Hari

Hari couldn't breathe.

Every second she spent in this cramped storage room sent her closer and closer to the point of passing out from hyperventilation. She would take the claustrophobia any day, though, over what awaited her out there.

Many would see her hiding as overreacting, cowardice, humorous, even. They didn't understand, though. After years of being constantly ripped to shreds and subsequently praised again, over and over again by the media, she had finally reached her limit.

The war had officially ended only a week ago, with the death of Voldemort bringing the fighting to a standstill. One week was all the time that it had taken for the entirety of wizarding Britain to mourn the dead and celebrate the living before going back to their usual ways. It seemed that after they had time to think things through, the wizarding world was once again divided- this time over her.

Half were furious and looking for somebody to blame- and who better than their resident 'Girl-Who-Lived'? After all, she had left them for almost a year instead of battling Voldemort outright. The other half, in her opinion, were worse, however. They seemed content to worship the very ground that she walked on, constantly hosting parties in her honour in the hopes that she would make an appearance.

What both halves seemed to have in common, over everything else, was to forget that she was an actual person in this whole mess. She had fought with them. She had cried with them. She had lost people too. They all assumed that because she was the 'Great Hari Potter', the 'Girl-Who-Lived', the newly named 'Woman-Who-Conquered', that she wasn't subjected to these human fallacies.

This was what led to her hyperventilating inside of a storage closet just off of Diagon Alley.

She had gone to formally apologise to the Goblin race and pay for any and all damages that she and her friends had caused in their robbery. She was extremely anxious, not only because the goblins were known to be incredibly bloodthirsty creatures that valued their wealth over anything else- and she had stolen from them- but because this was her first public appearance after her defeat of Voldemort. Having camped out at Grimmauld Place for the entire week, not sleeping in fear of seeing her loved ones' faces in her dreams (not that it helped, as she was still seeing them in even the smallest of things), she hadn't been fully aware of just how bad the wizarding community would be. Nevertheless, she surprisingly got to Gringotts without hassle. The goblins were extremely forceful at first, bringing her at spear point to the Director of the bank, Ragnok. Astonishingly, though, they agreed to listen to her reasoning rather than ending her, then and there- it seemed that not even goblins were spared gratefulness from her defeat of the tyrant. She had decided that the only way that she could leave Gringotts alive (the goblins weren't that grateful) was to tell Ragnok the truth. The whole truth. Whilst Hari became increasingly more nervous as the Director became more furious, she continued on explaining what exactly she had stolen from the Lestrange vaults.

The goblins were no strangers to dark magic. In saying that, they understood exactly what she was saying when she uttered the word 'horcrux'. They were livid. The indignation that they had somehow had something that evil underneath their noses for who-knows-how-long had Ragnok shouting to control his goblins who were just about ready to go on the warpath, with Hari standing there meekly, hoping that their rage at her, at least, had subsided.

Thankfully for her, it had.

Of course, she would still be charged for the damage caused and obviously she would have to pay them for a new dragon, but she left as a friend to the goblin nation, and feeling as though something had finally gone right for the first time in years. She had also purchased a bag that linked directly to her account to save her from having to make back-and-forth trips to the bank, and she was extremely appreciative that the money came out in any currency that she wished. Overall, her trip to Gringotts was costly, even if it barely made a dent in her accounts, but she had left as a friend to the goblin nation, which was more than most witches or wizards could say.

That was where her good day had ended, however.

It only took one person to recognise her, before she was ambushed. Countless people swarmed to either hug her, shake her hand or spit malicious insults at her. due to the new security orders in place, she couldn't apparate out of the alley, leaving her to squeeze through a weeping man and his ecstatic wife. She bolted, attracting even more attention as she went. She turned the corner, whipped out her invisibility cloak that she now carried everywhere, and disappeared, entering the first door that she saw.

Here she was now.

Finally calming down, she made a decision. Hari knew that although things would calm down, they would eventually flare up again in an everlasting cycle of hero-worship and hatred. She could never truly live here, and if she was honest with herself, she never had.

Ron and Hermione would soon be exploring their tentative relationship, having children and moving on with their lives- they didn't need her anymore. Everybody would be moving on, and she would still be stuck here because since she was born, conflict, pain and war was all that she knew. Hari needed a break from England. She needed to be somewhere that nobody would recognise her, so she would have time to heal without the constant reminders that were dished out to her here. It was with that thought that she put her cloak back on and started the trek back to Grimmauld Place, taking the cloak off in a side alley outside of the Leaky Cauldron. Sure, she could have apparated as soon as she left the alley, but walking in the rain had always soothed her aching soul, and she needed some time to make a call before she would be unable to use her phone again.

Pulling out the new device, she scrolled through her meagre contact list until she reached the person she needed to speak to. The phone rang a few times before a gruff voice, groggy with sleep answered the phone, Hari cursing herself for forgetting the time difference.

"Hello?"

"U-uncle Charlie? It's Hari… Can- can I stay with you? Please?"