Written for the Quidditch League Fanfiction Competition, Season 9, Round 5.
Prompt: Laziness.
Optional Prompts: [dialogue] "I wouldn't blame you if you hated me."
[object] bottle of wine
WARNING: alcohol abuse
Beta: ProudFangirl23
you shattered me (but you're paying for it)
Voldemort...dead.
Those two words don't mix well with one another, but it's the truth. Voldemort is dead. Defeated, once and for all.
But they lost so many.
Too many.
Remus and Tonks: a happily married couple of less than one year, with a baby. Even in death, they are together. But their eyes are glassy and unseeing. They cannot see Harry crying as he stares at them, or Hermione's anguished gasps. They will never see their child again.
And there is Colin Creevey, the annoying yet endearing little boy who used to follow Harry around Hogwarts. He died trying to sneak into Hogwarts. In the end, he was brave.
So many others have died. People who had long lives ahead of them, happy lives full of laughter and joy.
The war took so many.
Too many.
Harry cries.
He cries for the life he had lost when Voldemort attacked his parents when he was a baby. He cries for all the deaths that he has caused. He cries for everything.
Harry feels guilty.
He always does, now.
Guilt builds up in the pit of his stomach, making tears appear in his eyes and bile to rise in his throat as he remembers the memory of seeing the bodies of the dead, just after Voldemort was defeated.
Every time that happens (which is quite often), Hermione or Ron asks him what is wrong.
Harry always answers, "Nothing."
But that could not be further from the truth.
Harry, Hermione and Ron return to Hogwarts to complete their seventh year.
Harry wishes that he didn't.
He can see the place where Tonks and Remus's bodies had lay whenever he goes out into the grounds. When he closes his eyes, he can just see the battle raging behind his eyelids, people fighting and falling.
Hermione knows what he means.
"I can see them still," she says sadly. "I can see the wreckage that the Death Eaters caused, people trying to climb out, people fighting and dying for us."
Harry doesn't reply.
Hermione smiles sadly at him, and turns back around to go into the castle.
"Don't go feeling guilty, Harry," she says. "It's not your fault."
They usually visit Hogsmeade with Ginny.
Ginny always pulls Harry aside, and tells him, her blue eyes boring into his, "It's not your fault."
It's not your fault.
It's not your fault.
It's not your fault.
But Harry knows that it is.
So he says, "Thanks, Ginny. I know. Let's go back to Ron and Hermione, shall we?"
Harry starts to date Ginny in the middle of the year.
He loves her smile, the lock of hair that would always push past her ear, her glittering blue eyes.
He loves everything about her.
He won't let her come to harm.
He'd already failed at protecting so many who had stood by him when Voldemort took over. He won't fail Ginny too.
He promises that to himself.
He'll protect her, like a lion protects her cubs.
When Harry, Ron and Hermione have taken their N.E.W.T.s, they leave Hogwarts and start to find work. Hermione becomes a member of the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures department, determined to help house-elves. Harry and Ron join the Auror Corps.
Hunting down Dark wizards has always been Harry's dream. But now that he's doing it...not really.
It reminds him of Mad-Eye Moody, who died to protect him.
It reminds him of Tonks, who had constantly joked around and made people happy.
As he hunts down various Dark wizards who escaped the Ministry before, anger starts to build up in him, slowly but firmly.
Pure, undulated anger.
It's not your fault.
It's not your fault.
It's not your fault.
But it is, he knows. It will always be his fault.
"Potter, are you saying that you failed your mission, and one of the most terrible Dark wizards of all time is still running free?"
Vulcov isn't one of the most terrible Dark wizards of all time. Voldemort is.
"Yes," Harry forces out, his hands clenching into fists.
His superior stares at him, disappointment in his gaze. "I expected better from you, Potter."
Of course you did.
Harry stands up suddenly, slamming his hands on the table. "You know what? I'm quitting."
"Potter -"
But Harry has already disappeared.
He's let people treat him like that for too long. He doesn't want special treatment as the Boy-Who-Lived. But pureblood bigots treat him like that just because his mother was a Muggleborn.
He won't stand for it.
A voice whispers in the back of his mind. You deserve better.
He does, he realises. He deserves better.
After Harry resigns from his job, the complaints start to arrive in the mail.
It's your duty...
It's your responsibility...
It's your purpose in life...
You should apologize immediately...
Apologize immediately? Harry wants to laugh. He won't apologize. They're expecting too much of him. He tries his best, but it's never enough.
He does not have a duty, or a responsibility, or a purpose in life, now that he's defeated Voldemort. But the wizarding public wants more.
He won't grant it to them.
He retires to the basement of 12 Grimmauld Place, where he knows that a stash of firewhiskey and wine is hidden. He's never needed a swig more than he has now.
The wizarding world wants him to do more? Well, he'll do the opposite. He'll do nothing.
It is Harry's own act of defiance.
"Harry, we need you. Please come out. Ginny misses you."
"So what if Ginny misses me?" he slurs, putting the bottle of wine to his lips and gulping the liquid down. "I don't care. And you don't need me. I'm not going to be your personal Dark wizard hunter."
A tear slips down Hermione's face, but she brushes it away. She knocks the bottle of wine from Harry's hand furiously. "Harry, what has gotten into you? Resigning I can understand. But drinking wine? Neglecting Ginny? Neglecting us?"
At this, Harry scowls. He picks up the bottle of wine from the floor, and says, "I don't care, I told you! You're expecting too much of me. You want me to do more, but I won't! I'm not going to be pushed around like that! I'm going to sit here and do nothing, and wait until you realise what you're missing. Even if you beg me on your knees, I won't come back. Leave me alone!"
Hermione swipes the bottle of wine out of Harry's hands, and cries. Tears slide down her face, and she wipes them away furiously. In her heart of hearts, she knows that Harry's words are true. He won't come back.
Perhaps it is partially her fault. After all, she was the one urging him to become an Auror. She had seen all the damage that Dark wizards could do, and had thought that Harry would be skilled at capturing those wizards. She had initially wanted to join them as an Auror, but she is more passionate about magical creatures, so she had decided against it.
It is her fault, really. All of it.
Hermione stands. "I'm sorry, Harry." her voice quivers. "I really am. I'll - I'll leave you alone, if that's what you want."
She turns, and leaves, still crying.
I'm sorry, Harry...
And so Harry's act of defiance continues. No one bothers him now. Not Hermione, not Ron, not Ginny. He can sit in the darkness of the basement and drink wine all he likes.
It continues, for days, then for months, then for years.
He doesn't do anything except drink, eat and sleep.
Harry becomes more and more lost within his own mind.
He feels alone.
Sometimes, it feels like he doesn't know himself.
"Harry, please come! I know that you said that you didn't want us to bother you anymore, but please! It's urgent."
Harry stares at the silver otter hovering in front of him. It's been years since he's seen it. Years and years.
But still, he knows it.
It's Hermione's Patronus.
It's still the same. Harry remembers the first time she cast it, in the Room of Requirement during a D.A. meeting. It looks exactly the same.
It continues to speak in Hermione's voice. "If you do come, go to Diagon Alley. There's an alley next to Eeylops Owl Emporium. Go inside." her voice is shaky. "We'd really appreciate it if you came. You - you have to see this."
Then the Patronus disappears.
Harry hesitates for a moment.
It's urgent.
You have to see this.
"Expecto Patronum!"
Nothing.
"Expecto Patronum!" Harry thinks of Ron, and Hermione, and Sirius, and Ginny. He can see their smiling faces in his mind's eye.
This time, mist curls out of his wand and forms a shapeless cloud. Not corporeal, but it should do.
"I'll come."
Just as Hermione had described, there is an alley to the right of Eeylops Owl Emporium. Harry peers into it.
Then a force knocks him off his feet, and a voice cries, "Oh, Harry! Thank Merlin!"
"Hermione," he grunts.
Hermione slowly backs away, but her eyes are bright. "Harry, you don't know how glad I am to see you. You've got to come."
She leads him further into the alley. He can barely see her, because it's quite dark here. Finally, Hermione stops so abruptly that Harry nearly collides with her.
"Ron."
"Hermione? And - Harry! Good to see you."
Harry gives a halfhearted smile that he is quite sure no one can see. Then he whispers to Hermione, "What did you call me here for?"
"Look."
A ball of glowing light appears in Harry's palm, and he looks.
And recoils in horror.
There, in the middle of the alley, surrounded by red blood, is Ginny.
But it doesn't look like her.
Her straight red hair, which Harry used to love so much, has been ripped out. Her chest is a mass of scars. Her fingers are clawing at her face, and - Harry nearly falls backward - her eyes have been gouged out.
And then he realises what he has done.
He's neglected his friends, the people who'd trusted in him the most.
He's neglected Ginny, the girl he loves.
But most of all, he's neglected himself.
He's been so determined to be defiant that he's lost himself in the pits of his own mind.
"What - what - what -" he sputters.
Hermione places her hand on his shoulder hesitantly. "Let's go back." she said.
Hermione guides Harry to Grimmauld Place's living room, and sits him down. She opens her mouth to start the conversation, but Harry speaks first.
"I wouldn't blame you if you hated me." he says, trying to blink back tears. But they spill forth anyway. He cries, thinking of Hermione's tearful face the time he told her to not bother him anymore, of Ginny's body, surrounded by a pool of blood. He cries for the life he could have had if he didn't do what he did - he could have married Ginny, he could have been happy and not alone. He cries for Ginny's death, which he had indirectly caused by neglecting her. He cries for everything.
Hermione places her hands on Harry's shoulders.
"It's alright, Harry." she says, wiping away his tears. "I don't hate you. Ron doesn't either. Ginny doesn't - didn't." she corrects herself. "You're my best friend. You could have become a rampaging Dark Lord and I still wouldn't hate you. We love you, Harry."