Chapter Text
Twenty-five.
Minutes.
Tick, tick, tick.
It’s almost over. There’s still an infinity left. Blue curtains, a platter with blue painting, blue eyes, blue veins, blue…
"Harry?” Ms. Whatever asks.
"Yeah?" Harry answers because even if he is lost in his mind he has manners. Or whatever.
“I asked whether you went to see your friends or not?” Ms. Blueeyes has glasses. Funny Harry never noticed. He rarely does. Notice anything that is. “It would be good for you” she says.
Harry doubts it. He answers anyway.
"No" he says. Then:
"Do you think they blame me?”
Ms. Shehasglasses looks up. She writes on her notes. She always does when he says something. He rarely does.
“Who does?” She looks as she always does: with knowing, pretending to be interested but not too interested in the troubles of the Chosen One. Harry doesn’t care. He rarely does.
“Them. I couldn’t save them." Remus, Tonks, Fred, Sirius, Merlin, even Snape. The list goes on forever.
“I don’t think so. They are dead, they aren’t doing much.”
Helpful. Ms. Whateveritwas speaks like she doesn’t care but asks like she does. Harry thinks it’s calming. Like she wasn’t in the war, like she never lost anyone.
Harry remembers. It was Ginny who gave him her floo number. “You need help” she said. Then she left. Harry doesn’t blame her, after the battle he was, is, a shell of himself. Everyone is trying to move on, forcing themselves to forget, leaving Harry behind. Harry doesn’t blame them, really. He was interesting until he wasn’t, until there weren’t any Dark Lord to defeat. Hermione and Ron were starting a family. Ginny left. He doesn’t blame her, really. He isn’t himself.
Tick, tack, tick, tack.
Twenty.
Blue curtains, blue sky, blue veins, blue eyes. One, two, three, four.
A minute passes.
"I reckon they are grateful" she says. “You saved everyone else.”
Harry doesn’t know how to move on. He knows how to forget. Nightmares plaguing his mind, help us harry, he can’t get out, Hermione would say something like: Ho w are yo u? Harry isn’t there, You, okay? Mate? Of course, why wouldn’t I be?
Tick, tack, tick, tack.
Fifteen.
“You are distancing yourself. It’s not good for your health “she says. "Are you taking the potions I prescribed?"
Distancing himself. He feels distant. He is in London. Far from Hogwarts. Home?
"Yes" he does. If he remembers. He rarely does.
Distant. Tick, tack. He is far from home. His home is Hogwarts. How many miles is that? Kilometres. He is nineteen. His life just started. His life ended. You killed them.
It started two years ago. He remembers clearly: the day in the Forbidden Forest, he snuck in as Harry, ready to die, to vanish, disappear into oblivion. He was afraid to die. The Dark Lord killing him was inevitable in the end, he was a pig raised for slaughter, how poetic. He killed you. Harry isn’t afraid to die anymore. He is floating, looking at life through a veil, present but distant enough.
He came out pf the forest as a different person. Carried in Hagrid’s arms. Perhaps Hagrid left something behind, forgotten on the forest floor, changing Harry.
He looks at the door. Then the windows. Blue curtains.
“I can only help you if you let me” she says. “Healing is important.”
Mindhealer.
Far from home. Are you okay Harry?
He misses the war. He felt something then. Dread, terror, fear mostly, but dread, terror, fear is better than nothing. Better than now. He feels selfish. He should feel selfish. He feels empty. In his chest there is an aching space, like something was torn out violently, a part of him, an important part he misses. He doesn’t know what. He doubts Ms. Bluecurtains knows this.
“I feel empty” he says.
Ms. Shehasglasses looks up over her glasses which make dance the light coming from the window.
“In what way?” she asks, because of course she does. He regrets saying it, but he is accustomed to this. Regret. He regrets many thing. The things he has done, the things he never had the opportunity to do, things he let others do, Oh Merlin what have you done?
A beat.
“I miss something. Since the battle” he clarifies “Torn apart. Part of me is missing.”
Ms. Blueeyesoverherglasses takes notes. She has red painted nails. Red eyes. Beating heart. Oh, Merlin where is he?
“Do you know what is it?” she asks. Of course she does.
Me. Important part of me. What is it?
A beat.
Ten and a half.
“No” he says.
Tick, tack blue curtains, Harry has tenfi ngers. One, two, three, fourfivesix.
“We are making progress “she says. “Do not give up Harry. I understand it’s hard losing so many people, but what you can do for them now is live. So live.”
Live Harry! The Boy Who Lived, The Boy Who Did Not Die, a Sacrifice. Harry is a lamb waiting to be sacrificed, for the cause, The Cause. Burned on the altar, missed but never saved, it’s not personal, someone has to do it, you see.
“Thank you” he says, because he has manners, or whatever. “I’ll try” he says.
Five.
“That’s all I’m asking” she says. She absentmindedly tucks a loose blond curl behind her ear, glancing at her notes. She has red, neatly manicured nails, blue eyes orange eyeshadow, a pearl necklace, pleasant smile, she has to be in her mid-thirties, married, golden band on her finger.
Successful. You are afraid, aren’t you?
I am not.
Tick, tack, tick, tack.
Harry doesn’t remember a time when he wasn’t afraid. Freak. You are a freak, Harry. Fat finger pointing at him, he isn’t an angel, he is a pig in a blonde wig, how could you even think he is? Harry, he wants to kill you, did you know?
A present for your birthday: a maniac, a madman, he killed your parents Harry, he will kill you too. Thank you, Harry, you are extraordinary, you did what no one else could, how wonderful. We’ll always be grateful, thank you.
Harry looks at Ms. Whatever. She is looking back at him, her mouth is moving, Harry is answering, he doesn’t know what he is saying, it probably doesn’t matter.
Oh, Harry, are you okay? He is, thank you for asking, Hermione, how are you? How is life treating you? Better than before, I hope.
Hermione writes him letters when she can’t visit. She rarely can. She writes about the house she bought with Ron, white picket fence, domestic dream. Maybe kids soon. Ron writes too, although on rarer occasion, but not with less enthusiasm about whatever job he has in the Ministry. Harry is offered one too among the Unspeakables, but he puts that on hold until he feels like he is himself again. (He doubts he ever will.)
“Ah, look at the time!” she stands up. She has blue eyes.
One.
“Thank you” he says because he has manners, he is not an asshole, you see. “See you next week” he says.
You see. See.
“Goodbye” she sways. Says. Good-bye.
He apparates away.
(…)
It starts like this:
Tom wakes up. He usually does before anyone else, he is a prefect after all, he has to be perfect.
Then everyone else does. He is already in the common room when they come down, reading a book on Arthimancy. Green everywhere, chatter filling the dungeons, laughter, Tom hates it, too loud, Tom loves it he isn’t alone anymore.
Then Malfoy came with his nearly perfect blonde hair, fake looking smile, greeting Tom.
“‘Morning “he said to Tom.
“Morning” said Tom. Green everywhere, it’s already morning? Better start waking up, Tom!
Then they went to eat breakfast. In the orphanage some kids called it brekkie, like the dry bread and cold milk could compare to anything in the castle, Tom is glad to be here he is never hungry, Tom, do you have anything to eat? I am hungry, Tom.
“Grindelwald is gathering followers” Rosier fake whispers over the table mouth full of Tom did not want to know what. Merlin, don’t you have manners? He is supposed to be a pure-blood. Pure.
Tom wasn’t ever pure. He was born dirty from a dirty mother in a dirty orphanage. Tom is better than them, he never took anything for granted, he deserves the respect he got from them, he deserves to be their leader, you see.
“I heard that too” Avery is pretending sitting up straight like a statue, Tom naturally sits like that, you see. He takes small bites like he is an elegant Lord of the Pure blood, using his utensils properly, his teenage limbs moving awkwardly. “Mother wrote to me, said I shouldn’t worry about that stuff, I should just study for our N.E.W.T.S.”
“So, it’s true” Malfoy says helping himself from one of the plates. Piles of food. Tom can’t believe his luck. You are a lucky bastard Riddle, you will never go hungry from now on, you lucky bastard.
“I didn’t say that” Avery says.
“My family would never join someone from Germany” Malfoy says.
“He is Hungarian” Avery interjects.
“Doesn’t matter” Malfoy says.
It probably doesn’t, Tom doesn’t want war, war means that awful siren, Tom would kill never to hear sound that again. Hurry Up Tom! The Germans are here to kill you with their bombs! Oh God, shut up!
Then a Hufflepuff run in excited demanding the attention of everyone. Yellow. Tom doesn’t like yellow it’s like mud, Tom your clothes are muddy, you should pay attention, you don’t want to be spanked, do you?
“There is a boy!” she says” He was found unconscious on the shore, no one knows him!
Second-year. Can’t even speak properly.
Then because he is not only a prefect, but also Head Boy, or at least he will be, he stands up abandoning his empty plate, he never wastes food, you see.
It is a boy. He is soaking wet but undoubtedly a boy. He has dark unruly dark hair, simple black robes, no yellow, pale sickly skin, he is breathing, he has a scar starting from his forehead like the thousand arms of a lighting reaching across his sickly pale skin. God he is so pale.
“Professor? “He asks because he isn’t impolite and wants to help.
“My dear boy, help me lift him“ Slughorn says, there is so many people around them, Dippet is hurrying from the castle he is almost here. Tom doesn’t do anything because Dumbledore is there and he is leaning over the boy chanting searching for anything, oh god, is he dead?
“He has no physical injuries” he says straightening up. “He is just unconscious. “
It’s a boy. He has dark hair like the sky in London when the stars aren’t visible. He has a lightning scar, pale complexion, oh God, is he dead?
He looks like little Robin catching a cold the winter Tom turned eight. He was coughing even before that, but he only had a temperature after the night started to freeze. Medicine is expensive, the Matrons said, we can’t do anything. Robin was pale, his lips were blue, he had dark hair. He had no lightning scar.
Robin died four days after Tom’s birthday. The kids lined up to see how the men in dark clothes covered his little body and took him with them.
Tom was only eight.
Robin wasn’t the first. He certainly wasn’t the last. In February Rosemary, the strongest girl fell sick. She was taller than most of the boys, she had copper coloured hair and a freckled face. She used to hit the boys just because she could. Tom didn’t miss her a bit after she died. After all, she strangled to death one of his snakes. Tom stole her precius doll and never gave it back. It's hard to return it to someone who is dead.
