TWENTY-THREE.
Harry went to bed late and he woke late, with a head full of cotton and a stomach that felt full and empty and warm. It ached to touch but at the same time all it wanted was for Harry to wrap his arms around it and press tight. He lay for a while, too tired to sleep again and too tired to get up, and tried to decide if he was going to be sick. He really did not want to be.
Quidditch was largely at fault here. It had been the first match of the season, which Inna had said determined the rest of the season and so if they lost, she would choose one of them to kill so the rest were better motivated for next time. They had won. Inna screamed in Harry's face that it was all thanks to the sea serpent and that she'd known all along they were destined for it this year, which Harry thought was a little insensitive considering it was Harry who'd caught the Snitch, not the sea serpent, so really he would have appreciated a little credit. It was also insensitive since everyone knew they'd only won because Krum had dropped school Quidditch. When he'd told them, Inna had done a fair job nodding her compassion for two minutes and then excused herself to celebrate very loudly in the corridor outside his dorm. Krum's eyes had been lined purple and his hands had shaken.
'I'm happy he's decided to do it,' Harry had told Snape later. 'I think he really just needs a break from everything.'
'I am sure you are very happy indeed,' Snape had said. 'You will never be forced to learn to lose now.'
'I know how to lose,' Harry had argued, though to be fair it had been a load off his mind that he wouldn't have to.
After the match, they'd celebrated. Karkaroff had allowed them the use of the big dining hall for the occasion, and they played music and ate and scribbled words on the world map next to the names of students and teachers they liked or hated. Inna and Harry drew crowns next to the family name of every player on their team, and even Danila smiled a little when he saw.
They only had permission to use the room until eleven, so after that they moved to the courtyard outside and did fireworks. Blom had got them from somewhere and agreed to set them off on the condition they told everyone it had nothing to do with the match. He was a sore loser, Harry observed, though only until midnight, when he'd had enough to eat and drink to forget to be bitter. Nutt came at one point and told everyone to go to bed, so they moved again into the dorms, flinging open doors to pour the light and heat of the fires into the corridors, and at this point Harry started to feel like all the sweets he'd eaten were weighing on his stomach, and also his eyes would not stay open.
But once he'd got in bed, he couldn't sleep. At first, he was reliving the match and the party, excitement bubbling in him, a grin breaking out on his face even when he tried to relax his muscles. Then the excitement turned into a not-sadness, because he was still smiling and yet he felt strange and forlorn. He thought about how he had only a couple months left in Durmstrang before he would be going back to Britain for good. The thing was, he was glad to be returning to Hogwarts—glad didn't even begin to cover it, he was positively ecstatic about it much of the time—but Hogwarts didn't have the things that Durmstrang had, and it didn't have the people Durmstrang did, and it was plain unfair that Harry could not just have both.
He would never again live with Moody, either, when he'd come back. Or go shopping with Lamotte and feel horrible about kind of wanting Lamotte to like him, or make a joke that Mrs Bones smiled at even though she was confused. If it all went well, he would never again be carted endlessly between people and places, and he would never be a real orphan again. He would be someone's child, kind of. He would be the Black heir, apparently. None of it sounded like something that should be making him sad, which was why it was a not-sadness, odd and wrong.
When he'd finally slept, he'd dreamt of Privet Drive. He used to dream of it often, but it rarely happened anymore, so it was a little annoying when it did now. By the time the stomach ache woke him up, he'd gone through all the recurring bits: Dudley laughing at Harry as Harry's teeth crumbled and fell out of his mouth; Uncle Vernon throwing him into the cupboard that shut dark and cold, and grew smaller and tighter the longer he banged his head against the door; casting a Lumos just to see that the walls were covered with that awful phrase, you should die, scrawled hundreds and hundreds of times, all around him; stumbling out free at last and running into the kitchen to bury his face in Aunt Petunia's back, crying and clinging.
Usually when Aunt Petunia turned to reveal she was frying up Harry's hands to go with the beans, when she smiled nightmarishly and when Harry lifted his arms and saw the bloodied stumps, he woke up. It always happened this way. But this time, the dream carried on past the swell of horror, and Dudley ran into the kitchen and started laughing at Harry's new disfigurement, and Uncle Vernon came to throw him back into the cupboard, and the whole thing started again, and kept going, and Harry was thinking only, how much longer until I have no more body left?
He felt at his teeth now as he lay in bed, satisfied that he could feel both the press of his fingers on his gums and the slide of enamel on the pads of his fingers. Of course none of it had been real. He knew that. It was only that whenever he woke from the nightmare, for a while after it felt as though it had all happened to Harry exactly like that, and he remembered it the same as his real memories from when he lived in Privet Drive—better, maybe, since he could not stop dreaming about it.
Once, he would have been afraid to find he'd brought some of the dream back with him. He might have peered around for a darkness pouring out from the crack under the door or fling back the pillow in the fear that he might discover dozens of rotten baby teeth spread over the mattress. After all, he'd once dreamt of floating on the sea and woken to a flood. He'd dreamt of anger and woken to a storm. But he'd studied with Lisa long enough now to understand this was not how it worked. The sea could be calm and the sea could be angry, but nothing powerful could ever be helpless, and so the fear Harry felt in the dream was magically impotent, stuck in Harry's body and bothering no one and nothing but his racing heart.
He kicked off the sheets, wincing at the grumble in his stomach. The fear was fading away and, in its place, irritation blossomed. He was still trying to understand what it meant to be Harry Potter, the miracle child, and not Harry, the freak. And now he was supposed to be figuring out how to be Harry Potter-Black or whatever? And to catch up on a year of Ancient Runes over the summer since you couldn't take that at Durmstrang until fifth year, not to even mention that the Durmstrang Potions teacher had been so beyond hopeless that Harry was genuinely a little afraid of Snape finding out? He had his hands full.
He was supposed to be meeting Snape for breakfast. Breakfast and a conversation, Snape had said, which, duh, what were they going to do? Sit and eat in silence? Harry was in no mood for eating or talking, and anyway it was already eleven. Surely Snape would have eaten by now, even though he had technically told Harry to just come whenever he woke up.
But they hadn't really spent much time together since their visit with Sirius, and Harry thought Snape was probably a little upset over that in the first place. Snape did not like Sirius. Snape did not like Mrs Bones. Snape did not like having to travel out of Durmstrang, which was a real pain. Harry should show up for breakfast with a big smile and act like he couldn't think of a better place to be.
With a groan, he rolled out of bed, dropping to his knees on the floor for a little break before moving any further. Bed was definitely a better place to be than Snape's office. It had pillows. Also, it was much, much closer.
It was nearing noon by the time Harry knocked finally on Snape's door. The walk down had made him queasy and irritable, and he promised himself if Snape's opening salvo was to tell him off for sleeping until midday, Harry would just leave and go die in peace.
'You know, Mr Potter,' Snape said as he pulled open the door, 'I suppose on account of your young age you may be excused for your ignorance, but breakfast is typically not a meal one eats in the afternoon.'
'Okay, bye,' said Harry. But then his stomach grumbled again, and he couldn't help it. He turned to face Snape again. 'I'm sick so you have to be nice to me!'
Snape pulled Harry into his room, which also had a bed that was larger than Harry's and had more pillows. He made him tea in the samovar and even put the raspberry syrup in it that he always said was disgusting, all so Harry could chase away the taste of the potions he was given for his stomach. These took effect quickly, and less than ten minutes in Harry already felt much better, but he thought that telling Snape as much might mean he'd remove the blanket he'd given him or tell him to get out of his bed. He kept his arms wrapped around his stomach just in case.
'This is what happens when you stuff yourself full of sweets just before going to sleep,' Snape admonished as he took the cup of tea from him to set aside. 'What time did you go to bed?'
Harry shrugged. 'Not that late.'
'Oh, do me a favour and don't lie to my face.'
Snape thought Harry should try and sleep more, which Harry didn't really want to do. He did not argue, though. He felt like if Snape told him to do anything at the moment Harry would probably do it, even if it was ridiculous. He curled up on his side, took off his glasses and shut his eyes halfway, so through the blurry lines of lashes he could still see Snape moving around.
The room was dim despite the warm orange glow of the fireplace and the insistent daylight pouring through the crack in the thick curtains. Harry's thoughts drifted for a while, but soon he discovered that when he was not actively pursuing any particular thread, images from his earlier nightmare would flash before his eyes. He tried to imagine instead what it might have been like if Sirius had died in the war, and Pettigrew, too, and Snape. If Harry's parents had somehow lived as a result, which would have been more fair. It would be a strange, upside-down world, although it wasn't as if this alternate Harry in his alternate reality would ever realise anything was wrong. He would live his charmed life with two parents who loved him, and he would never even think about what it might have been like to be an orphan, or to stay with his aunt and uncle, or to have so many things to worry about.
The longer he imagined it, the more upset Harry became with this alternate version of himself. He probably wouldn't even care that Sirius and Snape were dead. His father would tell him that Sirius had been his best friend and Harry would go, okay, that's a shame, I guess. And his mother would tell him that Snape had been her best friend but only until he became a Death Eater and then died in Voldemort's service, and there would have been little else good to say about him. That didn't seem very fair to Harry, either.
'What are you doing?' Harry rasped at the dark shape Snape cut in the light of the fire, where he sat on the bench busy with something blurry and ill-defined.
'I am reading a journal,' Snape said softly. 'And you are supposed to be sleeping.'
'I'm not sleepy,' Harry whispered.
'Is your stomach still bothering you?'
'No,' said Harry, recognising this time that his tone did carry with it the suggestion of pain. 'I'm just sad today. I don't know why.'
Snape put the journal down and came to sit on the bed by Harry's side. He touched his forehead, as though expecting Harry's sadness to be only a fever in disguise.
'What were you going to talk to me about?' Harry remembered. 'You said breakfast and a conversation.'
'That can wait until you're feeling well.'
'No, it will distract me.' Harry peered up at him. 'And if you don't tell me I'll think it's something bad and I'll be anxious about it, which will mess up my stomach all over again, won't it?'
'A valid point,' Snape admitted, though he looked not at all happy about it. 'It concerns something that occurred when we visited Black's residence in Norway. While you were playing with your friends, Black and I spoke—'
'We weren't playing,' Harry clarified. 'We're not five.'
'While you were not playing with your friends,' Snape said a little more sharply, 'Black and I spoke about the future. He is clearly not ready to take on all the responsibilities of a parent—'
'You wouldn't be either if you'd been through what he's been through!'
'Would you let me finish? It has been previously agreed you can spend part of your summers with the Weasleys, but that still leaves things such as purchasing clothes and supplies, monitoring your health, or remaining in contact with your tutors regarding school performance. The Weasleys cannot be expected to tend to such things, and neither can Black. Not at this stage.'
Now Harry's stomach was really starting to hurt again. 'Well, I can do a lot of those myself. And you do some of them, too, don't you? So can't you just keep doing them?'
'Yes.' Snape swallowed. 'That has been Black's suggestion. He has offered to let me—to let me perform the standard duties of a formal guardian—while he remains guardian in name for the purposes of keeping the Ministry happy. You'll be able to visit with him, of course, as well as with the Weasleys if you like. But as long as you do not complain to Black—and he has asked me to tell you that he has exacting standards in this regard and will believe anything you say—then I will be responsible for housing you during the holidays, for providing you with necessities, and—and overall care.'
Harry pulled himself up to sit against the cushions. He didn't know what to say.
'It is an opportunity to make it real,' Snape said softly.
'It's not real though.' Harry stared down at his hands, splayed in his lap. For a moment, he imagined them as stumps. 'Because he'll still be my real guardian.'
'You would be neither the first nor the last child to have a parent who is not recognised as such in the eyes of the law. It does not matter—'
'It does so!' Harry exclaimed. It came out so loud. He made sure to speak more evenly when he explained, 'It matters. If it didn't matter, then you'd already basically be my parent because you do most of that stuff already. The only difference is that I don't get to stay at your house and, oh right, that you're not actually my parent. My actual parents are dead. And then my next actual parents hate me. And now my actual parent is Sirius, who doesn't even want me apparently. That's real.'
'Really, Potter? A piece of parchment is more real to you than lived experience?'
Snape's tone was sharp. It made Harry curl in on himself a little.
'You said you didn't know how to make it real,' he whispered. He gripped the blanket Snape had covered him with, distending the fabric into waves and hills. 'You said that it wasn't possible and you were right. So, there's no point talking about it anymore.'
For a beat, there was silence. Harry risked a glance up at Snape to gauge how upset he was, and he discovered that his eyes were fixed a couple inches to the side of Harry's head, the gaze in them hard and resolved. Snape's mouth pursed. He seemed to be bracing himself to say something long and complicated that needed laying out in his head first.
'I love you,' he said at last. 'You are my child. That is real, Harry.'
Harry froze. He was so grateful Snape was still staring at the wall.
'You can't—don't say that.'
'I do and you are.' His voice was growing stronger again, more like him. 'It is true that I can't give you a piece of parchment to frame on a wall. I cannot give you my name. But it is rare that we get everything we would like. So let me reiterate what I can give you: you can live in my house. You can expect me to care for you. You are my child. I—'
'Stop saying that,' Harry begged. His heart pounded wildly in his skull, making it impossible to see. 'It's embarrassing.'
'Fine,' Snape sighed. He sounded annoyed again. 'Are we in agreement?'
Harry tried to reply. He knew he should probably say it back. That was what you were supposed to do, wasn't it? But he couldn't even imagine the words coming out of his mouth. He had never said them to anyone except Aunt Petunia back when he was very little, and he didn't think his tongue would know how to curl around the sounds.
As the wait stretched, his shame grew. Eventually, he could not take it anymore, and crawled to Snape across the bed, then sat there with his legs folded under him and hugged his arm. He pressed his face into Snape's shoulder so hard that red and yellow shapes exploded before his eyes.
Snape hugged him back, which Harry had fully expected him to do and still somehow felt relieved for.
Harry considered saying he was sorry. He worried that if he did, Snape would ask him to explain what he was sorry for, and Harry knew he would never be able to say any of it out loud.
The ringing in his ears had moved into his jaw, then into his teeth. He could feel them falling out right now; could feel each tooth crumbling, sharp pieces digging into his palate and tongue. He tried to breathe himself into what was real. His face was all pins and needles, and the mad thought came to him suddenly that he was dying.
'I was reading an interesting article in the Potioneer's Monthly,' a voice reached him. Harry blinked, puzzled as to why Snape would think he cared. 'Shall I tell you about it?'
'—okay.'
Snape did tell him. It really wasn't at all interesting and Harry wasn't at all paying attention, but he liked the flat cadence of Snape's voice and the way the murmured words felt on Harry's scalp. He ran his tongue over his teeth as he let the words wash over him, and after a little while it did seem like if he stopped actively thinking about breathing, he wouldn't actually suffocate.
'That was very boring,' Harry managed to say. His voice broke only on the last syllable.
'I suppose there is no accounting for taste. But I'm afraid it's half past one.'
Panic spiked in Harry. What was half past one? Why was Snape kicking him out?
He held on tighter.
'I have my tutoring session,' Snape explained. 'Do you remember? I told you yesterday I was available until one thirty.'
'Oh.'
Harry forced himself to release him. His limbs did not like to listen.
'I will be back in five minutes.'
'Five—five minutes?' Harry repeated dumbly.
'Yes. If I don't make it clear the session is cancelled, I worry I'll find Miss Green has helped herself to a cauldron anyway. I'd rather not spend the rest of the weekend scraping bits of student off the ceiling.'
'You don't have to cancel it,' Harry argued weakly. 'I can just—'
'This is not a discussion. And you can do one thing only, which is to stay in bed and wait for me. We will finish our conversation when I am back.'
It hadn't been much of a conversation, thought Harry. He didn't say that, or even look at Snape as he left. He felt like he might start crying if he did, which was something beyond crazy.
It got a little better after Snape had left. Harry felt like there was enough space around him for the air he needed to breathe. Suddenly restless, he slunk out of bed and slipped through the tapestry into Snape's office, bright with the harsh light from outside. A scroll of parchment had rolled halfway down the desk, the letters on it small and fat like bugs.
The odd thing was, Harry's mind felt both very empty and very full at once. He had the impression that thoughts were buzzing around in there, one and another and another, but he failed to put words to a single one. So, when he opened a drawer to find a piece of blank parchment and a quill, he wouldn't have been able to explain to himself what he was doing, and yet he felt no hesitation.
He dipped the tip of the quill in fresh ink. At the top of the scroll, he wrote,
Certificate of Adoption.
He added the date and the place, Durmstrang, End of the World, then hesitated. He had no idea what a document like this might say. There probably wasn't even one document that you signed in real life, but endless and endless pages of legal stuff.
This is to certify that Severus Snape agrees to become the parent of Harry James Potter, born July 31st, 1980.
It did not sound at all right. He didn't know Snape's birthday, either. But did that even matter? Once he'd added his own signature below and an empty line for Snape's, he realised the whole thing was extraordinarily childish. What, was he going to draw a little house and a smiling sun, too? The two of them holding hands by the side? He'd told Snape earlier that he wasn't a five-year-old. He was certainly doing a good job proving that now.
He had just decided to toss the whole thing into the fire—he'd first thought to set it aflame right there on the desk, but that was stupid and anyway he'd forgotten his wand in his dorm—when the door to the office flung open.
'And what do you think you're doing?'
Harry spun around, shielding the parchment from view with his body. 'Uh—nothing?'
'Nothing?' repeated Snape mockingly. 'Remind me, did I tell you that you are supposed to stay in bed and wait for me, or that you are to make a quick getaway the moment an opportunity arises?'
'What? I wasn't even—'
Snape took a step forward. Harry shuffled a little to the side.
'What have you got there?' When Harry said nothing, Snape's voice turned dangerous. 'Harry.'
Harry gave him the parchment. He stared at his own shoes as Snape read, praying for another escaped convict to march in now and put him out of his misery.
He heard Snape clear his throat above him. Then, he pushed past Harry to get to the desk, grabbed the quill Harry had dropped, and in big, clear letters wrote out his signature on the bottom line.
Harry's arms came around his stomach again, hugging tightly even though it no longer hurt.
'You probably can't see it,' he spoke hoarsely, 'but at the bottom it also says in small print that you have to do everything I say.'
'Hm. I should have had a lawyer look this over. I suppose it's too late now.'
'And—and your first order is to bring me breakfast,' Harry said quickly. 'In bed. I haven't even eaten anything today and it's almost two. That's pretty irresponsible parenting.'
Snape narrowed his eyes. Harry was very aware that he was pushing it, but he held his ground.
'Breakfast in bed,' Snape bit out. 'Certainly, your majesty.'
Harry grinned, then threw himself back past the tapestry and onto the bed, ready to receive his feast.
The feast that turned up was disappointing at best. Harry did not see why he needed to eat porridge and white bread when his stomach wasn't hurting anymore. His saving grace was the jar or raspberry syrup by the samovar, which he upturned over his oats until you couldn't tell they'd ever been any colour other than bright red.
'Food is the best,' he informed Snape around a mouthful. The porridge was so cloyingly sweet that he was already on his second cup of tea, no sugar no milk. 'What am I supposed to call you?'
It had been an issue for a while, actually. Harry thought it would have been extremely strange to call Snape professor unless they were in a classroom, especially now that Harry hadn't been taught by him for ages and sometimes forgot that Snape had originally just been his teacher. He had taken care to avoid calling him anything if possible, though it did make it hard to draw his attention when he wasn't looking.
'You may call me whatever you like,' said Snape smoothly, which was no help at all. He ate a piece of bread off Harry's plate. It failed completely to make him appear casual.
'So, like, mate. Or old chum.'
The corner of Snape's mouth quirked up.
Harry cleared his throat. Today was so embarrassing. 'I guess it would feel really weird to call you dad or something.'
Snape kept his face carefully blank. Harry could tell he was also embarrassed. 'As I've said, you may call me whatever you like. I would avoid it in front of your godfather, though. He is dealing with enough.'
Harry didn't know what he would like, was the thing. Didn't Snape realise he, Harry, was also dealing with a lot? He didn't have the time or the energy to belabour this issue. Also, just thinking about it was making his cheeks hot.
'Okay, old chum,' said Harry eventually, and resumed eating his porridge.
As he ate, he remembered the time Snape had offered to take him in after first year. He didn't normally like to think about it, so the memory was a little frayed at the edges, truncated by gaps in recall. Harry remembered Aunt Petunia frying up his hands, which had never even happened, better than he remembered Snape asking Harry to live with him.
He set his spoon down. He put the tray aside. It was kind of difficult to eat when you'd just imagined your own flesh sizzling in a pan.
'Do you remember when you tried to be my guardian after first year?' Harry found himself asking. 'In Inari?'
Snape scoffed. 'No, Harry, I do not remember. How would I? It is not as if it was at all an emotionally loaded time.'
Harry felt stupidly pleased then. 'Yeah. I guess it was emotionally loaded. I remember I was really happy but also really anxious. I think I was having some protracted panic attack all throughout that day.'
'Well, thank you for letting me know years after the fact.'
'But now,' Harry pressed on, pleased that his brain was again allowing him to think thoughts that had words in them, 'it's just, I don't know, okay. Not that—not that I'm not happy or anything, I only mean that it's less stressful. Because it feels like it's not some really big change and even if Sirius decides I shouldn't live with you in the summers anymore or something, it won't be such a big deal. You'll still—it will still be kind of normal. Like now. And back then, I thought you'd just change your mind when you saw what I was like.'
He glanced up at Snape. He was smiling a little and also not. Not-sadness, thought Harry.
'What are you like?'
An image of the walls in Harry's dream cupboard, you should die you should die you should die, flashed before his eyes. He shook his head to dispel it. 'I don't know,' he said. 'Weird. But you're much weirder.'
'Am I?'
'Yeah. Like, so weird. No offense, mate.'
In the next moment, Harry let out a high shriek and kicked his legs out as Snape's hands dove up his sides and under the armpits. It took him an embarrassingly long time to understand what was going on. He hadn't really done this before, unless it was one of those things from his childhood he no longer remembered.
'Are you mad?' he screamed through tear-stained laughter. 'There's tea right there—you'll sp—spill it—'
'No, you will spill it if you continue to flail.'
'It says—it says on the thing that you're not allowed to tickle me!'
'I saw no such thing.'
'In small print!'
Snape let up. Harry's skin was still buzzing. His chest heaved. His throat felt raw. It had been a very strange thing, not unlike the not-sadness from earlier: it had not felt good and Harry had wished it would stop, but also he was still kind of laughing, and thought maybe he'd like to do it again.
'Oh,' he remembered as he watched the ceiling, willing his muscles to stop spasming. 'I've not told you yet. Guess what Sirius said he'll be getting me for my birthday. Wait, that's—you don't think he meant that I'd get it only if I lived with him and not you, right?'
Snape's expression softened when Harry peered down the bed at him. 'No, Harry,' he said. 'Although I suppose I should have said yes and seen what kind of gift might convince you to dissolve our agreement. It is good to stay humble.'
He was probably joking, but Harry still felt uneasy. 'No, I'd still rather live with you. Even if I didn't—'
Snape held up a hand. 'It also says in small print that you're not allowed to barter me for a new broom.'
'Ah, that's not fair! How did you know?'
Snape's face darkened.
'He's buying me a Firebolt,' Harry clarified unnecessarily. 'I guess I win.'
'For heaven's sake, this isn't something you can win or lose. You know very well I never had an issue with the broom itself, it was only—'
'I win,' Harry repeated, beaming.
He didn't get back to his dorm until evening. As he walked the dim corridors, he noticed that he was too excited to bother being afraid of seeing Uncle Vernon looming in a dark corner or remembering to check if his teeth were falling out, or whatever else. He would sleep just fine tonight, and he knew from experience that the afterimages of the nightmare only annoyed him the day after, fading away once new dreams had cleared the slate.
He pushed the door to his dorm open with his shoulder, arms full of the blanket he'd liked so much Snape had let him steal it, and then he stopped.
The room was always a mess, but this wasn't Harry's mess. It was the mess of overturned drawers and flipped mattresses; of knapsacks turned inside out and wardrobes plundered. Everything was still now, abandoned amid frenzy. A strong smell hung over it all, and the nightmare stuttered back to life as Harry's mind supplied: singed flesh.
No.
Struck by fear, Harry retraced the steps of the intruder, again flipping and overturning and plundering, accounting in his mind for every possession except two.
His Invisibility Cloak was missing. So was his wand.
Final chapter coming up next!
