The Ghost of Hermione Granger
Time travel/alternate reality story. Roughly canon compliant through Battle of Hogwarts/Book 7.
In the final battle Hermione makes the ultimate sacrifice for love. Twelve years later Harry, disenchanted with his empty marriage to Ginny, becomes obsessed with the idea of returning to the past to see Hermione again to thank her and to tell her what he has realized over the years about what she really meant to him. But will his traveling in time change everything?
Despite the title, Hermione won't ever appear as a ghost in this story. Ginny and Molly will behave badly in the story but for what are, hopefully, believable human reasons. Story will be Portkey compliant and end with Harry and Hermione alive and together.
Disclaimer: I do not claim ownership of the characters, plot or other elements from the Harry Potter series of books by JK Rowling. I make no money from this work and believe that it constitutes fair use under United States laws.
No Scottish novelists were harmed in the making of this fanfiction.
The Ghost of Hermione Granger
"If only I could go back in time, to see her again...to thank her for everything she did for me...to tell her what she meant to me-what she still means to me. If only...if only... Wait! There is a way..."
****
A blinding flash of golden light. A feeling of disorientation. Hermione Granger suddenly found herself sitting in a quite unlikely place, with an equally unlikely group of people. "Oh!" she gasped as she shot to her feet swiveling her head from side to side examining her surroundings. She had been at Hogwarts, in the middle of the battle. Hermione had seen Bellatrix Lestrange pointing her wand at Ginny Weasley. Suddenly all the noise and confusion disappeared, time slowed to a crawl. The sneer on Bellatrix's face and her moving lips told Hermione that she was taunting Ginny, but Hermione's brain refused to process any sound until Bella's lips started to form the word,"Avad-" In a flash Hermione did what she what she had decided to do during the long miserable months spent on the Horcrux hunt. Hermione shoved Ginny to the ground and took her place before Bellatrix, grateful that her Gryffindor courage hadn't failed her. She began to cast a disarming spell, but deep down she knew that it was hopeless. She was going to die. Instead of the green flash she expected though, came the golden light-and then she was here-in what appeared to be the waiting room of her parents' dental surgery.
She blinked her eyes and shook her head slightly trying to clear her mind. What happened? The battle...saving Ginny...her vow to herself...yes, she remembered... After Ron's abandonment of Harry and Hermione in the forest she had sworn to herself that she would do anything to protect Harry-and to protect Ginny, the girl he wanted, perhaps loved. She had tried so hard to love the boy who wanted her-to love Ron-but in the end, when he forced her to choose, she chose the boy she truly loved. Ron had ruined everything when he abandoned them. How could he do that to the girl he supposedly loved? His best mate? The cause that they had all fought for? She had accepted Ron back when he returned because he saved Harry's life, but she knew now that she could never learn to love Ron. Even though she knew that Harry would never want her in the way she wanted him-she chose Harry. She had decided almost two years before that his returning her feelings didn't matter. She would do, or be, or sacrifice whatever he needed. Even her life. She loved him, and she would always choose him.
Laying in the Hogwarts infirmary after the events at the Department of Mysteries in their their fifth year she had finally admitted to herself both that she was in love with Harry Potter and that it was probably hopeless because he didn't see her in the same way. She decided that she needed to accept both facts and figure out how to continue with her life. While outwardly she had seemed her normal self, inwardly she felt like she was being tossed about on a roiling sea of emotions. After she had cried out all of her tears she had turned to looking coolly and logically at her situation. Truthfully, before she had begun to dream about a future with Harry she had always seen her future as a solo one. She saw herself living in a tastefully decorated, book-filled flat with Crookshanks. Her life would be absorbed by some sort of challenging work. She would have her Mum and Dad, of course, as well as friends among her coworkers and old classmates. Harry and Ron would still be her best friends. She would make friends with their wives. She smiled inwardly at the thought of spoiling their children. Auntie Hermione would make a science of spoiling adorable little Potters and Weasleys. She supposed there might be men in her life, lovers that would come and go, but she had accepted that real lasting love wouldn't be part of her life.
That future made her a little sad, but it didn't seem too awful. But perhaps there was another option open to her-Ron. She didn't understand why, and sometimes he had the strangest way of showing it, but he seemed to fancy her. "He's a good person, I know he genuinely cares for me and wouldn't hurt me,"she reasoned," he'll grow up eventually, he'll learn to hold his tongue, not wind me up...I love him as my friend, perhaps I'll learn to love him as a lover." She knew that she would enjoy being a wife and a mum and that she would work her fingers to the bone to prove that she could be a good one. The fact that Ginny and Molly seemed to be actively trying to push them together (though Hermione was a bit suspicious about their motives) and that the rest of the Wesley clan seemed to like her was a great advantage. She felt that his family would welcome her with open arms.
Marrying Ron seemed to promise a brighter, happier future. Being a part of the Weasley family would draw her deeply into the Wizarding world-she would no longer be a Muggleborn outsider. Best of all, if Harry married Ginny he would always be a part of her life. He would be family. She could still have his friendship. She could still silently love him. It was the best solution for everyone.
She had begun her sixth year at Hogwarts determined to encourage Ron in his attentions to her. Unfortunately that went horribly wrong in so many ways. She seemed to go from humiliation to humiliation all year. Ron's poisoning and the tragedy of Dumbldore's death finally brought them together in a tentative sort of way by the end of the school year. In the months that followed his behavior towards her seemed to change for the better. Even though some of the ways that he spoke to her and treated her seemed a bit false and forced-she suspected that he was clumsily following advice he had received from his brothers or a cheesy self-help book-she had been touched that he was making an effort. But none of that mattered now...
"Oh," she said again softly as she sunk down onto the couch. "I'm dead." "Not exactly, Miss Granger," replied the familiar voice of the former headmaster of Hogwarts, Albus Dumbledore. He sat in an armchair opposite her dressed in his familiar starry purple robes, a pair of fuzzy purple and silver stockinged feet peeking out underneath. His appearance was younger and healthier, much as she remembered him from her first year, his hand no longer blackened. A copy of Martha Stewart Living with an elegant wedding cake on the cover floated in front of him. Hermione would have giggled at the incongruous sight had she been given to such things. He smiled and gestured at the magazine which promptly disappeared murmuring, "A bit of light reading...Clever woman. I've often wondered if she's one of us..."
He inclined his head, smiled and gestured at his companions, "Professor Snape, of course you know." Hermione's eyes widened in surprise, but she politely nodded to the former potions master. He nodded in return, setting aside the National Geographic that he had been reading. "But if he's here, with Professor Dumbledore smiling at him..." the wheels turned in Hermione's mind as she tried to reconcile Snape's presence with the events of the previous year. She thought. Snape, too, looked younger and happier than she had ever seen him. Even his hair looked less greasy. His manner was still proud but the sourness and nastiness was no longer in evidence. It took a moment for her to realize that while his robes were in his usual style that he was not wearing black, but instead a very dark green with silver stitching. There was a warmth in his dark eyes that she had never seen before and those eyes seemed to be focused on the person next to Hermione.
"Allow me to introduce you to Lily Potter," Dumbledore continued, gesturing to the woman on Hermione's right on the brown leather couch. She was a pretty woman in her 20's with long red hair. "Hello Hermione, I feel like I already know you," she said with a warm smile,"thank you for everything you've done for my son." Lily was dressed in simple muggle clothes, an emerald green cashmere jumper, jeans and flat slip-on shoes. "M-Mrs Potter, hello..." Hermione murmured, feeling very strange to be looking into Harry's eyes in a different face. In Lily's face those eyes were the same shape and the same arresting color as Harry's but without Harry's thick black eyelashes the effect was somewhat less striking. Hermione started to hold out her hand in greeting but Lily quickly pulled the younger woman into a hug. "Lily," she said,"just Lily, is fine."
From behind her, Hermione heard another familiar voice. "My turn next, Hermione dear." Hermione quickly turned towards the sound of her Grandmother Granger's voice. "Nanna!" she exclaimed throwing herself into the silver-haired woman's arms. "Oh Nanna, I'm so glad to see you. It's been such a long time." She couldn't help the tears that began to stream down her face at being reunited with her grandmother. Grandmother Granger had been gone for three years and Hermione had missed her terribly. Olivia Granger was wearing a straight blue skirt and a silky floral print blouse that felt wonderful against Hermione's cheek. She wore the golden locket that she had always worn around her neck. Her familiar rosewater scent awakened many wonderful childhood memories in Hermione. "So, you're a witch,"said Hermione's grandmother, "and your friends are witches and wizards." Hermione nodded, biting her lip, a bit fearful of her grandmother's reaction to that news. "Oh, Nanna, I'm so sorry we never told..."she began to babble embarrassedly. Mrs Granger held up her hand to halt her granddaughter's flow of words, "It's alright,dear. I understand. You were supposed to keep it secret." Hermione nodded and smiled, meeting her grandmother's warm, intelligent brown eyes. Eyes so much like her Dad's-and her own. Her grandmother leaned closer and whispered conspiratorially, "Would you do a bit of magic for me dear? I'd love to see it." Hermione reached for her wand beside her on the couch and pointed it at a small bowl of wildflowers on the table between Snape's and Dumbledore's chairs. "Wingardium leviosa,"she intoned, smiling proudly at her grandmother as the bowl rose into the air.
"Now that the pleasantries are over..." Snape drawled dryly. "Yes," Dumbledore smoothly cut in, "to answer your earlier question Miss Granger, you are alive and in a place outside of normal time and space. A short time ago, in what is, er, will be, your future Mr Potter has made a crucial decision. His decision has called this place into existence and called us here to assist you in the choice you will need to make if he indeed follows through on that decision." Hermione leaned forward, nodding as she listened to the headmaster's explanation,"What choice,sir?" Dumbledore replied,"As Shakespeare so aptly put it, 'to be or not to be...' "
****
Twelve Years Later
"I feel like I've been living with the ghost of Hermione Granger all these years! Hermione-this and Saint Hermione-that", Ginny shouted. She stood with her hands on her hips and angrily flipped her long red hair over her shoulder, "That's all I've heard from you for twelve years and I'm so bloody sick of it!" Even as the words left her mouth, Ginny knew that she was making a fatal mistake but her anger and jealousy had finally reached the point of no return. "The scholarships, the memorial, all of her bloody idealistic crusades that you've taken on..." she growled, tears of anger and frustration sparkling in her eyes, "sometimes this feels more like a menage a trois than a marriage!"
Harry Potter regarded her with an astonished look. His astonishment was quickly replaced by quiet rage. His jaw worked as he tried to master his temper. The atmosphere in the casually elegant living room of the Potter estate crackled with Harry's barely-controlled magical energy. "Well at least you're alive to bitch and moan about Hermione-she's dead. Dead." He drew in a ragged breath and turned away from her. "I would give anything," his voice faltered, and he continued in a strangled whisper, "anything, to see her again." He continued in his thoughts,"If only I could go back in time, to see her again...to thank her for everything she did for me...to tell her what she meant to me-what she still means to me. If only..." He turned back towards Ginny and continued in a stronger voice, "I would give anything, except my children and you of course, to have Hermione back." he added, the expression in his eyes turning icy. "Does your own life mean so little to you? What about our kids? She gave her life to save yours!"
Ginny gave a snort of derision, "She gave her life to save me? Oh, please! " she spat out. "She did it for you! She was in love with you! That pathetic swot was always in love with you," she hissed, her eyes gleaming triumphantly at the look of pain she saw in Harry's eyes. She added," She only gave my stupid brother the time of day because she knew that she wasn't good enough for The Boy Who Lived. You could have any witch you wanted. Who would want her? Once Ronnikins recovered from his discovery in fourth year that she had breasts, even he mainly wanted her because he wanted to have something you didn't have. " She lifted her chin and stared defiantly at her husband.
At that moment every light in the house took to flashing and every glass or ceramic knickknack exploded. Ginny felt a charge of static electricity shoot up her neck and her hair begin to stand on end as she was caught by the emerald laser beam of her husband's glare. With his Auror training Harry was able to Apparate nearly silently but at this moment, consumed by his fury, he disapperated with a thunderous gunshot sound that rattled every intact item in the room.
Ginny's moment of schadenfreude had been short lived. She cursed herself for letting her temper loosen her tongue. Pacing around the remains of her once-beautiful living room, flicking her wand at various spots around the the room, softly murmuring reparo, repairing a vase here, a crystal ornament there, she thought about her dilemma. She had said the one thing that she had sworn to herself that she would never, ever say-the one thing he must never know about her, and more importantly, about himself. Hermione Granger had loved him-not just as a friend, not as a sister but as a lover, and that she had sacrificed everything for that love. Ginny had always feared that knowing of Hermione's feelings, he would naturally begin to think about what his dead friend had meant to him. That was a path that she was determined that he must never go down. Little did she know that Harry already walked that path and was nearing the end of it.
She had been six years old when she first heard the story of Harry Potter from her mother and had declared that she would grow up and marry him someday. That dream that had dominated her life ever since. After Harry saved her in the Chamber of Secrets during her first year at school, Ginny became even more convinced that she would marry Harry Potter. Her feelings were not a girlish crush, she told herself, this was Love. True Love. Soulmates. She was sure of it. Hearing her parents mention that seeing Harry and Ginny together reminded them of James and Lily cemented it for Ginny. It was Fate. In the end, she had lived her dream-she was the wife of the Boy Who Lived, the conqueror of Voldemort. She shared his name, his bed, had borne his children-but, as small still voice in her mind had taken to whispering, "Have you ever really had his heart? Even after all these years, there's still so much he doesn't share with you, so little that you really have in common. He doesn't take your advice, he doesn't respect your opinions... Has he ever truly loved you? " It hurt so much! She had just wanted him to love her, the way she had always loved him, the way she had loved him before she even knew him. An even smaller, quieter voice that Ginny refused to listen to, traitorously whispered, "Was it worth it? Did you ever really love him? The real Harry, not the dream prince that you created in your head back when you were six?" He genuinely was the hero she had imagined him to be, but the real Harry confused her, sometimes bored her, and even frightened her.
And what about her debt to Hermione? Ginny cringed a little. Her feelings about Hermione Granger were so mixed-up, so complex. Hermione had saved her life. Of course, she felt gratitude for that! What kind of a monster would she be if she didn't? Still she couldn't help but resent her a little. Ginny thought that in a way Hermione had played the ultimate trick on her. Hermione had saved her life, requiring Ginny to feel an eternal gratitude to her, owing her a magical debt, but Hermione's sacrifice had also spoiled any chance for Harry to truly grow to love Ginny. In Harry's mind Hermione would always be that fresh eighteen-year-old girl nobly sacrificing herself. Ginny, though would grow older, her waist thickening with each pregnancy, lines appearing on her face, youth fading, and being flawed and human she would anger and disappoint him at times. How could she compete with Hermione's memory?
Growing up, Ginny had never much liked other girls. Surrounded by brothers, Ginny had absorbed some of their notions about girls. She thought other girls silly and weak-fun for gossiping and doing "girly" things, but not her equals. Besides, she adored being the center of attention in the Weasley clan as the baby and the only girl. Other girls were competition. As an adult she had many female friends but none of the sycophantic social climbers that she shopped and gossiped with were real friends. Ginny knew that, until she finally alienated her sister-in-law, Luna had adored her for standing up for her in school. Ginny did like Luna, but she could never feel truly close to her-she was just too odd a person for Ginny's taste. And in all honesty Ginny knew that she had stood up for Luna only partly out of concern for that uncanny girl. She had really wanted to take down those obnoxious Slytherins a notch or two. Her other sisters-in-law were jealous of her and disliked her for the way she lorded over them her position as the wife of the hero of the Wizarding World.
Still, Hermione had once been her friend. Her closest female friend ever. At first, her motives in cultivating a friendship with her had had been mostly cynical. It was all part of The Plan. Ginny had devised The Plan in her second year at Hogwarts. After the events of her first year, Ginny knew that marrying Harry was her Fate. But Ginny wasn't one to sit around and wait for Fate to work its will on her-she meant to guide Fate's hand. The Plan decreed that she should befriend Hermione in order to get closer to Harry. The older girl was a font of information. She would learn from Hermione how to make herself into everything Harry wanted in a girl.
Fate held two surprises for Ginny, though. The first was that in time she came to like and appreciate many things about the older girl. Hermione was anything but silly or weak. Ginny genuinely admired Hermione's intelligence, her kindness and her courage. But at the same time she couldn't help but feel a certain contempt for her. She was sometimes so boring and serious, a bit plain(and didn't seem to care much about making herself more attractive) and so weirdly Muggle. She could hardly believe that anyone could have so little interest in Quidditch.
The other surprise was that, even though Hermione tried hard to hide it, Hermione was in love with Harry. Hermione's insecurities about herself led her to keep those feelings secret but they were obvious to Ginny. The thing that terrified Ginny was the obvious deep affection Harry felt for Hermione. It wouldn't take much for that affection to blossom into romantic love on Harry's side as well. The second part of The Plan was to make sure that blossoming didn't happen. That was why Ginny, aided by her mother, worked so hard at pushing Hermione and her brother together. It was also why, near the end of her fourth year she finally took desperate measures to make sure that Harry would be hers. She hadn't really done anything wrong in the eyes of the Wizarding world-a little devious perhaps, but the sort of thing that was usually shrugged off with the old saying, "alls fair in love and war." But she knew that Harry wouldn't have seen it that way. Being raised in the Muggle world had given him so many strange ideas! Her first two attempts, made first with Mum's knowing help and later with the twins' unknowing help, had failed. At the start of her fifth year help had arrived from a most unexpected source which succeeded just as she had dreamed.
By Ginny's fifth year she had grown into a pretty and frankly sexy young woman. She relished the power that gave her over boys. She enjoyed trying out her feminine wiles on a series of boys, learning all sorts of lessons on how to please and tease the male of the species. She hoped that Harry was watching and taking in just how popular and desirable she was. When she finally captured Harry's attention she was elated. That elation quickly bred arrogance. Her arrogance led to contempt for Hermione. That contempt, mixed with her fear of the closeness between Harry and Hermione overwhelmed any fondness she had had for the Muggleborn girl. Ginny followed The Plan and turned on Hermione hoping to destroy any influence Hermione had over Harry. She didn't really succeed at that, but she did succeed in ruining her friendship with Hermione forever. Ginny was surprised to find that she regretted losing Hermione's friendship.
Ginny knew that things had gone very wrong in her marriage. Harry had been so besotted with her in the beginning, he had done whatever she wanted. After a few years that had abruptly changed. They were still happy together but she could no longer wrap him around her little finger. That was when he started forming charities and scholarships, becoming involved with politics, and that was when he spoke the name "Hermione Granger" again for the first time since the days after her death.
A few years later Ginny received a real fright that Harry would leave her. The Matrimonium Vinculum Spell was for life but that didn't mean that the husband and wife had to remain together under the same roof. She believed that only knowing that taking her children away from her would kill Ginny, as well as his attachment to Ron and her family had kept him from leaving. They had spent several months with a deathly chill between them, he had avoided her touch, her very presence. No angry words were ever exchanged. As much as it frustrated Ginny to hold her tongue, she did so because she suspected-perhaps due to his Auror work-that somehow he had learned what she had done to win him for her own. Eventually a thawing took place between them and on the surface all was well. The Potters seldom argued, they both doted upon their children and in the most private part of their relationship Harry was unfailingly kind and considerate-and heartbreakingly absent.
Ginny paused in her pacing and picked up a cobalt blue vase with a delicate floral pattern on it that she had repaired earlier and threw it at the fireplace where it shattered again with a loud and satisfying crash. She refused to believe it. He would hate her. He could never know! He didn't know, she lied to herself. Of course he didn't know. He loved her. And she loved him. They were perfectly happy together. This was just an ordinary fight. Nothing to worry about. "Reparo," she flicked her wand at the vase. "Accio," she said and the vase flew back into her hand. She noted with a sickening start that after being smashed twice the delicate pattern was ruined. Ginny was a smooth liar, and the person she was the best at deceiving was herself. Ginny Weasley-Potter wondered if her happily-ever-after dream was a lot like the vase she had thrown-would ever be possible to truly reparo it?