Within the Limit

Disclaimer: Nothing’s mine, except for the drabble itself. Harry belongs to Hermione – well, technically he belongs to J.K. Rowling and other related companies. But he’s all Hermione’s. ;)

Author’s Note: To PICK, Christine and Nielle. For reasons that only they know. “She” is Hermione, “he” is Harry. “It was something forbidden” refers to what the law thinks of friendship.

Summary: Hermione wonders – how much is going too far?

She wondered. That day was full of nothing but thoughts and ponderings for her. Her ingenious mind didn’t stop mulling over the wonders and mysteries and miracles of the universe. She wondered about mankind. She wondered about morality and society. She wondered why things were the way they were. She searched for an explanation. Trying to find the answer was never easy; she knew that. Yet she could always find the answer, always solve a problem. Always manage to figure out how something worked, what was actually the truth, what was actually real.

This time, though, her mind and intelligence didn’t help her. For this time it was different. She wasn’t solving anything; she was trying to figure out something. To find out the answer to this question that she’d been mulling over for a while. A long while, it seemed – yet seven years didn’t seem like a lifetime to her. No matter how hard she tried to find a different answer, pondered over the endless possibilities and answers to this question, she would always come back on one answer: the truth. For, you see, this question was something that she couldn’t face, but she knew she had to face it head on. Something that she couldn’t, but wanted to, deny. She wouldn’t rest until she figured out the answer to this maddening question.

What’s this question? you ask. Well, it was quite simple, really; it was just a bit difficult to figure out. (“A bit difficult” being the keyword here.)

How much is going too far when it comes to friendship?

You could have lots of answers here, she knew; and as I mentioned before at the beginning of this tale, every answer she arrived to only came down to a true, sole one. What was the problem? Every answer, save for the truth, she wasn’t satisfied with, and threw out; after all, what use were they? She needed only useful answers; not useless ones. They didn’t help at all. If they weren’t any use, then why bother paying attention to them, or pondering them?

So now she turned her attention over to the answer that remained: When you regret stepping over the line.

So the limit was –

There was no limit. Only when you did regret something that felt wonderful yet was horrible, by society’s standards and the so called Unbreakable Law of Friendship (it called itself a rule, but in all truth it was a law), then there was a limit.

She hadn’t submitted herself to the law – for as right and rigid the law was, it was wrong. It called friendship a mistake – especially the kind that she had with him. Mistake she knew it wasn’t; it was the exact opposite. It was right. Something to be thankful and happy for. For rarely did you have love in true friendships like these; especially theirs, for the law forbade it. It was something forbidden – something unspoken that silently told you not to break the law, to cross the invisible line of friendship. No matter how much she followed by the rules, this time she couldn’t stand for it. Sure, the law judged what was right and what was wrong; but that it judged itself. It didn’t let people decide for themselves, for who knew what people’s view of right and wrong might be? So the law decided that it itself was right in judgement; so it only allowed itself to decide what was right and what was wrong. Everyone else was wrong, as far as it was concerned. It had decided that everyone else was wrong, and that was it. No questioning, no contradictions. Only the law, the “rule” of friendship was right. And that only. No exceptions.

So for the first time in her life, she wasn’t going to listen to the law. She wasn’t going to abide by it. Not make it the law of life. Not follow its every word.

So what’s she going to do? you ask. Simple. Now that she knew what the limit was, she chose to follow her instincts and throw away her regrets, if there were any. Then she realized that she had no regrets. Absolutely no regrets at all.

Having come to that, she got up from the window seat where she’d been pondering all this and left the room, leaving the door slightly ajar behind her.

She found him standing by the fireplace, a thoughtful look on his face. Judging from his stance, he was musing over something, too.

She stood next to him, waiting for him to say something. No words were spoken all this while.

He turned to her. But he didn’t say anything. He just looked at her. Not thoughtfully, just a neutral look. His eyes told her everything. He was thinking the same thing that she had been thinking only a few moments before.

She knew that he didn’t regret it, either.

A small smile was what he offered to her. She took it and kept it as a mental photo that she would never forget and always remember.

No regrets? He asked her.

No regrets. She answered.

Then they crossed the line.