Work Text:
Well, wasnt this perfect?
There Harry was, walking quickly through the bustling streets of London when it started raining.
Lovely. Just lovely.
Bloody British weather.
He had forgotten his umbrella and there was no chance of casting a charm with all these muggles around, so Harry cast his eyes around for some form of shelter.
He quickly spotted an old, battered pub nestled between glowing shops and small, cramped houses.
The Lioness
It would do.
Harry hurried over to the welcoming doors, following some muggles through the entrance into the cosy building. It was not too crowded, but he could hear laughs and shouts from the couches and the booming voices of those sat at the bar. It was warm too, the air brushing against his sodden, cold body.
Harry glanced outside at the worsening weather. It was hailing now, and storm clouds loomed into the distance. It seemed Neville and Ron would have to run errands around Diagon Alley alone.
Resigned to his fate, Harry made his way to the bar. Might as well get a drink if he would be here a while. The cushioned stool creaked slightly as he sat, and he stretched, a yawn escaping him.
It had been a long week.
Between his job as an auror (which turned out to be duller than he thought) and evading the ever nosy press, Harry had barely been able to catch a break.
It had been two years since the war ended, but it seemed that the chaos was still present.
Well, healing took time. Harry knew that all too well.
Anyways, Harry deserved a break, even if it was only for an hour or two. And the chances of somebody else like him being here, a muggle pub, was low. So Harry ordered a drink and let the tension that had gripped him slip away.
His small moment of peace was interrupted by a lively voice behind him, making him jump.
“Oi, Bryce, the usual?”
A middle aged woman sat on the seat next to him, calling to the bartender and swinging her legs over the seat. She had a bright smile with pearly white teeth and soft eyes that glowed with joy.
The woman turned to him, still laughing from something the bartender said.
“Oh sorry, did I scare you? Gavin always tells me I’m loud enough for the queen to hear.”
She laughs again, talking as if Harry knows her, and whoever this ‘Gavin’ is.
Harry just nods and smiles, murmuring a “Don’t worry about it” as he turns back to his glass. But as the woman keeps talking animatedly with the bartender a strange feeling creeps through him.
She seems… familiar.
Her kind, round face. Her warm, dark skin. Her chocolate eyes.
He’s seen her before, he’s sure of it, in some old dusty memory that floats around in his brain.
Could she be a witch? No, she would’ve recognised him already.
It was impossible to find someone these days who hadn’t seen his face plastered onto a Daily Prophet newspaper with some new dramatic title.
He must’ve been staring though, because she turns to him again.
“You alright love?”
“Oh, uh- yeah… just, um- yeah.”
Harry threw the words out clumsily, his mind already groaning at his own awkwardness.
She gave him a wink and a smile then turned to talk to somebody else, ignoring his mess of a sentence.
He sighed, getting up and moving over to a comfy looking armchair in the corner. He was not going to chance another embarrassment like that.
But as his thoughts drifted away again, he looked around the room and found the woman staring at him.
They both looked away as their eyes met, but he caught the furrow in her brow and the strange look in her eyes.
Ok. This was getting weird.
She must be a witch, maybe she just hadn’t recognised him from the lighting and has only now just clocked it. If she is, she must be muggleborn or a half-blood because a pureblood certainly wouldn’t be caught dead here.
The woman stood, tartan skirt swishing as she waved goodbye to someone at the bar. She walked over, smiling again as if they were old friends and sitting in the plush armchair opposite him. The woman relaxed and lent back, raising an eyebrow at him.
“Do I… know you?”
She spoke first, and for the first time there was uncertainty and… worry? In her voice.
“Uh, I don’t think so… you just look familiar.”
Harry replied, hands fidgeting as the woman crossed her legs, looking thoughtful.
“I was thinking the same about you. Your eyes… I’ve seen your eyes before.”
His eyes? Everyone always said they were his mother’s.
“I’m Mary Macdonald, that ring any bells?”
Her head tilted, soft curly hair bouncing as she did so.
Mary Macdonald… the name clattered around his head, and he thought back for anything about this woman.
And there it was.
A memory, fifth year.
Mad-Eye Moody.
He had showed Harry a picture.
Of the Order.
He had listed off the people on it, starting with Harry’s parents, Remus, and Sirius then talking about the others. Unfamiliar and familiar faces. Some alive, some dead. But one of those people had dark curly hair, and a smiling face. A face that held chocolate eyes and dark thick eyebrows.
A face now staring at him with curiosity and confusion.
Albeit, she was older now, with some laugh lines and stark white strands of hair.
But it was still her.
Mary Macdonald.
“Yes… it- it does.” Harry let out the words, taking in a shaky breath.
“I think you knew my parents. You went to school with them?”
Mary sighed, looking down at her drink.
“I had an accident many years ago, I can’t really remember those times…”
She looked back up at him, offering an apologetic smile.
Oh.
That was it.
He remembered now.
Mary Macdonald had obliviated herself after the war ended.
Too many tainted memories, too many lost friends.
Some of those lost friends being Harry’s parents.
“What’s your name, love? I can remember… some things. Might help jog my memory, eh?”
“Harry. Harry James Potter.”
Mary’s brow furrowed again, her glossy lips pinching.
“Potter… that… I know that name.”
Harry remembered her comment before about his eyes.
“I think you may of known my mother, Lily Evans?”
Mary’s head snapped up at that.
“Yes… Lily… she was kind. She was clever too, I think”
Harry smiled.
“I’ve been told.”
“Told? You didn’t know her?”
Mary looked concerned now, and it warmed Harry’s heart. How could this woman care so much, have such a big, joyous heart, even with so much of her life missing? With so many parts just snapped away like that?
Though, maybe it was better for her to not remember those times. Too much pain.
Harry brought himself back to the conversation though, nodding.
“Yes, er, both my parents died when I was quite young. I barely remember them.”
A sad sort of smile fell onto Mary’s face.
“I know the feeling, kid.”
They went quiet after that, both caught up in their own thoughts.
Harry himself thought of his parents, and how his time with them was stolen. He thought of how so many of Mary’s years had been stolen.
The death eaters had taken so much, in both wars.
But Harry couldn’t go down that hole, not now. Too risky.
“I miss it sometimes. It’s weird”
Mary speak up again, her eyes staring at some spot on the floor.
“Hm?”
“My memories. I long for them. I don’t know anything about them, except for echoes of laughter and glimpses of light. But damn, do I wish I could have them back.”
She lets out a shaky breath.
“Ever since I lost them… it’s felt like there’s a part of me missing, like I’m incomplete. That without those memories I’m a different person. That without those memories I’m… I’m not whole.”
Mary had clenched her eyes shut now, and her voice was quiet against the chatter of the pub.
Harry didn’t speak. He didn’t know how.
Did he tell her of how bright and fun those times were? About how she had laughed with her friends and been free?
Or did he tell her of those times covered in darkness, where she lost everybody, including herself, in the end.
He decided it would be better if she simply knew neither.
Maybe shadows of the past were better than daggers of truth and, inevitably, suffering.
Suffering that tears and ripsthrough you.
Suffering that ruins you.
He looked up at Mary again.
He couldn’t tell her. All he could give were empty words and what ifs.
He settled for a thought.
A thought Harry hoped would console her.
“I bet you had fun.” He pushed it out, green, glittering eyes looking at warm chocolate ones.
Mary huffed a small chuckle.
“We better of.”