fic for pumpkinpasty: L'Etranger (Harry, Ginny, Ron, Hermione, Neville, Luna, PG-13)
Title: L'Etranger
Author: reverdybrune
Recipient: pumpkinpasty
Rating: PG-13 for some swearing
Characters: Harry, Ginny, Ron, Hermione, Neville and Luna
Warnings: DH spoilers, angst
Summary: "If people could see me the way I see myself-if they could live in my memories-would anyone, anyone, love me?"-John Green, An Abundance of Katherines. The picture we have of ourselves is never quite the same as the one others have of us.
Author's Notes: Recipient requested angst with Harry, Hermione, or Weasleys. I hope he or she doesn't mind that Neville and Luna edged their way in too. Enjoy, fic recipient! Many thanks, as always, to my lovely beta harryginnyphile, and of course, everything belongs to JK Rowling.
--
"Martyrs, my friend, have to choose between being forgotten, mocked or used. As for being understood -- never."
-- Albert Camus
6. Harry
You're seated in front of a crowd of people, but it doesn't feel like that. You keep forgetting it, absently letting your mind wander. You remember what it's cost to get you to this point.
The minister --Kingsley-- is giving some sort of speech about your bravery and sacrifice. It's a nice story.
The problem is that it sounds like something out of Tales of Beedle the Bard, which is just stupid. You don't understand how people can still see you as some untouchable hero when they've been there. They've seen what it's like, being in the middle of the fight; they ought to know firsthand by now what you've been trying to explain for years.
It seems like after everything you've been through together, after this war you've fought together, it wouldn't still have to be you (the hero) and everyone else.
"It is better to be the widow of a hero than the wife of a coward."
--Dolores Ibarruri
5. Ginny
He's dead. Harry's dead. Hagrid's holding the body in his arms and he's crying and oh God this can't be real... People are yelling, screaming, sobbing, and you're lurching forward and yelling because Harry is dead and Voldemort is there and you have to get to them, do something... But Neville is holding you back, and then Luna is too, and you can't get away. You can't get anywhere with both of them holding you but damnit you have to go to him, don't they understand? Harry is dead, and it's over, so you can damn well sob over his body with Hagrid if you want to. You can try to curse Tom bloody Riddle if you want to. Hasn't everyone been saying all year how Harry is your "only hope" even though he's only seventeen and unqualified and your bloody ex-boyfriend who does not deserve to die before you get a chance to fix things? And now he's dead, and your "only hope" is gone, and now they're going to keep fighting? So he's only the "only hope" until he's dead and then, then somebody else can give a damn and help out?
You can see the rest of your life play out before your eyes. It doesn't seem quite real. One curse, and that's the end. One curse, and you'll forever be that-girl-that-Harry-Potter-dated-once. But damnit, it was so much more than that. It is so much more than that. And if the only way to prove it is to die crumpled over Harry's body then that's what you're going to do. Maybe he didn’t want you to get hurt, but you knew what you were getting into when you fell in love with a hero.
"A woman can forgive a man for the harm he does her, but she can never forgive him for the sacrifices he makes on her account"
-- William Somerset Maugham
4. Hermione
Voldemort's challenge to Harry echoes through the halls, and in that moment when you realize that you haven't seen Harry since the Shrieking Shack, you know that you've failed.
All this time, you've done your best to keep Harry going, keep him fighting, keep him from blaming himself. And, at the most crucial moment, you let him go.
You're going to lose the war because you didn't keep a close enough eye on Harry to stop him from turning himself over to Voldemort like the idiotic hero that he is.
You should have told him that even if the rest of the world is content to live off his sacrifice, you aren't.
"Hope may vanish, but can die not."
--Percy Bysshe Shelley
3. Luna
The cellar at Malfoy Manor isn't very comfortable, but you suppose that for a prison, you could have done much worse. You wonder idly why they haven't taken you to Azkaban, and whether or not this is a good sign.
The first day you're there, nothing happens. The second day, Bellatrix Lestrange comes to your cell to try to torture you into talking about Harry. It's stupid, really, because even if you had wanted to say something you'd never have been able to through all the screaming. When Bellatrix finally lifts the curse and you can talk again, you say:
"Harry Potter is everywhere, but you'll never find him."
She hits you with the Cruciatus Curse again for that, but eventually seems convinced that you don't actually know anything useful. She's wrong, of course. You know plenty of useful things about Harry, just not the sort of things she wants to hear.
Later, Mr. Ollivander asks you what you meant by what you said to Bellatrix. "Harry is everywhere," you say, "because he is hope."
He doesn't understand. They never do.
"The youth, intoxicated with his admiration of a hero, fails to see, that it is only a projection of his own soul, which he admires."
--Ralph Waldo Emerson
2. Neville
It was never supposed to be like this. You aren't a leader. You're the one who does his very best to follow orders and never manages to do it quite right.
You go through the motions, try your best to organize the DA according to what Harry would do. So you don't know why, when you're the one painting "Dumbledore's Army: Still Recruiting" on the wall that you don't feel any different than you did before-when Harry was the one getting into trouble and you were the one who got petrified for trying to stop him.
You're still not Harry, still not your parents. You're just Neville, doing your best to do something that they might be proud of.
"Never waste jealousy on a real man: it is the imaginary man that supplants us all in the long run."
--George Bernard Shaw
1. Ron
You've never hated yourself as much as you do at this moment. You left them, Harry and Hermione, when you promised that you'd see this through to the end.
But they don't get it, either of them, because their families aren't in the middle of this like yours is. You know that's not their fault; you know that you're lucky to have a family at all when all Harry has is those bloody Muggles and Hermione's parents don't even remember she exists, but that doesn't make it any easier to go through each day not knowing whether your family members are still alive.
You know Harry didn't ask for it to be this way, but he could've told you, couldn't he? Could've acknowledged the fact that he doesn't know what the bloody hell he's doing instead of just sitting there brooding all the time, while people are dying and you're getting nowhere. Could’ve shown some anger at this crap situation you’re all in, because then maybe you wouldn’t feel so bad about being angry yourself.
"Freedom is what you do with what's been done to you."
-- Jean-Paul Sartre
0. Harry
You're sitting on your bed in your room at Number four, Privet Drive, flipping through the pages of the photo album Hagrid gave you back in first year. There's one picture--of your mum holding you and your dad with his arm around her and both of them smiling out of the frame like they're the happiest people in the world--that you can't stop staring at.
It's all you want--all you've ever wanted, and you can't grasp why that's so hard for people to understand.
Everybody wants someone to love, or at least they should, and yeah, for you, there's Voldemort and his stupid followers between you and that wish. So you fight them, but you'd like to think that most people in your position would do the same. It's not some bloody epic battle; it's just you, determined to get what you want out of life.
Sure, you could give up and whine about the crap lot fate's given you, but what good would that do? You'd still end up just as dead in the end.
At least this way, there's a chance.
Author: reverdybrune
Recipient: pumpkinpasty
Rating: PG-13 for some swearing
Characters: Harry, Ginny, Ron, Hermione, Neville and Luna
Warnings: DH spoilers, angst
Summary: "If people could see me the way I see myself-if they could live in my memories-would anyone, anyone, love me?"-John Green, An Abundance of Katherines. The picture we have of ourselves is never quite the same as the one others have of us.
Author's Notes: Recipient requested angst with Harry, Hermione, or Weasleys. I hope he or she doesn't mind that Neville and Luna edged their way in too. Enjoy, fic recipient! Many thanks, as always, to my lovely beta harryginnyphile, and of course, everything belongs to JK Rowling.
--
"Martyrs, my friend, have to choose between being forgotten, mocked or used. As for being understood -- never."
-- Albert Camus
6. Harry
You're seated in front of a crowd of people, but it doesn't feel like that. You keep forgetting it, absently letting your mind wander. You remember what it's cost to get you to this point.
The minister --Kingsley-- is giving some sort of speech about your bravery and sacrifice. It's a nice story.
The problem is that it sounds like something out of Tales of Beedle the Bard, which is just stupid. You don't understand how people can still see you as some untouchable hero when they've been there. They've seen what it's like, being in the middle of the fight; they ought to know firsthand by now what you've been trying to explain for years.
It seems like after everything you've been through together, after this war you've fought together, it wouldn't still have to be you (the hero) and everyone else.
"It is better to be the widow of a hero than the wife of a coward."
--Dolores Ibarruri
5. Ginny
He's dead. Harry's dead. Hagrid's holding the body in his arms and he's crying and oh God this can't be real... People are yelling, screaming, sobbing, and you're lurching forward and yelling because Harry is dead and Voldemort is there and you have to get to them, do something... But Neville is holding you back, and then Luna is too, and you can't get away. You can't get anywhere with both of them holding you but damnit you have to go to him, don't they understand? Harry is dead, and it's over, so you can damn well sob over his body with Hagrid if you want to. You can try to curse Tom bloody Riddle if you want to. Hasn't everyone been saying all year how Harry is your "only hope" even though he's only seventeen and unqualified and your bloody ex-boyfriend who does not deserve to die before you get a chance to fix things? And now he's dead, and your "only hope" is gone, and now they're going to keep fighting? So he's only the "only hope" until he's dead and then, then somebody else can give a damn and help out?
You can see the rest of your life play out before your eyes. It doesn't seem quite real. One curse, and that's the end. One curse, and you'll forever be that-girl-that-Harry-Potter-dated-once. But damnit, it was so much more than that. It is so much more than that. And if the only way to prove it is to die crumpled over Harry's body then that's what you're going to do. Maybe he didn’t want you to get hurt, but you knew what you were getting into when you fell in love with a hero.
"A woman can forgive a man for the harm he does her, but she can never forgive him for the sacrifices he makes on her account"
-- William Somerset Maugham
4. Hermione
Voldemort's challenge to Harry echoes through the halls, and in that moment when you realize that you haven't seen Harry since the Shrieking Shack, you know that you've failed.
All this time, you've done your best to keep Harry going, keep him fighting, keep him from blaming himself. And, at the most crucial moment, you let him go.
You're going to lose the war because you didn't keep a close enough eye on Harry to stop him from turning himself over to Voldemort like the idiotic hero that he is.
You should have told him that even if the rest of the world is content to live off his sacrifice, you aren't.
"Hope may vanish, but can die not."
--Percy Bysshe Shelley
3. Luna
The cellar at Malfoy Manor isn't very comfortable, but you suppose that for a prison, you could have done much worse. You wonder idly why they haven't taken you to Azkaban, and whether or not this is a good sign.
The first day you're there, nothing happens. The second day, Bellatrix Lestrange comes to your cell to try to torture you into talking about Harry. It's stupid, really, because even if you had wanted to say something you'd never have been able to through all the screaming. When Bellatrix finally lifts the curse and you can talk again, you say:
"Harry Potter is everywhere, but you'll never find him."
She hits you with the Cruciatus Curse again for that, but eventually seems convinced that you don't actually know anything useful. She's wrong, of course. You know plenty of useful things about Harry, just not the sort of things she wants to hear.
Later, Mr. Ollivander asks you what you meant by what you said to Bellatrix. "Harry is everywhere," you say, "because he is hope."
He doesn't understand. They never do.
"The youth, intoxicated with his admiration of a hero, fails to see, that it is only a projection of his own soul, which he admires."
--Ralph Waldo Emerson
2. Neville
It was never supposed to be like this. You aren't a leader. You're the one who does his very best to follow orders and never manages to do it quite right.
You go through the motions, try your best to organize the DA according to what Harry would do. So you don't know why, when you're the one painting "Dumbledore's Army: Still Recruiting" on the wall that you don't feel any different than you did before-when Harry was the one getting into trouble and you were the one who got petrified for trying to stop him.
You're still not Harry, still not your parents. You're just Neville, doing your best to do something that they might be proud of.
"Never waste jealousy on a real man: it is the imaginary man that supplants us all in the long run."
--George Bernard Shaw
1. Ron
You've never hated yourself as much as you do at this moment. You left them, Harry and Hermione, when you promised that you'd see this through to the end.
But they don't get it, either of them, because their families aren't in the middle of this like yours is. You know that's not their fault; you know that you're lucky to have a family at all when all Harry has is those bloody Muggles and Hermione's parents don't even remember she exists, but that doesn't make it any easier to go through each day not knowing whether your family members are still alive.
You know Harry didn't ask for it to be this way, but he could've told you, couldn't he? Could've acknowledged the fact that he doesn't know what the bloody hell he's doing instead of just sitting there brooding all the time, while people are dying and you're getting nowhere. Could’ve shown some anger at this crap situation you’re all in, because then maybe you wouldn’t feel so bad about being angry yourself.
"Freedom is what you do with what's been done to you."
-- Jean-Paul Sartre
0. Harry
You're sitting on your bed in your room at Number four, Privet Drive, flipping through the pages of the photo album Hagrid gave you back in first year. There's one picture--of your mum holding you and your dad with his arm around her and both of them smiling out of the frame like they're the happiest people in the world--that you can't stop staring at.
It's all you want--all you've ever wanted, and you can't grasp why that's so hard for people to understand.
Everybody wants someone to love, or at least they should, and yeah, for you, there's Voldemort and his stupid followers between you and that wish. So you fight them, but you'd like to think that most people in your position would do the same. It's not some bloody epic battle; it's just you, determined to get what you want out of life.
Sure, you could give up and whine about the crap lot fate's given you, but what good would that do? You'd still end up just as dead in the end.
At least this way, there's a chance.