Friday morning Harry dragged himself out of bed to start his chores. He knew what his Aunt said was a warning and that his Uncle would lose what little of a mind he had if he didn't return to his routine.

He made them breakfast and was too out of it to notice the worried stares from his Aunt and his cousin.

"Get it together boy! You ruined our breakfast!" Vernon yelled while he was eating.

Harry had burned the food as he was still feeling very ill and was extremely exhausted.

"He's still sick Vernon-" Petunia began.

"Yeah, right! The kid's just being lazy! He's a lazy, arrogant, ungrateful-!"

'Him and Snape sound so much alike,' Harry thought as he tuned himself out to his Uncle's rant.

He went and laid down on the couch until his relatives had finished eating. He wondered if he and Dudley were at the point where he could ask him for help with his chores. He realized it didn't matter if they were at that point because he had too much pride to ask him anyway.

Harry did the dishes and the rest of the chores, with the only help from his cousin being drying and putting the dishes away. His cousin also made them sandwiches for lunch.

Harry managed to make it to dinner and had begun feeling slightly better, or maybe he was just pushing through it. By dinner he was still vacuuming upstairs while his Aunt cooked it. She seemed to be giving him a break as she said that she wanted to make her special lasagna for them. Although, Harry knew that she preferred it when he made it even though she'd never admit to enjoying anything he cooked.

It was while Petunia was cooking and Harry was just about to come down the stairs with the big vacuum that there was a knock at the door.

"I'll get it for you Harry!" Dudley called up as it was usually Harry's job to do everything, even being the doorman.

Dudley gulped however when he saw that the man at the door was no other than Moody. Along with Moody were Remus and Tonks.

"Hello Dudley," Remus said politely, "we're here to see Harry, may we come in?"

"Of course we can," Moody didn't give Dudley a chance to answer as he pushed his way through and the other two Order members followed suit.

Aunt Petunia had walked out of the kitchen at this time, and Harry had sat down on the stairs listening to the conversation and needing to sit down anyway as his heart was racing from exhaustion. Dudley was standing beside the now closed door at the bottom of the stairs, exchanging perplexed looks with his cousin.

"What are you doing here?" Petunia asked.

"We're here to find out why we haven't seen or heard from Harry," Remus answered.

"He has been ill-"

"Likely story, ill with what?" Moody seemed very protective of Harry and Petunia took a step back instinctively.

"I'm not sure, we thought it was the muggle flu, but he hasn't gotten better so I've been suspecting it may be an illness of your kind... wizards, I mean."

"I want to see him, I don't trust you-"

"I'm right here," Harry stood up and looked at them from over the stairs railing.

The Order members and his Aunt were standing beside the staircase in the cramped hallway.

Moody, Remus and Tonks all looked up at the boy with surprise and concern. None of them could deny that he indeed looked quite ill. The boy had dark circles under his eyes, which wasn't something new for him, but they had somehow gotten worse, his messy hair was even messier as if he hadn't even attempted to brush it and his face looked thinner, and paler than when they all saw him last.

"You look like Hell Harry," Tonks was the first to say, very bluntly.

Harry gave a small smile, "thanks."

He picked up the vacuum and trudged down the stairs with the heavy object. Dudley took the vacuum from him, but the typically bubbly Tonks, who was standing the closest to the two boys frowned.

"You're making your sick nephew do his chores still?" She turned and looked at Petunia.

"Well, we've been keeping him in bed since Tuesday," Petunia answered.

"He has been sick since Tuesday and it didn't occur to you to let us know?" Moody had spoken now and was giving Petunia an accusatory stare.

"He has actually been sick since Sunday," Dudley found enough courage to say.

Dudley was still afraid of wizards and had his back against the wall as if to protect his backside. Harry would've found this amusing if Moody wasn't getting angry with his Aunt.

"Not helping Dudley," Harry hissed at him.

"I wasn't trying to help her, I was trying to help you."

"Well, you seem to be the only one in this family to be trying to help Harry, so thank you," Remus walked passed Tonks and over to Harry.

He put his hand on Harry's forehead, "you've got a fever, why didn't you write to us and tell us that you're sick?"

"I didn't want to bother you," Harry replied, his face going red from embarrassment.

It was embarrassment that he didn't need to feel because the people that were looking at him with worry were people who cared for him and didn't think any less of him for being sick.

"Harry, asking us to take care of you isn't bothering us. Sirius always told you that-"

"And he's dead, because he tried taking care of me."

Moody was no longer glaring at Petunia, but was observing the exchange between Harry and Remus. He felt sadness for the boy who had been through so much and he understood personally how hard the life Harry had lived was.

"We'll talk about this later," Moody cut in, "Tonks, go get Harry's things. We're taking him to the burrow where we can care for him better, and find out what's wrong with him."

Harry didn't say anything, but that sense of dread that he had felt earlier that Summer had come back. He didn't want to have to face Ginny and Ron, or the other Weasley's. He was ashamed that he had gotten his friends into so much danger.

Moody seemed to read Harry's mind, "no one's mad at you Harry, we've been sick with worry because we haven't heard from you."

Harry remained silent, but Petunia spoke up, "he has been more depressed, he wasn't eating even before he got sick and he always looks so upset. His nightmares have gotten worse too."

"Thank you for telling us that Mrs. Dursley, can you tell us more about his symptoms since Sunday?" Remus was still standing beside Harry and had put his arm around his shoulders in comfort.

"I noticed he was even more fatigued on Sunday, but other then that I didn't notice anything until Tuesday. He has had a fever, he has been coughing and getting dizzy. His body seems to hurt somewhere from what I can tell as he's always groaning like he's in pain whenever he moves. Is there anything else Dudley? That you've noticed since you've been with him more."

Harry was even more embarrassed and sent his cousin a look that said 'don't say anything,' but Dudley did anyway because he was concerned for his cousin.

"He's been eating, but it's like he's always hungry. He still won't eat though-"

Dudley stopped talking upon noticing Harry's glare and how he pulled away from Remus angrily. Harry walked passed Moody and His Aunt (Tonks was upstairs getting his things) and went into the sitting room.

There Harry sat by himself, or at least he felt like he might as well be. Moody and Remus had followed him and had sat on either side of him on the couch.

"Harry, there's nothing to be ashamed of," Moody said firmly, "you haven't done anything wrong by being sick. Or anything wrong at all really, what happened wasn't your fault."

Remus tried putting his arm around Harry again, but Harry only stood up and walked over to the window.

"We don't think you're weak or stupid, or anything else that's going through your head right now. We love you Harry, and so did Sirius. He would hate that you were feeling like this-"

"He would've understood," Harry sighed and closed his eyes for a moment, he refused to cry in front of them, especially in front of Moody.

"Yes, he would've and we want to understand too, but that doesn't mean we can't hate that you're in pain," was Remus' reply, "it's not your fault that you're in pain Harry, it's not your fault that you've been hurt. I know we haven't ever told you that because we didn't think it was necessary. We didn't-"

"Well, that was your first mistake," Moody interrupted, "Harry listen, I'm going to tell you the way it is. Look at me... thank you. Everything Remus said was right, none of this is your fault, but someone should have helped you long ago. I told Albus that multiple times before, in fact when I first accepted the job of Defence Against the Dark Arts I was excited to meet you. I was surprised when Albus told me you hadn't ever been to a psychological healer-"

"What's a psychological healer?" Harry asked.

"It's like a therapist Harry, my Mother has one," Tonks had entered the sitting room levitating Harry's trunk and empty owl cage, "I let Hedwig out, I thought she could meet us there. I hope that's okay Harry."

Harry nodded and Moody stood up from the couch, which he and Remus had remained sitting on when Harry had moved away from them.

"We'll talk about this later, we have to go before anyone gets word that we're moving you."

"How would anyone get word? I thought you guys were taking me Tuesday, so won't they?"

"Probably, but we can never be to cautious, especially when it comes to protecting you. So, let's go," Moody walked out of the sitting room, followed by Tonks.

Remus looked over at Harry and stood up from the couch too, "come on Harry, let's get you home."

Harry didn't say anything, but he followed Tonks and Remus followed behind him.

"We'll be taking Harry now Dursley," Moody was saying to Petunia in the hallway, "Harry will return one last time next Summer, which he wouldn't be if I was in charge, but Albus is in control of his care so... anyway, come on you three. Harry, up here with me."

Harry hurried past Tonks, Petunia and Dudley to stand beside Moody.

Harry couldn't deny the anger that he felt when Moody had mentioned his headmaster. He was still angry with him, despite breaking half of the headmasters belongings at the end of last year because he hadn't actually gotten his anger out. Breaking things never does get rid of anger, it just momentarily distracts the person and Harry knew that now.

"Here you go, I hope you're not too sick to fly," Moody passed Harry his Firebolt and smiled, "you're the only one I'm not worried about when it comes to fighting on a broomstick. Those two however, have a hard enough time flying regardless-"

Harry laughed when Moody gestured to Tonks and Remus. Tonks objected to that comment, but Remus smiled because he was happy that Moody had managed to get a laugh out of Harry.

Moody was thinking the same thing as he opened the door and walked out onto the lawn of the Dursley's.

"See you next Summer Harry," Dudley called and Harry looked back and waved with a small smile.

This didn't go unnoticed by Remus who said, "you and your cousin are getting along?"

"It's a long story," Harry replied.

"Talk about it later," Moody gestured for them to climb onto their broomsticks, "if one of us gets killed, don't break ranks."

"You said that last time," Harry recalled.

"And I always will say that, now Harry stay close to me."

Moody took off and Harry quickly followed, taking notice of how Remus and Tonks flew behind them and stayed close to each other.

Harry tried his best to concentrate on flying close to Moody because as confident as he was in Remus and Tonks' abilities, Moody was always the one he'd want to be close to in times of trouble.

Harry remained close to Moody during the flight from Little Whinging to Ottery St. Catchpole, where the Weasley's lived. It was a long flight, but finally they made it.

When they landed Moody sent Harry a worried look as he looked like he might be dizzy.

"You okay Harry?" Tonks asked as she had also noticed this.

"I'm fine," Harry lied.

"Let's get him inside so he can rest, I'm sure Molly will have cooked something up for him. Eating may make him feel better," Moody said, clearly not buying Harry's attempt at reassurance.

Moody walked up to the burrow's door muttering something about Harry's relatives and Harry being too thin. Harry watched as Moody knocked, and Molly and him exchanged the security question and answer. He realized that if this tiny bit of security was something that Moody was doing he should probably follow Dumbledore and Hermione's advice and do it too.

"Come on inside Harry," Moody said, moving out of the way to let Harry through.

"Harry my dear!" Molly embraced Harry and he returned the hug wholeheartedly.

"Hi Mrs. Weasley," he smiled at her when she let him go and looked around the familiar place.

He felt comforted by being there, but he couldn't ignore the sense of guilt that remained. Remus had walked over to Harry and putting his arm around his shoulders, led him to the dining table and sat down beside him.

"You don't look well dear, are you feeling alright?" Molly asked as she went into the kitchen and started cooking something for them.

"His relatives told us that he was sick and that that's why we haven't seen or heard from him," Moody answered for him, sitting down on the other side of him.

Tonks had sat down across from Remus and they were currently exchanging looks with each other. This didn't go unnoticed by Harry who looked between the two wondering what was going on.

"Is that true Harry? Are you ill?" Mrs. Weasley broke Harry's concentration on Remus and Tonks and he looked over at her.

"Um, yeah I've been sick since Sunday," he replied nervously.

"Why wouldn't you write us?"

"He said he didn't want to bother us," Remus told her and this caused her to send Harry a look of pity.

"Harry dear, you wouldn't be bothering us-"

"That's what we told him," Tonks added, but Molly kept talking to Harry as she put soup into a bowl.

"I love taking care of my family, and you my dear are family," Molly smiled at him as she put the soup in front of him, and also gave soup to the others.

Everyone thanked her and Harry ate, hoping he'd be able to go to bed after and not have to speak to the Order members about how he was feelings, both physically and otherwise.

Crookshanks came and started rubbing against Harry's legs.

"Hermione's here?" Harry asked, both excited and nervous at the same time and it could be heard in the tone of his voice.

"Yeah, we went and got her on Wednesday," Tonks answered, giving him an odd look.

"Awesome, she's probably asleep like the others..." Harry trailed off and started eating even faster.

After Harry was done his soup Mrs. Weasley ordered him to bed, for which he was thankful because he was exhausted and wanted to avoid Moody and Remus' enquires and useless reassuring words.

"We'll talk later Harry," Remus made a point of saying as he went to head upstairs.

"Yes, we will be," Moody added, "you can't avoid your feelings Harry, that's an unhealthy habit to have, especially as a future auror."

"Okay, well good night and thanks for coming to get me," Harry said sadly before going upstairs to bed.

"He really doesn't sound or look good..." He heard Molly say.

Harry felt happy about the 'future auror' part of Moody's comment, but then he remembered that Exceeds Expectations grade in Potions and that bit of encouragement got dampened.

'Maybe Professor Slughorn will accept my grade..." he hoped as he went into Fred and George's bedroom, which was where Molly had told him he'd be sleeping.

Before laying down Harry took out his wand and poked the bed, before looking under it and checking the closets, dresser and night tables. He was sure that Fred and George would leave him a present, but he found nothing except old jokes that had been discarded or renewed.

The twins room was messy, full of jokes and gags and old abandoned books and clothing, but Harry didn't mind. Mrs. Weasley had been nice enough to make sure Hedwig and his trunk had made it to his room for him and had also put flowers on one of the night tables for him.

Harry didn't even bother getting into pyjamas since he was already wearing baggy track pants and a t-shirt. He felt like he probably should have been wearing something more neat when his mentor, his father's best friend and Tonks picked him up, but they had surprised him and he was too sick to care. They hadn't thought there was anything wrong with his attire anyway. In fact, they were too concerned for him to even notice.

When he lay down on the bed he was asleep almost immediately however, he had entered into a sleep of memories that he'd rather forget, but knew he never would.

Saturday morning seemed to come too fast; the sun broke through the window and Harry pulled the covers over his head, refusing to get out of bed and just wishing for even an hour of dreamless sleep. This wouldn't be offered to him however, as Crookshanks, Hermione's cat laid on his chest purring.

"You're supposed to be with Hermione," Harry mumbled to the cat as he scratched his ears.

The cat only purred and moments later his bedroom door was opened.

"Harry?" He smiled when he heard her voice.

"Good morning Hermione."

He heard her walk over to the bed and pick up Crookshanks, "go on, I want to see him too."

He rubbed his eyes and began sitting up as she sat down on the bed beside him, "Mrs. Weasley told me you got here Wednesday?"

"Yeah, I did," Hermione was beaming at him, "I knew you were here when Crookshanks wasn't laying with me. You're the only other person he sleeps with."

During the time that Harry and Hermione had exchanged these very few words, Ron had gone downstairs and had found out Harry was there. He came bursting through the door at that moment;

"Hey mate!" Ron was beaming at him too and Harry was filled with happiness at the fact that they were both happy to see him.

"How are you? Did the muggles treat you good? Doesn't look like it, you look like Hell."

"Thanks, but I'm sick," Harry explained, "I've been sick since Sunday and actually my Aunt and cousin kind of took care of me."

Hermione felt his forehead, "you're burning up, I'm going to go tell Mrs. Weasley-"

"No, don't!" Harry grabbed her hand as she got up from his bed.

"She needs to know, she may have medicine for you-"

"It's just the muggle flu-"

"Wizards don't get muggle flu Harry, and when they do it's potentially dangerous."

Harry didn't know this and he groaned and laid back on his pillows, knowing he wouldn't be able to stop her.

"It's okay mate," Ron assured him after Hermione had left, "my mom will probably make you an appointment at St. Mungos-"

"Great, just what I need," Harry said, getting agitated, "to be seen by doctors so that everyone can know how stupid and weak I am."

"Man you're a lot of things, but stupid and weak is something no one can accuse you of being. You and Remus were the only one's that got out uninjured, even Dumbledore seems to have been hurt by the fight with you-know- - alright, Voldemort."

Harry had sent Ron a look, but became worried about what he said about their headmaster.

"He seems injured? I saw him just two weeks ago and he seemed fine."

"I don't know, the ministry is thinking he's getting too old to protect Hogwarts-"

Harry rolled his eyes and groaned, "they're still trying to get him out of the school? Really? He's the best headmaster Hogwarts has ever had and all the bad stuff that has happened to Hogwarts has happened when he hasn't been there to protect us."

"I know, but he seems slower and something happened to his hand that has gotten everyone worried. I overheard dad saying that he has been going on secret missions or something, and that the ministry wants to know what he's doing."

Harry thought about this; he had noticed that Dumbledore's hand was injured when he had seen him the other day, but that hadn't happened during the fight with Voldemort last month. He knew this because he had been there, had watched the entire thing and never did Dumbledore seem to get injured at all.

"Maybe his hand got injured during one of these secret missions?"

"I haven't got a clue Harry, but even parents are thinking that he has gotten too old. Some are trying to pull their kids out of school-"

"They're just saying that because the ministry is-"

"Mom said that-"

"That's ridiculous, I swear everyone has gone mad!" Harry had gotten up in his agitation and had grabbed jeans out of his trunk as well as a clean shirt.

"The safest place to be is at Hogwarts with Dumbledore. He isn't even that old, how old is he anyway?"

Ron shrugged, but just then Hermione walked back into the room just as Harry had changed his pants and pulled off his dirty shirt.

"He's 114 years old, 115 next month," Hermione answered, she stopped when she saw Harry.

She blushed and turned around, Harry was blushing also as he pulled on his clean shirt.

"Uh, how do you know that?" Harry asked awkwardly, sitting down on his bed against his pillows.

"I do my research, can I turn around now?"

"Yeah."

Ron had sat down at the bottom of the bed, Hermione got onto the bed and crawled up to sit beside Harry, leaning against his pillows too.

They sat in awkward silence while Ron watched, noticing how they were both still blushing.

Molly walked into Harry's room holding a cloth and levitating a tray, "Hermione told me you have a fever Harry so, I brought you a cold cloth and some breakfast."

"Thanks Mrs. Weasley," Harry said, feeling embarrassed and a little annoyed that Hermione mentioned his fever.

Hermione was looking at him with concern though while he ate his breakfast and he couldn't be mad at her when he noticed this. Despite not understanding why she cared about him so much. The truth was, Harry cared about her more than he could say. It hurt him deeply when she got hurt during the battle at the ministry.

'Which was your fault, she got hurt because of you,' a cruel voice in his head told him, but he shook it off.

It wasn't the voice of Voldemort the way it had mostly been last year, these voices were voices of trauma. He had these voices in his head for a long time, since before last year.

Harry blamed himself for everything that had happened at the ministry and he had trouble eating when these thoughts popped back into his brain.

"Eat Harry," Hermione encouraged when she noticed him put his spoon down.

"I can't, I'm sorry."

"Don't apologize for not being able to eat Harry, I understand you're sick," Hermione replied soothingly, "I'll take your tray down to Mrs. Weasley and tell her-"

"I wasn't apologizing for that," Harry got up before she could and picked up his own tray.

Ron and Hermione got up to follow him, "then what are you apologizing for mate?"

"For everything, for last month and everything else that has happened in the last five years-" Harry had turned to face the two of them.

"Harry, you don't need to apologize-" Hermione started.

"Yes, I do! You got hurt Hermione and it was my fault! I can't just ignore that, I can't keep letting you guys be nice to me when I know you- both of you nearly got killed because of me! As well as your sister Ron and the members of-"

Harry was still holding the tray, but his hands starting shaking and Ginny came rushing into the room because she had heard his outburst. Harry had had his back towards the door so Ginny was standing behind him.

"Harry, it wasn't your fault!" Ginny interrupted, "we didn't go to the ministry because of you, we went there for you! We wanted to save you, and Sirius because we love both of you-"

"But it was a trap Ginny! I should have known that, Hermione did-!" He turned to face her.

"After what happened with our father we understood why you believed it could be real. I think we all knew it could be real or a trap and whether it was or not we wanted to be with you. We didn't want you to fight all alone again, the way you always have had to."

"That's right," Ron said after Ginny had finished, "we wanted to fight with you this time, instead of staying on the sidelines."

Harry shook his head and tried to calm himself down.

'Why can't they understand it's my fault?' He thought to himself.

"Harry," Hermione said gently, putting her hand on his shoulder.

Harry turned again to looked at her and Ron, but found that he had started feeling dizzy again. Ron could tell so he took the tray from him and passed it to Ginny.

"Hermione, I think-" Harry started to say that he thought he was about to pass out, but before he could manage to get the words out he lost his balance and stumbled to the ground.

Hermione caught him the best she could and fell to the ground with him, holding him in her arms.

"Harry-" Hermione could tell he was still somewhat conscious, but when she felt his head he felt even hotter and she looked over at Ron as if asking him what to do because for once she couldn't think of anything.

"Ginny, go get Mom," Ron commanded and Ginny didn't need to be told twice.

She took the tray and ran downstairs to her Mother who quickly put down what she was doing and ran upstairs.

"Harry dear?" She went over to him and felt his forehead.

"He got out of bed and he was upset," Hermione explained while she held him, "and then he got dizzy and lost his balance."

"Harry, can you get back into bed?" Molly asked.

He nodded and struggled to get to his feet, but Ron grabbed his arm and put it around his shoulder to help him.

"I got you mate... there you go," Ron said as Harry laid down.

"I'm going to send a letter to St. Mungos and get a healer down here," Molly told them, "stay here with him."

Harry groaned, half from the sudden dizzy spell and the half from the fuss that was being made over him.

'Over your weakness.'

He had thought that he had been feeling a little better when he had first awoken, but whenever his thoughts went back to his guilt it was like his entire body turned against him. He suddenly felt like his body was on fire again and everything ached.

Ron sat down at the foot of the bed again and Hermione knelt on the floor, reaching for his hand. Ron noticed this and also noticed how Harry smiled and squeezed her hand when he felt her hand in his. He watched this little exchange knowingly;

'When are they going to stop doing their little dance and just get together already.'

Ginny had come back into the room and had taken a place sitting on top of a wooden box that Fred and George had left. She stayed quiet while she watched Harry and Hermione, a pang of pain in her chest as she did so.

'What's wrong with me? I'm dating Dean now-' she thought to herself, trying to shake off the familiar feeling.

Ginny, Ron and Hermione stayed by Harry's side while he drifted off the sleep. Each of them were anxiously awaiting Mrs. Weasley's return with a healer, hoping that they'd be able to help their friend.

Harry didn't know how many people loved him; the Order, the Weasley's and his friends all loved him more than he could understand at that time, They hoped he'd be able to see how much they cared about him someday, they also hoped he'd understand that it wasn't his fault what had happened, ever and that he'd be able to move on and be happy again.

This was easier said than done however, but the first step had been taken towards healing whether it was known or not.