A/N: Hi folks. This fic came to me as I listened to Staind's "It's Been Awhile" over and over again the other day. That song is so awesome, but warning: do not listen to it if you're feeling depressed, because it just might convince you to commit suicide. My first songfic. Please review. Thanks!
It's Been Awhile
And it's been awhile
Since I could hold my head up high
And it's been awhile since I first saw you
And it's been awhile
Since I could stand up on my own two feet again
And it's been awhile since I could call you
August 10, 1996
Dear Hermione,
How're you doing? How are things in Rome now? Been seeing the sights and badgering the tour guides while you
scribble away furiously, no doubt. Yeah, yeah, I know you. Don't bother trying to deny it.
Thank you for your last letter and for the birthday present. It was great to receive them. I'd never heard of some of the spells in that Defense book you sent, and I'm thinking of practicing them when we get back to Hogwarts. Maybe if we start up the DA again, we can all try them out. They would definitely come in handy, I'm sure.
Everyone is fine. All the Weasleys are here again, and the members of the Order. It's really strange being back here at Grimmauld Place. Everyone was kinda tiptoeing around me for the first few days or so. Professor Lupin keeps glancing at me like he wants to say something but then he just looks away again with this unbelievably sad look on his face.
And everytime that happens, something inside me dies.
I can understand your parents not wanting you to come back here for all of this summer again. I imagine they miss you a lot, since you're away at Hogwarts so much of the year. I feel bad for them, actually; we've been totally monopolizing you. Because of me, you didn't even spend last Christmas with them! So don't apologize for not being here. We'll see you on August 31 and we'll have you all year at Hogwarts. Your folks deserve some time with their only child.
Hermione, I've been doing a lot of thinking - especially about what happened at the Department of Mysteries this summer. You might want to skip to the signature because I'm about to tell you things that will probably make you uneasy or uncomfortable. I assure you that this is really me, Harry Potter, writing this letter. I know I've never written anything like this before, to anyone, and it might come as a shock to you.
But I have to say these things. I feel like my head will explode if I don't get it out, and I don't trust anyone else enough. I realize this is the coward's way of doing this - sending you a long letter when you are safely away in another country, but I've been the bloody, brave Boy-Who-Lived for so long.
Even I deserve a moment of cowardice?
I miss you.
I mean, of course, I missed Ron and the Weasleys and everyone else before I came here but, Hermione, I miss you in a different way. I miss you.
I miss you in a way that makes some little thing in back of my head scream "Warning! Inappropriate!" complete with flashing red light and siren. I never thought about it before, you know? But when I did, I was surprised that I hadn't until then. And once I made that one little realization, everything just dropped splat into place in some kind of bizarre domino effect. (I wonder, is there an equivalent to dominoes in the wizard world? Imagine trying to teach Mr. Weasley to play dominoes.)
Please, please forgive me if I've overstepped any boundaries so far, but I feel that if I can't at least be brutally honest on paper, I might as well not bother at all.
You know, when I look back on my life these past years, my life since I entered Hogwarts, I can scarcely think of an instance that hasn't been saturated, lightly misted or just simply touched by you. You have been everywhere to me. If someone were to Obliviate me (and I can hardly think of anyone who would want to do that. To sweet, innocent moi?!) everything else would leave me except for the memory of you. Because I'm quite certain that you have invaded even the smallest of my molecules.
Heck, I've been hearing your voice in my head for the past two years, though it was only recently that I realized that it was yours.
You uncomfortable yet?
And everything I can't remember
As fucked up as it all may seem
And yet, Hermione, there is so much about you that I can't remember, or just plain don't know. Which pisses me off, for some strange reason. After all the things we've been through together, even without Ron, after all the time we've spent in each other's company, there's still so much I don't know about you.
I don't even know what kind of wand you have.
Have I been so selfish, so caught up in the entire tale of woe that is my existence that even as I've come to expect you beside me, I never have really looked at you? I never have attempted to delve beneath your obsessive, brainy exterior? I never have, even once, asked about your secret dreams, your deepest fears?
There's only one answer to all those questions, isn't there, Hermione?
And, for that alone, I am ashamed and angry at myself. You have been a friend to the fullest extent of the word, and beyond, and what have you gotten in return?
The consequences that I've rendered
After all the things that my actions have caused, the results of my choices, I am surprised that you're still friends with me. No, I take that back. I'm not surprised. Because you are a better person than I could ever hope to be. If the tables had been turned and I was instead the friend in someone else's fucked up existence, I honestly would have "severed ties", as Percy so eloquently put it, a long time ago.
Who needs so much danger? Have you even had two consecutive months' peace since you've been my friend? If it wasn't Death Eaters, it was dementors. If it wasn't Basilisks, it was letters filled with bubotuber pus and malicious lies. It was the disdain of the entire school. It was humiliation at the hand of our best friend (and I haven't forgiven Ron for that, either. Has he even apologized to you?)
I put you in danger, Hermione. I almost got you killed. My heart as good as stopped, I couldn't breathe, I couldn't think when I saw you fall. I forgot where we were, I was deaf except for a steady whine of panic in my skull as the image of you collapsing replayed itself behind my eyes. Even now the memory is terrifying as I recall it.
What would I have done if you had died? If any one of our friends had been killed because of my own stubborn hot-headness? I nearly fainted with relief when Neville pointed out that you still had a pulse. And that spurred me back into action. I needed to get you out of there and to safety. Away from me.
And I knew you would be alright, because you're strong. You are fierce and stubborn when you need to be, and besides if you had died, who would watch out for me? Who would be the only person unafraid to tell me not what I want to hear, but what I need to - even if it irritates me to no end?
I've stretched myself beyond my means
You balance me.
You are the ying to my yang - doesn't that sound unbearably cosmpolitan? I heard it on the telly this summer. But in regards to us, it's true. Where I'm fast, you are slow. Where I'm rash, you are cautious. Where I want to charge head-first without a thought or a care to the consequences, you are the one trying your darndest to make me see the possible end results before I act.
It is very frustrating, Hermione, when I get like that and you get like that. I don't want you to oppose me even as I need you to. I don't want to hear why I should look at the alternatives, other scenarios even as I need you to tell me why.
I need you. Badly.
I am so tired, Hermione. When I heard that I was a wizard and that I would be leaving these miserable imbeciles I have to call relatives... I can't even articulate to you the range of emotions that overwhelmed me but, suffice it to say, I was pretty damn elated! Finally, finally my salvation had come. I was leaving my life of obscure drudgery and carefully-camouflaged abuse for a world where nobody knew me - yet were exactly like me - and I could start afresh.
Do you see anything wrong with that picture?
And near five years later, I am told that I am the only one who can release this world I've come to love, in spite of its greedy, fickle, ungrateful demands, from the blanket of evil that looms over it. Or die trying.
Why me? Why couldn't it have been somebody else, Hermione? I am so tired; I am weak. I am worn. If it were not for you and Ron and everyone else, I would have collapsed a long time ago. But out of all of them, I can recognize that you are the one constant. I knew, even as I'd never questioned it, that when my last clump of endurance is crumbling, I would need only reach out a hand and you would be right there to recharge me. You would be right there to be my Pepper-Up Potion. My chocolate.
And it's been awhile
Since I could say that I wasn't addicted
And it's been awhile
Since I could say I love myself as well
And yet, even as I know you (however flawed and incomplete that knowledge may be), even as your qualities continue to astound me now that I've taken the time to think about them, I am still putting you in danger. Most days, that's simply by being your friend. But then there are the times when it's my actions, my choices and decisions that lead you into mortal peril and for that I hate myself. I haven't loved myself in a long time. I'm not as wonderful a person as the wizarding world on-again/off-again believes that I am. I am a selfish idiot who couldn't even open his eyes to what he knew was right. An impetuous fool who led his friends face-to-face with some of the most heartless criminals to befoul the earth.
You tried. You tried so hard to tell me, to get me to really think before I acted. I was pleading with you to see what I saw, to let me go and save Sirius's life. The closest thing to my parents I had left. He was in danger. Voldemort had him.
Why didn't you just let me go, Hermione?
Because you were too busy pleading for another life. Mine. And that pissed me off tremendously because my life is nothing. You should have been worrying about Sirius's life. You see, I couldn't worry about me because I don't love me. I love Sirius. No, I loved Sirius, God help me. And because I loved him, he's gone.
I killed him.
And it's been awhile
Since I've gone and fucked things up just like I always do
Six weeks. That's how long it's been since Sirius died. Because of me. If I had listened to you; if only I had listened! Now when I think about it, that fight we had before we went to Umbridge's office, everything you said makes sense. Fucking hindsight. Why couldn't I see it then? Because I was once again blinded by my own emotions, exactly as Voldemort wanted. My brain had been flooded and was drowning, was incapable of coming up with a shred of logic and equally incapable of absorbing any of the logic you were desperately trying to impart.
My relatives would probably tell you differently but it's been six weeks since I've messed anything up. What a long time to have gone without ruining someone's life, without wrecking someone's office, without killing someone, heh?
This must be so depressing for you, isn't it? But look on the bright side (yes, there actually is one!), at least I'm letting some things out?
I tried to fight it at first. For the longest time I have viewed expressing emotion, any sort really, as some kind of weakness. Do you know what form a Boggart takes for me? A dementor. Professor Lupin said that what I feared was fear itself. But I've realized that it's not only fear. I've learned, from living with the Dursleys, not to show emotion if I can help it because chances are it'll be the wrong one and will earn me either a nasty look/word or a smack upside the head.
I think before this year I did a pretty good job of seeming bland and composed, which was why everybody was so shocked by the hot, bubbling cauldron of irascibility that was me. But even my ever-simmering temper was not so bad, not on the "manly emotions" scale. You can rant and rave and nobody'll think any worse of you. You are, afterall, just being a man. Now, tears, on the other hand...
But, yesterday I cried.
I broke down and I cried as I've never cried before. I cried until my throat was raw and my head ached. I cried until I couldn't anymore. I was buried away in Buckbeak's room and I think Mad-Eye Moody knew and placed a Silencing Charm on the room so I could be as vocal as I needed to be. And, boy, I made good use of it. Poor Buckbeak.
But I think he cried too, in his own, unique hippogriff way.
And it's been awhile
But all that shit seems to disappear when I'm with you
And in those moments when I finally let go, I was never more acutely aware of your absence than then.
Do you remember in first year when we went down the trapdoor to try to stop Snape (we thought) from getting the Stone? You hugged me just before I went though that last door and I don't think you had any idea what that meant to me. It was the first hug I can ever recall receiving. Ever. I'm sure my parents hugged me and all that, but I can't remember. I was too young.
But your words, your hug, your touch bolstered me and I was able to push open that door and do what I needed to do. And over the years, you've been the only person - besides Mrs. Weasley, perhaps - who has hugged me on a consistent basis. Your last greeting took the cake, that's for sure. You nearly knocked me down! But a glow began in my chest when your arms went around me, though I never stopped to think about what that meant until recently.
But now I have. I mean, I've thought about it and I've realized that being with you, being in your presence helps me tremendously. I don't know if it's because you make me think about other things - like homework, for instance, haha - or just because it's you, Hermione. But you make the bad stuff go away. Even in my dreams, your voice more than once last term pervented me from going any further down that corridor I kept dreaming about.
Why must I feel this way
Just make this go away
Just one more peaceful day
This is the longest letter I've ever written to anyone and a part of me is terrified that I've busted gaping holes into our friendship. But I'm hoping that what we have is strong enough to withstand any awkwardness.
A part of me wishes that I hadn't examined my feelings, that I'd gone on living in ignorant bliss, although that would just be continuing the unfairness to you. It was wrong of me for taking you for granted for so long, so long that it required almost losing you to make me open my eyes to just how much you mean to me. This will compound our friendship, for sure - between the two of us and between us and Ron.
I don't know how you feel deep down, but I hope you don't feel pressured in any way. That was not my intention at all. But I'd like to know what you think, your thoughts and feelings and whatever you tell me, I will accept. Because I need you too much to let our friendship fall apart. See, I'm being selfish again. As much as I hate myself and my circumstances, Hermione, as much as I hate these unwanted responsibilities that fate has unsympathetically foisted onto me, I want to live.
And I couldn't have survived up to this point without you. I couldn't have, and I can't, live without your hand, your influence in my life. This dependence on you puts you in even more danger because if Voldemort found out just how much I need you... What's to stop him from harming you, from hurting you, to get at me?
And that's the thing that scares the piss out of me about being so dependent on you. It wasn't so bad before but now that I know how I feel, now that I know that I need you-
And it's been awhile
Since I could look at myself straight
And it's been awhile
Since I said I'm sorry
I'm sorry, Hermoine.
I am so sorry for everything. I'm sorry that you had to be the one to be locked out of Gryffindor Tower that night in first year when you were scolding Ron and I about going to duel with Malfoy. I'm sorry that you had to overhear Ron's comment that hurt you enough to make you lock yourself up and cry all afternoon. I'm sorry for all the pain, all the evil that you've had to face just because you've been my friend. I'm sorry for taking you for granted, for not listening to you as you pleaded to the point of tears for my life.
I'm sorry for possibly endangering our friendship by sending you this letter. I am really and truly sorry for so many things, Hermione.
But I'm not, and I never will be sorry that I know you. I'm not, and I never will be sorry that you're my friend.
And I'm not, and I never will be sorry that I love you.
Always,
Harry