A Summer of Reflections

Chapter 4

Harry couldn’t sleep that night.

He pulled his watch from the bedside table and stared at it for what seemed like the millionth time since he had climbed into bed. Dim light from two candles he’d left burning nearby told him it was one-twelve a.m.

That can’t possibly be right, Harry thought, holding the timepiece to his ear to see if it was still ticking. It hummed musically back at him, reminding him that he’d picked it up during a visit to Hogsmeade last year. Considering the watch was magical then, Harry had no idea if it was working properly or not. With a disgruntled sigh, he set it back on the table.

Only two hours had passed. Two…

And he had spent most of that time in a restless state, turning over in bed so many times that his sheets were now tangled uncomfortably around his legs and his quilt had fallen on the floor.

Harry sighed again. Nothing was working. No matter how many times he rolled over on his sides or tossed onto his back or gazed blankly at the walls, nothing had helped. And that was all he could do to keep the image of Hermione and their kiss out of his mind…

Despite the fact that it had been a pleasant experience, thinking about that kiss confused Harry. After reliving it over a dozen times, he’d come to the conclusion that there was only so much reflecting he could do on the subject before his mind wandered into territories he wasn’t really prepared to go. Unfortunately, the good feelings he had about kissing his best friend were mixed with too many questions. And they were all questions he wasn’t ready to examine at present. For he wasn’t completely sure he wanted to know the answers…

So Harry had done everything he could think of to push those thoughts away. He’d counted cracks on the ceiling, stared at holes in the bed-hangings, and studied the furniture – sparse though it was in his gloomy bedroom – until every crevice and nook-hole was as familiar to him as the hairs on his head.

His bedroom at number twelve, Grimmauld Place was an odd mix of once-used opulence and derelict decay. The chair on the opposite wall near the center window had one wobbly leg; its small frame sat uneven with the wooden floorboards. Yet, Harry wagered the satin-like upholstery would have appeared stately when new. Now the material was stained and ripping at the seams; small bits of yellow padding could be seen poking out at the corners.

The bedside table was oblong and rested on a square pillar thicker than the Troll-leg umbrella stand downstairs. It was covered by a piece of lacy old cloth with browning edges that matched the curtains covering the windowpanes.

There was also a twin bed parallel to Harry’s with the same black bed-curtains draped around it, carrying the weight of years of disuse in its hole-filled fabric.

The wardrobe on the far wall, certainly the most interesting piece of furniture in the room, had deep gouges running vertically along the front of it, as if someone had carved the jagged gaps with a long, sharp knife. It was smaller than the one Harry remembered in his room from the previous year, but it looked as if it was part of the same set of furniture. The wardrobe’s surface, which he imagined had once been kept polished and shiny, was the same dull mahogany color; and it also sported the same large, clawed feet that matched the silver serpent-shaped handles of the double doors.

There was an oval carpet in the center of the room, but it was practically colorless. Harry speculated that it had once been a deep forest green color, but too many years of dust and neglect had left it neither gray nor brown nor even beige. It looked more like a large, dirty rag than anything else, with numerous threads splitting at the sides and several well-worn patches in the middle that were so sparse, it was a wonder the thing had survived this long.

There were no portraits on the bare walls where the wallpaper was peeling in many places and totally missing in others. Instead, many thick silver candelabra – also shaped like serpents – were spaced between the windows on one wall and sparsely between the furniture on the others.

On the whole, this room was very much like the bedroom he’d shared with Ron the previous summer. It was a bit smaller perhaps; the ceiling wasn’t nearly as high, but it had the same gloomy atmospheric presence that plagued the entire house like a disease. Truly, the only good thing about the room was that it was clean. But like most of the rooms in the house – even the kitchen and the drawing room, the two rooms in which Harry had spent the most time – this bedroom had not wholly escaped the shadowy feel of unpleasantness that clouded over it like a thick fog. And no matter how hard the Weasleys, Harry, and Hermione tried to brighten the old place, it seemed a larger, darker force was at work, determined to keep its stronghold over the domain that had once held one of the most prominent pure blood Wizarding families within its ever stifling walls.

No wonder Sirius had wanted to leave, Harry thought as he rolled over once more in his bed.

But thoughts of Sirius were painful these days, still fresh in his mind and close to his heart. Harry wouldn’t linger on them; he couldn’t do it. At least not without wanting to throw things across the room in anger or – conversely – break down into tears.

It was still too soon.

And trying physically to block his memories of Sirius from seeping to the surface where he’d have no choice but to examine them, Harry turned his head into his pillow and shut his eyes tightly.

Despite the reasons for his sleeplessness this night having nothing to do with his godfather (and everything to do with Hermione), nights like these were all too common for Harry of late. In fact, he hated nighttime these days, hated the hours that dragged from midnight till sunrise when there was nothing but his own musings to keep him company.

The lone improvement on last year was that Harry was no longer plagued by dreams of nameless corridors and darkened doorways. Moreover, he could not recall having had a single dream he even remotely remembered in the last month, but Harry wagered this could be due to the fact that he’d barely slept a couple hours each night during that entire time.

Truthfully, he hadn’t been able to sleep properly all summer. And when sleep came, it was intermittent; small doses of it came and went like a bad cold. But most nights Harry was kept awake by an incessant insomnia, brought on by what he could only term as a stubborn refusal by some unknown part of him to surrender himself to the overwhelming thoughts that were brimming barely under control inside his head. Harry speculated this same part of him had settled on the idea that if he stayed awake, he could somehow rein in the pieces of his mind that wanted to drift to Sirius – or even worse – to thoughts of Dumbledore’s haunting words to him a month ago regarding the stupid prophecy.

His prophecy… His and Voldemort’s…

That was another subject Harry was refusing to dwell on. Some part of him was convinced that the prophecy would simply go away if he did not think about it; while another part of him was just as sure he was making a huge mistake by not thinking about it.

Still, Hagrid had once told him, "What would come, would come…"

What good then would it really do him to dwell on something he could do absolutely nothing about? At least at the present time…

Yet, unwillingly – and sometimes very unwanted – came echoes of things Dumbledore had said to him.

"There is a room in the Department of Mysteries that is kept locked at all times… It is the power held within that room that you possess in such quantities… the power to vanquish the Dark Lord…"¹

He’s wrong, Harry thought, rolling over again as he flattened his pillow against his face. I don’t have that power… whatever it is…

And not allowing those thoughts to further intrude, he threw his pillow across the room, hoping Dumbledore’s confusing words followed with it.

Unable to curb his restlessness any longer, Harry cast his sheets aside (with a little struggle since they were practically glued to his legs) and rose from the bed. Sliding his feet into his waiting slippers and snatching his sweatshirt from the end of the bed where he’d left it (just in case); he strode across the room and opened the door.

But once in the hallway, Harry paused.

He could visit the kitchen and see if there were any leftovers from his birthday dinner, but he wasn’t particularly hungry, and he’d never really been the type to go for late-night snacks (unless he’d been starving at the Dursleys’, that is, and had no choice).

He could go to the drawing room and light a fire. He’d left some of his textbooks there that morning, and he still had that essay of Snape’s to finish. This specific essay wasn’t mandatory, but Hermione had suggested he write it if he wanted to take Snape’s N.E.W.T. Potions class in the fall (assuming he had somehow miraculously achieved an O on his Potions O.W.L., and Snape let him enter the class. Unfortunately for Harry, Professor McGonagall had recommended he take Potions if he wanted to become an Auror, or he would have gladly told Snape where he could stick his stupid essay.) He only had two scrolls completed so far, but Harry wasn’t really in the mood for homework either. And more importantly, he needed Hermione’s help with that bit about moonstones.

So Harry did what he’d been doing a lot lately and retreated farther into the house. As he had done last Christmas when he’d felt so isolated from the Weasleys, and even from Sirius, and as Sirius himself had done so many times in the past, Harry went to Buckbeak’s room.

He didn’t know what it was about this room that drew him the way it did – though obviously Sirius had been drawn to it, too, but perhaps not for the same reasons. Maybe it was because Harry had more privacy there; the room was quiet since it was so far away from the hustle and bustle of the rest of the house. Or maybe it was because Buckbeak was there, so the room smelled like straw and animal, a comforting combination that never failed to soothe Harry’s nerves when he was on edge. Or maybe it made him feel closer to Sirius because Sirius himself had spent so much time there before he died.

Harry didn’t really know the real reason why he went there so many nights, and occasionally during days when he wasn’t busy with menial tasks or homework and could break away unnoticed (which was rarely very often); he only knew that he felt better when he went there. And finding a place to be happy – if only a little happy, without impending thoughts about his uncertain future or memories of his burdened past – was all Harry cared about these days. It wasn’t much, a small oasis, a brief release from his unsettled life, but it was all he had – and Harry wasn’t, at the moment, willing to give it up.

Nor was he willing to share it with anybody else.

He had not told anyone he was having trouble sleeping, had not told them how many nights he had spent curled up on Buckbeak’s straw-strewn floor. He knew Ron and Hermione would only worry about him. Mrs. Weasley would molly-coddle him till he couldn’t stand it. And Lupin… Well, Harry had the feeling his ex-professor would want to sit him down and have a long talk, a talk he was quite sure he was not prepared to face.

Harry had always liked Lupin, had always appreciated his support and stable presence in the past. He was grateful for this link he still had to his parents, was aware that that link had not totally died with his godfather, but Harry was not inclined, at least at present, to open up to Lupin about what he was thinking or feeling – regarding the prophecy or Sirius’s death or anything else.

But always came the nagging questions at the back of Harry’s brain.

Eager to push aside his encroaching thoughts once more, Harry swept open the door to Buckbeak’s room and stepped quietly inside.

Someone had obviously been there since he and Hermione had searched the room earlier that day for Sirius’s letter. Dark as it was, Harry could see the sheets that had been half-draped over the few pieces of furniture, including the large, ornate-framed mirror, were resting neatly in their proper places once more. The roll-top on the desk was pulled tightly shut; the drawers were all pushed back inside the square frame. The floor was also littered with fresh straw. Buckbeak had obviously been fed and watered quite recently.

Harry often wondered at whom was taking care of Buckbeak now that Sirius was gone. He had not seen Kreacher the house-elf since he’d returned to Grimmauld Place. The traitorous elf had disappeared from the house entirely, and Harry had never asked what had happened to him. Obviously someone was making sure the hippogriff was being cared for properly (not that Kreacher had been the best of help in that department anyway), but Harry found it odd that he had never seen anyone else in the room, or even near it, during the many nights he had been there.

Following his customary routine, Harry walked soundlessly over to Buckbeak, and the hippogriff bobbed his head in greeting. After stroking the animal’s beak and feathers for a few moments, Harry moved away from him to take his usual place against the far wall when he changed his mind mid-stride.

An idea had struck him.

Perhaps he could spend some time alone, uninterrupted in search of Sirius’s letter, since he and Hermione had had no luck finding it that afternoon. Lupin had sounded rather certain that the letter was somewhere in this room, though he had sent Ron and Ginny to other parts of the house in search of it as well.

The trick was where to find it?

Glad to have something to keep his mind occupied and away from his many unwanted thoughts, Harry moved over to the desk and lit the gas lamp above it.

To his complete surprise, curled in the armchair near the door – bathed in the low light from the lamp – clearly asleep, was Hermione.

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