Disclaimer: I'm not JK, so I can only stake my claim on the characters that escape into this from my (warped) imagination. The plot is mine too, however, if reviewers ( Hint, Hint!!!) suggest things and they get included, they will be properly acknowledged.
-A/N and replies to reviews at the end- Please Review!!!!
Behind the Façade
By Ammarine
Chapter 3 – End of Term
Harry lay awake late into the night, unable to sleep while his brain was working 100 miles a minute. When he eventually succumbed to exhaustion in the early hours of the morning, it felt to Harry like only minutes had passed before Ron was stripping Harry's sheets down to his waist, something, Ron had learned, that never failed to wake the dark-haired boy, but Ron could never figure out why.
"Harry, get up mate. You need to wake up. You know you can't sleep in today. It's breakfast in 10 minutes, and if you're not ready in five, I'm going to get Hermione up here. She's in the Great Hall already, either that or in the library," Ron added jokingly. "And I don't think that she'd be too impressed with having to haul your sorry ass out of bed. C'mon! I know you can hear me, you prat!"
At the mental image of Hermione pulling him out of bed by his ankles, Harry; who was lying face down on the bed; tried and failed to suppress a snort. Hearing Harry's reaction, Ron grabbed the sheets pooled at Harry's waist and yanked them down to the end of Harry's bed.
"Hm-Hmph (Alright)," Harry spoke into his pillow, before rolling over onto his back and looking blearily up at his red-haired friend. "I'm getting up, there's no need to fret, Mum," Harry chastised when he saw Ron shaking his head and trying not to laugh. "But you know full well that Hermione wouldn't be able to pull me out of bed. She'd just sit on me until I tried to get up..."
Harry showered and changed quickly, and in just under 10 minutes, the two boys were leaving the Gryffindor Common Room to head down to breakfast. As they made their way down to the Great Hall, the two boys were in good spirits, both determined to enjoy their time together at Hogwarts before leaving for the summer the next day. Unfortunately for both of them, their moods were not going to last much longer.
Whilst crossing the Entrance Hall, they heard and arrogant drawl emanating from their right.
"Well, look who we have here, boys? Ready to go back to the muggles, Potter? Of course, there's always room for another mongrel in the dog kennel, isn't that right?"
Beside him, Harry heard Ron growl at the back of his throat, not bothering to restrain his friend. Himself fuming, Harry drew his wand and whipped around to face to white blonde-haired boy, more fondly known as Draco Malfoy to his parents and Ferret-Face to his 'friends'. A flicker of surprise shadowed the boy's face, before being replaced with a smirk.
"If you dare to say, no make that even breathe another word, I'll hex you into oblivion. Don't tempt me into letting me prove I'm not bluffing," Harry hissed to Malfoy, before turning and dragging Ron into the Great Hall behind him. Surprisingly to Harry, him and Ron weren't struck by any hexes after turning their backs on Malfoy, though he would have loved to go all out against the pompous, arrogant git.
Glowering, Harry and Ron stalked into the Great Hall and dropped into their usual seats, either side of their other best friend, Hermione, with Neville and Ginny Weasley, Ron's little sister, sitting across the table from them. Since the Ministry incident, Neville, Ginny and Luna Lovegood had somehow become a lot closer to the Golden Trio, so Harry's little group had almost doubled. Luna, being in a different house to the others, wasn't as close as the rest were, but she was still included in the vast majority of their conversations. The most startling consequence was that that Harry, Ron and Hermione now had to re-evaluate their friends and in their own ways, too. Ginny was far from being Ron's innocent little sister. No, she had lost that innocence to that diary during her 1st year at Hogwarts, Harry had come to realise. Neville, despite being abysmal at Potions and absolutely scared stiff of the Potions Master, was much more than what most people saw at the surface, Hermione mused. And Luna, once she believed in something, whether it was Harry or the existence of the Blithering Humdinger or the Crumple-Horned Snorkack, her faith never wavered, even if people thought she was, well, loony, Ron thought.
"Well, what's gotten into you two this morning?" Hermione asked, glancing up from her newly renewed subscription to the Daily Prophet to look at each of the boys. Across the table, Ginny and Neville's quiet conversation halted as they waited for an answer.
"Malfoy," Ron spat, his anger evident.
"Oh, I still don't understand why you two allow that smarmy prick to provoke you like this. Just ignore him; he's not worth bothering with." Hermione lectured to the two boys; despite the fact she knew they would never heed her advice. When had they done so in the past?
There was a moment of awkward silence surrounding the group. Harry glanced over at Ron, before muttering into his porridge, "He insulted Snuffles."
This comment, though paid no heed by the other Gryffindors at the table, caused reactions that attracted the attentions of most of the students in the Hall. Neville gasped and almost fell out of his seat, Ginny stood up, slamming her hands on the table and shrieked "No!" Hermione, with a loud thud, dropped her book on the table, which knocked her fork to the floor with a loud clatter. Cheeks flushing and her eyes blazing, the brown-haired girl's head disappeared under the table momentarily to retrieve her fork. Once she was settled once again, Hermione leaned forward and asked in a low emotion-laden voice, "He wouldn't?"
Harry nodded glumly, "He did."
"Oh, that's low, even for Malfoy. Harry, you realise that this is even more reason not to pay attention to whatever he says." When the only response from the raven-haired boy was a noncommittal shrug, a slightly disheartened Hermione gave up and returned to her book.
The five students sat silently for the next few minutes before the post owls arrived, mostly playing with their food instead of eating it. When the owls did arrive, all five of the students received a note, identical in appearance and content, except for one, Harry's. The four identical notes were small folded notes, with the student's name printed on the front, all requesting their presence with the Headmaster after breakfast. Harry's letter was a small rolled parchment addressed to Mr H. Potter, Gryffindor Table, bound by a thin black ribbon. Despite not noticing the others' worried looks, Harry said more confidently than he felt, "It's about my meeting last night with Dumbledore. Yours will be about it too, I presume." Before any of his friends could ask, Harry answered curtly, Dumbledore'll explain." Ignoring the worried looks that remained, Harry unrolled the parchment.
Mr Potter, it read,
After breakfast, I am obliged to inform you of the details pertaining to the current arrangement. I will be in my office in the door to the right of the Potions room at precisely 9am, I expect you to be in attendance also.
Professor S. Snape.
Once Harry had finished reading, his slight relief in not having received a hex from the note had been replaced with a simmering anger. For the love of Circe, Harry thought, if Voldemort doesn't kill the snarky bastard over the summer, then I won't hesitate! How am I going to cope? Then under his breath he muttered, "Moronic git" Hermione, having heard Harry's muttered comment gave him a curious look, the confusion on her face clearly evident on her face if he was looking, which wasn't the case. With an odd awkwardness settling over the group, Harry opted to play with his now-cold breakfast for the remaining time before his summons to Snape's office.
At about 10 to 9, Harry, deciding that he couldn't procrastinate any longer, begrudgingly pushed himself up from the table. He had seen Snape leave the Hall through one of the staff entry doors about 5 minutes prior and thought it best not to push his luck before the holidays had even started. Unsurprisingly, his four friends all left the table and the Great Hall with him and stopped in the middle of the Entrance Hall shortly after he did, where Harry finally spoke to them again. "I've got another meeting while you guys are with Dumbledore. I'll meet you lot in the Common Room after, ok? Please don't come looking for me, I'll be fine." His four friends nodded. "Right then, see you soon." Harry said and stood watching as his friends all climbed the staircase, looking over their shoulders at him, while he waved them onwards. Once they were out of sight, Harry turned and headed down the corridor leading him to the dungeons. Careful to remain out of sight of the Slytherins, Malfoy, in particular, Harry arrived at the door to the right of his Potions classroom with about half a minute to spare. Taking a deep calming breath, that didn't calm him in the slightest, Harry raised a fist and knocked hesitantly on the door.
Neville, Hermione, Ron and Ginny sat in shock facing the Headmaster. In the only way that the Headmaster knew how, he had straight-forwardly told Harry's closest friends of what was going to happen to Harry over the summer break.
Ginny was the first one of the four to break out of the shock that felt like hours, but was only, in reality, about a minute. "Have you gone insane? Harry's had a bad enough time at the Dursley's, but that's not enough, now you've got Snape harassing Harry over the summer too? For the love of Merlin, I thought we were meant to help Harry win this god-awful war, not hinder him!"
"It's Professor Snape, Miss Weasley, now please do sit down and drink your tea. As I mentioned before and will now mention again, placing Harry in the care of Professor Snape over the summer break was the only feasible option available to us." Dumbledore paused to look at Ron, while Hermione twisted around in her seat to glare at the red-headed boy. Ron, despite being unbelievably angry on behalf of his friend, could not stop a snort from escaping when the Headmaster mentioned both "Snape" and "care" in the one sentence. "Apart from the interruption," Dumbledore's twinkling gaze landed on Ron for a moment before continuing. "Sending Harry to stay at either with any of your families would have just been like inviting Voldemort's followers into your home as well. He would not be able to stay at Hogwarts either, as the school is only open to students in need, like Harry, but only when we are in times of peace. In addition, of all the Order members, Professor Snape was not the only one who is away on some assignment nor has a family to take care of.
"Professor," Neville said softly, "I know that at the moment you said he could stay with us or at Hogwarts, but what about staying with the Order? I mean, he stayed there at the start of this year and at Christmas, didn't he?" With this, Hermione, who had been slouching in her chair, and straightened up immediately and stared at the Headmaster.
Professor Dumbledore regarded Neville closely over his half moon glasses. "It is true, Harry could have stayed at Headquarters if he so desired, however, Sirius' death was a heavy blow to him, and both he and I know that he is not ready emotionally to do such a thing. There is nothing to stop him from visiting when Severus comes for meetings, but I know he would rather not stay there if at all possible. Miss Granger, you have been rather quiet during the meeting thus far, do have any questions at all"
"Yes, Professor, I do. Just the one. You said that Harry will be staying with Professor Snape. I was just wondering, sir, is Professor Snape, um, does he- oh, bugger it! Ooh, sorry sir. I mean is he always so harsh, or is just a prat at school?" By the time Hermone had finished her question, her cheeks were flushed for the second time that morning and Dumbledore was trying not to smile at the prefect's question.
"I do believe, that he is like that mainly just at school. However, I would not be the least bit surprised if he acts like that just to annoy us and scare the first years." Dumbledore replied with a grin at the bushy-haired girl. "Please, do not stop me from keeping you all in this little room on your last day of term. There are plenty of things you'd much rather do, I'm sure. But do remember, this can only be spoken about between you. Not even half of the Order knows of this plan. Good afternoon, then."
Several floors below the Headmaster's office was Professor Snape's office, where Harry was struggling to contain his temper.
"I do not understand why the Headmaster did not do this himself, it would have allowed me to spend my morning in a much more pleasurable way, however, I must fulfill this obligation," the Professor's voice sneered. "Now, Potter, you will be a guest during the break, but be advised, I do not get a break, so stay out of my way unless instructed otherwise, understood?" Harry glared at the greasy-haired man named Snape. "Now, regarding tomorrow, I have been instructed into inform you that you will catch the school train with the rest of the students, whereupon at King's Cross Station you will be met by three 'members' disguised as your relatives. You will leave the station altogether and will apparate to the meeting place. I'm aware that you are unable to apparate as of yet, Potter," Snape said rather viciously. Harry, his mouth still partly open from what he was going to say, closed it quickly and gave Snape a look, as though Snape was something nasty on the bottom of Harry's shoe.
"However," Snape continued not missing a beat, "plans have been made to incorporate that fact into account. I'm sure the Wizarding world would be lost if we didn't have our hero." The tone Snape used with that last comment clearly indicated that he did not include himself as part of the 'the Wizarding world'.
Harry could feel his self-control sliding inescapably away from him with all Snape's taunting. Not wanting to be anywhere near Snape when his fuse completely burnt out, Harry angrily pushed himself up from the wooden stool he was sitting on and asked, his voice shaking with anger, "If that is all, sir, I'll leave you to your work. I'm sure you don't have the time to sit around talking to students." Without waiting for a response, Harry turned and stormed out of the Potions master's office, in a rather Snape-like manner.
Snape sat at his desk, more intrigued now about the boy than he would ever admit to actually being.
The last day of the school year went too quickly for Harry's liking. It seemed that in no time at all that Harry was in his dormitory, packing his trunk. He didn't particularly feel like heading down to the Leaving Feast. He had a nasty feeling that Dumbledore's traditional end-of-year speech would centre mainly about the return of Voldemort, like last year's, and it was something he decided he could live without experiencing again.
Whilst half-heartedly throwing his belongings into his trunk, an idea flashed into Harry's mind. What if Sirius came back as a ghost? If the fact that he was dead was true, then it would make sense that Sirius would be able to come back as a ghost, then Harry could talk to him one more time and he wouldn't feel so alone. Nearly Headless Nick did, so why couldn't Sirius? Sprinting out of the dormitory, down the spiral staircase and through the Common Room, Harry searched frantically for one of the castle's resident ghosts. They'd tell him Sirius was going to come back.
After 5 minutes or so of running through the castle corridors, Harry was ready to give up when he saw Nick's ghostly figure drifting at the end of the corridor. "Hey – hey, Nick! NICK!" Harry called out. The conversation started so well, Harry thought, but Nick knew what Harry was going to ask, and the answer wasn't one that Harry liked at all. After that conversation, the pain and guilt over Sirius' death was re-ignited so fiercely that Harry felt like he had just lost his godfather all over again. Traipsing his way back up to the Gryffindor Tower, he looked up to see someone standing near the entrance to their Common Room. Before he could turn around and leave again, Harry's footsteps had been heard, and the person had spotted Harry. It was Luna.
"Hello," she said vaguely, glancing around at him as she stepped back from the notice.
"How come you're not at the feast?" Harry asked the girl.
"Well, I've lost most of my possessions," Luna said serenely. "People take them and hide them, you know. But as it's the last night, I really do need them back, so I've been putting up signs" Harry looked at the sign she had tacked up on the wall, and suddenly felt a strange pang in his chest. It was pity. Since Sirius' death, the only emotions Harry had let himself feel were anger, self-loathing and an indescribable grief. Now that he was feeling for someone other than himself, the boy actually felt a bit better for it. It reminded him that he was not the only person suffering. He finished his conversation with Luna. Despite the fact they talked about Sirius, Harry felt some of the wall that been built around him since the chat with Dumbledore start to crumble ever so slightly.
A/N: Well, the was a pretty uneventful chapter wasn't it?! ;-) Don't worry, Chapter 4 is going to be a fair bit more interesting!! I might be a tad slow with updates over the next little while, I have 5 uni reports due within 3 days, and I have field assessments coming up. So bear with me, I'm writing whenever I have to chance and I'll update as soon as possible!
There were a fair few bits used from OotP, but I don't feel like referencing, I'm all referenced out with uni reports. But I coined the snarky bastard from one of the many fics I've read recently. I thought it was a perfect fit for Snape!
I took portions of the books, like Harry talking to Nick before the Leaving Feast and chatting with Luna, and summarised them to let the story flow better. I just had to include Ron's snort into their meeting with Dumbledore. Originally when I wrote Dumbledore's bit, I didn't have many reactions, but when I proofed it, I found it hard not to laugh myself!! Same goes with Harry's mental image of Hermione pulling him out of bed.
Ophelia: Well, my impression of Dumbledore when he had the 'chat' with Harry after the MoM was that he had made mistakes, and pretty big ones at that, so I decided to use them to my advantage. Never fear, he'll be more himself in future chapters. Ithink it's more of a temporary setback for him. I have plans for this fic, and it doesn't include slash, so don't worry. I'm not a slash writer, though I do have some shippers in progress, but you're safe with this fic!
Lady L: I know, I made it fairly easy to guess who was hosting Harry, but if I didn't, it would have made the fic really confusing, that and I was feeling sorta lazy... Yeah, the past two chapters haven't had much action, they've more been to set up the plot further along the story. Glad you like!! Please update BTD soon!
DraginLover: Yay!! Someone who likes my Neville as much as I do. I've written him as a stronger character than I think JK has done, but I have big plans for this boy!! Keep an eye out! Snape and Harry is going to be fun to write, I can't wait!!
Dragonheart2: To be honest, I actually hadn't thought of Binns... [mutters] could be interesting... ;-) Glad you like the fic, hope you stay with me. Out of curiosity, how did you get the details of this fic? I sent out a couple of emails/messages about this chapter, so I'm not sure which message you received.