Harry didn't like the look the elderly woman had given him when she had answered her door and then rushed them into the parlor where a roaring fire was going.

"Isn't it hot in here Mrs. Fig?" It was sweltering in the room on the already hot day.

"Quiet hoodlum," she told him as she handed Snape a small jar of green powder.

"I didn't do it!" Harry insisted when he noticed a copy of the prophet on a small end table near the fireplace.

"Well somebody sure did!" She waved her hands in the air.

Snape shook his head and handed the jar to Harry. Wanting to get away from the woman who had often babysat him for Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon, who was currently giving him the same distasteful look Snape was, Harry took a handful of powder, stepped into the fire, and shouted, "Hogwarts," as he threw the powder to his feet.

Flames whipped around him as he spun, seeing various rooms beyond a thousand different fireplaces. Finally he saw the Great Hall in the castle and stepped out. McGonagall was waiting for him.

"Come along Potter," she ushered him out of the grate and out into the Entrance Hall. She too was glancing sideways at him, as if he had done something seriously distasteful.

"I didn't do it," Harry repeated from minutes before.

"Yes, well, we will see."

It wasn't long before he was facing the stone gargoyle guarding the Headmaster's office. At the password the gargoyle leapt aside and admitted Harry and the Transfiguration professor up the spiraling stone steps.

At the top of the stairs McGonagall didn't wait to knock, and instead pushed the door to the Headmaster's office open. Inside were Dumbledore, Tonks, and Shacklebolt. Great, Harry thought to himself, now the whole Order will know that I'm a virgin, or else they'll think I'm irresponsible and will never admit me to the Order.

"Harry, have a seat," the Headmaster offered solemnly. Seeing the other Order members just standing there Harry felt uncomfortable taking a seat... he felt like he would be interrogated and tortured if he did.

"Thanks, but I think I'll stand sir," he told him.

"Whatever you wish," came the Headmaster's reply.

"Harry, something of grave importance has come to our attention... it is very important that your reputation not be soiled in our current situation... the world needs to believe-"

Harry cut him off. "I didn't do it sir!"

Dumbledore remained silent as the other Order members glanced around at each other uneasily.

"You're nearly 17 Harry," Shacklebolt said. "It's time to grow up and take responsibility for your actions."

Harry shook his head in disbelief. "Why don't you take responsibility Shackelbolt? Because I sure didn't get her pregnant!" He was shouting now. "I've never even had sex!" There, he had said it, and now everybody knew, and his social life was ruined.

The Order exchanged uneasy glances again. "Not even once Potter? You can't tell me girls aren't falling all over themselves for you." Shackelbolt was grasping at straws.

"For your information they're not. And no, not even once."

Shackelbolt frowned. "Wait, you're not ga-"

"No!" Harry was frustrated now.

"Almost 17, not gay, and never had sex. That sum it up neatly for you?" They could feel the aggravation to his cutting tone. "Isn't there just some spell you can do to tell if I have or haven't?"

"Yes," Dumbledore stood now and moved around next to Harry so that he could perform some spell Harry had never heard before. He touched the tip of his wand to Harry's shoulder and incanted something that sounded Dutch to Harry's ears. Nothing happened.

"Well?" Tonks asked. There was a hopeful tone to her voice that Harry wasn't sure of.

"The chastity spell has proclaimed him clean."

"Mind if I check for myself?" Shackelbolt asked, perhaps wondering if Dumbledore wasn't covering for Harry by messing up the spell in some way.

Harry threw his arms up in the air. "Have at it. I can't even believe there is a spell for this. And I can't believe nobody believes me," he finished indignantly. Shackelbolt checked as well, and the spell again came up clean. Apparently Harry had passed the test.

"Satisfied?" Harry asked. There were nods around the room and Harry finally slumped down into the offered chair. "I don't even know her," he said. "I don't think I've ever even talked to her in the hall. Isn't she in fifth year?"

"She is a fifth year Ravenclaw Harry," Dumbledore informed him. "And under the Veritas Serum she has testified that you were the one that got her pregnant. She also said she was tricked and perhaps given a potion to make her more agreeable to the idea."

"Ugh," Harry ran his hand through his already wild hair. "Guess that rules out her lying about it."

"Maybe somebody was charmed to look like Harry, or her memories were altered," Tonks put in.

"Even so, I doubt anybody will believe that seeing as how it's in the front page." Shackelbolt was right... if it even got printed in the paper that Harry wasn't responsible for this, it would probably make the back page.

"We already know the paper lied," Harry said. "Didn't it say I got beat up by her father?"

"Well, they did have a picture," Tonks said, as if all the sudden not believing Harry again.

"My cousin did that on vacation... he ambushed me in the park. Then Draco got the whole thing on camera."

"Perhaps we should be having words with Mr. Malfoy then," Shackelbolt said.

"Agreed," Tonks also said, some of the same aggravation in Harry's voice coming across in her own now.

Dumbledore moved back to his seat now. "Seeing as how Harry is obviously not responsible for this matter, I believe he should be returned to his relatives house for the remainder of the summer. It is perhaps best to keep him out of the prying eyes of the wizarding world at the moment."

"Well perhaps Harry doesn't want to go back," Harry said, miffed that he was being talked about as if he weren't there at all.

The Headmaster sighed. "Harry we've been over this. You must return." Harry immediately thought of the thrashing waiting for him should he go back to Privet Drive... and then the next thrashing for Snape showing up at the front door. He was tired of being beaten, starved, and made to do all the housework.

"Send me back and I promise to try to get every girl I come across pregnant." It was a defiant statement that surprised the others, but still told them that Harry held the power in the room at that moment.

"Harry!" McGonagall was shocked.

"You have my word," Harry said, ignoring her and staring the Headmaster down.

"We could always potion him so that he can't," another Auror member suggested.
Harry didn't like the sound of that and his mind fought through ideas quickly to come up with something else.

"Or I could always just lie and tell the press that it is my baby and that I won't take care of it or whatever her name is... and I'll say it just like that." Fleetingly Harry had an image of Dudley stomping his feet throwing a temper tantrum when they were younger... and he felt as if it were him throwing a tantrum there in the room just then.

"I see we have no choice," the Headmaster said, disappointed. "All we have ever done is for your own good Harry," he said calmly. Then he dismissed him with a wave of his hand.
Harry rose from the chair, avoiding the eyes of all gathered there, and made for the door.

"And Harry..." Harry paused but didn't turn around. "This constitutes a deal... you will avoid all you have said that you will do should we send you back."

Harry nodded. "You have my word." He left the office door open as he descended down into the rest of the castle.

* * *

"Well Potter?"

It was Snape. Harry was walking down the corridor wondering what the Gryffindor password might be. He guessed he would just have to find McGonagall in her office later or during a meal.

"Well what sir?" Harry gritted his teeth.

"They are letting you stay the summer?"

"Provided I don't lie to the press and tell them it's my baby."

Snape glared at him and seemed to be raking him over with his eyes, assessing what madness would prompt Harry to lie about such a thing that would cause him so much trouble.

"You don't have to look at me like that," Harry said. "I didn't do it. They did a test and saw I was telling the truth."

"Why then would you lie about it?"

"Because I'm not going back." Here Harry had to fight not to look away, ashamed, but failed in the end. He knew the way he was treated wasn't his fault, but it was still hard not to feel as though it were.

"And you have told the Headmaster how you have been treated?"

Harry looked up and scoffed. "You said it yourself. I'm the boy who lived, and nobody will believe me. You know what, nobody has believed me about anything every step of the way... this, the triwizard tournament, the chamber of secrets... who the hell is going to believe... you know." He had started angry and found himself run out of steam by the end.

When Snape didn't answer Harry threw his hand down in an awkward way, as if saying it didn't matter. "I do what I have to to survive. So just leave me all the hell alone about it." He walked away, feeling a firey gaze against his back he was sure would be there, and wondering if he could earn detention or lose house points during the summer. No reprimand or demand to return came though, so he continued on to Gryffindor tower.

The fat lady glared him down when he stood before her, asking to be let in without a password. "The password is reset during the summer and anybody can enter. But I don't think you shall enter here today."

Harry frowned. "Why?"

"You think you're a Gryffindor? Brave and responsible? I think not. You just go and take responsibility for your little foray into adulthood." She crossed her pudgy arms, as if she meant not to budge.

"I didn't do it!" Harry half shouted, feeling indignant.

"And with an attitude like that, you'll never be a Gryffindor, even if you haven't done anything. James Potter, now he was a Gryffindor," she said pointedly, chin in the air as if proud of him.

"Yeah, well I'm not him," Harry said. "And you have to let me in."

"You're right about one thing, you aren't him. And I don't have to do anything without a password." She was angry now, and left the portrait out the side. Harry huffed and kicked the stone wall below her frame that was supposed to be the entrance to the common room. Where was he going to sleep now?