A/N: I have tried to show the character's reactions in this fan fic in as sincere and genuine a way as possible. I hope I have done them all justice. I was particularly apprehensive about sending the previous chapter of my 'word-child' into the world, but you were all so well-receiving of it that at a point when my creative confidence could have been crushed (nice alliteration there) it was actually given a boost! R&R Thankyou. :)

Friends, Forgiveness and Teddy

Harry finally pulled himself from Molly's arms with embarrassment, the tears gone and his grip on the reality of the moment had returned all too swiftly. She smiled wanly at him, the taut expression a shallow cover for the suffering it had caused her to see him in such pain. He recognised the look for what it was, and looked down at his feet trying also to hide the flicker of self-disgust that he knew would be there at the realisation of the injury he had caused Molly.

"I'm…so sorry," he murmured.

Molly Weasley took his chin in her hands and pulled his face gently up to meet her eyes. "No more hiding from the world Harry, or else how can the world help you?" He nodded, grasping what she was saying with an effort that cost his instincts dearly. He wanted to hide and hate himself, to be away from the watchful eyes of the world, and this was what his old self screamed at him to do, but he knew this was not the answer.

He turned towards the door, knowing his duty yet still not able to disperse the old and familiar emotions that had dwelt in his heart for so long. "Where are you going?" Mrs Weasley asked in a tone that could've been part of an innocent conversation at the Burrow during some happy summer holiday, it helped to think such things could still be revived. "To stop hiding," he said, and headed to find Ron.

Ron and Hermione were in the living room, the tenderness between them visible even to a stranger. And this was how Harry felt. He wondered how it was that four years could change them so much. He looked at Ron, he had become a leader, and Harry somehow knew this was what he had expected all along. How could someone who knew so much about loyalty and kindness and doing what was right not end up instilling such qualities in those around him?

He stepped forward; it was when they looked up and that Harry caught a glimpse of Ron's face that he thought he might break down all over again. It was not the look of harsh hate he had seen before, nor the expression of disbelief and doubtfulness used on his discovery, or even the commanding and curious one worn when he had cornered Lysander at the end of the alley. Ron was looking at Harry like Ron, an expression that made his heart want to swell and break all at the same time.

"Ron," Harry mumbled, but he was already speaking.

"You left." It was no more an accusation and barely even a question, but more a statement. Harry nodded but Ron continued. "We all thought you were strong enough Harry, like fools, after everything you've been through, we somehow still believed that you'd get up after it all, like you've done time after time, and be okay. And then you weren't-" Ron's voice took on a pleading tone now, asking Harry to understand, "and we weren't prepared, just weren't expecting…We sat around doing nothing, just expecting you to come out of it on your own…"

Ron had gotten up from his seat on the sofa and taken a few hesitant steps towards Harry. Hermione followed him, winding an arm around his waist as if it were the must natural thing in the world to do, just a familiar comforting movement. Harry was reminded with a pang the changes in them he had missed over the years, the things they had become, the relationships they had forged, that were now all alien to him.

Harry bowed his head but then, remembering Molly's words, looked up and looked Ron in the eyes.

"The pain I've caused…the things I've done to your family…and then, yes, I left. It was selfish and wrong. I left you to deal with things far worse than what I told myself I was going through. I deluded myself into thinking it was for the best, another mistake.

"And now I'm going to carry on doing it. I'm going to be so bold as to ask you Ron, and you also Hermione, for your forgiveness-as my friends, my only friends at times. The times I needed you most you were always there for me, and then, when you needed me, I threw it back in your faces. Most people would say that is unforgivable, yet here I am, asking for the impossible."

He stared from face to face defiantly, waiting for the rejection he knew must surely come, "Harry, we thought you were dead," he waited for the resentment with dread in each beat of his heart. "How can you believe that after that we would be willing to lose you again? If forgiveness is all it takes, them sign me up on the list, mate."

The last word of Ron's sentence caused a smile to beam on Harry's tired face for the first time in years. It broke through the usual haunted look that dwelt there with pure happiness. "Thankyou," he said quietly and then strode across the room and grabbed them each in a one-armed hug so brief that when he let go, Ron and Hermione both looked at each other in shock as confirmation that it had really happened.

Hermione suddenly grabbed him back in a gesture that was fast becoming usual, and hugged him. But the hug was too tight, and sent spasms running through Harry's chest again, he stepped back with a groan, clutching his chest as dizziness threatened to overcome him.

"What's wrong?" Hermione looked at him frantically, fear in her eyes,

"Stupefying spells…" Harry grunted.

"Oh, you have to lie down!" Hermione's worrying sent blissful warmth through Harry at it's familiarity as she threw a dirty look at Ron. "I'm stunned you even managed to wake up after just a couple of hours, that was strong stuff you were hit with…there's sure to be bruising…"

She pushed him up the stairs back to the room he had woken in, ordering him to lie down on the bed as she went to fetch something. When she returned she was carrying a small glass bottle with some liquid in it and a cloth. It seemed the comfortableness of the routine helped her, she certainly seemed easier as she made Harry remove his cloak, robes and undo his shirt so that she could dab the potion onto his chest which was, sure enough, purple and black all over.

"Thankyou Hermione," he mumbled, enjoying the cool numbing sensation now spreading through his throbbing body. She turned slightly pink as she concentrated on what she was doing, "For what, Harry?" she said it in almost a whisper, saying his name delicately as if it was something precious she was worried she'd break.

"For helping Ron to forgive-" his voice caught as she touched a particularly tender bruise, "-me." He let out the last word with a sigh, becoming strangely drowsy with the numbing effect of the potion, the warmth of the bed and the comforting touch of one of his best friends in the world. Through the haze of sleepiness he saw her bite her lip, "I'm so glad Harry you're-that you're not-that you're here." She avoided his gaze and pushed his shirt aside so that she could dab at his shoulders, not fully hiding the tears brimming over. They were, however, cut short by a gasp.

"Harry, what the hell is that?"

Harry, realising what she must've discovered, shifted uncomfortably. "A-a tattoo," he mumbled.

"What in the name of Merlin possessed you to-" her voice caught in her throat as if she was unable to voice such an atrocity.

Harry looked at his hands, he had completely forgotten about the tattoo, and was rather sorry she had found it. "After I left…I went through a rough patch, couldn't get off the Firewhiskey, you see…" he stared harder at his hands as he spoke sadly, "I got pretty plastered sometimes and, well, that's the result of one of the nights I wasn't really sober enough to control myself…" His face burned with embarrassment and he looked away as the still shocked Hermione traced the ink with her finger.

"But," she seemed to unstick her throat, "why, Harry, did you get a tattoo of a Hippogriff?"

He frowned almost comically, "I can't really remember, but I think it had something to do with rumour going around in sixth year that I had a tattoo of one of my chest…I guess it reminded me of Hogwarts"

Hermione simply shook her head and, to his surprise, looked sad, "You were that bad, huh? I mean, I knew you suffered a lot but, Harry; you actually had a problem with alcohol? I had an uncle who was alcoholic," she shuddered, "I know what that can do to a person…" She turned to look at him, determination in her eyes.

"That's how this all started, isn't it? We didn't talk to each other, and slowly we just kept on getting more and more distant. Harry, you have to promise me that you will talk to me about anything you are having a problem with, otherwise it will just happen all over again." Shocked by the fervour in her voice he nodded, her face broke into a smile.

"Now, you definitely need some sleep," she decided, eyeing him critically, "and some pyjamas, Harry, have you been sleeping in those clothes?" she asked scornfully. Harry looked at his hands again, remembering the number of times he hadn't bothered to get changed over the last few years. There was a habit he would have to break. Hermione collected some of Ron's nightwear and then, with one last beaming look, left Harry to fall into a deep sleep.

Dreams. The shadowy masked figures in a graveyard. The lifeless face of a young boy. A fluttering curtain in an archway with someone waiting just on the other side. Bodies lain out in a hall, row after row. A hooded figure reaching towards him with withered hands, sucking the happiness from him, stealing his soul…

It was strange to wake in a place that you had told yourself you would never see again. Harry had steeled himself time after time to accept his lot, he deserved to be separated from everything he loved after what he'd done to them. This was the logic he drummed into his mind, yet here he was, barely cost anything for his passage back into his first real home.

Barely cost anything but the emotions that still lurked there, those that threatened to overwhelm him a send him back into despair. When he had been alone he'd been able to wallow in these feelings without fear but now that he was…back they seemed to take on a much more sinister appearance, they were that which had caused him to leave in the first place. And with this realisation came an idea, a glimmer of some greater understanding that Harry now tried to catch hold of.

Could it be, he wondered, that these thoughts and feelings were all that separated him from those he loved? Was it not, as he had so long believed, the deeds that he set in motion, the lives lost due to him, that distanced him from the Weasley's and Hermione, but the reactions he had: caused by such events? Was the only reason he felt he could no longer live among real people not the acts he had performed, instead the very ideas he had created about himself? If so, he was the only thing standing between himself and acceptance from the people he loved.

This revelation was a glimpse of hope for Harry. Just being at the Burrow offered comfort and a glimmer of a chance at happiness that he had thought he would never feel again. The house that he had believed to be his prison during his depression was now the source of hope It was only now that he had lived four long, desperate years without it that he realised the house that was (and had always been) his home was the very thing that had been keeping him sane.

He sat up, examining Ron's pyjamas that smelt suspiciously of Hermione's perfume. Even this small thing seemed to increase the sprouting bud of happiness in his heart; the thought that his two best friends had found such contentment with each other was nothing less than brilliant.

But just as his mind thought this he found himself up and walking towards the door, he padded down the corridor, his legs seeming to know where he was going better than he did. He passed members of the family as he walked; they jumped when they saw him, the idea of his appearance still unexpected. They greeted him tentatively, even uncomfortably at times, he smiled back, equally hesitant.

And then he found himself outside the room he always knew he would end up at. This was his biggest mountain. He stared at it for he knew not how long, his thoughts churning up inside him with his emotions, crashing against his scarred heart like waves against a ship that had weathered too many storms. And then, as if it had grown impatient of his waiting, the door opened of its own accord.

Ginny Weasley looked pale and drawn, her shockingly red hair hung long around her face, contrasting with her ghostly complexion, yet she was still the most beautiful thing Harry had ever seen. His heart did a somersault and then seemed to plunge into despair. Ron and Hermione was more than he could ask for, did he really stand a chance with this desperate hope?

When she looked up she was faced with the sight of Harry clinging to the doorpost as if he was worried he would fall over, a torn expression on his face. But his eyes were instantly drawn to something small clinging to her legs; it appeared to be a puffskein with arms and legs. Ginny had frozen at the sight of Harry, but the puffskein seemed very much still active, jumping up and down in a way that made it even more puffskein-like.

"Ginny!" it whined, "Pick me up!" Ginny, trance like, swung the small pink thing into her arms with practised ease. Now it was on his level Harry saw that it was, infact, a small boy with a shock of familiarly pink hair, he was bundled up in outdoor clothes so that only his head showed. The boy stared at Harry with wide eyes.

"Ginny!" he whispered to the girl holding him, whose eyes were still very much fixed on Harry. It was the rather unsubtle whisper of child who doesn't realise his every word can be heard. "Who's that?"

Ginny seemed to regain the powers if speech, "That's Harry Potter, Teddy," she said, not looking at Harry any more. Teddy looked him up and down critically, his hair turning orange absentmindedly, "Harry Potter…" he tried the name out, clearly finding it familiar. His little face screwed up in thought, the shade of his hair turning even more violent. "We went to his funeral." Teddy beamed at Ginny, clearly proud with himself, but then his brow furrowed once more. "You said he was gone."

The small boy hardly seemed upset by the fact that a person who everyone said was 'gone' was now standing right in front of him. When Ginny didn't answer, however, he whispered again, "Ginny! Put me down!" She obeyed, and the four-year-old waddled over to Harry, rather encumbered by his attire. Harry bent down, resting so he was level with the boy.

"Hello Teddy." His voice was hoarse, and his eyes swam with tears. Teddy's hair turned pink again with pleasure at the fact that Harry knew his name.

"Hello Harry Potter," he chanted back.

Harry looked up, but Ginny did not meet his gaze. "He looks like Remus." He whispered quietly, trying not to let on the strength of the effect Teddy had had on him. "We're going to the park!" declared Teddy before Harry could speak again. "Do you want to come too?"

Harry did not look at Ginny again as he answered, "I would love too."

A/N: So this was going to be the last chapter but then I realised I couldn't fit it all in, which is rather annoying cus i thought, well, the beginning bit isn't so great but the ending will rock, only to find that the 'beginning bit' is actually the whole chapter! So luckily for you, there is still one more to come. Anyway, sorry, I had to put the tattoo thing in there because of my sister and our little jokes! Thankyou so so so so so so so MUCH to all my reviewers, alerters, favouriters and just general readers who happen to stop by. Last chappie coming soon :)