make this part look rugged
harry james potter did not have the happiest childhood. he lived in the shadows, in the place where boilers and pipes surround him, where nobody goes in willingly unless something's wrong. harry spent the first ten years of his life being that something. wrong, dirty, good-for-nothing freak boy. harry was a punching bag for his cousin, a source of free labor for his aunt, and a thorn on vernon dursley's side. harry knew nothing of his other family,the ones who would have loved him, until his eleventh birthday.
maps show you what is simple and true
harry looked down at his map. he had been gifted it in third year, which was damn near ten years ago. all four of the creators were dead, the boy who had filched it from Filch's office dead as well, and harry was the only one left besides george weasley who could use it properly. harry was far out of hogwarts now; he knows what spending too much time in the past has done to people. the safety hogwarts gave tom riddle warped him; the trauma hogwarts gave snape caused unnecessary cruelty to hundreds of children over the years. harry never really forgave dumbledore for hiring snape as a teacher - men who hate children should stay in lower-level school jobs, like caretaker or groundskeeper, anything other than in charge of keeping children alive. harry still looks at the map though, remembering. he added in the chamber of secrets. harry would never know what the marauders were like, but the map, hidden with insults to anyone who doesn't know the code, was close to a true rendering of their time there as he would ever get. objects are simple, unlike people.
not what he told you, just what you see
harry saw sirius being tortured, and sirius ended up dead. harry saw another child growing up without a father because remus lupin was too much of a coward to follow his family, and that child ended up an orphan, remus lupin dead. harry didn't blame himself for their deaths, not so far long after it happened. sirius was fully capable of making his own decisions, and while harry knew how desperate being locked up with no way out was (he had picked the lock of his cupboard occasionally at night, just to get outside, because a human being was not meant to be stationary, that's not how we're wired), sirius could have helped in other ways. if anything, dumbledore was to blame for not giving sirius any sort of outlet. a portkey to some of other secure location. anything! and remus, well, death happens in war. but harry still does not trust his imagination. he had been raised not to have any, and when he had visions or visualizations, they led to death. harry trusts what he can hear or touch, what can be verified by others.
what do you know, that's not your dad's mythology?
harry had first learnt of his father from hagrid. great wizard, looked just like him. snape taught him that james potter was arrogant and that he strut around like a showdog. harry had been told by so many others that his dad was kind and good and caring that he vehemently denied what he had no way of knowing. harry learned james' faults from a memory of all places, and sirius had loved james to the point of blindness (not to mention, sirius wasn't the perfect picture of morality either). remus had verified that snape gave as good as he got, but harry would never know if snape was the only one his father bullied. and now everyone who could have told him was dead, and harry has three things left of james potter: his name, his cloak, and his map. harry would never know anything more than other people's memories of james, not now that he was two years older than james ever got to be. harry would never have memories of his own, no family stories to pass down to his kids other than blowing up aunt marge and setting a snake on dudley. harry had been taught nothing of his father for ten years. harry had been taught so many things about james potter, but harry never really had a family. but he had a map, a map that his family had worked on, one that harry kept on expanding. now, with the war over and the potter fortune all harry's to live off of until he decides what he wants to do with his life, the marauder's map is his family as much as hogwarts is his home