Disclaimer:          I don't own, nor do I want to own, the characters in Harry Potter. J.K. Rowling owns  them. I've no intention of making any profit off of this, it's merely used to satisfy my desire to write and possibly to amuse you, the reader, though you can pay me if you so desire for completely unrelated reasons. Lyrics to Alone in the Universe belong to David Usher.
Warning:              This will be R and will contain *SLASH* You don't like it, don't read.
Summary:             Harry returned to Hogwarts after six years of self-imposed exile into the Muggle World and the defeat of Voldemort.
AN:                         I hate family get togethers… Don't you love the positive way I start of my authors notes? I hate school, money and my stepfather's family. Wonderful revelations. I'll try to be more positive now.

Thanks so much for everyone who reviewd. I can't believe I'm getting this many reviews. Seventy-four reviews for an idea that came out of song lyrics, metamorphisized into the desire to have a one eyed Harry in a band, and then suddenly developed a whole plot.

Now for obligatory but fun response to reviews:
Ntmara:                 No one recognizes him because it's been six years since anyone last saw him. He has long hair, one eye, no scar (which everyone knows him by), and he's now full sized. Also, people tend not to see what they're not expecting to.
Poola: Mmm…
Lee Lee Potter: No, you noticed it too. I must have been extremely brain-dead in writing the past few chapters. Don't worry though, instead of going back and fixing it which would take a lot of effort, I've managed to find a method of explaining it away in this chapter.
Katrina: I'm way ahead of you.
               

Thanks to everyone who gave me possible songs, as well as to those who offered to beta-read for me, and a special thanks to Diagonalist, who's betaed the first chapters and will hopefully continue to do so.



_.~*~._.~*~._.~*~._.~*~._.~*~._.~*~._.~*~._


Chapter IV

Alone In Lies


Jamie's on the bathroom floor she don't know why
She's shaking underneath the sink can't feel a thing
She'd love to live a life she's afraid of failure
With all the voices in her head
Now what was that I thought I hear you scream

I know you can feel it
You're already there
Asleep underwater
Just screaming for air
I know you can feel it
You're already...

Don't you know we're freaks and creature
Wake up I can almost see the light
I think we're alone here you and I
I think we're alone left wondering why
I think we're alone here you and I
I think we're alone in the universe tonight

Alex on the last train home from god knows where
A million miles away from where he thought he'd be
He's got his suit his tie his drink his MTV
He's trading all his life away
You can't escape we're all infected now

I know you can feel it
You're already there
Asleep underwater
Just screaming for air
I know you can feel it
You're already
Don't you know we're freaks and creatures
Wake up I can almost see the light

I think we're alone here you and I
I think we're alone in the universe tonight

We're all infected now
I know you can feel it
You're already there
Asleep underwater
Just screaming for air
I know you can feel it
You're already...

Don't you know we're freaks and creatures
Wake up I can almost see the light

I think we're alone here you and I
I think we're alone left wondering why
I think we're alone here you and I
I think we're alone in the universe tonight

_.~*~._.~*~._.~*~._.~*~._.~*~._.~*~._.~*~._


                There was something warm and definitely furry resting against my head when I awoke at some ungodly hour before dawn. Moving slowly so that to not waken said mysterious furry thing, I sat up to get a look at it.
                Lying on my pillow was a rather small, and, coincidently, furry, Himalayan cat. It woke and tilted its head up and stared at me with the most brilliant blue eyes I'd ever seen. It had the oddest look to it. It was almost as if its posture was trying to say, "How dare you wake me up this early. Lie down and give me back my pillow."
                I shook my head a little and chuckled. Reaching out, a scratched the kitten behind one ear and smiled as it purred. Then I stood and stretched, drawing my arms above my head and standing on my tiptoes. My back cracked a little as I did this, and I winced. I sounded like I was getting old, and I was only twenty-four. I couldn't imagine what I'd sound like when I was in my forties.
                I looked behind me and saw the cat staring at me intently. If I hadn't known better, I would have said the cat was laughing at me. It had the same mannerisms as my Godfather did when found something amusing in his animagus form.
                "Stupid cat," I muttered, "I am not old."
                It yawned and then stretched, looking bored. "Sure, whatever you say," it seemed to answer.
                I shook my head to rid it of sleep-clouded insanity. My friends really were right. I was crazy. I was standing in my room at who knows what hour in the morning, thinking a cat was talking to me.
                I knew it! I was going senile!
                …But wait… that was something to do with old age, and I was not getting old. Damn it! The cat was driving me crazy.
                Pointedly ignoring the cat, I began to survey my room. I wouldn't be able to get back to sleep any time soon, so I decided to make use of the time I was stuck with. Behind me I heard the cat jump off the bed and move to join me. It came over and began to rub its sides against my legs. I bent down to pet it again and then moved back to the bed.
                The bedroom itself was fairly bare. There were no decorations on the walls, the sheets and comforter on the bed were a neutral white, and the room was a rather non-descript hard wood. The bed was a regular double bed with a comfortable mattress, and there was a desk in the corner. It basically looked like room no one had lived in. It was clean, meaning the house elves had still taken care of it, but no one had put their own little mark on it.
              Made sense, considering I had just moved in.
                I decided to remedy that, however.
                I stood up once more and moved to my trunks, which had been pushed indiscriminately to the middle of the room. I got to my clothes trunk first and started to dump everything onto my bed. Out came the many pairs of dark leather pants and tight shirts.
                I don't know why, but I liked wearing those clothes. I'd started out wearing casual clothing, but my roommate, Kestor, managed to force me into them for gigs after learning I could play the drums and offering me a place in a band.
                "No alt. rock drummer is going to be wearing patchwork jeans or oversized sweaters!" he'd said when he'd looked in my closet on night. "Tomorrow, after work, I'm dragging you downtown to get some decent clothing. It looks like you've been living in someone else's hand-me-downs. I would be embarrassed to be seen with you!"
                Kestor had taken me all over town, just as he'd promised, and I'd ended up with leather pants and tight shirts. As uncomfortable as they'd been when I first got them, I'd grown used to them, and they'd become like a second skin.
                I grabbed a handful of hangers and hung up the pants and shirts so that they wouldn't get wrinkled, and then delved into my trunk again. Now came the more comfortable casual wear; jeans, t-shirts and other sweaters. I threw a bunch of the t-shirts into the chest-of-drawers and hung up the rest in the closet.
                Then there were the robes tucked safely under all of my clothes, so that my friends, who were snoops by nature, but extremely lazy, would not find them. I hung those up, but left one out to wear for my lessons later that day. I'd briefly considered wearing the one I had on now, but passing out on a bed in it had left it looking slightly worse for wear.
                To put away the rest of my belongings, I had to explore the remainder of my rooms. There was a small washroom off the bedroom, but I found it a little disconcerting, because everything in it was white; the walls, the tile floor, the shower and tub, the sink, the toilet. It was completely stark white.
                A quick charm worked wonders, making the washroom various shades of green. I knew they were Slytherin colours, but they were also my favourite colours, and they made me feel much more at ease.
                I put away all of my toiletries and cosmetics and then moved on to the other rooms.
                I'd obviously missed them when I'd walked through them the past night. Albus' words had shaken me up somewhat, and I was exhausted, so I had my excuses.
                These rooms were much nicer than my bedroom. There was a small kitchen complete with stove, sink, cupboards and icebox; all of them spelled to work much like muggle appliances. Albus must have ordered someone to bring them in for me, assuming correctly that I would be more comfortable with them than with their wizard equivalences, at least for the time being.
                Also in the kitchen was a large, dark, oak table surrounded by six elaborately carved, high backed chairs. It was beautiful, but also a rather cruel, if unintentional joke. At the rate things were going, if Dumbledore's assessment of the staff's sentiments towards me was correct, I wouldn't have enough people willing to talk to me to sit around that table.
                Finally, attached to the kitchen was the living room. There was a tall, almost ceiling-high maple bookshelf against one wall, two couches and a small coffee table facing a symmetrical stone fireplace. The stonemason who had created it had done an amazing job. It had to be the most beautiful thing in my rooms…
                That was until I saw the view I had outside. My rooms looked right out on the lake. The many trees and other plants growing outside were breathtaking. I was sure it would look amazing in the winter as well.
                I had at least one thing to be thankful for in accepting this job. I never would have seen something like this in London.
                I went back to my trunks and grabbed all of my books and music and small decorations and started to fill up the bookshelf, making the room seem a little more lived in. I decided spontaneously that if the teachers didn't hate me too much I would ask Professor Sprout if she would mind giving me a few plants to grow in my room. I'd never thought much of herbology, or botany in the Muggle world, but I did enjoy looking at plants, and growing them. They would do nice to fill the empty spaces in the bookshelf.
                Finally, I went back to my trunks to put away the random miscellaneous things that didn't really fit anywhere, when I saw the small shoebox at the bottom of one of them. It was sealed with packing tap, so it took me a little effort to get it open, but inside was a letter from my friends and a small care-package filled with all of my favourite non-perishable foods.
                There were Mars-bars, a can of soda, a small box of Ritz crackers, and a lot of bubble gum. I laughed a little. My friends weren't the most thoughtful people, and they rarely planned ahead for anything. That they'd managed to sneak that box into the bottom of my luggage was amazing.
                I put the box on the kitchen counter, but didn't read the letter. I knew it was only going to make me feel guilty. I'd lied to my friends about where I was going. I'd told them I was going to a small town that I knew was somewhere near Hogwarts. I'd even gone so far as to buy an apartment there.
                I was living a lie in two worlds, and I didn't need to be reminded of it.
                I slumped against the counter, feeling suddenly horrible and sick with myself, even though I knew there was nothing I could do about it. I couldn't tell my friends because either they wouldn't believe me, or they'd tell the rest of the world and I couldn't betray the wizarding world like that. I couldn't reveal myself to the wizarding world because there would be no way for me to leave afterwards.
                I was positive I was going to end up doing something as foolish as start crying, but then I suddenly felt something rubbing up against my legs again.
                It was that stupid cat!
                I chuckled lightly but it came out more as a choked sound. I didn't care. I bent down and picked it up and nuzzled it slightly. It purred again.
                I felt better.
                The cat didn't have a collar, so I didn't know it's name, but it was male. I was going to bring it up the Great Hall for breakfast to see if it belonged to anyone.
                It sat on my lap for some time while I fooled around with the couch, trying to transfigure it into the same style as the rather comfortable leather couch Kestor and I had in the apartment. So what if I had a thing for leather. It was perfectly normal. Besides, I was in desperate need of practicing larger spells, and with getting acquainted to my new wand.
                It was a rather nice wand, twelve inches, made of cherry this time, sturdy. It had dragons scale, and oddly, a feather from Fawkes. It had been quite a surprise when I'd been informed of that. It was reassuring though, because my wand was somewhat like the one I had lost.
                The one thing I had so say about performing wandless magic was that, while much easier to do, it didn't feel as – "clean," maybe. I believe one of the functions of a wand is to filter the magic a wizard or witch uses. I have no way of testing my theory, however. I'd never heard of wandless magic before in school, so I didn't know any wizards I could talk to about it.
                I started to dose off and daydream on the couch after I'd managed to turn it into a nice leather one, but I was wide awake when the cat started mewling at me. The sun was out so I checked the old-fashioned watch Remus had given to me one Christmas, because the one I had had broken, and the only other watches I could find were digital and shot to hell within a mile of Hogwarts wards.
                It was nearly seven o'clock. Realizing I didn't have much longer I picked the cat off my lap and ran to the shower. Once clean, I dressed, gathered my books and texts into a bag and slung it over my shoulder. It was quarter to eight by then. I left the room, and the cat followed me.
                I smiled, yet again. The cat seemed to have a way of lifting my spirits.
                I made it with plenty of time to the Great Hall and took a seat next to Professor Sprout. She seemed somewhat shocked, but I smiled at her and asked her how the maenadons were doing. I remembered her talking about them at the welcoming feast. They were a type incredibly strong, but impossible to control, vine. They were useful in potions and in making ladders, if I remembered correctly.
                This led to an interesting discussion of how to grow various plants, and I told her my theories, which led to her offering me several pots of plants to grow and test my theories on, which was exactly what I was planning.
                We were about to go into another debate when the cat, who had until then been sitting on the floor, jumped up onto my lap, nearly making me spill my cup of coffee.
                Dumbledore also stood up then.
                I looked around and saw the Great hall was filled with students.
                I noticed three new faces I hadn't seen the night before sitting on the other side of the Headmaster as I.
                Ron, Hermionie, and Charlie.
"I'd like to make a few announcements and introduce a few new teachers. They were unable to make it last night, which is why we postponed the introductions until this morning."
Oh, I thought stupidly.
The cat meowed in my lap, and I was positive it was saying, "Bright remark there, Bozo."

_.~*~._.~*~._.~*~._.~*~._.~*~._.~*~._.~*~._


AN:         Grumbles…  Stupid computer… I've been having major formatting problems on this chapter… it isn't co-operating.

I hope to get one more chapter up in the next week, and then I'm being dragged away from march break. No computer, so not updates for a week.
                Give me feedback. If you think it's worth continuing, tell me. If it should be scrapped, tell me. If you got a new puppy and want to brag about it, tell me. If you have random pointless plot ideas, I'd love to know.
                Also, if you have any questions you want answered, e-mail me. I do check my e-mail often, and there's a much better chance I'll get back to you.
                REVIEW! Use the little box at the bottom left. Feed the author *Nods enthusiastically.* You know you want to.