CHAPTER 112: Requiem For A Dream (Part 5)


His nails were neatly trimmed. He couldn't remember the last time he had cut them so perfectly. Over his time on the run, he stopped being so particular about his hygiene. What would be the point of trying to maintain a reputation when the papers were branding you as an animal every single day, over and over again? He'd let his nails grow a bit then, filling them with dirt and grime along the way, and when he did cut them, it was always quick, haphazard, leaving sharp edges and uneven sides. He didn't miss that, didn't want to go back to that cruddy lifestyle. But every time he looked at them, he couldn't help but feel he was looking at someone else's hand.

He moved his fingers against each other, a dance between his thumb and middle finger as they rubbed against each other. It was careful, tantalizing, and he now realized the power they held. The power he held. It filled him with a twisted sort of desire to just do it already, the type similar to the thoughts you have when you're walking on the street and suddenly wonder what would happen if you just threw yourself in front of a car. He wasn't sure, not yet, and that only made the temptation grow stronger.

Maybe he really was fucked in the head.

"You're not," Aurora's soft voice whispered behind his ear. She leaned her head on his shoulder. As if she hadn't been absent for weeks on end now. As if it was just their normal thing.

Harry didn't pull away.

"Isn't that the whole point of this?" He asked. "I'm too fucked up for this life, better to just go back and be done with it."

"Is that what you're getting out of all of this?"

"How could I not?" His voice was bitter and hateful, yet somehow still calm. "I have everything I could ever want here. A life with my family. A life that doesn't have to end bloody. And I'm fucking whining about it. What does that say of me, do you think?"

"It doesn't matter what I think."

"Yes, it does. You brought me here to teach me a lesson, so go on, then. Start your lecture."

Aurora's arm curled with his own before their fingers intertwined. That smell of ash and fire made him feel just a little bit light-headed. "This isn't a lecture. There isn't a message if you don't want there to be. No deadline. No one forcing you to do anything. You can stay here if you want. You can live your entire life here, you just have to decide. I just want you to be happy."

"Bullshit," Harry spat, and Aurora tightened her grip on him, grounding him to her. "You said this would be hard. Cruel. You knew from the beginning what choice I would have to make. So don't act as if I had any real options here."

"You do have a choice. There's always a choice, not even Fate can overpower Free Will. I just knew which one you were going to make."

"Oh, because you know the future, yeah?" Harry scoffed.

"Because I know you."

He wanted to say so much, wanted to ask her everything running through his mind, but what would be the point when he already knew she wouldn't answer? Maybe it was for the best. Back there, in his real life, there was always someone calling the shots on his life. They told him what he should think, and how he should act. Vernon, Montague, Junior, Bedivere - they all tried to mould him into whatever they wanted of him. Maybe he shouldn't be too harsh on Aurora for letting him be when he needed to think, even if he desperately wanted her input on this. Maybe he should be even harsher on her for dropping him here like this, even if he was immeasurably grateful for the chance to talk to his parents just one time.

They were already downstairs waiting for him, sitting around a large red and gold cake shaped like a Quidditch pitch. Miniature players flew above it, they were playing their own little game, and Harry vaguely wondered if they were edible as well.

"Happy birthday!" His mother beamed at him the moment she saw him. She rushed over to him and pulled him in for a big hug before giving him a long kiss on his cheek as she ruffled his hair. He couldn't help but smile in her embrace, holding onto her for a moment longer than he normally would have before he was passed on to his father.

"Happy birthday, son," he told him. The two of them hugged, and Harry found it just as hard to let go as he had with his mother. He wondered how many more of these he would get before he said his inevitable goodbye. He wondered even more why he was still considering leaving when a very big part of him didn't want to.

The cake was delicious, and the small Quidditch players did turn out to be edible in the end. It was just the three of them that morning, no Black or Lupin or Susan or the other Gryffindors, and Harry was grateful for it. This wasn't the first time it had been that way, they'd had lots of lazy Sundays and family evenings like this, but the fact that today was supposed to be his birthday made it all the more different. Whenever he had dreamed about it, it had always been this large affair with loud fireworks and massive pranks and hundreds of people and scenes taken straight out of the movies, and this was nothing like it. It was quieter, much more subdued, almost routine, and it made it all the more perfect.

They stayed in the kitchen for hours until it was finally time for them to go change for the others. He almost wanted to cancel the whole party they had planned for him. Lock the doors and stay just the three of them. But he also wanted to see Susan. He wanted to hold her and kiss her and never let her go. He wanted to fuck about with Ron and Dean and Seamus and just forget about Aurora's fucking choice. Maybe this was what he needed to remind himself that he did have a place in here, that this life could be enough.

Everyone started arriving shortly before lunch - all the fifth-year Gryffindors and their partners, the entire Weasley clan, Susan, and some of her friends. Even the parents stayed, some helping out his mum and dad here, with Black taking it upon himself to entertain the rest. It was all very overwhelming. He had got used to the attention over the past couple of months, but the level of warmth and adulation that he was receiving was unlike anything he'd ever experienced. Susan had been the first there, and he was so glad she stuck by his side as everyone at the party came up to him first and wished him a genuine happy birthday, sticking around and talking to him until more and more people started coming. It was all too much, and it only served to highlight that it wasn't really for him.

He smiled at them all. Barely managed to get in a word with all the surrounding noise. They were all yelling, shouting over each other so loud Harry began to wonder about the wards. Would they hold? Would they be found out? He couldn't wonder for long, he could barely hear himself think. Susan's hand in his was the only steady presence. He wanted to run away. He wanted to grip it tighter. He needed to be alone. He couldn't bring himself to leave them. Sweat poured down his forehead, and he was having more and more trouble breathing. And through it all, the smile stayed on his face. Nodding dumbly and laughing whenever he saw the cue cards in his mind that told him this was how he was supposed to act.

"Hey," Susan whispered in his ear. "Everything alright?"

"Fine," the words were painful. "Great. Thanks."

It wasn't a lie if he made it the truth. Fake it 'till you make it, right? He was getting what he wanted, sort of. He had Susan by his side, the feel of her right there soothing. He grabbed her thigh, almost possessively, and never let go. Dean and Ron and Seamus were all there, making their stupid fucking jokes just like he wanted them to. Even his parents came by every once in a while to say hello and ask if they needed anything else. Sure, Black came with them often, and one time, even Lupin showed up and gently patted him on the shoulders. But his parents were there and that was all that mattered.

Everyone started talking faster and faster, it became impossible to keep up. It was as if the entire world had been stuck in a fast-forward motion. Everything was happening so quickly, people coming and going from his table and moving around the backyard. Dean and Ron invited him over for a game of exploding snap. He sneaked out of the party with Susan. Lavender and her boytoy cornered him and Susan after they came back. Seamus gave him a shot of the Firewhisky bottle he somehow sneaked in without his parents noticing. He rebuffed a few of Granger's attempts to talk to him privately. Before he knew it, the sky was turning orange and the party was still going, and he was still there, sitting down with Susan and Hannah and her other Hufflepuff friends.

He stood up rather abruptly, and all of them turned to look at him.

"Sorry," he said absently, already rushing away. "Got to… yeah."

Susan smiled at him, or at least he thought he saw her smile. He hoped she did.

They were all looking at him. He could feel all their eyes on him, and somehow, he knew he wasn't just being paranoid. Of course, they were. He was all but running away from his own party, like a bloody sissy. Prick Potter didn't do that. Harry Potter didn't do that. He stormed into the house, the sound of the door crashing against the wall beside it echoing through the kitchen as he rushed to the bathroom. His hands trembled as he locked the doors. They didn't shake when he had been hunting for Montague and Dolohov or even when he was facing bloody fucking Voldemort himself. But here, in a stupid fucking party, he was nearly on his knees, cowering and not even understanding why the fuck he was.

He looked wrecked. Pale and tired and completely not himself. Maybe it was the alcohol, or something wrong with the food, or maybe he caught a cold for the first time in his life. There had to be an explanation for this because he couldn't understand why he looked just like that Halloween night when Montague tortured him. He couldn't go out like that. He wanted to just go up to his room and forget about everything. Maybe obliviating himself completely would cure him. He wouldn't know anything, wouldn't even know his own name. Maybe then, he could actually start a life here without acting like a freak all the time. Maybe that would erase all the damage that Snape and Montague and Junior and all the others made, and finally turn him into who he was supposed to be.

There was a soft click on the door beside him, and Harry immediately jumped backward. He pulled out his wand, seven different curses already on the tip of his tongue, and he barely managed to stop himself from launching them even as he saw Black's face peer inside. "Careful," the man raised his hands. "I come in peace, alright?"

Harry heard the words, but he still didn't lower his wand. His heart was racing, everything was telling him to be on edge, and Black was staring expectantly. He shoved his wand back into his jeans, bitter that he didn't manage to come up with an excuse in time. "The door was locked."

"Not from an Alohomora, it wasn't," Black gave him a disarming smile, one that maybe would have worked on him a couple of years back, before he entered fully. When he closed the door, he waved his wand behind him. "There. Now it's locked."

"And am I supposed to take a shit in front of you or what?"

"If you want," Black shrugged and leaned onto the sink, appraising him carefully. "Everything alright, Pronglet?"

"Don't-" the words got caught in his throat. "Don't call me that."

It only lasted a second, but Harry didn't miss the dejection that crossed through Black's face. Harry wanted to care. He wanted to bring himself to care. But he just couldn't muster it. "Okay."

"What are you doing here, Sirius? Did my parents ask you to check on me or what?"

"You're my godson," he said quietly. "They didn't need to ask."

Harry turned around, his back facing Black, before he unzipped his jeans and began to take a leak. The room felt so small, that he couldn't tell if he was feeling Black's discomfort or his own. He waited for the sound of the door opening and closing, but it never came. When he was done and turned around, Black was still there, and Harry knew that they wouldn't be getting out of there until Black got what he wanted.

"You can talk to me, you know," Black said. "Whatever Moony or I did to piss you off so much, you can tell us."

He gave out an acid laugh. "Oh, you didn't do anything. Neither of you did shit, right? That's the whole fucking problem here! You two did absolutely nothing wrong to me."

"If that was the case, you wouldn't struggle so much to simply look us in the face." Black walked up to him. "What's wrong?"

Harry turned away. If there was any space behind him, he would have taken it. "You don't understand. You could never understand."

"Try me."

It was the flippancy of the tone that got to him. The fact that this was Sirius fucking Black prying into his life. He'd been holding onto this for so long, he hadn't realised just how much it weighed on him. He was desperate to yell it out. Desperate to have everyone know and understand and fucking talk to him. Desperate to just fucking be happy and accept this gift instead of missing everything he used to hate about his life. He wanted an out, for someone to step in and make this decision for him. And if Aurora wasn't going to do so, then fuck her.

"What's wrong?" He finally asked. "Alright. How about the fact that I can't stand this life? I'm fucking sick and tired of having to pretend I'm someone else every fucking place that I go. I have to fucking be loud and happy and charitable and funny and smart and compassionate and warm and fucking perfect, and oh, if I make a fucking mistake you all look at me as if I'm someone else. Someone un-fucking-worthy. I can't fucking be myself without risking losing my friends and my parents and my girlfriend, not just because they'd all actually hate who I am as a person and leave me the moment they found out, but because I'm too fucked up to appreciate this fucking gift I was given and am constantly whining about everything that I miss from my life. I hate who I have to be. I hate what I have planned for my future. I hate that I can't make myself fucking happy with this stupid little life and I know this can't last, but, fuck me if I ever even think of letting it go because then I'm back to being a fucking mess. Is that enough for you, Sirius," he spat. "Does that satisfy your fucking curiosity?"

Black stared back patiently, he hadn't moved a muscle during Harry's entire rant. The silence made him want to start up again, but he controlled himself before he could. He couldn't say too much, but fuck had it felt good to just say everything he was feeling. Still, that didn't mean he was going to lose control.

Black took a deep breath and sat on top of the sink. "What do you know about my parents?"

"Only a little," Harry replied coldly. It wasn't the truth, Regulus had told him all about his family a long time ago. But one thing he had learnt is that he couldn't afford to depend on the knowledge of his old life here.

"There's a reason for that. I don't like to talk about them much."

"You hated them that much?"

Black laughed, a bit hollowly. "I loved them that much. Oh, they were the worst sort of bigots out there," he added when he saw Harry's surprise. "Moldyshort's loyalists. Dead Munchers through and through. But they didn't start out that way. Not for me, at least. They were Mum and Dad, and whatever they were, they were good parents. I can never take that from them. Yeah, maybe they spoiled me and Reg too much here and there, but they loved us, didn't they? That wasn't something you could take for granted back then, especially not for people with the same beliefs as them. Me and Reg, we never felt unloved or abused. I hate what they tried to teach us, I hate myself more for listening to them. If it wasn't for your father and the hat, placing me in Gryffindor for whatever reason… I don't like to think about what might have become of me. But they loved me right, and I will be forever thankful to them for that."

"Is there a point to this story?"

"After Hogwarts, things started to get more rough between us. They didn't like that I was in Gryffindor or that I was hanging out with your father. And as I started to see that my parent's views were wrong, I tried to tell them that, and it all kept escalating from then. I still loved them, and they loved me, but we had a harder time tolerating each other. The war was going on outside, and every year it got worse. My parents… I don't know, I think they convinced each other that I was just going through a phase. They thought that one day, I would see their reason, and we'd all go back to being a happy family. They wanted me to join the Death Eaters, and I couldn't. They planned out my entire life and had all these expectations of me. Regulus followed them, but I didn't. I loved them so much, turning my back on my entire family was one of the hardest things I ever had to do. But not a day goes by where I doubt my choice, because, in the end, I knew that it just wasn't right for me."

"And you think this is what's happening to me?" Harry scoffed. "God, this is so stupid. My parents aren't some… some fanatics like yours!"

"No, they're not. They would never make you choose like mine did. But that doesn't take away from what I want to say, does it?" Black challenged. "This life we have, we only get one shot at it. We don't get do-overs. We don't get to try again after it's all set and done. Don't waste this one chance you have by trying to live up to what everyone else wants you to make it. Do what you know is right for you, and you'll see that the right people will stay by you. Whatever that may be, you have to trust that your parents will be there with you."

"It doesn't work like that," Harry said through gritted teeth. "It's either or, I don't get to choose both."

"Why not?"

"It just doesn't, alright? I don't get a fucking say on it."

"Your parents aren't like mine," Black reminded him calmly. "You said it yourself. Whatever you want to do, I don't think they could ever willingly leave your side. And if that's the case, then why would you ever be forced to choose? I can't think of any other reason other than the excuse it gives you."

"Excuse?"

"To keep denying what's really messing with your head." He turned around and removed all the spells locking and silencing the door. But right before he opened it, Black turned back to Harry. "Your parents care about you. More than you will ever know. There's nothing they wouldn't do to make sure you are happy. We all do. When you make whatever choice you feel you have to make, don't forget that."

His talk with Black only served to fuck him over more. He felt himself spiralling over the next couple of weeks. Some days he was pathetic and needy. From the moment he woke up, he would immediately rush downstairs and stick by his parents until it was time to sleep. He would help his mother cook, it didn't matter if it was breakfast or lunch or dinner, he was there with her using the few skills he'd learnt from his aunt and managed to handle himself well beside his mother. But even after his years of experience cooking for three, his mother took pride in teaching him something new almost every time. They tried new dishes or tried experimenting around with the recipes of their usuals. Whenever they weren't cooking, Harry was forced to accompany his mother when she watched her crappy soap operas, or he'd go help her with the groceries or any other errand she had to run out of the house.

His father worked mornings and afternoons, but that didn't mean Harry stopped seeing him altogether. He'd stay up late at night with him. The two of them would play with his Nintendo, an apparent regular thing between them given how easily his father seemed to beat him at Mario Kart regardless of all the hours he had put in with Dean, Ron, and Seamus. Whenever they weren't playing video games, his father would introduce him to his favourite albums. The two of them would lock themselves in his study and his father would pull out his turn table and vinyls. His father favoured rock, The Who, Queen, ACDC, The Rolling Stones, The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, The Eagles. He listened to all of them with his father, whole nights spent listening, vinyl after vinyl, and he fell in love with the genre. And on the weekends, when his father was finally free from work, they'd go and have Quidditch pick-up games. Sure, he was forced to play as a seeker rather than a chaser, but it gave him the chance to watch his father in action.

Harry wondered how his father would feel if he knew he was a chaser, just like him.

Other days he'd owl Susan or Ron and the others and spend the entire day out of the house. He and Susan would go on dates every other day, and though sometimes Dean or Lavender or Hannah would ask them to hang out on a double date with them, Harry made sure they weren't as frequent as they were in the beginning of the summer. He just wanted it to be the two of them, and during their outings, he was becoming more and more possessive of her. He would hug her more, always holding his hand or having her near him, and it still wasn't enough. Harry learnt just how affectionate he could be, and he sought reassurances from her in ways he had never asked of anyone else. She gave them to him, always, reminding him that this was it for her and that she was never going to leave him. But it all sounded hollow to him.

And then there were the days he was on the opposite side of the spectrum. Those days when he never even left his room. When his mum and dad tried to come up and talk to him, but he'd just shut them out because it was too painful to be around them, knowing the expiration date for this fantasy was getting closer and closer. Because that's what this was, wasn't it? Just a fantasy. Aurora had assured him over and over again that this was real and not something in his head. That he could stay and live some sort of life here, but it still didn't feel real. Could it ever actually feel real? He wanted to think so, but he'd been here for months now, and it all still felt surreal in the worst of ways. If everyone kept thinking he was someone else, and the actual accomplishments he had never even happened here, was he himself even real here? Was anything he was feeling and experiencing real?

The conversation he had with Black was never far away from his mind. A lot of interactions he'd had with his mum and dad and Susan and Aurora were creeping in there, never leaving him alone for long. He tried imagining it, staying here, and stopping having to pretend he was a different person. He didn't know what he would do, didn't even know how he would start, but he tried imagining things. Ways he could fill that void that was in him, things he could do to give his life purpose and break him free from the monotony that Prick Potter had trapped himself in. It was all possible in a way. He wasn't sure his relationship with Susan would survive, not with the life she wanted to lead. But maybe they could still be friends. And he would still have his parents, wouldn't he? He could be with them when they weren't with Lupin or Black, and he could always visit them. Wouldn't that make it all worth it? He had a feeling he would drift off with his friendships, but he could try to put in an effort. Or he could have relationships with others. He could build a life here. He could at least try.

It was selfish, and there was a very small part of him that wanted to make him feel guilty for trying to find a way to stay. Prick Potter was a prick, and he hated him, but could he fully take his life away? Yes, yes he could. After all, wasn't that what Fate had done to him? This was just making things right. But even with those scenarios he came up with to try to make it work, even with all the assurances he made for himself and the fact that he could go feeling guiltless if he stayed here, it just… wasn't right, was it? There was something there, a feeling he could not put into words, that was telling him this was all wrong. That he didn't belong. That he was meant for more. That, maybe, it was time to try to stop and get back the life that was taken from him.

This wasn't a perfect fit, Harry knew that. He didn't belong here, not really. But this was the closest he would ever get. He could make it enough. Why was that all of a sudden not enough? Why was his other life the one he had to keep if it was also far from perfect?

It was the last Tuesday of August and Harry was locked in his room again. Susan had asked him earlier if he wanted to do something, and he still hadn't replied to her letter. Her owl, Astraea, was still perched right outside the window to his room, giving him that glare she gave him whenever he failed to write back to Susan instantly. He didn't want to go out today, stuck in another one of his moods, but he'd declined his girlfriend too many times in the past couple of weeks that he had officially run out of excuses.

The doorbell rang a few minutes past noon, and Harry was already expecting the worst. So he wasn't surprised when his mother yelled up at him: "Harry, come down here! Someone's here to see you." Turning Susan away when she came all the way to his house was different from avoiding answering Susan's letters, but that didn't mean he was going to get all dressed up. So he went downstairs, messy-haired, eyes half-closed and in his bright red pyjamas only to find Hermione Granger sitting on his couch, looking expectantly up the stairs.

Oh, great, he thought to himself. The only other person worse than Susan.

"What are you doing here?" He asked grumpily.

"Harry Potter!" His mother reprimanded him from the other side of the room. "You don't speak to young girls like that."

"Fine," he rolled his eyes before giving an absurd bow. "Oh mademoiselle, what brings thee to me on this most superb of days?"

Granger was unfazed by his moods. "Care to have a walk with me?"

"Not really, no."

"Harry…" His mother warned.

"Fine, fine!" He raised his hands and came down the rest of the stairs. "But don't expect me to get changed."

They left the house together, walking side by side through Godric's Hollow without saying a word. He'd been avoiding this ever since he first appeared in this world, he could have practically smelt her intense desire to talk to him privately since the start of the summer. It's the reason why he had mostly avoided her during all their outings and ignored her letters. It was when she finally gained the courage to ask him at his party that he grew more concerned. It would only be a matter of time after that, and he was right. She couldn't even wait until the both of them had gone back to Hogwarts.

Granger stopped abruptly, taking a seat on a bench the two of them came across. Harry joined her, only to realise they had come to sit right in front of the graveyard. He could see the place where the statue of his parents stood in his previous life, and its absence left Harry more conflicted than he had thought it would. Even though he had lived with them for over two months now, and had grown to see them as his parents… he still had his actual parents. Those who died for him stayed dead. These weren't them. And now there wasn't even a monument he could visit to pay them their respects.

"I know," she finally said after a few minutes.

"A lot of things, I'm sure," he rolled his eyes.

"No, Harry… I know." He kept himself steady, looking straight ahead. He tried to picture the place just as it was the last time he came here. It was dark, desolate, that had probably been one of the lowest points in this past shitty year. The memory ground him. If he had been so hopeless then and somehow managed to find a way to come back from that, then this shouldn't even be worth mentioning in the conversation. "I know you're a time traveller."

Harry almost snorted. The urge to laugh was climbing up and up his insides, and it took a lot of him to stop himself from actually doing it. Right instincts, wrong conclusion. Hello again, Hermione Granger.

"How did you find out?" He eventually asked.

"Because it's obvious," she scoffed. "You're not him. You're not… not my Harry, I realised it from the moment I saw you."

"And when's that?"

"The day after the Department of Mysteries. In your dormitory. I've known since the start."

For as much as he wanted to laugh, he had to give it to her. Wrong conclusion, but she still figured it out. Sort of. And he did kind of time travel. A month or so into the future, but yeah, he had.

"What gave me away?"

"Your eyes," she answered immediately. "They look so old."

"Just my eyes?" It sounded so absurd, so hard to believe. And yet, she had figured it out, hadn't she? "That's all it took?"

"It's what tipped me off, yes. After that, it was the weird way you acted around all of us. All that first week with you, it was… odd, I knew something was wrong. After that first week when you started pretending, it was harder to notice. But every time I looked into your eyes, I just knew you weren't him."

"And the time travel?"

"I used a time turner back in my third year, so I knew it was possible. It didn't fit, not exactly, and I tried to come up with other explanations, but I didn't like any of them either. Eventually, I just had to accept that something weird must have happened when you tried to break into the Department of Mysteries and left it at that."

Harry didn't say anything at that. It was a decent theory, this case of his was one where reality was much weirder than fiction, so he didn't blame her. Still, he wasn't sure why she was telling him all of this. He didn't see the point of it. And if she was asking him this now, how long would she wait before she went to his friends? To Susan? To his own parents? What would they do when they found out?

"You don't seem to like me much," Granger remarked. She tried to sound casual about it, but Harry could tell she was nervous. "Do we… grow apart in the future or…?"

More like in the past, Harry said to himself. In another life. He still remembered the first time he met her. He was sharing a compartment with Ron and Longbottom when, suddenly, Longbottom realised he had lost his toad. Granger had been the first person they saw, right outside their compartment. And she had been so happy to help them find it. It felt so weird, to think that the first people he talked to in the wizarding world ended up being the Golden Trio, who he grew to resent so much. It felt almost like a dream, something that only happened in his mind. Granger tried to be nice at first, even after Ron and Longbottom turned their back on him after his sorting. But after Halloween, he stopped reciprocating, and she seemed to take the message. And here she was, the only person who realised her best friend had gone missing. Changed by an impostor. And the first thing she asked was what happened to them that made him hate her.

"No," he reassured her before he could stop himself. "You were always sort of suspicious of me, so I just thought it best to stay away. It would have been hard to keep my secret with you always around me."

"Right," she smiled, and the relief lit up her face. "And… my Harry… is he…?"

"I don't know," he answered truthfully. "Didn't really plan on doing… this. It just sort of happened, and now I'm… well, I didn't plan this out."

"Oh," Granger tried to hide her disappointment, but she wasn't too good at it. "Well, that's… I'm going to miss him. But at least… well… at least we'll have you, right?"

"Yeah… right." The two of them went silent, and Harry still felt his heart pounding hard inside him. "Am I… am I really that different from him?"

She turned to him, and he appreciated the fact that she was considering the question. She looked him over, he could almost see the gears turning in her mind. And then she looked straight at his eyes, those chocolate orbs had never looked at him so intently. "Yeah, you are," she gave him a sad smile before reaching out and squeezing his hand. "But you still look like Harry Potter to me."

The words felt like a blow directly to his heart. They weren't cruel, nor did they come from hate. It was simply the truth. He was still Harry Potter, but he was so different from who he had been meant to be. And though it felt like a shock to his system, there was something so powerful in the fact that people could still recognise him as Harry Potter despite everything that had happened to him. He squeezed back her hand, holding onto it for a second longer before he stood up and gazed at the graveyard in front of him.

They were still dead. His parents. His Susan. And now, they weren't even there. His accomplishments. His friends. His actual life was still back home. He was an intruder here, and not just because he took over the place of the original Harry, but because this just wasn't his life any more. It could have been, a long time ago, but it wasn't any more. He was just too different. Damaged. Fucked up. Or maybe just different. Same face, different person, and that was okay. To pretend he was something that he wasn't, to force himself to live that life, would only be a disservice to who he had become. He would be depriving that happiness and love that he could get for himself just to keep pretending he hadn't changed.

"We can't get them back, can we?" He asked quietly. "No matter how much we try, it's just never the same, is it?"

"No," Hermione whispered. "But different doesn't mean less."

He was done torturing himself.


Harry stepped out from behind the statue of the one-eyed witch and took the castle around him. His conversation with Hermione from a few days ago had finally helped him sway his decision. He spent the past few days with his family and friends, putting all his mental effort into burning every single detail of them into his mind. It somehow prepared him, as if it was cementing his choice. But he still wanted to have one final conversation before he fully made up his mind. And since there were only two more days before Hogwarts started back up, Harry knew this was the last chance he was going to have to finish this conversation, so he apparated into Hogsmeade early in the morning and made his way back into Hogwarts for a final time.

He began walking through the hallways, making his way up to the Headmaster's Tower, only to find Dumbledore in one of the corridors. He was peering out a window, looking at the Hogsmeade in the distance. And when Dumbledore turned to him and smiled, Harry got the sense the old man had been waiting for him. "Ah, Harry, a bit early for term, isn't it?"

"Good morning sir," he greeted cordially before moving to his side. "Did you see me all the way from here, or was it the wards that gave me away?"

Dumbledore's eyes twinkled. "Both."

Harry followed beside Dumbledore as the two of them began roaming through the castle.

"You're here to talk me into giving you back your place and the captaincy of the Gryffindor Quidditch Team, I presume."

"No," Harry replied. "Not today, anyway. You'll probably have to remind me when term starts, more or less."

"Is that so?" Dumbledore sounded genuinely curious now. "Well, then, enlighten me, my boy. What can I do for you today?"

"You've fought in both wars, haven't you, sir? First with Grindelwald and then with Voldemort."

"That is correct, yes."

Harry whistled. "Two Dark Lords defeated in less than a hundred years. Almost single-handedly too if most of the papers are to be believed."

"Barnabas has always tended to embellish his stories," Dumbledore waved him off. "It was far from single-handedly."

"Do you ever miss it?"

"The war? The havoc and agony they wrought on so many people? I'd be concerned if I did."

"No, not the violence," Harry replied calmly. "The purpose you get. The relationships and camaraderie that are built amid the chaos. The thrill of the game that might just take your life if you take one wrong step."

"War is not a game," Dumbledore said seriously, his voice bordering on cold. "It's not something to be glorified or fawned over. It's horrible, barbaric, devastating. If you were to take something from your schooling, I'd wish it to be that."

"Oh, I know," Harry said darkly. "But at the same time, there's nothing quite like there, is it? I mean, look at you, sir. Headmaster. Supreme Mugwump. Chief Warlock. Three separate, highly influential positions, each with an obscene amount of work to them. Are they enough, sir? Do they fill that hole that the wars left behind? Or do you still feel like you're not doing enough?"

"What are you suggesting, Mister Potter?"

"I'm not suggesting anything, sir. I'm asking - genuinely asking - because I want an answer. Can it ever be enough?"

Dumbledore stopped walking and turned fully towards Harry. There was something in that searching look that immediately bothered Harry. He raised his Occlumency shields and met Dumbledore's gaze, but he never once tried entering his mind. "Is there something you wish to tell me?"

This was always going to be a futile conversation. But there was something about Dumbledore's lack of response that served as his answer. It wasn't a rally for war, but a sign that he would never be truly happy living a normal life, just like everyone here expected him to.

"Yes, sir," Harry replied calmly. "That day after the Department of Mysteries, when you had Ron and the twins leave, you told me that at one point or another, we're all faced with the same decision."

"Yes…"

"I believe I've made my choice."


That's it for this chapter, thank you all for reading!

By the time I'm posting this, I'm TWELVE chapters ahead, and I am finishing writing the first arc of Book 2 of the Pray For The Wicked Saga! If you are interested in learning how to get early access to them, join my discord server using the following link: discord . gg / jyPfbGqhJT

As always, thank you for reading, favouriting, and commenting! I appreciate all of you! :)