When morning came the next day, Harry was the first to wake. Long before the sun rose, he lay staring with sightless eyes up toward the ceiling of Ron's room. There had been no real purpose to that dream. A strange ending to a strange day, Harry thought with a fearful glance at Ron. No. The redhead was still quite asleep. Asleep, like Harry should be. It was five forty five and Harry was not growing any less tired then when he had first opened his eyes after a two hour period of drifting in mental darkness. There was no Death Chamber dream after the encounter with the phantom Sirius, and there was no extension of the previous dream before. Just darkness. And silence.
Silence.
That was something Harry had not grown accustomed to. Silence, here at the Burrow. It seemed that all the world was asleep now, the uncharacteristic silence ringing in Harry's ears like a finely tuned bell.
It was annoying.
Harry frowned. He had the sudden urge to cry out and disrupt this strange atmosphere he now found himself smothered in. A grin came to his face as he rolled over on his side; an idea was forming in his head. He could see Ron drooling on his pillow, mouth wide open and a face like an angel.
Snorting at the odd comparison, Harry carelessly tossed his pillow at Ron in an attempt to wake him up. Unfortunately, the action did not quite have the effect he had hoped. Instead of waking up, Ron merely rolled over; Harry's pillow stuck underneath his left elbow.
"Well, bloody freaking hell," Harry sighed angrily. He fell back down onto his now pillowless cot and resumed the new hobby he had mentally dubbed 'ceiling-gazing.'. The sunlight had begun to pour in now by the bucketful, instead of the tiny little trickling it had been doing only a few minutes ago. Harry watched the floating dust particles dance idly in the beams of light with a sort of mesmerized longing. There was something strange about their dance, that rhythmic pattern of motion that they followed...or was it something to do with the light?
Harry frowned and lifted himself quickly from his cot. It was the light. Why was everything tinted red? He removed his glasses and looked at them. Perhaps Fred and George had snuck in late at night and put a color charm on them? No, that wasn't it. He checked with his own wand to find nothing wrong with his glasses. It couldn't have been them anyway, because he realized after putting them back on his head that the world was still an eerie shade of pale crimson without them.
Perhaps it was the window?
Quietly, Harry slipped across the floor and peered outside. That didn't help. Everything out there was tinted red as well. He opened the window and peered through the small opening he had left himself. That hadn't helped either. It had to be his eyes. Harry closed the window and snuck into the hall outside Ron's room. Stepping into the bathroom, Harry noted that everything was still red.
What the hell is going on? He asked, peering at his eyes in the mirror. They were still green (he guessed) and they certainly weren't bloodshot. Frowning, Harry went back to Ron's room. He still had some time, perhaps some extra sleep would help?
After a forty five minute nap, Harry was quite happy to find that the world had come back to it's original shade of mixed colors. Ron was yawning as Harry sat up.
"Morning," the red head grumbled groggily.
"Good morning," Harry answered, sliding off his cot once more to face the day. His socks already on, Harry flew down the stairs toward the sound of a freshly cooked breakfast. "Good morning," he greeted cheerily, and found to his surprise that Remus Lupin had joined them for breakfast.
"Hello, Harry," he smiled warmly. Harry returned the expression and shared a one armed embrace with his only remaining link to a past they had both lost. "How are you this fine day?"
"Good," Harry grinned knowingly. "And yourself?"
"Not bad. Wonderful morning, isn't it?"
Mrs. Weasley nodded in agreement, then turned her glimmering hazel eyes upon Harry. "Remus just walked in not a few minutes ago, Harry," she informed him. "He'll be spending the afternoon here. Things were not taking proper care of you, though he won't admit it." She added this last part with a sly wink at Remus, who hadn't quite caught it.
"I-I am not!" he stuttered immediately, frowning at the accusation.
"I think she's joking," Harry chuckled. He moved for Fred to sidle in to the kitchen, having not yet seated himself at the table yet.
" 'Lo Mr. Lupin," Fred yawned. Remus laughed.
"Good morning Fred, or is it George?"
Fred shrugged. "I'm whoever you want me to be right now. Too tired to care."
The day went on without a hitch. Lupin bid them goodbye at nine thirty and left them to return to his flat. Harry wondered as he left if Lupin had had any luck finding work, but never bothered to ask. He didn't feel like getting the 'Don't worry about me,' lecture. Not that Lupin lectured...but that wasn't the point.
With a timid smile as he sat alone on the couch, Harry remembered the first and only time Lupin had lectured him. On his own safety, of course (because so many people felt they needed to remind Harry that he was important). It had been a rather unnerving moment, and it was the first time Harry could truly remember feeling awful for something he'd done. He supposed it was because of the immense respect he held for his professor that had caused him to feel such guilt. Of course, Harry respected Lupin now, but he didn't have the authority to parade around Harry's life and tell him what he should and shouldn't be doing.
Or did he?
With Sirius gone, would that make him my care taker? Harry shook his head to the mental question. No, he wasn't Remus' responsibility, and he didn't want to place that weight on the man. Remus had enough trouble supporting himself. A teenage boy like Harry would only add to that stress, and the fact that Lupin couldn't keep a job due to , would have made life hard on both of them.
With a sigh, Harry let his head rest on the back of the couch. He closed his eyes to kill the throbbing between his temples. The day had been long and slightly eventful what with the Order paying numerous visits during the day. All of the Weasley clan, along with Harry, were now enjoying the quiet of an empty house. At least, empty by Weasley standards.
Ron was asleep in the over stuffed chair near the fire. Harry, removing his glasses, decided to emulate this. He was snoring away in minutes; the perfect picture of innocence wrapped up on a pale, torn couch near the fire.
The first thing Harry was aware of was voices. Not the voices of anyone he was familiar with. It wasn't a repressed memory, Harry knew, as he drifted through the bodiless words. The voices sounded too official, and they were talking about things Harry didn't quite understand.
"The shock should have worn away by now..." came a female voice, stern but kindly all at once. And young. Very young.
But she wasn't alone. Another voice answered hers. "Of course, this is common place..."
"There is certainly no lasting physical damage." This was the same voice Harry had heard before.
"Mentally, however..." The second voice trailed off.
There was a hushed silence. Then; "I wouldn't worry. There's nothing you can do. The best thing for you now is to go home and get your mind off of it."
A third voice, unrecognizable, sounded very nearby. It was dry and cracked, as though it were coming through a throat that had been screaming for hours on end.
"I'll stay."
A sigh. "Very well."
There was a clicking sound, like a door closing, and then that was it. Everything went silent.
Harry's eyes shot open. He was still on the couch at the Burrow. Ron had gone now. Probably to bed. Harry ran a hand through his hair and looked up at the clock. It was midnight. With a sigh he started off for bed, pondering the strange echoes that had made their way through his head.
