Harry Evans: Memoirs of a well-lived Death (SI)

Prologue

All stories have a beginning. The issue is in determining where it lies. Does the life of a tree begin with the conception of the acorn, or when it becomes a sapling? Do the characters of a book already exist before the first chapter is written, in the mind of the author? Where does one draw the line between the blurry boundaries of continuity when looking at something as complex as human life?

For Harry Evans, the story had already been written, in a different time, in a different place.

It had also ended there in a manner that left many dreams unaccomplished and many a person grieving.

He'd died.

A traumatic affair for those involved. Parents having to come to terms with having outlived their child. Classmates being confronted with their own mortality by the empty seat in the lecture hall. Friends with a number on their phone that they will never call again.

But what about the deceased? Do the dead mourn their own death?

Seldom does a person gladly go into the embrace beyond, having done all their work on earth and given all the love they could. They are rarely happy with their last chapter. We are hesitant, however, to consider their opinion on the matter. The dead do not have opinions after all. So is the common consensus.

Rather than entering a theoretical discourse on the autonomy of the deceased, an undoubtedly interesting topic, we here shall look at a certain mysterious case study instead. Why not, after all, when one is readily available.

If someone were to survive their death, through reasons unknown. How would such a person mourn? While the loved ones of the deceased have lost one connection, no matter how dear, the deceased individual has lost everything. Their family, their friends, their life partner, all the way down to their bicycle, notebooks, laptop, career, apartment and their literal body.

How long does it take a dead person to get over having been deprived of everything they'd ever experienced?

1st of November 1987

A boy is kneeling on the ground in a forest clearing. An hour by bike away from his home, so that nobody can stumble upon him. He has been here for an hour a day, spread out over the past month. He has been digging holes.

The child's name is Harry. He is nine years old and wants to move on with his life. He wants to walk towards an uncertain, but existing future, rather than dwell on an unchanging past.

There are three holes and three crosses, carefully bound together from planks and twine.

If it has somehow remained unclear; the holes are graves.

Harry stood up from his kneeling position next to the largest of the graves and discarded the garden trowel he'd been using onto the pile of dirt he'd dug out. He was sure he looked comical in his bright yellow anorak, plastic red pants and green boots with little frogs on them. He wished the context was comical, but unfortunately, it was rather dreary.

"Today we are gathered here to mourn. Fitting, for it is the first of November. The day of the dead on which the connection between the living and the departed is said to be the thinnest," He said in a boyish voice, but with a solemnity and verbosity that would make any adult look twice to see if they had perhaps misjudged the age of the speaker.

"Three loved ones have been taken from me on nearly this very day, nine years ago."

A small notebook was retrieved from the right-side pocket of the anorak. Harry flipped through it, some words sticking out to him from the quick perusal. Apartment, diary, passport and copper cooking pots were some of the notable ones. He threw the notebook into the smallest hole, put his hands together in faux prayer and bowed his head. "We grieve the loss of the material for it has been imbued by interaction with the spirit," he said and held the pose for a minute.

The next item was a drawing of what appeared to be a young man holding a diploma standing in front of a large group of people who were all turned towards him with smiles on their faces. The picture was crumpled up and thrown in the middle grave. "We grieve the loss of the plans we had and the people we leave behind. We grieve the loss of the sweat that has been spilt on defunct goals and the love shared in now severed bonds." The words echoed through the clearing. Harry brought his head down and his hands up to say goodbye to the second grave.

The last one was the one he feared the most. Because there were some things in life, beyond items, dreams, friends and family, that one never got over losing.

He half-hoped that it would be possible to let go, to forget. But the other half of him wanted to remember, to use the suffering as fuel. Integrate it.

After some searching, made harder by the trembling of the small hand doing it, a very realistic doll was brought forth from his pocket. The doll was female and had blonde hair, pale blue jeans and a green sweater. Tiny little slippers adorned her feet. Harry stared at the abstraction as a few tears slid down his face and threatened to obscure his view. A superimposition of the woman that the doll was meant to represent appeared over the lifeless features. The ghost smiled sadly and mouthed something. Harry wasn't a lip-reader. But he thought he could identify the lip movement of the phrases he'd heard often enough.

'I love you and goodbye,' it said and Harry accepted that he had finally gone fully insane.

"I love you too." He whispered to the ghost. The words disappeared like the stillness of a lake under the influence of a skipping stone and so did the apparition. The doll was a doll.

Harry squared up, took back control of his whole body as only adults knew how and threw the representation into the last, largest hole. He was too distraught to bring himself into the proper position and simply began talking without a preamble. "We grieve the most cherished person left behind in another world, hoping that they may find happiness in a well-lived life." He managed to croak out shakily. The feeling that was starting to overwhelm him was hard to describe. If pressed he would have described it as half missing one's heart and half floating away, struck by an unbearably painful lightness of being.

He stumbled from where he was standing and fell to the ground. Rather than just metaphorically feeling as if his heart was missing from his tiny chest, he now felt something very real, if ephemeral, was flowing from somewhere inside of him. It was his magic, the force that had accompanied him since his birth in this new life. He gasped and tried to stop what was happening, but it was impossible. The ground was demanding too much and his magic was too willing to give all that it had. Just about when black spots started appearing in his vision did the event finally stop, leaving him gasping and trembling with his wet cheek turning the earth it was laying on into mud. He managed to force his head upwards to look at the graves he'd dug. It was because of this that he saw a soft green light appearing above them. It floated carelessly in the air for a few moments before apparently deciding that it would rather be in the ground. It tumbled down like a leaf and disappeared into the most important of the graves.

Harry stared, half afraid and half dumb-struck. There was a non-metaphorical gaping void somewhere inside of him but he nonetheless scurried up with an energy only to be found in young children to stare wondrously at the graves. He was about to step forward and try to glimpse inside, see the green light again, discern its properties, but the ground trembled again and he stumbled back instead. It was good that he did because the big pile of dirt that he'd pulled out of the ground heaved to the left, it heaved to the right, it heaved to the sky before suddenly slumping over the graves as if having been kicked by a giant. All the graves were perfectly filled, flattened, as if by someone who had taken great care to do so.

The entire phenomena, short and wondrous as it had been, left behind one stupefied and dirty kid and absolutely no real proof that anything interesting had happened on the 1st of November in a forest clearing one hour by bike away from Privet Drive 4, Surrey. The only curiosity to be found were three crudely made crosses, which a passerby would likely dismiss as a bad prank.

Harry for his part turned around and ran back to his bicycle. If he had stayed a bit longer, he would have perhaps seen a small sapling pushing itself out of the largest grave, defiantly pushing its bud out against the heavens.

31st of October 1981

Harry stared at the fireworks exploding over London from his bedroom window as owls fluttered across Surrey. The three-year-old sighed and clambered down from the small chair he'd used to reach the windowsill. He went back to bed and slipped under the sheets just as his bedroom door creaked open.

"He's somehow sleeping through the racket." His aunt's voice said quietly, eliciting a deeper, male grumble.

"He's the most lethargic boy in England, pet. He'd sleep through a world war if you'd let him." His uncle said, perhaps a bit too loudly.

"Vernon, quiet, you'll wake him up. You don't need to add your shouting to this ridiculous display as well. Really, what are peop-" The door quietly shut, blocking out any further talk.

Harry continued laying there, back to the door, the light coming from the streetlights illuminating just enough of the wall for him to be able to fixate on it. He could make out the grains, the bumps of paint, everything that the wall had to offer.

"The tyrant is dead. Long live the saviour," he whispered and brought up a hand to snap his fingers; a spark briefly lit up his fingertip before disappearing.

"But if this is the Wizarding World celebrating Voldemort's defeat, and I've been living with my aunts my whole life… then who is the boy who lived? And who am I?"