Author's Note: I own nothing, all characters and themes are the property of the brilliant mind of JK Rowling. I wrote this story as a final for my freshman seminar class which was called 'The Phenomenon of Harry Potter.' It was a brilliant class and, no we didn't just sit around and discuss HP all day! The story is based mostly off of my rough draft, but I will be extending it for creative reasons, so updates should come about once a week. Bear with me, this is only the setup chapter. Later chapters will be lengthier.
A Fool's Mistake: Ch. 1
"Mr. Potter, I trust you would be better suited to continue this alone," sounded the taut voice of Minerva McGonagall, easing the sullen silence. Harry could hear a slightly more broken quality threatening to escape from behind the deliberate control she usually upheld and felt a pang of the familiar feeling himself.
"Er…yes, I suppose I can get on without you," Harry replied setting down the massive volume in his hand rather vicariously atop its fellows.
"Well then," McGonagall moved toward Harry rather hastily and then paused, stretching her right arm toward Harry to place an aged hand on his shoulder consolingly. She patted it hesitantly and gave a stiff yet weathered nod before shifting her direction and walking briskly from the room.
Harry gazed around the office filled with brown paper boxes containing the discarded textbooks, trinkets, magical relics, and personal belongings of the man he knew so little about. Harry could not easily admit to himself that he knew next to nothing of Dumbledore's long life. It was a painful notion that had occurred to him only now that it was too late to speak to the man in question. A small empty perch near the old wooden desk seemed to leave a hole in the room in the absence of its owner. Fawkes had disappeared as soon as the funeral had ended, and his lack of presence was felt almost as much as that of his companion. Harry knew that with Dumbledore gone, there was no reason for Fawkes to stay; however, he would dearly miss the majestic fowl. Slowly the scores of books lining the walls gained Harry's attention again as he drifted out of his reverie.
Phineas Nigellus Black sat quite still in his frame, eyeing Harry impatiently, "Well, get on with it, boy. Staring at them all day won't make them move." Harry's ears were too trained to expect Phineas' voice shattering the silence with his commentary to be taken by surprise. Harry merely turned his head slightly in the portrait's direction in recognition and went to pick up more volumes from the shelves of his former mentor. As he moved closer to a copy of 'Magic: A Malady to Muggles,' the light from the high vaulted windows caught on a familiar silvery sheen and Harry, distracted, changed course.
Moving with a sudden fervor, Harry took in the sight of the pensieve, which sat in its usual spot, in the cupboard by the door. The small cupboard door hung open ever so slightly and it seemed silly to Harry that after all this time, Dumbledore still couldn't manage to properly enclose it. Harry knelt low on the floor and pushed the cupboard door aside to reveal a mass of silvery liquid swirling gently in a stone basin. This bowl was the only thing in the world that could give reason to the seemingly random actions of a man that few people truly knew. Harry, himself felt he knew the bearded, twinkle-eyed man better than most, but parts of his life were still shrouded in shadows. It was so strange that such a glossy evasive substance could be the key to grasping at the truth of Dumbledore's long existence.
Swiftly and without a second thought, Harry grasped the sides of the basin and set it out in front of him, dipping his head down low toward it. The tip of his nose just barely had the opportunity to dip into the surface of the liquid glass before he was pulled, headfirst, into a distant thought: long-abandoned.
A/N: Let me know what you think! This is my very first post on , though I've been reading stories for years, so be kind. I do, however, like constructive criticism. Thanks folks! More to come next week, and I promise the next one will be longer and have more meat to it.