This is something I wrote back during quarantine and how I thought it could have happened at Godric’s Hollow when Harry and Hermione visit in Deathly Hallows. Some parts of this are directly the same as Ch 17 of Deathly Hallows, which is indicated in italics. Several things mentioned were not in the movie, so just a heads up! I wrote it so that it could almost be placed directly in the book at the time when Harry and Hermione see the Potter’s cottage. I always thought that Harry being Harry would want to go inside the house, so this is what I believe could have happened if he did. Also, this is the first thing I have posted so I hope you enjoy it :)
Deathly Hallows: The Potter’s Cottage
As Harry and Hermione approached the gap in the hedges where a small cottage was revealed to be, which due to the fidelius charm ending with the death of the Potters was no longer hidden. The cottage showed prominent signs of the malicious events that had occurred within. There was a hole in the front of the cottage most likely caused by the curse being shot through the wall aiming to hit the occupants of the home. The right top side of the home also seemed to have been blown out, resulting from the backfired curse that Voldemort had cast. The cottage had been coated in freshly fallen snow, which hidden beneath was a blanket of ivy that had grown over the past 16 years.
“Harry look,” whispered Hermione.
Harry glanced at where Hermione was staring at. Words were scattered across a wall, some were just names and initials, while others were messages.
Good Luck Harry, wherever you are
If you read this, Harry, we’re all behind you!
Long live Harry Potter
But then in the middle of all the writing left by visitors over the past 16 years, stood the words describing the events that happened in the small cottage.
On this spot, on the night of 31 October, 1981,
Lily and James Potter lost their lives.
Their son, Harry, remains the only wizard,
Ever to have survived the Killing Curse.
This house invisible to muggles, has been
Left in its ruined state as a monument of the
Potters and a reminder of the violence
that tore a family apart
After standing and admiring the messages for a few minutes Hermione finally spoke up, just above a whisper, as if not to disrupt the calmness of the scene, and said, “I think we should get going. We shouldn’t be out here in the open.”
Harry exhaled and finally said something in return, “Give me a few minutes. You can keep watch.”
Harry started walking, not waiting for a reply from Hermione. His feet walked across the overgrown weeds and vegetation that had covered the stone path leading up to the small cottage. Harry reached for the doorknob, which was rusted from the years of weather, and he pushed to get inside. When Harry opened the house it was as if he took a step back in time.
Considering that the house had remained empty for 16 years everything was mostly left exactly how his parents had left it. Although the outside world had evolved and the vegetation tried to disguise the previous scene, Harry had not realized that it was all there, a simple mirage that hid his parents' past. All the damage and nature that was trying to hide the past simply disappeared from Harry’s eye and all he saw was what was left of his parent's lives. Harry had entered the living room of the small cottage, where a brown sofa sat in the middle of the room surrounded by bookshelves that contained both muggle and wizarding books and an immense amount of nik naks and pictures.
Harry approached one in particular, which contained four individuals. Harry recognized his parents, Remus, and Sirius, all of who were shown laughing as the picture moved, and then Harry noticed that he was in the picture, perched between his mother’s arms, with his father’s glasses attached to his face, falling off as they were too large for his small head, and his small hand found its way into Sirius’ hair as it looked as he was pulling it. Remus was leaning in towards Harry, his arm wrapped around Sirius laughing, no doubt making fun of Sirius as he couldn’t escape a baby. Harry stared at the picture for what seemed like hours. This one picture provided a small glimpse into the future that Harry could have had. Harry envied that form of himself that would have grown up with loving parents, the form of himself that would have known Sirius for so many more years, and the version of himself that wouldn’t have met Remus only because he was a professor at Hogwarts. He carefully flipped the picture frame over and undid the clasps. Harry removed the picture frame and carefully removed the picture from the frame and carefully placed it within the moleskine bag that Hagrid had given him. This picture was one of the few things that he had that could show that he once lived a normal life.
Harry moved across the room and when he was almost out of the doorframe he noticed something in the corner. The object which Harry had found interesting was a small broom, with a wooden handle which had his name engraved into the top of it, the same small broom that he had recognized as the one Sirius had given him, in which he had the picture that his mother had sent to Sirius all those years ago. Harry smiled at the idea of himself flying around the small living room where he could imagine his father chasing him around the sofa, where his mother would be laid across laughing at the two of them.
Harry decided to explore the rest of the house. He soon found the stairs, which had been overgrown worse than the rest of the house, but it wasn’t this that gave Harry an offset feeling, it was here where an eeriness had taken over. These were the very stairs in which his father was protecting Voldemort from reaching, and where his father’s body would have laid. The remnants of dark magic could still be felt and made Harry’s blood run cold. This would have been the very spot where James lay crumpled on the floor, with his last thought being of Lily and Harry, whose escape James would have died a million times for.
Harry pried his eyes away and continued to climb, as he could not imagine the body of James for a second more or he feared it may be ingrained into his brain. Harry soon reached the top of the stairs where he reached a small hallway. The hallway contained three doors, all but one were closed. He gripped the doorknob of the first one and peaked inside the room. The room was seemingly untouched by the nature that had invaded the rest of the house. It contained a bed neatly made and on the walls were a few pictures but the thing that stood out the most was a Gryffindor flag hanging on the wall, a reminder of his parents' years at Hogwarts. James and Lily, the epitome of what being a Gryffindor meant, had spent their Hogwarts years with their friends, just like Harry had with Ron and Hermione, a fact that sometimes Harry forgot, how normally his parents once were.
Harry quietly shut the door and proceeded down the hallway. He approached the second closed door and glanced inside, a bathroom lay behind it, the most mundane aspect of the house and the one room where the occupants couldn’t be identified. Harry proceeded to close that door and head to the last door, the one that was opened. Harry stepped through the door frame and looked around. The room was painted a scarlet color, with gold details scribbled across the walls with owls flying across the scarlet sky. Sat in the middle of the room was a crib that contained nothing but a small stuffed dog, which Harry picked up and analyzed, coming to the conclusion that it must have been a gift from Sirius, as it resembled his amigause form. Harry couldn’t help but imagine that it was a gift from when he was born. Sirius being so excited that he had a godson, who he couldn’t wait to cause mischief with. Harry placed the small stuffed dog back into the crib and stepped back.
His foot crushed something beneath it, looking down Harry saw it was a piece of wood. And it wasn’t until this moment that Harry noticed the damage done to the room. The door seemed to be falling off the hinges, no doubt from Voldemort forcing his way in to find him. Then small pieces of wood, perhaps it was once a rocking chair, laid across the floor, splinters of the object littered the room. The damage was probably caused by the rebounded killing curse that had hit Lily. And the worst damage was the wall which led directly into the chilly winter night, another effect of the rebounded curse. Damage from the weather over the sixteen years was also evident. Leaves and dirt blown in from the wind covered every surface and water damage was also apparent on the walls from years of rain and melting snow. The cold air seemed to hit Harry all of a sudden and suddenly he was transported back from the past to the crushing reality that he was standing in the room where his mother had stood against Voldemort. Although Harry had seen the scene play out from the memories of Voldemort, Harry felt that being in the room where his mother was murdered made the fact that she was dead so much more real. Harry had not realized that he had sat down on the ground with his back against the wall. He couldn’t help but imagine if this was in fact the spot his mother’s body fell after she was hit with the killing curse.
*SNAP*
The noise pulled Harry out of his thoughts, causing him to whip out his wand. He hadn’t noticed that tears were streaming down his face. His breathing was intense and as he was trying to wipe tears away Hermione entered the room.
“Harry, I was getting worried. You’ve been gone for nearly 20 minutes. I thought something might have happened.” Her voice had a hint of annoyance but mostly worried within it. She must have noticed that Harry’s cheek was stained from the tears that previously painted his face.
“Oh Harry,” she whispered, which was barely audible to Harry.
She walked over to him and put her arms around him, engulfing him into a hug, it was then at this moment that he couldn’t hold it any longer and let the tears flow. Hermione just held her arms around him comforting him as he let out all the emotions and fear he had been holding in for the past few months, honestly the past few years. And it wasn’t too long before he noticed he wasn’t the only one shedding tears. So they both just stood embraced by each other, letting their emotions run free. All the emotions from all the deaths Harry had experienced came rushing over him: his parents. Cedric, Sirius, Dumbledore, Mad-eye, and what Harry had feared was nowhere near the end of people who would have lost their lives for him. In the moment Harry thought back to the time he looked into the Mirror of Erised, which had shown that the thing he had desired most in the world was his parents, but looking at all the things that had happened since his first year at Hogwarts, he now believed the mirror would be filled of all the people that he longed to spend one more moment with.