The kitchen is dark when I find myself in the fireplace, but I can see light coming from the living room. I rush there my heart still pumping furiously for the exchange with Ron. There is not turning back now. My mind is reeling with too many thoughts, plans, schemes I need to adopt as soon as possible. Shall I go to Hogwarts to make sure he won't try to take Rose away or it's better to return to Romania for Hugo? Shall I inform the Burrow? Shall I inform McGonagall? Yes, surely, I need to send her a note but with what owl? There is not one in this house.
All these frantic thoughts flash in my head in the seconds it takes me to get to the living room but once there, they melt away as if never existed.
Harry is sitting on the floor surrounded by family portraits, the drawer where they were hidden is open, empty. Fragments of glass are scattered everywhere, as all the frames have been shattered when, in his fury, he had shoved them away.
He must have cut himself because some of them have bloody fingerprints on it. He doesn't seem to mind, however. He is staring intently to one of them clenched in his hand. It's the one of him and Ginny that appeared front cover of Witch Weekly three years ago.
He is observing it eyes wide open, mouth half parted, passing his fingers lightly on it leaving a red mark on Ginny's white dress. I see tears sliding on his face. He hasn't even noticed my presence.
I call softly his name making him startle.
He tries to pronounce my name, but nothing comes out from his mouth. He gulps as tear after tear, one faster than the one before, race each other on his face. I'm stunned. I don't think I ever seen him crying before, not in the worst moments, nor when it would have been more than understandable. And this mark of sheer humanity touches me more than I can say.
I lunge forward throwing my arms around his neck, his body shaking by sobs as he let the picture fall on all the others on the rug.
'You are back' he manages to utter after a while.
'Yes, I'm back' I say kissing his wet cheek, the saltiness of his tears lingering on my lips.
'What about Ron?'
'We talked, and we agreed on me staying a bit longer'
There is no reason to distress him with the truth and is a mark of his affliction that he doesn't doubt my words. In his right mind he would never have bought it.
He only rests limply his head on my shoulder.
We stay locked in that embrace for a long time until I don't notice the cut on his fingers which I point out to him but I only get back an unconcerned stare that moves back on all the pictures surrounding us.
I should heal his cuts, but my wand is still at the cottage, in my haste I left it there. I ask Harry for his own, but he is lost in the perusal of pictures and doesn't seem to hear me so, shattered by his expression I take his injured hand to my mouth sucking the cuts one after the other to stop the bleeding, my eyes tearing up in the meanwhile.
He observes wearily, reclining his head on one side.
'I'm afraid, if you stay, I'm only gonna harm you'
I shake my head succeeding in a watery smile 'Don't worry about me. I'm fine'
He sweeps me up in his arms then, impetuously, kissing my head.
Lulling myself in that embrace I feel so well and secure I may fall asleep. Suddenly all the turmoil of the day events weighs on me and I feel overwhelmingly tired. But I don't allow myself to nod off. It's me that must comfort him not the other way around.
So, I loosen myself up and I ask him again for his wand. He reaches for it on the sofa this time and give it to me. With that I heal the cuts and mend the broken frames.
'Do you want them back on the wall or shall we put them away?' I ask gathering them all but the only answer I receive is a fleeting distressed glance and I know it will be me the one who shall take that decision and mindful of the late memory blanks, I hang them one by one on the wall, so they are very visible.
He observes me doing it without speaking, staring at those pictures that remind him all he has forgot as well as all he has lost.
'It's time to go to sleep' I say once it's done.
'I cannot sleep, Hermione. I tried but I can't.' he mutters shaking his head wearily.
'I'm here now' I reply going to him 'I'll stay here, and I'll keep your hand the whole night. I won't sleep so, if you need me, I'll be there'
I won't share his bed. I promised myself we wouldn't anymore but nevertheless I won't leave him alone so I seat just beside while He slips in it, keeping his hand firmly in mine.
With a flick of the wand the light is off, and silence and darkness envelop us.
'Thank you' he murmurs.
'It's nothing'
Then, hush. Dense and absolute. A silence that speaks, because I can tell all what is passing in Harry's mind through the almost imperceptible change in the pressure impressed on my hand. It's discernible only because of that stillness that amplifies every sense.
Sometimes it gets stronger, and I know he is in pain, sometime gets lighter and I know he is trying to sooth himself somehow.
When the touch is getting lighter and lighter which make me almost think he is finally asleep a murmur reaches my ear 'I cannot bear this. Not again. It seems as though I'm only born to suffer'
'You are not born to suffer. It hasn't been only sufferance. You forget all the happy moments. You had many of those too.'
He plays with my fingers thoughtful. With his thumb he brushes my palm sending me shivers throughout my whole body. Why, oh why he has this effect over me?! Why even in the most pathetic moments I feel all this desire ringing in me? I am deplorable and not deign to be called a friend.
'I did. But I feel like I always got the short end of the stick. Why some people get to be happy their whole life, they see their children growing how it should be, they get old with the person they love, and I cannot? Why am I doomed to see people die around me?'
He is so right, it's incontrovertible, but the truth doesn't help much here, I must strive to convince him of the opposite 'You got many things to be happy about, many people you love are alive and healthy around you.'
'The fact that they are alive and healthy now doesn't mean that they cannot die too. And I cannot stand the thought. I cannot stand the idea that this may happen again and again'
His fingers interlocks with mine as he shifts in bed.
'This is the risk you take when you decide to love somebody'
'This is a risk I don't want to take anymore'
I feel like my chest is made of stone, it's only with an enormous effort that I manage to move it up and down to allow air flowing in my lungs. How can I convince him that is worth? Would I still want to love in his shoes?
'Harry, think about what you lived with Ginny. How you loved her, all the happy moments. Think about Lily, how lovely it was to have her in your arms. Are you not happy to have regained those memories? Having the choice, would you forget everything again just not to suffer?'
A muteness fell in the room, only the hums of a few cars outside is audible.
'I think I would endure double of what I am enduring now to have them again'
I would endure it too to be loved in the same way.
'So, you must resign yourself. You cannot have the one if you are not willing to endure the other. There is not easy way out. You must live with it.'
He is reflecting on my words and his fingers are now still, tightly around mine.
'But they are not coming back and there is an easy way out. A way that would allow me to be serene again'
'And what would that be?'
'There is always the white place'
'What is it?' I ask puzzled.
There is not an immediate answer to my question, it lay suspended for a few moments until his murmur return audible.
'Nothing' he says, and after a faltering moment he adds 'I'm glad you are back'
