Drarry Drabbles

Harry's Birthday Wish

Being Harry Potter and having survived two wars, you would think that he would be done fighting other people's battles. Harry quickly realized that he had had no time to find out what he actually was good at. Fighting those with ill intentions had been instilled into him at a young age, and when the Aurors came calling before his 18th birthday, he didn't know how to turn them down. He didn't think he was even allowed to say no.

So, that was how Harry found himself in Auror training, quickly moving up the ranks. He didn't even feel like a person anymore. Instead, he was playing the role of someone that everyone thought he was supposed to be, and he hated it. In fact, he would venture to say that he hated himself.

For someone who supposedly had everything, Harry Potter was completely and utterly alone. His job didn't make it easy to get close to people. The hours he worked were ever changing, and Ron and Hermione had started a family. Ginny and Harry had split amicably, but it still hurt seeing everyone else thrive while he was seemingly stuck in the past.

The worst part of all of this was that while his birthday had become a national holiday, he was stuck working. So many people in the office had put in requests to have the day off to spend with their families that he was forced to work, as he had no good "excuse" to have the day off. For all of the years that Harry had worked for the Ministry, he couldn't remember one where he had actually been able to celebrate his own birthday. Not that he felt there was anything worth celebrating anyway, so he stopped trying.

Waking up that morning, Harry hadn't expected anything different. He had quit making wishes years ago as the last one seemingly brought Hagrid to his door, changing his life forever. What was there to wish for when your life was essentially already over at 25?

As per usual, Harry was on patrol in Diagon Alley, bored out of his mind. Thankfully, the shock of his presence had much subsided over the years, and most people just nodded, smiled, or waved to him. That was how he preferred it, with the minimal amount of interactions possible.

Still, on his birthday especially Harry had to fight off the loneliness and bitterness, seeing everyone around him celebrating, but it wasn't even for him. He was just another bank holiday now.

And so his day went on, mostly monitoring the crowds. He had lunch in his favorite muggle cafe, taking advantage of his free birthday lunch. At least he had that to look forward to. His shift wouldn't end until right after dinner time, they of course had him pulling a double today without even a singular happy birthday being uttered, and Harry not for the first time wondered what would have happened if he had chosen something else to do with his life.

Most of his day was spent lamenting over his poor life choices and staring at those around him who were actually enjoying their days on his birthday. He wondered what would happen if he left his post. Would they even notice him? Would they fire him? Harry was planning out the most sure fire way to get fired when he heard some sniffling and a quiet cry.

"Hello?," he called quietly, trying to find the person belonging to the cries.

"Daddy? Where did you go?"

Harry immediately dropped everything to locate the young child. He found him quickly enough, and the platinum blond hair was a dead giveaway as to who's child this was.

"Hey there," Harry said quietly but calmly, getting down on one knee and smiling at the child. "Do you need some help?"

"Daddy said not to talk to strangers," the child whimpered, his head still down.

"Did he tell you anything about talking to Aurors?"

That caused the child to look up, and Harry could feel the relief coming off of him in waves.