trouble

When he pushed the door of 12, Grimmauld Place, Harry felt an odd sadness. Of course, it reminded him of Sirius. Oh, to see him one more time. But he had. He didn't tell about the stone. To anyone. He hadn't wanted to, even Ron and Hermione. It was all between him, and them. His now really gone family. 

He walked into the house. It was terribly dusty. Apparently, he, Ron and Hermione weren't the last ones to have come here. Hermione was right, they had come to search for them after their expedition at the Ministry. He sighed. Who would come here, now. 

After a few weeks of staying at the Weasleys, he hadn't been able to cope with it anymore. As sweet as they were, it was just… too hard. Hermione had been staying too, but she had been spending an awful amount of time with Ron, in his room. Harry didn't want to know what was happening in there. Though he suspected that there was much more of Ron crying than the rest of the family seemed to think. Harry could still see Fred dropping dead in that hallway. He would never get this image out of his head. He would never forget any one of them. He couldn't, even if he wanted to actually, as they kept coming back for him in his nightmares. He had been doing so many nightmares. Harry could not stay at the Weasleys any longer. And this was what he was left with. 

Harry truly loved Sirius. And he knew Sirius truly hated this house. Harry never found it very warm or welcoming. Sometimes, he would come to that room where he and Sirius had talked. The one with the tapestry. He would stare at it, reading and re-reading the names. Sometimes, he would look at those names that he knew, or had known, and think about them for a few minutes. Asking himself where they were now. If they were dead. If they were in prison. The hardest one was the name, freshly added, of Ted Lupin. Harry had hardly seen that boy. He didn't know shit about babies. He was being taken care of by some remaining member of the Order now, but Harry had known for quite some time he wanted to go and get him. That's what Remus had wanted, for Teddy to be taken care of by his godfather. That's what Harry knew his parents had wanted for him, and what he had wanted himself. But he wasn't ready yet. He was too much of a mess. He couldn't even take care of himself, let alone a baby. And not to forget that fuckin hell, he was not even eighteen yet. Harry had grown up way too fast, sure, but not in any way that would benefit a child.  

Oh for fuck's sake. Harry closed his eyes. He desperately needed a distraction. How many days had he been staying in this fucking house. He'd been sleeping in Sirius's room. Not only was it the warmest place in the house but he also found it… comforting. He went down to the kitchen, to get something to eat. Kreacher would make him breakfast every morning, even though he rarely saw him. On the table was his plate and next to it the paper and the mail. Hermione wrote to him every day. Ron sometimes. Ginny, never. He hadn't been able to keep it up with her. Not that he no longer loved her. But it was hard for him, coping with the Weasley, when the guilt of not having been able to save Fred was always in the back of his head. He couldn't do it. Ginny was a brilliant girl, she got it when he told her all about needing to be alone, for some time. Leaving the Weasleys. Leaving her. She had enough to cope with on her own. 

Harry sat and opened his mail. One of the letters was of an unusual format, and he recognized it right away. It was from the Ministry. He had tried to stay as much out of it as he could. For his concern, he had done enough. But here they are, weeks after the end of the war, summoning him on the next day, evidently not mentioning why. He'd go, of course. At least it gave him a reason to get out of both the house and the permanent discussion he was having with himself. 

***

Dressed with some clothes Molly Weasley had kind heartedly gifted him with before he left, he arrived at the Ministry, which had radically changed since the last time he was here. That horrible statue was gone, the one that troubled Hermione so much. There were no banners, no piles of newspaper in the hall. There were a lot of reporters, though, and if anything the Ministry simply was not the Ministry if it wasn't crowded with strict looking people coming and going to their tasks like bees, or ants. He had seen once, in his muggle classes of primary school, a box that the teacher had filled with dirt and a bunch of ants. It was fascinating to see them work through the transparent walls of the box. In the Ministry, it looked rather scary. He arrived at a desk and showed the letter he was sent, trying to ignore how everyone turned on his way to see the glorious Harry Potter. How glorious indeed, in his old clothes, wearing on his face the countless sleepless nights of the past few weeks. Hell, years. He frowned when he was designated the way to what he knew was the court rooms. He didn't like the sound of that. The receptionist offered to have someone guide him, without ever actually asking Harry for his opinion. So, he was soon in one of those awful elevators again, dropping all the way down to the Justice floor. 

"Ah, Potter !" someone reached to him. 

Harry had to blink a few times. 

"McLaggen ?" 

"Nice to see you mate ! Bet you weren't expecting to see me here !" Cormac said enthusiastically. But Harry didn't answer. "I work here. My uncle wrote a letter to Godrick knows who, next thing I know I work for the Ministry. How great is that ! It's very exciting, you'll see, we're on the front line !" 

From Harry's experience, being on the front line was rarely exciting when it had to do with governmental affairs.

"Do you know why I'm here ?" He asked. 

"Yeah, I thought it was weird too. I mean, of all people, you ! But you know, I'm not here to question the judge's decision." 

Harry frowned. What judge ? And what was it actually that Cormac did do ? 

"Shall we go in ?" He asked Harry with a large, polite smile. 

He followed him into the court room, and sat in the bleachers where Cormac told him to sit. 

"It shouldn't be long. We have so many people to go through, can't afford to spend days on one case. It'll be over in an hour or two. Plus, who's gonna think this dumbass ever killed anyone."

Then he waited. There weren't a lot of people, and those who were there didn't seem very preoccupied by what was going on. Harry figured they had just eaten. They had this satisfied joy on their faces, the slow but loud voices that indicated that digestion time of the day had arrived and the lack of concentration that comes along with it. No one paid attention to him. Thankfully, he didn't have to wait for too long. Soon enough, they all joined their seats, and the audience began when the president of the court asked to let in the defendant. 

***

As soon as Draco Malfoy walked into the room, the situation brightened into Harry's mind. It came back to him, their discussion on the bridge. The small looking, distressed breathing Draco Malfoy, crying in silence while other were exulting their joy or grief. He remembered his deranged blond hair, his dirty face, his dusty suit. The bruises on his face and on his hands. 

The Draco Malfoy standing in front of him had nothing to do with that. He had definitely lost weight, Harry could tell by his face, thinner than ever, and his slightly misfitting suit. His hair was done clumsily, it wasn't as neat as it usually was. But the biggest difference Harry spotted was on the boy's expression. Big dark bags under his eyes, his look was not arrogant as it had been at its best or terrified as it had been at its worse. Draco looked tired. He looked broken. Harry was concerned. 

As the days were passing at 12, Grimmauld Place, and Harry had been studying the tapestry, he had thought about the Malfoy family a few times. It had brought him to reconsider Draco. He had tried to picture him, as a child, alone in that gigantic, cold stoned manor. Tried to imagine what it was like to grow up raised by Lucius Malfoy. By Narcissa Black. Harry knew that she loved her son, enough to brave Voldemort. But Sirius had told him about his family. You can love your son, and still be a terrible person. 

"The defendant, Draco Malfoy, is facing the charges of joining the ranks of the Death Eaters ; alongside with them, planning the assassination of Albus Dumbledore, ; and fighting in the name of Lord Voldemort during the Battle of Hogwart." Harry noticed that, ever since he'd died, people had been keener to pronounce his name. "He is facing twelve years of imprisonment in the prison of Azkaban. The audience may begin." 

As someone of the Ministry, who was sitting right next to Cormac McLaggen (Harry assumed it was his superior), began his indictment, Harry looked back at Draco, on time to see Draco lift his own pale blue eyes up to him. He was wearing handcuffs. The situation was unreal. If Harry had thought about Draco Malfoy wearing handcuffs before, he would have imagined him outraged, spitting "My father will hear about this"'s at everyone around, making a scandal. But no, he was quiet, drooping. He could never survive Azkaban, he would get out of there a vegetable, Harry thought. If alive. I mean the man was a prick but did he really deserve that ?

"...as it is well known, the Malfoy and the Black families, of which Mr Malfoy belongs, have always been fervent defenders of the "blood purity" values and of Lord Voldemort. We count amongst his closest family some of the most dangerous criminals this court has judged over the years, and highest ranking soldiers in the Dark Lord's army. I am referencing, per instance, to his aunt, Bellatrix Lestrange, originally Black, who was arrested and held in Azkaban until she escaped three years ago, for numerous murders, attacks, and a use of the "Crucio" spell on the Longbottom couple, wich lead them to be treated for the rest of their years in a specific department of St-Mango for the symptoms this torture had on their minds. Bellatrix Lestrange is now deceased, fallen during the Battle of Hogwart. Mr Malfoy's father, a year after the return of Lord Voldemort, was arrested and placed in Azkaban for collaborating with the Dark…" 

Harry couldn't concentrate. He also didn't really care to. But mostly he couldn't. He was embarrassed to look at Malfoy but, in the meantime, couldn't help himself. His eyes were attracted like magnets, and Draco kept staring at him in silence. The rest of the trial didn't last very long. Draco had someone to defend him, which was good, Harry thought,  because he was clearly in no state of doing it himself. 

"My client, Mr Malfoy, ladies and gentleman of the jury, I would like to remind you, is only eighteen. At the time he is accused of having joined the Death Eaters, he was but sixteen. As it was pointed at before, he grew up in an aristocratic family that valued blood purity and had joined the ranks of Voldemort. What other choice do you have, I ask you, as a child, than obey your family, and the Dark Lord himself, when they ask you to follow them. How can we rationally say that he joined them, when he so obviously was forced into these ranks by wreaths, fear, and conditioning ? He did not choose to be entrenched in this highly violent and dangerous circle. He was born into it. You accuse him of having participated in the assassination of Albus Dumbledore. But could a child in this position have done anything else ? Have disobeyed direct orders, or rather menace of the Dark Lord himself ? What choice did he have, between facing certain death and torture, or to obey ? His own father, in prison, for disappointing the Dark Lord, and the threat of having his family murdered by him weighting on his shoulders ?..." 

Harry thought about his curiosity for Draco, two years before. How he followed him in the corridors or on the Marauder's Map. How he caught him, sobbing in the bathroom. How his saw him, shaking with all his bones on the astronomy tower. How angry he had been at him at the time. How repulsed. He thought about the boy's speech, about Voldemort trusting him. Giving him a mission. About the honour of his family. 

"... I will now address the third accusation that is held against my client, about his presumed participation in the Battle of Hogwarts alongside the Death Eaters. I would like to call a witness at the bar, your Honor." 

"You can." 

"Mr Potter."