Unofficial Portkey Archive

Life and Times

Rating: R

Ship: HHr (main emphasis)

The (unlovely) procedure: all rights go to JKR for previous plot and characters, Scholastic, Warner, and whoever else has their hands in HP.

Author Note: A return to Number Twelve becomes quick resolve, release, relinquish from the spectrum of bottled emotions: love not withstanding.

***

Chapter Forty-Two - Home

***

Harry was more than exhausted.

After we got back to Number Twelve, after showering, after he put antiseptic on the lashes Gin had done to my arms, after I fed him and we had "our time," we were out. I remember waking up and watching him sleep. The master bedroom didn't feel cold anymore. Actually, the entire Number Twelve felt livelier. His scent was everywhere, that pumpkin so sugary when I had a craving for sweets.

He was on his back with his left arm beneath my neck, lining my pillow's edge. He had his other arched above him with his face towards me. I was at his side. It wasn't too long ago when he had his injuries taped. A bandage wrapped around his torso to keep him from exacerbating the bruising and potential other fractures. That healed, and I kept the bandage clean. I kissed the boo-boo after Ronald had laid several hits that fateful day. Nothing as extreme as this, but his features healed, keeping an eye on him, again, with those injuries. But now, having faith in what the Ministry medics had done to him, especially after Kingsley expressed concern, this injury would linger. At least the consequence, a permanent bruise blotching his face for the rest of his life.

He was stubborn. I could make a case, explain how St. Mungo's could clear the bruise easily, but I knew he'd use his lightning bolt scar as an example of what it all meant to him. An aggressive attitude, Harry had a, "Come at me," personality. He thought it were a weakness if he went and "tidied" himself; to him, they were more like battle-marks. I didn't push him as much as I think I could. I probably would have won, too; but, there was a better place and better time. I just hated seeing another laceration here, another spot there, another knick physically to add to his already battered interior.

His left hand, the one with "I must not tell lies" hacked deep into his skin, pressed firm against my back.

My fingers slid slowly through his hair, combing from fingernail to the inside webbing of each individual digit. I did this with my left hand, my left arm around him, touching and laying bare chest to bare chest. We had the white sheets over us, but mine moved from my shoulder as I made my slight actions. Inclining, I watched him breathe, how his ribcage pushed upwards and downwards. Something unnoticeable-who would really see another take a breath?-I didn't take for granted. I grinned and ran the tip of my nose along his pectoral, shifting so my lips would run against the same imaginary line I created by the tip. I caressed where my lips landed, smiling when I peck-kissed him.

I lifted further, my left arm still about him, and kissed his forehead, the lightning bolt scar, the side of his nose, the darkened skin surrounding his eye, his cheek and then the side of his mouth. He awakened between giving attention the cheek and the corner of his mouth, but dazedly, sleep continuing with him. He sort of blinked open, drunkenly, tired. He smiled, making me smile.

"Hey…," I whispered, hearing nothing but Harry stretching, the sheets pulling inside his stretch, and Harry yawn.

I remained stationary, close to where I stopped near his face.

My eyes never left him and his various small and large movements.

"Hey…" He replied back to me after his yawn, the stretch, in whisper. He grinned in response and took a wandering glance about the room before coming back to me. "Anything wrong?"

I shook my head "no".

"No," I smiled and lightly kissed his grinning lips. "Everything is very right."

"Mm…," Twisting, he slipped to his side, rolling to his left to meet me. The left arm under my neck stayed, but his free arm now procured me, and tightly. He took me against him, and I snuggled into the crook the mattress, the sheets, his throat and his chest shaped.

Something so trivial… I was the happiest woman in the world.

I felt him kiss the top of my head and instinctively pull me closer, although we were at our closest.

I sighed contently, and squashed my nose against him.

He sparked laughter, and I followed suit.

I sighed once more, kissed him where I lay and soon I followed him back to our matched twilight.

***

Harry jostled me.

I didn't know what he was doing.

I hadn't put him in my trap, his arms around me instead of the other way, and I was startled at first by his motion. Weight to weightless, as Harry removed himself, lifting and pushing from the bed, the valley his body made ceased.

"Where are you going?" My speech was through a yawn, but my voice was anxious. I didn't want him away from me.

I don't think he realised he'd woken me, his back turned from me, his muscle folding the tanned skin amongst his shoulder blades. He twisted around the moment he had realised, having sat up to get up, and planted his lips on my forehead. "Start the daily routine. I need to begin a load of clothes, sheets in particular."

He winked.

"Need to make inventory of what we have and what we don't have in the refrigerator-"

"Don't," I started crawling behind him, keeping his stride to the ledge of the mattress.

Harry rotated his centre, took my face in his hands and eyed me level. "You've already done so much."

He kissed me, and when he did, the warmth, the care, the love washed from his steady lips, coursing through me as if our collision of body to body completed an electrical circuit. I think I felt my toes curl under the sheets, but just as fast as I felt the charge every nerve in my figure relaxed. When Harry released, my eyes still closed, I followed him unknowingly and nearly tumbled straight off the bed.

Harry chuckled.

Reveling in the multi-endorphin overload, I swayed in grins and fell backward in the bed. I kicked at the sheets and got comfortable, all the while observing a very naked Mister Potter wander the floor of our bedroom. I had my left arm above my head, my hand touching the intricately-detailed wooden backboard of the mattress. My right lay outside the sheets, above the comforter and followed the rounded curves of my form. My hair, gently poofed from my fall, the background. My eyes, settled directly on Harry, never dropped.

A bit of black hair on his chest, his smooth skin broke the pattern, nude, until below his navel which traced a line of dark down to his groomed pubic region. Subconsciously I'd let slip my right hand beneath the comforter, the sheet, to cup my right breast and give it a gentle squeeze. Leisurely gaining arousal, I watched how the muscles tensed when he moved, how his abdominals lightly protruded from his squared stomach, and how the hood of his uncircumcised penis covered his manhood like a wrapped gift.

I gave my nipple a tug and moaned subtlety when my breast snapped back into place.

Finally, and after he had bent down to pull up his boxer shorts, giving me a picturesque view of his taut buttocks, I couldn't resist. I almost started laughing, the thoughts, the building of emotions which made me antsy…

I decided to interject the silence with a…

Whistle.

Harry shot around with his forest green-and-navy blue striped shorts on his hips and did an awful impersonation of someone in surprise. He gasped. "Were you peeping at me, Jane?"

"I was," I replied in a smirk. "And, it was quite a lovely sight, if I may add."

"You're supposed to be falling back to sleep after I woke you…," He began over, and slowly. First, he climbed upon the mattress by kneeling on the end of the bed.

"And miss you strutting your handsome stuff?"

I giggled and fought him, my right hand slipping out from the comforter.

He'd lowered himself and gnawed playfully where my feet were positioned, formed by how the sheets lay.

I didn't really move, biting my bottom lip as he nipped my toes from above.

He kept his eyes on me, gazing, his teeth on the bigger of my toes where he sort of shook my foot around.

I smiled and gave another burst of giggle, especially when he growled, my lion.

He used the tip of his nose like a pencil and traced my right leg upwards, my calf, my thigh, my hip all getting his delicate treatment. He lightly kissed where my abdomen lay, having it retract to which he smiled. He moved further, to the round hilltops where he nudged me a bit more assertively, rubbing the growing stubble for he had shaved the night we got back home. He followed the concaved shape between my breasts where his slight weight gave aid to its appearance. He kissed to my bare shoulder, lingered at the crook of my neck, and then kissed my lips.

Throughout, I'd closed my eyes a half dozen times, but the final close remained and slowly I reopened them after he removed himself from my mouth.

Hovering, he kept above me, our noses barely touching. He stared into me, and I couldn't stop smiling. I took my hand and slid it behind Harry's head and scratched the back, slipping easily in-and-out of his mane.

He lowered himself from his crawl down on me, his elbows propping him up at my sides. "Are you going to go back to sleep?" He asked quietly.

I didn't answer him in that minute, casually caressing by finger his soft hair. I shook my head and gave him a smirk.

"You were asleep. I woke you up…," He leaned into the underside of my chin, at the hollow of my throat and began kissing lines. My eyes rolled into the back of my head and I swore I stopped breathing.

I let my sexuality tingle with every hair on my body erect.

"What's going to help you get back to sleep?" He questioned, nuzzling me by nudging the bridge of his nose against my jaw.

He stopped, moving back upward. I stuttered to open, but limply those eyelids did open. Staring right back at me were those green jades, one severely darker than its twin, but beautiful nonetheless.

"Hm?" He asked as if to repeat.

From the corner of my mouth a smirk carved itself until I'm sure it became evil, sinister, and as awful as my thoughts. I gave Harry a little notion, and then an obvious tug down of the sheet. His eyes went wide for a second, but he laughed and shuffled his way back into the sheets. I didn't get to see what happened next, everything going to black, but squealed into giggles when he grabbed me, threw the sheets over our heads and started ravaging me with the same sorts of gnawing, biting, lovable nipping of my feet.

He growled, and I shrieked with laughter.

***

I wasn't asleep for long.

At least, I didn't think so.

The room was brighter when I woke this time and I was on the opposite side of where I remembered when I fell asleep. I had my hands and arms wrapped about a pillow, and again it wasn't mine, so to speak. I knew this by the scent, and heavily, of Harry's pumpkin. Even without him, for he had gone downstairs following our love-making, I took to whatever came of his essence. I was definitely a lucky girl.

"Hermione…," Harry spoke in low tones, his hand stroking my head, my hair. He had on a pair of lounge trousers and sat side-saddle on the edge of the bed. He leaned over and was now beside me with his hand propping up his chin.

I stretched and made a tiny yawn.

I heard Harry lightly laugh through his nose at the tiny yelp I did at the end of the yawn.

His hand still stroked my head, and now, my cheek while my eyes adjusted to the environment. I went to rub them and blinked to get my clarity. I heard him say, when I saw him better, "…Good morning, baby."

"Hey…"

"You've been sleeping soundly."

I grinned and stretched again, rotating the pivots in my feet. I reached out and above with my arms, something popping in my upper back. "How long was I out?"

"In total? Almost fifteen hours."

"Christ…"

He laughed through his nose again. "Yeah, you must've been more tired than you thought you were. I came up here a while ago to get you up, but I just couldn't. You were like an angel. How the light hit your skin, how your hair lay…"

The rain had stopped earlier in the week, and now the sunrays breeched breaking cracks in the overcast.

I smiled and rubbed my nose along the pillow, squashing it into the softness while I squirmed.

"Are you hungry?"

I hadn't really been feeling anything, flittering between sleep and no sleep, but suddenly felt the urge for food.

I nodded, and then my stomach decided to speak up.

Harry grinned, his fingers sliding a lock of hair from in front of my face to behind my ear. "What's on the menu? Breakfast? Lunch?"

I lifted my head to see the clock and realised it was passed noon. I really had slept for hours. I guessed this was an example of how recklessly tired my body had gotten over that month without Harry, and how I rarely slept for a period of time. Instead, I'd sleep for short intervals that added to a fifteen hour escapade. I fell back to the pillow and answered in that sleepy tone, "Breakfast."

"What would you like?"

"You."

He snickered. "You've had me. That has to get dull after so many times."

"Psh." I retorted, rolling my eyes. I snuggled back into the pillow and clasped it, mimicking the original position of my arms and hands.

"Sausage?"

"Eggs." I resounded, and did a laugh, snorting.

He laughed when my laugh fell into a snort.

"I can definitely make you eggs, if that's what you want. Scrambled? Fried?"

Chuckling, I let him off the hook. He was being serious. "French toast?"

"The sweet sort with powdered sugar and maple syrup or just with a side like bacon?"

"Sweet, no sides."

"You've got it."

He went silent, and I couldn't feel him moving, his hand stopped on my head. I went to peer, but halted when I felt his lips kiss my cheek. "I love you," he said at my ear.

Grinning, I turned my head less than a centimetre and met his mouth. I kissed him, and in the brevity produced a moan of pleasure. Not so much sexual, but of…wow.

He grazed my nose with his, pushing away to get off the bed.

Opening my eyes, I followed him over to the closet. I pushed myself, with my elbows, from the bed. Under my arms I held the sheets against my front and yawn. I let my head fall to the side and combed the bushiness from my hair, or as most as I could, being interrupted by the sound of the closet's doorknob turning and Harry asking, "What are you going to wear today?"

"Harry, you don't have to do that. I'll get it."

"But, I want to, love. Let me."

Pausing, a smile resumed and I scratched the back of my head. I leaned back up and said, "The burnt orange-and-dark yellow plaid-like shirt on the far right."

The sound of metal scraping the closet rod was followed by a reveal of asked piece, "This?"

"Mhmm," I said, pointing towards the dresser drawers next and Harry following my instructions with a hanger in his hand. "The dark-washed jean shorts in the third drawer and one of the sleeveless black shirts in the first one."

One drawer slid opened while another closed. Harry turned to show me the sleeveless shirt he found. "This you mean?"

"Yeah, that's the one." I smirked. "Will you be getting my knickers, too? If so, the crotchless ones."

"Now that's what I'm talking about! Where are they?! The first drawer?"

I chuckled with a hand over my mouth.

Harry laughed loudly, but shook his head. "Nah, just helping a little where I can. I'll let you keep your privacy with the undergarments."

"The jean shorts and shirt are on top of the dresser," Harry went over to the closet knob. "And I'm hanging the plaid shirt here."

A clank echoed when he set the hanger on the knob.

"Okay," I smiled. "Thank you, love. I appreciate it."

Harry made his way out of the bedroom for me to change, but not before stepping once more to the bed. He put a finger under my jaw and led me to his lips. He kissed me and ran the finger along the point of my chin. "Mm… I'll be downstairs when you're ready."

He paused, and then said, "You have the most beautiful eyes. Up close, I can see tiny flecks of gold in those cinnamon irises. I missed that."

Mer…

I breathed in, and deep.

…Lin

I was that ecstatic school girl again; the kind that whimsically fell head over heels for her schoolyard sweetheart. "I love you," I stated, giving him a quick peck on the lips and watched him walk on out, shutting the door behind

When he was gone… I fell back to the bed with giggles.

I shrieked into laughter.

I threw up the sheets and let them gently fall back onto me.

I danced around, but gasped when I heard laughing.

I quickly flicked to the door, my hair swishing about, and saw it open with Harry utterly splitting his sides.

Embarrassed, but overwhelmingly happy nevertheless, I took the pillow and tossed it at the door.

***

"…Well, that's great, Cupcake. I'm glad to hear Harry is back and by the sound of your voice you're happy he's back, too."

"Very, very much." My hip tilted into the countertop. I had my right hand holding the telephone with my left about my middle, its hand helping to support its partner. "I couldn't be happier, really."

I watched Harry washing the dishes and setting them aside to dry later. Mum called or I would be assisting, side-by-side, with a dish rag. Uprooted, Harry continued while I chatted. Not too far away, for I didn't want him out of my sight. He paid close attention to the plates, forks, knives, with each being set on a rack. With each new piece, the ceramic would clink together or the metal would make a sound much like one would hear at Gringotts.

I could feel the layers of clothes, the plaid shirt parted, its sleeves rolled up to my upper arms, with the sleeveless exposed. Harry's gorgeous upper body, my eyes would flutter to his biceps when he'd lift a plate out of the soapy water, to his toned backside when he'd turn to organise it with the others. He caught me gazing at him, with a flick from his right, and made a face at me. He stuck out his tongue sideways, his nose and eyes crinkling. I laughed by the receiver, and did a face myself, sticking out my tongue and crossing my eyes.

"What's wrong, hun?"

"Oh, nothing mum," I laughed when Harry made another funny face from his side. I stepped and gave his arm a little push, to which he laughed and went on with his washing business. He smiled, and in profile, handsomely. "He's just being silly and it's contagious."

"Hello, Missus Granger," spoke up Harry, his voice giving off an echo.

Crookshanks purring was rather loud, brushing himself against Harry's leg. He was happy his playmate was back.

"Did you hear that?"

"Hello Harry, dear. We're happy you're back!"

"Mum says, `Hello' and that they're `happy you're back' from the business trip. Crookshanks! Down!" My ball of reddish-orange had decided Harry's leg a scratching post, wanting attention.

He grinned and set another plate in the drying rack, stepping around the carrot-coloured fluff hastily coordinating with his fleeting feet.

"Well, Cupcake, I'll let you get back to your day. Your father and I need to pick some things up from the shop downtown before it gets too late."

"All right, mum. Harry and I love you. I'll be sure to talk with Harry about getting together one weekend."

"Oh, and tell Harry `Happy Birthday' and have fun on your trip. Be safe, you know how we get to worrying."

I smiled into the receiver whilst looking at Harry. "All right, and tell daddy we love him, too."

"Will do, Cupcake. Talk to you later."

"Love you."

I went to hang the telephone on its stand on the wall, and said amidst the few steps back, "Mum and dad say, `Happy Birthday'."

I stopped when I saw a red flashing number on the message indicator. "What is this then? Did someone call while I showered?"

"No," Harry was at the rack now, drying and putting the dishes and utensils in their spots in the kitchen. "Are you sure it isn't-"

I'd pressed the button.

"Hermione, it's Gin. I've gone to Cho's if-"

"Ah." I mashed `delete' and the message cut.

The indicator reset to zero.

Gin called to apologise, to tell me where she went…and then, more apologies.

I didn't want to deal with that right now. Cho would be best for her at the moment. I was glad, though, she didn't run back to the Burrow. That was the last place she needed to be. Harry had expressed concern about Neville, as did I, and brother to brother I knew he wanted to talk to him. Not to necessarily get them back together, for now more than ever I believed Harry and his statement of "leaving them to resolve their problems". We couldn't protect everybody in our lives…even though it pained our personalities to resist temptation to do so.

"I think I may call him today."

"Hm?" We always had this telepathic connection. He always knew what I was thinking. My eyes went from the message machine.

"Neville," He replied, the dishes clinking when the base of one met the top of another. The windowed cabinets held open. "Take his mind off the torture I'm sure he's in. I know I'd be devastated if something like that ever happened."

"And, nothing will," I'd come over to help, but Harry knocked my hands away.

I just smirked. "As usual."

"That's because I've got it."

"Oh, Harry…," I slipped behind him and wrapped my arms around him. I lay my head on his upper back, his shoulder, "Quit being so damn perfect."

I smiled, and I heard him, felt him laugh.

"As the primary perfectionist in the house, you're beginning to bug the Hell out of me. You should know this by now."

"Beginning?" He teased. I felt him squeeze my left arm before gathering the set of knives and forks to dry off. "What an excuse."

"Competition."

"Well, you win then." He laughed.

I smiled. "I do win."

"You do. Checked Webster. Definition of Hermione: win."

I giggled and kissed that portion of his upper back. "Mm…," I sighed with utter satisfaction.

"I'm not going to push you this time," Harry said pointedly, my body forming to his, mimicking his movements back and forth to the cabinets. "But…"

"I know…" Lethargically pronounced, I sighed, but with exasperation this time.

"That's all I have to say about that. I won't bring it up again. You've always been wise with judgments; I shouldn't have pushed you the first time."

"Let's not talk about that right now…"

"Okay," He quickly announced, pivoting to face me. He took the dish rag he'd been drying the silverware with and seized me about the centre. He pulled me to him, the cloth easily showing the plaid shirt's excess material. Pulled tight, into a belt-shape, he had me on him.

I made a little, "Mm," and a subtle smirk grew into outright grin.

My hands went instinctively to his arms, the biceps, the niche his forearm and upper arm made at the elbow.

"What do you wish to discuss then?" He ended.

"Discuss?" I asked blase, smothering him about the neck and placed my lips upon his softness. I kissed him briefly, inching back to see him afterwards. "What is this…'discuss' you speak of now?"

"Mmm?" He pushed against me and kissed me just as brief.

I remained locked in his cloth-vice, hip-to-hip, enclosed on him and kissed him with length. "Mmm," I purred.

Our noses together, we grinned into each other's eyes.

I felt the cloth around me fall to be replaced with his hands, and strong, lifting me straight off the floor. He flipped around and set me on the counter where I stayed at first, but soon started to fall to my right.

He'd accidentally set the right half of me leaned into the sink.

"Harry!"

He caught me and slid me over.

I'd grabbed onto his shoulders and hung on for dear life.

We bowled over with laughter after the…death-defying balance on the tightrope.

"I swear I saw my life flash before my eyes!"

"Smooth," Harry grinned and winked. "Very smooth."

"Criminally smooth," I retorted with sarcasm.

"Mmm…," He pulled me to him, to the edge, his hands firm on my hips. He didn't move with hesitation, sliding down and around each buttock. His hands squeezed me, and then wiggled themselves into my back pockets. It was a difficult task, but he managed them in there.

"Insanely tight," He remarked with a kiss. "How do you get these on again?"

"Carefully," I laughed through my nose.

He fit between my legs, and when I felt him at my core I took my legs and loosely wrapped them around him, my calves at his thighs.

I had to hang on again. Harry took me up. He lifted my bum off the counter and I gasped, his strength incredible, and sexy. Our noses meshed while we kissed, and hard, roughly on my part with giggles. Slowly, he eased my bum back on the countertop with the same speed he laid into me, having me lean back. I shrieked into laughs, his stubble extremely ticklish against the erogenous zone, the soft part under my chin, my throat. My hands were all in his chaotic hair, in his thick tufts, as I breathed audibly. My eyes closed and that familiar smile formed with little effort.

He roared, now at my chest, between my breasts.

I gasped, tried to breathe to gasp again in smiles.

My sleeveless shirt was cut like a crew neck, but with thin strips of fabric hanging on my shoulders, revealing more skin than the average tee. Harry's face, his nose had nudge itself into one side of the lowered neckline where he attacked with kisses. He licked, driving me to those giggles, at the contour of my breast. I didn't have time to laugh, however; Harry's hands were under my arse and swiftly lifted me off the counter.

I squealed into a giggle, hearing Harry laugh into my chest at my surprise.

I locked my legs around him, and he placed me on the dining table.

Giving him the snog of his lifetime, I dropped back to the table.

From our lips, he came down by my lead.

***

I felt incredibly sexy.

Several romps.

A long, hot shower with my man.

A chilled butterbeer.

How my signature sleep shirt, charcoal and sky blue trim, swayed with my steps as I drew closer to Harry. He was on the sofa, stretched out when I saw him. He relaxed in another pair of lounge trousers, dark grey, the elastic band hanging low enough to see the lines his abdomen muscles made, cascading down between his thighs. He had his left arm behind his head, his right arm, his hand holding the television controller. The lights flickered from the tube as he flipped through the channels to find something for us to watch. The lights were dimmed enough that I could see the path I walked.

I put the bottle to my lips and took a sip. I stood at one of the two stands on either end of the sofa armrests. Harry didn't notice me there, his eyes watching the screen. He stopped on some Quidditch game, so I wasn't at all surprised. I sighed and rolled my eyes. I put the bottle back to my lips, took another swig, and then placed the bottle on the stand in front of me.

He quickly knew I was there.

I lightly came around, smiling at him taken to the flying broomsticks, and leapt on him.

"Oomph!" He resounded, catching me post-action.

I smacked him. "Don't you `Oomph'!"

"You're heavy!"

I gasped, said "Harry James!" and gave his cheek a little smack in the centre.

He still looked smug, and he even tried to sneak his hands up my legs, on my thighs which had been unveiled by the straddle of his waist.

I swatted his hands, and when he tried again, I smacked them harder.

He growled, snarled, and began lifting from the sofa.

He went to bite me, but I pushed him back down.

He bounced back, his head on the armrest.

"So violent…," He grabbed my hips, picked me up and set me back down where he wanted me.

I gasped, falling to him by his strength.

He trapped me with his right arm around my upper back, his left sideways, holding down my lower parts, his left hand on my left buttock.

"You're horrible."

"You're beautiful," He snipped at me.

I went to kiss him, and he swatted my arse.

Gasping became routine, and I smacked his pectoral.

He loosened his grip as I leaned upward. His hands left from around me, and I found them, lacing my fingers with his. I played with him, moving his hands, his arms around, tugging them and pushing them back. He laughed at my goofiness and I grinned.

"What are you doing?"

"Look at this," I put my hand flat against his.

"What?" He asked, glancing between me and our combined hands.

His fingers were almost a half-inch above mine, and in comparison, his hand engulfed my slenderness. "Large."

"Large?" He cocked a brow.

I leaned back down and gave him a peck-kiss. "Laaarrge…"

I scrunched my nose up when he peck-kissed the tip in return.

"It's extremely, extremely sexy," I'd lifted back into my straddle, pushing up with support from his hands. "How you're so much bigger than me."

"Well," He exclaimed in professorial speech. "The Neanderthal cavemen were sophisticatedly more of mass due in part because they had to fend for their-"

I smacked his chest again, making him stutter to a stop.

He laughed.

"Shut up…," I said with another eye roll, and a smile.

I put his hands back on my hips. "Here," I stated to rewrite his focus.

"Mmm…," He grunted, pulled me up, swung me around and I landed in his position on my back, switching places.

Snickering, Harry didn't even give me breath enough to readjust myself. He gathered my sleep tee, all the excess fabric albeit much less than what I wore earlier, and hiked it north. A barrage of kisses, starting from below my breasts and cascading over my tummy. I squealed into giggles, pushed up off the sofa with my shoulders and fell back into the angle of the armrest. My neck lay with the roundish outline, the back of my head on the armrest itself.

I closed my eyes and gasped, finding his mouth by sensations, multiple nerves firing off within all their cylinders when I felt him nearing my knickers.

The moment he landed a caress on the mound, I stretched into my arch, tilted my head back and let out a gentle moan.

He tore my knickers off and it was difficult, between lovable shocks rocking my core, to find his head.

But when I did, my fingers all inside his hair, I gave him a right, hard tug.

He grunted, making an "Oomph!" sound.

***

"Spot on."

"Spot on?" Harry glanced from The Quibbler in one hand, his other around me beneath our Gryffindor roaring-lion knitted quilt.

A lamp had been clicked on by a drawstring.

The television was turned off.

We were resting before eventually going off to bed.

I lay perpendicular, my head on his farthest thigh, on his lap, the quilt just over my shoulders. My flowing brunette hair, flowing a bit in a mess that is, fell all over the parts of Harry I hadn't covered. I lay facing towards him, and close. I'd been in and out of dozing, the silence helping with every so often a crackle of the newspaper turning.

We'd been talking, bantering as we did, and of course I was in my smiles.

"Spot onnnn…," I elongated in a dazed slur as the onset of my exhaustion began breaking down faculties.

Harry glanced at me beyond his glasses, his glass reflecting that shortened gleam from the nearby lamp. He leaned over and gave me a light kiss.

I grinned and fidgeted, laid out the length of the sofa.

I found the arm that was around me and clung onto anything Harry.

"…But yeah, I'm glad-no," He diverted. "I'm really glad you weren't there."

He rubbed my side.

"I wanted to be there," `Genuine' was a lesser term than what I meant. The promise I had to him went beyond reality. "I wished to be right there by your side. I read the papers religiously-"

"The stories, Hermione," He shook his head, stopped the rub for a beat, and begun it all again. "The stories I had to listen to from this… Kingsley called him a Priority, this terrible being if one can even call him that, Ivik…"

"…Stories?"

Harry stared blankly. It was almost as if he was looking into the past, keeping still with his only movement the resuming rub of my side. "I remember him just staring at me throughout my time there. When he was being interrogated by the Ministry all he did was… It wasn't even a stare. It was this cold look, sinister, evil, and the hatred he spewed wasn't anything I'd seen or heard since Voldemort."

"Kingsley offered him defense. He's a man of his word, Kingsley. He didn't just want Ivik sentenced to death without a trial, but Ivik wanted nothing of it. He called us filth, said something like he smelled sulfur. But, he would watch me as if he was calculating this…inner dialogue. I told Kingsley about my assessment, and he assured me he knew the look I received. He came out and told me he needed me there to bait the man into relieving potential information, and information he gave willingly. It was like he enjoyed telling his tales of murder to us."

"I had to walk out a few times. One time in particular. I remember it was one of the few times Ivik actually took his eyes off me. He started rambling about killings, or deaths he would have liked to done. One being, of course, mine; that, I took their "god" from them. I was in turn their, "anti-god," or "devil" as he put it. He started to… I want to say reminisce? Disgustingly… It was like he was talking about his innocent childhood, but he was describing how he'd kill me. He'd love to, `fillet' me: take a knife and take the top layer of my skin off, let me bleed until I scabbed over and healed, and then do it all again. He said how he, and many of his others, craved for killing the victims slowly. `Slower the better,' was something he insisted when asked again by the persecution."

"I could take that. I've been taking it," Harry laughed, and I knew it came from his morbid life story. "Well, I tend to believe I've been taking this my whole life. Maybe when I was younger, naive, thought the world was one way… But, all this hatred towards me came rhetorical. But, he was asked to describe the other murders he wanted to commit, and that's when I had to leave the courtroom. He…"

Harry cleared his throat.

All of my questions ceased.

"You don't have to go any further," I coaxed to renew the route of our discussion in another direction. If it hurt him to tell me details, I wasn't going to keep asking as much as I wanted to know everything. I understood the premise, having lived most of my life beside him already. I got it. "I just needed to know that you were safe. That's all."

"Very safe," He mused, running the hand he had rubbed me with against the side of my cheek, his fingers sliding into my locks of hair. "With or without the two dozen or so Aurors. And, there were plenty on hand. None of them paid particular interest to me as I'm sure all eyes were on Ivik. Kingsley, of anyone in the courtroom, was the one not to be trifled with. He brings this assumed authority wherever he goes. He's like the father role, and all the kids shush when he enters. When the judge asked me questions regarding the past and if I remembered seeing Ivik, all he did was laugh while I spoke, called me names. He did it under his breath at first, but he became audible the longer he got away with it. Ivik hushed when Kingsley silenced him. All he had to say was a single, `Silence!' and everyone went quiet, especially Ivik. That's authority."

"He stayed beside me, Kingsley. Maybe arms-length once or twice, but always right there. Standing, sitting, even eating-he'd ask, `Everything going all right?' He knew the whole scene affected me more than anyone, and that's why after I told him he wasn't reluctant to keep me there. He knew right away that I'd done my best and it was time for me to get back, especially when I heard you were…"

His voice trailed off.

His stroking of my head was soothing.

I closed my eyes slowly, and then reopened them.

"I love you." He expressed straight with unwavering loyalty.

Lifting up, he had to rearrange. He moved the arm, the hand that was upon me around to meet about my centre. I slipped aside him, giving space and quilt to him, shielding him figuratively as he shielded me, comfort, safety. I came in and kissed his lips with a sense of ferocity, with love, and lay my forehead to touch his. I remained there, the tips of our noses as one, and said with my eyes closed, "I'm sorry…"

"You've nothing to be sorry about, my love."

I pulled my knees together, and then shifted them across Harry's lap beneath the crimson and gold quilt. I kissed his lips again, and then lay my forehead back, touching. "…I'm sorry you've had to take the cards you were dealt. I wish, everyday, that something-me-that I could take some of that away from you. Like, absorb it to lessen-"

"I don't think you quite understand how much light you give my life," He kissed me, our foreheads never leaving its soul mate. "There's a reason behind my evacuation back to you. I needed to be around that light. I needed to be with you. I am but a ship on cursed waters, and you are my guiding ray of hope."

"Harry…" I sighed, smiled, shook my head and gave him a tightest of embrace.

I kissed him, and then nuzzled into his neck, my head on his shoulder. "I love you," I said into his ear. "I love you…"

He held me.

I closed my eyes and fell asleep in his arms.

{Inspirations for the chapter: Jewel's You Were Meant for Me. The passed chapters are a reflexive to her song as well. Also, Iris by the Goo Goo Dolls from Harry's point of view.}

{Added Note: At first I wanted this chapter to be communicative to the previous, having Hermione still mourning and have Harry pull her out of it. But, I thought that would be beating a dead horse with Hermione's affliction in "Funeral". What occurred here happened later on, and I hope it came off this way. Again, I wanted to put this added note in because-like Seamus's death and following written reaction-there would have been a greater response to Minerva's death, but wanted to put their `coming back together' in the forefront and not have what could have been a dragging episode. This may change when I go back and look at everything as a whole}

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