I don't usually write about Harry Potter because I tend to think that it's too brilliant for my words... but I guess this is more about life than him.

***Spoiler alert for those who haven't read the seventh book***

“Does it hurt?”
The childish question had fallen from Harry’s lips before he could stop it.

I know you've read the book, because I put a spoiler alert for those who haven't (and they should've immediately quit out of the page before their eyes accidentally slipped over a few words). But if you've forgotten, this is what Harry asks his parents about death in the Dark Forest when he is on his way to give himself up to Voldemort towards the end of the seventh book.

It took me a long time to figure out what exactly made this line stick with me. Often the kind of sentence that wedges itself into my brain like that is 'deep' or beautifully metaphorical or will inspire me in some way. Often these kinds of lines are obvious in what made them stick to me. But this wasn't. This was so plain. This seemed topical, no hidden layers- it was just a simple question. A pretty fair question, really. Why did this stick out more than a sentence during Snape's last memories or part of Dumbledore's past? Why did it double my tear production, keep me up at night, make me think and think and think about I-don't-know-what.

It didn't hit me until a few weeks ago. Sitting on a plane with a finished book, a dead ipod , and a computer with no internet, I began to type. I wrote three little entries about nothing much really, just about my life or about moments that I thought needed to be captured, theories that needed further developing. I wrote about things that seemed more fitting to be in the pretty notebook lying at the bottom of my bag, but, somehow, came out better when I typed. One such moment that I tried to recreate and think slightly deeper about was this, you won't understand what exactly it is or who exactly I'm talking to, but I don't think that I'm going to try to explain:

-I just want it all to go away.

It was a whisper of an answer that slipped through my lips before I could stop it. Like when 17-year-old Harry asks his parents- at the end of the seventh book- if death will hurt. A childish question. A childish answer that happened all too quickly. It was a thought that made itself into audible sounds forming words without my permission- something I thought only happened in movies and books to characters who weren't real. It left my mind and then my mouth before I had the chance to realise it. Before I had the chance to take that thought and disect it- keeping only the vaguely acceptable parts as though to have some traces of truth left behind- and mix it with what she wanted to hear. Before I had the chance to carve and chisel and polish it into something that was not a thought in the rough, but a mature, insightful, and smart answer. Before I had the chance to create an articulate, adult-like response that showed the growth and acceptance I had been faking.

That was what I did with questions and answers and comments. That was how I talked, communicated, lived. I took every instinct and changed it to what I instinct I was supposed to have, and then into what I was expected to think or say. I remodeled my words to match the face that I was wearing, the wall I had put up, the other girl I was pretending to be. What would she say? What would she think? Then suddenly with one sentence, seemingly simple in wording and length, my cover was broken. I was suddenly vulnerable because this was my real answer. Not my fake response that the other girl inside my head had fabricated. This was my raw and true and honest answer. It was stupid, foolish and immature, irrational and far too hopeful. And it was mine. It was real. It showed that I was not mature, not insightful, not articulate- but, rather I was childish and weak and cowardly. It allowed a peek inside of me, into who I was, how I worked- something that was never meant to be seen or heard. I had, for the first time in what must have been forever, let someone in. Not to say that I hadn't let people in, because I had- friends and such- but this was letting her in on an entirely different level, in an entirely different way. And that, in and of itself, was terrifying.

Harry Potter lives in a world and a time where he is the most wanted boy/man/person alive. His parents are killed before he can remember them, years later he find out about and is reunited with his last remaining family member only to see him killed shortly after. The teacher who he thought to be his biggest supporter and defender, the only man he thought could understand him and protect him was now dead as well. He couldn't be with the girl he loved for so many reasons a teenager shouldn't have to face, had been hiding and running for months, had put his closest friends in danger. They'd all ricked their lives for him and, just moments ago, three had died, in part, because of him. Now he was walking into the forest to surrender and be killed. All before he's even eighteen. And though I often felt that Harry got annoying and slightly big-headed at times throughout the series, I think we can all agree that he has a lot on his plate. Yet he always seems to be brave, tough, persistent, and filled with answers- if not in the inside, in his actual thoughts, then at least on the surface for everyone else to see. He always played that part, depicted that image.

I'm not trying to say that Harry Potter is fake, because I don't believe he is. And in that small moment, I'm not even trying to say that I'm fake, because I don't believe I am either. But I think that, as humans, we often put up walls to protect ourselves or to protect others or for any number of reasons we come up with. And that could mean having a brave face so that the people around you can feel safe. It could mean telling someone what they want to hear so that things are easier, cleaner for them and for you. So that you can be the person you want to be, the person they want you to be, even if only on the surface. It could mean not letting yourself cry to prove to god-knows-who that you are not and never will be weak. But then I think, as humans, we also all have a breaking point. I think that we all, at some point, have a moment where the wall falls down- when you just need to cry or you feel so fake that you can't stand another moment of it or, if nothing else, you just forget and it happens before you can remember. We let our guard down, or it comes down without our permission. For some people, probably, it can happen in a bigger way- an outburst, or a breakdown. For Harry and I, it came in a short line, a simple spoken sentence that could, to others, almost go unnoticed. He, like me, had built up an image and a character for everyone to see- a personality that he had gotten himself into and was now committed to keeping up. Then suddenly in a simple question, he had (maybe even accidentally) shown a different side- perhaps a truer side- which wasn't weak or immature or cowardly. It was only human.