Chapter Text
After the war, Harry was angry about everything. About the war. About everyone they had lost. About little baby Teddy growing up without his parents. And he was still angry about the things before the war. He had been through fucking enough before any of that happened. He had been through enough when Dumbledore died.
He had been through enough when Sirius died.
Even before that, when he was a 14 year old kid and he was forced to compete in fucking challenges that killed people. He had been through enough even before he saw Cedric’s body hit the ground.
He had been through enough when the basilisk started petrifying people. Well before he was blamed for the basilisk, because his would-be-murderer left a piece of his soul latched on to Harry’s, Harry had been through enough.
When he was an 11 year old child and the most evil wizard to ever live came after him at Hogwarts, the first place he had felt safe for even a moment.
When he was 10 and Vernon cheered as Dudley used Harry as a punching bag. When Aunt Petunia told her little Diddykins what good form he had as he landed his fists on Harry’s body.
When he was locked under the stairs.
When he was punished at school for magic he didn’t even understand.
When his parents were murdered.
Before Harry could even form memories, he had already been through enough.
And he fucking hated it. He was angry at a God he didn’t really even believe existed. He was angry at Dumbledore even as his heart ached for him. That man was the first adult to show him any care. That man was the one who left him with the Dursleys. That man had kept so many fucking secrets, Harry was still filling in the gaps to this day. He expected everything of Harry and gave him none of the information he needed.
And Dumbledore KNEW. HE KNEW he was going to die. He could have prepared fucking better.
Lately, Harry felt fifteen again. His rage was bubbling over and it was directed at people he knew were just doing their best. Ron and Hermione grieved, too. And he could see the haunted looks in their eyes sometimes. But mostly they acted fine. They went on and lived their lives. As if that made any sense. As if it was possible to go on after all that. He hated when they smiled and went on like everything was fine. And he hated that he hated them for it.
Ginny, too. He fell in love with her steady confidence. Of course she would get through this. And he didn’t want her to suffer. He didn’t want her to feel the way he felt. But he couldn’t be around her. Not now. He was broken and he didn’t know how to be around anyone who wasn’t. He didn’t want to hate people for not being broken like him, but it was hard.
The only one he didn’t hate was little Teddy. He was the only thing keeping Harry from just completely giving up and drinking himself into oblivion every night. Teddy was like Harry. He was a little kid who lost his parents in a war he wouldn’t remember. But he wouldn’t live a life like Harry’s. He would be loved. He would be cared for. Harry was going to make sure of it. Teddy had been through enough already, and Harry was going to do everything in his power to make sure he didn’t go through more than that. So Harry didn’t let himself give up. He got a job.
The only thing he had ever been good at was teaching Dumbledore’s Army. He applied for a position teaching Defense Against the Dark Arts at Hogwarts. He wasn’t really sure if it would be possible, seeing as he technically hadn’t even finished his seventh year, but figured practical experience had to count for something. Luckily enough Headmistress McGonagall agreed.
It was mid way through the school year, when Harry applied. The headmistress asked if he wanted to start up his class in the second semester. They simply hadn’t been able to replace everyone they had lost. The school was running on a skeleton crew with teachers taking on extra courses and some standard classes not being offered at all.
Harry really considered it. But it was Ginny’s seventh year. She insisted on finishing school and taking her NEWTs. Harry admired her strength. But he couldn’t match it. And he certainly couldn’t come in and become her professor. Not after the break up. Not when she wouldn’t even talk to him.
Instead, Harry insisted on taking the year to study himself. He pointed out to McGonagall that he had never gotten the seventh year curriculum himself. He asked what the curriculum normally included, not that there was much of a standard with the rotating string of professors. Still, he bought the textbooks that had been used in years past. And when he didn’t understand some overly academic explanation he reached out to members of the Order for help. Kingsley, Molly, Arthur - they were all supportive of Harry’s career ambitions.
Harry had always taken to Defense Against the Dark Arts. Part of him worried that, like he had lost his Parseltongue, he would lose other skills. He wasn't sure what was inherently him, and what came from Voldemort's soul. He worried that his affinity for the class had actually been Tom Riddle’s all along. But the more he studied, the more he found that this was truly his.
By the time the next school year came around, Harry was ready. He had lessons planned. He was determined to be a good professor. He remembered Lupin’s third year lessons. He was sure he didn’t fill his shoes. But, he thought, at least he was decidedly better than Lockhart, and he didn’t have Voldemort on the back of his head, so he had to be good enough. He wasn’t letting the kids down too much. They didn’t have to know how often he visits the Hog’s Head. How often he let himself get lost in firewhisky to drown out the anger.
It was nice being back at Hogwarts, too. And, as much as he hated to admit it, being away from his friends was a relief. He was barely holding himself together enough to hold down a job. He couldn’t deal with more social demands or arguments. He’d see them again during the school breaks.
__
Christmas break started out alright. He stayed at the Burrow. Things with Ginny were tense. They mostly avoided each other. In some ways it reminded him of the summer he was 12, when she was so shy she would duck away or lose her voice any time she saw him. But this was different. She wasn’t in awe of him. She was angry, and rightfully, so. He had been a messed up, bad partner, and then broken up with her because he needed “time” and “space”. It was such a fucking cliche he hated himself for it.
Things with Ron were mostly okay, though. And halfway through the week, Hermione was able to join them. He still wasn’t used to seeing his best friends all lovey-dovey. Sometimes he felt left out, like a third wheel in his own friend group. But, overall, he thought it was good. They seemed happy. And they should be, even if their happiness made his own anger over the war flare back up. Which it did. And then Harry would make some stupid, sharp remark. And Ron would snap back. And Harry would apologize and it would end there. Mostly. On Christmas eve, though, Harry didn’t apologize. He felt on edge. He felt like he had been holding it together for too long. He couldn’t do it anymore. Ron snapped at Harry, Harry snapped at Ron, and suddenly they were arguing. Really arguing.
“We all lived through the same war, mate. Don’t act like you went through more just because you were the bloody chosen one.”
“Didn’t I, though?” Harry felt indignant. It was him who was targeted by Voldemort every year in school. It was him who was left the impossible task of tracking down the Horcruxes. Hell, Harry himself was a Horcrux. Had they all gone through that?
“I need you to stop before you say something stupid. My brother died. ”
“He did, and that tears me apart. So many people died. I died. You know that, right? I died.”
“You didn’t really though. You’re here. Fred isn’t.”
“I did. I walked into my own death. I sat at a train station with a piece of Voldemort’s soul and I talked to Dumbledore. I died. I was dead.” Harry didn’t even know why he was arguing this point. His own death was probably the least traumatizing part of the whole war. In many ways, it would have been better if he got on the train and moved on to whatever was next. His death, a more permanent death, wasn’t a worst case scenario.
“And you woke up afterward. You’re just so fucking special, you don’t have to suffer the long term consequences of anything that happens. You die, but you get to get right up after. It’s not fucking real. You don’t get the right to throw yourself a pity party when some of us lost family .”
“Fred was my family, too.”
“Harry, you get fucking everything. You don’t get my family, too.”
Harry didn’t know how to explain. If the Weasleys weren’t his family, who was? He tried anyway. “Remember when I was 12? Remember when you and George, and Fred, came to the Dursleys’?”
Ron should be able to see it, right? Should remember the bars on the window. The way Harry was half-starved at the end of that summer. The way the Weasleys had welcomed him, let him stay at the Burrow. Ron could see that the only family he had at that point was Ron and Hermione and the Weasleys.
“What does that have to do with this?”
“Who do you think my family is? The people who kept bars on my windows, or the people who pulled them off with a flying car in the middle of the night?”
“It’s not the same. He’s not your brother. He's mine.” Ron huffed.
Harry wanted to argue. He was angry. But he also felt like a fraud. He probably didn’t have the right to claim Fred. He was making Fred’s death about him. Ron was right; Harry didn’t have a family. He didn’t know what it was really like to have and lose your family. He was making everything about him again. Even his pain was fucking selfish. He should learn to shut the fuck up.
“You’re right. I’m…” He tried to say the word sorry, but he was still angry. He hated himself but still couldn’t bring himself to believe that he was fully in the wrong. He wanted to rip his skin off. He didn’t say sorry. Instead he said, “I’m going to get a drink.”
And he did. Ron tried to continue the argument, but Harry couldn’t, wouldn’t. He had a drink, and another until he didn’t want to yell anymore. This was better than when he was fifteen and lashing out. He could mute it this way. He didn’t have to feel it so much. He had another drink.
He woke up with a pounding headache, a fuzzy memory of the rest of the night and a deep sense of shame. Did he cry at one point? He wasn’t sure. He got a drink of water, took some ibuprofen, and didn’t answer the door when he heard a knock.
Once the ibuprofen kicked in, he packed his things. He wasn’t mad at Ron anymore. Not really. Not more than the baseline anger he felt at everyone all the time nowadays. But he didn’t want to be around the Weasleys anymore. Ron was right. They weren’t his family. They were just being kind, letting him stay there. Nothing more. He thanked Molly so much for her hospitality, wished the whole family a Merry Christmas, and went to spend Christmas where he belonged - with Teddy. Orphans should stick together.
Andromeda and Ted were so welcoming. So kind. They didn’t even ask questions when Harry showed up on their doorstep carrying a suitcase. They just wished him a Merry Christmas and set an extra place at the table. Harry was glad Teddy had them. They were so much better than the Dursleys, not that that was a high bar to clear.
Harry pulled out a stuffed animal - a white owl that reminded him of Hedwig. It was a gift to Teddy. One of the first non-alcoholic things he had spent his paycheck, not just his parent’s money, on. As he watched little Teddy hug the owl tight, he felt more warmth and hope than he had since before the war. He had finally done something right.
__
After the winter holidays, Harry returned to Hogwarts. He missed it when he was gone. He guessed this was what you called homesickness. He remembered being 11 and hearing the other boys whisper from their four poster beds in the Gryffindor dormitories.
“Do you ever miss home?” Seamus said into the darkness. Harry wasn’t sure if he was talking to anyone in particular or just to the room.
“I miss my collection of chocolate frog cards,” Ron answered. “I have some here, but I had more at home.”
“I miss pants,” Dean answered. “Wearing robes all the time is so weird.”
“I miss my Gran,” Neville answered.
“I miss my mom,” Dean said. Something about Neville’s earnest answer cracked the other boys open, too. They started pouring out all the things they missed all the things that made them homesick.
Harry didn’t understand what that was like back then. There wasn't a single thing he missed about living with the Dursleys. So he pretended he was asleep.
Now, Harry realized, Hogwarts was his home. The only place he had ever really missed. He ached for it when he was away too long. The paintings on the walls, the ghosts, the banquet hall. All of it felt like part of him.
But in the aftermath of the war, he found himself getting homesick for things he couldn’t return to. Whole wings of Hogwarts were destroyed. They had rebuilt, but it wasn’t the same. The room of requirement had burnt away. He would never return to the DA headquarters.
And people. So many people were missing. Not just Dumbledore, and the others who had died. But some kids didn’t come back. Whether their parents were pulling them out of school for good, or just taking a year or two to let Hogwarts rebuild while they recovered themselves was yet to be seen. At least for now, the halls lacked the familiar babbling of students. Every classroom was half empty. The castle felt hollow in a way it never had in Harry’s school days.
Even as he yearned for the full, vibrant Hogwarts of his school days, felt homesick for a Hogwarts that might never exist again, something about it felt right. The world shouldn’t just move on. It should be broken down. Hogwarts had the decency to be just as changed as Harry himself after the war.
So Harry made it through the school year. Time didn’t pass quite right. It dragged out, but when he tried to remember what had happened the day or the week before he couldn’t quite recall. Nothing seemed to stick out except for the sadness that sat on top of everything all the time. And the anger that bounced around inside of him and occasionally burst out.
He kept going to the Hog’s Head. And he wrote to Ron and Hermione. He used the school’s owls. It was inconvenient. It would be better to have his own personal owl again. But he just couldn’t. Hedwig wasn’t some tool to be replaced. She was his companion. His first friend. When he thought about getting a new owl he remembered her lifeless body falling and he just couldn’t. And so he used the school’s owls when he wrote to Ron and Hermione.
And things were easier in the letters. He had time and he had distance. If he got angry at something they wrote, he could vent his frustration to his empty chambers rather than taking it out on his friends. He could write his own letter calmly. No blaming, no accusing.
Hermione was still studying. There wasn’t higher education in the Wizarding World, per se. But there were groups of wizards who would get together and research a particular discipline. Invent new spells or novel applications of existing spells. It involved a mastery of language and history and a deep understanding of related spells and etymology. Headmistress McGonagal had connected Hermione with a few friends who were involved in the research of transfiguration. They were paid with grants from the ministry. Hermione adored it. She couldn’t share a lot of what she was working on. You’ll see when we’re published, but for now, we have to keep it under wraps. You understand.
Half of what she could share went right over Harry’s head, anyway, but he appreciated her trying. And he was glad to see she still had her passion. He had never really thought about the future enough to realize this was even an option. But it seemed right for Hermione.
Ron was following through on the dream he and Harry had once shared - becoming an auror. His OWLs weren't really good enough for the career path. And his NEWTs were nonexistent. But his real world experience made up for it. At least that's what he put in his application. He was rejected four times. But there was a shift in politics when a ring of former Death Eaters was found to still be torturing muggles, even now. They witnessed the trials; they saw their compatriots sent to Azkaban. Yet still, they were going out and casting curses at innocents who couldn't defend themselves. So the ministry's need for aurors increased, and their scrutiny decreased, and Ron was given a chance.
When the school year ended, Harry decided to rent an apartment in the small town where the Tonks family lived. That way, he could see Teddy all the time. He also visited the Burrow regularly. Maybe they weren't his family, but they were some of the people he cared most about in the world.
Ron was still staying at the Burrow. Ginny had just moved out, but she was back every few weeks, like Harry, so they would sometimes run into each other. When they did talk, it was short and impersonal. Harry still couldn’t quite grasp how he and Ginny had both been able to get through everything alive, and he had still managed fuck everything up and lose her so completely. How could they be strangers to each other after everything?
Then one day in mid July, Bill, Charlie, Ron, Harry, Ginny, and George were all at the Burrow, and they got a game of 3 on 3 quidditch going in the yard. It was the first time he felt normal around Ginny since the break up nearly nine months before. It started out awkward as ever, but as they both went for a quaffle, Ginny side checked him and got to it first. The taunting grin on her face as she looked back at him was pure competitive joy. She taunted him and by instinct, before he could second guess, he taunted back, and they fell into a rhythm they hadn’t had since Hogwarts. It felt good, like maybe he hadn’t ruined everything. He couldn’t be her boyfriend, but for the first time he had hope that they might be friends again some day.