Notes: set in the aftermath of the Final Battle, a couple days after to a few weeks after. Mostly canon-compliant, with the exception that it is very important to me that Harry raise Teddy. Canon ships and past not-strictly-canon ships, but there is no schmoopy romance to be had here.
Warnings: implications of canon child abuse and neglect (including the whole thing with Riddle's Diary and Ginny and all that implies); drinking as a coping mechanism; obviously a lot of discussion of death. I think that's about it, but if I missed anything, let me know.
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It's not until later – after the battle, after the war, after everything – that he starts to realize. When the first hint enters his mind, the night after Fred's funeral, he's so smashed it nearly flows right out again. They all are; Ron on one side, slumping against Hermione; Ginny on the other, drinking steadily and barely speaking; Percy already dozing off against the wall; Bill with a hand caught in his long, loose hair; Charlie refilling everyone's cups as they empty. And George, in the middle of them all, laughing through his tears.
That's a good thing, Harry thinks. He hasn't cried yet. Hermione says it's unhealthy. He really doesn't have anything to say to that, except that he doesn't really feel like crying, he feels more like screaming nonstop for several years straight.
He's aware that that's a little bit melodramatic, so he hasn't said it out loud. He's just shrugged a little, and waited for Ron to tell her to get off his back.
Ron's a good mate. Hermione, too. He tries to say as much, but it probably comes out less coherent than he intended, because Ginny snorts into her firewhiskey and George laughs a little too loudly.
"Harry – Harry bloody Potter –" George says, affectionately, Harry thinks. "Remember that bloody – that fuckin' – that fucking flying car. Mum woulda . . ."
"Yeah," Ron agrees with the unfinished thought. "Bloody ridiculous, that was. Bars on the windows . . ."
". . . bars on the windows?" Hermione asks, more slowly than usual but considerably more clearly than Harry was capable of at the moment.
"Dursleys," Harry manages to get out, which he feels should be explanation enough.
"Dursleys?" Ginny asks, startlingly sharp in his ear.
"Dursleys," Ron agrees. "Bloody wankers."
"Yeah," Harry says, and watches Charlie's hand fall comfortingly on George's shoulder as he leans over to refill his drink, and feels something deep and painful stir beneath the dull grief which has been filling him for weeks and months and years.
He takes another swig of firewhiskey, and the feeling drowns.
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They're rebuilding the house in Godric's Hollow. It's slow and haphazard and they're making it up as they go, but Hermione does the research and Ron has a few vague instincts from watching his parents hold the Burrow together all these years and Harry works and works and works and it's good. It's good.
A few weeks in and the bottom floor is almost livable, if not entirely functional. There's a roof and a floor and walls, in any case, and the smell of soot and rot has given way to the fresh scent of new wood and dissipating magic.
Harry finds himself standing in the hallway, staring at the small door beneath the staircase.
"Let's get rid of this."
Hermione frowns at him from where she's charming the baseboard to be scuff-proof.
"What, the cupboard? Why?"
"I dunno," says Harry, shrugging, though he thinks he does, probably. He kicks at the door, which creaks a little.
"Harry," Hermione says, sounding exasperated a little amused.
"I don't like it," he says, a little defensively. "It reminds me of the Dursleys."
He doesn't want them here. Not one piece of them, not one memory. Not in this place where his parents gave their last for him; not in this house where Teddy will grow up. And that cupboard – it isn't that he has a problem with it, not a problem, it's just – it reminds him of them. Reminds him of being small and afraid and alone and he's done with that; he's way, way past that.
"Harry?" Hermione says again, but this time she sounds concerned, and uncharacteristically hesitant.
"Let's get rid of it," he repeats, firmly.
He's aware of Hermione's eyes on him, her mind working furiously, her expression puzzled and worried. He studiously ignores her, but there's no denying the gentleness in her voice, as if he's fragile, as if he'll break, when she says,
"Okay."
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The pictures of Tonks are easy to find, in albums and boxes all over Andromeda's house; photo upon photo of a bubbly, chipper girl growing into a bright and cheeky woman. Harry didn't know her, not really, not like he should have, but Andromeda will fill in the gaps. Teddy will know his mother.
The traces of Remus, on the other hand, are few and far between. Harry digs through everything he can find – the album Hagrid had given him, but also Grimmauld Place, Remus' flat, the rubble of Godric's Hollow. In Sirius' room, he finds a single snapshot of Remus rolling his eyes across the kitchen table, undoubtedly taken by Sirius himself. In the flat, there are a few pictures of the wedding. And in Godric's Hollow, in an album whose cover has been charred beyond recognition, there is a picture of a very young Remus blushing furiously as an equally young Sirius presses a kiss to his cheek.
Harry thinks he should probably be more surprised when he unearths that last one. Ron, who has been awkwardly silent as they sift through the remnants of the master bedroom, stares at it over his shoulder. The familiar way Sirius' arm is wrapped around Remus' waist leaves little room for interpretation.
"Huh," he says. "Did you know?"
Harry shrugs.
"Not exactly a shocker."
"Yeah. Imagine if they had gotten to look after you," Ron says, turning back to clearing the charred and rotting remains of the bed. "Two dads. Or, yknow. Goddads. You could have gotten away with anything."
"Yeah," says Harry absently, eyes still fixed on the picture. He remembers Remus' way of speaking to him; never condescending or patronizing but always kind and calming. He remembers Sirius' furious defense of him against everyone from Snape to Fudge to Dumbledore himself. He tries to imagine what that would have been like, all the time, ever since he was a baby. Tries to imagine what it would be like if that was all he knew.
He can't.
". . . Harry? You alright there, mate?"
He tries to answer – he's fine, he's fine, he's fine – but his throat is tight, and words die before reaching his tongue. Something is on his glasses, blurring his vision, and it takes him long moments to realize that it's his own tears.
Ron wraps an arm around his shoulders, and Harry starts to sob.
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It's three in the morning and Harry is sitting in what could loosely be called the Burrow's sitting room and he's staring down at the sleeping infant in his arms and thinking, I can't do this.
It's not the nappies or the formula or the colic (whatever that means; he still has no idea) – he just. He doesn't know how to do this. He has the Weasleys and Hermione and Andromeda to help him keep Teddy alive, but he's starting to realize – with an odd sensation as if he's been secretly filled with panic and pain all along, and now he's cracking – that he has no idea how an adult is meant to interact with a child that they love.
And he does love him. He loves this tiny color-changing person so deeply that it aches.
He can't do this.
There's movement at the top of the stairs, and he tenses for a moment before Ginny emerges from the gloom, lit by the warm glow of the single lamp he lit.
"Hey," she says, and moves around the couch to sink down beside him. She lets her head drop onto his shoulder, and gently touches Teddy's hand. His stubby fingers wrap around her slender one, and he makes a small, contented noise in his sleep. They sit in silence for long moments.
"It's okay," she says at last, so softly that is doesn't break the silence, but blends into it at the edges. "He's going to be okay."
"I'm okay," Harry says, and he thinks maybe it would have sounded defensive if he weren't speaking so lowly. He thinks maybe it does anyway, because Ginny's other hand finds his knee and squeezes it comfortingly.
She doesn't contradict him, but she doesn't agree, either.
"It's hard to know," she says, still quietly, still gently, "the damage they're doing when they're doing it. Especially when you're just a kid, and they're . . . not."
He swallows hard, and doesn't respond.
"I still find pieces," she says, calm, but with a current of something else underneath. "Things he took from me. And sometimes I take them back, and sometimes I don't. You don't have to, always. We're not what they did to us, but they did it. You don't have to pretend they didn't."
He doesn't question how she knows. Ron, or Mr. Weasley, or the Order members who watched him during that entire summer after fourth year. Ginny has always had a way of knowing more than anyone gave her credit for. Understanding more.
He holds Teddy more tightly, something burning behind his eyes and deep in his chest. It's grief, maybe; or something deeper, unnamable. But it's not fear. Not for the moment.
Ginny withdraws her hand from Teddy's grip and moves it to the back of Harry's neck, threading it into his hair. It's longer than he ever wore it before everything. He remembers kitchen shears and thinks maybe he'll keep it this way for a while. She presses a kiss to his temple.
"It's going to be okay."
And for the first time in a long time, Harry believes it.