Companion Piece to Soul Searching

Companion piece to Soul Searching

Harry trudged out the building, the dirty city air sweeping him up as he went. He was in Los Angeles. Alone. Exiled from his home. Cut off from his love. Or what once held his love.

The only thing that helped was the alcohol. It burned as it went down his throat. It clogged his mind, made him forget. He needed to forget. Forget what he had done wrong, let go too soon.

He continued to walk slowly to the bar. Sometimes his body went places he didn't want to go. But tonight he had to fight his body. It was screaming in protest of another night. It was his mind, craving pleasure, a break from the monotony of loneliness, who had led the way. Harry walked into the bar.

"Evening, Harry," said Mick, the bartender.

Harry walked over to his stool, and sat down, letting the premature weight hunch his back. Harry took a drink in his pale hand, it shook. Mick had already placed the vodka on the bar. He took a sip. This is what the Famous Harry Potter does on the weeknights, he said to himself. And on the weekends, he reminded himself, the little voice whispering in his ear, furiously, knowingly.

The voice was his only connection left. It kept him grounded. And it sounded like Hermione. When she said he needed him to be strong for her, that she couldn't stand loosing everyone, that Draco would never be able to hold her again. She had told Harry that he was her last hope. He took another drink, and it put the voice to bay.

Mick wiped one of empty the tables with a dirty rag. Everything here was dirty. "So... you heard about those Lakers?"

Harry stared, and ordered another drink. Mick shrugged his shoulders, and moved to the bottle, pouring out another shot. He had tried. He truly had. But as long as Mick had known Harry, he had never spoken. And it had been almost seven months now...

Harry sagged down to the soft grain of the wood paneling on the bar. It swirled under his eyes, turning into illusions, phantoms. Ginny, lifeless, as the dementors circled around her...Hermione crying...Ron's funeral. "Such a beautiful grain," he muttered to himself as he ordered another drink.

Absinth, this time. The drink was said to turn men mad, but Harry had no worries. He was far too gone to care anymore.

The voice, Hermione's voice, was sufficiently quiet now. She could always be drowned out by a few drinks. Whether by her choice or need, Harry did not know.

With the voice gone, Harry could finally think straight. He beckoned Mick. "You know," he said, his voice slightly slurred, and his breath reeking of man-corrupter, "I am famous." He nodded his head, and pointed to his scar. "Its true! But what does it get me? Shit. Everything's gone to shit now." He smiled manically, almost with coherent eyes. They flared, and then died down again, back to their glaze. "Ginny's gone, I've lost her. And its my fault. No. Voldemort's fault."

Harry leaned forward, attempted to grab Mick and continued. "I think we're both to blame. Don't you see?"

Mick sighed. This was the part he hated. Losing his customers before they had drank away all their pay. "Go home, Harry. You're drunk."

He pushed Harry out the door, and told him to get a cab. It wouldn't do if he lost his best customer in an accident.

Harry wandered about the streets of Los Angeles, looking for an escape. He found one on Seventh Street, a block away from his house. She was blank, and tired. Not old, but the wrinkles were beginning to form. Her tight black outfit did nothing but emphasize the sags that men had left her. A deformed body and dirty money. Fifty dollars for an hour, she had said tonelessly. An hour of freedom, from Hermione, the voice.

He brought the girl, or was it a woman, back to his apartment. She nodded, and began the task. Clothes coming off, hands coming on.

She kept silent the entire time. It was just another night for her, her daily grind. And how she hated it. Harry screamed. Screamed for Ginny, who was too lost to hear.

In the morning she had all ready left. A hastily written number was written on a card that Harry had left lying around. She had helped herself to the money. Harry held the card up for the sun to illuminate.

He had lost Ginny. She was in St. Mungos, being treated for an affliction which had no cure. She had lost her soul the day the dementors came. And yet, Harry was sitting in his cold empty room. And he had just sold what was left of Ginny. The one piece of her precious being, that still existed. Him.

He buried his hands into the blankets. "There must be a cure for my affliction," he said, quietly, hoarsely. His throat was sore from screaming. He took the paper and put it in the trash.

It was a start.