The Person in the Mirror

The mirror stood deep inside the classroom.

It was tall, with an ornate frame and two claw-shaped feet resting on the dusty floor.

The light from the snow outside fell through the window, illuminating the strange inscription at the top and making it look even more out of place among the old desks and chairs.

Harry recognized it.

The Mirror of Erised.

Memories of it surfaced. It could reflect a person's deepest desires, and it had once kept some people standing before it for so long that they gradually forgot their lives in the real world.

Harry tightened his grip on the Invisibility Cloak, preparing to look away.

Ron was still waiting for him. He had already checked the third-floor defenses tonight. There was no need to linger.

But just then, a bed appeared in the mirror. A pillow, a casually draped piece of clothing, and a phone with its screen lit up.

Harry stopped.

It was his bedroom from his previous life.

The pillow rested against the headboard, with a slight depression where he had slept.

One sleeve hung over the edge of the bed. The phone screen cast a small patch of light, illuminating every crease in the sheets.

He almost knew that all he had to do was reach to the side to find the charging cable.

The end had probably fallen into the gap beside the bed again.

The thought came so naturally that, for a moment, Harry forgot where he was standing.

He remembered the last time he had lain there.

He had held his phone above his face, his wrist growing sorer and his eyelids heavier, yet still wanted to keep looking a little longer.

Then his grip had slipped...

After that tiny mistake, everything had changed.

Now, the phone in the mirror was still lit, and the room was still there, perfectly intact, as though there was still time for everything.

Perhaps, if he just lay back down... Harry knew there was no basis for that thought.

But his feet had already shifted a little closer.

The bedroom door in the mirror opened.

His mother stood in the doorway, wearing the loungewear he had seen so many times. She looked toward the bed, seeming a little exasperated, as though she had already guessed he was still awake.

Then her lips moved gently.

There was no sound from the scene in the mirror, but Harry knew she had called his name.

The name that belonged to his previous life.

He instinctively opened his mouth, a reply almost on his lips.

But his mother was still standing in the doorway, and he could not bear to lower his head. He only wanted to look a little longer.

Before coming in, she would always knock softly twice. Even with the door already open, she would still say out of habit, "Why aren't you asleep yet? You'll stare yourself blind."

He had seen all these things before, so many times that he had assumed every day would be the same.

If he had not looked properly today, he could see her tomorrow.

Some things could wait until his next visit home to be said. Some things could wait until he was less busy to be done.

He had always believed there would be a next time, a future.

Harry moved a little closer again.

His reflection was there too, wearing his old clothes, looking the way he once had.

There was no scar on that face. He stood in his familiar bedroom as though he had never left.

These days, he had been busy learning magic, dealing with danger, and thinking about the things that had changed because of him.

He had set his longing somewhere far away.

He had even thought he had adjusted very well.

Until that person stood before him again.

Harry reached out. His mother reached toward him too, as though she was going to straighten his covers, just as she used to.

But his fingertips touched glass first.

It felt cold.

Harry paused, then slowly pressed his palm against it.

The light in the mirror shone on his mother's face. Only this thin layer of glass lay between them.

At last, his eyes began to sting.

How had they been since he left?

Was anyone still waiting for him? Could he ever say those unfinished words again?

He even wanted to explain that he had not left on purpose, nor had he truly forgotten them.

His mother kept looking at him. That familiar tenderness had not changed, but it could not answer a single new question.

Harry's hand remained against the mirror.

After a while, he suddenly wanted very much to tell her about his life now.

He really had learned magic, and he had made a few friends.

The red-haired one was good at chess. He was always complaining, but he was truly brave.

Even though he got scared too, he would still step forward when danger came. He was a very good friend, someone worth trusting to guard his back.

Another young witch was astonishingly clever, her head filled with countless pieces of knowledge. She was so serious that no one could get away with giving her a halfhearted answer.

There was always a warm fire at Hagrid's.

Whenever the big man talked about fantastic beasts, his eyes shone, as though every dangerous creature deserved to be treated gently.

These people...

They were not a few lines on a page, nor a story already written in his memory.

They truly existed.

At that thought, Harry's fingers inadvertently touched his chest.

The silver flight feather pressed against his palm, the green gemstone at its center reflecting a faint light. Harry gently rubbed the feather's etched lines.

Ron was still in the dormitory, too.

He might already be getting sleepy, but because of their agreed hour, he would struggle to keep his eyes open and refuse to actually fall asleep.

It turned out he already had so much he could tell her.

Every single thing had happened, clear and real. Those people could make him worry, make him happy.

He remembered how Ron always gave a wave when he called out to Harry in the corridor.

When Hermione encountered a problem, she would turn to him and wait to hear his thoughts.

And there was that blonde girl who, despite how well they already knew each other, still liked to lift her chin and declare that she would beat him.

Harry looked back into the mirror.

That life still belonged to him.

Those unspoken words, those ordinary days when he had thought there was all the time in the world, and the home he could never return to had all truly existed.

He slowly withdrew his hand, taking a trace of cold with him as his fingertips left the glass.

He lowered his eyes and remained silent for a long time before raising his head again.

"I am Harry Potter."

"But I haven't forgotten... who I used to be, either."

No one answered him. Harry closed his eyes briefly.

When he opened them again, he finally looked away.

He slowly folded the Invisibility Cloak and held it in the crook of his arm. Then he turned around.

There were some things he could never undo.

But he still had a long road ahead, many people worth cherishing, and stories yet to unfold.

But just as he stepped half a pace back, the light in the mirror suddenly went out.

The bedroom vanished, and darkness swallowed the figure in the doorway.

Harry froze mid-motion.

A dark red glow lit up deep within the mirror, revealing billowing smoke and a burning city.

The figures in the streets were tiny.

They fled between buildings as flames climbed steadily over the rooftops.

A tall tower slowly tilted amid the smoke and dust. Rubble fell, and soon it could no longer be seen clearly.

Then a deeper mass of darkness passed over the tower's top.

At first, Harry could not recognize what it was.

Not until it slowly unfolded, revealing heavy wing bones and the patterns of its wing membranes illuminated by firelight.

It was an enormous wing.

An immense black dragon loomed over the city, its outstretched wings almost blotting out the sky.

Its broad head emerged from the thick smoke. Great horns swept backward, and overlapping scales rose and fell with its breathing. Firelight flowed over them, leaving only a dull red.

It turned its head, opening golden eyes with vertical pupils.

A deep dragon's roar suddenly pressed into his ears. Harry's chest tightened, and he almost had the illusion that his body was vibrating with it.

Then he saw the person on the dragon's back.

Black hair, black robes. The hems fluttered in the hot wind, yet that person remained perfectly steady.

Harry's gaze was caught fast by that figure's back. An indescribable familiarity gradually made his body tense.

The person suddenly turned his face slightly.

The firelight first illuminated the line of his jaw, then swept over the bridge of his nose and his brow.

Finally, those eyes turned toward him.

Emerald green.

The scar on his forehead came into view as well.

Harry's entire body went rigid.

There was no mistaking it.

That person...

That person actually had exactly the same face as him!

But those eyes... sent a chill through his whole body.

They were too calm.

The collapsing tower, the fleeing crowds, the flames spreading along the streets-none of them brought the slightest change to that gaze.

Firelight swept over that face. The person's gaze passed through the smoke and suddenly stopped.

Harry's breath caught with it.

He saw me. The thought was terrifyingly clear.

For the first time, Harry was so distinctly afraid of a face that belonged to him.

His body backed away before he could think.

His calf struck a chair leg.

The wooden chair toppled, and the crash as it hit the floor abruptly dragged him back into the classroom.

Harry caught hold of the edge of a desk.

The cold floor, the dusty desks, and the snow falling silently outside the window gradually became clear again.

He slowly drew a breath, only then realizing he had not been breathing normally.

The person in the mirror had vanished. Those eyes, however, remained in his mind.

Harry stood beside the desk for a while.

He wanted to walk back over and confirm what he had just seen, to find out why that person had appeared here.

But in the end, he stopped himself.

In his current state, he was no longer fit to keep probing.

He had no answer as to why the Mirror of Erised had shown such a scene. Besides, the noise just now might well draw a patrol.

Harry slowly righted the chair and straightened out the Invisibility Cloak.

The city, the black dragon, that face.

He tried hard to remember those clearest details, but his fingers still would not quite obey him.

Back to the dormitory first. Sit down, drink some water, and wait for my thoughts to settle.

Harry put on the Invisibility Cloak, went to the door, and listened for a moment. Then he gently pushed it open and left in the direction of the main staircase.

The footsteps gradually faded away.

In the shadows along the side of the corridor, Snape slowly straightened.

When he had pursued them to this area earlier, he had told Filch to continue checking ahead, while he himself had noticed the door that was not fully closed.

He had approached it and was about to push it open when the person inside happened to pull down the fabric covering his head and face.

Black hair, glasses.

Potter.

Snape had been ready to speak.

Leaving his dormitory late at night, approaching the forbidden area, and trying to flee after being discovered.

This Gryffindor student clearly had a great deal to explain.

But at that very moment, something crossed his mind-he did not know what-and made his hand stop.

Then the boy had already walked up to the mirror.

Snape recognized the Mirror of Erised and understood the nature of viewing it briefly. For the time being, he remained outside the door, observing what was happening inside through the narrow gap.

He could see only a profile and a back, and he did not know whom Potter had seen.

He saw only that the child who could always handle so many things suddenly grew quiet, slowly approached, and reached out to press his hand against the mirror.

That expression kept the rebuke already on the tip of his tongue from coming out for the moment.

Later, the boy withdrew his hand on his own and straightened up.

His lips moved slightly, as though he had finally made some decision.

Snape saw that he was preparing to leave. But the very next moment, the boy inside suddenly went pale, staggered back, and knocked over a chair.

By the time the wooden chair crashed to the floor, Snape's hand was already on the door handle.

He could not see the image in the mirror and could only judge by the boy's current reaction. If the situation continued to worsen, he would push the door open and go in.

But a moment later, Potter steadied himself against the edge of the desk and began to regulate his breathing.

Then he righted the chair himself and straightened his clothes.

Snape released the door handle and stepped back into the shadows to one side.

The boy put on the Invisibility Cloak, and his figure vanished. The door opened softly, and footsteps passed in front of Snape, slowly fading into the distance.

At the other end of the corridor, a lamp came bobbing toward him.

"Professor! There was a noise over here just now. I heard-"

Filch hurried over, then stopped immediately when he saw Snape standing outside the door.

"Did you catch him?"

Snape turned sideways, blocking the way into the classroom, his expression no different from usual.

"I will inspect this room."

Still unwilling to give up, Filch peered inside.

"But that noise just now-"

Snape lowered his eyes.

"Go to the east corridor, Filch."

Filch opened his mouth, but in the end, he left with his lamp. The light swayed around the corner, and the corridor fell quiet again.

Snape turned his head and looked toward the main staircase.

There was no one there anymore, only the faint glow of snow falling through the windows.

He watched for a moment, his face still wearing that same cold expression.

Just this once.

For Christmas's sake.

Snape withdrew his gaze and reached out to push open the classroom door behind him.

His black robes swept over the threshold. As for the baffling well-wishes on that greeting card, he did, in the end, answer them silently.

Merry Christmas, Potter.