Fic: Scars (Harry Potter)
Title/Prompt: Scars #071
Fandom: Harry Potter
Rating: PG
Pairing/Characters: Multi-character POVs
Words: 1127
Author’s Note: This started off as one drabble and quickly became seven. It’s DH-compliant, but is sort of an EWE fic, I suppose, since the angst isn’t very congruent with the fluffy ending JKR wrote.
-----
Harry Potter. The Boy Who Lived. The Boy Who Vanquished Voldemort. The Boy Who Was The Saviour Of The Wizarding World.
Harry Potter. He who was worthy of all these tributes and then some. He who had been placed on a pedestal so impossibly high, by so many nameless, unknown faces, that should he (inevitably) fall from his perch, it would be devastating. It was a long way down from worldwide hero to obscurity, after all.
One would have to wonder though, just how the millions would respond if he ever voiced the singular dark thought that continually plagued his mind. Yes, he was worthy of all those accolades, but in the solitude of just his thoughts for company, and a bottle of Firewhisky, he’d admit that none of it was worth the loss, the sacrifices, the loneliness and the fear. Most especially the fear.
If he was brutally honest, if he hadn’t had to fight off the Dark Lord, then that would have been just fine with him. And he had to wonder just what that selfishness would do to their gloriously bright, hero-tainted view of him.
He imagined that his pedestal would crumble under the weight of their disappointment.
And he found that he didn’t care.
-----
Ron Weasley had run out of ideas. And truth be told, he wasn’t sure it was worth the effort anymore.
He tried talking to her, the best way he knew how, but she would plaster that same, “I’m fine, Ronald, stop asking!” exasperated expression on her face.
Every time he tried to get through, it was as if she barricaded herself behind a tall, thick brick wall that was impenetrable to sound. Or more precisely, his voice.
He was tired.
So very tired of her shutting him out.
He was tired of trying to be there for her, and tired of resenting her for not being there for him.
Everything was a mess.
It shouldn’t have been this way.
They had won after all, hadn’t they?
Hadn’t they?
-----
Minerva McGonagall. Headmistress.
Even after all this time, it sounded wrong. Logically she understood she was the best candidate. The only candidate. But it would never make it right.
It felt as if she was merely a temporary replacement. That he would return, and take up residence in his rightful office. But one glance at his painting, where he slept on soundly, reminded her that that would never be.
Hogwarts was her home.
It had been for as long as she could remember.
But everywhere she turned were reminders of the horrors that had lived in these walls.
The Potions Classroom would remind her of Severus, and guilt would claw into her old and weary bones. She had never doubted Albus, yet she had doubted him.
She should have known.
Sometimes, while she would be eating her evening meal, she would look down at the Great Hall and would be struck with the image of all the dead bodies that had once lain there in endless rows; grieving friends and family, crouched by their sides. And then she would blink, and the image would disappear before her eyes to be replaced by the hordes of students, chatting amiably amongst one another, the majority ignorant of what lay beneath their feet.
It was yet another reminder that life moved on.
But she was an old witch, and could admit that she hadn’t many years left ahead of her.
All she had left was the past.
And though it didn’t do well to dwell, she could do little else but.
-----
George Weasley died 2nd May 1998.
All that had been left of him was a living, breathing corpse.
-----
Hermione Granger, the fearless heroine of the Second Wizarding War, was afraid to fall asleep.
They would laugh, she knew.
They can’t hurt you anymore, they’d say.
But it was a lie. And they knew it. Because if they didn’t let themselves believe their lies, then they would fear sleep just as much as she did.
It was impossible of course.
Staving off sleep was as impossible as staving off death.
She saw nothing but pain behind closed eyelids.
Pain. Blood. Death. Fear. Pain.
The war was over.
It hadn’t even lasted that long.
The war was over, she’d repeat in her head.
But it didn’t stop her from waking in the middle of the night, drenched in sweat, eyes screwed tight, and mouth open in a silent scream.
The after-effects of continuous exposure to the Cruciatus Curse, they’d said.
Lucky to not have gone insane, they’d added.
Neville’s parents a constant reminder of just how lucky.
Funny, how she didn’t feel lucky at all.
-----
Ginny Weasley hated herself.
There were so many who needed her. Her mother, her father, George, Ron, Hermione.
But she could think of nothing but Harry.
And truthfully, her thoughts were occupied by Harry for purely selfish reasons.
Because she needed him.
And without him, her head that only somehow managed to stay above water, would give into the pull of everyone’s heartache, and she would drown.
She was afraid.
It was strange. He was gone, yet the world still lived on in fear.
Maybe he had won after all.
-----
Draco Malfoy didn’t have scars. Gaping open, ever bleeding wounds that had never healed, would never heal, was what he’d been cursed with instead. For if they never stopped bleeding, how could he ever scar?
He saw faces. So many faces.
The old man with his far too calm expression of quiet understanding, acceptance and sympathy. Sympathy he didn’t deserve. Sympathy that could so easily be misread as pity by someone like him. Sympathy that would spawn a hatred for not only the old man, but a hatred directed solely at himself.
Weak. Pathetic. Fool.
The girl with her bushy brown curls in wild disarray, her face scrunched up in pain as she weathered the manic onslaught of the Cruciatus Curse. And maybe it hadn’t been his fault, but somehow he thinks those screams that still pierced his eardrums may never have existed, had he not been so weak, so pathetic, such a bloody fool.
The lifeless, soulless eyes of his childhood friend.
Friend.
Did he even know the meaning?
Pathetic.
Eyes that were as red as the blood he bathed in, revelled in. Slits that cut through their skins, and instilled a fear so deep and unshakeable, he had been willing to torture, to kill.
Irredeemable.
But he hadn’t. The old man’s lips would move to say. But you didn’t.
Redeemable.
But it didn’t matter.
It didn’t make a difference.
Scarred.
-----
Fandom: Harry Potter
Rating: PG
Pairing/Characters: Multi-character POVs
Words: 1127
Author’s Note: This started off as one drabble and quickly became seven. It’s DH-compliant, but is sort of an EWE fic, I suppose, since the angst isn’t very congruent with the fluffy ending JKR wrote.
-----
Harry Potter. The Boy Who Lived. The Boy Who Vanquished Voldemort. The Boy Who Was The Saviour Of The Wizarding World.
Harry Potter. He who was worthy of all these tributes and then some. He who had been placed on a pedestal so impossibly high, by so many nameless, unknown faces, that should he (inevitably) fall from his perch, it would be devastating. It was a long way down from worldwide hero to obscurity, after all.
One would have to wonder though, just how the millions would respond if he ever voiced the singular dark thought that continually plagued his mind. Yes, he was worthy of all those accolades, but in the solitude of just his thoughts for company, and a bottle of Firewhisky, he’d admit that none of it was worth the loss, the sacrifices, the loneliness and the fear. Most especially the fear.
If he was brutally honest, if he hadn’t had to fight off the Dark Lord, then that would have been just fine with him. And he had to wonder just what that selfishness would do to their gloriously bright, hero-tainted view of him.
He imagined that his pedestal would crumble under the weight of their disappointment.
And he found that he didn’t care.
-----
Ron Weasley had run out of ideas. And truth be told, he wasn’t sure it was worth the effort anymore.
He tried talking to her, the best way he knew how, but she would plaster that same, “I’m fine, Ronald, stop asking!” exasperated expression on her face.
Every time he tried to get through, it was as if she barricaded herself behind a tall, thick brick wall that was impenetrable to sound. Or more precisely, his voice.
He was tired.
So very tired of her shutting him out.
He was tired of trying to be there for her, and tired of resenting her for not being there for him.
Everything was a mess.
It shouldn’t have been this way.
They had won after all, hadn’t they?
Hadn’t they?
-----
Minerva McGonagall. Headmistress.
Even after all this time, it sounded wrong. Logically she understood she was the best candidate. The only candidate. But it would never make it right.
It felt as if she was merely a temporary replacement. That he would return, and take up residence in his rightful office. But one glance at his painting, where he slept on soundly, reminded her that that would never be.
Hogwarts was her home.
It had been for as long as she could remember.
But everywhere she turned were reminders of the horrors that had lived in these walls.
The Potions Classroom would remind her of Severus, and guilt would claw into her old and weary bones. She had never doubted Albus, yet she had doubted him.
She should have known.
Sometimes, while she would be eating her evening meal, she would look down at the Great Hall and would be struck with the image of all the dead bodies that had once lain there in endless rows; grieving friends and family, crouched by their sides. And then she would blink, and the image would disappear before her eyes to be replaced by the hordes of students, chatting amiably amongst one another, the majority ignorant of what lay beneath their feet.
It was yet another reminder that life moved on.
But she was an old witch, and could admit that she hadn’t many years left ahead of her.
All she had left was the past.
And though it didn’t do well to dwell, she could do little else but.
-----
George Weasley died 2nd May 1998.
All that had been left of him was a living, breathing corpse.
-----
Hermione Granger, the fearless heroine of the Second Wizarding War, was afraid to fall asleep.
They would laugh, she knew.
They can’t hurt you anymore, they’d say.
But it was a lie. And they knew it. Because if they didn’t let themselves believe their lies, then they would fear sleep just as much as she did.
It was impossible of course.
Staving off sleep was as impossible as staving off death.
She saw nothing but pain behind closed eyelids.
Pain. Blood. Death. Fear. Pain.
The war was over.
It hadn’t even lasted that long.
The war was over, she’d repeat in her head.
But it didn’t stop her from waking in the middle of the night, drenched in sweat, eyes screwed tight, and mouth open in a silent scream.
The after-effects of continuous exposure to the Cruciatus Curse, they’d said.
Lucky to not have gone insane, they’d added.
Neville’s parents a constant reminder of just how lucky.
Funny, how she didn’t feel lucky at all.
-----
Ginny Weasley hated herself.
There were so many who needed her. Her mother, her father, George, Ron, Hermione.
But she could think of nothing but Harry.
And truthfully, her thoughts were occupied by Harry for purely selfish reasons.
Because she needed him.
And without him, her head that only somehow managed to stay above water, would give into the pull of everyone’s heartache, and she would drown.
She was afraid.
It was strange. He was gone, yet the world still lived on in fear.
Maybe he had won after all.
-----
Draco Malfoy didn’t have scars. Gaping open, ever bleeding wounds that had never healed, would never heal, was what he’d been cursed with instead. For if they never stopped bleeding, how could he ever scar?
He saw faces. So many faces.
The old man with his far too calm expression of quiet understanding, acceptance and sympathy. Sympathy he didn’t deserve. Sympathy that could so easily be misread as pity by someone like him. Sympathy that would spawn a hatred for not only the old man, but a hatred directed solely at himself.
Weak. Pathetic. Fool.
The girl with her bushy brown curls in wild disarray, her face scrunched up in pain as she weathered the manic onslaught of the Cruciatus Curse. And maybe it hadn’t been his fault, but somehow he thinks those screams that still pierced his eardrums may never have existed, had he not been so weak, so pathetic, such a bloody fool.
The lifeless, soulless eyes of his childhood friend.
Friend.
Did he even know the meaning?
Pathetic.
Eyes that were as red as the blood he bathed in, revelled in. Slits that cut through their skins, and instilled a fear so deep and unshakeable, he had been willing to torture, to kill.
Irredeemable.
But he hadn’t. The old man’s lips would move to say. But you didn’t.
Redeemable.
But it didn’t matter.
It didn’t make a difference.
Scarred.
-----