Hello! I know it's been a couple of weeks since my last post, but that's about as fast as this chapter came out. I know there's quite a bit of angst still, but everyone has been through so much devastation recently it's hardly surprising they are finding it difficult to move on. Believe me that they will move on though! The world can't be all doom and gloom forever, otherwise it would be a pretty horrid way to live!
Thankyou to those who have reviewed, it means the world to me! If you haven't reviewed then please do so, it's the only way I know what you think of it.
Oh, and as always, I do not own the characters or the Harry Potter world. That miracle is all J. (bless her cotton socks!)
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Hogwarts, 5th September 1998
The first couple of weeks went by before she had even realised. Ginny thankfully found herself with barely any time during the day to brood on the events of the summer (or on a certain green-eyed wizard.)
As soon as school had started she found herself swarmed by friends and survivors. Unsurprisingly there had been no returning students from Harry's year, and Ginny was somewhat relieved that she didn't have to face the stares and whispers from his circle of friends.
Instead she found herself surrounded by students who had idolised and reviled Harry at various times but had never really known him as a friend. And that meant that nobody felt brave enough to question her on her relationship (or ex-relationship) with him.
She spent the days reuniting with friends she had not seen since before the war. Many of the muggle-borns and half-bloods returned and Ginny was amazed at how quickly the school spirit seemed to have returned. It seemed like only yesterday they had all been fearing for their lives and listening to the daily death notices, yet she found herself easily slipping back into a world where the biggest concerns were how to smuggle food from the kitchens back into the dormitories (Ginny had long ago befriended the house elves in the kitchens who were always more than happy to help feed the 'misses and masters' of Hogwarts).
Of course, Hogwarts wasn't entirely rebuilt just yet. A castle that had been in existence since the Founders Era was hardly going to be rebuilt in a summer, but most of the castle was now standing proud and tall, and Ginny got a thrill at running her hands along the walls knowing that she had, in a small way, contributed to Hogwarts' return.
Sometimes it was as if the last three years had never happened, and Ginny craved those moments of forgetful bliss, when she could leave all her nightmares behind for an hour or two whilst she played wizarding chess with her housemates or snuck notes to her friends in class.
It wasn't always so easy, however. Ginny watched as students arrived, returning to the halls of Hogwarts, eyes shadowed with what they had seen and faces gaunt with the ghosts of their summer. She watched as Hogwarts embraced her students once more, surrounding them with an atmosphere of love and warmth and nurturing. She watched as students hungrily grabbed at their dinners, memories of a life on the run never far from their minds. She watched as these same students allowed the past to become the past, and as they started their lives anew.
There were changes amongst the students too. Different niches formed amongst them. The House loyalties were stronger than ever, and Ginny saw how the Slytherins moved about in groups, eyes twitching to the shadows as if they expected to be ambushed by the other houses. There were rumours of Slytherin students caught unexpectedly in corridors and hung up on the walls, of the Slytherin toilets inexplicably flushing out rather than in. Ginny had overheard more than a few whisperings between students in the other houses as pranks were planned and executed. Truthfully there was a small part of Ginny that suspected this was not exactly the way that they should be rebuilding society after the war they had just finished. The sorting hat's plea that the students should mix between their houses had once again gone unheard, and Ginny suspected that the current inter-house relations were against the grain of what people such as Dumbledore and Harry had stood for.
Even so, it wasn't so easy to look past the haunting images of death eater masks that she seemed to see each time she looked into the Slytherin tables. It wasn't easy to forget the cold curling lip of Snape last year as he watched Ginny and her friends be tortured by the Carrows and the other death eaters that he had allowed into the school. And it certainly wasn't easy to forget that not so long ago the majority of the parents from the Slytherin table had been trying to kill her.
So Ginny let the rumours and whisperings wash over her, preferring to stay ignorant to that aspect of the school psyche that caused her stomach to churn in discomfort.
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Ginny found Luna sitting in a tree by the lake. If she hadn't been looking for the blonde witch she would never have thought to look up.
One of the worst parts of the post-war present was that everybody had scars that needed healing, but most found themselves so absorbed with getting themselves through each day that they were oblivious to the hurts of those around them.
Ginny knew she probably should have sought out the other witch earlier, but she had spent the first couple of weeks remembering what life could be like and hadn't felt able to deal with anyone else's issues until now.
Before she had returned Hermione had taken Ginny aside and mentioned that Luna, if she returned, had been through some pretty dramatic stuff. She didn't go into details but simply told Ginny that the other witch would probably need a friend. Ginny knew Luna didn't have many within the student body, and that she was probably the closest thing to a friend she had. And so Ginny felt somewhat guilty when she realised she hadn't actually had a proper conversation with Luna all year, and had set out early on that Saturday morning to find her.
Luna was many things, one of which was certainly not predictable.
Ginny spent the better half of the day trying to find her friend, searching through the library and many of the hidden rooms and corridors within the castle. Finally she had tried outside, the weather was overcast and chilly and she had been grasping at straws when she made her way towards the freezing bankside of the lake. She had been very surprised when she had noticed a pair of shoes beside a tree, and even more so when she squinted upwards between the branches to see, very high within the tree's boughs, a blonde head of hair.
Ginny quickly tied her hair back away from her face, put her wand into her back pocket and began the climb upwards. It wasn't easy, and she wasn't at all sure why Luna would choose this tree on this day for a climb. But, as she had reflected before, Luna was anything but predictable.
Eventually she found herself amongst the branches of the tree, within a small hideaway amongst the leaves that seemed to have been created with two small girls in mind.
Luna hadn't yet acknowledged her presence, and instead had a small muggle pocket knife she was using to carve intricate details into a thick tree limb, and Ginny let her eyes wander amongst the swirls and twists of Luna's design. She reached out, wanting to feel the design etched into the steady wood, and finally Luna raised her eyes to hers.
Ginny felt her stomach drop when Luna's gaze met hers. Her blonde haired, blue eyed, bizarrely-minded friend stared at her with eyes that seemed empty. Ginny felt suddenly sick with guilt that she had let so many weeks pass by without seeking out Luna and making sure she was okay.
"Luna…" she whispered, not sure what to say.
Luna's cheeks were dirt streaked, her eyes red and her face was sallow and haggard. She looked like she was half-dead. Her hair hung limply by her face, the normally gleaming curls were lank and lack-lustre. Ginny felt her heart go out to her friend, unsure of how she could possibly help someone who seemed to be suffering so much internally.
She reached out towards Luna, who flinched but let Ginny touch her shoulder. Ginny was shocked at how cold the other girl was, her skin like ice. She brought her hand down to enclose Luna's and again noticed how ice-cold they were.
"Oh Merlin, Luna, you're freezing!" said Ginny. She quickly undid her jumper zipper and wrapped it around the other girl.
"Come on, lets get you inside with a nice cup of hot cocoa" she said soothingly, and began to make her way back down the tree. Whatever was going on in Luna's head, she knew they wouldn't be able to deal with it whilst they were up in a tree.
She reached out to Luna who seemed to have understood what Ginny was asking and had turned around to make her own way down the tree. As they descended Ginny noticed that many of the other branches also contained extensive designs similar to the one she had found Luna making. She wondered how much time Luna was spending up trees, and why nobody had noticed that she was obviously struggling.
She jumped the last few feet, landing heavily, before turning to help Luna down from the last branch. Luna once again flinched from her touch, and Ginny's concern skyrocketed.
She quickly bundled Luna back into her boots before they started the trek back up to the castle. Luna was quiet and subdued, and the closer they got to the castle the more it dawned upon Ginny that she had absolutely no idea how to handle the situation she found herself in. The only thing she knew she could do was to warm up both Luna and herself, so she directed Luna through the back passages of Hogwarts towards the Room of Requirement, sending out a silent plea along the way to the castle that the room would be free for them.
When they arrived at the tapestry of Barnabus the Barmy Ginny stood Luna to one side of the corridor before pacing before the tapestry three times and silently asking the Room to grant her a place of comfort in which she could reassess the situation. She opened the door and was surprised to see one entire side of the room was taken up by a huge glass window overlooking a vast expanse of gardens with a bright and cheerful sun pouring light into the room. In one corner there was a large couch draped with multi-coloured sequined blankets and pillows, and all around the room sheaths of fabric of all the colours of the rainbow decorated the walls.
Ginny smiled wryly. It certainly wasn't her idea of comfort but she supposed it fitted that the Room had judged that Luna would feel safe and secure in the midst of a kaleidoscopic mash.
She reached outside the door only to grab Luna, who barely even looked up at her, and gently ease her inside the room and over onto one of the comfortable looking armchairs. Ginny then dashed to grab a pile of warm looking blankets and cocooned Luna within them.
"I need a house elf" she announced to nobody in particular, and was relieved when a small pinkish house elf appeared at her side, bowing lower than Ginny had realised was possible.
"How might the lowly Dibble serve the young Miss?" asked the house elf, directing its questions to the floor in front of its nose.
Ginny gestured for the house elf to stand, not wanting to deal with the ridiculous house elf mannerisms at this time.
"Dibbles, could you get some hot cocoa for me and my friend, and maybe something to eat as well?" she asked the elf who glanced at Luna before disappearing silently with a quick nod.
Ginny glanced at her watch, surprised to see that it was now well after lunch. No wonder her stomach was growling!
Dibbles returned shortly, laden with a tray of sweets and sandwiches as well as a large steaming jug of what Ginny hoped was cocoa. She poured both herself and Luna a mug of the steaming brown liquid and handed it to her friend before sitting on another armchair opposite.
She watched as Luna sipped her cocoa, eyes downcast. Ginny wasn't at all sure what was happening but she was fairly certain the other witch was going through hell.
Time passed as the pair sipped from their mugs and as Ginny debated how to ask Luna what was wrong.
"Luna….is there anything you want to talk about?" she asked quietly, hating the tremor in her voice as she spoke.
She let time pass, and she watched as Luna stared pointedly into her mug, obviously debating whether or not she should talk about it…whatever 'it' was.
Finally Luna looked up, and Ginny breathed a sigh of relief when she saw that her eyes were less blank than they had been in the tree. Perhaps this wasn't as bad as all that, after all.
"Oh! Ginny! Sorry, I hadn't noticed you before" said Luna tonelessly, looking around her before seeming to realise she was nestled amongst a pile of blankets within a room of colour.
"Where are we? I don't think I've been here before" she said, her voice a shadow of the dreamy voice Ginny was so used to hearing from her friend.
"Umm, Luna, I found you in a tree, remember? You were freezing cold so I brought you in here to warm you up." Ginny explained, unsure whether Luna really didn't remember her journey to the Room or not.
Luna nodded silently, giving Ginny no further clues as to her mindset.
"…you were carving designs in a tree" prodded Ginny, unsure of what to do if Luna really had somehow blanked large periods of time from her mind. Given her experiences in her first year, having large chunks of mind-blanks unnerved her somewhat, although she was fairly certain Luna had just been out of it, rather than possessed by an evil sociopathic schoolboy.
Luna glanced down at her lap and began to trace unseen patterns on the blanket that lay there. After a moment her eyes rose to Ginny's once more.
"Yes" said Luna, "I remember. I like the trees, and they like wearing the patterns I give them" she said, her voice reverting to its normal dreamy tone.
Ginny smiled, glad to see her friend beginning to return.
Ginny looked at Luna, still concerned, "Luna….is everything okay?"
"Of course" said Luna, eyes wide with surprise at Ginny's question.
Ginny bit her lip, unsure how to push the question without making Luna retreat back into her previous silence.
In the end Ginny let the silence settle once more, adjusting her position on the armchair and pulling up her legs as she cradled her hot chocolate and studied her friend from beneath her lashes. Luna seemed settled, content to stare out the window at the Room's illusion of the outside world. She stared without blinking, hands holding tightly at the steaming mug. Ginny watched as Luna's wide blue eyes remained entranced on the world, lips parted as if in a silent whisper.
She knew that there was something troubling her friend, and that whatever it was that was causing her friend pain it was likely related to whatever evils Luna had faced in the Malfoy basement where Hermione had told Ginny she had been found.
But raising the topic of Malfoy Manor was also likely to bring up more painful memories, not only for Luna but for Ginny as well. She much preferred avoiding the topic of the past few years at all.
So Ginny sat, drifting in and out of her own musings, keeping Luna company as they watched the Room's sunset fall.
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As the days and weeks went by, Ginny made a point of checking in with Luna every day. Every morning at breakfast Ginny had taken to herding Luna away from the Ravenclaw table and sitting next to her at the Gryffindor table.
Luna's arms were skeletal, and Ginny encouraged every mouthful into her. Luna would stare at Ginny sometimes, eyes filled with haunted memories, and the sight would make Ginny shiver.
Nevertheless, Ginny began to develop an obsession with 'fixing' Luna.
Ginny knew that things could perhaps never go back to the way they had once been. The student body had seen too much and been through too much trauma to ever be the care-free children they had once been. But Ginny was determined to recapture some of the magic of her past, and she vowed to herself that in doing so she would help Luna through this difficult period.
If anybody thought having a Ravenclaw sitting at the Gryffindor table at mealtimes was odd, they didn't mention it. After all, only an idiot would dare cross Ginny Weasley on a mission.
Surprisingly, nobody even commented when Ginny started bringing Luna back to the common room after classes, nor when Luna started to sleep in one of the many spare beds in the Gryffindor quarters.
Ginny knew Luna had been severely bullied in past years by her Ravenclaw housemates, and in her opinion the best place for recovery was with friends. So she dubbed Luna an honorary Gryffindor and the look she gave the other students in the common room the night she wrapped Luna in a Gryffindor scarf was a clear warning to them all – Luna Lovegood was NOT to be messed with.
And to her immense relief, Ginny noted, as the mid-semester break drew near Luna began to look a bit healthier, her cheeks filled in and her eyes shone brighter. She actually responded voluntarily to conversations now, and would eat her meals without having Ginny constantly coaxing the food into her mouth.
Ginny could have danced a jig the day that Luna, voluntarily, told Ginny quietly over dinner that she didn't like chicken soup because it was what the Malfoys had fed her. It was the first bit of information Luna had ever given up about her time in the dungeons and although Ginny knew it was a far cry from facing the true demons, she was incredibly proud of her friend for struggling on despite it all. Ginny had formed some theories about what Luna had been through, and all of them made bile rise in her throat at the thought.
And as the Christmas break drew closer Ginny realised that she had spent almost half a year without sulking about a certain green-eyed wizard. In fact other than in her dreams, Harry barely came up in her daytime thoughts at all.
And that was an achievement to be proud of, thought Ginny smugly.
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Hogwarts, 20th November 1998
So it was a rather sudden surprise when the Owl Post brought an interesting headline article in the Daily Prophet.
The Chosen One's Chosen Ones
(Exerpt from Witches Weekly)
Watch out ladies! The Man-Who-Conquered is on the prowl.
These photos were taken outside the Hogsmeade Tavern, and clearly show that
Potter, who in the past has been exceedingly close-lipped about his private life, has more than enough to go around. Potter, who is currently in the fast-track stream of Auror training, was seen celebrating with friends. Observers say that Potter proceeded to be the life of the party, shouting several rounds of drinks for those inside.
"He certainly seemed to be getting on with some of the younger missus" says bartender Paul McRadden, and others in attendance confirm that Potter was indeed on the dancefloor with a number of the fairer sex.
Potter has in the past been romantically linked to Ginevra Weasley (of the Weasley's of Ottery St. Catchpole) and to Hermione Granger who fought beside him in the recent Second War.
Obviously Potter has now become available, and this reporter waits to see what scandals this young bachelor can reap on our witching world.
Tamara Buttnock, Witches Weekly
As Ginny read the article she could feel the entire student body in the Great Hall watching her, and she was mortified when she felt the beginnings of tears prick behind her eyes and a blush begin to spread up her neck. She would NOT cry, she told herself stubbornly.
She would NOT let the others see her upset over that arrogant pratt.
She speared an egg with her fork onto her plate, then began to violently butter her toast, aware that the Hall was silent in wait for her reaction.
After her toast was sufficiently massacred Ginny began to furiously cut it into bite-sized pieces, well aware that the current state of her stomach would not allow any of it to end up there anyway.
The Hall was still silent, and Ginny stubbornly ate her toast, turning to glare at the other tables who were all looking at her. Some students looked back down at their plates, obviously ashamed for being caught looking, but most just stared back at her, waiting for the drama.
She glared at those around her, who all were steadfastly ignoring the paper and eating their breakfast as if she wasn't currently murdering her eggs on toast.
"Oh! Look! A Seephentra has taken the muggle Prime Minister's wife! How tragic!" said Luna suddenly, her voice carrying across the room in the extended silence.
Ginny almost choked on her breakfast with the shock that Luna was speaking nonsense again.
"A what?" she managed to get out, after she had finished coughing up the bit of egg that had been stuck in her throat.
"A Seephentra. Look, it says here the muggle Prime Minister has recently arrived back from North America and that his wife has a new haircut. But look! You can see it's the shape of a Seephentra nest" said Luna in her clear bell-like voice.
Ginny looked at Luna blankly.
"What's a Seephentra?" somebody down the table asked as they tried to get a better look at the picture.
Luna looked taken aback at the question, as if she couldn't imagine how anyone hadn't heard of the species. "Seephentra's are a native species of duck in Northern America, but they're much smaller than the average duck and they make nests in human hair where they bury their eggs. When their young hatch they feed off the carrier's innovation, so you can tell if someone has been infested because they lack any kind of original thought."
Ginny snorted, trying to cover herself by taking her glass of juice.
As Luna began to explain the intricacies behind the mating habits of Seephentra, Ginny could feel the interest of the room dissipate. She chanced a glance behind her and could see the students going back to their breakfast and their table-gossip. She breathed a sigh of relief at the sight.
She looked back at Luna who was still talking a mile a minute about her bizarre creature, pausing only long enough to glance at Ginny and give her a big one-eyed wink.
Ginny couldn't help herself as she dissolved into giggles.
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After the incident in the Great Hall, Ginny noticed that Luna had taken a turn for the better. She began interact in the table conversations at meals. She began to initiate conversations with Ginny. And she even began to talk about Wrackspurts and Nargles and all her other imaginary creatures. Ginny watched and listened, encouraging the stories and creatures.
Ginny began to think they might come out of this alright after all.
The stories in the media about Harry became a daily event. Harry caught outside nightclubs with curvy girls in his arms became a commonplace image, and after a while they even shifted to the midsection of the prophet rather than the front page.
It took Ginny several weeks before she could look at the pictures without gagging. Watching Harry snog these….'wanton women' as her mother would say….it was pretty vile. She couldn't help but raise an eyebrow at the attire of the girls he was now spending his nights with. Day after day the reports flew in of Harry getting into barside brawls, being caught with women in the backseats of cars, making drunken appearances at social events. Ginny read each story, searching for the man she knew between the lines, but the more she read the more she wondered if she had ever known him.
What if she really had just been a 'phase'. What if she had been nothing more than the start of a hundred girls, no different to him than the next.
It didn't help to think these things, but Ginny couldn't help but wonder if the relationship she had treasured had simply been in her own imagination.
Harry's antics became old news, and the gossip reels continued onwards to the next big story. Ginny watched, amazed that despite it all, one day he might be caught on camera with his tongue down three (different) girls, and then the next the front page story would be about a latent death eater he had single handedly managed to haul in.
Ginny had no idea what was happening to him, and she knew the last thing she should do was worry about him. But she couldn't help but feel sad that it seemed the Harry she had known and had loved was disappearing in front of their eyes.
One thing was certain. Christmas break, only a week away, was sure to be interesting.
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Grimmauld Place, November 1998
Harry could hear footsteps in the corridor outside his room. They were much too loud.
In fact, this morning, everything was too loud. The sun was too bright. And life was just too damn cheery!
He groaned and rolled over, fumbling to find his wand under his pillow to close the blinds.
"Oi, mate! Rise and shine!" Ron's too-loud voice echoed through Harry's brain like a steam-engine. Harry felt the heavy weight of his best mate sink down on the bed beside him, and the bustle of something being put on his bedside table – something he hoped would make him feel slightly better this morning.
"Hangover cure. Thought you'd need it after the way you looked when you came in last night. Big night eh?" said Ron, but his words didn't mask the tone of worry underneath.
"Grmphh" replied Harry, still not daring to open his eyes.
"Come on, you can't stay in bed all day today. I won't let you" said Ron, whisking the covers off Harry and reflexively disarming his friend as Harry brought his wand up to aim.
"Nope. You've done that to me before, won't make the same mistake again" said Ron.
"Up Harry. Kingsley mentioned last night he wanted a word with you today, so you've got to get a move on. Dad said he'd floo you to the Ministry if you wanted?"
Harry groaned again. He hated going to the Ministry.
Harry threw the nearest thing he could find at Ron's head, which just happened to be a dirty sock, "I hate redheads" he muttered.
"Gross Harry. I'll take that as a no then, shall I? Stop messing about, I'm heading over to Hermione's in a little while and I want to know you'll at least get out of bed today"
Harry sighed and sat up, cradling his head as he adjusted to the new vantage-point of the room. Were the walls supposed to spin like that?
"Where did you go last night, anyway?" asked Ron as he casually wandered around Harry's bedroom picking up dirty laundry and throwing it all in one big heap in the centre of the room.
"I dunno. Dean was meeting up with friends after training and I sort of tagged along" mumbled Harry. He tried to cast his mind back to the night before, but all he could remember was vague flashes of a dance floor and a pub….they had met up with some girls, but he couldn't remember the rest of it.
"Seriously Harry, you don't need to even tell me. No doubt I'll find out about where you were when I get this morning's Daily Prophet. Just tell me, is there anything I'm going to have to clean up this time?" he asked Harry, who was now blearily looking at a number scrawled down his arm in black ink.
"Blimey Harry, how do you get so lucky, eh?" laughed Ron as he watched Harry try to make sense of the number and what it meant. Harry looked up at him in confusion.
"I don't even know whose number that is" he said frowning.
Ron rolled his eyes and chose to ignore the comment.
Ron was becoming remarkably skilled at making hangover potions, and clearing up the tears and rumours that Harry had recently started leaving in his wake.
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It had started soon after the Hogwarts term commenced, or maybe even before then. Ron wasn't sure, to be honest he wasn't sure how everything had turned out the way it was.
Harry had started training at the Auror Academy with several of their year-mates who were being fast-tracked in a similar program. Ron had been thrilled at the offer, but had negotiated to do the training part time as he felt he had a lot of things to sort out at home before he could move on with his life.
If Ron had thought that getting Harry and Ginny away from each other would improve Harry's mood, he was sorely disappointed. The late nights at 'work' continued, and Ron would wake up in the night and glance over at Harry's bed only to find it empty and barely slept in. Ron suspected that Harry was staying awake all night and Hermione confirmed his suspicions when she came to stay with him for the week after Ginny left and told him that when she went to get a midnight drink of water she had seen Harry sitting on the front porch, staring out into the night.
When Ron turned up for classes at the Academy he was taken aback at the energy Harry was putting into his training. He had thought that given Harry's recent insomnia he would be tired for the physical aspects of the course, but the very first day Ron walked into the gymnasium he had been met with the sight of Harry standing centre of the room, wand out, blasting curse after curse at the practice dummies. A small crowd stood around the perimeters of the room and Ron had made his way to a face he recognised, Seamus Finnigan.
Seamus had answered Ron's questions as they both stood entranced at the sight of Harry blasting the life out of the dummies. Ron didn't think he had ever seen such a focused mindset in his best friend, and if he was honest with himself the look on Harry's face as he fought the practice dummies unnerved him. It was as if Harry was channelling a pit of fire and anger into his spellwork, and there was a chill in the air as if the warmth was being sucked up by the powerful wizard.
Ron knew Harry was powerful. It wasn't exactly a secret after all.
But seeing Harry practice was like seeing a stranger. It didn't look, didn't feel, like the Harry Potter he knew.
"Quite something, isn't it" remarked Seamus, nudging Ron out of his thoughts.
"Yeah….how long's he been practicing?" asked Ron, noting the sweat stained t-shirt Harry was wearing.
"Oh, at least two hours or so. He does this every day, comes down here, doesn't speak a word to anyone and just starts pummelling the dummies as if his life depends on it. We've all given up trying to practice when he comes in because, really, who'd want to get too close to that?" he said, gesturing at Harry who was currently using some sort of tornado to rip one of the dummies to shreds.
Ron nodded numbly, worried that there was something he must have missed at home. Harry wasn't exactly the kind of guy who liked talking about his emotions, but Ron had always thought he had a pretty good grip on Harry's moods.
Until now.
"Doesn't anyone stop him?" asked Ron, looking over at Seamus who stared at him with a raised eyebrow.
"What? Get between the Man-Who-Conquered and his target? Yeah right, mate!" scoffed Dean who was standing the other side of Seamus.
"Yeah but….what about the instructors?" asked Ron. "Surely they realise that Harry's mindset is a bit fragile right now? Why do they let him wear himself out like this?"
"Wear himself out?" said Seamus in disbelief. "Ron, have you met Harry? He fights until he's dead and then just gets back up again. Literally. A bit of target practice is hardly going to stop him."
Ron frowned, sensing that there was something seriously wrong with his friend but unsure how to get his point across.
In the end he shrugged and let it go, deciding to mention it to Hermione when he saw her later in the day. She would know what to do.
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In addition to the violent practice sessions, Ron had noticed other things that suggested Harry wasn't coping quite as well as he would like others to believe.
Only a few weeks after Hogwarts had reopened Harry had announced at the dinner table that he was moving back to Grimmauld Place. Ron hadn't been at all happy with the idea, but Harry had insisted and it was, after all, Harry's house by rights. So Ron had helped him move out of his little orange bedroom at the Burrow and into Sirius' old house.
Ron had, for a while, managed to stay late enough most nights to plea tiredness and fell asleep at the house, not wanting Harry to be left alone. But eventually his list of excuses ran out, and he was forced to leave Harry to himself.
After that Ron had visited regularly, but Harry was rarely home and even when he was Ron had noticed that the levels of the firewhisky bottles were slowly diminishing. He hadn't mentioned it, but had begun to suspect Harry was finding other ways to fall asleep at night.
The late night partying was new, however. It had started innocently enough, with after-work drinks with Seamus and Dean and the others. Ron had joined them at first and they explored the nightlife of Hogsmeade and Diagon Alley – Ron was at first startled at the changes on the streets after sunset. Harry had been just as timid as Ron (at least Ron was pretty sure he had been). Neither boy had ever been the type to frequent pubs and nightclubs and at first they had hung back, watching as Dean and Seamus, seemingly much more acquainted with the lifestyle, chatted with various witches and wizards and enjoyed a variety of drinks that Ron had never even heard of.
Gradually Harry began to join in with them, and as soon as the clientele realised who Harry was, more often than not he was swarmed with witches wanting to get an autograph or, more commonly, a kiss.
Ron had, at first, been amused by their antics. That was until Harry began to lose his shyness. More than once Ron caught Harry making out with random witches behind closed doors, and soon after the media seemed to have caught on and the nights tended to end with a paparazzi chase.
Ron eventually tired of the endless nights and instead spent his nights now with Hermione, content to watch the 'telly' at her house whilst she read, or spent his evenings with her in his arms. But Harry persisted, and day by day the stories in the Prophet grew more lurid. Ron had always fancied himself a pretty non-judgemental type of guy, even a bit left-wing, but he had to raise his eyebrows at some of the things Harry was reportedly getting up to.
Hermione told Ron to mind his own business and let Harry work through his issues in his own way. Ron wasn't so sure this was the right answer, but as he didn't have any alternatives he simply let Harry be Harry, dropping by Grimmauld Place most mornings with a freshly brewed hangover potion.
He couldn't understand how the instructors at the Academy could let this go on, surely it impacted on the Academy reputation, having its young training Aurors seen as wild party boys by the press. But nobody seemed to step in, and Ron was forced to let things go on as they were, despite the rumbling concern he had for his friend.
However, Christmas was coming and Ron hoped that he would be able to get Harry to the Burrow, even for a night. He hoped that perhaps his father could step in and have a chat with Harry, man-to-man. He knew his dad saw Harry like one of his own, and he could only hope that he would be able to work his dad-magic on him.
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Harry leant forward to inspect himself in the mirror of the bathroom. Kreacher had done quite an impressive job at making the residence habitable, and the bathroom was (almost) clean of any mould.
He looked at himself in the mirror, surprised as always at the face staring back at him.
He was getting older. His face had stubble, his cheeks were starting to fill in after the gaunt look he had carried whilst on the run. At eighteen years of age Harry could see the resemblance to the pictures he had of his father at this age. But there were differences. Harry's eyes were obviously the stand-out feature, but his cheekbones were slightly higher, his face less square. And he was certain his dad had never felt the way Harry did, had never looked at anyone with the haunted expression his eyes now carried.
Harry wasn't an idiot. He knew everybody had scars from the war, and he knew he was no different. What made him angry was that he seemed to be finding it so much harder than everybody else to settle back into life. Ron and Hermione seemed to be playing happy families, the guys at the Auror Academy spent every day chatting about how exciting their new jobs would be.
And Harry knew he had absolutely no reason to feel so angry. He hadn't lost a twin like George, or a son like Mrs Weasley. He had lost friends, but so had everybody else. And everybody else seemed to be coping so much better than himself.
He hated waking up each morning. He hated opening his eyes and knowing that it was going to be another whole day before he got the reprieve that sleep allowed him.
And even worse was that he hated going to sleep, because every time he tried he was haunted by flashes those he should have saved. Every night he would end up wandering the dark hallways of Grimmauld Place, waiting for exhaustion to take him into sleep. Because if he wasn't completely dead on his feet when he went to sleep then he was guaranteed to have nightmares, and it was a toss up as to what was worse – the dread of facing a new day, or the dread of facing a new nightmare. They were both equal in his book.
Meanwhile the Ministry seemed to be using him as some sort of idol for the general public. He was getting tired of finding articles about legislation that had been "endorsed by Harry Potter" when he was never sure how he had ever endorsed anything. He went along to meetings but had a feeling he was simply there to be a Ministry stamp. A recent article had described how Harry had single-handedly captured an escaped death eater. The truth was Harry had been having lunch with some of his Auror Academy classmates and their trainers and had spotted a face he had recognised from the war, had pointed it out to his training master, and the death eater had been captured without any trouble. It was a pretty uneventful capture in Harry's book, but the media had pounced on it and twisted the story around so that Harry looked like some sort of medieval knight.
He was, in essence, the new Ministry Posterboy.
And he hated it.
Last week he had been forced to go to some posh party for an elderly Wizard, and was then suddenly on stage handing out awards. Nobody seemed to want him for Harry, they only wanted the Man-Who-Conquered.
Harry knew his recent behaviour was out of character, but he couldn't help himself. It gave him a bit of a thrill knowing that despite the amount of control the Ministry had over him, that they couldn't control him all the time. That despite the best efforts of Kingsley and his Ministry co-workers, Harry was able to go and get drunk and make headlines purely of his own accord.
It was something that was his.
He knew Ron was worried. Hermione no doubt disapproved. But the two of them had been left alone for the most part. They hadn't really had to deal with the really big issues. Things like the pardoning of Snape had been all him. Nobody had wanted to defend the old Potions Master. Ron and Hermione still weren't convinced of his innocence, and no matter what Harry told them they didn't seem keen to pursue it.
Harry had been pushing for Snape to be honoured amongst the fallen, and although he hadn't achieved this goal yet he was determined to succeed.
Ron and Hermione also didn't have to deal with people asking him questions like whether he thought the political party system of the Ministry needed changing, and if so then in what way. Or whether he thought the Flannigan family from the Cotswolds should be given an extra vote in the Wizengamot.
Harry felt so incredibly out of his depth most of the time it was the most he could do to simply nod. He had no idea about political systems, or legislation, or policy formation. He had no idea about paperwork and bills and voting structures. Give him an enemy to fight and he would do well enough, but when it came to important things like the political system of the wizarding world, well, Harry would rather stay on the sidelines thankyou very much.
But no matter how hard he protested it was still him, the Man-Who-Conquered, The Chosen One, the Boy-Who-Lived-Again, who was asked to give the final word in any situation.
And he hated it.
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So that's the end of that chapter. I've already drafted the next couple, but how fast I post will depend on how well the characters and I can work things out. Sometimes they're really talkative, and at other times all I get is silence. Sigh!
Remember, please read and review.
xoxo