As soon as they had gotten out of earshot of the Aurors flanking Kingsley’s door, Ron cornered Harry. He had a mulish look on his face and Harry wondered if he was about to be called out to account for where he had gone with Ginny that morning. He remembered his promise to Ron that he wouldn’t “mess her around” anymore, but he wasn’t messing her around; he had the possibility of a future now, for the first time, and he was becoming quite certain that he wanted Ginny in it.
As he was forming an argument, though, Ron spoke. “I want to tell my family.”
“I’m not”wait, what?” Harry, his mind still on Ginny, was caught off-guard. “Well, they’ll know pretty soon anyway, won’t they?”
Ron looked at him strangely. “How would they know? No one knew, not until you told Kingsley and Neville just now.”
Harry’s mind was starting to catch up to the conversation. “What are you talking about?”
“What are you talking about?”
“Nothing,” Harry said quickly; if Ron wasn’t going to start an argument about it, Harry certainly wasn’t going to bring up Ginny. “So, er, what exactly do you want to tell your family?”
Ron looked a bit confused, but let it go. He took a deep breath and said again, “I want to tell my family what you told Kingsley and Neville. About what we’ve been up to, about the Horcruxes. I think they should know.” He seemed ready for a fight, but Harry couldn’t agree more.
“Yeah, I think so, too,” he replied. “Look,” he added hastily, because Hermione had opened her mouth and Harry had no idea what she was going to say, which was potentially dangerous, “I know what Dumbledore said, that it was just supposed to be the three of us, but Dumbledore’s gone and Voldemort’s gone now, too, so what’s the point of the secrecy? I don’t think we should shout about what happened, I don’t want to give people ideas, we don’t need another Voldemort, but some people have, you know, earned the right to know, or something like that.”
Hermione, who seemed to know why he had cut her off, gave him a dirty look. “I agree with you,” she said. “And I was going to add that I’d like to be able to tell my parents, too, once I find them and reverse the Memory Charm. They deserve a good explanation of why I did that to them.”
“Luna, too,” Neville said quietly.
Harry nodded. “Yeah, Luna, too, and Mr. and Mrs. Granger, and the Weasleys. And that’s about everyone who needs to know, I think.”
The others nodded their agreement, then, Neville excused himself to go back to the greenhouses to help Professor Sprout. Harry started to follow him back to the entrance hall, but Ron stopped him.
“Actually, Harry, Mum wanted to see you, when you had a minute,” he said.
Harry felt as if a bucket of ice had just cascaded into his stomach. He hadn’t purposely been avoiding every Weasley besides Ron and Ginny, but he had been secretly glad not to run into any of them. He felt horribly responsible for Fred’s death because if he’d just given himself up the first time, maybe no one else would have died. It wasn’t much of a comfort telling himself that if he’d done that the diadem might not have been destroyed.
Something of these thoughts must have shown on Harry’s face, because Hermione said quietly, “No one blames you, Harry.”
“Yeah, mate,” Ron said, “it wasn’t your fault. Mum’s not going to curse you, she wants to talk to you. Honestly, I’d warn you if she were upset, but she’s not, not at you anyway.”
Harry nodded. “Where is she?” he asked dully.
“She was in the common room last time I saw her,” Ron replied. “C’mon.”
The three of them began to tread the familiar path to Gryffindor Tower and for one wild moment, despite the icy, leaden feeling in his stomach, Harry felt a stupendous burst of happiness.
This feeling evaporated quickly, though, as they turned into the Fat Lady’s corridor and nearly ran into not only Mrs. Weasley, but Mr. Weasley, Percy, and George.
“Harry!” Mrs. Weasley cried, pulling him into a rib-cracking hug to rival one of Hagrid’s. “Oh my dear, we are so glad that you’re alright!”
Harry hugged her back, but his throat was so tight that he couldn’t speak. The fact that she had instantly hugged him, seemed genuinely happy to see him and glad that he was alright, was nearly unbearable to him. He could feel his eyes burning and closed them tight to keep the tears back as Mrs. Weasley continued to hold him tightly.
“I’m sorry,” Harry finally managed to say, his voice muffled against her shoulder.
Mrs. Weasley pulled back so that she was holding him at arm’s length. “Thank you, dear,” she whispered. There were tears glistening in her eyes, which were already puffy and red, with deep bags beneath them; she looked as if she had been crying for hours, which, Harry reflected with a guilty twist to his intestines, she probably had been. Then, in a firmer voice, she said, “But don’t you dare go blaming yourself. It was not your fault, Harry,” and she gave him a very tiny shake. “None of this was your fault. Do you understand me?” She looked him straight in the eye and Harry could see the heart-break bubbling beneath the resilient surface.
“Yes, Mrs. Weasley,” he replied, because it was the only thing he could say.
She nodded and patted his cheek. “Hermione, dear, I’m so glad to see you safe and sound,” and she turned to pull Hermione into a hug as well, leaving Harry to face Mr. Weasley, who held out his hand. Harry shook it.
“Harry, we know we aren’t your parents, but Molly and I want you to know that we are as proud of you as we are of any of our children,” Mr. Weasley said. “You’re a part of this family, we want you to know that.”
There was something in Mr. Weasley’s expression that made Harry think that the man knew Harry had been avoiding them all day because of Fred. Harry was so overwhelmed by what he had said, and the fact that they still wanted to talk to him at all, that he couldn’t answer, he could only nod in reply, but he knew Mr. Weasley understood.
Percy also stepped forward with his hand out. “Harry, good to see you again,” he said formally.
Harry almost laughed as he shook Percy’s hand. After everything that had happened, the fact that Percy still retained some of his pompousness was strangely comforting.
Any desire to laugh, though, died as he turned, almost against his will, to face George. This was the first time Harry had seen him up close since Fred died. He didn’t look as if he’d cried at all. He looked disturbingly normal, except for the shock that was still visible in his eyes. He looked as if he hadn’t completely processed what had happened yet. Harry remembered how he had felt after Sirius had died, his refusal to accept the bare fact, and he thought that was probably how George was feeling about now.
“George,” he said, with absolutely no idea of what he was going to say next, but before he could continue, George threw his arms around his neck and hugged him so hard Harry thought his head might actually pop off his neck. Not sure what to do, Harry simply patted him on the back until George let him go.
“Er”thanks,” Harry said, rubbing his neck. “But what”I mean”“
“The joke shop,” George said fiercely, his eyes burning. “Without you, we would have never been able to open it so soon. Thanks to you, we got to, Fred got to, do exactly what we’d wanted to do since we were five. We’ll never, I’ll never, be able to repay you for that.”
Harry’s mind was blank. He gulped and managed a nod at George; he felt as if the mass of gratitude and grief swelling inside of his chest was compressing his lungs, making it hard to breathe. Just as he was about to succumb to the howl of emotion building inside him, he felt a warm hand in his and Ginny’s voice said, “It’s okay, Harry.”
The faces in front of him were a blur, but Harry squeezed Ginny’s hand tightly and found his voice. “I just”I can’t tell you all”,” he couldn’t continue, couldn’t put into words what it meant to him to have them all standing there, calling him a part of the family when a part of their family had just died.
“We know, dear,” Mrs. Weasley said in a slightly choked voice.
There was silence but for a few sniffles. Then Ginny said, as brightly as possible, “We’d better get back down to the Great Hall. McGonagall sent me up to find Harry, Ron, and Hermione, she said the Minister had his time, and she needed as many hands as possible to help with repairs if this place was going to be ready by the end of the week for the dratted awards ceremony.”
There were a few small laughs before they all broke up to continue the castle repairs.
Over the Next Year by Arial Felchem
Chapter Notes: ***This was originally supposed to be included in the awards ceremony chapter, but that chapter passed the maximum word count, so I broke this bit off into its own chapter; the awards ceremony chapter is already done, though, so as soon as this clears the queue, I'll submit the next part of the story.***