Hogwarts is my Home

Chapter 39: Life at the Leaky Cauldron (PA CH4)

"What do you want to do today?" Harry asked, flopping down beside me on my bed, waking me up. He had on the same clothes he did the day before.

"Nothing. You go and have fun without me."

"I can't knowing you're up here depressed."

"Well, what do you expect from me?" I spat.

"I didn't mean to make you feel guilty. Of course you're depressed right now, there'd be something wrong with you if you weren't. I'll stay with you. I need to do homework anyway."

"Me too. I haven't started any of it yet."

So we sat together on the couch and did our homework for an hour. He got distracted by four books stacked on my bedside table. "What are those?" he asked curiously, pointing to them.

I got up and grabbed them and brought them back to the couch. "They're pictures of me." I pulled out the latest one chronologically and opened it to the picture of me and Harry. "Look, it's you and me when we were little." 

He scooted closer to get a better look and chuckled. "Okay, don't think I'm mad, but I think I remember this day... The first train ride when you entered my compartment, I felt like I already knew you."

"I did, too. It was like being reunited with an old friend." He stared at me for a few seconds. I turned the page. "And here I am with Bill, Charlie, Percy, and Fred and George. Charlie was the first friend I made at Hogwarts." 

I shut that book and grabbed the one from when I was a baby and went to the first page of the Mystery Man holding me. "This guy is in most of the photos. I've looked through them all, and Liam- my dad- isn't in any of them. And Amara's only in a couple. But this guy," I said, touching the picture pointedly. I shook my head before deciding to keep my crazy theories to myself.

I shoved the book in Harry's hand. "Your parents are in them quite a few times. You can have a look if you want."

"Thank you," he said gratefully, flipping through them fast, trying to find the familiar faces of Lily and James. 

I got up and started unpacking my trunk, looking for another bottle of ink. "Hey, Toni?" Harry asked from across the room. I turned around. "Why are some of these pages empty?"

I walked behind him and held onto his shoulders as I peered down at the book. "That's just another confusing part of my life, I guess." I walked back over to my trunk and emptied the last contents, not finding what I was looking for. "Dammit! Hey, do you have an extra ink bottle?"

He was still staring at the blank page in the book. "No, and I'm almost out. Let's go to Flourish and Blotts."

I sighed heavily. He got off the couch and walked over to me and put his hand on my arm.

"What's wrong?"

"I don't want to. Last time I went out, everyone kept telling me how sorry they were."

He closed his eyes in distress. "So what are you gonna do, just live up here forever then and never come out?"

"I don't know, I didn't think that far ahead. I just don't want to hear it- no amount of 'I'm sorry for your loss' will make her come back."

He pulled me into a hug as I began crying. "I know, I know. I'm here. Cry as long as you need to."

I cried into his chest for a few minutes. He had grown a few inches from when I'd last seen him and I was now to his shoulders. 

I pushed him away gently and sat on the edge of my bed, trying to put all my stuff away. Harry got on the ground and put the things I handed him back into my trunk. Our hands touched several times, and it's not like it's never happened before, but something was just different this time.