Harry stared directly at it, that tiny fraction of the Light that was not obscured and blocked and hidden, even if it was only 3 parts out of 40, the other 37 parts were there somewhere. The 7.5% of the glass that was full, which proved that people really did care about water, even if that force of caring within themselves was too often defeated. If people truly didn't care, the glass would have been truly empty. If everyone had been like You-Know- Who inside, secretly cleverly selfish, there would have been no resisters to the Holocaust at all.
Harry looked at the sunset, on the second day of the rest of his life, and knew that he had switched sides.
Because he couldn't believe in it any more, he couldn't really, not after going to Azkaban. He couldn't do what 37 out of 40 people would vote for him to do. Everyone might have inside them what it took to be Hermione, and someday they might learn; but
There was a sort of awful appropriateness to it. You shouldn't go to Azkaban and come back having not changed your mind about anything important.
The last part of the Sun sank below the horizon.
It was strange, this feeling of not quite knowing who you were, which side you were on, of having
And that reminded him of what Professor Quirrell had said to his last question, which reminded him of Professor Quirrell, which made it hard once more to breathe, started that burning sensation in Harry's throat, sent his thoughts around that loop of the climbing spiral once again.
Why was he so sad, now, whenever he thought of Professor Quirrell? Harry was used to knowing himself, and he didn't know why he felt so sad...
It felt like he'd lost Professor Quirrell forever, lost him in Azkaban, that was how it felt. As surely as if the Defense Professor had been eaten by Dementors, consumed in the empty voids.
But then it hadn't
Harry looked at the fading sky.
He'd seen Professor Quirrell turn into a hardened criminal while facing the Auror, and the apparent change of personalities had been effortless, and complete.
Another woman had known the Defense Professor as 'Jeremy Jaffe'.
You couldn't help but wonder...
...whether 'Professor Quirrell' was just one more name on the list, just one more person that had been
Harry would always be wondering now, every time he talked to Professor Quirrell, if it was a mask, and what motive was behind that mask. With every dry smile, Harry would be trying to see what was pulling the levers on the lips.
Maybe there was some way to restore a trust in surface appearances and make a normal human relationship possible again, but Harry couldn't think of what it might be.
That was how Harry had lost Professor Quirrell, not the person, but the... connection...
Why did that hurt so much?
Why did it feel so lonely, now?
Surely there were other people, maybe better people, to trust and befriend? Professor McGonagall, Professor Flitwick, Hermione, Draco, not to mention Mum and Dad, it wasn't like Harry was