Despite Harry's best attempts to ignore Snape, the man doesn't cease his snarky comments as they wait for Sirius and Lydia to come greet them. He doesn't understand why they are late, or why Sirius is late to be exact, when he made it clear he doesn't want to spend one extra second in this man's presence.

It starts with the condition of his hair, which Harry thinks as ironic but he's probably too loud in his own head, because Snape's eyes narrow at him and he continues sneering about his talents as a potioner, to his lack of ethics when it comes to having his own way using his celebrity status.

Harry sometimes can't decide if he hates Snape or Voldemort more. It's a tight race.

After five minutes, they hear hurried, loud steps, sounding clearer with each step. Soon, they enter the room, hair dishevelled, sweaty and faces smudged.

"Harry," Sirius pants and Harry finds him oddly charming with his uncharacteristic fussiness. "We thought you were coming an hour later."

"Yes, we were told you were coming at eight," Lydia says, a lot less ruffled than Sirius, regarding Snape with aloofness that would bother him if it was on someone like Malfoy or Parkinson. "I thought that was rather late but didn't question it when it was clearly stated in the letter. Have you forgotten the time you set, by any chance?"

But it's the opposite for Snape and her attitude makes his eyes twitch in the corner. "I had to bring him early." He doesn't offer an explanation.

"Well, I have to go shower," Lydia announces, tying her hair at the top. She suddenly looks five years younger than she did a second ago. "I don't want to stink to my student."

The message is unmistakable and Harry sees Sirius' lips twitch.

"Might as well spoil yourself one last time in this house." Words spill out of Snape's mouth so smooth that Harry is half sure he prepared it beforehand.

"Is that so?" she sounds utterly bored and settles on top of a chair instead of going upstairs like she said she would, picking a loose strand on her knee and levitating it to the rubbish as everyone watches her. She lifts her head and looks at Snape with half lidded eyes. She seems to be really exhausted and Harry thinks with a hint of alarm that she doesn't look to be in a good state to help him out today. "I'm sure you're dying to tell what you're going to tell, so please, don't suffer further."

Snape, still looking his most cheerful other than the time he thought he caught Sirius two years ago, reaches inside his robes and holds out a letter in the air. Lydia's face suddenly looks more colourful, her strange eyes glinting and her glance shifts almost imperceptibly to Sirius.

"Oh," she says, her voice pleasant, "you brought that back."

Snape doesn't point out the shift in her demeanour and walks to her, letter still in the air, as if he's taunting her, willing her to leap at him to take it from his grasp.

She keeps still, her eyes dulling as she maintains a painful looking smile.

"Did you find anything?"

"Not a single curse or even a charm on it," Snape replies just as civil and hands the letter to Sirius, much to Harry's surprise, since it's clearly addressed to Lydia.

"It looks like your girlfriend is leaving again," Snape drawls, blinking like he's almost drowsing.

Lydia's face unfreezes, dropping the smile and she rolls her eyes while Sirius turns ashen behind her. She snatches the letter out of Sirius' lifeless hands, glaring at Snape as she turns the unopened envelope in her hands.

"Did you read it?"

"I had to, since the words themselves could be the curse," Snape eyes Sirius with glee, "It was truly heart warming. It's obvious he terribly misses you."

"Of course he does, I miss him too," Lydia dismisses, and it dawns on Harry who wrote the letter. He turns to Sirius in worry, feeling nauseous at the sight of his sunken eyes. Lydia still hasn't opened the letter and she doesn't seem like she has any intention to do so.

"I assume you have an obligation in the evening," Lydia prompts, tilting her head to the side. "We'll be done by eleven, if you can come get him at that time."

Snape nods curtly, still looking pleased with himself even though he's been basically kicked out. Harry wonders what's in that letter that would amuse Snape to this extent.

"I appreciate you checking this," Lydia holds the letter up, her mouth curving into a smile. "I owe you one."

Snape's expression sours like he'd rather have her attacking her and leaves without acknowledging her words.

Lydia fumbles with the envelope the second she makes sure Snape's gone. Her eyes fly over the words, too fast and Harry thinks she can't possibly understand what she's reading.

Sirius, behind her, purposefully doesn't look at the letter. He doesn't know if it's out of respect or if he doesn't want to react to what's there in front of Harry but Harry's leaning on the latter.

Lydia starts rereading the letter, slower and her breathing gets shallow and hitched. Sirius picks up on the change too, and settles down beside her. "What does it say?" he asks, putting a hand on her shoulder. Lydia rests her cheek on his hand and Harry feels a pang of jealousy seeing the easy way they interact. His interactions with Sirius are always laced with the shadows of the past, and the danger looming over them and while Sirius having someone makes it easier to sleep at night, it also scares him to think Sirius will have less time for him, when this is over and they all come out alive.

"He says hi to you," she says, pinching the bridge of her nose. She hands him the letter and Sirius reads it with a straight face. When he's done, he places it on the table and regards her with solemn eyes.

"What are you going to do?"

She shrugs, hopping down from the stool. "I'm not going to try to find Dolohov and kill him. I don't plan on looking for trouble."

"Yes, he's more likely to kill you," Sirius mumbles, looking like he's forcing the words out.

"I've never been a good dueller," she tells Harry. "That was my brother, Evan." She pauses and jabs her thumb towards the hallway. "I'll shower real quick."

Sirius beckons him to the same room they used on Saturday.

"Why did Crouch send her a letter?" he asks as soon as he closes the door behind him.

Sirius' mouth tightens. "He went to Lydia's house after he escaped, it seems."

Harry doesn't understand why she hasn't upgraded her security in the last fifteen years but doesn't say anything about it. "What does he say?"

Sirius ponders over what to say, clearly not wanting to reveal too much. It annoys him a little because Sirius always argued that they should tell Harry things, since they usually effect him one way or another.

"He tells her to leave the country. Probably the safest option for her."

"What is it about Dolohov?" he asks and Sirius instantly fidgets.

"She has helped the Aurors catch him, back then," he says but it's clear as day to Harry that this is not the whole story but Sirius isn't inclined to share more and Harry, disappointed with Sirius' unwillingness, leans back and broods in silence.

She actually comes back in less than fifteen minutes, with a big cup in her hand and Sirius leaves them alone muttering about something he doesn't catch. She puts a box in front of him unceremoniously and drops herself on the chair across him. He sends a glance at her before he picks it up, opening the lid. There are a few photos inside and a few letter and he recognises the people in the photo as soon as his eyes land on it.

His father, mother and Remus sitting on a sofa, with Sirius trying to keep a Muggle Christmas hat still on his head in the background. His mother is radiant, her hand curled around his father's arm and she lifts her head from his shoulder to laugh at something Pettrigrew says.

"You were sleeping in the next room," Lydia's voice breaks the silence. She smiles at him, but it looks cold as she traces the plant on her cup with her fingers.

"Thank you," he says, croaked, quickly looking through the photos. "I have some photos of them but I've never seen these."

"Yes, Hagrid asked me years ago to give some for you but I found these later."

"I appreciate it," he whispers.

"No big deal. Let's start, eh? Sirius talked my ear off all day about you. I swear he's not going to give me peace if I don't give you two some alone time."

Her words warm him just as much as the photos, making him guilty about the things he thought about her.

Her eyes glint across him –he's still taken aback by the colour but he's seen the photos of her brother and apparently it's a family trait. She doesn't mention whatever she's heard out of his thoughts. He blushes under her scrutiny, and tries to think about random things but everything that crosses his mind leads to somewhere dangerous.

"You're drifting," her voice cuts in through his haze, "focus. I hear everything you think."

Harry feels terror course through him and her eyebrows arch. "Harry, I was only baiting you. Now, I can hear everything."

Harry gulps, and thinks about Snape's dreadful class last week when they had to brew Wolfsbane potion and he dropped hints about Remus left and right.

"That's rude," Lydia says, voice amused and her eyes alive with interest. Harry thinks he shouldn't find them so distracting but a part of him think she's doing it on purpose, manipulating his mind.

"I'm not manipulating you," she laughs, "everything you think is a product of your mind and only your mind. I can't plant thoughts there. I can only guide you towards a thought."

"Sorry," he mumbles quickly but she shakes her head.

"How do you know I'm not lying? Maybe I can plant a thought."

He grunts in pain when she barges inside his head, probing around his most valuable memories. She slows down when she stumbles across his first memories with Sirius, and Harry, with horror, realises she's watching his memories like a movie in his mind and he's completely helpless against her.

"Stop it," he hisses, clutching his head between his palms.

"It's your job to stop me," she says, unbothered by the pain she causes, and flickers through his memories like she's examining a catalague. "The Dark Lord won't leave you alone because you asked nicely. Not that you were particularly nice here. I won't either. You know I'm not supposed to be there. You own your mind."

Harry forces himself to focus, trying to imagine this memory as a VCD. He tries to put it inside the box in front of him but just as the thought crosses his mind Lydia's voice booms in his head, causing another wave of ache through his whole body, his muscles tensing.

"That's not going to work. You're trying to put your memories with your godfather into a box that is strongly attached to him. It's as if you're telling me to come get it. Harry, do you not value these memories?"

"I said stop it," he yells, the fury her words ignite unparalleled to anything he ever felt. He expects her to leave his head like Snape did but she laughs, her face impassive on the outside while the sound echoes in his ears.

"You cannot scare me or the Dark Lord with your anger, Harry," she mocks him, and Harry desperately wishes for Sirius to come back. Their last lesson wasn't like this.

He wonders if she's doing this because of the letter she received.

"I don't have any problems controlling my emotions."

Her mouth still doesn't move, and she looks utterly at ease.

"It doesn't have to be fair," she goes on even though he doesn't have the energy to think about anything. She's probably more aware and conscious of his own thoughts than he is now. "You're going to have to work for it. Push for it. Not everything will come as easy Quidditch, Harry. Sometimes you'll have to cry with the pain of it."

"You're worse than Snape," he whimpers.

"I know, but it's in your hands to decide that you're not hurting. This is your head, Harry. You can differentiate between me and you so easily if you listen for it. I'm the visitor here. You don't have to follow me where I want to go. Use it to your advantage."

Harry settles back in the chair, forcefully relaxing his body and ruminates about her words. Her consciousness touch random memories, some irrelevant, some deeply personal but he doesn't allow it to get to his nerves. He allows her visit different times in his life as he tries to get to know her, the sound of her footsteps, the way she touches the objects, the way words align when she speaks at random intervals.

"You've never even told Sirius about these," she states the obvious as she examines his life with the Dursleys.

Harry doesn't respond, and feels a flicker of excitement as he catches a glimpse of her in Dursleys' kitchen, watching Harry cook with his skinny arms, juggling two pots on the oven at the same time.

Her eyes follow little Harry as he carries two plates sitting on the counter to the table, his tongue sticking from the corner to keep his balance.

This is my own mind, Harry reminds himself and wills a knife to appear in his hand. He almost laughs in delight when he feels the weight and leaps at her when her back is still turned.

He slashes through the air.

He feels a sharp pain behind him, his hand suddenly empty and he chokes on his spit, then blood. "You're too loud."

He heaves for a breath, toppling to the floor when his surroundings turn back to Grimmauld Place and gentle hands straighten him up, rubbing circles on his back. The phantom pain of knife digging into his organs remains and he pats his back to make sure there isn't actually one.

It is Sirius who's cradling him, while Lydia sits with an unimpressed frown on her face but he feels it's directed at Sirius, not him.

"Don't coddle him," Lydia says in a bored tone. "We don't have time to be gentle."

Harry thinks her methods are suddenly very similar to Snape's but he flinches at the thought of Snape instead of Lydia going through his memories. At least, he knows Lydia doesn't go out of her own way to torment him.

"It's alright," he tells Sirius and nods at Lydia, pushing himself back up to sit back on his chair.

She taps her chin, squinting at him. "How about you use Legilimency on me? Maybe you'll do a better job if you see what I mean."

He nods, reaching back to take his wand out. His hands tremble as he points the wand to her head. For a second, he thinks he could kill her and no one could stop him.

"What would you gain from that?" she says. Her mouth doesn't move and his wand turns towards himself. He tries to stop her but he can't fight her and it shoots a lightning through his arm when he resists.

"Your problem is that you don't see me as a threat," she says, cutting, harsh. His other hand inches towards his neck. "You managed to fight of the Dark Lord's Imperius but you can't fight this off because you think there's not a chance I'd actually kill you. You allow me to roam in your head, sucking your memories and tainting them with my presence, adding myself to every scene I touch because you think I won't use it against you but you know Snape will."

Harry's eyes fall on Sirius' blanched face but he doesn't make a move to help him. He can't tell if she's speaking aloud or talking to his head, like his own special whisperer.

"How can you be sure I'm not here to sell you out? What makes you believe I'm not playing with Sirius to help Barty? He's my best friend, Harry. Would it surprise you to learn I work with him?"

The idea –abrupt, out of nowhere, a perfect answer to this puzzle- seems logical and his mind wanders to his talks with Moody-Crouch, for some reason going through each memories with care. Fondness surges inside him as he listens Moody-Crouch's lectures, in classroom and in private. He's forgotten how precise he was at teaching. He learned a lot from the man. He was the one to suggest him to be an Auror. Such an great, talented man, he muses as he watches Crouch being interrogated with a Veritaserum, next to Lydia. They've been so hard on him. He's suffered more than enough.

Lydia leans in and taps him on the shoulder when Dumbledore staves off the dementors with Expecto Patronum. "Is this you idea of keeping me out?"

Harry realises only then that he was seeing Crouch through her lenses.

He glares at Lydia when she exists his mind. But he's still not certain his surroundings are real and he feels like his mind is about to shatter.

"I don't trust her," Harry grumbles, making Sirius rub his face and Lydia toss her head back in laughter.

"Don't muddle his brain," Sirius says like he doesn't have hope she'll follow through.

"He's so impressionable," Lydia says, "no wonder Barty tricked you."

"Like he tricked you," Harry snaps.

"Are you sure he tricked me?"

"Lydia!" Sirius huffs and gets up.

"Oh my god," Lydia throws a pillow at him, "get out. You're worse than Lucius Malfoy."

Sirius holds the pillow like he's contemplating throwing it back but puts it back, out of her reach, with a pointed look. "I don't want to know the story behind that comparison."

"Sirius," Lydia gives him a tight smile. "I can't shape him up if you hover over our heads."

"I don't want you to shape me up!" Harry objects, looking over his shoulder as Sirius walks away with a guilt coming off him in waves.

"Tough luck," she takes a sip from her cup. Harry squints his eyes to see what's inside but she doesn't put it on the coffee table between them.

"You're not old enough to drink this," she offers. "Come on, you're going to say Legilimens. The spell itself is quite easy. What's hard is navigating inside another person's head."

Harry lifts his wand, doesn't think about murdering her and murmurs the incantation.

It really is an easy spell. The silver shoots from the tip of his wand and he feels himself get sucked inside her head but he ends up in the same room.

"Is this your metaphor?" he asks, poking the table with his toe.

"Of course not," she says, with a hint of annoyance in her voice. "The metaphor cannot be personal or you'd give everything away. This is only what I want you to see, so you're seeing it."

"I don't see how this will help if you only show me this."

"You know this is not real. Smash it to pieces if you need to. But you only need to look for signs."

"Like what?"

"Look," she insists.

Harry's gaze wanders around and he doesn't get what she means. It looks like it always does, not a distorted image here or a strange item there.

His eyes catch the titles of the books.

Lydia smiles, wide and appreciative. "They're rather out of place, aren't they? I have no idea what the titles are, so I'm making them up. or I have no idea how the chair behind that oak desk looks. If you go behind, you'll find it floating in the air. Focus on the things people don't usually pay attention to."

He nods and he can't understand how he didn't get it when he first saw it. There is an uncertain edge to the room that there isn't in reality like Lydia's focus slips at times and they evolve the more they stand here.

"The more you let me hold this, the more power you give me. If you're going to do it, do it now."

Harry regards her with suspicion but decides to go for it. he gets up and walks to the door but her voice stops him when he grasps the handle.

"The door is locked."

He turns it anyway.

It is locked. He thumps his head to the door, gritting his teeth when she blows a breath.

"You're too hard on him."

"I'm sick to death with this conversation," Lydia mumbles as she goes through the documents Felix sent him. He doesn't understand what requires her attention this urgently that she doesn't even deign looking up.

"He looked ready to fall over," Sirius ignores her. "Snape had to keep him upright!"

"He's not improving," she throws the papers next to her, scowling at Sirius. "He can't even tell when I'm in his head. I'm shit at Legilimency, Sirius. I don't even try it with anyone."

"Maybe you're better than you think," Sirius says with arched brows. Occlumency usually goes hand in hand with Legilimency.

"I'm pretty sure the Dark Lord is better at this than I am. I know Barty is," she holds up a finger, when he opens his mouth to argue. "Who do you think taught him?"

"I thought you two worked on it together," he grumbles, not quite managing to ignore the jealousy it brings.

"We did but he always bested me back then," she says, not seeming bothered that Crouch had toyed around in her head.

"And now?" he asks, fearing the answer. He knows Remus and Tonks weren't able to go through his defences.

"I don't think so. He tried but he wasn't in the best state when I saw him."

His letter dances in front of his eyes and his hatred for the man comes back with vengeance. He should've read it multiple times, until it was ingrained in his memory forever.

Lydia,

I know receiving this will unsettle you, but I had to reach you somehow. And I don't want you to complain that I didn't send you a letter next time we see each other.

I know you're worrying about me (don't try to deny it) but no need. I'm fine and healthy. Don't try to find me, since I will be with my own lot from now on.

I'm not going to ask you to join us because that's not you. I'm going to ask you to leave. Please, leave now. Go to Australia or Zimbabwe or wherever. Dolohov can't keep it together in front of the Dark Lord long enough to stop talking about your death and Bellatrix goads him on.

I'm risking my neck leaving this to you. Please don't let this go to waste. Get out of the country, take your family and stay safe until this is over. If you do, I swear to you I'll travel to hell and back to stop Dolohov or anyone that means to harm you when my Lord is in power. But I can't do it if you stay here and face him.

I miss you. Believe me when I say it was the highlight of my last fifteen years to see you. I want my best friend back but I know it's impossible now. Let's stay alive. We didn't even have time to talk about Narcissa and Lucius' boy. He's atrocious, let me tell you but I reckon you've met him. If you ask me, it'd do more good to this world if we killed him instead of Potter. Thank Merlin she wasn't fertile like those Weasleys.

It's been so long. I'm sure you have many stories to tell me. I want to hear them all. I want to hear about those new developments in psychiatry you told me about. I want to hear if you kissed and made up with Black. Tell hi from me, but I guess he'll read this letter regardless. We've got a lot of stories together as well. You should ask him.

I'm begging you to leave, Lydia. Nowhere in this country is safe enough. Leave so we can meet again in another day.

Barty.

"I see what you're doing," she says quietly, defeated, and Sirius turns his gaze on her. Her mouth is curled on one side but it looks like anything but a smile. He is completely taken aback by the deep sadness in her eyes. She swallows, sucking her bottom lip into her mouth.

"How do you mean?" Sirius asks, even though he doesn't want to hear. He doesn't want her honesty.

"You're turning yourself into a sacrifice."

She keeps their eye contact, her eyes filling with tears, and Sirius distantly realises, out of all those times he's made her cry, this is the first time it isn't because of his harsh words, his brute, his recklessness, his coldness.

He's never once made her cry out of happiness, out of pleasure.

Always agony.

"You've done it when James died," she whispers after a while, fixing her eyes to the floor. A tear finds a path to her mouth and he finds he can't look away until it disappears. "Now you are doing it with Harry. I can't stomach watching it."

His heart spasms, a blinding ache spreading to his neck, to his arm. She surges from her seat, and knells in front of him, oblivious. Her hand, so small, with faint translucent scar on her ring finger, grasps his chin gently to make him look at her. When she speaks, her voice is firm but gentle. "I can't stand by you to watch you destroy yourself. Don't do it, you're not a filler. You're not a chapter in someone else's story. You're not here to be someone's memory."

As he stares into her face, her eyes almost brown in dim light, her mouth wet with tears, the realisation dawns on him, that she loves him, in all the right ways. She loves him in the ways he never loved her, to this point in his life.

His love was, in some ways, about his need to be the most important person in her life. His need to know that she can't live without him. At times, he felt like he was tugging at her stronger than she could physically untangle herself from, never giving her space to accommodate other people. Making a point of keeping her at arm's length whenever she refused to play by his rules, until she was grasping at him with desperate hands. He wanted to be the one to see all of her smiles, hear all of her songs, know all of her secrets. He wanted to be her husband, her best friend, her mentor, her family.

In the end, he managed to be just a memory.

She did live without him. She can live without him now too.

This is her very core, her refusal to be owned, by any person, by any ideology, by any sorrow. This is what got him so frustrated when he was younger, despite how much he admired it. It was always so easy for her to find her footing anywhere, to know and be sure of her self worth, regardless of people's thoughts or actions.

"I can never be like you," he admits and her face softens with a smile. She stands up, holding his face in her palms and his eyes close when she caresses his cheekbones with her thumbs.

"I don't want you to be like me," she says softly, as he buries his cheek in her palm. She tangles her fingers into his hair, "I want you to reclaim yourself." She tugs at his hair hard enough to make him look up, and she fixes him with a severe look. "And I want you to do it for yourself."

Sirius thinks it would be much easier to do it for her, to keep her at his side.

But he wants to love her in the right way, for once.

"I'll try," he says.

She laughs and she looks every bit the sixteen year old girl who got so bashful whenever he kissed her in front of people. "That's enough."

is she too harsh on harry? idk.
hope you enjoyed!