Green & Gold

Sunday October 8, 2003

“Ugh.” Harry groaned weakly before even opening his eyes. Merlin, he was sore. Had he drank an entire liquor store last night? Why was his head aching so badly and his body so stiff? Harry stretched out, groaning again as he did, and opened his eyes...

... to sunlight.

Bright, obnoxious, sunlight.

“What time is it?” he mumbled aloud.

“Nearly seven thirty.”

“WHAT THE HELL?” Harry twisted in his chair, automatically reaching for his wand as his question to himself was answered by someone else. Thankfully, he didn’t have his wand on him-

Which isn’t something he thought he would ever be thankful for.

-since the person who answered his question was Jasper.

Jasper who may question why Harry was brandishing a piece of wood in his face. Or worse- Jasper, who may have been stunned and exposed to magic for the petty offense of startling Harry.

Actually, Harry rephrased that as the complete weirdness of the situation sunk in.

Jasper, who may have been stunned and exposed to magic for the actual real crime of breaking in to Harry’s house.

Harry’s vision was blurred, but he was fairly sure that was Jasper. But... but that didn’t make any sense? Did it? He groped around for his glasses, found them wedged in the side of the chair, and put them on to see more clearly.

Yep.

That was Jasper giving him an amused half-smile in his doorway.

“What-“ Harry had to clear his throat, that was thick with sleep, and push away the ache that started pounding in his head from his own startled shout. “What are you doing here?” Harry demanded.

“Catch.” Jasper ignored his question and threw something to Harry. A soft, white, package that Harry easily caught.

“You broke in my house at seven thirty in the bloody morning to bring me... bandages?” Harry knew that Hermione’s defense of American muggles was wrong. This was not normal behavior. These people were mad.

“No. I broke in your house at eight o’clock last night,” Jasper said calmly. As if that wasn’t an entirely barmy thing to admit to. “But you need to go change your bandages, otherwise you’re going to end up in the hospital with a terrible infection.”

Harry shook his head, even though it sent a sharp pain through his body to do so. What the hell was going on?

“What the hell is going on?” he asked bluntly. “Why did you come here? Why am I getting an infection?”

Jasper was now the one who looked confused. He stepped slowly in to the sitting room and tilted his head to examine Harry. “Do you not remember anything from last night?”

Harry rubbed his straining eyes and tried to find the pieces of the puzzle he was obviously missing. He had went to Hogwarts yesterday, which had been terrible. Then he came home, and started drinking. And then...

Oh.

Dang.

And then he had the brilliant idea that maybe the hallows left a loophole open and Harry could still die by muggle methods. So he had tested that theory by cutting both of his wrists as deeply as he could. He remembered now how relieved he had felt as his mind slowly shut down, his breathing slowed to nearly nothing, and his pulse dropped down to a slow and uneven rate.

He remembered now how disappointed and furious he had been when he opened his eyes a few minutes later and his body was fully functioning again. The only proof of his actions were now thick white scars on both wrists.

He hadn’t even been drunk anymore.

So he had showered (apparently forgetting his wand in his dirty trouser pockets when he did so, probably much to the shame of Alastor Moody), he put on the most comforting clothes he could, drank the rest of the alcohol in the house, and then cried and cursed in to his lap until he passed out in his recliner.

None of these uncomfortable recollections explained the presence of Jasper though.

“Not much no,” Harry said evasively. “I definitely don’t remember you showing up.”

“I’d be happy to tell you of the exciting experience it was to witness you terribly intoxicated if you would kindly go change your bandages first,” Jasper said with a crooked and probably teasing smile.

Bandages. Harry looked down at the soft white wrapping again. Right.

“Why... Why would you think I needed these?” he asked slowly.

Merlin. Jasper hadn’t seen him cut his arms, did he? Harry didn’t remember seeing him before he summoned a knife and died and then came back to life, but he was a bit preoccupied at the time.

Please don’t have let me have exposed the wizarding world to a muggle, Harry pleaded to anyone who may hear him. Harry was terrible at obliviation and Hermione would never stop lecturing him on the dangers of exposure if he had to floo her for help.

Well. She would stop one day. Apparently when she passed from old age and Harry was still a bloody, thrice damned, eighteen year old.

Seventeen.

He didn’t even make it to eighteen.

Merlin. That was depressing.

“I tried calling you yesterday, but I got worried when you didn’t answer,” Jasper said patiently as he settled on Harry’s sofa. As Jasper spoke, Harry could feel himself calming down, able to shove away the weight of his own thoughts. He wasn’t sure if it was a testament to his own occlumency skills (he was sure Snape was mocking him in the afterlife just for the thought), the massive amount of sleep he apparently got last night, or simply Jasper’s rich voice that was doing it though.

“I came to check on you, and there was blood everywhere,” Jasper went on. “You mumbled something about cutting your arm, so I brought fresh bandages so you wouldn’t get an infection. Then I stayed the night just in case you needed a ride to the hospital at some point. You really do need to go change those bandages though. They’re meant to be changed every eight hours and it’s already been at least twelve.”

Harry had never missed his friends as badly as he did in that moment. Harry’s freakish ‘unable to die’ status notwithstanding, he would never have to pretend to be injured if he were with other witches and wizards.

“I’ll just er... go do that then,” Harry said. He stopped midway to the bathroom when a mortifying thought reached him though.

“Did I say how I cut my arm?” he asked Jasper airily, acting as if his answer didn’t matter to Harry either way. Harry looked around his sitting room as he spoke, taking in the newly clean floors, and felt a twinge of relief that the evidence of his night wasn’t on display. He didn’t much fancy seeing a puddle of his own blood, he’d done that enough in life, thanks very much. It was still embarrassing that Jasper obviously cleaned it up, but not as embarrassing as it would be if he had blubbered about trying to die to him.

“You did not,” Jasper said. “When I arrived your house looked like a murder had occurred and you were in the process of blacking out in your chair.”

“And you cleaned it up?” Harry asked.

“Bandages Harry,” Jasper drawled. “I’ll happily explain over breakfast afterwards.”

Bandages to prevent infection. Right.

Harry scowled at himself as he slammed the bathroom door behind him.

This is a hell of a situation to find yourself in, he grouched as he stared cluelessly at the white bandaging. He tentatively pinched the bandage and wrapped it around both forearms, tying it off tightly. They were unnecessary, as magic already healed him, but they did cover the scars from his experiment in case anyone thought to check. Harry pulled his jumper sleeves back down to cover his arms and went back to get a better explanation from Jasper.

Jasper was waiting for him, now at the countertop bar in his kitchen, unfairly looking like some sort of perfect version of a male Veela as he sat casually on the high top chair. Despite apparently sleeping in Harry’s couch, his clothes were unruffled and fit his tall and lithe body perfectly. The soft flow of the fabric only added to the image of grace that he always had. His eyes were soft and the color of liquid gold as he scanned Harry’s arms, nodding with approval at the bit of white bandaging peeking beneath Harry’s left sleeve.

“Would you like breakfast?” Jasper asked, sounding incredibly polite and patient. “I ate before you woke up. I hope you don’t mind that I put some food in your fridge. You’re welcome to it.”

“I’m fine,” Harry slumped down in the seat next to Jasper, not even trying to mimic his graceful posture. “You could tell me exactly what you did last night if you wanted though.”

Jasper smirked over at him and pushed a bottle of water and plastic tub of muggle medicine to him.

“I’ll trade you? I’m sure you’re sore, and you should drink water to help speed up replenishing your blood.”

For the love of...

“You’re worse than Hermione,” Harry glared at Jasper. “And that’s not a bloody compliment.”

“I’ll ask her if she thinks so when I meet her one day,” Jasper chuckled. “Come on, humor me. Two aspirin and one bottle of water and I’ll tell you whatever you want to know.”

Harry eyed the bottle of ‘aspirin’ warily. He’d never taken muggle medicine before. His aunt would never have wasted it on him, and at Hogwarts he had access to potions that worked instantly and effortlessly. But, it’s not like it would kill him to try it.

With that bitterly amusing thought, Harry popped the cap off the bottle and swallowed two of the fingernail sized pills and drank a genius amount of the water.

“Your turn,” he told Jasper. “You cleaned my house? Why? Why were you even calling me to start with?”

“I was calling to see how your day went Friday,”Jasper said evenly. “I was worried you might have had a long day without Alice there. As I said before, you didn’t answer and I was nearby and decided to come check on you. You didn’t answer the door, but I thought I heard you inside and was concerned that you were injured. So I let myself in and found your place destroyed and you drunk as a sailor. You said you cut your arm then passed out. I cleaned up because that’s what friends do.”

Harry couldn’t argue the last point, his friends had been stuck cleaning up his messes multiple times.

His friends.

“Oh they’re going to be furious,” Harry put his forehead on the counter and groaned. He had been a bit upset when he left Hogwarts yesterday and didn’t even tell Hermione, Ron, or Ginny that he was leaving. Then he warded his floo. Which meant the only thing that was probably keeping a howler from arriving any moment was Hermione’s knowledge that he was attempting to pass himself off as a muggle.

“Who?” Jasper asked him.

“Ginny mostly,” Harry said, reluctantly sitting back up. “I was, er- supposed to call my friends last night and forgot.”

“Common side effect of drinking I’m sure.”

Harry rolled his eyes at Jasper’s dry tone, then winced as his head did ache pretty good. At some point he’d have to stop drowning his sorrows in alcohol, it really wasn’t as effective as Sirius made it seem.

Sirius.

“Which one is Ginny again?” Jasper asked, pulling Harry back before he even had a chance to feel the guilt and grief that he always did when he thought about his godfather.

“Ron’s sister, ex-girlfriend,” Harry said. “Red-head who’s going to smack me the next time I see her.”

“Ex girlfriend?” Harry looked over at Jasper and raised a brow at the way he seemed to have stiffened in his seat. “Really?”

“Yeah,” Harry smiled faintly, remembering long nights by the Gryffindor fire with Ginny. Just talking, and laughing, snogging, and feeling so ridiculously normal. “We didn’t date long, but she’s still one of my best friends.”

“What happened?”

Harry shrugged and fidgeted with his jumper sleeve.

“She said we were trying to force something that just wasn’t there.”

Harry had only had to console one friend through a breakup, and Ron had been entirely too pleased to be shot of Lavender back when it happened, but he was pretty sure snorting wasn’t the reaction someone was meant to have.

“I’m sorry,” Jasper chuckled and offered Harry an apologetic nod of his head. “It’s just... Did Alice tell you that I used to date a girl who told me that exact thing when she broke up with me?”

“Seriously?” Harry let out a short laugh at that. “What a bloody coincidence.”

Jasper’s eyes were smoldering, the golden hue looking truly liquid as he met Harry’s eyes. “Bloody coincidence indeed,” he murmured.

Harry was caught in his gaze for what was probably an inappropriate amount of time before he cleared his throat and hastily got to his feet and moved to the fridge.

“You said you put food in here?” he asked Jasper, trying to distract him from his heated face.

“A bit,” Jasper said, sounding entirely unaffected by Harry’s odd behavior. Harry snagged the bag of grapes and made a production of rinsing them off before he felt the temperature of his face return to normal and he was safe to sit back down.

“Do you have any plans for today?” Jasper asked.

Harry had kind of hoped not to have a ‘today’, so he just shook his head.

“Might go see if Jacob’s busy,” he mused after chewing a couple of the grapes. “He wanted to give my bike a go.”

“If you didn’t already make those plans could I convince you to make some with me instead?”

Harry blinked at Jasper and began to get the feeling that today may end up even more peculiar than yesterday did.

And he’s pretty sure he died and came back to life last night, so...

“Aren’t you camping with your family?” he blurted.

“No. Though at some point you should tell me why you ‘bloody hate camping’,” Jasper’s mimicry of Harry’s accent made him laugh just enough to not dredge up memories of ‘the camping trip from hell’, as Ron aptly called it.

“Long story,” Harry waved his hand with a forced air of nonchalance. “But, er, if you’re not camping, why’d you say you were?”

“I went, but I had Carlisle bring me back yesterday,” said Jasper. “A good thing too, as I imagine you won’t actually remember to clean and bandage your arm without a reminder, will you?”

“I’m fine,” Harry scowled. “I don’t need a babysitter.”

Jasper’s voice was as soft as Harry imagined his hair was when he responded, “How about spending time with a friend then?”

“What were you thinking about doing?” Harry asked cautiously.

Jasper’s eyes lit up and he bent his head towards Harry, dropping his voice to one more suited for sharing secrets.

“How do you feel about hiking?”

***

As it turned out, Harry didn’t mind hiking. It was hard, but his muscles ached in the comforting way that quidditch practice used to cause. It was also nice to be out of his house, and in a place so foreign to him that nothing clouded his thoughts as he followed behind Jasper. But even with the clouds and drizzle of rain, it was hot. Harry didn’t notice the increased temperature as he hiked, but he definitely noticed his own sweat.

“Why don’t you look like you’re hiking a bloody mountain?” he griped at Jasper. Jasper looked entirely too natural, too good, while they hiked through the Olympic National Park. He had on long cargo pants, a thick, red, flannel top, and had on a professional looking backpack filled with supplies. He was entirely at ease out here in the forest. Harry couldn’t see a single drop of perspiration on him. In fact, his face was glowing with enthusiasm and he looked...

Good. Harry could admit that Jasper looked good.

Compared to him, Harry, in his joggers, black hoodie, and hiking boots Jasper lent him, looked like an idiot out on the trail.

“Because I spend most of my free time participating in outdoor recreation while you spend yours drinking and driving recklessly,” Jasper laughed. “Come on slow poke, we want to reach the ridge before the sun gets too low.”

“Then maybe we shouldn’t have wasted so much time packing a bloody picnic,” Harry muttered darkly, though he did pick his pace up to catch up with Jasper. When he had agreed to come hiking to ‘see something amazing’, he hadn’t known that it would involve an entire outfit change, and Jasper packing what seemed to be enough food to feed an entire army.

It was nice though, hiking with Jasper. Jasper had a calming presence that Harry felt drawn to. Plus, he spent the drive out to the park playing music, introducing Harry to ‘all the classics’, and driving Harry’s car clear up to 120. And he hadn’t even put a single scratch on it.

“May I ask you a personal question?” Jasper asked him after Harry caught up and they had moved further up the trail.

“Depends on what it is,” Harry said. “I reserve the right to plead the fifth though.”

“So you have been paying attention in history class!” Jasper cried with a dramatic gasp. “Edward is going to be so pleased.”

Harry rolled his eyes, and his lips twitched at Jasper’s theatrics. “What’s your question you prat?”

Jasper remained silent for a moment, as he apparently thought of the best way to ask.

“Why were you drinking last night?”

Harry hadn’t expected that question, and he stumbled in his surprise. A steady arm caught his elbow, and quickly released him once Harry was back on his feet. He looked at Jasper out of the corner of his eye, wary and suspicious of the reasoning behind his question, but he looked perfectly tranquil as he kept his eyes on the trail in front of them.

“Bad day,” Harry said shortly. “Sorry again about that. I was fine though, you didn’t need to come check on me.”

“You seemed totally fine,” Jasper drawled. “Drunk, your living room covered in blood, and all your shelves destroyed. Your work I assume?”

Harry hummed, not confirming or denying Jasper’s guess.

He told Hermione that he needed to ward his house against muggles, but ‘oh what if you want them to come over?’

“You are the least talkative person I have ever met,” Jasper rolled his eyes over at Harry. “Most people enjoy talking about themselves.”

“Oh yeah, I’m sure loads of people want to talk about knocking over a bookcase because they were having a bad day. That’s not embarrassing at all Jazz.” Harry gave Jasper an innocent smile to match his falsely enthusiastic tone which made Jasper shake his head, but Harry saw him smile as well.

Hogwarts students definitely under appreciated sarcasm. Harry loved it. As much as he may have gotten detention for it in England-

‘There’s no need to call me sir, Professor.’

-it seemed to make him friends in America.

“What if we make it a game? I’ll ask you a question, and you can ask me one. At least until we reach the lookout?”

Harry would have said no, but Jasper gave him a soft smile and he sighed.

Plus, Jasper hadn’t said he had to answer honestly. And Harry imagined he was going to have to make up a lot of answers to not breach the Statute of Secrecy.

“I’m going first,” Harry said stubbornly.

“Of course.”

The two of them hiked around a curve, and were ascending a steep part of the path, when Harry came up with one he had been curious about.

“Edward said that you were adopted by the Cullen’s after your parents died, did you go to them straight after or did you go to an orphanage first?”

“An orphanage?” Jasper raised his dark blonde brows at Harry’s question. “Harry, there hasn’t been an orphanage in operation in the United States in years. But no, I didn’t go straight to Carlisle and Esme. I was... on my own for a while.”

Harry sensed Jasper’s reluctance to expand on his vague answer, but it was a rather personal question so he just hummed and waited for Jasper to go.

“Why didn’t your friends come with you when you moved to Forks? Hermione sounds like she would have jumped at a chance to learn about a new culture. And Ron is an adult, surely Molly couldn’t have stopped him?”

Harry smiled as Jasper had clearly remembered details about Harry’s friends that he had shared in the past. Since Jasper had taken the time to remember things Harry told him, making Harry feel like he was important as just himself, not as one of his many daft monikers, Harry put real thought in to Jasper’s question.

“They’re happy in England,” he said. “I wasn’t. And they have family there, I’ve only got them. They knew I wasn’t happy, so they pushed me to find something new. But they couldn’t come with me. I wouldn’t have asked, it would’ve made them unhappy. If I had asked them though, they would have came and then we’d all three just be unhappy. It wouldn’t have been fair.”

Nobody knew more about the loyalty of Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger than he did. If Harry had asked them to come, they would have. They would have given up their families and futures for him, again. And they never would have complained about it either.

“Are you?”

“Am I what?”

“Happy,” Jasper clarified. “You said they wanted you to leave England so you could be happy. So, are you?”

“My turn, isn’t it?” Harry side-stepped the question. “Do you have a favorite and least favorite sibling?”

Jasper laughed and his eyes were glimmering with mirth at Harry’s question. “My favorite depends on what I’m doing,” he said. “When I want quiet company, Edward’s my favorite. If I want someone to rough house or just hang out with, Emmett’s my favorite. If I want to talk, Alice is. And when I need someone to knock some sense in to me, Rose is my favorite.”

Harry had always wanted siblings. Ron used to complain about having so many brothers, but Harry would have given his entire vault for just one brother or sister.

Not that Ron complained anymore. He knew now how precious his brothers and sister were. Ever since-

“And my least favorite is almost always either Edward or Rosalie.”

Harry was once more jerked from his thoughts by Jasper’s unexpected response. “Rosalie? Why?”

He liked all of Jasper’s siblings. He thought they were all brilliant in their own ways. But Rosalie ranked higher in his book than Emmett or Edward.

“Harry, you’re incredibly stubborn yourself, so you may have missed it, but Rosalie is the most stubborn person I have ever met before. And loud, Lord have mercy, Rosalie is loud.”

Harry laughed at that. Rosalie was stubborn, and loud. But he liked that about her. She was exactly how Harry imagined an older sister would be.

The two of them hiked the last few miles like that, tossing questions back and forth. Some questions were easy, like Harry’s favorite color. Some were quite personal (‘did you love Ginny or were you in love with Ginny?’). Harry refused to answer a couple of them outright, such as ‘what do you dream about most frequently?’

He had been pretty sure Jasper wouldn’t understand if he said Death Eaters and death, so he said nothing until Jasper asked a different question.

All in all, as daunting of a task that a five mile hike had been, Harry found it passed by relatively quickly as the two of them talked.

And it was definitely worth it when they reached the lookout that Jasper said was his favorite spot in the entire state.

“Woah,” Harry breathed. It was incredible. The lookout sat in the side of the mountain, nothing more than a little rocky cave really, but it was a clear and dry spot to sit and enjoy the view. Because the view, the real wonder, was brilliant.

Harry could see across the tops of the other nearby mountains. There were clouds of mist that obscured their peaked tops from his view, but he knew they were just beyond his line of sight.

He loved it. As far out as he could see, it was trees and mountains and mist.

Harry had never felt so blessedly inconsequential in his entire life.

What weight did his problems carry when the world was so huge and he was so small?

“I love it,” he told Jasper. Jasper slowly grasped his hand and pulled him over to a part of the interior cave wall that had been carved out to a crude imitation of a bench.

“I like to come here when it feels like I’m fighting against the world,” Jasper said. “It makes me feel-“

“Insignificant,” Harry said with a sage nod of his head. “Yeah, yeah me too.”

Jasper let go of Harry’s hand, but while Harry was captivated by the view before him, Jasper was by the view beside him.

They spent the rest of the day there, talking about nothing, breathing in the mountainside air, and just generally feeling incredibly relaxed.

Harry had even begun to feel grateful that he got to experience a day like today. He didn’t want to live forever, didn’t want to lose the only people he had left. He wanted to one day be a part of his family again, even if it was just in whatever the afterlife offered. But until then? Harry wouldn’t mind having more of days like today.

“Hey Harry?”

“Hmm?”

“Can I ask you one more question?”

“Sure.” Harry was on the edge of the cave mouth at this point, dangling his feet over the cavernous drop below him. Jasper had seemed stressed about the possibility of Harry falling, but Harry wasn’t worried. He wasn’t going to fall, or jump, what was the point? He’d just be unbroken and healed by whatever force kept him alive last night after striking the bottom. So he kicked his feet and watched as it sent little pebbles down below him.

“If you could live forever, what would you do?”

Harry turned his head to look Jasper in the eyes and answered his solemnly spoken hypothetical question with complete honesty.

“I’d find a way to kill myself.”