Disclaimer: Don't own Harry Potter and All That Jazz; which is kinda clear, since if I was writing it, then this would be unnecessary, for they would've gotten together in the actual book.
After The End
Authors Note: I'm so sorry it's taken me this long to update. I'm really sorry. I don't plan to take this long between chapters, but between school work, interior design I'm doing outside school, and the fact that the day only has 24 hours, chapters keep taking longer and longer.
Because you all waited patiently for it, and are loyal to the story, I have 2 presents for you.
The first, is a drawing made out of the steamy study scene in chapter four… Can be found:
And the second is a soundtrack to the story. I decided I ought to treat you with something really special. So here are some of the songs that have inspired (and continue to do so) this story. From chapter 1 on, 18 songs for you to listen when you read to this.
Can be found here:
Thanks a lot, I appreciate your loyalty and love you all. Here's chapter five (finally!)
"Always the years between us. Always the love. Always the hours." ~Virginia Woolf
Thanks so much for keeping up with me, even through the long waits! I adore you all.
And PS Thanks to Marce, for lending me her lamp.
Chapter Five: Splat! or A Rush Of Blood To The Head.
"Oh brother I can't, I can't get through
I've been trying hard to reach you 'cause I don't know what to do
Oh brother I can't believe it's true
I'm so scared about the future and I wanna talk to you
Oh I wanna talk to you"
~Coldplay
Silence.
Silence all around, wrapping him up like a heavily cold wet blanket that couldn't shelter him from the air that was blowing crazily across the cemetery.
He had never been there.
Yet something he couldn't understand kept stirring an irrefutable impulse within him, telling him, urging him to go. To tell them before he even told himself because he had to acknowledge the truth to them, had to apologise first.
Tears were swelling in his eyes as he leaned over the left one and brushed away some dry leaves that the cold wind had gently but waveringly placed on top of it.
It was going to snow soon, the coldness in the air was almost testable.
Silence.
Not that he had expected anything other.
Silence, heaving his need to articulate that which he knew he owed them. Heaving his terrible, terrible need to apologise.
Tears he couldn't hold in, tears that were telling him, whispering the words inside of him, words he knew he had to speak out loud to make it happen.
Tears that made his breath intake heavy and unstable.
"I'm sorry, you know," he said with his jaw rigid, squinting his eyes and wrinkling his nose in a determined effort to hold the tears back.
He tried to catch his breath, and his effort to hold back the tears became useless. He felt tears rolling down both his cheeks, burning their way down against his cold face, and fighting with their warmth against the coldness of the winter air.
"I'm sorry." More tears. Why in Merlin's name didn't he do it before? Why hadn't he done it before?
"I'm so sorry, SO sorry! For all those times when I thought you hadn't fought hard enough, for all those times when I blamed you, for all those times when I so terribly let you down. I'm sorry. I'm sorry I didn't realise before that you two died to give me something greater than myself. That you died for me to live the life you were leaving behind! I'm so sorry!"
He brushed the tears away furiously with his sleeve. He had to do that, he had to do it so badly that a sudden rush of adrenaline started to curse its way through his veins and made him feel a hot burning tickling inside his chest, even with the horribly cold wind hitting him on the face.
"I'm sorry that I let it down, I'm sorry that I turned my back on that life! I'm so sorry I wasn't strong enough. So sorry! So sorry that I acted like a coward when she was there all the time, ready to give me all of her, ready to surrender to whatever I was going to ask of her. And that I still wasn't able to face her and everything that she had for me! I'm sorry that I didn't let her give me that which you died so I could have.
I'm sorry that there were times when I thought nobody loved me. I'm sorry."
He kept rubbing his sleeve against his eyes, feeling the coldness of the fabric against his skin, his eyes felt horribly hot inside his very cold face.
"I'm sorry that I threw eight years of my life into the trash bin, because I was too scared. I was so scared. So scared that I wouldn't be able to make it, that I wouldn't be able to live through it. I'm sorry."
His tears were drying fast and growing cold on his face with the amazingly cold wind. It was going to snow very soon, probably that very afternoon. And he was only wearing an everyday jacket. His face was cold and his hair felt almost wet at the back of his head. But he was finally there, and the warmth within him was still strong enough.
"I'm sorry… mum." That word! That word which burned something in his throat and made his lips tremble as it came out. "I'm so sorry! Because every time I think about you, about what you did for me… I realise that I've wasted a great deal of it. You died for me, so I could live; and I've inflicted myself a tortured semi life. I'm sorry because I'm so aware I've let you down." He lowered his head, admitting his defeat, his helplessness in the middle of the acknowledgement that he had wasted his mother's sacrifice.
He swallowed hard.
"I'm real sorry…" he swallowed again. "Dad." Another burning stab in his throat, a strange tingling inside his neck and trembling right under his tongue as he spoke the word and heard it linger in the air. "Because it isn't until now that I realise what I should have looked for everyday. That I should have looked endlessly and tirelessly for that which made you die for us. I'm sorry because I realise I gave up looking far too long ago."
He raised his head and stared at the bare tree that was behind the gravestones and that grew imposing behind them, in the most horrendous irony; so full of life against such a perfect materialization of death. The wind hit his face wildly and violently, and Harry felt as the amazingly heavy weight on his shoulders began to feel lighter. He breathed a bitter laugh.
"Funny thing," he said, now turning to look at the horizon of white stone at the side of him. "When I first walked up to here, I didn't think I knew where to start."
He looked back down.
"I'm still sorry. But I should thank you." He shook his head slightly, a smile creeping through his lips. "Because, Merlin help me, she still loves me! After all this time, she still loves me!" he looked at his hands, helplessly his sight cloud again. He fought back, hard.
"All this time, all we've been through, and she still loves me. I love her. I've always loved her. I need her, so badly, so badly that even I can't measure it. And she's…" he struggled, admittedly at a loss for words. "She's," he chuckled. "I think you'd find that she's a lot like you."
He sighed, trying to breathe in, his chest pressing his heart against his ribs.
"She's devoted her life to love me. She would have died for me; she's saved my life countless times. She's… made me! She's made me who I am now, and," he struggled again, any way he thought of phrasing what was on his mind simply felt wrong. "And I… I'm a good man! And I know that's got to be the oddest thing to say, and this has got to be the oddest place to say it. And, I'm probably the least appropriate person to say so… But she's done a fine job with me." He smiled in spite of his situation. He couldn't help it when it came to her. He sighed. "You'd be happy."
"And whenever I think about her and what she's done for me, I know you would have liked her."
His breath caught up in his throat. He didn't ever think it was going to be that hard.
"You would have loved her!"
His hands had stopped being an interesting subject to be looking at. He faced the hard, impossibly white stone pieces in front of him, both buried so steadily and deep into the ground that they were unwavering to the wind that so violently blew all around.
"I came here," Harry started again. "I came here… to tell you guys that I know. I know now. And I'm still sorry. But you should know I plan to make it right, because she's… the way she loves me, I've realised I couldn't turn my back on it now, even if I wanted to."
He sighed again. All of a sudden, the rush of tears had stopped. He understood he had let it out. And it was a welcoming feeling.
"I know you didn't. I know because I'm alive."
He searched his mind, tried to search within him, wondering if it was all out. He took a deep breath.
"Thanks, for loving me. It seems almost offensive to thank you guys for that, especially after admitting that I sometimes thought no one loved me. But… I know you did. Loved me enough to let me live and screw up so badly and learn that I was wrong and come to apologise. Thanks. It's vague, to say something like this, but I think about you… a lot lately. And I love you."
He took one last look, then turned on his heels and started to walk away. Two steps and he had turned around.
"And I'm sorry, for all those times when I came and then couldn't get pass the gate. I promise I'll come back. I'll never do it again."
The walk outside was incredibly shorter than the walk inside. Probably because he felt lighter and much more calm as he walked outside than he had felt making his way inside. The sight of Neville's back leaning against the gate unspeakably lifted the remaining of the weight on his shoulders.
"Oh mate!" Harry said, making Neville turn around. "Your wife's going to murder me if you catch a cold out there, get in the car already!"
Neville laughed as he threw away the wrapper of a Chocolate frog he was still eating.
"Yeah, she would," he said as he walked to the car and opened the door. "All said and done, then?" he asked Harry as he, opened the door on his side.
"All said and done," Harry said, a grateful smile across his face. "Thanks mate!"
"No prob," Neville said as he got in the car.
Neville turned on the engine as Harry closed his door.
Apparition was forbidden at the Federation Headquarters, and although Harry had his own car, he had been going about business with Neville all morning, and he had drove Harry over at his own request and would now drop him back to work. As they started to drive away, Coldplay came on the radio. Harry liked Coldplay, there was a delicious contradiction between the singer's voice and the sweetness of the harmony that lured Harry inevitably.
Something about it, something about that tasteful contrast, reminded him of Hermione. Something about the music… or the lyrics, he didn't really know what, it just reminded him of Hermione. He smiled silently as his mind told him he was losing it.
He looked to his right and looked at Neville. They kept driving in comfortable silence. An enjoyable silence that presented no need to be filled. Neville understood. He had always understood things about Harry that no one, with the exception of Hermione did. He understood a lot of the parts of Harry that seemed to crash against the rest of him, and Harry felt he understood a lot about Neville that most people didn't. It had surely taken him a while to understand that Neville had a lot more to him than the small boy who lost a toad and asked Hermione for help.
He was thankful he had gotten over that, he was thankful he and Hermione had Neville in their lives.
Neville understood the hesitation that Harry felt during the war; he understood Harry's insecurities. Neville understood the need to get a job where he would develop for what he could do, not for who he was. Neville understood his need to visit his parent's graves. Neville understood his love for a woman that wasn't his wife, but that he had loved since before any of them had a clue about love. Neville had seen it happen, and unlike most of the people around them, he had never tried to take it out of the picture.
Neville knew about it all, knew about them belonging to each other, knew about them giving it up for each other, knew about them being unable to resist that self imprisonment any longer. Knew about them being tired of their façades.
And that never ceased to feel like a breeze of fresh air for Harry and Hermione.
"So," he spoke as he stopped on a red light. "How's it going with the house?"
"Great actually," Harry said, immediately excited to talk about the house. "It looks great, they just finished with the garden yesterday, Michael said it ought to be ready by the end of the week."
"That bloke, Michael," Neville said distractedly. "He's rather good, isn't him?"
"He's brilliant!" Said Harry. "Made a bloody fantastic job with the house! I swear, Hermione and me, we thought half of the house was irreparable. Then, in comes Michael and we're both speechless!"
"And what are you doing with it? Moving in?"
"Haven't thought about it," Harry answered honestly. Truth was he and Hermione had been walking circles around the possibilities since they started to fix the house, but they hadn't placed any cards on the table. "Haven't even discussed it with her,"
Neither one said anything for a moment. It wasn't until the light turned green and Neville kept driving that Harry spoke again.
"Is it?" Harry asked in a low whisper that he wasn't sure Neville hear because he had almost spoken those words to himself.
"What?" Neville asked puzzled.
"Love," Harry said, shrugging almost in spite of himself.
"What do-"
"No, it's just…" He interrupted Neville. "I just… I don't want to think this decision is rushed, but I… I can't help feeling this way about her! I've loved her; I've always loved her, before I knew what love was, before I got confused about it, before I got scared. Before I screwed up! And the most amazing thing is that she loved me too… and after all this time, after all we've been through, she still does!"
"Neville," he said turning to him. " I don't even know if I'd love me if I was her! I can't see straight, I can't think, I can't concentrate, nothing keeps my attention away from her!"
Neville laughed. His laughter amused Harry even though he knew his situation was no laughing matter.
"You know," Neville said. "In the language of the Contemporary wizard mate, you're doomed!"
"Exactly!"
Harry laughed in spite of himself. There was no other way to it, there had never been. He had always been hers and he couldn't have changed it, even if he would have wanted to. Harry loved Hermione. Now, back then… forever. It was the one single constant in his life since he was eleven. He loved her, and in spite of everything he had gone through he wouldn't curse his luck, for he had been lucky enough to have her love him back. He would go through it again if it meant he'd have her in the end. If in the end, he could still have that sweet feeling of lightness in his heart, and that goofy smile in his face when he thought of her, he would kill a dozen Voldemorts
The laughter died down and both Harry and Neville got quiet again. This time, it was Neville who spoke.
"Do you…" Neville hesitated, as if he was looking for the right words. "Don't you ever wonder… if you hadn't had the Voldemort -"?
"Always. Every day." he interrupted Neville. It was a fact, an undeniable fact that not a day would go by when he wouldn't daydream about it. That maybe if things had been different, everything would be easier for them. She would be his wife; they would have children, happy children. Everyone would be happy. At least happier. He usually tried not to let his thoughts go that far.
Harry sighed.
"I guess," he said. "That maybe it's just that people like us isn't supposed to have that,"
"Harry," Neville said as he drove the car around the corner of the street where the Federation was. "There isn't people like you two."
~*~
"Desperation is a tender trap - it gets you every time
You put your lips to her lips to stop the lie
Her skin is pale like God's only dove
Screams like an angel for your love
Then she makes you watch her from above
And you need her like a drug
Oh, love - you say in love there are no rules"
~U2
~*~
He loved her.
Did he love her?
There were times when he wondered. On gloomy days, on long days, on endlessly exhausting long days in which the morning alone seemed to last three days.
Was it love?
He couldn't help but wonder. Not because he wasn't sure, but because he wanted to tell himself that he was making the right thing. Again, not because he was having second thoughts but because he couldn't help needing strength to take the next step. It was a never ending mental debate.
He loved her.
Yet how do you do it? How do you do it to someone?
For love, he was doing it for love. And the question would start a slow deliberate dance inside his head, in spite of his efforts to help it.
He did love her. But he couldn't stop counting the reasons why he knew he did.
It was a vicious circle in which he kept spinning around hopelessly.
He loved her. He loved her, loved the way she fixed coffee, loved the way she arranged the paperwork, loved the way she curled her hair in her fingers while reading, loved the way her face brightened when she felt happy, and the way her brow furrowed when she was concentrating.
Loved the way he felt when he thought of her, loved the way she made him feel, loved the way he felt when he went to meet with her.
That feeling that wouldn't go away, that feeling that trapped all of his emotions in one, single beautifully mixed emotion that made his heart soar and something unspeakable inside of him rejoice with the heavy and very comforting weight he felt inside his chest.
That warmth, that velvety envelope he felt inside of his chest that suddenly made his impossibly hard beating heart feel too big for the space in his chest. That warmth, that delusion he felt in, that warmth which drove with him in the reduced space of his car all the way to Godric's Hollow.
The warmth that spread a broad smile across his face since he first caught a glimpse of the old, nineteenth century house.
What a perfect example of each and every feature in the Victorian houses that composed the Queen Anne period; stunningly looking white woodwork, flawless brickwork, details in blond limestone; a most imposing set of perfect oriel windows with impossibly beautiful corner towers.
The asymmetrical front was painted in an impassive champagne colour and some of its elaborated details in a strong shade of red with a massive growth of deep green ivy that covered a huge portion of the left side of the house from the front to the back. Along with the thick layer of snow that had been mercilessly falling since the night before, the house composed the most perfect image of a Christmas greeting card.
It had taken two months, and now the house looked so imposingly beautiful that the shadow of death, sorrow and depression that Harry had seen on it, seemed like something he remembered from a past life.
Upon arriving, he had to be honest with himself and admit that the astonishing result had exceeded all his expectations. Two months ago, the house's interior looked like an empty canvas. Loads of wooden furniture, perfectly patterned carpets, comfortable window seats, carefully detailed bathrooms and the most astounding ballroom dominating the left side of the first floor, but all of it covered in either white sheets or a thick layer of grey dust.
A lifetime in furniture and memories, resting neatly under cotton white sheets that covered everything, sacrificing themselves to shelter the old belongings from the dusted hand of time. The layer of dust was so thick, that not one of the sheets had survived the cleaning, they all had resulted permanently damaged and had been thrown away, an act that felt in itself, somewhat offensive. There, in the trash bin, were the only witnesses to the fate of his parent's belongings in the course of the last 25 years. Permanently damaged, with no promise of ever being restored, like so many other things in his life.
He had feared, at one point that restoring the house would not be possible. But the joy, the joy when, before his eyes, the house started to separate itself from all of those irreparable somethings that scarred his life way deeper than any war scar he may possess.
What a bliss he felt when Hermione found Michael to do the renovation. What a delight to hear when Michael told them that the house was completely reparable.
"The foundations are still standing, and the plumbing only has to be repaired in specific places, we can easily replace the windows and reinstalling the electric connections should be no problem." He had said.
Michael was a known renovator who had worked on some houses for the Federation. He was very talented and specialized in Victorian Houses.
Harry had told Michael that he could spend as much as he needed to in the house, and now, as he got up from the car and stared at the exterior, at the freshly painted walls, at the new windows and at the renewed garden, he was sure it had been money well spent.
How ironic it all seemed to him now.
Every penny had been worth it. Whether it had been spent on the new paint, in the restoring of the furniture or in the extra money he had paid to keep the renovation a secret. Every penny had been worth that one moment.
The house that had been his parent's, and that was now going to be theirs.
The moment of going in the house, smelling the fresh paint, feeling the restored furniture, using the fireplace for the first time. That moment and the two months before, the experience of witnessing the house in its original state and being able to fall in love with it as it came back to life, had no price tag for him.
He had almost hated it at the beginning. He hated walking into a that time machine, hated the heavy weight that would burden his heart in that unstoppable rush of emotions that inevitably came with the surrounding flashes of images that appeared everywhere and composed imaginary memories of the life that had once been his parents'. Staring into the emptiness that was the house, with Hermione grabbing his hand tightly and him crushing it between his fingers, trying to hold onto her as if to the life he actually knew, preventing himself from going insane in the emotional overload that the destroyed house brought upon him.
He had been torn when they started to search the house. The thousand things they had found!
In a matter of hours, it was as if the house had suddenly become a book. A recently opened book, waiting eagerly to tell a story about the people that had lived there in a detailed description that lay hidden in the endless list of objects that had collected dust over the years. Pictures of unknown people, letters that had been kept as memories in a bedside table; letters that had never been sent, kept hidden in an old trunk.
Clothes… the clothes that were still in his parents' closet, such unspeakably dreary thoughts had clouded his mind; why didn't someone take all of that away?
Clothes, toys, china, flute glasses, pillows, books, bottles of wine that were at least 50 years old.
An open book, where every little thing was a careful description in a new chapter. A book… and books were one of the things she was best at.
She had read the house from beginning to end. Every chapter, every word, every meaning that lay hidden in a subtle metaphor, she had taken it and made it hers, she had made the house hers and before he knew it, Harry found himself feeling completely overwhelmed by the differences she had made in the house. She had fallen in love with the house, and her happiness that was evident in every minute she spent passionately planning the reconstruction, had made him fall in love with the house as well. He started to look around the house and find Hermione everywhere.
In the new curtains, in the restored furniture and the flawless match it made with the new contemporary pieces. In the new carpets and in the newly polished wood floor, in the new glasses on the windows, in the repaired fireplaces that now shone with new marble. She had managed to leave something from her in the newly designed bathrooms, in the new Main Bedroom and even in its Walk In Closet.
He could almost breathe her in when he entered the house… he could almost breathe them, they were everywhere in the house and that had made the house their new favourite meeting spot.
He could imagine them sitting in the porch, easting breakfast in the small table in the kitchen, and having Neville and Helen over for dinner in the fancy dinning room. He could imagine her shoes in the right side of the closet, and her books in the library with its hidden door behind the stairs. He imagined the smell of her hair in the bed of the main bedroom and her perfume bottles in the dresser that sat across it.
He imagined a quiet Friday evening, watching a movie in the TV room. He had even imagined what could be done with the spare bedrooms. He kept imagining it whenever he came to the house and, from the front, he could stare into the window to the right side, which he secretly daydreamed about.
He would stare at the window on the side for minutes. It was the only room with a window facing west. He imagined her on a chair, the sun on her hair and a smile upon her face. He had to shake his head and clear his mind.
He chuckled and walked into the house.
Ginny had left the day before with Ron and the Quidditch team for Montreal where England was playing a match against Canada. He and Hermione were meeting in Godric's Hollow to check the ultimate result of the renovation and to have lunch with Michael before he left back to the States.
Saturdays… he remembered a time when he enjoyed Saturdays. He remembered a time when Saturdays didn't mean anything but another day on the fight. He remembered a time when Saturdays meant an impossibly large amount of homework piled over the weekend. How young and innocent they were. Saturday morning, bright sunshine cast upon the layer of snow that now covered almost every surface of the house's exterior and its surroundings.
Saturday morning, as he walked into the house, his footsteps echoing around the Entrance Hall and into the Living room as he walked into it. The sight that welcomed him in there, brought a bright smile upon is face. He didn't pay attention to the burning fire in the fireplace, or to the new sofa by that French designer Hermione had wanted to buy. He didn't look at the painting in front of him but to the small detail to its right.
The lamp.
Harry had given her that lamp.
He had seen it in New York and had compulsively bought it for her.
It was a 12 inches tall lamp, made with white and green recycled paper, wrapped around an iron structure that twisted around its axel in a shape that, from its hexagonal base, represented a developing leaf.
The designer, a very lovely lady with long dark brown hair and big dark and shiny hazel eyes; had told Harry that in Spring, when the leaves started to grow back in the trees, they curved around themselves before they were able to blossom in their entirety.
"It reminded you of us," Hermione had whispered with a lovingly melancholic smile before Harry had even started to explain it.
The lamp. Harry smiled and breathed a laugh when he saw it impeccably lying on top of a table positioned on the left side of the fireplace. He looked right and saw an identical table with a clean surface, expectantly waiting for an occupant to its surface.
He immediately looked down to his hand and the paper bag he was carrying with his own lamp inside. With the other lamp, with the lamp that was surely going to occupy that very surface.
"You know, he didn't even realise I took the lamp out of the house," he heard her voice say behind him.
He turned around and met Hermione who was wearing torn jeans and a green cotton shirt that he liked very much, she had on a furry coat and high black leather boots, the sight of those boots could have ridden him to absolute insanity.
"You think?" He asked absently.
She sighed. Musical sound in that breathing of hers that made his world so much better, if only because it allowed her existence.
"I'm sure," she said bitterly.
Bitterness in the hidden meaning of her words, bitterness in the metaphor. As I'm sure you would have, she meant.
She took the bag from his hand and walked into the living room to the empty table. Delicately taking his lamp from the bag, he heard her voice.
"Did she leave?"
He sighed, he didn't know why. He looked at her, as she bent to place the lamp in the low table. Either she was going to behave, or they were going to be late with Michael.
"Yeah, yesterday's afternoon. Went on an hypoglycaemic rant about missing the ball and what a shame that was."
She laughed.
"Oh dear! Didn't you promise her to take pictures of the evening for her?" She said smiling as she turned to him.
"Do we have to go?" he asked her, pulling his best pleading face.
"Yes, we do," she said as she walked to him. "You know what occurred to me this morning when I was lying on my bed, staring at the ceiling after I woke up?"
Harry smiled. He had an idea he was going to like it, that imagery alone was a good set up.
"What?" he asked, honestly interested.
"We're going on a date." She said, trying to hide a smile and pretending to be somewhere between impressed and offended.
"A date?" He asked, playing along. How he cherished moments like this, his entire life wasn't enough to cherish each and every one of the moments like that he got to share with her.
"A date!" She walked close to him, her eyes sparkling as she did so.
"We've got to be losing our touch," he said, as he wrapped his arms around her waist as soon as she was within reach.
She threw her arms around his neck and pressed her temple against his.
"I know is hideous," she said in a gentle whisper. "But we're going together and alone and…" she tilted her head to look into his eyes.
And she was giving him the look. The one that could pin him to the wall and turn him into the most useless excuse of a man at her service.
He looked at her. In her eyes, that something, the warmth he had thought about while driving, there it was, looking at him, straight ahead, live, in full colour.
"I'll wear that dress you bought me in New York," she whispered. She leaned into him, brushing her lips against his ear before she whispered.
"And if you behave, I promise I'll let you take it off me later."
~*~
While lovers laugh and music plays
I stumble by and I hide my pain
The lamps are lit the moon is gone
I think I've crossed the Rubicon
I
Walked the streets of love
And they're full of tears
I
Walked the streets of love
And they're full of fears
~The Rolling Stones
~*~
For Harry, there were days upon days. There were days among days. Days that went by quickly and in a rhythmic rush that usually sped up around his activities and disappeared into the depths of the past months he flipped through the pages of his calendar.
Days that didn't seem to end, days that were boring, days when an hour contained several days in the most impossibly real of the illusions, because Harry knew days only had 24 hours. Days that flowed in the way a good song combined music and lyrics. Songs like days, days like songs, beauty and ugliness, where there is perfectness just as there is the offensive attempt to do just fine.
Good songs as good days. And Bad songs, just as there were bad days,
And there was the one day Harry dreaded and avoided with a passionate strength and an undeniable anger: He hated it with the same passion with which a devoted musician hates the horribly offending attempt of a song that the merciless dj's insist on playing over and over, always with the appalling misconception that they were doing good.
The day he wished to erase off the calendar, in the same fashion good musicians wished to take the bad music off circulation. He wished it. He wished it badly and with the most fervent need. It was just one day. One day! One day he wanted to ignore, one day he had wished to sleep through. Because ultimately, the fact was that the mystical balance of the universe would not be utterly destroyed if Harry Potter refused to acknowledge the twenty-second of December, so the reason people kept insisting on celebrating it simply escaped his comprehension.
Many things escaped his comprehension, but that unstoppable insistence, that almost fanatical hunger, completely failed to enter his head as a coherent thought. He found it impossible to swallow their overrated impression of him, as if he was worth the attention. As if it was a celebration that he had faced one of the most terrible moments of his life. As if one yearly celebration where everyone danced and went home pissed up out of their minds, would magically erase the memory of the people lost, of the moments gone, and the experiences missing that had developed into the event they all wanted to consider a holiday.
He was no hero. He never had been. Something inside of him burned and twisted in a horrible pain whenever Ginny would look up at him with a smile, firmly holding his arm, and smiling stupidly to everyone who approached to thank Harry. The torment! The humiliation, the awkwardness, the feeling of being an utterly lost soul in the middle of a crowd where no one really saw through him. Especially his wife.
He didn't care. He didn't like it. He didn't want it.
"Celebrate the sixth anniversary of Harry Potter's heroic defeat of He Who Must Not Be Named," the invitation read. Such a fabricated lot of rubbish it all was. Harry hadn't defeated Voldemort, he hated that word; defeat. So hideously mythical, carefully constructed out of lies that had been fed with the eager will of people's hunger for hope; in Hermione's words.
Torture, is what that ball was. Torture that never ceased to make him terribly unhappy and uncomfortable, torture that made his soul twitch horribly around memories he wished he didn't have. Torture he had unwillingly endured five times already, and during which time he had only clarified one truth: it never got any better.
He couldn't help it, his mind purely continued to proliferate that feeling of being impossibly trapped within the four walls that composed the Great Hall of Hogwarts. Not the music, not the nice people or their well-meant greetings; not the food, not fancy decorations, not the wine, not the old friends made it better. Although, truth to be told, the wine and the old friends sometimes had helped tremendously.
He was tired, he was trapped, he was being made fun of in an incredible display of ignorance and disrespect for him and whatever it was that he had done and whatever reasons people thought he might have had. He felt like a puppet being forced to perform in a very lousy show because the truth was that no one in the room had ever understood his true purpose. It was a stupid analogy, but it was one that worked for him.
It was like the most gigantic and unbearable hole in the holidays, the only day he did not look forward to when December and its celebrations arrived. The Federation's ball? He could deal with it. The Ministry's party? Very bad, but he could also deal with it. The One Big Happy Weasley Family Christmas Dinner? He could also endure it, however painful it was to sit in the same room with Hermione and pretend he didn't wish to bump into her under the mistletoe and blush like a 15 year old before snogging her senseless in the most clichéd of the displays of love there were.
But not that utterly display of the biggest of lies. Not that party, not its unbearable mocking face, not the celebration he so badly wanted to omit. And that particular year, as he opened his eyes in the morning of the 22nd of December, Harry realised that in the course of just one year, he had lived enough lies to burden his already exhausted soul for a lifetime.
One grain of truth, one small particle of something real and absolutely empirical that wasn't being kept behind closed doors and shushed whispers and runaway trips to the outside of Britain was what he was longing for.
One little truth that could be seen by everyone and that could be shown everywhere. One little truth that didn't make him feel like everything that was true in his life was actually a lie to everyone else.
That very thought that tormented him endlessly, was ironically his one Christmas wish. Ironically, because, what did he care what everyone thought of his life and what was true of not?
Had it turned important all of a sudden? Had it turned important in the course of a year for the reasons he knew he wouldn't be able to keep hidden much longer?
A year ago, they had both settled on an unspoken agreement about keeping it a secret for the time being. What in the world had changed that suddenly, one morning he woke up and 'the time being' was over? Something had changed, something that had been small and quiet a year ago, was now gigantic and loud and didn't want to be kept hidden or quiet anymore.
Truth. One bit of actual, verifiable, public truth. He longed for the truth to be out of the closet, once and for all; at least for a little while. For a little while his hurt would hurt no more.
Truth that would make them enthusiastic, happy and outrageously willing to celebrate what both of them had wanted to avoid every year.
He sighed as he looked at his messy, wet hair in the mirror.
The truth that had made her eyes shine and sparkle the day before.
The truth that had driven him through an unknown eagerness when he opened his closet and took out his suit with amusement as opposed to laziness; that had him trying to tame his hair with enthusiasm as opposed to hopelessness. For the first time, and however out of character it seemed for him, he was actually looking forward to the night.
The one thing that was bound to make the evening bearable, and possibly even appealing that, like everything in his life that could possibly be considered appealing began and ended with her. She. His reason, his inspiration, his strength. The only love he truly knows how to love back.
He sighed. What an impossibly perfect truth that was. So perfect, so impossibly perfect that he was, really and honestly, for the first time, looking forward to the party. He sighed again. Sighing had turned into a part of his character all of a sudden. He was doomed.
He smiled in spite of himself. He really was doomed. He took out a red and gold tie that she had given him; Prada. He thought hopelessly about her, like a spark that caught fire, his lips formed into a smile every time he thought about her and the thousand images that would drive his mind into the craziest frenzy of imagined memories he was looking forward to create. The Prada tie, she had bought it for him in Paris, said that it was absolutely astonishing and that it was so Gryffindor that she had immediately thought of him.
He thought of her, imagined himself grabbing her hand and walking her slowly and deliberately to the dance floor in front of just about all the wizarding world.
She had opened the box and taken out the tie and had thrown it over his neck, delicately attempting to tie it. He had been utterly mesmerized by the eagerness with which she described how the sight of the tie had ignited a series of thoughts about him that revolved in her mind until that very moment.
He had ravishingly made love to her right then.
He was so doomed.
He shook his head slightly to himself, breathing a laugh. He couldn't even carry a thought to end. He looked at the tie in the mirror as his hands expertly made the knot. She had once told him that neither one of them would ever be able to look at that tie and not think about his desk at the office nor the way he had so hungrily shagged her against it.
He smiled broadly at his reflection. She had been so right.
He finished the knot and started to button his shirt, a white cotton piece, also by Prada and also from Hermione. Hermione had chosen that in New York.
She kept telling him that he was doing things the wrong way; he was supposed to button first and then tie the knot. But he kept doing it the other way around. She had bossily told him that behind him in front of that very same mirror and then had opened his trousers and wrapped her hand around him. She had forced him to walk them both to the bed and have their way around each other. They had been late.
He kept smiling. He lowered his head as he buttoned the last buttons on his shirt.
He didn't even hear her until she spoke.
"Your tie is not straight."
He raised his head and looked in the mirror to meet her reflection standing at his back, her eyes on him. He had been unconsciously expecting to hear the doorbell ring.
But of course she had Apparated. He mentally shook himself. Why had he been waiting for the doorbell to ring? He grinned at her. The doorbell, that was so totally out of character.
She grinned back.
She walked slowly and deliberately to him, her face glowing in the dim light of his bedroom.
"Prada then," she said with a mysterious smile.
Harry turned around and met her smile face to face.
'Is it too fancy?" he asked nervously, flattening the fabric of the tie against his shirt. "I keep wondering when is it going to turn into a small flat,"
She laughed, shaking her head slightly in a flirtatious fashion he was convinced only he had been a witness to.
"Too fancy?" Her laugher lingering in her tone. "You'll wear it for life!"
"I'll have to!"
She lowered her head for a moment biting her lower lip in the same fashion she had just laughed, looking impossibly ravishing. She raised her head and met his eyes, a mischievous twinkle in her own. A tiny, playful smile spread across her lips as both their eyes connected and a floating, invisible, ethereal something suddenly seemed to be luring him to her, to the time and place when his body would completely be at her mercy. And that smile of hers, it refused to go away!
"What?" he said, smiling in spite of the tingling feeling in his body that kept insisting he should throw her over the bed and have his way with her.
She raised her face to him and their eyes met again. The same feeling he had, he could see it in her eyes.
She breathed a laugh.
"I'm just wondering how am I going to keep the women away from you tonight!"
He smiled. Moments like those, when he could almost smell the feeling inside of her body that called out for him. He stared at her, his eyes moving down from her face to the graceful neck that was exposed down until her cleavage where her breasts insinuated to him behind the shiny red fabric of her dress.
Further down, where stylised drapes of the same fabric hugged her waist tightly and allowed a lively moving skirt to caress her legs in a swift movement of layers of fabric that floated glamorously to her every move.
He swallowed.
Crowning the breathtaking image, he stared at a pair of strappy stilettos with shining little stones all over the front strap. He blinked and looked back up to her face but his eyes were quickly drawn back to the cleavage were the low cut corset insisted on reminding him of what lay beneath the fabric.
It took a moment for him to register that she had just spoken.
"What?" he asked stupidly.
"I'm guessing it worked then," she said smiling triumphantly.
"You want to put that on a shirt?" he asked staring at her as he ran a hand through his hair, trying to distract his mind from every thought that wanted the dress out of the way.
"Is that what you bought in New York?" he asked breathlessly.
"You mean what you bought for me in New York,"
"And money well spent, that was." He said as she approached him slowly.
"I almost feel like it's too beautiful to be worn," she said with a sigh as she came up to him and leisurely grabbed his forearm with her hand and then started to run it softly up and down his arm, sending electric impulses all over his body.
She moved it higher and reached his shoulder. Her hand pressed his shoulder with her hand before she steadily grabbed his neck and caressed it, a moment then grabbing it firmly.
He savoured the moment, the feeling of her hand touching him through the marvellous fabric his shirt had been made of. He thought that at least now he knew why it was so expensive.
She smiled at him. Her hand grabbed his tie and started to pull at it, fixing the knot he had made earlier on the centre.
"You have to stop doing that," she said with a mischievous smile. "Put the shirt first, then the tie!" She exclaimed playfully as she finished replacing the knot and ran her hands smoothly down his chest.
She pressed her hips to his and her smile broadened.
"You have to stop doing that!" he whispered as he grabbed her by the back of her waist and pulled her to him, pressing her hips even more against his.
"I do?" she asked teasingly.
"If you want to go to that party, that is," he whispered smiling at her, moving his lips close to hers, only inches away. "Unless…"
Her eyes twinkled and then her smile broadened.
"Unless nothing!" she exclaimed taking a step back and looking at the mixture of disappointment and surprise in him. "I told you if you were good tonight! We're leaving, get your jacket!"
~*~
"Take my photo off the wall if it just won't sing for you
Cause all that's left has gone away
And there's nothing there for you to prove
Oh look what you've done
You made a fool of everyone
Oh and it seems like such fun
Until you lose what you had won
Give me back my point of view cause I just can't think for you"
~Jet
"I sat for a portrait once, electric experience!" Tonks said happily as Harry wondered vaguely when the conversation had gone to talking about portraits.
"Great, you slept with DeKooning once, can we get on with our lives?" Seamus said with a smirk.
"I did not!"
Around the circle, old friends, war companions and work mates; collective laughter as Tonks tried to say how, for the tenth time, she didn't sleep with DeKooning. Another waiter with another round of drinks approached them and the empty glasses were quickly switched with filled ones. More laughter, more jokes and teasing went around the small circle as the alcohol freshly took hold of the laughing jokers once again.
But no amount of collective laughter or alcohol managed to take his eyes off of her in front of him on the opposite side of the circle.
He was sure she had choreographed their positions. He only had to look in front of him to find her dressed in that dress that was so good on her that it had him wondering whether it came from heaven or hell.
More than once, she would raise her eyes and met his own above the crowd and the noise around them, when for a moment the crazy, drunk frenzy that surrounded them would shut itself down and allow them to share an endless moment of genuine fascination.
Literally, he would not hear a thing; he would not see anything else but her. Her eyes staring intently at him and the carefully masked desire that only he could read in that secret look that her eyes would shot him with. The spark that was almost invisible and almost too quick to be seen but which he managed to come across in her stare. A moment he wished he could fold and pocket so he wouldn't forget, even though he knew he wouldn't.
A moment that would disappear as fast as it had appeared; they would blink and the moment would be finished. He would go back to his fake attempt at being interested in the collective conversation and back to stealing glances at her, trying to be quick and pass undiscovered. A stolen glance at her cleavage, another one to her waist, a quick one to her hips, a long, stolen moment during which he stared at her neck, drifting away from the conversation he was supposed to be taking a part of. He would raise his eyes to her face to find her staring at him. Her eyes signalling him to continue his distracted role in the conversation.
He sighed.
Taking a distracted part in a conversation he had no interest in. Taking a part in the conversation when he would much rather be taking part in a very different kind of conversation with the very distractingly hot woman across him.
Distracted again by her. He shook his head slightly and drank from his Jack Daniels. He enjoyed the sweetness of it as it reached his throat and lost his eyes on Hermione's dress and the way it curved over her hips, sending a thousand thoughts to his mind; thoughts he knew he shouldn't be having while in a circle that was discussing the portrait Ernie had paid for his daughter.
He tried to clear his mind from the thoughts that had him wondering how he could better take the dress off, when could he do it, and what would she be wearing underneath. He took another sip from his whiskey and found the glass was empty. He stared at it distractedly, as if his mind couldn't quite process the thought.
"Looks like you need a refill," he heard her voice say in front of him. The way he had heard her voice was a momentary fascination; above the sound of the music that a band as playing and the noise of hundreds of people chattering. He had heard her voice as if it would have been magically charmed to be raised over the rest of the sounds around him that had no importance at all.
He met her eyes and smiled at her.
"Me too," she said happily, smiling back.
She crossed the small circle and came to his side quickly.
"We'll see you around mates," Harry said as he waved his hand with the empty glass and placed the other on the small of her back.
"Bye," Hermione said as she and Harry started to walk towards the opposite side of the Great Hall where the drinking bar was located.
"I can't believe Hannah!" Hermione said as soon as they were out of eavesdrop. "She didn't keep her eyes off of you!"
"She didn't?" Harry asked truthfully amused. "Really?"
"You didn't notice?" Hermione exclaimed. "It was so obvious it was painful!"
Harry laughed.
"I told you I was going to be completely unable to take their eyes off of you!"
"Well," Harry said as they approached the bar. "I think you're doing a brilliant job at it. You're the only one I haven't kept my eyes away from!"
"Then I guess you could say we have both very good taste when it comes to dressing each other." She said with a smile.
"A Jack Daniels for me," Harry said to the bartender. "And a Martini for the lady,"
"Have we met?" Harry heard Helen's voice behind him.
They turned around and met the grinning faces of Helen and Neville.
"Helen, hi!" Hermione said as they hugged and kissed hello.
"You two have been taken the entire evening!" Helen said as she kissed Harry's cheek.
"Everyone wants to have a word with Harry," Hermione said as she took her drink from the bartender. "Is ridiculous!"
"I'll say!" Harry muttered as he drank from his refilled glass. "What's your poison?" He asked the couple as he shook Neville's hand.
"A vodka tonic for my wife, and Brandy for me," Neville told the bartender. He turned to Hermione.
"You're looking beautiful tonight," he said, immediately causing a smile from her.
"You do!" Helen said, turning to her too. "Where did you get that?"
"Harry bought it for me in New York,"
"Designer original?" Helen asked.
"Austin Scarlett original," Hermione said smiling broadly. She looked at Harry who was smiling just from looking at her. He had an idea of how goofy he looked and he rejoiced in the knowledge that he didn't care.
"And look at you mate!" Neville said as he passed Helen her drink. "What's with the fancy suit?"
"Hermione bought it for me," he said looking down at himself. "Nice isn't it?"
"Very nice," Helen said as she checked Harry out.
"It turns into a small flat," Harry said jokingly as he took another sip from his drink.
The laughter suddenly had a different sound to it than it had back in the circle they had just been in. He smiled as Neville wrapped his arm around Helen, while they were both laughing at Harry's statement.
He looked over at Hermione and smiled at her. Definitely a different sound in the laughter.
She smiled back at him as the laughter died down and he felt his heart leap in his chest. He had to admit that had been the best date of his life.
"Who's watching Frank?" Hermione turned to Helen, taking a sip from her drink. Harry couldn't help looking at her lips and the terribly tempting way in which they wrapped around the edge of the glass.
"A sitter," Helen answered. "Muggle sitter. Neville had to charm my cell phone so I could use it out there in the grounds."
"How did you do that?" Hermione asked with wide eyes.
"Had to pull some strings at the Ministry," Neville answered with a grin. Harry laughed.
"Neville!" Hermione exclaimed.
"Speaking of which," Helen interrupted Neville when he opened his mouth to answer Hermione. "And before you two can say another word, I'm going to call the sitter outside."
"I can't believe you did that!" Hermione said, her expression somewhere between surprise and offence at the thought that someone had defeated the statements in Hogwarts: A History. "How did you do it?"
"Mate," Harry said to Neville. "Either you tell Hermione what kind of charm you used, or she'll spend the next month in the Federation's library."
"Not to mention she'll be mad at me," Neville said drinking from his glass.
"Oh don't be silly," Hermione said, smacking his arm friendly. "I won't get mad,"
"But only if you tell her," Harry said grinning.
"Harry!" She smacked his arm now. She turned to Neville. "No, only if you take me out for a dance."
Neville smiled.
"Not afraid I'll step on your feet?"
"Not even!" Hermione said smiling back.
"Brilliant!" He answered. He turned to Harry. "Sorry to steal your date, mate!"
"Go on, I trust you," Harry told him. "I'll steal your wife to the dance floor as soon as she comes back."
"Fair deal," Neville said as he placed his drink on the bar. He took Hermione's drink from her and left it on the bar too, then took her hand and walked her to the dance floor.
He leaned back against the bar, watching Neville and Hermione, completely unable to take his eyes off of her. Unable to stop looking at the way her eyes twinkled when she smiled, or the way her hips moved beneath the layers of fabric that composed the skirt of her dress, or the way her hair seemed to float seamlessly as a frame to her smiling face.
Best date of his life, by far. Even if he counted the needless 'thank you' that he had gotten since they crossed the door, even if he counted the thousand times he had been asked about Ron and Ginny. Best date of his life, because he had walked in with her grabbing his arm, and he was walking out with her at the end of the night. Best date of his life, because he loved her crazily and she looked like a smouldering temptation that was a promise to him if he was good.
He remembered her words. "I promise I'll let you take it off me later"
He was so going to behave, he thought as he drank his whiskey, an evil grin on his face.
"You have to do something, you know,"
Helen's voice startled him suddenly. He jumped and turned to see her standing on his left side.
He smiled at her.
"What do you mean?"
"Look at you!" she said. "The way you look at her, is so obvious is pitiful!"
Harry laughed wholeheartedly and stared at his drink. He shook his head and drank it all. He raised his eyes and saw Hermione again. She was in what seemed to be an appealing conversation with Neville. He tried to see himself looking at her and to see what Helen saw. It was probably very obvious.
Helen sighed next to him.
"It doesn't have to be like this Harry, you know it doesn't." She whispered.
Harry lowered his head and sighed. He had to admit that it was probably pitiful too.
"You don't have to keep doing this to yourselves!" she said in a whisper as she grabbed his arm. He looked at her and her warm brown eyes reminded him of Hermione. There was honest concern in her eyes, a sincere anxiety and a truthful intention to make it better.
"There is a way out!" she said.
"It's not that easy, Helen!"
"But this ain't easier either!"
Harry sighed again. He looked over to Hermione. Neville must have told her something funny, because she was laughing with genuine happiness shining over her face.
He looked back at Helen.
"I know it's hard," she said reassuringly. "But Neville and I are here, and we support you. Please tell me you know that."
He smiled a weak smile at her.
"We know."
"Good." She said smiling back. "Now take me to the dance floor and wipe that sad expression off your face, it doesn't match your suit."
He laughed.
"Okay," he said nodding.
He took her hand and walked with her until they found a comfortable spot in the dance floor. He had just wrapped his hand around Helen's waist when he heard someone say his name.
"Harry hi!"
He turned to see the face of Lavender Brown, dancing right next to them with a Quidditch player from the Tornados.
"Hello Lavender," Harry said quietly. His blood started to speed up through his veins. Hermione had told him about it, Parvati had warned them, and his heart's beatings started to go faster and faster inside his chest. He feared the colour on his cheeks would give him away.
He looked at Helen, desperate for a device to manage his way out of a conversation with Lavender.
"This is Helen," Harry said stupidly. "Neville's wife,"
"Oh yes," Lavender said with a grin. "We've met. You look beautiful tonight Helen," she said in a tone that suggested she was reciting a practiced line.
Harry's heart was beating quickly and painfully with the desperate fear he was suddenly being a victim of.
"Thank you," Helen said, forcing a smile. She turned to Harry and Harry saw, to his immense relief that Helen tried to move the dancing to his right and away from Lavender.
"Is Ginny dancing with Neville, Harry?" Lavender said before they could get away. "I haven't seen her tonight!"
Harry sighed and looked desperately at Helen before he turned to Lavender.
"She couldn't make it," he said, trying to fix his eyes in the spot between Lavender's eyes, to avoid her stare, at the time he attempted to control his voice. "She's in Canada, with England's Quidditch team,"
"Oh yes!" Said Lavender, looking over at her partner. "How could I forget? Big game, isn't it?"
"Yeah," Harry said. "She was sorry she wouldn't be able to come,"
"Oh you tell her I said hi." Lavender said with what seemed to Harry a very hypocritical grin. He couldn't wait to get away from her, but unfortunately, she wasn't going to let him go easily. "You came alone?"
Harry sighed.
"No, I came with Hermione," he said, looking briefly at Lavender and then turning to Helen, almost as if talking to her. "Ron's in Canada too,"
"Oh but of course!" she said excitedly. "He's England's best keeper, isn't him?"
"Yeah, well-"
Harry was interrupted by Neville's voice.
"Sorry, hate to interrupt,"
Harry turned with wide eyes, welcoming Neville's timing.
"Hermione's gone to the toilet, and I really need my wife for this song they're playing,"
Harry smiled at Neville then turned to Helen.
"Not even a full song," he said. "Save it for next time,"
He took Helen's hand and placed it on Neville's.
He didn't say anything to Lavender as he walked away, although he heard Neville greeting her. He walked quickly out of the Hall and into the Entrance Hall. People was getting in and out of the front doors in big furry coats and shaking snow out of their heads. It was snowing heavily outside the castle and a very cold breeze flew into the Entrance Hall through the opened doors. Harry leaned against the wall and tried to catch his breath.
For the first time, in a year, he had looked at Lavender and had feared the unexpected. He looked at Lavender and feared that she'd know.
Hermione had told him about her lunch with Parvati and the conversation about them being spotted together in Los Angeles. And now he had seen Lavender and could have sworn he saw knowledge in her eyes and a mysterious sparkle in her eyes that seemed to tell him she was only trying to answer the right questions. Parvati's warning seemed to be ringing in his head.
He ran a hand through his hair closing his eyes and taking a deep breath. He tried to shake the thoughts out of his head; he couldn't let a paranoiac feeling of his imaginative mind ruin the evening. They were having fun, Hermione was having a good time and he was not going to ruin that with the suppositions that his mind made after a short talk with Lavender.
"Play the hero," he told himself in his mind.
He opened his eyes and straightened up, looking to the left into the hallway that led to where the first floor's bathroom was. He walked to it and attempted to find Hermione.
He didn't have to walk all the way to find Hermione.
She was staring into the grounds through an opened window in the hall. He looked at her from a distance, marvelling in the way she looked, with the pale moonlight reflected on her and the way her dress glinted in the night.
He was suddenly trapped in an internal struggle. He could have watched her all night, and his night wouldn't have gone to waste, but he also wanted desperately to hold her to him and feel her arms wrapped around his waist. He smiled to himself before he broke her reverie.
"Don't jump," he said.
She turned around, staring at him with surprise for a moment before she smiled.
"Would you save me?" She asked with a glowing smile.
"Not in this suit." He answered before breaking into a laugh.
He walked to her and wrapped her in his arms, smelling in the essence of her hair and the smell of her. That smell that wasn't her perfume or her shampoo but the smell of her that he knew only he recognised, from intimate moments when he had smelled her and made sure he could lock the memory of it so he'd remember it.
She stepped away from him and smiled.
"If I tell you," Harry started. "That you look beautiful, for which time would I be saying it?"
"Tonight? Eleventh," she said with a smile.
"Really?"
"Nah, I just made that up!" she said, suppressing a giggle.
"Well, you look beautiful," he said, resting his hands on each side of her waist.
"Thank you," she said, wrapping her arms around him, just as he had wanted her to. "Why aren't you at the party?" she asked with a mischievous smile.
"Because it's a dance, and to dance you need a partner." He smiled back. "My partner is right here." He touched her cheek with the back of his hand, and she closed her eyes, breathing him in.
"Me?" She asked in a whisper.
"Dance with me, Hermione," he whispered back.
She opened her eyes.
"Alright, let's!" She took his hand gently and started the walk back to the Great Hall.
Neither one spoke as they walked back. All thoughts Harry had of Lavender started to vanish deliberately as he and Hermione returned to the Hall. He had certainly imagined the whole thing; there was no reason to tell Hermione about it. He turned to look at her, she was walking steadily and with her head slightly bent low, as if paying attention to the way her feet touched the ground.
For a moment, he felt a tickling sensation inside of him, urging him to suddenly stop her and touch his lips against her temple. The moment vanished as they entered the Great Hall and Hermione raised her head, looking around.
She looked up at him and smiled. He smiled back and dragged her to the centre of the Hall, which had been emptied to give space to the dancing couples.
He didn't realise when he found a good spot and started to dance. The comfort of the moment made everything around them pieces that fit so perfectly in a puzzle that he couldn't see the difference between them. He became conscious of their situation the moment the tickling feeling that he had felt inside, somewhere between his stomach and his heart, started again.
Her right hand was wrapped in his left one and he had both hands against his chest. His other hand was protectively placed on the back of her waist, her arm resting against his own and her hand gracefully placed on the spot where his arm met his shoulder.
He lowered his head slowly and their faces were inches away from each other. He had looked intently into her eyes and her eyes had met his stare. And that had been it.
He remembered the feeling because he had experienced it before, many more times than he would like to admit. His eyes on hers, and that tickling feeling that started to revolve inside of him with that recognisable desire to kiss her.
He suddenly wanted to kiss her, like a burning feeling inside that he felt unable to control. He wanted to kiss her so badly that his body was seconds away from wrapping both arms around her and press her against his chest, which suddenly seemed to be so far away from her.
The music that they were dancing to, suddenly became an ethereal and hypnotic surrounding space that made him afraid he'd forget where they were and all the people they were surrounded by.
He stared at her face, her lips that were slightly glossy, the soft curls of her hair that were kindly framing her face. The way her neck curved beautifully to meet her shoulders and chest, and the way her dress hugged her breasts and exposed a part of them to him.
He raised his eyes back to hers and found them filling with tears.
Something inside of him tore painfully, and not only because she was crying, but because he realised, that they had gone through that same moment, countless times already. And the excruciating truth was that they shouldn't at all.
All the people around were suddenly separating them, as an agonizingly justified response to the people that were now playing Quidditch an ocean away from them. He was standing only inches away from her but the reality was that they weren't anywhere closer to where he knew they ought to be. She blinked and caught her breath, tears falling from her eyes.
"Harry!" she cried quietly, lowering her head and swallowing a louder cry.
"I know," he whispered reassuringly, also lowering his head.
They had felt it too many times, in too many places, immediately disguising it as something else that would have nothing to do with the reality that they knew they couldn't yet face. So many times that it was painful to think about it. In the Weasleys dining table at Charlie's birthday three months ago, at Hermione's kitchen two months ago. In the street, three weeks ago, at Bill's birthday last week, at work the day before; too many times, too many places. Too many lies that were, for a reason that escaped his jurisdiction, finding their pitch that night. Of all times and places, it was right then, in the middle of Hogwart's Great Hall, when she raised her head and looked at him, that he saw it in her eyes that it was time.
She had big tears on her cheeks that twinkled against the lighting; she was painfully biting her lower lip to hold back a gasping intake of breath that would call the attention of all the people around. Once again he felt pain, not only because he realised the heart wrenching situation they were in, but also because he didn't want her to cry those tears or to feel that same pain he was feeling.
He made his mind very quickly and without second thoughts.
The time had arrived.
He hadn't expected it, and he could see it in her eyes that neither did she, but the time had come, and he could see their second chance practically knocking on their door, and Merlin help him, he was not going to let it go to waste.
In that swift, thoughtless way in which he had always done the kind of things people might have considered heroic, he conducted his actions.
He let go of the hand he had wrapped around his left one and grabbed her other hand. Her eyes met his with a puzzled look for a very short moment, but he didn't let her ask any questions. He started to walk with her, pulling her gently at first but then feeling how she walked by herself, willing to follow him. He silently thanked her for the moment of loyal trust.
He felt like he was in a dream, because of the hard and fast beating of his heart and the way he could sense her anxiety in the way her fingers moved where he held her hand. They arrived quickly to the Entrance Hall, and looking around the emptiness in it told Harry that mostly everyone had arrived, and that there was a good chance that outside, very cold snow was falling over.
But he was not going to hesitate.
He walked with Hermione's hand still firmly wrapped in his, and went through the doors that led to the snowy darkness of the December night.
He looked around and once again saw no one.
He grabbed Hermione and pushed her against the cold, snowy stone of the wall and he met her eyes for a very swift second that clarified the intentions of his mind even more.
He pressed his lips against her in a fierce kiss that could have instantaneously taken his breath away. She responded at once, her hands going to his neck and pulling his head closer against her. She still had tears in her face and some of those tears had left a salty flavour on her lips that encouraged him into the kiss. Her hands still transmitted her anxiety as she ran them through his hair, but her lips kissed him hungrily with the very same feeling that had disturbed their dancing moments before.
He didn't know whether it had been the fancy dresses, or the expensive drinks, or the company of good friends living in authentic happiness. He didn't know if it had been the bloody brilliant way in which she looked, or the way she had fixed his tie earlier, or the way she looked at him when he found her near the bathroom.
He didn't know what, but something that night had triggered the sparkling moment that was about to take place and kissing Hermione against the cold wall of the place where he could say, it had all started, he thought of Helen's words earlier that night.
Neither one of them had their coats on and Hermione's purse was still inside on a table where they had been seated. He didn't know what the next step was, but he knew where they were going. He didn't really know how, or where, but he knew that right then, they were going to do exactly what Helen had told him earlier. They were going to do something about it.
Author Notes:
~The character of Michael is inspired in Anne Rice's character in "The Witching Hour"
~The lines: "Great you slept with DeKooning, can we get on with our lives?" And "Don't jump. Would you save me? Not in this suit." Are from "Great Expectations" by Mitch Glazer.
~"Because it's a dance and to dance you need a partner. My partner is right here" from "Shall We Dance" by Audrey Wells.
~The joke about the Prada shirt turning into a small flat is from "Sex and the City"
~The joke about the hypoglycaemic rant is from "A Lot Like Love"
The two titles for this chapter belong, respectively, to a "Sex and the City" episode, and to a Coldplay album. Both of which rock fabulously.
Please, if you find another line that you think isn't mine and isn't credited here, let me know and I'll credit it immediately.