a/n: Thank you for reading, I changed the title again (because I'm an idiot and now the title is a huge spoiler for what happens later...but oh well...) and thank you to my beta who helped me rewrite the first few chapters :) thanks davros! hope you like this chapter too ~siriusbarks

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III.

Harry wasn't sure why he was still going along with Luna's "surprise" since it was her oddest and most unpleasant surprise yet. Especially in light of the fact that it was his birthday—one of his first few birthdays as a free adult—and yet she had brought him to the most depressing, hollow place imaginable. The childhood home where he never got to celebrate his birthdays, and the first 11 years of his life were spent wishing himself a happy birthday, alone and forgotten in his dusty cupboard.

While he knew Luna's intentions were good, he really rather she had brought him here on any other day, instead of on his bloody birthday.

Still he went along with it, as Luna led him through the empty, still house, and they revisited each place of his childhood home and he told her a different story of each wall and room. Each memory seemed to tumble out of his lips automatically as he walked through the small muggle house.

Not all the stories were grim, but they weren't as happy as his memories of Hogwarts where his life really began and took a turn for the better. Still, there were a few nice ones here, which he explained to her with a tired smirk.

"This is the kitchen where Dobby once snuck in and tried to stop me from going back to Hogwarts. Because he wanted to protect me. Like he always did." He held back the emotion of remembering how Dobby had died, three years ago, again trying to protect him. He loved Dobby, oddly enough. And Dobby was one of the first 'persons' or beings, human or not, to love him. He truly didn't even appreciate how much he loved Dobby until the brave house-elf was dead, at Shell Cottage, having saved both his, Hermione and Ron's life.

"May he rest in peace," Luna murmured quietly and held onto his hand as he led her up the landing of the stairs.

"This is where I once slid down the banister." Harry smirked. "As I tried to catch one of the 1000s of letters Hogwarts was sending me, inviting me to study there as an 11 year old."

Luna's blue eyes peeked curiously at him; she nibbled at a strand of her long, blonde hair. "Didn't they just send you one letter like everybody else?"

Harry shook his head and his hand slid over her waist, leading her further into the house. "No. The Dursleys didn't want me to go. So I had to try to get the letter from them, but they kept taking them away. So eventually Hogwarts had to send me more and more letters until I could finally open one."

"You had a strange childhood," Luna said.

"Comparing it to yours, that is saying something."

Luna narrowed her eyes. "I just grew up on a goat farm. Not a funny farm."

Harry smirked but decided to say nothing of Nargles or her father's Crumple-Horned Snorkack. It was true that the Lovegoods were eccentric, but at least Luna had been raised with a lot of love.

He led them to a second-floor window and stared out at the view of the street, where it had started to rain down on the lamplights and muggle cars parked along the neighbour's house.

Harry pointed at a bush beneath a streetlamp. "That's where I once saw Sirius's animagus, before I even knew the large, black dog was him." Such a shame because if he'd waited a moment longer, he might've met and saved his godfather then. Sirius might never have died, if he knew earlier... "I didn't get to meet Sirius then. Unfortunately. Because it was right before I stepped onto the Knight Bus." His lips pulled up in a contemplative smirk. "And right after I accidentally blew up my Aunt Marge into a balloon." Even now that memory could sometimes make him smile.

"You see? You do have good memories here," Luna said.

"Most of them in connection with the magical world. Or escaping from this place." He gestured his thumb at the spare bedroom, where steel-bars had once covered the window until the Weasley's flying car had broken him out by ripping the steel bars right off. He hadn't even had a bedroom in this house until after his first year at Hogwarts, under pressure from the wizarding world, the Dursleys had finally decided to give him the room that once existed only to store Dudley's spare toys. Really that made him angrier than anything. The spare bedroom should've been his all along. But out of cruelty, the Dursleys denied him it and kept him in a cupboard. A human being, a child, kept in a cupboard, while a whole spare room was used to keep toys. Toys that all belonged to Dudley and which Harry hadn't even been allowed to play with or enter.

"They're still memories," Luna mumbled in reply, as she wrapped one of her wispy blonde strands around her fingers.

Harry tried not to lose his temper at her, just now. "Ones I'd rather forget and nobody needs. I sincerely hope you were joking when you said they were going to make a museum out of this place." His green eyes trailed around the empty house in dismay, imagining wizarding visitors tramping up and down the hallways, taking pictures of the Boy-Who-Lived's cupboard.

"We could burn it down?" Luna suggested perfectly seriously. He had no doubt she would, if he told her to.

"Good idea," he said sarcastically. "But I'd rather be sure Mr. Museum has insurance before I burn down his whole investment." He started heading down the stairs, his hands in his pockets. "I think we should leave now. If that's the end of your surprise. Thanks, Luna."

His mind flashed with mild anger and irritation as he stormed down through the house. He wondered what Luna's true purpose in bringing him here was. What kind of birthday surprise was this, bringing him to Privet Drive? Sure, she probably thought it would help him. But why on his birthday?

Why had Luna wanted him to come here now? He didn't exactly feel any better after having a tour around; he felt the same or angrier. He was trying not to be cross with her; because Luna hardly ever made him cross (she was usually too cute to make him truly, well mad), but just now he really could not understand her aim or intention at all, unless it was to be cruel. Though Luna had never been cruel to him before, so it did not compute, mostly it confused him. In the same way, her radish earrings (and the point or logic behind them) used to confuse him before he gave up understanding them altogether and just learned to accept Luna's eccentricity. Except on days like this where her eccentricity took rather unpleasant downturns.

"Slow down," Luna called after him.

"Why should I?"

"Harry, wait," she called again and tried to catch up with him. "There's a surprise for you under the stairs."

He stopped walking.

"You mean in my cupboard?" he asked with absolutely no amusement. He really hoped she hadn't stuffed dead Dursleys or moles in his cupboard, he really wouldn't put it past her.

"Harry, relax." She ambled up to him and raised her hands to press them down on his shoulders. "If you listened to what I was trying to say before. I brought you here so you could make some new memories. Better memories of this place. We already heard your bad memories, now let's make new ones," she said with a winsome smile that at any other time would make him want to drop everything to kiss her. if it wasn't so out of place.

Harry was really trying not to lose his temper. "I don't want better memories of this place, Luna. I just want to get out of here—"

"You'll change your mind once you see what's in the cupboard."

Harry rolled his eyes again. "Again, Luna, I think you know why that's the last place I want to visit."

It's like she was trying to piss him off now. He had absolutely no desire to see the disgusting little dusty space that had once been his room; even if he had a few fond memories of playing with tin soldiers or other found toys as an innocent child, not knowing he deserved better or that he was being mistreated by the Dursleys. He just sort of learned to accept the way he was treated until it seemed normal to be treated like crap.

"You'll change your mind." Luna coughed. "Ginny?"

"Ginny? What does Ginny have to do with this?" Harry stopped walking and looked back up at Luna. He'd broken up with Ginny before he started dating Luna and while he was on good terms with the red-head, because he was still mates with Ron and all her family, he really did not see her often.

Suddenly he heard a coughing sound from the cupboard. "What on earth did you put in there?" His mind flickered with the odd possibilities Luna might've stuffed his cupboard with: Nargles, house-elves, birthday presents, cakes, wombats, moles, something really weird...maybe even a goat sacrifice. With Luna, you couldn't predict what she might be up to or try next. One time she had even tried to bring a baby elephant home as a pet, not realizing it would soon outgrow the capacity of their flat to hold the large animal.

But then his lips set in a grim line. Because a thought had occurred to him.

"Wait...Why did you mention Ginny?"

The blonde's smile grew wider. Yet she refused to answer.

"Luna what did you put in that cupboard?"

"Open it yourself and you'll see."

"Fine." Harry headed towards the cupboard's door and put his hand on the handle, before he hesitated. "Wait," he told her, "You didn't put anything dangerous in here, did you?" He took out his wand just in case, it was some kind of banshee or boggart she'd decided to stuff into his old cupboard as a sort of wacky, new-age therapy.

Luna licked at her lips. "Not that kind of danger."

"Nothing illegal either?" he asked her with raised brows. Because he knew his Luna. And he knew that the little blonde liked illegal things.

"Not this time," she assured him with a smirk.

That only gave him some peace of mind.

Harry didn't put away his wand, in case. He'd only defeated Voldemort and many Death Eaters in battle, but he didn't want his life ending now over some weird birthday prank-gone wrong.

"Go on," Luna said in anticipation.

Harry briefly thought how odd his girlfriend was, before he opened the cupboard and his jaw went slack. (It briefly also occurred to him that he might be the luckiest too.)

"Well...this..." His face grew hot and red. "...wasn't what I was expecting."

"Hi, Harry," Ginny said.

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A/N: No, it's not what you expect. Or maybe it is. Or maybe it's not. What do you think will happen? Also if you spotted any SpaG or embarrassing spelling errors, I'd appreciate if you pointed them out so I can fix it

~siriusbarks