A/N: For this challenge, we had to select 2 haiku from a randomly generated list of 20 or so. Completely random. The goal: Try to work all the words from the Haiku into the story and if possible, the meaning of the haiku as well. This is part one in a multi-part story which is not posted in consecutive order.
Summer Writing Series Challenge (June 18)
Challenge: Choose 2 Haiku and write a 2,000 word story
Title: Romance Found, Friendship Lost
Word Count: 2,000
Life in the small town of Ottery St. Catchpole was usually a quiet and lazy affair. The entire town knew one another on a first name basis, save for the strangely peculiar families that kept to themselves on the outskirts of the miniscule settlement. The local inhabitants, like all muggles, were completely unaware that one of these particular families, a group of redheads called the Weasleys, were, in fact, wizards and witches. Being wholly unaware of this fact made the local inhabitants doubly unaware that their two guests were also a witch and wizard. Harry Potter, The-Boy-Who-Lived, and Hermione Granger were visiting this odd family for yet another summer before returning to their magical school, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
This particular morning during the summer holiday before their seventh and final year at the esteemed wizarding world school started just as uneventful as any of the several hundred that had passed that year. Pots were being scrubbed in the kitchen sink, knitting utensils were flying at a rapid pace, and four disheveled redheads and their guests were sleepily eating their breakfast.
The fluttering of wings was heard from outside as a large, brown barn owl swooped into the precariously built house and dropped a red envelope that was issuing smoke into the lap of Mr. Potter.
"Bloody hell!" Ron said covering his ears immediately. "Who would send you a howler this early in the morning?!"
"I don't know." Harry replied with equal confusion and annoyance. He grabbed the envelope as if it were toxic and ran through the garden in a mad attempt to reach the garage. Hermione followed as quickly as she could and just as the doors to the magically quieted building were closed, the envelope burst into flame. When the smoke cleared, all that was left was an origami mouth that, with a sudden increase in volume, began to shout hoarsely at him in a very recognizable voice.
"HARRY POTTER!" The frolicking, paper mouth screamed in the angry tone of his ex-girlfriend Cho Chang. "IT'S BEEN ALL SUMMER AND YOU'VE YET TO APOLOGIZE TO ME FOR THE MOCKERY YOU MADE OF ME AT THE END OF TERM! I EXPECT A REPLY BY THE TIME WE RETURN OR WE'RE THROUGH! I KNOW IT'S ALL THAT HERMIONE GRANGER'S FAULT FOR HOW YOU'VE BEEN ACTING AND IT'S EITHER HER OR ME!"
Harry shared a helpless glance with his best friend and shook his head, awestruck that his ex-girlfriend still considered them a couple. "What's she going on about?" Harry asked frustratingly as they tried to shake the ringing from their ears. "We haven't dated since fifth year, let alone last term. You'd think she would know by now that I'd choose you over her any day of the week!"
"I don't know, Harry." She said sympathetically, blowing at a dandelion that she'd just picked. They watched the seeds somersault through the air on a lazy, morning breeze. They walked slowly back to the oddly constructed Weasley residence, admiring the flowers in the field and the greenery all about them. "She stopped making sense when we returned to Hogwarts sixth year."
Harry had held a glum expression on his face from the moment the red envelope settled precariously in his lap, through the outburst of the mystically enhanced message, and even now, during their short walk back to what they considered normalcy.
"Things should be better this year, Harry." She said with a smile. "You're finally out of St. Mungo's, Voldemort is gone, we can stop being soldiers and start normal lives."
Harry looked to his best friend of six years and smiled wanly. He wanted to have a normal life, even that of a wizard, but with reporters swarming around him like piranhas every time he was in public, that normal life seemed so far away. "I can still hear their screams, Hermione." He said sadly as they took a detour to a large hammock that was strung between two trees in the garden. "How can I have a normal life with the deaths of so many on my conscience?"
Harry fell into the net-bed feeling like a helpless lump and felt her slide in next to him. She pulled him into a hug and began to caress his raven, black hair gently. "I can still hear them too." She admitted softly, dangerously close to his ear. "When I close my eyes, I see you in front of me still, with green light all around you. When you fell to your knees, I thought I'd lost you."
Harry wrapped a protective arm around her and kissed the crown of her head gently. "That wasn't the smartest thing I'd ever done." He admitted with a slight chuckle. "But I had a feeling that the killing curse would backfire on him again, and it did."
"Your screams were worse than when you were under the cruciatus ... and all I could do was stand there oafishly while you fell to the ground." She let out a whimper, the pain of nearly losing her best friend evident in her trembling voice.
"Shh, I'm here, we're both here and that's what matters, Hermione." He cooed quietly in her ear, pulling her into a tight hug. They had all been silent about the atrocities they'd witnessed during the final death throes of the latest wizarding war. Some things were best left unsaid though, eventually, those horrors leaked into the world of speech and nightmares forcing their witnesses to relive the things that should remained locked away and untold.
Harry kissed her furrowed brow as she fought back the tears that came so easily as of late. Of all their adventures together, the last two months had been the most harrowing. Kidnappings, murders, outright assassination attempts, everything that one reads in the history books but never expects to happen seemed to crawl from the woodwork and assault them with fierceness.
The Ministry of Magic had just gone through a major restructuring to rid itself of the lazy, complacent aristocrats that had risen to power and ignored the pleas of the people when the first report of a reborn Dark Lord had surfaced. The new minister was chosen from the lower ranks of the hard working souls who manned the wizarding government and Arthur Weasley had been the landfall winner. Pure-blooded families came to blows with those of lesser stature while new policies and laws were made and older ones were wiped from the books. Scores of muggle neighborhoods were wiped out in an attempt to ferret out The-Boy-Who-Lived and his followers, killing hundreds of innocents, including the family of Hermione Granger and Harry Potter.
The two best friends would have been on the casualty list had they not been in a special training program of intense magical study and theory. They went in as friends and an unspoken bond formed between them at the news of their family members' demise. The final confrontation with the resurrected Tom Riddle ironically occurred in the same location that Harry's parents had met their doom and one small child became the first and last savior of the mighty dark wizard's reign.
Hermione nuzzled against his lips as they lingered on her pale skin, sparking something deep inside Harry's heart. He looked at her suddenly with a new light, noticing once again how his bookish best friend had changed into an extraordinary young woman. His one arm pulled her tightly to him and he felt her breathing catch and become ragged across his bare neck. She looked to him with pleading eyes and his mind went numb before he could ponder the consequences of his actions.
It was a gradual movement at first, but unmistakably magnetic as their lips inched closer than they had ever been. Harry's heart went from a serene canter to a frantic gallop as Hermione's warm breath grazed gently along his lips. She let out a small gasp as their lips barely touched, a slight jab in boxing match where a full contact uppercut awaited for the participants the next moment.
Neither had felt the likes of the kiss they were now sharing, each lost in a sea of new emotions and rolling hormones. Harry felt, for the first time, that he truly belonged to something bigger than the plots and schemes of those around him. His heart soared as the warmth from his first real kiss sank into his lonely subconscious. Hermione trembled against him, seemingly chilled by a sudden gust of wind that had swept through the area.
Both were so enchanted by the other, they didn't notice the smoldering eyes of jealousy burning with hatred from behind a closed screen door, mere meters away from them. Ron Weasley turned away, sullen and bereft of hope as Harry and Hermione separated from one another. They gasped in low, ragged, breaths as they swept their eyes over each other's faces in search of the meaning to the turn their lives were taking.
"Harry ..." ("Hermione ...") They said in unison, the words they were searching for on the tips of their tongues and swimming languidly in the back of their minds, waiting patiently for the two of them to place a label on their new discovery. Words became meaningless as they discovered the other felt the same and they retreated into one another, savoring the beat of their hearts as they kissed once more.
They were suddenly pulled from the exploration of their relationship when the anguished screams of their best friend echoed from his room.
"Oh, no." Hermione said breathlessly. "Ron ..."
"Must have seen." Harry finished with his face in his now free hands. The newly formed couple began the journey that would take them to a place they had not wished to visit. They had both realized that Ron's feelings had been stronger than platonic towards the bushy-haired witch and with heavy hearts they began the slow climb to his room.
With trembling hands, Harry slowly opened the door to his friend's bedroom, staring awestruck at the devastation that awaited him. Everything Harry owned, from his robes to his owl's cage, lie in tattered pieces across the room and the many photos of the trio were mangled shards of moving happiness. Ron stood in the midst of the wreckage, livid beyond measure as he turned in a rage borne of hate and loss on his once best friend.
"YOU'RE DEAD!" The berserk redhead bellowed as he shot forward and sprung a surprise right jab squarely in the center of Harry's face. Cartilage cracked, bone creaked, and blood spurted from the swift retaliation of having his heart broken.
Harry stumbled back in a daze, his surroundings blurred with the loss of his circular, black-rimmed spectacles. He didn't see the barrage that was waiting for him when he didn't fall. Punch after punch with hoarsely screamed obscenities fell upon him. He barely had enough time to cover his damaged face before a knee connected with his stomach, blasting the wind from his lungs. He heard Hermione's pleas distantly then they were silenced by a loud crack that caused him to flinch.
A great thud reverberated from the Chudley Cannons' shrine and Hermione was instantly at Harry's side. He felt her warm, salty tears splash listlessly on his lips as she kissed him and cradled his head in her arms.
"WHAT IN BLUE BLAZES IS GOIN ON?!" Molly Weasley shrieked as she slid her wand back into her apron like a gunslinger on an American western. She listened to the confessions of Hermione and the weak gasps from Harry concerning the jealous tirade that just occurred. Ron struggled in the mystically formed ropes like a helpless fly in the web of a spider. He cursed both their names as his mother healed the man who stole his love from him and his mother frowned upon her son, chastising him for his actions and admonishing him ruthlessly for his crass attitude towards his friends' happiness.
A/N:And we have another cliffhanger! Imagine that ;) I hope you enjoyed the wild ride I've given you which was inspired by the haiku below. There may be a continuation of this, should the timing be right
awestruck lazy helpless
piranhas somersault, glum
redheads jab, blowing
hoarsely, paper screams
oafishly mystically, head
frolicking smoke blows