Right in Front of Me

just hold on

It's not over 'til your dying breath,
So what do you want them to say when you're gone?
That you gave up or that you kept going on?
What do you do when a chapter ends,
Do you close the book and never read it again?

  

Harry was feeling more anxious than he ever remembered feeling. He and Dumbledore were going to Hogsmeade to try and figure out more information about the Death Eaters who escaped from Azkaban. The only way his mum and dad felt comfortable with this was if Sirius came too, as Padfoot. His dad suggested he go as Prongs... but they all decided that a deer strutting about Hogsmeade would be a little more suspicious. Through all The Order missions in the war they had taken to telling Dumbledore about their animal forms. Dumbledore agreed to Sirius coming and figured it would help ease Harry's anxieties about it. It only half helped. Having Sirius there was reassuring but he couldn't help but feel like something really bad was going to happen.

"All right, H?" Sirius asked, as they were sitting in Dumbledore's office waiting to go.

"Er... yeah!" Harry said, trying to sound brave. It came out as sounding more like he was going through puberty. He cleared his throat. "Yeah. You and Professor Dumbledore will be there and... it'll be fine!" He sounded like, as much as he was trying to convince Sirius that he was fine, he was trying to convince himself too. Sirius got up and kneeled next to him, putting his hand on his shoulder.

"Harry," he started, "you can be scared. You're 12 years old for Merlin's sake! If you weren't nervous I'd think you were a psychopath or something. Hell, I'm nervous and I'm... older than you." Sirius finished, a sly smile on his face.

"I know how old you are Pads." Harry said, grinning wide. Sirius chuckled. Harry's smile faltered. "I just... I want to be brave like you and dad and Moony and mum but... but I'm not! I'm not brave! That ruddy hat made a mistake sorting me into Gryffindor." Harry finished, feeling embarrassingly sorry for himself. Just in that moment.

"Is that what you think being brave means?" Asked Sirius, after saying nothing for a few moments. "That you're never scared, or never worried about anything? That would make someone a moron! It's normal to be scared, Harry. Being brave doesn't mean that you're never scared, it means that even if you're scared, you always try to do the right thing. And that's what you've always done, since you were able to talk. You care about people, Harry. That's what makes you a Gryffindor. The sorting hat has never been more right." Sirius was looking at Harry with such intensity that it was hard not to believe what he was saying. Even though it was a bit hard for him to hear all those things about himself, he trusted Sirius and knew that he would protect him. Just then Dumbledore entered and motioned the two of them to follow him. Sirius changed into Padfoot and they were off.

When they got to Hogsmeade Harry was standing as close to Sirius as possible. He let Dumbledore lead the way and finally they got to a place that he'd never been to before. He could tell rather quickly why his family had never brought him there, it was dark and gloomy and he had an eerie feeling the second he followed Dumbledore through the doors. All eyes turned and looked at Dumbledore, Harry looked around and none of them seemed too happy to see him here.

They took a seat at a table in the middle of the restaurant and waited for someone to come take their order. "Relax, Harry." Said Dumbledore, quietly. "You are with me." Somehow that didn't really make Harry feel any better.

"What are you doing here, Dumbledore?" An old man asked in a harsh voice. "Shouldn't you be in your nice pretty castle, chasing butterflies or something?" His accent was thick, and Harry could hardly understand what he was saying, but what he said caused a few of the surrounding people to laugh. Dumbledore didn't seem phased by this though. He simply smiled and looked up at him.