Broken Mirror

By Cutting Edge

ooo

I won't go back. Not now. I have to get away. I need to get away. I won't go back.

"Harry?"

Harry started at the sound of his name and looked up from his seat on the bed, hand on his wand, tensed and ready to fight. The sight of a familiar face causes him to relax. Slowly.

"Hello, Arthur."

"Harry!" Arthur Weasley exclaimed again happily, walking into the shabby hotel room. "It's so good to see you! The wizarding world has been in an uproar wondering where you've disappeared off to."

"Have they? I should have figured."

"Of course you should have. You can't just kill Voldemort and not expect people to want to see you. You saved the entire world!"

"Yes, I did, didn't I." he muttered to himself. He stood and walked over to a window that faced the parking lot in back of the muggle hotel he was staying at.

"Harry?" Arthur asked. "Are you alright? You've been missing for days. Molly's been having kittens." He looked around the room they were in. "Why in Merlin's name did you ask me to meet you at a muggle hotel? Why couldn't you have just come to the Ministry?"

"Because Arthur, that would mean going back into the wizarding world and having to face all those people."

"But- but don't you want to see them? They want to see you. All of them. They want to thank you."

Harry sighed as he watched a muggle family getting out of their car. A little girl with pigtails jumped out of the back, laughing as her father caught her and swung her into the air.

"I don't want their thanks Arthur. I don't need more publicity then I already have. If I go back I'll never be left alone. It'll just make it harder."

"What harder?" Harry didn't reply. "Harry?"

Harry turned from the window and looked at Arthur. "You told me before that you would help me if I ever asked for it. Are you still willing too?"

"Of course I am, Harry. I'll do whatever I can but I don't understand what all this is about. What's going on?"

"I need to get away. I need to disappear."

"What? What are you talking about?"

"Arthur, I have to get away from the wizarding world. I want to disappear into the muggle world."

"Harry, you can't do that. You're the Boy-Who-Lived! People are going to try and find you."

"I know. That's why I need your help. You're the Minister of Magic! You can keep the Ministry and all the others off my tail. Pleases Arthur, I can't do this without you."

"Harry, if you would just tell me why."

Harry sighed as he walked back over to the bed and sat down on its edge. Resting his head in his hands he spoke.

"Do you know what it's like to live there? To have to go through every day knowing they're gone. Sirius, Hermione, Neville, Luna and Remus and Ginny. All of them. Do you know what it's like knowing that I killed them?"

"Harry, how many times do you need to be told? You didn't kill them!"

"But I did. They were my friends, Arthur, so they fought and he killed them. If they hadn't been my friends then they would still be alive."

"No, that's not true. They were Order members Harry. All of them. They didn't fight because they were your friends. They fought because they knew it was right."

"Ok, maybe, but still. Why should I stay when they're all gone?

"Why shouldn't you? Do you think disappearing into the muggle world will help? They'll still be gone Harry. It won't help your grief."

"I know that. But it's better then staying and being reminded of them everyday. Its better then having reporters hounding me for interviews, asking me how I am. I want out. The wizarding world has brought me more grief then the muggle world ever did. It may have not been much better but at least I didn't have some mad wizard trying to kill me at every turn. I didn't have to feel guilty about my friends being killed."

"Harry – "

"I lost myself, Arthur. Somewhere along the way, when he killed them. They've always been by my side through this. I don't know who I really am without them. It's like I'm a mirror that's been shattered into a hundred pieces and scattered across the ground. I need to figure out how to put them back together. I can't do that with people hounding my every move." He looked up.

"I'm not going to be gone forever, Arthur. I'll come back."

Arthur sighed as he looked at the man sitting on the bed before him. Should he help him? Should he help the most famous wizard in the world disappear?

"I'll help you. I'll do whatever I can."

"Really?" Harry asked. Green eyes searched Arthur's face as if he didn't believe him.

"Yes, what do I need to do?"

"Not much. I just need you to halt any investigations into where I am. Tell them that I'm fine, that I'm going away for awhile. Tell them that I'll be back though if they won't leave you alone."

"Alright. Will you write me every now and them to let me know you're still alive and not lying on the side of a road in the middle of nowhere?" Harry gave him a small smile.

"I'll do that. Thank you."

"Take care of yourself Harry."

"I will." He shook Arthur's hand. "Give Molly my love."

He grabbed a bag sitting on top of a desk. With a nod and a small pop, he disapparated. Arthur sighed as he looked at his watch. It was getting late. Time to go home.

End