The Lost Boys (The Long Grey Road Remix)
Gran had barely spoken to him when he told her that he'd broken Dad's wand. Well, after the initial screams of rage -- "I don't care where you were, you should have more sense than to let anything happen to your wand! What would happen if you were caught in your sleep? You get your wand, Neville! You never let anything happen to your wand!" -- she had barely spoken to him for the first few weeks of summer holidays.
He had been ashamed, all that summer, to pass or to look at the photographs of him and Mum that sat upon the mantle above the fireplace (the mantle was too high yet for Neville to reach without standing on his toes, and Gran had moved them there when it had become apparent that he broke nearly everything he held or even touched), had been certain that they would look at him, knowing, disappointed, exactly as they must have been so many times before. It was worse now, though. He was lucky, he knew, that he hadn't been killed -- or worse, even -- without his wand.
When the letter with this years' books had arrived, Gran had said something cold about having to buy a new wand this year. He had asked, timidly, if he might simply have his Mum's old one, instead of going to all the trouble and cost of a new one. Plus, he had heard things about old Mr. Ollivander at the wand shop.
"Alice's wand had to be taken from her and destroyed," Gran said simply. "She was dangerous with it, after those Death Eaters rent her mind."
Since the Tournament, Gran had stopped using euphemisms for what had happened. He had always believed Harry, and that was what had told him that she did, too. That was also what terrified him the most about this war, because it meant, he guessed, that she knew there was worse coming, that she might as well steel herself now because she would see far more this time around.
Neville was glad that Uncle Algie had taken him to Diagon Alley instead of Gran. He knew, as always, that Gran only meant well, but she was... things were just always hard with her. Besides, Uncle Algie had given him a little extra for newt eyes and a few other ingredients he needed for a fertilizing potion. He'd started keeping a bit more of a collection over the summer.
He was not surprised that it had taken as long as it did for the wand to find him, or for him to find the wand, or whatever it was that had happened. And he had felt bad, for awhile, about keeping Harry, because the dark-haired boy had looked so bored and unhappy in the corner he retreated to. He always hated doing these things in front of Harry, truth be told, because Harry was so good at everything, and even if he wasn't brilliant at something, chances were that he was a lot better at it than Neville.
But he had the curious feeling, when he and Harry laughed later (even as Neville wished, a little, that it might come true, that he might really shake himself out of that ever-present fear of his Potions professor, the threat of whom was only somewhat less menacing than that of Voldemort), that the other boy really was glad of his company, and it was joined by genuine relief that Harry had forgiven him for his clumsiness in the Department of Mysteries.
Gran had still been cold when he and Uncle Algie came home that evening, but she had smiled, her face tired and barely its former warm self at all, as he showed her his wand.
Neville wished, sometimes, that he might have at least some of Harry's courage. Most often these days, though, he would then laugh at himself, because wishing would do nothing, and his plants needed care.