I disclaim to own everything. Something like that.
Harry James Potter tended to be a young man that kept his word. As such, he'd done as instructed by his headmaster during his first year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. He hadn't gone looking for a certain object that had ended up being utilized in a way so brilliant that only Albus Dumbledore himself could have thought it up, at least, he didn't after he was told not to.
No, Harry Potter hadn't gone off in search of the Mirror of Erised at all after that first year. The last time he'd laid eyes upon it had been down in the room with Quirrel and Voldemort, and, to be honest, now that he was in his third year at Hogwarts, the spectactular mirror of desires had become nothing more than a faint, foreign memory, buried somewhere amongst other forgotten details that were no longer of much importance to the thirteen year old wizard.
To be quite honest, the only thing on his mind at the moment was the up and coming Quidditch match against Ravenclaw as he hurried down the empty corridor that night. He was heading for the Gryffindor Common Room, having snuck back into the castle after spending a bit too much time down at Hagrid's Hut, where they'd had themselves some tea and a nice, but bizarre little chat about some new magical creature the half-giant wanted to look for the next time he left the school grounds: something like a harpie, except not a harpie, exactly.
How the conversation had gotten there, Harry couldn't quite recall now, as he'd gone down to see Hagrid in the first place because he was feeling a bit low that he hadn't acquired the necessary permission to go to see Hogsmeade Village with Ron and Hermione. While they were no doubt having a grand old time off together during the day trips there, all on their own in the winter wonderland of a village, Harry was stuck in the dreary castle, having not yet figured a way to get to said village without being caught in the act of trying to. He suspected that Fred and George probably knew a way of doing so, but he had felt initially too bummed by it all to even bother asking.
So instead that evening, Harry had traversed down to the familiar little hut by the Forbidden Forest, hoping to, well, get his hopes up by having Hagrid tell him that Hogsmeade wasn't all that it was cracked up to be; to be told that Ron and Hermione weren't off having a blast all their own, going on veritable dates to places he couldn't imagine. Instead, Hagrid had managed to go on and on for a great bit about just how wonderous and grandiose the village of Hogsmeade really was, particularly mentioning a little pub ran by a woman by the name of Rosmerta, where Hagrid had assured Harry that Ron and Hermione likely spent most of their time there together, sipping on something called Butterbeer.
It had caused a strange twinge of anger and jealousy to spark in the gut of his stomach almost at once when Hagrid began to go into more detail about it all, and by the time his old, half-giant friend had gotten to the part about just how many a couple first got their starts by going off in Third Year to snowy, romantic Hogsmeade, he actually emitted an audible groan, not bothering to withhold his mental-verging-on-physical pain at the thought of it all.
Now that's how the subject of the harpie-yet-not-a-harpie creature discussion had come up; he'd simply desired a change of subject and Hagrid had obliged. Finally, Harry remembered why, but remarkably, he still cared little.
In fact, Harry, by now, didn't particularly care what exactly his friend had been trying to describe at all. Even more so, he was trying his best to care even less about why he was so jealous of the idea of Ron and Hermione spending hours alone over something so silly sounding as Butterbeer. No, he should be far more concerned with not being caught out of his dormitory afterhours - that would be his focal point of worry, if anything at all. Filtch had been having a particularly nasty week with Peeves as it was, and Harry felt quite sure that the Squib wouldn't dare pass up a chance to take out his aggression on one of his least favorite students, should he be caught out of bed so late.
Turning a corner, Harry paused briefly and turned to look behind himself as he thought he heard a sound of possibly approaching footsteps. However, nothing, nor no one, was there, so he continued on walking - until he heard the sound again. Standing stalk-still, flat-backed against the wall, Harry narrowed his eyes behind his glasses as he peered down the other end of the dark corridor, before giving a start as his eyes caught sight of a glint of light coming from a lantern - a lantern carried by none other than Argus Filtch. Just his luck.
Taking off at a running start down the opposite end of the corridor, desperately needing to outrun the shine of the lantern before it would fall upon him and reveal his identity to the schools' caretaker, Harry disregarded the stitches aching in his sides as he ran himself breathless, inwardly cursing at himself for having not brought along the invisibility cloak for his trip to Hagrid's. Finally, just when it felt as if Harry's knees might very well just give in from all the running, there appeared a spot of hope: he noticed a door handle just up ahead.
Reaching said handle in the nick of time, Harry twisted it fiercely, before flinging open the door, diving within the room, and then slamming the door shut tight behind him. After doing so, he paused for a moment, bent forward slightly as he struggled to catch his breath. Once he felt a bit better, he then took off his glasses and wiped them off against the tail end of his shirt, cleaning them so that he could better get a look at the place he now found himself him once he placed them back upon his face.
It was a room unlike any other he'd seen before. There were various things here and there. Piles of text books, ripped up letters, broomsticks, shelves full of knick knacks, various weapons (some of them bloodied a bit, even) and there was an entire wall shelf full of rather obvious transfiguration experimentations gone horribly wrong. Wincing at the sight of a particularly awful dead lizard body with a mouse head, Harry turned away from this particular shelf altogether, before finding himself standing before something all too familiar, indeed, considering the foriegness of all the other objects.
Taking a few steps up closer to the tall object, Harry realized that it didn't seem quite as ominous and forboding as it had done the first few times he'd spied on it as a smaller child. It still possessed a sort of curiously magnetic attraction, though, and so the young wizard walked up even more closely to it. Thinking back vaguely upon how he'd first experienced it, seeing the image of his own young self with both his parents standing at either of his side looking back at him, he gave a faint smile to himself (though it gave him more of a sad appearance than a happy one).
And so, with melancholy thoughts and anxious feelings pulsing through him, Harry took a deep breath and did something he had promised to not do a mere couple of years earlier, which was to go looking for the mirror again. Granted, he'd found it by pure accident, but he was willingly and knowingly about to gaze into it, to see something that would hopefully manage to raise his spirits more than the tea and harpie talk down at Hagrid's had managed not to do.
Now at first upon truly peering into the looking glass, Harry did a double-take, before blinking several times, quickly in succession. Perhaps he'd simply expected to see his parents at either of his sides again, and the fact that he didn't came as a surprise, but there was more to it in either case, for Harry soon felt his body turning warm, as well. He was quite sure that if he was looking into a proper mirror, he'd appear quite flushed.
As it was, this was the Mirror of Erised, and (for whatever the reason - Harry didn't want to delve too deeply into figuring out why at the moment) the image that he looked upon was one of he, himself, only a bit taller, and with a rather pretty looking young woman at his side, her arm hooked around his. Growing only warmer in the face as he continued to stare back at what he saw, Harry watched the projected image of Hermione - a less bookish-looking Hermione; a smoother haired, brighter eyed Hermione - unlink her arm from his, before taking hold of his hand instead, giving it a squeeze as she smiled at him fondly. It was a smile he'd seen her give him before in reality, and it struck a nerve that made his heart seem to skip a beat.
Giving such a start, Harry struggled to swallow down a lump as it developed in his throat as he felt the sensation that someone really was holding his hand take place. It was clear that this mirror still had the same hypnotizing effects as it had had when he was smaller. The only thing, apparently, that had changed, was what his heart currently desired, and if Harry was to be truly honest with himself, he'd likely already known this all along.
However, the young man with the lightning bolt scar didn't feel like being completely true to himself this evening. Not at all. With some effort, he took his eyes off of the Mirror of Erised, and the warm feeling of Hermione's hand holding his disappeared along with the image of it against the glass.
Breathing a bit strangely, Harry felt a twinge of guilt then strike him, amongst the many other things he was feeling at the moment. He'd had an inkling - a tiny one - but an inkling, no less, that Ron and Hermione might have been up to developing something between one another lately. And even if he himself was developing feelings for one of them, as well, he didn't feel up to putting himself in such a place - into such a position. He knew how Ron's mind worked quite well by now. Ron, it seemed, felt cheated by design, regarding just about everything. If Hermione was going to keep spending a lot of her free time with Ron, then Harry wouldn't be the one to become a threat to it.
Feeling a strong urge to glance just once more at the phantasmic mirror, Harry ultimately fought it off, turning and marching right back for the door through which he came, slowly creeping outside and peering about to make sure that Filtch wasn't there, before leaving the room altogether, closing the door behind himself quietly as he went.
Moving along more quietly and calmly now toward the portrait of the Fat Lady, Harry couldn't help but to repeatedly recall the image he'd just laid his eyes upon moments beforehand. The beauty of her face - the charm of her smile - her small hand within his - fingers intertwined - the smile on his own face…
Harry felt quite sure that he'd never be able to forget it, but that he would, at least, be able to keep it to himself.