love songs for ghosts and englishmen @englishghosts - Tumblr Blog

Early Wolfstar Fandom vs. Today

I'm going to use @chdarling's response to an ask earlier about Remus and Sirius both being "messy, troubled, imperfect characters" and the effect that would have on any sort of relationship between them as a jumping off point to talk about changing trends within the Wolfstar fandom over the past 22 years that I've noticed. I'm specifically going to focus on 1999 to 2005ish and then compare that era to today.

Please (respectfully) chime in if you disagree with anything or have something to add! I would love to learn more, especially from those who were active in the fandom at that time!

intheradianceofthefuture

One of the things that piss me the most about the fandom view of Sirius is when he’s described as hating, despising or being an asshole to Peter before Azkaban

There’s no evidence of that (and I refuse to take “before Wormtail wets himself” as him being mean because it’s not a rude thing to say to a friend you’re close with and he uses the same tone he spoke to Prongs and later to Remus - it’s only Sirius being the tactful, humble and gentle person he his)

Likewise the harshness and hatred Sirius shows toward him in the Shrieking Shack totally make sense if you thing that Peter’s destroyed his brother’s, sister in law’s and his own lives, along with Remus’ and the ones of all the innocents killed by his double-crossing.

Yes, he does denigrate and offend him calling him a talentless and opportunistic tag-along, but he says this out of anger and pain. He says it because he loved Peter and felt betrayed. It wouldn’t hurt that much if he never care about him.

Despite the scarcity of the intersactions described in the books, however, we can actually see Sirius loving and caring for Peter as a friend.

Firstly he trust Peter instead of Dumbledore or Remus, (and we all know how strong Pads and Moony’s bond was is , wheather you believe they’re totally gay for each other or not) with something he valued more than his own life. It never occurred to him that Peter could betray them. Never even had a sparkle of doubt (otherwise he wouldn’t have risk the Potters’ life)

It’s also said that he checked on Peter the night the Potters died, he made sure he was safe. Was it an habitual routine, or did he remember the casual mention of how distressed and fed up poor Wormy was in Lily’s letter?? Either way, it shows affection and concern toward him.

Also I find interesting that Sirius is said to be scared twice in the books: when James, Lily, Harry and potentially Peter are in danger and when he’s about to die (we’re coming back to this one later).

Later, when Pettigrew, being the asshole he is, blames Padfoot and then justifies himself, Sirius yells at him. And the words he says express mostly anger, disappointment and disbelieve, almost. They show us how it hurts Sirius that his friend, whom he cared about and trusted and loved so much is not the person he thought he was and betrayed him.

Peter should have died for them, as the Marauders - Sirius included - would have died for him. Now, we all know about Pads’ nobility and bravery, but dying for someone is NOT something you do lightly (he himself is said to be scared of death, as anticipated) yet Sirius doesn’t even stop to think if he would have die for Peter, because of course he would have.

Now last thing I can think of (it’s late at night/early in the morning here, I should definitly write this stuff in a different time) is that when Peter starts begging for his life, he adresses Sirius first, even before any of the kids (they’re just kids, they musy have mercy, or at least be easier to manipulate, after all Harry didn’t find it in him to kill Black when he thought he was guilty) or Remus, the only one who could hold back and balance Sirius’ fury.

Because Sirius’d never kill nor hurt a friend on purpose, unless he thought he was a spy at least, and he’s Peter, a Marauder, Sirius’ friend -except he’s not anymore.

Of course you’re entitled to have your own opionion, but I just feel it’s so out of the character for someone like Sirius, whose defining trait is his loyalty

blitheringmcgonagall

This is so perfect @winterlustwanderer !!!!!!!

ebookporn

• An Oxford comma walks into a bar, where it spends the evening watching the television, getting drunk, and smoking cigars.

• A dangling participle walks into a bar. Enjoying a cocktail and chatting with the bartender, the evening passes pleasantly.

• A bar was walked into by the passive voice.

• An oxymoron walked into a bar, and the silence was deafening.

• Two quotation marks walk into a “bar.”

• A malapropism walks into a bar, looking for all intensive purposes like a wolf in cheap clothing, muttering epitaphs and casting dispersions on his magnificent other, who takes him for granite.

• Hyperbole totally rips into this insane bar and absolutely destroys everything.

• A question mark walks into a bar?

• A non sequitur walks into a bar. In a strong wind, even turkeys can fly.

• Papyrus and Comic Sans walk into a bar. The bartender says, "Get out -- we don't serve your type."

• A mixed metaphor walks into a bar, seeing the handwriting on the wall but hoping to nip it in the bud.

• A comma splice walks into a bar, it has a drink and then leaves.

• Three intransitive verbs walk into a bar. They sit. They converse. They depart.

• A synonym strolls into a tavern.

• At the end of the day, a cliché walks into a bar -- fresh as a daisy, cute as a button, and sharp as a tack.

• A run-on sentence walks into a bar it starts flirting. With a cute little sentence fragment.

• Falling slowly, softly falling, the chiasmus collapses to the bar floor.

• A figure of speech literally walks into a bar and ends up getting figuratively hammered.

• An allusion walks into a bar, despite the fact that alcohol is its Achilles heel.

• The subjunctive would have walked into a bar, had it only known.

• A misplaced modifier walks into a bar owned by a man with a glass eye named Ralph.

• The past, present, and future walked into a bar. It was tense.

• A dyslexic walks into a bra.

• A verb walks into a bar, sees a beautiful noun, and suggests they conjugate. The noun declines.

• A simile walks into a bar, as parched as a desert.

• A gerund and an infinitive walk into a bar, drinking to forget.

• A hyphenated word and a non-hyphenated word walk into a bar and the bartender nearly chokes on the irony

- Jill Thomas Doyle

neil-gaiman

A zeugma walked into a bar, my life and trouble.

littlesystems

For the people who are out there “fighting the good fight” and “trying to make fandom a better place,” I have two important questions for you:

1. Is the author dead? x

2. Is your baby in the bathwater? x

What do I mean by those things? Let’s start with #1. The Death of the Author is a type of literary criticism, the extreme cliff notes version of which is that art exists outside of the creator’s life, personal background, and even intentions. I’m using it slightly differently than Barthes intended, but that’s okay, because the author is dead and I’m interpreting his work through my own lens.

In fandom, the author is dead. In fact, the author was never alive in the first place, not really. The author has only ever been the idea of a person, because unlike published fiction, the only thing we know about a fanfic author is that which they choose to tell us about themselves.

Why is that important?

Because it might not be true. Hell, that happens in real life with published authors, who have SSN’s on file with their publishers, who pay taxes on the works they create and have researchable pasts. If the author of A Million Little Pieces could fake everything, why can’t I? Why can’t you? Why can’t the writer of your favorite fic in the whole wide world?

Stop me if you’ve heard this before: “you can only write about [sensitive subject] if [sensitive subject] has happened to you personally, otherwise you’re a disgusting monster that deserves to die!!” Or maybe “you can only write [x racial or ethnic group] characters if you’re [x racial or ethnic group] otherwise you’re racist/fetishizing/colonizing!”

You can play this game with any sensitive subject you can come up with. I’ve seen them all before, on a sliding scale of slightly chastising to literal death threats.

Now, I could tell you that I’m a white-passing Latina whose grandmother was an anchor baby. I could tell you that I speak only English because my family never taught me to speak Spanish, something which I’ve been told is common in the Cuban community, though I only know my own lived experience. I could tell you that I’m mostly neurotypical. I could tell you that I’m covered in surgical scars. I could tell you lots of things.

Are any of these true? Maybe! I could tell you that my brother has severe mental development problems, so uncommon that they’ve never been properly diagnosed, and that he will live the rest of his life in a group home with 24-hour care. Is that true? Am I allowed to write about families struggling with America’s piss-poor services for the handicapped now?

Am I allowed to write about being Cuban? After all, I did just say that I’m Cuban. But is it true? Can I instead write a character that’s Panamanian? Maybe I really am Panamanian, not Cuban. Maybe I’m both. Maybe I’m neither. Maybe I’m really French Canadian. Should we require people to post regular selfies? I can’t count the number of times I’ve had someone come up to me speaking Arabic, and I’ve been told that I look Syrian. What’s stopping me from making a blog that claims that I am Syrian? Can you even really tell someone’s race and ethnicity from a photo?

Am I allowed to write about being a teenager? Am I allowed to write about being a college student? Am I allowed to write about being an “adulty” adult? Can I write a character who’s 40? 50? 60? How old am I?

All of this is to say: you can’t base what someone is or is not “allowed” to write about on a background that may or may not be real. No matter how good your intentions. And I get it - this usually comes from a place of well-meaning. You’re trying to protect marginalized groups by stopping privileged people from trampling all over experiences that they haven’t suffered. I get that. It’s a very noble thought. But you can’t require a background check for every fic that you don’t like.

If you say “you can only write about rape if you’re a rape victim,” then one of three things will happen:

Real survivors will have to supply intimate details of their own violations to prevent harassment

Real survivors will refuse to engage and will then have to deal with death threats and people telling them to kill themselves for daring to write about their own experiences

People who aren’t survivors will say “yeah sure this happened to me” just to get people to shut up

Has that helped anyone? I mean really - anyone??

So now let’s get to point #2: is your baby in the bathwater?

If your intention is to protect marginalized people from being trampled upon, stop and assess if your boot is the one that’s now stamping on their face. Find your baby! Is your baby in the bathwater? Which is to say: find the goal that you’re advocating for. Now assess. Are you making the problem worse for the people you’re trying to protect? Does that rape victim really feel better, now that you’ve harassed and stalked them in the name of making rape victims feel safe?

Let’s say you read a fic that contains explicit sex between a 16 year old and a 17 year old. Is this okay? Would it be okay if the writer was 15? 16? 17? Should teenagers be barred from writing about their own lives, and should teenagers be banned from exploring sexuality in a fictional bubble, instead of hookup culture? Is it okay for a 20 year old to write about their experiences as a teenager? Is it okay for a 20 year old to write about being raped at a party as a teenager? Is it okay for a 30 year old? How about a 40 year old? Is it okay so long as it isn’t titillating? Is it okay if taking control of the narrative allows the writer to re-conceptualize their trauma as something they have control over? Is it okay if their therapist told them that writing is a safe creative outlet?

Is your author dead?

Is your baby in the bathwater?

Now let’s take a hardline approach: no fanfiction with characters who are under 18 years old. None. Is the 16 year old who really loves Harry Potter and wants to read/write about characters their own age better off? Should they be banned from writing? Should they be forced to exclusively read and write (adult) experiences that they haven’t lived? Will they write about teens anyway? Should they have to share it in secret? Should 16 year olds be ashamed of themselves? Should we just throw in with the evangelicals and say that the only answer is abstinence, both real and fictional?

Let’s say that no rape is allowed in fiction, at all. None. What happens to all the hurt/comfort fics where a character is raped and then receives the support and love that they deserve, slowly heal, and by the end have found themselves again? Are you helping rape victims by banning these stories? Are you helping rape victims by stripping their agency away, by telling them that their wants and their consent doesn’t matter?

Is your baby in the bathwater?

Fandom is currently being split in two: on one side, the people who want to make fandom a “safer” place by any means necessary, even if that means throwing out all of the marginalized groups they say they want to protect - and on the other, people who are saying “if you throw out that bathwater, you’re throwing the baby out too.”

The whole point of fandom is to be able to explore all kinds of ideas from the safety and comfort of a computer screen. You can read/write things that fascinate you, disgust you, titillate you, or make your heart feel warm. This is true of all fiction. People who want to read about rape and incest and extreme violence and torture can go pick up a copy of Game of Thrones from the bookstore whenever they want. Sanitizing fandom just means holding a community of people who are primarily not male, not straight, not cis, or some combination of those three, to higher and stricter standards than straight white cis male authors and creators all over the world.

There is nothing you can find on AO3 that you can’t find in a bookstore. Any teenager can go check out Lolita, or ASOIAF, or Flowers in the Attic, or Stephen King’s It, or Speak, or hundreds of other books that have adult themes or gratuitous violence or graphic sex. The difference is that AO3 has warnings and tags and allows people to interact only with the types of work that they want to, and allows people to curate their experiences.

Are these themes eligible to be explored, but only in the setting of something produced/published? Books, movies, television, studio art, music - all of these fields have huge barriers to entry, and they’re largely controlled by wealthy cishet white men. Is it better to say that only those who have the right connections to “make it” in these industries should be allowed to explore violence or sexuality or any other so-called “adult” theme?

Does banning women from writing MLM erotica make fan culture a better place?

Does banning queer people from writing about queer experiences make fan culture a better place?

Is M/M fic okay, but only if the author is male? What if he’s a transman? What if they’re NB? Who should get to draw those lines? Should TERFs get a vote? What if the author is a woman who feels more comfortable writing from a male character’s perspective because she’s grown up with male stories her whole life, or because she identifies more with male characters? What about all the transmen who discovered themselves, in part, by writing fanfiction, and realized that their desires to write male characters stemmed from something they hadn’t yet realized about themselves?

How can we ever be sure that the author is who they say they are?

Who is allowed to write these stories? How do we enforce it?

Is it better for none of these stories to ever exist at all?

Have you killed your author?

Have you thrown out your baby with the bathwater?

freedom-of-fanfic

this post is AMAZING.

lionowlonao3

THIS THIS THIS!!!!

st-pam

tangleduplnblue

PLEASE EMPLOYMENT JELLY

justanotherspringday

Not risking it all I want in my life is a job I actually like

zairak

Sure why not, I’ll try anything at this point

impishtubist

To the school, Lily is the Muggleborn girl who was friends with blatant blood purist Snape—and Lily knew he called Muggleborns a slur since we learn this information from her, this was something she had to make excuses for to her other friends for years and she outright admits this—right up until she herself was impacted. This told every other Muggleborn that Lily could not be relied on, she would not pick the safety of other students over her friendship with Snape (ie, the argument over Avery and Mulciber; somehow that was not a glaring warning sign to sever that friendship. I don’t care how long I’ve known someone, if they’re hanging out with people I consider flat-out “evil,” I’d be skeptical of this). She knew Mary, presumably as a friend since it’s doubtful she’d bring up the treatment of some random student and it’s implied Mary was her roommate since Mary informs Lily about Snape camping outside their common room, and yet even Snape dismissing a Dark magic attack as a joke was not enough to have Lily going “Sev, what the actual fuck?!” Makes you wonder what it was like in the Gryffindor dorms, one girl who’s hanging out with junior Death Eater Snape and then another who’d been attacked by this guy’s friends and knows her roommate is defending the same guy and by extent, her attackers. Lily def had a rep and it was “the Evans chick who only cares about blood purity when it personally inconveniences her.” We know she had arguments with Snape about it, but nobody else was around so they would have no knowledge of it. There’s a time to keep conflict private and there’s a time to go off on someone regardless of who’s around, and when discussing something that is actively getting people killed outside (blood purity in this case), it’s time for the latter. Otherwise, she’s going to be ostracized simply because “oh, so you can excuse your best friend being a bigot and wanting to join the mass murderer so long as you don’t have to deal with it yourself, but he directs his bigotry at you and now it’s a problem? Go screw yourself.” I know I definitely wouldn’t have trusted Lily if I attended Hogwarts, that’s worrying as hell

I don't really know how chaos night turned into Lily meta night, but sure, I'll post this 😂

#i'd never thought about it but it makes so much sense #marauders #lily evans #severus snape

muffinshark

jpaddey

I solemnly swear that I am up to no good. The Marauders, Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs.

mikonez

And I know you're strong, I know you're a manmade fortress. But we're alone and I'm so willing to be proven wrong.

- Timefighter, Lucy Dacus

commodorecliche

headcanon that whenever crowley finds himself pining for aziraphale, any and all poets/authors/song writers within a 20 mile radius have a sudden need to write something full of Yearning, even if they don't understand why or where the feelings came from

by the 21st century, crowley was accidentally responsible for (at least) 487 billboard top 100 love songs

azfellandco

#screaming im obsessed with this#meanwhile every time aziraphale gets overwhelmed with love for crowley#the clouds in the sky get hit juuuuust right with sunlight#by the 21st century Aziraphale was responsible for several thousand perfect sunsets#and 39 photos of the sky saved onto smartphones#that the owners can’t bring themselves to delete for reasons they don’t understand themselves (via @tharacelehar)

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling Rating: Mature Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Sirius Black/Remus Lupin Characters: Remus Lupin, Sirius Black

Summary:

Tomorrow they're going to London, to check if Sirius's childhood home is fit to house the Order's headquarters. Sirius's eyes become distant whenever he is reminded of that fact, so today they're pressed as close as they can in Remus's bed, warm under the old quilt and a little drunk on Remus’s last bottle of cheap wine.

For the @wolfstarbingo2023

#wolfstar #wolfstar bingo 2023 #remus lupin #sirius black #remus x sirius

in-flvx

Voldemort hears that one of the Black bothers plans to join him (and allegedly has a photowall with clip outs about him above his bed) and gets all blushy and excited about it. Only to be majorly disappointed when it's regulus instead of Sirius who shows up

strugglequill

He's less intelligent. Less creative. Less loud. Less flamboyant. Less likeable. Somehow also less unlikeable. Less strategically valuable. Less beautiful. Less hot. Less leggy. Less sexually experienced. Less kinky. Less scary. Less queer. And less insane.

What else is there, really?

Even his hair is shorter.

Maybe he cries more?

plecotusauritus

Love you, canon Sirius. Sirius, who loved his motorbike and leaned back in chairs. Sirius who suffered 12 years in Azkaban while being innocent. Sirius, who missed crossword puzzles and turned into a dog to escape. Sirius, who bonded with other animals and magical creatures. Sirius, who wanted to commit a murder in front of children. Sirius, who is tall and terrifying. A pureblood heir. The bad child. Sirius, who is top of the class. Sirius, who chose his own family. Sirius, who bullied other students for fun and told Snape about the willow because he was a noisy git. Sirius, who doesn't apologize for who he is. Sirius, who ate rats to be closer to Harry and fought Molly who tried to question his parenthood. Sirius, who is brave and energetic and didn't do well just sitting in the house when others are in danger. Sirius who didn't lose his mind in Azkaban. Sirius who was a competent wizard, loyal friend and loving godfather. Sirius who is moody and drank alcohol to cope and lost his temper. Sirius who never wanted to be apart from James. Sirius who hated the dark arts. Sirius who was mean to Kretcher. Sirius who risked his life constantly for people he loved and died protecting Harry.

yellowistheraddest

EPIC DRAWING TUTORIAL TIME

cw for nudity

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling Rating: Explicit Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Relationships: Sirius Black/Remus Lupin Characters: Sirius Black, Remus Lupin Additional Tags: Post-Sirius Black's Prank on Severus Snape, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Minor Violence, Blood, Mildly Dubious Consent, Consensual Underage Sex, Floor Sex, Hand Jobs, Blow Jobs, First Time, Porn with Feelings Summary:

The thing is, Remus is acting almost normal. They talk, and they go to classes together, and he laughs at Sirius's jokes. But there's something missing when it's just the two of them. Gone are the secret smiles Remus seemed to have just for him, and he now flinches when their legs and feet touch under tables, or when Sirius's hand brushes his. They have spent the last couple of Ancient Runes lessons not passing each other notes with dirty jokes in futhorc.

#wolfstarbingo2023 #wolfstar #remus x sirius #sirius black #remus lupin #marauders

savage-garden-nights

This game is missing its instructions

This post contains spoilers for IWTV and abstract discussion about domestic violence.

Most viewers of Interview with the Vampire will put the twist in the last few moments of Episode 7, when Daniel finally loses patience with Louis' fancy footwork and pushes him into an emotional collapse. Back in the Rue Royale timeline, we see Louis howl over Lestat's body, betray Claudia, and choose his lover one final time. And we realize his secret: he chose Lestat more than once.

In fact, he chose him every time.

This moment may allow audiences to find the real Louis in the Rue Royale story. But it's still a misdirect--another magic trick. It doesn't explain anything. It's not the key to the story.

To find that, we have to rewind back to Episode 6, the outstanding penultimate episode.

Following Episode 5's shocking and disorienting scene of domestic violence, Episode 6 is another highly structured, tightly controlled episode. Louis clings to his attempts to make his toxic romance story fit into a simple, conventional framework. Previously, this tactic has allowed Louis to build a certain amount of flexibility and ambiguity into his story. It allowed two possible versions of Louis--the sweet, passive intellectual and the screwball chaos addict--to coexist.

In Episode 6, that tactic fractures, then fails. And when it does, it fails so hard that it brings Louis' entire narration with it.

Episode 6 sort of works on a casual viewing, but it can't withstand scrutiny. In fact, it only really works if the audience does Louis' homework--if we make assumptions we shouldn't make. The actual events are chaotic and uncomfortable, escalating toward totally unhinged. Transitions and time jumps make oatmeal of the sequence of events. Important scenes are skipped entirely. Louis takes some of his most decisive actions--revealing a powerfully motivated, desperately conflicted, psychologically spiraling character. That exposes him. And so he elevates Claudia and Lestat's conflict (a B plot at best) until it completely suffocates the main plot.

Louis is on full tilt in both timelines, dancing as fast as he can to hold on to his secrets. His goal isn't just to hide his true feelings about Lestat and Claudia, but important truths about his identity and sense of self. Keeping both the intellectual and the screwball in play is a whole lot of work for Louis on a good day. It's exhausting. Rescuing one from the other demands extraordinary measures.

How do you know it's not just bad, rushed writing? Plenty of ways, but let's pick on this one: in the middle of the episode there is a a scene where Louis and Claudia lay down a list of rules for Lestat to come home to the Rue Royale. This scene is crucial. It may be the most crucial scene in this season. Its the only chance we have to understand what Louis and Lestat's exact deal is. It's the only time we get to hear in whole words what Louis wants and expects from this relationship. It's the only time anyone explicitly sets boundaries.

The rules scene is the key.

Half of this scene is cut for no reason. It doesn't save time. It doesn't make room for something more important. It's not an oversight. What it does do is ask you to make an assumption, which is exactly how Louis has been getting through this until now. Whatever Louis said in those unspoken rules has to be so strange that Louis can't share it and maintain the cover story. But the fact that it had to be cut does the job just as well.

"A singer can shatter glass with the proper high note, but the simplest way to break glass is simply to drop it on the floor. - from The Vampire Lestat by Anne Rice

Return to the index Opening the puzzle box, on how Louis manipulates the narrative so he can hide in it

angstsplatter

Like many other fans, I hate the fact that Harry became an auror after the War.

But I also completely understand why.

We’re talking about the boy who, at 11 years old, was convinced he was the only one who could stop Quirrell from getting the sorcerer’s stone for Voldemort since Dumbledore was gone and, with his friends, set off into facing completely unknown obstacles to stop a grown wizard.

We’re talking about the boy who, at 12, knew it had to be him that went into the Chamber of Secrets after Ginny.

We’re talking about the boy who, at 13, was willing to face down the man who he believed to be the traitor who murdered his parents - who wanted to face the man who he believed to be the traitor who murdered his parents. The boy who traveled through time to go against the government and do what was right to save that same man’s life. The boy who was so offended on Remus’ behalf and thought no differently of him for being a werewolf.

We’re talking about the boy who, at 14, was forced to face down dragons and learn to compete with a level of magic he wasn’t close to learning yet. The boy who not only watched Cedric get murdered but who had the presence of mind to take Cedric back with him when escaping from a genocidal murderer whose sights were set specifically on Harry.

We’re talking about the boy who, at 15, wanted to officially join the adult group built to fight Voldemort. The boy who was willing to run to the Ministry all by his lonesome to save Sirius from Voldemort himself. The boy who duelled alongside his godfather against Death Eaters, who chased down one of the most dangerous Death Eaters there was to avenge said godfather.

We’re talking about the boy who, at 16, started more actively trying to defeat Voldemort. This was the year that cemented that Harry was the one meant to face Voldemort, and Harry is the boy who simply accepted this.

We’re talking about the boy who, at 17, accepts that he needs to die to defeat Voldemort and walks willingly to his death to protect his friends and other loved ones.

I completely agree that Harry needs a break. The a lighter profession would be better for him.

But that’s not the type of person Harry is. He could never stand idly by and let others do the fighting. He was always at the forefront of the fight, long before he’d fully realized his fate. As much as I think being an auror would be hard on Harry, as many dark places as I think it would take him, too, I think it would be worse for Harry to sit by knowing he could be out there, physically fighting for good, and not be doing it. Harry has to be an auror.

At least for a while.

I believe Harry would immediately become an auror after the War and work at it for many years. I also believe that this would not allow Harry time to heal. I think he would have a lot of ups and downs with his mental health, but ultimately fight through it to remain an auror because being able to do that would - in Harry’s mind - outweigh the struggles it brought him.

It wouldn’t be until after Death Eaters and their ideologies have largely been imprisoned or forced underground and things had calmed down more and their lives felt mostly rebuilt that Harry would finally give in. That finally, he would accept that, although he felt the need to do what he was doing, he wasn’t happy. Finally, he’d see how he was hurting his friends as they struggled along with his mental health as he did. He’d see his friends around him, happy with where they were at, and admit that he wanted to feel that, too. Admit that he deserved it.

At that point, I think Harry would work up the courage to retire from being an auror (although the department told him they’d welcome him back at any time) and take some time off to be a stay-at-home dad. Being able to be with his family and be there for those important moments would help Harry begin to heal. Slowly, he’d start to shed his savior burden, the weight of the world slowly lifting off his shoulders and become a weight for all of them to share. He learns to laugh again, to smile, to just enjoy being alive.

When the kids are all off to school, Harry begins to get listless again. He thinks about becoming an auror again, but everyone’s worried that he’s still not ready for that. Hermione, who has had all sorts of position in the Ministry and knows a lot about various issues in their world, suggests some alternatives to Harry. He says he’ll think about them, but he’s actually already decided before he even leaves Hermione’s office.

Harry feels he owes it to his kids (and, of course, Ginny) to talk to them about it first and make sure they’re okay. They’re already part of a large family, though, and they absolutely love the idea. Harry hasn’t set foot in Grimmauld Place for years but couldn’t bring himself to get rid of it, either. He’s finally got reason to go back, though, and immediately goes to work on it, cleaning it, updating it, and making it brighter, friendlier, and more welcoming.

Grimmauld Place becomes a foster home for abandoned and disowned young kids. It starts off mostly for young kids who haven’t started Hogwarts yet. And Harry suddenly has a house full of kids again while his own are away at school. During the summer, the foster kids’ family grows, as Harry, Ginny, Luna, Neville, Dean, Seamus, and Cho all pitch in on raising the kids and looking after them, as Harry and his family adjust for their first summer together.

Dean and Seamus still help out but end up officially adopting three kids through the foster home.

As foster kids grow up and age out of the house, many of them also come back to help out and babysit and foster.

And Harry just gets this huge family and has so many kids he loves and he never looks back on his auror days because he’s found a better and happier way for him to help others and make a difference.

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