Author's Note: I wrote three chapters of my other story and now that it's got some good substance to it, I'm gonna post a chapter for this one. I think I'll try to go back and forth on each story. I hope you guys like Chapter Fourteen! Please Review!!

La Vie Comme Un Infirme-Chapter Fourteen: Pranks and Reality

That night, Sirius finally decided to let Harry's friends have a get together for him. So, after work one day, he came home to write a return letter to the five Gryffindor children. He had asked Jana to stay for a while longer to look after Harry while he did so, as he decided it was best for the get together to be a surprise and didn't want him to know what he was doing.

Once he was finished and had delivered the letter, Jana told him of all she and Harry had done that day.

"He's very frustrated with everything," Jana said, sighing lightly. "I'm trying to encourage him, but he's just so upset."

"I'll speak with him," Sirius assured her. "Thank you for your time." He reached into his pocket to withdraw money to pay her, but she refused.

"It's all right." She smiled. "I don't need any money. I get paid enough at my real job, which I need to be heading off to. I'm just doing it to help Harry because I know how much he's suffering. But, thank you anyway."

Sirius felt a bit awkward at not giving Jana any money, but he understood that she was merely helping them out of the goodness of her heart, which Sirius liked because it showed her true personality: selfless and caring.

"Well, if you insist," said Sirius. He held out his hand and she shook it. It wasn't a very firm shake, but it was one full of sincerity. "Thank you so much," Sirius said again. "We really appreciate it."

Jana's smile was bright now. "It's nothing." She said, chuckling, which made her brown eyes twinkle. "I love helping children. Well…I better be going." She gave another smile and walked into the fireplace. Talking a handful of Floo powder and shouting, "Ministry of Magic," she vanished.

After watching her leave, Sirius then turned to Harry who was holding his book of Braille in his lap, flipping through the pages. He sat down on the couch beside the boy and put his arm around him.

"How are you feeling today?" Sirius asked. Harry had a very frustrated look on his face, just as Jana had said he had had on his face all day.

"Angry." Harry replied, resting his head on Sirius' shoulder. Sirius noticed that the boy now had tears in his eyes. "I can't do this. It's too hard. I just wish I was a normal boy again."

The tears began to flow and Sirius wrapped both arms around Harry. "I know, Harry," he said. "I know."

"But it's NOT FAIR!" Harry brought his voice to a shout and suddenly began screaming and pulling his hair like a five year old.

"STOP IT!" Sirius was overwhelmed. He tried holding onto the boy tighter, but Harry threw himself onto the floor with all his might and began beating his fists, all the while screaming his heart out.

"Harry, STOP IT!" Sirius leapt down on the floor beside Harry and tried to hold him still, but the boy was going crazy, digging his own nails into the sides of his cheeks, making them go so deep that blood was showing.

"STOP IT!" Sirius shouted again. Finally, he gained control of Harry by grabbing his wrists, preventing him from scratching himself anymore.

Sirius managed to cradle the screaming boy in his arms, but the child kept screaming as though he were a toddler.

"Harry, you have got to calm down!" Sirius shouted. He had never in his life seen Harry act this way. It was as if he were a whole new child.

Harry tried to push Sirius away, still screaming his lungs out. Sirius couldn't think of what else to do to get Harry to stop. Only one idea came to mind. Without warning, he smacked Harry across the face with his hand.

But, instantly, he knew that what he had done was a mistake. He pulled back in horror at the realization of what had actually taken place. The guilt seeped in and his entire body began to sweat and tremble. He couldn't believe it. He had hit Harry, who needed him now more than ever and whom he loved and had promised never to harm in such a way. He couldn't believe it.

Harry seemed to be just as shocked at the action as Sirius was. He had stopped screaming instantly, but tears were still running down his face. More guilt thrust itself at Sirius as he noticed the red mark on the side of Harry's face combined with the scratch marks, blood, and tearstains. It was the most horrible sight he had ever seen.

"Harry…." Now it was Sirius' turn to cry as he gently took Harry's face in his hands, rubbing the blood off his face and pulling him closer, half expecting the boy to pull away or start screaming again, but he stayed calm. "I'm so sorry…."

The tears were coming down from both of them like waterfalls.

"Why did you do that?" Harry asked, his face buried in Sirius' chest.

"I wasn't thinking…." And in all seriousness, he wasn't. It was an impulse and the first solution that had come into his mind. He had not been thinking of the consequences. "I'm sorry."

They stayed wrapped in each other's arms for a while, until Sirius felt it appropriate to begin a conversation. He pulled Harry away from him so that the two of them were face-to-face. It didn't matter that Harry couldn't see. Doing this would make him understand that the conversation was serious and that he had to listen.

"You are not ever to do that to yourself again. Do you understand?" He hoped his voice was just stern enough to get the point across, but not too much to the point where Harry felt fearful of him.

Harry's eyes were dry now, but his cheeks were still red and puffy. Sirius' handprint had begun to fade, but the scratches were very deep and still very visible.

"But, I don't want to live like this," the boy replied, sniffling. Sirius could see the tears forming again.

"But, you have to live like this." Sirius didn't care what his voice sounded like now. He was too scared and worried about what Harry could do to himself. He needed to do whatever possible to get his point across. "You don't have a choice. For now, you have to learn this way of life. Everything won't go back to normal overnight." He sighed and pulled Harry back into his embrace. "I know you're frustrated, but hurting yourself won't make anything better. It'll just make it worse."

He kissed the top of Harry's head and stroked his messy black hair. "Besides, if you keep hurting yourself like this, they could take you away…." He choked on the last few words. His throat grew tight and the tears were unstoppable.

"Who would take me away?" Harry asked, his voice quiet and almost muffled by Sirius' shoulder.

"The authorities…the people at the hospital," Sirius explained, the tears still coming. He didn't want to think of that actually happening. It was the worst thing that could happen, but he knew it would if Harry couldn't control himself. "Hurting yourself intentionally is considered a crime and the people at the hospital will make you stay there until you stop doing it. It's a law…you don't want to be taken away, do you?"

"No…." Harry was clearly frightened by the thought of being taken away from his godfather. He clutched on tighter to the back of Sirius' robes and began to cry softly.

"Then, you can't beat yourself up, because that's exactly what they'll do." Sirius gave another sigh and a haunting image of Harry locked in the psychiatric wards of St. Mungo's, blind and confined to a wheelchair without a clue about what was going on around him, and Sirius not being able to see him. He tried his hardest to push it from his mind, but he knew it was Harry's fate if he didn't change.

"I don't want them to do that. I want to stay with you…" Harry's crying became louder and he began to sob uncontrollably. "I love you."

"I love too, Harry," Sirius whispered, stroking his hair again to calm him down. "That's why I don't want anything to happen to you." He didn't want to see Harry hurting himself. He was already hurt enough as it was. He needed to be happy and learn to live his new life. He needed to face reality instead of trying to escape it when he couldn't.

&

"Has anyone seen my goose feather pillow?" asked Seamus as he walked into the boys' dormitory of Gryffindor Tower. It was the one thing he was looking forward to after a long day of school. It always made him fall asleep after a stressful day, and after writing two class essays and taking a test, he felt very stressed.

"No," replied Dean dully, not even looking up from the book he was reading for Transfiguration. "Try looking on your bed. That's where all my pillows are."

"You have a goose feather pillow?" asked Ron kicking off his shoes and plopping onto his bed as if he were diving into a swimming pool. "Don't tell Lavender. She'll report you for cruelty to animals."

"But I didn't kill it," said Seamus, walking over to his bed and pulling the covers so he could look to see if his pillow was there. "Me mam bought it for me."

"So?" asked Ron, watching Seamus destroy his bed. "She'll still report you just for the possession of something animal-made."

The sound of a door handle opening made all three boys turn to look as Neville walked in through the door with a sort of nervous look on his face.

"Hey, Seamus. Did you say you lost your pillow?" The round-faced boy asked timidly.

"Because I think Wood's using it for something. It's yellow, right?"

"Yeah." Seamus ran out of the room and down to the common room where he found Wood sitting in one of the chairs with a yellow pillow and a big jar of honey. What could he possibly be using that for?

Percy Weasley was right behind the chair, looking over Wood's shoulder with one of his I-Don't-Think-You-Should-Do-This-Because-You'll-Get-In-Trouble looks.

"Wood, what are you doing with my pillow?" asked Seamus, running over to him and preparing to snatch the pillow from Wood's hands. He spoke so loudly that everyone else in the common room turned to look at him and Wood.

"Well, since I knew one of you little first years had a goose feather pillow, I thought it would be nice to take the feathers out and drop them on Flint sometime, as payback, of course." Wood gestured over to the honey jar beside him. "Of course, I would want to make them stick, so I thought I'd cover him in honey first."

All the while, Percy was muttering under his breath and giving Seamus hand signals that said, "I told him not too, but he did it anyway." All the other students continued to watch the commotion.

Ignoring Percy and the other students, Seamus rounded on Wood. "You guys are never going to get even with each other because you're always going to be trying to get back at each other, so why don't you just go about your own business."

It was the truth, after all. Everybody knew it. Slytherins and Gryffindors, especially the Quidditch players, had been fighting each other for centuries. No one could ever win. It was preposterous. "You shouldn't just take other people's stuff without their permission. How did you know I had a goose feather pillow, anyway?"

That was the most important part of the whole situation. Wood should not have taken Seamus' pillow without his permission. Seamus would have never have allowed Wood to do something so stupid with us a valuable pillowcase. Okay, so it wasn't all that valuable in terms of money, but anything your mother gives you is worth a lot to you and you don't just let anybody take it and use it for their stupid purposes.

"Simple," said Wood in answer to Seamus' last question. " I went around asking if anyone knew where I could find feathers because I had thought up the idea of dumping feathers on Flint's head a long time ago, so when I heard you had a goose feather pillow, I had to use it." He said it as though it were the most obviously thing in the whole world.

"And you did it without my permission." Seamus was angry. He could feel the heat rising in his cheeks. It was his pillow, and no one else was allowed to have it.

In a fit of rage, Seamus grabbed the pillow from Wood and whacked him clean in the head with it. Percy yelped from behind the chair, but no one seemed to care. Several of the other students gasped and a few got up from where they were sitting in case something else happened.

Now, Seamus was worried that Wood might clobber him, so he was glad that the other students were at least considering trying to help him. The fifth year boy was so big and muscular that he could probably tear down a whole house. Percy was obviously worried about the same thing because he held onto Wood's shoulders to keep him from flying at Seamus. Several other boys in the room followed suit.

But, whatever was going to happen between Seamus and Wood was suddenly interrupted by two identical voices that came echoing down the stairs. It was the Weasley twins, two redheaded third year boys who were known all over the school for causing immense amounts of trouble.

They cleared their throats loudly, making all the students, including Seamus and Wood turn around and look at them.

"Stealing from people is never going to produce a good prank," said one of them (Seamus couldn't tell which one.).

"If you want to pull a real prank on someone," said the other,

"You should talk to us," the first one finished.

Wood looked as though they were angels sent from Heaven. "That's a great idea!" He said. "Why didn't I think of that before?" Then, turning to Seamus, he said, "sorry, Finnegan. I don't need your pillow. I can use whatever ideas they give me."

He ruffled Seamus' hair and walked over to talk to the twins.

Seamus was relieved. No beatings for him and he could keep his pillow.

Percy, on the other hand, didn't seem so happy with the idea of Wood taking ideas from the twins. He fainted as soon as all three of them had walked out of the room.

End Note: I hope you guys liked this chapter. I liked this chapter pretty well. I wanted to get in posted before school started back (tomorrow, ugh). As you can probably tell, there's going to be a big surprise in store for Flint somewhere down the road. And no, Percy and Wood are just friends. Nothing else is going on between them. I thought I would clear that up so that you guys don't make something different out of why they're always together. Anyway, about the first half of the chapter, I meant for it to be very deep. It actually had something to do with what I was going through a few years ago. I was very depressed and felt like hurting myself, but I knew I couldn't because I knew that I had to handle everything. As a Christian, I believe that everything happens for a reason, and that tragedies are no exception. People can't run from them, but rather they have to face them, and hurting themselves in anyway is not an option. So, don't ever do anything to intentionally harm yourselves, any of you. I just thought I would throw that out there in case anybody needed it. Stay tuned for the next chapter.

Beaucoup d'amour à tous,

Amélie