Neville Longbottom sat at the Gryffindor table running his fingers over the Drooble's Best Blowing Gum wrapper he usually kept in his pocket. He had already memorized its every crease and every tear just like he had with the others that he kept hidden in a jar in the bottom of his trunk in the dormitory he shared with Harry, Ron, Seamus, and Dean. He had never told his friends about his parents; scared that they would make fun of him for having loonies in the family or that they would give him that look. The look the teachers gave him whenever they thought he wasn't looking or the look that Harry, Ron, and Hermione gave him when Neville's mother Alice gave him the candy wrapper he was holding now. Pity, sympathy, compassion, but never understanding.
Neville bent his head over the table, his facing screwing up with tears for his parents that were the best aurors the Ministry ever had and now they had to share a room with Gilderoy Lockhart and not even know themselves. He had tears for his gram who was always so strong and took the looks head on but who he heard crying at night when the tears kept him up as well. He had tears for himself because he would never know the feeling of looking into his mother's eyes and seeing unadulterated love and pride. And finally, he had tears for this little candy wrapper. A candy wrapper that was so small and inconsequential to others, held his whole world in its every little wrinkle and slight rips.
The boy who could have lived but didn't; the boy who could have been the chosen one but wasn't, Neville knew all of that. He laughed drily. The funny thing was that in the end, Neville hadn't ended up any better than Harry, worse actually. While Harry didn't even know who his parents were, just that they were dead and died for him, Neville knew that his parents were alive, but that didn't matter, they were as far away as Harry's. Neville could look at them and try and make himself believe that they recognized him this time, but they never did. They were in a realm all by themselves, untouchable by anyone else.
He carefully folded up the wrapper and held it in his hand, one tear sliding down his cheek. He whispered, far too low for anyone to hear, "I love you, Mum. Even though you don't know who I am. I love you."