Part IV: But, sometimes, imprisonment can be so good.
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"Harry, what are you doing here?" she asks, voice tired after having apparated into her apartment only to be met with, what should be, the surprising sight of me sitting on her chesterfield, impatiently waiting for her.
"You don't sound too surprised to see me here," I note.
She shrugs, throwing herself onto the seat across from me. "I know you… you always come at the most inopportune of times, figures it'd be today of all days," she admits with a sigh.
My eyebrows furrows as I regard her, something's wrong. "What happened?"
"Nothing," she tells me and I scowl at the lackluster response. "Why'd you have to come, Harry?"
"I thought you were expecting it."
"I was… but that doesn't mean I wanted it to come true."
I close my eyes and let out a deep breath as I try to keep my emotions in check, pinching the bridge of my nose lightly. "Why not?" I somehow manage to croak out regardless of how much I really don't think I want to hear the answer to that question.
She shakes her head slightly and I think I can see her eyes glisten and, despite how much it hurts to know that I caused that, I can't help but feel a twisted twinge of pride overwhelm me at the knowledge that I still hold a place in her heart, that she's not indifferent to me.
"Harry, I told you before… why can't you, just for once, respect my wishes?" she asks me, her tone inching closer and closer to the edge of desperation.
I shrug helplessly. "I… I love you..." I admit, probably pointlessly, but I just want her to know. "I miss you; I want you back in my life."
She shakes her head. "It's not always just about what you want, Harry."
"I know that."
"Really, then what about Molly and Ginny? What if I can't forgive you for that?" she asks me.
"You don't mean that," I tell her, silently pleading with God that she doesn't, to have some mercy upon me. Cor, I need her, I really need her.
"I don't know, Harry," she quietly says, her shoulders slumping forward a bit as she speaks. "I honestly just don't know anymore. Truth is, I can't promise you anything and you can't do that for me either… let's just face the facts already, we're fucked, in every facet of the word."
I shake my head stubbornly, moving up and out of my seat and timidly moving towards her, afraid to scare her off. Merlin, I've missed her. "You don't mean that," I whisper as I kneel in front of her, I feel her tense as I touch a hand to her cheek, but she doesn't dare move regardless of the fact that I can tell she wishes she could.
"What if I do?" she retorts, weakly.
I shake my head resolutely. "You want to, but you don't," I tell her, closing my eyes as I lean my forehead against hers, breathing in the scent that I'd gone so long without. Good God, I've missed her.
After a moment of silence she finally manages to gather the strength to push me away, but not much, merely a few centimeters. "You can't just expect everything to go back to normal, Harry… what you did… it-it's irreversible, you still have society to account for."
And it's at that moment that I think I began to truly hate reality. "I know that, I do."
"It doesn't seem like it though."
I groan; she always was a difficult one to talk to, always black and white with her, never grey. "Hermione… I-I know things can't just go back, that too much has happened, but I don't think we should give up, I don't think that we should just let everything we had go like this."
She snorted bitterly. "Then you probably shouldn't have done what you did, Harry, did you ever think about that?"
"Of course I did!"
"Really? Are you sure?!" she persists like the bossy little chit that she is and I'm drawn between wanting to wring her neck or shag the bloody day lights out of her, and it's the most magnificent feeling in the world. She forces me to a draw, makes me work for everything, always challenging me, and out of some blasted, masochistic need for her I love it.
"Yes," I repeat self-assuredly. "You-you know how it happened, you may not know the exact details, but you know enough… I know you do, Hermione… you know it's not what I wanted to do."
"Doesn't matter though, does it? Because he's still there," she pokes my chest roughly, "isn't he?"
I nod. "Yes, he is."
"See?!"
"No," I simply tell her. "No, I don't."
She rolls her eyes. "Oh don't be difficult now just for the sake of proving a point, Harry. Don't hurt me again like you did before… if you truly loved me you wouldn't even be putting me through this all over again," she rationalizes, unjustly so, and I can't help but smile at her tirade having missed even those annoying huffy little tantrums of hers.
"I won't put you through that pain again, I promise," I say, again, in a futile attempt to assuage her.
She scoffs loudly, betraying the entire purpose of my previous comment. "Then what would you do, Harry? What the hell do you propose we do about the fact that you have Lucifer reincarnated lying in your fucking body?-and, for Christ's sake, I'm supposed to report you if you ever try to contact me, Harry, don't you get that? I'm supposed to send you to Azkaban, why the hell do you have to throw the fact that I'm too weak to in my face like this?!"
"You know that's not why-"
"No," she stops me, roughly wiping away a stray tear that's running down her face. "No, I don't know-now, I don't know anything as far as you're concerned. I don't know you anymore so stop pretending as if everything's the same as it was."
"Don't lie," I snap.
"I'm not, Harry. All I am is absolutely lost and terrified… I just want to let go already, why can't you afford me the chance to have a clean break?"
"Now you and I both know that's impossible, that one… we can't be without each other."
"Want to bet?" she manages to spit out.
I can't deny that her acerbic tone cuts me, but I won't give up, I can't, so I just shake my head, again, in response. "No," I say, my voice choked but defiant nevertheless. "I-I also wanted to tell myself that we could… live without each other," I elaborate as an afterthought, nervously running a hand through my hair as I pray that she may be able to make sense of a sure to come rambling on my part. "But… but we can't, Hermione. It-it'd be so much easier if we could… life would be so much simpler, but, truth is, none of it's worth anything without you."
"Well poor you then, I, however, can make it without you, that much I promise you."
I smile sadly as I regard the huffing girl before me, her arms are crossed and she's glaring at me angrily, Merlin I've missed that. "Don't give up," I whisper, gathering the courage to bring my hand to her cheek again, assuring myself that even if she does push me away it'll be worth the try, the rejection will be worth it if I can touch her even for a second.
She doesn't push me away and I can't help but grin.
"Why do you have to hurt me like this, Harry?" she asks, biting her lip. "Why won't you just let it be?"
"Because, like I said, none of it is worth anything without you… I need you, we can do this."
"Do what?"
"Get past everything that's happened."
"And how can you be so sure?" she challenges me, but there's no resistance in her tone as she brings her own hand forward, clapping it over my own, closing her eyes as her thumb massages the back of my hand, leaning her face into my touch.
"I-I don't know, but I am, I just… I know…"
She pauses. "That's not enough."
"I think you just don't want it to be."
She opens her eyes, looking at me. "You should go."
"No."
"Harry-"
"I'm done, Hermione," I stop her before she has the chance to rationalize why this is all so wrong, well any more so than she already has. "I'm done trying to fight this… whatever the hell it is that keeps on trying to pull us apart, I won't let it stop me anymore. I'm not going to let him win anymore than he already has. I-I know that with you in my life I can fight it, I may not be able to get him out, but I can fight… I can, I promise!"
After a moments hesitation she speaks, her voice broken as she does. "Don't make promises you can't keep."
"I wouldn't say all this if I didn't honestly believe I could do this."
She turned her face away from me, chewing on her lip and I could see the cogs turning in her head as she stared off into space. "And what about everyone else, Harry...? There's a world to account for, one that wants retribution."
"Let's go away, just the two of us, a secluded island… a world that doesn't know us, totally disconnected from England… you can write anywhere…"
She clasps a hand over her mouth as she takes in a deep breath. "I…I have a life, Harry. Whether you want to see it or not, it's been years… I have a life, without you in it."
A sharp pang hits me as she utters those words, but I don't let myself be deterred by it, I believe in this and I won't give up, not again. "Why are you so scared to give this a try?"
She lets out a disbelieving scoff, pushing my chest lightly, but just enough for me to lose my balance for second and fall to the floor. "Who are you to ask me that, Harry? How can you just expect me sit around like some blasted little bint, just twiddling my thumbs and wasting away like an idiot until you're finished doing God knows what?!"
"Why are you so scared?" I repeat my voice harsher this time as I raise myself off the floor and return to my keeling position. "You know you want to."
"And how can you be so sure about that, Harry, who says? Contrary to what you may think the world doesn't revolve around you-my world doesn't revolve around you!"
"You very well know I never thought it did. What I do know, however, is that you're here cowering and `wasting away' like an idiot just because you're scared."
Her nostrils flare and face goes red as she hears me use her own words against her. "And so what if I am, huh? Of course I'm scared, look at you-look at what you've done!"
"Why can't you believe that I can change?!"
"Because I've seen, first hand at that, what you're capable of."
"Would I lie to you though?" I challenge. "If there was ever any doubt in my mind that I couldn't do it, would I ask you to go away with me?"
She shrugs stubbornly. "You disappointed me once before, didn't you?"
I purse my lips, trying to hold back the urge to mangle her. "You didn't answer the question."
She shakes her head. "And I won't."
"Why?"
She rolls her eyes angrily, clenching her jaw as she glares at me, opening her mouth with a sneer but no sound comes out when she does. She clasps it closed inhaling sharply before letting out a deep and frustrated breath. Finally, after what feels like hours, she answers. "You know why," she whispers angrily through gritted teeth and I feel a pulse of unparallel joy jolt through me upon hearing her utter that, regardless of how much she may despise me for forcing her to.
I smile softly, propping one hand on her thigh as I bring the pother to her face, again, and gently rub it. "I can do it, I promise… I won't let you down."
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