beautiful world

Harry wasn't Harry any longer, Harry was Harry's Body with someone else in control while Harry sat back and watched with a somewhat vague sort of bemusement.

There was a knock on the door and Harry jumped a little and turned. "Seamus?" he called, knowing that it would be him. Seamus always got up twenty minutes after Harry, it was a 'we've all got to share the shower and may as well get used to it' ritual. Much less chaotic and cruel then the girls, who still worked under the 'first come first served' principle.

"Harry?" Seamus replied in a mocking sort of tone, knocking again. Dean would be down in twenty minutes and Seamus hated it when Harry was slow.

He gathered his things and opened the door, waiting for Seamus to comment on his eyes, how they had changed. Seamus grinned in a sleepy sort of way, and dashed past, shoving Harry into the hall in a friendly sort of fashion, and slamming the door behind him.

"No, I don't think so," Harry whispered, replying to Seamus' question. No, he wasn't Harry at all.

"Hello, Harry, you're running a little late today," Hermione greeted from the common room where she sat finishing her charms assignment. She'd showered earlier and now her hair was drying, and Harry watched the firelight turn odd wisps of it a fiery sort of auburn colour. "Harry? ...Harry."

He blinked, startled, and looked up at her. "What?"

"Are you alright? You were just...staring at me."

Not at her. At the colours in her hair. Infinitely more interesting. "I was running a little late," Harry echoed, to prove that he had been paying attention. "I'm never late, except for class."

"Exactly," she said, frowning in confusion. "Are you alright?"

"Same as always," he lied faintly. "And wrapped in a towel." With that, he excused himself and went up the stairs to his dorm.

The day passed somewhat in a blur. That wasn't anything strange, really, because all the days had begun to blend together for Harry. Wake up, eat breakfast, go to class, eat lunch, go to class, go to Quidditch practice, eat dinner, do homework, sleep, rinse, repeat as necessary.

The only thing remarkable about this day at all was that Harry nearly died three times. The first was in Transfiguration class, where they were attempting to change their mice into parrots and Harry had somehow managed to get it wrong. Professor McGonagall had barely managed to rescue him from being eaten by the resulting creature Harry had created. Later, in Care of Magical Creatures, he'd somehow fallen off the fence they'd been instructed to sit on while watching as Hagrid attempted to calm a small herd of Huffalumps, which had then begun stampeding, nearly trampling him. The third near-death experience occurred during Quidditch practice, when Harry had somehow managed to... fly directly into a Bludger. A Bludger that hadn't been moving.

His stomach still bore that bruise the next morning, as Harry lay awake in his bed, having woken up even earlier than usual and not quite seeing the point to getting out of bed.

He did, of course, because it would not do to be late for the second day in a row. He showered, though this time his eyes avoided the steamy mirror, and just as Seamus came down the stairs, Harry left the bathroom, dressed and groomed. Hermione glanced at her watch as he strode into the common room and then smiled at him. Her hair was drying again and Harry tilted his head a bit and smiled back, watching prisms of light dance in her hair.

"Finished all yesterday's homework?" she asked.

"Yes," he replied, after a short pause. There was always a pause between their questions and his answers these days.