Snapshots of Me
Grimmauld Place no. 12, 11th June 1998
“Harry….”
“Yes, Mione?”
“What did you do to this place? It’s… unrecognisable.”
“Well, Kreacher didn’t help, but Winky did, and turned out I inherited many things and people from many extinct families, so now I got many house-elves to help me redecorate, so–.”
“Harry!”
“They wanted it, Mione. They die without a family. I’m not going to let them die if I can do anything about it, and they’re happiest when they’ve got work to do.”
“It’s still slavery, Harry! I can’t believe it–!”
A whirlwind of bushy brown hair makes a beeline back to the front door, moments after stepping foot on the entry hall of the airy home. Soon after, the occupant of the said hall returns to one: me.
To think that I looked forward to Hermione’s opinion on Sirius’ old home that the host of house-elves and I have been toiling to refurbish, all these weeks….
It’s just a month after the Battle of Hogwarts, I know. A month full of hasty-but-still-heart-wrenching funerals and sometimes-unpleasant discoveries and mostly-tearful reunions. Emotions are volatile more often than not and broken and often rub jaggedly against each other, I know it well, but reality still hurts.
Grimmauld Place no. 12, 31st July 1998
I am eighteen years old today. An adult not only in the eyes of the wizarding world but also the mundane one. Kreacher baked me a birthday cake, Neville sent me a birthday card and a cutting of a soothing-smell-perfuming plant whose name I can’t pronounce, Andy wishes me well for this day onward, Teddy gives me his customary wet morning kisses, and… that’s all.
Somehow, the birthday that I celebrated alone while still trapped in Privet Drive number four was much more festive.
Grimmauld Place no. 12, 21st August 1998
“Andy, this is…. There’s nothing…. The House of Black is….”
“As black as the name is? Composed of only the three of us at present? Unacknowledged by the Family of Malfoy as the primary House?”
“Well, yes, but….”
“You’re progressing nicely, dear. For one who is learning so late of how to be a proper lord, you are learning quite fast, in fact. It’s time to show it to everyone else.”
“Andy….”
The air of levity abruptly leaves the woman seated across from me, making her look decades older and nearly as haunted as the sister who shared her features, although thankfully not as mad.
“I know what you meant to say, Harry,” she sighs, and guilt heaps itself on me like a ton of stones.
The guilt becomes a twisty snake that writhes in my chest and guts, when her blue-grey eyes look into mine with a frankness that also makes me feel exposed. It becomes only worse when she continues with, “I wish to belong to a family. You wish to belong to a family. And Teddy needs a family. We deserve it. You deserve it, Harry. All that I’ve been teaching you these two months and more, they are never meant to steer you to a particular path. They are never meant to resurrect the House of Black as it was, either. By taking up your legitimate lordship for the House of Black, you protect yourself and us – all of us, up to the house-elves and more – and it doesn’t mean that you will lose your lordship of the House of Potter. You just need to show up in a few public places as Lord Black, as I said before, and you don’t need to do it everyday.”
Damn. I can’t refute her. She’s spot-on with my wishes, too.
She also taught me about the worth of my Slytherin side, though, these past months, in addition to all the lessons about managing a House and behaving as a lord. Bargaining advantageously is one of such lessons. So, “If I do this, don’t ask me to stay full-time in the magical world, please? And don’t scoff at my non-magical lessons? I do want something to fall back onto if the magical world acts up again.”
She raises an eyebrow to that.
And then she demands that I couch the words, tone and posture of the deliverance to be lordlier than I’ve just managed.
Oh, damn. Another lordly lesson.
Fortescue’s Ice Cream Parlour, 22nd August 1998
“It’s so… odd.”
“What’s odd, Harry?”
“This place…. Mister Fortescue was so kind to me. I spent most of the summer before our third year here, working on my homework, and he helped me much with my history assignment. You know, about the witch burnings. And I keep expecting him to come here and begin chattering about history. He… loved history, so much. I think my history assignment that year nearly matched Hermione’s.”
“In length? Or in mark?”
“Both.”
I grin wanly at Neville, who is seated across from me at one of the small, round tables just outside the newly opened ice-cream parlour, and he replies likewise.
“Marks seemed the farthest, in our minds, when the castle was occupied by the Death Eaters,” he murmurs, eyes tethered to his bowl of melting strawberry ice cream but unfocused.
My heart skips a beat. Hogwarts. The castle is never the same after the battle, with so many potant curses and deaths of innocents marring its grounds and halls. It’s truly a ruined, haunted castle, now, like what the Muggles would see when the wards were still up. And those very wards, accumulated and strengthened in a millennium, are all down, at this point, after Voldemort’s forces tore them apart. The teachers, likewise, with only Professors Binns, Sprout, Sinistra and Vector remaining.
Hogwarts is no more, and the first of September looms dark not only for the school-aged students, but also the wizarding society of Great Britain.
My first home is no more.
“D’you know,” I force the words out, regardless of how croaky my voice sounds, “that Hogwarts isn’t the only school round here? Andy told me. The scholarships can’t cover everyone, and the power requirement for Hogwarts entry is rather high, too. And the Death Eaters slaughtered them.”
He nods woodenly and wipes at his eyes.
My own eyes and cheeks are wet, now I realise.
Yes, the first of Andy’s prescribed outings is a big failure, because of one small remark that my traitorous mouth let out.
Longbottom Hall, 31st August 1998
“Thanks for inviting me, Neville.”
“Thanks for agreeing to come, yourself. I…. It’s…. This place is so… empty, after Gran passed away.”
“My place, too, if not for Andy and Teddy and the house-elves.”
Neville laughs a little, as we leave the public floo of his home. “How’re you coping with the elves?”
I grin ruefully. “Bossy little blighters. I love them, though. They mean well. They’ve helped me and Andy and Teddy so much, not to mention keeping up with everything.”
His laughter turns more genuine, so does my grin, which quickly becomes a soft smile. “They were bad, when I got them. The Death Eaters didn’t treat them well. The non-Death Eaters were surprisingly not much better in treating them. But they loved their former bosses, anyway,” I confide. “They didn’t get along with each other and Kreacher, at first, but the total makeover of my place was apparently a good bonding experience for all of us. Now, what about your baby murderous plants?”
He hits my arm, grinning. And outright laughs when I rub at the throbbing spot, grimacing. That sod.
And then he confines us to his many, many greenhouses… which makes for quite an adventure, especially among his more blood-thirsty, cantankerous and otherwise touchy-feely babies.
Nope. I’m not going to tease him about his babies, ever again.
Atrium of British Ministry of Magic, 1st September 1998
“Nev… you sure? They’re staring at us….”
“Well, Gran wanted me to be an Auror, and Dad used to be an Auror. I would at least like to try to be an Auror.”
“Well, my dad, too, and I’d like to try, myself. Plus McGonagall did so much for me in that career consultation. But how can I be an Auror if they keep staring at me like that?”
“Face it, Harry, you’re ‘the Man Who Conquered’.”
“Damn it, Nev. Not you too!”
I really, really, really want to hit the grin off Neville’s face. But lately he rarely looks happy, especially since the passing of his grandmother.
Well, and the fellow Auror trainees gathered here will spread a bad, bad, bad rumour, too, if they see me doing… anything, let alone hitting the prat.
Plus, Ron’s just stepped out of one of the floo stations, and he’s making a beeline to our little spot beside the pond bearing the under-construction new magical statue.
Time to be “Harry Potter, Man Who Conquered,” then.
The Leaky Cauldron, 5th September 1998
“Hi, Harry.”
“Oh, hi Hannah, Susan. Umm, sorry for asking, but why’re you here? I thought I was meeting Neville?”
Hannah laughs, her cheeks pink, her eyes sparkling. Susan just… blushes, and refuses to look at me.
I frown.
And then, “Neville thought it’s a good idea for a double date,” Hannah confides, while dodging an elbow to the ribs courtesy of her friend and former Housemate.
Oh. Oh. Oh.
I look at the two girls, goggle-eyed and speechless. What should I say? What should I do? I’m blushing, myself, for Merlin’s sake! Damn you, Neville! Wait till I switch that prat’s tea with… something, next Monday. See how great he deals with surprises.
Diagon Alley, 3rd October 1998
“Harry?”
“Yes, Mione?”
“Could we talk? For just a minute?”
“I’m on duty, Mione. Can it wait till the evening? My shift ends at that time.”
“Mufliato. – I just…. Harry, I’m sorry, about your home, about the elves. I…. In my training, I came across a book, and it detailed the history of the elves, from the beginning till it’s perverted by our kind, and…. I’m sorry, Harry.”
I smile sadly at Hermione, who is anxiously wringing her hands before me after she’s cornered me beside Quality Quidditch Supplies. “You know that books aren’t always correct, too, Mione? Think Lockhart.”
She hits my shoulder weakly and laughs, with more than a hint of a sob in it.
I hug her. I can’t help it. She may be only my fourth friend after Hedwig, Ron and Hagrid, but she has never left me in my hour of need, while she can indeed do something about it. Being at odds with her has been hard on me.
“Just… think and research carefully before you hurt someone, next? I mean, unless it’s a fight for your life or freedom,” I murmur into her bushy mane. “And the elves would like to know you’re appreciative of their work, too, I bet. We did work hard on that house partly so that we could display it to you.”
She hugs me hard, in response.
I don’t care that I’ll be reprimanded by my trainee supervisor after this, or the Chief Auror, or even Head of DMLE. – I tighten my own hug on my best friend.
Grimmauld Place no. 12, 25th December 1998
“Hello, Missus Tonks, Harry, Teddy. Thank you very much for inviting us,” Neville says as I beckon him in.
“Yes, thank you. I… we didn’t look forward to spending Yuletide alone,” Susan affirms shily.
“It’d be so lonely…. My relatives from Mum’s and Dad’s sides are all busy. Besides, I’m of age, this year, so they don’t have to take me in for the holiday,” Hannah smiles wistfully.
Andy frowns, as do I, with Teddy mimicking us as he sits leaning against my front. “It’s not a good reason to shunt away your own family member, dear,” she says, while pulling Hannah into a hug. I nod firmly… and so does Teddy.
Susan giggles, if a little sadly, apparently catching the little blighter at the act.
Thankfully, instead of wallowing further in our respective familial problems, we then fall into an exchange of our respective jobs and activities, also updates from former yearmates.
The surviving and not hiding or too broken yearmates, at least.
Grimmauld Place no. 12, 14th February 1999
“Harry, why are you in a hurry? It’s Valentines Day!”
“I’ve got morning shift, Gin. You know that.”
“Can’t you ask for a day off? You’re the Boy Who Lived! And now you’re the Man Who Conquered!”
“I was Public Enemy Number One, too. So?”
“It doesn’t count!”
“It counts, Ginny. People’s opinion of me can turn round fast. You know that, too.”
“I asked for a week off from the Harpies to prepare for this day – for you. And now you’re running away from me.”
“I’m not running away anywhere, Ginny. I’m going to work. You can ask my superiors if you don’t believe me. You can even ask Ron about it. He’ll take up the shift after me so he should be free right now.”
I’ve been jamming various parts of me into pieces of the Auror trainee uniform in my room, while Ginny’s ranting… and now Teddy toddles in, faithfully guarded by Kreacher.
“Dada!” he proclaims cheerfully, beaming wide, showing off his two newly grown front teeth.
“What? Dada? Are you taking Professor Lupin’s place, Harry?” Ginny squawks, apparently switching topics… or being sidelined by the toddler now clinging to my leg.
I give her a sharp glance, before jamming the last piece of my uniform – my outer robe – down my head. “Andy is the one who taught him that word, Ginny. Go complain to her. I’m just happy that I can be Uncle Harry. Now, Kreacher, please take this little rascal to his grannie. I’m nearly late to report in.”
Ginny huffs and vacates the edge of my bed. “Fine,” she snaps. “Be that way. But don’t go crawling back to me, ever again.”
I sigh, shrug, and Aparate out.