AN: Sorry for the long wait. I was working on a later chapter and I wanted to have it more finished before I posted a new chapter. I hope you enjoy and I will try to update the next one a little sooner. :) Enjoy! and Review!
Chapter 59
"I Shut My Eyes and The World Drops Dead¹."
Cameron sat down on the bed beside his daughter in her old bedroom. She had come home, told her parents nothing, dropped her bags on the floor and went up to her room to curl up in her old bed with Sophia secure in the makeshift crib close by. As soon as he sat down beside her he saw the light reflect off the tears on her face. "James called," he said, running his hand over her hair. "He told me what happened."
"Oh, so you know what a freaking idiot I am for marrying a great big asshole," she growled, pulling her knees up and crossing her ankles, knocking the heels of her expensive red Louis Vuitton's together.
"You're not an idiot Bonnie. Everybody makes mistakes and Harry is no different."
"So you're taking his side?" she accused.
"No, of course not. I'm on your side, all the way. I'll have Harry arrested if you want me to."
Bonnie nuzzled back down in her pillows. "Don't bother." She put her hands together and set them under her cheek. "I knew it. I knew when I saw her letter sitting there on his desk. Her signature, so pretty and simple. I always knew. He loves her," she said, starting to cry. "The only reason he married me instead is because she went crazy and they took her away."
"That is not true Bonnie. Harry loves you and always meant to be with you."
"That's not what I got from him. He said so much, how much pain he was in, how sorry he was that it happened, but never once did he say that it didn't mean anything to him. He couldn't even lie and say it because he knew for a fact that it did. He wanted to sleep with her. It wasn't an accident. He kissed her, he didn't try to fight it he instigated it."
"I'm sure you both just need to discuss it more. I'm sure he can explain."
"I'm sure he can. I just…" She sighed heavily. "I just need some time to think about things. Could you leave me alone?"
Cameron sighed and smiled half-heartedly. "Sure. I'll be downstairs with your mother. Do you want me to take Sophia?"
She glanced over at Sophia in the makeshift white crib beside her bed. "I suppose so."
Cameron came over and picked Sophia up from the crib and rested her on his hip. "Alright. Come down when you want to talk. We'll be having dinner in a little while."
Bonnie said nothing as he walked out and shut the door. "Today, Bonnie my dear…" She sighed heavily to herself, "Today your husband is an awful, awful man."
/-
He could smell the sanitary disinfectant. He could see the white sheets and white walls and white floor before he opened his eyes. He could taste the insanity on his tongue. It was the strongest hint before opening his eyes to greet the barred windows of his shared room in the psychiatric hospital. He sat up in bed and looked around noticing immediately that he was still wearing his own clothes minus his belt. His black jeans didn't have a zipper, just buttons, so they were non-lethal he supposed and his v-neck T-shirt was thin and safe. Wrapped around his wrist was a wrist-band, like the ones they gave you when you went to the hospital for a surgery so that they didn't misplace you. Written on it was his own name SIR POTTER, HARRY JAMES and the name of the hospital, BETHLEM ROYAL HOSPITAL.
"Oh my God, they've committed me to Bedlam." He looked around the room to take it all in. His own bed wasn't white like he had suspected, it was laid with a light blue comforter, quite hideous actually, even by his own standards. Maybe he had been living with Bonnie too long.
At the thought of her he didn't bother to look any further and curled back into a ball. He stared at the wall, which was white, and wondered how he got there. He wondered if maybe he passed out or did his father drug him to get him there? Well, Josh would have done it. He wondered how Bonnie was, if she was crying. He hoped she didn't cry. He would rather she be angry at him, just angry. But he knew that wouldn't be the case. Bonnie would surely be upset by the fact that her husband slept with someone else. He wondered how Sophia was; his sweet, dear daughter that he had hardly seen much of before now. He missed her. He missed her sweet cherub shaped face like an angel with rosy cheeks and fair skin and eyes the color of oceans before mankind.
He fell back to sleep thinking about Sophia and her mother.
/-
"Sir Potter?"
Harry breathed deeply of the disinfectant, an immediate reminder to where he was. He turned over in his hideous, itchy bed and looked up at an orderly in a gray uniform. "What?"
"You've been here twenty-four hours, in solitude. Its customary that you now go to meet your counselor for a customary meet and greet."
Harry narrowed his eyes. "A meet and greet."
"Yes, he will talk to you for an hour and decide how to diagnose you for now and then he'll show you around the hospital."
"Is my counselor Josh?" Harry asked curiously.
"No, though Josh and your father have both talked to your counselor to let him know why they would like you stay here for the next few weeks. For observation. He will go over that with you."
Harry rolled over again and moved out of the bed and stood tall in front of the orderly. "Alright. Take me to him."
The orderly led him out of his room and into the hallway. The walls of the hospital were cream colored and cold, the tile floor square and white but each door to each separate room, solid and impenetrable, was each painted their own separate color of the rainbow. Harry found it far more disturbing to his psyche than if it had all been painted white. He hated when hospitals made it look like they were trying too hard to put patients in a better mood. If you're really depressed would bright colors really help you? It never had before.
They passed a few areas of the hospital on the way to the counselor's office, most of them empty but one, with a TV and a card table, which was filled with the majority of patients. The orderly stopped in front of a gray door with two long glass panels down the length of it. The orderly opened the door and nodded to the secretary.
"Sir Potter is here for his meeting with Dr. Ross."
"You can go right in Sir," the secretary said to Harry with a pleasant grin, full of perfect white teeth.
"Hmmm, nice to know I still get my title in a mental hospital," Harry said as he walked to the door and turned the handle. He shut the wood door behind him as he analyzed the man in the black leather chair behind a sleek, modern black desk in a sleek modern office that seemed to have been designed by IKEA. Bonnie would know for sure.
He took a few steps forward, lightheaded, and reached for the chair as he thought of her and fell in. Dr. Ross was an older man, stylish with that light black hair dusted just a bit with gray and one streak of gray down the side of his hair adjacent to his sideburns. He was covered in wrinkles, aging gracefully in a world where everyone was Benjamin Button. Dr. Ross probably thought it made him look wise and full of psychological knowledge. Like, if he looked sixty he must have spent twenty years in school and twenty working for and learning from his patients.
"How are you feeling Mr. Potter?"
Harry paused, surprised by the title when everyone he had met today before now had used his proper one. Harry sighed heavily. "Its Sir Potter. And if you call me Mister Potter this won't work and I'll probably end up strangling you before the day ends."
Harry could see him try to hide his fear but he saw it. He reorganized papers on his desk. "So sorry Sir Potter. My mistake. It won't happen again. Now, I suppose we'll begin with why you are here. You were brought home from being kidnapped less than two days ago, is that correct?"
Harry winced, lifting his eyebrows to stretch his skin-it felt tight-and then answered, "I have no idea. I was apparently on drugs."
"Yes, E. Was it your captors who gave you the drugs?"
"Well, I know that any kind of hallucinatory drugs could have dire consequences, especially on one such as myself, leaving me in a comatose or constant state of delusions, though my captors also knew that, but since my hands were either tied to a chair or staked to a wall I would have to assume that I did not put the E in my mouth by my own doing, nor do I remember asking to be drugged by my kidnappers to drive me further insane. So yes, my captors gave me the drugs."
Dr. Ross nodded slowly. "Your father said that you were seeing things. You mentioned memories coming through like a full closet when the door won't close. Were you repressing things, Harry?"
Harry looked at his knees and was silent for a long moment but the doctor waited for him. "As a child, I repressed things. I didn't realize I was doing it at first, I thought I was blacking out from the pain from beatings my uncle would give me, but then I realized I was repressing moments. Five or six minutes of time when I had been talking to someone about something would be gone but the rest of the conversation would be there in my memory, like I had edited it, poorly, to fit my needs. I stopped repressing as much when I was eleven, when I went to Hogwarts because I wasn't at home as much but I guess the battle was too much. I knew the walls I had put up to hold it all in where I didn't have to think about it were breaking down but they were strong enough." He paused thoughtfully and continued even more softly. "Until Ganelle pulled at it until it broke."
"Are you still seeing these…memories? Are you seeing them right now? Are they like hallucinations?"
"Yes and no. I see them, now, but they're not like hallucinations. My uncle isn't standing over my shoulder calling me a bastard or anything. Its kind of like there's a screen on the wall and I'm watching it happen over and over and there's a box in my ear doing the sound effects, like when you go to a drive-through and there's those little boxes you put on your window to hear the movie."
"You seem much more calm then when your father was explaining yesterday."
"Well, you see, that was yesterday, a few moments after I had been kidnapped, driven further insane and coming off of Ecstacy. Now that I've had twenty-four hours of sleep and time has passed I'm able to concentrate on more things. But don't worry, you can still work on me if you like. I'm still crazy, I can still feel fingernails on my cheeks, my wife hates me and my daughter is unknowingly hating me with her. I'll probably need to be medicated and you'll probably have to strap me down to do it because I'm severely fearful of doctors, needles and terribly against medication; I think its the downfall of modern society. And I may be suicidal, I can't tell yet. I'm a very religious person and suicide is the worst sin as its against God's master plan but who could possibly care now? I'm going to hell anyway after committing adultery, all the murders I've committed, sitting around my house for a couple of years without doing anything for society. I've never committed gluttony though. Plus, the movie for the next hour for me is going to be my uncle, staring at me with an expression that very obviously says he is plotting, not my demise, but my next undoing.
"So," he said, leaning back his chair, "do you still offer lobotomies or do I have to wait until I'm as far gone as I'm going to get, because I'm fairly certain that Bonnie is never coming back. It's all down hill from here."
Dr. Ross leaned back in his chair for a moment and stared at the composed gentleman in the seat before him, he almost wondered how much of it was a lie. But Josh had brought him in and Josh was a great therapist and he knew a liar. Dr. Ross reached forward to press a white button on a speaker box. "Ms. Edwards, please bring a Prozac for Sir Potter. And please have two orderlies bring it in." He turned to Harry. "Are you going to take it willingly?"
Harry looked at him and then back at the orderlies as they walked into the room. "This is a muggle hospital, isn't it?"
"This is the wing for magical patients. I am a wizard and so are the orderlies behind you. Miss Edwards is a muggle. Unfortunately, except for sleep aids and calming draughts, the wizarding world has made very little advances in psychological cures or aids."
"But, if I wanted to leave, could you really stop me?" he asked curiously, analyzing the room.
"I am not sure Sir Potter. I have never seen you in action. But I'm going to guess not, which is why I ask. The only improvements we can make are ones we accomplish with your cooperation."
Harry nodded and, without much thought, he held out his hand to the orderly for the small pill.
"Its a light dose. We may start you on a few things and change the doses as we learn more."
Harry smiled at the irony. "Just like childhood. An experiment once again."
/-
There was another hour of discussion about Harry's past, which he was more than willing to express unlike he was to Josh because everything was now out in the open to himself. Why hide it? It wasn't going to be repressed again. There was no going back.
When they were finished and the doctor had more appointments with the other patients to attend to another orderly took him out of the office and showed him around the building. He explained the every day schedule that he would be expected to abide by. "You'll be woken up at seven every morning, you'll join the others in the group bathroom to wash. Breakfast is at eight. After breakfast at eight-thirty we have group therapy in the big blue room. When group therapy is over at nine-thirty we have free periods. Most patients spend it in the TV room. We also have a library and a gym or you're welcome to stay in your room. Just let an orderly know where you are. Lunch is at eleven-thirty and your appointment with Dr. Ross is at twelve-thirty. You have an hour to two hours with him, depending on how much you need that day. When your session is over you have more free time. Bed time is at eight pm. No exceptions."
"What if I don't sleep?" Harry asked.
"Then we'll help you sleep," the orderly offered, though to Harry it sounded a little like a threat. "Once your dosage is set , the nurses will take care of what you take at what times. Medication is given out up to three times a day, they'll call for you if you have a dose to take."
The orderly walked him to the big blue room before he realized it. "Its nine-fifteen, you have fifteen minutes of group therapy with everyone else before free period. It'll help you understand how the circle is run."
The group paused for a moment while Harry took a seat, the door was closed and the group began again. Since everyone had said what they wanted to say and there were fifteen minutes left in the session Mrs. Diane, her first name, had everyone introduce themselves. Mark, because no one had last names here, was an American who had lived in London for ten years, since he was twenty-five. He had been in the hospital for most of that time trying to calm his depression to a manageable state. Melony, a very pretty young woman in her mid-twenties with long black hair and blue eyes, suffered from Dissociative Identity Disorder. They weren't introducing themselves by their names and diseases but Jacob, who was sitting beside Harry in the circle would lean in after the patient said their name and tell Harry their disorder. Jacob, Harry guessed, suffered from some kind of personality disorder that craved Harry's approval. One man, around sixty, seemed to suffer from Catatonic Schizophrenia. Mrs. Diane introduced him as David. The girl next to him,Veronica, was in her forties and suffered either Histrionic personality disorder or Borderline. Jacob couldn't tell. And the young girl across from him with dark brown hair in braids and brown eyes, eighteen, suffered from Bipolar I. Her name was Ashley.
Harry raised his hand slightly to catch Mrs. Diane's attention.
"Yes Harry?"
"Um, are we going to be in the same groups every day?"
"Yes. It helps everyone get closer to each other so that you can support each other in your recovery."
"Is there any way that I could be in a different group?"
"And why would you want to be put in a different group Harry? Is there something wrong with this one? I'm sure that everyone here wants to help you and would appreciate the help you can offer them."
"Well, I don't think some of us are going to get along."
"Why is that?"
Harry didn't want to say it out loud. Would it upset him? Would the images of his uncle be replaced with images of her? Would he then spiral out with guilt thinking of her and Bonnie? Harry sunk down in his seat again. "Never mind."
/-
"Hi Bonnie," Ginny said, sitting down on the couch beside Bonnie in her parent's living room where she had been watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer for the last six hours. She turned to her friend as she identified the show; Bonnie was wearing her bright pink Zac Posen asymmetrical dress. To Bonnie, this was mourning clothes since her everyday clothing was dark colors. It was rebellious against Harry's ideals. Her hair was perfect, smooth and clean, so was her skin and her nude heels, which were crossed at the ankle and rested on the coffee table amongst the Buffy DVD Season Collections. "Whatcha doin?" Ginny asked, despite the obvious.
"Watching Buffy."
"That's what your father said."
"Of course, I've been skipping ahead to parts with Spike in it. In the early seasons I skipped ahead to scenes with early Angel. His brooding was hot in the beginning but without a sense of humor you're just a big jerk who is grumpy all of the time."
Ginny nodded slowly. "Right. Um, where is Sophia?"
"Sleeping in her crib. We set it up in my room." She turned to glare at Ginny. "Don't think that just because I'm upset I'm being a bad mother. Don't judge Ginny."
"I was not thinking that you were being a bad mother. Not at all Bonnie. You're a great mother."
Bonnie turned back to Buffy, fast-forwarding through a scene between Buffy and Riley. "God. Riley sucks ass. He's the worst boyfriend ever. Why would she ever date him, he's a douche."
"Bonnie, did you just use the word douche?"
"Yes. Do you have a problem with that?"
"Um, no. I guess not."
"Good, because if you have a problem with anything I decide to do you can just get out. I'm in no mood to put up with anyone aside from Sarah Michelle Gellar and James Marsters." She looked at Ginny with her eyes narrowed. "Are you Sarah Michelle Gellar?" she asked.
Ginny simply shook her head nervously.
"Then maybe you should go."
"But Bonnie, I came here to talk to you."
"About what?" she asked, watching Spike escape from the underground base of the Initiative.
"Well, about what happened? Don't you want to talk about it?"
"You mean do I want to talk about how my husband cheated on me with one of his followers, who I had known he'd been secretly desiring since she had to leave fifteen years ago, in the middle of his being tortured by two of his other followers and his enemy's follower?" She paused but Ginny had no reply aside from shocked silence. "No Ginny. I would not like to discuss my husband's infidelity with his crazy, secret lover, follower. And I don't understand why you would assume I would like to speak with you about this since you cheated on Fish with another guy who you ended up marrying. Is that what you're going to help me understand? That Harry and I will end our relationship so that he can be happy with Ashley, who he has secretly loved for years? Just like you? Is that what you wanted to talk about? Or did you want to explain how I drove Harry away or did you want to touch on my being a bad mother again?"
"Bonnie, I…no, that's not what I wanted to say at all."
"Just go Ginny." Bonnie pushed the buttons on the remote harshly to fast-forward through a Buffy/ Supportive-Willow scene.
Deciding she would try again later Ginny stood from the couch and left the room.
/-
That night Harry laid wide awake on top of his itchy blue sheets, his arms behind his head, thinking about Bonnie and Sophia…and, admittedly, Ashley. In-between wondering if Bonnie would come back to him, maybe allow him to stay with her, even if only for a little while; if she would let him be with her, stand near enough to smell her even if he had to live in guilt for the rest of his life; if she would bring Sophia, who he wanted to see at least past the age of five to see if her hair looked like Bonnie's or crazy like his; if Ashley was back on her medication; if she had actually loved him or if she was just crazy; if she felt guilty, less than himself of course, for sleeping with him; if she missed him—in-between he wondered what he would think about after his lobotomy.
.
That night Bonnie had gotten into a fight with her father who was just trying to be supportive and ended up with his daughter believing he was on Harry's side, despite his many denials. She took Sophia from her crib and used the two guards left with her to move her things, again, to France, to stay with her grandmother. Mrs. Mrs. McNeal was more than happy to have her there and immediately had the guest room set up for the night where Bonnie fell straight to sleep with Sophia in the crib beside her.
.
That night James consoled Lily to sleep and kept himself awake the rest of the night with coffee watching Lily and his youngest son sleeping.
.
That night Sirius drank a little and passed out on the couch while Jackline laid awake in their bed with Mason asleep in her arms.
.
That night Fish breathed deeply of the fresh air and then put his cigarette to his lips. He sat beside the window blowing smoke out the opening so he didn't infect the clean air that Kacy breathed. She was asleep in his bed, curled up around his pillow and wrapped only in his new black sheets. She had taken him shopping earlier in an effort to get his thoughts away from his friend. It hadn't worked but he allowed her to buy him new sheets, comforter, pillows and a bed that stayed close to the floor and wasn't very decorative, but more than he had before. Kacy liked it.
He had a little more than four months left with Kacy. His beautiful, soft spoken southern belle. Her parents were coming by to visit tomorrow before they left the country to go back to the states and he wasn't sure what kind of a mood he would be in in the morning to greet them.
He hadn't thought about it since their first night together until tonight, but he realized that he was really…in love with Kacy. He really shouldn't have done it to himself. Losing her would be more painful than anything.
He shlepped lower in his seat in the window and took another puff of his cigarette.
He looked up at the empty sky feeling very corny thinking of what he wanted to do. Who else do you ask, even if he didn't exist, to heal your true love and save your best friend? He had only spoken to St. Jimmy's superior once, when he was five, a second after meeting St. Jimmy. He had never even told St. Jimmy what He had said to him exactly. Why would he? He wasn't religious, the side-kick didn't have to believe in anything if he didn't want to. It wasn't necessary for success. But he was given the option of asking for something, same as Harry was. There was a consequence of course, there always was for everything in life.
He had never wanted anything before. Harry had always wanted his parents and Bonnie. He got Bonnie for free and received his parents as a consolation prize. Fish had never asked, never even thought to ask. He had grown up in squalor with nothing but a leaky roof and raised by people who used him as a drug hideaway, by making him swallow it. Anything better than that was enough.
But now…He sighed and glanced at Kacy. He put his cigarette out on the ledge and walked over to Kacy, curling up on the bed beside her. He nuzzled into her collarbone and wrapped his arm around her waist.
But now everything was so screwed up. Now he was in need of things only one person could provide. And he was sure he wouldn't get both.
/-
The next morning, after breakfast and group therapy, which was centered around Melony, who was Theresa at the time, Harry was left in the TV room with the other patients. It was basically a play room. A lounge area set up on one side with two long couches and some random plastic seating spaced randomly around the room. A very old television sat before all of the seating. On the other side of the room was a table where some people played cards, couches to read books, couches to lay about, or just talk.
He thought he would rather be in the gym or the library doing something but really he just wanted to sit there. He picked a chair, which was tall in back and had low arms, and curled up sideways in it, his legs hung off to the side and he could feel the pain of the chair arm digging into his back while he just did nothing. It felt really nice to do nothing and because of his drugs he didn't really notice Uncle Vernon shouting at him anymore. The noise had mellowed and the picture was getting sort of hazy in the back of his eyes.
He hadn't bothered to say anything in group therapy, he hadn't eaten anything at breakfast, and he hadn't slept at all last night. He didn't let anyone know, afraid that they would give him another type of drug that would make him sleep or force feed him somehow. He doubted they really could force him to do anything, except that he was sort of…mellow. Would he bother to put up a fight when he was in this type of mood?
He pulled himself up tighter into a ball in his chair and closed his eyes. Hopefully someone would wake him up for lunch, where he would pretend to eat some more by pushing his food around on his plate and staring at it as though it was interesting.
/-
"Sir Potter?" Mrs. Diane asked the next day in group. "Are you focusing?"
"No," he admitted, curled up in a ball on his chair, his arms wrapped around his knees and his cheek resting on his knees, his eyes closed.
"Sir, this is not the place to sleep. We are in group. Perhaps you would be more interested if we talked about you. Would you like to talk about anything with the group?"
"I'm sure the group knows nothing about my problems." He ran one of his fingers over his bottom lip where they had insisted that he remove his lip ring, they didn't want to chance him hurting himself. They had even removed the harmless earring, a dangling cross, that he had pierced himself for his twentieth six months ago. Six months to go until he was twenty-one. It even amazed him how young he still was. And yet still too old.
"Sir, we are all here for you. Whatever you need to say to us, we are here to listen," Mrs. Diane said calmly. "Come on, why don't you tell us a little about yourself. It doesn't have to be anything big."
Harry paused for a moment, focusing on the screen of memories in his peripheral. "When I was nine, my aunt and uncle were going through a phase. On New Years they sent my cousin to his friend's house to stay the night and they had a swinger's party, the kind where they switch partners and have an orgy in the house. I know because I was in the cupboard under the stairs, locked in all night. I heard everything and saw a lot. Dr. Ross says the trauma of it probably crippled my ability to connect with anyone and why I delayed sexual activity for so long."
The group stared at him with their mouths open. Melony looked disgusted. Mrs. Diane looked unsure what to say.
/-
Harry decided not to participate in group for the rest of the week. He kept himself from falling asleep and focused on everyone's stories, though the enthusiasm he remembered having when he had listened to the stories of his follower's lives was missing. He didn't seem to be able to feel anything for any of them. It wasn't surprising since he couldn't feel anything for himself except hatred.
One morning, as winter was coming in and the frigid grounds were laid with a light dusting of snow, Harry asked to go outside. One of the orderlies followed him outside and stood to the side while Harry took a nap in the snow. The ground was cold and pierced his skin through his T-shirt but it felt better then nothing. His medication was numbing. The less he saw of his memories the less he felt of anything.
Another orderly came outside to let Harry know that he had visitors in the visitor center. He got up instantly and ran back into the building, instantly assuming that it was Bonnie, come to speak to him. When he arrived at the visitor's area he realized how large an assumption that was. His father and Fish were sitting at a table waiting for him.
Harry sighed heavily and walked over to their table. He hadn't spoken to any of his family or friends since he had returned from the torture. Before he could sit, James stood up and pulled Harry into a hug. Harry didn't feel much of it except for the arms around him. James probably meant for it to be comforting but no emotions were brought up in Harry.
When he pulled away they both sat down, Harry across from them.
"You look tired," Fish said. He paused and as the silence stretched he decided to speak again. "You never looked tired," he mumbled.
"Its the medication," Harry admitted. "They've got me on a nice set of drugs that make me calm and pliable. Sometimes they make the flashes of memories go away to but they slip through a lot."
"Have they diagnosed you with anything?" James asked.
"Dr. Ross assumes that I suffer from Chronic Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder with a delayed onset and Major Depressive Disorder with psychotic features. The psychotic features refer to my hallucinations."
"What is Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder?" James asked.
"It means that I suffered a trauma in the past and now I suffer the consequences. My mind makes me re-experience the episode over and over in my head. I have nightmares, which Bonnie mentioned but I don't remember." He paused, staring at the table and then glanced up at Fish. "How is she? Has anyone spoken to her?"
"She was with her parents for a while. Ginny went to see her but she reported that Bonnie turned on her and told her to get out. Then Cameron tried to talk to her and she turned on him to." He paused. "She's staying at her grandmother's right now."
Harry turned away from them. "She'll never come back to me."
"You don't know that," James assured him. "She's just going through a difficult time, same as you are. If she had cheated on you, wouldn't you want time apart to think?" he asked.
"Either I would have forgiven her by now, or would have killed her lover and us both."
"Well thats just you," Fish reminded him. "She isn't going to kill anyone so she's thinking."
"How are you dealing here?" James asked, trying to change the subject. "Are you okay?"
"Oh, never better. I love being in the mental institution. Its like a playground that you're trapped in. Sometimes we go out in the yard and hold hands singing chum by yah to get our feelings out."
"Really?" James asked, seriously wondering if he had chosen the wrong place.
"No, not really. Actually I spend a lot of time throwing back pills, staring at walls in a daze and talking to people who really annoy me." He leaned into the table toward them. "You wanna know who Ashley is?" Harry asked.
"I…know…who Ashley-"
He cut Fish off. "That's Ashley," Harry said, pointing to Ashley across the room talking to her family. "She has bi-polar disorder, so sometimes she likes me and sometimes she doesn't. And I have to see her every. single. day. For an hour and a half. I asked if I could be moved to a different group but they wouldn't let me so now I have to see her all. the time. And talk to Ashley, and they prefer when I use her name when I address her. Ashley, Ashley, Ashley. And her," he said, pointing across the room to another woman. "She has borderline personality and so she pretends to be Ashley, my Ashley, just to upset me." He paused, looking down at the table. "And then I try to throttle her and they have to shoot me up with more drugs and put me in my room."
"Are they mis-treating you here?" James asked.
"It doesn't bother me. It helps me sleep. Its never restful sleep but its better then the insomnia."
"You can come home if you want," James offered.
Harry shook his head. "What home? Its abandoned. My wife has stolen my daughter and is hold up with her at her evil grandmother's house. Her grandmother, who hates me, and has always told her that I was the wrong choice, that I would ruin her life." Harry shook his head despondently. "She was right. And Bonnie is never coming back to confirm or deny it."
/-
After letting Harry know that his mother and the rest of the family was doing fine, though Little Sirius was a little confused about what was going on, family was being asked to leave so that the patients could continue their day. Fish waited at the table with Harry while James signed them out.
"What do you want me to tell Bonnie if she talks to me?" Fish asked.
"Tell her…" He took a deep breath. "Tell her that if they don't give me a lobotomy soon, I'll do it myself." He leaned forward and lowered his voice for no specific reason. "Because I can't. be here. anymore. I can't."
"Well then we'll take you home," Fish offered.
Harry just shook his head slowly. "No. I can't."
/-
He went to bed that night, with the windows open to let the cold air through to breathe on him. He stayed awake. He hadn't attacked anyone that day and so the extra drugs they usually gave him were absent in his bloodstream leaving the insomnia to run rampant. The thoughts followed it. Without sleep to handle the thoughts, to muddle them and absorb them into his unconscious and spew them out in unidentifiable ways, he had to address them when they came to him.
What surprised him that night about his thoughts was that they didn't revolve entirely around Bonnie and his daughter. Every few minutes they would shift from 'when would Bonnie come to see him, at the very least to yell at him' to wondering 'What is Ashley doing right now?' 'Was she okay?' 'Was she still in the hospital trying to recuperate?' Some part of him wished they were in the same hospital, he missed her. And then he felt like slitting his wrists for thinking about her, for missing her, for wanting to be near to her, to care for her, for licking his lip and thinking of their kiss.
He rolled onto his side and focused on the sound of his roommate breathing, the sound of the old man's breath hitting the pillow, hot and moist and ruining the fabric of the case. Ashley had used to listen to him breathe. He knew she did. He thought back to one day, when they were little…seven years old. He and Ashley had been alone, which was rare as Fish followed him around constantly. They had stayed at her house because she hadn't been feeling well, recovering from a broken arm that her father had given her.
/-
"I can't believe he touched you," Harry told her, stroking her pale arm where the cast had been and her tan stopped.
"Its healed now. No big deal." She turned on her side and Harry ran his fingers up to her shoulder . "Its not like I live with him."
"Your step-father seems nice," Harry said. "Is he nice?"
He felt her pause and noticed her expression as though she was feeling the breeze on her face. "He's nice."
"I missed you when your mother wouldn't let us visit you. What did you do to keep yourself busy?"
"I watched Disney," she admitted, smiling. The boys liked Disney, strangely, but they did.
Harry's smile widened. "I love Disney."
"I know," she smiled back at him. "Do you want to watch a video?" she asked, sitting up to motion to her collection.
Harry got up to the tape storage. "Which ones haven't you watched yet?" he asked.
"I skipped Sleeping Beauty. Do you like that one?" she asked.
"I like them all," he reminded her. He took the tape out of its case and slipped it in the VCR. He got back onto the bed with Ashley and they laid back against the headboard together to watch the movie. A little while in, near the end, he tired out. He was so comfortable beside her and she was so warm, the perfect temperature to sleep beside. He snuggled up to her side and listened to the movie with his eyes closed. He drifted off as he heard the movie end and she shut it off then she snuggled back up to him. His uncle had pounded on him that morning and he had thought he wouldn't be able to sleep for at least a week. He could hear the blankets shift as she moved and rested her cheek against his shoulder and heard her sigh happily after he sighed. She was listening to him breathe, feeling his breathe against her neck. He touched her hair and ran it through his fingers. Through his lips he breathed against her forehead, "I miss you."
Ashley sighed deeply against his chest. "I miss you to."
/-
He was so tired of missing her and had no idea why he did. He was right beside her, breathing her in, feeling the warmth of her skin and they missed each other? They always missed each other and she apparently knew what he felt because she felt the same. She wasn't just repeating what he was saying, she was expressing how she felt the same way.
She called out to him with her heartbeat, with her voice. He wondered what it would have been like if she had been the one. If Bonnie had found a life in France and Ashley was the one to return to him…early. Would he have been happier? Would he have died? Would he be in the hospital, therapy, would the followers see him differently? Would the walls have come down?
He would never really know.
/-
"Fish, would you calm down!" Harry commanded as they stood in the street, calmly pacing each other. Fish would go a few feet one way, Harry a few feet the other and they would meet in the middle. "Lets be rational."
"Rational!" he shouted hysterically. He pointed across the street to the dark haired fifteen year old sitting on the curb. She wore skinny jeans, folded up at the bottom and flat, black sandals and black painted toe-nails. Over her lithe top half she wore an ominous Superman T-shirt, her skinny, slightly tanned arms sticking out of the black sleeves, her hand holding a Marvel coffee cup full of black coffee that she sipped at from behind her thick, dark bangs. Her hair ran down to her shoulders in messy dark waves. "Harry! That girl tried to shoot you. NO!" He paused to correct himself. "No, I'm sorry. She tried to KILL YOU! What the hell are you thinking?"
"I never tore up her contract. She's healthy and on medication and she's sorry for what she did. She was out of her mind. Even I do that every once in a while."
Fish stopped and walked up to him, hushing his voice to speak softly. "What about Bonnie?"
Harry narrowed his eyes. "What about Bonnie? She's in France. And I'm not going to date Ashley, I'm just reinstating her."
"What if she's still crazy? What if she tries to kill you again?"
"She won't. I wrote to Cameron, he made sure her papers were real and he told me she was officially fine as long as she continued to take her medication."
Fish sighed and looked over Harry's shoulder at Ashley as she hugged her knees with one arm and set her coffee down with the other. She noticed the blonde staring at her, smiled at him and waved her hand.
Fish sighed heavily at her genuineness. "Fine, but if she tries to shoot me…"
"I'll get rid of her, I promise."
.
"You look nice today," Ma'am giggled, poking sixteen year old Ashley in the side making the girl cringe away.
"Thanks."
"Whatcha all dressed up for?" Omi asked, her smile knowing and mocking.
"Nothing. I dress like this all the time." Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail at the back of her head, her bangs pulled back so that they held volume and style. She wore a light gray sweater over her black, lacy top that went past her hips, under which were black tights, feet slipped into ankle boots with studs around her ankles.
As she lied she noticed the girls's smiles widen, Ial's included and Ashley assumed that it was because she didn't usually get so dressed up. She had gone shopping with her mother last night. Two weeks seemed like a good enough amount of time to make a move on a boy after his former love wrote to his second in command to let him know she would be in France another four years and was under the control of her grandmother. At least, that was how Fish summed it up. Was there an unspoken or spoken rule as to how long you were supposed to wait until you made a move?
She was wrong about why they were smiling. She heard him breathe before he touched her, his gentle and strong fingers dropping softly to her shoulder and running in what felt like slow motion down the side of her arm. "Morning," he mumbled.
Ashley turned her head slowly to look at him over her shoulder. "Morning."
He grinned at her, his pretty white teeth looked so good on him, they alone made her want him. He eyed her up and down and then to the girls crowded around her. "Morning girls."
"Summer Morning, St. Jimmy," they greeted in unison, 'summer morning' being an expression that they used because St. Jimmy was never around to greet during the school year.
He turned back to Ashley. "Um, Sweetie, I was wondering if you wanted to be my date to Sober Day."
Ashley's smile widened and she turned to face him completely. "I would be honored to be your date St. Jimmy."
"Great. I'll pick you up at your house at seven forty-five, before I gather the troops."
"Okay."
He smiled at her and ran his fingers through the end of her ponytail. He leaned in close to her body, his hand landing on her neck. "Would you wear your hair down for the concert tonight? For me?" he asked, his thumb running over her soft neck under her chin.
"Sure. I can do that."
He leaned forward and kissed her cheek and then turned back to the audience of Omi, Ma'am and Ial. "Girls," he said as he walked away from them, tugging playfully at one of Ma'am's pigtails. "Is it an up-do day?" he asked jokingly before turning and heading over to the boys, Fish included.
He watched from the corner of his eye as the other girls helped Ashley take her hair down and ruffle it to hide the bump from the hair tie.
.
At seven forty-five on the dot Harry arrived at her doorstep, his motorcycle parked out front. Before he had the chance to knock Ashley had opened the door. He looked her up and down again, taking in her punk outfit. She had on a thin leather jacket that hugged her arms, long and tightly hung around her body. Underneath was a long black T-shirt, a thin gold chain with a large old-fashioned key hanging from it. Her black skinny jeans hugged tightly to her hips and were loose around her calves and folded up at her ankles, where her black Converse with spiked ankles began.
He stepped up the stairs to meet her and put his hands on her neck and ran them down her shoulders. "You look nice."
"Thank you," she smiled.
"Just for the record Ashley, you don't have to dress up to impress me. I think you look very pretty when you're dressed down." He ran his fingers through the waves of her brown locks. "I like your hair down. Its soft."
Ashley ran her fingers through his hair and softly down the back of his neck, her hand gripping the waves of his black hair at the crown of his neck. "St. Jimmy?" she whispered softly, looking up at him.
"Hmm?" he asked, looking deeply into her face, at her eyes and skin and her lips.
"I don't miss you so much anymore," she said softly, running his hair back and forth through her fingers. "It feels so much different now. Better."
Harry smiled, leaning into her. "I don't miss you so much either."
/-
Ron, Hermione, Tim, Tom, Fish, Kacy and Fish's band gathered in the Potter's house in the TV room watching the news. Fish leaned forward to stare at the TV, Kacy's hand resting softly on his shoulder as they listened.
A news reporter was broadcasting from a helicopter filming a large mob of angry people gathered around a small house in Surrey.
A million newspaper articles had been released since Harry had been put away. Many of them on the state of his condition, which somehow got out despite Fish telling only six followers his exact condition. Many of the articles were on what had been done to him, which was released by the auror department and censored for public release because of its disturbing nature. And many, many more were focused on Harry's affair with Ashley (who, to the reporters, always went without a last name as it was never discovered.) A newspaper article had most recently come out entitled: Savior Cheats With Old Flame.
A young woman, known only as Ashley, was one of the three girls, plus Lucius Malfoy, to kidnap Sir Potter. During the kidnapping, somewhere between the pickup and the torture, Sir Harry Potter committed adultery with Ashley, a girl who had just recently been released from the mental institution where she had been committed for eleven years after she tried to murder the Savior, then known only as St. Jimmy.
Our main worry is this; how is Lady Potter doing and why would anyone cheat on her?
Now, the followers were outraged at the onslaught of shame to Harry's name, blaming the whole thing on Ashley who was released from the hospital that morning and not arrested under her plead of insanity and with promise to stay on her medication. A therapist would be required to visit her house once a week to make sure she was following the court's orders.
This was not good enough for the followers who put all of the blame on her and were now crowded around her mother's house ready to attack her.
"What should we do?" Fish asked, noting the swords and wands in people's hands as they stood outside the defenseless Ashley's house. Ashley was a witch but she had never learned to use magic and she was unable to defend her house against the British wave of followers. Fish wanted to do something before the next wave received the news, which could be on the internet.
"What do you mean, what should we do?" Ron asked. "She's an awful person. Let them get her."
"Look, you don't know Ashley. She was crazy when she was younger, without her drugs. She could be completely normal when she's on them. Besides, Harry admitted that he was not raped, he slept with her to. She doesn't deserve to have her house ransacked and be murdered by a large, angry mob. Some of them used to be her friends."
"You think they'll murder her?" Hermione asked.
The group of them turned to Fish questioningly.
/-
Ashley took each step softly, grinning widely as she watched Harry through the lens of her camera. She crouched down on the gravel in front of Harry's lounge chair where he was sleeping quietly, in the middle of the playground, where they were hanging around. She aimed the lens and pressed down on the button to snap the photo. He woke up at the sound and the feel of the flash on his face and looked at Ashley. He narrowed his eyes and glared at her as she looked at the photo she had taken on her Polaroid, waiting for it to develop. "Aww, you look so cute."
Harry got up and wrapped his arms around her waist from behind and lifted her off the ground and swung her around making her giggle. He set her back down on wobbly knees and grabbed the camera from her. "What are you doing?" he asked grumpy and playful.
"I'm taking pictures. Look at the one I got of Fish and Hanna." She showed him. "They look cute together."
"Sure they do," Harry scoffed. He wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her to him, running his fingers into her hair. "I think we look nice together."
"I could agree with that." She tilted her head back to let him kiss her.
Harry wrapped his other arm around her waist and pulled her against his body. He walked backward, pulling her forward with him toward a blanket in their hangout area amongst the trees in a hidden part of the park. Slowly, he lowered them both onto the ground.
Ashley shifted side to side trying to adjust her back against the blanket over the dirt. She lifted her arms and wrapped them around Harry's neck as his mouth descended back to hers and his body laid between her legs. He pulled his body up hers, kissing her softly and lovingly, taking his time to enjoy the taste of her lips and appreciating that there was no rush. Ashley ran her fingers lazily through his hair enjoying him just as much.
"St. Jimmy?" she asked, between the connection of their mouths.
He groaned softly in response, unable to form words as he was lost in her.
She opened her eyes and pressed her thumbs softly against both sides of his neck, a touch that meant she wanted to look at him. He moved back and raised himself up on his arms, looking into her eyes. She ran her hand over his cheek. "I love you."
Harry stared down at her calmly, his thoughts on pause as the words processed in him. He lifted his hand, balancing on one, and ran it over her forehead and back over her dark hair splayed out behind her head. He leaned down and kissed her forehead softly, pausing to let him lips rest against her skin then leaned down to press his forehead against hers. "I love you to," he whispered. And as he pressed his lips back to hers, he realized again that he meant it. "I love you Ashley."
She breathed deeply, soaking in his words through her skin as though she could feel what they meant and the honesty would change how softly her blood flowed. She felt his hand that had previously run through her hair go down her arm, over her ribs and her waist and rested on her naked thigh. He slipped his hand under the light fabric of her black dress, running his finger up to the hem of her panties. He pulled his lips from her mouth and nuzzled the side of her face. "Ashley?" he whispered gruffly in her ear.
"Hmm?" she breathed, followed by a feminine gasp as his fingers touched her between her legs.
"Do you want to sleep with me?"
She sighed as though extremely relieved. "So much Jimmy. So much."
He kissed her again, gently, in reply.
/-
Ashley woke crying, having just been taken from a dream where she and Harry had actually been given a chance together. But she knew it wasn't meant to be. Those gentle hands, those soft words admitting love and that question she so badly wanted to say yes to. How many times had she had those fantasies where she had ended up with St. Jimmy instead of Bonnie while she was in the hospital, after she had tried to murder him? And now, now that she knew how it felt to be with him, how it felt to have him feel her and feel for her and admit it to himself while she loved him and he loved her. Now she knew how it felt, and it was amazing…and yet it was tainted. The entire memory. Not only was she not sane during the act she had taken Harry from his family, from his wife and his daughter and turned Bonnie against him. It was a magical moment then, and now it was just a scene of casualties and infidelity.
She wiped her eyes on the back of her sleeve and got up to investigate the noise that had woken her from her dream.
She pulled back one of her curtains to glance outside only to be assaulted by the sudden rock that cracked the glass in her window. She gasped and threw herself back on her bed. She got down on the floor hurriedly and peeked out the window so that she could see outside but no one could see her. There was a growing crowd on her front lawn holding wands and very large sticks and rocks.
She got up and ran for the door. "Mommy!" Ashley yelled, running down the hallway to the kitchen where she guessed her mother would be. The dark haired woman was in her robe under the kitchen table, hiding with a newspaper. Ashley ran up and sat down beside her. "What's going on?"
Her mother looked at her and then handed her the newspaper. The front page was a giant moving photo of her in the cafe, following after Harry when she was about to kidnap him. Someone had seen them. The headline to the article was The Savior's Secret Whore.
"They called me a whore?" Ashley whined. "I'm not a whore."
Her mother touched her shoulder to get her attention. "Ashley, I think they're here for you. Harry's followers. Did he send them?"
"What? No! Why would he send them?"
Her mother shrugged.
"No. Harry wouldn't do that. He knows I'm sorry."
"The followers don't care either way. That's what their note said," she told her, holding out a brick with a piece of paper attached with a rubber band.
Ashley took it out and read it.
.
Ash, or should we call you St. Jimmy's Whore,
We've never preferred Hell's Angel over you, but St. Jimmy is married to her and you've ruined his life. He's in the mental institution because she has left him and taken his daughter with her and refuses to speak to him. Not only was he tortured and kidnapped and now in pain because of you but you've ruined his family as well. For that you must pay.
Come outside. We're waiting. Sweetie.
The Suburban Children of "Sub Gossip Parents"
.
Ashley glanced at her front door. She assumed the letter, asking her to come outside, "We're waiting," meant that they weren't coming in after her. She had no ways of defending herself against them. No wand. Maybe a hockey stick in the garage. She probably had a gun but she really didn't want to kill anyone and her aim was awful.
But maybe she deserved whatever they decided to dish out.
She got up from under the table, taking the note with her, and headed to her room to get dressed. She washed her face, put on some makeup, pulled her hair back tightly in a smooth ponytail and slipped on a printed dress. She sat down on her bed and stared at the note, thinking about her options until she realized she had only one.
/-
"Get. Out. Of. My. Way!" Fish grumbled as he shoved orderlies off of him, making his way to his leader in the TV room. "St. Jimmy, what the hell are you doing?" Fish asked as he stepped in front of Harry who was lying passed out on the couch in front of the TV. There was a strange man standing over the arm of the sofa staring down at him.
Fish stomped over. "St. Jimmy. Wake up. Its an emergency!" he yelled, taking his friend's shoulders in his hands and shaking him forward and back until his eyes slipped open.
"What?" he asked drowsily, looking up at him through half-lidded eyes.
"Wow, they really do know how to put you out. Did they get that recipe from Ganelle?"
Harry glared at him, though without much effort. "Don't say that. I'm recovering," he explained.
Fish looked around the room at the patients talking to each other, playing pool, reading the newspaper and magazines (with supervision) and then back at Harry who had been asleep on the couch dressed in some black sweat pants and a thin V-neck tee. "Yeah, it looks like that," Fish lied. He saw Harry trying to go back to sleep but Fish started shaking him again. "Harry, for god sakes, wake the fuck up. Ashley is in trouble."
"Why? Are the orderlies at her hospital being female or gay again?" he asked.
Fish furrowed his eyebrows having no idea what his friend was talking about, since Harry had never revealed what Ashley had said to get him to go with her. "No. She's home now. They've released her from the hospital under court orders to continue taking her medication and receiving at-home therapy."
Harry nodded softly, staring at the wall. "That's good."
"Not for long you idiot. That's why I'm here. The newspapers and news station have finally gotten ahold of the story. And who do you think they blame with Ganelle and Hanna both in jail? Ashley. And your followers, at least the ones who live in England, at least for now, are gathered in front of her house ready to kill her for you."
Harry sat straight up on the couch, immediately alert. "What are you talking about? I never made that order."
"They didn't ask for an order, they're doing it on your behalf. They think Ashley has ruined your life and they want her to pay for hurting their leader. She delivered you to your tormenter."
"Good Lord," Harry groaned, climbing off the couch. "Does her mother still live on Privet Drive?"
"Are you going to stop them?"
"What? You think I'm going to let them attack her? Are you insane?"
"Do you want me to come?"
"Go home to Kacy," Harry said before apparating, leaving fearful orderlies looking around for him.
Harry apparated onto Ashley's front yard, the memory of it still the same as when they were children, except that there were now rows upon rows of followers making their way to the front of it. That's when he realized Ashley was opening the door and stepping out. She turned to close the door behind her before stepping down off the front steps and standing on the walk-up in front of the door.
She lowered her face, as though she was waiting to be collected for the guillotine. Harry looked her up and down. She looked different, sharp and sane somehow. It was happening all over again, that feeling. But he couldn't just stand there while they advanced on her.
And of course, someone cast the first stone, striking Ashley in the arm with a rock. She turned to protect herself but Harry reacted instantly. He stomped over, his testosterone running high, released from where it had been bottled up for months when he had been sleeping.
"WHAT THE BLOODY FUCKING HELL IS HAPPENING HERE?" he yelled, as he made his way over to the walk-way.
Rocks paused in the next person's hand, raised to strike.
Harry grabbed the turned side of Ashley's form by the arm and dragged her behind him protectively.
The followers lowered themselves slowly, bowing or curtseying before rising again. "St. Jimmy," a follower spoke first, not one of his favorites, none of whom he was able to spot in the crowd and assumed that they knew better. "We were just trying to help. We assumed you would wish for Ashley to be punished and since you were…indisposed, we wanted to help you."
"You do not make your own orders to do what is right for me. You wait for me. Unless Fish told you cast stones, you don't do anything. Its none of your business."
"But Bonnie-" Someone else spoke up only to be cut off.
"Bonnie is her own person and if she wants to attempt cold-blooded murder through stoning Ashley that's her decision but this has nothing to do with any of you so get the FUCK OFF OF HER LAWN!"
The followers backed off slowly before dispersing to opposite ends of the street and apparating or driving away.
He waited until he was sure they had all disappeared before he turned to her, running both his hands through his hair and then pressing them against his temples, bruising them with his force. He looked up at her, dropping his hands, and grinned out of the side of his mouth. "Hey sweetie."
She lifted her hand in greeting before dropping it, unsure of herself in front of him.
He looked her up and down before focusing on her face entirely, the way she looked so…good, healthy, aside from the developing bruise on her bicep. "You look good, healthy."
"Its the meds. They really do work," she assured him.
"I can see that. I always wanted to see you healthy," he admitted.
There was a long pause where neither of them spoke, Ashley holding her bruise and Harry staring at her mournfully, as though she had died.
"St. Jimmy?" she asked, breaking the silence. "I am sorry for what I did. I just wanted to make sure that you knew that. That I didn't mean to ruin everything for you."
"You didn't ruin everything. Things just happen."
They both paused again, Ashley staring back at him now. "It wasn't meant to be. Was it?" she asked. He was silent as he had no answer. "Us? The feeling was always there but it was just never enough to-"
He walked to her, backing her up against the front of her house and gently pressed his forehead against hers, holding her face in his hands. He knew he was too close for both of them but he needed the closure. His eyes watered with the strain of holding himself back. He took a breath. "I can't do this Ashley."
"It's okay," she whispered, leaving her hands to herself, feeling that it was better that way for both of them.
"I love my wife. I love Bonnie," he cried. "So much."
"I know you do," she whispered with him, her eyes shedding tears to cope with the tightness of her throat. "I love her to. She's a good person."
Harry breathed deeply of her scent and closed his eyes for a moment. "I didn't mean to do that…with you. That was never meant to happen. We both know…that this…" His thumb stroked her cheekbone.
Ashley nodded. "I know. I'm sorry I did that to you."
"I can't leave her, Ashley. She means too much to me."
"I know."
He sighed heavily, pausing again to stroke her cheekbone with his thumb, making sure to be gentle with the anxiety coursing through him. He lifted his forehead but stayed close to her, holding her face in his hands so he could look into her eyes when he spoke. "But I'll always miss you Ash," he told her. "Always."
Ashley swallowed heavily. "I'll always miss you to St. Jimmy. Always."
Harry's fingers reached over to run down her hair, to the back of her head and leaned up to kiss her forehead, resting there a second longer than necessary to take in the moment that would have to be worth a lifetime.
Finally he dropped his hands, his mouth and he backed away. "I should go sweetie," he mumbled.
Ashley just nodded, feeling as though the moment was already over.
Harry seemed to come upon the feeling as well and glanced at her eyes one last time as she looked at his and then apparated back to the hospital.
When he arrived at the hospital, back in the TV room, he pushed past the orderlies to the nurses station where they handed him his pills, since he was gone when they normally handed them out, then went back to the couch, laid down, and went back to sleep, wiping his eyes with the back of his arm.
1. An excerpt from a poem by Sylvia Plath.
