Disclaimer: Unfortunately, I do not own the rights to HP, and if I did, book 6 would have gone a completely different way.
Happy Ever After
By Pearl Drop Angel
Chapter 3: Happy Ever After
Harry, unsurprisingly, woke up in a hospital bed. He was surprised he actually woke up considering the Sectumsempra he'd taken to the chest, it could have been fatal. But it was done. The person that he'd chased almost as much as Voldemort himself was now in Azkaban, awaiting trial.
He should have been happy and relieved, but he kept on thinking that he should have caught him before he'd committed his biggest crime, kept thinking that, if he had, Dumbledore and Hagrid would still be alive. And he found himself crying for the loss for the first time in years.
"Harry, you're awake!" A familiar feminine voice called from his right. He grimaced; the bloody creature was wreaking havoc inside his battered chest. And he wished she hadn't seen him at such an embarrassing moment. She'd seen plenty before, but this time, he felt different about it.
"Hello, Hermione," he mumbled quietly, his ribs groaning from the effort. For the first time he looked around since his awakening, noticing many blurry figures. Hermione was to his right, sitting on a foldaway chair and looking like she hadn't slept in days, Ron was behind her, being shaken awake by Fred and George. On his left were Molly and Arthur Weasley, both occupying the only plush armchair. This, of course, wasn't unusual. They were on his contacts' list, meaning that they all received an owl when he arrived at St. Mungo's. What was unusual was that the person at the very top of that list wasn't present, but then again, she was probably still extremely angry at him, not that he blamed her. Didn't matter, as soon as he returned to the office he would remove her name from the list, and she very likely didn't wish to be on it anymore.
His eyes fell on Hermione again, and on her puffy tired eyes. "How long have I been here?" His voice was rough and his throat scratchy.
"Three days," Hermione replied readily, bringing a water goblet to his lips, which he gladly drank from. "Oh, Harry, we were so worried! I mean, first you disappeared without sending us an owl, you're gone for nearly three months, and then you end up in the hospital with a fatal wound!"
"Yeah, mate! You had us worried, why didn't you write?" Ron asked, getting up from his rickety chair to stand next to Hermione. Harry felt a stab to the heart seeing them together.
"Sorry," he mumbled sheepishly. "I was going to write, but then I got sidetracked before leaving. I got mad and I forgot." He was nearly getting mad thinking about it again.
"Oh, yeah, I bet," Fred piped up sarcastically. Harry watched him, wondering what Ginny had told everybody. She was the type that liked to rant and rave when she thought she was wronged. Maybe he should have been more careful of what he said in a roomful of Weasleys.
"Makes me ashamed of calling her my sister," George added.
"You don't even know the half of it, Harry," Ron told him, looking like the world's evil had beseeched him.
"Don't speak like that of your sister, Ronald Bilius Weasley!" Mrs Weasley tried to sound reprimanding while she fussed over Harry, and not succeeding very well, something highly unusual for someone who seemed to have a Degree in doing just that.
"Oh, please, mom, you were the first one to be disappointed," George shot back, immediately quieting the Weasley matron.
To tell the truth, Harry was confused. He'd thought he might get his head ripped to shreds by some new Weasley invention for having dumped the Weasley's baby girl, and here they were, all complaining about Ginny's behaviour. "Er-did I miss something?"
Hermione rolled her eyes at him. "Harry, you've been gone a trimester. I'd say you missed a lot."
"Yeah, you missed tons, and you're bloody lucky for it," Ron grumbled, crossing his arms defiantly.
"Why? What happened?" People looked at each other uncertainly, not knowing what to say.
"Well, Harry," leave it to Hermione to pick up where nobody would. "You know how in school Ginny was too popular for her own good?" Seeing him nod she continued. "Well, apparently, she still is. Men backed off only because she was with you, but once word got out that you broke up with her, she was back in full swing, and she liked it."
"Yeah, bloody loved it," Ron murmured again, darkly.
"For the first month, she changed men as often as she changed clothes, mostly Aurors. I think in a way she was trying to get back at you. She was right twisted about that. Fussed about it for weeks. Anyone who mentioned you got hexed with her famous Bat Bogey," Hermione explained.
"Yeah, she threw a fit when mom told her you were right, Harry," Fred laughed.
"Yes, it was priceless! We went and got a pensieve just to put that memory in," George added. "We'll show it to you when you get out."
"You'll do no such thing! Harry needs his rest," Molly Weasley replied, her tone menacing.
"W-wait!" Harry called, surprised. "You told her I was right?"
The Weasley matron huffed in indignation. "Of course I did! Giving you an ultimatum like that, she should have been ashamed of herself," she put her hands on her wide hips and took a shrill tone, beginning to do what must have been an imitation of a ranting Ginny. "'He was just going to leave me to go to work, so I told him that if he didn't propose right there, I'd leave him'!" She let out an angry growl indeed. "Indeed!"
"Molly, please calm down," her husband, Arthur, put a calming hand on her shoulder, "This can't be easy on Harry."
"Oh," she said, coming down from her angry state. "That's right. I'm sorry, Harry dear, I'm sure you've already had to think about it more than you should have."
He shrugged in reply. "It's okay, actually. I was so busy I didn't have time to think about it, and now I don't care," that, of course, was not necessarily true. He'd fumed about her for about to hours, and then stopped caring. Even if she said the things she did, he was in the wrong as well, for letting her think that there would eventually be a proposal. But even that thought didn't plague him very much. He'd spent the entirety of his time away thinking of Hermione. And he felt guilty for it. It was as though he were betraying both of his best friends.
"Yeah, well, we've had to think about it!" Fred exclaimed.
"Yeah," George agreed. "Even if she was a hag to you, Harry, she's still our sister. She drove us mental with all the blokes that were chasing her! Good thing she calmed down now."
"Oh, did she?" Harry asked, his question driven by simple curiosity.
"Yes, she did," Arthur told him. "These last few days she's been busy moving her things into Neville Longbottom's home."
"Neville?! Really?" Harry asked, completely taken by surprise. He'd always known that Neville was more than infatuated with Ginny, but he never would have guessed that his ex-girlfriend reciprocated. And now they were living together.
"Yes, they've been going out very steadily the past two months. I think she's using him to take out her frustration at you, but I can tell she truly fancies him. It's quite nice actually. I suspect he should be proposing soon, if only he manages to get the guts," Molly sighed. "She behaved horribly, at first, but I'm quite happy with the situation, actually."
"You are?!" Harry asked, completely shocked. He'd always thought she'd wanted them to get married more than anything else.
"Yes, very. Just don't tell her that. To tell the truth I used to hope for a wedding between the two of you, but I saw long ago that it wouldn't have worked," she told him tugging at the blankets to make sure they covered him well on all sides.
"Bullocks!" Ron exclaimed. "Since when?"
She gave him a sharp look for his choice of wording. "Since I know my daughter. I know how stubborn she can be. And I know what it's like to be in love. And Ginny did not behave like people in love. She behaved like a dog that had a juicy bone and didn't wish to let it go, even though it didn't meet her fancy. Much as I thought the same of you and Hermione."
The creature inside Harry's chest perked its ears at this, causing quite a nauseous feeling in his gut. "What?" He asked, maybe a little too eagerly.
Harry saw Ron open his mouth to reply, but he was cut off by Hermione. "Let's not talk about that, now," she interrupted quickly. "Tell us about Snape, it was all over the papers!" And thus, the conversation was masterfully moved onto another subject.
Oh, yeah, what happened to him?" Harry asked interested, though the question of what had happened between Ron and Hermione was still present in his mind. "How did the trial go?"
"there hasn't been one yet," Hermione told him. "The Wizengamot was waiting for you to wake up to schedule it. The Daily Prophet said that you're going to have to testify."
Harry quirked an eyebrow. "Maybe we should let them know I'm up and about."
She replied with a smile that made him want to purr as loudly as the monster within him. "Maybe we should," and Harry saw from the corner of his eye that the twins were leaving the room to find someone. Hermione watched him with a steady intense gaze. "He won't be able to make his way out of this one, Harry."
He fell back on bed, filled with certainty that she was right. She'd never assured him of something wrong before, and he trusted that she wasn't about to start, either. For now, he would think of the trial, what happened between Ron and Hermione could wait until Snape was given the Dementor's Kiss.
°*°*°
Okay, he'd been wrong. The romantic situation between his best friends should have been cleared before. Now, it was driving him insane. It had been four days, and the beast was clawing at his insides, begging to be given an answer, but Harry wasn't able to provide it. He'd been put under the strictest of protections to assure that he arrived safely to the Courtroom. He'd hated being treated as though he was incapable of taking care of himself, but Kingsley had asked him to do this, so he'd acquiesced.
He was in the middle of the most important trial of the century, for bloody Merlin's sake, and all he could think about was whether or not Ron and Hermione were still a couple! While he was in the courtroom his anger filled him, and all he thought about was the trial, but when he wasn't there was nothing further from his mind. He'd been called to testify a whole of six times in the last nine hours, he's said what he had to, now, he just wanted the bastard taken care of so that he could go and find out what was plaguing him.
Snape wasn't allowed in the courtroom while Harry was present, but if he had been, Harry guessed that he would have felt different. His pure hate for his ex-teacher would have made his blood boil, but Harry couldn't see him, or his façade of remorse. Now, he was left alone in a small room outside the Court's, his door heavily guarded, with nothing but his thoughts for company, waiting for someone to call him to hear the Wizengamot's decision.
And, finally, as though his thought had summoned him, a wizard wearing the standard Auror robes peeked through the door, telling Harry that the Wizengamot had reached a solution. He followed the wizard into the painstakingly familiar room, watching the spot where he remembered Dumbledore once sitting, comfortable on a chintz chair that he'd summoned, and finding, right next to his memory of years before, a nightmare that had followed him to the present day. In the chair that he sat in for his own hearing, was Severus Snape, hair as greasy as ever, crooked nose raised in haughty distaste of all that surrounded him, looking for the world like he was the one judging the ones before him. He was thin, nearly as thin as Sirius had been when Harry had first seen him, tired from the constant run that he'd been in ever since the day of Dumbledore's murder, even more, since the day of Voldemort's death.
And there his blood boiled. He heard the Minister of Magic asking if Snape had anything to say about the crimes he was accused of. And Snape did.
"I quite enjoyed it."
Harry was ready to draw his wand and do something drastic, but thankfully, the Minister acted for him in a much harsher way than he would have ever managed.
"Very well. In light of the presented events, and of your own words, you are unanimously declared guilty of several capital crimes, and will, therefore be subjected to the Dementor's Kiss. The sentence will be executed immediately," he gestured to a door, that opened instantly, allowing in a single Dementor, one of the only ones the Ministry still allowed, and Harry watched, not feeling the least bit of nausea that he usual felt around one of the dreaded creatures.
°*°*°
The Wizarding world was all a celebration, the Burrow alight with fireworks provided by the Weasley twins, everyone laughing at demise of the final evil of the War of Voldemort, yet Harry heard and saw none of it. He was slumped against a tree, nursing a glass of strong liquor in his hands, feeling like he was something atrociously dirty among the perfect happiness of the moment.
"Harry, what are you doing out here all alone?" His creature perked right up, but he himself was even more demoralized by the apparition of one Hermione Granger, feeling though his very presence was tainting her.
Watching her out of the corner of his eye, he shrugged, hoping that she would catch the hint and leave. But that would have never been something that Hermione would do. Walking around him so that she faced him completely, her eyes staring fixedly into his, she raised her left foot, and brought it down hard onto his left.
"BLOODY MER-" He swore colourfully as he hopped on his uninjured foot, his drink sloshing off the sides of his glass. "Hermione, what was that for?"
"For thinking that you could just shrug your shoulders and make me leave without first knowing what's wrong with you," she said simply, taking his alcoholic beverage from his hand, and dumping it on the grass beneath their feet.
"And that one?" He asked, referring to his now empty glass. "Because you make a depressing drunk, and you're already too depressing as it is right now." Vanishing the glass, she leaned against the tree next to him. "So what's wrong?"
He shook his head, taking his eyes as far away from her as possible. "It's disgusting, Hermione."
"What is?" She asked, her eyebrows drawn together in question.
"I am," he told her simply.
"Oh," she said quietly. "And why are you so disgusting?"
He brought his hands to his face, rubbing vigorously, trying to buy some more time. "You weren't in that Courtroom, Hermione. You can't understand."
"That's codswallop, Harry!" She replied in anger. "I always tried to understand. I might not, but you know I'll try."
"You can't understand this," he spoke quietly, his eyes digging holes into the ground.
"But I can try," she said ardently, placing a firm hand on his upper arm, forcing him to look at her. He didn't want to tell her, he really didn't, but he was incapable of refusing her. "What happened at the trial?"
He inhaled deeply, letting the breath out as slowly as possible. "Snape was given the Kiss."
She huffed, exasperated. "The trial was on the WWN, I know that," she told him impatiently, letting him know she understood he was stalling.
He nodded, swallowing hard, his throat very parched. "When I saw it…Merlin, Hermione, I enjoyed it! I liked watching his soul get sucked out. I liked his pain. He said he and enjoyed doing it, he liked killing Dumbledore. I liked that the most important part of him was being ripped out to feed one of the most disgusting creatures in the world," his hands were over his face, hiding it from her, and, most importantly, from her expression. He didn't want to see the disappointment in her eyes, he didn't want her to look at him as though he were some Death Eater scum.
"Harry," she called him softly. Hearing her he almost thought she pitied him. "Harry!" More loudly. "Harry!" He felt her hands, her white pure hands, grabbing his wrists, tugging hard to pry his hands off his face. But he wouldn't look at her, he stared defiantly at the ground, avoiding eye contact at all costs. Losing her patience, she wrapped her left arm around him in a half hug so that he couldn't cover his face again, and brought her right hand firmly under his chin, forcing him to look straight into her eyes.
She was close, Dumbledore's beard, she was far too close! "Harry, when are you going to stop underestimating yourself?! I told you, the trial was on the WWN, and let me tell you, there was not one person listening who wasn't relieved and happy that Severus Snape was no longer a threat, especially after he said that! Goodness, Harry, we're having a party! We listened to an execution and now we're laughing and having fun!"
"Don't try to make me feel better Hermione," Harry whispered back. "The party is because a huge threat is gone. Nobody here liked to listen to death."
"Neither did you, Harry," she answered firmly. "Don't act all misunderstood. You didn't like listening to death. If you did, you wouldn't be here, feeling sorry for yourself. What you felt was because you were upset by what he said, and because of how long you've been chasing him. You were gone three months, Harry. Three long months away from home, with no friends, and the thought of putting Snape in the bag, and you've been trying to catch him since the day you became an Auror."
He shook his head vigorously, still firmly locked in Hermione's arms, "It's not like that, Hermione."
She sighed, frustrated and tired, trying to figure out how to make him see that he was wrong. "Ron and I broke up two months ago," she said quietly, her eyes avoiding his for the first time that evening.
Despite the fact that his ears perked up and the beast was suddenly wide awake, he replied tartly, "You're changing the subject."
"No, not really," she said with a smile. "Do you know why?" Watching her intently, he shook his head again, this time slowly, almost in a dream state. "There were a lot of reasons, really. For one I didn't like the person I became when I was with him," seeing Harry's confused expression she elaborated. "I was always jealous of the fact that he looked at other women, prettier women with lovely hair, like Fleur," Harry cursed his best friend in his own mind. "I was vindictive and somewhat tyrannical. And I didn't like our bickering, it was getting so childish and so tiresome. "I didn't like the fact that we couldn't stay together for more than a few months at a time without needing a time out, or one of those stupid vacations," she gave him a small half smile at this. "He wasn't too happy with me at first. He thought he had a right to me, because he'd gotten to me first, and I didn't like that either. We're both better now, though," she added on a lighter tone, "Ron finally invited Luna Lovegood on a date last week, it seems to be going really well, and he and I are back to being just friends."
"Hermione, what-?" He began to ask slightly confused.
"Don't worry, Harry, I've got a point," she reassured him quickly. "The main reason for our splitting up was that we're not in love with each other. And, more specifically, I'm not in love with him. I told him I'm in love with someone else," he felt her hold loosen, become almost a lover's embrace. "I told him I'm in love with you, Harry," she told him softly, her voice cracking slightly. "I love you because of you're kind, because you can always get me to break the rules, because you listen to me, and for another million reasons. I love you for your pure heart, Harry, I love you for you." He thought beast was dancing the conga, but he didn't much care at the moment.
"Hermione-," he began, but she cut him off again.
"No, wait," her voice was quivering madly, her eyes brimming with tears, "I didn't tell you this to impose my feelings on you. It doesn't matter if you don't return them. I just needed to tell you this to let you know that you are a good person, Harry. I couldn't love you otherwise. I just thought if you knew you'd stop and think twice about it before calling yourself disgusting in front of me," she was letting go now, ready to turn her back on him and leave.
"WAIT!" He shouted, throwing his arms out to grab her left hand, the closest to his. Her shoulders were shaking, her whole frame trembling, choked sobs making it past her constricted throat. "Please, Hermione. Don't go." It really was quite ironic the way he'd been trying to get her to leave earlier, and now, he thought he would die if she did. "Please!"
There was something in the way he said it, that made Hermione stop in her tracks, though she wouldn't face him.
He used her left hand that he was still clutching as leverage, whirling her around so that she spun surprised, straight into his arms, her eyes wide and scared.
"Please, Hermione, I need you to stay with me," he begged. She sighed, nodding, and trying to hold back a hiccup. "And I don't mean just now," seeing her eyes find his and penetrate them, he took the final leap. "I need you to stay with me forever, Hermione, because I'm in love with you, too."
He watched as her face slowly changed, blossoming in the light of hope. "Y-you do?"
He smiled, finding her insecurity wonderfully sweet, and incredibly attractive. "Yes, Hermione," he told her, leaning his forehead against hers, "I really do." And, no longer able to contain himself, he closed the small distance between them, and pressed his lips softly against hers, feeling an incredible warmth spreading through him, ignoring the beast within him that was practically melting.
When they separated, she watched him, her lips spreading in a happy smile, and, finally, laughed quietly, the sound shaking after the hiccups.
Harry smiled uncertainly, not sure what she was laughing about. "What's so funny?"
"Nothing," she replied, shaking her head, making her bushy hair bounce form side to side, "I just though that I might be happy ever after, yet."
And Harry, laughing along with her, agreed.
The End
Alright that's it people, the end. I'm sorry if it doesn't really live up to expectations, I'm not happy with it at all. In the first draft actually, the Weasleys were all still supposed to be mad at Ginny for eloping with Neville, but I changed that, and there was supposed to be a conversation with Ron that I decided to take out because it didn't flow very well, but now I think I should have gone like that. No matter, I decided to post it now because I didn't feel like having to wait until I came back from vacation. And sorry that the fluff at the end is not very descriptive, but my dad keeps shooing me off, so I had to make it quick.
Hope everyone enjoyed it, and please tell me what you think
Thank you
Pearl Drop Angel
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