Missing a Pain in the Forehead

Harry Potter returned to Godric's Hollow to collect his belongings before apparating to Hogsmeade a week before the start of term. He didn't have to be back at Hogwarts officially until the Welcoming Feast, but living alone no longer sat well with him. The defense professor awkwardly carried two trunks as he made his way through the village back towards the castle. After almost dropping the heavier of the two, he thought to cast a levitation charm but quickly dismissed the idea as frivolous. After the final dual such everyday uses of magic seemed irreverent and thoughtless and reminded him too much of Lockhart, Malfoy and Skeeter.

A round, grandfatherly man half waddled, half jogged out of his shop toward a now clearly struggling Harry. Without so much as a "here, let me help you," the small man cast a feather-light charm on the trunks, and ruffled the young professor's hair before returning to the dingy bookstore from which he had emerged.

Long after Harry had grown too old for it to be appropriate, complete strangers continued to ruffle his hair. He was short and boyish well into adulthood, but no one in the wizarding world ever mistook him for younger than he was. How could they, when the ends of the last two international wars were dated with references to his age? "Nineteen years ago, when Harry Potter was only one year old, he defeated the most powerful Dark Lord that ever was in all the history of wizardry," bearded wizards would half whisper to little children with the same animated tone and wild facial expressions they used to explain Santa at Christmas time. Mothers who could no longer tolerate their grown sons loitering about the house would bemoan their lot and wonder aloud why their twenty year old children can't so much as find a job when Harry Potter had not two years ago rid the world of the threat of Voldemort, the Death Eaters and a corrupt minister all at the tender age of eighteen. He may have looked not quite sixteen, but the hair rufflers had to have known that the Savior was no longer a teenager. Harry couldn't understand the phenomenon and did his best to ignore it just like he had learned to ignore the entire wizarding world outside of the walls of Hogwarts.

By the time he reached his quarters, the defense professor's mind was drifting in unpleasant directions. He had come to the realization that it didn't bode well for people with pasts to be alone with their thoughts for any substantial length of time. Acting upon this theory and terrified of where his memories might take him, Harry sought out the staff common room.

Minerva and Flitwick were seated side by side in oversized armchairs positioned near a work table. They seemed to be discussing some element of magical theory and didn't even look up from the many open books laid out in front of them when the defense professor threw himself onto the worn couch at the other end of the room. His colleagues' voices were reassuring, but Harry couldn't help but feel the painful reality of a solitude he had only known since after the final battle. There was something red and dangerous missing from the back of his mind. Except for the occasional moments when it would thrust itself painfully to the forefront of his consciousness, Harry had barely noticed the presence until it was gone. There was no longer any trace of the thing that had shared a dwelling with his soul, and the young man's thoughts echoed in the emptiness of the vacated space, a constant reminder that his world had changed.

Left to his own thoughts, Harry was quickly lulled into a calm trance by his former professors' quiet chatter. He had been staring mindlessly at a portrait of a purple robed figure for nearly half an hour when Snape walked in. "Potter," the potions master said in his typical, uniquely distant form of greeting.

"Severus," Harry murmured still lost in thought, his eyes never moving from the portrait. Unsettled, Snape looked questioningly at an unresponsive Harry. With a curt nod he dismissed the boy's strange behavior and sat in a chair a few feet to the side, far enough from the transfiguration and charms professors to avoid being drawn into their lively conversation.

Snape was in no mood for Minerva's too cheerful banter and overly helpful suggestions or for Filius's tendency to discuss the most petty and mundane charms with a bouncy, intellectual exuberance that was almost frightening. He left the two to their examination of the difficulties associated with enchanting magically animated objects and allowed his mind to drift. The former death eater's eyes focused on a crease in his woolen robes, two inches down from his left elbow.

After some time, Snape turned to look at the Potter boy and followed the young professor's gaze to the portrait on the wall. A familiar, bearded man smiled benevolently at him from the ornate frame before choosing a particularly round lemon drop and depositing it in his mouth. Potter watched as Snape withdrew his attention from the former headmaster and again focused on his left sleeve.

"I miss him too."

"Which one?" Snape quipped sarcastically.

"Both of them," Harry said with more gravity than Snape had expected. The potions master's eyes darted up to a spot just above the boy's glasses before quickly looking away.

Harry rose to leave, suddenly feeling guilty and tainted. On the way back to his rooms he ran into the gaggle of war orphans Minerva had allowed to stay during the summer months. "At least the wizarding world has managed to learn something from Voldemort," Harry silently mused; he was in a particularly ungenerous mood. As usual, the group was clamoring with excited discussions about one of Hagrid's many "pets." The half-giant had let the children into his heart as he was wont to do with any friendless creature or lonely soul that crossed his path.

Acutely aware of the invisible barrier that kept him from sharing in these children's innocence, Harry unconsciously reached a longing hand out towards two students lagging behind their friends. He caught himself and quickly stopped his hand which was now only inches away from a first year who had been slowed down by the burden of supporting her crippled older brother. The girl looked up at her professor questioningly. Harry shook his head, smiled and ruffled her hair before sending the siblings on their way.