Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or any of the characters.

A/N: Thanks to MaeSilverpaws1, who is beta-ing this story.

Chapter Fifty-Eight

Rainy Day

Harry was starting to feel a little nervous as he walked down to breakfast. It was the day of the first Quidditch match of the season. At least he thought it was; it was so dark outside he wasn't sure if it was morning yet or not. The rain was coming down so badly that he was sure he wouldn't be able to see two inches in front of him. All in all, it wasn't the best day for Quidditch but the weather wasn't going to postpone the match and he wasn't about to let it stop him from winning.

"Are you even going to be able to see?" Ron asked as they walked to the pitch, when Harry took off his glasses as water splattered on them.

"It's going to be hard with these things," Harry frowned.

"Hm … let me see them," Hermione said holding her hand out for the glasses. When Harry tried to hand them to her, he missed her hand by a few inches … not a good sign. She muttered something and then tapped the glasses with her wand and it glowed for a second before she handed it back to him. "How's that?"

"Wow!" Harry said as he realized the water was no longer hitting his glasses. "Hermione, you're brilliant!"

"I didn't do much," Hermione said smiling proudly.

"You did everything … I can actually see as well as everyone else now," Harry smiled.

"Now if only you can figure out how to make the rain stop, that would be great," Ron smiled at her.

"Sorry … I don't think even Dumbledore could do something like that," Hermione said.

"Too bad," Ron sighed, "Come on mate, we better get to the changing room."

"Yeah," Harry agreed.

"Finally you guys got here!" Wood huffed when they got into the room.

"Don't mind him, he's just nervous," Angelina said.

"I'm just concerned about this weather," Wood grumbled. "If we play how we have been practicing I know that we don't have anything to worry about. We have better fundamentals than the Slytherins! We will win this game!"

"No pressure or anything," Fred chuckled, but he was looking serious too. Everyone started to filing out of the room towards the pitch, Ron and Ginny taking the rear and sitting down on the bench for the reserve players. Even with the spell that Hermione put on his glasses, when Harry looked back at his friends, he couldn't really make them out very well. This really was going to be a difficult game.

Madam Hooch had to shout to be heard over the rain and Harry couldn't even hear the whistle but took flight because everyone else did. He didn't see the Snitch at all as it was released and he was starting to get tense again. He usually felt at ease by the time he was in the air, but this time he felt disorientated since he was not able to see everything or even hear. These were both of the sense that he normal used and they weren't going to help him much now. What was he supposed to do … smell the Snitch?

Since his line of vision was only a few feet in front of him now, he knew that he was going to have to fly all over the place if he was going to have any chance to see the Snitch. His nerves seemed to leave him after the first couple of minutes, now that he had a game plan he felt like he could do it. He passed Malfoy, who seemed to have decided to sit still and watch a certain area in hopes the Snitch would pass by. It seemed to be a little passive for Harry's taste, but he realized that it wasn't the worst way to go about it.

He decided that he would have to keep an eye on Malfoy, just in case the blonde boy's plan worked. At the same time he was still going to have to fly around. It was a good thing he decided to keep his eye of Malfoy, because that git had actually picked a good place. Harry was fortunate enough to be looking at him when Malfoy started his dive. Harry raced off after him, pushing his broom as hard as he could. It didn't help at all that he couldn't tell were the Snitch was and he had to hope that Malfoy wasn't just feinting or he would lose the Snitch before he could find it. He wanted to get this game over with.

There was a flash of lightening and Harry saw it. Malfoy wasn't that far behind the Snitch. Harry leaned even harder on the broom, forcing himself to go as fast as possible, gaining inches on Malfoy, who seemed to be flying all out too. However, Malfoy suddenly slowed down for a reason Harry couldn't understand but he didn't care much. His eyes were on the Snitch and he wasn't going to take them off of it until it was in his hand. The hesitation made it so Harry and Malfoy were neck and neck.

Suddenly Malfoy bumped into him, and Harry had a hard time keeping the Snitch in his line of view. He was sure at that time that Malfoy probably had lost the Snitch in the rain.

He couldn't afford for that to happen to him as well. So he didn't look at Malfoy as the blonde boy continued to try to slow him down until a Bludger was sent at Malfoy by one of the twins allowing Harry to have a moment without being bothered. It was enough.

His hand wrapped around the golden Snitch.

It took awhile for anyone to realize the game was actually over and it took even longer for Madam Hooch to stop the mess that was the Gryffindor and Slytherin Chasers. However, as soon as they realized they won everyone on the team flew at Harry to hug him.

"That was brilliant Harry!" Fred said there was a major party going on in the Gryffindor common room. Everyone was excited after the victory today and didn't seem to mind that they were still soaking wet.

"Yeah … thanks for the Bludger, it really helped," Harry smiled at him.

"That was me!" George protested.

"Okay then, thanks you," Harry turned to him still smiling. "It was just in time."

O

Harry worked extremely hard in his Animagus training on what would be their last day before the Christmas break. He hated that he still hadn't master his transformation on his toes, where as the others had and Hermione was already moving on to her shines. He couldn't understand why he couldn't get past this. He might not be as good as Hermione in Transfiguration, but he was better than most. However every time that he tried to do the stupid spell it just won't work.

What was worse was the few times that he had managed to change something it didn't look remotely like it belong to a wolf. It had taken Hermione several minutes to transform him back and he only got worse with his transformation after his failure. Even when Hermione told him about her little trick that had helped her and Ron out, he wasn't able to make any headway.

"Harry?" Hermione said an hour before they had to go back to the common room. Harry was sitting down on one of the couches that were in the room, looking into space with a grimace.

"What?" he sighed sounding annoyed and tired.

"Did you need any help?" Hermione asked uncertainly.

"Hmph …" he said obviously surly, "I'll doubt it will help."

"I'm sure …" she started to say, but Harry interrupted her.

"I just can't get it! I don't know what's the matter with me! I just can't get it!"

Hermione looked at him closely, and though she couldn't really understand what he was going through, she knew it couldn't be because of his abilities. He had never showed a block like this when it came to Transfiguration. "I wonder if the problem is the fact that you think you can't do this?" she then mused.

"Maybe," Harry allowed grumpily, "that's doesn't really help me get past this."

"Just get over yourself already, Harry," Hermione rolled her eyes and his expression when he looked at her was so shocked that she just had to laugh. "Sorry … I didn't really mean it how it sounded. I just mean that this problem is probably all in your head."

"And how do you think I should go about getting around this problem, if you have all the answers?" Harry huffed at her.

"Maybe by figuring out the reason why you have such a block," Hermione suggested.

"You always make things sound so easy," Harry made a face at her.

"You're trying so hard, Harry," Hermione said. "I know that you feel like you have to do this more than the rest of us. For me it's just doing the transformation but …."

"Yeah, I get it," Harry said.

"Maybe if you stop thinking so much about finishing the transformation, you'll be able to start …"

"Yeah … fine, I get it," he cut her off again and finally she took the clue and got up to leave him alone.

Harry leaned back into the couch, thoughtful again. Hermione was right of course, he was thinking about getting through this transformation as quickly as he could so that he could be an Animagus. He wasn't sure how he was going to clear his mind of that thought, but he tried to calm down. Ginny came to sit next to him, she obviously had heard the conversation (as did the rest of the people) but she didn't say anything about it. Actually she talked to him about the most recent professional Quidditch match between two of the top teams.

They had only taken ten minutes to talk, but somehow, he felt a lot better after talking with her. Maybe it was the Quidditch talk … how could that not make him feel calmer … or the fact that he didn't feel like such a failure at this second. When he finally tried the spell again using the tip that Hermione had told him about earlier, he was actually able to concentrate better than he had before. He knew as soon as he said the words that it was going to work this time … he could feel the magic working before his toes even started to turn into claws.

He smiled as he looked down at his feet, a wave of relief flowed through him. He had started to think that he wouldn't be able to get this, that he would fail in something that was this important to him. Finally he had some proof that he would be successful … pressure was falling off him. He knew that it wasn't going to be easy from now on, but he wasn't going to let himself get held up like he had been.

"Good job everyone," Hermione said a little while after that and everyone started gathering their things knowing that it was time to for them to leave. Harry said goodbye to Neville and Luna, who he most likely wouldn't see until after the holiday break and then walked with the others back to their own common room.

"Are you sure you don't want to come over for Christmas, Harry?" Ron asked as they walked. "You know how good Mum's cooking is … it is so much better at Christmas."

"Stop it," Harry groaned, he could only imagine how good that meal would be. He'd have to talk to Sirius and Remus about this next year and see if he could convince them to allow him to go next Christmas. However, he was going to be seeing his dad this year. Remus had promised that he would take him. He understood now why Remus had made him wait until Christmas instead this summer. Now that that Remus was his professor, it wasn't that odd that Harry would go with him to St. Mungo's to see his dad. Sure, he was still annoyed about all the security around him, but he was happy that things were going to work out from now on.

Harry was starting to get anxious about the meeting. He knew a lot about his father from the stories that Remus and Sirius had told him, but this would be the first time that he would see his dad that he would remember. He honestly didn't know what to expect, but he knew that he was going to remember that day for the rest of his life.