Disclaimer: See Prologue.
Author's Note: First of all, I'm sorry this has taken so long to post! Unfortunately, RL (and final papers) got in the way.
For those who were wondering, David is just a good friend of Hermione's.
The happy ending you've all been waiting for; thanks for reading and reviewing! Enjoy!
Second Chances
Chapter 5: Confessions
"Your Harry is waiting for you outside the waiting room."
Hermione looked up from the chart of the patient they were getting ready to discharge. "He's not-" she corrected automatically, before she was interrupted by her friend and sometime mentor, Abby Brantley, making a skeptical noise.
"Hermione, that man is so head over heels in love with you a blind man could see it. All you have to do is say the word and I have no doubt he'd do anything you ask. Merlin, Hermione, the way he looks at you sometimes, the way he smiles when he sees you… It's enough to make me go weak in the knees and believe me, that doesn't happen easily when you've been married as long as I have."
Hermione smiled slightly, shrugging aside Abby's words and returning her attention to her work but they came to mind again a few minutes later when she had finished all her tasks for the day and walked out to join Harry.
He was talking to a young boy who was also in the waiting room with his father and even from where she was, Hermione could see the hero worship glowing in the boy's eyes as he listened to Harry, no doubt telling brief, modest stories of his years at Hogwarts to appease the boy's curiosity about his life as the famous Harry Potter.
Unconsciously, her steps slowed and her expression softened as she watched Harry interact with the boy and she suddenly thought that this was what she loved about Harry, what she'd always loved about him. That even with his fame and despite the way he'd been brought up by his detestable relations, he was still such a kind person. Not perfect-she, of all people, knew that-but still, he was, in the simplest terms, a nice person.
He looked up and saw her and smiled and she thought that Abby had been right. There really was something in the way he smiled when he saw her… He was just happy to see her…
He turned back to say a quick goodbye to the boy before walking towards her and somehow that little gesture, that he'd remembered the boy, told her everything she needed to know.
It was what Harry was, a hero but a modest one, a powerful wizard, a loyal friend, and just a good person-and she loved him.
She had loved him as just her best friend for years and she was in love with him now, still, always.
"Hi," he greeted her.
"Hi. It looks like you made a new friend," she smiled, gesturing at the boy.
He shrugged slightly and grinned. "He's a nice kid. He wanted to know whether it was true I defeated a dragon when I was 14 years old."
"What did you tell him?"
"That I didn't defeat the dragon; I said I basically tried to play Quidditch with it and sort of won by default."
Hermione laughed. "That's one way of putting it."
Harry sobered and said, more earnestly, "And mentioned that if it hadn't been for you, I'd have been fried for the dragon's lunch before anything else."
"That's not true, Harry," she protested.
He stopped walking, putting a hand on her arm to make her pause as well as she glanced at him curiously.
"It is true, for that and for just about every other crazy thing that happened at Hogwarts, I couldn't have done it without you. And I never quite thanked you for it. Until now."
"Harry, I…"
He shook his head slightly. "It is true-and thank you."
And then he smiled; she smiled back; then they continued walking.
Outwardly, nothing had changed and nothing much had just happened-but she knew differently.
Something had changed, somehow.
And she was in love with Harry, had never stopped loving him even though she'd tried and even convinced herself that she'd succeeded.
She'd never stopped loving him.
It was why it had never worked with any of the guys she'd dated in the last 7 years. It was why, somehow, almost subconsciously, she'd always compared every man she dated with Harry- only to find them lacking. It was why she knew she would always remember that moment of his return and hearing him finally say what she'd never thought he would say. It was why she'd felt, on hearing him say the words, that she'd been waiting her whole life for that moment and those words…
And it was why she was going to tell Harry that she loved him tonight.
She just needed to decide when and how…
~*~*~
Stupid, stupid, stupid, Harry berated himself mentally.
He hadn't meant to say his thought aloud but he had. And now Hermione was looking at him strangely.
She had just commented, as their server, whose name was Emily, left after taking their order, "I always liked the name Emily." She smiled a little, her tone becoming nostalgic. "When I was little and didn't like having a name like Hermione that was so different, I used to pretend my name was Emily; it was my idea of a perfect, pretty, and common enough name."
He hadn't meant to say what he'd thought aloud. "I know. You named our daughter Emily."
There was an odd silence and he suddenly realized what he'd said and how incredibly insane it sounded. Oh bugger.
Hermione was staring at him as if he'd just sprouted horns.
"Oh God," he blurted out, "I didn't mean to say that out-loud." He thought frantically but really, what choice did he have but to explain all about Sirius's ghostly visit and the visions he'd seen? There was no explanation he could give that would make him sound sane-there was only the truth.
"I- er- I can explain what I just said. I'm not crazy-or at least, I don't think I am," he tried to joke, lamely. "It- I- that is- something happened to me before I left Boston and it was why I left, why I came back home to England-to you."
He let his breath out in a half-sigh before meeting Hermione's questioning gaze bravely. "Sirius came to visit me," he finally began bluntly.
"S-sirius? Harry, you- you know he's dead…" she said, rather hesitantly, in the tone of one breaking an unpleasant truth to someone whose sanity is questionable.
He let out a brief laugh. "That's what I said when I saw him. It was his ghost, or his spirit, or something, really. And he told me-he told me that he and my parents had been watching me and they'd decided to intervene because of the mess I had made."
Hermione was still frowning slightly; he could see every logical part of her brain trying to rationalize what he'd just said and failing. "The mess you'd made? Of what?"
"The mess I'd made of my life." He managed a self-deprecating smile. "He told me, in brief, that I'd been a monumental idiot to leave you. And then-this is the part that's really going to sound crazy-he showed me an alternate universe."
"A- a what?" Hermione was peripherally aware that she probably looked and sounded rather like an idiot but she couldn't help it. All that Harry was saying was so- so unbelievable. And while she'd gotten used to accepting things that weren't rational since she'd first been introduced to the magical world, this was in the realm of the impossible-and the insane. But- but she knew Harry wasn't crazy; she'd spent so much time with him in the last few weeks since his return…
Harry's gaze dropped from hers to focus on the tabletop as his hand idly played with his napkin. "He- he showed me the answer to the question of what could have been… Beginning from that last night before I left-" he glanced up at her quickly, "the night you told me you loved me," he added, his tone and his expression softening, becoming tender, "he showed me what would have happened if I'd responded the way I should have-the way I wanted to respond and kissed you again…"
He paused and then continued, still addressing the table more than her, "And he showed me the future, the future we could have had, the future I still hope to have…" His voice lowered until she could hardly hear it. "We- we were married and we had two children."
She gasped softly as he continued on, not looking at her.
"Our daughter was named Emily. She looked like you-she was so beautiful… And we had a son, Andy, who looked like me." He managed a slight smile. "Poor boy; his hair was just as messy as mine always is."
He finally looked up at her, love and hope warring in his eyes. "It- it was the most amazing, beautiful thing I've ever seen, that future. It was-it was a glimpse of all I've ever wanted in my life. And I realized then that I needed to come back and see you. I needed to see if I had any hope of making that dream come true…" He paused and then finished with a smile that tried to be casually cheerful, "Plus, after Sirius came back to this earth just to tell me in no uncertain terms what an idiot I'd been, what else could I do but admit that he was right?"
"Oh Harry…" Hermione finally said softly, blinking back the tears that had welled up at the depth of the longing in his tone as he described what he'd seen.
He shrugged slightly, trying to smile and not quite managing it. "So now you know what made me come back, how I finally realized what a blind prat I'd been. And you know," he added softly, "just why I'll wait as long as I have to, do anything, to show you how much I care and I'll never leave you again…"
She swallowed the lump of emotion in her throat, reaching across the table to take his hand, a wavering smile on her lips as she met his eyes. "I don't need time; you don't need to wait. I love you too."
He caught his breath, a new light beginning to dawn in his eyes. "You mean…"
She laughed slightly, a laugh more of happiness than amusement. "I mean, I never really stopped loving you. I told myself I had and I tried to move on, tried to date, but there was always something missing, something not quite right… Some of those fellows were so- nice-but they weren't you." She paused, smiling into his eyes. "After all, I think I've loved you for so long that loving you is just part of who I am now and nothing can ever change that."
"I love you," was all he said in response, though the look in his eyes was much more eloquent.
He brought her hand up to his lips, kissing it and as he smiled, he said a silent thank you to his parents and Sirius, knowing that somewhere, they were watching and smiling.
And he thought that, after all, maybe it was for the better that it had taken him this long, had taken them this long since they'd first realized their feelings, to reach this understanding. It made this moment, this happiness, that much more precious. He knew, now, just how much he needed Hermione. He knew that he could live without her in his life-he just didn't want to. And as he met Hermione's eyes, he knew he would never have to live without her again.
~The End~