Chapter 18

                                        

                                              
Chapter 18
                              
"What's wrong, Harry?"
                              
Harry lowered his head. He could do this. They were his family, and they would always love and comfort support him. He knew it. Breathe, he told himself. "S-Something happened five years ago."
                              
"F-Five years ago?" Hermione breathed. She was already sensing where this was going. She didn't let go of his hand.
                              
"It wasn't just the war. I mean, I was shaken from the battle, the forest... the people we lost. But it wasn't why I... snapped."
                              
Hermione glanced to her husband for some support, and Ron nodded and said, "You can tell us anything, Harry. You'll always be our brother. We will always stand by you. Please, don't think that we wouldn't."
                              
"I n-never thought t-that," Harry said, stifling a sob. "I'm j-just so... ashamed."
                              
Hermione gasped. "Oh, Harry. Don't be... whatever it is... we won't judge."
                              
Harry nodded. His friends were there next to him. I can do this, he thought. "You r-remember... one the last cases I had, I mean... it technically wasn't mine. I found that wizard in the muggle lockup?"
                              
"Vaguely?" Ron said, but Hermione shook her head. "He slept with a bunch of muggles, tortured them and Obliviated them? They had no idea what happened to them."
                              
Raped them, Harry thought, but he nodded. "N-No one really questioned how I knew he was there."
                              
Ron looked a little puzzled and glanced to Hermione, who wasn't involved with it. "You got a tip, mate?"
                              
Harry shook his head. "I put him there. Well, hung a sign on his neck with his wanted picture and dropped him in front of the station."
                              
He felt Hermione stiffen and knew she was connecting the dots. Her grip on his hand tightened.
                              
Ron would need more, as he said, "I-umm-okay? Why didn't you just bring him to Ministry?"
                              
"I wasn't really thinking clearly. The muggle police had a case on him."
                              
"Harry... what happened?" Hermione asked, just like Draco had. Her voice was full of sympathy... and pity.
                              
He took a deep breath. "Gin and I had broken up a few months before that. We both discovered we liked other people, things...."
                              
"You told us that and we accept that completely," Ron reiterated.
                              
"Thanks... but it wasn't easy. Everyone knew me. Every single witch would find me at the bars in Diagon Alley, and I was too... paranoid about telling anyone I was gay. I imagine the press would love that, still. The Boy Who Bottoms and a whole slew of new stories about my deviant sex life. No, I didn't want the world to know my... preferences."
                              
"It's understandable, Harry, and I'm sorry that you have to hide like that."
                              
He nodded. "I thought about using glamours... Polyjuice... but it didn't feel right? I wanted to be me and somehow thought it was morally better to go out to muggle clubs. No one would know me... or so I thought. He... that guy... picked me up."
                              
Hermione's grip tightened to the point of pain, but Ron just looked confused.
                              
"I had no idea what I was doing. Nearly twenty and had never done anything before. He played on that. He was... experienced and said that he'd show me... how. So, I went home with him. I wasn't scared... I was a wizard. I had my wand. He seemed so nice," Harry murmured.
                              
Ron had finally caught on and looked thoroughly alarmed. His hand was shaking. Harry looked away.
                              
"He gave me a drink... Mad-Eye'd be spitting angry at me for drinking it, but I did. It was some kind of Confounding Potion. It only knocked me out for a few minutes and left me dazed for hours, but I woke up already tied down to the bed, stripped."