You're WHAT?!

Author’s Note: Well, that’s it. It’s over. The H.M.S. Harmony has been sunk by the cannon of canon. JK Rowling herself said it. It’s not changing, folks. Well you know what? I don’t give a damn. I guess this just means we’re all writing Alternate Universe stories now, and I can certainly live with that. So I’m coming out of my self-imposed hiatus to write this, and for once, I’m not waiting until I finish it to start posting, and then post chapter by chapter. No, I’m doing this the traditional way, the way you all probably do it. As I write a chapter, it goes up. Now, be forewarned, this may well mean that the story never gets finished. I’ll try, but I give no guarantees.

Morning. Why, why, why did it have to be morning? Why in Merlin’s name couldn’t he just sleep until noon, just this once? He was, after all, allegedly the savior of the Wizarding World. Couldn’t the savior sleep in a little? Harry sighed. Probably not. He could almost hear Hermione insisting he get out of bed and get started on the day. I’ll bet they let Dumbledore in after he defeated Grindelwald. He sat up and pulled the curtains aside, probably the biggest mistake he could have possibly made. The bright sunlight spiked into his eyes, blinding him instantly.

“Ack!” Harry fell back onto his bed, his hands over his eyes.

Brilliant, Potter, now you’re the blind savior of the Wizarding World. He rubbed his eyes and opened them slowly, letting himself get accustomed to the morning sunlight. He fumbled around for his glasses on the nightstand, but they weren’t there.

“Oh, right,” he muttered. Once again, he reached up to his smooth forehead, rubbing where his scar used to be.

When he had defeated Voldemort, there had been a surge of magical energy, and just before the connection between their wands severed for the final time, all of the magic Voldemort had stored within himself moved through the connection into Harry. When Harry awoke in St. Mungo’s two days later, he found that the energy had fixed his vision and healed his scar, not to mention every other lasting injury he had acquired over the course of his life. The leg that had shattered in the final battle felt better than it had done before.

Harry stretched. The curtains around Ron’s bed were as yet undisturbed.

He’s probably relying on me to wake him up. Harry shrugged. I might as well, Merlin knows I’d rather be woken up by a friend than by my alarm clock. Especially if I get in late. Ron hadn’t been in bed when Harry turned in the night before, and he supposed he was celebrating somewhere. Parties were still going on all over Hogwarts, and since classes were still suspended, nobody really felt they had enough reason, or, really, authority, to tell the students to stop celebrating the downfall of the worst threat to the Wizarding World in recent memory, possibly in all of history.

Harry drew Ron’s curtains aside, and froze. Ron was in bed, but he wasn’t alone. Lying next to him, and indeed, partially on top of him, her bushy brown hair spread across his chest, was Hermione. The lack of anything covering her shoulders or upper back gave Harry a rather large clue as to the nature of the rest of her body, and, indeed, her activities with Ron the previous night.

Harry felt as if somebody had punched him in the gut. He knew, of course, that they were together. He’d be a horrible friend if he didn’t. And he was happy for them, he really was. But that didn’t change the fact that he was in love with her. Faced with the impossible conflict of being happy for them, while at the same time, being insanely jealous of Ron, and horribly lovesick for Hermione, Harry had put up a shield around his feelings, and while he didn’t withdraw from them, per se, he wasn’t quite as open with them as he had been previously. He knew Hermione had noticed, she had talked with him about it, but he had written it off to her as anticipation of the ever-nearing final battle. After the battle, Harry figured he would have to come up with something new, but apparently Hermione had written it off to the psychological aftermath of a horrible trauma, which nobody could argue that the final battle was not. She had not, however, allowed him to withdraw as he had tried to do. She let Ron go off to some of the parties alone, and she spent time with Harry, helping him work through some of the intense depression he was feeling.

At that point, however, she was soundly asleep, blissfully unaware of the gut-wrenching effects her bare back was having on her best friend. Harry closed the curtains, and sat down heavily on his bed, hanging his head.

That was a nice little bludger to the stomach, he thought miserably. It certainly drove that point home nicely. Deciding to leave his two best friends to get up on their own, considering he couldn’t even face the idea of them being that kind of together, Harry quickly dressed and headed downstairs.

Author’s note: Well folks, maybe my muse is back! Maybe I’m just back from hiatus. This story seems to be getting itself written pretty damn quickly so far. Or maybe it’s just the hellraiser in me, subbing in for my muse, wanting to give a big ‘screw you’ to every R/Hr shipper out there who’s wearing a stupid smug grin on his/her face.

Hermione awoke to a small sliver of sunlight poking through the curtain, illuminating the entirety of the inside of the bed. She smiled as she remembered the night before. Ron had been kind, gentle, understanding, all of the things he hadn’t been before. He had really grown up a lot in the past couple of months. She looked up at Ron’s face and, reaching up, stroked his cheek softly.

“Good morning, sleepy-head,” she said softly.

“Mmmmmm…g’morning,” he mumbled softly, his eyes opening, and a grin spreading across his entire face.

“How’re you feeling?” Hermione crossed her arms over Ron’s chest and leaned her chin on top.

“Amazing.” Ron stroked her hair softly. “How about you?”

“Wonderful,” she said with a big grin. “I really want to thank you for last night,” she said softly, a blush spreading across her cheeks. “I’m sorry I…”

“Shhhhhhhhh, don’t worry about it,” replied Ron. “You’re not ready. It’s fine. We won’t go any faster than you want to go, Hermione. Just being here with you was terrific.”

“Thank you, Ron,” she said, moving up and giving him a kiss. “I think it’s time for us to get up, though.”

“I don’t know, I’m awfully comfortable right here,” he said, drawing an arm around her waist. “Couldn’t we just stay here for a few more minutes?”

“Well, okay,” she relented. “It’s not as if we have class.” She rested her head on Ron’s shoulder, and looked up, really only registering the sliver of sunlight through the curtains for the first time.

That’s odd, I was sure we had closed them all the…Her face fell.

“Oh,” she said softly, too much so for Ron to hear. “Oh, no.” Hermione felt an ache in her heart.

He saw us, she thought unhappily. He has to think we…oh, Harry, I’m so sorry. She closed her eyes, trying not to think about how much she must have hurt her best friend.

Hermione had known Harry was in love with her for at least as long as, and possibly longer than he had himself known. She had tried to shield him from her relationship with Ron as much as was possible without allowing Ron to know, but she could see the pain in his eyes every time they were together. The smile that he put on for them, telling them he was happy for them only made it worse, because she knew he was torturing himself with guilt for wanting anything other than what was apparently making them both happy.

I wish you would let me help you, she thought, remembering the times they would sit together, just the two of them, while Ron had gone off to various parties, at Hermione’s urging. She was there for Harry, she wanted to help him, but she knew he had to initiate it himself, it was his damn pride. She couldn’t offer any help, because it would mean admitting she knew how he felt about her, and that would crush him. She accepted his lies about why he was pulling away from them, because to do otherwise would tell him she knew, but she refused to allow him to move too far away.

After a few minutes, Hermione managed to convince Ron that it was time to get up.

“Can I ask you to close your eyes?” Hermione felt herself blushing bright red as she sat up, clutching the sheet to her chest.

“Anything for you, Hermione,” he said as he put his arm over his eyes and squeezed them shut. “I want you to be comfortable.”

“Thanks,” She kissed him on the cheek, and pulled her clothes together, pulling them on hastily. “Okay, you can open your eyes now.” Ron sat up, and put his arms around Hermione. “Do we really have to get up now?”

“That depends,” said Hermione, arching an eyebrow. “Do you want to miss breakfast?”

“Time to get up,” said Ron, grabbing his boxers. Hermione laughed and stood up.

“I’ll see you downstairs,” she said, closing the curtains.

She descended the stairs slowly, knowing full well she’d find Harry on the sofa by the window, trying not to look up the stairs, knowing she would be coming down them. She sighed. Sure enough, Harry was in his usual spot, and as soon as she saw him, he looked away, staring out the window. The bright sunny morning was already starting to fade, clouds beginning to gather almost as if they were congregating for a meeting. They looked rather like stormclouds, too, and Hermione sighed again. She had been hoping for a nice day so they could spend the day out on the grounds. She was more or less sick of parties. She didn’t feel much like celebrating, not when her best friend was in so much pain.

She sat down next to Harry on the sofa, shoving everything down below the surface, everything that might give away to Harry what she knew, the action at which she had become so good it made her want to throw up. She was sick of hiding things, but she had to help Harry as best she could, and that meant he couldn’t know.

“Morning, Harry,” she said tentatively.

“Morning,” he said softly, still staring out the window.

“Did you sleep well?” She peered around, trying to get him to make eye contact, but his gaze didn’t budge.

“Uh-huh. Didn’t want to get up.”

“Harry,” she said softly, placing her hand on his shoulder. She opened the door just the tiniest bit, allowing her voice to fill with concern. “Are you okay?”

“I dunno,” he said softly, and she had to slam the door shut again to prevent her eyes from filling with tears. It was her fault he felt like this, and she couldn’t even apologize.

Just then, Ron came down the stairs, and approached the sofa.

“I’ll be right back,” said Hermione softly, and stood up, meeting Ron halfway between the stairs and the sofa.

“What’s the matter?” Ron looked over at Harry.

“I don’t know,” she lied, feeling her stomach twist as she did so. “But I think he needs me, Ron. Can you go down without me? I’m not really hungry anyway.”

“I’d like to help,” said Ron. “I can skip breakfast if there’s anything I can do.”

“I don’t think so, Ron, but that’s really really sweet of you. I think he just needs a shoulder right now.”

“Okay, but I want to do something. Maybe I can get him up on a broom later…” Ron looked out the window. “Maybe not.” The clouds had already covered the sky, and they looked ready to release at any minute. “I’ll find something,” he said. “I’ll see you after breakfast.” He kissed Hermione on the cheek, and headed out the portrait hole.

Hermione hoped Harry hadn’t seen Ron kiss her on the cheek. It would only compound his pain. Luckily, it looked as if his gaze hadn’t moved since she sat down.

Sitting down next to Harry again, Hermione tucked her feet under her and touched Harry’s knee. She decided the direct approach would probably be best.

“Harry, I’m here, I want to help you, please talk to me.” Harry turned to her, and she could see turmoil behind his eyes. She had a feeling that she was going to get a glimpse of a depth of Harry that she had not visited for quite a long time.

“Hermione,” he began, but paused. She could see indecision painted all over his face. He wasn’t even trying to hide the battle going on inside him whether or not to really talk to her.

“Harry, you can tell me. I’m here for you.” She put a hand on his shoulder. “You can tell me anything, Harry, really, anything.” Her hopes that he would maybe decide to actually tell her everything were dashed when he laughed once, softly, probably thinking it had been too soft for her to hear. “Please, Harry, I want to help you.”

“I…” Harry looked her straight in the eyes, and for just an instant, bared his soul to her. She didn’t flinch, just reached up and touched his face softly.

“I’m sorry, Harry,” she breathed. “I didn’t realize you were hurting so badly. Please let me help.” It was the truth. In that one instant, Hermione saw all the pain Harry was feeling, and realized she hadn’t even come close to understanding how much she had hurt him.

“I don’t know where I belong anymore,” he said softly. While she knew that was far from the worst of it, she could just tell that he was, in fact, beginning to really open up to her again. “As much as I wanted to fight it, I was the boy who lived. As much as I didn’t want to be, that was who I was, that was my purpose, to…to kill Voldemort.” Harry’s voice shook. Hermione could tell that the fact that he had killed somebody, even somebody as vile as Voldemort, was eating away at Harry. “And now, now he’s gone, and I don’t have a purpose anymore. I don’t even have…I don’t have anything.”

That wasn’t what you were going to say, she thought miserably.

“You’ll find where you belong, Harry, I know you will. That wasn’t your only purpose. If it was, you wouldn’t be here anymore. If you had a purpose, and that was why you were alive, then you must still have one now if you’re still alive.”

“I suppose,” said Harry softly.

“Come here,” she whispered, and pulled Harry into a hug.

I wish you would stop being so damn noble and just open up to me. Blow up at me if you have to, just show me something.

“Hermione, I…”

Come on, she pleaded Harry silently. Please, let me in.

“I’ll be okay,” he said, pulling out of her arms. “I don’t want you worrying about me.”

“Don’t do this, Harry,” she said softly. “Don’t push me away. I want to be there for you. I want to help you.” She felt tears threatening to roll down her cheeks. “Please, Harry.”

“I need to sort this out myself, I think,” he said, standing up. “I think I’m going to go for a walk.”

And with that, he walked across the common room, and through the portrait hole, leaving Hermione alone in the common room, wishing for her best friend back, and not quite sure why she felt quite so sorely rejected.

Author’s Other Note: Wow, I can’t believe this. Two chapters in one night. But I promised you chapters as I finished them, and I just finished this one. That’s it for tonight, though, it’s almost four in the morning, and I have class tomorrow. I’d like to thank everybody who has already reviewed, and is actually up at this insane hour of the morning. G’nite all, and I hope you enjoyed this chapter (feelin’ a little better now, Flint&Steel?).

Author’s note: No, I’ve not given up on the story, no, it’s not finished, yes, I’m still working on it. It’s just coming a little slower now, that’s all. Don’t expect any more nights with more than one chapter. I don’t know how long this will be, I have no specific length plan, chapters will be written for as long as I feel they have something left in them to write. They might be insanely short, they might be a bit on the longer side, but for those of you who have not read my other multi-chapter stories, the chapters just don’t tend to be that long. I don’t write novel-length stories. Sorry if that disappoints you, but such is the way I write. At any rate, enjoy, and I’ve not forgotten about you.

Harry walked straight out into the rain, hearing in his head, and promptly ignoring, a voice that sounded remarkably like Hermione’s telling him he shouldn’t be out walking in the pouring rain. He just didn’t care.

The rain seemed to welcome him, to take him in with open arms, and within minutes, he was soaked through. It made no difference, though, he just kept on walking.

“That was stupid, Harry,” he muttered. “You know you can’t tell her, and you almost blew it.” He sighed.

I came so close, so very close to ruining everything. He thought about Hermione’s face as he left the common room, and it felt as if somebody had closed a monkey wrench around his stomach and given a good sharp twist to it. If only you knew, Hermione. If only I really could tell you anything.

Harry reached up and touched his face, where Hermione’s hand had been just a short time before. To feel her hand on his skin, to feel her arms around him, it was indescribable. It almost broke his resolve. He almost spilled everything. He felt horrible leaving Hermione like that, but he didn’t have a choice. He couldn’t let her know. He had to be the supportive friend, but she was making it nearly impossible for him. She knew he was hurting, and wanted to help. She couldn’t possibly know she was making things so hard for him.

Thinking back to when their eyes met, Harry shook his head in frustration.

I never should have let her see it, he thought, kicking a stone. Now she’s just going to want to help me even more. I do have a way of making things more difficult, don’t I?

*****************************

Hermione sat in the common room, hugging her knees to herself, still watching the portrait hole.

I don’t even know what I’m waiting for. He’s not going to come back until he thinks I’m gone.

She looked over at where Harry had been sitting just minutes before, and felt a strange pull, a strange desire to sit there, to feel the warmth that he left behind. Almost on autopilot, she moved over to the end of the sofa where he had been, and felt a strange kind of comfort in the warmth that was still in the cushions. She leaned on the window and tried to think, tried to figure out what she could do to help her best friend.

I just wish he’d open up to me, and talk to me about what he’s feeling. I suppose it’s not going to happen, though. He probably doesn’t see how I could help him. She sighed. I may not be in love with him, but I still love him. I can’t stand seeing him like this, and knowing that it’s my fault… She felt a tear run down her cheek. I’m so sorry, Harry. You don’t deserve any of this. I wish I was a better friend, I wish I hadn’t hurt you, I wish… She looked down at the grounds, and saw a lone figure walking out in the storm. She gasped.

“Harry,” she whispered, knowing instinctively it was him. “Oh, Harry, no.”

She bolted up off of the couch and ran up the stairs to her room, taking them two at a time.

“Oh, Harry, I thought you were going to walk around the castle,” she muttered as she grabbed the cloak she had rain-proofed, ran downstairs, and back up to Harry’s room. She snatched his cloak off the hook and rain-proofed it as quickly as she could, and took off like a shot for the main doors. She threw her own cloak on as she pushed the heavy door open. Holding Harry’s cloak under hers, she ran in the direction she thought he was walking, her heart pounding in her chest. From the grounds, she recognized the direction in which he was heading, and she prayed she was wrong.

Not the whomping willow, please not the whomping willow. Her heart began to race even faster, and she sped up as images flashed before her mind’s eye, horrible pictures of what Harry would look like after walking into the range of the branches of the lethal tree. She had seen so much death already, so many horrible things done to the human body, and each image that she saw was progressively worse than the one before it.

Finally, after what felt like an eternity running through her own private hell, Hermione saw the whomping willow through the nearly torrential rain. Her heart stopped as she saw it thrashing wildly. Did he? Nearly petrified, terrified to move any closer for what she might see, Hermione willed herself forward with all of her might.

A wave of hot relief washed over her when she saw Harry, still intact, still whole, sitting just outside of the reach of the enraged tree. It could obviously sense him there, and was trying with all of it’s might to smash him to a pulp, but he was sitting mere inches out of reach.

“Harry!” Hermione sprinted the final distance and threw her arms around him, pulling him back a couple of feet. She pulled his cloak out and wrapped it around him. “Harry, what are you…why…don’t you have…” She plunged into a frantic silence, knowing the answers to all of those questions, and not liking any of them, but still needing some kind of explanation.

“I wasn’t going to do it,” he said calmly, turning to look at the tree, still thrashing angrily. “I thought about it, but I wasn’t going to do it.” He turned back to her, the numb look on his face gone, replaced with the expression she had come to know far too well as of late, trying to mask pain greater than anything the whomping willow could have inflicted upon him. It was impossible to know from looking at her, wet as she was from the rain despite her cloak, but Hermione had finally seen more than she could suppress, and tears were flowing down her face freely, mixing with the cool raindrops.

“Promise me you’ll never do this again,” she choked out, holding his shoulders firmly. “Please, Harry, promise me.” She looked into his eyes, and could see, added into all the pain from before, regret from knowing how much what he did upset her, and in that one case, she didn’t care. She knew that that would keep him from doing it again. “I can’t lose you, Harry. We didn’t get through all of that to lose you now. I need to hear it from you, Harry. I need to hear you promise me.”

“I promise,” he said softly, nodding. “I’m sorry, Hermione.” He turned away, but she put a hand on his chin and turned his head back to face her again.

“It’s okay, you’re alright.” She shivered, unsure if she was cold, or just coming down from the intense adrenaline rush that had coursed through her when she first saw Harry. “Just please don’t do it again. We need you.” After a pause, she added “I need you.”

They stood, and made their way slowly, shakily, back to the castle. Breakfast had since let out, but nobody was in the halls, much to Hermione’s relief.

As they approached the common room, Harry’s stride began to shrink. It was obvious to Hermione he didn’t want to go in.

He probably knows Ron is in there.

Nevertheless, they reached the portrait hole, and Harry had said nothing, so Hermione gave the password and they entered.

Harry pulled away from her, not harshly, just away, and headed up the stairs to the boy’s dormitories. Hermione stood in the middle of the common room, looking up the stairs, feeling more helpless than she could ever remember feeling.

“Hermione, are you okay?” Ron approached her from a nearby sofa.

“I don’t know,” she said softly. She had a very strong feeling she wouldn’t be seeing Harry again for the rest of the day.

“Need a hug?” Ron peered into her eyes.

She nodded silently, and Ron wrapped his arms around her, drawing her close, apparently not caring that her cloak was still soaking wet. She leaned into his arms, placing her head on his shoulder, but she couldn’t help but notice that she felt no comfort from his embrace.

Author’s note: I really am sorry it’s taken me this long to write this next chapter, although, to be perfectly honest, I’m not at all sorry about the reason. The fact is, the problems I’ve been having with my personal life that have been fueling this story have more or less solved themselves, believe it or not. While this has resulted in extreme benefit for me, you all kind of got screwed, because it’s much harder to write this story without the problems I’ve been having. Nevertheless, it will be finished, it just might take awhile, and I may put out a couple of stories (one-shots probably) in the meantime, just because I’ve really started writing again, and those are coming a lot easier than this one is right now. I hope there isn’t a drop in quality for this story, I’ll try my best.

Sure enough, Harry was not heard from for the rest of the day. He didn’t come to lunch, and by the time dinner rolled around, he still showed no sign of coming out. Hermione was getting more worried by the minute. Ron had been aware of her tension all day, and had tried to ease it, to do something to calm her down, and she appreciated it, but for some reason, nothing he did seemed to help her. Finally, after dinner, sitting on the couch with Ron in the common room, his arm wrapped around her shoulders, something clicked in Hermione’s mind.

No, she thought, unsure as to whether to believe herself or not. No, that can’t be it. She looked up at Ron. There’s only one way to be sure.

“Ron?”

“Hmm?” Ron picked his head up off the back of the couch.

“Kiss me?”

“Of course.” He smiled, and leaned down to her, closing the already small gap between them, and pressing his lips to hers.

Nothing, she thought miserably as he pulled away again, his smile only having grown. He obviously felt something, but…

“Ron, I think we need to talk.” She sat up, moving slightly away from Ron as she did so, sitting cross-legged on the sofa facing him.

“Okay,” he said, warily, with the instinctual knowledge possessed by all males that those words rarely presaged anything good.

“I…I wish there was a good way to say this,” she began, knowing full well that what she had just said was already equivalent to breaking up in any teenager’s mind.

“You’re breaking up with me, aren’t you,” he said, looking down.

“I’m sorry, Ron, I truly am, I wanted it to work between us, but I just…” Hermione cursed herself in her mind for not having thoroughly thought out what she was going to say. “I didn’t feel anything,” she whispered, looking down. “I’m sorry.”

“You didn’t feel anything?” Ron looked as if he had just been punched in the gut, and Hermione could feel the guilt rising in her stomach like a cement building being poured out bit by bit. “The whole time, you didn’t feel anything?”

“No, I did, just…not in the end.”

“When? When did you stop feeling anything?”

“I…I don’t know,” she whispered, the fresh concrete of the now-skyscraper of guilt threatening to spill out of her eyes. “I’m sorry, Ron, I really am.” She knew she sounded like every horrible girl she had ever seen break up with a guy, exactly like the girls from whom she swore she’d be so different she’d belong to a different species. “I know you’re probably furious with me, and I can’t say I disagree with you. I want to still be your friend, and I hope one day you can forgive me.” She looked up tentatively, tears sitting at the corners of her eyes like olympic swimmers poised at the edge of their diving platforms.

“I…I need to think,” he said quietly, and stood up, walking up the stairs.

Left alone on the sofa, Hermione could not help but think about how much she had hurt her two best friends, her two only friends, the only two people who had ever cared about her outside her family. Making the emotional and seemingly-logical step to the conclusion that she was a horrible friend came with ease, and Hermione felt like the worst kind of scum. Hugging her knees to her chest, and feeling truly alone, Hermione allowed the tears through, and started to sob softly.

Author’s note: Yes, yes, I know, it’s short. And it’s late (to put it mildly). But this was a very hard part to write. And this chapter was never going to be long. Chapters are as long as they need to be.

Author’s note: I realize that it has been a very long time since I last updated, and I must apologize, but I feel it’s only fair to warn all of you who may be reading this that it will be a very long time before this is finished. I will keep my promise, I will finish it, but I have been dealing with a lot lately, and I have also been writing a lot of original material, and to be perfectly honest, I am kind of losing interest in writing fanfiction. Again, I will keep my promise, this story will finish, but I cannot speculate on when. And after I finish this I am going on indefinite hiatus. This may be the last story I write for portkey. At the same time, I may yet return. I do not know yet.