Chapter 03 - End of Year Reunion

The two men were walking down the empty corridors talking quietly. Today marked the end of the exams season, and while everyone was longing for the end-of-year feast, there were still N.E.W.T. and O.W.L. examinations underway for fifth and seventh-year students. Being the culprit of causing some sort of distraction that could lead a student to lose some points was something neither was willing to risk.

"Oh," blurted Harry, "I forgot to tell you that Teddy and Victoire are joining us for lunch on Sunday. You don't mind, do you?"

"Not at all. I'll tell Hannah," said Neville smiling.

"Thanks." with a sigh of relief, "Ginny would jinx me. I've told her two weeks ago I would tell, but it slipped my mind."

"That would be a laugh," suggested Neville. "The Daily Prophet would have a field day with that one. "Top Ministry Official involved in domestic scandal" or "Has Former Chosen One Harry Potter lost his abilities?"

They both laughed a little too heartily and were frowned upon by three elderly witches on a portrait stirring a cauldron under a full moon, or what the artist of portrait thought was a full moon, and was strangely similar to a stilton cheese ball enlarged and slightly crooked.

"I've endured worse from them, and it would be better to be on the news because my wife hexed me than because the wizarding world thinks I'm a brain-addled deranged teenager."

They stopped at the door of Gryffindor's Common Room. None of them had set out for this particular location when they started walking. They've just wandered through the corridors, side by side, steadily drawing near that place as if that was the obvious destination. Harry couldn't remember wanting to go there. He had avoided going there all year. But there he was. And it was his feet, if not his brain, that led him here.

"Have you been inside yet?" Neville asked, fully aware of the answer.

"Not really. I've... never found the time with all the classes and keeping up with work at the Ministry," Harry stumbled to justify.

Neville understood. He knew what Harry was feeling. The excitement mingled with anticipation and dread that he had experienced before.

"It's ok. I get it. It took me three years before I gather the courage to go inside."

He let Harry have a moment and then continued:

"Want to go in? If you don't, that's fine; we can..."

"No." interrupted Harry. "Let's enter."

They stood in front of the Fat Lady portrait while she pretended to be interested in what was happening in some empty landscape portraits on the other side of the hall. She was doing an awful job of ignoring them. Harry grinned.

"Hum hum." Neville coughed. "Can we come in?"

"Oh, sorry, I didn't see you there." said the Fat Lady in a high-pitched surprised voice.

"You're always welcome here Pro-fes-sor Longbottom." she continued stressing Neville´s position while ignoring Harry. "But I'm afraid that the Gryffindor Common Room is under restrict access only to Gryffindor' students and respective Head of House, as is Hogwarts rules. You may enter. But I'm afraid your friend must stay outside." she politely smiled at Harry with a triumphant gleam on her eyes.

"Well... Harry's a Gryffindor, and I'm Head of House, and he's with me, so there's no problem with that," Neville told her politely.

"I'm sorry, but rules are rules. I'm a Hogwarts' portrait, and as so, I'm bound to defend the entrance and secrets of Gryffindor's common room from other houses and strangers". She made a point in saying the last word as if throwing a punch at Harry.

"He's no stranger!" said Neville indignantly. "He's Harry Potter. I doubt there's a more highly regarded Gryffindor than him, aside from Godric Gryffindor and Albus Dumbledore."

Harry almost burst out laughing, seeing the game the Fat Lady was playing. She was annoyed at him for not visiting her all year. He decided to play along with her.

"That's ok, Neville," he said in a friendly tone. "She probably doesn't remember me with all the students she's seen throughout the years. Or maybe Sir Cadogan was right about her after all," he whispered to Neville in a really loud way so that the Fat Lady could clearly hear what was said.

"And what has that sycophantic buffoon has been saying about me?" she burst out, with her eyes bulging and her nostrils flaring. "He´s he telling lies again about my... my little indiscretions with Violet? Because that was ages ago, and it wasn't that..."

"Oh no, nothing of the sort." Harry told her, "He was just telling us how you're getting old and can't do a proper job because you forget things. Which he says it's natural at your age..." Harry was stopped mid-sentence by the angry retort of the Fat Lady.

"Old? I'm old? He's the one dressed like a walking trash can and calls me old? I'm the one who can't do my job, while he can't even mount that fat pony of his without shoving his face on the ground? And he as the nerve to call me old?" Her face was red with anger, and her hands curled in fists.

"And you," she burst in Harry's direction, "I know perfectly well who you are, Mr. Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived, The Chosen One." Her eyes were now so narrow it was hard to see them. "I remember very well who you are. I remember every time you sneaked at the dead of night to wander the corridors out of hours making some mischief."

"But apparently," she continued with a tone of sarcasm, "famous Mr. Potter is the one who forgot that he's a Gryffindor and decided he's too important to pay a visit to his old common room and... to me" she crossed her arms, turned her face way sounding hurt.

Harry knew this was the thing that was bothering her. The fact that he didn't visit this place once all year was why she was acting like a spoiled child who didn't get what she wanted from her parents.

"Caput Draconis!" Harry said softly. She was taken by surprise and forgot to act as if she was angry with him.

"That was the first password we used in my first year. Of course, I remember. But I'm a teacher now." he explained to her like. He adopted the same tone of voice he used to explain to Lilly that she had to wait a little longer to go to school with her elder brothers. "I can't just go around and enter my old house dormitories. People will say I'm playing favorites. And my daughter is in Gryffindor. It would be awkward for both of us if I just showed up while she was with her friends, or with..." He didn't finish the sentence.

"I understand," she said with a sigh. "Of course, you can't go entering students' dormitories at will unless you're the Head of House. But I was hoping you'd visit me anyway."

"You're right. I should've come sooner. I'm sorry".

And, as Harry knew it would, the apology worked like a charm. The Fat Lady smiled, winked, and revealed the hidden entrance.

"Go on. Enter," she told them.

"Thanks," said Harry. But he stood there, looking at the entrance without moving. His shoes felt like they were magically filled with lead, and he couldn't, for all his might, forced them to move. Not that he was really trying. He just stood there remembering all the times he had passed through that door before. They felt like a lifetime away. They were a lifetime away.

"Come on," said Neville pushing him slightly. "It's easier if you just do it. The longer you stand there, the harder it will be to force yourself to entry."

He climbed through the door, and, after a deep breath, Harry followed.

Harry didn't know what he had expected. He didn't even know if the familiarity of the room was comforting or slightly distressing. It felt as if the two decades that passed failed to materialize themselves in the old common room. He and Ron wrestled younger students from these same armchairs, and the mantlepiece where he talked with Sirius was still the same. Everything was the same. Yet... there was something not quite right in the room. Something that he couldn't quite grasp what it was. He felt like a stranger there. Like this was not his common room.

That was odd. He spent six years there. Six happy years, for the most of it. This had been his first real home. And it felt as he had just left it a minute ago. Just like he had just come back inside after realizing he forgot his potions book on his way to class. But in the tiny fraction he spent outside of it, the room has changed itself, while, confusing as it sounded, staying the same. Everything was in the right places, but the room's feeling was not one he recognized anymore. Not one he felt comfortable with.

But "this is not MY common room," he thought for himself. No Ron is munching over a chocolate frog, no Hermione's over a stack of books trying to get full marks on another homework, nor Fred and George creating another raucous experience and making everyone laugh...

It was only him and Neville there. But they weren't the same lost kids that were trying to fit in the wizarding world. One to famous without knowing why. The other not sure he was supposed to be there, to begin with. They were two grown men trying to relieve a little bit of that youthful joy that made them feel like they were a part of something. They've outgrown the common room. It belonged now to a new generation of Gryffindors that were trying to live their own stories. It has passed on.

"It's weird, isn't it?" Asked Neville.

Harry didn't answer, but his looks told everything.

"It's the same, but not really if you know what I mean," continued Neville. "It's like we're on the outside looking in."

"Yeah..." Harry muttered, going close to the window and looking to the grounds. An owl passed over the tree line of the Forbidden Forest. Harry could've sworn it was white as snow, but probably just a trick of the light.

"Shall we go then?" Asked Neville. "The exams should be over in 10 minutes, and we want to get to Hagrid's before being bombarded by students anguishing about the answers they gave in question 7 or something of the sort".

Harry half-smiled, nodded, and followed Neville through the entrance hole. They silently made their way to the castle's grounds. There was a light breeze from the lake that softened the heat of the day. Harry saw a large tentacle emerging from the water, and students, free of exams, relaxing by the lake. He was reminded of summer days, much like the one he spent with Ron and Hermione near the lake ages ago.

Hagrid's hut's familiar path was now home to a white marble cenotaph shining in the sunlight. Its marble shinned as if it was encrusted with small diamonds that reflected the sunlight as thousands of rainbow beams across the grounds. A trick of the light that was as good as any enchantment in Harry's opinion. The cenotaph comprised four perfectly cut blocks of rectangular marble, vertically stacked on top of each other, each slightly smaller than the previous one. These rested above three large horizontal ones, forming three small steps. At the top, there was a white tomb that represented the resting place of the fallen.

On each side of the monument stood the banners of the four houses, testifying Hogwarts' unity in mourning. On both tops, the crest of Hogwarts was carved within a head of laurels, on top of which the following was written:

Battle of Hogwarts

May 2, 1998

Below the crest, more words were engraved, filling almost all of the lower block. The greater block of words read:

Remember

the Dead who fell

so you might

Live in freedom.

These words were followed by a list of about 50 names and dates that Harry knew by heart. He read them nonetheless, lingering more on some names than on others as they stirred some deep-rooted memories:

Collin Creevey 1981 - 1998

Fred Weasley 1978 - 1998

Lavender Brown 1979 - 1998

Nymphadora Tonks 1972 - 1998

Remus Lupin 1960 - 1998

Severus Snape 1960 - 1998

Harry stood there, hands in his pockets, rooted to the floor, eyes fixed on the names in front of him, but his mind gazing into memories that, painful as they might be, still brought comfort and some happiness. He couldn't quite describe the feeling if he was asked. He wasn't sure if it was sorrow mingled with joy or happiness tainted by melancholy.

"Potter! Longbottom!"

Harry froze. The voice had jerked him out of his numbness and made him stand fully alert. Even after all these years, it made him feel like he had done something wrong and was about to be told off. He turned to the doors of the castle and saw Professor McGonagall, slowly walking towards him, supported in a cane, but with the same expression, she wore when he first met her, on his very first day at school. Even using a cane to better move herself, she still seemed like someone you wouldn't want to cross.

He remembered he was a teacher, and surely- why, surely - he wasn't about to be told off by his former Head of House. He looked sideways to Neville and was both amused and apprehensive when he saw that his arms were stiff as boards, and he was shuffling his feet a little nervously. Professor McGonagall got nearer, and Harry relaxed as he saw a little smile on her eyes.

"Hello, Professor," they both said at almost the same time.

"So, Potter, how was your teaching experience?" she asked with a tone of something of amusement in her voice.

"It was... uh... fine, I guess," Harry said, not sure if this was the kind of answer expected by the former Head of Auror Office, current Head of Magical Law Enforcement, and guest professor of Defence Against the Dark Arts at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

"Fine? You guess?" continued McGonagall, clearly amused by his awkwardness.

"Well..." he continued, still not sure what he was about to say. "it was a challenge. It's different to plan a whole year of lessons than it is to prepare a single lecture. And keeping students interested in the subject and properly behaving, certainly is hard."

"I'm glad you appreciate how hard it is for teachers."

"So, Professor, how did the exams go?" he asked, trying to sound calm.

"Fine, I guess," answered McGonagall with a small grin.

Harry smiled back. "I was wondering..." he started before being unceremoniously interrupted by his old teacher.

"I'm not going to tell you what marks Albus got." She said bluntly. "But" she continued seeing his expression, "you need not worry. He did well. Very well indeed. Just like Ms. Potter did on her OWLs examination this morning".

Harry grinned in relief.

"Thank Merlin they took out for the women's side of the family," McGonagall said.

"What?" said Harry dumbfounded. Neville snorted.

"Potter, you were always a gifted student but never worked hard enough to meet your potential. Ginny, and your mother, on the other hand, we're not only gifted but hard-working. Like your kids. Well, at least these two." she said with a hint of both amusement and annoyance. "Your eldest son clearly he is more like you, and even more like your father and your godfather. You did name him right". Harry chuckled.

"I hear he followed his uncle's example and pursued a career as curse breaker. Am I right?" asked McGonagall.

"Yes. They're in Peru right now. Bill thinks that the legend of the Fountain of Eternal Youth means there's a Philosopher's Stone somewhere hidden in the Amazon jungle." Harry explained, not entirely concealing his pride and a little bit of jealousy, on his eldest son's adventure.

"Hum... well, Mr. Weasley always seemed eager to put himself in unnecessary danger even while at school, so that doesn't surprise me". Harry couldn't quite understand how much of her tone was of disapproval and how much was of pride.

"In any case," she continued, "I'm glad to see you teaching Potter. I think it was about time you let others chase dark wizards and do your part in educating younger generations." She smiled at him.

"Well, I know I've said several times before, but I really would like to have a quiet life from now on."

"You and me, Potter," McGonagall added. "I think that three generations of Potters and Weasleys are more than enough to earn a quiet retirement."

"You won't come back, Professor?" asked Neville, slightly alarmed.

"Oh no, Longbottom. This was my last N.E.W.T. examination. I notified the Ministry six months ago that I'm going to retire for good this time after this. I'm getting too old for this." the old teacher sounded tired.

"You're not old," blurted Harry. "And no one knows more than you about Transfiguration."

McGonagall smiled gently.

"Your parents would be proud of the man you become." She added with a glint of emotion in her eyes.

"I like to think so." Harry confided in a small voice.

"I know they would. I'm proud of you. Of both of you!" she added, looking intently to Neville. "You lot really turned out alright."

The pride in her voice was unmistakable this time, and Harry was reminded of the time she proudly confronted Amycus in Ravenclaw´s tower. Neville looked like he had been smacked in the face by the Whomping Willow.

Professor McGonagall said them farewell and took the path towards the gates and out of Hogwarts for the last time.