Authors Notes: Told you I'd be back with more, though a little later than I thought! Thank you again for all your wonderful reviews, I will eventually answer some of them personally, but at the moment all my energy is being focused on writing whilst I have the chance. Cause my fiance doesn't know the full extent of my HP obsession lol and I have to write when he's not around. Thankfully, he works early shifts which means he goes to bed early and I can sit up late and write (cause I do all my best writing at night).
I hope you enjoy this chapter J
Four
He was standing in the Great Hall at Hogwarts. It was breakfast time, the smell was so familiar to him. He started to make his way up the aisle between the Gryffindor and Hufflepuff tables, when he realised that everyone was laughing at him.
He couldn't understand at first, why everyone was laughing. And then he realised. He was completely naked. Blushing furiously and trying to cover himself up, he ran the rest of the way to his seat in between Ron and Hermione, both of whom started to immediately push and poke him.
'Get off me,' he said, trying to fight back. But his arms were heavy and he couldn't move them…
'Wake up, Harry!'
He jumped up, startled, looking wildly around. Sunlight was pouring in through the window, and after a few confusing moments, he remembered falling asleep, watching Hermione sleep.
'We slept late,' she was saying crossly. 'It's almost 10am. We should've been working!'
'No we shouldn't,' Harry groaned, stretching. He decided that sleeping in a chair was not a good thing- muscles he didn't even know he had felt like they'd been compressed and then stretched out.
'Harry, we've got so much to do!'
He was looking at her as if he had never seen her before. Somehow, in his sleep, his mind had been made up on what they had to do that day.
'And if we try to do it, we're going to crack,' he said sensibly. 'You look like you haven't eaten or slept and I know I look no better. So, we're taking today off.'
'We can't!' she cried.
'We can,' he said firmly. 'We're the head of the department, we can take whatever days we want off.'
'I…' she faltered. 'I never thought of it like that.'
'So we'll take today off and get back to work tomorrow. Nothing is going to be harmed by us doing this. We need a break.'
For a moment, she looked like she was going to keep fighting him. But then she shrugged her shoulders and sat back down on her bed.
'What will we do?'
'I have an idea,' he said, winking. 'You stay here and relax. I'm going to go to the Burrow and get Ron. And I'll explain when I get back.'
She looked at him, mystified, but he disapparated.
~*~
The Burrow looked the same as Harry had always remembered of it. It was hard to believe it was almost a year since he had last been here. As he headed towards the door, he heard a gasp and a thud and before he knew what was happening, Molly Weasley had thrown herself around him, sobbing.
Harry, who had never been any good in this type of situation, patted her awkwardly on the shoulder. The minutes seemed endless, but then he heard footsteps and a voice whispering. Molly released him, wiping her eyes, looking almost ashamed.
'I'm sorry,' she said, as tears still flowed. 'I just… I just still can't believe that you… you did it and you… you survived…'
She looked like she was about to fall onto him again. He braced himself, ready for it, but instead she bent down and picked up the basket of washing she had dropped and headed back to the house, not realising she hadn't even hung the washing out.
'Don't mind mum,' the man standing next to him said and Harry started- he had forgotten someone had come to help him. He almost didn't know what to say when he realised it was Percy. 'She's still very shaken up, what with Fred…'
Percy trailed off.
'Come in, Ron will be pleased to see you.'
Harry couldn't think of anything to say to Percy. It had been so long since he found himself in his company.
'I think I owe you an apology,' Percy said abruptly as they reached the back door. He stopped, with his hand on the handle and turned to look at Harry. 'I- I wrote a letter to Ron, back when Umbridge was at Hogwarts.'
Harry felt his insides burn. He remembered that letter, very clearly. Percy had told Ron to sever ties with Harry, before he became violent and unstable.
'I know,' Harry said and Percy looked away, shame evident on his face.
'I was a fool,' he said, shaking his head. 'I believed that power was everything. I was ashamed of my family. I wanted to be the best, stand above them all.'
Harry's mind floated back to his first year, watching Ron stand in front of the Mirror of Erised, seeing himself as the better of all his brothers… and then a more recent memory floated in, the memory of the Riddle Harry and Hermione kissing, after telling Ron that he was worthless and they didn't care…
For the first time, Harry saw just how alike Percy and Ron were, though he made the decision on the spot to never, ever mention this to Ron.
'It's alright,' he said to Percy finally. Percy gave him a feeble smile and turned the handle and opened the door to the kitchen.
The kitchen was empty. For a moment, Harry was thinking that he was about to see Ginny, but as soon as she came into his mind, a feeling of guilt crept in. Several confusing seconds later, he remembered she was at Hogwarts, which had been fully restored over the summer.
He actually felt relived when he realised he wouldn't be seeing her. It was a feeling he couldn't explain. But, he thought, he'd been having a lot of feelings he couldn't explain.
At that moment, Ron entered the kitchen, still in his maroon pyjamas, yawning and stretching.
'Morning,' he said to Harry, waving his wand so that a cup of coffee came soaring over to him. 'I didn't believe Percy when he said you were here.'
'Well that's nice,' Harry said, trying not to laugh. Ron shrugged, and sat down at the table.
'So…' he said, looking at Harry. 'Just passing by?'
'Nope,' Harry sat down too. 'Hermione's cracking up, too much work. And so am I. And you look like hell.'
'Thanks for the compliment.'
'Go get dressed and then apparate to Hermione's house,' Harry said, standing up again. 'I'll explain everything there.'
And with that, he left Ron looking very confused, headed out of the kitchen and disapparated from outside the boundaries.
~*~
Harry let himself back into the Granger house and found Hermione in the kitchen, curled up on a stool at the breakfast bar, sipping a cup of coffee. The way she was sitting reminded him a lot of Luna Lovegood, who always looked like she was about to fly away.
She was reading the paper and was concentrating so hard that she jumped when Harry tapped her on the shoulder.
'Geez,' she said, holding her heart. 'Next time say something.'
'Sorry,' he said, smiling. She rolled her eyes and looked at him as if she was about to say something, but as she went to, the front door opened and closed again.
'Ron!' she exclaimed as he walked in and Harry realised that she had not seen him since they started working together. Hermione slipped off her stool and ran across the room and threw herself into his arms and hugged him tightly.
Harry felt the beast rise in his chest, but it setteled as soon as Hermione let go of Ron. He wondered what was going on with himself, but he couldn't think about it, they both turned to him.
'So what is all this about?' Ron asked, sitting down on the lounge. Hermione sat herself down on the armchair and they both looked up at Harry with wide, expectant eyes. Harry thought for a moment before speaking.
'We need to have some fun,' he said slowly. Ron and Hermione looked at each other and then back to Harry. Harry walked forwards and sat himself down on the coffee table. 'We've aged 20 years in 3 months. Hermione, we're working our butts off. We live and breathe work. And Ron, the last time we had lunch, all you could talk about was sales projections and cash flow.'
'We're adults now, Harry,' Hermione said slowly as if trying to make him seem reasonable. 'We have to behave like adults.'
'But we never got to behave as anything but adults,' Harry retorted. 'We got saddled with tasks and missions and spent 7 years of our life fighting Voldemort, instead of having fun!'
'Well, that is true,' Ron said quietly and earned himself a stare from Hermione.
'Look,' Harry said quickly. 'I'm not talking about quitting our jobs and running away to Mexico. I'm talking about all of us taking the day off today and picking one fun thing each to do.'
It appeared as if neither Ron or Hermione had any objections. The look on Ron's face suggested that his mind was running over all the fun things that he could think of and trying to narrow it down to just one. Hermione's face, on the other hand, had split into a wide grin.
'I know what I want to do.'