Talking With Grief: Chapter 2 (Disturbing Thoughts)

Author's Note: OK, short Author's note cos I'm a bit pressed for time. Hello readers, second chapter! I'm not too happy about this chapter for some strange reason that I can't explain, but I did it in a rush, I suppose. Lupin still isn't here, but he will be entering in the third chapter, so rest assured, he will be here soon as I'm sure some of you will be glad to hear. Yay, Lupin! Ahem…

Still Harry and his thoughts: some thoughts on the prophecy this time though. He's extremely bored in the confinement to his room, as I'm sure we all know the feeling sometimes. Thank you for your reviews, but please feel free to keep doing so. Enjoy!

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Harry found himself at his desk yet again, parchment smoothed out on the old knotted wood, quill rolled off onto the carpet where he had not been bothered to pick it up. He had supposed that he ought to write to Lupin, as it had been four days since they had last heard of him, and Tonks had made him promise that he would write every three days so they knew that he was all right.

But what was going to happen to him? Dumbledore had told him that he was totally safe at the Dursleys, apart from the possible threat of Uncle Vernon's spit frothing over Harry's face enough to make him sick of course. However, with this fresh letter, he wasn't getting very far at all; he was simply stuck for words in the deepness of his grief and despair.

Gathering what little energy he had about him, once he had awoken from his thoughts a little, he bent down and picked up his abandoned quill. Trying to force himself to concentrate, he rested his hand on the table and effortlessly wrote in untidy, small writing:-

Dear Lupin –

Things are fine here at the Dursleys, they are treating me surprisingly pleasantly. I'm fine too; I'm enjoying my holidays thoroughly. Dudley had his birthday yesterday, although I spent most hours up here in my bedroom. This year he got 39 presents, and that's not even including the smaller ones. Well, better go. Say hi to Tonks and Mad-Eye for me, and Mr and Mrs Weasley if you see them. Hopefully I will see Ron and Hermione soon, although the weeks have been passing slowly. Hope everything is going well. – Harry

He read it through once more and folded it up. Yes, that would do, it showed that he was all right and that everything was OK– didn't give anyone any reason to worry. Harry got up and made his way to the window where the daytime sky was just starting to turn a darker blue, stringed with the thin wisps of floaty white cloud. Of all the hours he spent here, he liked the evenings the best… nobody disturbed him, as they were all too busy with their eyes glued to the TV screen.

Hedwig had returned the day before, only four hours after Harry had sent her off to deliver that letter to Sirius, and to Harry's surprise, the letter had been removed from her foot, which meant somebody must have read it. He groaned when he suddenly thought of this…what had he done? People were going to think him a crazy lunatic! Maybe they would even try to hospitalise him in St. Mungo's, but no, that was just being stupid again.

Even so, he wondered who it was that Hedwig had taken the letter to. Whoever it was was quite near to 4 Privet Drive, as it usually took much longer than four hours for his snowy owl to make the journey to her destination and back again. She was now out hunting again, even though it was still evening time. Harry had a slight pang of guilt at this, for he had snapped harshly at her when she had been prancing around in her cage out of boredom; she had caused quite a few owl droppings and a bit of dirty straw to land on his floor, which had annoyed him immensely.

He lay on his bed, waiting for Hedwig to return, and trying in vain to force his mind to remain blank and empty. It was a while before she finally did soar back through the window, in a blur of white movement, and glide onto Harry's bed beside him, staring up at him unblinkingly with her sharp stare.

"Hullo Hedwig," Harry murmured, stroking her gently below her wing. He heaved himself off the bed, opened his drawer and retrieved a few owl treats from the packet that Ron had given him. Apparently they had made Pigwidgeon giddier than normal – which Harry found hard to believe – so in effort to prevent Pig from zooming around the room at a hundred miles per hour, he had offered them for Hedwig, who seemed to find them extremely tasty.

Hedwig accepted the treats gratefully, also, it seemed, seeing it as Harry's apology. She hopped up onto his knee.

"Can you deliver another letter for me?" asked Harry, folding up the already crumpled note to Lupin which he had clasped in his hand for the last half an hour or so. "Can you take this to Lupin? I know you've had quite a few jobs in the past couple of weeks, but they want to be reminded that I'm all right here."

Hedwig hooted softly in the way she usually did, and as she did so, Harry realised that she did look tired. Lupin, Ron, Hermione and Hagrid had insisted that letters from him were to be received frequently until he was taken to The Burrow. Unfortunately for his owl, she was the only means of communication Harry had; Uncle Vernon would not let him use the telephone.

"Thanks," he called as she swooped out through the window yet again. He was sorry to see her go. At the moment she made extremely nice company.

All of a sudden, the door burst open and Uncle Vernon strode in, his face twisted in a disgusted way, which of course, was not uncharacteristic.

"What do you want?" asked Harry, surprised. He couldn't have possibly done anything wrong up here, he hadn't left his room for two days. He glanced at the old tray that his Uncle was holding, puzzled. Was he accusing him of sneaking food out of the fridge or something?

"Food," said Uncle Vernon shortly. His neat moustache twitched slightly – so unlike the way that Professor Dumbledore's did when his headmaster found something slightly humorous – and Harry knew that behind it, his face was working terribly to boom an accusation at him instead of doing something for Harry's own good. Well, he was definitely doing this against his true will, that was certain.

Harry had reverted to throwing bits of tissue at the mirror (trying to hit his nose) for the past few days for entertainment. His boredom was mounting due to the imprisonment in this room – as hungry as he was, he didn't want to miss a chance to wind Uncle Vernon completely up the wall. But his Uncle spoke before he did.

"Who were you talking to?" he snarled, thrusting the tray into Harry's arms which knocked him onto his bed, and towering over him… which was probably to try and gain some authority over him, Harry thought with a slight grin.

"Me?" Harry questioned, trying to sound puzzled. He looked from left to right in exaggerated movements.

"Yes, you! Don't play thick with me!" spat Uncle Vernon.

"I don't know what you're talking about," said Harry mildly, as innocently as he could make his voice sound.

"You were just talking to somebody inside this room! I could here you from half way down the blasted hall!"

"Ohhh, you mean that I was talking to someone. I was talking to my friend Ron through a special way of Wizard communication. His dad – Arthur Weasley – just wondered why I hadn't phoned Ron or Hermione up yet, that's all," said Harry with a swift smile.

Uncle Vernon paused, opening and shutting his mouth like a scarlet, blubbering goldfish. Harry could have sworn that his eyes were bulging out a little more than usual.

"You shouldn't push your luck," snarled his Uncle. He had obviously found nothing to say to his nephew's last remark, and he turned on his heel and walked stiffly out of Harry's room. The possibility of Arthur Weasley turning up – as he had threatened at the train station – was too much for Vernon Dursley to bear. He had already been through that escapade in the holidays before Harry's fourth year, when Mr Weasley and his sons had arrived by Floo Network to take Harry away ready to go to the Quidditch World Cup. Harry felt a small surge of triumph as he watched him leave. 

"I thought you said that I wouldn't be getting any food from you?" Harry called loudly as his Uncle slammed the door. He heard Uncle Vernon stop dead in his tracks, but after a moment of two of silence, he carried on walking down the hall at a quicker pace.

Harry scrambled back to sit on his bed properly and looked down at the grey tray of food he was holding. You could hardly call it a very nutritious meal: Aunt Petunia had placed a small pile of plain over-cooked cabbage in the middle of his plate, with a big scoop of sloppy, watery mashed potato on top. Still, Harry wasn't complaining; the last time the Dursleys had given him any trace of food whatsoever had been yesterday morning at breakfast time, so that was two days he had gone without any food (besides his small stack of sweets left over from last year of course, which he hadn't really been in the mood to touch) and his stomach was growling hungrily.

He dived in to his uninteresting meal and gobbled it up enthusiastically, taking small sips from the cup of fresh orange, which strangely enough tasted like it was a good couple of days off. After he had finished and there was not the tiniest lump of potato left, he put down his tray with a clatter, pulled himself into his pyjamas and got into bed. It was only five o'clock at night, but there was nothing else to do, and Hedwig wasn't likely to return for a few hours at the least. It was still light; Harry pulled the covers over his head and shut his eyes, doubting very much that he was going to sleep.

For the first time since the third term at Hogwarts had ended, Harry found his thoughts drifting to Voldemort. He had thought about him before of course, after all that Dumbledore had told him – but that had been the last few days of school. All his thoughts lately had been based around Sirius, and nobody else – nothing else mattered.

But, he realised, it was important to think things through, because in the end, whether it was soon or far off into the future, Harry and Lord Voldemort would have to confront each other in some way, and that would either change – or end – Harry's life forever. But it couldn't end Harry's life, for then Voldemort would win, and then there would be no stopping him either. He hadn't actually realised at the time when Dumbledore had told him all this, that he would most likely be handling the lives of all the people in this world in this, and that meant wizards, witches and muggles alike. He would have to win, otherwise . . . well who knows what would happen.

And he needed to win for himself too, to make Voldemort pay for what he had done, and of course his followers – his Death Eaters: Bellatrix Lestrange and Wormtail in particular. If it wasn't for all three of those people he hated most – James Potter, Lily Potter, and Sirius Black would still be present right now, and what a happier life he would have led if they were. His Father, Mother, and his godfather would be here, and he would have actually had the chance to know them all so much better than he did. That, of course, would mean that he would have to kill; he didn't want to kill, but was there any other way?

Something small in all of this was bothering him immensely, and it triggered off in his mind. He would have to tell Ron and Hermione about the prophecy and everything else that he had shockingly discovered, that he wasn't here to lead a normal life, not even to be an Auror, his only purpose here was to destroy something evil. That was all that life was to claim of him.

He wondered if anybody else knew what the full prophecy had contained, besides Dumbledore – if his headmaster had told anybody else. He doubted it somehow, but everyone had certainly known that there was a prophecy, some kind of prophecy. They had called it a weapon, a weapon that Voldemort had needed to claim. Harry had been so curious back then - when Lupin and Sirius had let him know some of the finer points about the Order – curious to know what the weapon was, but now he wished that Dumbledore had never let him know, his life had hardly been filled with happiness before that, but now he felt it was going to be disastrous. Ron and Hermione needed to know… but how was he to tell them? He was to be a victim, or a murderer. To them, his two best friends, this would be extremely disturbing news.

Harry bit his lip worryingly; it was possible that soon he would not exist, but at the moment, he did exist, so perhaps he just had to concentrate on now. He rolled over onto his front and buried his face in the pillow, pulling the covers more tightly over his head. He had very confused and concerned thoughts: Voldemort… the current evil that was present… his close encounters with him already had been hard enough… and Wormtail… was he only loyal to Voldemort through fear? … Or perhaps just with him now as a last resort to carrying on his life? … Bellatrix … she was as evil as Voldemort … he had no reason to be scared of her though… but she killed Sirius… she killed Sirius… for that, Harry thought, she would pay…

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