I don't own harry potter. JK Rowling does. You know this, so stop staring.
-x-
( hermione today's your first day of hogwarts you don't want to be late for the train come on darling )
They come for her cloaked in darkness.
Full of shadow. She breathes in their inky laughter and musky, damp smell and can feel her legs prepare to run already.
You would recognise it, too, if you had been there.
Her house begins to burn. Smoke fills her lungs. Screams fill her ears.
She's not sure which is worse.
Her parents rush into her bedroom, still in their night-things and they all know what's happening, but somehow, now that it's real they are all confused and dazed and it's like a dream.
( i'll miss you mum be sure to write me I love you; watch out for the boys hermione; don't worry dad you're the only man in my life i'll see you soon )
"Run, Hermione! Get out!" come their voices. She scurries out of bed and they take turns climbing out the window.
Hermione thinks this would be funny, were it any other situation.
When her feet hit the ground, she falls to her backside on accident.
"Sorry," she stutters to no one. Her legs are shaking and numb, like jelly or pudding. Like a fruitcake.
Hermione wants to giggle. She just compared her legs to fruitcakes, haha.
( dear mum I met two boys at hogwarts and they've become my friends their names are harry and ron and they're wonderful my studies are doing great although i'm not sure about my most recent charms test ha charms imagine that I love you give dad a kiss for me your daughter hermione )
Her parents pull her to her feet and she doesn't want to see it but still, she looks around her.
Houses burning. People crying and shouting and women writhing naked in the air.
She thinks of the Quidditch World Cup and thinks she may just be having a nightmare.
But then again, no. She can feel it in the way her breathing has quickened and the dull aching of adrenaline in her chest that it's real.
And her heartbeat speeds even more with her realisation, and she wants to cry but she knows she has to be strong, if not for herself then for her parents.
( mum i'm always worried about harry because he's always getting himself into these dangerous situations like during the quidditch world cup and i'm scared he's going to get hurt and I don't know what I would do with myself if that happened why does he have to be the hero all the time )
Hermione thinks that it is one of the few times in her life that she wishes Harry could be there to help her.
She needs a hero. She needs a hero. She needs to be saved.
( i don't need a hero i don't need a hero i don't need him to save me )
They run quickly, silently, away from their home, the fires and screams and hooded figures resonating in their ears but they are alive.
They are alive and that's all that matters.
Hermione takes her father's strong hands in hers and her stomach drops as she feels them trembling.
She's frightened to know he's frightened and for a moment she is so blinded by fear that she cannot see straight. She tries not to cry.
She hears them, behind her. And she knows.
People are running, following them, laughing harshly and she so wants to cover her ears but she doesn't want to let go of his hand.
( daddy i'm scared i had a bad dream; that's the thing about dreams sweetheart they'll never be real unless you make them; promise; i promise )
When he suddenly turns toward her, desperation gleaming in his eyes, something in Hermione knows.
"No, no, no," she chokes out, her replies hoarse and disgusted.
He takes her face in his hands roughly and Mrs Granger puts a hand over her mouth.
Hermione can feel her mother crying a few feet away. She feels it and senses it and she's never been more petrified. She feels like a small child, a little girl waning under her father's distressed gaze.
He drinks her in like Scotch. He's drunk from the sight of her.
"We love you, Hermione, you know that?" He says.
( mum dad i missed you this year was really bad for harry his godfather died and i don't know how he's going to deal with it on top of everything else i love him so much I just don't want to see him get hurt i hope he doesn't do anything stupid i hope he knows i'm here for him )
"No, no, don't do this. Mum, don't let him do this, don't let him -"
"We do, Hermione. You've always made us proud and no matter what -"
Cackling, screaming, burning, closer, closer.
"No matter what, we'll find you. We'll always find you." His voice is more anxious now. Hermione cries, spit spills from her lips and she has forgotten all about holding herself together.
"Why are you doing this? Don't leave me, please don't leave me -"
They're so close now she can taste ash in her mouth, twisting and turning the grime against her tongue.
He rips himself out of her grasp.
Hermione loses her footing and lurches her stomach against the pavement trying to stop him, but she is so tired and so confused that all she can do is watch their hands enclose over the others' and their feet pounding away.
Closer, closer, the laughter comes. She turns around. Lights from torches bob in midair.
All of the street lamps are somehow extinguished. She knows they are going to find her, here, in the darkness.
She scrambles off of the road and into the ditch beside the street, hiding herself in the dirt and leaves and sucks in her breath.
She wants to calm her heart and soon the tears stop flowing as she sees the fires dancing upon sticks above her.
Any sadness and desperation she had at protecting her parents vanishes.
She wants to live. She knows that her mother and father are defenseless.
And she doesn't care.
She can't care.
( now that the war is really starting we all have to stick together no matter what happens we have to protect each other because we're family and that's what family does )
She bites her lip so hard she draws blood. The metallic, bitter taste fills her mouth and it seems an eternity for the Death Eaters to pass above her.
She doesn't breathe as they do.
She wonders if she's still conscious, if she's still alive or maybe she's dead and none of this is actually happening.
Maybe this is all a nightmare. She's going to wake up any second and the more she thinks about it the more she believes it.
She hears them screaming.
Nightmare, nightmare, nightmare.
( that's the thing about dreams sweetheart they'll never be real unless you make them )
Cover your ears, Hermione! Cover your ears!
But she can't bring herself to do it and she's frozen and she can't breathe and she's drowning and she's so glad it's not her.
( they'll never be real unless you make them )
When she wakes up, blurred faces and shadowed forms watch her from above.
"Who are you?" she mumbles, trying to move her body but her limbs are like bricks and she's hearing music from somewhere, a saddening piano but she's not sure if her mind is making it up to block out the crying.
The people looking over are tense. She feels it in the way they're standing, hears it in their breath. Something isn't right.
"Who's crying?" she wonders out loud. Her head pounds. A feeling of dread hovers over her.
"Who is it?" she is beginning to get frustrated because the fleeting shadows of people standing over her, watching her every move aren't answering her question and suddenly she is so confused and she remembers and it hits her like an oncoming train and she's crying suddenly, and it hurts and it really just hurts. Ow ow ow ow ow, she screams, because it hurts so badly it's like knives piercing every inch of her body and like something pulling her body forcefully underneath icy cold water and she can't breathe.
"Harry!" she calls out and she doesn't know why, but she does. Someone places a hand on her shoulder and she recoils because the hand is cold, and unfamiliar and not what she asked for.
She feels forsaken, and abandoned, and as the light gathers in her corneas and the blurs begin to focus, she shields them with a shaking hand.
She closes them again.
She can't look down because the ground has disappeared. What is keeping her standing now?
The set of thin, frail arms that have somehow wrapped themselves around her body. She falls into them.
She knows these arms. She knows them like she knows the truth she can't admit.
( you said to us once before that there was time to turn back if we wanted to )
She looks in his eyes, expecting to see radiant, passionate green, but instead there is something dull and sad lingering behind his lids.
She can't turn back time. They can't change the past. She doesn't want to be in this house because it reminds of her of the home that probably remains as a pile of dust, scattering in the wind to some distant place..
He places her gently under the sheets and breathes in his scent before she falls asleep.
( dear harry my parents said i could visit the burrow this summer and i hope you can as well anyway i know this was a short note but i just had to make sure you were doing alright after everything that's happened see you love hermione )
She doesn't leave his bedroom for the next few days.
Ron comes to visit with Ginny and the rest of the Weasleys and Lupin and Tonks but she doesn't get out of her bed.
Ginny scolds her after a silent visit for being a coward and for not having enough bravery to face it, because she's frustrated and sad and insecure.
Hermione stays silent. She wants to jump up and kill her, and hurt her and make her feel pain but she's still because Ginny is right.
A coward is what she is and she's alright with that for now.
Harry sits with her at night. He doesn't mind that she doesn't talk back. He pours his heart out about Dumbledore and Hogwarts and how awkward it is when Ginny shows up.
He tells her of their romance, and how she made him feel like he was an entirely different person, with an entirely different life.
He says that she made him feel loved and cherished and normal. He says he's never felt that before with anyone.
Sometimes Harry thinks she's asleep, but either way he doesn't mind, because nothing he has ever felt can compare to what she's feeling right now, and he doesn't know what else to do.
But Hermione has never slept through one of his rants.
She stays awake and listens, entranced, by the fullness and the beauty and the feeling in his words because Harry has never opened up to her like this before.
( dear hermione i'm sure i can come visit the burrow during the summer i just have to clear it with the dursleys and everything i'll work something out talk to you soon love harry )
One night, something strange happens. She is in between sleep and consciousness when he slips into bed next to her. Her eyes snap open in a moment of clarity, but she doesn't push him away.
He radiates of exhaustion. He has been sleeping on a couch for over a week now.
"I'm just going to lay down her for a few minutes, Hermione..." he whispers. She pulls the comforter up over his body.
She listens to his breathing, slow and steady and drawn-out. Seconds pass, and then minutes, and what seems like days.
"Harry?" she asks. His body jerks in surprise.
"Yeh...yeah?"
"When it happened I kept wishing you were there."
"What do you mean?"
"I guess, because you've always been the hero I kept wishing you would save us. Pathetic, isn't it?"
"No...it's not...I mean, well, you...I'm really sorry, Hermione." His arm hesitantly finds it's way around her shoulders.
She thinks it will be uncomfortable, awkward, but it isn't.
"Me too."
They are silent for a few moments, as they both let it sink in. Hermione's parents are dead. The sadness, the destruction of the war has touched her life, tainted it. She feels dirty.
"It was my fault, you know. That they died, I mean. They were screaming my name as they were tortured, and I could hear them so close to me. I could have helped them if I was brave enough."
Hermione's voice is quiet and casual. Harry shudders next to her and he gently shakes his head, pulling her body into his arms, and he remembers when he and Hermione were once the same size. She's so thin now, small and breakable and fragile from not eating and he is surprised when she fits loosely in his embrace.
( ron hermione's neighbourhood was attacked by death-eaters some aurors found her parents bodies they're both dead they found hermione in a ditch next to the road she's okay but she's still unconscious she's going to stay with me at the dursleys for a while i thought you would want to come visit her love harry )
"I love you," he tells her, and suddenly he feels hot, wet tears on his chest. They've seeped through the material of his jumper but he doesn't mind, because best friends don't mind things like that.
"Why are you crying?" asks Harry, but doesn't expect an answer because it was a stupid question to ask in the first place. He kisses her forehead gently and tells himself that best friends can do that sort of thing. Best friends are allowed to like that sort of thing, aren't they?
"Harry?"
"Hmm?"
"The other night, you told me that Ginny made you feel cherished and loved, like an entirely different person," Hermione says. Her voice is muffled as she speaks into his chest. He shivers as her breath tingles his skin, and he nods slowly.
( you said to us once before that there was time to turn back if we wanted to )
"Well...how do I make you feel?"
He thinks on this for a second, before pulling her even closer to him and lacing his fingers naturally through hers.
"Like Harry," he whispers. "Just...Harry."
( we've had time, haven't we? )
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