It was the sort of place kids' parents didn't like them hanging out. It was supposed to be a playground but druggies had long claimed it as their own and now it resembled something more like a twisted metal hell than a children's play area. Crooked monkey bars, broken asphalt with fading graffiti. The park benches were broken and scratched from skateboarders using them to grind on.
He liked to smoke cigarettes there even though he was told they would kill him. He didn't really care, he'd seen death and it didn't seem like such a bad place. Of course, that was provided you went towards the light and you didn't end up fucked over in hell or worse yet, limbo. Walking the world as a ghost seemed to be as miserable as it got.
It was cold out and long streams of white came from his mouth when he exhaled. He didn't bother buttoning up his denim jacket; it was too worn and torn to be bothered. Who would believe he was grotesquely wealthy back home? Certainly the junkies wouldn't believe it as they watched him darkly from the shadows, eyeing up his ragged Vans sneakers and torn Levi jeans. He looked like a pothead or maybe a midnight skateboarder or some combination of both. They didn't trust him since all he ever did was smoke cigarettes and stare off in a daze. He didn't care though, sometimes he wanted to fight just so he could bleed and remember he wasn't really dead.
He sighed and tossed the cigarette to the ground creating an arc of red as it froze in a sizzle of death. He listened as the sound of flip-flop sandals plodded up behind him. Only one idiot wore flip-flop sandals in the freezing cold and that was Jasper King.
"Harry" the voice said in acknowledgement.
"Jasper" Harry nodded back, not turning around. What was the point of looking at Jasper? Harry had a perfect image of him in his head- tall and handsome with spiky brown hair and sunglasses even though it was night. Jasper would be wearing a leather jacket and jeans that fit him like they fit a model. Jasper looked like he belonged in Hollywood but he was crazier than your average Beverly Hills eccentric. Harry listened to the busy smack of gum as Jasper chewed furiously.
"Listen, roomie, we have a problem." Jasper took in a long breath of late night air. "That girl Charlie, the one who claimed to be a medium? She's a fraud but she's angry because I lit her stupid fuckin' Oujii board on fire last night and threw it out the window."
"So?"
"So I sort of threw it in her convertible, the roof was down and next thing I know the smell of burned leather is filling my nose and the whole thing set me off. I mean, she's flipping out over burning cow carcass yet she supports a chain restaurant that sells charred cow flesh every day. Where is the logic? To demonstrate this I fled the apartment and went to McDonald's down the street. I guess I proceeded to create a pile of napkins which I lit on fire."
Harry wished this was abnormal but these bizarre things always happened with Jasper. Only the really bad ones involved fire though. "Not my problem Jas."
"Only it is" Jasper insisted, leaping over the back on the bench and sitting next to Harry with a ridiculous amount of athletic grace. "It is because now Charlie is out for my blood and I have to quit my job."
"How does any of that have to do with your job as a lawyer?"
Jasper looked too relaxed for a man claiming all this and Harry had a sudden urge to laugh at the thought of how much his old friend Hermione Granger would hate Jasper King.
"Well, I was supposed to be taking up a case of a guy who works at that particular McDonalds. He's actually the manager and by God I know the ass will recognize and report me" Jasper searched his pockets for another stick of gum. "Ain't life funny the way everything connects? Hoo-rah for existentialism."
Harry wasn't even worried or mildly annoyed by any of it. He'd let go of his Earthly bounds to normal life ages ago when he'd defeated a dark wizard named Voldemort, fallen in love with his best mate's girl and fled to the lousy U.S. of A. where he met a crack pot, but genius, of a lawyer.
"We could just move" Jasper suggested. "I've always wanted to go to Britain, let's move back to your place Potter!"
Harry gave him a sullen look. "Let's not. If you want to move you're free to, but I'm staying in our apartment here. Its nice and I'm used to it."
Jasper stood, cracking his neck loudly. "You know that's not an option. We are intrinsically connected remember? We cannot part until we've understood the course of why fate brought us together."
"Your philosophy, not mine" Harry reminded him, also rising to his feet.
"Well, you better keep respecting it chum. It's my hard working ass that pays for that sweet apartment we call home, not to mention the food, clubs and incredible hook ups."
"Hard working?" Harry scoffed. "You're a shark Jas."
"Too true" King grinned toothily. He threw a well-muscled arm around Harry's shoulders. "But I do make a lot of money. You're just a bum but an interesting one. I know you'll lead me to him."
"Not now Jasper" Harry warned harshly.
"You have no clue how rare you are. So many people claim to be in communication with the dead only you really are. I don't know how or why because you won't say but it is honestly incredible Potter. You just don't see it. Who else can put me in contact with him but you?"
Harry had only one spot that wasn't numb and this was it. "Yeah it's a miracle" he spat angrily. "I thank God everyday. You have no clue King, and you wouldn't believe it even if I told you. You want to talk to your old man because things ended badly between you right? Well, here's something about me, one of the endless things you don't know. I never knew my parents, they both died when I was one. You think that ever since I got cursed with the bullshit I don't secretly wish to see them every day? You forgot something though bro. I see ghosts or spirits or whatever. That means miserable souls trapped in a sort of limbo, stuck in a grey tastelessness for ages to come. Do you want that for your old man?"
Jasper wasn't listening though, he was jogging in place as if in sudden work out ritual as they waited to cross the road. Harry rolled his eyes and calmed himself down. Yes, he was using Jasper and Jasper was using him. It was mutual and it was fine. Whereas Harry knew too much about Jasper King, Jasper knew nothing about Harry. And that was just how Harry wanted it.
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By the next morning Jasper had forgotten all about his quitting work and moving away and by the time Harry got up Jasper was already long gone, the smell of scrambled eggs with ketchup still present in the kitchen. Harry read the newspaper with a breakfast of black coffee and Marlboro cigarettes. He could feel the pain of starvation in his ribs and he looked at the cereal but it just made his stomach churn. Food was rarely a viable option for him, much like sleep. As such he knew he looked pale and thin, he could see the blue semi circles under his hollow green eyes and feel the slight shake of his hands. Every day he was dying but every night he was still unfortunately alive.
Yet the few women he knew said he was incredibly handsome. Nobody had ever come close to describing him as "incredibly handsome" in the past. Decent looking, cute, yes, but he wasn't exactly an object of lust. Jasper claimed it was like the vampire appeal- people are attracted to death in inexplicable ways and because Harry was so connected with the other side ever since the final battle with Voldemort, the connection had somehow made him taller and stronger looking. It was true that he no longer required glasses and his messy hair had grown somewhat of a silky quality. All of these things suggested that for a twenty-year-old kid he hadn't come up too shallow in the gene pool.
He decided to take a walk to clear his troubled mind. Of course, he knew it wouldn't clear his mind really but it might help and at any rate, the prospect of good city air in his rotting lungs was somehow appealing. He dressed in the same clothes he'd worn the night before and hit the streets with a sulky looking disposition. New York City. It was so full of people but so easy to vanish within. He headed to tourism districts so he could blend into the thousands of faces and be the same. There was a nice little sub shop trapped between two souvenir shops where he liked to take noon coffee at. He settled down at the window bench, sipping the hot grinds and watching the mobs pass by.
The door opened with the ding of a bell and he heard female laughter as they shook off the cold and tilted their heads upwards, deliberating over the food choices. "So, what are you going to get your boyfriend?" asked a teasing voice with a British persuasion. "You can't go back to England empty handed."
"This trip was supposed to be for research and business. What will he think when I come back with a `I Heart NYC' shirt instead?"
"Lucky for you Ron doesn't think" giggled another voice.
Harry's heart seemed to stop and everything grew silent around him except for the sound of breathing- her breathing. He had recognized her voice immediately and in retrospect he realized it was her the moment she entered the room. He just felt it somehow.
"Don't look, don't let her see you" he urged himself. But of course, curiosity killed the spotted snarkle as Luna Lovegood would have put it. Harry turned his neck slowly and Jasper would be in all his glory. Fate. She was looking right at him.
Her face grew pale as her eyes widened with recognition. "Oh my God" she gasped. He swallowed heavily, neither of them noticing as her friends stared at her with confused looks. They were both frozen in their spots, brown eyes staring into green like lasers transfixed for destruction.
"Hermione? Do you know him?" Of course they had no idea who he was. Granted it'd only been a year since his face was splashed all over the media as the Boy Who Defeated Voldemort, but he had changed a lot since then. Hermione wasn't answering still.
Lacey Carlton had worked with Hermione for a year at the Diagon Research Foundation and while they were friends, they were very different. Both beautiful and smart, Hermione was the practical sort who had years of darkness and pain lending to a quiet personality. Lacey on the other hand, had graduated from Hogwarts before the years of horror and blood fell on its ancient grounds. Lacey had experienced men drooling over her and treating her like royalty. She had a pure blood, rich upbringing and her good looks and intelligence made her quite a force to reckon with. She wasn't egotistical, just confident. Right now she knew she wanted Hermione Granger's little friend. Sure, he was a fix-me-upper in his tattered clothes but at the same time the rough look was so "Rebel Without a Cause" she wanted him all that much more.
"Hermione! Introduce us!" Lacey urged her with a sly grin.
"H-H-Harry?" Hermione stuttered. Lacey's smile suddenly vanished as her eyes flicked up to his forehead. Shiny locks of Raven hair covered where his scar should be. She felt a thrill of excitement. She loved flaunting the fact that she was friends with a member of the Golden Trio, but knowing Harry Potter himself would be so much juicier.
"What are you doing in New York?" he asked her, his tone flat and unreadable.
"Business trip" she gulped, trying to regain herself. "We're supposed to be collaborating on a new potion method with the NYC Research Trust." She had so many questions to ask him she didn't know where to start. They fell silent again.
Lacey wasn't much good at handling quiet moments. "Is this the Harry? Harry Potter, your best friend?" The other two witches gasped as they finally realized what was happening. Neither of them even seemed to hear Lacey though. Harry's response was particularly unusual.
"Am I Hermione?"
"Am I what?" she asked, confused, her flustered tone bringing up warm memories of years ago.
"Am I still your best friend?"
Her jaw visibly dropped open. "Of course you are! It's been…" she trailed off, looking suddenly uncomfortable as if the tiny sub shop was closing in on her.
Lacey sighed and decided to have a little tact. "Let's give Hermione and her pal a little time to catch up" she said flippantly. "Come ladies, we can go to that excellent café I suggested in the first place". Prodding them forward she gave the couple a last glance back but they didn't seem to notice anyone other than each other. Lacey got a strange feeling looking at them.
"I need some espresso" she smiled, hooking her arms through theirs and leading the way.
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He came to his feet uncertainly and for a second she thought she had gotten it all wrong. Since when was he so tall and well balanced? What happened to scrawny little Harry with humble eyes and a friendly smile? Now his eyes were dark with unspeakable horrors and he looked like he hadn't had a genuine moment of peace in his entire life. In a way that was true though. Had she ever given him peace? She'd like to think there had been a time when their friendship had helped but now she felt uncertain.
"You look…" she trailed off. He already knew how he looked, why did she need to tell him?
"You look beautiful" he replied shortly, not sure why he had said it. It was true of course. The outside sun caused the blonde streaks of her brown hair to sparkle and her eyes conveyed a poise that had been a guiding light for him in years of trouble.
"I…" Why am I having so much trouble speaking? She thought furiously. "Where have you been Harry? You left a year ago. You never said goodbye."
"I left a note" he offered lamely.
"All it said was `Need time to deal'. You didn't even sign your name!"
Harry noticed that the kitchen staff were becoming overly interested in their display. "Let's go to the park" he quickly offered.
She paused a moment and he saw something in her eyes that pierced his heart like a spear. Distrust. He promised that if she went he would tell her everything and so she acquiesced to his request.
The park was sunny and happy and they felt terribly out of place. They slumped down at a park bench and Harry reached for a cigarette. All it took was a single disapproving look from her and he put them quickly away. He looked off into the blue sky. What to say he mused. Then he let himself travel back in time.
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They had spent the summer leading up to what should have been their seventh year hunting down horocruxes. They spent a lot of time traveling like a bunch of backpacking college kids except for the quiet look in their faces. Harry was glad Hermione and Ron were with him but he was also filled with a constant dread that they would be hurt, or worse yet, killed.
At first he spent a lot of time thinking about Ginny and how he missed her. When he was feeling in a more optimistic mood he would imagine himself stepping off a train, his war done and she would be standing there smiling. In these dreams they would rekindle their relationship and he would become a pro seeker and over time they'd even start a family together. He even got so ridiculously far as to picture their kids; a redheaded boy and girl both with emerald eyes. Of course, these bursts of hope just sickened him later until he released all his daydreams into dust.
One afternoon they rode the train alongside a setting sun and Harry was remembering their first ride to Hogwarts when an owl suddenly swooped through the train's open window. Ron grinned as he untied the parchment on its leg, a letter from the Weasley household. He ripped it open and read over it as Hermione watched his expression with a look of interest and Harry merely gazed out the window.
"Fleur's already preggers!" Ron yelled with an excited look.
"They only just got married" Harry commented dryly with a hollow grin. "Bill works fast."
"Harry!" Hermione scoffed, reaching over and slapping his knee. Ron continued to scan the letter, occasionally reporting about how various family members were holding up.
"Ginny's stopped moping about Harry" he read before realizing what he was doing. Hermione gave him an aghast look but Harry's face was calm and impassive.
"That's good" Harry said. "She deserves to move on."
Ron said nothing and the room grew very quiet. "Harry if we're going to confess about relationships" Ron began suddenly without prelude. Hermione was shaking her head furiously like Harry couldn't see her. Ron ignored her and pushed forward. "Hermione and I have been… together… since the end of sixth year."
Hermione looked furious at Ron but then turned to Harry with an embarrassed look. She didn't know why she felt so squeamish about it. He was their best friend after all. Yet his green eyes were focused on her with a peculiar expression and she suddenly felt guilty for no apparent reason.
"I already knew that Ron" Harry yawned. He leaned back his head and closed his eyes so he wouldn't have to see their baffled looks. They took him for an idiot. He could hear their midnight kisses and hurried whispers. They thought he was asleep but what he had yet to confess was that he hardly got any sleep anymore. Too many nightmares.
After they destroyed the final horocrux he went to look for Voldemort on his own. He slipped sleeping potion into their drinks as they stayed at a hotel for the night. As they lay sound asleep he took off out the window and was gone for a year.
He hunted Voldemort far and wide feeling odd in the role of predator. They ended up in the Chamber of Secrets just where they had done battle many years before. The details of who cast what and how every exact bone of Harry's body was broken or each drop of blood was spilled is irrelevant and Harry couldn't remember the majority of it. All he knew was that when Voldemort died there was no flash of light this time. It was blood and wide, white staring eyes. Harry watched the last breath leave Tom Riddle's mortal body and then he crumbled beside him, blinded by pain and haunted by fatigue. He barely felt his face hitting the cold ground and his eyelids didn't even close but darkness still came.
He would always remember seeing the proverbial white light. And he remembered thinking it was bright and stupid but not beautiful. There was a feeling of growing lighter and he seemed to float upwards effortlessly. Then there was a voice only it wasn't speaking in English or parseltongue. Still, it made perfect sense to him somehow. It said "Not Your Time" and then it felt like being a hit by a truck and all the darkness was gone.
It was Argus Filch who found him oddly enough. Hogwarts had closed but he still patrolled the hallways keeping an eye on the old castle. On his rounds he found Harry Potter limping out of the girl's bathroom covered in blood.
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"I already knew most of that Harry" Hermione sighed. "Ron and I went to St. Mungo's and tortured ourselves with grief over your instable condition. And then you came to and they said you seemed to be suffering hallucinations."
"I wish they were hallucinations," Harry snorted.
Hermione gave him an odd look and continued slowly "then you just disappeared. What were you so afraid of Harry?"
"I needed time to think Hermione" he insisted. "I had a rather miserable time and I had to sort things out."
"By fleeing to America?" she asked, exasperated.
He looked down at his hands, studying the long scar across the back of his knuckles from the final battle. "There's rather a little more to the whole ordeal" he sighed. "First, I felt like there was nothing left here for me. Ginny was dating again, you and Ron had each other and everyone else who I ever loved was dead. I know it sounds like self-pity but I thought I could look for more if I could get far enough away. Then there was the whole issue of being nutters."
"You aren't insane Harry" Hermione argued fiercely.
"I know that now but at the time I thought the Healers were right, that I was hallucinating".
"What did you see?" she asked, her tone suddenly hushed.
His tone was so icy it caused her to shiver and cower back from him every so slightly. "Oh, I still see them Hermione. They come to me, I can't seek them out like Jasper thinks I can. They just approach me when they have a message they want me to send on and I have no choice, they won't leave me alone until I do."
"Who?" she asked, thoroughly perplexed.
"The dead" he responded as if it was obvious. "They're ghosts and they walk around here trapped because their fate is undecided. Sometimes, the only way they can get off this terrible Earth is by taking care of something their death got in the way of. So they bring the message to me."
She looked horrified. Was such a thing possible? "I read once" she began timidly "that when one has a near death experience they gain a connection with the dead."
"Sometimes," Harry nodded, "As in my unfortunate case".
"What do they look like?" she shuddered.
"I don't want to talk about it," he warned, his eyes flashing. Is he scared? She wondered. He was almost never scared; he was too noble and courageous to be bothered with fear. And then she realized that what was in his eyes wasn't fear but physical illness. He wasn't your laid back medium or psychic; he wasn't the reluctant ghost hunter in movies. He was being tormented by these spirits to the point where he was literally half dead. And it all clicked; his changed appearance, the look in his eyes. She turned away so he couldn't see her tears; she knew how he hated feeling pitied.
He cleared his throat loudly. "I came here, I met Jasper King and I moved in with him while I sort things out."
"Who in the name of Merlin is Jasper King?" she asked, composing herself. Harry quirked a smile a little and it looked out of place on his worn face.
"He's a dirty lawyer who's obsessed with the supernatural and fate. You'd hate him."
"He's a muggle?"
Harry nodded with a vague shrug. He stood and she quickly jumped to her feet, afraid he was leaving her. "When are you coming home?" she asked, grabbing his hand. It felt cold and rough.
"I don't know Hermione" he sighed.
She grit her teeth. "Well that's not enough Harry Potter! People miss you and love you and need you! What are you even doing here?"
He raised his arms in a hopeless shrug. "Contrast" was all he could manage.
"Contrast?" She sputtered with a bewildered look.
"Yeah. In my life here there are all sorts of oddities and that's good because it means mine don't stick out too sorely. At the same time though, I can hear the pointless ramblings of Jasper on fate and meaning and all those ridiculous things and they remind me of how stupid it all is."
"Because your friend is a moron you think everything to do with hope can be thrown away?" she asked, hitting a perfect bull's eye. "Well that's just idiotic Harry."
He grinned in spite of himself. Good old Hermione, she'd let him know when he was totally off. "How long will you be in New York?" he asked, changing the subject.
"A month. It's a fascinating city but we also have a lot of work to get done."
"Still haven't mastered the concept of mixing work and play?" he asked in a tone that she recognized as humor much to her surprise.
"The other women have been begging me to go to a club with them but its not really my scene" she shrugged, feeling like it was ludicrous to be chatting about idle matters when there were so many more disturbing undertones playing out.
"I don't like them much either but what's the use of going to New York City if you can't even brag about getting in at a reclusive club?"
"But you're not the famous Harry Potter here" she teased suddenly, feeling almost like she was flirting with him.
"Doesn't mean I don't have connections" he smiled shyly.
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She knocked on the apartment door looking around at the hallway with some surprise. Harry was so humble in their Hogwarts days that she expected that wherever he had gone to he was living in modesty. However, the apartment building she was in was very expensive and classy with a beautiful lobby and a uniformed doorman. How flustered and out of place, not to mention a bit stupid, she felt standing there dressed up. Why was everything so ridiculously surreal when it came to Harry Potter?
The door opened and to her surprise it wasn't Harry but rather a well-muscled man with handsome features, wearing nothing but a towel and drinking from a milk carton. "Oh Christmas came early this year!" he smiled, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand and eyeing her up and down in a surreptitious way.
A hand from behind grabbed the man and shoved him to the side. "Sorry about that" Harry apologized in a hurried manner. "This is Jasper King. Play nice Jas, she has a boyfriend." Hermione thought he said the last word a little off tone.
"All the good ones do" he nodded with a sneaky wink. "I'll go put some clothes on."
"Please do" Harry nodded, his tone dry and dark as ever. "You're a little early" he commented.
"No, you're running late" she retorted snippily. "The girls are waiting in the lobby".
"I just have to change my shirt" he flinched as if being scolded. She noted how he now wore nice black slacks and expensive shoes, a far cry from his shoddy attire earlier in the day. She followed him through the apartment, which gleamed with perfect cleanliness.
"Jas makes keeping a place clean hard" Harry commented.
"You clean?" she asked with disbelief, remembering how he had been less than neat back at Hogwarts.
"It passes the time when dead people aren't attacking me with important messages" he said in a soft voice that made her feel another spike of concern. He was too good at passing his issues off as stubborn stupidity. He'd rather look like a prat than a victim.
He pulled off the white t-shirt he had on and pulled a button down from his closet. Her eyes widened at all the scars coursing across his flesh and back muscles. She wondered if they were all from the final battle. He took a quick look at his reflection and ruffled his hair with his fingers so that it fell messily across his scar. The effect was quite attractive. Of course, she wasn't supposed to be thinking about that.
"I sent Ron an owl" she started slowly. "Telling him I saw you today. Don't worry, he won't spread the message or anything. It'll stay between us."
Harry shrugged. "I suppose he has a right to know. Well, let's be off then."
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It was a high-end club and as such it had clean bars and professional staff. There was a pleasant variety of music being played and the atmosphere was laid back to the point that Hermione actually found she was enjoying herself. Jasper had come along with them and her co-workers thought he was quite the catch with his striking looks and bizarre charm. He escorted them out to the dance floor time and time again but Hermione remained content in her seat with her one alcoholic beverage.
She noted that Harry drank like a fish but said nothing to this. They discussed small pleasantries, mostly about her. He asked various questions about the wizarding world he had been estranged from for a whole twelve months. Halfway through the night Lacey came off the dance floor looking a little sweaty but in a way that made her even more attractive.
"Harry, even heroes dance don't they?" Lacey teased.
"I wouldn't know about that" he shrugged acting like a bit of an asshole.
Lacey was unfazed though and Hermione saw an alarming determination in her friend's eyes. Hermione liked the fact that Lacey was so strong willed but right now it sickened and annoyed her. Harry wasn't a prize to be won.
"Just one dance Potter" Lacey begged with a pouting face. Harry glanced over her shoulder.
"Ah I would but I promised Hermione this dance" he lied. "But look, Jasper is headed over here. I think he fancies you." Lacey made a disgruntled face and Harry leapt to his feet, grabbing Hermione's hand and dragging her to the dance floor.
"Thanks for using me" she grumbled.
"You'd think with the way everything is in this world people could cut the drama" he mumbled as if not having heard her.
"Not everyone sees the world like you do Harry" she sighed as a slow song started. Harry absently pulled her to him and for a moment it felt like there were no abandonment issues between them, no year of estrangement.
"Lucky them" he muttered, resting his chin on top of her head as she automatically leaned in against his chest. She listened to the sound of his heart and it reminded her that he wasn't as dead as he liked to pretend he was. "I'm sorry for seeming so pitiful" he suddenly apologized with a twisted smile.
"Apologize to yourself Harry" she replied in a no-nonsense tone. "Its your life you're ruining."
There was a long silence and neither of them could even really hear the music playing. "I'm not dead Hermione" he suddenly said.
"I know that" she whispered against his shirt.
"That's what makes living so hard."
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"What am I doing here?" She thought with a great deal of dismay. More pressingly though was "why does this feel so right?"
She was stretched out across his bed, the lights dimmed to a comfortable setting, the door locked. He was smiling in a way he hadn't smiled in a very long time and she felt like it was because of her and that made her feel better than she thought she could.
"This is like a slumber party" he said decidedly. "I feel like a little girl."
"Well, I didn't want to say anything but you kinda look like a little girl" she smirked.
"Funny Granger" he retorted, maturely sticking out his tongue. She laughed and realized it was like a slumber party. They had gone for a late night walk and ended up at his apartment where they proceeded to reminisce about the good old days. He had managed to order up a basket of wizarding world specialties like chocolate frogs and Bertie Botts. Hedwig hadn't gotten to deliver a message in over a year and she was in the best mood Harry had ever seen in her since she made the trip. Now they dared each other to eat the funny looking jellybeans as if they were eleven again.
Suddenly he looked away for a moment and his eyes grew dark. She felt herself choking as she watched his eyes go from emerald to forest green to black. His body looked rigid and she called out his name fearfully. She grabbed his shoulder but he was as unmovable as a boulder. He crunched his eyes shut tightly, trembling ever so slightly and to her horror she watched as two pinpoints of blood came trickling down each cheek from the corners of his eyes. She screamed.
In a matter of seconds Jasper had the door thrown open and he was in the room in his boxers hopping from one foot to the other excitedly. To Hermione's shock she saw the look on his face was not shock or fear like she would expect, but rather glee. She felt overcome with confusion and she couldn't seem to breathe in that instant. Harry opened his eyes suddenly and they were back to their vibrant, usual green. He tumbled off the side of the bed and landed on his hands and knees and started coughing violently. Jasper slapped him on the back with a hard THUD and it was then that she noticed he was coughing blood onto the carpet.
He pushed Jasper away and slowly staggered to his feet looking exhausted. She scurried to her feet and helped him back onto the bed, laying him back and placing his head in her lap. With scared, shaking hands she brushed his damp hair back from his forehead, tracing his cold lightening bolt scar in hopes of soothing him. His breaths were ragged and damp sounding and a little more blood seeped from the corner of his lips. She used the end of her pajama sleeve to wipe it away. Seeing him hurt and tortured brought back that cold feeling in the pit of her stomach she had grown so accustomed to back in their Hogwarts days. She remembered with some reluctance how she was constantly worried for him, afraid of losing him or seeing him hurt. Now she knew it was simply because he was always on her mind, some part of her obsessing over him ever since he had saved her from a mountain troll years ago.
"What happened?" she asked Jasper in a trembling voice. Jasper was clutching his hands in anticipation, as if he was about to see if he'd won the lottery.
"Message from a ghost" Jasper said in rushed tones. "A strong one too judging by all the blood. Usually its just from the eyes."
"USUALLY?" she yelled, accidentally jostling a still motionless Harry. "This happens often?!"
"Every time he's given a message. I thought he explained this to you."
"He didn't want to talk about it" she whispered, the words caught in her throat amidst a strangled sob. "How often does he get messages?"
"Only a couple times a month" Jasper shrugged.
She couldn't even muster a response. She looked down into Harry's open but unseeing eyes. Jasper's jostling was quickly annoying and she looked at him with blazing brown eyes. "Could you leave?"
"I want to know what he saw" Jasper insisted, crossing his buff arms over his puffed out chest.
"Get. The. Fuck. Out." She warned in a dead panned tone, feeling ready to hex him even if he was a muggle.
He grit his teeth and let out a sort of snort like an obstinate child. "I didn't know Harry had such a crazy girlfriend" he muttered under his breath as he left. She didn't have time to ponder how incredibly ironic that he was calling her crazy in that instant.
"Harry?" she asked quietly, shaking him a little. He suddenly took a loud, long breath and sat up fast as a lightening bolt. He jumped to his feet and looked around bewildered. She tried to take his hand but he yanked it away.
"I need to leave. Now" he told her with wide eyes.
"What? Why? Where?"
"England. I have to go to England". He went to the closet and threw open the door revealing a state of the art safe. He mindlessly twisted the combination- the date he defeated Voldemort. The safe popped open and he extracted a single object- his wand. Hermione watched with fear and astonishment. He said nothing as he let Hedwig out the window, whispering something to her. "There, I'm packed" he nodded, looking around shortly.
"Are- are you going to tell Jasper?"
"Who cares, he knew I'd leave suddenly at any time. Anyways, you can tell him."
"What? No, Harry, I'm going with you…. Wherever it is you're going exactly."
He knew that wasn't an option on so many levels that he couldn't tell her. He walked over and grasped her shoulders in such a way that made the wind go right out of her lungs and her body freeze like a statue. "It's your prerogative to worry yourself sick over me" he started perceptively. "But it's my prerogative to always protect you. Please just understand that". Then he did something he'd never done before. He leaned down and kissed her cheek so softly she could barely perceive his lips. But they were there. And then he was gone, apparating into nothingness with a loud POP.
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She wouldn't shed more tears over him, she just couldn't. And yet her eyes were burning and her throat was doing that choking, sobbing thing. She wanted to know his secrets, she wanted to be a part of his life. She liked worrying about him because it meant that she was close enough to him to see the danger. She liked that he was annoyingly protective because that meant she had some importance to him. Now he had taken off to somewhere in England and she had no idea if she'd ever see him again. She remembered the blood rushing from his mouth with a dark chill.
She was staying at a nice wizard hotel in New York's hidden magical section and she was surprised at how modernized it was compared to Diagon Alley. The hotel was clean and beautiful and she keyed into her room with a sigh of fatigue. She took off her jacket in the dark, placing her bag by the door. Then she heard a noise. Footsteps and rustling. She drew her wand and crept carefully through the pitch black towards the sound.
"Petrificus Totalis!" she shouted, aiming evenly at the blur of a white shirt on the other side of the room. Her shot was perfect, resulting in a loud thump on the floor. Flicking on the lights she ran to examine the prowler.
"Honestly Ron!" she squeaked, blushing as she waved the enchantment off him. "What are you doing here?"
He glared at her with an annoyed look. "Did you honestly think I wouldn't come when I received word that you found my best mate?"
The redness in her face turned to crimson. "I told you not to bother, that I would arrange for a time when you could travel safely" she reminded him.
"Like I could possibly wait" Ron snorted. "Well? Where is he?"
"England" she replied miserably, sinking down onto the plush king size mattress.
"W-what?!" Ron sputtered his eyes wide as saucers.
"Oh Gods Ron… he's changed so much. I mean, his life is a complete mess. How did we let him get like this?"
"He didn't give us much choice" Ron softly spoke. He watched as she crawled up wordlessly into the bed and under the covers. He laid next to her but when he touched her back she grew stiff and he retracted his hand. He felt like she was worlds away.
He turned out the lights with a gesture of his wand and lay by himself in the darkness. He wondered if this was part of a normal relationship but he knew it wasn't. They'd been together for two years and she still never told him things. Right now he knew she had a lot on her mind but she was so quiet. The trouble was, he wasn't any better. He had imagined that their trusting friendship and passionate understanding would be enough to fuel a long lasting future but now he was beginning to doubt it.
He wanted to laugh when she wanted to be serious, he liked going to pubs when she preferred staying in. The bickering had never stopped and sometimes he accidentally would hurt her with his words and that made him feel awful.
Suddenly Hermione's cell phone rang and Ron jumped, still not used to the crazy device her parents had bought for her. Hermione was clearly still awake as she crossed the room to her bag.
"Hello?" she yawned.
"Hermione? This is Aunt Jane. It's your daddy love. He's in the hospital."
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She had left as quickly as humanly possible. Unlike Harry she couldn't just apparate across an ocean and she had to make a stop at the international floo station where she paid to get sent over to her parent's house which she had felt could be safely attached to the floo network after Harry defeated Voldemort. Ron was trailing her the whole way asking her questions to which she had no answer.
She gasped when she saw the house. Things were tossed about and knocked over, a lamp lying shattered across the floor. "Bloody hell" Ron cursed. "What happened here?"
"I don't know" she whispered for what felt like the millionth time. Her mother's car was still in the garage and she found the keys for it right where her inanely neat parents always kept them.
"Oh no, we aren't driving are we?" Ron asked, his voice squeaking a little. Playing Quidditch high above the ground on a rod of wood was okay for him but driving at high speeds in a metal box with wheels nauseated him.
"You don't have to come" she said in a tired voice, walking into the garage without him.
"Don't be ridiculous. I'm coming, even if your parents don't like me. I want to be there for you."
"Its not that they don't like you" she argued in a rather petty way. The engine started with a rumble. "They just don't think you're right for me."
Ron wanted to say, "maybe they're right" but he knew it wasn't the right time. She looked pale but as resolved as ever and she pulled out into the quiet street with a loud screech of wheels.
The muggle hospital was busy and bright in a way that made Hermione's temples throb. She looked at the directory quickly and followed it to the trauma ward. She was walking so quickly Ron had to half jog to keep up with her. All her Aunt had said was that there'd been some sort of incident and her father received an injury that wasn't fatal but beyond that Aunt Jane knew very little. Now they found her sitting in the waiting room gently rubbing Mrs. Granger's back to sooth her.
"What happened?" Hermione asked, her eyes wild with concern.
Aunt Jane's jaw dropped. She didn't know about Hermione's magical talents. "I thought you were in New York City. How did you get here so quick?"
"I-uh-wasn't" Hermione ended lamely.
"She cut the trip short last night because of a death in uh… my family" Ron chimed in with a decent save.
"I'm so sorry to hear that" Aunt Jane offered sympathetically.
"It's alright. It was just my brother Percy. He's a bit of a…"
Hermione cut him off before he got carried away in his fantasy of Percy's untimely demise, which had yet to transpire. "How's Dad?"
Beth Granger looked up at her daughter with watery eyes and then stood, pulling Hermione into a firm hug. "Oh Hermione it was terrible!" Hermione felt shaken by her mother's frailty. She was used to a bossy, know-it-all Beth Granger.
"Tell me" Hermione begged.
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Beth Granger awoke to the noise of breaking glass. She sat straight up in her bed feeling frightened from a bizarre dream in which she had been begging a young man to save her life and he himself bled and began to die.
Now she was much more terrified by the noises coming from downstairs. She turned to her husband and violently shook him awake. "Douglass! Doug! There's somebody in the house."
He muttered incoherently and then his eyes fluttered open. "What?" he asked with a tone of dismay.
She never got a chance to answer her husband because at that moment their bedroom door flew open with such violence that it smashed against the wall with a loud bang. She screamed a little in spite of herself and she felt her husband's arm wrap around her shoulders. The light flicked on revealing a broad shouldered man with a pock marked face and slick black hair. He had a gun aimed at them and Beth felt like she couldn't swallow, like she might choke to death.
"What is the meaning of this?" Doug Granger asked in a false bravado.
The ugly thug smirked. "I want the combination to that safe down in your pretty little sitting room."
"There's no money or drugs in that vault," Doug told him in a wary tone. "Just paper work."
"Yeah, right, and I'm the tooth fairy. What's the combo jack ass?"
"It requires a combination and a key," Doug continued, trying to keep his tone even. "Just let me reach into this desk and get it out."
The thug's stare widened as Doug reached for the handle. He leapt across the bed and grabbed Doug by the front of his pajama shirt, ripping him from the bed and tossing him to his knees on the floor. "Thought I'm stupid huh? Thought you'd pull a gun on me? There's no key. Give me the damn pass code!" He went to strike Doug across the head with the butt of his gun for dramatic effect but in his vigor he must have struck harder than he intended because a spray of blood splattered across the white bedroom wall and Doug crumbled to the ground motionless.
"Douglass!" Beth screamed, wrestling the covers away to go to him.
"Don't move" the thug warned her, aiming the gun at her head. "Just give me the combination."
"I don't know it!" She sobbed. He asked her three times until she was screaming the truth; she positively did not know the combination, Doug had never told her and she never asked. It really did require a key and it really did just have papers and a couple family heirlooms of a delicate nature and little monetary value. The thug pulled the hammer back on the gun and grit his teeth.
"Too bad lady" he muttered. She heard a bang and she closed her eyes knowing it was the end, ready for pain and blood and darkness. But it never came. When she reopened them there was another back facing her, a tall man with a collared button up shirt that was quickly turning damp with blood. He was standing between her and the gun, but where had he come from? She watched him grab the assailant to thrust him into the wall whilst seizing the firearm. He bashed the thug across his ugly mug and then turned to her. It was the young man from her dream. He gave her a little wave, almost as if shy and then disappeared again.
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Beth told Hermione the story out of earshot of her sister whom she knew would declare her insane. "Who was the boy Hermione?" she asked, looking desperate to know.
Hermione was about to say she didn't know but then suddenly it clicked and she felt like an idiot for not knowing immediately. "I can't believe it" she whispered, covering her mouth in shock and taking an unsteady step back from her mother. "Black hair? Green eyes?"
"Yes! Yes!" her mother nodded eagerly.
"Mom, the man, the one who took the bullet for you. That was Harry Potter."
Beth blanched. "Your friend?" she asked softly. "Oh no Hermione. I'm so sorry. Why? How? I'm so confused."
"Me too mum" was all she could manage before nearly passing out in a nearby seat.
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It was another sleepless 24 hours. Her father had suffered a concussion leaving him still unconscious and her best friend was quite possibly dead. Ron tried to stay there for her but eventually he nodded off and she woke him and told him he ought to get a real sleep in a real bed. He didn't put up much argument but made her promise to call if anything changed with her father or especially if she got any news of how Harry was doing. He told her he'd enquire at St. Mungo's about Harry possibly being admitted there before he let himself fall into an unmoving Ronald Weasley sleep.
Now she found her self in a half asleep state in which her eyes were open but she was having a dream about the time she had let Harry go on to get the Sorcerer's Stone and she found herself mumbling "I don't want to let him go, I don't want to accept this". Then her damn cell phone woke her again.
"HELLO? HERMIONE?" She heard Ron shouting from the other side. He still hadn't quite grasped the common use of phones.
"I'M ON A FELLYTONE THEY HAVE AT ST. MUNGO'S," he continued. "HARRY ISN'T HERE." She got a sick feeling in her gut.
"Okay Ron, thanks love. Get some sleep. And please don't shout."
"Oh… right" he replied at a slightly lower decibel. "You ought to rest yourself you know."
She smiled faintly at his concern. "I can't Ron. You know me."
"Yeah" he yawned fondly. "Obsessed with Harry." The words had slipped out of his unconscious and through his mouth. He suddenly felt very awake with shock. "I didn't mean it like that. I mean, you love him like I do; he's our best mate. And you're Hermione Granger the worry wart."
She said nothing, the three words still ringing in her ears. She heard a distant good bye and a click but the phone stayed at her ear. Obsessed with Harry. Obsessed with Harry.
She wandered down to the hospital cafeteria desperate for a cup of coffee. Aunt Jane had brought a very sleepy Beth Granger home hours ago and now her Grandparents sat vigil in the waiting room, hoping he would awake any moment. She slowly made her way back, sipping her drink, and when she got there the doctor was talking to her grandparents.
"What happened?" she asked, taking her grandfather's warm hand.
"Your father is awake Ms. Granger. If you'd like to see him." She almost dropped the coffee, quickly following the doctor in. "There doesn't appear to be any lasting damage, the head trauma may create chronic, severe migraines for some time but those should fade after a while."
Hermione smiled at him gratefully and then went to her father's side. His head was bandaged but he was smiling at her. "My girl" he grinned.
"Daddy" she sobbed, finally letting the tears fall.
"The doctor said your mom is okay. I was so scared something had happened to her. He said that man… that crook was knocked out when the police got there but they don't know how. It doesn't matter though, so long as she's unharmed."
Now she saw in his eyes how afraid he had been for his wife and she took his hand, kissing the back of it firmly. She was speechless by the love he had for his family, something so strong and enduring she wondered what it was like to feel that. Was it grown with time or had he known from their first few years?
"Harry saved her," Hermione whispered. "My friend Harry, you know, the stupid self sacrificing courageous one." She felt more tears spill down her cheeks.
Doug Granger clenched his jaw. "I don't know how but all I can say is that I owe him so much gratitude, more than you can even understand."
"Oh, but I do understand" she sighed, looking away out the window and releasing his hand. A moment of silence lapsed and he studied his daughter closely. She had grown into such a powerful, intelligent girl, beautiful and courageous, everything he loved of his wife and himself and then some. He touched the back of her hand delicately.
"For a moment, when I saw that gun pointed at me I was so sure I was a dead man. And do you know what my last thought was? I thought `Please don't let it end like this, I have to see my daughter again. I want to see her get married; I want to be there to give her away to the perfect man. I want to see her float down the aisle like a dream and in the moment have all the happiness dark days have robbed her of.' Will you ever have that happy moment Hermione?"
She gave him a baffled look. "I'm only 20 Dad. I'm sure I'll marry, just not so soon."
"I don't mean marriage, I mean, will you ever let those dark thoughts go? I don't know everything about your battles in the wizarding world but I know when you sleep in your old room you scream from nightmares. I know when you smile its only half a smile. Just last night I saw evil and greed and all the terrible things in human nature. But we can't let these things stain us Hermione, we can't let them make us less than human…"
"We can't let them make us feel dead," she mumbled, thinking of Harry. Suddenly the misty look in her eyes vanished and her vision grew sharp and clear. She turned to him and kissed his cheek. "I need to go find someone," she said with a sad smile.
"I know you do honey. I'll be just fine."
He watched her leave the room and he felt happier than usual despite a swollen head.
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Harry laid in an all too familiar setting staring at the vaulted ceiling and ignoring the lingering pain from where he'd been shot. It had been close, too close. He'd barely gotten there in time and he kept remembering Mr. Granger's blood pooling from his head to the carpet. Maybe he'd been just a little too late and the agony of not knowing was ripping him apart. Once he'd tried to sneak out but just sitting up made him black out and crumble back down dizzy. Madam Pomfrey gave him a good scolding over the matter.
Hogwarts was open again and he knew they'd keep his malady a secret as long as one of the sneaky students didn't find out. The hospital wing looked the same but it felt different. There was no Ron and Hermione there fretting over him and although he'd pretended to despise it in the past, he missed them now. He wondered how long it would take Hermione to figure out he'd been in her parents' house. Not long he figured. She was ridiculously clever.
And of course, that was why he knew he'd been in love with her for years. He had kept that part out of his story when he'd talked to her. He neglected to mention how it pained him to see her with Ron, how he was ashamed of his jealousy, how he compared every woman he'd ever met in New York City to her.
He closed his eyes, hoping to sleep. How long had it been since he'd really slept? He couldn't say with any certainty, but now he felt the insomnia gobbling him up. He heard a rustle at the curtain beside his bed. He feigned sleep so Pomfrey wouldn't force any nasty potions on him.
"I know you're awake Potter" said a voice. He opened his eyes quickly and she was standing there at his bedside, an unreadable expression in her features.
"Your father?" he asked quickly. She almost laughed at how selfless he was.
"He's fine Harry. You saved him and my mother. But, I thought…I thought…"
"You thought I was dead" he finished for her. "If the Dark Lord can't kill me, a lousy bullet sure as hell can't do it. These things just kill my soul and will, not this pathetic body."
"You don't have to live with a dead spirit" she sighed, sitting down on the bedside, her added weight barely making an effect on the mattress. He looked away. "Harry I…" she paused a moment, gently touching his shoulder.
"Out of body warning" he quickly interrupted as if he didn't want to hear what she had to say. "I've only had one message like that before. They're incredibly urgent and powerful; its like everything suddenly goes black and all I can see is the person's spirit. When they're dead, they look black and rotting, they have empty eye sockets and they're horrifying. But sometimes, when something bad is about to happen people's souls will leave their body and come to me to beg for help. I know they aren't dead because instead of looking evil and dark, they look bright and radiant. Your mother came to me about the robber even though it hadn't happened yet."
"Does it hurt?" Hermione asked.
"The blood is just a side effect" he shrugged. "Its gross but aside from choking on it, its not really dangerous. What hurts is the feeling that my head is being ripped apart, that there's air just expanding in my skull and it will explode. Its hard to get used to."
"You have a way of understating things" she commented, not wanting to seem tearful, trying to be understanding of what he was telling her. There was a long silence and neither of them looked at each other, gazing off in opposite directions. "I love you," she finally whispered in an almost inaudible voice. He said nothing and she felt a pang of anxiety well up inside her. These were the unspoken words she had kept locked away for so long, as far from her heart and mind as possible. Now they were floating in the air and she knew he didn't return her love. He was protective of her because he was a hero, he trusted her because he was a friend. He had never loved her and now she wondered if he was even capable of loving anymore. Maybe he really was dead on the inside. She stood up and turned her back, needing to leave and be alone and cry.
"Wait" he almost yelled, his voice frantic. "Please wait. I- I love you too." Now he was the one having trouble talking. "More than you could even understand" he continued, his voice growing stronger and his eyes lighting up as he spoke. "The way you care about me and believe in me when nobody else will, the way you get that determined gleam in your eye, the way you never cower back. You've seen a little bit of hell and you know what its like. Our kind are so few Hermione. Once you see such evil you can never be like everybody else, but you understand and you always have."
She felt speechless. Was this really Harry Potter? How had her life changed so much in 48 hours? But then he said the single name that sat in the room like an elephant. Ron. And nothing had ever been more confusing in her life.
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It was hard to remember back to the days when Christmas had felt lonely. Now it was such a joyous time and Hermione strolled about the house humming a carol as she waved about her wand to hang mistletoe and holly as well as the occasional wreath. The house felt warm and cozy and smelled clean with the scent of cinnamon drifting in from the kitchen. She still found it hard to believe she lived in such a beautiful house and as she went into the kitchen she felt full and delirious with joy.
Mr. and Mrs. Granger were reading a Christmas story to their grandson Tyler who was only 5 but very articulate and intelligent. Her husband insisted Tyler took after her.
"Well? Where's Ronald?" Asked Mrs. Granger, looking up from the book.
"On his way" Hermione smiled, pouring herself a cup of tea.
"We're very nearly done with this book. He's supposed to be bringing one about the wizard who invented snow or something like that" Mr. Granger laughed.
As if on cue Ron came through the door, stamping the snow off his feet. "Happy Christmas!" he grinned. He walked over to Hermione and kissed her cheek, his lips cold from the storm outside. "Where's my boy?" He looked around and located Tyler sitting between his grandparents.
"I'm not your kid!" Tyler laughed at his goofy uncle. "You have your own children!"
"Speaking of which" Hermione interrupted, "where is Luna?"
"She brought the brats to her father's for a little. She should be here soon."
"Wicked" Tyler grinned. His cousins were ten-year-old twins, both girls but he liked to play with them; they always had great games.
It had taken Hermione a while to convince her husband they should have a child. He loved kids but he was afraid of the sort of father he would make. Yet in the five years since she had given birth to Tyler he had proved himself to be an excellent Dad. She watched as Ron handed her parents the promised book and she walked into the dining room where the table was set and a giant Christmas tree stood complete with twinkling candles. Two hands came around covering her eyes. "Guess who?" a voice whispered in her ear, giving her stomach a fluttery feeling.
"Knock it off Harry" she smiled, turning into his arms. "How was work?"
"I hate going in on the holidays" he frowned.
"Well, that comes with the territories of owning your own major business" she teased. It had been twelve years since he'd moved back to the wizarding world. Unable to engage in any full time job due to his sporadic, horrific episodes he decided to use his savings to upstart a few small businesses for a share of the profits. Both went from struggling to great success with his help and over time expanded into international chains. He continued to fund various projects and industries creating "Potter Enterprises". He had to go to board meetings time and again but he managed to spend a lot of time at home which allowed him to keep his dwelling condition private.
He kissed her with a broad smile. "Wait until you see what I got you for Christmas."
"Better not be another kid" she half joked. "Tyler raises enough hell alone. He really must take after his father."
"Oh, but he got being a wise ass from his mother" he retorted as she walked away.
Dinner was a feast of many courses. Doug Granger watched with annoyance as his son-in-law pushed the food around his plate, eating very little. "I don't get it. You eat like a bird but you're built like an athlete."
Harry gave him a wan smile but Hermione gave her father a warning look. Doug knew Harry had some sort of weird health complication that had to do with his seeing dead people or whatever it was he did. Doug felt bad for the guy but he couldn't help but tease him; he always liked making jokes at people he liked.
Harry looked around the table at the Grangers and Weasleys. He noted that one seat was empty and he gave his wife a puzzled look. She rolled her eyes. "He said he'd be late."
"Ho ho ho Brits" called a voice from the other room. "Sorry I'm late there was this whole thing with fire and…"
"Do us a favor Jas" Harry asked. "Save it for later".
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