Yawning Harry reached for a new parchment. He was sitting in the library, working on an essay for Professor Sinistra, and thought it was not very late he was tired. Slytherin had won their match against Ravenclaw, which meant that Gryffindor was still in the run for the quidditch trophy, and Wood now had the whole team training five evenings a week. With his anti-dementor lessons that left Harry one evening a week to do his homework.

The text of the book was growing blurry in front of his eyes and he rubbed his eyes tiredly. How he longed to just go to bed early for once! But he really had to finish this essay, because it was due tomorrow, and Sinistra would not be happy with him if he did not turn it in.

-          “Can I sit here?”

Surprised Harry looked up, spotting Ian standing not far away. The other boy gestured for an empty chair at the other end of the small table Harry occupied. A quick look around told him that all the other tables were full.

-          “Ok,” Harry shrugged. “Just don’t bother me.”

-          “Thanks. I won’t.”

With that Ian sat down and spread his own books. Harry wearily watched his half-brother from the corner of his eye. He knew very well that Ian disliked him, the memory of the previous summer still fresh in his mind. Ian had gotten him in trouble before and he hoped this was not some sort of scheme to get Harry in trouble again.

For the next hour and a half they sat silently, working on their respective assignments. They didn’t speak and they barely looked at each other. It was unnerving, being so close to someone who disliked you that much.

In his first year, when he first found out that he had a father that was alive and even a younger brother, Harry had been curious about Ian and wanting to get to know the other boy. However he had realized quickly enough that his feelings were not returned.

After another hour Harry had finished his essay and decided to head back to the common room. He still had an essay to write for History of Magic but since he had already done his research for that he could finish it in the common room.

Two days later, when Harry was sitting in the library during lunch, Ian once again showed up. This time there were plenty of empty tables for him to choose from but even so he took a seat by the end of Harry’s table. Harry watched his half-brother discretely but did not say anything.

HPHPHPHPHPHP

-          “I believe that we last left off with it being your turn to ask a question, Mr. Potter.”

-          “Yes sir.”

Swirling his tea in the tea cup Harry tried to think of a question to ask. He had thought a lot about this game of Snape’s during the last week and come up with some questions that he wanted to ask. That said he had still not been sure that he had not imagined it all until he walked into the office ten minutes ago and saw that the tea pot and the little bottle of truth serum were there again.

-          “What was she like? My mother?” he asked.

From the corner of his eye he could see Snape sipping from his tea thoughtfully.

It still felt unreal to be talking to Snape like this; to be able to ask the man questions about his mother and not be rebuked for it. Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon had never allowed him to ask too many questions and his parents had always been a forbidden topic. What little he knew of them he had mostly been told by others, like Hagrid. Yet his mother remained a stranger to him.

-          “Lily was … a genuinely kind person. She always had a very strong sense of right and wrong and always strived to do what was right. She was smart, a very talented witch, and brave.”

Harry tried to imagine his mother like the person Snape was describing. Young, like on the picture Snape had given him, yet kind, righteous, smart and brave. It made him feel a little warm inside, hearing her described like that. She must have been a very good person for Snape to describe her like that, when he didn’t like anyone other than Ian.

But then he remembered that she had cheated on her husband and thereby conceived him. It was like stormy clouds gathering to cover an otherwise sunny sky. The happiness he had felt quickly faded. His mother may have been all of that but she had obviously also been an unfaithful liar. Had his father, James Potter that is, even known that the child his wife gave birth to was not his own?

-          “What made you upset?”

Snape’s voice was surprisingly gentle. Harry felt like he was going to cry. His Aunt and Uncle had always told him that his mother and father had been worthless freaks. Stubbornly he had held on to a hope that they had not been, a hope that had been fulfilled when Hagrid told him the truth. Now it seemed that his mother had been far from the nice person Harry had always imagined. Why hadn’t he thought of this before? Already in his first year he had been told how he had been conceived but it wasn’t until now that it hurt.

-          “Nothing,” he snarled, trying to get mad so that he would not cry.

-          “Now drink some of your tea and answer the question again,” Snape said, raising an eyebrow.

This patient Snape did nothing to make it easier on him not to cry. If anything it just made him want to cry more, because his mother was a lying cheater and his biological father was Snape! What did that say about him?

Angrily he looked up to meet Snape’s gaze, ready tell the man exactly where he could put his stupid tea, but while Snape’s tone may have been gentle and patient enough before, the expression in his face was enough to make Harry close his mouth again. It wasn’t worth it. Snape would kill him if he said any of the things running through his mind at the moment.

Instead he did as he had been told and carefully sipped the warm tea. It settled warmly in his stomach and, surprisingly enough, took some of the hurt and anger away. He recalled that Snape had said, that first and last time he heard the man speak of it, that his mother had been inebriated. James had been missing and thought dead and his mother had most likely sought support from her childhood friend.

-          “Now, what made you upset?” Snape repeated.

-          “I don’t know,” Harry shrugged. “It’s just …”

With a sigh he struggled to find the right words. Snape didn’t say anything to hurry him on but Harry still suspected that the man was moments away from yelling at him for procrastination. And saying that he did not know was not enough. While not a complete lie it was not completely truthful either and the truth serum would not accept lies.

-          “What you said … about my mom …”

-          “I gathered that much. What I don’t understand is why it would upset you. I have nothing but good things to say about Lily.”

-          “Well, that’s kind of the thing.”

-          “What do you mean?”

Snape’s forehead wrinkled as he tried to make sense of what Harry was saying. Harry on the other hand struggled to make sense of his own thoughts and formulate them into words. What did he mean?

Putting the tea cup away he pushed his hands through his hair, unaware that his adoptive father had made the gesture quite often in his youth.

-          “When you describe her like that,” he said slowly, thoughts slowly lining up in his mind as he spoke, “it kind of makes her sound like a … saint or something.”

-          “And … why is that bothering you?” Snape wondered, confusion seeping through in his voice.

-          “Because,” Harry tried to explain, gesturing weakly with his hands. “She can’t have been all of that.”

A moment of silence followed at his words. Harry did not look at Snape but at a spot somewhere a bit to the left of the man’s chest.

-          “She was,” Snape told him then. “She was all of those things and then some more. She was a wonderful woman; loving and kind and loyal and …”

-          “No,” Harry interrupted, shaking his head. “She can’t have been.”

-          “Why not?”

-          “Because, if she really was all of that … then I wouldn’t be here, would I?”

HPHPHPHP

Confounded Snape looked at the boy sitting in front of him. In a matter of minutes the boy had gone from nervous to dreamy to sadness to hurt to anger to confusion and then now to positively radiating vulnerability. He didn’t understand it. Why had his description of Lily affected the boy so? It wasn’t as if he had badmouthed her.

If she really was all of that, then I wouldn’t be here, would I? The words hung between them, Potter tensely waiting to see what Snape would make of them. But Snape did not understand them. What did the boy mean? If Lily really had been all of those things he had just said she was, then Potter wouldn’t have been there? It made no sense! Lily had been all of what he had said and then some, so good was she!

Was it something Petunia had said? Had she fed the boy some lie about his mother, vehemently feeding off of whatever had drove her and her sister apart so many years ago? No, that didn’t make sense either. Potter wasn’t even mentioning his aunt.

-          “She cheated on my dad.”

The words were spoken so silently he almost missed them. It took him a moment to progress their meaning. Meanwhile Potter seemed to be sinking into himself, almost disappearing in the chair he was occupying. Snape’s mind was spinning like mad.

Cheated, Potter said. She always had a very strong sense of right and wrong, wasn’t that what he had said, just minutes ago? Somehow Potter must have connected that to Snape’s re-telling of how he was conceived (and how he regretted his brusque manner now).

-          “She thought he was dead,” he heard himself say. “She was grieving and she had been drinking. Had she been in her right mind she never would have cheated on James.”

Little knives of pain pierced his heart as he admitted it out loud. Lily never would have chosen him had she been herself. He was just her comfort when she thought that her first choice was dead. However that was not what was important right now. What mattered was that her son was sitting in front of him doubting his mother’s character because of the simple fact that he had been conceived.

Potter still did not say anything but continued to look much too vulnerable for Snape’s comfort. How was it that the idiotic troublemaker suddenly looked like he would fall apart if Snape said something wrong?

What was he supposed to say? What should he do?

-          “Lily is the best woman I have ever known,” he admitted, not knowing what else he could do, “but she was not perfect. No one is without faults. She should not be judged based upon what she did that one night.”

He meant what he said and hoped that Potter would understand that much. While he himself was hurt that she had never told him that they had a child together he still loved her deeply. After all, he had hurt her many times and yet it had been him that she chose to seek comfort with.

Slowly Potter seemed to pull himself together; if it was from what Snape had said or not, Snape did not know, but the boy straightened a little in his chair and looked less vulnerable.

-          “If you wish to, I believe it is your turn to ask a question,” Snape said almost hesitantly.

For a moment it seemed as if Potter had not even heard him, then the boy lifted his head a little.

-          “What … uh … What was her favorite subject?”

-          “She was a very good student and was on top of all of most of her classes. Potions especially were her forte though I believe it was Charms that she enjoyed the most.”

The answer came easily enough. It was clear that they were now back to asking less personal questions. Snape was not about to object. He had seen a side of his son today that he had never seen before.

-          “What is your least favorite subject, Mr. Potter?” Snape asked evenly.

-          “Divination, I think.”

Their session did not last much longer after that. Potter was still obviously uncomfortable, twisting in his chair and refusing to meet Snape’s eyes, and Snape had no reason to force the boy to stay.

HPHPHPHPHPHP

Professor Lupin grasped the lid of the packing case placed upon Professor Binn’s desk and pulled, quickly stepping away as it fell open. Slowly the Boggart Dementor rose from the box. The hooded face turned towards Harry and a glistening, scabbed hand grabbed the dark cloak. The lamps in the otherwise empty classroom flickered and then went out.

Silently the Dementor swept towards Harry. It drew a deep, rattling breath and a wave of piercing cold broke over Harry.

-          “Expecto patronum!” Harry yelled, pointing his wand at the dementor. “Expecto Patronum!”

He tried to do as Lupin had told him, to focus on a very happy memory. It worked, at least a little, because the silvery shadow of his Patronus was coming out of his wand, halting the dementor. The cold kept coming over him in waves and made it hard to focus on happy memories. His Patronus faded away and the Dementor moved forward again.

-           “Expecto … Expecto …”

Around him the classroom and even the Dementor was dissolving. He felt like he was falling and around him there was a thick, white fog from which he could hear his mother’s desperate voice.

-          “Not Harry! Not Harry! Please …”

Next thing he knew he was lying flat on his back on the floor and Professor Lupin was leaning over him. The lamps were once again lit and he cursed to himself. He had done it again!

-          “Here,” Lupin said, handing him a chocolate frog.

-          “Thanks,” Harry said, accepting it gratefully.

Sitting up he took a bite from the frog. Cold sweat was trickling down his back.

-          “That’s very good Harry!” Lupin said. “Very good indeed!”

-          “I didn’t manage to hold it off,” Harry commented.

-          “But you made it pause for a moment and that’s a very good start, Harry!”

It wasn’t good enough though, Harry thought as he stuffed the rest of the frog into his mouth and stood up again. If he wanted to be able to defend himself against the Dementors he would have to do a lot better.

-          “Another go?” he asked, looking at Lupin.

-          “I think you’ve had enough for tonight. Eat some more chocolate and then you should return to your dormitory and get some sleep.”

He wanted to object but also knew that Lupin was right. They had been at it for a while now and this was not the first time Harry passed out.

Lupin gave him a chocolate bar and Harry sat down to eat it while Lupin stuffed away the packing case.

-          “How are things going for you otherwise, Harry? I’ve heard your quiddich captain has you busy training most evenings?”

-          “Yeah. It’s Wood’s last year and he really wants us to win the cup.”

-          “Are you managing to keep up with your homework?”

-          “Sort of. I take every chance I’ve got to study.”

-          “Yes, I heard that you’d been spending a lot of time in the library lately.”

Curiously Harry glanced at the professor, wondering why the man was asking him these questions. Then again, it was nice to have someone just ask him how he was doing without having any ulterior motive.

-          “And, how are things between you and Professor Snape?”

-          “I don’t know,” Harry shrugged. “Why do you ask?”

-          “I heard you two have been spending some time together every weekend.”

-          “Ah, that. After Sirius Black broke into the school Dumbledore forced us to … meet, every week. Thought I might need it or something.”

-          “Dumbledore forced it?”

-          “Yeah. It’s not like we’d ever spend any time together if we didn’t have to.”

At the sad look that appeared on Lupin’s face Harry kind of regretted his words.

-          “That bad, is it?” Lupin wondered.

-          “No … Not really, “Harry admitted. “I mean, at first it was, but lately he’s been … acting weird.”

Lupin raised an eyebrow and Harry tried to explain himself.

-          “Well, at first it was more like detention that anything else. He had me write all these essays about werewolves and yelled at me if it wasn’t good enough.”

Since Harry was looking down at his hands when he spoke he did not see the strange expression passing over Lupin’s face at the mentioning of werewolves.

-          “But the last couple of weeks he’s been almost … nice. Not nice-nice of course, I don’t even know if he knows how to be nice, but he’s been less mean, you know? He’s even let me ask him questions about my mom and everything.”

-          “Your mother?”

-          “Yeah. I don’t know that much about her really but Snape’s been telling me about her.”

There was a strange expression on Lupin’s face. Harry did not know what it meant but a moment later it was gone.

-          “If you want to I could tell you what I know about her as well,” Lupin offered.

-          “You knew her?”

-          “We were in the same house and in the same year. I spent most of my time with your father, James, but I’d say I know a thing or two about her, yes.”

-          “I’d like that,” Harry said.

-          “Then I’ll tell you, sometime. Now however it is getting late and you’d better get back to your common room before curfew. Wouldn’t want to get in trouble, would we?”

With a smile on his face Harry returned to the Gryffindor common room. Suddenly there were two people offering to tell him about his mother, and he didn’t even think that Lupin would demand anything in return!