Disclaimer: Don't Own

Disclaimer: Don't Own. Don't Sue.

Summary: These walls hold grief and love, fathomless, too deep for him to see, believe. An untested transportation spell gives Harry the chance to see the homes of James, Lily, Remus, and Sirius before 1981. But Harry isn't quite so practiced in the art of not interfering with the future.

Takes place in Harry's fifth year. Slightly AU.

Author's Note: Oooh, shiny, a chaptered story.

Chapter Summary: In which Harry learns of a new spell, and snoops through his childhood.

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Where The Heart Is

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Part I: In Through a Window

Bright. White. Flashing. Sound. Breathing, and he was lying down, no, standing up, no spinning, spinning like a leaf to the ground, or maybe backwards into the sky, sideways, upside down. Pain, pleasure. Everything was nowhere. Waiting. Lights.

Where…was…he…?

What…was…he…?

And then-

Silence.

Harry Potter sneezed. Once, twice, three times.

That was way worse than floo travel.

What the hell had just happened? He had just been sitting there, in Charms, and he had gotten a letter the other day, from er…Snuffles, saying that the Order was alright, but that he had finally gotten permission to leave, and now he and 'Moony' were traveling together.

There was no mention of what exactly they were doing, or where they were, but he hadn't expected the letter to mention that anyway. And he was relieved also, that Sirius had managed to get away from headquarters. Harry, as well as anyone, knew that Grimmauld place was eating away at his Godfather's soul more than the Dementors ever had - if maybe in a different way.

He had been looking at the letter, which made him wonder what it would have been like to live with Sirius, as he often did these days. And then he was wishing he could have lived with his parents. Wishing they had had the house and the home and life he'd been born to…

Then, aloud, as if trying out the idea, he had mumbled: "I live with my parents, I belong at Lily and James Potter's home.

And then? He was…where?

Aww. Crap. Stupid Hermione and her weird dusty books with confusing spells that didn't make any sense. Damn, damn, damn.

For someone who was so keen on keeping strictly to the rules, and thinking everything through so methodically, she sure was eager enough to throw morals to the wind in the face of research.

"Oh Harry, don't be silly." She'd said, "Look, it's just a sort of transportation spell. I can cast it on you and then, for a certain amount of time, when you think about someplace, you'll appear there. The book wasn't exactly clear on what you're supposed to think of, or how exactly it works, but you can, er, try it out for me"

"So I'm your guinea pig? What if it's dangerous?" Harry'd replied, a bit anxious.

"Come on Harry, that hasn't stopped you from doing anything before. Besides, doesn't it sound useful?"

"And this is different from apparition, how?"

"Well…er…for apparition, you need a wand, and uh…well, the Ministry doesn't have any restrictions on this spell. It'd be good to have the option."

She'd paused, and they both knew what she was thinking. It be good to have a way to escape, like, for instance, if you are ever trapped in a ring of Death Eaters, with Voldemort trying to kill you, again. After that, he hadn't argued.

But now he was really wishing he had stuck with the answer no. He had been thinking about living with his parents. Did that mean he was at wherever his lived before his parents had died?

It was quiet enough to assume he was alone and not under any sort of attack. It was also cool and dry and there wasn't any wind, which meant he was probably inside somewhere. Well, that wasn't too bad. At least he wasn't in much immediate danger. He'd probably be able to get out and then spell himself back to Hogwarts.

Harry opened his eyes.

He wasn't quite sure what he had been expecting. Maybe an old crumbling cottage, or flat, all ruined. A decaying little brick house, perhaps, distant and ruined; lonely on the edge of a neighborhood. The house would, no doubt, be rotting with old peeling wallpaper; empty; desolate.

Whatever he'd thought, he had not been expecting this.

He'd guessed one part correctly, he was inside. But the house wasn't collapsing at all. In fact, it looked to be in pristine condition. Well maybe not pristine. Truth be told, it was a little messy. It looked recently lived in, friendly. Not like the ruins of a murder sight. It looked like a home.

He stood slowly. He appeared to have landed on a hardwood floor; light pine that smelled of rain washed shoes, mops, and spilled milk.

He was in the kitchen. There was a smallish cauldron sitting on the back burner of the stove, and the sink was filled with dirty dishes. A half empty baby bottle sat on the counter. There was a refrigerator, the magical kind, it looked like, and someone had arranged the alphabet magnets on the door to say: "Padfoot was here"

Under that, the letter Q held a to-do list to the door. Harry bent closer to read it.

Things To Do:

Thursday 19/8/81

Pick up eggs

Wash and put out milk bottles

Check on Moony

Retrieve package for Order

Water house plants

Invite Bathilda for goodbye tea on Saturday

This was so strange. He felt as though he was trapped in some alternate dimension. Where had he gone? The most logical answer he could come up with, was that somehow, the house had been preserved perfectly as it was the night he died. As a memorial, maybe?

But that didn't make very much sense. They had been killed on Halloween, he thought. And the date on the to do list was for nearly a week before then.

It was easy to push it out of the way, and to ignore the feelings creeping across the back of his neck, but all of this was starting to tug at his heart in an oddly painful way. Here he was, in his own house. The place where he could have grown up, with all his wishes and dream, everything he'd ever wanted but couldn't touch. His home. But he didn't fit here, and it seemed like a sick joke to play, instead he was just the missing piece that had been chewed up by the dog.

This place was something younger and freer than he ever would be, than he ever was, except, maybe until the day of his parent's death. Harry twitched nervously, rocking from foot to foot, and shook the thoughts away. He might as well look around.

Harry was halfway to the kitchen table, to examine the pile of papers stacked on the slightly scratched surface when suddenly there was someone banging on the front door.

Harry froze. He wasn't supposed to be here. Somehow, someone knew and they were coming for him. He was in so much trouble, students weren't supposed to cast spells on each other, let alone ones with untested results. He was dead, so, so, so dead. Hermione would kill him and then McGonagall would hover up his ashes and feed them to the giant squid. Crap.

"Lily? James? Hulloooo?"

What the hell? Harry's brain supplied him with the logical question.

"It's Bathilda, I've brought over some muffins, had extras. Is anyone there?"

A small voice in the back of Harry's brain was whispering that obviously, the facts proved that James and Lily were not dead. Because neighbors did not bring muffins to dead people. And the weirdly preserved house theory barely held up under observation.

"Hello?" The voice at the door asked one more time. Then it was silent again. Just as Harry figured it was safe to move and determine what the hell was going on, there was more shuffling, and then a newspaper with a note scrawled across the bottom was shoved through the post slot.

Harry stood stalk still for another moment, but Bathilda had begun to hum, and he could hear the sound fading away. He tiptoed to the window next to the door, and twitched aside the curtain until he could just peek through.

A short little old witch was waddling away, down the walk. It was lovely outside, and the sun sprinkled brightly across a small stone path. The grass was green and well kept, and delicate golden end of summer leaves littered the ground, a red painted picket fence lined the edge of the garden. There was a cheery potted rose on the doorstep.

He leaned down to pick up the newspaper.

It was the Daily Prophet. Obviously that morning's paper. Dashed off in long hand over the title was "Come pick up Muffins from B. B,'s house", but below the heading was written the date: Thursday, 19 October 1981.

Somehow, Hermione's experimental spell, had managed to throw him back in time to his house from the past.

He wondered briefly why the spell had chosen this particular date. There was nothing significant about it that he could think.

But then…maybe that was the point? He had asked to see Lily and James' home. Just as that and nothing more. The place he would have grown up in.

A logical part of his brain told he that he needed to go back. That every second he stood about was another second something could go wrong. He didn't even know what was happening back at the school, he'd disappeared in the middle of charms class-people were bound to notice.

But this was such a golden opportunity.

He would just…look around.

Harry started in the living room. It was smallish, and there was one absolutely hideous florally patterned couch pushed against one wall, but the rest of the furniture seemed relatively simple and tasteful. Harry could only assume it had been some sort of joke or gift.

Two potted plants sat in a corner, and an old, worn quilt was lying folded over an armchair. Baby toys were collected into a basket in one corner, but whoever had been in the room last had left a blanket lying on the floor.

Four home-made looking stuffed animals lay out: a shaggy black dog, a grayish brown wolf, a stag with horns that had tiny bells attached, and the smallest, which Harry couldn't help but glare at, was a crocheted rat.

He could imagine himself perfectly. A round little baby, giggling and laughing, green eyes bright with excitement, and it made him wonder, if it was only so easy to imagine because once, he had lived that very life?

He felt so oddly detached, as though he were viewing an old home film of this house, of himself, or looking in through a window on someone else's life. The baby he imagined wasn't him. It was what he would have been, could have been, once was, but no longer.

Instead Harry walked out of the living room, slowly, his head turning as he noticed something here, something there. A barn owl sat on a perch next to the window, his feathers charmed into pink and purple polka dots, blinking golden eyes regally as Harry passed by. The wallpaper looked to be soft tan and olive stripes, but when he squinted, looking closer, he realized that the olive stripes were actually hundreds of miniature stags and does.

There were portraits on the walls, some frames empty, but most softly asleep. Here was an older man who looked nearly identical to him, and woman with slightly graying hair.

They were his grandparents, he realized.

He followed a hallway to a staircase. At the top of the stairs were four doorways. The first was a bathroom, with a red and gold shower curtain. The sink basin was still damp from whoever had used it last, and the toothpaste laid open, minty gel sluggishly oozing out over the counter top.

The next room appeared to be the baby's room. His room - Harry corrected himself, It was his room. The wallpaper was very pale yellow, and printed with tiny zooming golden snitches, and the ceiling had real moving clouds on a spongy blue background. A light wooden crib sat in one corner, and a small, matching wardrobe in another. The whole room had a gentle, warm, milky sort of smell, which Harry had, in his slim experience, come to associate with babies. More toys sat in a basket off to one side, and out on the changing table was a tiny set of midnight blue wizard robes. Harry smiled.

Back out in the hallway, Harry inspected the last two doors. He picked the one on the left, which had an odd hoof-shaped gash in the wood, near the bottom.

Opening the door, he realized it was his parent's bedroom. An unused-looking bassinette sat in one corner. Probably, from when he was to young to sleep in a different room. The carpet was soft and tan, and the wall had been painted a deep, rich red. The bed was unmade, recently slept in, and clothes were strewn across one of the two matching wardrobes.

A blue silk dress had been hung from a bar on the black iron four-poster bed, and folded underneath it was a pair of dress trousers and a button down shirt, all muggle. He leaned closer and realized that there was a note pinned to the dress shirt.

Don't you dare, James. Ruining the clothes will not get us out of going to dinner with my sister. I've already consented to letting Sirius come with Remus to babysit - I can compromise only so much.

A wry grin pulled at Harry's mouth. He could imagine his mother, leaning down across the bed as his father grumbled in the corner, he could see her pinning the note to the shirt, knowing that James would be desperately trying to escape the wrath of his sister-in-law.

The last room was an office. There was a dark wooden secretary desk, open and piled with papers. The walls of the room, though, were incredible. They were covered in hundreds of photographs.

Pictures of Order members and Hogwarts teachers and students, some pictures from something that looked like an auror party, a group of women in medi-witch uniforms smiling, standing in front a sign that read St. Mungo's Department of Dark Related Injuries.

This one showed Dumbledore and McGonagall, Sirius and James laughing and giving them rabbit ears.

That one showed Lily waving, in a bathing suit, holding baby Harry in front of a sign that said 'Welcome to Blackpool.'

The next one showed Peter Pettigrew, trying to out-drink Remus Lupin, who seemed to be downing bottle after bottle of fire-whiskey as though it was nothing more than water.

There were lots of pictures of the four marauders together, some with Lily included. And some of just James and Lily, and some of Peter, and some of Sirius and Professor Lupin, and Harry thought it a little strange, the way they sat in pictures. Like they were more one person together, than two separate people, the same way James and Lily sat for pictures.

There were two that confused him. One was of Professor Lupin. And he was obviously kissing someone, but whomever he was kissing was just out of the picture, and then they pulled him out of the frame. And the other, hanging right next to it was of Sirius, doing almost the same thing. He was kissing someone, just out of the frame, except, unlike the other, instead of being pulled down, he pulled at whomever he was kissing.

Scrawled underneath the one with Remus was, "M + P, Christmas 1980."

It was very odd. Because Harry couldn't imagine his godfather with anyone, and it was even more impossible to imagine Professor Lupin with a girlfriend. Who were the mysterious other people anyway? Why had he never heard of them?

But the next picture Harry noticed made him forget the others immediately; In fact it nearly made him choke. They looked younger, but there was no mistaking Professor Snape, standing next to his mother. They were both smiling and she was hugging him. Another tiny note was scrawled across the bottom. Harry leaned close to look.

"Sev and Lily 1974, and James, don't you dare try to take this down".

Harry coughed uncomfortably and turned to look instead at the papers piled on the desk.

They seemed to be sorted into three of piles. One of ordinary family things, the bill for milk delivery, a receipt from Madam Malkin's, a house deed, birth certificates and marriage certificates, and all sorts of other things.

The next pile all sorts of work for the Order. On top a half finished charm invention, the runes and words trailing across the page in a mad jumble of magic and intricacies, all in Lily Potter's neat squarish handwriting.

The last pile was also Order work, but in James' scrawling hand. The top of the pile seemed to be a partially done report for the arrest of an unknown Death Eater.

It was odd, to see these piles of work, side by side in a room papered in family and friends. But, Harry could see how it would be good to be cocooned in pictures of normality, of joy when dealing with work that centered on the imminent demise of the Wizarding World.

And suddenly, and abruptly, though he had not even been considering it before, he wanted more.

He wanted to stay, and be a part of this life he never had. How hard would it be? All he had to do was say that he had gotten trapped, and that he couldn't go back. And then he would meet his parents, and he could live with them, and he could be happy.

But it was a futile wish, and he knew it. And no matter how much he wanted to. No matter how perfect it would be.

He wouldn't.

To be continued…