A/N: Sorry I wasn't able to upload last night, but my internet
has been acting up a lot recently, and it kicked me off before I could
upload. So, because of that, I'm going to upload two chapters today
instead of one. Enjoy! Oh, and by the way - this chapter gets quite a
bit more graphic, so if you aren't in to this stuff, I advise you to
watch out...
Disclaimer: I have a sucky internet service, but no rights to the Harry Potter books. (Psst! That means I don't own them, which in turn means don't sue!)
Chapter 4
Harry was looking into his Potion Master's eyes, which had suddenly grown menacing after looking at the marks on his hand. This was quite a change from the previous looks that he had been receiving from him.
After Harry had passed out on the floor from the Cruciatus Curse that he had placed upon himself, he had felt a sharp pain in his forehead from someone touching his scar. He half-awoke in someone's lap, and saw Snape hovering over him, looking into his eyes with concern. He realized that he must have been in Snape's lap, and was slightly disgusted for a minute, before realizing that Snape must have chosen for him to be there. With that thought, he had fallen back asleep.
Sometime later, he had once again awoken because of Snape. However, this time, it wasn't because Snape had touched him. No, it was because Snape had been talking.
"Merlin, why the hell did I have to do that to him?" he had quietly whispered to himself, and Harry was shocked to see tears starting to fall down his cheeks. "If his life wasn't hell enough, I've added so much more to it now." Harry knew that Snape was talking about him, and for the first time in his life, he felt sympathy for the man.
Carefully, slowly, Harry reached out his hand to his Professor's face, and grazed his fingers over his cheeks, wiping away the tears. Snape jumped back suddenly at the sudden touch, and looked over at Harry.
"Harry?" he asked very softly, and Harry couldn't help but smile up at him. He never thought that he would be saying this, but God, it felt good to just be civil towards this man for once, instead of always yelling at him. He noticed Snape start to smile, but then a look of realization crossed his face, and he quickly stood up.
Harry wasn't sure why, but instinct made him grab Snape's arm. For some reason, he wanted him to stay there with him, to keep him company. Snape spun around to face him, and Harry looked up with pleading in his eyes.
"Please, don't leave," he said, almost feeling as though the tears were going to start to fall again.
"You'd rather have your friends in here than me," Snape replied, but to Harry's relief, he kneeled down anyway.
Doing this had made the two start a very comforting conversation, until Harry started coughing. He had placed his right hand up to his mouth to cover it, and upon pulling it back down, Snape had grabbed it. Harry was shocked that he would do this, but soon found out why.
He looked over at Snape, who was examining his hand closely, his eyes filled with shock. Harry then realized that it was the hand that had the scars from Umbridge's quill on it.
Snape looked up at him, his eyes filled with anger, and said, "Did you do this?" His voice was slightly menacing, and Harry just looked shocked. He couldn't talk. No one knew about this except for Ron and Hermione, and he hadn't wanted them to know then, either. But he had blabbed it out during his little 'anger session', so he knew that it was only time before someone asked him about it. He just didn't think that that person would have been Snape.
"Potter?" Snape asked unconsciously, calling him by his first name again. This made Harry feel worse, as it reminded him of all of the times at Hogwarts when Snape had tormented him. And with that, he remembered the times spent with his other Professor, who he had loathed even more than Snape.
The last name seemed to being everything back, every memory from last year at school when he was with Umbridge. He remembered sitting in Umbridge's office, having his hand cut open. He remembered sitting in McGonagall's office, having Umbridge tell him he couldn't play Quidditch, and then again in the same place, Umbridge telling him he could never be Auror. He remembered when Umbridge had found out about the DA, and when she had caught him trying to talk to Sirius through her fireplace. Harry's eyes filled with soft tears, and he just shook his head to answer Snape's question.
Snape must have understood, because a look of dawning comprehension came over his face. "Harry," he said, once again going back to using his first name, to which Harry was grateful for. "Is this what Umbridge did to you?"
Slowly, his eyes still wide and misty, he nodded, and Snape made a scowling noise.
"Why that good-for-nothing-" he started loudly, but then looked back at Harry. "How did she do it to you? What did she use?"
Harry still didn't say anything. His mouth didn't seem to be able to move. This was something that he had kept inside for so long, and he really didn't want to let it back out.
"It's all right Harry, you can tell me," Snape said in a soothing voice, and Harry once again looked him in the eyes.
"She – she – she used a quill," he told Snape, trying to form the words together. Snape seemed to be puzzled slightly.
"What kind of quill?" he asked quickly, pressing Harry for answers. Harry sat there a minute, trying to compose his thoughts.
"I don't know really. I had never seen one before," he started, his voice soft and shaking slightly, before growing darker with his next statement. "All I know is, she never had to buy ink for it. I provided it for her."
Harry shuddered slightly, remembering the pain and the anger he had felt then. Snape saw this, and looked over at him. Harry could tell he was confused, but that he knew that it obviously wasn't good, based on Harry's reaction.
"What do you mean, you provided ink for her?" he asked, his voice puzzled. "Do you mean you had to use your own ink or something?"
Harry grinned grimly. "Oh yes. I had to use my very own ink." He was feeling a bit deranged now, and Snape was looking at him with shock.
"I still don't think that I'm following you, Harry," he said softly, looking at him.
Harry's could feel his smile turning grimmer. "Well, put it this way: whatever kind of quill she had, it somehow got the blood out of my hand and used it for ink."
Snape gasped. "What do you mean?" he said quickly. Harry's grin finally vanished completely as he looked at Snape. He really didn't want to go on, but he knew that Snape would demand to hear the rest now that he had gotten this far.
"Well, as soon as I set the quill on the parchment and started writing, whatever marks I made would form on the back of my hand, making it bleed, and the blood from it would somehow form on my quill and become my ink," he said, and Snape gasped again, looking utterly more shocked. "It would heal over each time, but once you've been sitting there for almost four hours a night for over a week, it doesn't heal so easily anymore, and eventually just stops healing over completely."
Harry looked up at Snape, and saw that his Potion's Master was, for once, speechless. "To put it lightly, it hurt like Hell," Harry said, the grim grin coming back to his face. "Not much unlike what it felt like when I cut my wrist." Here, Harry quickly cut himself off, not wanting to go into any more detail.
Snape looked up at him, apparently finding his voice again. "Why did you do that?" he asked suddenly, and he seemed very intent on knowing why. Harry didn't really want to go into details, especially not since Snape was the one he would be telling them too. I mean, yes, he hadn't had much trouble telling him other personal things, but this was something that he thought might have been too personal. After all, after today, Snape would probably go back to loathing him, and Harry would probably regret telling him what he did.
Snape must have seen the hesitation in his face, because he said, "Harry, you don't have to tell me this if you don't feel comfortable with it, but I would appreciate knowing." Harry sat and considered this for a few minutes before finally coming upon a decision.
"I can't," he told Snape, who's face fell. "I'm sorry, but I just don't want to talk about it right now. It's all just too much to go into at the moment, and I'd just get myself even more upset." Noticing how Snape was taking this, he quickly added, "I'm sorry."
Snape looked up at him. "No, it's fine, Potter," he said, though it didn't sound like it was. Harry felt a little pissed off at Snape again.
"Oh, so now, because I don't want to share something with you at the moment, you have to be all jerky to me again, right?" he asked Snape, his words growing cruel.
Snape looked up at him, his eyes regaining their usual malice. "Potter, do not speak to me that way," he said, his voice growing ever icier.
"As I've said before, I'll speak however I damn well want to speak with you," Harry said, his anger getting the better of him.
"Potter, you're an arrogant little bastard," Snape said, his eyes practically burning into Harry now. "You're quite like you're father in that way, you know."
Snape must have realized what he just said, for his eyes grew wide, and he said, "Wait a minute, Harry, I didn't-"
But Harry, completely fed up with the man in front of him now, just shouted, "Yes you did! You were full aware of what you were saying! Just get the hell out of my room!"
Snape just stood there, in the same spot, not moving, so Harry yelled again. "Get out of my room! Now! Get out!!" His eyes were blazing, and he was practically screaming. Snape looked really shocked, and possibly even hurt, but Harry didn't care, and as Snape backed out of the room and shut the door, Harry let out a large breath of relief. Then, he started to cry again.
Once again, his sobs were loud and gut-wrenching, and he bent over, bringing in his knees to his chest, hugging them with his arms. He started to sway back and forth slowly, still holding his knees protectively. He started to get that incredibly empty feeling back inside of him, and he felt suddenly so alone. He needed to get the pain out of him again, but there was once again only one way.
He pulled himself out of his bed, and then sat on the floor. He practically dragged his crying self over to the wall where something was glittering on the floor. He reached out his hand and grasped the shining piece of glass that Lupin had thrown over there earlier. He turned himself around, and crawled back over to his bed, heaving himself into it.
He then sat up, staring at the shiny object, which now had dry, crusted scarlet stains on it. The shard was again looking entirely pleasing to him, and he grasped it tightly in his hand again – so tightly in fact, that the other edges gently dug into his skin. He winced at the pain, but welcomed it all the same.
He hastily ripped off the bandages from his left wrist, and stared at the cut there. The slice that he had made on his skin seemed so beautiful to him somehow, and he couldn't wait to just pierce the skin there again. So, raising the glass above his head like a dagger, he violently shoved it down, this time actually stabbing the wound more than cutting it, releasing a fresh supply of blood.
For the second time within a matter of about a minute, he almost screamed, but held it in and again welcomed the pain. He smiled grimly to himself, knowing full well what everyone would say when they found out. But he wouldn't let them find out. He would bandage up the wrist again when he was done, and hope that no one would notice the difference.
Before he had time to change his mind, he pressed the miniature blade against his skin forcefully, bringing forth more blood, and more pain. He continued doing this, until the pain became almost unbearable. Then he took the sparkling object, and placed it on his upper arm, putting a gentle pressure on it, until the skin there also broke.
He felt another sharp pain, and then pressed harder, adding more pressure to the wound, making it bleed freely down his arm. He stopped for a second to marvel at the blood that was slowly trickling down his arm. It looked so wonderful flowing down like that; it was as if those were Harry's past memories, opening up and flowing out and away. As the blood slowed, he swiped the blade over the cut again, and watched more of the blood flow out.
As he sat in awe at the blood flowing like a tiny stream down his arm, he traced it with the glass, making delicate curved lines down the arm after it, releasing more blood as he went. Suddenly, he reached the creased line in his skin where he bent his elbow, and felt a sharp pain that made him scream out in pain. However, not wanting to alert anyone else in the room of what he was doing, he bit his inner lip. He was holding it down so hard that he started to taste the blood in his mouth.
He looked down at his arm and whimpered, realizing that whenever he bent his arm, he felt pain in the place where he had first felt the sharp pain. More sobs escaped his mouth as he dropped the shard to the floor and hugged his arm to his chest. The sobs just kept coming out of his mouth, not stopping, and each time one left his mouth they became louder.
His throat started to get soar from the sobs and from the screaming and yelling he had done earlier, and he started to cough, sobs separating them and making them sound choppy. He couldn't stop crying long enough to get all of the coughing out, so he just kept coughing harder and harder, and soon started to cough up blood. Little flecks were flying out of his mouth and spraying the sheets in front of him, and the tears fell harder from his eyes, feeling like they were burning his skin because they were so warm.
He tried to hold his breath, to stop the coughing and the sobbing, but he couldn't. They both just kept coming. Soon, the sheets in front of him were covered in blood, both from his arms and wrists, and from the stuff that was coming out of his mouth. His throat felt like it was on fire, and his scar was once again feeling like the blade he had thrown on the floor was white-hot and was stabbing at it.
Finally, Harry felt to tired to hold on, and as the world started to spin around him, he slipped back onto his pillows, and all became black.
Well, go on and read the next chapter then...
SiriusBlack4Ever
