Coming out in the open and Suspicion

"Remind me once again why I'm here." Harry mumbled to Penelope who gave him a forced smile.

"Because staying inside that class day and night without ever seeing the sun will rot your brains." She quipped.

"I very much doubt that being stared by half of the whole damn school will be any good for my brains either." He replied drolly.

Penelope had been nagging him to come out of the rooms in order to socialize for a few weeks now.

He knew that he was very bad at socializing and apparently, she knew that as well and had taken it upon herself to help him get rid of this aspect.

He had ignored her at first. Thinking that she would leave him be after some time. He was wrong.

She had been strangely persistent in this endeavor of hers and would not take no for an answer.

After a few weeks of getting constantly annoyed by her, he had finally decided that stepping outside for once would be better than getting constantly annoyed by her and had joined her as a spectator in the latest Quidditch match.

The problem was that as soon as he entered the stadium, the whole stadium had gone silent and everyone was now looking at him like he was some kind of weird animal.

Maybe coming here was not such a good idea after all.

He decided that it was time for him to use the Shroud of Concealment so that everyone could go about doing their own thing but a soft hand held his own as Penelope smiled at him and led him forward up the stairs at the top seat in the stadium.

The students continued to stare at him for a few moments before silence gave way to whispers which gave way to chatter and soon enough, everyone was openly talking about him.

He did not like it.

He did not like the attention they were giving him.

How they thought of him as Boy-Who-Lived and not as a living breathing human.

How they could openly comment anything about him as they liked.

He wanted to tell them to mind their own business but the soft hand held him firmly and continued to pull him up the stairs.

It took a long time before most of the students stopped staring at him. Even then, the ones closest to him still continued to stare at him like he an alien.

To them, he probably was.

The ones sitting closest to him, tried various method to talk with him.

And by that, he meant that they asked him some rather stupid questions.

Had he killed a bunch of hags when he was 5 years old?

Had he been trained by Dumbledore in secret since when he was child?

Did he remember killing Voldemort?

He had wanted to span at them. Turn them into a rat and leave them to get trampled by others.

Well, maybe not that drastic but still, he was angry.

But Penelope held his hands through all of this and warded off most of the ones asking the rude questions and he answered the polite ones with a simple yes and no.

He didn't even remember seeing the Quidditch match at all. Not that he was ever all that interested in the game.

The only thing he managed by going in the stadium was get a mild headache.

At least the warm smile that Penelope constantly threw his way when going back to the castle was worth something.

She had told him that if he went out among people on a constant basis then they'll get used to his presence. After that, it'll not be all that hard for him to make another friend.

Penelope had given the same speech to Hermione who herself was a bit of a reclusive type. That if she couldn't make friends within her own housemates and if they didn't see her for the wonderful person she was, then she should at least try to make new friends in other houses.

She might even find a few study friends in Ravenclaw.

Harry had felt a knot form in his stomach as Penelope had said that.

The idea that Hermione would find new friends and forget him worried him a bit and he wanted to tell Penelope to sod off and leave them alone but he couldn't muster to energy to do so. Moreover, he knew that she was trying to do this for his own good so couldn't really blame her for anything either.

Tired with all the day's event, he bade Hermione and Penelope goodnight despite the fact that it was barely evening right now and left for his private room in order to sleep.

Funny how talking with strangers could be more tiresome than studying day and night.

—————

Dumbledore had taken his appearance in public as a good sign and had called him to his office the next day.

Harry was not particularly interested in talking with the old wizard and had planned to make him wait for a few days before meeting with him but Penelope had told him that that would be a rude thing to do and Hermione had, unsurprisingly, sided with her.

Once again, he was pressured by his friends to do something that he didn't wanted to do and once again he wondered if his friends were trying to make his life better or worse.

When he entered the office, Dumbledore gave him a grandfatherly smile that fooled so many students in the school and offered him some kind of shiny black candy reminding him of all the times when parents tell their children to not take sweets offered by suspicious looking men.

He held a snort and refused the offer.

Then Dumbledore had gone on to explain how proud he was that Harry had finally decided to spent some time trying to make new friends and he once again wondered if the old man was really that optimistic and naive or if all of this was just a facade.

Whatever it may be, he remembered how Dumbledore had plotted for the original Harry to die at the hands of Voldemort near the end of the war. And he was never going to forget it.

But what about now?

His actions so far had clearly indicated that he was not much of social person and that he would likely not sacrifice himself for the good of the others.

So what would Dumbledore do now, knowing that he was a horcrux and that as long as he lived, Voldemort would never truly die.

If Voldemort got resurrected, and he had every plan to let that happen, then would the old man simply cast a killing curse at him and chalk it off as the greater good.

The sheep that was the wizarding population would probably buy it as well, congratulating him for giving mercy to the Boy-who-once-lived whose soul was utterly corrupted by the Dark Lord.

No, he would not be falling for his grandfatherly act any time soon.

Maybe Dumbledore really was a simple old man was wanted the good for everyone else but he was too cynical to believe in such things.

By the end of the meeting, Dumbledore had told him how proud he was of him and how he would look forward to seeing him attend more classes and more social gatherings in the future.

Harry left with a suspicion in his mind and wondered if Penelope truly wanted to help him or if she had been forced into this somehow.

Dumbledore could easily bypass her weak occlumency shields without her noticing and cast a few subtle compulsion charms on her and she would never realize that anything was wrong with her.

He needed to do a Legilimency check on her to make sure that everything was alright and that she was not a puppet dancing on the tune of someone else.