Volume One: 2004
01
“Seriously? You actually want me to tell Mum you’re skipping Easter dinner for work?!” Ron yanked at his hair in frustration.
“Don’t do this to me, Harry! You missing family dinners all the time is already hard enough to deal with — this is Easter dinner! The Ministry of Magic has an Easter holiday!”
“Apologize to Molly for me.” Harry took off his glasses and rubbed his temples, exhausted.
He was sitting at his desk, stacks of reports spread in a mess in front of him.
“But those fugitives and Death Eater remnants don’t care about holidays. I still have several mission reports to get through.”
Ron exchanged a troubled look with Hermione, who stood to one side, then cautiously settled into the chair across from Harry.
“Are you avoiding Ginny? Don’t worry — her boyfriend won’t be at dinner this time.” Ron watched Harry’s face and said it like a promise.
Harry frowned and let out a sigh.
“I told you, Ginny and I ended things on good terms. I’m not avoiding her.”
“Then you’re avoiding Mum!” Ron narrowed his eyes and slapped the desk.
Harry said nothing.
He pressed his lips tight and glared.
“It’s the same every year — the moment it gets close to May, you throw yourself into work and shut everyone out. If I hadn’t made a copy of your office key, would you have locked me and Hermione out too?!”
“I wouldn’t do that to you two,” Harry said.
“Harry…” Hermione, who had been silent until now, finally spoke.
Her eyes were full of worry, her expression grave.
“Honestly, I think you need to see a mental health professional.”
Harry lowered his gaze, avoiding both their eyes.
His hands, which had been rigid at his sides, began aimlessly turning over the documents in front of him.
The letters swept past in a blur.
He couldn’t take in a single word.
“I didn’t know St Mungo’s had taken on therapists, is that one of those cushy positions where they just hand out Cheering Draughts?” Harry gave a deliberately casual shrug.
“Besides, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with me. I’m upbeat. Perfectly sound in mind and body.”
“Sound in mind and body?” Ron’s voice shot up in disbelief.
“Who just got out of the hospital half a month ago?!”
“That was an accident. An occupational hazard, comes with being an Auror.” Harry was completely unbothered.
“Dude! I used to be an Auror, all right?! And Michael, who goes on missions with you, told me you fight like someone with a death wish. There were plenty of those injuries you could have avoided!”
Ron crossed his arms and called out the excuse without mercy.
“The point is, Harry, your self-preservation instincts genuinely worry us.” Hermione’s expression was almost pleading.
“Try seeing a therapist for our sake, would you? I know the wizarding world doesn’t take these things seriously, but there are plenty of good therapists in the Muggle world… George went to see a Muggle therapist a couple of years ago too, didn’t you know?”
Harry stared at Hermione for a long moment, then finally gave in.
“All right, all right… But, seriously? Self-preservation instincts? Where did you even pick up that term?”
“Do you really think Hermione wouldn’t read a dozen psychology books for your sake?” Ron gave Harry a relieved pat on the shoulder.
“Trust me, Harry, therapy helps. The students from the Battle…”
Ron paused.
His tone went quiet.
“The ones who survived, some turned to Cheering Draughts, some went to see Muggle therapists. Everyone ended up with some kind of damage, one way or another. That doesn’t make you weak.”
Harry’s brow furrowed, but nothing else in his expression gave much away.
Ron couldn’t really tell whether Harry agreed with any of it.
“I promise I’ll go see a therapist.” Harry relented, flipping the report in his hands back to the first page.
“But I really do have to miss this Easter dinner. You can see, I have a lot to get through.”
“And the therapist,” he added.
“That can wait until after Victory Day.”
02
Ron and Hermione left.
Harry figured they had probably reached the Burrow by now.
He made a deliberate effort not to picture Molly’s disappointed face or the warm, easy atmosphere inside, imagining it would only make this night feel emptier.
He missed Molly.
He missed the Burrow.
They were the closest thing to a mother and a home he had ever found, and he wanted desperately to go back.
The warm fire in the hearth, the rich scent of Easter chocolate, and the sound of Molly fussing and fretting without ever stopping.
But he couldn’t make himself take that step.
Not when May was drawing near.
Around this time of year, he always felt too ashamed to meet Molly’s eyes.
May 2nd.
The sixth anniversary of the victory in the Battle of Hogwarts.
May 2nd.
The sixth anniversary of Fred’s death.
The moment that thought surfaced, Harry felt an invisible hand clench tight around his heart.
Every breath became a struggle, laced with a pain he couldn’t push away.
Dense and relentless, that pain had been there since six years ago, and it hadn’t faded by a single fraction.
Every time May crept close, the days turned unbearable.
Even the air, light as it was, pressed down on every inch of his skin and bone like something crushing.
Sometimes he even found himself asking, why were Molly and Arthur still so good to him?
Why was Ron still willing to be his friend?
He had cost them a son.
He had cost Ron a brother.
George had nearly lost half a life over it, and that house, the one that should have been full of love and laughter, was missing a corner forever now.
It would never be whole again.
How could he walk through that door as Fred’s anniversary approached, shamelessly soaking up their warmth, as though he didn’t deserve to be cursed for it?
And it wasn’t only the Weasley family.
Harry carried guilt toward most of the wizarding world’s survivors.
Every year, during the Victory Day speech, he would lose himself somewhere in the middle of it.
What was there to commemorate?
What was there to celebrate?
Innocent lives had been extinguished that day.
Classmates he had spoken to were lying on the ground with open eyes and ashen faces.
Elders he had relied on and trusted would never breathe again…
There were times when Harry genuinely couldn’t tell whether they had won or lost.
If they had won, why did everyone carry those scars?
If they had lost, why was he the one still standing in front of a crowd giving speeches, why hadn’t he died along with the rest of them?
Eventually he came to a conclusion.
The truth was, whichever way it went, he was the one who should have died.
He had climbed over too many bodies to reach what people called victory, and yet Merlin had seen fit to keep him alive.
What a cruel joke.
And so becoming an Auror, throwing himself into every mission without a thought for his own life, had become a kind of compensation.
If the world insisted on keeping him alive, there had to be some reason for it.
Maybe to build a better life for those who survived.
Maybe to die in the next fight.
A breeze drifted in and shifted the curtain.
The wind at the end of April still carried a chill.
Harry watched the night sky come and go through the moving fabric.
He drew in a long, slow breath, then let it all go at once, his whole body sinking back against the chair.
“Harry Potter.”
He said it to himself.
“You somehow made it through another day.”
➤ Next: George Weasley
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