The Man Who Knew Almost Nothing

Chapter Three

The worst of years come to an end

Harry prepared breakfast for both of them the next morning. Gilderoy seemed slightly pensive as he sat at the table watching Harry making an omelet. It was obvious that something was on his mind, that he was troubled.

“Did you have a good night?” Harry asked him.

“Nightmares,” Gilderoy whispered. There was something disconcertingly childlike about the man. The thought made Harry just a bit uncomfortable.

“Yeah, because you want to bang him,” he thought uneasily. “Can you talk about them?” he asked, serving breakfast.

“I’m in a full ... a full body bind again and he’s touching me. I don’t ... want him to. I don’t like him. And I can’t move.”

Harry’s stomach felt sour as he pulled a chair closer to where Gilderoy was sitting. He reached toward him and made eye contact, pausing long enough for him to nod his permission. Harry laid a hand on his shoulder.

“It’s okay now. No one can hurt you anymore,” he told Gilderoy. There was a fierceness in his voice almost as though he were making a vow.

“They used to give me dreamless sleep potions at the hospital sometimes.”

“I can make one of those for you, or we can talk about it if you want. I’ve often heard that that’s the best thing.”

Gilderoy lunged toward him, pulling Harry into a crushing hug without any warning and beginning to sob. Harry patted his back and struggled for breath. As Gilderoy’s maniac grip lessened, Harry relaxed and gently touched his soft, wavy hair and kneaded the back of his neck. The passionate instincts of the night before that had sent him scrambling to his room became compassionate feelings as he held Gilderoy close. His own eyes moistened with tears as he felt Gilderoy’s body trembling with pent-up sobs.

Harry walked him cautiously to the couch in the living room in front of the hearth and sat down with him. He smoothed Gilderoy’s hair and wiped his eyes and cheeks with his own sleeve.

“How long did it go on?” he asked gently.

“Five months ... almost six, I think,” Gilderoy answered.

“And ... when did he stop?”

“Almost a year ago now, but these things, from what I know, they ... stay with you don’t they? Anyway, I think the staff was getting suspicious of him. Maybe they sacked him. Maybe he just got bored of me.”

“Bored? Of him?” Harry thought. “Not bloody likely.”

“I was ... afraid sometimes that he would come back. It was funny though. Some of the mediwitches thought I was handsome too, and they always tried to comfort me when I was afraid or bring me an extra dessert, but I ... never felt anything more than gratitude toward any of them, not even the prettiest or kindest ones. As much as he had hurt me, made me afraid or ashamed, I wanted ... I wanted someone who was a him, but who would treat me as kindly as those witches, someone that I could love ... Is that wrong, Harry?” asked Gilderoy.

“Of course not. You have the right to choose who you love. That’s what my friends always told me,” said Harry with a little grin, remembering the look on Seamus Finnigan’s face when he, not to mention the rest of the Quidditch team, walked in on him and Fred Weasley during his sixth year. After the initial shock, there had been butter beer toasts to their health and happiness at Hogsmeade.

“Harry, could you ... I mean, this must sound so silly. But could you ever ... love me?” asked Gilderoy, raising his eyebrows. His eyes were so hopeful, so desperate, so afraid, so lonely. Harry had to wonder if he had ever looked at Fred that way.

“Gilderoy ... I know I could love you, but would that really be the best thing right now? I know you’re hurting and that you need so much ...” Harry told him, patting his hand gently.

“I know that too and what I think I need ... is you.”

Gilderoy reached toward Harry and began unbuttoning his shirt with fumbling fingers. For an instant Harry thought about what a bad idea it might be. Then he mentally shrugged and started to help Gilderoy, who gave him a timorous smile.

The job was halfway done when a loud tapping at the window startled them.

“Of all the time to get an owl!” Harry thought, groaning and trying to ignore it.

“I don’t believe it, Harry,” said Gilderoy, who had looked over his shoulder at the noise, “there is an enormous white owl tapping on your window. Amazing!”

“Her name is Hedwig, and she has a delightfully inappropriate sense of timing,” Harry told him as the insistent owl began tapping again.

After opening the window, Harry took his letter from the owl and sat down to read it, not to mention clear his head. The owl perched on the back of Harry’s couch, looking Gilderoy over with her great yellow eyes.

“Does she bite, Harry?” asked Gilderoy, reaching to pet the bird.

“No, but she might nip at you a bit,” he replied, glancing up for a moment to watch Gilderoy cautiously touching the owl. It was rather sweet.

Hedwig made a funny little noise, but made no move to fly away or maul him.

“I think she likes me,” Gilderoy laughed.

Harry, however, had returned his attention to his letter, which was from Hermione:

“Dear Harry, I heard a rumor just this morning that you left St. Mungo’s with none other than Gilderoy Lockhart and took him home with you. You know that I never believe anything that I hear on the street. But it was Lavender Brown from the hospital that told me ... If it’s true, then there must be a fantastic story behind it. In any event, owl me back would you? Love, Hermione Weasley.”

Grabbing a piece of stationary from a nearby end table, Harry scribbled a reply, glancing at Gilderoy and Hedwig as he did so. He smiled as he watched them.

“I bet she can tell just as easily as I can how hard it’s been for him,” he thought, writing his note to Hermione.

“Dear Hermione, I was going to write and tell you, but I guess it will be less shocking to hear this way. The answer to your questions is, yes, I have taken Gilderoy Lockhart in. Don’t ask me why. It gets too complicated too fast. Just imagine spending six years in a hospital room with no visitors. Yeah ... But don’t mention this Ron, if you don’t mind. I’m not sure he would be happy with my decision given his history with Gilderoy. I’ll break the news to him gently ... eventually. Love, Harry.”

“Sorry, Gilderoy, but I need Hedwig to deliver this to Hermione for me. We’re trying to keep up correspondence and everything,” said Harry, folding his letter and holding it up for the owl, which made rather regular trips from the Little Burrow to the home of Ron and Hermione Weasley.

“She will come back, won’t she?” asked Gilderoy as Hedwig swooped over to Harry and claimed the letter before winging her way out the window.

“Of course,” chuckled Harry.

There was an awkward silence as Harry looked down at his half buttoned shirt.

“Where to go from here ...” he thought.

“I think breakfast might be a bit cold,” Gilderoy observed, looking toward the kitchen. He too could sense the awkwardness caused by the interruption.

“I’ll warm it up if you’re hungry.”

“I could eat.”

Harry couldn’t stop glancing at Gilderoy’s clothes as he ate. They didn’t look that bad, but he had worn hand-me-down things himself and it bothered him to see Gilderoy in them. He thought of his vault at the wizard’s bank and knew that he could easily afford to feed and cloth his guest. Then, of course, there was his Quidditch income. Thinking of that reminded him that the season would be starting in a few weeks, and he imagined that taking Gilderoy along with him would be splendid. Finances, obviously, were not a problem. Harry only wondered what Gilderoy would think about him buying everything for him. Ron had always hated being given even a sickle, much less a galleon. Would Gilderoy feel the same? One of a thousand things to worry about.

“So ... would you like to go shopping this afternoon?” Harry asked him, trying to sound enthusiastic.

“Shopping? That’s when you go somewhere and buy something, right?”

“Yes, very good. So would you?”

“I would get to go places where there are people?”

“Yes ...” answered Harry, wondering if it was a good thing or a bad thing.

“I would love to go shopping then.”

“Great. I know just the place to take you. Diagon Alley and Troubadour Alley in wizarding London. Best places to find clothes and things.”

“Sounds great.”

Harry glanced at his hearth, which was full of ashes and cinders, and said, “We will be traveling by floo powder, of course.”

Gilderoy only smiled vacantly.

It had never bothered Harry that Ron wasn’t incredibly smart. And, now that he thought about it, Neville’s brand of mild stupidity had only annoyed him once in a great while.

“One more time,” Gilderoy requested as they stood in front of Harry’s hearth.

“You throw the floo powder in the fire, step into the fireplace, and say very clearly where it is you’re going. That’s all there is to it,” said Harry, trying to hide the impatience in his voice. He had been new to the method himself once, and he tried to remember that.

“So I would want to say, ‘Diagon Alley’, right?”

“Yes, exactly,” nodded Harry.

Gilderoy put his hands on his hips and said, “I still don’t understand how ...”

“You can’t trust me?”

Gilderoy looked at him with a wounded expression as he said, “I never meant that! I just ... don’t understand these things.”

“You’re a wizard, Gilderoy,” he told him, adding silently, “although, I suspect you’re nearly a squib.” “You were born to be a part of the wizarding world. Memory or no, these things will eventually seem natural to you.”

“Thanks, Harry.”

“Go on then,” he instructed, holding out a little pot of floo powder.

Gilderoy took a handful of the powder and threw the powder into the flames, just as he had been instructed. Stepping into the hearth, he took a deep breath before saying, “Diagon Alley” and vanishing in a roar of magical flame.

“Not bad,” nodded Harry, collecting a handful of powder for himself and following him.

Gilderoy was sitting on the floor in the back room of the Diagon Alley shop that was the designated floo for the area. He was brushing soot from his clothes with a dazed look on this face. For a moment Harry was a bit concerned.

“That go all right for you?” he asked Gilderoy, giving him a hand up.

“It was amazing. Can we do it again?” he asked, peering into the chimney with great interest.

Relief washed over him as he brushed the soot from his own clothes. The last thing he needed was for Gilderoy to have an irrational fear of floos.

“Of course. We’ll be going home that way,” said Harry, leading him out the back door of the shop.

“Messy business though,” commented Gilderoy.

“Can’t be helped. It’s easier than apparating and faster than bus or car,” shrugged Harry as they walked up the alleyway leading to Diagon Alley.

Gilderoy stopped short when he saw all the witches and wizards walking along the street, dozens of them and mostly an older crowd since school was in session. The colors of the robes and other wizarding attire dazzled his eyes as he watched the people walking by. It was a busy day on Diagon Alley.

“Harry, what are they all doing here?” he asked in breathless awe.

“Shopping, same as us. This is the very heart of wizarding London, you know,” Harry told him. He nudged Gilderoy forward, but the man just wouldn’t move. “Here, is this better?” he questioned, clasping Gilderoy’s hand. He intertwined his fingers with Harry’s in an even more intimate gesture.

“I think so,” said Gilderoy with a smile.

“Come on then,” said Harry, pulling him along down the crowded street and feeling ten feet tall as he glanced at the smiling, handsome man at his side. “This could be all right.” he thought.

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