Harry is in the Great Hall, looking around him, his entire body aching. There is no more fighting, no more screaming, no more flashes blinding him. There is now a horrible silence. The only sound coming from people whispering to each other, or people crying. Crying over the friends or family members that they have lost that night. Friends and family like Fred, Tonks, Lupin… Lupin, the last of Harry's father's friends. The last of The Marauders. Lupin, the new father. Lying there, dead. Next to his wife. Leaving baby Teddy without parents. Leaving him in the same situation as Harry back when he had been a baby. Harry feels sick to his stomach, because this is all his fault. They are dead because of him. If only he had gone to see Voldemort earlier. If only he had found and destroyed the Horcruxes sooner. If only… Harry looks at Mrs. Weasley, who is sitting with Fred, crying, while holding his hand. The rest of the Weasley's, together with Fleur and Hermione are standing around them, also crying, all holding each other. Harry feels sick to his stomach, and he gets up. He looks at Remus and Tonks a final time, and leaves the Great Hall. He sits down in one of the hallways, which is covered in rubble, dust, bricks, blood… Harry breaks down, and he buries his face in his hands. This is all his fault...
But then he hears footsteps, so he quickly grabs his wand, and holds it up. He sees the blond young man, and recognises him, even through his tears. He stands up, and prepares himself to fight. Draco's mother had protected him, she had lied against Voldemort for him, and Harry had hoped that maybe, just maybe, the Malfoys had finally realised just how evil Voldemort really was. But now that Draco has followed him here, when he is on his own… There can be no other reason, other than to try and finish him off. He must be here to finish the job, to avenge Voldemort's death. Every inch of Harry's body is aching, and he knows that he is too weak to fight right now. But he will fight. After tonight, after everyone who has died, everyone he has lost over the last years, he will not go down without a fight.
"Do your best," he says, but then he realises that Draco isn't even carrying a wand.
"I just want to talk, Potter. I'm not here to fight," he says, and it actually takes a few seconds for Harry to realise that he is telling the truth. Harry falls back down onto a piece of the wall that has broken off, too tired, too emotionally broken to hold himself up. Draco sits down on another piece of the wall, and he lets out a deep sigh.
"I am truly sorry," Draco says, but Harry just keeps staring down at his feet. Why? Why would Draco apologise? What is the point?
"I don't care."
"I am though. And I am sorry about your friends. About Lupin, Tonks…"
"You hated them."
"Tonks was my cousin," Draco says, but Harry just laughs, shaking his head. "I did care, Potter. And Sirius…"
"Don't you dare speak about Sirius," Harry says, now looking furious, and he points his wand back up at Draco. "You didn't even know him, so don't you dare!"
"I didn't want any of this," Draco tries, fear in his eyes because of the wand. But Harry can also see that he is telling the truth. So he lowers his wand, and looks down at his feet. "I never wanted to do any of that. But if I wouldn't do it, he would kill me. Or he would kill my parents," Draco explains. Harry looks up, and sees tears in his eyes. He has never seen Draco like this. He has seen him scared, he has seen him angry, but he has never seen him like this, sad, full of regret, pain. He had always felt hate for him, but now he just feels sorry for him.
"Why are you telling me?" he asks, and Draco shrugs, his lip slightly quivering.
"I don't want this, Potter. I don't want any of it. I don't want this fighting, this… I don't…," he tries, but then a tear falls from his eye, and he quickly wipes it away, looking embarrassed. "I don't want this," he repeats, pointing at his arm, to the place of which Harry knows the dark mark must be.
"But why are you telling me?" Harry tries again, and Draco wipes away another tear.
"Because I want you to know the truth. I am not evil, I am not like him," Draco says. "I know the things I've done are awful, but… I don't actually hate you, Potter."
"I don't care," Harry says, all of the sudden feeling the anger building up inside of him. "My friends have all risked their lives, some of them have died. Everyone here, they…," he says, and he gets up. "They stood up to him, they didn't give in to him because they were scared. You're just a coward, Malfoy!" Harry realises that he is shouting, but he can't stop himself. "You could have stood up to him, you could have fought! You could have died!" he shouts, even though he knows that he is being completely unreasonable. Draco has gotten up as well, but he doesn't say anything, he just looks ashamed of himself. "They shouldn't have died," Harry then says, and he breaks down. He knows that he is showing weakness in front of Draco, but he doesn't even care anymore. "They shouldn't have died!" he shouts, and he pushes Draco hard against the chest.
"No, they shouldn't have," Draco agrees, and Harry punches him in the chest again. Draco lets him, and Harry just keeps pushing and punching him, letting it all out, until Draco is standing with his back against the wall. Harry is still punching him, tears streaming down his face. But then Draco puts his hands on the side of Harry's neck, and he presses his lips against Harry's. Harry immediately stops punching, and he steps back, now looking more shocked than angry.
"What was that?" he asks, but Draco just shrugs.
"I just wanted you to calm down."
"And you thought that that would calm me down? What is wrong with you?" Harry asks, and he storms away, leaving Draco standing there on his own.
It has been a few weeks since the Battle of Hogwarts, and nothing has been the same since. Harry had worried about Teddy losing his parents, but that day he hadn't even realised that, because he had been Teddy's godfather, that he would now get full custody of the baby boy. He had moved into 12 Grimmauld Place, and it had needed fixing up. It is going to take time to fix the place up, to make it into a home, but for now it will do. Hermione had figured out how to finally get rid of the painting of Sirius' mother, and some of the posters on Sirius' wall, and she and Luna have been helping Harry to make the house into more of a home. But Hermione is with Ron and the Weasley's most of the time. They are trying to deal with losing Fred, but is has broken all of them. And Luna is helping her father, who has been driven mad by his time in Azkaban. The wizards at St. Mungo's have told her that he will get better, that he just needs some time, but Luna is scared to leave him alone for long times. He tends to go looking for creatures that even Luna has never heard of.
So Harry is on his own most of the time, taking care of the baby boy. Here he is, just a teenager, he has beaten Voldemort… He had expected things to become easier after that, but things are tough. He wants to grieve, he wants to stay in bed and cry, deal with everything that has happened since his eleventh birthday. He wants to deal with losing Sirius, Dumbledore, Dobby, Fred, Tonks, Lupin, Hedwig, Snape even. But he has no time for himself. He may not be Teddy's father, but the day Lupin and Tonks died, he did become a parent. And every single minute of the day, he is taking care of the little boy.
Harry is now sitting on the sofa, the now pink-haired baby boy in his arms, and he is almost falling asleep. All day he has been cleaning the house, and whenever Teddy cried, he had run over to him, scared that someone had come into the house to hurt him. Scared that a Death Eater had come to finish the job. Scared that he wasn't good enough to take care of Teddy. Scared to disappoint Tonks. Scared to disappoint Lupin.
There's a knock on the door, and Harry's head jerks up. He looks down at Teddy, who is looking up at him with now green eyes. But they have been every colour of the rainbow so far. It used to freak Harry out, to find him looking different every time he saw him, but now it is normal to him. Harry gets up, puts Teddy down in the cot in the corner of the room, and goes to answer the door, holding up his wand. Voldemort may have died, but there are still Death Eaters out there, they are still not all caught and put in Azkaban. But when he opens the door, he finds Hermione standing there, looking exhausted. She wraps her arms around him, and he lowers his wand. He returns the hug, and kicks the door shut.
"Oh, it is awful, Harry," Hermione says, and Harry can hear that she is close to tears.
"What is wrong? What happened?"
"Nothing, I'm sorry," she quickly says, and she breaks the hug. "Nothing happened. It's just horrible, to see in how much pain they are. Molly and Arthur, they… And George…," she tries, but then she breaks down in tears, and Harry leads her to the living room, and sits her down on the sofa. He quickly goes over to Teddy to check on him, and sees that he is now sleeping. Harry joins Hermione, and grabs her hand.
"How is Ron?" Harry asks, and Hermione shrugs, tears still falling from her eyes.
"He's trying to stay strong, for his family. But when we're alone, he keeps crying. It doesn't help that his best friend hasn't even been to see him once since it happened," she says, and Harry feels a pang of guilt going through him. "Why weren't you there?"
"Where?"
"At his funeral, Harry."
"I couldn't… I have Teddy, and…"
"So?" Hermione interrupts him, now looking more disappointed than upset. "He is your best friend, Harry, and his brother died. He needs you. Oh god, you're not still blaming yourself, are you? Is that why you're avoiding them?" she asks, and Harry nods, because he knows that there's no point in lying to her. "You have got to stop blaming yourself, Harry. They chose to fight that night. Fred chose to fight."
"If I had gone to see Voldemort sooner…"
"Then he probably still would have died. Do you really think that Voldemort would have left without leaving victims? I know that that's what he said, but… think about it, Harry. This was his big fight, he wanted it to be brutal. Fred still would have died," Hermione tries, but Harry still feels sick with guilt when he thinks about Fred, about the twins, about their family, about Ron…
"No one is blaming you, Harry. They all miss you."
"I can't…," Harry says, and Hermione lets out a sigh and looks over to the cot in the corner of the room.
"So will you be joining all of us tomorrow?"
"What is happening tomorrow?"
"We're going to start cleaning up and rebuilding Hogwarts," Hermione says, and Harry looks over to Teddy, but before he can come up with an excuse, she interrupts him. "He can stay with Molly. She'd love to look after him. It would be great for her to have a distraction."
"But Hermione…"
"Harry, please."
"I'll be there," Harry says, and Hermione flashes a small smile. But he is terrified to go back there, to face the true damage that had been caused that night. To face his friends, who have all lost friends. All because of him.
"Do you want me to take Teddy with me now? Or will you bring him tomorrow morning?"
"I'll bring him," Harry quickly says, because he is not leaving Teddy out of his sight for a full night.
"So we'll see you tomorrow then?"
"Yes," Harry says, and Hermione flashes a small smile before giving him a long hug. She says goodbye, and Apparates back to the Weasley's.
"Hey," Ron says, when he sees Harry Apparating into the grass, carrying Teddy Lupin, and a bag with the baby's things.
"Hey," Harry says, simply not knowing what else to say. Ron comes up to him, and takes the large bag from him. He ruffles the baby's dark hair, and looks down at him, a sad smile on his face.
"He looks like his dad."
"He does, today," Harry adds, and Ron can't help but let out a chuckle. "He ehm… No, Ron, I am sorry."
"I know. Hermione explained to us why you stayed away."
"I'm sorry."
"It's okay," Ron says. "We're good," he adds, and he gives Harry an awkward hug, while trying not to hurt baby Teddy.
