Settled on James's bed, Harry opens the book and reads the chapter's title: "The Pool of Tears." Bloody brilliant. It's like fate knows what his plans are as soon as the children fall asleep. Hopefully he can get them all out before Ginny gets home and then can push all his feelings back down long enough to get through the brief waiting for him on his bedside table.

He's partway through the chapter, and James and Lily have already fallen asleep. Lightweights Harry thinks, shaking his head. "Who am I then? Tell me that first, and then, if I like being that person, I'll come up: if not, I'll stay down here till I'm somebody else – but, oh dear!" Albus grips Harry's sleeve and pulls.

Harry looks down, stopping a moment. Al nods furiously. "That's it!" he says, and looks back at the book. "Where are the words?"

Harry wrinkles his forehead and points at where he's at on the page. Albus studies the words so hard it looks like his face is straining, trying to make sense of the jumbled letters on the page so he can devour them. It's wonderful to see Albus so enthusiastic about the story, about anything. He's been too apathetic for a four year old. "Ready for me to read some more?" Al nods, not looking away from the page.

Harry continues telling Alice's tale of shrinking down to the point where she's swimming in her own tears and attempting to make friends with a mouse.

After finishing the chapter, Albus is pensive. "It's good that she's not alone anymore," he says. Then looks up at Harry. "One more chapter?"

His eyes are so earnest, but Harry really must get all his adult shit worked out. "Tomorrow night, little man."

Albus scrunches up his face and pouts.

"Hey, if we read all the chapters then the book will be over and we'll have to read something else. It's better to draw it out and really enjoy it, right?"

Al considers this and sighs. He climbs off James's bed and nods. "Okay, Dad."

Harry tucks him in, kisses him goodnight and puts out the light, then carries Lily to her room. He then fills the bath and sinks into it, his own tears feeding the tub, making him feel as foolish as Alice in the story for falling into and nearly drowning in his own tears. The idea that he's relating to a children's story lights a small flame of hilarity inside him. "Oh, Potter. You've really lost the plot, haven't you?"

XxxX

He's asleep; he's got to be asleep. There's no other explanation for how he's got to this point – stripped bare, covered in slick sweat, oil, musk – surrounded by men, equally naked, faceless; yes, that proves it's a dream, but it feels like heaven. There's a man on either side of him, one wrapped around each leg, rubbing their erections against his oily thighs; their chests puffed up with muscles, pushing against him like he is the filling to their sandwich, and when he looks down, his cock, full and thick, slips in and out of another man's mouth. The man's lips are taut, his throat relaxed, taking it all the way to the back and looking up, meeting Harry's eyes with eyes that are shockingly grey. Come bursts from his cock, feeding the man's throat; he pulls back, and paints the man's face with another spurt and then another. He rubs his cockhead through the mess, spreading it over swollen lips, shuddering, gasping.

His eyes fly open. They meet darkness. He's in bed; he's gasping, panting to catch his breath and Ginny's chuckling beside him as he realises he fucking came in his sleep. And Ginny witnessed it, and it was incredible, and very much not a dream about her. He cheated on her in his dreams – again.

Humiliation washes over his skin as he swears, pulling back the sheets to assess the damage, memories of past discovered wet dreams earning him a week in his cupboard flooding his mind.

Ginny must sense his mortification. "Hey, it's all right. Let me take care of it." She gets up, fetches new sheets, swaps them for the others using her wand and some fancy charm work. She crawls back in bed and cuddles up beside him. He's clean and dry and as wrung out as a wash rag.

"It's okay, Harry. It's been a while."

Oh god, must she remind him of how long it's been? Hasn't he suffered enough? But then, the guilt brings perspective. It's been just as long for her. She's wrapped up alongside him, clinging to him; these are signs she wants sex.

"I can't get it up again," he admits.

Her thighs tighten around his leg, her groin hot and damp. "Would you be willing to help me out? I have a rubber cock you can use instead. Just help me get to where you are?

A rubber cock! Harry swallows, arousal stirring inside him again, practically against his will, but fuck. He nods. She kisses him and Summons the dildo from her drawer, puts it in his hand. A shudder runs up his arm. It's not the same as the real deal, obviously, but it's cock shaped and flesh coloured, and has a hefty set of rubber bollocks to hold onto. He wonders how it would feel to rub it against his own hardened cock – to penetrate his arse – though he imagines that would hurt, but fuck it all that he wants to do it anyway.

A quiet plea from Ginny draws him back to the present. She needs this now, needs to orgasm, to have her husband show her she's as important to him as his own needs. He shakes himself, and smiles as Ginny rubs her clit, her legs trembling. He loves her. He wants to please her, doesn't want to disappoint or to hurt her.

He touches her cunt with the rubber tip, watching her shudder and buck her hips forward, begging for more contact. He runs it up and down, and then zeroes in, and pushes it inside an inch.

"Yeah … like that. Deeper," Ginny calls, her right hand rubs her clit in bursts of frenzied circles and slower strokes, while she pinches her nipples and squeezes her breasts. First one, then the other, her breath hitching as he pushes forward and draws back, changing the angle, watching her reaction. "Right there! Fuck! Keep it there, but pound it!"

The sweet smell of sex, arousal, and the sounds of her desperate rise to orgasm begin to get him hard again. It's not the same as it was in his dream – the masculine builds and drives, the power dynamic that sends his mind soaring – but arousal is contagious and if he were in his old headspace of going through the motions and paying no mind to what he could be if he let himself, he'd fuck her with his own cock. He pushes in and out, finding the rhythm she needs, feeling the slick sweat building behind her knee as he uses her leg to leverage himself, and knows, just fucking knows he's going to hurt her one way or another. Better to notget off on that.

Ginny's legs tighten as she bucks her hips and comes, nearly sobbing with relief and pleasure, and he's happy he could give her that much, even though really all he did is man the dildo. She brought herself off. He pulls it out, runs his hands over the outsides of her thighs and up over her hips. "Feel good?"

Ginny laughs. It's a real laugh. "Fucking brilliant." And for some reason, hearing that feels like a hammer has driven another nail into his coffin. He can't live like this anymore. Can't keep lying.

He says nothing, realising too late that Ginny's moved on, taken the dildo from him, used the loo, and come back to bed while he'd stared off into space.

"You're so far away, Harry." Ginny's voice is little more than a whisper in the dark. "Where are you right now?"

Hating himself further, he covers their bed with another lie. She's just had a brilliant orgasm, it would be cruel to tear her to pieces right now. "There's a sting happening tomorrow at work. Dangerous people. I'm … I'm sort of scared." His lie is heavy in his heart. He's longing for tomorrow to come, for the danger to take over, to rely on his instincts, to face evil head on and take his mind far away from the things he needs to address.

She buys it, and pulls him down beside her, then spoons up around his back, holding him close. The comfort she offers is genuine, as is her love for him, and he can't even tell her the truth. He closes his eyes tight, ignoring the tears leaking from the corners.

"Get down!" Cormac's voice breaks through the ringing in his ears, the atmospheric curse smoke filling the warehouse.

Harry flattens himself against the concrete floor, breathes the sulphuric air through tight lungs. It's quiet. If he could only manage to crawl to the other side of the stack of crates he's hidden behind, he could send his Patronus to Kingsley for backup. He mentally curses himself for not being prepared. He usually triple checks his backup is standing ready before even setting out on assignment, but this morning his mind was in a fog of self-loathing. He deliberately sabotaged the sting by not performing the check and not encouraging McLaggen to ask, instead distracting him with small talk about his poker game. Instead of his life flashing before his eyes, his mind spins through each and every one of his failures.

There's a shout from the Potions dealers, followed by another volley of Curses. There's no time to think about the past. He's got to survive today and he can deal with thinking afterwards. Harry gets to his knees and jump-rolls to the opposite side of the crates, his wand in hand. "Expecto Patronum!" he shouts. Nothing happens, not even a wisp of vapour. He stares dumbly at his wand, realising too late that he's exposed on his left side.

A red Curse blasts towards him and he freezes. Time slows down. He closes his eyes, makes his peace, welcomes the end of his life. And then he's knocked aside by a brute force, far too solid for a Curse. His arm burns with a searing pain, and his head strikes the tower of crates. The world goes dark.

XxxX

When he opens his eyes again, his vision is blurry and the scent of eucalyptus assaults his nose and throat. He knows where he is, closes his eyes again, and wishes he was still passed out.

"Potter!" Kingsley's deep voice is gruff and jarring, nothing like his usual tone.

He cringes, but opens his eyes. There's no sense in feigning sleep when the Minister for Magic is breathing down his neck. "Hey," he croaks, swallows. Damn smoke must have singed his throat. He'd kill for a glass of water.

"What are you playing at?" Kingsley demands, suddenly looming over him, a formidable dark shadow, blurred by his poor eyesight. "McLaggen only just managed to knock you out of the way of the Curse that could have killed you! And you gave away your position! If he wasn't built like a bloody ox, you'd both be dead, and I'd be left to carry the news to your grieving families and the whole wizarding world!"

Harry grimaces. He's got no excuse. If that had happened … Ginny, the children … His heart speeds up; he's hyperventilating. Spots fly in his vision. "I didn't …" He can't make anymore words come out. He's having a heart attack; that's got to be what this is.

Kingsley seems to realise he's not all right. His tone changes. His hand is warm and heavy on Harry's shoulder. "Breathe it out, nice and slow. You're still in shock – I didn't realise." Harry struggles to slow his breathing, forcing long blows out, even as his lungs attempt to fill themselves against his efforts. Can I get a Healer in here? is the last thing he hears, succumbing again to darkness.

XxxX

"Harry?"

Ginny's voice. Something cool and damp brushes his lightning bolt scar, sends a jolt of cold through his head, shocks his brain back into awareness.

He lifts his hand and stops her, holding onto her wrist. He opens his eyes. There's no more physical pain; the Healers have done their jobs well again. He doesn't want to lift the floodgates to his emotions right now. He's not strong enough.

"I'm sorry," he whispers, moistens his lips with his tongue, though even his tongue is dry. "Water?"

He groans as he sits up, but it's not real discomfort. He feels as limber as ever, just utterly spent.

Ginny hands him a glass of water and remains silent while he drinks. He can practically hear her thinking, her brain working hard.

More guilt. She wouldn't be this tightly wound if he'd been honest, if he'd said something ever, dropped any hints. He swallows. She's just heard the news her husband nearly got himself and his partner killed; now's not a good time to tell her he thinks they're not working, that they've been living in a jury-rigged marriage these past six years. He finishes the water and now has to piss something fierce.

"You're on administrative leave, Harry," Ginny says finally. "Kingsley told me before he left. After whatever investigation they do to wrap that up, he's putting you on a mandatory personal leave to get your head on straight."

Harry's stomach drops. He should have expected it, but hearing it is a whole other experience. He nods. "Okay."

"What were you thinking?" she says, then stops. She knows this sort of questioning backfires with him; it chases him further away until she backs off and he doesn't feel he's being attacked.

He sighs. He hates that she has got to the point that she checks her fierceness – her bright and independent personality – so as not to chase him away. How can he have let it come to this, to burning so hot and cold that she alters herself to reach him, and he doesn't even bother to try to meet her halfway?

"I wasn't," he lies. Another plaster on top of a dozen others, while the wound underneath festers from lack of air. "I'll talk to Rolf about it." That is a truth. It feels like magic in his mouth. He clings to it, hoping Rolf will provide the answer – a way out of the hole he's dug for himself – with as little reciprocal damage as possible.

She nods. "The children are at the Burrow. They're anxious. Albus, especially …" His heart, which he'd thought was squeezed dry, aches and bleeds all over again. Heat floods his body. What the fuck was he thinking? "They'll be happy to see you again, and to have you home for a while."

Harry nods, then blinks. His eyes are wet.

"I love you," she says at the same time he sticks salt in the wound and says, "I need to piss."

She shakes her head at him, though she's smiling. Thank fuck she has a sense of humour. She's too good a person to be with him. He wishes he could tell her that and not have her hate him.

"Go on." She stands up, swinging her hair out of the way so it lies flat down her back. "I'll get your clothes ready. The Healers have cleared you to come home."

XxxX

Harry sips his coffee and fiddles with a toast triangle.

The children make a mess at their small play table, sloshing milk and cereal over their bowls and drawing faces and shapes in the spills. Albus looks up at him and meets his eyes. His disappointment in not having had a chapter read to him last night hangs unspoken in his gaze.

Harry gives in under it. "How about we read a chapter before my appointment?"

Al jumps up so quickly he unseats himself and sends his bowl of cereal spinning across the kitchen floor. Harry can't help but smile. There aren't any tears this time or self reproach. Al's so fixated on getting the book, he runs out of the room leaving milky footprints down the hall.

Harry points his wand and Vanishes the mess with a quick wave. He loves magic. If only all his problems could be solved so easily.

Albus returns with the book a minute later and Harry scoops him up despite his frequent protests he's too big to be carried. He's not complaining now; he's grinning. "You two want to listen to the story, too?"

James and Lily wipe their hands on their laps and follow him and Albus, Lily hanging onto James's hand, down the hall to the living room.

Harry opens the book to chapter three and begins reading. "A Caucus Race and a Long Tale." The chapter is about Alice attempting to make sense of the strange new world she's found herself in, and, unfortunately, none of the rules she's learned to live by seem to apply here. She's left feeling lost.

By the time he finishes the chapter, Lily and James have scarpered, leaving him with Al on the sofa.

Albus looks up at him, confused. "I don't get it."

Harry shrugs. "I think it's just showing how unpredictable all the creatures in Wonderland can be. And Alice is trying to figure out how to make friends and get along with them, but she doesn't know their rules, so she says the wrong things and they get upset and leave."

Al quirks his head to the side, considering. He's really too young to understand this book, but Harry can't help but love to see him try. "I do that sometimes."

"What?" Harry presses. "What do you say that makes people upset?"

Al shrugs and sighs. He's wearing his frown again. "Everything." He closes the book and carries it out of the room, leaving Harry staring after him. What was that all about? Harry is the king of putting his foot in his mouth, and he's had a lifetime of practice learning how not to do it, but Al is so young, so innocent still. Has he passed on his affliction through his genes? Turned his son into a hot mess without meaning to?

Ginny slams the front door, coming in from an early morning interview. Her arms are full of groceries. "Shit!" she swears, then sees Harry. "Sorry 'bout that. Didn't mean to slam the door."

Harry jumps up and relieves her of her burden. He carries the groceries into the kitchen while she chatters at him about work. He's not listening. It's not that he's trying to be obtuse, but the more he tries to focus on what she's saying, the more his mind wanders, and he can't make any sense of it.

"You're not hearing a word I'm saying," Ginny says, though she's smiling.

Harry shakes his head side to side, like he's trying to clear water from his ears. "I think I've got a case of Wrackspurts."

She laughs. "Yeah, I've heard that one before. You'd best get dressed and be on your way. Your appointment's in half an hour."

Shit. Time flies. He kisses her quickly when she puckers her lips at him, and then she slaps his arse as he hurries out of the room. If she only knew what was on the discussion table with Rolf, she'd not be so playful. He represses a shiver and decides not to think about it until he has to – he looks at the clock – in twenty minutes.

XxxX

Rolf is as wonderful as ever when Harry stumbles into his office a few minutes late. He gestures to the sofa, a teapot waiting on the coffee table.

Harry sinks onto the pink cushioned sofa and Rolf takes a seat in his wheeled chair, scoots over to his desk, pulls a stack of handkerchiefs from a drawer and rolls back over, setting them on the table within easy reach, somehow without making Harry feel worse. How does he do that? He's grateful and blinks back the prickling in his eyes, not quite ready to let it go, but the gesture has his emotions primed and ready to pour out.

"I wasn't expecting to see you back so soon," Rolf says, watching as Harry takes his tea, doctoring it with a bit of milk and sugar cubes. He's in the mood for something sweet to counteract the bitter taste in his mouth. "Ginny arranged this appointment for you, but I want you to know that she didn't ask any questions about what we talk about. It's still a safe place to say all you need to, and everything we discuss will remain confidential unless you give permission otherwise."

Harry nods. He doesn't really need the reassurance; he's never suspected Rolf would break confidentiality, but it's nice to be reminded that he's got an ally or, at least, an objective ear. "Okay. I don't know where to start. Can you ask me a couple questions first, and I'll answer, see if that gets me talking?"

Rolf holds his teacup and saucer on top of his belly. He's reclining in his chair, and the crazy hairdo and goatee, with his small round glasses pinched on the end of his nose, make Harry think of a badger. He almost asks which house Rolf was sorted in at Hogwarts, but realises that's stalling and would waste their time.

"All right." Rolf sips from his cup. "According to your wife, you're on leave because you almost got yourself killed. Was this a deliberate act, Harry?"

Oh shit. He'd not planned on being called out so early. He has to set his tea down to arm himself with a handkerchief. He never used to be such a bucket of tears, but then, he's never really let himself feel like he has the past few days. Tamping it down doesn't seem to work any more.

The tears start to fall. He thinks about how miserable he's been, senselessly so, how hurt his family was from his foolishness, how much more hurt they'd be if he'd died. "Sort of," he manages, and then can't manage anything else for a few minutes.

Rolf waits patiently.

Harry looks up at last and meets the kindly blue eyes. "I'm a fraud." More tears fall.

"Tell me about it," Rolf says when it's clear he needs prodding.

Harry doesn't know what's happening; it feels like his head's caught in a whirlwind. His answer to Rolf comes out in a hoarse whisper he can't even hear over the roaring in his ears. "I'm gay."

But the minute the words are out of his mouth it's as if a hundred pounds he'd not been aware of carrying vanish all at once. The light sensation floods his body – from his scalp, down his torso, into his fingers and toes – and he feels like he's just lit up like a Christmas tree in the dark. And then, his stomach bottoms out and dread threatens to sink him again.

Rolf clears his throat. "There's nothing wrong with being gay, Harry. I think you're starting to realise that. Admitting it aloud after repressing it for years can manifest as a rather shocking sensation, almost like walking through a ghost, but don't let your past fears be shackles anymore. Let them go. Tell me more. You can put them back on later if you need them. Now, though, here – this is the place where they can come off."

It's like magic. The dread recoils. He pictures it like creeping shadowy hands with long clawed fingers shrinking back before a bright light. He breathes. It feels good to breathe. His lungs prove he's alive, his senses razor sharp, heightened. "How do you do that?"

Rolf's forehead creases between his eyebrows. "Do what?"

"Just …" He gestures absently, not really sure what he's even trying to say. His tears have dried. "…make me talk, tell the truth and then I feel better. How do you do it?"

Rolf's face softens. He smiles, though it's sort of a sad smile. "It's rather amazing isn't it? How freeing it is when you're not hiding, not trying to protect yourself from hurting?"

The truth of his words smacks Harry across the face. It really feels like a slap. Then he realises he's just slapped himself. He looks at his hand, lips turning up. "Fuck. I've wasted a lot of time, haven't I?"

Rolf shifts in his chair, sets his tea on his desk, and crosses one ankle over his knee. "Let's not worry about that right now. Tell me about what it feels like to say you're gay, and to mean it."

Harry attempts to blow his fringe out of his eyes though it's a lost cause. "It feels good. Like I'm just Harry again, like I'm not playing at being the Chosen One. All the old expectations don't apply anymore. They just don't fit me right."

Rolf nods. "Have you been noticing men more frequently lately? I know many men and women who have come out later in life, and a lot of them tell me they manage to live in hiding by ignoring it, but one day, something happens, and they can't anymore, and everywhere they look they notice what they want is all around them where they couldn't see it before. Like they take off their blinders."

Harry nods. "Yeah. I've been noticing other blokes a lot. I used to just tell myself it was a phase I'd grow out of, but I'm starting to realise it doesn't work like that." He pauses. "Then I've realised I'm pulling away from Ginny a lot more. I've always done it, so I thought it was normal to sort of, you know, go through phases where we aren't close. But when I look at her parents and the rest of the family, and how they all seem to know what their partner is thinking without saying anything – it's not like how it is with me and Gin." He chokes up again, scarcely believing he said that aloud. "What am I supposed to do next?"

Rolf sits forward and puts both feet on the floor. He rests his arms on his knees, hands clasped in front of them. "That depends on what you and Ginny want. Some people decide that staying married works for them; they choose to appear as a married couple in public, and are best friends and partners in everything but the bedroom. They satisfy that part with outside arrangements they're both aware of. But that's not the right path for everybody, and unless it's really what you both want, it can breed more resentment."

Harry ponders a bit. He thinks of Draco Malfoy in Fortescue's, the dodgy bloke cupping his arse in public, and Malfoy acting just as annoyed and embarrassed as Harry would be if Ginny did that to him. No. If he's going to do this – drop this bomb on her – he wants her to be able to find a husband that can be everything she needs, and he wants to be able to do the same.

"I don't think that will work for us, for me, anyway. I can't speak for Ginny, but I can't live like this another day." His words come tumbling out. He's thinking aloud; more than talking to Rolf, he's talking to himself. "In the warehouse, when the Curse was coming at me, I thought I was going to die and I was okay with it because it meant I didn't need to face the truth. I never want to feel like that again. I don't want to teach my children it's normal to do that either. Albus especially, he's so much like me in some ways … I'm going to tell Ginny when I get home."

Rolf nods and glances at his watch. Harry's not feeling the weight of the fear-shackles coming back. The shadow seems to have retreated for good; he can't even sense its presence anymore, not even at the fringes of his awareness.

"I want to see you again tomorrow, Harry. It's likely that you're up against a real shit storm, and it will be good to know that I'm waiting to hear all about it. Help keep the intrusive thoughts from bogging you down again."

Harry stands and Rolf does too. He reaches to shake Rolf's hand, and then pulls him into a hug instead. They pat each other with some manly backslaps and Harry steps away, grinning. How can he be grinning? He's going home to have his arse handed to him. "Thanks … For everything."