"Don't worry about it -"
"No, seriously. You and Professor Adams have been very kind to me. No one else really is. I appreciate it."
"Would you have ever imagined, back when we had Snape, that you'd be out here doing extra credit potions work, for fun!" Harry joked. But Neville did not fall for his trap to lessen the seriousness of the conversation. Instead, he tugged on another batch of gillyweed and jarred it. His shoulders heaved and he turned to face Harry with a very intense expression out of place on the boy's usual timid demeanor.
"And I never thanked you for the other thing. For… for Lestrange."
Harry ducked his head down to stare at the water.
"What do you mean?"
"Bellatrix Lestrange. She's dead. I've never told you, but she - she hurt my parents. Tortured them to insanity. That's the reason she was in Azkaban in the first place. How did she die? Was it you or Sirius Black?"
"It - it wasn't Sirius. But it wasn't - "
"Harry."
Harry looked up. Neville still had that intense expression.
"Did she suffer?" His voice cracked at the last word.
"Yes," Harry whispered. "It wasn't me. But I - I know who - and it was violent. She suffered a great deal, Neville. All the dead in Azkaban did."
"Good." Neville plucked another gillyweed as though they were merely discussing the weather.
"You don't care?" Harry asked. Of all people - nervous, bleeding-heart Neville - but no, he didn't look the part now. Neville's expression was twisted, serious.
"About what? That you're a Dark Lord in training? You're going to fight You-Know-Who, aren't you? I don't care what it takes or how you do it. The Death Eaters liked to torture innocent people, they left children orphaned. They didn't care that either of us were infants."
"I'm not a Dark Lord in training," was all Harry could say.
"What are you, then?"
"Someone forced into this mess against his will."
Harry sat in the water. His jeans rubbed and weighed down against his legs. The water was cold and he welcomed the shivering. Alive - he was alive. He dug his fingers into the thick sandy mud and words tumbled from his lips.
Voldemort. Tournaments. Ministries. Horcruxes. Death. Pressure weighing down harder and more suffocating than the weight of his bloated clothing. That was the problem. Harry was drowning and his head hadn't even gone under the water yet.
"Damn. That's pretty shitty," Neville said once Harry had run out of words. "I'm not sure what to say. I hadn't guessed the necromancy part. Huh. That makes a lot of sense, looking back…" he trailed off, pensive.
"I'm not sure why I told you."
"I think you needed to let it out. That's - that's a lot. You have every right to be scared."
"I'm not scared!"
"I mean, you probably should be. It's not a bad thing, Harry. I'm scared, and I'm not even you." Neville sighed and slowly dragged his feet over to where Harry was sitting. They watched the thick clouds move over the sun streaking reds and oranges across the darkening sky. "At the World Cup… I was terrified. I've told you what I experienced. I thought they would come after me and my grandmother, that they would torture me just like they did to -" He stopped, letting loose a heavy sigh that revealed maturity well beyond his years and demeanor.
The boy continued. "I guess they thought they could distract us with this tournament. Like we'd all forget about the horrors that we witnessed. But nothing can hide the truth, can it? He's trying to return. We might have another war. And you'll have to fight several battles at once. Pah! They think they distract us with extra Quidditch games and dancing, but we aren't really children anymore, are we?"
They made their way to dinner.
Harry wasn't sure what prompted him to unload his heart to Neville but he felt better. Tired, like he'd taken a long jog, but calm for the first time in a while.
They entered the Great Hall at the tail-end of dinner. The entire Gryffindor table was absent. Harry turned to Neville in confusion when he made eye contact with Alabasandria at the high table. Sitting next to her was Sirius and Harry felt his face flush in embarrassment.
Nope! He did not want to talk to either of them. He dragged Neville from the hall before either adult could speak to him.
They headed up instead to Gryffindor Tower. The noise emanating from within could be heard from a floor away. The Fat Lady couldn't hear them shouting the password over the noise but she let them in regardless. There was a riotous party unfolding. Someone (probably the twins) had set up flashing rave lights and the thumping bass of wizard metal music pounded off the walls. There were clumsily arranged streamers and decor in red and gold strewn across every surface.
"What's the occasion?" Harry shouted at Lavender who was manning the punch bowl.
"You! Ron and Hermione seemed worried about you. They said you disappeared after lunch. George suggested we cheer you up since you missed the last party the night you got chosen. And well… that one was kinda a bummer. It was tense, I'll say. This one will be much better. Here, have some punch. Fred put a lot of Dragon's Breath Vodka in it."
Harry took a cup. It was filled to the brim. He took a hesitant sip and gagged at the sharp taste. Mama had let him sip some firewhiskey once, and he'd almost vomited. This wasn't much better even if it was watered down with a citrus punch. Neville laughed nervously as he took his own cup.
"Won't we get in trouble?" He shouted.
"Oh c'mon! Will McGonagall give all of us detention? Besides, I'm keeping guard. We have a strict third-year and up limit for drinking. We're being very safe."
Harry shrugged, appeased, and took a larger sip. Neville gagged as he tried his drink.
"Here, cheers." They toasted their cups. "As you said, I guess we aren't kids anymore!"
The rest of the night was a blur. He ran into his friends at some point. He gave Ron a big hug and when Hermione asked why he was half covered in wet mud, he didn't remember why that was so. Harry was a giggly drunk. He couldn't stop laughing. Everything was incredibly funny. One of the Weasleys (they'd morphed together in Harry's mind) was dancing on a table and Harry just watched them and giggled like an idiot for a while.
He felt similar to the high he got from ritualistic murder, just without the murder part. Carefree, lightheaded - although more clumsy than powerful.
Things got chaotic and out of control at record speed. The twins unleashed some experimental fireworks that blinded most of the partygoers and resulted in someone tripping over someone's cat - Alicia's or Katie's maybe. Harry hadn't known, he didn't keep track of people's animals. The point being, that there was a dead cat and the vibe was soured. Harry, who needless to say, was absolutely shitfaced, grabbed the dead cat by its tail, slurred out something incomprehensible, and promptly brought the thing back to life.
This would have been a stupid thing to do had everyone else not also been shitfaced, because instead of panicking, everyone cheered and got right back at it. (Poor Alicia however, would forever be confused by the odd behavior of her cat who suddenly required no food and spent most of its time staring at things it could not see, as still and silent as a ghost.)
"You know I love you, right Hermione?" Harry sobbed. He reached over to pat Hermione's hair. Hermione, who was actually Luna, but with no idea what an appropriate amount of alcohol was, and thus convinced that she was actually Hermione and not, in fact, Luna, sniffled and hugged Harry.
"I love you too," she sobbed. "You're my best friend, you know. I'm so happy!" She wept because she wondered if all the creatures in the forest were happy too. Did the Thestrals require more snacks? Should she start knitting scarves for the House Elves? Luna had so much love to give and so few arms with which to dish out said love. God, she wished she had more arms. "Harry, do you know a spell to give me more arms? So I can pet all the creatures of the woods?"
"Of course I do," said Harry, though he did not. "That's the best idea I've ever heard, Hermione."
Luckily, this was the moment the prefects decided that enough was enough and they were saved from whatever abomination Harry was about to create.
Harry was not going to get up the stairs to his dorm without dying, so he sat down where he was standing - in the middle of everyone scurrying around him - and bundled up to sleep right there on the floor. Luna, who was not sure how she'd even gotten to this common room, let alone how to return to hers, sat down next to him. Neville tripped over Harry and did not bother trying to get back up, snoring as he laid down, face buried into the carpet. Ron and Hermione found them after the party had finally dispersed, and shrugged and joined them too. Sleeping on an alcohol-soaked floor was hardly comfortable, but it was a little more so as the friends wiggled around like spaghetti to form a cuddle pile.
And that was how McGonagall found them the next morning. A pile of tangled limbs spread across the floor surrounded by an absolute pigsty and an unholy amount of empty liquor bottles.
....
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