AN: Ah, I have decided to leave my romantic side on the doorstep and to bring out the full-blown effect of angst in me. Well… I'll try, at least. Sorry, all romance seekers out there, this is a land-locked fic, just pure angst and pondering on Harry's part. (But there's the smallest hint of D/H. Blink and you'll miss it.) Apologies to whoever may get offended, and don't flame because of what I did to any of these characters. It's a fanfic, okay?! And I know there are a LOT more fanfics like this out there, involving the twisting of characters… oh, wait, I'll stop here.
Disclaimer: Familiar names belong to JK Rowling. Song belongs to P.O.D. Bless their wonderful hearts. Anything else, like OOC behavior and canon errors, blame me, flame me, praise me, bow to me, send me good songfic ideas… at the press of that cute little button down there. Read the fic first, though.
Dedicated to: Little Suzy and Johnny boy. Also to the Harry Potter characters. Apologies, guys!
Note: I reduced the four-line paragraph to two lines. It's a hard thing to do, you know. Sorry, P.O.D! I still love you!
We Are
Last day of the rest of my life
Walking down the dank, cold streets of lowdown London, the once-famous Harry Potter closed his eyes and brought back all the memories he had kept hidden deep inside. He kept them inside for good reasons, because if her ever brought them back out again, they would destroy him, utterly and completely.
I wish I would've known
Cause I didn't kiss my mama goodbye
But, as he stared grimly around at his seedy environment, he realized that it wouldn't really matter. After all, what else is there to live for, when all your friends are gone, and the only place you ever called "home" was destroyed as well.
I didn't tell her that I loved her and how much I care
Or thank my pops for all the talks
And all the wisdom he shared
Harry sat down on the edge of a dirty, rotted-out park bench, lit a cigarette, and began blowing gray wisps of smoke into the equally gray air surrounding him. He shut his eyes, reaching deep inside for the eluding memory of what happened the last day of school… and the reason why he was all alone on a dark London street with nowhere to go home.
Unaware, I just did what I always do
Everyday, the same routine
Before I skate off to school
"Malfoy…" He whispered, evoking the name of the one who had brought them to this despair. "It all begins with him, bloody fucking Malfoy."
"I was walking down the corridors… running to Charms class." He inhaled the poison into his lungs, the poison that he lived for. "I heard noise up ahead, and thought that it was just another Crabbe and Goyle scuffle. So, I turned around the corner, and then…"
But who knew that this day wasn't like the rest
Instead of taking a test
I took two to the chest
"It was the last fucking thing you'd expect. There he was, Malfoy, waving his wand around, and yelling something… and his eyes… his bloody fucking eyes." Harry continued his whispered monologue, staring down at his hands, shaking ever so slightly.
"His eyes had this… kind of crazed emotion in them. And he was just… killing people left and right."
Call me blind, but I didn't see it coming
Everybody was running
But I couldn't hear nothing
"Malfoy's Avada Kedavras were echoing all around the corridors, people were screaming, everyone was rushing past me, trying to get away… I heard someone shout something like: He finally snapped! Malfoy's bloody snapped!"
"Of course, the good, great Harry Potter couldn't stand all this… could he?" Harry clutched his cloak tighter around himself, huddling into the dingy folds of the too-large coat.
Except gun blasts, it happened so fast
I don't really know this kid
Even though I sit by him in class
"No, bloody fucking Potter… that's me, has to run up to Malfoy, and yell at him to 'fucking stop it already!' Shit, there were bodies everywhere, and I was scared to look at them, at the blank expressions on their faces, I was so fucking afraid I'd see someone I'd recognize…" Harry drew a shaking breath.
"Malfoy looked at me, and then, there was this vague kind of recognition in those gray eyes of his… but then, it all disappeared, and the demented cloud drifted over him again." Harry suddenly pulled the cigarette from his lips and flung it away, a gesture of unexplainable anger. "And then, Malfoy sneered, and he fucking pointed his wand at me…"
Maybe this kid was reaching out for love
"Everyone knows what happened to Malfoy before the beginning of seventh year… his parents fucking disowned him. They left him with an apartment in Hogsmeade, and a small share of the Malfoy account. But still…" His eyes gleamed emerald fire in the half-dark. "They fucking disowned him."
Or maybe for a moment
He forgot who he was
He stared up at the starry sky, which was probably the only part of that dark alley that gave off light that wasn't stolen, or wasn't broken. "I still dream of it. The stench of death, the screaming, the pounding feet, my pounding heart. On my way to get to Malfoy, I stepped on a hand, damnit! A hand!"
"But what really haunts me the most, was that look in his eyes… like he really, finally snapped. Like he wasn't himself. When he pointed his wand at me, the glare spread over his whole face and body… and I knew he wanted my blood."
Or maybe this kid just wanted to be hugged
Harry took off his glasses, which anyone could see, was way too small for him already. "I always pitied him, I guess. What can be worse? Having no parents, or having parents that hate your fucking guts?"
Whatever it was
I know it's because
We are the youth of the nation
"So, Malfoy pointed the wand right between my eyes, with this smirk on his face. The fucking smirk did it for me, like he was just telling another anti-Potter joke, not as if he was actually about to make sure Potter would never be around again for him to laugh at."
We are the youth of the nation
Harry began to cough badly, and he doubled over, eyes screwed shut, glasses on the damp, broken, cobbled ground.
"And then, like he was just saying another boring spell for Charms, he simply said 'Avada Kedavra'. Just. Like. That."
We are the youth of the nation
"I remember pulling out my wand right before that, jumping to the side, and yelling out another spell… the first spell that came to mind." Harry put his head in his hands, shaking uncontrollably. "It was the spell Professor Flitwick was going to test us on that afternoon…" He raised his head, eyes shining with anger, at himself, at Draco, and at the whole damn world.
"How in bloody hell was I supposed to know I had just yelled out the Returnus Charm?"
We are the youth of the nation
Harry closed his eyes, allowed himself one tear. One tear shed for a young man whom Harry had never even liked. "I just watched his dead body keel over, just like that. I didn't even realize what happened until Hermione grabbed me and began to bawl… and when Ron slapped me on the back, without full knowledge of what happened." Harry shook his head. "Do you know what he said? What he fucking said?!" Good one, Harry! You got him good! What did you hit him with? Stupefy, Body-Bind? Come on, don't be shy, what?!
"Ron didn't cry at the funeral. Hermione did, though. I couldn't. I didn't even attend. I couldn't even go to all the other funerals… the ones of the people Malfoy killed. Twenty-three in all."
Little Suzy, she was only twelve
"Hermione… oh god, a whole different story. A story I would never have thought about again… if only I had the choice." His voice caught, his breath choked. "No, the monsters of the past always come back to haunt you… Hermione was just too damn young for that!"
She was given the world
With every chance to excel
"She was so… accomplished. Perfect grades, damnit, she had friends… me, Ron and some girls. Shit, why her?" Harry raised his voice, desperately looking for a way to let out his rage. "Why fucking her?!"
Hang with the boys and hear the stories they tell
She might act kind of proud
"We were so nice to her… and she was so wonderful, bossiness and all. But I think something snapped in her that day Malfoy died. She disappeared after school. Never answered our letters, her new apartment was empty, her parents apparently thought that their beloved only girl died…"
Harry glanced up, eyes sparkling with tears. "She didn't really die, but fi you think of it, she kinda did, in a way."
But no respect for herself
Harry's voice is barely a whisper. Once clear as a bell, once strong, now, it's cracked and weak, wasted on years of nicotine and disuse. He stares up at the sky, and his eyes have changed as well. They've lost their brightness, their sparkle, and sadly, their innocence.
"You know, I saw her again. Once or twice. I don't really know what would be better… living for years without knowing if she was dead or alive, or seeing her again as what she was… as what she is."
She finds love in all the wrong places
"I saw her, as I was walking through the street, looking for a decent place to sleep that night. I saw her, dressed in thigh-high boots, and a fucking skirt cut so short…" Harry trailed off, lost in the painful wondering of how his once best friend had changed so much. "She had her hair straightened, and looking at her, she could have been beautiful… but she was… well, a whore."
The same situations
Just different faces
"She told me how she wanted her life to be. She'd find the perfect man, one who would be charming, handsome, smart, kind and loving. They'd settle down in a cozy nook in Godric's Hollow, have two kids or so, and just basically have a simple, happy life." Harry smiled, ever so faintly. "Ron and I laughed at that… but when I saw her, and when I realized how her dreams must have been crushed into pieces, no one could laugh. No one could laugh."
Changed up her pace since her daddy left her
"Ron told me what happened to her family. Her dad died, apparently. And her mom went off somewhere, thinking Hermione was dead and gone as well. I never told anyone that Hermione was still alive… she probably would have liked it that way, so she could go on selling her soul without us, her memories, coming back and tearing her to pieces."
Too bad he never told her
She deserved much better
"I can't stand it, you know. The thought of Hermione, the girl I had grown up with, the girl I had loved like a sister… every night, sleeping with another arsehole, one after another, giving up her body just so she could feed herself and her kid." Harry snorted. "Yes, she's got a kid. Two, even. I don't know. I saw her once more, and she saw me. She was about to wink at me, when she saw my scar. Fuck, her eyes just went dark, she turned away, and began to walk as fast as she could on those cheap stiletto heels. And to think, I never even told Ron."
Johnny boy always played the fool
"Oh shit… Ron…" He looked up with dull green eyes that had seen more than their fair share of life and its evils. "He was always the comedian… his wisecracks, his sarcastic comments, even his goofy grin… maybe it was his ingenious way of hiding it all inside."
He broke all the rules
So you would think he was cool
"He confessed to me, after Malfoy's little escapade, that he was only breaking rules because I was breaking rules. He was only doing this, because I was doing that." Harry fumbled in his pockets for another cigarette. "He loved me like a brother, willing to give up his life for me… and damnit. How was I supposed to fucking know that that was exactly what he would do?!"
He was never really one of the guys
No matter how hard he tried
Often thought of suicide
"Look, Hermione and I loved him. We tried our best to show him friendship, and we really did get there… we were the best of friends once…" Harry choked on his tears. "But I guess he was some sort of an outcast, what with his perfect brothers, the so-called Hermione-loves-Harry episode…"
It's kind of hard when you ain't got no friends
He put his life to an end
"I read his diary once." Harry stood up and began to pace under the dim starlight, eyes fixed on the ground. "It was full of thoughts on suicide. It fucking freaked me out. I was just sitting there, wondering how could Ron, cheerful, happy-go-lucky Ron actually scrawl down lists of ways to kill himself, and research poisons, deadly plants…" He looked up at the sky, which was turning a dingy sort of gray.
"Then he killed himself. I read his diary again when they gave it to me, and it said that slicing his wrists would probably the last thing he would do… 'too messy' he said." Harry glared at nothing at all. "Tell me, why did he do exactly that, then?!"
They might remember him then
"Thousands of people went to Ron's funeral. I stared at each of then as they threw in a clod of dirt into his grave, and I realized that it was all their bloody fucking fault Ron was in there in the first place… Why couldn't Parvati have paid him more attention? Why couldn't Seamus laughed with him for a while?"
Harry lit another cigarette, only to flick it onto the ground. "Look, I know that these are little things, probably insignificant to you and me… but the little things add up, and maybe… Ron just couldn't take it anymore."
You cross the line and there's no turning back
"I think I was the last one he ever communicated with before he picked up that rusty blade. I had been getting a whole bloody load of letters from his parents telling me that 'their precious Ronniekins had locked himself up in his room and won't come out.' Then I get a letter from him."
"Pure and simple. It was just like Ron, frank and straight to the point."
Harry reached into his pocket, bringing out a tattered piece of paper, obviously read and reread countless times. "Yes, yes, all these years, it never left my side. Like Ron, too, in a sense."
"Harry,
Mum and Dad had probably sent you a whole post-office worth of letters by now. Never mind them, pay attention to this. To me. For the last time.
I'm leaving this all behind. My pain, my loser pose, and for you, probably my jealousy, as well.
By the time you read this line, I'll be lying in a pool of blood on the floor of my room… if I haven't chickened out, of course. But I never chicken out. You should know what. You're my 'best friend'. I guess my so-called courage will be the only thing I can ever be proud of.
Or maybe not. With you standing beside me, maybe I actually had nothing at all to be proud of.
Harry, remember the night you chucked that Potter Stinks badge at me? Just wanted you to know, I kept it.
Goodbye."
Told the world how he felt
With the sound of a gat
Harry crushed the empty cigarette package, hot tears sliding down his cheeks. "Do you know what he did? When the Ministry of Magic forced open his door, they found him, wrists slit… and a fucking scar cut into his forehead. His so-called suicide note had only five words on it… Now I'm just like him."
We are the youth of the nation
"Maybe it was all my fault. I killed Draco. Hermione lost herself because of that. I virtually killed Ron as well." Harry held out his hands in a heartbreaking gesture of despair. "Throw me into Azkaban, then. Or, better yet, get a Dementor to Kiss me."
We are the youth of the nation
"It'll be my first real Kiss then." Harry chuckled grimly.
Who's to blame for the lives that tragedies claim
"I'm all to blame, then? The famous, wonderful, good, great, intelligent Harry Potter, who did nothing in his life but save the world over and over again, reduced to some arsehole living on the streets, convicting himself for the deaths of his friends and classmates."
No matter what you say
It don't take away the pain
He stopped, glaring. "Shut up. Don't comfort me. I'm way past comfort and sweet words! It's all lies, then… I've been living a fucking lie, so what do you expect from me? What else could I expect from other people?"
That I feel inside, I'm tired of all the lies
"Do you want to know what happened to Hogwarts? To that beautiful, strange castle that was my only home? Well, it's gone. Burned down with Dark magic. People tell me it wasn't my fault, but I think the death of his only son, the son he had so easily thrown out, drove Lucius Malfoy to madness. You'd think he'd actually be happy, that fucking bastard. So he calls together a small group of his buddies, and the walk into Hogwarts and throw themselves a little party in the Great Hall."
Don't nobody know why
It's the blind leading the blind
Harry was silent for a while, then his face contorted with tears, and he threw the wrapper on the ground, bursting out "Why does it always have to be my fucking fault?! It's always me, me, me! I defeated Lord Voldemort, I saved the whole fucking world, and I fucking killed my best friends, and virtually burned down my only home!"
I guess that's the way the story goes
Silence. Harry stood there, his chest heaving with all the pent-up anguish that he had concealed throughout his years. His face was marked with tearstains, useless tears, wasted on a boy who had gone mad, and was now dead, finally at peace. Wasted on a young woman, killing herself more and more with every passing 'customer'. Wasted on his best friend, who wanted nothing more than to be like him, but who was now simply a painful memory.
Will it ever make sense
Somebody's got to know
Harry walked over to me, still sitting on the bench, head bowed, hands clasped on my lap. He tentatively reached out and rested a hand on my shoulder, both stiff from the cold. "God, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have lost my temper…" I raised a shaking hand. "It's okay. I'm fine. Harry, thank you…"
"No… thank you… you listened."
"It was okay with me… I'm sorry."
"Don't apologize. It's over and done."
"Is it, Harry?"
"Yes. Look, it's late, and it's dangerous."
"I'm fine… I can manage."
"Well, goodbye, then."
"Yes. Goodbye."
There's got to be more to life than this
He stepped back, suddenly shrinking back to what he was before he stepped onto the road paved with tormenting recollections. He returned to a lonely outcast, another poor man walking the streets. Where had the Potter Boy gone? The Boy Who Lived was no more, he was swallowed up by pain, sorrow, grief and guilt.
There's got to be more to everything
I thought exists
I sat in the seedy alley, waiting for the sun to rise. I sat there, twirled an unlit cigarette between my fingers, and sadly marveled at the tale of that man. The broken, battered Potter boy.
We are the youth of the nation
How one incredibly beaten young man finally lost it all, all he could ever live for, and decided to take it all out on the innocent people he walked with everyday… and losing his own life in the process.
We are the youth of the nation
How one young woman, with so much potential, who could have had the world on the palm of her hand, spirals downward, and finally finds a life, however low, for herself. How she could come home every night to a shoddy room, her body used and pushed, to throw the money on the dirty kitchen table and run upstairs to her self-revulsion and disgust.
We are the youth of the nation
And how one man, his dreams shattered, his faith destroyed, his life like nothing he ever wanted it to be, decided to end it all. How he thought it was his only way out. How he knew the commotion he'd create. How he used to believe in himself. How he used to.
And how he is finally at peace. Unlike the rest of us.
Unlike Harry, who still walks the streets, lifeless without anything to live for.
Unlike Hermione, who commits an act of suicide every night, simply to feed her own children and herself.
Unlike me, who sits on a rotting bench by the grimy light of day, wondering how dreams that were once so beautiful and believable, could be shattered in one final moment.
We are the youth of the nation