“Why love if losing hurts so much? I have no answers anymore; only the life I have lived. The pain now is part of the happiness then.”
- Anthony Hopkins
“The tragedy of life is not that is ends so soon, but that we wait so long to begin it.”
- W.M. Lewis
Prologue: May 2, 1998
Following the fall of Lord Voldemort
Harry Potter stood on the battlefield amongst all of the fallen - friends and enemies laying side by side, their lives over. Behind Harry on the ground, milky red eyes staring lifelessly up at the sky, lay the body of the late Lord Voldemort, finally defeated. The seventeen year old boy took in all of the destruction, all of the dead - people who once had been loved and had dreams of the future - and knew that he could never fix what had befallen here this day. Yes, in the end he had won, but maybe the price was just too great.
He had fulfilled the prophecy and his destiny, but now what? What was he supposed to do now? He could not just go back to a normal life, celebrating his victory over Voldemort while so many lay dead for protecting him. Inside the castle the Weasleys, Hermione, Neville, Luna and so many others who had stood by him were at this moment partying, feasting, and mourning those lives lost. But Fred was dead, leaving behind a broken twin; Remus and Tonks lay cold in death, leaving their only son an orphan who would grow up with only pictures to fill the emptiness they would leave. At least fifty others had met the same fate. All of the names ran a mantra through Harry’s head so fast he wanted to only keel over and disappear along with them.
Mum and Dad … Cedric … Sirius … Dumbledore … Mad-Eye … Hedwig, his faithful pet … Dobby, who’d once tried to get him expelled from Hogwarts and then saved them all in Malfoy Manor … Fred … Remus and Tonks … young Colin Creevey …
The list went on. So many names and faces were lost forever because one man wanted to control the world and he, Harry, failed to stop him fast enough.
He couldn’t face his friends, the closet semblance to family he’d ever known; couldn’t bear to watch as they shed tears over their brother and son. None of them would blame him, he knew that, but that didn’t change the fact he blamed himself.
Harry walked through the tall oak doors of the school, heading for the open entrance to the Great Hall. He passed nobody on his way as they were all inside eating, laughing, and acting as if everything was right in the world again. He didn’t mind though, because truthfully, he didn’t want to be seen by anyone. They would gawk and shake his hand, thank him for saving their sorry asses; Harry didn’t want their gratitude or their sympathy.
And so he was thankful that nobody paid him any attention. His eyes were free to roam the Hall and search out the crowd of red hair that he was looking for. Finally he spotted them, all sitting together at the Gryffindor table, excluding George, who was still huddled protectively over his twin’s still body.
He realized then that what he really wanted was to not have to face them every day for the rest of his life anymore. Obviously he could not take his own life, that was too drastic and he refused to allow the war to take that away from him too, but there was one thing he could do; he could leave, run away, start over somewhere where no one knew his name--
Harry stopped that line of thought right there. Leave? How could he leave everything he had ever known or loved behind? He wasn’t a coward - where was his Gryffindor courage? Besides, Ginny would certainly hex him in to the next century for even thinking of leaving. And yet, the idea had a strange lure to it. The possibility of just going and putting everything to his back was so tempting - but no … he had to stay. It was the right thing to do.
Just at that moment, as if she had read his mind, Ginny Weasley looked up from the conversation she was having with her mother. She smiled and sent him a questioning look, as if to ask if he wanted some company, and he gave her a small nod in reply, waiting in the shadows of the pillars as she quickly excused herself and came to meet him.
“Hey,” she whispered breathlessly.
“Hi.”
She gave him a strange look; he had forgotten how perceptive she could be. “Are you alright?” she asked.
“Yeah … I mean, no … er - I don’t know.”
She gave him a tentative smile, like she was affirming to him that she understood perfectly, and took his hand, her smaller one fitting in his larger one as if it were the most natural thing in the world. “Lets go for a walk.”
He let her pull him out of the Great Hall and down a corridor. Neither spoke as they walked past the rubble, fallen statues and torn tapestries. On one side the wall had been busted through completely by giants and they stopped in front of the huge hole, watching the orange sun descend gradually toward the surrounding mountains.
“It’s sad, isn’t it?” said Ginny. “For years Hogwarts was this indestructible haven, almost separate from the outside world, and now it’s ruined.”
“Yeah,” Harry agreed.
They were silent for a long moment before Ginny began again. “I thought you were dead. You know, when Hagrid carried you out of the forest.” She spoke so softly he had to strain to hear every word. Tears brimmed at the surface of her eyes and he wanted nothing more than to wipe her soft cheeks dry, but at the mention of his near death any comforting thoughts vanished to be replaced with his depressing ones of earlier. He wasn’t good for her, or for her family. He could never make this up to them.
“Ginny, listen,” he said thickly, “I’m sorry about Fred--”
“Don’t.” She released the hold she had on his hand so suddenly he stiffened in surprise. “Just don’t, Harry. I don’t want to talk about Fred right now.”
“I’m sorry.” He turned away and shoved his fists into his pockets.
“Fred knew what he was getting in to,” she murmured after a minute. “He understood what might happen if he stood up and fought. He always believed that V-Voldemort needed to be stopped. ”
She watched him steadily, her facial features first adopting a look of confusion before it changed to knowledge and frustration. “I know that look Harry James Potter!” she spat. Fire burned in her brown eyes and he was surprised by the quick turn around that her mood had taken. “You are not going to blame yourself for this!”
Like lightning illuminating a dark night, he saw the faces from all of those names on the list in his head flash before his eyes. Their eyes, normally full of life, were literally deadened now, frozen as they were; they scorched Harry with their furious immobile glare, seeming to accuse him of everything that had happened. Then he saw all of their families, who would be forced to mourn those dead because of him. He felt sick, sick to his core.
“How can I not blame myself?” he exclaimed loudly, turning to her. “Tell me Ginny, HOW?” He crashed his hand into the cold, hard brick, wanting to lash out, wanting some kind of release; and he cursed furiously as all he got was a throbbing ache in his wrist to go along with the emotional pain that was trapped in him.
The tears fell freely as she didn’t try to hide the hurt his words caused her. Harry turned back to the crimson sun and the bloody battle ground and the giant hole in the bricks, the hole that so resembled the tearing in his heart that had ripped open with the rage he felt. He knew he had scared Ginny from the look on her beautiful face, and he wanted to take it back more than anything, but he couldn’t, because he wasn’t ready or prepared to deal with this horrible day and all of its consequences. He had told himself while he was surrounded by the dead fighters outside that he didn’t know how to face any of them, and now he’d just proven himself right by blowing up at the one person he wanted at his side the most. This inner turmoil and anger he felt disgusted him, and he could not - did not know how to - stop it, because his head was spinning in circles and he was going to scream unless things started to make more sense.
Harry walked away. He left the crumbling castle and started across the seared grass. He refused to stop and think, just let his anger and instincts take over until he was on the other side of the gates to the school grounds. Ginny was calling his name in the distance but he ignored her. After exploding on her, it was clear to him just how much he needed to leave and to run away to a place where he would never be wanted or needed again; where it would not be possible to hurt his adoptive family with his cursed presence ever again. He wanted to be able to just be. He wanted freedom, and he would never get that by being here where everybody knew who he was.
And so Harry Potter, The Boy Who Lived, The Chosen One, defeater of one of the darkest wizards of the age, left all that he knew behind and began his journey to find the life that he’d always wanted and, until this day, had always been denied.