Warning: Spoilers for the 5th book, and it's a tad confusing.
Author's notes: This is set during their sixth year and Harry is in Slytherin.
Boys don't cry
April 2, 1997
There are nights when you wonder what would have been in your life if you had been sorted into Gryffindor. Maybe you wouldn't have had to face Voldemort in first year, there would have been a reason for you to battle Tom Riddle in the Chamber of Secrets, Peter Pettigrew might not have escaped and you would have been living with Sirius, you would have been saved the embarrassment when Hogwarts found out that Ron was the one you missed most, and maybe, just maybe, you wouldn't be crying in Hagrid's Hut during your 6th year because Sirius would be alive and sulking in Gimmauld Place.
But right now, you find solace in the small but comforting home of your first friend, the only friend before and after Ron.
Hagrid's Hut.
You sit on his large chair and whisper nonsensical words to no one as the large man boils water for the tea you so badly need. It is strange because you never cry in front of people. Never ever. Not when the Dursleys beat you, or starve you, not when you lost Ron's friendship for what appeared to be a life time and most certainly not when Cedric died, when you curled up into a small ball like an unborn baby and tears streamed down your face like rivers that just went on and on and on. So you ruefully wonder why it's different when you are 16 and parentless and unloved.
Suddenly the door swings open and a tall and gangly redhead with too long limbs that beautifully make his slender frame perfectly flawed, enters the small cottage.
"Hagrid, have you..." and before he finishes he sees the you, the young man he remembers as the eleven year old boy who shook hands with that pale faced boy after he had just been called the "wrong sort of family for someone like Harry Potter." You look up at him with claret red eyes which are circled by bright pink like the flesh you scratch until it bleeds only now there are perfect spheres of emerald rocks in the middle. He turns to leave, his ears pink matching your own pink puffed eyes, but a look you don't see in Hagrid's eyes makes him stay.
"Harry..." His voice seems small now, awkward and uncertain. He takes a step toward you and you notice it is as undecided as his previous statement. What you don't notice as you stare blankly at his feet is his hand reaching out to you, but as it comes in contact with your forearm, you come undone. He flinches away when you collapse against the chair, tears falling again, however instead of running through the river as it had once been, the tears drop on your hands, now saline rain on already salty skin.
The tea has been forgotten.
"Don't cry anymore." Ron says, now standing facing you, so tall and at this moment so much taller than you in the huge chair. You freeze and find yourself rigidly snapping your head to look at him properly.
"Why not?"