Chapter VI: Of Work
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"Hi," he quietly greeted her, taking a seat on the swing by her at the park that Ron had told him she was at.
She clenched her jaw, seemingly steeled with resolution not to talk to him.
"I'm a prat."
Sadly, however, her defenses were no where near impermeable when it came to Harry, he'd always been her weak spot and she cursed him for it as he uttered those three simple words, the ones that spelled her undoing. "I like to sit here… watch the kids… I don't know why, it's not as if I want kids now or anything, more so the fact that I miss those days, I think. I miss when it was the three of us, like that, so close… we were great, amazing mates… I'd never expected to experience such an infallible form of friendship. Terrible how it's all gone to hell now, isn't it?"
He sighed, tiredly ran a hand through his hair, pulling at the follicles lightly as he tried to come up with something-anything to say in response to that. "I… I didn't mean what I said last night."
"Don't lie," she told him, voice clipped, an unadulterated anger resonating deep within him as he heard it. "You very well know you did, so don't lie to me of all people, I've put up with too much of your shite to have you lie to me too now."
"But I didn't… I mean, not really. Part of it was true… I do feel as if after the war there just wasn't any point in me anymore… it had defined me for so long, every single aspect about me, that for some reason having it gone all of a sudden was just such a shock to my system… I didn't know who I was, what I wanted to do, where I wanted to go. For so long I'd only had this one mission in mind and it was the very essence of my being and then having it disappear like that left me… baffled, I suppose."
"Bullshit," she retorted, definitely taking him by surprise with that cutting rejoinder, so contrary to the usually appeasing and comforting Hermione he knew.
"What?" he practically squeaked.
"Bullshit," she repeated, slower that time, taking great care to annunciate each syllable.
"Well-well I don't think that's very fair of you to decide," he sputtered.
She scoffed, finally turning her head to face him, sending him a frosty look as she raised an eyebrow. "Harry, the truth is that this, whatever the hell it is that you may call this, isn't living. No matter how much you want to deny it, no matter how much you tell me that this is your way of living the truth is that it's all a lie, a load of shite that you're too weak to face."
"You walking around numbly as if the world around you doesn't exist, but while you do that you still manage to hurt everyone that loves you, and the worst part is that all of those years spent fighting are suddenly just as worthless for me as they, apparently are for you, because the reason why I did it, the reason that I was as far deep in it as I was, isn't even really here to reap the benefits of it… I love you, Harry… but I can't watch you destroy yourself anymore… I just can't, not after spending so much time fighting for you to finally have a chance at a normal life and then watching you destroy yourself. I won't… I won't let myself go down with you! If you're going to keep doing this I want what's left of my heart to remain unshattered and I think… I'm starting to think that the only was I can be sure of that is if I stop… stop caring, stop fighting, stop worrying for you for no reason, it's not as if it's doing any good anymore, it's all just so pointless!" she told him, roughly wiping away at the tears that were streaming down her face.
"Hermione," he whispered, raising a hand to reach for her cheek, only to have her slap it away before disapparating.
--
"Hm," she laughed quietly.
Harry, however, was none too amused by her reaction, primarily the fact that he wasn't in on the joke, so to speak. He furrowed his eyebrows, raising his gaze from the file and onto her. "What?"
"It's just Alex's file; remember how he told us it was a combination of three spells?"
The confusion, ironically, was only growing on Harry's part as he gave her a baffled "yes" in response.
"Well I'm reading the file now, since I'm going in to start analyze the bones today and I just noticed that he wrote four spells, not three here. He forgot that there's one needed to make the actual incision... typical Alex, he's always so forgetful like this," she giggled.
"Yeah," Harry dryly agreed. "That's hilarious."
"Oi, just because you didn't find it as amusing as I did doesn't mean you have to be such a prat about it, Harry," Hermione chastised him.
He shrugged. "Hey... I have a question, why do you need that `medium' spell, or whatever the hell it's called?"
"You got it right," she told him. "But it acts as a medium, it's not called `that medium spell.' It's primarily used in healing really, with so many different charms and potions that they have to use on the patients they need something to act as a medium so certain components of it won't counteract badly."
"Oh," he nodded. "Wait... does that mean we could be dealing with a healer or at least a medical student?"
She shook her head. "No, that would narrow it down quite a bit, though, but I'm afraid it's a simple spell, you learn it in the first week of Uni since it's such a vital one. You can find it in any medical book and it's incredibly simple to cast."
He couldn't help but let out a growl as he heard her answer. He pushed his file away from himself as he clapped his hands over his face, groaning in aggravation. "What the hell is it with this case? Why aren't we getting anywhere?"
"Harry, it's only been a few days, surely you've spent longer on other cases."
"Yeah, I have, but those didn't have a bloke who has a fifty page long list of suspects, all ex-girlfriends who would gladly roast his bullocks. It's preposterous! Between the 'hell hath no fury like a woman' M.O. and the fact that he gyps most of his business partners, and the fact that he's just a bastard there's no way to decide who the fuck it is."
"Language!"
He moaned. "You're not seriously going to go off about that now, as if you don't have your moments as well."
"Mine are in good humor," was her tight lipped and superior response.
"That's one word for it."
"Well at least it gets your mind off of your aggravation with the case," she winked at him. "I have to go in now, Jenny told me the cadaver should be ready for me by now, meet me for lunch?"
He nodded, a petulant pout on his face as he grimaced over the fact that she'd been able to distract him so easily. Blasted chit! "I'll bring Greek over."
"Ooh, my favorite! Bye," she kissed him on the cheek before flocking off out of his flat.
--
"It was a bitch trying to find you, by the way," he announced as he took a seat beside her on the steps the steps of Grimmauld Place. "Don't know why you're here anyway."
"People watching," was her monotone reply, completely devoid of any feeling.
He sighed. "But why here?"
She shrugged. "Somber place, somber mood… rather fitting, really."
He nodded. "You were right… before, what you were talking about… I was selfish, I was being a useless drunk, and it was a waste."
"That's not what bothers me though, not knowing the reason for it is what pesters me," she openly told him, turning her body to face him, scrutinizing every detail of his stiffened form.
"What are you talking about? I told you."
"No, you didn't. You told me bits and pieces, but there's something you're leaving out, I've known you long enough to realize that much, at least."
There was no point in denying it, he realized, she was right, she could always tell. "Truth takes time… that's what they say, right?"
She nodded slowly, eyebrows strung together as she tried to make sense of the connotation.
"Well I need time."
"Okay," she whispered, placing a hand atop of his in reassurance.
"Can I ask you something?"
"Sure," she told him, more than a bit baffled by where the conversation was going, what with his sudden question.
"Do you-do you believe what she said… you know, the prophecy and all that other shite?"
"Honestly?"
"Always."
"No," she admitted, letting out a breath of a laugh, the most she could even bring herself to let out given her current state. "Don't believe a word of it-there were more talented people, stronger wizards, smarter men… I don't believe that there was anything about you that made you any better than anyone else…"
"Then why did you follow me like that? Why fight?"
She shrugged. "You're enigmatic; you demand this amazing sense of allegiance. I don't know… despite the fact that I never believed in everything everyone spewed and that I always thought that it was just another excuse for society-a way of finding a hero even if they had to do so forcibly thrust that title unto someone-it wasn't hard to love you or be willing to go to the ends of the world for you without the slightest thought. They-their fighting for you, in your name, and all of that… it may be politics, Harry, but despite that you were worth it… never forget that…"
He smiled slowly, feeling almost as if someone was literally pulling on the corners of his mouth to force him to. "I want to still be worth it, Hermione…"
She smiled up at him sweetly. "Then you will be… just takes work…"
"I think that'd be a nice change as it is, yeah?"
She giggled lightly, biting her lip. "Yeah, it would be."
--
"You-you're Harry Potter," the girl stuttered, staring up at him in wide eyed wonder and it took all Harry had in him not to sneer at her.
"Yes, yes he is, Jenny," Hermione stiffly interrupted her intern, actually causing the poor girl to jump in surprise by the terse voice suddenly appearing from behind her. "And it's probably be best if you focused on closing your mouth rather than leering at him," she huffed angrily and Harry couldn't help but send an amused smirk her way as he heard those words.
The intern, however, ignored Hermione completely, regardless of superiority or scare factor, as Ron referred to it. Instead she just widely smiled up at Harry. "You know, you're much handsomer in person. All of my mates told me you'd be, we even had a longstanding bet about it, but I just didn't believe it was possible... nice to know that miracles can happen though."
Harry's eyebrows shot up in surprise. "I have a girlfriend."
"Oh, that's okay, really."
"One whom I'm committed to and would roast my bullocks were I to cheat. I've seen that fate now and take the threat rather seriously... but, uh... thanks I suppose."
"Harry!" Hermione called out, and he couldn't help but wonder when she'd made her way to the other end of the lab, in front of what appeared to be her office. "I'm hungry and we have a case to discuss.
"Right, that'd be my cue, nice meeting you... Jenny, right?"
"Oh, it was my pleasure," she sighed as he moved around her and towards a glaring Hermione.
"What?" he asked as he moved past her and into the rather comfortable looking office.
She threw him a dirty look. "She's six years younger than us, Harry."
"I told her I have a girlfriend," he assured her. "Besides... Christina is also six years younger, are you trying to say something about my relationship?" he cocked an eyebrow as he began taking out the food.
"Care to explain your unusually chipper mood?" he asked, sarcasm clear in his tone as he stressed the word chipper.
She shrugged; wrinkling her nose as she grudgingly admitted "I don't like her. it's so hard to get her to focus as it is, she's always going off about you and asking me questions about you, it's disgusting really."
He chuckled. "Here, have some moussaka, that always makes you happy."
She smiled. "You know me too well, Harry."
"So... learn anything new?"
"Well Alex was right. Difficult part now is isolating the spells since the patterns that their trace markers leave have been combined, layered over one another, but the prat was right. I've been able to isolate one spell, though, the medium used, I went for that one first since from what I could make out of the depth of the etchings it appeared to be the top most layer, plus there are only about five different variations of it so it's easier to narrow down, this one's relaxo carmen. You may want to write a note about that for the profiler though, it's a very simple one, easiest there is really. You basically just point at your target twice while saying the words."
He nodded, moving for a piece of paper off of her desk and grabbing a pen as he did what she told him. "And to think we thought that this might be some genius."
"Well they did get past that security system," Hermione offered pityingly.
He shrugged. "Still far from genius."
"Well he or she must read journals... the one about the combining spells is very new and ground breaking stuff. They obviously read some sort of journal about magical studies, and only a few have even written on this. Most of the prestigious ones don't even want to broach the idea since they think it's so absurd... actually, the only premier one that even bothered to write something on it was Sweden's Magi Månatlig."
"If it's Swedish how do you know about it?"
"It's in English actually-founder was Swiss-the only thing Swedish about it is its name, come to think of it. They have some of the best institutions for magical studies there though, primarily more liberal so experts from all around the world tend to flock there and they're generally the lot who submit papers for the magazine too," she explained as she took a rather astoundingly large bit of her musaka... it really was a rather awe inspiring sight, the sort of thing a bloke would aspire to really. Showed some of Ron's influence on her actually, she tended to let loose more when alone with mates, paying less attention to eating as daintily as she did in public. Nice change of pace, he noted.
"So I was thinking."
"Call the presses, Harry Potter is actually capable of thought, real thought," she teased him good naturedly.
He laughed, nodding his head in acquiescence. "I was wondering if you'd like to go out tomorrow night, all of us-you, me, Ron, Christina... double date, I guess."
She nodded slowly. "That sounds like fun, but highly improbable of happening any time soon."
"Why?"
She sighed, putting down the shish kebab she had taken up after having finished her moussaka. "Ron and I are dealing with some stuff right now and I think we just need some one on one time, you know? it's been tough, with me just getting back after being away for two weeks, and then there's the fact that the second I got back I took on this time consuming case... there just hasn't been much time for what Ron likes to refer to as "Ron and Hermione time.'"
"Witty name," Harry noted.
Hermione gasped. "I can't believe you are mocking it! You, the bloke who once actually considered naming his child 'Albus Severus Potter' just after the war ended."
"Oi, short lapse in judgment," he defended, grinning, as he pulled a piece of pork off his own shish kebab and threw it at her.
"Exactly my point-and, besides, you know Ron, he's too stubborn to actually go about admitting that it's a terrible name."
He smiled. "So... trouble?"
"You know how it is; I'm a bit of a workaholic... not exactly the best trait to build a 'healthy relationship' on."
"Some would call it admirable."
"Ah but those don't have the Weasley reproductive genes," she quipped wryly. "It's not that he's even pushing for it or anything, it's Molly that's the root of our problems. Since Neville knocked Ginny up I've apparently become a hag and am coming close to my expiration date. Ron's having a hard time with it; you know how the Weasley men are with their mum."
"Pansies?" Harry offered.
"That's about it."
"Well if it's any consolation, you're a rather sexy hag, all the blokes turn to stare at your arse, I swear, it's rather plump... and then there's the way it sways-"
"Oi," Hermione stopped him, blushing profusely as she threw a hand over his mouth. "I get it, I'm not a hag, message received, Harry."
"Well no need to be a prude, Mione."
She choked on the water she had been drinking when she heard that word. "Now using the nickname was just cruel, Harry, cruel."
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author's note: so i was feeling inspired and wrote this up in about half an hour... not 100% sure about it, honestly, but I like the flashback so I'm going with it, lol. Anyway, i hope you like it and please review, opinions are always welcome!
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