Chapter Text
Harry had been staying with the Dursleys for the first half of the summer, as he’d done every summer. But he was lucky enough with his choice of friends that he’d been invited to spend the second half of the summer with Ron.
This summer has been excruciatingly bad. He’s been put to every one of the chores, except that half of them were made to be practically impossible. They even got him to cut the lawn with nail clippers, to which he almost flipped them the bird. But he hadn’t, and he still wished deep down that he did. He never truly finished cutting the lawn, but there was a circular patch that had been finished, and that small patch had taken up multiple days of work. He’d have gone crazy if he’d had to finish the whole backyard.
Not to mention, he also got attacked by dementors and had to use magic to save himself and Dudley. They’d been attacked in public, and once they’d been hidden in an alleyway, he’d cast Expecto Patronum. That act had gotten him temporarily expelled from Hogwarts. If he’d not been cleared of all charges, he’d never be able to perform magic ever again. In conclusion, his time with the Dursleys was hell.
In comparison, the Weasleys' house was just about the best place ever. He’d been spoiled rotten with Mrs. Weasley’s cooking, and it was nice being able to finally see Ron and Hermione, even if Hermione had arrived a couple of days later.
He’d been constantly nagged at by the Dursleys for not being useful enough, and he was just about ready to run away if it wasn’t a horrible idea. He’d been living off knowing it was only temporary, and that he’d be at the Weasleys soon enough.
The problem was that he felt useless at the Weasleys too. There was nothing he was obligated to do here, but even while helping with chores and running errands, he felt as though he was just taking up space in their house, and eating food they couldn’t afford to be sharing. He wasn’t stupid enough to think Ron cared whether he took up space in his room or not, but deep down he knew that he was probably causing issues by just staying here.
And in his mind he was. Voldemort had been after him since he was an infant; he’d been in danger his whole life. And, now that Voldemort had returned, it was obvious that his being at the Weasleys could put all their lives in danger.
His thoughts were short-lived when he was woken up to Ron shaking him like a maraca.
“Harry! Wake up!” Ron insisted.
His fight-or-flight reflexes should have kicked in, but he just lay there blinking. Harry was certainly conscious now, and was quickly getting a headache the longer he did nothing. He thought of kicking Ron off his bed, but the tone of Ron’s words caught hold of his heart.
“What’s going on?” Harry asked, starting to get annoyed. Ron was still shaking him for some reason, so he pushed him off lightly to sit up straight. “Okay, okay, give me a second to breathe. I think you twisted my brain.” He reached for his temple, vision blurry.
“Look at this!” Ron frowned. He pulled out a newspaper from The Daily Prophet from behind his back. It was wrinkled from the angle Ron was holding it, but still legible.
The Daily Prophet had not been writing anything good about Harry recently, nor had it ever. All of their work was extremely biased against him, and it made sense since the Ministry of Magic seemed to have a great influence in what was written. Lately, he’d been written about in The Daily Prophet about Voldemort's reappearance, saying that he was lying, and that Voldemort was not back at all. Which was a problem he'd have to figure out sooner or later.
Harry moved the hair from his eyes and took the paper. "HOGWARTS SEEKS CHANGE” was clearly written in big bold letters on the front page. Under it was written "Unforeseen circumstances have made last year’s enrolled students of Hogwarts uncertain of Hogwarts safety-” but Ron had ripped it out of his hands and turned the page.
“Sorry, second page.” Ron winced.
It was obvious the first page was about Cedric Diggory’s death. Nearly no one believed him about He-Who-Should-Not-Be-Named’s return. Cedric’s death was not a tragic accident; it was a planned homicide by Harry Potter that resulted in his acquaintance’s tragic death, not some accident.
It wasn’t surprising that students were uncertain about Hogwarts’ safety after that.
He himself didn’t feel safe. Time was running out, and he couldn't pretend that he didn’t have to go back to school when he knew it’d be unwise not to. It’s not like he could stay at the Weasleys forever, and he certainly didn’t want to stay with the Dursleys for longer than necessary.
Ron gave the newspaper back, flipped to the second page this time.
This time, the bolded words said “NARCISSA MALFOY’S BODY FOUND DEAD!” with a couple of paragraphs underneath.
Harry was shocked. That was not at all what he was expecting. He almost didn’t believe it, but after the third time of reading the headline, he realised his eyes were not playing tricks on him. But it felt like a joke, like he was the victim of one of Fred and George's pranks.
Beside the article, sat Narcissa Malfoy's photo. A standard 3 quarter view of her with her darker hair tied up in a loose braid. He’d seen her at the Quidditch World Cup last year, and the similarities were undeniable. Mrs. Malfoy had truly died.
The text below didn’t even say much about her death-
Narcissa Black Malfoy’s body was found dead on August 22nd at 3:14 AM in the garden of Malfoy Manor. There is no word from Narcissa's husband nor son about how this happened, nor of their reaction and plan regarding this event.
However, the housemaid did state right after being told what happened that “Narcissa has… had a busy schedule. It didn’t even occur to me that she was in danger of some sort!”
Her cause of death has been labelled as unknown. No traces of impacts nor magic were found.
The rest of the article was just background information on Narcissa Malfoy, which included her obituary, Lucius Malfoy, Draco Malfoy, and Narcissa Malfoy’s sisters- Bellatrix Lestrange and Andromeda Tonks. It came as no surprise that Andromeda Tonks’ piece mostly just pointed out her relationship with her muggle-born husband Ted Tonks, and her half-blood daughter.
“How did this-...” Harry was speechless. He didn’t particularly like Narcissa Malfoy; in fact, he didn’t like her. She was a Voldemort supporter and Blood Purity enthusiast, yet her death made no sense nonetheless. How had she died?
“I know!” Ron practically screamed.
“Does Hermione know?” Harry questioned, looking up from the page to Ron’s wild appearance. It only hit Harry that his friend was still in his pyjamas, hair definitely not brushed.
At that, Ron turned around and immediately began to head for Ginny’s room, where Hermione was staying. He could soon hear Hermione loudly telling Ron it was too early. He couldn’t make out what any of them were saying afterwards.
Harry turned to check the time, and she was somewhat correct; it was 9 AM. Although 9 AM being named early was opinionated, in this household, 9 AM was just about too early. At the very least, it's too early for this level of noise, especially during summer break.
It’d been around 30 hours since Narcissa’s body was found.
He wondered when she’d died. Surely it wouldn’t be long before she’d be found. Technically, he didn’t know how big Malfoy Manor’s garden was, but it couldn’t have been that big, right? Not big enough to hide a body for long, at least. It seemed it must have happened that night when they found her body, because it makes no sense for her to be killed in the middle of the day; servants and housemaids would see.
Harry wondered if Malfoy would be attending Hogwarts later than other students. Hogwarts started in a week, and he figured Malfoy would probably have to go through legal and family matters. He wasn’t sure what had to be done when someone in the family died, but it was just common sense that it was most likely to be a lot of paperwork. And, for a family of that popularity, it was sure that people would want interviews and more information from the source. Perhaps Malfoy would be too busy with legal matters to pick on students this year.
That thought was immediately shut down. He’d find a way to pick on people, whether it was simply making time or sending someone else to do his odd jobs. He wasn’t sure what Malfoy’s problem was with his constant rude comments and just outright bullying, but it sure did earn him one heck of a reputation among classmates.
He yawned, stretching his arms and legs whilst sitting. He hadn't been expecting that news, but he also wasn’t expecting to be rough-housed into consciousness.
BANG
Harry could hear Ron's scream following shortly after. It didn’t sound like a scream of fear, more like one made of pain. He knew what Ron’s screams of fear sounded like. Although the Weasleys’ house was clean, there were a good number of spiders. Harry, too, had his own encounters with spiders here, but he didn’t really mind so long as it wasn’t bird-sized.
Harry turned his head away from his clock and back toward the doorway Ron had run out of. His curiosity quickly became concern. It definitely wiped most of his sleepiness away, adrenaline rushing in his veins a bit.
“Ron? Are you okay?” He called out.
Ron didn’t answer him. He was busy arguing with Ginny, or Hermione, maybe both at the same time. Were they mad about the news?
What the heck was that about? It sounded like something heavy fell over. It wasn't like glass shattering, but like someone threw a shoe at the floor. Which was a weird analogy, but it worked nonetheless.
“What the actual hell, Ginny!” Ron cried, leaving Ginny’s room. Ron marched over to one of the two bathrooms and slammed the door shut.
Harry finally got up to go check what was happening. “Ron? Are you okay?” He followed.
Harry stood outside the washroom, not quite sure what to do.
Ron opened the door and revealed a blossoming red mark on his forehead. It was slightly indented, as though he'd been hit by a corner of something. It wasn’t bleeding at all, just irritated as hell.
“Oh my,” Harry barked out, letting a laugh escape him. He was still worried, but the sight was undoubtedly funny.
After Harry had fetched Ron an ice pack, Harry explained the news to both Hermione and Ginny.
From what he was told, Ron had attempted to tell them the news, but they kept trying to get him out of Ginny’s room, not wanting to listen to what he wanted to say so early in the morning. In doing so, Ginny threw the nearest book at him.
In all fairness, Harry had thought about kicking Ron off of him when he was shaken awake. The only difference was that he just accepted it, which resulted in his still-pounding headache.
Ginny explained to both Hermione and Harry that she’d meant to hit him in the chest as a warning, but her aim wasn’t great while half asleep. She did seem to sincerely feel bad, but she made no effort to properly apologise to Ron yet. A sibling thing, probably.
Breakfast was bacon and buttered toast.
The table was awkwardly quiet in comparison to when he was woken up. Ron was glaring at Ginny, probably waiting for an apology.
“What?” Ginny glared back defiantly.
“You threw a book at my freaking head!” Ron exclaimed, pointing to his head while standing up. He didn’t need to point it out; the bright red shape forming on his head was smack dab in the middle of his temple. “I probably have a concussion!”
“I’m sorry, Ron. I didn’t mean to hit you in the head. It was a lucky shot.” Ginny continued eating her food, avoiding eye contact.
Mrs. Weasley opened her mouth, then shut it. It was obvious she wanted to butt into the conversation, but wanted them to solve it on their own. She didn’t need to reteach them how to get along after every fight; they were teenagers and had some sense of siblingly love for each other, even if at the moment it seemed to be nonexistent.
Harry picked at his food. He’d eat more if he wasn’t concerned that the second he looked away, a full-blown fight would break loose. Harry wasn’t that hungry, so it didn’t really matter to him much when Ron accidentally swept his plate off the table while gesturing wildly. His bacon and toast were now covered in shards of what was once his plate on the floor.
“Ron Weasley! What is the matter with you?” Mrs. Weasley sat up, finally speaking. She gestured furiously at what Ron had done. “That was my nice porcelain!”
Ron quickly sat back down. “I’m sorry, I didn't mean to! I swear!” He was still gesturing, and it hit Mr Weasley's glass, almost tipping it over. He ended up holding his hands on his lap, realising he was soon to be on a roll of smashing dishware.
George and Fred were both laughing.
Mrs.. Weasely held her breath and hid her face with her hand, clearly frustrated, but muttered, “It’s alright, but be careful! Look at Harry’s food.” She pointed to the spot beside Harry where the plate fell. She turned around, opening one of her upper cabinets to grab another plate.
“It’s okay, Mrs.. Weasely, I had enough anyway.” He raised his hands like he was guilty.
“Harry, you barely ate anything. Come on, I’ll fetch you some more.” She grabbed a plate different from all the others at the table. The ones on the table were cream with gold detailing on the edges and middle. The leftover plates were a plain light blue.
“I swear. It's really not necessary, Mrs. Weasley." He looked at Mrs. Weasley and was really trying to convince her, but she’d already started filling the plate. Supposedly, his fate had already been decided. He stood up and took the plate from her. “Thank you.” He smiled.
“It’s not a problem at all, Harry, and you better start calling me Molly.” She’d been adamant about calling her Molly previously, but he still felt a little unsure whenever he did.
“Right.” He sat back down and ate quietly.
Mrs. Weasley used Reparo to mend the plate back together, then turned to the mess on the floor and cast Scourgify.
He just continued eating, trying to get a noticeable dent in his food so that Mrs. Weasley wouldn’t be too concerned. She'd been paying attention to how much he’d been eating since he’d gotten here, and it was uncomfortable, especially because it shouldn’t be her problem to worry about. It wasn’t even as if he had an eating disorder. He knew he hadn’t been eating much lately, but he just didn’t have an appetite, and other times it was easy to forget- which was probably due to his lack of appetite. He blamed his loss of interest in food on academic stress, and everything else that happened last year.
He knew some people skipped out on meals because they felt self-conscious, or because of society’s pressure of beauty standards. But his self-consciousness had nothing to do with the way he ate. He knew he didn’t have a great body; it certainly wasn’t something he was very happy in. He had a good bit of muscle from Quidditch, but his ribs, hips, and spine were all poking out a bit.
As much as Harry didn’t know about eating disorders, he did know his case sounded like one in particular. The only difference was that he was still healthy, and healthy looking, and this lack of appetite hadn't become a problem. He wouldn’t let it get that far.
Once life would go back to normal, so would he.
“So, um… Mrs. Malfoy, isn’t that something?” Mr Weasley started.
After no one else chimed in, Mrs. Weasley replied: “Let’s not talk about that at the dinner table, dear.”
Probably for the best.