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Dudley sat in the back corner of the cafe, staring nervously at the door as an untouched cup of tea slowly cooled in front of him. It was still five minutes until they were supposed to meet, but every passing moment made the anxiety worse.
Just as he was beginning to wonder about the merits of leaving and hoping Harry wasn’t extremely pissed about it, said cousin walked in the door.
“Hey, Dudley,” Harry said as he approached the table, kindly not saying anything about the strained smile he was receiving in return. “It’s, er, nice to hear from you?”
Dudley could feel his face heating a little, and he squirmed in his chair. He was honestly surprised Harry had ever agreed to meet him, what with everything Dudley had put him through when they were kids. But he was glad, since that was exactly what he wanted to talk about.
“Thanks for coming,” Dudley said, remembering his manners. He gestured for Harry to sit. “I know you probably didn’t want to. Probably have a whole ton of more important things to do with you…” He mada vague gesture to indicate magic, and Harry grinned a little lopsidedly. “Yeah,” he continued. “Um, anyway, I just wanted to talk. Apologize, really.”
Harry’s eyebrows rose, a baffled look overtaking his face. Dudley sympathized. “I think I’m going to need a drink for this.”
He headed over to the counter without another word, leaving Dudley nothing to do but stare after him. He looked different than Dudley remembered, taller and broader, stronger. Though that was probably to be expected seeing as it had been almost five years since the last time they were face to face. Dudley himself had changed a lot in that time, dropping to almost half his weight after he stopped letting his mother dictate his eating habits. There was something else there, though, something less physical that Dudley wasn’t quite sure how to quantify.
It took a few minutes for Dudley to figure out what it was. For basically their entire lives, Harry had looked scared and lonely and downtrodden. The reason for that was no mystery, though Dudley sure as hell regretted his part in it now. But Harry didn’t look like that anymore. He looked… maybe content was the right word for it. Apparently taking out that evil wizard had been just the thing for him.
Harry returned a few minutes later with a steaming mug of tea into which he proceeded to empty the contents of a small flask with a grim expression. Dudley watched this with his mouth slightly open. That was certainly new too.
“So,” Harry said after a long sip of the presumably spiked tea. He waved his wand, only making Dudley flinch a little, and suddenly the sound of the rest of the cafe dimmed. “You wanted to talk?”
Dudley nodded dumbly, trying to gather his thoughts. “Uh, yeah, yeah,” he mumbled before clearing his throat uncomfortably. Despite his preparation for this very moment, he didn’t exactly feel ready. “I’m sorry, Harry. For… for everything.”
There was silence for a few minutes, and Dudley could feel the tension between. Harry didn’t say anything in response, apparently content to watch Dudley grow more and more anxious.
For all the soul searching he’d done since the day they left the house so Harry could go off and fight evil, he wasn’t any better at saying what he was feeling. He hadn’t exactly been brought up to be a talker or a feeler, and five years wasn’t enough to cure him of that. No matter how much he’d tried during that time.
“I’ve been seeing a therapist,” he finally said, trying to ignore the surprise on his cousin’s face. He worked out his shame at not being strong enough--his father’s words, unsurprisingly--long before now, but he could be a little touchy about it sometimes. “Been seeing her ever since you left. Well, since they told us you’d won and we could go home.”
Harry opened his mouth to say something, but Dudley shook his head. He didn’t want to be interrupted, not when he wasn’t sure he’d be able to continue if he was. Words were still hard even when he wanted nothing more than to talk.
It had been even harder in the beginning, coming back to a house that no longer felt like home, with parents who he’d barely spoken to in months. Everything he’d thought he’d known, slowly chipped away since that day Harry’s first letter came, had come crashing down and Dudley didn’t know what to do about it. Ignoring it had seemed like the best idea, but if there was one thing he’d learned from Harry, it was courage.
“My therapist, she… well, I think she has to know about magic, otherwise she’d probably say I was crazy,” Dudley continued. Some days he wasn’t sure he wasn’t, but that wasn’t important now. “I never told her specifics, not about you or what happened when you left for good. Not that I really know, about the end.
“But she’s been really good about helping me with all my other issues,” he said with a short laugh, thinking about the hours and hours he’d spent in her office, listing out his many sins. Harry smiled crookedly, but didn’t interrupt. “I’m sure you know there’s a lot of them. And a lot of them about you and us growing up and all that. I was awful to you, I know that now, and I know you probably won’t ever forgive me. I wouldn’t blame you. I don’t think I can ever really forgive myself. But I want you to know--no, I think I really need you to know--how… how sorry I am about everything I said and did to you since we were kids.”
He paused for a moment, heart beating frantically in his chest as if he’d just come from a run. “That’s, uh, that’s all I wanted to say.”
Dudley sat back in his seat a little once he’d finished, mentally and emotionally exhausted by speaking so much and so deeply. He felt wrung out and empty, but there was also something almost like relief stirring in the back of his mind. Maybe his therapist had been right about the benefits of talking out his feelings.
All through Dudley’s apology, Harry hadn’t moved more than a few vague facial expressions that gave nothing much away. Dudley couldn’t tell what he was thinking at all. It was unnerving, but Dudley knew he’d said what he needed to say and now he just needed to wait.
Eventually Harry sighed, shaking his head a little. Dudley tensed, but there was a smile on his cousin’s face. He let himself relax again, just the smallest bit, until Harry finally spoke.
“I forgive you, Dudley.”
For all that being forgiven had always been a possibility of asking forgiveness, Dudley felt more than a little shell shocked by actually hearing the words from Harry’s own mouth. Like he’d said, he hadn’t really expected Harry to forgive him. He wasn’t sure he deserved it either, much as his therapist had tried to talk him round to giving himself some leeway for being a child in a toxic home.
Dudley took a deep, calming breath, just like his therapist had taught him. “Thanks, Harry,” he said, voice a little rough. “I really- I really appreciate that.”
They stared at one another for a long minute, and Dudley wondered if Harry was as unsure of how to continue as he was. They’d never really had a conversation before, and certainly not one like this. Despite them having grown up together, they were practically strangers.
“So… what now?” Dudley finally asked. He picked up his cup and took a sip, but made a face at how cold it was. Bugger, waste of a few good quid.
Harry shrugged, twisting his own empty cup between his hands. “I guess we either go on with our lives like before,” he said, voice neutral, “or we try and start again. Before today, I never would have thought I’d say this, but I think I’d like to start again. That is, if you want to too.”
“Yeah,” Dudley replied before he could even think about it. But he wasn’t about to take it back, because he never thought he’d have the chance to start over with Harry and he wasn’t about to blow it. “I’d really like that. I don’t really talk to mom and dad anymore, so you’re kind of my only family, you know?”
“Oh, I know,” Harry said with a wry grin.
Dudley winced internally. He’d really put his foot in that one, but thankfully Harry didn’t seem to mind too much. It’d be just his luck to fuck up as they were starting to patch things up.
“How about another drink then?” Harry asked, smiling a bit more genuinely than before. He stood from the table, waiting for Dudley to do the same. They walked over to the cafe bar, sound washing over them like they’d just stepped through a bubble. “And then we can catch up.”