A/N: Am currently looking for a beta reader, if interested please let me know!
________________________________________________________________________________________
On Parent knees, a naked new-born child,
Weeping thou sat'st while all around thee smiled:
So live, that sinking to thy life's last sleep,
Calm thou may'st smile, whilst all around thee weep
I don't think is one of us who hadn't at one point wanted to be him. Everyone wanted to be like him. To be The-Boy-Who-Lived.
It sounded so...important.
He was the first person to ever stand up for me, to make me feel like I was worth something. He gave me hope, he gave me strength.
It seemed sometimes that he really was a fountain of life. We all believed that no matter what, he'd always bounce back, he'd always be there.
I think it was his courage and support that helped us to get though this, helped us to survive.
He helped me to survive.
But now....
Now, only four of us wake each morning, only four of us shuffle down to breakfast each almost unbearable morning, only four climb gratefully back into bed each night, thankful for one more day to be over. The bed next to Ron's is stripped clean and bare. The trunk at it's foot has been quietly packed and taken away.
And with it went the glue that held us all together. There's a hole in our room now, and each time I glance over at that empty bed it gets bigger and bigger.
We don't talk about it.
We keep the hangings around the empty bed closed.
And we all dread the day when we return and it's not there at all.
Thy soul within such silent pomp did keep,
As if humanity were lull'd asleep;
So gentle was thy pilgrimage beneath,
Time's unheard feet scarce make less noise,
Or the soft journey which the planet goes:
Life seem'd all calm as its last breath.
A still tranquillity so hush'd thy breast,
As if some Halcyon were its guest,
nd there had built her nest:
It hardly now enjoys a greater rest.
Have you ever met someone with an old soul? Someone whose quiet and complacent and just exudes this warm comforting presence?
Someone who makes you feel calm and safe?
I must have done enough sketches of him to fill sketchbook upon sketchbook, if I had bothered to keep any.
I've drawn all of them, Ron, Seamus, Neville...
And all of those drawings are perfect captures of who they are.
But I could never draw Harry.
Sure, I could produce likenesses of him, tons of them in fact. But something was always off, something not quite right.
I think it was the eyes.
No matter how hard I tried, I could never capture everything that resided in those eyes. All the emotions and knowledge and secrets that made up Harry.
Classes finish tomorrow, my Hogwarts education finishes tomorrow. Then it's on out unto the real world. I used to think I'd miss Hogwarts after I left, who knows, maybe I will. But right now what I want more than anything it to leave.
They moved the empty bed out yesterday, Ron went white in the face when he saw the empty space. Only it wasn't really there, because they had moved our beds around, to make it look like there had never been five, only four. But it didn't matter, we all knew.
We all could see where the fifth bed had been. We could all see the empty space.
We all slept in the common room last night.
I don't fool myself by thinking that we'll keep in touch, the four of us. I know that as soon as we walk out these doors for the last time, we'll never look back. We'll never be haunted again.
It wasn't the eyes themselves, but what was behind them.
Sound, the clarion, fill the fife!
To all the sensual world proclaim,
One crowded hour of glorious life
Is worth an age without a name
Everything is quiet now.
It seems like nobody speaks anymore. There is no more laughter in the common room, no more pranks pulled on unsuspecting students....
Sometimes I want to scream, to yell out to break the damn veil of quiet that's descended on us.
But when I open my mouth..... nothing comes out.
We rushed down, in our pyjamas, running through the cold corridors of the school without socks or shoes on, not noticing the cold that was already seeping in on us. Ron in the lead, the grin on his face wide and maniacal, Dean and I close behind, Neville bringing up the rear. We were ready. Ready to welcome the warriors home, ready to welcome him home.
We had all been so certain.
But the looks on their faces when we arrived. When Snape turned away from us, when McGonagal bowed her head.
And the small, so very small, body resting in Dumbledore's arms....
and then the silence descended.
Oh Captain, my captain! our fearful trip is done,
The Ship has weather'd every rack, the prize we sought is won,
the port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring;
But O heart! heart! heart! O the bleeding drops of red
Where on the deck my Captain lies, Fallen cold and dead.
The ship is anchor'd safe and sound, its voyage closed and done,
From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won;
Exult O shores, and ring o bells
But I will mournful tread
walk the deck my captain lies.
Fallen cold and dead.
I lost.
I lost him.
I lost.
They all won,
I lost.
The parties outside the window, the bonfires throughout the night. The rejoicing, the celebrating.
How can they? Don't they know? Don't they understand? He's not coming back.
He'll never come back.
No more late night adventures. No more faking Divination homework sessions, no more one on one Quidditch, no more veg outs on chocolate frogs and bertie botts. No more smiles, no more jibes, no more quiet warm laughter.
No more.
I see them all. Everybody celebrating. I see the other students carrying on as if nothing was changed, I see the looks they give us Gryffindors. I see best friends laughing with best friends.
Oh Gods, it hurts so much.
I slept in his bed that night. After we found out, I fell asleep wrapped in sheets that still smelt faintly of him, of soap and grass and Qudditch and the high sky air.
Of freedom.
When I awoke I found that I had been moved back to my own bed, and his was stripped of linen. The bare mattress white like snow and cold like ice.
Like the hand I held, like the cheek Hermione kissed goodbye.
The tears which mark both our cheeks.
The quiet funeral, which the entire school attended. Even Malfoy. Malfoy, staring at the shrouded figure, Malfoy, with one silent tear making it's way down his pale cheek, hurriedly wiped away with one gloved hand, but not before I saw it.
People filing past us, making condolences, hugs and silent tears.
I'm so sorry.
No! No you're not! If you were, you would never have come! Don't you see, don't any of you see? You never knew him! He would have hated all this! Hated all this pomp and circumstance!
You never knew him!
Yet you used him, made him your sacrifice.
And he, so calm and excepting. So willing.
He looked no more than a child in Dumbledore's arms. No more than a small child, fast asleep and content.
Harry.
You gave us our peace,
I hope you finally find yours.
Thus when the silent grave becomes
Pregnant with life as fruitful wombs;
when the wide seas and spacious earth
resign us to our second birth;
Our moulder'd frame rebuilt assumes
new beauty, and forever blooms,
And, crowned with youths immortal pride,
we angles rise, who mortals died.
-End-
Poems, in order. "Epigram" by Sir William Jones, "A quiet soul" by John Oldham, "Answer" by Sir Walter Scott, "oh Captain. my captain" (excerpts) by Walt Whitman and "Belinda's recovery from sickness," by William Broome.