Chapter Text
Harry clapped his hands together to get everyone’s attention. “Alright guys, today we’re going to be doing some revision. If there’s a spell you’re still having trouble with find a partner and start practicing. Ron, Hermione, and I will be walking around to help you out if you need it.”
With this everyone dispersed into all their different groups, practicing a myriad of spells that they’d learned over the past month.
Everything was going great, absolutely fantastic, until someone needed help with a Merlin damned patronus . Of course Harry couldn’t actually blame Hannah Abbot, he doesn’t think anything could truly hide his love of Luna. Doesn’t mean he wasn’t hoping for them to at least have more time together before they got found out.
It was just after he’d finished helping a fourth year hufflepuff with a shielding charm that it happened.
“Harry!” Hannah called, “Do you think you could help me with my patronus charm?”
The teen happily nodded as he walked over to her. “What’s the problem?”
She let out a frustrated sigh. “I just can’t get it. I think of my happiest memory but all I can manage is a mist.”
The indian teen thought for a few seconds before responding. “Well,” he tried. “Have you considered that the happy memory you’re using may be too superficial?”
Hannah gave him a confused look. “What do you mean?”
“Like, how genuine is the memory? Is it just a memory of say for example you getting an A on a test you thought you’d fail?” He explained. “Or is it something that reminds you of a sort of bone deep happiness?”
He got a skeptical look at this, “Oh yeah, what's your ‘bone deep’ memory?”
All he could do was smile a bit bitterly, “Well mine is sort of made up. It’s more like a memory I wish I had of spending the holidays with my parents.”
Her eyes widened at this a bit, “So,” she asked hesitantly. “It, it doesn’t have to be a real memory?”
“Nope.” He said confidently. “Now are you ready to try?”
“Only if you do it first, just so I can feel a bit better.”
Harry laughed a bit. “Of course.” The teen closed his eyes as he prepared to do the spell, summoning his happiest ‘memories’, he was left quite surprised though when the thing that came up as he recited the spell was his and Luna’s talk from a few nights ago. The spell worked all the same it felt like so he had no worries as he turned to look at Hannah. Only to be confused at the shocked expression on her face. He turned to look at his patronus and figured out why.
Standing before him, instead of the familiar stag he’d come to associate with his father, stood a tall and proud thestral .
Harry felt his face going up in flames knowing exactly what this meant.
Luna it appeared was no off better. The girl who to others was usually the definition of calm looked shocked as she blushed right to her roots.
Hermione of course was the one to ask the question they all wanted to know. “Harry what in the world happened to your patronus?”
The boy in question wondered if it was too late to play it off cool. The answer was a definite yes considering his already flustered appearance.
He laughed awkwardly, “Haha, umm. Well. ” He tried awkwardly. “Your patronus can actually change if the source of your happiness has changed. So if you switch up the memory you use for the charm, it can in turn change your patronus’s shape sometimes.”
“Yeah that’s not explaining why yours is a bloody thestral though mate.” Ron cut in, wanting the other boy to just get to the point already.
Before he could give some weak answer a slightly larger thestral seemed to show up out of nowhere and stand right next to his and began to nuzzle it. He would have found it wonderfully cute if they weren’t being faced with the whole ordeal of being outed to the entire DA. A few moments later Luna, much more composed, was standing next to him, her usual serene smile on her face.
“I think one of those muggle sayings would apply to this situation Harry.” She said playfully as she looked at the faces of all the other DA members. “I believe the phrase is ‘the cat is out of the bag’.”
Harry laughed softly, "It would appear so." He then looked around at the shocked faces if all his fellow schoolmates and sighed. He knew they wouldn't be getting anything else done that day. "Alright from the looks of it we're ending today's session early. Think of it as a nice day off, you'll receive." At these words they all continued to look at him expectantly, probably hoping to learn more about him and Luna. He of course was having none of this. "Shoo shoo," he said as he started ushering all of them out of the room. There were of course some grumbles of protest but they all made their way out agreeably.
Hermione, Ron, Neville, Ginny, and the twins were the only ones left to stay in the room with Luna and Harry. Varying looks of shock on all of their faces.
As usual Hermione was the first to speak. “Wh-Why didn’t you tell us anything?!”
He shrugged, “We wanted to keep it to ourselves for a bit.”
“But we’re your best mates!” Ron said.
The teen arched a brow, “Yeah and you’ve constantly made fun of Luna and called her Looney even after I told you to stop. And Hermione insists on antagonizing her and telling her she’s delusional for believing in things like nargles. So what makes you think I would have been comfortable telling you about our relationship when you act like that?”
Ron spluttered, unable to come up with a response to an admittedly good point.
“Well we thought you were into Cho Chang!” Hermione rushed in to defend.
Harry gave her a disbelieving look. “Being into Chang would be messed up for so many reasons .” He just honestly couldn’t even get past that thought. “What in the world even made you think I wanted to date her? ”
She shrugged aggressively. “I don’t know maybe because you’re always looking at her all longingly and sighing and talking to her.”
Harry honestly thought he’d lose his mind at these accusations. “First of all, I’m not even going to explain that first part to you because just no. Second of all, I talk to her because she’s still depressed about Cedric being killed and will come to me for comfort sometimes. That’s literally all that is. He was her best friend and I knew him enough and was with him in his last moments.”
Luna, Ginny, Neville, and the twins just looked on with mild interest as their argument continued. Looking back and forth between the three sort of like you would at a tennis match.
Ginny turned to Luna. “You’re both happy right?”
“Extremely.” She happily replied.
The redhead let out a long sigh. “Well, that’s all that matters I guess. I will be honest with you though it’s gonna take me a while to get used to, but that’s okay.”
Luna smiled brightly at the girl and hugged her, “Thank you.” She whispered. Ginny fondly rolled her eyes as she hugged her back.
“Of course.”
The sweet moment between them was quickly broken by the progressing argument of the other three. It seemed to have escalated quite a bit within the few seconds Luna and Ginny had turned to talk.
“-Y CAN’T YOU JUST BE HAPPY FOR ME?”
“WHY COULDN’T YOU JUST TELL US FROM THE BEGINNING THAT YOU WERE TOGETHER?” Ron yelled back.
“BECAUSE I SHOULDN’T HAVE TO! WHY DO I NEED TO SHARE EVERY SINGLE TID BIT OF MY LIFE WITH YOU! WHY CAN’T I TAKE MY TIME WITH SOMETHING BEFORE I HAVE TO LET YOU TWO KNOW ABOUT IT?”
“WE’RE YOUR FRIENDS!” Hermione shouted. “WE’RE SUPPOSED TO ALWAYS BE THERE FOR YOU! HOW DO YOU EXPECT US TO DO THAT IF YOU KEEP THINGS FROM US?!”
Harry threw his hands up in frustration, “OH SO NOW YOU WANT TO BE THERE FOR ME?”
The red head rolled his eyes. “WILL YOU GIVE IT A REST ALREADY WE APOLOGIZED! IT’S WHAT DUMBLEDORE TOLD US WE HAD TO DO!”
He went quiet at Ron’s words, it felt like all the air had been sucked out of his lungs. “You left me all alone at the Dursleys’. ” he said, voice raw from yelling, in disbelief that Ron would say such a thing. “You left me to just sit and marinate in everything that had happened. In literally being tortured and witnessing Cedric, in witnessing someone I almost loved die.” Harry tried his best to fight back tears as he spoke. “I actually wanted to tell you two about that, about how Cedric and I almost got together before he got killed, but for an entire summer you just fucking shut me out. Because you decided that Dumbledore’s words were more important than your friend. Because suddenly, out of the four fucking years that I’ve known you you chose that moment to listen to an authority figure. So no, I won’t give it a rest, because you betrayed my trust and left me alone with my abusers like it was no big deal. When the time came for you to seriously act like my ‘best mates’ twice now, the both of you have failed to meet what I’ve probably set as the lowest bar possible.” He sighed as he rubbed a hand down his face, exhaustion starting to settle into him at his own rant. “I just, I can’t do this right now.” Without another word the teen quietly walked out.
The room was deathly silent, everyone but Luna looking at the door in shock. Her face on the other hand was just etched with worry.
Ron and Hermione were both deathly pale, the weight of their words and actions finally coming down on them with full force.
“We fucked up.” Ron said aloud. “We fucked up really bad.”
Hermione gulped, “It appears so.”
“Ya know,” Neville said softly to the others around him. “I’m not too sure if I should have been here for this conversation.”
Fred simply shrugged. “Eh you’re fine, this argument was bound to happen at some point.”
George nodded, “It needed to happen. Ron and Hermione have been a couple of ponces lately.”
Without bothering to speak to anyone Luna made her way to the door, wanting to be quick and find Harry. She paused for a moment, staring blankly at the door with her hand resting on the knob. “If your really expect to gain trust from an injured animal, you should stop pushing it into bear traps.”