KILLSHOT // [H.S]

036. MIRRORS // HOME

036. MIRRORS // HOME

It had been a long time since Harry had woken up this way, panicked, sweaty, and feeling like an invisible string tied his chest in a tight knot.

"Go back to bed, Harry," the woman said, looking at her child with a forced smile. "Mommy's okay, my love. Just go back to sleep."

Harry didn't understand why his mother had gone from screaming in fear to acting as if everything was fine. He knew she wasn't. The blood pooling on her forehead and sliding down her face was a dead giveaway. But he was a child and far too young to understand why Mommy had ketchup on her skin.

That's what she would call it.

Ketchup.

She knew her son was too smart to believe it was indeed the red condiment on her face. But it made her sick to her stomach, thinking about telling her son it was blood. Blood that was caused by a man she loved and thought loved her back.

"But I want to help you," he pleaded with her, never able to go back to bed when he saw her this way.

"I know you do, my sweet boy," she said, her heart aching over her son's confession.

He always wanted to help her. He wanted to remove her from the house of pain and torture she lived in - a constant nightmare from which she couldn't wake up. But every time he woke up panicked and sweaty, he knew he had failed her.

There was no way to know the day he finally snapped. No therapists or doctors evaluated his brain to come up with the reason why. Not a single soul knew what he did to protect her - not even her.

"Harry," she said, her voice soft and angelic as always. "You need to protect her."

Harry looked at the woman. It had been a while since they last saw each other. And yet when they did, Harry felt like he was looking in a mirror. She had the same vibrant green eyes and a smile with dimples that poked through her cheeks on only rare occasions. 

Her love and warmth radiated from her body, even in his dreams. She would always say he shared the same ability, but he knew better than to think they had that similarity. He could never have the heart she did.

"Promise me, Harry. Promise me you will protect her."

"I promise."

The second the words left his lips, she vanished into thin air.

Harry frantically searched the dark. It took him a moment to realize she had only been there in his dreams. He hated the moments when he realized she wasn't really here; he missed her terribly.

You need to protect her, his mother's words rang through his head.

I need to protect her, he thought to himself. I need to protect Rory.