Warning for some mild violence in the beginning of this chapter! Also AU Harry being a dick in the latter half of this chapter.

When Harry first came to, he had the hazy idea that he had been rescued. He wasn't wearing his glasses, so the entire world was a blur, but he heard a cheerful female voice that made him feel instinctively safe, and he saw a blur of red hair, something he had come to associate intrinsically with family.

He didn't think too hard about it. If he had, he might've realized that the voice belonged to neither Molly nor Ginny, and that he didn't know any other (living) redheaded women.

As it was, he drank the water that the blurry red woman provided, and even obediently swallowed down several bites of stew before passing out again, feeling warm and safe for the first time in several weeks.

The next time he woke up, he was decidedly less out of it, and was aware enough to scramble for his glasses when he caught sight of a blurry, tall shape in the doorway.

"Here," a familiar voice said gruffly, and then his glasses were placed on his nose and the world came into focus.

A tall, handsome, achingly familiar man was towering over him, his wand pointed at Harry in open hostility. Harry instinctively scrambled backwards madly, and hit his head on the headboard of the bed he was occupying.

His eyes watered with the blow, but he didn't move, surveying the man in front of him with anger, "You again."

The Sirius Black lookalike held him at wandpoint and surveyed him right back. "Me again," he said mildly. And then, "He was right. The more I look at you, the less you look like him."

Harry frowned, unable to decipher what that meant. However, as he continued to study the Sirius-imitator, he found he agreed with what the man said. The more he looked at him, the more obvious it was that it wasn't Sirius. This man looked far healthier than Harry had ever known Sirius to be, far less gaunt and haunted than Harry's godfather had been. His hair was thick and luscious, teeth straight and white, and he lacked the tattoos Sirius had collected in Azkaban.

Of course, he realized, you couldn't Polyjuice into a dead person. This was probably the result of a series of painstaking human transfigurations, probably based off a portrait of Sirius from before Azkaban. Though it seemed like a lot of trouble to go to for a goal that was still unclear.

Still, it was not a bad imitation, Harry reflected. The imitator had managed to capture the proud cast of Sirius's features perfectly, and the glow of health that this man had only accentuated the handsomeness of his godfather's face. The overall effect of it all was, well, a Sirius who had never been to Azkaban.

Harry sucked in a breath as it hit him, and it hurt. Was this his new torture? Getting to glimpse the man Sirius would never get to be because of him? Because of Harry?

"Who are you?" The Sirius imposter demanded, twisting his wand threateningly in his hand.

Harry frowned, and looked down at his hands. He was pretty sure that Malfoy's modified long-lasting Polyjuice had worn off towards the end of his two-week long captivity, which is what had necessitated his rescue in the first place. If the Death Eaters had known who they'd had under their noses…

Harry wondered what had happened to Malfoy, who had blown his cover to rescue Harry, to slip him a wand and thrust something in his hand— a portkey?— that sent him off to that random alley outside the bar, where Harry had stupidly gone and gotten himself captured again.

Harry blinked back the tears of frustration and focused on his hands. His hands were his own. He lifted a hand slowly to touch his forehead and felt his scar beneath his touch. He was Harry again. Which meant that someone was playing a game with him.

He let a mask of calm slide over him and looked up to meet the false Sirius's hard gaze.

"I think you know who I am," he said. "Who are you?"

Sirius's frown deepened. He looked like he was about to say something, but there was a sound from outside the room and Sirius glanced away from Harry for a split-second.

Harry took advantage of the momentary distraction and pounced on him, catching the man by surprise and unbalancing him. He tackled him to the ground, snarling, and they wrestled. The man was larger and stronger, but Harry was running on the adrenaline and desperation of someone with nothing to lose.

Harry was finally able to wrest the man's wand free. It went rolling, and Harry instinctively made to grab for it, which was a mistake.

Seizing the opening, the man was able to flip them, pinning Harry to the ground.

The door opened and there was a shout of "Padfoot!" Which made Harry snarl harder.

"I can't get a clear shot," The newcomer panted.

There were two of them, now. One of them armed, and Harry was wandless. Distantly, Harry realized he was likely not getting out of this, so he committed to cause the most damage he possibly could.

Harry thrashed, whipped his head up, and slammed it into the man's face as hard as he could. He felt cartilage crush under his assault and was viciously pleased.

"Goddith, Ow—" the man swore and Harry seized the moment to sink his teeth into the closest bit of flesh he could reach, biting down until he tasted blood and not letting go even then.

The man thrashed on top of him like a fish, gasping in pain, and blood filled his mouth but Harry still didn't let up.

He didn't let up until someone's wand let out a flash of light and he flopped back down onto the ground, his vision going black.

When Ginny heard a repetitive tapping sound on her window in the middle of the night, she opened it expecting to find a very lost and stressed owl.

She sighed when instead she saw a possibly lost but supremely unstressed-looking Harry Potter, standing in the garden tossing pebbles at her window like a Muggle cliché.

"Rapunzel, Rapunzel," he said drily, smiling cockily up at her. With a flick of his wrist, he tossed another pebble up at the now open window which she peered out of.

"What is that, a disease?" Ginny asked, swatting the pebble away before it hit her face and pretending not to feel the quick sting when it connected with the back of her hand.

She rolled her eyes, but inside, the part of her that couldn't help but love this scary and broken man was so pleased that he had chosen her, come to see her. "Well, come on up then, I guess, since you've come all this way." She waved him up.

She was quite looking forward to him making a fool of himself trying to climb the trellis. Much to her disappointment, however, he sprung up onto it nimbly, and with a couple graceful upward strides, he was at the thatch of roof right outside her window in a matter of seconds.

"How did you even get here?" Ginny demanded, looking around for a broom. They were pretty far from the Potters' place, even for a broom-ride, and Harry was apparently on foot.

"I flew," Harry answered idly from the top of the trellis. He hoisted himself easily onto the roof.

"Where's your broom?"

Harry rolled his eyes and threw a long leg past her into the window. He wagged his eyebrows at her, "Not everyone needs a broom to fly."

Ginny pretended that that didn't make her blood freeze. She knew what he was implying. Voldemort. Voldemort could fly.

"You know, he would say if I was a good boy and didn't scream during the Cruciatus Curse he'd teach me to fly." Harry grinned at her, and her stomach was churning so she couldn't tell if his grin was mocking or hard. He laughed at her, and she let herself be pushed to the side as he levered himself through the window, his body brushing against hers.

Ginny didn't know why he did this. He'd bring it up all the time, casually. How he'd spent a couple years held captive by Voldemort. No one knew what had happened. They didn't talk about it, as a general rule, and Harry certainly wouldn't give you an answer if you asked him about it, but he'd do this. Make off-hand remarks that chilled Ginny to the bone. And she would have to pretend she didn't care if she wanted to hear any more.

Ginny pictured a tiny, scared Harry trying not to scream during the Cruciatus and wanted to cry. She shuddered, and pretended it was from the cold. She busied herself with shutting the window.

"So, he taught you to… to fly?" She asked eventually, hesitantly.

She didn't know if this was the only way he was able to process the trauma, or if he just did it to unnerve and disturb her, or if it was just Harry's way of casually mentioning his childhood the way she'd mention her dad or her brothers.

She had a sudden memory of Arthur helping her onto a broom, his face kind and his hands gentle, even as Fred and George jeered at her, doing loops in the sky above her. She tried to picture Voldemort holding a broom handle steady for a young Harry to clamber onto and felt either a laugh or a sob build up in her chest.

"Oh, no," Harry said, tossing another grin over his shoulder at her. He had crossed the room to her desk and bookshelf and was poking through her stuff with shameless interest, "But he did teach me the Cruciatus. If a Death Eater couldn't make me scream, he'd have me Crucio them."

…

If Ginny hadn't been so bloody exhausted, she would've set an alarm and made sure Harry was either gone or lying on the floor a respectable distance away before anyone else woke up and discovered him in her bed.

As it was, she woke to a bright light shining directly in her eyes, Harry's decidedly naked torso pressed up against her back; and her father, who was wielding the Lumos that was half-blinding her, and struggling to contain what Ginny was certain was apoplectic rage.

"He's here, Molly," Arthur called grimly out the door, extinguishing the Lumos with a whispered Nox that reminded Ginny of nothing so much as the steam a dragon exhales from its nostrils.

Ginny struggled to sit up, kicking subtly at Harry's legs behind her to make him release her. She choked down a yelp when he simply caught and trapped her leg between his. He refused to let her up, instead wrapping his arms more tightly around her and pulling her flush against his chest.

She knew he was just doing it to be annoying, and Ginny hated that her heart sped up and she felt warmth pool in her belly, even as she tensed, very aware of her father standing above them, wand ablazing.

Harry seemed to notice or at least guess the effect he was having on her because he chuckled into her shoulder blade, the rich sound vibrating against Ginny's back. Ginny wanted to melt in mortification.

"Ginny," Arthur said, his voice tightly controlled. "Get out of bed, please."

"Morning, Mister Weasley," Harry said lazily, and pressed a kiss onto the side of Ginny's neck, which he followed up with a soft and indecent "ahhh" sound that Ginny felt from her hairline right down to her toes. Judging by her dad's pained face, he'd felt that sound acutely as well. "Hope we didn't keep you up last night," Harry said, smirking against her shoulder.

Ginny couldn't see him, as he was behind her, but she would bet that he had winked. Her dad's face looked like it was turning purple with the effort to control himself.

Ginny could feel Harry grinning behind her.

For a moment, she hated him. Harry knew how she had felt about him (still felt about him, honestly, even though she knew now that it could never happen), and he just didn't care. He would use her to get at her dad for no reason other than to piss him off, to make her dad feel powerless and angry while Harry sat there, calm and grinning, all the cards in his hand.

And then she remembered what he'd said last night, remembered that picture in her head of young Harry, eyes streaming as he bit his tongue trying not to scream as his little body was wracked by the Cruciatus Curse.

"Nothing happened, Dad, he's just riling you up," Ginny said, tapping on Harry's arms, folded around her middle, to indicate that she would like to be released. Instead, one of Harry's hands inched upwards to cup her breast. She slapped it lightly away, her face heating.

Her dad's lips were pressed together in clear disbelief and anger, and Ginny closed her eyes, slightly hurt and feeling like an idiot. They were in bed together, obviously, Harry shirtless and cuddling and kissing her and clearly doing everything he could to encourage her father's imagination. Who could blame her father for jumping to the obvious conclusions? But then again, she was sixteen. What business of her father's was it if she had a boy in her bed? Who was her father to tell her what she could or couldn't do with her body?

She gritted her teeth, the familiar feeling of anger and betrayal that he would use her like this welling up within her. She and her father were both riled up, dangling on Harry's whim, puppets on his strings, singing and dancing at his command. She and her father shared fundamentally different beliefs on sex before marriage, something she didn't particularly want to get into right now but would if she had to.

Harry had primed them all up for a nice little fight that he could lay back and watch from the comfort of her bed. Because she was telling the truth, but there was no way she could assure her father of that fact without outing Harry, and they both knew she would never do that. So here she was, trapped in Harry's arms, teeth gritted, looking up at her purple-faced dad.

The image of little Harry, scared and crying, forced its way back into her mind and Ginny took a deep breath, trying to remain calm.

"Harry, let me up," she ordered. Normally she would have tried to get free, but she was relatively certain that if she struggled, her father would take that as a sign to try to kill Harry.

"But I'm so comfortable," Harry whined, nuzzling against her.

Arthur's wand was out again in a flash. "I believe she told you to let her go, Mister Potter," Her father's voice was steel.

"Dad, it's fine," Ginny snapped. "Harry, please."

There was a pause, and then Harry obeyed, lifting a leg to release her leg, trapped between both of his, and loosening his arms enough so that she was able to wriggle herself free and sit up.

Arthur relaxed only marginally.

"Nothing happened, Dad," Ginny said firmly, meeting his eyes defiantly. "And if it had, it wouldn't really be any of your business anyway."

Still splayed out on the bed, Harry snorted. "I'd say nothing happened quite a few times, actually—"

"Shut the hell up, Harry," Ginny snapped, her eyes not leaving her father's. "Harry needed a place to stay. It was the middle of the night. I said he could sleep here. Is there a problem?"

Arthur's nostrils flared, but he took a deep breath, and lowered his wand, clearly trying to calm himself down. "Unfortunately, there is," he said.

"Ah, told you about that, have they?" Harry asked lazily from where he was still flopped onto the bed. He rolled himself onto his side, and the sheet fell away, revealing his bare torso. He smirked up at her dad.

Ginny frowned as her dad averted his eyes and stared resolutely at the opposite wall.

"That won't help," Harry said carelessly, sweeping a dismissive hand at him. "I don't need eye contact. Fortunately for you, though, you haven't really got much up there that's of interest to me."

He perked up, and Ginny already felt her stomach rolling with dread. "Although, maybe if you've got anything juicy, like Ginny in the bath—"

Arthur Weasley turned and looked Harry dead in the eye as he leveled his wand, once more, at his chest.

"Dad," Ginny said placatingly.

"Ginny, get away from him right now," Arthur ordered. His eyes were hard.

Ginny knew better than to argue with her dad when he was like this. Arthur Weasley was a hard man to anger, but when he did get angry it was idiotic to mess with him.

But Harry loved to mess with people.

She slid out of the bed, not looking at Harry, and felt embarrassingly naked in her tiny shorts.

"Dad, please," she tried again.

"Ginny, go downstairs," Arthur commanded, his eyes not leaving Harry.

She bristled at his tone and was deciding whether or not leaving would lead to either or both of the two men being murdered in her room, when the door burst open and Molly Weasley bustled in, bearing a breakfast tray and looking harried.

Her eyes darted around the room, rested briefly on Harry, and then she turned her head determinedly away from him, even as she approached him, brandishing the tray in front of her like an offering to a hostile animal.

"Here you go, dear," She said, her voice strained, as she plopped the tray onto the bed. She didn't meet Harry's eyes.

"Thank you, Molly," Harry said, turning a charming grin on her, "It looks delicious. And can I just say, you look beautiful today."

"I—thank you, you're welcome—" Her mother stuttered, glancing at him and then, stricken, glancing away just as quickly.

Ginny's dad was glaring at him again, and Ginny prepared to intervene, while also trying to understand what was going on. Why would no one meet his eyes?

"Arthur, we should probably leave—" Molly addressed her husband in a hushed, but clearly-audible voice. She darted an anxious and slightly apologetic look towards where Harry, seemingly oblivious, was digging into his breakfast. "The message said not to stay in the same room as him…Just got another strange Floo-call from Sirius…Fred said he could help watch— I mean, er, keep him company…"

"I'm not letting him out of my sight," Ginny's dad said tightly. He still hadn't lowered his wand.

"What's going on?" Ginny demanded. Her mother gave her a slightly wild look, and her dad's eyes slid to her briefly, before his gaze went steadfastly back to Harry, who continued to enjoy his breakfast at wandpoint.

"Harry?" She demanded.

Harry looked up at her and gave her a beautiful lopsided grin. "Oh, didn't I mention last night? I'm a wanted man."

A/N: Hope y'all liked that. Please let me know what you think! This may be sad, but reviews are the only thing that inspire me to actually think about this universe and write. Thank you so much to everyone who has commented or supported me in any way!
** If anyone's curious about canon Harry's backstory, I have a few ideas that I am still trying to solidify! I don't know how important it is going to be yet (my gut is saying not that important) but feel free to speculate or suggest.

Additionally, I know it's a really crazy time and I hope everyone is staying safe & healthy. If anyone wants to know about how they can get involved/ support the protesters, here's a link to a great compilation of resources! (remove spaces) Black Lives Matters . carrd . co

Also, Happy Pride Month! Edit: I realize that JKR's tweets are a thing, and I just want any trans people reading this to know that you are valid and you are legitimate and that I see you. Let me know if there's anything I can do. 3