Disclaimer: Harry Potter and his world belong to J.K. Rowling. This story belongs to me.

Sticks, Stones and Broken Bones

Chapter 15: Keep Calm and Carry On

"Harry?"

Harry raised his head slowly, his eyes glazed over as he made out the outline of Mr Weasley in front on him. Harry was still sat on the floor of the Quidditch shop, staring off into space and with no idea of how much time had passed since Snape had stalked out.

In fact, his mind was mercifully blank.

Blinking slowly as unwelcome thoughts began to trickle in through the exhaustion that clouded his mind, Harry vaguely registered the concern and worry that lined Mr Weasley's face as the man bent over to see if he and Ron were okay.

"Come along, Harry," Mr Weasley said softly, although Harry thought there was a tinge of worry in his voice too. Harry frowned. "Let's get you home. Why don't you help him up, Ron?"

Harry felt arms grab him by the shoulders, the touch gentle and reassuring, but he couldn't prevent himself from flinching slightly at the contact. His mind may have been foggy and exhausted but his nerves felt like they were lit fuses, his body ready to spark into life at the earliest provocation.

"Easy mate," Ron muttered with a frown.

Tentatively, the hands remained, and Harry found himself being pulled up to his feet. Pain flared up in his back at the unexpected movement, but though he couldn't prevent the hiss of pain from escaping his lips, he did his best to push the feeling away.

Emotions meant weakness, and weakness was vulnerability. He clung to his armour, the armour that had protected him for all those lonely years on the streets, as well as the years of degrading and bullying at the Dursleys. He shut his mind off from the pain, the memory of the fight, Malfoy, Snape...everything.

Numbness had overcome him once the fight was over, and he pulled it back now. He didn't want to think. He didn't want to explain to the worried Mr Weasley, who he had come to respect in the last week, why he had just beaten up a boy he had only just met. He didn't want to look at Ron and see the fear in his eyes.

Harry clenched his aching fists to dispel the pain in his heart. He had been through worse before and he would no doubt go through worse in the future. At least he was okay physically; there were no broken bones this time for one thing. His knuckles were a bit sore, but that was nothing in the grand scheme of things, and he pushed the discomfort aside with little care.

In fact, Harry was actually more worried about how the Weasleys were going to react to what had happened. They had made it clear that he was welcome in their home, but what would they think now? He'd tried so hard to be respectful, polite and not be a bother or a burden, but in one afternoon he'd surely ruined it. Aberforth had tried to tell him that the Weasleys were used to trouble, and Harry wanted to believe him, but he couldn't help the doubts that were clouding his mind.

He always been told he was too much trouble.

All he wanted to do now was go home. He only hoped he was still welcome and that he still had a home to go to.

Sighing slightly, Harry looked to Mr Weasley and saw the worry and confusion in his kind eyes. Harry hated the stress he was causing the man, but he knew he would have to face the music eventually. He would accept whatever the man decided to do with him, even, he thought with a heavy heart, if he wanted him to leave. He had survived this long on his own and Harry had no doubt, even though he had become attached to the Weasleys, he could survive on his own again.

No matter what happened, even if it was the worst case scenario, he would not let it break him. Not after everything he'd been through.

With this new focus breaking through the fog in his mind, Harry shrugged the hand from his shoulder and walked slowly but purposefully to the front door of the shop, his head raised defiantly even though his heart was beating traitorously in his chest.

"Harry," Mr Weasley said, almost pleadingly this time, but Harry refused to turn his head.

Harry clenched his fists tightly, ignoring the sting of pain in his knuckles, and pushed his way through the door and into the bright light of the bustling wizarding street. Light and noise hit him as soon as his feet touched the cobbled road of Diagon Alley, overcoming his senses and leaving him standing bewildered and unsure in the doorway. It was too much, too soon. His nerves were on edge, and all Harry could see was threats in front of him. He closed his eyes, clenching them tightly as he stood there, frozen in the sunlight.

Harry felt a hand reach tentatively to rest on his shoulder, but Harry jumped at the unexpected contact. Turning around quickly, Harry realised with flushed cheeks, that it was only Mr Weasley. Though Harry turned away from the man, he didn't shrug the man's hand away. He was just too tired to fight it at the moment.

Still shaking slightly, Harry allowed Mr Weasley to guide him through the busy streets and back to the pub so that they could floo home. He didn't resist; Harry was just glad that he didn't have to think anymore. The fog was becoming more and more numbing to his mind, and he welcomed it.

"No..."

Hands grabbed at Harry's tattered shirt, pulling him into a side alley, away from the crowd.

"Leave me alone," Harry begged hoarsely. He fought and struggled but there was only so much his starving body could do. He was weak, and no match for the boys who had taken him.

"Poor little street boy," they mocked nastily, pushing him against the wall. His back hit the bricks with a thud, pain erupting from the area. He cried out, but the alley was empty; there was no one to save him.

He was alone.

Hands grappled with his clothes, searching for prizes whilst he was held back. Over and over again, the boys pushed him as he struggled. The little money he had gathered that day was stolen, his shoes and glasses too.

Anger and fear coursed through him, and he could sense that familiar feeling building up within his chest. It burst out before the thought had even fully formed in his mind, knocking the boy who held him to the floor.

Harry slid down the wall to the floor as the hands left him, scrambling away as quickly as he could, his fists raised shakily in front of himself.

"Leave m-me alone," he threatened desperately. "I...I haven't got anything. Leave me alone."

They ignored him, anger burgeoning on their features, advancing with fists raised and fury in their eyes. Harry scrambled backwards until his back hit the wall with a painful thud. There was nowhere else for him to go.

There was no escape.

No! No, no, no...

Harry shot up out of bed, his voice muffled in his throat as he tried to contain his screams. Sweat dripped off his forehead and his hair, and caused his thin pyjama top to cling to his skinny chest.

His eyes were dulled and clouded over, and his breaths were coming hard and heavy. It was a few minutes before he was able to calm down long enough to even realise where he was.

The first thing he noticed was the comforting sound of Ron snoring in the bed beside his. At first Harry had hated the noise, oddly on edge with having another person so close to him whilst he slept, but now he found the idea strangely reassuring. It reminded him that he wasn't on his own anymore, and that he was safe now.

He was glad though, that he hadn't woken Ron up. Harry didn't want his friend to see him like this. To see him so weak. It had been bad enough in Diagon Alley, Harry thought. Since returning to the Burrow, Harry had done everything he could to try to act as normally as possible, hoping, somewhat irrationally, that the Weasleys would just pretend it had never happened.

Ron had so far not mentioned it, apparently happy enough to give Harry the space he needed, but Harry knew that the red-headed boy was desperately containing the questions that he wanted to ask, and that they would come eventually. But Harry didn't want to explain it. He wasn't even sure if he could.

All he knew was that he'd lost control.

He hadn't meant to, and hadn't even been aware of what he had been doing at the time, but the simple fact was that he had lost control. And that scared him. It scared him more than the nightmare that still lingered on his mind.

He was safe at the Weasleys, much safer than he had been on the streets. His life wasn't threatened daily here, nor did he have to fear attacks every time he walked around a corner.

So why had he lost control? Was that his life now; a ticking time bomb that could go off at any moment? Would he ever be normal?

And more scary a thought; would it happen again?

Harry pulled himself out of bed, his feet padding softly onto the floor as he tried to control his shaking limbs. He had to get outside. He wasn't running away, but the confining walls of the Burrow were doing little to comfort him.

He needed fresh air. He needed to see the sky and feel the wind whip through his hair. After living on the streets for so long, he had grown used to finding comfort in the freedom of the night sky.

Slowly he crept through the silent and sleeping house. It was late; Harry knew there would be no one awake at this late hour. For once, he welcomed the isolation, the loneliness. No one could understand what he had been through, and what he couldn't seem to get over. No one would ever truly understand what it had been like for him at the Dursleys, nor what his life had been like on the streets. The constant fear striking at his chest, day in, day out. The hunger that ravaged him, something that had never seemed to go away, even if he'd managed to get a decent meal for once. The pain of a beating, and the pain of knowing that there was no one there to comfort him afterwards or to make it better.

He was alone in knowing how that felt, because he had been alone all his life. Just because he had friends, and - dare he say it - a family now, didn't mean he felt any better about what had happened to him. It didn't make it go away...

The cool night-time air hit his face in a gust of wind as he stepped out of the kitchen door into the garden. He breathed it in deeply, relishing the time he had to himself once again. To be himself; the poor little street boy who had been hurt far too much, and who didn't have all the answers. And who didn't have to have all the answers.

When he had got back from Diagon Alley, pale and shaking, he'd run straight up to the room he shared with Ron without waiting for anyone else to come through the Floo.

He'd lain on his side, his back still painful, and had waited for the inevitable to come. He hadn't even considered fighting it. He'd vowed that he would take whatever they chose to do to him, whether it be punishment or simply getting rid of him altogether. He'd known that he was refusing to think the best of them, even though they'd done nothing as of yet to break his trust, but he still, to this day, couldn't help that little part of him that struggled to believe that any good would come of anything.

However, when the door had eventually creaked open, and Harry had sat up to meet his fate, Mrs Weasley hadn't seemed angry or cross; she'd only seemed worried and...sad. Immensely sad.

Without a word, she'd made her way over his bed and had sat next to him, stoutly ignoring the fact that Harry had immediately tensed up. Gently, she'd reached over to pull his jumper and t-shirt up so that she could inspect his back. Harry, for his part, had been unresisting in his exhaustion. Silently, she'd begun to apply a soothing cream to the bruise Harry had known would be there. She'd never said a word as she'd worked, a fact for which Harry would be eternally grateful for. He'd found it oddly comforting. She hadn't tried to find out what happened, nor had she made him explain himself. No, all she'd done was make sure he was feeling alright.

It was strange, he'd thought, after she had left him alone once more, obviously having realised that he didn't want much company right now; Mrs Weasley had clearly known that something had happened in the Quidditch shop, but Harry, used to being blamed for everything that had ever gone wrong, had been surprised to find that she didn't care about that.

No, not that she didn't care. Just that...she cared more that he was alright.

Harry smiled as he watched the sun rise. She'd cared enough to fix him up, even though the fact that he'd been hurt had been his own fault in the first place.

She'd cared; it was a novel sensation for the boy, but Harry found that he liked it.

A few days later, Harry climbed out of bed with what seemed to be a thousand butterflies fluttering around in his stomach. He was nervous, and for good reason, he thought.

Today was his first day working for Aberforth. It had been a few days since the Malfoy incident, but Harry's head was no clearer on what had happened than it had been at the time. He was nervous, not about the work he was going to be told to do, but more about what Aberforth would say about recent events. The man seemed to have an uncommon ability to just simply know that something was wrong. He'd only met the man once, and yet Aberforth had already got Harry to talk about what had been bothering him, something no one else had ever really managed to do.

Harry was stubborn but it seemed that Aberforth was just as stubborn, if not more so, and although Harry didn't want to talk about anything now, he was scared that as soon as he saw those bright blue eyes, his secrets would come spilling out whether he wanted them to or not.

In other circumstances, Harry would just avoid the man, and the problem, altogether, but in this instance, he found that he couldn't simply pass up this opportunity, no matter how much he wanted to pretend like nothing was wrong.

Harry had always wanted a job, especially since he had been living on the streets. A job had always been the Holy Grail for him; the one way he had ever been able to envision himself actually living a real life.

Most kids, when they're young, dream of being an astronaut or a fireman or something like that, but Harry had never cared. His dream wasn't that he would have a cool job someday. It was just that he would be earning enough to get his own place, and buy his own food, and that one day he would have enough spare change so that he could buy his own clothes and books without having to take them. That he could earn enough money so that he would never have to beg on the streets again, or know the meaning of an empty stomach.

Of course, for Harry, living on the streets as he had, finding anyone willing to employ him had been almost impossible. Unsurprisingly, most people he had tentatively approached for odd jobs had dismissed him in seconds, simply on appearance. No one wanted to hire a dirty, smelly, orphaned street rat. Even worse, those few people who had looked past his grimy looks, had simply told him he was too young and to come back when he was older.

It had been painful to walk away after that kind of dismissal. It wasn't like he had a nice home to go back to until he was old enough to work. Harry hadn't, at the time, even been sure he would survive until his next birthday. Life had been getting harder and harder, and without a job Harry knew it was never going to get any easier. He'd hated begging from the first time he had forced himself to do it, and he despised stealing with a passion, but without a job, he'd had little choice. It was either that, or die; the simple harsh truth of Harry's life on the streets was that he'd had to look after himself.

But then he'd helped a red-headed stranger and his whole life had changed faster than he could comprehend it.

Now, not only did he have a real home, decent clothes and three square meals a day, he also had a job. He had the means to earn some money, rather than having to beg or steal it. Whether he needed it now or not was irrelevant; it mattered more to him than Aberforth or Mr Weasley would ever know. It meant security for the boy in a way that even a roof over his head didn't provide.

He vowed to himself, as he made his way downstairs for breakfast, that he would be the perfect employee. He would do whatever Aberforth asked, and he would do it with surety and efficiency. Harry wouldn't make Aberforth regret taking him on.

He had stayed in so many places over the years, always moving, always leaving something behind, that the meaning of home meant little if anything to him. He just didn't understand the concept. But a job? A job provided him with a commitment in a way that even the Burrow didn't do. It tied him here; to Aberforth, to the Weasleys, to the magical world. By accepting the job, he was committing himself to this new world, this new life.

Harry sighed deeply. It was a big step, but one he was ready for. It was a step he had been waiting to take for his whole life.

"Mr Dumbledore, Sir?" Harry called as he regained his balance after stumbling through the Floo. The pub was empty although it wasn't late and Harry felt the tendrils of unease begin to rise in his chest. Harry looked around somewhat nervously, but he couldn't spot his new boss anywhere. "Sir, I'm here."

"Through the back, Harry," came a gruff voice from the open door at the back of the pub. Harry recognised it as belonging to his new boss, but the fact that he couldn't see the man made him uneasy. Harry had walked into too many bad situations in his colourful past to stop being cautious now.

Tentatively, Harry walked slowly to the back door, still confused as to what was going on. He was tense, ready to spring into action if necessary. Poking his head around the open door, Harry saw that the door led to a small concrete yard. What he found in that yard surprised him.

Stood around Aberforth, bleating loudly, were three gruff goats.

"Sir?" Harry asked tentatively, as he looked at the scene with mild consternation, his heartbeat levelling slightly now that he knew he wasn't in danger. No wonder the pub was so grimy, Harry thought, eyebrows raised; the man had goats living on the premises.

"It's not 'Sir', Harry," Aberforth corrected, his attention still firmly on the goats. "Now instead of hanging around in the doorway, why don't you come meet my goats?"

"Erm...okay," mumbled Harry. Quietly, Harry came through the door and walked slowly over to the goats. The floor, that Harry had expected to be concrete, was in fact covered in hay and what appeared to be animal droppings. Anyone else would've been disgusted by it, but Harry had slept in some pretty disgusting places and the smell didn't bother him all that much.

"Now," began Aberforth gruffly, as he stroked the head of one of the goats. "These are my friends and I trust you'll treat them with the respect they deserve?"

The gruff voice that Aberforth normally used was slightly gentler when he spoke those last words, so Harry knew it was no threat. Nervously, Harry nodded his head. One of the goats butted his head gently against his leg, and Harry looked with concern over to Aberforth. He'd never really had much experience with animals, apart from shooing them away, and he had no idea what to do.

"Just give him a little stoke, lad," Aberforth suggested gruffly, having noticed Harry's reluctance. "He won't bite. Well...he won't bite you at any rate."

The last part was muttered, almost as if the old man was talking to himself, but Harry caught it, and it certainly didn't do anything for his nerves.

Slowly, Harry raised a pale hand and placed it on the goat's head, ready to pull it back at a moment's notice, just in case the goat decided it didn't like him. To his surprise though, the goat just bleated happily and nudged Harry in the leg in what seemed to be an affectionate way.

"His name's Brian," Aberforth told him, a small smile on his face as he looked towards the boy. "This here is Wulfric, and that fine chap over in the corner is Percival."

"Hi, Brian," Harry said quietly as he continued to stroke the goat between his small horns.

"Here," Aberforth said, chucking over a small bag. "Give him some food. He'll be hungry."

Harry opened up the bag and pulled out some grass. His eyebrows rose in surprise; he had expected some sort of meat or something.

"Goats don't eat much more than grass and shrubs," Aberforth told him, having noticed Harry confusion. "Since we don't have much in the way of shrubs here, they make do with this."

"Don't they get kind of...confined here?" Harry asked curiously as he fed a handful of grass to the eager goat. The yard wasn't very big, especially for three goats, and it was surrounded by fairly high walls on all sides. "You know, wouldn't they be happier... running free?"

"They don't stay here all the time," Aberforth replied gruffly. "Only every now and then. Most of the time they roam the hills around Hogwarts. They like the attention they get here, though."

"Mmm," muttered Harry absently as he continued to feed Brian. After a few moments, the goat seemed to get bored of Harry's attention and moved over to the corner to join one of the other goats.

"So..." Harry began as he watched the goat leave. "What is it you want me to do, sir?"

"Harry, I know I'm to be your boss now, but don't call me sir," Aberforth said, leaving the goats behind as he went over to join Harry. "Makes me feel like my brother."

Silently, Aberforth gestured for Harry to follow him, a small sense of trepidation making it's way onto the young boy's features as they made their way back into the pub.

"Now, about your job," Aberforth began as he sat at one of the stools at the bar. Harry, somewhat unsurely, sat next to him. "Let me get a few things straight. I'm no slave driver. If you don't feel comfortable doing something, just say so and they'll be no hard feelings. You're here to help me out, but it'll be no help to me if you've got a problem with what you're doing. I'm not going to take advantage of you. Understand, lad?"

"Yes," Harry replied, almost biting his tongue to stop himself saying 'sir'.

"One more thing, and then we'll get started," Aberforth continued once he was satisfied with Harry's reply. "Now, Arthur's mentioned that you've had some reservations about the whole talking part of this deal."

Harry nodded unsurely, his gaze dropping to knees. Part of him hated himself for being so weak, but he couldn't help it any more than he could help breathing. He'd never had anyone to talk to before, so it felt very unnatural to the timid boy.

"Well, I just wanted to say, lad," Aberforth continued gruffly. "That I'm not going to make you do anything that you don't want to do. Like I said last time, I'm nothing like my brother."

"Mr Weasley said it might help...you know, to talk?" said Harry tentatively, as he fiddled with a loose thread of the sleeve of his jumper. "That it might...make me feel better or something..."

"It might," Aberforth agreed grimly. "It might not. There are no guarantees. Either way, it's up to you. You'll have your job either way. That is if you still want it?"

Harry did his best not to seem too eager with his replying nod, but the small smile tugging at Aberforth's lips suggested that he hadn't been entirely successful.

"What exactly will this job be?" asked Harry carefully. "You, erm...you didn't really mention much in your letter."

"I just need someone to help out around here," replied Aberforth. "It can get kind of lonely for an old man like me, and I like you, lad. I wouldn't mind your company every now and then."

Harry hadn't thought of that. Aberforth had seemed so comfortable last time Harry had met him that it hadn't even occurred to him that the old man was unhappy. Oddly, Harry felt a strange sense of pity building within him. Pity mixed with understanding; Harry knew how it felt to be lonely as well.

Shaking his head slightly, Harry realised that Aberforth had begun to speak again, and he forced his attention back to the old man.

"Truth be told," Aberforth continued, "I don't get a lot of customers so there's not much you can do on that side of things. Although Albus mentioned that you shouldn't be paraded around the Wizarding world just yet, so maybe that's for the best. Today, I was wondering if you'd help me out with my goats. They make a hell of a mess, but they seem a bit adverse to magic, so I have to clean up by hand. I could use a little extra help?"

"Sure," Harry agreed. He'd never been afraid of getting his hands dirty, and was willing to do whatever it took to keep this job.

"Come on, then," Aberforth said gruffly as he led the way back into the back yard. "Let's get started."

He handed Harry a shovel and picked one up for himself. Without further ado, the old man, with strength belying his age, began to shovel the mixture of hay and excrement into a wheel barrow. Harry readjusted his own shovel in his hand before immediately joining the old man in the smelly work.

For a few minutes, neither spoke, revelling instead in the satisfaction of the manual labour. Despite the smell and the disgusting nature of what he was doing, Harry found himself enjoying the physicality of the task. He's missed out on that recently. Quite apart from getting satisfaction from doing a job well done, Harry had always found that his nightmares were less intense when he went to bed exhausted.

"Now, how've you been since I last spoke to you, lad?" Aberforth asked after a few moments, taking a small breather as he petted one of his goats affectionately. "Feeling more settled in at the Weasleys these days? I noticed that Arthur didn't accompany you today."

"I'm fine on my own," Harry shrugged as he took a moment to wipe the sweat from his face. "Anyway, I think I might...I might have let him down..."

Harry dropped his gaze to the dirty floor they were trying to clear up, desperate not to let his emotions get the better of him. He'd struggled in the last few days, half-expecting punishment still to be given to him when he was least expecting it. The fact that the Weasleys had not pushed him away only served to make him more confused.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Aberforth asked, as he once again picked up his shovel and resumed work. The fact that Aberforth's attention was not fixed on Harry actually made it easier for the shy boy, and it gave him a little time to ponder the question without putting him under any pressure.

Harry had been quiet for so much of his life, that he almost found it hard to speak at all. He wasn't mute, not by any stretch of the imagination, but he did find it a struggle at times to gather the courage to form the words he wanted to say.

At the Dursleys, no one had cared for his opinion, going even so far as to hurt him when he gave it, and on the streets there had been no one there to listen full stop. His voice had still worked, and his thoughts had still formed in his head, but he'd never really had anyone to talk to before.

And now that there actually was someone who wanted to listen, Harry was finding it extraordinarily hard to form the words his mind wanted him to say.

"I got into a fight," Harry admitted, taking a deep breath to calm his nerves. "I just...I lost it..."

"What do you mean?" Aberforth said as they both continued to work. The fact that they were actively doing something as they talked actually made it easier for Harry to speak.

"He pushed me," Harry told him quietly, his eyes focused on his shovel. "Malfoy pushed me, and it was like something just came over me."

Harry took another deep, steadying breath to calm himself down, and for his part, Aberforth remained silent as he patiently waited for Harry to speak.

"I punched him then, I think," Harry whispered, his words almost lost over the sound of the goats bleating.

"You think?" prompted Aberforth, his gruff voice more gentle for once.

"I...couldn't do anything to stop myself," Harry continued after taking a moment to consider his words. "My head...it felt like fog. I...erm...I didn't know what had...happened until Ron came over to me. I just saw red."

Harry raised his head tentatively, half-scared to see the disappointment his the old man's eyes, but when his gaze finally met Aberforth's, the young boy saw nothing but understanding. Even so, Harry felt like he had to explain himself. Swallowing deeply, Harry began to speak.

"I...I don't like hurting people," Harry said somewhat desperately. "I know what it's like...you know...to be hurt. I don't want to become like them. I'm not like them!"

"I know you're not, lad," Aberforth reassured him gruffly, a reassuring expression fixed on his face. There was no disappointment there, and Harry felt himself relax slightly. "I reckon you just lost control, that's all. Happens to the best of us."

Harry frowned at the way Aberforth had said that. "What do you mean? Has something like that happened to you?"

Instead of answering the question outright, Aberforth simply said, "People like us...we have certain experiences that we'd rather forget?"

It was phrased as a question and Harry felt himself replying almost against his will; after taking a deep breath, he nodded slowly.

"Well, sometimes, if we try to push those bad memories away...they can come back to haunt us," Aberforth said grimly, his attention focused on his shovel as he carried on with the task.

"So what happened...it was...like a flashback?" Harry said, pausing for a moment.

"Something like that," Aberforth replied gruffly. "Like I said, it happens to the best of us."

Harry felt the clenching in his chest lighten slightly as he considered the older man's words. He hadn't, as Harry had perhaps expected, simply dismissed his worries as nonsense. Nor, Harry realised, had Aberforth told him that everything would be alright and that he'd get over it. In fact, all Aberforth had done was tell the simple truth; that it was a terrible thing to be haunted by, but he was not alone in suffering from it. It helped more than Harry could say.

"How do you deal with it, then?" Harry found himself asking. It was all well and good that, if not common, these flashback things did happen to others as well, but it wasn't enough. Harry was concerned with what to do to stop it happening again.

"I find talking helps," Aberforth answered, raising his eyes to meet Harry's. "And time. Some things you'll never get over, but they get less...intense after a while. And you've found a good family in the Weasleys. Let them try to help you. Don't push them away."

"I'm not a kid anymore," Harry said with a frown. "I'm not some child who needs a hug to make it all better."

"I never said you were, lad," Aberforth said, his tone full of understanding. "But sometimes we all need a bit of comfort and there's no sense in ignoring that. Embrace it, I say."

That was all well and good, Harry thought, coming from a man who lived in an empty pub with three goats.

Harry was pulled out of his musing when Aberforth asked, "Out of curiosity, how old are you?"

"Erm...twelve," Harry answered, frowning. "Wait...what date is it?"

"It's the 25th of July, I believe," Aberforth answered after a moment's thought.

"Then yeah, I'm still twelve," Harry replied quietly. "I'll be thirteen next week though. On the 31st."

"Well happy birthday for then, lad," Aberforth said with a small smile, before resuming with the work.

Harry shrugged. His birthdays had never been anything special, and he had no reason to think this one would be any different. Aberforth noticed the slightly odd reaction, but didn't comment on it.

"You said you thought you'd let Arthur down?" Aberforth prompted, momentarily taking Harry by surprise and slightly off-guard.

"Yeah," Harry stuttered, after taking a moment to gather his thoughts. "I mean...I keep messing up. I just can't seem to be normal."

"And how did he react to the fight in particular," Aberforth asked with a frown, ignoring that last admittance for the moment.

"He...didn't really," Harry replied quietly. "I mean, he hasn't even mentioned it. That's part of the problem..."

"You expected to be punished," Aberforth said, voicing Harry's thoughts.

"Well, yeah," Harry replied, stopping work for a moment to run a hand through his untidy hair. "I mean...I know it was wrong, what I did. I just don't get why they haven't said anything."

"Adults aren't perfect either, lad," Aberforth said gruffly. "Though I suspect you know that better than most."

Harry didn't say anything, but the expression in his eyes spoke for him.

"I suspect Arthur and Molly haven't said anything because they don't know what to say," Aberforth continued simply.

"Then what am I supposed to do?" Harry asked, somewhat desperately. He wanted nothing more than to put that stupid fight behind him, but at the moment it was still hanging over him, ready to come back to haunt him when he was least expecting it.

"Have you tried talking to them about it?" Aberforth enquired gently. "I reckon they were trying to give you some space. They probably thought you didn't want to talk about it."

"I didn't really," Harry mumbled. "I just...hate not knowing what's going on."

"I can understand that," Aberforth admitted. "But you'd be surprised how much the Weasleys will understand as well. I know you've had a few experiences that mean that trusting is hard for you, but I reckon they genuinely have your best interests at heart. And if you don't tell them what's wrong, how can you expect them to help you?"

"I suppose...I can try," Harry said, after swallowing nervously.

"That's all anyone can ask," Aberforth said with a nod.

Harry didn't say much after that, but the silence wasn't unwelcome. He had a lot to think about.

A/N- Grr, another chapter I'm unhappy with. This one felt forced as I was writing it, but it's been such a long time since my last update that I felt I couldn't wait any longer to post. So, sorry if it's not up to usual standards. I've also been re-reading some of my older chapters and I've found so many little mistakes that I think I'm going to have to spend some time fixing them. If the next chapter is a little long in coming, that's why.

On a brighter note though, I have recently posted a new one-shot in which Harry gets drunk and is found by an annoyed Snape, which so far has received 50 reviews! Thank you to everyone who has given me such great feedback so far.

I've also got a Christmas one-shot in the works, so keep an eye out for that!

Anyway, thanks for reading!