hello! updating this right now bc ffn got this much later than ao3 so ive got to catch it up lol pls dont expect the next chapter anytime soon đź’€

re this: one commenter mentioned it feels like filler, and ive got to agree: it is. but the reason im putting it in is bc i feel its necessary to create the conflict & backdrop.

so, theres gonna be a bit of repetition and recap, but i hope it doesnr get *too* boring, yeah?

Unfortunately for him, the universe seemed hell bent on not just sprinkling, but vigorously rubbing salt into his wounds. They'd gone from barely there to scabbed over to being ripped open and fully bleeding.

Graphic but…got the point across.

It honestly didn't feel that way at first. Harry had actually been eager when he'd seen the familiar owl slam straight into the window. He scrambled off the bed to get it open before the damn thing could kill itself on the fall down. Luckily, Harry managed to get a hold of Pig and the letter half undone from its leg without any damage.

Well, except a few ruffled feathers and some damaged pride but the owl was used to that. Harry set him down in Hedwig's cage where a bowl of water and some owl treats were handy. Thank god she'd gone for a fly or there'd be a tantrum to avert and he really wasn't in the mood to play mediator to a bunch of squabbling owls.

"Help yourself, Pig," he waved an absent hand before turning to the letter which turned out to be not one but two, upon inspection. With furrowed brows, Harry ripped the seal off the first one, immediately feeling baffled at seeing Hermione's blocky letters on the parchment. What the—?

Dear Harry, it began

I hope you've settled in well. I know the Dursleys are, well, horrid but I do hope they're treating you decently. I heard a certain someone had a chat with them so maybe that has a positive effect?

Don't be too startled that this is coming with Pigwidgeon; Ron sent me a letter and told me to attach any of mine to his if I wanted to send you one. Sometimes he can be quite thoughtful, don't you think?

Anyway, I just wanted to check in with you. I do hope you're doing well, Harry. Send me a letter whenever you can, and I'm sure the Weasleys would love to hear from you as well.

Love

Hermione

Harry's brow cleared at the explanation within, though something about the letter still nagged at him. The bit about 'a certain someone had a chat with them'—what was that supposed to mean? Did someone talk to the Dursleys? Who could—? Hell, who would do that?

Try as he might, he couldn't come up with anyone who'd have any reason to interact with the Dursleys, let alone in a way that helped Harry. And it wasn't like their sparkling personalities had gotten any better this summer—if Hermione hadn't included that little bit, he wouldn't even have been able to guess anything was different. Setting the matter aside for now since there wasn't much he could learn dwelling on it, he moved on to the next one which was, predictably, from Ron.

Harry!

Are the Dursleys treating you well then? I hope for their sake they are. I know it's only been a few days but I've already asked mum when you can come over and she gave the most annoying non-answer ever so I'm afraid there's nothing on that end, mate. Things at the Burrow are chaotic as ever. Fred and George have been holed up in their room, only come out for lunch and dinner, and that doesn't bode for anyone. Mum keeps sending them suspicious looks but they've managed to get past her so far. No guarantees how long it lasts, though.

Ginny's being weird—all…girlish and giggly and annoying. She blew up at me because I stared at her too long but c'mon, the smile looked deranged on her, okay? I can't be blamed.

Anyway, best be off. I can't make this too long or Pig'll nosedive well before reaching you. Can't have that.

Write back whenever you can.

Ron

He fell back on his bed, both letters clutched tight in his fingers. There was…something niggling at the back of his mind, something he couldn't place a finger on. It was great to hear from his friends, there was no doubt about that, but…

Harry sighed. Maybe it was just cabin fever. He was going stir crazy cooped up in here with nothing to do except weed the lawns and scrub the toilets and clean the house and cook increasingly dangerous food for his relatives. All that meat, butter, wine, and not a single green vegetable in sight. Maybe that'll finally do them in and he can be free to step out of the house.

The slightly morbid line of thinking didn't help with the feeling of claustrophobia, but it definitely made him snort and shake himself out of his paranoia. He dropped the letters on the side table, resolving to send a reply once Hedwig comes back. There wasn't any rush—it's not like he had anything exciting to share. Maybe…his list of chores?

Nah. No point in sharing the misery.

With the amusing image of his friends opening a page of parchment with the Dursley's weekly shopping list on his mind, he closed his eyes and quickly succumbed to sleep.

Another week had passed and Harry was proud to say it was a Christmas miracle he hadn't done something drastic with how things had been progressing.

His relatives had gotten worse. Harry's attempts to stay away from conflict had only heightened their own aggression, as if they couldn't stand to see him act so disinterested, needing to trigger a response from him. On the nightmare front, he'd been getting louder and louder with his screams and pleas, to the point he'd woken Uncle Vernon and Dudley twice by now. Both of those had resulted in some heavy threats and pointed gestures.

The weirdest things so far, though, were the letters from Ron and Hermione. Harry had written them about twice so far, each time asking for information on what was going on with the Wizarding World, with Voldemort—was anyone even doing anything? And each time he'd gotten an annoyingly vague response along the lines of 'Don't worry, Harry, I'm sure things are okay. Tell us about your vacation!' as if they didn't know very well that he hated talking about the Dursleys. That's not to even mention how unnerving it was to hear his stay here referred to as a 'vacation', not when it was the furthest thing from it.

It was extremely unlike them to treat him like a small child, having been through everything they had together and knowing what they do-that was usually the prerogative of every single adult around him and really, there was definitely something fishy going on. Sure, they'd had their moments when things were a little too unbelievable for any of their tastes, but to be outright dismissed like this? It felt…demeaning; Harry could admit to himself that he was expecting a bit more consideration from his best friends.

It was also in the way they wrote their letters that made him suspicious. The same words, the same phrases, the same tone. He knew things were…off, but he couldn't quite put a finger on it.

He hadn't been back for two weeks and he was already at the end of his tether. It felt like a fist pushing its way through his rib cage to squeeze his heart, harder with each day, making it impossible for him to breathe. Harry woke up gasping, Cedric's name on his lips, the sense of dread that came with it setting the tone for the rest of the day. There was nothing else to do, nowhere to go and he was struggling, more so than ever before.

Harry had always known how hostile the Dursleys' house was. It wasn't possible to grow up here and be ignorant of the fact. But it had never been as stark to him as this last fortnight. Seeing the unprovoked cruelty, the malice, on their faces—the way they'd let him starve without a single thought. Perhaps it was his experiences of the past year that put their actions in such horrific context. Harry had seen real evil in the eye and managed to come out alive at the other end of it and yet, yet the Dursleys bothered him this way.

He could duel Voldemort and escape with his life and sanity intact but two weeks with his relatives and he was spiraling. How was that for dramatic irony?

(There was a part of him-small, but powerful-that refused to acknowledge it, refused to think about how weak he was. He didn't want to believe how easily he was letting a bunch of mug-his relatives beat him down. He was supposed to be stronger than this, he'd definitely gotten out of worse but a few days in this house and he wasn't Harry Potter, Boy-Who-Lived anymore. No, he was back to being Boy Freak, back to cowering behind his own shadow and tripping over his own feet. He hated it, hated it, hated it.)

As Harry kept falling deeper into that line of thought, a tap on the window drew his attention to a small post owl hovering with a rolled up bundle tied to its leg. Harry opened the window, letting it perch on the edge of Hedwig's cage. Thankfully, she didn't mind sharing her space for a few minutes.

"Another one, huh?" Harry muttered, depositing the required change in the owl's little pouch, untying the newspaper from the proffered leg. He dropped the paper on a pile of older, untouched ones, choosing to watch the owl fly away instead of opening it. It was interesting, the Daily Prophet, because Harry had no interest in actually reading it. Newspapers and magazines were usually Hermione's forte, Harry much prefers absorbing current events through osmosis by being in her orbit. But after the…events of the Third Task, he'd realised it was necessary for him to do some of the heavy lifting himself. Not least because the importance of being prepared was thoroughly drilled into it. So, though his experiences cautioned him against it, he'd taken out a hasty subscription a day before leaving Hogwarts.

Of course, just because he had the newspaper didn't mean he actually read it. It hadn't helped how things were going because it meant he was in no mood to make it worse by subjecting himself to the, no doubt, idiocy of the Daily Prophet.

Today, though. Today he was in a weird mood and maybe he thought rifling through the printed columns would shock-reset him, maybe he was just a little too bored, or maybe he'd finally snapped—whatever the reason, he decided to pick up the day's newspaper and actually read it.

A half hour later, boy was he glad he did.

Because as he flipped through the pages of the newspaper, not only was there not a single mention of the events of the Third Task, but right there, in the middle, on a nice double page spread was Harry's face, blown up alongside a little stamp sized photo of Cedric, a meager obituary dedicated to him that was more about taking potshots at Harry than honouring a boy gone before his time.

Across all the papers he'd accumulated over the weeks, there were little comments here and there buried amongst other articles. On its own, it didn't count for much, but taken together—as any regular reader would—it painted a…clear picture.

Harry Potter was raving. Harry Potter was delusional.

Harry Potter was not the Saviour they were expecting.

Harry read through the entire thing once, twice, once more- the words refusing to sink in beyond surface level. No way was this legal…was it? They couldn't just—?

But they could. It was right there in front of him. Slander, pure and simple.

(Should he really be surprised, though? Wasn't the entirety of the previous year exactly like this? Deemed guilty for words he hadn't said and acts he hadn't committed? Tried in the court of public opinion again and again and again?)

Staring at the picture of him on the third page - taken right after he'd gotten back from the Graveyard, his face gaunt and bloody, eyes intense even through flat ink, looking exactly as unhinged as they were making him out to be - Harry was taken by the overwhelming urge to laugh. Not just laugh, but cackle, with his entire chest. He barely suppressed the urge, recognising that the Dursleys were still in the house, and he didn't want to bring the Daily Prophet's words to life just yet.

Instead, he got up from the bed and mechanically made his way to the bathroom. Turned the knob. Stepped up to the sink.

Splashed some water on his face, not even caring as it dripped down down his wrist and into his sleeve or that it soaked the front of his shirt. He gripped the side of the counter, barely in control of his actions at this point.

His thoughts were—a whirlwind- he didn't know what to feel, or think.

Harry had lived most of his life under a pretence of falsehood. He was, depressingly, used to being thought of as something - someone - he was not. After all, hadn't the Dursleys brought him up thinking his name was Freak? Hadn't he been unable to respond to Harry the first day of primary? Did not the entirely of Privet Drive consider him a mannerless, godless deviant? Did he not enter the Wizarding World—what was supposed to be his refuge—already cemented in people's memories and opinions?

Unlike what everyone around him thought, Harry was neither a pampered little prince nor a live fuse ready to be lit. He was just…tired. He'd been living in survival mode since before he even knew what it was (Godrics Hollow. A jet of green light. Screams. Silence) and this was no different. Year after year, he'd been confronted with the fact that nothing he did was worth a damn, and that he had no one to rely on but himself. It had been a long time since Harry had out any faith in his relatives but he'd truly thought this new world would be different- that he would be different.

But no. It was the same old, wasn't it?

(On some level, Harry recognised he was perhaps overreacting. He didn't usually have a tendency towards dramatics—most of it was conditioned out of him—but it was either lose it in the privacy of his mind or out loud in a house with people who despised his very existence. The choice wasn't so hard then, wasn't it?)

He took a shuddering deep breath, lifting his head up with Herculean effort, and looked at the mirror in front of him.

And promptly snorted at his reflection.

God but he was a mess, wasn't he? Not that it was surprising—Harry hadn't had a decent night's sleep in weeks, the recent nightmares hadn't made it any better, and the constant-being-on-edge combined with the lack of decent human interaction was enough to drive anyone to the edge, let alone someone like him who'd been there long before this final straw.

And it was the final straw, wasn't it? Because it was one thing to constantly undermine him and paint him as a liar when it was just his head on the cutting block. Sure, everyone thought he cheated his way into the Triwizard Tournament, but that was fine, because he was really the only one being affected.

This was different. This was about something much larger than him, or any one person. Hinting at his delusions and untrustworthy character wasn't so innocent anymore, not when the issue was something as serious as the resurrection of a Dark Lord, one who had the ability to bring their entire society to its knees. It wasn't as simple as slandering a teenage boy anymore— it was wilfully misleading people by covering up information that could very well save lives.

That- that Harry couldn't stand by, not quietly and meekly. Not when he could - possibly - do something about it.

(What that was, he wasn't sure yet. But he was still the Boy-Who-Lived and he was still the Triwizard Champion and all of that had to count for something. He was gonna find out what that was)

First things first, though, he needed to get information. And he knew just where to get it from too.

this is an extremely self-indulgent fic. everything im including in it is bc i want to read it and like it so it might not always make sense bc of that. so, while i always appreciate constructive criticism, please keep that mind.

hope u enjoyed it!