Warnings: Alternate canon (there will be changes to some storylines), spoilers for all 7 books, does not follow epilogue, unbetaed (all mistakes are my own) and likely full of Americanisms (or Canadianisms in my case), Albus is a nice person (please no bashing)

For MayMarlow. You might not remember this but you helped encourage me to write this a few years ago. Thank you. Happy Birthday! I know it's not finished, I had planned to publish this when it was all complete but then I saw it was your birthday so consider this an early treat!

Paper Tears

(Tears) 3rd person singular present, plural of tear

Verb:

1. Pull or rip (something) apart or to pieces with force

2. (of the eye) produce tears

Noun:

1. A hole or spilt in something caused by it having been pulled apart forcefully

2. A drop of clear salty liquid secreted from glands in a person's eye when they cry or when the eye is irritated.

Synonyms:

Mourning – weeping

(Source: Google search for 'tears definition')

Childhood

Harry

Before:

(Before what? Before the vanishing of the glass, before the raining of letters addressed to a Mr. H. Potter under the stairs, before the friendly groundskeeper who gave him his first birthday cake, before finding out he was a wizard, before friends, before danger, before Hogwarts, before finding a home—

Before the beginning of the words 'Once upon a time.')

Sometimes Dudley's gang could not find him. If Harry was quick enough and smart enough, he would find his way to the library, one of his perfect havens because Dudley and his friends seemed to be allergic to anything that resembled literature, anything of paper and ink. But Harry loved it.

There was a special smell that came with old dusty libraries, of aged parchment with dulled edges littered with tiny rips and creases, ink that faded away to dull hues of grey, brown and green, so well loved that the words followed readers home and etched themselves onto their hearts. It was always with delight that he traced the golden letterings of old leather spines, observed and recorded the different colours of the covers and guessed with anticipation what tales might be waiting inside. Even just sitting down in the creaky wooden stool surrounded by shelves and shelves of fiction made Harry feel welcome, as if he were among friends.

His courtship with classical literature had not begun until Harry was seven, struggling with the rest of his classmates to learn the difference in spelling 'went' and 'want' and the differences between the words 'sew' and 'sow.' The English language was confusing. So many words that sounded the same and yet expressed different meanings, so many contradictions to grammatical rules that had made Harry's head spin. At times he had wanted to throw his schoolwork at his cupboard door, if not that Aunt Petunia would beat him with a stick if he dared.

He had seen no appeal in learning to read, if only to keep up with his classmates and pass the year, not when he'd been too busy being chased by Dudley and his bulky followers, avoiding another beating. Survival was more important, learning how to protect himself was more important.

At least, it had been.

For one day, that fateful day, his cousin had thrown another explosive temper tantrum… this time, about his books.

Dudley Dursley was as lazy and spoiled as he was fat. Anything resembling schoolwork was torn up and thrown into the trash, or flushed down the toilet, or fed to the next door neighbour's dog, or forced down Harry's throat as a practical joke. Either way, Dudley avoided doing his own work the way he avoided libraries, as if they could infect him with a deadly virus and kill him.

Aunt Petunia had been trying to coax her little baby to read a nice little story about pirates but Duddikins had only wanted to play with his game console. When his mother attempted to take the console away, the result had not been a pretty one.

Dudley's face was scrunched up like a walrus on a rampage. Furniture had been thrown and hurled across the room (narrowly missing Aunt Petunia but landing with stunning accuracy on Harry's body, he had had to learn some intense dodging that day). One of the objects sent hurtling towards Harry's head had been a battered anthology of stories with a shout of "I will never look at that rubbish so throw it in the bin!"

After which, Uncle Vernon entered the living room, his mustache spluttering with his voice as he boomed, "Well? You heard our son! Boy, get rid of that silly book and take it out of our sights!" Then Uncle Vernon turned around and joined Aunt Petunia in pampering his cousin and trying to assure him that they would never let another nasty looking book near him again. They would phone the school, they would. They would enforce more playtime hours just for their special boy.

The scene would have normally made Harry half envious (of the parental attention, not the smothering) and half disgusted (because frankly, who was scared of a book? Unless it was hurtling at their head?) But instead, (likely suffering a little bit of a minor concussion, next time Dudley tried to pummel him into the gravel, Harry would throw a book at him, nice weapon) Harry had stumbled back to his cupboard in silence.

He had taken the book with him.

Later that night, when Harry had determined that his relatives were deep under their snores, he turned on his flickering light and stared down at the cover of his first book.

It had not been an impressive first sight.

The book was a worn paperback, lacking a cover which had been torn off in haste. The pages were frayed and Harry saw scenes of abuse against the margins and paragraphs, where Dudley had scribbled in nonsense with (thankfully) pencil. There were stains, probably from milk, which made other pages stick together stubbornly until Harry carefully peeled them away, asking the book to hold still so that he would not damage it further. It was large enough to fit into a large coat pocket but extremely thick, like one of those weighty textbooks Harry saw university students carry.

The book was damaged, unwanted and completely ordinary.

Just like Harry.

He had liked it immediately and promised to religiously erase all signs of vandalism from its pages and to take the best of care for it.

When he had looked at the inside cover, he saw the title and read it to himself clumsily, his tongue sluggish around the unfamiliar syllables.

An Anthology of Children's Classics.

Underneath the title were the editor's names and a list of all the stories printed (waiting) inside and a little box that said, 'This anthology belongs to…."

The line was blank.

Harry had grinned and pulled out one of his markers, writing in a messy scrawl his name.

'This anthology belongs to... Harry James Potter.'

Something that wasn't Dudley's anymore, just his.

He turned the next page.

And read.

He had never felt anything like it.

The first story was Peter Pan. Harry ate up the story like he'd been starving for days. Never had he felt so connected to another person (another character) before. Harry laughed and cried with Wendy and Peter on their adventures. He understood Peter's longing for a mother, the longing for family. He longed for the comradeship that Peter had with the lost boys and feared Hook as the characters did. But at the same time, he admired the charisma Hook sometimes showed and the elegant way Hook spoke.

It was like he had stepped into another world, just by turning one page he made unforgettable friends living in the ink of the pages. And for once, he did not feel so alone.

Harry had read all night, forgetting everything else, immersing himself in Wonderland, Narnia, Treasure Island and depths under the sea. He met more pirates, strange creatures, animals that could talk and other little boys and girls that were as uncertain as he felt every day of his life. He grinned at the sappy endings of the fairy tales, felt the injustice that the villains created (he'd never eat an apple again!) and imagined himself standing side by side with the protagonists, aiding them in their quests.

After that fateful night, that fateful day, Harry had read the anthology again over a hundred times and ventured to the library to borrow more literature.

In his hours of recess, hiding from Dudley, he graduated from children's classics and dared to venture into more advanced classics. He journeyed to Paris and made friends with a Hunchback and was torn with despair at his unhappy ending. He joined a fake Count on his quest for revenge and then questioned the moralities of justice, what was justified and what wasn't. He even read social commentaries disguised as Victorian Romances, laughed at Elizabeth Bennet's wit, took note of the lesson not to judge a person by their appearance first.

When he felt like reading shorter things, he looked at Edgar Allen Poe, shivered at the dark descriptions of night and ravens, of death and madness. He discovered the creeping and cold gods of H.P. Lovecraft's creation and gaped in horror at their descriptions. He looked at the morbid poetry written by Keats when he was dying of illness, fearing death. He read limericks and folklore when he wanted to laugh.

The world was at his fingertips whenever he stepped into the fiction section of his favourite place in the world.

The librarian, Mrs. Potts (her surname reminded him of his own and he liked to pretend that she was his aunt instead of Petunia) adored him. Sometimes she would even let him drink some hot cocoa, a finger to her lips and a kind smile. It was their secret. She recommended different worlds to him, talked to him about his favourite stories for what seemed like hours on end.

And when Harry grew wistful about these imaginary worlds, she would look at him with understanding eyes.

"Reality is much harder to live in than fiction, isn't it, darling?"

He would stare longingly at the shelves of books and answer, "Yes, Mrs. Potts. It really is."

The holidays were the worst. He would only have his sole book for company and would reread it until he saw the words in his sleep and only had his imagination to accompany him. His relatives would never consent to him escaping to the local library to read more. In fact, the Dursleys were ignorant that Harry was literate at all.

It was unbearable. There was nothing to distract from the endless chores he had to do, the scraps he scarved down for dinner or the beatings that seemed to have increased since Dudley was allowed to have his mates over.

And when it got to be too much, Harry would write.

At first he would write nonsense, random words and sentences that had no meaning to him onto a notebook he nicked from Dudley's second bedroom. Fragments like love, family, belonging would litter a page in wet black ink. Sometimes they were covered over by other words sad, lonely, nothing.

But Harry began to change his words into sentences. Writing I wish someone would take me away from here, a relative, a missing relative who has never stopped looking for me. I wish I had a friend. I wish I could live in one of my books. I wish I had someone to talk to. I wish I was loved. I wish. I wish. I wish.

The wishes became reflections, the reflections became stories and the stories just flowed out.

(And within him, a certain shadow began to sigh…)

Tom

Pain.

Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain.

That was his first memory.

No. That wasn't quite right.

That was his first memory in the diary, in the abyss of endless white, white, white, white, annoying, screaming, bleeding white.

Thoughts. Incoherent—Why is he here? Why does everything hurt? Make it stop, make it stop, if he had known what it would feel like being stuck in this endless white for all eternity he would never have done it, he's sorry, he's screaming, mercy, please mercy...!

Memories. Images. Scattered—There are children laughing. Why are they laughing? Hissing of snakes. Green flashes and cloaked figures. Cold winters and lonely beds. An old man's disapproving blue eyes... (Why do you hate me? Why? Is it because I'm better than you? I will show you, I will show you—)

Screams—No, he hadn't meant to (but hadn't he? That man rejected him, they all rejected him and he had wanted them to hurt like he did and so he—) He just wanted to show them (Avada Kedevra), prove to them that he was better, he didn't mean to. Hide. Blame someone. Protect his basilisk, his friend. The half-giant. Yes. Blame him. No one will believe him, not compared to perfect Riddle, the pitiful and beautiful orphan—

Blood—No, no, no, it wasn't supposed to happen, wasn't supposed to happen—

Green light—Vacant eyes, the cold press of skin as he shook the corpse (his father) and screamed at it, stabbed at it (to feel the blood on his hands), and saw his grandparents (they were there, he hadn't meant to) looking accusingly at him with blank stares (he had just wanted to see them, wanted to know that there was someone else out there with the name Riddle but when they scored him—)

Incomprehensible.

If there is no one to hear him, if there is only white, white, white everywhere, is he truly screaming?

Harry

When he returned to the school, the first thing that Harry did when he had the freedom was visit Mrs. Potts to borrow more books.

When she asked him about his summer, he hid the bruises around his wrists (when Uncle Vernon or Aunt Petunia gripped too hard and threw him into the garden to do more weeding) and smiled genuinely, "I wrote things."

The librarian was delighted, "Oh, like a diary, dear?"

Harry wrinkled his face, "No. Not a diary. A book of words and wishes. I filled the whole notebook up. And then I wrote some stories... but they're not very good... and I ran out of space in my book..."

"Well then, a summer of writing is a summer well spent. How about you tell me about your story then? It may have promise!"

They spent the hour chatting about a boy with a flying motorbike, a boy who saw shadows that looked like animals (stags, wolves, dogs and rats, and then a comforting pair of green eyes which flickered like stars) against the sky.

The next day Mrs. Potts bought Harry several leather journals.

It was the best gift Harry had ever received.

Year 1

Harry

An introduction.

(An introduction to what? To an entrance hall of floating candles and shifting skies, to sorting hats which speak of your true nature, to trolls, to a fantastic game where you flew freer than the snitch you needed to catch, to suspicious figures meeting in a forest, to unicorn blood and trap doors, to a mirror and a bodiless voice that Harry will never forget—

A introduction to magic and dreams of a lonely boy in an orphanage.)

Entering Hogwarts was like entering a storybook that he had never heard of before, one where he stumbled into the protagonist's role and hoped to keep his head down, just happy to find somewhere he belonged.

He often wrote letters to Mrs. Potts in one of the journals she gave him. His uncle and aunt never knew and he never sent them before he found out about the magic. But he imagined, one day, when he was all grown up, he'd visit her and give them to her. He'd tell her that she saved his life from loneliness and was his only friend. He hoped that she would remember him then and maybe she'd say that he was like her son.

Now that he was at Hogwarts he wrote more letters to her. He wrote two sets. One set told the truth, everything that ever happened to him. (He made sure to hide these letters in a box and got Hermione to spell them with the most powerful charms as they learned more. And later, when Ron mentioned it, warded it with his blood and a password.) The other set told her how his muggle school was, the one his relatives claimed he attended. She sent him many replies, and many more journals and books to read.

Hogwarts was amazing. He'd never felt so at home anywhere else, besides his stories.

He was only disappointed that no one else seemed to share his love for books. Hermione read constantly, but she read things of fact (not that Harry didn't find those interesting as well… he just appreciated a more creative approach to his prose and a hands-on one for learning magic.) She was always searching for more answers and knowledge, striving for perfect grades. Harry had a feeling that she was trying to prove that she was capable of magic, despite her muggle background. He told her more times than he could count that she was brilliant and she didn't need to push herself so hard to prove it. Hermione only brushed those comments away.

Ron wasn't a fan of books. He did read the adventures of Marvin the mad muggle. Harry had attempted to read it, but found the author's depictions of muggles to be so disturbing and hilarious that he couldn't continue (some arguments had sprouted out over said depictions of muggles that ended with Ron becoming horrified with himself for reading such 'crap' before he went to apologize to every muggleborn he knew.) Otherwise, Harry read some of the quidditch books Ron leant him or some of the warding books Hermione recommended (perhaps it was the subject matter or the way it was written, but Harry found the warding books to be more interesting that the dry and calculated summaries of Goblin rebellions… accounts that Harry suspected were not very accurate at all.)

It was a shame, Harry realized, that in a world that was so magical, witches and wizards had forgotten how to write and imagine other worlds. Even more of a shame that they too seemed to fall victim to bias even when they wrote theoretically objective non-fiction.

Tom

Screaming, screaming, screaming, into the white. Time passes. He has no idea how many years it has been. Does it matter? He thinks that he is the same age. But what age is that? He can't remember. Only the pain and a deep regret, something he hates… something he's sorry for (no, it hisses, never sorry, never, never, no one should ever turn me away)... something that trapped him here...

Who is he? Why is he here? Why can no one hear him?

He's… he can't remember but he's something important… he's greater than… than… what? Why does that even matter? He just wants to get out, listen, you fools, let him out, let him out!

What use is it to demand anymore? He doesn't remember. Everything is white. Two dimensional. Flat. He's pressed down all over and he can't lift himself up if there even is a 'himself' anymore. Does he even exist? Will anyone come?

No. No one will come. So no will see his weakness if he—

Save me.

Harry

(Save me.)

Harry froze.

"Something wrong?" Ron inquired. The other boys looked up from their beds, not caught by slumber yet.

Embarrassed, Harry waved them away and whispered to his friend, "It's nothing. Just thought I heard something. Probably just my imagination."

Ron didn't look convinced at first. Harry wasn't sure why but his friend had recently started hovering over him, as if to act like a wall between him and the outside world. When Harry asked him why, Ron's ears went pink and he would say something about how Harry had nightmares and that they worried him. Harry wasn't sure what nightmares had to do with Ron's behaviour but he was both touched and embarrassed by it.

"Honestly, mate, I'm fine."

Slowly Ron nodded, buttoning up his pyjamas before he crawled into his own bed. "Alright... but if you have any trouble sleeping, feel free to wake me. We can play chess or something until you get tired."

A rush of affection surged through him and Harry ducked his head away to hide his smile. "Promise."

It did not take long for the other boys in the dormitories to quiet down. It had been a stressful day with Potions and a string of assignments that were due the following day. Most of Harry's peers had procrastinated and spent the evening rushing through last minute rough drafts of their papers. Harry had almost been in that position himself, but Hermione had convinced him to finish his two days before. They had both had to bully Ron to start on his and thus the trio had spent the evening playing chess and reading (mostly Hermione, and at times, Harry when Hermione wanted to play against Ron.)

Lying against the mattress, Harry couldn't help the sense of unease that fluttered through him. He felt a surge of unbalanced fear and anxiety that did not belong to him. It was like someone had stepped into his mind and poured out everything they were feeling into his very being and Harry's heart went out to them.

(Save me.) He heard again, like an echo to his breaths. This time, Harry was sure that he had not imagined it.

Who are you? He thought in return, his pulse rushing through his ears as he stared at the shadows on the drapes. He half expected the invisible spectre to step out from them and introduce himself.

But there was no answer. Only the snores of the other Gryffindor boys and his own shaky heart.

Unsettled, Harry laid there for a very long time, waiting for a voice that did not come again.

0

He dreamed that night. He saw seven shadows with red eyes, five of them fast asleep, entrapped in different objects. But when Harry tried to see what the objects were, he thought he could feel shadowy hands cover his own eyes (maybe he had a shadow like Peter Pan's for the hands felt very familiar), whispering that Harry belonged to it alone…

The sixth shadow appeared to be slithering away muttering something about stones while the seventh one appeared to be drowning, tearing its hands through pages and pages of bloody paper like a wild animal being speared at all sides. The white was overpowering the shadow, smothering it with overwhelming weight and Harry wanted to go to it, to help but—

No, you are mine, the eighth shadow behind him claimed and Harry was wrapped up in warmcoolwarm darkness.

The darkness was painted in images of a hanged rabbit from the rafters and the glee of seeing children tremble before him. All of it illuminated in green. That green flashing light and laughter. Harry could never forget the light when he dreamed.

0

Harry was grasping at shadows, half expecting to feel those fingers against his neck but instead meeting the fluttering cloth of the four poster bed. Fleeting. Gone. He couldn't feel his blankets wrapped around him but only felt numb, as if he were wrapped in snow. Slowly, Harry tried to steady his breathing until his fingers stopped trembling but he could only feel his heart beat shaking in the echoes of his ears. The trembling wouldn't stop.

He wrapped his arms around himself, trying to feel warm again. "I'm already…" he whispered to himself, like he used to whisper to the spiders before he had his book. "It's going to be alright." A story he used to tell himself before he fell in love with stories. Well, more like a lullaby without music.

The words didn't soothe him tonight but it helped to say something out loud. Perhaps there was comfort in hearing a voice, giving the illusion of company, even if that company was himself. Perhaps he was trying to catch the essence of a voice he heard long ago but couldn't remember. All Harry knew was that he didn't want to close his eyes tonight. He didn't want to dream.

So slowly, he lit the candle by his bedside and pulled out his old book of fairy tales. He read. And for that time, he was safe and far away.

Ron found him later, when Ron awoke in the middle of the night to go to the loo, still reading as the candlelight grew low. Rather than question Harry or make any incredulous comments, Ron just took a seat next to him, telling him to 'scooch over' and the two boys huddled over the book, reading back and forth to each other.

In the morning, Harry awkwardly bumped his shoulder against Ron's and murmured "thanks."

Ron just rolled his eyes and put an arm around Harry to ruffle his hair, "Don't mention it. They were pretty cool, those muggle fairy tales of yours… though there weren't any proper fairies in any of those stories… why call them 'fairy tales' in the first place?"

"Geez, Ron, that's not the point," Harry laughed.

Ron knew that. But Harry had a feeling that Ron said a lot of things to make people laugh when they needed to.

"You should read some wizarding tales, I'll owl mum and ask her to send Ginny's copy of the Tales of Beedle Bard, you'd get a kick out of those…!"

0

The nightmares were pushed away but not forgotten. Harry and Ron spent many nights reading whatever muggle books that Mrs. Potts sent Harry via Hedwig and the assorted Wizarding tales that Mrs. Weasley kindly let him have. The stories whispered back and forth between the boys helped Harry cope with the numbness that often clung to his skin.

"Sometimes I dream about this boy," Harry blurted out once, when they were reading the tale of the three brothers.

Ron, who had never asked about the dreams before, closed the book and looked at him intently.

"There's this… this orphanage… and it's cold… in terrible condition… Sometimes there are sirens, bombs… and children who refuse to come near the boy but… I dunno, they call him all sorts of names and he's not very nice but he feels so…" Harry shakes his head, "Sorry. It's silly. I don't know why it bothers me so much. I've dreamt of worse…" Like the shadows trapped in objects. Like the laughter and the green light.

Ron just frowned at him. "Don't think it's silly at all. I mean, once I dreamt that a giant spider was going to eat me unless I would tap dance for it, I couldn't look at my shoes for weeks! And I still hate the damn things! Fred and George, the berks, thought it was funny that I woke up screaming so they'd sneak spiders into my bed every night, Merlin, I couldn't sleep for weeks…!"

Harry laughed, feeling not better but a bit lighter at Ron's words.

The words 'save me' and the little boy in the orphanage were thoughts Harry left alone, only to ponder when he wasn't with Ron or Hermione (which wasn't often.) Everything was fine. He had magic. The world had magic. How could anything bad ever happen to him again, save for coming home in the summer?

0

He was wrong. There was Quirrell and the stone and Voldemort staring at him with slit eyes, making Harry think of those shadows again and Harry reaches out and like some sick twisted deus ex machine, he kills Quirrell with a touch and how can fairy tale characters continue after they've killed a man what—

Every story has its villains.

Harry

Summer that year was cold for Harry. In reality, the weather was warm and the sun tried to cheer him but Harry couldn't forget the horror of seeing Quirrell's face twisted and burning up under his fingers. When Harry looked back on the incident, he knew that this had been the only way that he could save himself but still he had killed someone. There was nothing he could do to sugar coat it or make the murder heroic. He had killed someone (yes, a 'bad' person but still a person) and was rewarded for it.

"Self-defense," Dumbledore had assured him.

Harry still wanted to throw up. Logically, he knew it was better that Quirrell was gone and Harry would have to move on but he couldn't stop seeing that face twisted up in molten fire. He had never really taken the darker fairy tales seriously, such as the original Cinderella where the stepsisters mutilate their feet to fit the shoe. All these archetypes had to spill some blood, with purpose or with incident, to achieve their ends. Harry absently wondered how many people he would have to mutilate to escape from Voldemort's wrath if he was to survive Voldemort's eventual return…

"That might not happen for years. Voldemort is just a spirit now, what can he do?" he whispered to himself when even The Secret Garden could not distract him.

He was getting better at telling more (lies) stories to himself but somehow he'd grown old enough not to believe them. He wasn't a very good storyteller.

He had hoped for the comfort of Ron or Hermione's letters to help him but two weeks had passed and not a single letter had arrived for Harry. He was alone with the Dursleys when even the whispers of his books couldn't help him.

The Dursleys were avoiding him largely because they didn't know Harry wasn't allowed to use magic outside of school. Harry hadn't abused this unspoken lie very much except to threaten Dudley to stay away from him and to take trips to the library to visit Mrs. Potts.

If there was one person he could not hide his troubled feelings from, it was her.

"Now what seems to be the matter, dear? Did you not like the book I lent you?"

"Oh! No, I loved it! I think it's my favourite so far because the magic in The Secret Garden feels more… well more real than any magic I've seen. I like the idea of nature being its own form of magic… I just, I've been distracted since I read it a few weeks ago…"

Mrs. Potts seemed to sense that Harry did not wish to discuss his troubles in any detail because she merely handed him another biscuit and Harry was grateful she didn't push.

"I find sweets to be my vice but you can't fault an old woman for taking her pleasures when she's feeling sad," she winked.

Harry gave a half-hearted smile.

"But sometimes…" her voice seemed far away despite her being near, "sometimes, sweets aren't enough. I do find that keeping a journal close by helps."

Harry felt some of the biscuit slide down the wrong tube. "A journal?" he said after coughing, "But what if someone read it?"

He could picture it now. Malfoy chortling over Harry's deepest darkest secrets, magically making copies of how Harry felt when the Dursleys locked him in the cupboard, of Harry's guilt, of Quirrell. Writing random quotes was different from writing what happened to you. The ink suddenly became a wire, transcribing your very soul.

Mrs. Potts rolled her eyes. "Then don't write about you. Write about something else. Anything else." She waved over to the shelves outside her office window. "Write a story."

0

Writing a story was not as easy as Harry thought it would be. At first, Harry blamed his environment. The cupboard was too cramped for him to feel comfortable, especially when he kept hitting his head over the ceiling. So he egged his relatives, convinced them with a few nonchalant remarks about 'walls having eyes' that they should move Harry to the second bedroom lest Dumbledore bring his wrath upon them all if Harry gave the word.

But even the second bedroom, more spacious than his cramped little cupboard, didn't help. Harry would stretch his limbs, surprised that he could stretch as much as he liked and almost missed the company of his little spiders and the confined walls that almost felt like hugs (if hugs from the Dursleys were cold and rotting wood.) His homework, he finished quickly after sulking about how much he missed Hermione and Ron's arguments about procrastination. Even Snape's potions essay was finished and reviewed twice before Harry returned to the dreaded blank parchment, quill in hand, ink dry, trying to fish words out of his brain.

(Snape might be right, Harry thought miserably, there didn't seem to be a single thought in his brain tonight. Or for the past three weeks except to regurgitate quotes from textbooks.)

He hadn't been sure where to start. He didn't want to think about the guilt (though Quirrell's face often seemed to crawl from the ink to his page and Harry would blot it out) and he didn't want to think about the voice he sometimes heard at night (laughter and green light or the same animalistic save me.) Every time he tried to scribble the first sentence, he would reread it five times in increasing disgust before he crossed the words out furiously and tried to start over. By night, he'd have a row of parchment covered in criss-crosses and hands all stained in ink as if he'd gone to battle with his nonexistent muse.

"I just don't know what to write," he ended up complaining to Mrs. Potts the next time he stopped by the library. (He was rereading the Last Unicorn for pure inspirational purposes, not because he wanted to distract himself, of course not!) "Everything I start with sounds terrible or childish."

Mrs. Potts only looked unimpressed as she dusted some dirt off his cheek. "Are you not a child yourself?"

"Well…" Harry blushed.

"There's nothing wrong with sounding childish when you are writing as a child. You should treasure the time that you have now, someday you will look back on your younger days and want to recapture the hopeful voice you had back then," she told him sternly before her face softened. "Write what you love, dear. You're not aiming to become a novelist so have fun. Write about flying robots or ninjas or whatever it is that young ones like these days."

"But…"

"Not another word! You're much too serious. Enjoy yourself. Take advantage of being a child while you can."

She sent him off with a stack of manga books. "Sometimes childish can be another form of mature," she winked as she showed him one of the more humorous panels of a girl running into a talking cat. Harry wasn't sure what she meant exactly but couldn't help but feel that Mrs. Potts had become bolder in her opinion of him after years of acquaintance. But somehow he didn't feel very upset about it.

The manga (Japanese comics) proved to be very silly at times indeed as Harry laughed over the adventures of a talking cat and his reluctant owner but then teared up unexpectedly when said-owner could no longer talk to the cat and felt lonely. The humour had been like the allure of a gingerbread house, revealing darker truths (not quite as dark as a cannibal witch but truths like loss and grief that Harry had never tried to process deeply.) He found some manga so over-the-top that Harry wondered and delighted at how they had become translated into the Western market but he was too engrossed with endeared laughter to care.

He could see what Mrs. Potts meant. Write what you love and if it touched at least one person, than that was all that mattered, wasn't it? Besides, Harry didn't think he'd show anyone his stories. He'd be writing for himself.

He thought about how much he loved flying on a broom and decided to write about a boy who wished that his feet would never touch the ground again.

The story began.

0

By the end of the week, Harry had run out of parchment and wondered if he could nick a few pages from Dudley's schoolbooks (Harry doubted that Dudley had changed his study habits this year and felt that Dudley's notebooks would be filled with gruesome doodles or blank pages.)

So far Harry had just rambled about the boy who traded gravity for wings, a boy who had fantastic adventures with various friends he had met but was now feeling left out because he couldn't join his friends in certain activities (he couldn't swim for one or join them in a car ride, he kept hitting the ceiling when he tried to sleep.) Harry wasn't exactly sure which direction he was taking this story but he was having fun including random nonsense for the sake of comedy and going off on random tangents. Though there was a part of Harry that whispered this was just escapist fantasy, nonsense, unrealistic… and sometimes Harry wanted to scrap the story altogether, if only to stop the voice from taunting him in his sleep. But then he remembered how much he liked the story of the talking cat and kept going.

The only problem was that his parchment was loose and Harry disliked rolling it up. Maybe he was old fashioned but he didn't like his books rolled up into scrolls. He much preferred them flat and smooth. He couldn't wait to get to Diagon Alley and see if they sold any journals that he could write in instead…

Of course, just as Harry's new hobby gave him something to look forward to in the summer, a little house elf named Dobby became the catalyst for what turned into the worst summer of Harry's life.

Suddenly the Dursleys locked up all of Harry's magical belongings downstairs, even Harry's story (which he had pleaded had nothing to do with Hogwarts, of course when Uncle Vernon had seen the sentence 'the boy had wings', obviously the story had to go.) Harry nearly punched Uncle Vernon when his story was crumpled up and stuffed into his trunk, crippled and wounded under Harry's cauldron and bird cage. Harry was locked up in his room like Rapunzel in her castle, like the farmer's daughter in the dungeon waiting for a little man to help her.

Only Harry had no one. Just a dog flab for gruel deliveries every day. Just darkness and thin blankets when the light bulbs died out in his room. Harry huddled there, feeling like the walls were the house's jaws, slowly descending upon him. You'll never go back to that damn school, Uncle Vernon's voice bellowed in the dark confines of the room. He'd never see Mrs. Potts again either. Or Ron or Hermione or Neville or Hagrid.

He curled up even more, tugging the worn blankets around him. Everything was so dark. He couldn't—

Tom

Laughter. Cold bottled laughter. It comes from him. It must come from him. There's nothing else but white. He's alone, all alone and he's stopped saying words or thinking them. He only laughs and sees green light flashing through his eyes over and over, the faces of that filthy man with that filthy name and yellow eyes of a gorgeous slithering creature while a girl falls backwards, face so pale and blank. Hissing. Beautiful hisses that caress his soul. He hisses and he laughs and he can't remember how to articulate words because everything is always white and if he could he would stab out his eyes and see beautiful rubies instead only he can't because he's not really there (but if he's not really there than is this real how is he hearing laughter how does he know he's alone how does he know if he exists—)

'It's dark,' some faraway voice whispers but he has stopped looking for it. It used to whisper to him constantly (years? Days? Months?) ages ago. A childish thing. His only thing. He thinks he sees a small boy, curled up in the dark but he knows the boy is not there.

'No one will save you,' he wants to taunt back but he can't form the words. He's not even sure if there are the right ones but they must be. He was (is) brilliant. He knows, he knows but what does it matter—?

Nothing is there.

Everything is white.

He laughs.

Harry

When Harry saw the twins through the bars of his window, he thought he was dreaming again of his story. The story of the boy with wings, the boy who gave up gravity. He thought his character was staring at him, trying to save him when they both knew that said character wasn't real.

Except the twins were awfully loud and Harry saw Ron, next, urgently tying rope around the bars and—

The bars broke free. Harry still couldn't move. Ron was throwing his arms around Harry, asking why Harry hadn't answered his letters, asking Harry what the muggles had done to him and asking where Harry's bloody trunk was hidden and saying how he was going to punch a muggle (to hell if they were Harry's relatives.) Harry was still trying to process the fact that the Weasleys were real and that they had come for him.

Only when Ron pulled Harry to the car (a flying car) and the twins were dashing through the window with Harry's things (Uncle Vernon chasing them as they went) did Harry burst into hysterical giggles much to Ron's concern.

"I'm fine," he said, wiping at his eyes once he calmed down. "I just… thank you. I didn't think I'd ever be leaving there."

(No one will save you, said the cackling voice from the destructive backdrop of green. And even now, he wondered, is this real?)

Ron's face darkened while Harry saw George's grip on the wheel tighten and Fred give a dangerous smile. For a moment, Harry was frightened they would ask why Harry was locked up or that they might turn around and try to curse the Dursleys into dust. And once, Harry would have been happy to let them do that but now he just thinks of dust and curses and sees Quirrell in flames, Voldemort as vapour and dust, screaming, screaming—

"We should have come sooner!" Ron cut in to Harry's alarm, "I told mum there had to be something wrong when you didn't get my owl! Mind you, she insisted Errol was getting old but I know you'd never ignore my letters!"

"Next time—"

"—we're having you over—"

"—at the Burrow—"

"—as soon as you're off—"

"—the train."

"No muggle interference," both twins finished.

Harry choked up then, blinking back the wetness in his eyes. This was real. This was happening. Ron and the twins had come to him and he wouldn't have to go back to the Dursleys again (at least for this summer.) He lifted up his trembling arms and buried his face in his sleeves. Ron's hand didn't leave Harry's shoulder for the rest of the ride.

0

The Burrow was like a fairy-tale home, a proper witch's cottage if a witch could be compared to muggle ideas of fairy godmothers or even elves. Muggle fairy tales could be a bit strange about portrayals of magic in that respect. Harry couldn't help but be reminded of the tale of the old woman in a shoe, except the Burrow was cozy and filled with vibrant life despite the messy piles of cookbooks and knick knacks hanging from the ceiling. But most comforting were the smells of nutmeg and vanilla from the kitchen, making him think of a couple laughing together in the photo album that Hagrid gave him. Or at least the way he imagined their laughter. Their sounds often changed in his head when he made up different versions of them, fleeting, ephemeral.

When Mrs. Weasley stormed down from the stairs, shouting, "Where have you been?!" Harry felt himself stumbling back, stepping in front of Ron but he needn't have worried. Fred and George both winced at their mother's voice but still had tiny glints of mischief in their eyes.

Harry forced himself to relax then. If the twins didn't look frightened then surely Mrs. Weasley wouldn't act like Aunt Petunia or Uncle Vernon when they were upset. Ron and his brothers would be alright (for the most part.) Still, Harry couldn't help but cringe every time Mrs. Weasley's hands flew wildly about, a fierce mother hawk who had seen her chicks jump recklessly from their nest too soon.

"Do you have any idea how worried I've been?!" she continued, her eyes darting back and forth, inspecting every centimeter of her children for any injury. "What if you had crashed?! What if you had fallen out of the sky?! Or been seen?! What would your father do?!"

"But mum—" one twin (Fred, Harry assumed) said.

"—Dad was the one—"

"—who built it—"

"—in the first place!"

"That doesn't mean you can DRIVE it!"

"But mum, they were starving him!" Ron blurted out, unable to stay silent any longer. "Look!"

He pointed and Harry wished that he could evaporate into thin air as Mrs. Weasley turned her eyes towards him. He half expected her to start yelling in his direction, to Ron as well, but instead her face melted from righteous fury to something soft that made Harry's heart ache.

"You must be Harry, dear. I'm so sorry about my boys. Arthur and I were going to get you ourselves if we didn't receive any post by this morning."

"Um…" Harry looked at her, unsure of what to say. "That's… that's alright. I, um, I'm sorry for dropping in so suddenly…"

"Nonsense, you're welcome here anytime," she insisted with such genuine force that Harry wasn't sure how to respond.

He found that he couldn't keep eye contact, finding the soft pity (for what else could it be?) in her eyes too much for him and so he glanced quickly at the wand in her hands instead. Then he tensed again, wondering why she had it out in the first place. Was it a wizard thing? Was he wrong about wizarding disciplining methods after all—?

Something sad and angry crossed over Mrs. Weasley's face when she saw this but she quickly put on a smile that reminded Harry of Mrs. Potts. "Why don't you show him your room, Ron? No, Fred, George, you're not going anywhere. You're going to listen."

"Come on," Ron pulled him towards the door. "Don't worry. Mum can be brutal with her lectures but she'll probably just make them de-gnome the garden later and do the dishes for the rest of their lives."

"Oh," Harry felt silly for being so obviously tense, for remember harsh calls of 'boy' even now. "Okay."

0

The Weasleys are wonderful. Harry didn't remember a time he had ever felt so content in any place but Hogwarts but the Burrow was coming close. He still felt like a stranger among them, an outsider watching a lovely family drama from the telly but Mr. and Mrs. Weasley never made him feel unwelcome. They always asked after his health and tried to fatten him up with second helpings (which Harry had to decline, not used to eating so much.) He couldn't help but feel as if he had to be extremely polite in their presence, afraid that they'd find some blemish in his character which would tarnish their opinion of him forever so he avoided talking to them for more than necessary.

He was already familiar with the twins and Ron, who thankfully, kept up their jokes, their attitudes towards him unchanging after the escape from the Dursleys save for a few sharp glances the twins would send each other when Harry did something.

Only Ginny seemed to avoid him and Harry wasn't sure why. Every time he looked at the girl she would go pink in the face and rush out the nearest exit. Frankly, Harry felt as if he was infected with some kind of disease but Ron assured Harry that Ginny merely had a big case of hero worship (something that Harry felt he didn't deserve and resolved to clear up with Ginny as soon as he could.) He wasn't sure how to befriend anyone beyond saying 'hello' like he did with Ron or saving them from a troll but he started off with quiet smiles and trying to ask Ginny how her day was. When that didn't work, Harry decided that he'd just sit in the drawing room where everyone usually gathered to play chess or knit, and just write quietly. Maybe if he could get Ginny used to his presence, she'd calm down.

Of course, that only led to the twins pestering Harry about his writings and Harry would blush and hide his parchment, only for them to steal it when they had the chance.

"Now what's this then… the boy couldn't get his feet to touch the ground, no matter how much he tried. It was as if his feet were repelled by the very earth itself, like magnets… what are magnets?"

"Give it here, George, hmmm well that sounds very muggle indeed. Never heard of this kind of magic. Though maybe Dad knows of some cursed shoes that could do this to a bloke, oi, Dad!"

"Alright, give it back, please," Harry jumped for his pages, face burning. "It's not done yet. I don't even like that sentence anymore!"

"Aw, why not? I thought it had a nice rhythm to it!"

"Fred!"

"Just think of it, Fred, my boy! Our Harrykins, becoming a bestselling author for young wizarding children everywhere! The next Beedle Bard!"

Harry would have asked who this 'Beedle Bard' was if he wasn't trying to tackle Fred around the waist in attempt to get his parchment back. George, the git, held Harry back by the shoulders, standing serenely as Harry wiggled around and cried out for justice.

Just as Ron was about to storm over the separate them, Ginny slammed her book down and roared, "Oh that's it, you bastards, leave off him!"

The twins, Ron and Harry stared at her as if she had been possessed by another creature entirely.

"Now Ginerva…"

"Don't now Ginerva me! How would you like it if I went into your room and told Mum what plans you have up there? Hm? No? Don't like it?" Ginny smirked when the twins paled, "Then give Harry back his story!"

As the twins quickly rolled up the parchment and gave it back to Harry, Ron whispered to him, "Merlin, I bet them five chocolate frogs that she wouldn't show her true colours for year at least after she met you. Guess I lost."

Harry only blinked at Ginny (who promptly turned red again and rushed out of the room), a bit amazed and dazzled at how scary and efficient she could be.

When he ran into her later, in the hallway, they sort of stared awkwardly at each other before Harry blurted out, "Thanks! I mean, for earlier. That was really cool of you."

Her ears, like Ron's, turned pinker in embarrassment.

"Ah, it was no problem… my brothers can be a bunch of berks… I'm ashamed to be related to them sometimes…" she scratched her cheek.

"Right," Harry nodded, not sure if he should agree. Siblings weren't something he was well-versed in but he would have loved an older or younger sibling to care about when he was younger. Or maybe not. They would probably have turned out like Dudley and that wasn't a very pleasant idea to think about.

"So… you write… stories…?"

"Oh." Harry stared at his feet. "Yeah, they're not very good… more private…"

"But I think that's really cool!" she blurted out before she looked quickly away, as if burnt, and pulled something out from behind her back. "Here," she pushed it into his hands. "For you."

He stared down at it, wondering for a moment what he was supposed to do, when he realized it was a book. A journal, to be exact, with pink borders but a lovely light green shade to it. The cover was all in perfect leather, just as Harry always pictured old fairy tale books to be like and each page was blank with light golden lines.

"I noticed that you didn't have time to buy any journals when we went to Diagon Alley," Ginny said quickly when Harry just kept staring. "I know it's a girly colour but it's a nice journal and I thought you should have it, you know, for your writing. Better than loose pieces of parchment and you can enchant it so no one can read it but you and—"

"This is amazing," Harry said honestly. "Thank you so much."

Ginny beamed at him, all red, but this time she kept eye contact.

"Oh, but are you sure? Do you still need it or…?"

"No, no! Keep it! I actually found a journal in one of my second-hand books and I'm going to use that as my diary. Ah," she glanced around the corners of the hallways, "you won't tell anyone that I have a diary, will you? Fred and George can be such pain-in-the-arses…"

"I swear," he hid a smile. "And just between you and me, I don't think there's anything uncool about having a diary. Mrs. Potts always tells me that it's not healthy to bottle your emotions up…"

Her eyes lit up, "Who's Mrs. Potts?"

"The best librarian ever…"

They spent the rest of the summer talking about their favourite books and imagining what crazy secrets the twins would write if they had a diary. Ginny gave him a lot of novel series with amazing witches as protagonists to borrow while Harry did his best to retell some of his favourite muggle books. He found his old copy of fairy tales at the bottom of his truck and had Ginny promise to take care of it as long as she borrowed it and she so swore.

By the time September arrived, Ron was bemused and slightly horrified at how quickly Harry and Ginny warmed up to each other. The twins were slightly frightened (their sister could be terrifying and they loved to tease Harry to see reactions but if their sister was actively friends with Harry than they would stay far away) while Mr. and Mrs. Weasley thought it was very sweet.

"Hey, you two aren't sweet on each other are you?!" Ron whispered in horror when he heard his mother and father talking.

Harry just stared at his best friend incredulously. "Ron, I'm twelve. I don't even know if I like girls, let alone if I want to date one!"

That shut Ron up quickly enough though Ron quickly added that if Harry ever fancied Ron when they were older that Ron would be flattered but probably not interested.

"Nice to know," Harry rolled his eyes. He shrugged at Ginny but she only blushed again and quickly gulped down her cereal. They were working on the blushing. Harry figured that Ginny still needed to get used to him.

Since the twins incident, Harry had not written anything at the Burrow but his fingers were always twitching for his pen or quill. He couldn't wait to get back to Hogwarts and the privacy of his bed to write by candlelight. He kept Ginny's gift by his bedside and took care to keep it clean.

The rest of the summer had given him inspiration to write about a girl who plays Quidditch but stumbles upon a conspiracy to steal one of the fastest brooms in the universe. When he had told Ginny about it, she seemed very excited and had even insisted on naming the main character Katherine Lovegood. ("The edit of the Quibbler has that last name I always thought it sounded pretty," she explained.) He couldn't wait to talk more about it with her on the train…

But Ginny seemed distracted this morning, misplacing her robes in her cauldron as she packed for Hogwarts. She kept pausing to write in her little black diary, smudges all over her hands.

Maybe she was writing a story too, thought Harry. So he didn't ask her about it, waiting for her to approach him on her own if she felt like she wanted to.

Tom

Dear Diary, something seems to fall down on the white space around him. He's not aware of it at first. He's not sure if he's been screaming or just interacting with the pain but when he sees the traces of black ink (black, this is black, it exists, there isn't just white anymore) he grabs at it in excitement and remembers words.

Yes. This is a diary. He's in a diary. He was… he is, waiting to be brought back to life again and now someone has come.

Something fantastic happened today, it continues, and it's all thanks to you!

He grabs the letters and wraps them around himself, memorizes the way they are traced and remembers each sound that they make. What happened next? He wants to ask the voice but some old forgotten instinct tells him to wait. To bide his time. Not yet. He shouldn't feed yet. He needs… what is the damn word… information. Yes. Information and… and… win their trust… yes. He needs to do that too. That's the word.

I got the courage to give him one of the diaries Mum gave me for my birthday last year and he loves it! Even though it's pink! I swear, he couldn't get any more perfect! And now he's talking to me and I think we're friends! Me and Harry Potter!

…Harry Potter? The words are not familiar to him unlike the rest. He understands the meaning of 'birthday' and 'year' and 'pink' (another colour, another thing this horrid place lacks) but not 'Harry Potter.' Must be… a… a… what is it? Damn it (a curse, but not that kind of curse, not the ones with green lights and fascinating unblinking faces) he used to know but he's been here for so long that he feels he has to pry open his skull with his hands to pull the information out—

A name. Yes, that's what this 'Harry Potter' must be. A name.

"Who is he?" he asks, unsure why he grasps at this name so. A forgotten past. Something else he should know but his crippled mind refuses to unlock.

More black spills onto the white but nothing like the logical lines of letters. A mess, he thinks with disgust (muggles are beneath him, he remembers now). But then words come again, hurriedly…

He's the most wonderful boy in the world! And what about you? Do you talk back?

He feels irritated with this phrasing, with the change in topic. But he lets it past. 'Wonderful'? 'Boy'? Could this new entity be a young girl or boy perhaps?

Yes. Must be. They're… what's the damn word…vulnerable. He needs to… to… be their companion. Yes. He's, he was, is, charming. He will pull words from her and then… and then…

(A chamber, he remembers. Yellow eyes, pale corpses, green light. Yes, yes—)

"Hello," he says back, picturing an elegant script that was once his, setting the words back in place inside his head. "It's nice to meet you. What is your…" think, a signifier for a human identity with no real meaning at all (and yet, he sees a script, something about 'flight of death', names have power and power comes with… knowledge) "name?"

The ink falls excitedly into his white, white world.

My name is Ginny Weasley. And what's your name? Do Diaries have name?

Name. Name. What is his name, he… he doesn't… never mind. Unimportant. He's lips twitch.

"I don't need one," he says. Not now. The name will come in time. But it will be his and this child will not take what is his. "You may simply refer to me as your diary. I'm all yours, here to listen to you as a good…" what is that word for minion? For follower? For voluntarily giving another soul power over you? Ah, yes. How could he forget? "…Friend."

He starts to laugh as she spills out her troubles. The laughter doesn't translate back to the pages. No, the laughter is his now too.

And now this knowledge, all the knowledge from her little brain is spilling into the white, adding colour to this desolate dump. She's magical. She's going to Hogwarts and he remembers something of that place, a place of books and the chamber and corpses and oh, yes, he's going to soak up all the thoughts that he can.

"Don't worry, dear Ginny," he lies, "I will never tell anyone your secrets."

AN: There will be 7 chapters in total. I am constantly working on this so you can expect monthly updates at least.