The next morning Harry told us all about what he had experienced the night before from the screaming book, dropping his lantern, almost getting caught by Filch and Snape, and the chance to see his parents in a mysterious mirror.
"I'm just saying, you could've woken me up," Ron said, clearly upset that Harry got to go on some special quest and we didn't.
"You guys can come tonight, I'm going back. I want to show you both the mirror." Harry responded and my head snapped toward him. "I'd like to see your mum and dad." I smiled at him and Ron nodded.
"And I want to see all your family, all the Weasleys, you'll be able to show me your other brothers and everyone."
"You can see them any old time, just come around my house this summer. Charlie and Bill try to visit during the summer." I told him and a large smile grew on his face. "Anyway, maybe it only shows dead people?" Ron asked.
"So that means I could probably see my parents again?" I asked, hopeful. Harry nodded enthusiastically.
"Shame about not finding Flamel though. Have some bacon or something. Why aren't you eating anything?" Ron cut in, barely breathing between words.
"Harry? Are you alright?" I tried asking him, but he turned to us with a troubled look on his face.
Harry had told us that his biggest worry was not being able to find the abandoned room the mirror was in again since he had been running blindly the night before. We all huddled under the cloak and slowly attempted to retrace Harry's steps.
"I'm freezing," Ron whispered. "Let's forget it and go back."
"No!" Harry responded harshly. Ron turned to give me a look but I just shrugged, knowing how frustrated he was at himself for not remembering the way. "I know it's here somewhere." We continued walking, passing a few ghosts, while Ron continued to moan and groan about how his feet were either so cold they felt numb or how they hurt from walking so much. I sighed in relief when Harry jumped, exclaiming, "It's here- Just here... Yes!" As he dragged us to the room and ripped the cloak off of us as he ran directly up to a beautiful golden mirror. As Harry was looking at it, I could read "Erised stra ehru oyt ube cafru oyt on wohsi" but I couldn't make sense of it. I knew it couldn't be Latin, English, or French, but that still left a lot of possibilities.
"See?" Harry practically pleaded to us.
"I can't see anything... but you," Ron told him, and I nodded my head, giving him a sympathetic smile.
"Look. Look at them all... There are loads of them!" He told us, completely in awe.
"We can only see you, Harry..." I tried to tell him but he shook his head and grabbed my arm and put me directly in front of the mirror. "Look in it properly. Stand where I was." I gasped.
In front of me were my parents, my grandmother, the entire Weasley family, and one man with long dark hair that I couldn't recognize.
"Oh my god..." I whispered, raising one hand out to touch the mirror, pulling back slightly when my mom did the same. I turned around but only Ron and Harry were there but when I looked back at the mirror I could see my family. Tears welled up in my eyes.
"Do you see them?" Harry asked. I only nodded, not being able to form words yet. After a minute Ron had decided he had waited long enough and pulled me away to stand in front of it and he gasped as well.
"Look at me!" He exclaimed, awestruck.
"Can you see all your family standing around you?"
"No- I'm alone... but I'm different! I look older... And I'm Head Boy!" I shared a confused look with Harry.
"What?" We asked simultaneously.
"I am! I'm wearing the badge Bill used to... And I'm holding the House Cup and the Quidditch Cup! Bloody hell, I'm Quidditch captain, too!" I was utterly confused when Ron looked at us, excited.
"Do you think this mirror shows the future?" Our smiles dropped a little, but Ron was back to staring at the mirror.
"No, it can't, Ron..." I whispered.
"How can it? Our families are dead... let me have another look." Harry tried, but Ron wasn't letting this go so smoothly.
"You had it to yourself all last night, give me a bit more time." He brushed Harry off, and I scoffed. "Excuse me? And what about me?" I said harshly, glaring at the redhead. "Ron this shows our family with us. Things that we cant make happen." I tried to reason but he brushed me off as well.
"You're only holding the Quidditch Cup, what's interesting about that? I want to see my parents!"
"Don't push me!" A sudden noise directed all our attention to the doorway, making us realize we had been yelling at each other and not realizing how easily we could be caught.
"Quick!" Ron threw the cloak back over us as the red eyes of Mrs. Norris came around the corner, peering into the room. We stood as still as we possibly could. Does this work on animals, too? Can she smell us? But she just walked away to find her next prey. Hopefully Scabbers. I thought, bitterly, with a quick glare at Ron.
"This isn't safe, guys. She might've gone for Filch. I bet she heard us, maybe even smelt us. Come on." I told them, grabbing each of their arms and leading them back toward the Gryffindor common room. When we finally got back to the Fat Lady, she was extremely confused about there being a voice and no body but let us in either way, which we laughed about once we reached our room.
"Want to play chess, Harry? Sam?" Ron tried to ask us the following day but we both shook our heads while staring into the fire.
"No," Harry responded. Ever since last night, I couldn't stop thinking about seeing my parents with me, especially at my current age and I knew Harry, who had never even seen a photo of his parents before, couldn't either. I held my family's book and a piece of parchment that had the words from the mirror written on them, even closer to my chest. I spent most of the night trying to decipher it with no luck.
"Why don't we go and visit Hagrid, then?" Ron tried again, I assumed partly out of boredom but also in an effort to apologize for being rude last night without having to actually apologize.
"No... You go." Harry said quietly, not quite fully in the conversation.
"I know you're both thinking... You two can't go back to that mirror." He warned us and I gave him a confused look.
"And why not?" I asked him and he shrugged.
"I don't know... I've just got a bad feeling about it- Sam you know what I mean. Plus you've had too many close calls already. Filch, Snape, and Mrs. Norris are all around. So what if they can't see you? What if they walk into you guys? What if you knock something over?" I fully turned to face him.
"Ron, I don't have a bad feeling at all. And I would know." I told him, feeling a little bad when a look of hurt flashed on his face but I just turned to look back at the fire.
"You sound like Hermione," Harry told Ron in a monotonous voice. "Plus I trust Sam's feelings. If she thinks it's okay then it must be." Ron only scoffed.
"I'm serious, Harry. Both of you. Don't go." Ron had to have known in his mind that we were clearly going to go back at the chance of seeing our parents but thankfully he stopped nagging us about it when the twins came in.
That night, after Ron had gone to sleep, Harry and I quickly put on our robes over our pajamas and made our way down to the classroom and took turns in front of the mirror. It was awfully quiet other than a few whispers here and there but mostly to our family members. Every once in a while we'd ask the other person something about what they were seeing but it wasn't much, especially since I had shown Harry photos of my parents before. I didn't mention the strange man in the mirror, though.
"Back again, you two?" We jumped a good foot in the air and spun around, I was holding my wand just in case. Behind us sat Headmaster Dumbledore, who seemed to be giving us a small smile with his hands in the air. I looked down at my wand, gulped, and hid it behind me, causing the old man to chuckle. We must've walked right past him.
"I- I didn't see you, sir." Was the best thing Harry could think of saying. I gave him a cold stare and he just sheepishly smiled back at me. I sighed and shook my head. "I'm sorry, sir, I know we're out-" But I stopped when the man put his hand up once more to quiet me.
"Strange how nearsighted being invisible can make you." He told us, my stomach dropped once I realized he knew about the invisibility cloak. Although, it did help a little that he was still giving us a small smile. "So..." He started again, standing up from his seat. "You, like hundreds before you, have discovered the delights of the Mirror of Erised." Harry and I shared another look, and I turned to look back at the mirror and the words above it.
"I didn't know it was called that, sir."
"But I expect you've realized by now what it does?" He asked.
"It- well- It shows me, my family. Sams, too." I nodded to show I was still listening but I was still looking toward the mirror.
"And it showed your friend Ron himself as Head Boy." I looked back at him.
"How did you know-" Harry started.
"I don't need a cloak to become invisible." He told us. "Now, can you think what the Mirror of Erised shows us all?" We shook our heads no. "Let me explain... The happiest man on Earth would be able to use the Mirror of Erised like a normal mirror, that is, he would look into it and see himself exactly as he is. Does that help?" We thought quietly.
"It shows us what we want... Whatever we want." Harry said slowly. I jumped and looked back at the headmaster. He smiled warmly at me and signaled me to talk.
"Mirror of Erised... It's desire backward. It says, 'I show not your face but your heart's desire'. Is that correct, sir?" Harry just looked at me confused. Once Dumbledore nodded I turned Harry to face the mirror and showed him the words above it. "When you read it like we normally would, it doesn't make any sense but if you read it backward like you would if you were looking into a mirror, that's what it says." Harry's eyes widened once he realized what I was saying. Out of the corner of my eyes, I could see my parents smiling and nodding, my mother was even clapping a little.
"Correct. It shows us nothing more or less than our deepest, most desperate desire of our hearts. You, Harry, who had never known your family, see them standing all around you. Sam, who knew them for such a short time, sees them as well. Ronald Weasley, who has always been overshadowed by his brothers, even sister, sees himself alone, the best of all of them." He was saying, and I nodded along, feeling more guilty about being so upset with him now that I fully understand why he was so desperate to keep looking in the mirror. "However, this mirror shows us neither knowledge nor truth. Men have wasted away before it, entranced by what they have seen, or been driven mad, not knowing if what it shows is real or even possible.
The mirror will be moved to a new home tomorrow, Harry. Sam. And I ask that you do not go looking for it again. If you ever do run across it, you will now be prepared. It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live, remember that. Now, why don't you both put that admirable cloak back on and get off to bed?" He phrased it in the way of a question, although it wasn't. We both nodded and hurriedly put it on, but I stopped for a moment and looked at the old man.
"Professor, why do I see someone I don't know?" I asked him, hoping he would have an answer. "He has long dark hair but I've never seen the man before." Harry looked at me and then back to the Professor.
"Now, that I do not know. Perhaps it is someone you know but not remember?" I sighed but nodded. "Thank you, sir." He nodded back, but this time when I went to put the cloak over myself, Harry stopped it.
"Sir- Professor Dumbledore? Can I ask you something as well?" He asked.
"Obviously you've just done so, but you may ask me one more thing, however." He smiled at the boy, with a sparkle in his eye, as if it was one of his favorite jokes and I had to do all I could not to roll my eyes at how horrible of a joke it was.
"What is it you see when you look into the mirror?"
"I? I see myself holding a pair of thick, woolen socks," he informed us, and I looked at him confused, clearly not believing what he said, but knowing better than to pry or say anything. Harry was staring as well.
"One can never have enough socks," he told us, a matter of factly. "Another Christmas has come and gone and I didn't get a single pair. People will insist on giving me books." I nodded along, pulling Harry under the cloak and into the corridors to make it to the common room. We hardly spoke, but we both knew Dumbledore wasn't being truthful, though we understood why he wouldn't say what he really did see.
Once we got into our beds, Harry having to throw Scabbers off his pillow, we both fell asleep pretty quickly, but I did have one question. Where were they moving the mirror to?
I hope you guys enjoyed the chapter. Leave a like if you can and have a great day or night. Hopefully, this helped you get out of reality for even just a little bit.
xx