Friday evening
"You want to get out tonight?" Lily sounded a little hesitant, and pulled away from Harry slowly.
"Yeah, I figure it's better than having to go through all of this again tomorrow. We'll go back to my place and you can meet my fiancé," Harry's goofiest grin spread across his face.
"Ooh, he's got a fiancé, does he? Who's the lucky broad?" His dad punched him on the arm hard.
"No one you'd know. She was literally born after you, you know, died."
"You hear that Lily? Our boy's a cradle robber! Bet you had to beat em off with a stick, didn't ya? I told Lily that any kid of ours would be too sexy for the world to handle, but she insisted on giving it a go," James rolled his eyes at Harry with a conspiratorial grin.
"Focus up, James." Lily was not amused. "It's already almost ten o'clock, sweetie. What do we have to do?"
Harry was caught off guard by that. "You…you guys don't know how to get out of here?" His heartbeat thrummed in his throat. James was suddenly sober as he replied to his son's question.
"Dumbledore was supposed to explain before he cast it, but we got word that the Death Eaters were coming earlier than expected, and he had to start casting way ahead of schedule. He said we'd figure it out, when it came to that part."
"Ah shit," Harry sighed, and scrubbed his face. He was suddenly very, very tired. "Ginny was right. I shouldn't have come here tonight. I wasn't ready. Now we're all stuck here, and no one even knows that I'm here."
"No no no, honey, we're so glad to have you here. To be honest, I'm kind of glad we're all stuck here together, so we can catch up. We've lost so much time." She launched herself at her son once more. Harry thought to himself that being hugged by his mother would never lose its novelty.
Harry sighed, grateful. "I feel the same way, mum." He hesitantly hugged her back.
"Get in here, James," Lily said, her voice thick, as she grabbed James' arm and pulled him into the hug.
Harry's stomach dipped and rolled, his mind whirring to commit to memory the feeling of his parents hugging him. His mother was soft and warm, almost as tall as he was. His chin felt right on her shoulder. His father didn't exactly tower over the two of them, although he was a bit taller than his son. Though his father currently looked to be only a couple years older than him, Harry got choked up as he realized that he had never before felt as safe as he did in his father's arms. James was a little soft, his Quidditch days behind him, but there was something in the reassuring smile and the wink he gave Harry over Lily's head that made him relax for what felt like the first time in his life. These were his parents. They would never let anyone hurt him.
Lily leaned back, releasing a long sigh. She wiped away tears that Harry didn't even realize he had cried.
"Oh my baby boy. What have they put you through?"
"God, mum. Where to begin?"
"Well, how about the very beginning?" James said, grabbing the tissue box and passing it around. He'd never admit it later, but he had cried quite a bit as well.
Lily laughed. "It is, after all, a very good place to start," she joked.
"That's…" Harry's brain churned, and finally dug up the memory. "I love the Sound of Music. I always used to sneak out and watch it whenever Aunt Petunia had it on."
"Me too. It was always Tuna's favorite movie." Lily smiled at him softly, lost in memories. Harry cracked up while James watched her, melancholy.
"Sorry…Tuna?"
"It's an old nickname. When I was learning to talk, I had trouble saying her whole name, and apparently called her Tuna for a couple of years. It made my parents laugh so much that the name stuck. Once we got older, it morphed into Tuney, since she hated Tuna so much. And me, I suppose," Lily finished with a sigh.
Harry grunted out a laugh. "Join the club."
Lily cradled his face in one hand. "How bad was it? You can tell us. We can handle it." Harry took the hand on his face and held on to it tight.
"It was pretty bad. I got dumped on their doorstep just after my - uh, you, died, and all three of them resented me being there every day after that. Aunt Petunia, Uncle Vernon, and my cousin, Dudley, pretty much treated me like a house elf until I went away to school. After that, I was a prisoner over the summers, since they didn't want me hexing them or something. That was actually an improvement, believe it or not, since I actually got a room of my own," Harry chuckled mirthlessly. James clenched his fists over and over, trying to calm himself.
"I knew that idiot Vernon was trouble the first time I met him. I can't imagine his son would be any better than him. And Petunia was bad enough to disown her own sister, no wonder she had no trouble abusing an innocent kid!" James muttered through gritted teeth.
"Actually, Dudley's gotten better over the years. We're not friends, but we have a kind of truce. He's not so bad, really."
"Well, I guess that's something…" Lily sighed. "I'm going to give her a talking to when we get out of here, but I'm too exhausted to be mad right now." James rubbed her back lovingly.
"We can go to bed soon, love. But first, I need to know, why on Merlin's green earth did you not go to Sirius instead? Dumbledore knew that's what we wanted, that's what was in our will! How did you end up with those monsters?"
"Ah. That's quite a bit more complicated. Well, Dumbledore brought me to Petunia for a couple different reasons. He had a theory that since Mum sacrificed herself for me, her blood would protect me from Voldemort. Course, that only worked until fourth year," he muttered to himself. "But uh, honestly? Sirius…wasn't really in a good place to take care of a child at that point in time." Seeing his parent's confused faces, Harry decided to just push through and tell them.
"He was in Azkaban." Both Lily and James went pale.
"What did that moron do now?" James asked, voice shaking.
"Nothing," Harry replied hastily. "Everyone assumed he was your secret keeper, that he had been the one to give you up to Voldemort. Of course, it wasn't true," Harry interjected vehemently. "Still…he was there for a long time. I didn't even meet him until I was thirteen." Harry began to wilt. Much as he wanted his parents to know everything, this was more than he could really handle right now.
"Awful," muttered Lily. "There's no fucking justice in the world. Of course he didn't give us up. He wasn't even our secret keeper, you know."
"And Remus? He was our second choice." James was hoarse.
"He had a really hard life once you were gone. He couldn't have afforded to take care of me, and I think he was always too worried about hurting me to try." The two of them nodded.
"Poor Remus. Never did think very much of himself, and without us to talk him out of it…" Lily shivered.
"What about Peter?" Harry looked from Lily to James, courage flagging.
"M-maybe we should pick this up tomorrow. Mum's tired, and so am I," he said, trying his best to be nonchalant.
James stared at him hard, searching his face for meaning. Harry suddenly had a flash of a memory that might have been: he could imagine James giving him this hard-eyed look while catching him in a lie as a kid, perhaps breaking his curfew.
"What happened to Peter, Harry?" James asked forcefully.
"Leave it James. We're all tired. It'll keep for tomorrow," Lily rubbed his arm in a soothing manner and dragged him to their room. "Harry, are you alright on the couch again? I'm afraid we don't have an extra bed, but I can grab you a blanket and a pillow."
"Yeah, that'd be great, Mum. Thank you." Harry sank into the sofa, glad to have at least dodged one bullet today. He found a scrap of spare parchment and started writing himself a letter.
Sunday Night
Three figures suddenly appeared in the night outside the abandoned cottage in Godric's Hollow. Luckily none of the neighbors were nosy enough at ten o'clock on a Sunday night to be watching the shadows make their way to the backyard.
"This must be it," Ginny panted, lighting her wand to show the others what she was looking at.
"This place is somehow even creepier at night!" Ron rubbed his arms, but not because of nighttime chill. Hermione came round the other side of the house.
"I can't believe it!" Her cheeks were flushed with excitement. "Now that I know what I'm looking for, I see your uncles' spell. It's incredible! I wish I had more time to study it before we go in."
"You may get to do just that. I've been thinking about it, and I think that I should go in by myself." Ginny braced for the oncoming fight.
"Oh." Ron look taken aback. "Uh, yeah. I guess that's fine."
"Really? You're not gonna fight me on this?"
"It makes sense," he shrugged. "Not as if all three of us need to be in there to explain how to break it. And Harry definitely loves you, judging by the size of that rock." He gestured to her engagement ring. "And truthfully, I'm not that excited to jump into a time bubble that may not be broken any time soon." Hermione hit him on the shoulder.
"What Ronald means, Ginny, is that you have the best chance of the three of us of both getting in and getting out. I was just about to suggest the same thing." Hermione took the shorter girl's hand in hers. "You be careful, alright? We want both of you out in one piece, and soon."
"What's the worst that could happen to her, Hermione? She goes in, tells them how to leave, bingo, bango, Bob's your uncle."
"I don't think anything will go wrong. But this is an experimental spell that, as far as we know, was only ever cast once. Since there's no precedence for breaking it, we don't know the possible risks or best practices, and I…" She grabbed Ginny and hugged her tightly. "Just be careful, that's all. You're smart, Ginny. Trust your instincts."
"Oh, I guess I didn't think of it that way." When Hermione released his sister, Ron leaned in and gave her a gruff hug. "Good luck, Gin. Try not to die, yeah? Mum and Dad would never forgive me."
"But you'd be just fine, huh?" Ginny laughed, clapping him on the back. Ron pulled back and looked her in the eye.
"No, of course not," he replied softly. Ginny swallowed and pulled him into a genuine hug.
"I love you too, Ron," she muttered into his shoulder.
She turned to face the doors to the basement, checked for her wand, and turned back to Ron and Hermione.
"Take care of each other while I'm gone. I don't think this is going to take long. And for the love of Merlin, don't tell Mum!"
She turned back to the doors, took a deep breath. Screwing her courage to the sticking place, she grabbed the handles and pulled.