August 9, 1996

"I heard you were in the hospital yesterday. I wasn't sure if you would feel up to coming today," said Mitch, looking genuinely surprised to see Harry when he arrived at his office the next morning. "Are you feeling okay?"

"I feel fine now," Harry said truthfully. The nurse had allowed him to take a Dreamless Sleep Potion and he had gotten more rest last night than all of last week combined.

"Well I'm glad you're okay," said Mitch, leading Harry to the arm chairs they normally occupied during these sessions. "Do you want to talk about what happened?"

"I did something stupid," he said under his breath.

"What's that?"

Harry sighed. "I flew over the Forbidden Forest and got attacked by some weird vine. It was pretty nasty. I almost got eaten by a flower."

"A flower? That must have been frightening."

"I guess. Remus saved me though."

"I'm glad he did," said Mitch. "But what made you fly over a forest that you knew was off limits."

"I was upset with Remus. We sort of had a fight and I went out on the grounds without his permission. He tried to come after me to talk or something, but I was still mad so I just flew away. I didn't even realize where I was going until it was too late."

"May I ask what you were fighting about?"

"I broke the rule about telling Remus when I'm going outside." Harry felt silly having to admit this.

"So you broke a rule and got in trouble and your way of handling the situation was to break the same rule again?"

"I told you it was stupid! But I wasn't just upset about that… Remus made me feel foolish and I kind of lashed out at him and accused him of blaming me for Sirius' death," Harry said quickly.

"Who was Sirius?"

"My godfather and Remus' best friend. He died a couple of months ago because of a stupid mistake I made," he said, his voice thick with emotion. "Voldemort was sending me these false visions of Sirius being tortured and I tried to rescue him- only he wasn't ever there. My friends and I were surrounded by Death Eaters and Sirius came and tried to save me, but he died instead."

Mitch's eyes went wide and his mouth was hanging open in wonderment. "Is all of that really true?"

"I don't tell lies," Harry replied curtly, gently rubbing the back of his hand that was still scarred with a similar message.

"Merlin… you've been through so much Harry. It's a miracle that you've made it this far and turned out as well as you did."

Harry smirked, knowing just how true that statement really was. Mitch shook his head to clear his thoughts and became professional once more.

"So you feel guilty about what happened to your godfather, is that it?"

Harry nodded.

"Do you really feel as though Remus blames you?"

"I don't know… I guess not. He's never really said it but I'm sure that he must deep down. It's not the first time I've made a mistake like that…"

"What do you mean?"

"Cedric died the year before because I told him we should take the tri-wizard cup together…"

"That was the tournament. I remember reading about that in the Daily Prophet."

Harry snorted. "The Daily Prophet isn't very reliable. I hope you read the Quibbler version as well."

"Actually, I did. That must have been a very traumatic experience."

Harry nodded again.

"Were you directly responsible for Cedric's death?"

"Well, no… Wormtail killed him."

"And did you directly kill Sirius?"

"No… Bellatrix Lestrange was the one who cursed him…"

"Then you must understand that you should not feel guilty about things you had no control over. You've done the best that you could have during some pretty horrific experiences."

"I guess," said Harry, though he wasn't sure he would really believe it.

Mitch paused for a moment and then changed the subject. "Are you still experiencing nightmares?"

"Not last night… but yeah…"

"And in those nightmares do you still feel guilty about exposing the fact that you were abused."

"I guess so," he said. He had been dreaming that Vernon was attacking him because Ron and Hermione discovered the bruises. Mitch had proposed that his subconscious felt guilty about what happened and was punishing him much in the same manner his uncle would have.

"Do you feel like you deserve it?"

"Sometimes…" he whispered.

No matter what he had said to Mitch, he really did feel responsible for what had happened to Sirius and Cedric. He hadn't fought back against his uncle as much as he used to because he felt he deserved it. When his uncle wasn't punishing him, Harry had found a way to punish himself.

After a rather long session today about "misplaced guilt", Harry decided to join Remus for lunch once more. They ate together in amiably, enjoying each other's presence or the first time since he had arrived at the castle.

Another owl arrived today. As expected it was another letter from his friends. He still couldn't bring himself to read it for some reason so he saved it at the bottom of his trunk with the others he had received.