Just Another Notch

Staring at my reflection in the mirror long-ago broken and disguarded into Dudley's second bedroom, I wonder how anyone can consider me some type of hero. How can I save a magical world when I can barely survive in this muggle version? With a morbid fascination, I twist and turn, completely naked and far from glorious, my body is a testament of human endurance. Ribs apparent, hipbones jutting, skin so mottled with bruising, old and new, it looks like sad attempt at camouflage. Blacks, blues, yellows, greens. I poke and I prod, each color and variation of it's hue having a different level of pain.

This is my reality.

My final wake up call.

My last straw.

I cough, tasting the bile thrown up after a particularly vicious punch from Vernon during my birthday beating. Sixteen now and look what I have to show for it. Bars once more on my window. Three more locks on the door. A bucket for my "facilities" which is emptied only once a week. One meal, if any, a day. No contact from "them"  despite their demands of letters every three days. It's been a week and a half since I last wrote a missive dictated to me with Vernon breathing over my shoulder discouraging any "funny business" on my part. Vernon has used to time since "their" warning off to grow a bigger pair and once he noticed the lack of follow-through on my protectors parts he took steps to protect his family. The Dementors of last summer have fed the Dursleys paranoia of magic and turned their general loathing of my being into fear of what I may do in retaliation.

I watched from my barred window as Vernon and Dudley burned all my possessions in the yard. My trunk, my father's cloak, Sirius' Firebolt, the photo album from Hagrid, my snapped wand. Anything remotely freakish or abnormal was cast into those flames in order to cleanse their residence of unnaturalness. Hedwig they left to waste away, locked in her cage. My girl finally gave up the fight last night and I'm so relieved to see her go. She deserved so much better than a master like me.

I reach out to touch the reflections of myself, distorted by the cracks along the surface of the mirror and remove a section about the size of my hand that I know to be loose. it warms in my touch as I stare into it, able to see my mother's eyes looking back at me, green orbs locked on my inflamed scar. How odd is it, that I resent her more for her sacrificing herself and letting me live than I do Voldemort for his killing my parents and then attempting the same with me.

Why do I feel nothing when I think of all the things that were destroyed in that fire?

Why do I feel nothing when I think of Sirius? Of Cedric?

When did I become so cold?

When did I become so numb?

Why don't I care more?

Because if I'm perfectly honest with myself, I've always expected it never to last. The Dursleys have always taken and destroyed anything that made me even remotely happy. I have never had a sensed of possession, of mine, until Hogwarts and even then it wasn't really true. So it took them six years before they had enough and made their move, I knew it would end someday, it was a nice dream while it lasted but I'm more prone to nightmares anyway.

As for Sirius, for Cedric... can I really waste my energy mourning for people I never really knew, when I could use that energy to focus on my survival?

I mull over this question as the setting sun catches the glass in my hand and it winks at me. Cedric was a nice young man, certainly handsome and smart. Perhaps even funny. I don't know. I don't believe I had more than three conversations with him bar casual greetings and goodbyes. My reaction to his death, as extreme as it seemed at the time, was I can admit now,  good acting on my part. As the poster boy of the Light it was expected of me to care for every human being's life and like at the Dursleys I found in the Wizarding World, things go easier if one does as one is expected without being told. Less notice from those in authority equals less pain.

And Sirius, he was a means to an end. A haven away from the Dursley's and Dumbledore's squib-watcher's eyes. By no means did I trust that irresponsible man. Or child in an adult body. How could I when rather than take me to St. Mungo's after digging me out of the rubble of my parents house, he hands me off to a fellow member of Dumbledore's vigilante group, in some rash pursuit of vengance on my parents behalf. Would not James and Lily Potter preferred their son to have medical attention rather than be avenged? Not to mention the fact that if he were capable of escaping Azkaban like he did, why wait so long to do so? Why not come for me? Why escape to commit the murder you are accused of in the first place? Was I not reason enough to seek freedom?

No.

No. More.

No more useless questions without answers. No more what-ifs. No more wasted time. This is my life. Fate may have fucked me hard and hung me out wet. Dumbledore may have some elaborate chess strategy for this King piece to his Queen. But I have a power that he knows not.

My blood.

I hiss in euphoria as crimson blooms in the wake of the mirrors edge on my wrist. I bleed. I feel. And isn't that what the Headmaster claims is my most powerful weapon? My ability to feel.

Another notch.

The glass bites through old scars. Reopening and reminding me of thier purpose. So much better than a bit of string tied to one's finger. I control here. The depth. The length of the cut. How high I desire to climb up the ladder of scars along my forearms.

This is power. Another notch.

This is something even the Dursleys can never take away. Another notch.

This is something Dumbledore cannot stop or warp to the benefit of the Greater Good. Another notch.

This is MINE. Another...

This is me.... LIVING. And another.

Prophecies be damned. And another....

******

TBC

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Author note:  This is a rather dark version of Harry if you haven't got that memo.  He's more fuck-the-world-I-just-wanna-live kinda guy. For a while I considered this being a suicide and thus a oneshot but I didn't wanna be that cruel. Rather this is like a prolouge or something and in further chapters I'll backtrack to tell you how he came to this point and what he'll make of his future ( if he has one. Still haven't decided if he dies here and we're flashing back or if this is a catalytic moment that changes everything). As for the warnings those are just precautionary they may or may not happen but rather safe than sorry. Review tell me what you think.