average human’s Reviews > Avada Kedavra > Status Update

“Hey, Harry, how did —”

“Don’t talk to me,” Harry repeated to Theo, who was snuggled in the window seat of the library with Hermione. Harry stormed past them and knocked on Snape’s office door once before trying to open it.

And found out that he couldn’t.

“What the fuck?”

It was his unprecedented inability to storm in to Snape’s office without being granted permission that cleared off some of his anger and instead allowed confusion to take over.

“Sev?” Harry knocked loudly, certain Snape was in there since it was where he had been all summer so far. “Hey, it’s me!”

“Wait, please.”

Harry irritably rapped his knuckles on the doorframe until Snape finally called for him to enter.

“You can’t lock me out of our office,” Harry said hatefully as he sat in the posh green chair he’d added by the small fireplace just for him to use.

Snape snorted from where he was pacing behind his desk. “Apologies Harry, but since you are meant to be at quidditch practice, I was attempting to keep your motley band of misfits from interrupting me.”

“Well you don’t have to worry about that anymore, do you? I’m not fuckin playing quidditch.”

“What?” Snape stopped his pacing to stare incredulously at Harry. “Why? You have been so excited?”

Harry flung the parchment that had been presented to him this afternoon when he was in the middle of training with his team for the third time. “My ‘contract has been terminated’,” he scoffed as Snape grabbed the paper to read. “Apparently, Timmy’s fuckin followers made a house call to the owner of the team last night. Now, suddenly, I’m ‘a liability’.”

Harry felt justified in his own anger to see Snape look absolutely devastated as his eyes flicked over the parchment for a brief instant before he blinked and his passive mask was firmly in place.

“Contact Amelia,” he said. “Ask her if the DMLE can spare aurors to appease your teams fears. Surely they would allow you to play if you brought protection for them to your training sessions and matches?”

“Nah.” Harry propped his feet up on the little side table next to his chair. “Fuck them. If they’re too scared of Timmy to let me play, then I don’t wanna play for them anymore, do I?”

It was a bit of a lie. Harry had wanted to play for the Arrows more than almost anything. But if one person being killed means they’re too scared to have him on their team, then he didn’t want them to win the World Cup anyway.

“Harry, you have to play,” Snape said vehemently. He sat in the matching green chair to Harry’s and stared him down with a weird look in his eyes. “You worked hard for this. You have always wanted to play professionally. Go back and talk to them. Or I can go, if you would like?”

Harry didn’t even know Snape liked quidditch this much.

“It’s fine.” Harry waved his hand with forced nonchalance. “I’m gonna play for the Canons.”

Snape let out a sigh of relief.

“When Timmy’s dead.”

“What? Why would you wait? Why not play now?”

Harry shrugged and picked at his nails. “Cause they’ll probably just try and kill off the Canons owner next, yeah? I’m gonna write to their captain and see if I can play for them after I kill Timmy. Plus, I sent Viktor the announcement that I got recruited younger than he did, so I win, right?”

Snape’s voice was soft, laced with pleading, “This was your dream Harry. I hate for you to give it up.”

Harry gave him a small grin, it really was vindicating to know Snape cared about quidditch as much as he did.

“Oh I’m not giving it up,” he said. “I’m just gonna kill Timmy first, aren’t I? Then when he’s dead I’ll win the World Cup.”

It was a pain in the arse, to push this off until after they dealt with Timmy, but Harry wasn’t actually as disappointed as he originally was. He’d bested Viktor, which was a big part of wanting to play professionally so early, but also he had fourteen years between graduation and becoming Minister, he could win the World Cup at least a dozen times in that span.

And, the real reason Harry hadn’t cursed anyone for kicking him off the team, was because they were going to be pissed when Harry joined the worst team in the league and made them look like idiots for doing this.

And that’s just what he told them before he left Appleby.

Snape rubbed his eyes, abruptly looking exhausted. Actually, he didn’t look too great at all, period. His skin was pale and the stress lines around his eyes were pronounced in a way Harry didn’t usually notice. Snape’s shoulder length black hair was mussed up and lankier than usual, like he’d been running his fingers through it a lot. He also had his shirt sleeves pushed up, which Harry had never seen him do aside from when he’s working on multiple potions at once, a sure sign of stress.

Which made since, because Snape’s been locked up in their office since they arrived at Invisibility Way and claims he’s been nonstop busy. He would show up for breakfast with Harry, then lock himself away all day while Harry was at Appleby and nobody would see him until he came to have breakfast with Harry the next morning.

Personally, Harry thought he was taking Barty’s death pretty hard and didn’t want to hang out with any of Harry’s friends. Also, he thought maybe he was avoiding Mavis who kept bursting in to tears at the worst times.

Harry liked Mavis, but he was kind of avoiding him too. He hated when people cried, it made his skin itch and his stomach curl. But Hermione, who officially moved in with them this summer, has taken up his slack and has spent tons of time with Mavis so he ‘didn’t feel alone’.

“What if you can’t?” Snape asked quietly, his eyes solemn when Harry quirked a brow at him. “What if you die before you get the opportunity?”

Harry laughed lightly as he plucked the parchment from Snape’s slack hand. “You need to get out of your office more,” he teased him. “I’m not dying. Who’s gonna kill me? Timmy? Dumbledore? Pft,” Harry scoffed, “they already tried, didn’t they? C’mon, come eat lunch with us. You can watch me take the Canons to victory after we kill Timmy.”

Snape’s eyes flicked to a book he had open on his desk before he glanced back at Harry and sighed. “Is it somehow important to you if I show up to lunch?”

“It is,” Harry said with mock-solemnity. “I’ll probably never forgive you, but more importantly, could you forgive yourself?”

Harry was joking, so the flash of grief in Snape’s eyes was so out of place that he thought maybe he imagined it.

“I will be there,” Snape finally sighed. “Go change Harry, you stink.”

“Will do.” Harry jumped to his feet and gave Snape a sarcastic salute. He’d probably be more offended if Snape wasn’t probably right, he’d been up since six doing workouts with his team before the the captain came and sent him home. “You should shower too,” he told him on his way out the door, “I’m inviting Tonks.”

Harry paused a few feet away from the office and turned and looked at the door curiously.

“What’s wrong Harry?” Hermione asked from where she was still sitting with Theo.

“Nothing,” Harry said, still examining the door curiously. “I just- just thought Snape would throw something at the door after I closed it.”

Hermione and Theo laughed, but Harry wasn’t actually joking. His resolve to make Snape cheer up before they had to go back to school in September strengthened.

If Harry could bring up Tonks and Snape didn’t throw anything, then he was more depressed

2%

Susan stepped out of the floo and almost immediately groaned. “You,” she said flatly. “Terrific.”

“You didn’t think Harry would plan the greatest prank ever and not invite me? Did you?” Fred asked with a cocky grin from where he was laying across the sleek sofa in the sitting room. “You remember Charlie, right?”

Susan turned juuuust a little, presenting Charlie Weasley with her left hand instead of her right. “I suppose you’re helping as well?”

Susan hoped Harry knew Charlie was coming, otherwise he was going to be upset. Sure Harry let Charlie join the gang, and anyone could see how hard he worked to appear casual and unaffected by his presence, but Harry couldn’t fool Susan. She noticed his little ticks in his fingers when Charlie moved too quickly or spoke too loudly. And she didn’t think Harry kept a close eye on Charlie’s hands because he found him attractive.

Even if he was terribly attractive.

“Harry specifically asked me to help,” Charlie said with a roguish smile as if he could guess at Susan’s thoughts. “He said, and I quote, ‘I need an adult or Snape’s gonna be pissed and I know you like fire’.”

“What?” Susan was startled in to a laugh by that. She looked Charlie over carefully. He didn’t look much like the twins or Ron, aside from his blue eyes and freckles. His red hair was cropped short and his features were more... more hardened than the other Weasley boys. She glanced at his arms, taking note of both the tattoos and the muscles, and smiled slyly at the burn marks littering his arms. “I suppose you do know quite a bit about fire, don’t you Dragon-Man?”

“A bit,” Charlie said with a wink that temporarily soothed Susan’s newly diminished confidence.

Susan never used to worry much about her looks. She was attractive, beautiful, and didn’t struggle to find willing partners once her hormones kicked in and she wanted to experiment. She wasn’t vain, necessarily, she just knew she was attractive as clearly as she knew she had two arms.

Then she lost one arm and didn’t know anything about herself anymore.

Susan was about to see how far the supposedly ‘romantically disinterested’ Charlie Weasley was, when Hermione, Theo, Draco, and Harry trooped in the room and interrupted her.

Another time then, she decided with a small flick of her head for Charlie before she settled herself on the floor beside the chair she knew Harry would take.

Harry always took the chair that had the best view of the exits.

Sure enough, Harry sat in his chair and Theo shoved Fred’s legs off the sofa so he and Hermione could sit while Draco took a hesitant seat next to Charlie on the smaller love seat.

“Where’s Ron?” Harry asked Draco immediately.

It was Fred who answered him with an apologetic grimace. “He’s at the shop with George. Sorry darlin, I paid him to cover me today.”

“His loss,” Harry shrugged. “Kay, Mione, let’s go over the plan then.”

Hermione nodded and pulled out a parchment from her bag that she got up to stick to the wall. “Operation ‘Blow Up Malfoy Manor’, step one—”

“Excuse me?” Susan said with just the right mix of condescending in her polite tone. “Operation B.U.M.M.?”

“Blow Up Malfoy Manor, yes?” Hermione said, her brows furrowing over her brown eyes at Susan’s interruption. “That’s what we’re doing, isn’t it?”

Fred and Charlie began snickering quietly while Susan blinked slowly at Hermione, waiting for her to understand precisely what she’s done.

It took a few seconds, but finally Hermione’s cheeks turned a brilliant red.

“Operation bum,” she whispered, horrified. “Oh God.”

Susan gave Theo a very pointed look, “I wouldn’t let Hermione name your future children.”

Harry and Draco howled with laughter with the Weasley’s while Theo blushed alongside Hermione now.

“Fuck off Susan,” Hermione snapped. “It was a poorly thought out acronym, no need to be a pillock about it.”

Susan loved Hermione all the time. But she liked her as well as loved her when Hermione got snarky and rude.

“Quit,” Harry said from his spot. He was quiet, but they all heard him anyway. “Can we get on with it?”

Harry didn’t specifically admonish Hermione, but Susan knew that he wouldn’t have spoken up if Hermione hadn’t just called her a ‘pillock’ either. He was so needlessly protective, it was adorable. It was probably a good thing she’d never once in her life been attracted to Harry, or else she would have to steal him from Fred.

She glanced up at Harry and could easily admit that he was fanciable, he just wasn’t her type. His facial features were too delicate, he looked too easily broken. It was a look she could appreciate in girls, but she liked her blokes to look more rugged.

Not that Harry wasn’t strong and powerful, but maybe she just knew him too well. She knew what had the potential to break Harry and vice verse. She knew that the battle had broken him, in a way, and he knew that the loss of her arm had broken her in a way.

They were open books with each other, to an extent. Harry wouldn’t share plans with her when he thought there was a chance she’d get hurt, but she wasn’t going to be sidelined in any plans anymore either.

Especially not this plan, because this plan was hers and it was brilliant.

“Step one then Hermione,” Susan said. “I think that’s for us,” she told Harry cheerfully.

“Er...” Harry ran a hand through his hair and Susan just knew something stupid was about to come out of his mouth. “I told Fred he could come with me.”

Susan counted very slowly in her head (Lupin would be so proud) before she responded to that sudden shift in plans.

“And why, precisely, are you taking Fred instead of me?” Susan asked with a sharp glare. “This was my plan, my idea. I want to go.”

Harry shifted his eyes away guiltily and Susan knew it was some mad protective thing.

“No,” she cut him off before he could even say it. “I’m going.”

“I’m a better thief,” Fred said with a bright smile. “Harry’s just playing to our strengths.”

Susan was no big fan of Fred’s. And she liked him even less when he would jump in and hand Harry perfectly logical explanations to hide his illogical thought processes behind.

“Harry, no,” Susan said, ignoring Fred entirely for the moment. “I’m going.”

“Your wand has a trace on it and it’s a muggle area,” Fred said, butting in to a private argument again. This is why he gets on Susan’s nerves, he lets Harry do whatever he wants and never argues against him, even when Harry is being a prat. “Mine doesn’t.”

“Then give me yours,” Susan snapped at him.

“Sue, c’mon, I’ll be gone for fifteen minutes and then you can go to the manor with us,” Harry said pleadingly. “If we get caught then they might call the cops or something mad, I don’t want them trying to fuckin arrest you.”

“Aren’t they already kind of like cops?” Draco asked, his nose scrunched up in what Susan and Hermione dubbed ‘pureblood confusion’. “I thought that’s what muggle military is?”

“It’s a little different,” Hermione said patiently before launching in to an overly detailed explanation.

“Susan, we need your help to perfect this spell,” Theo said, taking Harry’s side as Susan should have known he would. “It’s trickier than Timmy’s followers make it look.”

“I know you guys perfected it already,” Susan rolled her eyes. “I’m going with Harry and that’s that.”

“No you aren’t, that’s that,” Harry said stubbornly.

Harry and Fred got to their feet, Harry’s cloak already halfway out of Harry’s pocket when Susan caught a glimpse of Charlie and had one final idea.

She jumped up and pulled Fred to the side of the room quickly. She yanked his head down by her mouth to make sure the others couldn’t hear her threat. “Either you tell Harry that you’ll stay and I’ll go, or I’m going to shag your brother while you’re gone,” she hissed quietly before releasing him.

Fred blinked at Susan, his jaw dropping and overall looking just as horrified and worried as she thought he might. Fred never said anything, but she didn’t think he was the biggest fan of her either. Which would certainly make it a shame for him if she stole away one of his siblings.

“Change of plans, darlin,” Fred called over to Harry. “You take Susan to rob the garrison and I’ll wait here and make sure the other supplies are ready.”

Harry scowled.

Susan smiled.

Then Harry sighed and held his hand out and she skipped back over to him to grab it.

“If you get hurt then you’re out of the gang,” Harry said flatly. “Disarm Fred and take his wand.”

Susan knew Harry wouldn’t kick her out, and she wouldn’t get hurt this time. She smirked at Fred before turning her wand on Charlie and disarming him before he even realized what she was doing.

“Oi! What the hell?!”

Susan pocketed his wand and tossed him hers. “It won’t work very well, since you didn’t earn it, but you can use mine until I get back,” she said with a wink. “See you guys soon.”

Harry’s face was blank as he threw the cloak over the two of them. He pulled a parchment out of his pocket and studied the address Hermione found for them carefully. “Ready Sue?”

Susan squeezed his hand while her heart thudded in anticipation for the upcoming adventure. “Ready.”