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Harry stands in the Hospital wing bathroom, the tap turned to rush cold water over his reddened hands as he breathes slowly. Harry splashes water on his face and rinses the bile from his mouth.
Since Cedric was murdered, Harry felt a knot form in his stomach. A squirming ball of eels that seemed to disrupt him constantly and whisper ‘what-ifs’ to him as he tried to go through life. Acid trying to bubble itself up his throat and take residence outside of his stomach. He was constantly dealing with someone else's issue. He often found he just wanted to hide from the stares.
His pulse never seemed to drop lower than the pounding drumbeat that seemed to follow him everywhere. Anticipation seemed to prequel every action, no matter the actual significance. Umbridge was absolutely no help in the matter.
Trying to sleep? Palpitations. Eating supper while being stared at? Stomachache. Ron and Hermione’s bickering? Acid reflux. Pollen season was the worst, he sniffled and coughed constantly, feeling out of it from muggle allergy medication when he could get it and too young to legally buy his own medication from the wizard shops. The coughing only served to jostle his stomach.
Harry seemed to often break out in hives from overwhelm, his body seemed to swell like a pufferfish from stress. Fluid would fill his ears and he’d hack like he was trying to get a hairball up.
In summary, Harry is miserable. He feels as if he has a constant stomach flu and is coming off incredibly ditzy with his mouth-breathing blank stare and constant tissues.
It was scorching in the Herbology Greenhouse. Professor Sprout insisted on keeping it boiling hot and humid even during the winter months with a number of charms and spellbound reflective panels that beamed the sun into the classroom. And into Harry’s eyes
Ron and Hermione bickered over something stupid. The plant in front of him was infected with some nasty magical ailment and rotting into compost. It had turned to a bubbling sludge full of potato weevils and crawling worms.
Harry breathed out, willing his stomach to calm. It’s so hot in here, the air was suffocating. Everything is wet from humidity and the air smells like dragon manure. He can feel the hives raising into welts on his back.
It looked like the oatmeal Harry had that morning, the plant that was. The bugs like the cinnamon specks and caraway seeds he had mixed in. Butter pooled and melted into miniature valleys and hills like the green ooze from the plant into the decomposing soil.
And then the oatmeal was coming back up. Harry’s head lurched forward with a violent gag as his stomach twisted sharply
Harry was stumbling to the side, out of the greenhouse and pushing past Lavender. She makes some type of offended sound and brushes the dirt that Harry’s gloves had transferred to her robes.
He keeled over and vomited onto the snow. He could feel his skin breaking out in hives.
His entire body tensed with the effort of upheaving chunks of partially digested apple and oatmeal. He felt his eyes strain and blood vessels in his face burst with every cough and heave.
Harry groaned, panting as he finished up. His body gave weak dry heaves. His abdomen hurt from the strain. His sweaty skin melted the snow. He had taken off his outer robes at the greenhouse flap. Now he had collapsed into a heap in just his shirt and trousers into the snowbank.
Harry shivers and grunts as he pushes himself up and kicks snow over the spewed contents of his stomach.
Ron had apparently easily identified the familiar queasy look on Harry’s face and was carrying Harry’s things out of the greenhouse. Ron grimaced and handed Harry his coat, patting him on the back.
Harry wipes the cold water off his face on a cloth and lies down on a hospital wing bed. He only wants to stay here until lunch is over.
He didn’t enjoy this. It wasn’t intentional. He was aware that people like Draco and his two shadows thought he made himself sick intentionally to get out of class. Harry couldn’t ignore the fact it happened in his potions’ class most often. This was only due to the overwhelming amount of foul-smelling ingredients and perfuming clouds that bloomed from various cauldrons and choked Harry into violent gags.
Professor Snape’s glare has twisted his stomach into knots since he was a first year. The man looked like one of Aunt Marge's dogs, ready to bite Harry.
Harry shivers and tucks himself under the blanket. He never felt right after vomiting, He felt better then he did before. But something was dreadfully off, the feeling was familiar. Harry is cold.
Harry stares at himself in the bathroom mirror of Privet Drive as he brushes his teeth. His cheeks have hollowed. His hair is falling out and when Harry sticks out his tongue, it’s scalloped. The indents on the side of the dehydrated muscle are deep and detailed from his teeth pressing into it.
He hasn’t digested anything substantial in a while. It shouldn’t surprise him. It’s not that he hasn’t eaten, but ever since Sirius died he hadn’t kept down a single meal.
Professor Dumbledore had said in his letter he was coming to pick Harry up soon. Harry had not packed. He did not think he was coming. Harry felt exhausted all the time, it seemed that he wasn’t doing much these days.
The Dursleys mainly left him alone these days. He had fulfilled their wish of staying in his room, being silent and pretending he doesn’t exist. When he did come down to dinner he found his portions slightly larger than his normal laughable portion. Petunia’s scowl almost had a tinge of worry in it, Dudley didn't protest so hard at Harry’s portion allowance when he found Harry never managed to finish it and that he was allowed to swoop down and steal the rest of his plate like a vulture on a rotting corpse.
Harry found himself in the shower, letting the hot water run over him early in the morning often, running bony fingers over his ribcage and watching in the mirror.
He didn’t like how thin he was. He didn’t like the exhaustion and the weakness and the absolute churning of his stomach. He vomited often out of anxiety. He pulled his shedding hair and he beat his chest weakly, coughing up the mucus in his lungs that had formed due to the heavy pollen the night air blew through his window.
He was tired. He didn't want help.
Harry went to bed most nights starving. He would try to eat dinner and be utterly disgusted. Maybe it was his Aunt’s cooking, but Dudley didn’t seem to have a problem with it, not that he ever did.
He soothed himself to sleep with ideas of morning eggs and thick-cut fatty bacon. Only to wake in the morning and lie in bed, disgusted by the idea. Or sit at the table and stare blankly at his food like he could will it into his small intestine without passing his throat.
Eggs started to disgust him, he seemed to have the most trouble with them. He vomited them every time without fail. To be clear, Harry doesn’t do this intentionally. He does not force his index and middle fingers down his throat until he is reunited with whatever he’s managed down. Harry worries. He worries about Ron, and Hermione. He worries about The Weasley family and the Order. He worries about Dumbledore and Hagrid. His stomach is full of hornets. Not butterflies. Hornets.
There was a constant ache, and an air of anxiety that clouded rational thought. He was nervous about throwing up, which made him nauseous, which made him want to spew, which made him anxious. It was a vicious cycle. He didn't want help.
Harry was equally shocked to find Professor Dumbledore at his bedroom doorframe as Professor Dumbledore was to find Harry curled up in bed, letting Hedwig perch on his open dresser drawer and eat the dead field mouse in her beak. He couldn’t deny his room was a mess. He didn’t have many muggle things, but it looked like his trunk had outright exploded in his room. Broken ink bottle shards in their half-dried puddles of ink, inked and abandoned sugar quills.
“Hi..” Harry coughed, rolling out of bed and forcing himself onto his feet. God he was dizzy, when he blinked, his brain felt as if it zapped and fizzed inside his head. “Hi, Professor.”
He squinted and blinked as Dumbledore flicked on the light. He visibly made a great effort to hide his reaction.
“Harry. Good to see you, dear boy. Would you like some help packing?” Dumbledore offered kindly.
Harry appreciated the lack of comment on the way his hips stuck out, and his ribs could be counted through the t-shirt he was sporting.
He suddenly became incredibly aware that he was facing the headmaster of his school, in his messy bedroom, wearing a fraying old t-shirt- one of those sleep shirts teenage boys keep around till it becomes more holes than shirt, and boxer shorts.
Harry tugged the hem of his shirt lower. “Er- No, I’m sure I can manage.” He flushed.
“Nonsense.” Dumbledore smiles. And with a flick of his wand, Harry’s things are sent into his trunk in neat, folded piles.
Dumbledore flicks some weather-appropriate clothes onto Harry's bed and exits the room, floating the trunk down the stairs. Harry stands there and wrestles with his mortification for a few minutes.
He pulls on trousers and a jumper, the clothes feel looser than they did in May. It’s August now. He frowns at the way they only serve to highlight his protruding bones and short stature and turns from the mirror quickly.
He remembers profoundly little of the conversation that happens before he’s taking Dumbledore’s arm and- and he’s vomiting into a bush. Harry forgot how much he hated apparition. It was more a weak dry heave of stomach acid and the biscuit he managed, splattering over the grass before Dumbledore vanished the mess.
He’s standing in front of the Burrow’s back door. Being dropped off by Dumbledore. He’s saying goodbye to his professor, his head is spinning as he tugs off his trainers and arranges them neatly next to his trunk as the adults talk. Harry cannot focus on any word they say for the life of him right now.
Molly has always been vocal about how thin Harry arrives at King's Cross every September, he doesn’t see why this would be an exception.
Mrs. Weasley flings her arms around Harry after opening the door. She’s talking.. At Harry. He should probably start listening soon.
In Harry’s defense Mrs. Weasley talks exceptionally fast, Harry manages sounds of acknowledgement. Mrs. Weasley is taking Harry’s hands in her own and examining them, she’s running her thumb over his hollow cheek and she’s running her hand through his hair. Mrs. Weasley not so subtly wraps her thumb and forefinger around Harry’s wrist, they touch easily. She’s still talking. Harry had never once wondered where Ron gets it from.
And then Harry is sitting at the kitchen island on a stool. And a ceramic bowl of beef stew is on the placemat in front of him. Mrs. Weasley is cutting thick slices of bread and buttering them at almost the same thickness.
Harry felt an enormous amount of pressure to eat. Mrs. Weasley’s cooking was miles better than anything he had ever had- literally anywhere, but it was rich. Heavy and satiating, the kind of meal that stuck to your ribs and could keep you warm. Harry had no idea how Ron was so thin with how he ate. He didn't like th
Crookshanks traces figure eights around Harry’s ankles, the scruffy orange cat jumps onto his lap. Hermione is here then. Harry has always liked cats. In his opinion, a dog liking you was part of their personality, it was much more special to be loved by such an independent creature. Growing up, Dudley thought cats were evil to the extent of trying to run a black cat over with his electric bike. Harry didn’t know what had happened when it went down, but all of a sudden, the bike came to a dead halt in front of the cat as it groomed itself. Dudley, being an object in motion: stayed in motion. He was sent flying over the cat and into the pavement.
Harry had been sentenced to a week in his cupboard for this, even though he insisted he did not do it. Dudley thought he did, and that was all that mattered.
Harry also felt exceptionally queasy. Broth was one of the easier things to keep down, He let it flood his spoon. The golden oil floated to the top and danced in the light, shimmering at him from their little bubbles in the deeply colored broth. Steam warms his face and his lungs. The broth is silky from being simmered with bones, collagen thickening the liquid.
A whole clove of garlic floats onto his spoon. Harry actively misses Mrs. Weasley’s cooking when he’s not home. He should smack Ron next time he complains.
Is Mrs. Weasley still talking? Oh shit. She’s paused, looking at Harry for a response. He chokes a little, pretending to have a mouthful of soup. “Yeah, Er- I agree.” He offers, hoping he gets away with his absence of attention.
She laughs, seeming to understand what has happened. Harry’s face flushes. “You’re sweet.”
Mrs. Weasley opens a junk drawer and pulls out a pair of shears and a comb, washing both with some sort of solution next to the sink. Harry would guess it’s the magical equivalent of disinfectant based on the colour.
“You’ll let me get some of that hair out of your eyes won’t you? Arthur can always put it back with a spell if you don’t like it, I’m afraid I'm not too good with any particular clipper charm.” She smiles kindly, wetting Harry’s hair and pushing him to sit up straight.
Harry did need a haircut. He felt it would be rude to decline her offer as she was already combing his damp hair and taking snips off. From the moment Harry met Mrs. Weasley, she had never stopped trying to get his raven hair to lay flat. Harry had long given up on such a lost cause. Aunt Petunia once cut the cowlick off completely and it grew back inarguably more pronounced. Harry was uncomfortable with the intimacy of the service. Being cared for had always felt offendingly foreign.
Harry managed to drain the bowl of most liquid. He ate slowly, willing himself to focus on the comb in his hair. He focused on the wooden spoon in his mouth. Especially small, slow bites. Setting down the spoon and only picking it up a few moments after he had swallowed. Harry was making an exceptionally great effort to satisfy Mrs. Weasley with how much he was eating. An effort to push the blame from his own issues to a simple lack of resources. He didn't want the help she was offering, he didn't want to rely.
Harry is exhausted, his thoughts make little sense even to himself. He does not doubt for a second that repeating them aloud would make them feel considerably stranger.
Mrs. Weasley showed him his shorter hair in a handheld mirror. It was nice. Not anything special, just a trim. Harry smiled to show his thankfulness, making a conscious effort to meet Mrs. Weasleys’ eyes. It always irked him, People with bad manners. It seemed I was the only child growing up to not think it ridiculous to thank the teacher after every lesson or to say please when he asked to go to the bathroom. He was teased relentlessly for it. He had tried teaching Dudley some manners a while back, and he had the regrowing bald patch to show for it.
And then he was alone. Mrs. Weasley was upstairs and fixing him a bed in Ron’s room. Ron would come barreling down the stairs soon enough and greet him with overexcited rambling, Hermione and Ginny likely long since asleep.
Harry is quick on his feet, dumping half his bowl into the larger soup pot that bubbles on the stove. He rushes back to his seat and wipes the broth off the edge of the bowl. Harry looked around, nobody saw him.
Yes, he felt guilty for doing so. Harry was putting soup that had indirectly touched his mouth back in the communal pot. Worse, He was lying to Mrs. Weasley, who had been nothing but kind to him.
He would do it again though. It was simply too much for him to eat, and he didn’t want Mrs. Weasley to worry or feel offended if he vomited her cooking. Aunt Petunia seemed incredibly offended when he would bolt from the table clutching his mouth and vomit what little he had eaten of her work.
Harry was already uncomfortably full, his stomach felt hard and he felt bloated. He sincerely doubts it will stay down. But he needs to keep it down, he wills himself to keep it down. At least until he won’t be caught.
Harry scrapes off some of the butter from his toast, hiding it in his uneaten stew. He does not take bites when nobody is there to witness it. Harry doesn’t see the point in doing so if he is only eating to please Mrs. Weasley.
Harry runs his hands through his cut hair, was it weird to have your friend's Mum cut your hair for you? Harry didn’t think he minded it. He preferred it to Petunias' haircuts.
Ron comes bolting down the stairs, Harry smiles at his predictability. Ron has the exact same haircut as Harry was just given. Neither of them comment on this fact.
Ron greets Harry, Harry greets him back. Harry makes an active attempt to play the exhaustion in his body off as a byproduct of the late hour, hoping in the dim light Ron does not pick up his gaunt frame.
Ron does not pick up on the real issue at hand, or if he does- he doesn’t say anything.
And then Harry is taking his shower, most people in the house have gone to bed. He got away with eating only as much as he had in front of Mrs. Weasley. To Harry’s shock, he did not find himself kneeling over the loo as he gags and chokes. He stood in the shower, letting the warm water run over him.
Mrs. Weasley has put soap, towels and a set of clothes out for him. The soap didn’t burn his skin, or itch terribly. It felt warm to the touch and it produced a surplus of light blue soapy bubbles at the slightest touch. Clearly not a Muggle soap.
The towels are soft, soft like old towels that aren’t washed in bleach, something bought before everything was made to break and be replaced.
They had hot water even after everyone else had taken their showers. It runs down Harry’s body in waves, warming him from the outside in. He feels guilty, running up the utility bill in this house. Eating their food, sleeping in their sheets and wearing their clothes. Do wizarding families even have water heaters? Hermione would know. Harry opens something called a ‘shower steamer’ It looks to be from a Magic shop by the colour.
It’s a little dry puck of compressed powder, it smells like eucalyptus and it fizzes in his wet hands. Harry squints at the instructions, He sets it on the shower floor.
Whatever it is, it stings his eyes and violently clears his sinuses. Harry dries off, wipes his glasses and gets dressed. The pajama top simply has ‘Weasley’ On the tag, Harry figures it’s been in the hands of every Weasley son at one point.
Harry crumples into bed after the many stairs to Ron’s room- who has recently claimed the attic, Ron is already snoring.
—
Harry groaned, the sun peaking through the curtains and into his eyes. Someone was shaking him. The sheets on his skin were soft, his hips didn’t dig into this mattress and pinch the skin in between. Harry never had a few moments of peace before fully being awake, the moment he was conscious, the dread settled inside him and started to take root in uncertainty.
“Harry.. mmh.. breakfast.” Ron was mumbling at him. Harry groaned and willed himself to sit upward. The sun is in his eyes, this room is so incredibly dusty. Harry sneezes, coughing up phlegm as Ron hands him a grubby handful of tissues. Ron is beyond used to Harry’s.. Issues. Harry is almost used to Ron's insistence on helping. Almost.
They never formally talked about them, but Ron knew Harry had terrible allergies and got sick often. Harry knew that Ron carried around tissues for him and to not take it personally if Harry couldn’t manage to hold a conversation during a meal.
Harry wiped the snot from his face, Ron was haphazardly getting dressed. Neither of them looked at the other out of drowsiness. Harry digs through his trunk for clothes and gets dressed- someone has carried it up during the night or early that morning. Ron leaves the room. Harry flops back over into bed and closes his eyes, just for a few more minutes.
It seems he only sleeps a second when he’s woken up again by a cannon-loud sound.
Harry sits up with a start, yelping as he hits his head on the ceiling. He’s sleeping under a part of the ceiling where the vault’s angle is particularly sharp. Harry is half asleep and has now hit his head, he does not care if he’s describing the ceiling wrong.
“Harry!” Hermione is yelling at him. She says many things after that. Harry couldn’t tell you one of them. “What time did you get here??”
“Whattimi’saat?” Harry mumbles, surprising even himself with how congested he sounds, He sits up, rubbing the bump on his head and reaching for his glasses.
When the world comes into focus, Ginny is flopped down on Ron’s bed, and Hermione is at the doorway. Crookshanks is curled up next to where Harry’s head was. Harry sneezes, coughing violently. Crookshanks hops down off the bed, irritated with the disturbance.
“It’s a quarter to noon. What time did you get here last night? Are you sick?” She pries, Ginny tries to coax the cat back into the room. “You look.. Thin.” She’s running a hand through her hair and shifting from foot to foot.
“Like.. Midnight? I’m not sick. I know.” Harry is familiar with her habit of asking a question and not waiting for an answer before asking the next. “What’s new?” Harry mumbles, he’s glad he fell back asleep fully dressed. He thinks he might have jumped right out the bedside window if Ginny saw him wearing what was likely something that would eventually be handed down to her.
Harry regrets asking this, because Ginny goes on a rant about Bill’s upcoming wedding. Apparently, he’s having one of those.
Harry finds himself without a single spare moment these days between the Weasley family, Hermione and his own issues. He’s anxious and overwhelmed constantly. Of course, he was not helping the matter with his own private investigations of Draco Malfoy and his business in KnockTurn Ally.
Harry really does love the Weasley household. But it was loud. At least with the Dursleys’ there was eerie quiet, but it seemed he was never alone, never without a dish to wash or a placemat to set.
Harry was constantly asked how he was, which was a nice change of pace. But Merlin did Harry long to be alone. He longed to hole himself up in solitude for a while. Often, Harry wonders how Ron is such a social creature, his visits to the Weasley household refresh him quite quickly. Ron once shared how antisocial he thought Harry was for a famous person, then he met the Dursleys at King’s cross. He did not wonder why after that.
Harry, deep down knew he was much quieter than he liked to think. He was not silent, just quiet. He barely spoke and he hated being asked personal questions in front of a crowd. Right now, Mr. Weasley is asking him about Penicillin over dinner. His bags are packed into the car and Hedwig has long since arrived at Hogwarts,
Harry stares at Mr. Weasley. “Er.. I don’t know.” He flushes. He does know how Penicillin works, he just doesn’t want to explain to a family of wizards how Muggles eat mold as medication over dinner. Hermione doesn’t seem to have a problem with it.
Harry is struggling through his spaghetti Bolognese. Mrs. Weasley had gotten him some wizard allergy medication that seemed to settle his nausea and the wheezing cough he was plagued with. It did not get rid of the residual fear around eating. He had not vomited anything more than post-nasal drip since he apparated. He didn’t want help, because that would mean admitting he was gross.
The fear around eating stayed though, he worried about getting sick at the table constantly. Harry often got in his own head and made himself feel sick over nothing, it was not something he wanted to talk about.
—
They were about to board the train, Mr. Weasley was pulling him aside. Harry guessed it was the usual ‘Don’t go looking for trouble’ and ‘Write to us if you need anything at all’. Mr. Weasley said something just far enough away from that to shock him.
“Harry, I wanted to talk with you sooner.” He lowers his voice, pretending to be setting the time on Harry's watch. “Me and Molly are always here for you if you ever need to talk.. About anything. Okay?” He sounds.. Really serious. It’s off-putting.
“Er.. okay?” Harry nods. “Thanks. I will.” He looks over to the clump of people boarding the train. Spotting the Weasley family, none of them are looking at him.
“Harry.” Mr. Weasley sighs. “Just.. eating disorders are deadly. And nobody would judge you for getting help, alright? Nobody can force you to do anything, but.. Everyone wants to help.”
Harry’s face flushes with embarrassment. The conversation is cheesy and painful on many levels. For one, Harry does not have an eating disorder. Or at least he doesn’t think he does. Ron knows Harry doesn’t make himself puke. The amount of sheer concern in Mr. Weasley’s eyes is uncomfortable to be looked at with. He hates this.
“Er.. I don’t.. I don’t have a.. That. I just.. I get sick a lot.” Harry shifts uncomfortably on his feet.
Mr. Weasley’s smile is kind. “What do you mean?” Harry hates this. Harry hates this so much.
“Er… I don't know. I get in my head and I get sick from nerves. I’ll grow out of it.” Harry shrugs. The train is mercifully hooting, about to take off. The conversation is cut off.
—
Harry’s old habit kicks back into first gear. Only somehow Malfoy has found a way to work it into his teasing. Malfoy would clutch his stomach and pretend to retch when he saw Harry in the hall. He would whisper to him and ask him how his first trimester of pregnancy was going.
Harry is back at the burrow before he knows it for Christmas break. He’s been avoiding Mr. Weasley since the awkward chat they shared. Unfortunately, not a single Weasley adult will let this go. Bill, who he’s met maybe three times, gave him such a pitying look Harry nearly vomited on his shoes.
He had noticed the normal questions of ‘How is school’ and ‘Are you staying out of trouble?’ had been replaced with things like “Harry dear, when’s the last time you saw your Primary?”. If Harry didn’t know better, he’d feel like they were trying to parent him. It was uncomfortable.
Molly and Arthur were nice. But they were not his Mum and Dad. They were not entitled to force him to do anything. This fact only made the guilt stronger as they were not forcing him to do anything, they had backed off when Harry gave them signals too. He had no reason to bite the hand that feeds him.
Harry had declined the offer to get him fitted for a new glasses prescription politely. He didn’t need new glasses- they had gotten him new ones the previous summer.
Harry was in the car with Mr. Weasley, on their way into London. The fireplace was currently ‘too crowded with presents’ to reasonably take the floo. Harry knew it was just because Mr. Weasley knew he hated any form of ‘teleporting’ since Cedric died. Harry didn’t need to tell him- Harry vomited without fail every time, it was obvious.
Harry sits in the passenger seat of the car as Mr. Weasley drives. He drives slower than uncle Vernon. And he wears his seatbelt. Harry is usually terrified in cars, he’s used to Uncle Vernon’s colorful language and liberal use of the horn. Mr. Weasley drives like he’s doing so for pleasure.
Harry knows that the older likely is doing just that. If Uncle Vernon liked Wizarding things half as much as Mr. Weasley liked muggle things, Harry’s first Hogwarts letter would have been framed over the fireplace, instead of thrown in it.
Harry would be uncomfortable alone with the adult, but Harry's been alone or trusting a strange adult for most of his life. It's a comfortable silence, broken by Mr. Weasley.
“I’ve booked you a checkup at a wizarding hospital before your eye exam.” He starts, Harry sighs.
Mr. Weasley gives him an apologetic glance, taking a turn and turning on the windshield wipers as it begins to rain. “I don’t have to be in the room with you if you don’t want me there. You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to.”
Harry didn’t say anything. What was he supposed to say? He didn’t know how to react to being.. Treated like this.
“But, it would ease Molly and my worries alike if you would just… attend. If you think you’d rather go to a muggle healer I understand.” Mr. Weasley gave a hopeful glance. “I know it’s none of my business. But Harry, please try to understand. You’re as good as a son to us. It’s terrible to watch you waste away like this.
Harry had never felt more guilty in his life. He nodded stiffly. “Er.. sure.. I guess. I’m not great with needles though.” He tries to joke. “By ‘not great’ I mean I faint.”
The attempt to lighten the mood only half-works. Mr. Weasley smiles, patting Harry’s shoulder. “Ron’s the same way, still has Molly hold his hand.” Mr. Weasley winks at Harry like he was sharing a secret. Harry snorts.
—
Harry sits in a waiting room filled with wizarding children, all of which are loud and excitable. He’s cold and the room smells of cauldron-grade cleaner.
He was called back into an exam room with Mr. Weasley. Harry didn’t expect how much he didn’t want Mr. Weasley to exit the room and leave him there. He found himself answering the question with a nervous expression and a nonverbal head gesture.
The Healer entered the room. Harry found it rather similar to a ‘normal’ checkup. One at a Muggle doctor.
She checked his reflexes, listened to his heart and wrote down his date of birth. Of course., a 'Quick Quotes Quill’ was writing for her. But it wasn’t like Rita Skeeter’s, it wrote facts. Harry found himself anxiously looking over at Mr. Weasley for him to answer her questions. He didn’t know why he was so anxious to tell this stranger his birthdate, and who he lived with at home. But he was enormously relieved to find Mr. Weasley had seemed to memorize these facts.
“Thirty-first of July, 1980.” Mr. Weasley responded to the Healer’s question at Harry’s nervous glance.
The Healer smiled at Harry like he wasn’t sixteen years old, and more five or six years old. “Can I check your hair? It won't hurt. Promise."
Harry flushed at the condescending tone. He knew what a lice check was. She poked the comb’s bristles against her fingers, proving to him they were not sharp. He nodded, avoiding eye contact.
She ran the comb through his hair, he knew she could see the shedding. She didn’t mention it, putting the single use comb in the bin and turning back to him. “How much do you weigh?”
“Er.. seven and a half stone.” He could feel the flush of his face spread under his shirt.
“Alright, can you take off your shoes so I can measure you up against the wall?” Harry cooperates and tugs his muddy trainers off. By the end of the exam, she pulls Mr. Weasley into the hall. Harry doesn’t strain to hear what they’re saying.
—
Harry was intended to be fitted for eyeglasses right now. But he was lying down on a cot as he had blood drawn. As long as he didn’t think about it, he wouldn’t faint. He was fine. Harry is fine. He’s fine.
He filled out the thinly veiled mental health screening test. He held the quill with a sweaty hand as he filled in the parchment.
Harry is exhausted by the end of it. A number of tests are run, and questionnaires filled in. Mr. Weasley seems surprised by how long it takes. He sends Harry an apologetic look every few minutes.
Harry climbs into the car, rubbing where the needle mark was before it was healed. Three hours have passed and he is thoroughly exhausted. Mr. Weasley speaks softly and apologetically. ”The results should come sometime this week. We won’t have to drive back in though.”
Mr. Weasley ruffled his hair. “Sorry about that. You like ice cream?”
Harry didn’t know why Mr. Weasley cared so much. He didn’t mind though. He nodded and buckled his seat.
—
GAD and Suspected Mast Cell Activation Disorder with complex cortisol intolerance, that's what the letter said Harry’s diagnosis was. His Mast cells were overactive and in Harry’s case, reacted to stress like he had been poisoned. Treatable with medication but not solvable. That was the part that Harry understood.
He had been told it was just anxiety. He had been told the pain was not there. He had been told he was dramatic. And yet, he didn’t feel relief. There were very limited resources on what he had. And it seemed like the healers could barely explain what it was. Mr. Weasley didn’t seem to have much to offer Harry on the topic.
The medications had helped, it had been a few weeks and he was breathing easier. He found himself putting on weight and became more energetic.
Harry finds himself writing to Mrs. Weasley equally as often as Ron does, updating her on what is going on from his perspective, thanking her for the care packages she sends.
He found himself writing to Mr. Weasley in specific, asking questions he would have asked Sirius. Asking for advice he would have asked for from his own Dad.