Disclaimer: All things HP belong to JKR and not me.
Author's Note: Angst alert! Because my Muse wanted to write of H/Hr breaking up and when my Muse wants something, mine is not to question, mine is but to write or die.
Posted in 3 parts, because even though it started out as a one-shot, it ended up having a (very short) Prologue and an Epilogue too.
A Long Way Home
Prologue: Dream
Last night, I dreamed of him again.
In my dream, I saw him standing at the other end of a busy street.
People were moving past us, children laughing, adults talking, arguing, laughing, all busy and all preoccupied with their own lives and their own concerns. And in the middle of it all, there he was.
I saw him first, recognized him even from that distance, as I think I should have recognized him from any distance. There was no mistaking that unruly hair that no comb could ever make lie flat. There was no mistaking his stance either; I knew the way he carried himself, the way he walked. I recognized that tilt of his head.
Even now, after years had gone by.
I knew I would recognize him even if a century had gone by.
I had known everything there was to know about him. I knew of his dreams and his nightmares; I knew the way he woke up in the mornings, first squinting, then blinking, in that brief moment of disorientation he usually had. I knew the way he liked to be touched, knew the way he liked to touch me. I had felt the solid warmth of his back and chest beneath my hands, felt the way he trembled when I touched his erection. I had known what it felt like to have him inside me, filling me, stretching me. I had seen the look on his face when he hit his climax and heard his cries and his groans. I had heard my name on his lips at the moment of ecstasy. I knew the tenderness of his touch and the force of his passion.
I knew the intensity of all his emotions.
And I knew, too, the hurt that I had caused him.
I knew the moment he saw me because he stopped moving, his entire body stilled, and he simply stared.
For a moment, we both stood staring at each other, unmindful of everyone else around us.
I saw the beginnings of a smile on his lips and then I was moving towards him, first walking, and then running. Running, running, until I threw myself at him and felt his arms close around me with enough force to push the breath from my body.
I was crying and laughing at the same time, with a hysteria that I would have been ashamed of at any other time and would never have shown anyone except for him.
I heard him breathe my name in that way he had that I loved, that soft, husky, caressing whisper that made my name an endearment and a prayer-and just the one word gave me forgiveness and absolution at the same time. He said my name the way every woman dreamed of hearing her name spoken, with a mixture of love and longing, the way I'd dreamed of hearing him say my name for years now. "Hermione…"
And then he was kissing me and I knew that I was finally home…
Last night, I dreamed of him again and I was happy.
And this morning, I awoke, alone again.
~To be continued…