Harry Angel

Here's the third chapter, the last one will be along later ~ thanks Kim for your wonderful work


Three

Harry couldn’t believe that he had fainted. He had never fainted before, not even when Aunt Marge’s dog Ripper had caught him when he was eight and sunk his teeth into Harry’s leg. It had been the worst pain Harry had ever had to suffer and it had seemed like hours before the nasty brute had finally been tempted into letting go by the means of the production of a nice piece of rump steak that he could chew instead. Uncle Vernon had been furious with Harry about that incident, because steak was apparently “bloody expensive.”

For a while, after Remus left, he had just sat in the kitchen and wished he could go back to Heaven. His memories grew ever more vague as time went on, but at least there he had felt loved. All he had were fragmented images; he thought that Dumbledore had hugged him, that his father and Sirius had persuaded him onto a broom and that they had chased each other through snowy clouds, upsetting yet another cherub with their impromptu game.

Perhaps that was a dream?

He thought that his mother had held him, had stroked his hair and sang to him. But maybe not? That could have been a dream too. Though when he might have dreamed when he hadn’t been able to sleep was a mystery that Harry was not even going to think about.

He had expected Snape to say something to Remus, something about Harry being in the room, about foolish tricks and egotistical brats. Perhaps repeat some of the awful things that he had said to Harry earlier about selfishness and stupidity. But the ex-professor had surprised him. He had kept silent, contenting himself with merely staring at Harry with narrowed eyes from time to time.

His eyes were so black, Harry thought, they were unfathomable. That was a word, wasn’t it? Hermione would know. He wished he could ask her.

Harry was still sitting on the sofa. He pulled his knees up and hugged them; he felt so cold all of a sudden and this was all he could do to comfort himself.

He sighed deeply. Harry didn’t need to breathe anymore. Or eat, or drink. He had not needed the loo or even any sleep since he had come back. But he wanted those things, he wanted normality. And at least he could still sigh; that felt normal, at least.

When Snape had seen him, after days of desperately trying to get anyone to notice him, Harry had been completely overwhelmed. He had known with out a doubt that he was lost, that he would return to Heaven. Snape would never want him, not in a million years.

He shouldn’t want to be back here anyway should he anyway? Did it make him weird to want to be somewhere that he had been so unloved and ignored? It was wonderful in Heaven. But somehow he felt cheated. When Gabriel had sent him back a few short days ago Harry had felt that there had been a chance that he might finally have a normal life.

But Snape? Snape as a soul mate?

Snape had hated Harry ever since the first moment that he had seen him, probably even before that, really. Snape hated Harry for reasons that had nothing to do with him at all and now he hated him because of the enmity that had developed between them over the years. Now it was personal too.

After Snape had killed Dumbledore, Harry hated him in return. If he had met him at anytime in the next few months he would have killed him if he could. But instead Harry had been captured at Godric’s Hollow; Bellatrix Lestrange had been waiting for them and Harry had managed to somehow send Ron and Hermione to safety. But she hadn’t wanted them anyhow, had she? She just wanted Harry to be hers to torture and kill, whatever Voldemort had decreed.

It had been Snape who had saved him. And in the process of rescuing Harry, he had taken a particularly nasty cutting curse to one arm. An injury that had taken weeks to heal, weeks that had seen Harry nursing his guilt close, the guilt that he might have caused Snape to be endangered and he had as penance insisted on helping him to get better.

Each moment that he had spent with Snape had been punishment indeed in those few short months before the final battle. The man had repeatedly lashed him with words, insulted his intelligence and yet also ensured that he had carried on to face Voldemort as prepared as he could possibly be. And sometime in that peculiar interlude Harry had stopped hating the other man and had come to admire him instead. He still found that he could not like him, but he respected him, respected his strength and his courage.

He was under no illusion how Snape felt about him though, even before his ex-professor had told him, yet again, in exhaustive detail, exactly how he felt just a little bit earlier.

They had left now though, Snape and Remus, and Harry was alone again. He couldn’t help himself, he was brooding he knew. He had gone four days now with out talking to anyone but Snape and he felt very lost and alone.

“Pull yourself together, Potter! You do seem to have a way with self pity, do you not?”

Snape had come back! Harry felt stung by his sharp words and yet at the same time very pleased to see him. He still thought that he had every right to be a bit upset, but when he looked at Snape the man looked almost, well nearly, not cross.

“Sorry, Professor,” he mumbled.

“Yes well, kindly refrain from using the honorific and I shall forgive you. And stop muttering, it makes you seem even more stupid than you truly are.”

Harry was about to apologise again, but he could not quite bring himself to do so, instead he said.

“What shall I call you then?”

Snape looked at him consideringly for a moment.

“Since you kindly removed that monumental blight on my life that used to go by the name of Voldemort, you have probably earned the right to call me anything that you wish,” he answered smoothly, “but I would prefer it if you would call me Severus.”

Harry smiled; he felt much warmer now and just a little bit less lost.

“Severus.” The word felt strange in his mouth.

“Don’t overuse it. But you may address me by it, if you feel you must.

“I am going to bed now, I have had a very long day and I need to sleep.

“Do you wish me to find you some bed linen? Several of the rooms upstairs are currently empty.”

“No thank you S…Severus, I don’t need to sleep any longer, not since I died.”

Snape snorted rudely and slammed out of the kitchen again.

“Oh do what you bloody like! You normally do anyway!” he shouted over his shoulder as he left.

But Harry was rather touched that Severus had thought about his sleeping arrangements and had bothered to come to find him.

He uncurled a bit on the sofa, laid his head back against the soft feathers of his wings - they had some uses after all! And he waited for dawn to break humming softly to himself to keep away the night. It was a song that he could not remember ever hearing and at the same time he felt that he had known it all his life; it stopped him from feeling so alone.



The first morning Severus determinedly ignored him. Except to narrow his eyes and scowl in Harry’s direction from time to time and hiss under his breath every time that Harry sighed or even worse, tried to ask a question.

It was a glorious day, but Harry felt himself strangely reluctant to go outside. He could not get used to the fact that he could not feel the wind against his face, not even the gentlest of breezes or that the sun seemed to hold no warmth for him. It was like wandering through a dreamscape.

He also found himself strangely reluctant to leave Severus’ presence.

To keep himself occupied he started to hum. It was one of those songs again, the ones that he didn’t remember hearing and now couldn’t seem to forget.

He had just run through his repertoire for the third time when Severus, all at once, very obviously, had had enough.

“Potter will you please stop that endless caterwauling!” he bellowed causing Harry to gasp in shock.

“S…sorry!” Harry said, softly.

“You can stay,” Severus said, more gently, “but be quiet and do not interrupt me.”

Harry couldn’t help himself, he smiled. He felt like he had won a victory, a tiny one but still a victory.

When, a little bit later, Severus began to whistle one of the tunes that Harry had been humming under his breath his smile widened even more.


The next few days developed into a pattern. Remus was out from first thing in the morning to late at night and, when he was there, Severus ignored Harry, except to send him the occasional glare. But when they were alone Severus was, well, he was civil most of the time.

Harry felt strangely fascinated by the older man.

He couldn’t help noticing the way he pursed his lips and tucked his shoulder length hair behind his ear when he was concentrating on something. Or the fact that he drummed his fingers on the worktop when he was reading one of his copious collection of potions books, or that dark stubble defined his jaw, which in turn seemed to emphasis the curve of his neck and he couldn’t help wondering what Severus would taste like if he licked him. Just a tiny lick where the jaw line met his ear, the bit that got exposed when he tucked his hair away.

He was not a handsome man, Severus Snape, but his face had a quiet strength and Harry felt increasingly drawn to him.

He liked listening to Severus talk, he found. He liked hearing the deep honeyed voice. Harry’s silence, his quiet presence proved quite effective in letting him learn more about the other man. After an initial period of mistrust, Severus seemed to almost forget that Harry was the child of his enemy and began treating him in a way that might almost be described as fond.

Oh he still lost his temper from time to time, especially when Harry wouldn’t eat or drink. He tried to fool Harry into picking things up or catching things, but Harry couldn’t.

One of the hardest things about being here, back on earth, was that he could touch nothing, affect nothing. Nothing but Severus, it seemed. He wasn’t even really sitting on this sofa was he? Or leaning back against the cushions. It wasn’t like he could feel them or anything; it was just an illusion, which was probably intended to make things seem more real to Severus than if Harry were to sort of float an inch or two above everything. Either that or Gabriel had decided that the ex professor was right and Harry was very close indeed to insanity and needed a bit of apparent normality to stop him going completely round the twist!

But the little touches from Severus had helped Harry feel more real as well.

Once, when Harry felt deeply lonely and lost, he had taken himself off, not wanting to inflict his mood on Severus. The other man had found him and squeezed his shoulder in a gesture of comfort. Another time he had brushed that same hand against his cheek. Those touches burned with intensity against Harry’s skin, emphasised by the fact that he could feel nothing else at all.

Harry found that he was more and more attracted to Severus and could not seem to be without him for long, not now that he had found him.

The ex potions professor in his turn began to treat Harry as a sort of puzzle that he needed to solve. He periodically asked him questions and tried out little schemes, such as chucking things at him, which always fell harmlessly to one side, or eating and drinking in front of him as he obviously thought Harry had been deluded into thinking that he couldn’t consume anything and that if he just got hungry enough he would crack and demand sustenance.

Harry gave up telling Severus that he was dead; the man just didn’t believe him. The magical world, for all its wonders, did seem to have some very peculiar ideas. Like the way that everyone decided that Harry was evil because he could speak parseltongue, or that Sirius had been a Grim, which, if they saw him, would cause them to drop down dead after a single glimpse.

Maybe they didn’t believe in angels? Or maybe Severus just didn’t want to believe?

Whatever the truth was, Harry didn’t like the little schemes very much, because they never worked and then Severus would get really snarky for a bit. Harry couldn’t help thinking that Severus and Archangel Michael would probably get on quite well if they ever met; they certainly seemed to share an opinion about Harry’s ability to annoy them.

Severus still snapped at him frequently and insulted his intelligence almost by the hour. But, by the third day, he seemed to have become quite accustomed to Harry’s presence, and had even stopped sneezing when he was in close proximity to Harry’s wings.

Harry felt more used to them now and hardly seemed to notice that they were there. He thought his halo was less wonky too but he couldn’t really check, as he didn’t have a reflection or a shadow.

Harry felt quite pleased that Severus never seemed to need any sleep either; he was working hard at research. There were several potions that he wanted to perfect, he told Harry in one of those increasing moments of near harmony that they seemed to be establishing between them. Wolfsbane was one and another was a potion that reversed the damage that was caused by repeated exposure to Cruciatus.

That he might have a personal interest in the second potion was betrayed by a certain tremor in his hands when he was tired, or had been chopping potions ingredients for a prolonged time.

Harry told Severus a little more about himself too. He told the older man a bit about his childhood and his first experiences of the magical world. He thought that once or twice the other man had seemed to almost sympathise with him.

He certainly smiled at Harry on occasion and even snorted with laughter once, when Harry told him that dead men didn’t wear glasses. It had appealed to Severus sense of humour apparently which left Harry feeling strangely warmed for hours afterwards.

He had found himself looking at those lips from time to time and wondering what they would be like to kiss. He wanted to run his fingers through Severus’ hair; it was thick and glossy and he wanted to touch it, smell it. But he didn’t think Severus would approve so he restrained himself.

All at once, it was Harry’s final night and he really and truly didn’t want to leave.

Being with Severus like this, Harry had finally found a strange sort of contentment. But if he was going to be leaving soon then he wanted to say goodbye to Ron and Hermione, and Ginny. He decided he would also visit Neville and Luna and Remus and Hagrid, one more time.

Time seemed to be different in Heaven, he thought. He had believed that he had been there for a very short while and yet weeks had passed here on earth; who knew how long it would be before he saw the people that he loved again?

Severus was humming to himself and Harry really didn’t want to go. He wanted to crawl into those strong arms and to hold the man that he had become so fond of. He wanted to be held in return, but Severus didn’t see Harry like that, did he? Severus had - except for those weeks when Harry had been in Heaven – been Harry’s constant companion of late and Harry had grown very fond of him. He thought that perhaps it was even deeper than that; he wanted to love him, to be loved by him, but he didn’t think that that would ever happen.

Severus tolerated Harry. He hadn’t asked him to leave, Harry thought, because he felt sorry for him. He could see that Harry was lost and alone and so he hadn’t sent him away. Even though, as he kept telling Harry, he valued his solitude.

“Um, Severus,” he began. The other man stopped his singing and looked up at Harry.

“Yes?” he said, shortly.

“Er, I have to go soon, I think.”

“And where on earth do you think you are going? Apparently nobody can see you but me?”

“Um not earth. I’m returning um back there soon, Sev.” Harry said, not wanting to mention the “H” word as it seemed to annoy Severus so much when he did. “I think it’s time to leave, and I want to say goodbye to my friends.”

Severus harrumphed at him, and snarled something about the Potter talent for over dramatisation.

Was it Harry’s imagination or did the other man look a tiny bit sad?

He wouldn’t look at Harry as he sneered, “Good I have been waiting for you to go. I really need some peace and quiet for a while!”

He still didn’t look up when Harry left.




Harry did visit them all. Being an angel seemed to have some advantages after all; he would just think of someone and all at once he would be with them and this time, although they couldn’t seem to see him, it was almost as if they sensed something at least.

Ginny was sleeping.

Harry was glad to see that she was alone. He was not planning on saying goodbye to Malfoy. He just thought it was a pity that he wasn’t allowed to haunt the blond boy; he wouldn’t have minded the use of the skills that Peeves seemed to enjoy if only for a day or two!

He watched his former girlfriend for a moment, drinking in her beauty. He found himself close to her bed, without even consciously wishing it and she stirred and turned her face in his direction.

“Harry!” It was a whisper and Harry found himself holding breath that he didn’t have.

“Goodbye, Gin,” he said softly. “Be happy. Even if it’s with Malfoy, I hope you find the love that you deserve. But tell him…..tell him that if he hurts you, I will find a way to come back and fucking haunt him!”

A single tear made its way from the corner of Ginny’s eye, ran down her cheek and sank into the pillow on which she lay.

He reached out a hand and touched the cheek, tracing the trail that the tear had left and she sighed and her eyelids fluttered, but she did not awake. Just for a moment he thought he felt the warmth of her skin and the gentle caress of her breathing.

Harry stepped back and turned to leave. He didn’t notice the single white feather that was somehow deposited on Ginny’s pillow beside her hand, waiting for morning.

Neville was sitting up in bed and reading a book with the somewhat peculiar title. “Green fingers and their erotic uses.” by Rosy Glow.

Harry sat on the bed by Neville’s feet.

“I know you can’t hear me, mate,” he said, “ but I just wanted to say thank you and goodbye. You’ve been good to me, Nev. You stood by me and supported me. You really have been a true friend.

“Goodbye Neville. Have a good life.”

Neville looked up, for moment he almost seemed about to speak, he even opened his mouth. But in the end he gave himself a shake, closed his book and laid it aside until the morning. He didn’t notice the rather fine white feather that he’d used as a bookmark; he simply blew out his candle and lay down to sleep.

Luna was sitting at a battered mahogany desk writing what appeared to be a diary. She looked up when Harry appeared and then reached out a hand and touched the air near Harry’s face. He didn’t think that even she could see him, but she spoke to him nevertheless.

“Harry, is that you? Have you come for a visit? That’s nice, we’ve missed you, you know. Are you going away? To the other side?

“Sleep well, Harry, and watch out for cherubs when you get to Heaven, everyone knows that they are very cranky!”

She popped the fine white feather behind her ear and went back to writing when Harry left.

Remus was with Tonks. He peered around the room when Harry materialised and sniffed the air once or twice looking a bit confused.

“Harry?” he said in wonder.

“What is it, Remus?” Tonks was obviously getting ready for bed. She was wearing a pair of orange pyjamas that were decorated with kneazles and which clashed violently with her purple hair.

Remus still looked perplexed.

He shivered. “ I don’t know, poppet,” he said. “It’s just that, for a moment, I thought…it’s just that ….It smelt like Harry in here.”

“Oh Remus!” Tonks said sadly, she took him in her arms and stood holding him, stroking his back.

“Goodbye, Remus!” Harry said, “I could have loved you like a dad, I wish that we’d had a bit more time.”

Remus cocked his head to one side, almost as if he were listening for something. Then he held out a hand and caught the feather that seemed to have appeared from nowhere and held it tightly as if frightened that it too would disappear.

Hagrid was snoring like a runaway express train.

“Bye, Hagrid.”

The giant didn’t stir when Harry spoke to him, except to mumble something about keeping away from the forest now that Grawp had gone back to Albania. But Fang looked at him and wagged his tail and whimpered.

“Look after him for me, Fang,” Harry said. “Don’t let him raise anymore dragons.” Fang whined and placed a giant paw over the feather that appeared from nowhere and now lay starkly against the coverlet.

Hermione and Ron were together. They lay in each other’s arms as if seeking comfort. Harry stood watching them for the longest time.

“Goodbye, you two! I loved you both like I’ve never loved anyone before. Thanks for everything. Goodbye.”

Hermione did not stir. She, like Severus, would not have believed that Harry was an angel; she would have needed proof, lots of proof! And then she would have read a huge pile of books about after-death experiences and tried to find a way to help. Ever logical, dearest Hermione.

But Ron sensed something. He frowned in his sleep.

“Bye Harry,” he murmured, not really waking. “We love you mate.” In the morning they too would find a feather, the brightest and whitest of all, lying between them on the cover of the single bed in which they were squeezed.

Harry was outside Grimmauld Place at last. His goodbyes over, all except one. As he moved towards the shabby back door he felt a drop of water on his nose and then another and another all at once it was raining and Harry was getting wet. He could feel it drenching him warm and glorious.

He could feel something!

Harry threw back his head and yelled his delight to the heavens above.