When I take my head out of the fire, the flames turn back to their orangish shade dancing lazily amidst the coals. I stand a moment there, kneeling in front of the fireplace gathering my energies. I feel quivering all of sudden in the middle of this forlorn night. Weariness is menacing to overcome me. I'm starting to feel this is more than I can handle but I'm still of the same mind regarding St. Mungo's. If I can prevent it, I will. They would just made him swallow any kind of potions to calm his nerves, but the problem is the mind. I always felt the magical community is underdeveloped in the mind field. They tend to cure everything by potions or magic. They don't give much space to psyche treatment.
Probably that's why there are so many dark wizards at large. You just need to see what kind of dismal place Azkaban is to understand their policy on wrongdoers. It's all about punishment. They just want them to disappear from the magical community and hopefully never go back. You finish there notwithstanding the gravity of your felony. The same if you have killed or pickpocketed.
That cannot be right. I wonder, if that deranged Death Eater would have received a different attention in all those years in there, would have still nurtured, year after year, all that bitter rancour against Harry that brought him to do what he did. If he should have been in a better environment, his mind occupied with something else instead of boredom brought by inactivity, have the chance to receive some active help like a counsellor, maybe, and just maybe, all this could have been prevented.
But I don't pride myself to have all the answers. Perhaps he was bad at heart if it's possible to be bad at heart. Most probably he was just very much troubled. Like Harry.
I gather all my strength and I go back to the living room sure to find him there. The room is pitch black, but I perceive him sitting on the edge of the bed, immobile.
'What's going on?' I ask resolutely.
He startles at my words that ring into the silence and I see his head turning toward me, but he doesn't utter a sound. To give him time to make order in his mind I decide to prepare a tea, I ask him if he wants one and I perceive a nod.
When I got back with the fuming cups he was still sitting where I left him.
'So, what's going on?' I repeat steadfast giving him a cup.
'I got a nightmare'
'Yes, I spotted' I answer somehow impatiently 'What about?'
'One of my nightmares of the graveyard'
He recounted me of those nightmares several times. They are frightening. That experience in his fourth year traumatized him for life. No surprisingly. It wasn't exactly all unicorns and rainbows.
I replayed in my mind Sunrise words 'He was in an ugly place. He was scared, he was screaming' and I feel a quiver. I take a sip of my hot tea to cast it away and give me the strength to keep on the conversation.
'There was Sunrise involved, I guess…'
'Yes' he admits hasty 'but I don't want to talk about it'
'Sunrise was having a nightmare too, a scary one apparently'
The cup is still in his hand, but he doesn't take it to his mouth.
Outside a car speeds in front of the window with a loud hum, the headlights brighten for a moment the room enough for me to glimpse Harry's troubled expression.
'When you went away, Molly took her down' I let the sentence suspended a moment waiting for a reaction. When it doesn't arrive, I go on 'From something she said it seems she was aware of the nightmare you were having'
Harry neither disclaimed nor confirmed it.
'There is something dodgy going on. There is something you are not telling me'
He finally drinks his tea and after a moment, speaks 'Yes, there is something I'm not telling you' and before I can ask for elucidations, he turns his head toward me 'And I'm not planning to either' he continues stern.
I'm about to press for more openness but he knows me too well and doesn't allow me to.
'Hermione, you are my best friend and I've always told you pretty much everything but this, I'm not going to. So, save your breath'
I feel a bit hurt, but I decide not to pursue the matter. For the time being at least.
Tonight, I took a resolution. I'll be a friend, I'll be positive, I'll be a friend, I'll be cheerful, I'll be a friend, I'll be affectionate, I'll be a friend.
I'll be a friend.
I've always done it up to ten days ago I don't see why I cannot do it again.
And overall, I won't let gloom settle. Today we are going out.
I think he passed the rest of the night awake; I could feel him moving continuously.
When dawn approached, however, he snuggled up and nodded off. Now he is sleeping very close to me.
I start to caress him; he moves slightly so I stoop on him, and I kiss his forehead whispering his name. A smile appears on his lips as he opens his eyes.
All this intensity and greenness dazzle me as usual. I can also glance a glimpse of disappointment and the smile faltering seeing me, but I was expecting it, so it doesn't pain me. Not too much at least.
Although, after the faltering moment, the smile returns steady, a cheeky smile that makes me crazy. Stop, Hermione, we agreed on friendliness. A cheeky smile, period.
He grasps me swiftly and grinning, squeezes me and pecks me.
'I'm so glad you are here' he says burying his head in the slope of my neck between my hair.
'I'm glad to be here too' I answer in a flutter. Friendliness! Friendliness! I answer, period.
'I thought we could do something today' I say emboldened by his good mood.
He rises on his elbow 'What do you want to do?' he asks smiling with all his curls as crazy as they can possibly get. How cute is he?! ….. I can acknowledge he is cute even as a friend. Right?!
'We could go somewhere on the seaside. What do you think?'
I see him waver, undecided.
'I'll modify your face' I say encouragingly.
'Alright but make sure I'm really unrecognisable'
After one hour of complicated spells, we are ready to go, and not even Molly would recognise him. I've got a real knack for this kind of things.
I chose a place in Wales where I've been a couple of times with Ron and the kids. The beach is sandy and it stetches for quite a long trait making a very nice stroll.
Being weekday and low season not many people are around which makes it even nicer and I know also more enjoyable for Harry who always feels more at easy when it is so being less chances of being recognised and bothered. We stop to get breakfast in a café on the beach and I'm glad to see his good mood carry on.
Surprisingly he starts to chat. He talks about the Ministry on some actions decided upon and about some issues arisen. I cannot fail to notice that's all referred to the time before the accident.
I don't think he has worked since then.
'Are you going to return working?'
I have my personal opinion about his career. It's great and everything but I don't think it had ever helped his peace of mind much. It's too stressful and too gruesome. Being an Auror means to have to assist every day to murders, crimes, dealing with deranged individuals notwithstanding the high danger it comports. I never advised him against it when he decided to pursue it; I knew how he cared for it and he needed a new object to focus his mind on after Voldemort to prevent his mind to slide in depression, thereby I helped him at best of my abilities to get it. But knowing his past and his struggles, I always thought that a more cheerful job, like in the Quidditch field for example, where you have the adrenaline but not the danger, would have suited him better.
I also had the suspicion that he undertook it to redeem himself from the guilt he feels in regards of all the people who died to allow him to defeat Voldemort. Kind of paying up a debt preventing any such deaths to happen again. A dangerous thing of course because, obviously, it's a debt that he will never feel fulfilled. He cannot prevent every death nor catch every single dark wizard on earth, and he will only end up feeling even more guilt.
He looks at me enquiringly 'What do you mean?'
I'm taken aback 'Do you know… it's already a few weeks you are not going'
His expression from light and carefree it was, darken all of sudden turning pensive.
'Do you want to? You could retire, you worked there long enough'
'To do what?' he says shaking his head.
'Take care of Sunrise as one thing'
He doesn't answer, he rests his cup on the table and his eyes travel back on the beach. Some children are playing, and we can hear their shrills while they are merrily chasing each other.
'I've been to the Burrow yesterday'
He keeps looking away, but I know he is listening.
'She is asking for you, she asked for you tonight too'
He bows his head; I know this conversation distress him, but I feel he needs to return being a father for that forlorn child, and I want to understand what's going on.
'She was quite upset yesterday… She was quite upset tonight'
'I know she was upset yesterday as I know she was upset tonight. I always know when she is upset' he interjects abruptly fiddling with the teaspoon, uneasy.
'How do you know?'
He shrugs his shoulders 'I just know. She is moody and very often gets upset in the mornings and evenings'
'Yes, that's right' I say baffled and hoping for more openness than tonight, I go on 'How…?'
He glances shiftily at me, taking the cup to drink the last drops of his coffee, his distress blatantly heightened.
My expression is puzzled, I don't understand. How can he possibly know if it's weeks since he had seen her the last time?! I must find out more and I'm about to speak but, as tonight, he divines my intentions and smirks seeing my half open mouth ready to pester him.
'Don't trouble yourself with it. She is fine today, anyway. She'll be fine. I'll do my best'
I called at the Burrow once home while he was having a shower.
It is true.
She has been quite cheerful the whole day.