Written for prompt of the day at The Golden Snitch forum. Prompt: Failure. Words: 820+?
Please review! Enjoy! I love writing child!Harry!
Harry Potter wants to say something.
For some reason, his throat is tight and he can't get the words to escape into the open air. He can't even figure out why he wants defend her or why his teacher's discussion have effected him so strongly.
It's a new teacher talking in whispers to another teacher from another class.
They are talking about him.
...
It wasn't bad things they were saying. Which had made his heart soar for a few moments until the talk turned to his parents.
How lucky he was to be raised by such kind guardians.
He had started to draw absently in his notebook as it came up and it made him pause. Yes, he was lucky he supposed. Aunt Petunia always said he was very lucky they had taken him in because no one would dare take him in and feed him.
He had heard this before.
It hadn't bothered him. Harry continued to draw. First the lines that outlined the grass, he rooted around his box to find the right colour. Dark green was better for grass and he finally found the right crayon on the botton of the box, much to his satisfaction.
Then they talked about his father.
"I heard he was no-good drunk."
"- got into a lot of fights."
"I saw him once from a distance. Trouble, probably not in the right mind."
Harry wasn't good at drawing in general so he decided to go with a simple stick-figure. Maybe his dad had glasses like him? He paused on the black crayon, hovering over the paper. If his dad got into a lot of fights, then he wouldn't have glasses. They would get broken all the time. All it took was a push from Dudley to bend his own glasses out of shape. He was lucky enough to be fast at running so Harry couldn't say he had ever been in a real fight either.
Harry drew a messy blotch of black over the circle on the stick-figure instead. Glasses, perhaps not, but maybe he got his uncontrollable hair from him. That would be nice.
Next he drew a smaller figure next to the tall messy-haired figure, interconnecting their hands and with a sudden impulsiveness, he grabbed a yellow crayon and drew a bright shining sun over the pair. Cheerfully hovering over the newly-made family with a childish crooked curve to it's rays.
"His mother..."
Harry kept drawing, concentrated and determined on the next piece to complete his art.
" -I wonder what kind of foolish girl would get hooked up with someone like that."
His crayon wavered for a second while he paused to listen.
The second teacher snorted decisively, "A failure, that's who."
"Pity. Hope the kid doesn't take after her."
"In that family? His aunt probably keeps him on a leash."
"Nobody likes the failures."
...
Harry wants to say something.
He feels like he should defend his mother. A woman he has never met. The one who he imagines is beautiful in the darkness of his cupboard. Someone who defends him from the monsters.
She. Wasn't. A. Failure.
Harry feels the strangest urge to cry and he can't tell if it's from the teacher's talk or the fact that he can't remember her. He ends up staring his scrawled family portrait miserably. He knows that she wasn't a failure at anything, he feels it, he knows it.
So what if his father got into fights.
Sometimes you fight to defend yourself.
So what if his mother had been...a failure.
The urge to cry fades within him.
Harry sniffles and picks out the last coloured crayon that he hasn't used yet. Red. It isn't a very good red colour and it faintly reminds him of fresh strawberries. He draws the last piece that completes his fantasy. Harry doesn't know if his mother had red hair but it's the last crayon he has, and he doesn't want her to be like Aunt Petunia with dark hair.
The smaller figure in the middle is him. Holding hands with both of them and he draws glasses on the smaller one and decides the scar doesn't look good on such a nice picture so he leaves it out.
It's his picture and he can do what he wants.
His father can be kind. His mother can defend him from the monsters. They can both hold his hand underneath the shining crooked sun.
Harry Potter stares for a long time at what he has created and finds it impossible to believe that anyone in this picture could've been anything less than kind and caring. He knows. Somewhere in the back of his mind, in his heart, in his young memory...
They.
Were.
Not.
Failures.