Title: Deathbed Confession
Pairing: None
Warnings: Character Death
Rating: K+
Word Count: 814
Disclaimer: HP doesn;t belong to me...I wish it did...but it doesn't.
NOtes: written for the hideaway contest.
Colin Creevey arrived at the old house in Godric's Hollow. He knocked on the old, rusted door and looked around him. The house was very old. He looked behind him at the street and took in the dusty atmosphere. Everything seemed dark and bleak, the heavens holding back the sun seemingly as a tribute to the long time hero. Shaking his head to rid himself of unwanted thought, he fidgeted with his bag and felt inside for the reassuring bulge of his camera.
He turned back to the front door, startled at the sight of a person's grim face where the closed door was a moment before. Without words the tall stranger motioned for him to enter the room and led him to another closed door.
"He is inside." And with that, the stranger left him with his fear of what lay beyond that door. He did not think he was ready to see the man he always placed as his hero, lying in the bed about to die.
With shaking hands he touched the doorknob and the door opened. The inside of the room resembled the weather outside. Everything seemed like it had lost its color and in the center of the room laid the Boy-Who-Killed-Voldemort on his deathbed.
He walked inside the room, entranced by the simplicity of it. A sudden loud cough came from the bed, and Colin walked to the end of the bed.
Harry looked old and sick; bags were hanging under his eyes and his racking coughs shook the bed. Harry opened his mouth several times, trying to speak, but interrupted by more hard coughs.
Colin stood by the bed, unmoving, waiting for Harry to speak first. After a long time the coughs died down and Harry finally spoke, "You're here to take my picture, right?"
Colin could only nod. He took out his camera in preparation to take the picture for the Daily Prophet. He started fixing up the stand, but was stopped by Harry's words.
"I am not the hero everything thinks I am, you know. I must get this off my chest. Come here, Creevey." When Colin hesitated Harry added. "Please! This is important." Colin walked over to the bed, and he knelt down beside it. It was a moment before Harry spoke.
"I have a dreadful secret. Everyone who knows about it is already dead. I am the only one left." Harry sounded bitter when he said this. "I am no hero."
Colin tried to interrupt and contradict him, but Harry spoke before he could. "The day of the Final battle. It was Voldemort and I. Voldemort had broken my wand and I cowered. I was so scared of dying I buried myself in a corner."
"You are only human. What's important is that you did kill him."
Harry laughed bitterly, "I whimpered in fear. Voldemort sent the killing curse at me, and I closed my eyes, accepting my fate. Out of no where Ron jumped out, and he took the curse meant for me." Harry tried to go on, but was interrupted by his coughs.
When he stopped coughing, he spoke again. "Voldemort was about to kill me again, but he fell into a crumbled heap, revealing Draco Malfoy. He had saved me and killed Voldemort."
At this point, Colin was convinced that his childhood hero was delusional. Draco Malfoy was convicted of being a Death Eater and for the murder of Ron Weasley. He had been sent to Azkaban and died with in the year.
"Malfoy was a spy for the Order, and the only one who knew was Dumbledore and then me. I was devastated over the death of Ron and angry for acting like a coward. Mad at myself and the things I could not do, I blamed everything on Malfoy and became the hero. I-," Harry suddenly burst into horrible, soul-shaking coughs. Colin waited for the coughs to stop, but they only got worse. The stranger who Colin had met before had rushed into the room.
Creevey had no idea how long the coughing lasted, but he knew when it had stopped that the Boy-Who-Lived had dead. Standing next to Harry's cold form, he barely registered the stranger leave.
His mind raced through everything that he had just been told. He struggled to put together all the pieces in play, and he tried to make sense of what hidden truth he has trodden upon.
Colin looked down at the Boy-Who-Lived, and he could not bring himself to take a picture of his stilled form. Shaking his head he packed up the stand he had set up. Let the lives taken be repaid. Such a secret should never reach the ears of anyone.
He walked out the front door and glanced back at the house. No, no one would ever find out this deathbed secret.