The Five Steps

Harry Potter rode the buses all over Surrey that summer. It was quiet except for the rattling and squealing of the bus itself. People seldom spoke to each other, old ladies got on with their awkward packages, and people in suits got on and off while chatting on their mobile phones. The drivers were surly - even when they'd begun to recognize Harry as a regular, a nod was all he got.

It began by accident. Harry had been loitering by the bus stop wondering what to do with himself the day after he'd left his fifth year at Hogwarts. When the bus pulled up and the driver opened the door, Harry felt too stupid to explain or wave the driver away. He got on and pulled three Sickles and some Knuts from his pocket.

"Don't take foreen money." The driver grunted. "Fifty p."

"Sorry." Harry turned to get off the bus.

But the driver waved him on and muttered something about bluhdee forners.

The windows were grimy. The seats were cracked. It was depressing, but Harry felt at home. The slow lurching and creaking of the bus suited him and the uneven motion lulled his restlessness. It gave his inability to sit still a purpose and a destination.

Harry Potter was nobody in the Muggle world. He liked that. He got up each morning before dawn to catch the 6:00 a.m. bus to Blackwater. If he was lucky someone would buy him a cheap bitter coffee and a tasteless bun at a small stand next to the Little Whinging bus stop. Looking pitifully underweight did have that one advantage - occasionally someone would try to feed you. It would be his meal for the day. He didn't return to Privet Drive until late at night when he was sure the Dursleys were asleep.

He climbed on the early morning bus in his shabby clothes and the other passengers looked like they were still asleep. They ignored him. It was as good as an invisibility cloak. He waited for someone to leave a paper behind. There was a fat man with thick glasses, who got on near the M3 carpark; he usually left his Daily Mail behind. Harry sprang for it as soon as the man headed for the exit. If he looked like he was reading the paper it prevented anyone from trying to talk to him. He ruffled the pages and stared at the words but they jumbled and he couldn't pay attention to them.

Bus fare was not expensive but Harry had very little Muggle money and his newfound hobby would have been cut short within a week if it hadn't been for the ticket he'd found the third day on the bus to Aldershot. It was a shiny plastic interzone pass good until the end of July. Harry was the only person on the bus besides the driver. The pass was lying on the floor under his seat.

I should turn this into the driver. Harry thought, cramming the orange plastic card in his pocket. But I'm going to keep it instead. I need it. I have to make until the term starts again in September. If I can just keep myself together until September, it will be okay.

The days passed. Harry read the papers cover to cover without actually comprehending one word of what he read. He began to think that this is how the rest of his life would go. He'd get up and eat a bun made of polystyrene and get on a bus until he was too tired to do anything but crawl back to his miserable room at the Dursleys'. He imagined himself aged forty, emaciated and unkempt - doing nothing but riding the bus and sleeping for few hours each night at Number Four Privet Drive. In his mind he imagined himself looking like Sirius as he'd seen him during his own third year: first peeking from the front of the Prophet and then in the Shrieking Shack. He was flooded with guilt. Harry knew that riding the bus would not eat him up as Dementors had fed upon Sirius. He was ashamed. He'd had a chance to avenge Sirius's death at the Ministry of Magic, and he'd failed.

Sometimes thinking about Sirius was too painful and other times he welcomed the pain. When Harry could feel its sharpness, he did what he could to increase it. Pain was a respite from feeling blank.

Sirius would have been cleared of charges, eventually. Then I would have gone and lived with him. We would have finished cleaning up Grimmauld Place. He'd push further reaching for the cutting edges... He would have taken me on holiday and maybe I'd have had a proper birthday.

At least this raw torn up feeling was something, was more than the he felt the rest of the time, which was only a dreadful sense of waiting - not waiting for anything, just waiting for its own sake.

What am I waiting for? He's gone. He isn't coming back. I saw him fall. I'm not waiting for him to come back. I'm not.

On Tuesday, July 19, according to The Times, Harry found a stray pamphlet in the seat next to his: "So Your Beloved Pet Has Passed". There was a grainy photo gracing the front, an old lady clutching a cat toy and staring forlornly at an empty cat basket. The pamphlet informed Harry that there are five stages to grieving. He read them aloud on the empty bus, holding each one in his mouth and sampling its flavour and texture. Denial was salty like a rasher of bacon, anger was bitter and metallic - a taste he knew well - bargaining was new and left an unpleasantly oily aftertaste, depression had no flavor (like over chewed gum), and acceptance was oversweet and artificial. I'll never accept it.

The bus heaved to a stop. Harry left The Times and took the pamphlet with him. Instead of crawling into bed that night exhausted, he slumped at his desk. He read the thing over and over. The part about losing one's beloved dog was maddeningly painful. He read it until his eyes ran and dripped onto the pamphlet. If the drips were tears they came without emotional release.

The next morning he did not get up to ride the bus. He stayed in bed. For three days. No one cared. He didn't shave or bathe. He didn't read anything. He hadn't eaten a proper meal in a month. His mouth felt papered with thick dusty newsprint. He half hoped that if he gave up both eating and drinking he'd just stop. Not die - just cease. That is what had happened to Sirius. One moment he was there dueling with Bellatrix, and the next he was gone. Everyone said "gone"; no one said dead. Perhaps he wasn't dead. But Sirius was gone. If I lay very still, perhaps it will all make sense?

Thirst finally won, but when Harry tried to stand his head swam and he was forced to his knees. He crawled to the bathroom and drank from the tap. Dudley saw Harry crawling back to his room and said nothing, which was odd. Harry didn't care. He climbed back into bed and ignored Hedwig who hooted softly and sadly. Her cage had been open all summer and she came and went as she pleased. She sat on the bureau now and watched Harry for some time, then stretched her wings and soared out the open window.

Time dragged or flew. Harry didn't know or care. His eyes were crusty. He slept fitfully only to awake in the middle of the night, confused.

Then Remus Lupin was there. He cleaned Harry up with a wave of his wand and the charms wrapped around him, steadying him. Harry realized he was crying great deep heaving sobs that wracked his pitiful half starved frame, crying without really feeling it. Lupin patted his back as if Harry had had a nightmare and could be lulled back to calm and sleep. Lupin brought him some broth, which Harry threw up as soon as he swallowed it. Lupin cleaned up the mess and held a phial of pale yellow potion that tasted like lemon drops. Then Harry was sleeping, really sleeping, dreamless.

Remus Lupin was still there, sitting at his desk, doing a Quibbler Everchanging Crossword, when Harry woke up with a croaking noise. Lupin nodded and poured Harry a glass of water. He helped Harry to the toilet and waited outside. Harry was grateful for that. He wasn't sure he could make it on his own, his head felt too light. Harry carefully avoided looking in the bathroom mirror. Lupin guided him back to his room and Harry went back to sleep.

Days might have passed, Harry wasn't sure. He'd moved on to eating soup and bread. He was able to get up and use the toilet on his own. But he dutifully swallowed the lemony sleeping draught, and drifted away into sleep.

When he woke, Lupin was always there, either sleeping in a tatty armchair that Harry had never seen before or reading. Harry inspected Lupin and noticed new and deep lines between the man's eyes. He watched him sleep and a thought grew: He has lost them all now. Wormtail, my dad, and Sirius - twice. But he isn't acting like a prat and trying to - to - dehydrate himself to death. This must be horrible for him, too.

When he woke up, Lupin's eyes were clouded instead of bright and sharp. Harry curled up in bed and tried to hold back his tears.

"I'm sorry. . . ." He wondered if this sobbing in front of other people would ever stop? Mrs. Weasley, Dumbledore, and now Lupin.

Lupin said nothing, laid his hand on Harry's shoulder and then sent him to splash his face with cool water. When Harry came back into his small bedroom, Lupin was reading the pamphlet.

"What do you think of this?" Lupin asked evenly.

"It's a lie isn't it?" Harry sat down on the bed. "There aren't five stages of grief. There are too many to count."

"What do you mean, Harry?" Lupin put the pamphlet back on the desk. The question expected no particular answer; it was simple curiosity.

"It's shite." He grabbed the pamphlet and tore it up. "Each second is different and I feel nothing, but everything hurts."

"I know." Lupin got up and left promising he'd be back the next day.

Harry slept without the potion and he saw Sirius fall behind the black curtain over and over. Sirius fell but he never came back. Harry heard murmuring voices behind the fluttering veil. He walked up the steps towards the curtain, but he couldn't get up the stairs. For every step he took he was a step further away from the arch and the veil. He tried to run up the stairs and the stone arch sped away and vanished. Harry was alone in the dark.