Disclaimer: This counts for the entire story. I do not own Harry Potter or any of the concepts or characters involved.

Author's Note: I know, I know I should be writing my other story... I haven't updated it in ages... but this one was just kicking around in my head begging to be let out. So here it is. Hopefully, I will update this one more frequently. Someday I'll work on the other one.

One Harry's Mistake

Harry Potter, of 23 Godric's Hollow, awoke feeling a sense of immense accomplishment. It was July 31st and he had finally turned seventeen years old, was finally able to do magic outside of school. It's really a wonder I made it this far, he thought to himself from the depths of his feather mattress, after all times I've ended up in the Hospital Wing. Well, that's what being the school's best Seeker will do to you…He lazily recounted the dozens of, in the words of his mother, suicidal and idiotic Quidditch stunts he had performed over the years. He had never missed a match and still remained undefeated. Glancing at the clock on his bedside table which read 9:17, he decided it was finally time to grace the world with his presence, and pulled back the covers, hopping out of bed.

After showering in the adjoining bathroom, which he shared with his two younger siblings, and dressing, he was about to mosey downstairs when he reminded himself that he could now do magic. Grinning, he checked his hair one last time, to make sure it was sufficiently messy, and Apparated directly into the dining room.

"Sleeping Beauty has finally joined the land of the living!" were the only words of warning Harry received before being tackled by two children and three grown men acting like children. It was going to be a fantastic day, he could tell.

***

Despite the war and Voldemort, Harry's seventeenth birthday party was going to be a huge event. He had been anticipating it for nearly his entire life and knew that his parents would never allow it to be a failure. The house was sparkling, the food was steaming, the drinks poured, the music blaring, the guests arriving… nothing could go wrong. And nothing did go wrong. Except, as he realized the next afternoon when he awoke, drinking nine and a half bottles of firewhiskey in a span of less than five hours was not the brightest idea.

Harry opened his eyes at approximately three in the afternoon on August first. The first words out of his mouth were extremely unintelligible, but if anyone had been in his bedroom, which no one besides he was, the meaning would have gotten across: his head felt as if it were about to explode. He vomited promptly.

Feeling not a millimeter closer to comfort, Harry tried to generate an excuse to give his parents, but soon realized that a splitting headache would not allow for any such brainstorming. After all the times I've charmed my way out of detention, you'd think I'd be able to think of something… they definitely won't fall for food poisoning or being pranked by Sirius or hitting my head or having a disease or… or… or… The king of evading punishment seemed to have used up all his luck. There was simply no way he could convince them that he did not have a hangover and that he had not drunk and unreasonable amount of alcoholic beverage. Harry resigned himself to a fate of grounding for the rest of the summer holidays and lurched out of bed, deciding he might as well see if either of his parents would help him get rid of his headache. Which neither of them probably would, but anything was better than sitting in bed feeling awful. This did not prove to be true when he staggered across his room and tripped over a pile of gifts, and landing facedown on what he soon recognized as his savior.

It was a brightly colored book with the moving picture of a dashing young man on its cover, titled The 237 Most Handy Spells Any Young Wizard Could Want. Ron, Dean, Seamus, and Neville had given it to him the night before. Of course, Neville was not actually present, since being the Boy Who Lived, especially in such dangerous times, required high security. Harry had been highly perplexed by the gift ("Bloody hell, why'd you get me a book?!" had been his slightly drunken response), but had eaten his words after glancing at the first few pages.

Harry flipped through the index, looking for a spell to rid him of his tell-tale symptoms. Finally, between Hair Hysteria and Hygiene Hints, he found Hangover Help. He turned to page eighty-four and briefly looked over the wand movement before rummaging around for his wand. Perhaps it was the headache, perhaps his nervousness at his misbehavior being discovered, but either way, Harry neglected to review the pronunciation of the spell before rummaging around for his wand, a mistake he came to bitterly rue. After finding the misplaced eleven-inch, holly and phoenix feather object, he pointed it at his head, waved it in a complicated fashion, and murmured, "Corporis Absendo."

Nothing happened.

The headache remained, worse if anything. Harry's frustration level rose and he turned back to page eighty-four, checking pronunciation and discovering that the spell was really Crapula Abscendo. He recast it and at long last felt relief he sought. Harry once again Apparated downstairs, explaining to his rather disbelieving parents that he had just been very, very tired. Luckily, Lily and James asked no questions, and Harry proceeded to dine on leftover sandwiches before hurrying outside to try his newly repaired Firebolt. It had been extensively injured in the last Quidditch game of the year by Slytherins who could not contain their anger at losing to Gryffindor, and especially to its cocky Seeker, for the umpteenth time.

After flying for a few hours, in an attempt to burn off any unwanted calories from the previous evening's festivities and therefore retain attractiveness, Harry's headache began to return with gusto. This time it felt akin to the time he had taken a Bludger to the head during a Slytherin game, and kept playing, until making the choice to jump off his broom to get the Snitch, which he had succeeded in doing, but also ended up landing head-first on the ground. (He had remained in the Hospital Wing for weeks, but at least they had won.) As the pain began to build and became unbearable, Harry also had an instinctual and unexplainable feeling that sleep would be the only remedy. He landed, dismounted, put his broom away, and rushed inside, up the stairs, and too his room, forgetting entirely that he could have just Apparated. Harry collapsed onto his feather mattress, falling instantly asleep.

Harry Potter, no longer of 4 Privet Drive, was having an absolutely wretched day. By no means was it the worst day of his life, but it was up there with the day he had accidentally blown up Aunt Marge (although that part had been fun) and had subsequently thought he would be sent to Azkaban. On top of Bill and Fleur's wedding having been rudely interrupted, the unexplainable encounter with Death Eaters in the Muggle world, the necessity of the painful return to 12 Grimmauld Place, the terrifying spells they came across on entry, and the worry over what was going on at the Burrow, Harry had a splitting headache. His scar was burning… burning more fiercely than it ever had.

The pain in his scar was reaching a peak, stabbing at him as it had done many times before. Faintly he heard Hermione and Ron discussing where to sleep, but could not fight the pain much longer. He had to succumb.

"Bathroom," he muttered, and he left the room as fast as he could without running.

He barely made it: bolting the door behind him with trembling hands, he grasped his pounding head and fell to the floor, then in an explosion of agony, he felt the rage that did not belong to him…

Once the vision had passed he found himself spread-eagled on the cold black marble floor, his nose inches from one of the silver serpent tails that supported the large bathtub. But the pain was not gone. In fact, it had worsened, and Harry felt a sort of headache he had never felt before. He was a headache veteran and had experienced just about every headache in the book, due to all of the dangerous situations he had been in, but had never experienced a headache just like this. It was a sort of extreme, all-consuming torture which he felt throughout his entire head, not just near his scar. He hardly managed to pull himself off the floor, and did not even hear Hermione knocking to ask if he needed his toothbrush.

Harry pulled the door open, gasped something about exhaustion from the day's events, and stumbled into the drawing room. He barely succeeded in getting into his sleeping bag before losing consciousness.

More Author's Note: The spells are completely bogus. I looked up some Latin words on a free online translator. "Corporis Absendo" translates roughly as "leave body" and "Crapula Absendo" as "drunkenness go away." I quoted a bit from Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows in the second part, with Harry, Ron, and Hermione at 12 Grimmauld Place. I don't plan on doing so again in the story.
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