'There you are!'

Ginny sat grinning by the dinner table. Hermione turned her head and also smiled at his entry.

Harry found himself standing fixed in an awkward stance, his hand still on the door handle. He turned around: a room with a mirror, a sink, a bath and a toilet.

'Did you forget something in there?' Ginny teased him.

Clearing his throat and adopting a casual air, Harry closed the bathroom door. He ambled towards the dining room through the corridor as if savouring the warmth and aromas for the first time, and letting every step absorb the sense of coming home. One wall was full of moving pictures. His own self stood with his arm around Ginny, both surrounded by a playful cluster: James Sirius, Albus Severus and Lily Luna. Another picture showed Hermione and Ron and their children, little Rose jumping with excitement. A quirky window between the pictures framed the nightfall and, in the garden, Flutterby Bushes waved their leaves.

The dining room was softly lit by candles when he entered. On Ginny's left, Ron sat picking his teeth.

'I had the last piece before it got cold,' said Ron, his smile brilliant in his middle-aged face. 'We were worried you had flushed yourself, mate.'

'Oh?' Hermione sneered. 'I distinctly recall someone at this table who locked himself up one night and groaned, "I swear I won't ever eat again!".'

The three of them laughed and Harry placed himself behind the one vacant chair. The table was cleared, and dirty plates stood balancing in the kitchen.

'You're oddly quiet, Harry,' Hermione pondered on his right. 'Won't you sit down?'

'And oddly grinning,' Ginny giggled. 'You look like you've won a million Galleons. What were you doing back there?'

Harry chuckled, trying hard not to let his voice break. 'I just … It's just so good to see you all. To have you here with me.'

'Likewise, mate,' Ron bowed.

'Oh, Harry,' Ginny said, her eyes sparkling. 'We love you so much.'

'We do,' Hermione said warmly. 'Furthermore, I sympathise with how you feel, Harry. Now and then we need to stop what we're doing and consider how lucky we are to have one another.'

Harry took a seat. He gazed at them all, smiling and shaking his head.

'I feel … I feel …' he said, intent on finding the proper words. 'I feel somehow … reborn.'

'Reborn?' Ginny said, raising an eyebrow.

'Yes. I feel that, come what may, it was worth all the loss. Even though I'm not yet sure what "it" is.'

'A visit to the loo is no doubt an underrated experience,' Ron agreed.

'Not the loo. I was … I was somewhere else.'

Ron's lips curled. 'It can feel like that sometimes.'

'Ron, please,' said Hermione.

'Sorry, mate. Just being stupid.'

Harry laughed and beamed at Ron. 'You're amazing, Ron. You always were.'

'See?' Ron smirked. 'I'm amazing.'

'Yes, darling,' said Hermione, and they blew each other kisses.

'So,' Harry said, taking a deep breath, 'did I miss anything?'

'Merely the pinnacle of the evening,' said Ron. 'My precious wife and my dear sister spent most of your absence discussing the particulars of my alleged laziness.'

Ginny snorted. '"Alleged"? We were tidying up after dinner, while you, Ron, were conveniently "busy" doing nothing.'

'"Nothing"?' Ron snorted back. 'I was building a card castle! A magnificent one, no less. Well, until Hermione blew it up.'

'I most certainly did not,' Hermione smiled. 'You're simply not very good with cards.'

'It wasn't even an Exploding Snap pack!' Ron protested, while Harry and Ginny shot each other knowing glances. 'Regular cards don't suddenly detonate on their own.'

'I might have cast a slight spell,' said Hermione with an innocent gesture, 'but that was only to clear the table.'

'And as for not being a skilful card player,' Ron went on, ignoring Ginny's snickers, 'you'll remember, snookums, that we wouldn't have got anywhere near the Philosopher's Stone unless I'd prevailed in that game of Brag.'

'I believe you've had enough wine for tonight. It was chess, you silly man.'

'Oh!' Ron blurted. 'Chess! Naturally! I think I have had enough. I –'

'Anyway!' Ginny interrupted. 'Let's return to where we were before Harry withdrew and Ron attempted architecture. You were saying, Hermione, about Hogwarts?'

'Right! I'd just left the Ministry to arrange an impromptu meeting with Professor McGonagall. I passed the gargoyle, went up the stairs, opened the door – and what do I see?'

Ron inhaled dramatically and whispered: 'An entire nest of Gulping Plimpies?'

'No, Ron – I see Harry, head in the Pensieve, and Dumbledore's portrait ruined.'

Even Ron looked taken aback.

'You knew about this, Ginny?' he said.

'Not in the least! We didn't really talk today as we were busy with the arrangements for tonight. What on earth were you up to, Harry?'

Harry shifted in his seat.

'Well,' he hesitated, 'it's a little confusing even for me. I'm not sure where to begin.'

'At the beginning,' Hermione proposed.

'Fair enough. Er – I was surveying the Pensieve's memories, you see, and –'

'Why?' said Ginny.

'Well, because … before that, I'd thrown a small key in it.'

'Ah, yes,' Hermione chimed in, 'the golden one you found on your pillow this morning.'

Ginny's eyes popped. 'A key? And that occurred just before we had our chat, Harry? I knew something was afoot, even then. But I've never been one to pry.'

'I'm sorry, Ginny! I didn't want you to worry. You were barely awake.'

'But who put the key there?' said Ron.

'I don't know. On the other hand, I had a weird dream that night, so I –'

'The Sky Pies!' Ron trumpeted. 'That's only natural. You'll dream bonkers with those.'

Hermione smiled. 'Did you ever have anything materialise on your pillow after eating them?'

'Let me tell you what "materialised": some darned fine explosives for the porcelain sea. I could –'

'Gross, Ron!' Hermione and Ginny shouted, while Ron and Harry smirked.

'What was the dream about, though?' Ron said.

'Oh,' Harry fretted, 'never mind that, only a stupid nightmare.'

'You sure, mate? Jokes aside, I've been there, more than once. Those nightmares aren't the usual fare.'

Ron's eyes had genuine concern swimming underneath the casual ease. He gazed at his friend until he gave in.

'No,' Harry sighed. 'They're not. The one I had was almost as real as sitting here now.'

Hermione patted Harry's hand. Ginny, pouting her bottom lip, said:

'The little baby woke up fwightened and fort what it dweamed was twoo.'

The hairs on the back of Harry's neck stood on end and he gaped in astonishment at her.

'Ginny!' Hermione flared up. 'It's not funny!'

Ginny squeezed her head in between her shoulders. 'Only a joke,' she muttered.

'Well,' Ron said, 'hardly one of your better ones.'

'All right, all right!' she scowled at her brother, then addressed Harry: 'Forgive me, Harry. That was incredibly insensitive of me. Please, go on.'

'Um,' Harry faltered, 'I, er … I –'

A stifled giggle cut him off. Hermione covered her mouth, her eyes glinting with amusement.

'I apologise,' came her muffled voice.

'I-I …'

Hermione exploded with laughter. She guffawed at the ceiling as if releasing years of pent-up emotion while a tittering Ginny and a chortling Ron joined in.

'It's – it's,' Hermione huffed between convulsions, 'it's too good! "Fort what it dweamed" –'

'Was it twoo, Hawwy?' Ron leered. 'Was it twoo?'

Harry stood up, his chair slamming to the floor. He stared at the others like a cornered animal.

'Awww,' came Ginny's mocking voice. 'Are you fwightened, little baby? Are you afwaid now? And you who've come so far.'

'He came further than I thought,' Ron nodded at her.

Hermione chuckled, wiping a tear. 'You've done well, Harry. Really well.'

'Who are you people?' Harry hissed at them, his heart pounding. 'This is not my house! There's no way!'

'Oh, dear,' Ginny said. 'You're no longer able to tell, are you?'

'Who is?' Ron shrugged, his hands locked behind his head.

'What do you want from me?' Harry roared.

All three cackled.

'We're your family, Harry,' Ginny mused. 'All we hope for is your affection.'

'No,' he panted, 'you are not Ginny. And you' – he pointed at the other two – 'are not Ron and Hermione!'

'Aren't we, though?' said Hermione. 'We performed quite well just now, didn't we?'

Ron leaned over the table. 'Be honest: could you actually tell the difference? If not, it's all academic now, isn't it? Come on, mate, let's enjoy what we have.'

'It made you so happy, Harry,' Ginny cooed. 'And you'll stay happy, if you stay with us.'

Hermione raised the fallen chair back in place.

'Sit,' she said, 'and take a while to consider.'

Harry seated himself without a word.

'We look the same. We behave the same. It's been that way since day one. You know that.'

Harry kept silent. He watched his thumbnail scraping along the table's grain.

'And we'll be here for you,' Ginny said. 'Always.'

His thumb came to a halt.

'Always?' he whispered.

'Yes, my love. Always.'

'No,' said Harry, looking up. 'No, you will not.'

'Of course we will, mate!' Ron grinned and gave him an affectionate nudge. 'I promise!'

'No,' Harry repeated. 'You'll grow old, Ron.'

Ron had a violent coughing fit. He spluttered and gurgled, grunted and spat. When at last he managed to compose himself and looked up, his face was sagging and wrinkled, his hair white.

'D-don't,' he wheezed. 'H-H-Harry, it's me!'

Ginny and Hermione gasped.

'What have you done to him?' Hermione cried, her fingers trembling over her lips.

'He's your best friend, Harry!' Ginny whimpered.

Harry swallowed hard, his eyes wide and teary at the decrepit man.

Ron struggled to speak. 'R-remember the day we took the car … and f-flew to Hogwarts? Remember, H-Harry?'

Hermione was beside herself and pulled at Harry.

'He trusted you!' she cried. Then she lowered her voice: 'As I did, Harry. Remember when … remember when we lured Umbridge to the Forbidden Forest? And Grawp rescued us from the centaurs? A-and then the centaurs' – she gave a faint chuckle in-between snivels – 'saved us from him? Isn't that how it happened?'

Harry looked at Hermione with his mouth agape.

'Hermione,' he stammered, 'you – I – I'm sorry –'

She covered her face and her chest heaved with sobs.

'– but you … you must age.'

Her cries broke off with a gulp. She held up her knotty hands, staring at them in terror. In dread anticipation, she put them to the leathery skin of her sunken face.

'Why, Harry?' she whined, peering at him from under her white fringe. The bushy chaos had dwindled to thin cascades. 'W-we only want to be seen. Like everyone else.'

'Give us a chance,' Ron rasped, slumped in his chair.

'You will change,' Harry sighed. Dark spots erupted on Ron's brittle skin, his nose and ears bulbous and drooping. 'And then you'll die.'

Ron stiffened. His cloudy eyes still had something of surprise in them, but his body was motionless and his breathing had ceased.

Harry turned to Hermione, whose fragile figure also withered, her hair hanging like a chandelier from her declined head.

'You will disappear,' he said. In the blink of an eye, she vanished. Only the chair remained, and Ron's seat was likewise empty.

Ginny's flaming red mane swished in the air. She ran up to Harry and kneeled by his side, her hands clutching his. Her deep, brown eyes gazed up at him intently.

'Harry, my love, listen to me. I'm telling you this not for my sake, but for yours: If you let go of me, I'm gone forever.'

His eyes twitched, yet he said nothing.

'Harry? How often have you considered your fortune? That we happened to meet, you and I? So, so, so many times. As befits you,' she beamed, 'because you're a humble man!' The next second her countenance changed. 'Should you go through with this, Harry, every one of those grateful moments will be poison to you. Your own mind will be your worst enemy. Do you understand, my love?'

He beheld her beautiful face. Lively and wise. Loyal unto death. The one person where he found peace and relief. She whispered:

'I know, Harry. I realise we must die. But there is more, my love. Don't you see? There's always more.' She put on a comforting smile. 'Did you really think nothing of me would be left?'

Her eyes glimmered in the candle light. For the slightest instant, the glowing amber faded, and a grey haze passed over the irises.

'Yes, Ginny,' said Harry, his brow furrowed. 'As though you were never born.'

Ginny barely achieved a gasp before she was gone. The weight of hands pressing on Harry's lifted into nothing.

Harry's body sank in the chair as if inflating, and a bitter loneliness settled in the room. The house was silent, save for the sounds accentuating its state. A clock ticking. A dripping tap, garden leaves rustling, the roof creaking.

A few of the candles had burnt out, and shadows dimmed the pictures in the corridor. They no longer seemed to move. In the darkness, they even looked blank.

Harry's head dropped.

'What did I do?' he mumbled, glaring at his shoes. 'What have I done?'

Harry's feet rested, not on the dinner-table floor in his house, but on a rug. He was sitting in an armchair, facing a fireplace. The fire had nearly gone out. From the windows, the overcast day spread a flat light over three comfortable armchairs, encircling a table with a clay teapot. The sitting room led to the main entrance and, on the left, a flight of stairs.

Sharply inhaling, Harry rushed from the chair, ran to the front door and hurried up the staircase. He paused on the corridor carpet, eyes darting from wall to wall, then burst through the door in the middle.

Empty.

A window yawning behind a cleared writing desk. A bookshelf containing a handful of dictionaries.

Harry caught his breath for a moment and let out a wheeze. He backed out. In the doorway, his gaze wandered about the room – the window – the desk – the chair behind it – and he stepped out.

He flumped down on the staircase, ruffling his hair and adjusting his glasses. Resting his jaw in his cupped hands, the muscles in Harry's face relaxed as the fire's snaps dulled and blended into the peace of the house, a silence wrapping him like a thick quilt.

Opposite the stairs where he sat, a wallpaper pattern coated the wall. Flowers, perhaps, or abstract nothings, recurring over and over in colours approximating brown and yellow hues, muted by shadows.

In this way Harry sat staring, the minutes passing gently as a cloud.

Gradually, the patterns started overlapping. They floated around one another, in and out of new shapes, resembling dogs, elephants, teacups or palm trees before crumbling into nonsense again.

As the clutter of details tangled, a larger structure began to form. The teacups, the butterflies, the stars, the snowflakes – all gathered into a single body. It resembled an enormous rose. Then a head. Or a skull. Presently, the intricate parts slimmed into something tall and symmetrical. With a circle on top.

A keyhole?

Harry's head bobbed up, eyes in rapt attention. In –

'Hey!' he said.

Eyes darting, his eyebrows constricted in craggy wrinkles. Over the –

'Hey!'

He yelled like a man on a bad telephone line, his fingertips to his temples. What was going on? He –

'I'll tell you what's going on! I can hear you!'

… … …

… … …

'I know I heard you. Answer me!'

… … …

'I think we can assume I won't suddenly snap out of it, you know. I can't unsee what I saw, and I can't unhear what I heard.'

Harry rose. In a few nimble movements, he rushed to a sofa further into the sitting room. He lay down, closed his eyes and –

'No, he didn't! I'm walking back to the staircase – aaand now I'm sitting down. I'm not getting up!'

… … …

'So, who –'

Groaning and sighing, Harry was overcome with sadness. All his terrible experiences had taken their toll, and now, living seemed a cruel j–

'Sod off! That's not what this is about! I will soon return home, and –'

And with that thought, Harry felt at ease.

'Huh. Well, all right.'

He hunkered comfortably on the steps.

'They're tolerable.'

He grinned stupidly and started hitting himself in the face – he just could not help it, he loved to –

'Ow! Damn it all! Cut it out! I am not hitting myself, and I'll babble absolute poppycock for hours on end if you don't stop.'

… … …

Harry breathed more evenly and he walked up to one of the armchairs and reclined. Gazing at the hearth, he said:

'Er – okay. That's better.'

The chair was soft and relaxing, but Harry felt alert rather than tired.

'Fine. Thank you. Now, tell me who you are.'

He got up and strode to the fireplace. The flames had died, but the logs were still warm and crackled softly.

'Very nice, but tell me who you are!' he repeated idiotically. 'Oi! Skip the adverbs, would you?'

… … …

Harry's question was justified; he was not an idiot, after all.

'Would you kindly answer me?'

Next to the hearth hung an iron poker. Harry grabbed it by the handle and stirred the fire.

'What are you doing?' he asked himself. 'No, I'm asking you! Will you stop describing my actions and set about telling me –'

He held the poker in both hands, aimed the sharp point at his eyeball and –

'No! Curse you! I'm dropping the poker on the floor!'

But he picked it up again and he poked it straight –

'– up your arse, assuming you have one!'

Realising how ungrateful he was, Harry ran like a nutter across the parlour, jumped over the sofa and crashed through the window. Landing in a bush, bleeding and panting, he was belatedly humbled enough to –

'Like hell I am! I – I may be bleeding, but I'll never succumb to you any more, you shifty, greedy, cruel bastard!'

His foul, ignorant tongue was in evident need of – of –

'Hah-hah! Not quite the virtuoso improviser, are you?'

Harry was confused and –

'I'm perfectly bloody lucid.'

– confused and –

'Hear ye, hear ye! My name is Harry Potter, being of sound mind and body –'

Clearly unable to fathom even the most rudimentary idea, he did not –

'– sound mind and body, and, although acting under some duress and the undue influence of a complete prick –'

– did not –

'It is too late, you scumbag! I've already –'

– have a CLUE –

'– I've seen and heard –'

– AS TO THE –

'– AND I'LL LIVE –'

– TRUTH!!1 OV –

'– WITHOUT –'

– TH @#!! !58_ –

'– YOUR STORY!'

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