grave. He tried not to note how small they were. Once done, he reset the dirt. Snow was already starting to fall back over it.
The kitten gave another meow, again snuggling deeper into the fabric. Harry smiled down at it, running his hand over the dirty snow filled fur.
"Let's go home," he whispered to the kitten. It closed its eyes, purring against his touch. He stood, giving one last look at the place that should have been his home, before walking his way along the fence and back out the from gate.