Standing and moving to the doorway of the lab, he spotted Draco stirring something in a small cauldron on a countertop.

"Is Professor Snape out again?"

Draco looked up. "Out running errands."

Harry nodded. The man was out of the shop a lot. Harry would have thought that he would have been there watching Draco make potions to be sure he didn't screw anything up. Or maybe that was just what he did when Gryffindors were in his class.

"What are you making?"

"Moonfruit."

Harry walked over to look into the cauldron from the other side of the counter. "What's that?"

"Once I add moon leaf and powdered asphodel it will congeal and turn into big solid globs. It tastes like grape and mint and gives you extra power temporarily."

"Why haven't I heard of it before?"

"It's expensive. Moon leaf is only found once a year way up in the mountains in North America. And there's a lot of werewolves out there, so it's dangerous to collect under the full moon in June."

"Oh."

"Watch." Draco dumped a small bowl of minced leaves into the cauldron, followed quickly by a small phial of white powder. The mixture in the cauldron turned purple, and turned into globs as promised, as Draco stirred.

"Who buys this stuff?" Harry had been out of the loop for quite a while now, and was a little wary of whether or not there were still death eaters loose and how many.

"Aurors from the ministry mostly. Healers sometimes to help patients who are weak."

Draco picked up a solid glob that still jiggled like jello, and held it out to Harry. "Want one?"

"Professor Snape will be mad."

"I'm allowed part of every potion I brew. I've got three moonfruit at my flat already."

"That's ok," Harry said, unsure if Draco was trying to get him in trouble or not. He already had powers enough to last him anyway.

"I thought you'd already taken some... we saw you floating this morning."

Harry's head snapped up. "I er... it's been happening since... you know. Since I killed him."

Draco raised a brow. "So... you can levitate now?"

He shrugged. "I've never tried to do it on purpose before. I just wake up like that sometimes."

A throat cleared, startling the two boys. "What else can you do since that time?"

Harry turned to find Snape standing in the doorway. He looked down to the ground and shrugged. He hadn't spoken to the man since he had passed out two nights ago in his lab.

"It was unclear how you killed the dark lord, since you did it without a wand. There may be... side effects, such as increased skill and magical prowess. The dark lord often overdosed himself on moon fruit, giving himself prolonged power and abilities."

"So I might have some of his powers then?" Harry had thought about it, but had never been sure. It disgusted him to know part of the evil monster might still live within him.

"It is possible, or it is possible that the components in the moonfruit he ate just before the battle were passed on to you as you... sucked the life from his body."

Harry turned his head, still ashamed that he had killed a man, even if the man was a monster. He had no idea how he had done it, only that he had placed his hands over the man's heart and face, and the life had slowly drained from him.

"Do not be ashamed. It was a necessary action." Severus paused, suddenly realizing that two old enemies had been standing there talking over moon fruit when he had come upon them, and then realized that he himself was talking to Harry Potter, the boy-who-disappeared, and who had apparently been tormenting himself for over a year.

"What other powers do you have?" He forced his mind back on topic.

"I don't know exactly. Sometimes I can reach for something and it will fly into my hand," here he held up his hand and thought about the little corked jar of white powder next to Draco on the counter, and it flew to him. "Other times it doesn't work at all. I have to tone down my wand magic too because sometimes too much power gets poured into it. I'll go to levitate a chair and it will fly up through the ceiling or something."

"And you have been dealing with all of this on your own?"

Harry just stared at nothing. Of course he had been. Who else was there to help him with it? After a moment, Snape cleared his throat, and Harry came back to the conversation.

"I guess," he paused, nervous all of a sudden. There was something else he could do, but it frightened even him, and he was unsure of whether or not he could trust the two men before him. They had saved him, and had kept him a secret so far, but if he frightened them... there was no guarantee that they wouldn't call in the reporters to look at the freak show that he had become.

Snape seemed to sense that Harry wasn't telling them everything, and for some unknown reason that Harry was grateful for nevertheless, let the subject drop.

"You are feeling stronger now?"

"Yes."

"I would wager that the reason you are not dead from the poison, is because your newfound powers kept it at bay. Judging by the other ingredients on your list however, you were feeling the effects?"

Harry nodded. "Aches and pains, headaches, weakness... and sometimes it felt like my hair was on fire when I showered."

"Because of the amount of poison you ingested from this particular potion, you will not be able to take this potion again without doing yourself serious harm, if not death."

He swallowed and nodded again. "Is there something else?"

Snape gave him a wary look, and then said, "You will have to find it for yourself if you insist on hiding. I have done more than my part by keeping you hidden in the storeroom. You are lucky that I diverted Mr. Weasley yesterday morning before he entered my shop."

Harry looked up at this, suddenly curious. "Ron was here?"

"Oh yes. He has been toting around an old picture of you all over the country. He asks Muggles and Wizards alike if they've seen you on the day's he doesn't have to work."

"Where does he work?"

It was Draco who spoke this time, and Harry expected there to be bitterness in his voice, but there was none. "He's an entry level Auror apprentice at the Ministry."

"Oh." Suddenly he felt like his throat was so dry he couldn't speak anymore. Was that what Ron was doing when he'd seen him in Dublin?

"And Hermione... Ginny?"

"Hermione took up a job as an apprentice in a magical research office ten minutes from here, and Ginny just graduated... I heard she turned down a position for some Quidditch team so she can have time to look for you." He watched Draco as he spoke, still amazed that there seemed to be no malice or bitterness in his voice.

Harry couldn't deny that he had wondered about his friends, but he had had too much difficulty thinking on them too much, knowing that he couldn't muster any emotion even with his closest friends in mind, so he hadn't dwelt overmuch on it. And now, knowing that some of his friends had moved on and started their adult lives, and he had not, suddenly struck him hard. Even Draco was doing something, preparing himself financially to someday have a life beyond school, beyond war. And it bothered him too that Ginny had not moved on yet. It had been thoughtless of him to leave her behind without a goodbye, and without a note. He had tried to write to her too many times, and had never sent the letters, although he still carried them around with him.

"Perhaps you should lie down again Potter. You're looking too pale for comfort. Another fall and you'll be overly bruised and I neglectful for letting you get that way." Snape motioned for Harry to return to the couch, which he suspected had been magically largened and softened since he had started sleeping there.

Harry complied wordlessly, and went back into the other room, laying down on the couch carefully. He didn't notice for a few minutes that Snape still stood in the doorway, watching him, or even that Draco had walked through and left through the front door to the shop until Snape spoke softly.

"What am I to do with you Potter?"

Harry looked over. "Sir?"

"You are free to lay listlessly upon the couch in my storeroom and recover for as long as you like, but it would be more a detriment to you for me to allow you to do so." He had the strong urge to use the word ‘wallow' but refrained, because he knew Harry was not wallowing. The boy radiated lost, as if he were on a street corner holding a cardboard sign reading, ‘Lost and need help. Will work for a map.'

"I tried to leave-" Harry said tonelessly, trailing off when he couldn't think of anything else to say to make it sound less like an excuse.

"You tried to run again. To continue on in your path of hiding."

Harry wanted to say oh, but didn't. So he had him pegged, at least a little. Something he would never have imagined from this particular man. And why was it that this man suddenly knew more about Harry and his emotions than he himself did? He didn't know, but was intrigued that somebody knew something about him. Somebody had it together, and had taken care of him for the last seven days, and had still not turned him in to Dumbledore, or the press, or the loony bin.

"I don't know what to do."

"Do you want to come back?"

He thought on it. Sometimes he thought he'd like to, to just show up and say, ‘here I am... really? What are you talking about missing, I've been here all the while!' And other times he thought he really couldn't handle the pressure of living a normal life, of being accountable and explaining to those he loved that he had lost himself. And yet he had explained to Snape...

"I don't know."

Snape looked thoughtful for a moment before he disappeared into the lab. Harry thought that perhaps he too had given up on him, just as Harry had done himself, but another few seconds and he was back with a mop and bucket.

"Get up Potter." He said it with some of the old sternness Harry recognized from school, and pulled himself up off the couch.

Snape held out the mop and bucket, and Harry took it, unsure of what was going on.

"Mop until you figure it out Potter."

"Sir?"

"The front room too. And don't use magic or it could interact badly with any spilled potions ingredients."

"But what if I'm seen?"

"That's your problem isn't it?" Here Snape crossed his arms and waited. Harry stood there for a moment, wondering if this was punishment for something, or if it was meant to be payback for the kindness he had received... surely the anti-potion wasn't cheap, nor the three meals a day he'd been given.

Uncomfortable all of a sudden with being stared at, Harry set the bucket down and soaked the mop in it, before setting to work, scrubbing at the floor even though it was generally already very clean. Perhaps this was part of Draco's job.

When Harry reached the front room, where he could be seen through the wall of windows or if any customer came in, he scrubbed hurriedly and made his way back to the back room in a flash, feeling as if he hadn't really left, and then moved on to the lab.

Two hours later, when Draco returned with the supplies he'd been sent for, Harry was still mopping, having gone over the floors in each room many times over. Severus was standing in a doorway watching him with his arms crossed.

"What's that about then? Have you replaced me?"

"No. He needed a purpose. And do not tell me you enjoyed scrubbing the floors four times a week."

"Not complaining, just curious was all."

"Good. Do not question him on the floors. He himself does not know why he has been set to the task."

Draco gave a small nod. Snape had never led him wrong before, and he couldn't see him leading Potter astray either. There was a time and reason for everything he supposed, and in time maybe Harry would figure that out as well.