There are two facts that all children need to disprove sooner or later; mother and father. If you go on believing in the fiction of your own parents, it is difficult to construct any narrative of your own. -- Jeanette Winterson, Weight: The Myth of Atlas and Heracles

Albus Severus Potter liked to know things.

He would take things apart just to see how they worked then put them back together better than before. He spent hours at his Granddad’s side, tinkering with Muggle things in the shed at the Burrow. Albus also liked to read. His parents knew that if his Galleons weren’t being spent on things to build with, they were being spent on books. His Auntie Hermione’s house was one of Albus’s favourite places to visit because she had a library -- a real library! -- in her house, and she was happy to let Albus borrow just about anything he wanted.

But there were some books she wouldn’t let him read. There were some books she hid in the house and even Rosie didn’t know why they were hidden or what they contained. Sometimes Albus was able to see parts of those restricted titles: --- Second Wizarding War ---, Tom Riddle ---, --- and Harry Potter. And for years he tried to sneak glances at the books’ contents, but it seemed that whenever he got close, Auntie Hermione would pop up and usher him off to some other activity.

He remembered the ruckus on 1 September 2017: everyone staring, pointing, whispering about his dad. Uncle Ron claimed it was all about him, but Albus had seen the glances before and knew it was something to do with Dad. And while Mum and Dad never really talked about the war at home, Albus knew there was something in those books that his parents were keeping from him.

Albus knew his own family didn’t really like to talk about the war, but because Albus liked to know things, he paid attention whenever anyone did talk about it. He knew the Weasleys and the Potters lost families members during the war, but unlike other families whose war-related deaths were of Muggle-borns on the run or in hiding, the Weasleys and Potters lost family in the fighting. He knew rather early on that his dad had once done something so important that most of the Wizarding world felt they needed to thank him. He knew that his dad, Auntie Hermione, and Uncle Ron were on Chocolate Frog cards which noted many of their achievements including the hunt for Horcruxes and the defeat of Voldemort. He knew that many of the Weasleys and his dad were awarded the Order of Merlin after the war, and he knew that the medals were the Wizarding world’s way of saying thank you. He knew from watching his dad when they went to the memorial at the Ministry that many of the names his father lingered at longest all had the same date -- 2 May 1998 -- next to them, and he knew that that was the date of the Battle of Hogwarts.

So when Albus started school, he immediately went in search of the things he did not know about his family; he felt it was the only way to know who he was. He went through shelf after shelf, even offering to help Madam Pince re-shelve books just in case they weren’t on the shelves on the days he’d looked, but after two years with no luck, he just about gave up. He thought that just maybe Hogwarts didn’t have such dark reading. Maybe parents were upset about the Second War and just wanted to forget it.

And while he hadn’t had any luck finding Auntie Hermione’s forbidden books at school, after an off-handed comment in Potions one day, Albus finally thought to check the Restricted Section of the library. So in his third year at Hogwarts, Albus asked Professor Longbottom for a note for the library, but Professor Longbottom wouldn’t do it. He’d known Albus since Albus was born, and he somehow saw through his excuses. So the following year Albus asked Professor Flitwick for a note, but it seemed that he too saw through Albus and understood why the boy wanted access to that section. It wasn’t until fifth year, during O.W.L.s, that Albus had a legitimate reason for needed access to the Restricted Section. Professor Tutaere, his Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, was talking about advanced protective charms and the possibility that they would appear on the O.W.L., so Albus approached him after class and asked for a note to the Restricted Section so that he could study some of those advanced concepts. The professor happily scribbled a note for him.

Finally Albus would be able to know the full story, to read the books his family hid from him for years. But things didn’t go the way he’d planned. Of course, he found all the books he could ever hope to find about the Second Wizarding War in the Restricted Section, but they didn’t tell him what he thought they would.

Albus read Causes of the Second Wizarding War and Its Impact on the Modern Ministry. He found out about the climate of the Wizarding world before the First Wizarding War, and how it altered the world. He was scandalized that werewolves like Teddy’s dad were treated so poorly. He was shocked that families, like his friend Scorpius’s, once believed that because they could always trace their ancestry back through wizards and witches they were somehow better than others. He was outraged that the Ministry used to care more about money and power -- who had it and who could get it -- rather than what was best for the wizards and witches it governed.

Albus read Tom Riddle: Becoming Lord Voldemort. He found out about Tom Riddle’s quest for immortality. He was horror-struck that Riddle murdered in cold blood. He was disgusted that Riddle’s desire to rid the Wizarding world of half-bloods and muggle-borns was born out of a deep self-loathing. He was appalled that Riddle blamed his mother for her human weakness in the face of death and took out his anger on those around him starting at a very early age.

Albus read Salvation and Harry Potter. He found out about the part of his dad’s life that never made it through the front door. He was amazed that Grandad and Grandmum Potter died to save his dad’s life. He was astonished that his dad killed a basilisk, survived the Tri-Wizard tournament, dealt with ostracism, participated in the Battle of the Astronomy Tower, survived a year of being hunted like an animal, and destroyed one of the most evil wizards of all time all before he turned eighteen. He was flabbergasted that his dad had done so much with little thought of saving himself, that it was always for the salvation of others.

On the train home from fifth year, Albus saw James, Fred, Roxanne and Louis all huddled in a locked compartment. When he peeked in the window, his brother quickly drew the shade down. Once the boys and Lily were home, Dad called James into his study. Albus knew that James, like all the older Weasley cousins, had taken N.E.W.T. History of Magic even though he hadn’t passed the O.W.L.. Albus figured that Dad wanted to talk to James about what Albus already knew, so after a moment, he knocked, and when his dad’s face appeared, weary, at the door, Albus merely said, ‘I know too, Dad.’

His dad didn’t bluster and deny it like Albus thought he might, he merely opened the door wider for Albus and gestured him into the room. Albus took his dad’s desk chair, next to James who merely rolled his eyes, and his dad conjured another.

Sitting back down he looked at both of his sons and said something Albus never expected to hear. ‘My life isn’t all what you read about or heard in class. There’s much more to it.’ He paused as if gathering his strength, and Albus held his breath. ‘What do you want to know?’ he asked, looking at Albus and James both.

James started. ‘Why didn’t you tell us?’ he asked angrily. ‘Why did I have to hear about it in class and not from my own dad?!’

This was what Albus thought his dad was waiting for because all he did was breathe deeply before answering.

‘I didn’t tell you, James, because your mum and I wanted life to be as normal as possible.’ He looked at his sons. ‘When I started at Hogwarts, I had no idea what’d really happened to my parents. Auntie Petunia and Uncle Vernon disparaged them, told me they were good-for-nothing layabouts who’d gotten themselves killed in a car accident. But when I got to school everyone was whispering about how I killed Tom Riddle as a baby. On the train, even some Muggle-borns like Auntie Hermione knew my history, but I didn’t know anything. I felt like my whole life was this gaping hole because I’d been lied to. So though you may feel like you were lied to, James, we didn’t ever hide the war from you, just our roles in it.’

Albus watched his brother’s reaction. Like Albus, James had always seen the attention the family got in public in Wizarding areas, but he’d never much cared. Most of the people the family knew, like Professor Longbottom and Minister Kingsley, got the same sort of stares out in public, so James never considered that not all families received that sort of reaction.

‘I don’t like the attention the Wizarding world gives me; it’s why we live so near Muggles, why you went to Muggle primary school.’ Though his dad was still facing James when he said, ‘I’ve seen what happens to children who think they’re important -- better than others -- because their parents have told them how important they are,’ Albus couldn’t help but think of Mr. Malfoy. ‘And really, I didn’t quite have a choice in things,’ he mumbled.

‘Yes, you did!’ James raged, and Albus wondered if James was forgetting the prophecy. ‘You didn’t have to fight him over and over again! You didn’t have to try to beat him at the Battle of Hogwarts!’

Albus’s dad put his hand over his eyes and slumped his shoulders. ‘James, how I wish that were true, but even when I didn’t try, didn’t want to give in to what your Auntie Hermione calls my “saving-people thing�, Riddle or his supporters brought the fight to me by coming after those I cared about most.’

James still look apoplectic, but his dad just watched him and waited. ‘Why you, Dad? Why our family?’

Their dad merely shook his head. ‘The only person who could answer that has been dead for quite some time. I think Riddle saw so much of himself in me that he was threatened by it, and he believed so much in magic as a fix for everything that when he heard that prophecy, he couldn’t help himself but to act on it.’ He looked at both boys. ‘As for why our family, what do you do when an older student hassles a younger one for no reason?’

Albus didn’t respond, but he was thinking of the time James had a week of detentions in fourth year for hexing a fifth-year girl who’d driven a poor first-year to tears for bumping into her in the hall. James didn’t know either student, but he’d told Albus later that he’d have done it no matter who they were because people who knew better shouldn’t pick on others just because they could.

Their dad nodded. ‘You do the right thing because it’s the right thing to do. It isn’t always the smartest decision, and you can get in trouble for making it, but you do it because it’s right that you do. That’s what the Weasleys and the Potters and the Lupins did. They fought because that’s what they felt they needed to do.’

Albus watched the fight drain out of James as he slumped back in his chair. ‘I just, I guess I felt betrayed not hearing it from you,’ he told their dad.

‘I understand that, James, but we did it to protect you, all of you, from feeling like because you were born into this family you were automatically privileged. Or worse, feeling like because you were born into this family you had something to prove. You knew we’d all been involved in the war, but we all lost so much that it wouldn’t be regaling our children with stories of our exploits so much as reopening old wounds.’ His dad reached out and placed a hand on James’s knee.

‘As I said, it isn’t all like the books claim. There was a lot of luck involved, and I always had Uncle Ron and Auntie Hermione around to help. The story of me killing the basilisk and saving Mum, for example. It was coincidence that I was Parsletongue, and while Hagrid started us in the right direction, Auntie Hermione is the one who figured it all out. And I can’t tell you how much that year still rattles all of us. Your Mum still has nightmares about Riddle coming alive from that diary, and while we weren’t in love then -- we were too young -- I will never forget how scared I was that I was too late and she was already dead. Those sorts of stories don’t make for good bedtime tales. And why should we burden you with fears long gone?’

James looked his dad in the eye and nodded. ‘I can see what you mean. I wish you’d told me, but I guess I understand why you didn’t.’

‘Good,’ their dad said. Then he turned to Albus. ‘You’ve been rather quiet there, Al. I’m not surprised you found out early, but I’m sure what you pieced together isn’t anywhere near as complete a picture as what James got in class. And even that, as I mentioned, is rather lacking. So what do you still want to know?’

Albus thought about all he knew about his father and his family. He thought about how sombre The Burrow was in early May, and he finally understood just how much of a sacrifice his family made at the Battle of Hogwarts. He thought about Tom Riddle’s quest for immortality, and he understood why his dad had always been so frank with them about the dangers of his work, and why it seemed that no one in the family was truly afraid of dying. He thought about Minister Kingsley’s frequent visits to Mrs. Tonks and Teddy and Grandmum and Granddad, and he understood how necessary it was to keep pushing for change. He thought about Scorpius and his family, and he understood why Mr. Malfoy was always inquiring about how Dad was doing. He thought about the reaction his dad always got in public, and he understood how much people needed to express the overwhelming emotion of knowing that someone else was willing to sacrifice his life for theirs. He thought about how he and James and Lily had been raised, and he understood that his parents really had done the right thing in not telling them all those painful details.

Albus Severus Potter liked to know things. But after that afternoon, Albus realized how important it was to understand things too. He knew he was the son of The Chosen One, defeater of Lord Voldemort and Saviour of the Wizarding World. And he understood just how lucky he was to be the son of Harry James Potter.