Hopeless

Hopeless

Viopathartic

A/N: I was almost close to not posting this. I wasn't sure if I should because I thought it was…very bad for some reason. I don't know—my self-esteem has been down. Don't know why, to be honest.

To everyone reviewing and enjoying the story so far, I'm honored!

This chapter reveals a lot in a sort of vague…detached way, but hopefully you can decipher it.

Hope you enjoy it.

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"Liam adores you."

I was sitting in the living room, keeping an eye on Liam when Anne tells me this. I laugh; I can't deny it either.

"I think I like him too. He's a cute one, Anne."

Liam has some book of his in his hands. He stares at the pictures, skips the words, and flips the pages. Once in a while he would randomly giggle. I stare at him in fascination. I've never really been around kids. When I was living with the Dursleys, their friends were couples with grown children. And when I went to Hogwarts, I was around kids my age.

It's certainly strange to watch the behaviors of a child like Liam. They find the smallest things the funniest and don't have a care in the world. I envy them.

"You done eating already? I mean, I could have watched Liam…."

I shake my head. "I wasn't that hungry." Truthfully, my appetite disappeared when Hermione and Ron sat down in front of me. "And Liam's no problem."

"Well, thank you anyways, Harry," says Anne.

"No proble—oh!" Liam suddenly fell against me; he stood up by himself, but he was too fast. "Woah there, Liam."

Like a strong little guy, Liam manages to balance himself again and makes his way over to his mum. She smiles affectionately and gives him a great big hug while showering him with small kisses. I'm just content to watch a scene like this. Mother doting her child.

"Do you like children? I mean, I see the way you are with Liam, but..."

I answer quickly, "Yeah, yeah...I do. I've just never had the opportunity to be near them."

"Do you have a girlfriend?"

I turn to her and arch an eyebrow. What a question! Anne blushes.

"Sorry, I like to know what's happening in life."

I smirk. "Right. Well, no, I don't. "

Anne nods in understanding and lets her son go.

"So how long have you known Hermione?"

The questions keep coming and coming.

I squint and do the math in my head. "I'd say...eleven or twelve years?"

Hermione's cousin looks impressed. "Wow, that's nearly half of your life!"

"She IS my life," I find myself blurting. I then process what I said and stutter to cover up my mistake, "I mean...she's practically been around me for nearly half of my life. It'd be weird if I had to live without her..."

Anne looks at me oddly with her head tilted to the side. Liam gurgles and I think I hear his book ripping. His mother takes away his "toy" while asking softly, "And Ron? You guys are best friends too, right?"

I nod. "He was my first friend. Hermione was my second, but both are my best friends."

"That must be nice," commented Anne, "to have a healthy friendship. More than a decade...wow. I can scarcely remember my university friends...it seems so long ago."

"I can't forget them," I shrug. "They had been there for me when I...was struggling and helped me conquer something that plagued me since I was a little tod. I owe them...everything."

"So that's why you're the best man?"

Her question startles me. Why did she suddenly ask that?

"What?" I manage to croak.

"Well, I hear being the best man is brutal. You have to listen to the bridezilla AND the groom."

I smile slightly. If that's all I have to take, I'd be glad.

I feel something tugging on my sleeve and I realize that Liam had abandoned his mother. I laugh and take his hands into mine, which were insanely small. In no time, he'll grow like a tree.

Suddenly, a thought comes to me.

"Hey, what time is it?"

Anne glances down at her watch and says, "It's 8:45."

I quickly excuse myself and hand Liam back to her mother. Before she can even open her mouth, I leave the room.

See, I try and go see Luna every week—mostly on Fridays. Her presence is always comforting to me because I can share everything with her. That used to be the same way with Hermione, but what I usually share with Luna cannot be revealed. It's the reason why Hermione is no longer mine. It's the reason why I suffer every day.

Luna's there to suffer silently beside me.

I quickly change so that could meet Luna at her flat. When I go back downstairs, I find the Grangers and Ron sitting in the living room, watching Liam as he plays with the same book from before. Hermione and her mum are chatting quietly and the both of them turn their eyes on me when I enter.

"Harry, you're dressed nicely," Mrs. Granger comments. She turns to Hermione. "Where's he going?"

"I don't know," Hermione answers and she glances at me again. "It's almost nine, Harry…where could you be heading off to?"

"I feel like visiting Luna, so…" I trail off.

"Luna? Your girlfriend?" Anne asks, interest piquing. Didn't I just tell her that I didn't have a girlfriend?

"Luna? Loony Lovegood! Harry's girlfriend? No way! I mean, Harry would have told us, right?" Ron then narrows his eyes at me. "Right?"

I wish he was feeling jealously rather than anger towards me. That would have been better.

"Luna's a friend of mine. She's all alone with no one to talk to so I sometimes visit her," I shrug as casually as I could.

"Comforting her, eh?"

I glare at Anne. She pretends to not see it as she pulls Liam onto her lap. Liam giggles at this sudden move, and his mom starts tickling him. I soon forgive her for her suggestive comment.

"Anne, lay off Harry," Hermione says and then she focuses back on me. "Does she know that you're coming?"

I nod at her.

"Anyways, I'll be back late so I'll try to enter the house quietly."

Luna has a flat in the wizarding side of London. It is small and easy to afford with her salary from running the Quibbler. I've already memorized its location and was there in a few seconds.

Knock, knock. Luna opens the door for me, smiles slightly at me, and beckons for me to come in. As she walks toward her kitchen, fetching some tea, I see that her choice of clothing is relatively normal today. The pair of jeans she's wearing makes her look slim and petite. Of course, she still has her radish earrings dangling from her ears. She can't be Luna without them.

We pass a few moments in silence, as always. I suddenly feel the need to break the pattern.

"I just came from her parents' house."

"Really?" Her voice is detached. If people didn't know her like I did, they would have thought she wasn't really listening.

"Yeah, I'm staying with Ron and her."

"That's nice," she comments.

"Yeah."

I watch carefully as she pours my tea. Her face is serene and somehow, it comforts me. Her little ways always do, but she doesn't know that.

"How are you?" I ask, for conversation.

"Good. You?"

"Fine."

We're both lying, of course.

"How's work?"

"Work is work."

It doesn't matter who's asking and who's telling. Our answers are always the same, always without meaning.

I take a sip of my tea and she takes a sip of her. I put my cup down and she does the same with hers. We're always copying each other too.

The clock ticks at an intermittent meter as we go about with our tea sipping.

Tick…tick…it's like a song and it's all I hear…tick, tick…

"Do you ever think--"

Here it comes again, I knew it was coming. Knew it. "No."

A pause comes and goes. Luna takes a moment to gather her courage and asks, "Why?"

"So I can go through the day. So that I won't give up…"

"I think about it all the time...in yet, I still get up in the morning," she says to me in her dreamy, detached voice.

"But you're strong, Luna."

"And you're not?"

The answer hangs in the air.

I take a nip of my tea; the small sound is all I can hear because the room is so quiet. We are so quiet in each other's presence, in yet, we still speak to each other. We've learn to communicate in ways so that no one else would catch on to our struggles each day, so that we wouldn't be asked why we never like to double date with Ron and Hermione, why we prefer to be alone rather in the presences of our friends.

I smile at our cleverness and I know that Luna sees. She doesn't comment but stares at me. I know, through years of experience, that she wants to say something right then. I put my cup of tea down with preciseness and slowly push its plate away.

I glance up at her, signaling for her to start.

"He smiled at me the other day," Luna reveals in a quiet voice. Her large, omniscient eyes see me.

"For the longest time, ever since the h-hospital, he smiled at me," she repeated, voice trembling. "We were…standing by the refreshment table yesterday…and I commented on this and that. Suddenly we found something really funny," she gives me a quick smile, "and we started laughing. It was like we were—it seemed as if things were the way it used to be, you know. It was so real and it made me think…a-about how happy…how in love…the two of us—the four of us--"

I reach across the table and squeeze her hand. I don't need to be reminded.

"The way it used to be," she whispered again to me. She brings her other hand up and covers mine with hers. "I keep on remember, Harry. I keep on…wishing that they would remember too…"

She begins to cry softly, ducking her head down and letting her blond, angelic hair fall. She lets her forehead meet our clasped hands.

I close my eyes, depleted and devoid as I feel her tears touching my skin.

Because I know how she feels.

"I'm so sorry, Luna," I mumble. I've always been sorry because it was I who caused all this to her. I was the one who decided to let Hermione go, unknowing that she would eventually fall into the arms of someone else. Someone who Luna loved.

Someone who she loves.

Luna sniffs and lifts up her head. She gently removes her hands from mine and rests them on her lap. There she is, composed again. She always does this. "It's for the best. For their own safety. I wouldn't want anything to happen to Ron or Hermione. We love them, that's why...right?"

I nod.

Then she says, "But..."

My jaw clenches because I know what she is going to say next. I've gotten better with reading Luna since we share a common thing in our lives, a common disaster. She looks up at me and our eyes suddenly connect. When she speaks, she speaks not to me, but my soul.

"I don't know how much more of this I can take."

I don't know how much more of this I can take.

I think the same thing when I apparate back to the Grangers' home. The only light that is on is coming from the kitchen. I manage to find the key that is hidden under the doormat and slip into the house.

On my way through the living room, I see that someone is on the couch, sleeping. For one moment, I thought Ron was sleeping there, but then remembered that he was probably sleeping in Hermione's room…they've shared a bed before, I think…that's how people have babies…

Then, I remember that Anne's husband was coming back from a business trip. The guy gives a loud snore and I try not to snicker. Brings me back to the days where I shared a dorm with Ron.

One by one, weary as I am, I pull off my shoes. My robe follows after and I fold them so that they're neat again. I flick my hand and the drawer near my bed opens.

I place my hand at the back and the drawer and feel it there as it always is, cold and round with a hole in the middle. Abandoned and forgotten underneath a pile of clothes. I still carry it with me and always stash it so that it wouldn't be found. I stand there for a moment with my pants still on while wearing nothing else. I close my eyes and try to remember—even though I shouldn't—how it felt when it was on her finger, full of promise.

As quick as I could, I pull my hand away and shut the drawer with a bang.

I'm tired.

I decide that I could skip one day of brushing my teeth and slowly crawl into my bed. As always, I think of her and only her…her radiant smile, her kindred eyes…and I dream.

Black, gray, red, blue, green, they're all beautiful colors…I'm somewhere else in another place…oh, back at Hogwarts we are, back to where it started…He's finally dead, yes, yes, I killed him, but now, she's lying in bed and everyone's crying. My fault. My fault. If she hadn't...and if she wasn't...none of this would have happened. I see Ron in the bed next to her and Luna, sitting by his side, and holding his limp hand. She's pleading for him to wake up.

 Madam Pomfrey comes in; her face is white like a blanket…Mr. Potter, the spell that Voldemort shot at her…her memories from the past months are gone…I'm by her bed as I always am…I hear that Dolohov has run away and some other bad people escaped as well. She's sleeping, and I see myself pulling off a ring from Hermione's finger and it's the hardest thing I have to do. I cry and cry as if my soul has been taken away, but I realize that I couldn't do anything else because I had done enough. They're going to hurt her. Too much. I don't want to go through it again. I'm thinking that she's going to be safe for awhile. That someday, someday, everything bad would all go away.

I'm standing at the entrance, feeling elated. She's awake! Hermione's awake!

Then I'm sad because I see Hermione and Ron, together, awake and alive. He's holding her hand, and Hermione's still confused. She just woke up. Everyone's happy and they see the two holding hands. They clap, they cry, they smile.

Luna stands by the doorway, gripping the threshold so tight that I have to go to her and whisper. She watches Hermione and Ron and it's like she has given up.

She didn't know. She's shocked. I whisper that I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry.

I should have told her.

The dream ends, and I finally wake up to my nightmare.

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If my writing seems too simple in this, tell me and I'll try to step it up.

Thanks for reading.

Viopathartic