Disclaimer: All Harry Potter characters and places and animals and whatever you can think of belongs to J.K. Rowling. I don't own anything, except for the idea, and I don't earn any money with this story.

Author's Note: This story is going to be Canon. It plays after the seventh book, in the years 2013/2014. Apart from that: I'm not a native speaker of English but I do hope that there aren't any severe mistakes (be it grammar or spelling or both) in the text. I am, however, grateful for every feedback.

Have fun reading!

Maia

A little bit like dying

Preliminary notes

"Good morning", you say and look around while feet are scratching over the floor, pages are rustling and many, many curious faces are watching you, full of expectations. Maybe thirty faces, maybe seventy – you've always been bad at estimating and you can only handle numbers as long as they've got something to do with history.

You smile – because that's what one does, after all, because it drives the nervousness away (yours and theirs) and because you feel like smiling. You like to start your lectures with a smile. During the following ninety minutes, your smile will get lost anyway. You're taking your subject too seriously and your students are taking it too seriously as well to be still smiling when you're in the middle of something.

You arrange your notes, not because you have to – you're perfectly prepared, you usually are – but you want to give your audience the opportunity to concentrate on you. The start of a new term is always the same procedure. You know that your students need some time to thoroughly look at you. To share first impressions, after ten seconds. You know that. You used to be a student, too.

"Welcome to the lecture 'Contemporary History'", you start your introduction when there's silence in the room, "In this lecture, we will be dealing with what was called the Second Dark War by our history books. I assume that you already possess some basic knowledge on this subject or that you have at least a huge interest in it – otherwise I can highly recommend the lecture by Professor Bufton."

You can observe the first frightened gazes. You're used to that. You've brought your introductory speech to perfection, it's informative, provocative, brilliant – and most of the time it scares your students.

"When you decided to take this lecture and enroled in it, all of you received the bibliography sent to you by owl post", you continue calmly and pretend not to notice that there's some panicking going on. You have experienced several years of students and so far, there's never been a class that didn't panic during the first lecture when you mentioned the bibliography.

You briefly lift your hands and gesture that there's no need for getting nervous. "Please, Ladies and Gentlemen, this is not supposed to mean that I expect you to have bought and read all of the books on the bibliography", you explain to them and some of your students laugh. Good. You've got everything under control.

"I only expect you", you raise your voice again, "to prepare the material for each lecture. I attached a course programme to the bibliography which tells you when we will be dealing with which text or book during the lecture. I ask you to read the relevant texts carefully because otherwise you won't be able to follow my chain of thoughts. And then there's no reason for you to come to the lecture at all."

There's silence in the auditorium. You're looking at white, young faces which are staring back at you and whose respective owners probably wonder whether you just prematurely kicked those out who won't be able to read the texts in advance of each session.

"May I ask for your help, please?", you smile at them in a friendly way and don't wait for a reaction, "It's sufficient to just raise your hands. Who of you expects this lecture to be dealing with Harry Potter?"

All the hands go up into the air. You see a forest of arms and you nod.

"Thank you. Who of you expects that we will be dealing with the Dark Lord?"

The forest stays. You nod again.

"Thank you. Who of you expects to be hearing something about Albus Dumbledore?"

No one moves. You nod. There's an amused smile, pulling at your lips, but you keep control over them.

"Thank you. Who of you expects to be dealing with Death Eaters?"

Some of the trees of arms haver, probably because it's getting hard to keep the arms up in the air but they all manage to and you nod again.

"Thank you. Who of you expects to be hearing about the Black family? About the suppression of house elves? About ridiculous pranks, played by teenagers at school, which were to forge destiny? About friendships which saved lives and about friendships which killed?"

Some of the trees fall down. You can watch confused faces and you can hear whispering and you nod again.

"Who of you expects to learn something about love and hatred? About guilt and atonement and pride and humbleness? About people who risk their lives for others and about people who died so that others could live? Who of you expects to be gnawing on history in order to come closer to the truth?"

You can feel that they don't know what to do anymore, which of your questions to answer so some of the hands go down and others go up. You nod. And nod.

"Well, who of you is ready for the truth?", you enquire of them, "The truth is like a cat of prey which is wandering around in its cage, which is hissing and bellowing and which doesn't want to be touched. And that is exactly what we will be doing. If you're scared of cats of prey, then you don't belong here. If you're scared to lose the classification of Good and Evil, then I ask you to leave right now. I discuss grey areas."

They stare at you and suck on their quills and you think that they're still children and who on Earth has sent them to you in order to study history, a history that is bloodier and more cruel and more diverse than these children could possibly imagine. Nevertheless, you nod and give them a smile.

"Don't worry", you say, "We will tame the wildcat together."

You clear your throat and look at your notes.

"Any questions so far?"

They haven't had any questions, apart from the usual ones. When is the exam going to be written, what is it going to look like, when are your office hours, are there going to be any study trips – the normal stuff. You're relieved because they made things easy for you – there could have been students who would have wanted to change your whole programme but you were lucky.

(Probably you were so lucky that no one has even read your course programme and that is why there were no complaints. You're used to that.)

Finally in your office, you close the door, sighing, and sit down on your chair – black, comfortable, rotary, best muggle quality combined with magic. Exactly what you need after a long day at university. Calmness, relaxation, intellectual stimulation, correspondence and a mug full of hot, dark, bittersweet chocolate.

Today, there's only correspondence and preparations waiting for you. No calmness, no relaxation, just texts written in tiny, hard to decipher handwriting and owls with clicking beaks.

Nevertheless, you wouldn't want to change your life.

You skim through several pages of parchment, browse letters by colleagues and students of higher grades and put them all away to busy yourself with your file of secondary literature. Although you've developed the bibliography and course programme weeks ago, you still worry during those first days back at uni whether you've chosen the right ones, whether you've done something wrong, whether you should have better -

You shake your head. No, you shouldn't have better done this or that. You chose the texts and memories and interviews and films that fitted best. Definitely.

With an almost tender movement, you try to erase one of the dogs-ears on the parchment that is lying right in front of you. It doesn't really make any difference when you're looking at it but you're feeling better. These texts deserve to be treated with respect, at least in your opinion. They are important contemporary witnesses and you've put a lot of effort into teaching your students this kind of attitude.

They always see only the paper. Those black, printed letters which combine to words and sentences. You know the confused looks of your students after having read the texts; they're the same looks every year, and every year, there's some hope dying in you, hope to meet students who know right from the beginning what you're trying to tell them. Who don't refuse to decipher half-truths even if they have believed them since their childhood.

You think of a girl with a sad, blue gaze, of a boy with a cold, beautiful smile, of a bunch of redheads, of crazy friendships and stray enmity, of love and hatred and of everything in between.

You think of a woman with a mad laughter, of a man with a proud chin, of teenagers who wanted to conquer the world, of a boy with a scar on his forehead, of men who were heroes and of men who became heroes. You think of life and death and of the small, thin line separating them. Two words. Nothing more.

You put the file back into your cupboard, collect some loose pages and wend your way home where hot chocolate will be waiting for you.

tbc.