The world is a vampire

Sent to drain

Secret destroyers

Hold you up to the flames

And what do I get

For my pain?

Betrayed desires

And a piece of the game

Even though I know

I suppose I'll show

All my cool and cold

Like ol' Job

If Monday was a person, it would be Umbridge.

After the very first day of school, Harry was totally fed up with Hogwarts already. Before the hearing, he wanted nothing more than to return here. After the hearing, he was delighted and overjoyed not to have been kicked out of school. Now he wondered whether it might not have been better to retreat with Sirius to his unloved house and scrape mould out of cupboards.

Harry had already got himself detention, for a week, every Friday; and his exorbitantly daft classmates obviously knew nothing better to do with themselves than to run their mouths over Harry and Umbridge's fight.

If Harry finally managed to get a hold of Dumbledore by one of his fancy robes, Harry would ask him to let him put his memories of the 'fun' in the graveyard into the Pensive so that every single half-wit and hella stupid student, who was wandering the corridors of Hogwarts, could look inside and see what Harry had to see. So that they could be where Harry was. So that they could see how Pettigrew had killed Cedric and Riddle had climbed out of a cauldron – horribly ugly, but deadly.

The satisfaction when every single person in this madhouse had to admit that it wasn't him who was mad, but them – namely for not wanting to believe him. Harry could literally taste it, the satisfaction (though it tasted more like Shephard's Pie at that moment, he was sitting at dinner after all), but he already knew that Dumbledore would not allow Harry to use the Pensive to convince everyone.

Because, that would be an easy solution to this problem – and Dumbledore wasn't one for easy solutions.

And then, of course, there was Fudge, the biggest joke right after Lockhart, who wasted the rest of his life feeding the Daily Prophet with defamations about Dumbledore and Harry. Harry fervently hoped that once Riddle had revealed himself, the man would spend the rest of his life scrubbing toilets at the Ministry. Without magic of course.

Someone sat down next to Harry, he assumed it must be Ron or Neville. He didn't have many classmates left who would willingly talk to him.

'Hey Harry.'

To his astonishment, it was Dean, who now propped an elbow on the table and pulled a bowl of roast potatoes towards him.

'Shitty Monday, innit?' Dean asked thin-lipped.

Harry looked at him briefly from the side. Seamus was Dean's best mate, Dean himself was sitting a little further away with Lavender and Parvati, chatting to them (the topic, Harry could guess). Seamus, Harry thought, looked as intelligent as a mountain troll.

He turned back to Dean, who was chewing thoughtfully his dinner.

'Yeah, shitty Monday,' Harry said curtly and turned his attention back to his Shephard's Pie.

Next to him, Hermione poked listlessly at her food. Ron was besieged by Fred and George ('Could you sign off on this, Ronnie?' 'Lads, I'm a Prefect, I can't –' 'That's the point, ickle brother.').

Dean had barely eaten a quarter of his dinner when he scowled and pushed the plate away. 'Well, I'll see you on Friday, Harry.'

He looked at Dean with a furrowed brow. 'Okay?'

'We've detention together at Umbridge's,' Dean explained, smiling sardonically.

Harry raised his eyebrows and pushed his plate away as well. 'Why's that?'

'Because I couldn't help but ask what proof there was that Cedric's death was an accident.'

Hermione snorted softly beside Harry and shook her head disapprovingly. 'You shouldn't have done that, Dean.'

Dean shrugged. 'If I got a Knut every time someone said that to me …'

Harry felt a grin tug at the corner of his mouth. It was nice to hear that he was obviously not the only one willing to grill Umbridge about Riddle's return; even if Professor McGonagall did not approve of it at all. She had given Harry strict instructions to keep quiet and inconspicuous.

But unfortunately, that wasn't his thing at all, and Dean's obviously either – marvellous.

'See you Friday then,' Harry confirmed as Dean swung his leg over the bench, stood up and left the Great Hall.

Hermione also gave up eating and got to her feet. 'I can't stand the gossip here, let's go to the common room.'

Whilst Hermione was rounding up Fred and George for testing their Fainting Fancies on unsuspecting first-years and Ron was busy being as one with his armchair as possible, Harry was hanging around the table, bored and trying in vain to find the motivation to write Snape's essay on moonstone.

There was a scrape and a chair was pushed next to Harry at the table.

'Busy with the essay for Potions?' asked Dean as he glanced at Harry's parchment, but there wasn't much to see apart from the heading.

Harry just nodded idly and continued to watch Hermione and Fred argue, Dean following his gaze.

'She's not entirely wrong, is she?' he said, dropping into his chair.

Harry just grumbled quietly. He turned to his comrade and asked, 'Don't you usually do homework with Seamus?'

'I would, but …' He pointed over his shoulder with his thumb.

In a corner of the common room, Seamus and Lavender were stuck together like conjoined twins.

'Oh,' Harry said. So that was why Seamus had been sitting with Lavender and Parvati. Maybe his paranoia had kicked in again and the three of them hadn't been talking about him at all.

'How long are they like that?' asked Harry.

Dean chuckled. 'Depends on what you mean exactly. It ranges from 'always' to 'since the Yule Ball'.'

True, Harry had made every effort to erase that disaster called the Yule Ball from his memory, but until dementia finally took him, he would have to remember that miserable evening.

'I see, Seamus has better things to do, so you're hanging around with us now?'

Dean dug books, parchment and a quill out of his bag. 'Hope you don't mind, I'd like to do our homework with you guys. A problem shared is a problem halved. I'm decent at potions.'

Ron, who had realised that help had arrived, broke free from the symbiotic connection with his armchair and came shuffling over.

'Hey, Dean.'

He gave Ron a friendly nod.

A short while later, Hermione squeezed in to join them at the table, but announced that she was too upset to do any homework. She showed off some home-made hats and had one of her usual squabbles with Ron about S.P.E.W.

Dean looked back and forth between the two squabblers, uncomfortable, and then cast a questioning glance at Harry.

'Yes, they're always like that,' Harry confirmed grumpily. 'And no, I haven't figured out how to turn them off yet.'

Dean just cleared his throat and opened one of the potions books he'd fetched from the library. Harry pushed his chair closer to Dean so he could take a look at the pages.

He had been trying to think as little as possible for some time, as Crabbe and Goyle seemed very happy thanks to their mindless existence and Harry thought that this must be a desirable state every now and then. Unfortunately, his brain had a habit of forming thoughts against his will, and one of those thoughts that was currently taking shape in Harry's aching head was that it had never occurred to him that Dean smelled amazingly good. One reason for this was, of course, that Harry had never had a reason to be so close to the other boy before, and the other … he can't remember. There they were again, his three problems: forgetfulness, whatsit and the other.

While Harry was lost in thought about what Dean's smell reminded him of, Dean talked about the essay and explained the properties of moonstone. Harry's sphere of thought only reached a fuzzy babble, but at least Dean sounded so much more pleasant than the teachers, especially Snape. Harry's ears tended to retreated into his head like a snail into its shell whenever Snape opened his filthy mouth.

'Harry?'

He took his eyes off the book he'd been staring at dully and looked up sleepily at Dean. 'Hm?'

'So, aren't you gonna write down what I said?' his mate asked, raising an eyebrow.

Harry blinked. 'Come again?'

Dean pointed to a passage in the book and explained it again. Harry pulled himself together and listened attentively. Unfortunately, his headache thwarted his plans, he sighed, rubbed his temples and pulled his glasses off his nose.

'You all right, pal?' Dean asked concerned and closed the book.

Harry nodded sluggishly. 'Yeah, yeah. Sore head, bloody Monday.'

'Heard Madam Pomfrey has a potion for that.'

'For Monday?'

Dean laughed, Harry grinned slightly.

'That'd be great! But meant the Headache, of course. And honestly, the Draught of Peace is something I'll probably have to give myself intravenously in Umbridge's class to keep from freaking out at the bollocks she's spouting,' Dean said, putting his things in his bag.

Harry watched him in confusion. 'No Potion essay?'

He looked up again. 'Maybe later. Thought we'd go to Madam Pomfrey's first.'

Harry thought about following Dean's suggestion, Ron was sitting opposite him and had at least already started his essay, Hermione had disappeared into her dormitory after the squabble with the redhead.

'Wanna come with us, Ron?' Harry asked, because he thought it was rather mean to leave his best friend sitting there like an unwelcome dessert.

Ron yawned and tidied up. 'Nah, not in the mood. I'm going to bed.'

Harry shrugged and stood up. He'd noticed, of course, that Dean had shot up quite a bit over the last four years, but somehow he hadn't noticed at the same time. Harry could ponder why he was thinking such confusing rubbish, but the headache was just getting worse and he'd rather not.

He left the common room with Dean, curious looks following him as always, and Harry had a great desire to shout at them all that there had to be more interesting things in their lives than watching a 15-year-old leave a room.

They hadn't got very far before Harry realised that Dean was thinking about how to ask him insensitive questions as sensitively as possible.

'I'm telling the truth,' Harry finally growled in a bad mood.

Dean nodded thoughtfully. 'I believe you. I mean, sure, we don't know each other super well. But I can't remember you ever being fussed over for attention and stuff like that. Y'know, my parents are muggles and I didn't read the Daily Prophet over the summer. The cuttings Seamus showed me then … That's just not you, I have no clue why the others can't see that.

'But it was impressive how you made it through this tournament!' Dean looked at Harry with wide eyes, Harry in turn avoided his gaze, embarrassed.

'I had a shit load of help. Without it, I would've failed miserably at the first task. For the second task, I was slipped some Gillyweed by a friend a few minutes before the task even started. I had no idea how I was supposed to get by underwater for an hour, let alone find Ron.

'And in the last task, we know that Fake-Eye Moody paved the way for me so I could touch the Cup. I just wish I hadn't …' Harry bit his lower lip.

Dean was walking beside him and had been listening attentively in silence.

'Anyway,' Harry continued, 'I had a lot of help, all the time. I didn't do anything on my own, unlike the other champions.'

Dean snorted snidely. 'Oh come on! You don't believe for a second that their headmasters didn't give them a hand whenever they could!'

Harry rubbed his temples, remembering how Hagrid had shown Madame Maxime the dragons and Karkaroff had snuck after them.

'Okay, okay. Kinda true. But still, I didn't win because I'm brilliant. Hermione, for example, is brilliant.'

'Well, she just knows the books by heart,' Dean said, shrugging.

Harry shook his head. 'She can do so much more than that.'

The two were silent for a while, the hospital wing not far away, when Dean asked a question.

'But you've had help over the summer, haven't you?'

From the tone of his voice, Harry would say that he meant something specific, but Harry's slow and Monday-tortured brain refused to play Sherlock any longer and just did the unmotivated Watson.

'What do you mean by help?' he asked, yawning, the door to the hospital wing already coming into view.

'Well, you know. Psychological help,' Dean whispered, leaning down a little.

Harry gaped at him like a mooncalf. 'Er, nope. Got dropped by my relatives, who loath me to the bits, like every summer, and that was it. Well, I ended up staying with Ron after I endured one month at the Dursley's, but I guess psychological help isn't a thing in the Wizarding World.'

Dean looked at Harry in disbelief as he pulled open the door to the hospital wing. 'There's no psychological counselling? You saw someone die! They can't just say, 'Oh well, how unfortunate, but he'll get over it'!'

'Mr Potter, Mr Thomas?' Madam Pomfrey came scurrying out of her office and looked questioningly at the two students.

'Got a headache,' Harry said, pointing unnecessarily at his temple, as if Madam Pomfrey might otherwise misunderstand him and think his abdomen was hurting.

Madam Pomfrey just nodded, darted to a cupboard and purposefully pulled out a potion. She dropped a few drops onto a teaspoon and handed it to Harry.

For a change, a magic potion tasted a bit like mint and not like Dudley's rancid sports socks. After less than a minute, the headache was blown away. At least one problem that could be solved quickly and easily.

Harry and Dean were on their way back to the Gryffindor Tower in not time.

'Thanks,' Harry said to Dean and tried to smile genuinely.

Dean, on the other hand, had no problem at all with an honest smile. 'No biggie, more importantly is, you're feeling a bit better.

'Well, I might not be your first choice, but …' Dean hesitated sheepishly, 'if you want to talk, I'm here.'

Harry felt tingly, on the one hand appreciating Dean's offer, on the other feeling embarrassed. And then he had to think about how Ginny had poured all her little feelings into a diary in her first year at school. However, Harry was sure that Dean wouldn't drain his life energy and a Tom Riddle would emerge from him. At least, Harry fervently hoped so. If that happened, he would have himself committed to St. Mungo's. Then he'd had enough for good.

'Thanks, Dean. But I'm fine,' Harry said in a strained voice.

His emotional world was as gloriously chaotic as you might expect in adolescence, but it was true that there was a little more chaos than there should be.

When they arrived in their dormitory, Dean patted Harry gently on the shoulder and quietly wished him a good night.

Harry crawled under the duvet and hoped for a dreamless sleep. He didn't get his wish, but the dream consisted of Harry lying on the couch in the common room and Dean sitting in an armchair in front of him. He was holding a clipboard and a pen, wearing glasses and a white coat.

'Alright Harry, tell me how you felt when you saw Cedric die.'

'Shitty.'

'Could you describe it in a bit more detail?'

'Really shitty.'

Then Harry woke up.

Despite all my rage, I am still just a rat in a cage

Someone will say, "What is lost can never be saved"

Despite all my rage, I am still just a rat in a cage

Tell me I'm the only one

Tell me there's no other one

Jesus was an only son, yeah

Tell me I'm the chosen one

Jesus was an only son, for you

(Smashing Pumpkins - Bullet with Butterfly Wings)