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It had to be known that Harry did not intend to return to Hogwarts. He said his piece to that effect the summer after sixth year, when he knew his duty was to hunt down Voldemort’s horcruxes, and that winter, when Hermione wistfully remarked that maybe after the war they could finish out their education. He repeated himself in the spring, when Voldemort was dead, and in the summer, when he participated in the rebuilding efforts without any further promises.
No one other than Hermione argued with him, and Harry had been ignoring Hermione’s good advice for so long that it no longer registered.
When September 1st rolled around, Harry waved Ron and Hermione onto the train like a proud parent. His friends laughed at him because crying was out of the question — that was the purview of homesick first years, not two eighteen year olds whose parents did not show to the train station. In the cases of both sets of parents, it would take years, not months, to return to normalcy.
Sirius was quite nearly late to the station.
He ran through the barrier at full speed, his briefcase hovering next to him when Sirius abandoned the theater of holding it for the muggle audience on the other side.
“Always wanted to do that,” Sirius said, coming to a stop next to Harry. “Did you know there is a whole muggle station on the other side?”
Harry’s lips twitched. “I did. The Dursleys used to take me through. I’ve never taken the train on the muggle side. Little Whinging didn’t have a station and Aunt Petunia thought trains were grimy and overcrowded anyway.”
“Overcrowded’s the right word for it,” Sirius agreed, looking around. “Who knew there were so many of us left alive?”
A woman in hearing distance turned around to shoot Sirius a sharp look.
Sirius was, as ever, unperturbed. “Madam, I didn’t survive two wars to be unable to joke about it later.”
A blast of horn punctuated his sentence. Last call for the train.
“You’d better go,” Harry said to him.
A little desperately, Harry couldn’t bear to look away or to do anything but walk Sirius to the doors of the closest cabin. He felt like an overprotective parent, letting his child out of his sight for the very first time, but Sirius didn’t quite resemble a first year.
“I guess this is goodbye.” Harry breathed through the sudden vice closing in around his lungs.
The separation hadn’t felt real yesterday, nor a month ago when Sirius accepted a one-year contract as the school’s Defense professor. Now, though? Now Harry knew it would be the last time he saw Sirius until a Hogsmeade weekend, when he would visit and pretend he was quite fine without his godfather’s presence, thank you, and living alone in Grimmauld Place was perfectly fine.
Sirius reached out. His hand hovered between them for the barest moment before Harry grasped it and allowed himself to be pulled onto the train.
Always, Harry would take Sirius’ hand.
When Sirius was only moments ago a deranged murderer and newly a framed man, and when Sirius reached out, falling into the veil, Harry grasped him by the wrist so hard he bruised. When Death Eaters attacked and Harry and his friends went on the run, Harry grabbed Sirius’ outstretched hand. And now? Harry could hardly give up the years-long habit.
The doors of the train closed behind Harry with a clang.
“I didn’t mean to do that,” said Sirius.
Harry had to huff at that. Never did Sirius look as dog-like as when he had knowingly done something wrong.
On the heels of Sirius’ reflexive denial came laughter, and, “Fine, I did mean to do it. I’m not leaving you to your own devices for the whole year.”
“You never tried to convince me otherwise.”
“I didn’t need to, did I?”
And how could Harry begrudge him when Sirius simply looked happy that Harry was with him?
“I’ll make a terrible student,” Harry warned him.
“Can’t forge a warrior and turn him back into a kid,” Sirius said, sagely, in the sort of tone that had Harry wondering which muggle karate movie from the 70s he was quoting.
The train trembled as it left the station, its movement evening out as it built speed. Harry squeezed Sirius’ hand. He had never felt motion sick, but now he looked out at English countryside suddenly all around the train and he was close.
“Lets find the food trolley. You look like you could do with some pepper-up pumpkin juice. We should have had a bite before boarding the train.”
Reluctantly, Harry let go of Sirius’ hand. He couldn’t hold it forever. Probably. “I planned to finish my breakfast after I dropped you off at the station.”
“Kreacher’s, now.”
“He does like my scrambled eggs,” Harry said with a sigh. “I was ready to become a shut-in in what I’m sure is the grand old tradition of Grimmauld Place.”
“You would have made my Great-Great Aunt Agatha proud. Don’t be so glum. You can be a shut-in at Hogwarts. Take some lessons from the ghosts. You’ll do alright.”
And with that, Sirius directed them both to the trolley. He was right — Harry did feel better after some juice, and also after several hours in a cabin with Sirius, shoulder to shoulder as they talked about nothing at all.
*
“Welcome back, Mr. Potter.” There was no surprise in McGonagall’s expression when Sirius and Harry stepped off the train together. “Would you like to make use of my floo after the feast? The house elves found no luggage belonging to you on the train.”
“Bit of a spontaneous decision,” Harry admitted. “Thanks, Headmistress.”
Her expression softened. “A good decision. I hoped you would return, Harry.”
Harry nodded, looking away.
McGonagall had been one of the people to whom Harry had so ardently sworn that he wouldn’t be returning to Hogwarts. And yet here he was: walking through the stone corridors once more. Sirius was gone, something about a separate staff entrance to the head table, and Harry stuffed his hands in his pockets and wondered what the hell he was doing here.
He felt too old to be here, like he’d accidentally put on a firstie’s robes. He kept expecting to see his wrists and ankles poking through his robes.
There was quite a bit of cheer when Harry entered the Great Hall, as though everyone had simply been waiting for him.
Harry took a seat across from Ron and Hermione.
“Knew you wouldn’t skip out,” Ron said, looking relieved to see him there.
“He did not,” Hermione corrected, fondly. “He was moaning about it the whole train ride. I was, too.”
Ron huffed, but refused to look embarrassed about it. “What’s Hogwarts without my best mate? It would be like, well, Hogwarts without you, Hermione.”
Hermione looked pleased. “Quite. We’re glad you’re here, Harry.”
Harry could only nod. He looked up to catch a glance of Sirius at the staff table. It was only after that, that he could say, “Me, too.”
*
As happy as the Hogwarts staff was with the return of Harry and his yearmates—and, as it was, with every student that was alive to return to Hogwarts—the castle did not have a ready place for the influx of students.
Instead of cramping the traditional dormitories, the returning students of Harry’s year were assigned to other parts of the castle. The Slytherins were consigned a third-floor corridor, previously of the first year forbidden corridor fame. For their sake, Harry hoped the corridor had been cleaned after Fluffy’s occupation and that the devil’s snare had been removed.
The returning Ravenclaws found themselves sharing the Divination tower with Professors Trelawney and Firenze, and, as often as they could find an excuse to do so, Lavender and Parvati.
The Hufflepuffs had promptly refused to part with their own. The returning students joined the small class of first years in what Harry assumed would involve lots of babysitting and helping with homework.
It delighted Hermione to no end that the Gryffindors were situated on the same floor as her beloved library. Harry privately wondered if it was in fact no coincidence — McGonagall had no doubt known which of her students would appreciate the placement most.
While the girls’ dorm room was closer to the library, the boys’ was in the direction of the west tower, overlooking an inner courtyard. Used decades ago as a botany study room when temperatures grew too cold to meet in the greenhouses, the walls were decorated with artwork of native magical plants.
“This is the best room in the castle,” Neville promptly declared.
Harry, who on sleepless nights would stare up at the whomping willow drawn all over the ceiling, was of another mind. The willow’s branches had a habit of trying to attack the moonlight entering the room through the two windows. The whole thing reminded Harry of Crookshanks when the cat was on the prowl.
There were many such sleepless nights for Harry.
When he could no longer bear to stay in bed, Harry would slip out of his bed and head toward the library. He passed the library’s entrance, instead making his way up the Astronomy tower.
There was nothing wrong with the tower. No repairs to be made, no rule against going up. But Astronomy classes had been moved to another tower and teenagers didn’t come here to make out anymore. Harry didn’t bother with his invisibility cloak; he felt so removed from house points that it was laughable.
The top of the Astronomy tower was cold and quiet. The glass on the observation deck had been repaired. Harry pushed the window open and rested his forearms on the ledge.
For a few moments, he looked up at the moon, but he’d never much cared about the sky at night. He looked forward instead, barely making out the treetops. There was the real whomping willow out there, stiller than the picture.
The first two times he went up to the tower, Harry was left alone.
On the third, footsteps followed him up, and they settled in next to Harry. Sirius was warm and solid all along Harry’s right side. Harry exhaled, relishing the sudden warmth.
“You come up here a lot.”
“Checking up on me?”
“Yes.”
“Is it still spying if you admit to it?” Harry wondered. “Look, there’s Malfoy’s great horned owl returning from its hunt. It does this cool swoop sometimes— there it is.”
“Have you told Malfoy he resembles his owl?”
“Yes, and he said thanks,” Harry huffed. “Can’t even have a proper rival anymore.”
“The trials of peacetime.” Sirius took Harry’s hands, pressing them between his own warmer ones. “Have you considered a different setting for your brooding? My position comes with some nice quarters. I have a fireplace. You can stare out into the fire with this same expression, but you’ll be warmer.”
“I can’t brood properly around you,” Harry admitted.
“I’ll be quiet as a church mouse. Those are the very small kind, you know. Can fit in a teacup.”
“Mm.”
Harry was quiet for a long while. True to his word, Sirius let him. Slowly, Sirius’ hands lost some of their warmth, but they stayed around Harry’s.
Sometimes Harry hated his godfather for how unshakable his love was, how Sirius could never let go once he had something in his teeth. The rest of the time, he loved him. Loved him to madness, to heights of feeling that no one else had ever been able to inspire in Harry.
In the daytime, or even in Sirius’ cozy rooms, Harry wouldn’t have been able to say it. But now, under the cover of night, he said, “I had a whole plan, you know. I’d send you off and I’d spend the year quietly trying to fix myself, and when I picked you up at the station at the end of the year, I would be alright again.”
Sirius’ hold tightened. “Trauma’s not quite that easy to fix. Harder to do it alone.”
“Less embarrassing to do it alone.”
“There is that,” Sirius conceded. “It’s messy, maddening. Best to have good company throughout.”
“You weren’t really going to leave me at Grimmauld Place,” Harry realized with a huff.
“I would have pulled you bodily onto the train if I had to. It was my luck that you came willingly. Minerva may have twisted my arm with the job offer, but you’ll always be my first priority.”
Harry let himself be pulled back into the warmth of the tower, then down to Sirius’ quarters. The fireplace was as nice as promised.
Sirius threw floo powder into the fire. “You want to talk to Tonks or Remus? They’re both pretty good at this and are never asleep at this hour anyway.”
Harry kind of hated him. “Tonks.”
He kind of hated Sirius even more when it turned out that he and Tonks both knew a thing or two about mourning a beloved mentor and not knowing what to do with their lives now that the path they were on had turned from stone to sand.
*
Harry kept up the Astronomy tower habit. So did Sirius. After a few months of sheer repetition, Hogwarts regained much of its former shine in Harry’s eyes. It wasn’t only the location of wartime violence — it was meandering stairways and corridors, and it was greenhouse plants that tried to eat his hair, and it was first years learning Wingardium Leviosa.
It was Sirius in his element as the Defense professor and McGonagall in her element running the show. Harry didn’t attend all his classes — even most of them, some weeks — but he was always early for Defense.
“It’s my Lockhart phase,” Harry said to Hermione when she teased him about it. “Everyone gets to have one crush on a professor.”
“I had three,” Hermione replied, primly.
Ron looked at her, aghast. “Who?”
“This was before you, of course,” Hermione assured him without answering. “Didn’t you have a crush on a professor?”
“No?” Ron looked between them both. “They’re all old? No offense.”
“None taken,” Sirius said, passing them on his way into the classroom. “I have the self-confidence of a dozen men and have absolutely no unresolved issues about turning forty soon.”
“It really is a Lockhart phase…” Ron quietly muttered.
Harry, who had taken a seat in the first row, had nothing to say for himself. Did it count as a crush on a professor if he’d already had it before Sirius became a professor, and would have it after they’d both moved on from Hogwarts? Harry couldn’t remember a time when he hadn’t loved Sirius; it felt as though from the very first moment he knew Sirius, truly knew him, that he was doomed.
It was inevitable, really.
But it was nice, if only for a while, to box up his feelings in something as simple as a crush on a teacher.
*
The topic came up during one of Harry’s evenings in Sirius’ quarters. He sat on the ornate carpet by the fire, a textbook strewn open in his lap because he had figured he needed to do something other than brood and stare at Sirius.
“Everyone’s traumatized,” Harry grumbled to Sirius. “I don’t need to go around being dramatic about it.”
Sirius shook his head, settling down next to Harry. “Remember my Grimmauld Place maroon bathrobe stage? If that wasn’t drama, I don’t know what was. Remus helped me a lot, back then.”
Harry peered over at Sirius. “Did two you, ah…”
Sirius huffed a laugh. “No, never. I had my fun at Hogwarts as a student.” He raised a brow. “It helped take my mind off of things. You could try it. Plenty of your yearmates returned.”
Harry shrugged. “That would be hard.”
“Are you doubting your charms?”
“Don’t need any with this scar.” Harry gestures to his forehead. “Nah, it would be awkward, what with me being in love with you. I don’t want to lead anyone on.”
“Ah,” Sirius said. He didn’t look particularly surprised. “I did wonder when that would come up.”
Harry shrugged. “No longer running for my life or plotting to kill the Dark Lord, so. Nothing to busy myself with and ignore it.”
“Schoolwork?”
“I attend two classes in five and no one’s written me up.”
“I should have a word with your professors,” Sirius huffed. “Truancy should be for a purpose, not this aimless nonsense. You’re not even smoking, Harry. Where did I go wrong?”
“You were very handsome,” Harry told him, earnestly. “You should do something about that.”
“I could cut my hair.” Sirius affected a thoughtful expression.
Harry reached over to tug at Sirius’ hair, just because he’d wanted to for a very, very long time. “Wouldn’t help. You’d still be too handsome.”
Sirius was no help — like this, on the edge of a smile at Harry’s words, Harry was more hopeless than usual.
“What would you suggest?”
Harry opened his mouth, closed it.
Sirius’ smile broke out fully.
“Sirius,” Harry said, helplessly. His hand curled in Sirius’ hair, but he didn’t tug.
“Back at Hogwarts, Remus would tell me to count to ten before I made a decision. It’s supposed to curb my impulses. If I want to make a mistake after ten seconds, then I may as well.”
Harry sucked in a breath. “It’s been a lot longer than ten seconds.”
“Yeah. Yeah, it has been.”
And despite that, Sirius waited, and he waited, and the very moment that Sirius began to move, Harry surged forward to kiss him.
*
Harry still went up to the Astronomy tower to brood. But finally, the tower was also once again being used for its true purpose of midnight rendezvous.