LUCY:

February 24, 1996 was a Saturday. It marked one year since the second task. It marked one year since the nightmare had started, too. The fact that it happened every month, every 24th, didn't make it any less terrifying. The darkness, the cold, the hopelessness, the knowledge that Cedric wasn't coming. It never got easier. Every 24th, I was launched back into reality feeling as if I really had been down there all night long. The first time I'd woken up from that nightmare, though, Cedric had been right there, pulling me swiftly to shore and assuring me over and over and over and over that he was there and I was safe.

A year later, when I jerked awake from the same horrible nightmare for the thirteenth time, I was all too aware of the fact that Cedric's presence was a comfort I would never have again.

I tried to steady my breathing as I swallowed my tears. The sun had not yet risen, but I needed to get out of the castle. I changed into one of Cedric's jumpers with trembling hands and practically fled the dormitory. I cast silencing spells all around me as I sprinted through hallways and corridors, and I was careful to stick to shadows as I darted out into the dawn. I didn't stop running until I reached the end of the dock on the Black Lake.

I lowered myself to the wooden planks and let my legs dangle freely over the water. It was then that the first sob escaped me, and the tears began to fall.

I wrapped Cedric's jumper around me as tightly as I could, but there was nothing left of him to hold. Never again would I get to hold him the way I once had, and never again would he get to hold me the way he once had.

Part of me wanted to jump into the water, to see if he would somehow come to save me again, but, unfortunately, I knew better. If I ever did find myself at the bottom of the Black Lake again, there would be no Cedric coming to find me, no Cedric to pull me to the surface, no Cedric to help me to shore, no Cedric to sit with me until the panic passed.

Even if I found myself at the top of the world, somehow, there would be no Cedric then either. I found myself thinking of the Quidditch match when I had first conjured my corporeal patronus, the time my bear had charged down Draco Malfoy and his goons. Cedric was woven into the fabric of that moment, that part of my story. He was there in the memory I used to fuel the patronus. He was the first person to find me on the field. He was there the last time I'd conjured that patronus too, last June before the third task, the night I taught him how to conjure a patronus of his own. He would never again be there for any patronus-worthy moments that I might experience in my life.

Sooner than later, everyone would believe Harry. Eventually, the world would know that Cedric had been murdered by Voldemort. But what would happen then? Would people still remember Cedric, or would people forget him in their realization of the threat that Voldemort was really back? Would Cedric become a martyr, a hero? Or would he be nothing more than a memory that faded more and more and more and more with time?

If I had learned anything in my fifteen years, it was that memory was fragile, it was fragile and it was complicated and it was a weapon and it was so valuable there was no way to possibly describe how much it meant to me. I had been making an effort to cling to the memory of Cedric, but already I could feel it slipping. As I tugged his jumper ever tighter around me, I found that I'd forgotten exactly how tightly he hugged me. I could remember feeling safe every time I was in his arms, I could remember the gentle strength of his reassuring hugs, but I couldn't feel it anymore. It was like his hugs had held my broken pieces together, but I hadn't yet found a way to pull everything together on my own. I doubted it was even possible. I found, too, that the jumper had forgotten how Cedric smelled, and I had too. I could remember the pine and the soil and the books, but I couldn't actually feel it either. I had my memories, sure, I remembered, but the difference between remembering and remembering left me feeling empty and cold.

Memory was fickle. Memory was weak. Memory was insufficient. And yet, memory was part of me, for better or for worse.

As the sun rose over the water, I was profoundly aware of how small I was. The castle behind me had stood for a thousand years, unbroken and unyielding. The lake that stretched out before me and the hills beyond it had been there even longer. The sun climbing across the sky bit by bit by bit by bit had been around the longest of all. The sun painted the sky with colors so vibrant the water echoed those colors right back with equal intensity. And there I was in the middle of it all, just a girl and a shell of one at that.

Eventually, the warmth of the sun, weak though it was, chased my sobs away, though the occasional tear continued to race down my cheek to join the lake below. I watched as each one hit the surface, I watched the small rings ripple outward from the point of impact.

Was Cedric's short life nothing more than a tear in a lake?

Was mine?

I knew my condition was limiting. Werewolves didn't lead normal lives. Werewolves didn't have normal jobs, werewolves didn't have normal bodies, werewolves didn't have normal friends, werewolves didn't have "normal" in their lives at all a lot of the time. I had always held out this resilient, rebellious hope, though, that my life would mean something anyway. Sometimes I had moments where I was sure I meant something to the world, but sometimes I was just a broken little girl lost in the world that made her that way.

I wanted to be more than that, though. I wanted to find a way to be more than that.

I looked down at my hand, the one where I must not tell lies had been carved into my hand all week. It was an ugly scab, not likely to heal anytime soon. I wasn't lying about Cedric, but I was living several other lies. Umbridge knew the truth about my last name, but she didn't know the truth about where I went on full moons. Plenty of people had learned the truth about my lycanthropy over the course of the last year, but only a select few knew the truth about my last name. So many people in my life, people I considered my best friends even, didn't know the full truth of who I was. It didn't bother me a lot of the time because I knew it had to be that way, but sometimes it did bother me. Sometimes I just wanted to leave the wizarding world behind and go running into my family's arms. But if I did that, I knew I'd be leaving a true family behind, too.

It was a beautiful morning, a rare cloudless one. It had just turned fully blue when I heard him coming. I had figured he would come at one point, once he realized I wasn't in the castle and checked the map and realized what day it was, but it was a pleasant surprise when I heard him walking across the dock.

Harry lowered himself down beside me without hesitation and started swinging his feet back and forth over the water. "Good morning, Lu."

"Morning," I replied, my voice sounding pathetic even to myself. "Beautiful day, isn't it?"

"Definitely. D'you remember how bloody cold it was last year?"

"I don't remember much about it," I admitted. "I was a bit shaken up."

"That's certainly understandable. Do you want to talk about it, or would you rather just sit in silence together?"

I shrugged. "I'm just missing him more than usual today."

Harry nodded, not making any further comment.

My chest was growing heavier by the moment. I needed a release, and I didn't want to break down crying again with Harry right next to me. I tried talking again.

"You know, it's funny," I said, absently sending a stream of blue sparks into the air in front of me from my fingertips. "I never expected the second task to become a good memory."

"What do you mean?" Harry asked.

"Well, it was quite terrible in the moment. Water was one of my greatest fears. I remember thinking in the tent that at least I'd never have to go through something that scary again." I laughed humorlessly. "What a lie that turned out to be."

Harry remained silent, seemingly unsure of what to say. I couldn't blame him.

"Now I realize how good of a memory it is. I was in trouble, and Cedric was there. He's never going to be there again. He wasn't there when Mum and Dad died, he wasn't there in the caves, he wasn't there when my magic stopped working or when it suddenly exploded with force again, he wasn't there for any of those horrible full moons when I'd... he wasn't there."

My voice failed me as the sparks swirled faster and faster. I hurriedly closed my hands before I could lose control, but they continued to swirl in front of me.

"Stop it," I half-commanded, half-sobbed, slashing my hand through the sparks and successfully dissipating them the second time. I cradled my head in my hands and pressed the heels of my hands into my eyes until I saw stars. "Sorry, Harry."

"I don't know why you're apologizing," he said.

I tried to hold the tears at bay, really not wanting to cry in front of Harry, but they stung the backs of my eyes. I had been trying to be strong, I had tricked myself into thinking everything might get better, but at the end of the day, I always found my way back to the Black Lake, troubled though its waters were. The Black Lake was where I had so often lost control, where my world had so often fallen apart. I wished so desperately that I could stop myself from returning time and time and time and time again to its cursed shores, but something always lured me back, demanding that I confront myself as I was, authentic and raw without anyone there to protect me or make excuses for me.

At least at first. I couldn't help but notice that nearly every time I was there, someone else joined me at one point or another.

Harry reached out and laid a hand on my shoulder. "I'm not going anywhere."

I wanted to believe him. I wanted so desperately to believe him. I wanted to throw my arms around him and never let him go, I wanted to tell him that I believed him and that I wouldn't let anything or anyone come between us, but I knew all too well that the world didn't work that way.

"You can't promise that," I choked out. "I know you think you mean it, but you can't promise that."

"I can promise to choose you," he said.

I wiped my face with my sleeves after a moment and turned to face him. "What do you mean?"

"I can't promise I won't have to go away, because the world is going crazy right now and I don't know what the future holds, but when it's my choice to make, I'd always rather be with you than not. I'd choose you." Harry shifted his weight on the dock so he could stretch out and lean back on his elbows. "You look like you don't believe me."

I certainly felt a blush rising to my cheeks as I pulled my knees to my chest and turned away from the water to face him better. "Maybe it's hard to believe that anyone would choose me," I whispered. "Cedric more or less got stuck with me, remember?"

"I doubt he saw that as a bad thing."

"No, he didn't," I said quickly, "I didn't mean to suggest that he thought it was a bad thing, he never said anything like that, I know he loved me as if we really were brother and sister, but..."

"I'd choose you," Harry repeated. "You're my best friend. You've always been there for me, so why do you find it so hard to believe that I'd choose to do the same for you?"

I pulled my knees closer to my chest and shrugged.

Harry grinned. "Can you keep a secret?"

I blinked at him. He knew bloody well I could keep a secret.

Harry's grin widened. "You can't tell Ron, alright?"

"What kind of secret are you keeping, Potter?" I asked, narrowing my eyes.

"Nothing bad, nothing bad," he said as he pushed himself up to a proper sitting position. "It's just that, well, a year ago today, I tried to rescue you first."

I raised my eyebrows, tucking the lower half of my face behind my knees so he couldn't see the furious blush making my cheeks burn.

"I realized soon enough that you were Cedric's person and Ron was mine, but I didn't even really think twice about it before trying to cut you free."

"And it's not just because you knew how much I hated the water?"

"Oh, no, I knew that, of course, but the fact of the matter is that I don't know what I'd do without you."

"I don't know what I'd do without you either," I said softly. "You're my best friend too."

"I did know about your fear of the water, though. I would have still cut you free first, even after realizing you weren't my intended person, but the merpeople stopped me so I just made sure Cedric got you to the surface instead of staying until the others arrived."

This new information made even the tips of my ears burn, but I tried not to dwell on it.

Harry smiled. "Listen, if we head up to the castle right now, I'm sure we could still catch breakfast. Are you hungry?"

"Not particularly, but you can head on up," I replied with a shrug.

"I had a feeling you'd say exactly that," he said, pulling a box out of his pocket, "so I'm glad I brought one of the boxes of Bertie Bott's we didn't open last week. You can find the good flavors, and we can toss the bad ones to the grindylows. I'm not particularly hungry, either, but these could last us until lunch, I reckon."

I couldn't help but fall a little bit more in love with him in that moment. With how easily he was adapting to my mood, with how readily he had anticipated my answer, with how quickly he offered a solution, with how gently he was studying me as he tore the top off the box.

He held it out to me. "Maybe it would be easiest if you tossed all of the bad ones out first, so we're only left with good ones."

I nodded and immediately grabbed out a sardine one. I drew my wand and placed a bubble around it and guided the bubble into the water. Soon enough, a grindylow approached and popped the bubble with one of its long, skeletal fingers.

"He seemed to enjoy that," Harry commented.

"Grindylows love to eat fish," I replied. "They can eat algae, too, but they prefer fish."

"What does the Giant Squid like to eat? We could enlarge a jellybean and see if he'll come over to check it out."

I cracked a smile. "I don't know what the Giant Squid likes, sorry. I don't exactly make a habit of wandering down to the lake, so I'm afraid we haven't really gotten to know each other all that well."

"Such a shame," he replied. "You should get Dennis to introduce you, I've heard they're friendly."

For the first time in what felt like a long time, I threw my head back and laughed. Merlin, Harry James Potter was magic.

It was ridiculous how much I was starting to love those Bertie Bott's Every-Flavour Beans.