Chapter 3.
The flat was silent when Joe returned home in the early hours of the morning; he'd been out all night with his new girlfriend, Sadie, a new employee of the department for the regulation and control of magical animals, where Hermione had previously worked. This was unusual, there was always some sort of noise in the apartment, rustling from Harry's room as he slept or his light snoring but tonight it was completely silent. Joe looked around and saw an empty bottle of firewhiskey on the table in front of the sofa.
"Harry?" Joe called; walking round the apartment to make sure Harry wasn't passed out somewhere like he'd often found him.
"Damn it, where are you?" Joe muttered, pulling out the magical version of the iPhone that George Weasley had come up with a year and a half ago, and dialled Harry's number, listening it to ring continuously.
"Harry when you get this call me, you're not at the flat, is everything ok?" Joe told the answer phone, sighing and hanging up.
Joe didn't know why he was bothering ringing Harry, maybe it was the firewhiskey, proving that he'd been there and not just gone home with one of the girls at the party. He'd also seen Harry's run in with both Ron and Ginny so knew that Harry would be somewhere across the country on his godfathers bike getting pissed to wash away his worries, like he always did.
...
"Her?" Ginny asked, looking at Harry expectantly, her eyebrows raised as she wrapped her arms around his neck, moving herself into a more comfortable position on his lap.
"I've told you a million times, the only woman in the pub who I'd ever go for is sat on my lap." Harry rolled his eyes, taking a swig of his beer and hugging Ginny closer to him.
"You're ruining the game!" Ginny scolded, taking a swig of her 'Magners', "You have to chose one person that you would go for if we weren't...us." "Why?" Harry asked, kissing her neck tenderly, "When I have everything I want here." "Because that's the rules." Ginny rolled her eyes at her boyfriend.
"Fine, you go first though." Harry told her, looking around the pub at the male population.
"Him." Ginny nodded discreetly at a tall man with wavy blonde hair, he looked like a surfer, with a t-shirt on and casual jeans.
"Seriously?" Harry asked, "He looks thick." "Well sorry." Ginny muttered before turning back to Harry, "Your turn." She beamed, knowing she's trapped Harry.
"Fine." Harry scanned the pub, "Her." He nodded at a decidedly ordinary looking girl with her friends though Ginny noted she had a very pretty smile, she looked kind and friendly.
"Not bad." Ginny shrugged.
"What, no comment?" Harry asked her cheekily.
"Nope." Ginny shook her head, "She looks...kind."
"This game was stupid!" Harry laughed, "The only girl I want is you, now can we go home? I'll show you how much I want you." Harry whispered the last part into her ear in a husky voice.
"Fine, only because you're such a smooth talker." Ginny said sarcastically, jumping up and dragging Harry out the pub.
"Who's Miss Eager Beaver." Harry teased as they aparated away.
...
"Hey." Harry greeted the woman at the bar, she was around twenty, attractive and was with a group of her muggle friends.
"Hi." She said, raising one of her eyebrows and studying Harry, a bored look on her face.
"Can I get you a drink?" Harry asked her, his green eyes twinkling.
"Okay..." She rolled her eyes, "A, I already have a drink, which you would know if you'd actually paid any attention to any other part of me except my chest, and B, I'm seeing someone."
"You have blue eyes with the smallest tint of green in, your hair is almost jet black at first look but has shades of red in." Harry told her without looking up.
"I'm still seeing someone." She grinned, turning and walking over to her friends.
"Seriously, not even the time of day?" Harry asked her, following her and watching as she frowned slightly.
"Look, I don't know what your problem is but you seriously need to go, my boyfriend is coming over here." She told Harry, no longer smiling, her look cold as ice.
"Wow, I'm just shaking in my boots." Harry muttered sarcastically.
"Everything ok?" A voice asked behind Harry.
"Perfect." Harry answered without turning around, "So an overall no to that drink then?" He asked her one last time.
"Seriously, bugger off." She muttered.
"What's wrong?" The same voice asked, and Harry turned to see a face he'd never thought he'd see again.
"Dudley Dursley?" Harry asked, incredulously, hardly recognising his cousin.
"Harry?" Dudley asked, his face trying to see any part of his cousin and stopped at the green eyes of his aunt and cousin, the only ones to ever possess a pair that were that green.
"3...4 years has it been?" Harry asked, looking at Dudley who was still in shock.
"3...We thought...we thought you were dead." Dudley mumbled.
"I was for a couple of minutes." Harry joked, taking in Dudley, who had changed immensely since Harry had last seen him. His blonde hair had darkened to a light brown colour, he'd obviously continued some sort of exercise seen as he was chunky now, not chubby but well muscled though he still seemed to loom over Harry.
"Why are you hitting on my girlfriend?" Dudley asked, anger clouding his face for the first time.
"She's pretty." Harry shrugged.
"That doesn't give you the right to hit on her; she's not a piece of meat." Dudley told Harry, looking at the girl fondly.
Harry felt as if someone had whacked him in the stomach with a baseball bat, Dudley was the well mannered yet protective boyfriend while Harry was the annoying lowlife of the bar. Ever since Hermione had came and talked to him, he'd been afraid of looking at himself to clearly and seeing she been right all along as usual. Now he couldn't escape it, he'd become someone he hated, someone he'd rolled his eyes at a year ago, "Your right, I'm sorry."
Dudley watched as Harry walked out the pub, a bottle of beer in one hand, the other rubbing the back of his neck and Dudley read the scars etched into the skin from where he was stood, 'I must not tell lies.'
"I'll be right back." Dudley told his girlfriend, Jen.
"What...?" She asked but Dudley was already through the door.
Dudley spotted Harry walking towards a motorbike and words from what seemed like a different life shot through his brain, 'I had a dream about a flying motorbike.'
"Harry!" Dudley called, striding over to him.
"What?" Harry asked.
"When did you become that guy?" Dudley asked confusion on his face, "What've you been doing for the last three years?"
"It's a long story." Harry shrugged.
"I've got time." Dudley told Harry.
"I'll cut it short, my parents were killed by Voldemort, my godfather was killed by one of his followers, my mentor and teacher died, and my only remaining father figure was killed. I was in a war, and we won but sometimes the casualties don't seem worth it, especially since my girlfriend dumped me nine months ago." Harry told Dudley.
"Wow, that's a lot to deal with." Dudley started and then frowned, "maybe...maybe you were supposed to go through it all, to feel that bad, to become the best you can possibly be, and if you give up then it'll be like you failed. I don't know, one guy shouldn't have to go through all that shit, it's not right, and I didn't help, I made your childhood miserable and for that I'll always be truly sorry."
"To be honest, what you did seems like nothing anymore." Harry kicked the bike into life, "But thank you."
"But if I see you hitting on my girlfriend again I'll kick your arse, wizard or not." He told Harry.
"I'll steer clear." Harry promised. With that note Harry kicked off, propelling the motorbike into the air and through the moonlight...
...
"So what do you want to do tonight?" Harry asked Ginny, placing some home cooked pasta in front of her and opening a bottle of goblin made wine.
Ginny looked up guiltily, taking a long sip of wipe and a large mouthful of pasta while avoiding answering his question.
"Let me guess, late night practice session, press conference, interview, night out team building?" Harry asked, rolling his eyes and sitting down.
"Don't act like that, I don't have to go." Ginny defended, looking at Harry with hurt in her eyes, "I get it your jobs more important that mine, catching criminals, so when you spend five days solid at the office I can't complain."
"Can we not start this again, please?" Harry begged her, picking up her hand in one of his lovingly, "I just miss you, I hardly ever see you anymore."
"It's only because I'm just picking up fame, I'm their shiny new toy. Next season they'll find someone else to obsess over." Ginny grinned, entwining her fingers with his, "This is amazing by the way."
"Thanks, so this hype will eventually settle?" Harry asked, "Because papers are still crazy about me."
"That's because ninety percent of their readers are female and you're sexy." Ginny grinned playfully, "Sexy and mine." "Damn straight, and you can tell the next obsessive fan boy that he can back off unless he wants Harry Potter duelling him." Harry muttered defensively, their little spat almost forgotten.
"As long as you tell the next bimbo clinging on to you, begging you to save her to clear off otherwise they'll be on the end of my bat-bogy hex." Ginny grinned.
"So where are you going tonight?" Harry asked, looking up and watching as Ginny's expression fell and slight annoyance returned to her brown orbs. "Gwenog's to go over the plays for tomorrow's match. I'll be back early and no drinking." Ginny told him, dropping his hand, "But, like I said I don't have to go." "Yes you do, you're saying that to make me feel better, if you don't go she won't start you." Harry took a big mouthful of pasta, not looking up at Ginny.
"It's not the end of the world." Ginny shrugged though not meeting Harry's eyes.
"It means a lot to you, just go." Harry said tiredly, "I'll do some paperwork or something." "Harry..." Ginny looked at him guiltily. "It's fine. Go." He told her shortly, quickly polishing off the last of his pasta in silence and draining his wine before standing up and placing them in the sink to wash and dry themselves, disappearing into the bedroom, slamming the door behind him.
"You've got to be kidding me." Ginny mumbled, staring at the closed door before finishing her own meal and wine. After placing her dish, cutlery and glass in the sink she headed to the bedroom.
"Hey you haven't seen...?" Ginny started to asked while she searched through a pile of clothes before looking up to see what she was searching for, on Harry. She was pissed off now, he was wearing his scarlet Gryffindor jumper with his name on the back in gold writing, the same jumped he'd basically given to her and that she always wore to an eve-of-match run over, she thought it was lucky somehow, not to mention unbelievably comfy. He knew she'd look for it to wear and was wearing it to spite her.
"What?" Harry asked, looking up from the hundreds of files that surrounded him on his bed, his voice with an ice cold edge to it.
"Nothing." She fumed, grabbing a Harpie's jumper with her name on the back before leaving the room, slamming the door behind her.
"Hey Ginny..." Joe trailed off, looking at Ginny slightly cautiously as she stormed out the apartment.
...
"Where have you been?" Joe asked, breathing a sigh of relief when Harry entered the flat.
"Out, when to a bar, why?" Harry asked, as he saw Ron and Hermione for the first time sat on the sofa, looking nervous, "What's going on?"
"We didn't know where you were! The state you were in the last time we saw you wasn't exactly confidence building stuff!" Hermione cried.
"Why are you here now?" Harry asked Hermione, "Where were you when me and Ginny were having problems? You'd have known what to do! Where were you nine months ago when Ginny broke up with me? Where were you when everything turned shit? You were working, building you and Ron the perfect life. Why are you caring now?!" Harry practically bellowed.
"Don't yell at her!" Ron shouted back.
"I'm sorry!" Hermione cried at Harry, fat tears running down her cheeks, "I just got promoted to the DoMLI and everything was moving so fast, Ron proposed and then you and Ginny broke up and I knew you two were having problems, I figured in a week or two you'd be back together."
"But you weren't there!" Harry cried back, "I needed my best friends and you weren't there!"
"I tried, I swear to god Harry I tried!" Hermione whispered, "I spent hours banging on your door, begging you to open it. I spent hours trying to get you to listen and you pushed me away!"
"I needed you to tell me how I could have fixed us when we were still happy, I needed you then, to stop the smashing, not to try and pick up the pieces." Harry's low voice sounded drained of all energy.
"I know! We know! Don't you know that we'd do anything to change that!" Hermione cried helplessly, "I can't take back how I acted, I know I can't, but please let me try and help!" Hermione begged.
"What's the point anymore?" Harry asked.
"Maybe we should have a night to cool off." Ron finally spoke up, "It's been a long day, we're all tired...let's just..."
He and Hermione left without another word and he was left with an angry looking Joe, who turned on Harry as soon as he left, "What the hell?" He asked angrily.
"What?" Harry asked, waving his wand and making the flat tidy itself up.
"They care about you so much and you can't even see it!" Joe told him, anger bubbling in his voice, "You need to get over whatever it is, apologise to them and go to their wedding."
"You don't understand, I didn't do anything!" Harry muttered.
"Does it matter anymore!? I know you miss them and they miss you. As for understanding! My brother was killed in the war Harry! You know that! His wife was left without a husband, my nephew without a father and his friends without him! They love you enough to care and you're throwing it back in their face like a child! Grow up, get over it!" Joe fumed, turning and walking into his room, slamming the door in anger.
...
Harry wandered around the empty park, it was five in the morning and the world seemed to be sleeping. He looked up at the bright half moon in the sky, visible because the lengthy spell of rain. He saw the sparkle of her blonde hair first, shimmering in the moonlight before she made her way towards Harry in her usually dancing like way.
"Luna." Harry smiled genuinely at his friend who he hadn't seen in nearly three months.
"Harry, do I take it the ratspurks have left your brain then?" She asked...
Okay, just to address a few reviews...
I know I sort of painted Ginny to not giving a crap but first impressions my friends...
Hermione is also OOC because I don't know why but I've always thought that her ambitious streak may one day have it's consequences..
And while Ginny lost Fred and her friends in the battle, she's not dealt with the loss of her parents or two father figures, while feeling responsible so Harry's emotions were all tied to her, explaining why he's more openly bitter about the break up...and there's a bit more of Ginny's side to come...
I had to bring Dudley back because I wanted to show how he could change when his parents aren't near him!
The tattoo is the date of the final battle and I figure it was when Harry's life away from Voldemort began, sort of random...
So please review ! x Can I asked for 10-20 reviews before I update again?