Memories

"Is it hard?"

"Is what hard?"

"Being so popular and loved by everyone."

"Not at all. Just be yourself, and if the media hates it, then screw them."

"Are you serious?"

"Of course I'm serious!"

Harry shook his head. That stupid conversation always came back to haunt him. But it can't come back now, Harry yelled mentally. He was in the middle of taking his O.W.L.s, and if he screwed up...Harry didn't even want to think of it.

"Tell me some more."

"About what?"

"About being Harry Potter!"

"What is there to tell?"

"Have you ever had your first kiss?"

"Yes."

"Who?"

"How about I start asking the questions?"

"Okay, I get the idea...Are you a virgin still?"

"Not necessarily."

"Really?"

"Didn't I just say something about this?"

"Yeah, but that was about kissing, not sex..."

"Shut up."

"I love it when I'm right!"

Harry dropped his quill and put his head in his hands. Professor McGonagall began to shoot worried glances in his direction, but made no move to check on the soon-to-be-sixth year.

"I said, 'Shut up.'"

"And I refuse to shut up!"

Harry smiled at remembering how he had silenced the other person by pressing his lips upon the other's. Professor McGonagall stood and walked over to Harry, whispering concerned questions into his ear. Her questions fell on deaf ears as Harry willed himself back to those days.

"I love it when you kiss me."

"I know you do."

"Now it's my turn to say shut up."

Harry smiled at the memory. Professor McGonagall was making some class announcement, and all the students were filing out. Harry sat were he was, smiling like some crazed madman and rocking in his seat as he recalled every passionate touch, every fiery embrace they had shared.

"Why did you pick me?"

"Pick you?"

"You know...pick me to be your lover."

"I dunno. You were just always there, and then I found myself in love with you. So I just followed my heart."

"In a battle over head and heart, who would win?"

"What?!?!?"

" 'In a battle over head and heart, who would win?' "

"The heart, I guess."

"Why?"

"The heart rules the head. A person who thinks with their heart makes the wrong decisions, but gets the right results. A person who thinks with their head makes the right decisions, but gets the wrong results."

"Now that is even more philosophical than what I said."

Harry began to laugh out loud, startling McGonagall and Dumbledore, who had gathered in the front of the room, whispering to each other and nodding about Harry's eccentric behavior.

"I do try sometimes."

"I noticed."

"Do you think they'll ever find out?"

"About us?"

"No, about the monkey in the moon. Yes! Of course about us!"

"Eventually. I think everyone already suspects something."

"Nah."

"No, seriously. Next time someone looks at you, stare into their souls."

"How in God's name am I supposed to do that?"

"Look into their eyes. A person's eyes are the windows to his or her soul."

"Where'd you get that from?"

"My mother told me once, and then someone else told me again. It's just something I remember."

"Oh. Do you miss her?"

"My mother? All the time. I wish I could've known her. I hate living my life being someone else's charge. I'm not their child, I'm just their child's friend. It gets annoying."

"Try living my life sometime."

Harry suddenly sat up, his stool falling to the ground in a loud clatter. Startled, the teachers watched as he stared them each in the eye, before running out of the room. A voice in his head yelled at him, "Keep running, Potter! Run, and don't ever stop! Running is the only way out!"

"Your life can't be that bad."

"It is."

"It can't."

"It is."

"Is not."

"Is to."

Harry finally stopped running, the cold rain soaking him as he fell onto the ground in front of the gravestone.

"WHY? WHY DID HE HAVE TO GO FIRST?" Harry yelled at God, at the teachers, and anyone who was listening. He began to pound the ground in front of the marble slab with such force that mud splattered onto the lettering, making the words even more visible:

Here lies Draco Malfoy,

Dead of Voldemort's Will,

On This Day, March 14

May His Soul Rest In Peace

Harry's mind wandered back to their last conversation...

"Is too, Potter. My father beats my mother and me for no apparent reason. My mother has been beaten so bad that she's stuck in Saint Mungo's, being treated for psychological problems. You complain about never knowing your parents. I complain about knowing them. Sometimes, I think it would've been better if my father wasn't a Death Eater, and he had gotten killed."

"I'm sorry, Draco. I really am."

"I don't want your sympathy. I just want you."

Harry began to cry. That had been the last thing they had said to each other, except their customary, "I love you," before Harry snuck out of the Slytherin boy's dorm room. The next morning, Draco had been found dead with a Malfoy family sword driving deep within his chest, his wrists slashed, and the message, "See you all in Hell," emblazoned on the wall behind him in blood.

Draco had said good-bye to Harry, pulled out the sword, and slashed his wrists. He wrote the message on the wall behind him, then waited for the sun to rise. He recited a poem from somewhere, then plunged the sword deep into his body.

Harry stopped crying. He had found a solution. Startling the teachers yet again, Harry ran up the stairs to Dumbledore's office, mumbling the password along the way. He pulled the sword off its rack in Dumbledore's trophy case, and slashed his wrists while smiling cruelly.

By the time the teachers undid Harry's locking charms, he had already departed this world. His body sat with the sword in the same place in the chest as Draco's had, and on the wall behind him was the message, "I'm going home," written in his own blood. A folded piece of parchment was found in Harry's pocket:

I try to stay sober, but I'm dying again.

And I am aware now that everything's going to be fine,

One day, too late, just as well, and I'm not scared now.

I'll rest assured now, I'm never gonna get away, but I'm not scared now.

Dumbledore unlocked a hidden drawer on his desk and pulled out another folded piece of parchment that only a few other people had known about. It was stained with Draco Malfoy's blood and written on it was:

I try to stay sober, but I'm dying again.

And I am aware now that everything's going to be fine,

One day, too late, just as well, and I'm not scared now.

I'll rest assured now, I'm never gonna get away, but I'm not scared now.

Signed at the bottom of Draco's letter was the words, "Everything's fine again," in Harry's handwriting. On Harry's letter, Draco had signed those same words. Dumbledore threw a look at Professor McGonagall.

"They knew about each other. They were...lovers."