Author Notes:
Dear reviewers: Thank you for your patience and for your reviews. I appreciate all the feedback you leave for me, and I thank you for reading.
Because there have been large gaps in posting, I thought I would give you a short summary of why (in the hopes you can understand). First off, when I started this story, I worked full-time and attended school full-time. Of course at the same time, I worked as a freelance songwriter (I own a publishing co.), and I traveled as a professional singer. I completed another musical project, and I wrote my first Young Adult novel (84K words, which is now in the editing stage of the publishing process), and hopefully it will visit a bookstore near you in the not too distant future. Finally, I graduated from college with my second degree.
So, I say all that to let you know that I have never forgotten this story. In fact, I have loved writing it, but there has not always been time for this story to receive any of my focus.
However, this is the last chapter, although I will probably add an Epilogue in the next few days (after I formulate a good enough plan for everyone). Again, I thank you for reading and reviewing-you are the ones who made me want to really try to keep this story moving along. I hope you've enjoyed it as much as I have!
Read on…
AM I TOO LATE
An Unstoppable Force
Chapter Eighteen
Hermione stood in the living room of her flat and hugged her arms around her chest. Her eyes had been larger than her stomach-the mountainous chocolate cake had barely been touched. She had spent most of her lunch in a state of cycling nostalgia.
One minute she and Harry had been flying on Buckbeak and she was terrified. The next minute she was meeting Harry on the Hogwarts Express for the first time. Then she was trapped in the bathroom with a disgusting troll. Then she was gripping Harry's hand in the Forbidden Forest. Then she was screaming his name during a Quidditch Final. Then they were cuddled on her couch watching her favorite movie for the zillionth time. Then…then…then…
Then he was leaning close to her. She could feel his breath on her cheek, on her lips. Then…he was pulling away. She had shoved her cake away from her by that point and shuffled her way back to her flat.
Now the idea of a life with Harry absent weighed heavily on her shoulders. How would she ever pick apart his life from hers when they had crossed so long ago? When they were practically fused together? Did she even have memories that lacked Harry?
She needed to leave. She needed a vacation, a respite, time away from everything familiar. Gathering her spirit and her assurance, she packed a suitcase and shut it just as a knock sounded on the door.
Hermione peered out into the living room from her bedroom. Someone knocked again. Before she could reach her door, it swung open and Harry stood in the doorway, obviously startled to see her standing there.
"W-what are you doing here?" he blurted.
"I live here," she answered as smoothly as possible. She pressed a hand to her chest in an attempt to calm her pounding heart.
"I knocked."
"I heard."
"I didn't think you were home," he said sheepishly.
"So, you were going to what? Lounge around and wait for me?" she asked. A slip of anger eased its way inside her mind.
Harry shrugged. "That was the plan."
Then, she noticed how crestfallen he looked, how dark the circles under his eyes had become. She could feel her resolute will crumble ever so slightly. She had never been good at watching Harry hurt and saying nothing. "What's wrong?"
Harry laughed. It was a mirthless sound. "That list has gotten a bit long."
Hermione dropped her suitcase and motioned for him to sit, but he shook his head.
"No," he said, "I have to get this out. There are things, I-I need to say to you."
Hermione's stomach knotted. She smoothed her hands down her thighs, bit her bottom lip.
"Beth and I aren't getting married," he said.
Hermione swayed on her feet and reached for the chair to steady herself. Of all the things she thought Harry would say, those string of words had never entered her mind.
"W-why?"
"You."
"Me?" Hermione squeaked, sounding decidedly a lot like Winky, the late Bartemius Crouch's freed house-elf. "Why?"
"I didn't know, Hermione," Harry admitted quietly. He stared at his hands. "I knew we were friends, and I knew I cared about you…but I didn't know how I cared about you."
"How do you care about me?"
"Everything got so complicated at once," Harry continued without looking up at her. She stared at the top of his dark hair. "We've been…us for so long." He finally glanced up and watched her with his piercing green-eyed stare. "I didn't know."
"You didn't know what?" she asked, trying to control the urge to move closer to him.
"I didn't know I loved you," he said, and Hermione's heartbeat faltered. She squeezed the back of the chair until her knuckles were white. "I knew I loved you. But it's different now."
"What are you saying?" she said in barely more than a whisper.
"I'm…I'm in l-love with you, Hermione."
Her knees buckled and without realizing it, she had crossed the room and flung her arms around him. She trembled in his arms.
"Oh, Harry," she breathed against his neck.
"I'm sorry," he said. "I didn't understand. Not truly until I caught Beth with that guy."
Hermione pulled away and stared blankly at Harry's face. "What?"
"I went to see Beth," Harry replied. "And I found her with another man. In bed."
Hermione's soaring heart stopped and tumbled back down. "You realized your feelings for me after you found Beth cheating on you?"
Harry's attuned hearing picked up on something sharp and edgy about Hermione's words, but he blubbered on, "Well, yeah. I wanted to talk to her about…about what almost happened with you that night. And there she was…all this time with someone else."
Hermione stepped away from Harry. She shook her head and mumbled, "Second fiddle."
"What?" he asked, screwing up his face. One second Hermione had been hanging on to him for dear life, and now she was inching across the room from him. He had no idea what was going on.
"Second string, second pick, second choice!" Her voice rose as she spoke. "No thank you, Harry Potter!" she screeched.
"What is wrong with you?" Harry asked and crossed the room to her. As far as he could tell, she was having some sort of fit. "What are you talking about?"
"I won't play second fiddle to anyone!" Hermione yelled indignantly. "You only realized you wanted me after your precious china doll wanted someone else-"
Harry grabbed Hermione's arms to stop her from moving. "-I have wanted you my whole life!" he yelled in return. "Only I was too bloody stupid to know that's what it was. You were always there. Always. And I never thought you'd leave-"
"-well, imagine that!" she argued. "Having your cake and eating it, too!"
"Stop it!" he yelled at her. "Merlin, Hermione. I was a kid. What the bloody hell did I know?"
"You are not a child anymore, Harry Potter!"
"I know that. Don't you think I know that?" Harry said impatiently. He wondered if this is what Ron felt like when he crashed headfirst into the wall that was Hermione Granger's stubbornness. "You're right, okay? On some level, I took you for granted. I thought you would always be there-"
Hermione huffed and tried to yank out of his grasp. He pulled her firmly toward him.
"Will you listen to me for a minute?" he asked in exasperation. She momentarily quit fighting him. "I didn't know until I realized that at any moment you could leave, you could walk away, marry some bloke and let him whisk you halfway across the world, and then…then I would have lost the most important person in my life…."
Hermione's mouth dropped open. She stared at Harry, thunderstruck.
"It's always been you, Hermione," he said gently. "Always you. And I-I don't want that to change."
Hermione closed her mouth and stared at Harry's chest. A knot had lodged itself halfway up her throat, and she was afraid if she spoke, she could cry.
"Tell me, Hermione," he said. "Tell me I'm not too late." He lifted her chin with his fingers. She tried to swallow past the lump in her throat as she looked into his clear eyes. "I'm not, am I?"
"I…I don't kn-"
Harry didn't wait for her to answer. He kissed her, easy and slow. It caught Hermione so off guard she opened her mouth and gasped. Harry took this opportunity to deepen the kiss. He pressed her body into his and slid one hand up her back and beneath her hair. He cradled the back of her neck in his hand.
Hermione melted into him. She tingled. Every sane thought escaped and she could think nothing other than, Oh, God, oh Harry, oh, God, oh Harry. She must have let her inner moans escape because Harry released a guttural sound and lifted her from the floor. She wrapped her legs around his waist and he moved swiftly to the couch.
The passion between them erupted and Hermione didn't know if such a force could ever be stopped. Harry pulled away from the kiss long enough to pant and ask, "The bed-bedroom?"
"W-what?" she stuttered, trying to gather her scattered wits. The heat in her stomach, seeping down to her toes, was a bit distracting.
He kissed down her neck, licked across her collarbone, nibbled at her earlobe. Hermione moaned. And with his lips against her cheek he asked again, "Would you rather be in the bedroom?"
"Oh, Merlin, I don't care…"
Harry grinned against her lips. "That's my kind of girl."
He swept Hermione up from the couch long enough to allow them to shed a few layers of clothing, and though Hermione had always assumed she would be modest around Harry, she tossed aside her clothes fervently. And fortunately, she remembered to cast a Silencing Charm on all the walls in her flat-they definitely needed it.
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