Second Chances by Timorous

Funerals were nearly always accompanied by rain, at least according to theatrical law. Reality differed on the subject, as the day someone died was generally random, and weather is based upon season and more extenuating facts involved in the science of meteorology. Along with this, rain is generally a symbol for some sort of grief in a character’s life, according to theatrical law. Once again, nature has never conceded to governing itself by the whims of any person’s dramatic timeline.

Harry knew this to be true. In the many instances of his lifetime, rain had fallen on happy occasions, and sad as well, but more often than not it fell on the days which passed unnoticed. Today was not any different. Early spring brought showers, of which would, according to the old saying, bring May flowers. Today's rain was warmer than winter’s frigid storms, and the damp clung in the air.

Letting out a small sigh, Harry couldn’t help but ponder on the garden outside. It was overgrown, the crab apple tree branches pricking the ground, a few late-growing, and now almost completely rotted away, fruits scattered under it. The grass was overgrown, green due to the past two weeks of rain, and there were a couple dirt filled pots sitting on the covered veranda which held the remains of plants. Lily Evans Snape was an awful gardener. To make a pun of it, all the green in her thumb seemed to have gone to her eyes.

The sound of approaching voices grew, soft, and in comfortable conversation. Harry’s eyes snapped away from his observation, and he grabbed at the cup of tea in front of him. He had it raised to his lips by the time Lily and Severus Snape entered the kitchen.

“Harry! We were just talking about the curtains in the living room.”

Harry winced at the cold beverage, quickly lowering the cup and attempting to smile at his mother’s statement.

His eyes went from her smiling face, one now adorned by several more wrinkles than he originally remembered, and to the face of Severus. The man did not smile back, however, the cold anger he had once always held when looking at Harry was replaced by a reserved expression.

“I think a light blue would look very nice, maybe a chiffon, or semi-sheer,” Lily moved about the kitchen, setting the pot of tea, which she had made nearly thirty minutes earlier, on the stove, “your father thinks otherwise.”

The teasing glance, filled with mock disapproval, drew a small smile from Severus’ lips.

“We want privacy as well, dear,” he quietly returned.

Lily tossed her head in disbelief but said nothing more, busying herself with preparing several more cups of tea. The room lapsed into silence, peaceful, if a bit tentative.

Harry hadn’t visited his parents for nearly a year. He claimed work as an excuse most of the time, whenever his mother firecalled, or as was more her wont, called by way of muggle cellular device.

Harry’s twenty fourth had come and gone, and that was when Lily had put down her foot and demanded a visit.

It had been seven years, since they’d come here, bouncing through to an alternate reality. It had seemed like a dream, Lily alive, and just as Harry’s many imaginings had made her out to be; even to Severus.

“Alright! Everyone ready for another cuppa?”

Harry smiled again and nodded his head, Severus murmuring a soft “yes”. The mugs, along with an open tin of biscuits were set on the table. Lily seated herself and immediately began nibbling at a biscuit, legs crossed, and joy on her features.

A creature of sunlight and radiance was what Severus had once described her as, when they had been trapped in a dark dungeon, facing down the second dark lord, the one of this world. That time had been terrifying, and yet Severus had been a steady pillar. Harry could hardly believe that a man he once loathed had become so close, and now, so distant.

Harry’s gaze once more turned to the garden, attempting to throw that particular memory to the wayside. His mind sidelined him though, the neglected plants casting him into a trawl through the past memories of the many chores he had performed for his aunt. The melancholy pricked more than he thought it would. The Dursley family had survived in his previous reality, in this one they had been murdered.

“Not the prettiest, I know,” Lily said woefully, “but I was always rubbish at herbology. It seems I’m even worse with ordinary plants.”

“It’s not so bad,” Harry replied, coming to her defense.

She laughed, shaking her head and taking another bite of her biscuit before turning away from the garden, as if just by that action she could forget it. Harry wished he could forget so easily, though it seemed that he carried few of his mother’s traits.

“How goes your job? Or can you not tell us about it? I’ve heard the Department of Mysteries keeps you busy!”

“Not much to tell anyways, and pretty busy, yeah, but I don’t drown in it.”

Lily sent him a motherly look.

“Don't worry, mum, I’d let you know if they did.”

“I could always call Crimpet and give her an earful, you know I’d do it. I have to see my son at least twice a year.”

Harry gave a wan smile and nodded in agreement.

Lily looked on the verge of saying something else, but the phone rang from the next room over.

“Oh! That must be Dee! Sorry boys, I’ll be back in a jiffy.”

She swept out of the kitchen, leaving them behind.

It was uncomfortably silent. Harry shifted in his seat, fingers reaching out and fiddling with the tea mug handle. Once upon a time, when Severus and Harry had been thrust into this new world, filled with as much danger as the last, and with everything unknown, they had grown very close. Harry had no qualms about acknowledging the man as his stepfather.

He’d grown apart from both his parents though. After the Dark Lord’s defeat, he had pursued schooling, then a career, and as days passed, the dark of years past seemed to outweigh the relative quiet and peace of his present.

“You don’t look well.”

Startled, Harry looked up to see Severus keenly surveying him.

“I-I am, no health problems.”

The answer did little to deter the man’s opinion, and yet he relinquished some ground, allowing a beat of silence, and that piercing gaze to be fixed upon the kitchen wall.

“Your mother misses you.”

Harry didn’t have the ability to respond as a lump grew in his throat.

“As do I.”

Harry cleared his throat but didn’t speak.

“What happened?”

The question felt so wrong, so incomprehensibly removed from this situation.

“Nothing happened, nothing at all. It’s different from that.”

Black eyes grew curious, and elaboration was silently asked for.

“It’s, I don’t know what it is, but some days it feels like weights sit on me. Memories stay, not, not big ones,” he glanced at Severus and saw only the same interested curiosity, “little things. The ones that just don’t go away.”

Unable to maintain eye contact he looked to the back yard, a titmouse having just alighted on the concrete steps coming off the veranda.

“The big ones are for dreams, but the little ones are for the rest of the time. Sometimes I feel jumbled up, two different realities, maybe we aren’t supposed to be here.”

“That isn’t it,” Severus replied firmly.

“Then what is it? I keep seeing faces of people dead there, but alive here, in dreams speaking with people still alive there who are dead here. It is all mixed up. Every time I feel like I’ve moved past it, it comes back feeling bigger, stronger. I can’t forget.”

“Do you remember Ms. Lovegood? The one here, after we removed her from her years long imprisonment?”

Harry shuddered, how could he forget? Trapped in that dungeon, chained to the wall, and in the corner an emaciated pale figure, dirty hair hanging, and her sweet voice lilting in nonsensical words. The Luna of his past world had survived, and after the Dark Lord’s death, she had seemed well on her way to thriving. The one here was like a flower who had wilted too soon.

“Do you remember what she says about it?”

Harry gave a slow nod. She said she woke up there still, even when thousands of miles away. As if she had never escaped.

“That is the result of trauma.”

The implication was infuriating, demeaning to Harry. He wasn’t a woman who had been tortured for nearly two years. He should be able to go to sleep and wake up without ever having to think of the past.

“We were given a second chance, Harry, coming here. It was a gift. But we don’t leave the things we experienced behind. Some things stay with you.”

“I’m tired of it.”

“Sometimes so am I,” Severus placed a hand on Harry’s forearm, “just tell your mother, I know I do. Or me. It isn’t a thing to be done alone.”

Ruefully, Harry realized a teardrop had escaped.

“Is this my third chance?”

“Millionth in my book,” Severus accepted the play at levity, “you’ve muddled a good score of potions throughout your schooling.”

Harry managed a smile, gripping his father's hand, and taking comfort in the strength behind it.