Mad, not Ill

What contented men desire

Rating: R
Genres: Angst, Romance
Relationships: Harry & Hermione
Book: Harry & Hermione, Books 1 - 6
Published: 12/03/2008
Last Updated: 12/03/2008
Status: completed

Semi-AU, picks up five years after Voldemort's death. Harry's married to Ginny, bue hisn't really happy. When he divorces her to woo Hermione, who's dating his best friend Ron, will things get any better? One-shot, kind of a sad fic. Rating for suicide themes at the end, so be forewarned.

Chapters

1. Mad, not Ill

1. Mad, not Ill

Story title adapted from American novelist Robert Anton Wilson: “Of course I’m crazy, but that doesn’t mean I’m wrong. I’m mad but not ill.”

Anyone who has read my other work knows it, but just in case you haven’t: Harry Potter is certainly not mine. I think it would be pretty obvious, since I’m posting it on Portkey rather than through Bloomsbury, but there you go.

Mad, but not Ill

8 December, 2002

Harry Potter turned the bouquet over in his hands a few times. Even though he had been absolutely sure ten minutes ago, he still needed to ask himself: What in the holy Hell was he doing? He was taking a leap of faith, no doubt about it. In the five years that had passed since the timely death of one Tom Marvolo Riddle, commonly referred to as Lord Voldemort, Harry had been content to live out his life in peace. He had sought solace in the arms of his old girlfriend, Ginny Weasley, and they had been married just two years ago. No children yet, with red hair and green eyes, and that was probably a good thing.

For someone who has desired nothing more or less than a family of his own for the better part of twenty-two years, it is most unusual to actually be pleased that he has no children. The reason for this lapse in logic is quite simple: he came to his goddamned senses; just a month ago he realized what a monumental mistake he was making. What was he doing married to Ginny, who had only ever wanted the status and wealth that came with being wife of the boy-who-most-righteously-kicked-Voldemort’s-ass, when the only person who had stood by him through thick or thin was seeking her own solace in the arms of another man? Maybe she didn’t feel the same, he didn’t know. But he had found an old journal of his dad’s, from the Marauders’ seventh year. He mentioned asking Lily out, seriously, for the first time, and said that ‘if you aren’t willing to stake everything on love, than you don’t deserve it in the first place.’

So there he was, standing with snow melting off his coat and a bouquet of red flowers in his hands, outside of the door to a one-bedroom apartment rented to Miss Hermione J. Granger. He knocked tentatively, shifting his weight as he wondered what he was going to say. He heard the bolt draw back, and the door opened to reveal the slightly flushed face of his one true love. She was dripping wet, a towel wrapped around her head, and was dressed in a white terrycloth bathrobe. She had evidently just gotten out of a shower. He managed a lopsided grin. “Hi.”

She looked at him for a moment, startled, with those gorgeous brown eyes. Then her face split into a smile, and she widened the entrance. “Hi there Harry, come on in.” He obliged her, hung his coat on the rack, and followed her to what passed for her lounge. “I’m glad you’re here.” She started, sounding oddly serious.

“I need to…”

“I think I should…”

They both chuckled. Harry inclined his head towards her, indicating that she should share her news first. “Alright then. You should know that Ron took me to dinner last night.” Damn, he had forgotten that. He knew they were dating, sure. He obviously figured that into his decision, and realized who he would rather have as a friend. “And, well…” She was very flustered. A glint of light on her left hand caught his eye. He could feel the blood rushing from his face. Oh no, oh dear sweet merciful God no. “He asked me to marry him. And I said yes!” She was positively gushing, but Harry was so engrossed in his own shattered heart that he didn’t see how hollow her eyes were.

He felt no joy, though he knew he should be happy for his friends. He felt no anger, though he had left his wife to find the woman of his dreams engaged to another man. He felt no shame, though he had been planning to break up a perfectly happy couple to satisfy his own selfish ambitions. In fact, Harry James Potter felt nothing at all. His face was a rock wall, devoid of any emotion. “That’s wonderful Hermione, I’m so happy for you.” He told her in a dull monotone. He rose before she could say anything more. “I need to go now, something came up.” He apparated away, forgetting even his coat. It wasn’t until she saw the red carnations on her couch, right where he had been sitting, that Hermione began to understand what she had done.

1 June, 2003

Harry sat, alone, for six months. He did nothing but stare at a single picture. It was of her, younger and more carefree. She was laughing, smiling, playfully swatting the arm of the tall redhead next to her. Harry didn’t even notice that she would often cast a sad look on the black haired, bespectacled boy on her other side. His pain and solitude went undisturbed. He didn’t even know where he was, how would anyone else find him? Except one owl did it. The letter told him the date and time of the wedding of Mr. Ronald Bilius Weasley and Ms. Hermione Jane Granger. He knew what he needed to do. He turned the parchment over, retrieved a quill, and began to write.

6 June, 2003

After her wedding, in the Florence hotel that would serve as the honeymoon resort of Mr. & Mrs. Ron Weasley, Hermione no-longer-Granger-but-Weasley found a single anemone flower and a wedding invitation on the windowsill; an invitation to her own wedding. She turned it over, and began to read the letter on the back.

Dearest Hermione;
You’ll be a married woman when you read this, and I guess I should be happy. You found what I realized too late, and took what I couldn’t. Tell Ron that he finally beat me at something.
I’m going to tell you a story, one that should sound very familiar. One day, there was a very lost and confused little boy riding a train with his new friend. He didn’t really know where he was going, or how he was going to get by when he got there, but then he met a very special girl. Every year she saved his life. Every year she contrived to get herself hurt somehow, and it always gnawed at him inside. He never realized why until much later, when he was married to another woman. He loved his friend, more than he thought it possible to love another person. So he left his wife, and went to tell his love how he felt.
She broke his heart. She didn’t mean to, and that made it worse. Vindictiveness he could live with, it had been his whole life for so many years, but she had been so innocent, so unaware of how much pain that one sentence had caused him.
Yes Hermione, the story was about me. Maybe saying it now is some kind of cardinal sin, maybe I’ll be condemned to an eternity of agony, but I don’t care. Worse still would be the pain of knowing I had never told you. I love you Hermione. I will always love you, whether or not you could ever love me back. Maybe it’s too late, maybe you really are happy with Ron, but do me one last favour. Write that down, and keep it in your purse for a rainy day. Keep it for a day when the glow of love no longer warms your skin, ‘Harry loves me.’
Whatever happens to my life, it looks like you weren’t meant to be in it. Maybe I can live with that, maybe I can’t. We’ll just have to see.
Goodbye, my love.
Harry

Hermione looked up, through the window. The rain was coming down pretty hard now, unusual for a Tuscan summer, but there was a man looking back at her. She could only barely make him out. He was wearing a wide-brimmed hat and a long leather coat. A large duffel bag was in one hand. The rain was soaking through his shirt. He was far away, but she knew who it was. It was him. They looked at each other. She couldn’t see his eyes, and doubted he could see hers, but she could sense his gaze; it was burning hot on her skin.

“Why Harry?” she asked, more to herself, her voice barely audible. “Why did you have to wait so long, make me wait so long.” A hundred feet away, he bowed his head in shame. Had he heard her? Impossible. And yet… How ironic that tonight, the night she was to give herself fully to a man for the first time, was the night she realized she didn’t need to have waited so long for who she really wanted.

A car’s headlights blinded her, and when she looked back he was gone again. Off to wherever he was going, to a place that held no memory, where she would never see him again. In that terrible instant, everything became clear. The fog that had so often clouded her judgment, that had kept her from the right path, lifted. And it started, with her husband’s hands on her hips. “Hey love, what are you looking at?”

His breath was warm in her ear. Maybe, given enough time, she could grow to enjoy the sensation. But not now, not when it was so painfully clear that it was not his breath. She turned from the window, but did not face him. “Nothing. You go sit on the bed, I’m going to slip into something more comfortable.” He was consumed with love, maybe only lust; he didn’t notice how inhumanly even her voice was, or the tears that were ruining the little makeup she had worn. She went to the bathroom and closed the door.

Ron heard nothing for a long time. When he was just starting worried about her, the bathtub ran. He gave it some time, and it stopped. The sound of water being displaced by a body, a splash as some of the water hit the floor, then nothing. Half an hour, one hour, two. He grew worried. He opened the bathroom door. Her wedding dress was hanging beside the mirror, her wedding and engagement rings stacked neatly on the edge of the sink. He looked in the tub. She was there, eyes closed, naked as the day she was born. Every square inch of her body, save her head and neck, was covered in permanent ink. The ink made many markings, hearts with names in them, lightning bolts made from initials. Most prominent, right across her chest, was the legend ‘I love you Harry.’ She looked so peaceful.

What Ron could not know is that, at the exact moment he saw his dead wife, a detachment of Scotland Yard broke down the door of a broken-down farmhouse on the outskirts of Greater London. Inside they found a thin, black-haired man with wire-framed glasses hanging by the neck from a length of rope. Both autopsies proved inconclusive, and the mysterious deaths were termed suicides.

***

Harry Potter and Hermione Weasley were buried in the same cemetery, with just a single plot between them. The next time Ron went up to visit his wife, he found her entire grave had been moved several feet to the left. A new gravestone was placed dead center between the two mounds, reading. ‘Here lie Harry Potter and Hermione Granger.’ No amount of labour, physical or magical, would revert the plots to the way they had been. The next time he went up, this time with his new and pregnant wife, someone had carved an epitaph into the marker.

HP+HG
True love never dies

Ron remarried, had a whole house full of kids, and generally lived life well. When Harry was pronounced dead, Ginny’s first stop was Gringott’s bank to collect his impressive fortune. Much to her surprise, it seemed that Harry had not actually had two knuts to rub together. Every ounce of the Potter fortune had been given to a Mr Erik Plutarch, in exchange for a rather sizeable monthly allowance. She was left with absolutely no settlement, and instead married an exceedingly wealthy wizard.

Not long after Ginny’s interesting bank trip, a man strolled into Gringotts’ Toronto branch to add a name to his personal account. He was thin, had black hair, wore wire-frame glasses and a neatly pressed suit. He added the name Mrs Beatrice Plutarch and, until that moment, had not existed. Except on paper.

*Sniffle* That’s about as sad as I get. I’m not real happy with the ending either, but I couldn’t really manage to get the info across in any better way. Sorry. But there’s a little hope for the future in there, and isn’t that the point?