Kissing the Angel
Harry Potter laid on his bed in Gryffindor tower, curtains tightly closed and spelled against hearing anyone or anyone hearing him. He wasn't making noise, apart from the occasional scream of agony muffled unnecessarily into his pillow. But even those releases of emotions didn't help.
Sirius was dead. His godfather, his one chance at escaping the Dursley's forever, was dead. Your fault, the mantra played over and over in his head. Your fault. No matter how many people tried to tell him otherwise, he could not escape the guilt, the accusations, that came from inside himself.
He remembered Sirius's voice during the battle at the Department of Mysteries. His mistake at calling Harry by his father's name. Thinking that he was the same wizard he had been before Azkaban, thinking that it had not been years since he'd been in a real duel. He'd been kissing the Angel of Death the entire battle, and the Angel finally took him.
Harry punched the pillow as hard as he could. Why wouldn't the Angel take him? He was so ready to go. He'd lost everything, or would. The prophecy told it all – if he didn't win, no one else could, and everything would be his fault. Translated, everything that happened in the war was his fault, because no one else could win.
He wanted to meet the Angel. No longer was he satisfied with just a kiss from the Angel, he wanted to feel Death's cold embrace. But he couldn't bring himself to force the Angel's visit. That would be more like a jerk into the world beyond this one. Besides, dying on purpose would just heap more guilt on him, because it would be forcing the world into eternal darkness.
Not even in the thought of death could Harry find peace. Harry had given up on peace. He didn't deserve it.