»»————- song: ————-««
one summer's day
★ joe hisaishi ★
❝ once you've met someone,
you never really forget them.❞
- zeniba, spirited away
♢ ♢ ♢
Snape decided to break the news to Harry tomorrow, since that was when he had his final Potions class of the year. No use rushing, Snape reasoned. It wouldn't be very subtle if Snape randomly summoned Harry to his office when it was already so close to dinner.
It was only the next day, when Snape sat in his office languidly as he finalized exam grades, that he bolted upright in alarm.
He had been so ecstatic about the Dursley's no longer being protected by the blood wards that he hadn't thought of one very important thing: Dumbledore knew how kind Harry was, how selfless.
He would try to change Harry's mind.
Snape rifled through his drawers, looking for the Marauder's Map. He had long debated with himself whether to return it to Harry or not and hadn't quite made up his mind. He was glad he hadn't.
Because he couldn't let Dumbledore get to Harry first.
♢ ♢ ♢
It was the final week of classes, and as exams were over, the teachers had little control over the students, who were either packing excitedly or taking advantage of the beautiful summer weather. Harry fell into neither category, seeing as he had little reason to be excited to pack, and by extension to be grateful for the warm weather. Late spring always put a pit in his stomach, because warm weather always meant going back to the Dursley's and doing the gardening all summer long as he desperately drank water out of the hose when Petunia wasn't watching.
There wasn't much to do. Feeling bad for Sage, who was pretty much left to his own devices for the year as Harry ran about with this whole Sirius Black business, Harry spent most of his evenings in hissed conversation with the snake. It was fascinating; until now, Harry never thought much of what it would feel like to live as an animal, let alone an animal with no legs and an appetite for bugs and frogs. Which got him thinking about what it would feel like to become an Animagus... but he tried not to dwell on it too much, since that also got him thinking about his father, and he found it difficult to keep his eyes dry whenever he thought about his parents.
During the day, Harry tried not to ever be alone in the same room as Draco, both of whom were clearly doing their utmost to avoid each other. And this proved to be quite difficult, given that they were in the same House and lived in the same dorm room. It was awkward enough the whole year, but now that they weren't stressed about exams or a supposed mass murderer on the run, it was doubly hard.
Figuring it would be harder for the two of them to bump into each other out on the vast grounds, Hary wandered about outside in the late morning sun between classes, trying not to feel sorry for himself and reminding himself to eat a bunch at dinner that night to try and offset the Dursley's penchant for witholding food, when he realized he had accidentally walked under a tree that Cedric Diggory was sitting under.
Before Harry could awkwardly shuffle away, Cedric looked up. "Oh," he said, looking like he wasn't quite sure whether to stand up or what to do with his stretched out legs. "Hello."
Harry gave him an awkward smile, then a genuine one when he saw the book in his hands. "Hey, is that Quidditch Through the Ages? That's my favorite book."
Cedric flipped back to the cover, as if he'd forgotten what he was reading and had to make sure. "Er, yes. It's my second favorite book, actually."
"What's your first?" Harry asked, genuinely interested. He'd never really seen Cedric around and had no idea what he did besides Quidditch.
"Hogwarts, A History," Cedric replied, his eyes lighting up. "Which everyone thinks is crazy." He deflated a little. "I know everyone thinks History of Magic is boring. I mean, Binns is definitely the most boring person I've ever come across. But not the subject."
"I've seen Hermione read that," Harry said, surprised. "Never shuts up about it."
"Would you like me to?" Cedric sounded worried.
"Oh, no!" Harry backtracked, realizing how that sounded. "I'm not a history person myself. But I can see why you find it interesting. I only said that because Hermione likes to use it to rub it in my face that I don't know anything about the magical world." He laughed a bit.
Cedric looked intrigued. "You don't?" he asked, a bit incredulously.
"Nope," Harry said, plopping himself a few feet away from Cedric against the large trunk of the tree. "Didn't even know I was a wizard until I was eleven."
Cedric looked astonished. "That's..."
Harry waved it off, not feeling like explaining at the moment. "My relatives aren't too fond of magic," he said simply.
"Ah," Cedric said, looking like he was having a hard time processing this. "Sorry, I'm not sure how to react to that. I grew up with wizards, so magic to me is like breathing. It's always been around me."
Normally Harry would have gotten a bit jealous over a statement like this, but because it was Cedric, who looked so awkward and a bit bewildered, Harry found himself not minding at all. On the contrary, he excitedly leaned over. "So, you were raised in a wizarding household, right?" he asked eagerly.
"Er... yes," Cedric said, looking vaguely alarmed at the enthusiasm. "Yes, both my parents are magical."
"What's it like?"
Cedric tilted his head, thinking. "Well... normal, I guess. Well, I guess for you not normal—" He stumbled over his words, clearly trying to find the right wording. "What I mean is, I take a Muggle Studies class. With Professor Burbage?" He looked to Harry, who nodded in recognition; Hermione had mentioned the teacher multiple times, praising her for her ability to teach something so foreign so effectively to her students, most of whom had no idea about the Muggle world.
"Yeah, my friend takes that class," Harry said. "She's a Muggle, though, I think she's barmy for taking the class on top of everything else—"
Cedric suddenly grinned. "Granger, right? She's in my class, I ask her questions all the time. Yeah, she's quite the overachiever."
Harry laughed. "Yeah, that's her."
"Yeah. Anyway, before finals we were learning about how Muggle parents raise their children. And it was just... so different. I can't imagine how hard it would be without magic."
"Yeah, but think of all the accidental magic that Wizarding parents have to deal with," Harry said, thinking about the frazzled mother he had seen at St. Mungo's.
Cedric looked surprised. "True, now that I think about it. When I was four, I grabbed my mum's sweeping broom and flew out the window on it because I saw a photo of a Quidditch player in the newspaper." He chuckled awkwardly. "I don't actually remember that, but my parents talk to me about it all the time."
Harry laughed along with him, imagining a little Cedric flying away as his mother frantically chased after him. "You must've been a handful. Well, I guess your Quidditch passion showed up early."
"Actually, my magic showed up late," Cedric said. "I was a really easy kid in terms of magic, apparently, and my parents were so glad. I didn't burn anything up, didn't explode things, wasn't a Metamorphmagus, didn't accidentally hurt anyone... Now that I think about it, I guess that would be normal kid stuff in the Wizarding world because you could just put out fire with a spell or fix stuff with Reparo. Is that harder for Muggle's to deal with?"
For a brief moment, he thought about Neville, poor Neville who's magic also showed up late, yet wasn't considered an "easy kid" but a defect instead, poor Neville who had to be dropped out of a window to have the magic forced out of him.
Harry considered, also for a brief moment, to mention that he was in fact a Metamorphmagus. But he had never told anyone that, not even Draco, and he wasn't really ready to give that up to a virtual stranger, for some reason.
But Harry had never heard Cedric say so many words in one go, and was pleasantly surprised to find how friendly he was. "Yeah, I guess you could say that," he said, thinking about the multitude of times he had accidentally burned the breakfast when Vernon or Petunia would provoke him. He had always assumed he had just overcooked it, but now that he thought about it... food doesn't really spontaneously combust that often, did it? "If you break a plate, you have to throw it away. It's basically unfixable. And you need a lot of water to put out a fire, plus Muggles don't have an Extinguishing Spell or Flame-Freezing Charm so it can be pretty fatal."
Cedric's eyes went wide as he took this in, looking fascinated. "Wow," he said, shaking his head. "That's so cool. Well—I mean—not the fatal part, I mean—"
Harry gave him a smile. "I get it," he said. "That's exactly how I felt about the Wizarding world. It's so different."
"And life still goes on," Cedric said thoughtfully, "Magic or no."
"Yeah," Harry said, a small smile curving his lips as he looked out at the puffy clouds moving slowly past across the cornflower blue sky. "Yeah, that's pretty amazing, isn't it."
Cedric looked over, looking grateful. "Sorry about nerding out about stuff like this. No one really likes it when I talk about Muggle Studies or history."
"Hey, Quidditch history all the way," Harry said. "And honestly? I think Muggle Studies should be a required course for Wizarding students. There are way too many wizards who don't know a single thing about the other five billion minus one million people we share a planet with."
Cedric's eyes again went wide as he nodded enthusiastically. "That's exactly what I say!" he said, but then deflated. "But no one really agrees with me. Most of the other people in the class only take it because they couldn't find any other class that would fit in their timetable."
Vaguely, Harry remembered Draco bragging to him about how he got out of having to take Muggle Studies because his father had pulled some strings and allowed Draco to take a different class under self-study. Now he wondered: was Cedric pureblood? That would be odd, indeed. But the way he spoke, he definitely didn't have a Muggle background.
"They should listen to you," Harry said seriously. "I'm serious, you should bring it up to the Board of Governors or something."
Cedric looked thoughtful. "You know," he said, "That's not a half bad idea. I should at least bring it up to Dumbledore."
Harry was surprised at how quickly Cedric had warmed up to the idea. Given his disposition, Harry would have assumed Cedric was the shy type, nervous about public speaking. "Yeah?" Harry said. "You definitely should, then."
Cedric gave him sheepish smile. "Do you... think you could help me with that, in that case?" he said. "I could use some help. Only if you want to, of course—"
"Sounds fun," Harry said, and was surprised at the fact that it was true. It did sound like fun, going up against the Board of Governors and challenging the norm for a useful cause. "I could probably get Hermione on it... no, scratch that, I can definitely get her onboard with that. She's passionate about this kind of stuff, and she can probably get things done better than I can."
"Sounds good. But all the same... I'd still want you there," Cedric said in a rush, as he stood up clumsily. Looking at him trying to get up, one would never guess he was a star Quidditch Seeker for his House. When he drew himself up, Harry found himself looking up a whole head above him—he had forgotten how much taller the other boy was. Cedric reached out a large but hesitant hand.
"Deal," Harry said, grasping the proffered hand and shook it. It was so rare for a person from another house to look so favorably upon a Slytherin. And although Harry was a sort of exception given his celebrity status, the suspicious looks he was given and the whispers he heard behind his back were always still there. He knew what people said about him: that he was the next Grindewald, the next Voldemort. But Cedric didn't seem to care about any of that, that he was a Slytherin or the superhero who defeated Voldemort.
For a moment, they smiled at each other.
And then Harry felt eyes on him. It was a small, subtle feeling, but present all the same. He turned around to see Dumbledore, a mere silhouette at the entrance of the Great Hall, who raised his hand slightly.
"Huh," Harry said. "Weird. You think that's for me?"
"Well, it's definitely not for me," Cedric said. "I can't think of anything I've done wrong."
"And you're saying I have?" Harry joked.
"Well, with all the trouble you've caused in this school over the past three years, I think I'm justified in thinking that," Cedric joked back. He raised a hand in casual farewell as Harry joggged away.
"Remind me to get your address before school's out," Harry called over his shoulder. For a moment, he saw Cedric's face shift, like the sun breaking out of the clouds.
And then he was at the Great Hall, and Dumbledore smiled down at him.
"Come," he said. "We have much to talk about."
a/n: well well.... whatever will happen to poor draco?
anyway it's my birthday!! went around town today with my friend, got some cool rings, and decided to bang out another chapter lol hope you guys enjoyed!
edit: because orionmoony requested haha here are the rings and also the story behind it because it's cute
i have a turtle necklace that my friend got for my sweet sixteen 3 years ago because when i was little, i used to call myself turtle in japanese (kame) and everyone called me that for years, so i love this necklace
and then yesterday i wasn't planning on getting rings since nothing fit and my friend (who got me the necklace) was the one who wanted them anyway... but then i found the ONLY two rings that fit me were a moon phase one and a turtle one
the turtle was important to me for obvious reasons, but the moon phases are too because i absolutely loved my earth science class and i love all things space (would love to work for nasa one day but i aint smart enough for that)
and so we approached the lady of this tiny antique store and she says softly "hello ladies, have you found treasures?
and idk it was the most perfect and pure interaction it was just wonderful lol
and just for funsies here are my other favorite rings