Harry had loads on his mind.

Hermione acting funny, for one. She had walked right out of Divination and quit the class. It was so unlike Hermione to quit anything once she'd got it in her mind that Harry was sure there was something else bothering her that she wasn't telling him and Ron about. But honestly, it wasn't just Hermione that was bothering him.

The security 'round the castle had nearly doubled for since the night Sirius Black snuck into the dormitory. There were loads of aurors just marching about the castle, and so many dementors out on the grounds that Harry got shivers just looking out the window. They were like storm clouds filling the sky.

Because of security and dementors, Harry, Ron, and Hermione couldn't go visit Hagrid, which was usually one of the best parts to Harry's week. But honestly even if he could have gone, he wasn't sure he would have. He felt guilty for that fact, but if Hagrid's demeanor in Care of Magical Creatures was any indicator, then his friend was in a right depressed state and would have needed cheering up himself, too much so to be expected to help at cheering Harry up...

Remus Lupin had inexplicably called off their anti-dementor lesson on the tenth, too, and the 17th and 24th had both passed by with Harry still feeling frustrated and stupid. "You're being far too hard on yourself Harry," Lupin had said. "You don't believe me, but you have produced the full corporeal form twi--"

"Twice, I know, but I haven't seen it! I can't do it every time, and that's scary."

"You've come far enough to protect yourself on the grounds of Hogwarts, Harry."

"But what if I'm not at Hogwarts when I'm attacked?"

Lupin had looked affronted, "Not at Hogwarts? When do you ever plan to be near to a dementor elsewhere?"

"Dunno, that's the point, isn't it? Being prepared anywhere? For anything?"

"Oh Harry, the dementors are under the Ministry's control. They aren't just floating about Little Whinging. You're perfectly safe outside of school."

"But they weren't very much under Ministry control that night on the Express, yeah? You had to protect us!"

Remus Lupin had made a concerned expression, "I am sure, Remus said, there was an explanation to that which I cannot personally guess at. But they did no harm, Harry. I am sure everything would have been all right."

Harry wasn't.

And now, here he was in the DADA corridor, outside of Lupin's office door, knocking ,and Professor Lupin was out once again, the rumor had spread about breakfast in the Great Hall when Lupin's seat the staff table was, once again, vacant. He'd been wanting to see Lupin, been looking forward to it, even, he realized. He had worked exceedingly hard on the revisions that Lupin had set him for his paper on inferi, harder than he reckoned he, Harry, had ever worked on a paper before. He could've just held onto it until Tuesday, when it was really due, but he'd been going to use turning it in as an excuse to talk with Lupin. And now, well if the Professor was sick again -- there was no telling he would be better by Tuesday.

Harry sighed. He didn't think he could handle it if Snape taught this class. He couldn't.

Please anybody but Severus Snape.

The door to the DADA office opened and Harry turned to see Professor McGonagall coming out, closing it gently behind her. She turned to start down the corridor and spotted Harry standing there in the center of the hall. They stared at one another for several long moments, then she said, "Mr. Potter, I am verra sorry, but Professor Lupin isn't feeling very well today. You must not disturb him!" 

Harry hung his head, "Yeah, I won't." He turned and started down the hall. 

"Mister Potter," McGonagall's voice rang through the hall and Harry stopped, turning to look at her. "The stairwell is this way, Potter."

Harry realized he'd automatically started back toward one of the secret passageways he remembered from the Marauder's Map. "Oh ... Right. I got spun about, sorry Professor," Harry muttered.

McGonagall watched him pass by her and head for the stairs. "Mr. Potter."

"Yes, Professor?" Harry asked.

"Would you like some tea?"

Harry hesitated. He didn't have anything else to do except the loads of homework waiting for him upstairs in his dormitory, and honestly he could use some extra explanation on some of the finer points of turning a mouse into a tea cup, so he followed McGonagall to her office. "Have a seat, Mr. Potter," she said, and he watched as she put her wand into a stand beside her desk and crossed over to the bookshelves.

He waited until she'd returned carrying two cups of steaming hot tea. "Two sugars?" she guessed. Harry nodded, and McGonagall's teaspoon measured the sugar out with a flick of her wand. "Milk?"

"Not a drop," Harry replied.

McGonagall's eyes softened at the words for some reason. "Be verra careful with that cup, please, Mr. Potter," she said gently, her eyes on Harry's grip on the cup she'd handed him, "It means a great deal to me... and it is simply irreplaceable."

Harry looked at the cup. It was blue and there were deer on it.

"What's so special about it?" Harry asked.

"I keep some of the cups that students make during their mice-into-teacups classes," McGonagall said. She watched Harry sip tea from the cup, then looked down at her own cup. "That one was your father's."

Harry looked at it again in surprise, "This one was?"

"Yes, Mr. Potter."

Harry traced a finger over the gold edge. "It's cracked," he noticed.

McGonagall nodded. "Aye, it fell off the shelf one night, and luckily I was able to repair it for the most part... but it's still quite fragile and I'm missing some of the china there - see that chip?"

Harry nodded.

"I never found that piece, no matter how I tried to look for it."

Harry stared down into the tea a moment before he looked up. "Do you have my mother's tea cup, professor?" McGonagall nodded and she got up and went to the shelf. She had a stack of several cups together - and she moved one with black and gold cross hatching to select one with tiny pink rosebuds that looked like heart-shaped blossoms. "Here it is," she said, turning to show it to Harry.

"They aren't a set?" Harry asked, disappointed.

"Och no," McGonagall shook her head, "These are cast far too young for things like that to come into play in the development of teacup patterns, Mr. Potter. Rather, these are based on the students hopes when they are young."

Harry's cup, he remembered, had been a very ordinary white teacup.

He no sooner thought of it than he noticed it on her shelf.

"I do, Mr. Potter."

"What does an ordinary cup mean for somebody's hopes, Professor?" he asked, feeling rather disappointed in himself for not having a more intricate pattern, like some of the other ones that were clustered about McGonagall's shelves.

She looked at the cup, then turned back to him. "That you have yet to find your dreams, Mr. Potter."

Harry held the blue tea cup very tightly in his hands. He was terrified he might drop it. He looked up at her. "It doesn't mean that there aren't any, does it?"

"No, Mr. Potter," McGonagall said.

"Because Professor Trelawney keeps talking about the grim."

"Is she still on about that?" McGonagall shook her head.

Harry flushed and looked down. 

"Have a biscuit, Potter."

He looked up and saw her holding out a tartan tin, filled with unevenly cut biscuits. They smelled divine, much better than most ordinary biscuits. Harry took two. McGonagall took one and closed the tin, setting it on the desk. 

"Do you know what today is, Mr. Potter?"

Harry answered, "Sunday?"

"It's your father's birthday," McGonagall answered. 

Harry looked at the cup in his hands, then up at the Professor again. 

"He would have been 34 today."

Harry bit his lower lip. He wanted to ask her questions, but he wasn't sure what to ask and it seemed funny to suggest that she tell him literally anything she wanted about him. So instead, he said, "I can't imagine turning thirty-four."

"One day you will," McGonagall promised.

Harry hesitated. Then held up his tea cup. "To my dad."

McGonagall seemed surprised by the gesture, then smiled in a benign way that he couldn't quite scrutinize. "To your father, Mr. Potter," and she very gently tapped the side of her cup to his.