Harry Potter (One-shots and Short Stories)

Admitting Defeat - Part 1

Fandom: Harry Potter

Pairing: Harry Potter x Reader

Warnings: Angst a little... injury? Stubborn Harry?

Request: hey!!! I love your writing and I was wondering if I could request a harry potter x reader??? literally anything is good, there's a lack of harry fics on this site :(

A/N: I've never written for Harry before (which sounds ridiculous considering how much Hp stuff I write) SO the lovely amazing ❤ helped me figure out a plot for this request and I now love Post-war Harry with my entire HEARt thank you. ALSO this is a potential part ONE? Lemme know if you guys want MORE.

Word Count: 1.1k

You would think after the wizarding war there would be a very long period of peace. That was not the case in the slightest.

It seemed like new threats were popping up every day and Aurors were expected to shut them down, they had dangerous jobs, tight deadlines, strict rules and few safety measures in place to keep them safe. This left you to sit at home anxiously waiting for Harry to return, and you were tired of playing this waiting game.

Harry may have been the Boy who lived but that didn't make him any better than the other Aurors with the same training as him, if anything it made him a target.

Imagine being the person to kill "the boy who lived"? The irony that title holds. Accomplishing something even Voldemort couldn't?

It was nerve-racking, especially when school starts next month and the train to Hogwarts leaves taking you with it to start your first year as a professor.

You wished nothing more than for harry to come with you, to come back to his home but he was stubborn, he put himself on the line every day because he felt he needed to, that no one else could take his job and fill his shoes, like he is solely responsible for keeping the entirety of the wizarding world safe from harm.

You're busy ranting to yourself in your head as you pace the living room, arms crossed and brows knitted together when Harry comes in quickly through the fireplace a puff of green smoke contrasting against the red liquid he seems to be coated in.

"What the hell Harry?" You ask, the tiredness evident in your voice.

"Hi," he says with a sort of lopsided smile, his glasses just as crooked.

"You have no problem working late for a case but it's against every fibre of your being to stay at work late to take a trip to the nurse?"

"I have you for that," he teases, ignoring how cleary upset you are with him as he grabs your cheeks with his dirty hands and kisses you.

You almost don't kiss him back but seeing him like this reminds you of how easily he could have not come home, so you take the chance to kiss him while you have it.

"I'm not here to stitch up your wounds, in less than a month I won't be here at all, are you gonna travel to Hogwarts every time you get hurt?"

"I'm sure Pomfrey could fix me up." He jokes as he tries to kiss you again but you back away this time.

"No, Harry I'm being serious. This job is too much, you're too reckless like this and you can't keep doing this to yourself, you deserve a break, happiness."

"I have happiness, I have you," he tries to sweet talk you but you roll your eyes so he continues trying to argue, "I'm good at defensive magic, I can keep myself safe I promise."

"If you're soooo good at defensive magic then why are you bleeding all over our brand new living room carpet?" An argument that Harry can't seem to rebuttal as he sees a smear of his blood on your cheek from his hands. He closes his eyes for a second but can't seem to reopen them as his head falls onto your shoulder and you wrap your arms around him supporting his weight.

"I know you want to help people, I know you feel like you aren't doing enough but you fought in the biggest wizarding war there ever was, you deserve a break, you deserve to do something that fulfils you not something that fulfils what you think other people want or expect from you."

You bring your arms up and run your fingers through his unruly hair, squeezing him tight as you prepare to say what you feel.

"I can't keep doing this Harry, I can't leave for Hogwarts knowing you're out there being reckless, I can't go to sleep without knowing you're safe, knowing you're not really happy. What do you really want?" You ask him the last part quietly into the skin of his neck, his sweaty skin and dirty clothes don't gross you out for a second because all you want right now is to get some raw honesty out of him and it shouldn't be this hard, he shouldn't have to be covered in blood and falling apart in your arms to tell you how he feels.

"I just want you."

"Forget about me for a minute okay? Think about yourself for just a moment, just you, what do you want?"

He doesn't answer you so you continue to prod it out from him.

"Well, the harry I met in year three wanted to be a professor remember? We met in Lupins class and I said I'd like to be as good of a professor as he is someday and you agreed, you said you wanted that too! What happened to that dream Harry? The war took if from you momentarily but we won the war, you can have your dreams back, you can have me and be a professor just as you wanted before. You could teach defence just like Lupin did and you will help kids really learn, you can even help make some future Aurors good enough to replace you."

And at that moment he stops thinking about you, about Ron and Hermione, about his parents or Remus or Sirius, he just thinks about himself and what he truly wants. He thinks about the fact that he does deserve to have what he wants, he worked really damn hard for it. That he wants to go back to Hogwarts with the girl that he loves, he wants to teach one of his favourite subjects so well that it makes Remus Lupin proud, he wants to be kind to every student he meets, he wants to go home.

"Okay," he agrees and your heart feels like it's going burst from how vulnerable and broken his voice sounds, you can't help but squeeze him tighter, 'Ow, okay that hurts I'm still injured here." He teases, his voice back to normal and you pull away with a bright smile.

"Okay, then we better get you cleaned up so you can fix the carpet then."

And Harry stares at her for a moment, her bright smile and loving eyes, he's so glad that he has someone to stitch up his wounds, someone to tell him how it is and help him see things clearly, someone who loves him whether he saving the wizarding world or reading a textbook to a bunch of bored kids, someone who makes him clean up his own blood that he got on the carpet because he doesn't deserve special treatment, but he does deserve a new life, to move on, go home, with her.