In Need

Harry Potter leaned on the edge of the astronomy tower and looked out over the Hogwarts grounds as the sun sank below the horizon. This was one of the few places that he had found peace and quiet over the past few weeks, which is why he continued to ignore the dark figure in the shadows that had quite silently come through the door several minutes ago. Harry had no wish to invite what would surely be a scathing comment of one kind or another if he were to acknowledge Professor Snape, so he stubbornly held to the relative privacy he had sought on the tower in the first place. He had, however, concentrated so hard on ignoring Snape waiting in the shadows by the door that when he somehow appeared at Harry’s side and finally spoke, Harry nearly jumped out of his skin.


“Mr. Potter. I see that you have managed to evade your entourage,” said the quiet voice next to Harry.


Harry glared at him over the top of his glasses. “If you wanted to use the tower you could have just asked, Professor.”


“On the contrary, I have no wish to disturb your solitude,” he said, not looking particularly pleasant as he said it, but also remarkably free from the particular sneer he usually had around Harry.


Harry didn’t know whie lie liked worse - predictable, spiteful Snape or this new and unpredictable demeanor. “But you did seek me out,” Harry replied warily.


“Indeed.” Snape was silent for a few minutes and Harry scuffed his tennis shoe in an awkward pattern on the paving stone he stood upon, waiting for him to say something. Anything. When he finally spoke, though, it took Harry rather by surprise. “I was hoping that you would indulge me with a question about Professor Waters.” Harry waited with a puzzled expression as Professor Snape cleared his throat. “How did you know she could heal in the ground?”


“Oh. Er, I just remembered that she did it herself once when I had detention with her.”


It was Snape’s turn to be puzzled. “Do you mean that she was demonstrating the magic to you?”


“Well, sort of. I mean she had to do it - she broke her wrist nearly in half, after all. But then she stuck it in the ground and it was fine a few minutes later.”


“I see. Thank you, Potter,” is what Severus said as he swept away from Harry and proceeded toward the stairwell. What he was thinking, however, was more like, “Broke her wrist and didn’t even tell me? Has magic to heal her own injuries and I didn’t even know it? How could she not think to share such information with me, and what else about her do I not know?”


Severus paced restlessly through the halls making the evening rounds from which he had been excused for the past weeks. He paused at the classroom for the defense against the dark arts because he saw a light under the office door. Creeping stealthily through the classroom, he slid the office door open to find Remus Lupin pushing Megan’s desk across the room. Severus was enraged and slammed the door the rest of the way open. He stalked into the room, towering over the startled Lupin and glaring dangerously at him.


“What is the meaning of this?” he demanded. “You have no business sneaking into a professor’s private office. I am sure that the headmaster will be most interested to hear that you have broken into his niece’s workspace and are touching her things and shuffling them around. One would think that even if you have no qualms about making opponents of those equal to your abilities, that at least you would have the sensibility and good taste to leave in peace the personal and professional articles of one who cannot yet protect them.”


“Snape, please,” said Lupin wearily. “I have no ill will toward you or Megan. I’m only here to fill in until she’s able to take over teaching again. Classes are starting Monday and the students need a defense against the dark arts teacher, even if it’s a substitute.”


“This was arranged with Albus? Without my knowledge?” fumed Severus.


“I suppose you could technically say that, but it wasn’t on purpose - my coming was announced at the staff meeting on Thursday and Albus had only owled me that morning to ask. I’ve had this job before, after all, and with the Ministry going through its overhaul I can get away from my work there until my department is reorganized.”


Severus relaxed somewhat, but the evening had cultivated a growing feeling of unease. He functioned on knowledge, and had discovered that his was lacking. He decided that familiarity would be the best course for reassurance, so he went to Megan’s quarters. He opened the doors of her wardrobe and ran his hand over the row of clothes hanging in there. He picked up her running shoes, placed uncharacteristically neatly in the cupboard and tossed them to their more customary location at the foot of her bed. He opened a drawer filled with odds and ends and as he browsed through the assorted seashells, muggle coins, letters, something tucked in among the bric-a-brac caught his eye - it was a gift. He lifted the small box carefully out, finding it to be heavy for its size. It was wrapped in white paper and tied with white ribbon done up in a bow, and the card on top said, ‘To Severus on our wedding day, with love from Megan.’


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Neville Longbottom visited his parents for the first time since the battle. They hadn’t changed, but he had. The weight of all of the past years had been lifted from his shoulders and he no longer felt ashamed to be their son. Had it not been for the assistance of the Order, he might very well have ended up here in the hospital here with them, but all had ended well for him and he accepted his survival with no small amount of wonderment and gratitude. On the outside, he was still the same old awkward-looking Neville, but on the inside he had finally accepted what started years ago through his friendship with Harry, Ron, and Hermione - he was a wizard, he was a Gryffindor, and he was ready to live up to the name Longbottom instead of feeling haunted by it.


Neville watched his mum handling his phoenix medal, wished that she could understand what it was, and wished that she could know that Voldemort wouldn’t be hurting any more people. Although, if there was any gift to his parent’s condition, it was that the terror of their experience seemed to have been paradoxically removed at the time of their torture. He shrugged and sighed and, seeing the night nurse poke her head in the door to signal that visiting hours were over, he stood up to leave and kissed each of his parents on the cheek. They smiled vacantly at him, but when he reached to take his medal back his mother started to look upset, so he left it with her, looking back over his shoulder as she clutched it happily and watched the glowing metal shift its colors from inside.


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Viktor had spent the night with Hermione again. Over her protests, he had impatiently shoved her homework to the side and taken her into his arms. Now that they had been together and his appetite had been whetted, it was much more difficult for him to control than when he had refrained from sexual contact with her altogether. Her prim cuteness made her all the more irresistible to him when he would look across the sea of people at meals in the great hall and see her talking with childhood friends and goading them relentlessly to study even though no new assignments had been given for weeks.


He knew. He knew the secret now of what could get her to put her books down and forget about them (for awhile at least, he added wryly), and he knew what that serious face looked like when it expressed only need. When they had first made love, Hermione had been painfully shy with him afterward, the boldness that need fosters having been satiated. He had covered his initial alarm at her reaction and treated her playfully, gradually warming her up to accepting the physical part of their time together as welcome. He had backed off enough to let her initiate the next move, and had been rewarded as he read to her from Wind in the Willows, his English noticeably less halting than when he had first come to Hogwarts.


At the Gryffindor breakfast table, Ron noticed but did not comment on the Bulgarian grammar that Hermione was absorbed in as she ate. Commencement was only a few months away, and he had a feeling that these last few months were going to be much different than he had ever imagined, both for his friends and his family. Harry was once again in the limelight and had been especially moody, always trying to sneak off to be alone. Hermione was wrapped up with old Vicky and bowed out of many things that in the past she would have been a part of. Fred was still too shaken to go back alone to the house that he had shared with George, so Ron had gone with Bill and Charlie over the course of several evenings to pack some of George’s things up. They had managed to clear out a room for Ron, who would be moving in with Fred after graduation, and had already moved some of Ron’s things in there. Yes, Ron thought as he polished off his bread and tomato, things were much different than he had ever imagined.


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Hagrid, who was on his feet again, tagged after Charlie as he did his morning chores. Charlie, while extremely happy and relieved to see his old friend well on his way to recovery, would really rather have done them on his own. Between his incessant prattle and his trying to help (but actually only creating more work for Charlie in the process), Charlie found that it was taking him nearly twice as long to get everything done since Hagrid had been well enough to accompany him. He sighed inwardly and reminded himself that the most important thing was that Hagrid was better. He knew that under the same old shirt and heavy coat that Hagrid was wearing, were yards of bandages covering the healing remnants of what could have been mortal wounds. He smiled up at him with a mischievous twinkle and said, “Well now, that’s just about everything, right? Have we forgotten anything then?”


“Aw, yer teasin’ me again,” said Hagrid, grinning at Charlie. “I know yeh saved my favorites fer last - an’ I bet they’re right hungry by now too.” As Charlie swung the door of the dragon pen open, the enormous beasts craned their long necks down to snuffle the now familiar Hagrid, and his beetle-black eyes glittered adoringly back at them. “Do yeh think...” he asked tentatively, “do yeh think that maybe we could bring Olympe along with us one o’ these mornings? I tol’ her all about these here beauties, an’ I jest know she’d love teh see ‘em sometime.”


“I suppose so, if she wants to. So she’s extended her stay then?”


Hagrid blushed, “Ah, well, yeh know, we’ve been enjoyin’ our time. I didn’t ask her teh come an’ she didn’t ask teh stay, but since both’ve happened, I’m happy teh have ‘er here.”


Charlie grinned and shook his head as he poured dragonsdraught over the slabs of meat he’d brought. He was happy to have taken over Hagrid’s duties temporarily and was now thinking ahead to what his next move would be when he was no longer needed at Hogwarts. Before he arrived back in England, he had assumed that after the battle he would just return to what he had been doing before, but being back with his family - especially in their current need - had led him to consider that there might be other options that would allow him to remain closer to them than he had been over the past several years.


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A/N - Hi all - I am sneaking in this as a much-needed study break. And, yippee (don\'t faint) I\'ve posted *2* chapters!!! I\'m a bit spazzed out from a combination of no sleep and too much chocolate soy milk (mmm, chocolatey...) but also pretty psyched that I finally got to write this & the next that I\'ve actually had mostly written since last August. (What\'s my hurry, right?) :-D

- Also - sorry if it was unclear in the last chapter, but everyone who fought with the Order was decorated. Not with the same stuff, but no one went away empty handed.

- Just to be clear and hopefully thwart any worries that any of you might have on the subject - Madame Maxime is going to keep showing up as Hagrid\'s special friend, but any content about them is going to be strictly G-rated. Not even gonna go there. So my apologies to anyone who wanted to read about elderly half-giants gettin\' their freak on.

So as always, thanks to all of you who are reading, and especially to those of you who take the time to review. You are way cool and I really appreciate it!

Maggie - Thanks - you always seem to pick up my own way of thinking with sometimes scary alacrity, and you always have such sweet things to say. Yeah, the whole Fred thing and the Firenze thing will definitely be showing up some more. One thing I\'ve appreciated in your stories is your own approach to loss and coping.

Droxy - Wow, thanks for such great comments! Yes, I totally agree with you re: Fudge. His presence there was a combination of my not knowing who else would have been appropriate to represent the Ministry, and my own somewhat jaded view of politics, having spent waaaay too much time in D.C. - things seem to be done more by procedural policy than by common sense sometimes. Also, I thought your comments were right on re: the memorials & ceremony. Some number of years ago, my family stopped doing traditional funerals and instead we now do private gatherings that are designed the way we want and express what we (and the deceased) want. I feel like people are hemmed in by ritual when it becomes stale and done for its own sake, yet people keep doing it and keeping up appearances even when they are falling apart inside. When they are in private, then they feel freer to just be however they need to be. Also, love that you picked up on the photo thing -my own parents are like a combination of the Waters and the Weasleys - darling people, but a bit much with cam camera.

appy lady - Hi! Thanks for dropping a line! I know, some authors find themselves unable to continue with their stories. I promise though, that this story will get finished - slowly, probably, but unless something untoward happens I won\'t leave you hanging.

joanna_ms - Hi - thanks for adding your thoughts! Glad you liked the pensieve. I figured that since every time a character goes into one in the books, they are able to be tangibly present, so it lent itself well to the scene. Plus, I was inspired by the song \"Pictures of You\" by The Cure.


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