Even though you will never read this - happy birthday, Daddy!
Father's Memories
Thomas Creevey spends the last minutes before his son's funeral sitting alone in the kitchen, holding one photograph in his shaking hands. He doesn't look at it (he doesn't need to, he remembers everything vividly even without it), but holding it is comforting enough.
His boy.
They have killed his boy. In a way, they have killed his whole family – Colin lies inside of the cold white coffin, Dennis is still breathing, but so tired and broken. Linda has lost all her liveliness and is now a fragile shadow of the woman she once was. And Thomas himself hasn't looked at the mirror today, because he knows that the man who will stare him back looks more dead than alive.
He should have saved his family, should have kept them safe.
That was what he swore the day long ago (but it feels like it was just few days ago), when Linda came to him, laughing and crying at the same time, lips forming the words "Thomas, we're going to have a baby". He swore he would keep his wife and child safe, no matter what. He would die for them.
He closes his eyes, recalls the day when Colin finally was born (red and wrinkly and uglier he had expected), then another day seventeen months and two days later, when he and Linda carried Dennis home. Colin was a great big brother from the beginning, and Thomas is still little ashamed for thinking that Colin would be terribly jealous.
He remembers, with tears in his eyes, Colin's tenth birthday. He had always been fascinated by photography, and Thomas had carefully saved enough so he could buy a camera to Colin. It wasn't the best model in the shop, but Thomas knew Colin would love it – and he did.
The fourth day he remembers wasn't happy – not to him or Linda, at least. But Colin was thrilled when a stern but friendly woman appeared to their doorstep with a letter and a story almost too incredible to believe.
Maybe he should have guessed then that Dennis would follow his brother to this strange world. They had, after all, shared always everything from toys to secrets. But he didn't want to think the possibility that he could lose both of his sons to the world he could never truly understand.
Thomas allows himself to think the day when Colin stepped to that scarlet train for the first time. It was so hard to let go – but he had to. Colin laughed and hugged his parents and brother, promised to write and send photographs (and he kept his promise faithfully until the day that monster attacked on him).
He remembers the cold horror in his stomach, how Linda cried herself to sleep, how Dennis ran to Colin's room and buried his little head into his brother's cold pillows. How he prayed for hours when he couldn't get sleep (Dear God, let him live, he doesn't deserve death, please, if you let him live I'll do anything, you can take me instead) even though he hadn't been religious for a long time. How they visited Colin once (so pale and cold and were they sure he was still alive?), the quiet Christmas, tiredness and unhappiness, and finally the tall man with white beard came and brought the joy with him.
When the woman came again two years after her first visit, Thomas cried, but Dennis didn't. Excited Colin had told Dennis all about Hogwarts over and over again, and now Dennis could follow his brother to a fairy tale. Thomas remembers how he let them both go and smiled, but was so, so afraid that something dreadful would happen again.
And he was right. They killed his boy.
Thomas finally glances at the photograph he's holding, touches Colin's cheek and looks at his brave eyes. Then he stands up, straightens his tie and hopes he could be as brave as Colin was. Courage is one thing he needs today, and tomorrow and next year and the year after that.
Linda and Dennis are waiting in the living room. Thomas takes their hands and slowly they go.