Dearest Harry - Eileen's Story

A/N Chapter Fourteen is with Kim and will be up later today. Poor Kim has a migraine *soothes her head with a cold compress*



Thirteen

Harry was asleep. He was curled up like a cat, with his head resting in Eileen’s lap, squashed on a sofa that was far too small for him, so that his legs stuck awkwardly over the wooden arm. He didn’t seem to mind at all, though.

Eileen’s hand was stroking the soft dark hair lovingly.

“What have they done to this boy, Severus?” she asked ruefully, “It don’t seem right, that he has had such a hard time when he could have come to me. I’d have loved him, you know?”

Severus sat down opposite his mother. He had an armful of her belongings, since he was the one doing the packing. They had been at Eileen’s house for a little over four hours now, but she seemed reluctant to let go of Harry for any reason whatsoever, even to pack up her precious things. She seemed utterly besotted with her beloved grandson and he was equally smitten, it seemed.

When Eileen had first closed the door behind them, they had just stood gazing at each other hungrily, lovingly, as if no one else mattered. There was a time, just a few days ago, when that would have made Severus furious, jealous; but not now, not anymore. Meeting Harry had already given his mother more joy than Severus could remember in many a long year. And Harry, why Harry, he had finally come home. Severus had watched the boy keenly, and any lingering mistrust of Eileen, of his grandmother, had disappeared as soon as her dark eyes met his green ones, and Severus had watched the boy fall ever more in love with her as the day wore on.

Severus had hated him for years; but he hated a phantasm, hadn’t he? He had never known Harry, not until the last few days anyhow. The boy was still prickly with him, at least; perhaps always would be. But one smile from Severus’ mother, one tender touch, and the boy’s resistance had melted before Eileen’s love, like snow in the sunshine. How could Severus deny him that? After what he had seen in the last few days, what he had learned, there was no way that Severus could find it in his heart to resent him anymore.

He had watched Harry wander around Eileen’s little sitting room whilst she made the tea. Far from the snobbish rejection that Severus had expected, Harry wore a look of reverence, of wonder at being in his grandmother’s home. His hand hovered tentatively, almost, but not quite, touching each of her prized possessions which were displayed on practically every surface across the room. He had eventually and oh so carefully, picked up a photo of Severus as a school child, after being given permission by Eileen, and smiled over the top of the frame at Severus in an almost friendly way. “What age were you here, Professor?” he had asked, looking back down at the photo. Severus remembered it well. He had been about eight when the photo was taken; all knobbly knees and nubbly jumpers.

Severus told Harry about the day that the photo was taken; how his hair had not wanted to lay flat and he had been disgusted when his teacher had spit on a comb and run it through his hair seconds before the photo was taken. It was by far the most civil conversation that the two of them had ever had. “You’ll have to give Mum your photos, Harry, to add to her collection,” he had said. Harry’s smile had been infinitely sad when he pointed out that he didn’t have any pictures of him aged eight, or indeed any from his childhood at all, come to that. No one had bothered to take any, nobody had wanted them.

He had brightened though, when he had produced a large, leather-covered book, which he said did contain some photos of him as a baby. “There are photos of Mum, er Lily in here too,” he said. Then Severus, Harry and Eileen had squeezed side by side on the cramped sofa and looked at the album that Hagrid had given to Harry several years ago, when he had been just thirteen. Severus had had to turn away as the poignancy of the moment overwhelmed him. The pages of the book were so well thumbed, the book so treasured. This was the only memento Harry had of his mother, and the sight of the boy and Eileen, heads bent close together, looking at photos of a girl with bright hair, whom both of them loved and whom neither had known, was just too much in the end for Severus and he took himself off to the kitchen to make more tea.

Not that much tea was drunk in the end. Harry and Eileen talked non stop and used similar gestures to describe things and laughed in the same way. Even though Eileen had a rich Yorkshire burr, and Harry used the broadly RP* English accent that his Surrey upbringing had given him, they still said things in the same way and held their head in a similar manner, cocked to one side when they were curious. And though Harry was in many ways the image of his father, he had his mother’s smile, which came directly from Eileen; and he ran his hand through his hair in the same way when animated in discussion and crinkled his forehead just like his gran did when unsure about something.

And as the afternoon wore on, Harry moved ever closer to Eileen, until he slipped down on the sofa with his head resting on her thin, but willing, shoulder. And as it got later he continued to sink lower and lower into the over-soft cushions whilst she told him of the love she had for her daughter, whom she had never known, and had regaled him with stories of Severus’ own childhood. Finally, he ended up where he was now, with his head in her lap and his breathing even, deep in slumber.

When Harry had fallen asleep, Severus had braved himself to ask his mother about moving out, fully prepared for the arguments that were to come. She loved her house, Eileen did. For so long when he was a child, they had moved from rented room, to rented room, never stopping for long, always on the run from the wrath of Tobias. Eventually Tobias had seemed to lose interest in them, and they had settled in the little house that Eileen had bought with money given to them by her mother; a house which was dark and bleak, but better than nothing and did them as a home for several years. Until, finally, when Severus had been teaching for a year or two, he had been able to buy this little place. A tiny cottage in a pretty village, far from the mill town where Spinner’s End was situated; close to the Dales with its splendid walks and dry stone walls. Somewhere his mother had been able to finally settle, put down roots, make friends and plant a garden; something she had always longed for.

So it was with some trepidation that he finally asked her about moving out. He had his arguments marshalled; he was ready to plead a need for Harry to know his grandmother, a need for her to be safe. But she simply agreed with no fuss at all.

“I owe him that, Sevvy,” she said, “I have let him down badly. I should have trusted you. Trusted that you weren’t bad, that you might have made a mistake, but were good at heart. I’m your Mum; I’m supposed to know you better than anyone. I should have known that you would never hurt your sister,” and then, so softly that he barely heard her, “or your sister’s child.

“I trusted that Petunia would be like Rosie, when it turns out that both she and her husband seem to have been far more like Tobias.” Severus didn’t know how his mother had worked that out, because Harry had said very little about the Dursleys to her. His confusion must have showed on his face though, because she said, “He didn’t have to tell me anything, love. I can see it in his eyes.

“I haven’t got long,” Eileen said, “Not nearly long enough, really, when I should have had all of his life so far. But I’m going to do my best, love the lad like he should have always been loved, and if I’ve got to leave my home to do it, then that’s fine with me. What’s bricks and mortar compared to this precious lad?”

Gently, she shook Harry’s shoulder. “Come on, love, wake up,” she said, “It’s time to get you home, back to the folk that care about you.”

Harry smiled up at her. His glasses were off again, and that always made his face look strangely naked. Like this, he was very like his mother in ways that were less apparent when his glasses were on.

The boy stood and held out his hand to Eileen, helping her to her feet and taking her arm as they walked to the door. He seemed to think for a moment that it was time to go, to leave her behind; he looked enquiringly at Severus, who said,

“Mum’s coming with us, Harry. She wants to get to know you better, don’t you Mum?”

“Aye lad,” Eileen had said in a gentle voice, standing on tiptoe in order to place a kiss on her grandson’s cheek, “that I do, sweetheart, that I do.”

And so they left.

They left the only home that Eileen had known, the place that Severus had seen as a sanctuary so many times in the past. They did it, never knowing if they would come back, not sure of their welcome at Grimmauld Place. They risked a future that was scary and unknown and they did it for one reason and one reason only: They did it for Harry.




Harry was completely overwhelmed. No one had ever looked at him the way that Eileen had, with such love and understanding in their eyes. Harry had just decided that a family was not for him, that he would have to learn to survive without anyone who cared for him like that. Then Eileen had come into his life and now he grasped at her like a drowning man. He had to have more, couldn’t give her up; not now, not ever, if he could help it.

Before today, there had always been a certain emptiness in Harry, a deep need to be loved. He had once thought that Sirius would be the one to fill that void. But he had lost his godfather, mostly through his own fault, he thought. But he was not going to lose his gran.

When they had returned to Grimmauld Place, Eileen had been exhausted. Molly had cleared Harry’s room as she had promised. She had tried to make it attractive for an older lady, put a chintzy cover on the threadbare armchair, hung flowered curtains at the window, shone the brass at the hearth and set out some tea things by the fire. Harry’s belongings, which had been rescued by Remus only the day before, had been moved upstairs to the room that the Dursleys had used. There were three beds in that room, after all; one was Harry’s, one for Ron and one for Malfoy.

They had had a long chat that morning, him and Mrs Weasley. She had agreed that making Snape and Malfoy sleep in the, frankly, rather dangerous, library was not an ideal solution. So, Ron had moved out of his tiny attic bedroom to give Snape some privacy and been given a serious talking to by his mother. He was not to fight with Malfoy, they were on the same side now and they had to get on. Harry didn’t know how her discussion had gone, but he saw Ron and Malfoy eying each other warily and thought that Mrs Weasley had already done her stuff.

So, an unexpectedly gentle, Severus Snape had taken Eileen to the large sunny room that had lately been Harry’s, and tucked her up in the cosy bed and, whilst his gran got her rest, Harry got on with his plans.

He spoke to Remus about Malfoy, making the ex-professor promise to talk with the blonde boy later. He spoke to Snape about stocking a laboratory with all the ingredients that he would need for a variety of potions, including Wolfsbane. And he listened very carefully to the diagnosis that Poppy gave Snape about Eileen’s health.

“Her magic is damaged, Severus,” Poppy had said. “Seeing how Harry reacted to his magic coming in, and considering your own illness at seventeen, which I remember well! I was the one to treat you, after all, and you needed more than a fortnight to recover. I suspect that she had magic fever when she was seventeen, but that it was untreated, for some reason. She survived, but it fractured her magic. That’s why the cancer has taken her over, her magic is too broken, too fragmented, to fight the intrusion.”

When Snape had told Harry about Eileen, he had also told him that she was dying, but it hadn’t really registered then. He hadn’t known her, had thought she just wanted to meet him in order to ask him to save Snape. But then, then he had met her and she looked at him as if he was the stars and the moon. She asked him about himself, his favourite colour, his favourite food. She stroked his hair and touched his cheek and called him “My Lad” in a way that made him warm and tingly inside. It was heady, addictive, this interest, having someone in his life who seemed to care about him and Harry was not going to let it go, not going to let her go not yet, not if he could help it.

She came downstairs for supper looking a bit stronger and sat at the scrub-topped table. She was introduced to everyone, and she smiled, and said hello, and was friendly and polite, but, most of the time, it was Harry that her eyes sought out, Harry that she looked for.

For his part, Harry noticed the dark circles under her eyes, and her hollow cheeks, and the way her hand shook when she held her tea. He wanted to cry, because he had just found her and he didn’t want her to leave him. This had been the best day that Harry could ever remember, a day that had been a revelation to him that had filled him with joy. Finally, he knew what it felt like to have somebody love him and he didn’t want that feeling to ever end.

After dinner they all moved through to the sitting room and Harry sat at his gran’s feet. He was holding her hand and, when the jolt of pain ran through her, he felt it too. His head went up and their eyes met and she smiled.

“It’s alright, lad,” she said, when the pain had gone, “It’s not so bad!” But then later it came again and this time it was worse, and she closed her eyes for a moment whilst it held her in its grip.

Then Harry made a decision; he was going to try to make her well. He had thought about it all day, on and off. He had never done this for anyone before, only for himself, and only then when things were really bad. But he was not going to lose anyone else that he could love, not if he could help it. So, the next time that his grandmother flinched with pain, Harry turned and gently grasped both her hands in his own.

She sat on the sofa and he knelt at her feet. He felt a tingling in his fingers and in his toes, running through his veins. It was his magic, vibrating, seeking release. Eileen gasped; she had evidently felt it too. Her eyes met his, wide, astonished. “It’s alright Gran,” Harry said, “I won’t hurt you.” This time, when she looked at him, her eyes betrayed nothing but trust, belief in him. Somehow, they had connected at a very deep level and it was as if there were just the two of them, and that it had always been so and always would be so. Time stood still and Harry felt that, in this moment, there would never be anyone in their lives again; that they would just have each other, be together for eternity.

For Harry, the voices around them stilled, and the room blurred, and all he could feel was his grandmother’s pain. He could feel the blackness that was the cancer and, somewhere deep inside her, weak and fragile, but holding on somehow, he could feel her magic.

The summer before his Hogwarts letter had come, one of Petunia’s neighbours had died of cancer and Harry had felt sad. He had liked the woman. She had always been nice to him and once, when his aunt was out, she had given him a chocolate bar. One of the very few that Harry had ever had in his childhood. So he had gone to the library and looked up the disease and seen pictures of tumours, he knew what they were like. That woman had died, but Eileen would not, not until he knew her better, not yet, not while he needed her, not now he had found her. Harry would not allow it.

He closed his eyes and released his magic. He followed it with his mind, a shining, shimmering ribbon of molten gold, flowing, pulsating, rushing into Eileen, streaming into her blood, rushing through her veins, chasing the corruption away.

Ahead of him, he saw her pain. It was black and distorted, misshapen, sharp. But Harry followed it to the source and he shattered it with his magic, he blew it apart. One cyst was destroyed, gone forever. But Harry knew that there were more, the battle had just begun. This time, he was seeker and beater, as he hunted down the infection, as if it were a snitch, and destroyed it as if it were a bludger. Tumour-by-tumour, cyst-by-cyst, he vanished each one, carefully, thoroughly, he shrank them, removed them, chased them away, banished them forever.

But Harry knew that cancer had to be completely eradicated. He had to do more than just suppress it or it would come back stronger than before. Somehow, he had to strengthen Eileen’s magic, stimulate it. He let it sing to him, call to his own magic, and he followed the song, until, deep inside her, he found it at last.

Whereas Harry’s magic fizzed with strength and vitality and sang with life, Eileen’s was thin and fragmented, like the broken, wispy web of a spider blowing in the wind. So Harry fixed it. He took the broken ends, and reconnected them and, each time he joined a fragment with another, he infused it with some of his own magic and he sealed it with love.

Finally, after what seemed like hours, he joined together the final disjointed strands and it was if Eileen’s magic finally came alive. Reconnected, revitalised, it too pulsated and Harry was propelled back along the paths that he had taken, faster and faster, until they were two separate individuals once again, disconnected and Harry fell backwards onto the floor in an ungainly, unconscious heap.



A/N: * RP stands for Received Pronunciation. RP is the standard accent of the “Home Counties” of England. For many years, it was the accent of TV and radio announcers, teachers etc, although many announcers etc now speak with a variety of regional accents.

Most of the actors in the Harry Potter films speak with an RP accent (except for Hagrid, McGonagall, Wood, Cho Chang and Seamus Finnigan and Michael Gambon as Dumbledore, am not sure what his accent is meant to be!). And Harry, considering his upbringing, the social position of his uncle etc, would be likely to speak with an RP accent, as does Daniel Radcliffe and, indeed, Joanne Rowling. There is some debate in Britain that suggests that Snape comes from Northern England. Which is something I agree may well be indicated in the books, certainly his general dour demeanour could be attributed to a rather clichéd characterisation of a “Northerner”.

There are a variety of regional accents in the North of England, but the county I know best is Yorkshire. So, in my story, that’s where he and Eileen come from.

When Severus first went to Hogwarts, his accent may have been quite noticeable, certainly his house at Spinner’s End indicates a “Working Class” background, possibly in a Northern English county, which would suggest a broader accent and, if Eileen had to take numerous jobs that were poorly paid, in a variety of different establishments, then it is possible that her accent would have broadened over the years as she tried to fit in with her work colleagues. I love the Yorkshire accents (because they vary across the county) and so I have given Eileen a fairly gentle generic Yorkshire accent, thus she says “were” instead of “was” and uses the word lad a lot, she also says “aye” instead of “yes”. Severus lost his childhood accent at Hogwarts, where, at least in the films, the children mainly speak with broadly RP accents. ~ Lucie