War Changes

Harry looked down at Ron's lifeless body. "What have I done?"

Pictures of what just happened were running through Harry's mind. He was trying to figure out what happened. He was walking back towards the castle, and then he heard Ron cry out his name and tell him to watch out. Harry looked over to his side where Ron's voice was coming from, he also saw a masked deatheater pointing his wand in his direction and saying a curse that he would hear so well. Ron then jumped onto him, thus taking the blow of the spell, which was now evidently the killing curse. The deatheater then ran to catch up with the rest of the deatheaters who were leaving since it was now dawn.

"Oh my God..." Harry said in a shaky voice. "This is my fault."

Harry kneeled down next to Ron. He touched his hand, which was ice cold; he took his hand in his own and squeezed it. How was he going to tell Hermione? She and Ron had been going out for two years now; this was going to break her heart. She'd blame Harry of course if she knew what happened. Ron used his life to save Harry's, that hurt Harry more than anything did because he felt that it was his fault.

Harry looked around him; they were on the quidditch field. Harry remembered the times Ron and him would come out here at dusk and just fly around on his broom with no worries of being killed, just the worries of Snape's potions exam coming up. Harry's lower lip quivered as he was trying to hold back his tears, but it was impossible to do, and then he just cried. Cried for his parents who he never knew, and he cried for Ron and his family. He cried for all of the younger kids who would never get to have the enjoyable experience at Hogwarts like he did, cried for Dumbledore, who's body was supposedly hung outside of the Death Eater's headquarters, he also cried for Hermione. Hermione, the one girl he ever truly loved. He remembered the day he found out that Hermione and Ron were going out, oh how hard it was to hold back his rage, his sadness and most of all the disappointment he had in himself for not asking Hermione out first. He'd never get the chance to go out with her now, she'd be too mad at him for killing Ron.

"I loved you like a brother...you can't leave me now...you're the only family I've ever known," Harry said in a voice barely comprehensible between the sobs. "Please...please!"

What was he to do now? He was too ashamed to go back to the castle; he would have to tell Hermione and Ginny what happened to Ron, which would break his heart twice over. No, going back to the castle was not an option. But where else could he go? Harry got up and just started walking. He didn't know where he was going. He finally decided to transport himself to the United States. He wanted to be as far away from Hogwarts as possible, and after thinking about how to do that he decided to become a Muggle. He took of his robe, which was ripped everywhere and started walking around. Eventually, after walking a few miles, he passed out on a street in a place he had never seen.

When Harry woke up he was in a dark room, it was small, and had a foul odor. He coughed; he recognized the smell as cigarette smoke. Someone walked into the room.

"Hey guys, he's up!" the stranger yelled out the door.

"I'm busy, can't you tell!?" someone else yelled back.

"Shut up, and get over here! Bring Jake with you, he's probably getting high in his room," the stranger yelled back.

The stranger walked over to Harry who was now sitting up in his bed. The unidentified man was about Harry's height, spiked brown hair, and he was in pretty good shape. Harry also noticed that his eyebrow was pierced and he had a picture of a naked woman with blonde hair on his arm. The man stuck out his hand. "Hey, the name's Jimmy. We found you lying in the middle of the street when we were driving back from my girl's house. You looked pretty wasted."

"Uh...my name is Harry...where am I?" Harry questioned as he shook Jimmy's hand and rubbed his forehead with his free hand.

Jimmy shook his head. "You're in south Chicago, damn, you must have been wasted!"

"I must have been what, wasted? No, I was just very tir-" Harry was cut off.

Two other men walked into the room; one was tall and lanky with blonde long hair and a very sleepy expression on his face. The other one was much bigger than Harry was; he had a buzz cut, and was sort of heavy looking but Harry had a feeling it was muscle. He slapped Harry on the back, which confirmed Harry's feeling that he was not fat, just very muscular. "Hey man! My name's Chris. This is Jake, but don't try to talk to him, he's cranky when he's high, and he's up in the clouds right now if you know what I mean!"

"Anyways we were just about to go out. Chris's chick is having a party, it should be pretty hot, so you wanna come? There's going to be lots of girls..." Jimmy asked Harry.

"Uh, no, I think I should go and find somewhere to stay, but thanks anyway," Harry replied.

"What, hell no. You gotta go to this party, its going to be off the hook! You can stay here; we've got loads of room. Yea, we can get out another sleeping bag and put it on the couch or whatever, you seem like a cool guy, so come on," Chris was saying, he then turned around and looked at Harry again. "You may want to brush your hair or something cause your hair is looking pretty whacked."

Harry, remembering why he came here in the first place decided to go. It was something to do, and it would keep his mind off of what he ran from. He brushed his hair, which was really messy, as Chris had said and put some of Jimmy's clothes on because his were pretty dirty. When they got to the party Harry didn't know what to think. There was alcohol everywhere, people were passed out against walls, and people were kissing in the corners and were two seconds away from having sex! The music was loud, and it was a kind of music he had never heard, it had the same beat going on the whole time. They were saying words, he just couldn't understand what they were over the loud bass.

Chris and Jimmy showed Harry around the place and introduced him to some of their friends. Chris and Jimmy both were drinking and asked Harry if he wanted a beer. Harry, very unlike himself, gave in. After his second beer he was pretty drunk, being a rookie and all. Most of the time he just sat on the couch talking to the people who were next to him. He had never been to the United States before, but he would hear Aunt Petunia telling Dudley stories of how dirty it was, and how unsafe everything was. Harry was just thinking about how stupid Aunt Petunia was because it was perfectly safe here, when a guy hit some other guy with a beer bottle for talking to his girlfriend.

A thin girl with bleached blond hair, blue eye shadow and bright red lipstick came up Harry. She was wearing a skimpy red shirt that showed off her cleavage, and a tight black skirt that was only three inches longer than her underwear, if she had any on.

"Hey babe, I haven't seen you here before," she said in a flirty manner.

"Well I-" Harry was trying to make out words but the presence of the girl made it hard for him to think. Never before had he seen girls dressed that way. He was used to seeing girls in robes or wearing knee-length dresses or skirts.

"Trish, he's new here, I'm sure he doesn't want to be "hanging out" with you," Chris shouted at the girl since the music was so loud.

Trish turned back towards Harry. "Follow me if you're looking for a real party," she said as she walked down the hall. Before she went inside she stuck out her arm and gestured for him to follow with her pointer finger.

Harry, being drunk, followed her. Trish grabbed Harry's shirt and pulled him into the room. Just before Harry got in, he looked over at Chris who was giving him thumbs up. Harry then closed the door behind him and Trish.

An hour or so later, Chris knocked on the door and opened it. Harry and Trish were both asleep on the bed. Harry heard the knock and was slowly waking up. He felt dirty, the bad kind of dirty, he was sweaty, and he smelled horrible. It was a toxic mix of sweat, Trish's cheap perfume, and other bodily fluids. To top it all off, he had a pounding headache. He looked at Trish who was still sleeping. "What the hell am I doing?" Harry thought to himself. He then remembered that Chris was there. "Yea?"

"Hey man, Jimmy, and I are going, you coming with us?" Chris asked.

"Uh, yea, I'll be out in a minute," Harry replied and then shook Trish awake. "Trish, um, I'm going, bye."

"Why the hell did you just wake me up? Get out!" Trish screamed at Harry who was putting his pants on.

Harry walked out of the room and closed the doors behind him. He saw Chris and Jimmy waiting for him. There were still a lot of people at the party, most of them were passed out though. The house was a mess! Harry thought of what Aunt Petunia would have done if he had had a party at their house and made this kind of mess. They walked out of the house and the brisk Chicago air made Harry's hairs stand on end. They got into Jimmy's car and started home.

"So, you nailed Trish. We all do at one time or another," Jimmy commented to Harry.

Harry shrugged. "Oh."

"You okay man?" Chris asked in an almost concerned tone of voice.

"Yea, yea, I think I drank too much. I just have a really bad headache," Harry said as he rubbed his forehead. "MY SCAR!" Harry thought to himself just as he rubbed his hand over the place where he had the lightning shaped mark. Harry tried to pull his hair down over the scar as best as he could.

Chris looked at him with a puzzled expression on his face. "You sure you didn't have none of those drugs?"

Harry, realizing how ridiculous he must have just looked, tried to play it cool. "No...I just have a thing with my hair looking good...just a pet peeve of mine..."

Chris acted like he believed him, but Harry had a feeling that he still thought Harry was using drugs at the party. "Oh okay, just making sure."

When they got home it was near four o'clock in the morning. Harry, Jimmy and Chris dragged themselves into the house. Harry realized that the familiar smell of marijuana was gone, which usually came from Jake. "Hey, did you guys forget Jake?"

"No, he's getting a ride from someone else," Chris muttered as he flopped onto the couch and immediately drifted off into a deep sleep.

Thoughts of Ron and Hermione and the rest of the wizarding world came back to Harry as he sat down at the kitchen table and rested his head on his arms. Harry started drifting off into sleep, and the last thing he thought about popped into his mind. "I wonder what they're doing right now."