Author's Note: Wow, I know that this took an insanely long time to get out, and I apologize for that, what began as simply not having the time became writer's block became a myriad of other excuses. But that's all in the past. Enjoy, and once again (and for the last time on this story) thank you all so much for reading.
Harry sat on the edge of his bed and held the invitation to Ron's wedding in his hand. He smiled for what felt the hundred millionth time since He and Hermione had finally gotten together. He turned the invitation over in his hands, marveling that this is was what it had taken. Of all things in the world it had been his best friend getting married to finally drop the last puzzle piece into place. Years spent abroad, finding himself in the many and varied conditions of the whole planet, and he really only had to wait for something as simple as watching his friend grow up to decide it was time to do the same.
Hermione was in the living room, he could hear her moving things around. They had been to see Ginny earlier that day to get some of Hermione's things and of course to swear the roommate to secrecy for the time being. The question was still lingering in the air around their heads. Neither was sure how fast they were meant to be moving in their relationship, or how slow. The conversation had been fairly brief after the idea of moving in together had been posed.
Harry had simply asked if she thought they were ready for that step. She said she didn't know. They both talked about not rushing things, trying to find a perfect balance so as not to ruin what they were building before the foundation was properly established. Which was a fine, even headed and ultimately very wise thing to realize. The truth of love however is anything but fine, even headed or ultimately wise. Because while on the outside they could both claim to want to take things slowly, the gears were in motion, and the machine had several years of lost time and missed opportunity to catch up on.
Harry put down the invitation with it's looming deadline on the bed beside him and walked out to living room. Once there he saw Hermione sitting on the floor trying desperately to make sense of the chaotic mess around her. The living room was littered with relics from her life with Ginny. Clothes and other assorted belongings each stacked in piles, the intent of these piles escaping all but Hermione. Harry casually sat beside her on the floor and wrapped his arm around her. He pulled her close to him and she leaned into the embrace, her head eventually resting between his shoulder and his armpit.
"How's it going, Beautiful?"
"Rubbish." She sighed into him, he felt a shiver run up his spine at the feel of her breath on him.
"Why rubbish?"
"I have too much crap."
"I like your piles." He pointed to one in particular, "You realize, however that it's bad form to stack the larger things on top of the smallest things, yes?"
"I like to tempt the engineering fates." She smiled.
"I see that, and you're doing it wonderfully. Remind me to get up and walk away very carefully later."
"Will do."
"So, what exactly do you plan to do about the fact that you have too much crap?"
"I would give some of it away, but most of the stuff I grabbed has some kind of sentimental attachment."
"So it stays."
"Which would be great, and is really sweet of you, except."
"Except?"
"Well, this is hardly all of my things, Harry. There's more at the apartment."
"And?"
"Well, when I eventually move it all over here, there won't be much room left. Maybe we should get a bigger place."
"A bigger place? Eventually move it over here? When did we cement the plan for you to move in? Because I was under the impression that we weren't going to rush anything."
"I don't mean tomorrow, Harry." She stifled a laugh, "I meant eventually."
"As in when we finally do move in together, get married and grow hopelessly old and boring?"
"I somehow doubt you'll ever be boring." She cocked an eyebrow.
"Damn, I was looking forward to boring."
"But seriously, we should start to think about getting another place. Maybe a house. We can certainly afford it."
Harry looked around his old place. He looked at the nook in front of the bay window that he would some times curl up in to watch the rain. The kitchen where he had first kissed her. The bathroom he had so recently locked himself in. The living room. The first room he had see all those years ago when he bought the place. He was still a boy, still shaken from fighting a war he had had no business fighting for a people he had not known about at all until he was eleven.
"This place..." He paused, "I'm not sure I can just give it up."
"What?"
"A lot of stuff happened in this daft old flat. Those memories are meaningful to me. Just like your piles of stuff."
"I get that, but you abandoned this place for years."
"This is true."
"When did it start to feel like home again?" Her face had a mixture of concerned girlfriend and the look she always got when confronted with a mystery.
"In truth?"
"I should hope so."
"Well, kind of... Since you started staying here."
"Well, then, and I'm not going to say you're thick, but do you think that maybe any place we live will be home so long as we live there together?"
"That..." He hung his head, "Yeah. That sounds about right."
"You're thick."
"You said you weren't going to call me that."
"That was before I knew that you had absolutely no argument for wanting to keep this place at all."
"It's kind of messy in my head."
"I wouldn't have it any other way." And with those words she pounced on him and smothered him with kisses. Her piles of precariously perched belongs toppling around them.
* * *
Ron and Luna were married a few weeks later. The ceremony was short, but beautiful. The vows exchanged were written by the the bride and groom, respectively, though Harry had a feeling that Ron's vows may have once been a little known work by Pablo Neruda. Harry and Hermione had shown up separately, not wanting to steal the thunder of the newly weds. Ron and Luna went to the Isle of White and then to Canada for their honeymoon, and when they returned they were welcomed at their new place by Harry and Hermione. Ron and Luna became the first to be told that Harry and Hermione had gotten together.
That fall both Harry and Hermione were professors at Hogwarts. Two years later, in the Great Hall where the two had shared many meals and many conspiratorial conversations they share one more. Harry asked Hermione to marry him. They married the following spring on Hogwarts grounds, Ron served as Harry's best man. Molly cried and hugged the two of them hundreds of times throughout the day. For the first time in many years Harry's name appeared in wizarding newspapers worldwide, this time however was to announce the union of the two long time best friends.
* * *
Harry twisted in his chair. He sat in his office at Hogwarts, a room he had come to love deeply in his many years in it. He stared up at the wall, at the portraits of the Head Masters before him. The wise old Dumbledore looked on him, as he had for the last thirteen years, with total pride. Snape, whose portrait Harry had fought to have on his wall, looked on Harry with his normal sneer, though over the years Harry had been known to have long and friendly conversations with the portrait. Harry's eyes shifted to his desk.
Among his many years of accumulated miscellanea were several frames. One contained a picture of his and Hermione's first child on his very first day at Hogwarts. Young Albus, or Alby as he and his wife called him had been the most wonderful thing Harry had ever had a hand in, and as the years at Hogwarts had proved the young man had much more of Harry's penchant for trouble making than Hermione's penchant for studying. Another was a picture of the two taken eighteen years prior on their first day as professors, next to it was a picture of himself, Ron and his wife when they were no more than fourteen. Another picture was Ron and Luna on their wedding day, as well of a picture of his own wedding day. There was one of him holding his daughter, Sarah a name which both parents had liked, if not loved, and one of the few they found themselves able to agree on. She was still too young to attend Hogwarts, but more and more everyday it was obvious that she was the one to take after Hermione.
And in a place of honor, at the very middle of his vast desk and slightly behind his name plaque sat the most important frame of all. It held only a very old letter which said simply:
I miss you, Harry. Hope you come home soon.
Love, Hermione.