Living Past the End

Disclaimer: All things HP belong to JKR. No money is being made from this or I wouldn’t be in so much debt…

Author’s Note: This was started years ago but it’s been slow going as I keep getting distracted with other fics. Written for Addisonj who requested a fic involving the Trio transitioning from war to peace-time.

Living Past the End

Chapter 1

Harry jerked awake with a sharp gasp.

His heart was pounding, his face sweaty, his throat scratchy from the screams he never allowed himself to scream.

He wasn’t alone in the room. The sound of someone else’s breathing filled his mind and his grip tightened on the wand he never let go of, even in sleep—especially in sleep. He was immediately tensed and poised to leap up, the words of a hex forming in his thoughts, only waited for more of a sense of the person’s location, of the nearest place to duck behind.

It took a full minute of tension before sanity—and reality—broke through the mindless fog of automatic reaction and he remembered, realized. It was only Ron. Of course it was only Ron. He was at the Burrow, sleeping in Ron’s room as he always did at the Burrow.

And the War was over. Voldemort was gone.

They were safe.

Death Eaters were still being rounded up but his role—their role—had mostly ended. It was up to the Aurors now, up to the last, surviving members of the Order.

Harry lay in his bed stiffly, staring up at the ceiling in the darkness.

In. Out. In. Out. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale.

He tried to regulate his breathing, tried to force his muscles to relax, one by one, but couldn’t fully manage it.

Besides, he hated the darkness. If he had his way, he’d keep so many candles lit up throughout the night, it would be nearly as bright as full daylight.

Darkness meant danger. Darkness provided cover for enemies. Darkness meant increased vigilance was needed. Darkness meant the acrid taste of fear.

And darkness meant sleep—uneasy sleep, stalked by the twin terrors of memory and dread.

He hated sleep now too. Not that he ever got much of it these days. He didn’t think he’d slept more than a few hours, at best, on any night in the last year.

He lay as still as he could, trying to will himself to relax, not to react to the almost-stifling restlessness, the urge to get up and investigate, make sure that nothing lurked outside.

Maybe this was insanity, some corner of his mind suggested coolly—that detached corner of his mind that had developed as a shield of sorts against the emotions, the fear, that would otherwise strangle him. He’d read or heard somewhere that the definition of insanity was doing the same thing over and over again expecting the same result and after all, wasn’t that what he did every night, always expecting, always hoping in some corner of himself that this would be the night he could sleep, this would be the night he got the better of the terrors that stalked his dreams?

He heard a creak and almost bolted upright, straining his ears. And heard nothing aside from Ron’s continued steady breathing.

He tried to ease himself down; the creak had only been the usual sounds of a house settling. There was no danger.

To say nothing of the fact that he knew that there were wards put up all around the Burrow.

He ought to know; he was the one to put them up every night. He knew, without saying, that both Mr. and Mrs. Weasley considered it unnecessary (which is why they didn’t do the same); he also knew that Ron, if he’d known, would have said he was acting paranoid, that there was no danger to protect against anymore.

Knowing all that didn’t change the fact that he needed to know the wards were up. They didn’t solve the problem—his current state was proof of that—but they did help.

Harry gave up the battle to keep still and swung his legs off the bed to sit up fully. He was too restless to lie still any longer and decided to get up, double-check the wards, if only to give him something to do.

Moving carefully, he stood up, easing his way across the dark room and opening the door with equal care. Ron might be a heavy sleeper but he knew that others weren’t and he had no wish to wake anyone up.

The Burrow was entirely still and silent, as it should be at that hour, and Harry crept quickly and quietly down the stairs.

He was almost to the front door when he sensed something, some movement, behind him and he whirled, his wand up, his lips parting on a hex—

To find himself staring at the point of another wand and, behind it, a very familiar face and form.

He promptly lowered his wand arm, dropping just that little bit the guard that had flown up automatically. “Jeez, Hermione, what do you think you’re doing? I almost hexed you!” he said in a heated whisper.

“Me? I almost hexed you!” Hermione returned in a whisper, although hers was decidedly calmer than his had been.

It was too dark for him to see much of her face beyond a pale shadow in the darkness but he didn’t need to see her face to know that her expression had softened a little, could hear it in her whisper, as she asked, “You couldn’t sleep either?”

“I can never really sleep,” he admitted. “I was just going to--”

“If you’re about to check on the wards, I just did,” Hermione interrupted him.

He blinked and gaped at her. “How’d you know?” he blurted out.

She made a gesture to indicate the front door. “You were going outside. What else would you be going outside at this hour for?”

He felt a flicker of an odd emotion and realized, belatedly, that it was amusement at her matter-of-fact tone. So very Hermione of her, he thought inanely.

“I actually meant, how did you know I even put up the wards?” Even as he asked it, he knew it was probably a silly question.

“Of course you’d put up wards at night. And even if I didn’t know you would, I’ve seen you taking them down in the mornings and I’ve heard you come down to check on them before.”

It was definitely a silly question; this was Hermione after all. Of course she’d known.

“You- you don’t think it’s silly of me since the War is over and all?”

“Silly? Of course not. And I’m glad you put up the wards; it helps me sleep better at night.”

He relaxed, realizing at that moment how nervous he’d been, how much he hated his own weakness, his inability to relax, to just let it go. He hated his inability to stop feeling afraid, to stop feeling like he was still fighting.

He hated it but for some reason that he couldn’t explain, he felt better knowing that Hermione felt some of the same thing. To her, somehow, he could admit his weakness in a way he couldn’t with anyone else, and doing so didn’t make him feel weaker but in some odd way, almost made him feel stronger, better about it. Maybe it was something about her matter-of-fact acceptance, her unquestioning understanding, but he felt better.

“Let’s go sit down,” Hermione said. “It’s silly of us to just be standing in the hallway like this. Unless,” she paused and glanced back at Harry, “you want to go back to sleep?”

“No!” he burst out involuntarily—although he did somehow remember to keep his voice low--not able to suppress his tiny shudder of reaction. “No,” he repeated more calmly in a whisper.

He felt Hermione’s look but, thankfully, she said nothing more about it as they went into the family room, settling down side by side on the couch.

They were silent for a few minutes, a comfortable silence, somehow, sitting together in the dark as they were.

“I have nightmares too,” Hermione finally said quietly.

He let out a shuddering breath. “Yeah. I- I’m afraid to sleep because of them,” he admitted.

“Oh, Harry… Don’t you ever get to sleep without nightmares?”

“Not lately.”

“It’ll get better, Harry. Really, it will. It’ll just take some time.”

He wasn’t so sure of that but somehow, hearing her say it, he could almost believe it.

“Ron doesn’t seem to have any trouble sleeping.” And even though he tried, he knew that some of the envy he felt over that seeped into his tone.

“I think… it’s different for Ron. This is his home; he grew up here and is surrounded by his family. It makes sense that he’d find it easy to feel safe here.”

“I suppose.” A home. Harry wondered what that must feel like, to have a home that you could feel completely safe in. Hogwarts had been the first home he’d ever really had and Hogwarts no longer felt safe to him, hadn’t proven to be safe for him. And much as he liked being at the Burrow, much as part of him basked in the feeling of being with a real family, he always knew that the Burrow wasn’t his home, the Weasleys weren’t his family.

“I- I envy Ron, you know,” he found himself admitting, his voice very low. “It just seems… so much easier for him.”

“In some ways, it is, but you know that Ron’s life isn’t perfect either.” She paused and then added, in a suspiciously bland tone, “Besides, it must be easier to be happy when all you care about is Quidditch.”

He laughed as he knew she’d intended him to and then was surprised at himself. He couldn’t really remember the last time he’d really laughed, sincerely, not the forced chuckle he tended to use during the days to deflect attention from the fact that he felt positively suffocated from all the attention.

He sensed rather than saw her smile and felt himself relaxing further, feeling some of the ever-present tension ease.

It was still dark but the darkness didn’t seem so terrible now that he wasn’t alone. There was an odd comfort just from being with someone else. The darkness no longer seemed full of lurking dangers.

Another silence fell until all he could hear was the soft sound of his and Hermione’s breathing, the quiet sounds of the night. And for the first time in a very long while, the silence didn’t seem ominous. He simply sat there and enjoyed what felt like the first real moments of peace he’d known in years.

After a while, he felt Hermione lean her head against his shoulder. “This is nice,” she murmured quietly and he knew she understood, felt much the same as he did about this sharing of the darkness with someone else.

It was… nice. A very tame, bland word but oddly fitting, too. Because it wasn’t about drama or intensity; it wasn’t as if he and Hermione were doing anything to ward off the darkness. This was a quiet thing, a calm thing, just him and Hermione, sitting in the dark—and for the first time, he felt as if the War might really be over…

Amazingly, he must have dozed as the next thing he knew, he was opening his eyes to find the pale, gray light of dawn filtering in through the curtains, dully illuminating the room. He must have dozed and, more than that, he had not dreamed.

He squinted across the room to the clock to see that it was just after five in the morning; he had managed to sleep for nearly three hours.

He turned to look down at Hermione, still leaning against his shoulder, to see that she was, apparently, asleep as well, her eyes closed. Seeing her now in the light, he could see the tell-tale shadows under her eyes, proof that her nights had been quite as restless as his had been. He was suddenly very glad that she had managed to get some sleep too.

“Hermione. Hermione, wake up,” he said, his voice gentle, not quite willing to move his shoulder and wake her up more abruptly.

She blinked and opened her eyes to focus on him almost immediately. “Oh, Harry. I must have fallen asleep,” she said, sounding as surprised as he had been.

“We both did,” he answered. “But we should probably go back upstairs before people start waking up.”

“Yeah, you’re right.”

Hermione pushed herself to her feet, moving with something less than her usual briskness, and he stood up as well, following her out of the room.

“Well, goodnight, Harry,” Hermione said and then paused, “Or, I guess, good morning.”

He felt himself smiling—and that, in itself, was unfamiliar enough to give him a moment’s pause. “See you later, Hermione.”

She gave him a small smile in return as she left, heading to Ginny’s room, while he turned towards Ron’s room.

That was how it began. And it became a ritual, a habit, of sorts.

He didn’t think it was really intentional, on either his or Hermione’s parts, but that was how it began, their meeting up at night, when all the Weasleys were asleep. Just the two of them, sitting and talking quietly in the darkness of the nights until they dozed and, somehow, managed to find the few hours of dreamless sleep that still evaded him elsewhere.

Oddly, he never mentioned it to Hermione or anyone else during the day—he never knew why except that their nightly interludes seemed somehow a thing apart from the rest of the world and to mention it during the day seemed as if it would break the strange unreality that lingered about those night conversations.

There were times it almost felt as if he were living two lives—the one during the day when he was nearly constantly tense, feeling half-suffocated by the very affection and concern of the Weasleys, to say nothing of the constant demands on his time and attention from the outside world, all wanting to make much of the Boy Who Lived and Hero of the Second Voldemort War, as the media had already styled him; and the other one during the nights, when he was, somehow, just himself, just Harry.

And during those nights, in the intimacy that the darkness encouraged, he and Hermione talked. They talked, a little, about their nightmares, the memories and the fears that still haunted them, and to her—only to her—he could admit how tense he still was, how afraid he still was, and admit just how much he hated the tension and the fear. To her, he could admit how suffocated he felt sometimes at being at the Burrow, where Mrs. Weasley, especially, almost smothered him in her maternal concern as Mrs. Weasley seemed to be channeling all her grief over Fred into even more affection for Harry. To her, he admitted too that he had nothing to say to Ginny when they were left alone during the day and, rather than getting better, it was almost getting worse.

And to him, Hermione talked about her parents and her guilt at not staying with them now that the War was over but that she just couldn’t bear to be with her parents, who cared so much but knew so little of what had happened in the last couple years. To him, Hermione finally admitted that part of her restlessness stemmed from not knowing what to do now, finished with Hogwarts as they were and no longer at War. To him, Hermione also admitted how she was afraid that she and Ron would never really be able to be more than just friends, that the relationship that had sort of started but then been put off as the War intensified was just not resuming the way she had rather expected it would.

To him, Hermione admitted that there were times she felt almost unspeakably old compared to Ron, somehow. His response to this was a teasing, “Yes, you’re quite the grandmother. I’m amazed you’re not going gray. I’ve been thinking I should buy you a cane.”

She’d elbowed him in response. “Harry!”

He’d sobered and then asked, “You don’t feel that way with me? After all, you’re older than me, too.”

He’d half-wondered if she would respond teasingly but she had tilted her head to the side thoughtfully, in one of her characteristic poses, before she’d answered, “No, I’m not sure why, but you’re… different.”

He’d hidden his relief with banter. “If that’s your way of telling me I look old, I don’t appreciate it.” And he’d been rewarded by her soft laugh.

For they did laugh during these nightly conversations. It wasn’t all serious conversation in those times. Whether it was a representation of his added comfort, he wasn’t sure, but he found his humor returning to him. It was easier to smile, easier to laugh, in those nightly conversations with Hermione than he found it during the day. And he knew Hermione felt the same way, could hear it in her tone and her laughs, that were… lighter, came quicker, than they were during the day.

They didn’t always talk. Some nights, they simply sat in comfortable silence and he would let the sound of her breathing calm him, conscious of the solid warmth of her against his side, and before he even realized it, he would slide into sleep.

It started almost by accident but it became a ritual and then, it became something like a need. He relied on the comfort, relied on the strength, relied on her friendship. Relied on the way her presence seemed to keep the worst of the nightmares at bay. It made the days easier and while it didn’t entirely ease his restlessness during the night or completely abolish his fears, it helped. He found a measure of peace during their nights and he needed that.

“What do you want for your birthday, Harry?” Hermione asked, during one of their nightly conversations.

“I don’t know.”

“Very helpful answer, thanks,” Hermione teased.

He half-smiled but then sobered. “Sorry, it’s just I wasn’t exactly thinking ahead to what would happen after… everything so it’s not like I made plans for my birthday.”

Hermione’s tone softened. “I know you weren’t. But you can think about it now; there must be something you want. A new broom. Quidditch stuff. Some books.”

He gave her a teasing glance. “I think you’re mistaking me with you. I’m not strange like you, remember?”

Hermione pretended to huff in offense but the smile tugging at the corner of her lips betrayed her.

“Seriously, Harry, there must be something you want. You can tell me.”

He hesitated, sighed, and then finally burst out, “I want to be left alone.”

He realized belatedly how that sounded when she stiffened and moved away from him. “Oh,” she said flatly and very softly and he could hear the hurt in her voice, though she tried to hide it.

“No, Hermione, I didn’t mean you!”

“You didn’t?” He felt her relax a little but she stayed where she was, as if she was still prepared to jump up and leave the room.

He could have kicked himself for his thoughtless answer, blurting it out like that, without thinking of how it would sound, without thinking of how it would hurt her. On a sudden impulse, desperate to make up for his stupid words, he put his arm around her shoulders, bringing her back against him the way she had been.

He sensed her surprise but then she relaxed against him, her head resting on his shoulder, and he knew he was forgiven.

“I didn’t mean you,” he said again. “I meant… I was talking about everyone else, the media and everyone, wanting to talk to me, to interview me. All the people I’ve never met, writing to me as if I’m their new best friend. Even…” He hesitated and then added, “Even the Weasleys, aside from Ron, who just care so much, are always talking to me, asking if I want anything, and are all so concerned and caring and it just…” he trailed off guiltily. “Sorry. I know I’m being an ungrateful prick.”

“No, Harry, you’re not. I can see how the way the Weasleys treat you would feel a little suffocating.”

“Yeah, suffocating. I know they’re only doing it because they care and they’re so glad we’re alright and safe again but I just… I wish they’d leave me alone, stop treating me as if I’m some visiting dignitary or someone who can’t so much as lift a finger. They’re all so glad to have me here, to know it’s all over, and they expect me to celebrate with them but I just… I just can’t… I don’t feel glad; I don’t feel like it’s over… I just don’t…”

Mrs. Weasley hadn’t let him so much as pour himself a glass of water since he’d arrived. When he tried, she was always shoo-ing him back to his seat and bringing him water herself. Admittedly, Mrs. Weasley fussed over them all but she fussed over him the most. And perhaps that was another reason these nightly interludes with Hermione comforted him. Because she was the only person who didn’t treat him any differently. She didn’t expect him to act happy when he wasn’t, didn’t treat him like a returning hero. Ron didn’t treat him like a hero but he did expect Harry to be happy and didn’t understand that Harry just didn’t feel that way—at least not yet.

Hermione was different. She… understood. She always had understood, he thought now. It was no wonder he liked being with her.

He lifted the shoulder Hermione wasn’t leaning against in a half-shrug. “Eh, it’s okay. I’m just being a prat, complaining because people are being too nice to me. As for my birthday, just get me something you think I’ll like. I trust you.”

He sensed rather than saw Hermione’s slight smile. “Okay.”

He shifted, settling more comfortably on the couch. She relaxed further against him and, after a brief hesitation, he rested his cheek against her hair.

“Anyway, after everything you’ve done for me this past year, you really don’t have to get me anything.”

“Don’t be silly, Harry. It doesn’t work like that; of course I’m going to get you a birthday present.”

“Thanks,” was all he said, quietly, but knew she could hear in his tone how much it meant to him.

He let his eyes close, hearing the sound of her quiet, steady breathing, and, for almost the first time, was consciously aware of how comforting it was. He didn’t know why it was but the sound of Hermione’s breathing was calming, whereas he already knew that the sound of Ron’s breathing had no such effect on him. His last conscious thought before he slid into sleep was that he didn’t understand it but he was thankful for it.

~

His birthday did end up being a happy day, the happiest day since the War had ended, since Mrs. Weasley had given in to his request and had refrained from throwing a party for him. It had, instead, been a relatively quiet day (or as quiet as any of his days were) and almost uniformly pleasant, barring the special birthday visit from Minister Scrimgeour and a few other Ministry officials. (He supposed he should feel honored but he didn’t. He still disliked Scrimgeour and listening to their congratulatory platitudes irritated him.)

The Weasleys gave him a new broom; Ron (predictably) gave him some Chudley Cannons gear.

Hermione’s gift was a book about famous Quidditch players of the last century. It was the gift of one friend to another, nothing more and nothing less—and he was surprised by a feeling of something almost like disappointment but was not really. He wasn’t disappointed, exactly; it wasn’t that he’d wanted anything more. (He was still a little surprised every time he even received any presents that didn’t consist of something like a used tissue, let alone several real presents). And yet… And yet, he was conscious of something, an emotion he didn’t really care to identify since it seemed the height of ingratitude, just a niggling sense of surprise that, in spite of how much closer he felt to her after their night-time conversations, she would still get him such a… purely friendly gift…

And for the first time he wondered why Hermione continued to join him in their nightly interludes. Did she feel the same comfort he did? Did his presence, his company, help her to sleep as hers did for him?

That very night, he found out, if not exactly why Hermione continued to join him, that the conversations they had did mean something to her. Found out, again, just how much Hermione cared about him. And he found out, too, just how much their nights meant to him.

He was waiting for her in the dark family room before she crept down to join him and as she sat next to him, she handed him a small box.

“What’s this?”

“It’s the other part of your birthday gift.”

“Hermione, you didn’t have to get me two--” he began but she interrupted him.

“It’s not really a gift. Just open it and see.”

He did. It was a key.

He stared for a moment before looking up at her. “Hermione, you—what is this for?” He paused and then added, teasingly, since he saw the flicker of a half-hesitant expression cross her face, “Did you buy me a new car? Or is this the key to the Crown Jewels?”

She smiled, obligingly, and then sobered. “No, it’s the key to a house.”

Now, he really stared at her. “You got me a house?!”

“No! I mean, yes, sort of, but not really,” Hermione rushed to explain. “It’s my grandparents’ vacation house, in the south of France. They spend a couple months there every year and when they’re not using it, they rent it out and allow my parents to use it a few weeks every year. My parents agreed to let you stay in it for the next month.”

“Your parents agreed to let me stay in it?” Harry repeated a little dumbly.

Hermione nodded. “Yes. It’s their month for using it and they’re not planning to visit themselves so they agreed. I thought… Harry, it’s a place for you to get away from everyone here. You can hide there. The cottage is rather isolated so you’d have your privacy but it’s close enough to the town that you can get anything you need easily enough. You can go to the beach and just relax. And I’ll tell the Weasleys and anyone else who asks that I don’t know where you went so you won’t be disturbed. You’ll be alone, Harry, where no one can bother you.”

“Your grandparents’ house. Alone,” Harry repeated inanely. He knew he sounded and probably looked like an idiot but he couldn’t help it. If Hermione had handed him the moon, he could not have been more surprised. Even when he’d said that he wanted to be left alone, he’d always thought it was impossible. He’d said it knowing it could never happen, that he couldn’t escape the attention.

“Yes. It’s what you wanted, Harry, to be left alone. And now you will be; you can be,” Hermione explained simply.

“No, I won’t,” he blurted out, unthinkingly, and realized belatedly that it was true. He’d never thought it could happen but now—now it was possible. Hermione had made it possible. And it was only now that he realized he didn’t want it. He didn’t want to be alone, didn’t want to run away, if she wouldn’t be there with him. That was really it. It was her. He wanted to be left alone, yes, but he wanted to stay with her more. He wanted to have these nights of talking to her, wanted to have her companionship and her understanding—wanted it more than he wanted to be left alone.

“Come with me,” he said flatly, urgently. As requests went, it sounded rather more like a command. “I want you to come with me. You—and Ron,” he added as an afterthought.

“But… Harry… are you sure? I thought…”

“I’m sure,” he interrupted her. “I want you—and Ron—to come with me. I wouldn’t have much fun if you weren’t with me too,” he added. “So, will you come?”

She nodded. “Yes, I’ll come. Of course I’ll come.”

He smiled. “Thanks, Hermione.”

And then on an impulse and because he’d just realized how much these nights with her had come to mean to him, he bent his head and brushed his lips against her cheek—except she turned her head at just that second and his kiss landed not quite on her cheek but closer to the corner of her lips instead.

He froze and felt her stiffen and they both jerked back a little to stare at each other and for a moment he felt a flare of something like panic that he quickly covered with a forced quip. “You have to come with me, you know, because I don’t speak a word of French so I’d be in trouble on my own, probably end up ordering a plate of live eels when I wanted a sandwich or something.”

She relaxed and returned his smile. “Well, I suppose, if only to save you from having to eat eels,” she teased, feigning a put-upon tone.

And just like that, the moment was over and they were just two friends talking.

“If you want to, we can leave tomorrow,” Hermione said.

“Yeah, okay,” he agreed. “We have to say bye to the Weasleys and everything but yeah, it’ll be good to get away.”

“It’ll be a vacation, Harry. You’ve never had a real one, have you?”

“No, I haven’t,” he admitted with a candor he probably wouldn’t have had with anyone else but this was Hermione and if there was one person in the world whom he could talk to about nearly everything, it was her. It was odd but even though the admission skirted dangerously close to one he never spoke of if he could help it—the Dursleys and how they’d treated him—he felt the last remnants of tension dissipate with the words.

It was so normal now, just like any other night, so normal he could almost forget that odd moment just a minute ago. Almost.

He couldn’t quite forget it, though, part of him still reeling from it. He’d almost kissed her. He’d almost kissed her—but that wasn’t what had shocked him most. What shocked him was that, in that frozen split second, he’d wanted to kiss her. Wanted to move his head just that little bit so he could touch his lips to hers. Wanted her. He’d wanted to kiss Hermione. Hermione, whom he’d never felt that way about, never thought about in that way.

And that flicker of heat, of desire, terrified him more than almost anything else.

Which was why he was so grateful that the tension, that heat, was gone now. It was a fluke, he told himself, an accident, a natural, instinctive, male response to almost kissing a girl. That was all. That had to be all it was.

Didn’t it?

~To be continued…~

Disclaimer: See Chapter 1.

Living Past the End

Chapter 2

Given everything, it proved to be almost ridiculously easy to leave the Burrow. Ron agreed readily in the morning and, while Mr. and Mrs. Weasley weren’t thrilled over his leaving—Mrs. Weasley in particular had not been pleased, especially when Harry had refused to answer her question of where they were going—in the end, of course, they had given in.

And now, here they were—just the three of them, in her grandparents’ summer home. And they were alone. The Weasleys had been told to answer any questions about Harry’s whereabouts (of which she was sure there would be a lot) with the answer that Harry had gone away on an extended vacation.

“Nice place your grandparents have, Hermione,” Ron grinned appreciatively as they looked around.

“Yeah, it is,” Hermione agreed. “I used to come here almost every summer when I was little and stay with my grandparents for a while. Here, Harry, you can stay in this room,” she added, opening the first door as they reached the first floor up the stairs. “This is the room I always use,” she added, opening another door down the hall and throwing her knapsack, into which she’d shrunk all that she might need, onto the bed.

“And I’m going to sleep in the tub?” Ron asked teasingly.

She grinned at him. “If you want to, you can, but in case you decide against that, there’s another room at the end of the hall.” She winked at Harry and felt her heart lift a little at his responding smile before she added, still addressing Ron, “Or there’s a closet downstairs you can sleep in.”

“So many choices,” Ron said in mock amazement. “You’re too kind.”

Now Harry laughed and Hermione felt a wave of gratitude and affection for Ron, for his good humor and his ability to make Harry laugh. For all the times that Ron annoyed her— and there were many— she forgave him because, no matter what else, Ron could make Harry laugh. Dear Ron. She did care about him so much, even loved him in a way… And it was because of moments like this, these rushes of affection for him that had made her think that she and Ron could be more than friends, that she fancied Ron in that way. Now, though—oddly enough-- she suddenly realized why she’d been wrong and why she and Ron would never be more than friends. She cared about Ron, yes, but she cared about Harry more. When she felt a surge of affection for Ron, it was usually for Harry’s sake; it was because of Harry. It was because Ron could make Harry laugh as almost no one and nothing else could—and Harry’s laughter was rare enough— and precious enough to her— that she was quite willing to love everyone and everything that made Harry laugh.

“I don’t know about you guys but I think it’s time for the beach,” Ron said, changing the subject with such abruptness that Hermione suspected he’d just been waiting until now when he could make the suggestion.

“That’s fine with me,” Hermione answered before looking at Harry. “Harry, what do you think?”

“The beach sounds great. We’re here on vacation after all,” Harry said with enough enthusiasm, not all of it forced, that Hermione couldn’t help but smile, her chest filling with an almost painful pleasure mingled in with the beginnings of hope that, here, Harry might actually begin to recover and to relax.

The beach wasn’t far and they reached it in an almost remarkably short time. It was crowded, as Hermione had expected, it being the summer and the peak of the tourist season, but since the tourists were mostly— if not all—Muggles, she didn’t expect Harry would be noticed at all.

“This was a brilliant idea, Hermione,” Ron enthused and Hermione glanced at him to see that he was looking towards a group of girls, all young and all bikini-clad, with a distinctly glazed expression on his face.

Hermione bit back a smile. Ron was so predictable at times.

She turned to look at Harry and any amusement she’d felt vanished in an instant. Something was wrong. Oh, Harry was smiling-- for her and Ron’s benefit-- but the smile was forced. And more than that, she could see the sudden tension in the set of his shoulders, could sense the heightened awareness in him.

(It still surprised her sometimes that she knew him well enough that she could read him so well just from something as subtle as the set of his shoulders, but she could. She hadn’t spent the better part of the last seven years watching him and worrying about him for nothing.)

And something was wrong now.

Before she could react or even begin to wonder what it was, she heard the sound of a shriek and then-- She started and flinched in automatic reaction, glancing around to see where the shriek had come from-- But then, almost quicker than thought, she felt herself being yanked backwards so she stumbled, pulled off-balance, and found herself half-leaning against Harry-- found herself half-behind Harry, with his hand gripping her wrist like a manacle.

“Har--” Her gasp of surprise was cut off as she saw his face, saw the expression on it. His features had abruptly sharpened, becoming stark, and his eyes-- his eyes were blank and yet almost burning. And with a sudden chill, she realized what was wrong. She knew that look, had seen it before-- too many times before. And she realized in the same instant that Harry was gripping his wand, tensed, and poised for action.

Oh God.

Hermione glanced around quickly, noting that, thankfully, since they had not gotten far onto the beach, no one else was very near and had not, so far, noticed anything. In the same moment, reaching around him, she closed her free hand gently around the hand that held his wand, exerting a slight pressure until, slowly, he lowered his wand.

She was only peripherally conscious of hearing Ron’s voice, sounding a little shaken and stunned. “I say, Harry…” All her attention was focused on Harry, her heart aching over his reaction and all it revealed.

Moving slowly, she tugged on her arm until he released his grip on her wrist so she could move to stand beside and slightly in front of him, shielding him from the view of most of the people on the beach. “Harry,” she said softly.

At first he didn’t react, her voice not quite impinging on his consciousness, locked in an automatic, quivering tension.

“Harry,” she repeated and it was only then that he blinked, some animation slowly seeping back into his features, before he turned his head just enough to focus on her.

“What happened? Who screamed?” he asked, his voice stiff.

“Someone splashed water at a girl when she wasn’t expecting it.”

“Oh.”

And with the return of animation came realization and dismay. “I- I’m sorry,” Harry blurted out. “I just—I should—I can’t—I should go.”

With this less than coherent statement, he turned and it was her turn to grab him, before he could take a step. “Go where? Harry, talk to me about this.”

He glanced around for a moment, scanning their surroundings, the sand, the ocean, the many tourists. “I can’t—I don’t know if I can do this.”

“Do what?” Ron blurted out. “It’s only a beach.”

Hermione threw him a sharp glance and he promptly closed his mouth, still looking confused but unwilling to interrupt again. She turned back to Harry, seeing the way his eyes moved constantly, looking for anything or anyone that might pose a threat.

She suddenly felt stupid; she hadn’t thought of this. In her single-minded desire to grant Harry’s wish to be left alone, she hadn’t considered the one, very real, benefit that staying at the Burrow provided: familiarity. Here, everything was new, and the beach was too open, nowhere to hide, with too many strangers around. And after everything he’d been through, Harry was not about to feel comfortable when surrounded by strangers.

“It’s okay, Harry. We don’t have to swim or anything.” She thought quickly. “How about we just walk along the beach or through the town, explore a little?” Reconnoitering their surroundings, as it were.

“But…” Ron objected before he broke off and she glanced at him just in time to see Ron’s half-wistful look at the group of bikini-clad girls. Ron looked back at them and met her eyes and had the grace to blush.

“The beach will still be here tomorrow or the day after that,” Hermione pointed out. “Harry, what do you want to do?”

“Let’s explore the town,” he said, with a slight twist of his lips that attempted to approximate a smile but failed. He was still tense, she could see, but the blank look in his eyes was receding, his expression smoothing out.

“Okay, then, exploring the town, it is,” Hermione said with manufactured brightness. “Come on, Ron.” She reached out and linked her arm with his, pretending to pull him forward, as she linked her other arm with Harry’s.

They set off towards the town like that, with her between the two boys. She kept up a deliberately cheerful running commentary on everything they passed by, freely inventing stories from her childhood visits here when she couldn’t think of any true stories to tell. Ron, after a few discreet nudges from her elbow, helped, chiming in with questions and teasing responses.

And Harry walked… no, stalked… along beside her, not moving to unlink his arm from hers but otherwise, unresponsive. She kept half an eye on him and was always aware of what he was doing, or not doing to be more accurate. He was… something like an animated statue, except for the fact that his eyes were constantly moving and he tensed and flinched at just about any sound other than the usual murmur of people and traffic. She suspected he only heard maybe one word in every ten, if that, and he certainly didn’t respond to her stories or Ron’s teasing in any way.

It was unnerving, like walking besides a cardboard cut-out of Harry, who looked like him and moved like him, but was missing all of what made him Harry.

She was running out of cheerful commentary and she could see that Ron, too, was beginning to flag, his ripostes becoming more lame, as he kept glancing at Harry with an expression of mingled concern and nervousness and apprehension, as if he half-expected Harry to suddenly explode.

Oh God. What could she do? She needed to do something, anything, to bring Harry back, to snap him out of this.

Her gaze fell, and the sight of the somewhat uneven cobbles on the street gave her an idea. At any other time, for anyone else, she would have scorned to resort to such a pretense, but for Harry…

She slipped her arm out of Ron’s and, at his glance, caught his eye with a slight tilt of her head towards Harry and then the ground. As an attempt at communication, it was a signal failure as it only resulted in Ron’s giving her a blankly puzzled look.

Harry would have understood. She sternly quashed the renegade thought and promptly put her plan, such as it was, into action.

Deliberately, she caught her foot on one of the uneven cobbles so she stumbled forward and would have fallen, except for Harry’s quick response in grabbing her arm.

“Hermione! You okay?” The words burst from both Harry and Ron, Ron taking a quick step towards her.

She gave Harry a quick smile. “I’m fine. Thanks for catching me.”

And she was rewarded for her ploy by a twitch of his lips that was almost a smile and the sight of his eyes meeting hers, no longer blank or distracted, but alive with honest concern.

Yes, this was Harry.

She turned to glance at Ron. “The streets are uneven,” she said, a little lamely, and then caught the doubting look that flitted across his face. There it was; he was suspicious now that her stumble had been deliberate. She hid her smile. Dear Ron.

“It’s a cute little town,” Harry ventured.

“Yes, it really is,” she agreed, having to fight to keep her voice from betraying her rush of relief and joy that he was back, he was speaking, was looking around with an eye to appreciate the town’s charms and not just to look for potential threats. “It started as a sort of off-shoot of Nice and the other vacation spots but it’s just off the beaten path enough that it’s not entirely run over with tourists.”

“I like it. It’s quaint,” Harry observed. “I can see why your grandparents would choose here for their vacations.”

Ron made a show of looking around. “I don’t know; it looks much like any other town to me. Personally, I thought the view of the beach was the most impressive.”

Hermione bit back a laugh, glancing at Harry to see the amusement lighting his eyes. “Somehow, Ron, I don’t think it was the scenery that caught your attention,” she quipped.

Ron pretended shock. “Of course it was. No one could appreciate natural beauty more than me.”

“Yes, I know, the beauty you were admiring was very natural,” Hermione teased.

“Of course,” Harry agreed with a mock solemn tone. “Human beauty is just as natural as any other kind.”

Ron assumed an exaggeratedly-injured expression. “There’s no need to make fun of a perfectly sincere appreciation for beauty,” he said in a tone that sounded rather like Percy’s at his most haughty.

Harry and Hermione exchanged glances and then, as one, began to laugh as Ron joined in.

It was, Hermione thought, almost the first time Harry had really, spontaneously laughed and joined in with teasing Ron since the War had ended. Looking at him now, she could believe that he was entirely himself again; he looked so… young and happy, when he laughed like this. His eyes were bright, the shadows that usually clouded his expression gone for once. The sight of it caught at her heart and she suddenly realized just how much she’d missed seeing this side of Harry, the laughing, teasing side of him.

She stopped laughing, her amusement drowned out in the wave of emotion, and she blinked back to reality to see both Harry and Ron giving her questioning looks.

“What is it? Did I just grow a second nose or something?” Harry asked lightly.

She shook her head, partly to answer him and partly to clear away her uncharacteristic wistfulness. “No, I was thinking about something else. Come on, there’s a little café up ahead that has some great ice cream,” she suggested.

“Ice cream! Brilliant!” Ron enthused.

She and Harry exchanged amused looks and fell into step slightly behind Ron, as he sped a little ahead of them in his eagerness.

It was like old times. The War felt, for the first time, very far away, almost as fantastical as one of Luna’s mythical creatures. She responded to the feeling, not even trying to analyze it but only enjoying it.

The rest of the day passed almost in a blur, a blur of laughter and teasing and friendship, untroubled by any danger. It was the sort of light-hearted fun they had not had in years and Hermione gave herself up to enjoying this taste of uncomplicated fun.

So much so that it felt rather jarring for reality to return, with something like a mental thud, when Ron had yawned his way up to his room and Harry, after a moment, stood up, mumbling about putting up some wards.

She stood up as well. “I’ll help. It’ll be quicker that way.”

He nodded and, together, they slipped outside and began to work. It was very familiar by now, working together to put up wards, and they accomplished it quickly, in silence, not even needing to talk to coordinate their actions.

He finished first and then she put up an additional one to ensure that the wards were not accidentally set off by any non-magical people, since they were surrounded by Muggles.

It was a beautifully clear night and Hermione would have lingered to look at the stars when something about Harry’s very silence made her glance at him and she realized that, in spite of everything, Harry was still far removed from wanting to linger outside at night. She felt a swift pang of sympathy and hurried to finish testing the wards so she could go inside again, knowing perfectly well that he would stay outside as long as she was out.

They hurried inside and Hermione made a point of closing and locking the door behind them and, for good measure, casting the spell on the lock so it could not be opened by an Alohomora or any other magical means. It was the work of a minute to repeat the spell on the ground floor windows as well and when she turned back to Harry, he was almost smiling.

“Will you be all right to sleep now?” he asked, his voice quiet.

“I was going to ask you the same thing. Will you be able to sleep?”

The almost-smile faded and some of the shadows returned to his eyes. “I hope so. I think so. It was… it was a fun day, a good day.”

She smiled slightly. “Yes, it was. Good night, Harry.”

“Good night.”

She turned away but he stopped her with a word. “Hermione.”

“What?”

He hesitated and then, in a rather abrupt movement, reached out and grasped her hand, squeezing it briefly before he released it. “It was a fun day,” he repeated. “Thanks.”

It was not the most eloquent statement in the world, but this was Harry. She gave him a quick smile. “You’re welcome. Good night.”

~To be continued…~

A/N: Apologies for the shortness of this chapter but it was the only place I could think to end it. The next chapter is longer, I promise.

Disclaimer: See Chapter 1.

Author’s Note: Apologies for the long wait! This chapter has been ready for a while but then RL issues have kept me from posting. The next chapter is also done and I’ll try to post that in the next week or so to make up for the long wait for this chapter.

Living Past the End

Chapter 3

The dream was almost always the same, slipping into her subconscious with the insidious subtlety of a master thief.
It was night and she was running, running, always running, the sound of her own breathing harsh in her ears, the acrid taste of stark terror and helplessness filling her throat until it almost choked her. She was running, she never knew where exactly; all she knew, the one thought that she held on to, was that she had to find Harry.
She had to find Harry and then she would be okay. She wouldn’t be afraid anymore, she wouldn’t feel helpless anymore-- she hated feeling so afraid and so helpless but she knew if she just found Harry, she would be okay.
She stumbled, tripping over something, and fell to the ground with a cry. And then she turned to look at what she’d tripped over-- and she screamed.
It was Harry.
She had found Harry-- but she wasn’t okay, would never be okay again. He was... he was... he was gone... It was in the dark red blood pooling beneath his head, in his eyes that were so blank and so empty and just staring up at her, in the expression of torment that lingered on his so-still face...
Harry...
The danger she’d been running from was still there, was getting closer. She knew it but she didn’t move, didn’t care.
All she did was close his eyes, her hand passing softly over his still features, her fingers caressing his cold skin as she never had in life.
The danger was there now, but she didn’t care, didn’t move. It was over.
Hermione jerked awake with a strangled sob. She was gasping for breath and her face was wet with tears.
She looked around the darkness of the room almost wildly, trying to let the reassurance of reality seep into her, calm her. It had been a dream, only a dream, and Harry was fine; they were in her grandparents’ cottage and the War was over now.

She wiped the lingering tears from her face with her hand, trying to forcibly even out her breathing and her heart rate. Harry was fine; he was just across the hall, hopefully sleeping.
She let out a shuddering breath, trying to push the nightmare from her mind. She hated this! She hated the nightmares, hated the terror and the helplessness she felt, hated her own weakness. During the days, she was better, was in control through sheer strength of will, her rational mind repeating, always repeating, her own personal mantra that the War was over and Harry was no longer in danger. But at nights, at nights and in sleep, her rational mind lost control and her fears-- her irrational, lingering fears-- took control of her.
She had hoped, after the pleasant day they’d had, that she would be able to sleep.

She tried to relax back into her bed but after a few moments, gave up the attempt. Every time she closed her eyes, the image of Harry lying dead flashed into her mind and she shuddered.

She would just check to see if Harry was sleeping—she hoped he was. Hoped that the measure of relaxation he’d managed to have during the day would extend into the night so he could sleep peacefully for once. And then she would double-check the wards.

Moving quickly and quietly, she crept to Harry’s door, pausing to listen for a moment. She didn’t hear anything. Very slowly so as not to make a sound in case Harry was sleeping, she turned the door knob and pushed the door open, peering inside.

To see Harry, with the blanket from the bed wrapped around his shoulders, sitting in the window seat, his head turned to look at her.

“Oh,” she whispered, slipping inside. “I hoped you’d be sleeping.”

“I thought you would be sleeping.”

She shook her head in a jerky motion, a slight shiver going through her at the thought of the nightmare. “No.”

“You look cold,” he said after a moment, and then made a welcoming gesture with one arm.

She hesitated for one moment, stayed by a vague, indefinable uncertainty. Yes, they might have become rather accustomed to these nightly interludes, but they had always been in the family room of the Burrow, an impersonal sort of space. This—this felt different. It was different, somehow. She and Harry had been alone in a bedroom before, yes, but it had usually been during the day, had usually been with full knowledge that there were other people around. Now, they were truly alone. Ron was sleeping, and it was just late enough—or early enough—to make it feel as if they were the only two people awake in the world.

He looked at her curiously. “What? I promise I won’t bite.”

It was his tone, more than his words, that did it, the familiar thread of teasing in his voice. She mentally shook off the momentary uncertainty; she was being silly.

“Well, it’s not the full moon, so I guess I’m safe,” she quipped as she crossed the room. And then she could have kicked herself as Harry’s expression blanked for a fleeting moment, and she remembered Remus—and why werewolf jokes would not be particularly funny to Harry right now.

Her lips opened to apologize, but then he blinked and responded, in a tone of studied lightness, “I’d probably start by biting Ron anyway; he looks tastier.”

She smiled, a little tentatively, as she sat down beside him on the window seat. “I’ll have to tell him that.”

The window seat was narrower than the couch in the Burrow had been, and after a moment, Harry shifted, hunching his shoulders so the blanket could wrap around her more snugly.

At first, Hermione sat rather stiffly, a little self-conscious at how very close she and Harry were sitting because of how narrow the window seat was. Her thigh was pressed against the length of his. It wasn’t… exactly a bad sensation but it was not particularly comfortable and she could not feel quite at ease.

Comfortable it may not have been, but the reassuring solidity of his body did, however, serve as tangible proof that Harry was alive and everything was fine. The nightmare had only been exactly that, the product of her own worst fears.

She felt another slight shiver go through her at the memory, the mental picture of Harry lying dead that haunted her.

“Are you still cold?” Harry asked and then without waiting for an answer, moved to put his arm around her shoulder, pulling the other end of the blanket around her with his other hand so that, for a moment, she was encircled by his arms.

She was cold, not in body, but in spirit, somehow, something of the inner chill from her nightmare lingering and so she nestled against him with an unself-conscious willingness she would not normally have shown. She was very conscious of the half-shy, boyish tenderness she felt in Harry’s arm around her shoulders, in the affection revealed by his actions.

She let herself half-lean against him, allowing the solid warmth of him to comfort her, relax her, until the lingering tension from her nightmare had dissipated. And she suddenly knew that this was what she’d needed, wanted, after her nightmare. She had hoped, sincerely, that Harry would be asleep, and if he had been, she wouldn’t have woken him up, but this was what she’d needed.

He didn’t say anything and neither did she, as they just sat in silence. It was a comfortable silence, a comforting silence, the silence of true friendship that neither asked for nor needed anything else to make it complete.

“What are your nightmares about?” Harry finally broke the silence, his voice quiet, pensive.

Hermione hesitated, her honesty and habitual candor with Harry warring with her instinct not to say anything that might disturb his fragile peace. After a moment, she answered with deliberate evasion, “Failing all my N.E.W.T’s.”

He didn’t respond immediately, was silent for just long enough that she knew perfectly well he didn’t believe a word of it and was debating how to respond before he said, with attempted lightness, “You could take your N.E.W.T’s tomorrow without studying and still come out at the top of the class.”

She smiled briefly. “Thank you.” She might not have nightmares about the N.E.W.T’s but it didn’t make his assurance any less meaningful. His faith in her was sweet and precious—all the more so because Harry rarely expressed such absolute certainty in anything.

He was silent for another minute and then he said, softly, “You don’t have to tell me about your nightmares if you don’t want to.”

And there was a thread of something—something like hurt—in his voice that had Hermione making up her mind. She didn’t want to disturb his peace, but hurting him in any way was unthinkable. “My nightmares are of you, Harry,” she finally admitted, slowly. Of you getting hurt or dying, she mentally added but was careful not to say.

She felt him stiffen beside her before he forcibly relaxed himself.

“Funny,” Harry finally responded, his voice a little odd, trembling slightly with suppressed emotion, “mine are too—about you, that is. Of something happening to you or to Ron and me not being able to do anything about it and just having to watch it happen.”

She didn’t know what to say. It was the most Harry had ever said about his nightmares, the most he’d ever revealed about his fears. Always before, he’d generalized or been evasive, saying only that his nightmares were about the terrible things that they’d seen in the last year or something like that, but never much more than that.

She swallowed back a lump of emotion in her throat and shifted until she could lean her head against his shoulder. “Oh, Harry…” It was all she could think of to say, just his name. She couldn’t reassure him that the War was over and they were fine because he already knew that, as did she, and it didn’t stop the nightmares. She couldn’t promise him the nightmares would go away because she didn’t know that they would. All she could do was say his name and hope that just knowing she understood would provide some comfort.

His arm tightened around her slightly and she felt better.

“What a pair we are, Harry,” she sighed after a long minute of silence. “Both of us unable to sleep at nights because of nightmares about the same things.”

“Yes, the insomniac pair,” Harry said, and hesitated before he blurted out, “But I’m glad we are a pair.” He paused and then seemed to realize how his words might sound and he added, “Not because I’m glad you can’t sleep but because it’s… easier, being part of a pair, than it is to be alone.”

“I know. It is easier,” Hermione agreed.

She felt Harry rest his head against hers for a moment, the gesture making her aware of just how closely they were sitting and of the fact that she was leaning against him, and she would have straightened, would have moved away from him, in sudden self-consciousness, but she found she didn’t want to. It was comfortable like this, leaning against Harry as she was, feeling the warm weight of his arm around her shoulders, and resting her head against his shoulder. It felt… safe… like this. And after the last year, feeling safe was the most precious emotion ever.

“It was fun today,” Harry said quietly, after a long moment.

“Yeah, it was.”

“I guess… I thought—I thought it would be easier, because of that.”

Hermione smiled a little sadly. “Yeah, me too. I guess we were both wrong.”

She felt rather than saw his slight smile. “You, wrong? I think I need to write to the Daily Prophet and report this.”

“And ruin my reputation for always being right?” she quipped. “Don’t you dare.”

“It would be a way of getting my name in the papers, wouldn’t it? My 15 minutes of fame as the boy who exploded the myth of Hermione Granger’s omniscience.”

She laughed softly, as she knew he wanted her to, but she couldn’t help the slight clench of her heart. It was the first time he had made a joke out of his fame, managed to speak lightly of the fact that he didn’t need to so much as lift a finger to get his name in the papers.

“Getting famous at my expense, Harry? That’s not very nice of you,” she said lightly—and realized her mistake as she sensed his abrupt shift in mood.

“I’ve always been famous at other people’s expense,” he responded and there was an almost savage note in his voice. “I’m the famous one and everyone else is only mentioned as they relate to me in some way.”

“Well, yes,” she agreed cautiously. “But you are the hero.”

His reaction—his rejection—was both physical and verbal, as he almost recoiled from her, his head jerking up. “Don’t call me that!”

“I didn’t mean it that way,” she hastily added. “I only meant that that’s how people think of you so of course, that’s the way the newspapers portray you.” She paused. “Not that I think of you as being a hero,” she said with something less than complete truth, for once. “If you want, I’ll even go around telling people you’re a coward.”

There was a beat of silence, in which she played her words over in her mind and inwardly winced, wondering if she’d misjudged.

But then— “Thanks, Hermione, you’re too kind.”

His voice was dry and she relaxed. He had understood, had taken her words as the jest they had been. After a moment, she rested her head against his shoulder again and knew that the fleeting discordant moment between them had been well and truly forgotten when he rested his cheek against her hair.

She let her eyes close, enjoying the comfort of his solid warmth against her, the ease of it, the safety of it… It was almost… seductive… emotionally seductive, if such a thing could be. After a year and more of worry and fear, safety was the most attractive thing of all.

And her last remembered coherent thought was to wonder how it was that he could be both the object of her fears and the source of the best comfort to her fears.

Hermione drifted awake slowly, conscious of a distinct reluctance to do so. She kept her eyes closed, willing herself to go back to sleep, but finally gave up and opened her eyes.

She was still in Harry’s room, still leaning against him, with his shoulder serving as her pillow. And she had slept—slept peacefully, dreamlessly.

She shifted her head just enough so she could look at him.

He was sleeping too, his head resting against the wall. It did not look like the most comfortable of positions, but she couldn’t bring herself to wake him. Sleep—peaceful sleep—was so precious and she would not disturb him.

Instead, she just watched him sleep, in the steadily-brightening light through the window.

She knew him so well, had spent nearly every day of the past seven years with him. But had she ever really looked at him as she was now? She rather doubted it. During the day, when he was awake, she couldn’t study him like this because he would notice and feel uncomfortable. Now, though, she could just look, her eyes moving over every familiar feature.

His hair was, as always, disheveled and sticking up every which way. In sleep, his forehead was smooth and free of the frown lines she was so used to seeing. It was only now, in seeing him sleeping peacefully, that she realized just how accustomed she had become to seeing the shadows in his expression, just how much on guard Harry always was during the day. Now, in sleep, he looked younger. He still did not look entirely like the 18-year-old boy he was; he had been through too much, endured too much, in the last year, and his experiences had left their marks on his features. The faint lines on his skin, the chiseling of his features, and a few other physical traces of the past few years kept him from looking truly young anymore. But he did look younger.

For a split second, the remembered image of the young boy she had met seven years ago was super-imposed over that of the young man she knew now… And then she blinked and she was looking at Harry again, the familiar face she saw every day.

Her gaze moved, focusing on his scar, the jagged mark just off the center of his forehead, the symbol of his fame and his fate. She knew he disliked it—he still had the habit of trying to flatten his hair so it covered his scar—but she rather liked it. To her, it had come to represent not the darkness and danger which was what she knew it represented to Harry, but all of Harry’s strength, his courage, his loyalty. To her, it represented why she had done all she had in the last couple years, why she had risked her life—why she would still, willingly, give her life.

Her gaze lowered to his lips, relaxed and slightly parted in sleep—and she was surprised by a flash of emotion, of wanting. She wanted—so much her fingers almost itched with it—to trace his lips with her fingers, learn his face with her fingers as well as she already knew it with her eyes. She wanted… to kiss him.

She wanted to kiss Harry. That was a surprise but what truly shocked her—stunned her, really—was how powerful the impulse was, the impulse to touch her lips to his, to wake him with her kiss.

To irrevocably change the most important relationship in her life.

The thought was like a bucket of cold water being dumped on her. Changing—risking—her friendship with Harry on an impulse. No, she couldn’t. It was too much to risk.

And, thankfully, before she could think about it anymore, Harry stirred a little and then his eyes opened as he blinked a couple times before his eyes focused on her.

“Morning,” he mumbled, his voice scratchy from sleep.

“Morning, Harry.”

“I slept,” he said, a thread of surprise in his tone.

She smiled slightly. “So did I.”

He studied her for a moment. “Why is it that when I’m with you, I can sleep without nightmares?”

She couldn’t read his expression but there was something in it that made her suddenly a little self-conscious. And she reacted automatically, taking refuge in humor. “Ron used to say I’m scary so maybe I scare your nightmares away.”

He didn’t return her smile, only looked at her. “I think you’re right. You scare my nightmares away,” he repeated, and his tone turned it from a feeble joke into something else entirely.

“You scare mine away too so it’s a fair exchange,” she said, trying to sound teasing and only managing to sound a little breathless. It was something about the way he was looking at her, an expression she didn’t think she had ever seen in his eyes when he looked at her.

“Do I really?”

“Yes,” she said simply.

He gave her a slightly tremulous smile. “I’m glad.”

She returned his smile as their eyes met and held and, slowly, their smiles faded. And she felt it again, the flash of attraction, of wanting to touch him.

She blinked and looked away, suddenly almost afraid of Harry’s ability to read her thoughts. What if he saw that she wanted to kiss him? “It’s getting brighter outside,” she observed, stating the obvious in an attempt to distract him—and herself.

“Yeah. Looks like it’ll be another nice day.”

“I should leave, go back to my room before Ron wakes up.”

“You’ve got time,” he returned swiftly. He didn’t tighten his arm around her or react physically, but she was warmed by his words, the implication that he didn’t want her to leave. “Really, without Mrs. Weasley here to knock him up in the morning, Ron might end up sleeping until noon.”

She laughed softly. “That’s true.”

Another brief silence fell, that she broke before it could lengthen.

“What do you want to do today, Harry?”

“I don’t know. I hadn’t thought about it.”

“I don’t think I want to go to the beach today,” she volunteered, and was rewarded by his quick glance at her, as he relaxed slightly. He was not ready for the beach yet, was not ready to spend the day in such an open space, surrounded by strangers, and where he would need to leave his wand behind to venture into the water. She knew that and had spoken automatically, letting her own statement serve as the excuse for not going to the beach so he wouldn’t need to admit it. Or rather—since she knew he wouldn’t have admitted it—let her statement serve as the excuse so they wouldn’t spend the day at the beach where Harry would have spent the day unable to relax.

“We saw most of the town yesterday. What else is there to do, since you know this area better than either me or Ron?”

“There are some historical sites nearby. I’ve visited them before when I’ve come here with my parents.”

“And I’m sure you know enough about the history of these sites to give us a history lesson that lasts the entire day,” he said in a mildly teasing voice.

“Well, yes,” she admitted. “But I won’t if you don’t want me to. I know I can be, well, annoying, as Ron would say.”

“I don’t mind it. And you’re not annoying,” he assured her.

She turned to look at him, giving him a half-smile. “You should be careful. You almost sound like you mean it.”

He met her eyes frankly. “I do mean it.” He lifted one shoulder in a half-shrug. “I think it’s kind of cool that you know so much.” He paused and then looked away, his voice lowering a little. “Besides, it would be ungrateful of me since your knowing so much saved all of us more than once.”

“You don’t have to be grateful!” she burst out.

He glanced at her and she saw his lips open to protest but she rushed on before he could, thinking quickly for something she could say to convince him, or at least distract him from his thoughts. “I had ulterior motives in saving us, you know. I have this problem where I don’t like being in pain or in danger,” she said, with an attempt at a smile. “If I could have just saved myself without saving you, I’m sure I would have.”

He forced a half-smile in response to her lame humor but it was fleeting. “No, you wouldn’t have,” he said, quietly. “I know you, remember?” He paused and then added, giving her a rather odd look, “You’re friendship and bravery too.”

Friendship and bravery.

The phrase stuck in her mind, evoking faint echoes of memory, of having heard those words before.

And then she did remember. Remembered a night of fear and uncertainty and friendship. Remembered impulsive words and an even more impulsive hug.

“Harry! You- you remember that?”

He managed a slightly crooked ghost of a smile. “Did you think I’d forget that night? I have this weird thing where I remember times when people try to kill me.”

Her breath caught in her throat as she stared at him for a moment, too stunned at this rather mordantly humorous reference to the dangers he’d faced to respond to his words. Harry didn’t joke about his experiences. Or at least, he never had before. And the fact that he was doing so now, even if it was clearly forced and almost an echo of her own humor just a moment ago had to be a positive sign.

She forced a smile of her own in response. “I guess I just didn’t expect you to remember what I said. It wasn’t that important.”

He almost jerked, straightening up. “Yes, it was important!” he said forcefully. “What you said—Hermione, that meant a lot right then. That you said I was brave when I was feeling anything but.”

“You were brave. You are brave,” she corrected herself.

He gave her a sideways glance, his lips twisting a little. “How can you say that, knowing that I’m still so scared, I can’t even sleep unless you’re there to keep away the nightmares?”

“Having nightmares doesn’t mean you’re not brave. It means you’re… human. No one could have gone through what you did without having nightmares about it.” She stopped, half-guiltily aware that she was being hypocritical, comforting Harry with words that she could not quite believe herself. Because she hated it too, hated this feeling of weakness, hated that at night, her fears won out over her rational mind.

“I just wish I could get over it. I shouldn’t still be this scared. The War is over; I know it’s over—but I just can’t stop—” he broke off abruptly, as if the words had been choked off by his emotions.

“I know,” she said quietly, filling the sudden silence. “I can’t stop it either and it bothers me too.” She let out a small, unamused laugh. “And I’m supposed to be the clever one, the rational one.”

“You are the clever one. Having nightmares doesn’t change that.” He paused and then added, “No one could have gone through what you did without having nightmares about it.”

She gave him a faint smile as she nudged him with her shoulder. “No fair to use my own words against me.”

“How else am I supposed to win an argument against you?” he retorted, a thread of teasing in his tone.

“I guess we just need to agree not to feel bad because we still have nightmares.”

“Easier said than done.”

“I know it is,” she said resignedly. “We’ll just have to help each other remember not to blame ourselves, won’t we?”

He gave her a slight smile. “You always help me.”

And there was something in his smile, in his eyes, that made her flush, her eyes dropping from his. “It’s full morning now so we may as well start getting ready for the day,” she changed the subject. “There’s a good bakery in town so I’ll run out and get us some breakfast if you’ll knock up Ron.”

“I notice you’re giving me the harder job to do,” he teased. “Wait, you’re going to go out alone?”

“Harry, it’s broad daylight in a predominantly Muggle tourist town. What do you think will happen? Anyway, I’ll have my wand with me.”

“Still. I’ll come with you.”

“Honestly, Harry, it’ll be fine.”

“Humor me,” he said in a tone that said he wasn’t going to yield on this. “Besides,” he added with a change of tone, “if I try to wake Ron up at this hour, he’s more likely to hex me than actually get out of bed.”

“A fair point,” she agreed, giving in. “I’ll meet you downstairs in a little while.”

“Yeah.”

They exchanged smiles as she left his room to return to her own for the start of the day. She let out her breath slowly, shoring up her courage to get through another day. Another day of just being with her best friends, without worrying about being attacked. The War was over; Harry was safe; everything was fine, she repeated her usual mantra to herself again. And with a few more days—weeks—of fun and of peace, she thought she just might be able to believe it.

~The End~

Disclaimer: See Chapter 1.

Author’s Note: Thank you all for reading and reviewing. As you see, the last chapter was NOT the end of this fic; I’m sorry about that mistake and any confusion it caused. And as promised, the latest chapter. Enjoy!

Living Past The End

Chapter 4

It should have been a good day. It had been a good day.

They had gone into Nice and basically played tourist. It had been beautiful, picturesque, if crowded. Ron had groused a bit at being dragged, as he put it, to see old buildings and things instead of the beach, but it had been mostly good-humored and consisted more of making teasing comments to and about Hermione’s love of history than anything else.

Hermione had, predictably, given both him and Ron a history lesson— to which he had bitten back a smile and Ron had barely bothered to hide his impatience and not even bothered to pretend to listen. But Hermione had taken it in stride and contented herself with a few teasing ripostes.
The sun had shone and, fortunately, no unexpected, loud noises had occurred to startle them-- him-- and it had been just about the perfect day. The sort of perfect day he’d never even dared to imagine, a day where he was with Ron and Hermione and they were all safe and happy, just three best friends on an outing.
And yet he hadn’t enjoyed it. He hadn’t been able to relax enough to enjoy it. Oh, on an intellectual level, he’d known it was a pleasant day and he’d told himself repeatedly that he was having fun, was enjoying himself. But repeating the words hadn’t made them come true. And he hadn’t really felt the enjoyment.
No, he’d spent the day tense, wary. He knew they were surrounded by Muggle tourists but Nice wasn’t a purely Muggle town and one never knew where Dark wizards or danger could lurk. And after the last year, he knew all too well that even the sunniest, most beautiful day could turn into a horror in the space of an instant.
The War might be over, the Death Eaters scattered and defeated-- but not for him. Not when he still felt constantly alert, even afraid. Not when every time a stranger brushed too close he automatically stiffened and tried to reach for his wand. Not when he had lost sight of Ron and Hermione for a moment as they passed through a milling crowd and his heart had instantly sped up, a hard hand of panic squeezing his heart, until a moment later, there had been a break in the crowd and he had spotted a familiar flash of red hair and quickly maneuvered his way through the crowd to join them, slipping his arm through Hermione’s.
But he thought he had hidden his wariness well. It was a rather sad relic of the last couple years that he’d gotten so used to hiding what he felt and he’d made a deliberate effort to talk and laugh and not betray his tension by so much as a glance or an unguarded gesture.
And if Ron’s and Hermione’s behavior was any indication, he had succeeded. Ron had relaxed and become more like the cheerful Ron of before the War than he had yet been, a near constant grin on his features. And Hermione had been herself too, assuming the didactic tone that she hadn’t really used in more than a year as she told them about the history of the city. She and Ron had even fallen into a couple of their brief squabbles, also in a way that they really hadn’t in the last year, when they had generally been too focused on the dangerous present to bicker. And perhaps most telling of all, their bickering hadn’t been abruptly cut off with a look of guilt as one or both of them remembered that there were bigger things to worry about than petty disagreements. Instead, the bickering had ended as they generally had before the War, with both Hermione and Ron addressing themselves solely to him for a little while until one of them forgot themselves and addressed the other with some teasing remark, signifying that all was forgotten.
And he had realized with something of a pang how much he had missed this, without even realizing it consciously, how much he had missed the Trio, the easy friendship they had had. The way they were complete, the three of them, never needing or wanting anyone else.
His pretense had been worth it just for that, he thought, just to see Ron and Hermione acting so carefree, almost as if the War had never happened.
So he managed a grin as Ron stood up with a cavernous yawn. “Okay, I’m off to bed,” Ron announced.
“Night, Ron.”
“Sleep well, Ron,” Hermione said.
Left alone, he glanced at Hermione and offered, “You can go up to bed too. I can take care of putting up the wards.”
She lifted one shoulder into a half-shrug. “No, I’m not that tired yet. I’ll help you.” She gave him a teasing glance. “Besides, I want to make sure you do them right.”
“Hey!” he protested in mock offense. “I’ll have you know I’ve gotten a lot better in the last couple months!”

“Still not as good as me,” she quipped.
“No,” he acknowledged readily enough—he didn’t think anyone was as good as Hermione was at putting up wards— “but I have improved a lot. I had a good teacher, you know,” he added, rather more seriously.
He felt rather than saw her quick smile of thanks at that before they separated to put up the wards. As usual, she finished before he did and he turned back to see her watching him. “What, didn’t I do them right?” he asked lightly.
She tilted her head to one side, pretending to think about it. “They’ll do.”
He let out a huff of feigned injured pride and she laughed and he smiled as he fell into step beside her as they returned inside.
She touched his hand lightly, giving him a quick smile. “Good night, Harry.”
“Good night,” he returned automatically even as he felt his usual dread of sleep return. And on a sudden impulse, without even thinking about it, he found himself blurting out, “D’you want to meet me down here in a few minutes? I mean, unless you think you can sleep tonight. You don’t--”
“Of course I’ll meet you,” she agreed readily, interrupting him.
He managed a smile. “The usual meeting of the insomniac club.”
“Right.”
He changed into his pyjamas quickly and then went downstairs, bringing the quilt from his room with him. She joined him within a few minutes, settling onto the couch beside him.
They exchanged slight smiles but were otherwise silent for a few minutes.
He felt himself relaxing a little, about as much as he ever did these days, with Hermione beside him, alone in the cottage except for Ron, sleeping upstairs.
“You didn’t enjoy yourself today, did you?” she asked quietly.
“Yes, I did,” he lied automatically.
She gave him a look and he shut his mouth on the reassuring lie. “How’d you know?” he asked instead.
She lifted a shoulder into a small shrug. “I know you.”
He grimaced a little. “I thought I was being so good about hiding it.”
Now she smiled, her lips curving upward slightly. “You were. Good enough that I didn’t notice it for most of the morning until just before noon.”
“What did I do to give myself away?”
Her lips twisted a little into a thoughtful expression. “It wasn’t really anything you did so much as it was what you didn’t do. Ron said something funny and I glanced at you but you didn’t smile.”
“I was smiling,” he protested. He didn’t know exactly what she was referring to but he knew he’d been smiling. He’d been careful to keep a smile pasted on his face at all times for the better part of the day.
“You were smiling but it wasn’t a real smile. I realized that when I looked over at you and your expression didn’t change because of what Ron said. And I realized that you hadn’t even heard what Ron had said because you were too busy looking around, too busy keeping watch.”
He sighed a little and made a face at her. “You see too much.”
She let out a brief laugh. “Sorry.”
“It was a good day,” he said. “I just... couldn’t relax enough.” He shrugged a little. “I know the War is over and there isn’t much danger anymore but I just... can’t stop being alert, can’t stop being afraid. I’m so—”
She cut him off. “Don’t you dare say you’re sorry, Harry.”
He obeyed, biting off the word. “Okay,” he agreed mildly. He paused but then began, “I didn’t want to take away from your fun or Ron’s so I tried to hide it. You should be able to enjoy yourselves even if I’m being stupid.”
“You’re not being stupid!” she said sharply. “I thought we agreed that we weren’t going to blame ourselves for still having nightmares and still being afraid.”
“Maybe at night but during the day... it makes less sense to be afraid during the day.”
“Oh, Harry,” she sighed, her voice abruptly gentling. “You and I both know that bad things don’t only happen at night. We can be in danger in broad daylight too.”
Yes, they did both know that. And even if he’d thought the exact same thing several times over the course of the day, somehow it still bothered him to hear her say it. Bothered him to know that she was afraid during the daylight too.
Which was nonsensical of him.
On an impulse, he reached over and squeezed her hand. “But you had fun today, didn’t you? It seemed like you did.”
“Yes, I did, for the most part. At first, this morning, I was tense too but then, after a while, I managed to relax more.” She smiled, a little wistfully. “I had almost forgotten how much I like seeing old, historical places, and trying to imagine what it must have been like so many years ago.”
He smiled too. “You sounded like your old self today, going on about the history of everything we saw.”
“I probably bored you and Ron out of your wits.”
“No, you didn’t,” he denied automatically and then corrected himself with a half-grin. “Well, okay, you did bore Ron.”
“That’s surprising,” she said with an entirely straight face. “He did such a good job of hiding it.”
He laughed and then found himself blurting out, “I missed you, you know.”

She gave him a confused look. “I haven’t gone anywhere.”

He grimaced. “Sorry, that came out wrong. I just meant… it was nice to see you get so excited about the history and all that today. I realized that you haven’t really done that lately, haven’t really had anything to be excited for, not really,” he stumbled over how to express what he meant. “It was just… nice…” he finished lamely.

Her smile was soft, understanding. “Yes, it was nice.”

“I guess… I just got so used to all of us being serious.”

“Having fun feels a little strange now, doesn’t it?” she agreed.

“Yeah.”

“It’ll come back, Harry. It’ll get better. We were serious for so long; it’s not surprising that it would take some time for us to fully realize that we don’t have to be like that anymore.”

“Because the War’s over and we’re all safe,” he finished rather flatly.

He knew she noticed his tone, the dull thread of disbelief, born of an inability to believe it, in his tone, but she didn’t say anything. At least not then.

“Did you ever think about what you’d do after this was all over?” she asked instead after a brief silence.

“Not really. At least, not in the last months. At first, I did, a little. I thought about… about being with Ginny again,” he admitted with a sudden rush of candor.

“Oh.”

“But then I just stopped.”

“Thinking about Ginny?”

“No. Yes. Thinking about anything that would happen after it was all over. I stopped…” he trailed off and then finally finished, very quietly, “I stopped really believing that I’d survive.” Because he had stopped believing that. He had never really put it into words before, certainly never spoken of it aloud, but there it was. Why make plans for a future that he didn’t think he would live to see?

“Oh, Harry.”

“I guess I was wrong,” he said with an attempt at lightness that failed miserably. The look on her face made his heart twist and he wished he hadn’t said it, hadn’t admitted it.

She reached out and grasped his hand, squeezing it and then retaining her grip on it. “Oh, Harry…”

“It’s okay, Hermione,” he was quick to reassure her. “I didn’t mean to… it’s over now and I’m fine. Anyway, I just wanted to say that that was why I never really made plans for when it was all over. What about you? What did you plan?” he asked, shifting the subject deliberately.

“I didn’t really make any plans either.”

“You? Not make plans? I’m shocked,” he said teasingly, even as he felt like bands had tightened around his heart. For Hermione not to make plans told him more than almost anything else could about how worried she had been.

The ghost of a smile crossed her face. “I know. I just… I wanted us to be safe again. That was all.”

“And now? What do you plan to do?”

“I don’t know.”

He slanted a glance at her. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard you say that before.”

A glimmer of answering humor lightened her expression before she sobered, sighing a little.

“What about you and Ron?” he asked after a moment. The other, easier part of life-after-the-War, or what he had thought would be life-after-the-War. “I thought… thought you were just waiting for all this to be over.”

She started shaking her head even before he’d finished speaking. “No. Ron and I… I thought we might end up together for a little while but… no. We’re too different, I think, and I… I don’t care about him that way, I know that now. I thought I might, in 6th year—but I don’t.”

“I’m sorry,” was all he could think to say, rather inanely.

“There’s nothing to be sorry for. I think Ron knows it too so it’s all right. We’re best friends and we’ll stay that way.”

“Are you sure about that?” he asked on a sudden surge of curiosity and something like doubt. She had sounded confident, of course, but then Hermione generally did. “It’s just… today, you and Ron seemed so—normal, comfortable together—like your old selves.” He waved a hand around in a gesture of uncertainty, even diffidence. “I don’t know. You and Ron were getting along today, as well as ever. And you both seemed… happy…”

“Harry, are you—do you want me and Ron to be together?” she asked carefully.

“I want you and Ron to be happy,” he answered promptly and entirely sincerely. It was such a truth that he didn’t even need to think about it. “It’s just… well, I guess I always sort of expected that you and Ron would end up together and now that the War’s over…”

He sensed rather than saw her shake her head again. “It wouldn’t work, Harry. The War, everything this past year—I just know myself better and I know I don’t feel that way about Ron. Not now… and sometimes I wonder how much I ever really did or if it was just what I thought I should feel,” she added more softly, almost as if she were speaking more to herself than to him.

“As long as you’re sure and you’re happy about it.” He lifted his arm to put around her shoulders, bringing her in closer to him, in a brotherly embrace.

And like a brother, too, he turned his head to drop a quick kiss on her temple—but she turned her head to look up at him at the wrong moment—the right moment?—and for a split second, a second that seemed to freeze in time, they were almost nose to nose. No, not like a brother—how he had thought he could be like a brother to her, he couldn’t for the life of him remember. Their faces were so close, their breaths mingling—and then not, because he’d stopped breathing—and all he could think in his suddenly fogged brain was that it would be so easy—incredibly easy—even natural—to touch his lips to hers and kiss her. She didn’t move and neither did he—he could have sworn that time stopped and the earth stopped rotating too as everything just stopped, stilled.

He was about to kiss Hermione!

The thought rang through his dazed brain with all the volume of a claxon and had something like the same alerting effect and he almost jerked back, abruptly dropping his arm from around her and focusing his gaze on the floor. “I’m your friend, so of course I want you and Ron to be happy,” he said again, rather inanely, striving desperately to sound carelessly friendly.

“Well, it won’t be because I’m with Ron,” she said with rather more firmness than was warranted, the sort of resolve generally reserved for oaths—or the sort of resolve of someone trying very hard to hide her discomfiture. And then, more gently, added, “We’re just not… right together.”

He would have looked at her but since he was the cause—the stupid cause—of her flustered state, he kept his gaze studiously focused away from her. “Well, I can see how that might be a good thing. Honestly, I’m not sure you’ll ever find someone who’s really right for you,” he paused for a moment and then finished, quietly, “because that would involve you finding someone who deserves you and—” he flicked a glance at her before looking away—“I don’t know if that’s possible.”

The silence stretched on for a couple minutes, for long enough that he finally had to look over at her to see that she looked—dismayingly—as if she was fighting back tears and more than that, a look he wasn’t sure he’d ever seen before, a look as if he had just single-handedly defeated a dragon.

“Oh, Harry,” she finally said, giving him a watery smile, “that might be the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me.”

He returned her smile almost reflexively, because he couldn’t not smile at her when she was looking at him like that. “I meant it.”

Their gazes met and held for a moment before he cut his eyes away, suddenly obscurely uncomfortable for no reason he could identify. It was just too… something… And he responded to the impulsive need to deflect attention, injecting humor into his tone as he said, “But if you tell Ron I said so, I’ll deny it.”

He sensed rather than saw her answering smile.

“What about you and Ginny?” she asked after a few minutes of comfortable silence and now she sounded once more herself, a thread of teasing in her voice.

“What about me and Ginny?” he returned, deliberately obtuse.

“If you’re going to pry into my personal life, I get to pry into yours.” More than a thread now, more like an entire tapestry of teasing.

He smiled automatically at the humor in her voice. “There’s nothing to tell.”

“That’s not fair.”

He threw a smirk at her but then sobered. “Honestly, I don’t know about me and Ginny, if there’s ever going to be a me-and-Ginny again.”

“Isn’t that what you want? You said… you said that’s what you thought about, what you hoped for after the War ended.”

“It was what I was hoping for,” he answered candidly. “But now… now I’m just not sure…”

“Don’t you still care about her?”

“Yeah, I guess so,” he answered rather flatly.

He felt her sideways glance. “You don’t sound very certain, Harry,” she ventured carefully.

He sighed a little. “That’s ‘cause I’m not. I just…” he waved his hand in an aimless gesture meant to indicate his confusion. “I don’t know what I still feel for her. I did think about being with her at first but after a while, I just… stopped…”

“I know, you told me,” she murmured.

“No, it wasn’t—that’s not—even before I stopped thinking about what I wanted to happen after the War, I’d stopped really thinking about her. It was like, with everything that was happening, I just… forgot to think about her. And I never really remembered to think about her until after it was all over.” He paused. “And now I sound like a selfish git.”

“No, you don’t. You aren’t,” she assured him quickly.

He threw her a quick slight smile. “Thanks.”

“It just happens that way sometimes, Harry. You were busy; you were fighting a War, for heaven’s sake—if ever anyone had a good reason for not thinking about a girl, it was you. And you didn’t—we didn’t see much of Ginny this past year.”

“Out of sight, out of mind?” he asked rather ironically.

“Something like that.”

He made a face. “Yeah, but—doesn’t that say something about my feelings for Ginny in the first place, that I just stopped thinking about her when I didn’t see her?”

“It might,” she agreed cautiously.

He was silent for a moment, thinking. He hadn’t really bothered to try to figure all this out; after all, what was the point of analyzing it anyway? He didn’t think about Ginny; he didn’t really need to think about Ginny. He hadn’t talked to Ginny much before they’d left the Burrow and even when he had, it hadn’t been for long, had mostly consisted of commonplace nothings and awkward silences.

But, he supposed, in an odd way, that was what Hermione was for. She made him think about things, or more accurately, often talking to her made him think about things he otherwise wouldn’t. It could have been—maybe even should have been—irritating but somehow, it wasn’t. He was just more comfortable talking about things with Hermione.

“I never stopped thinking about Sirius even when I didn’t see him, didn’t know where he was most of 4th year,” he abruptly blurted out.

“Well, you… were fond of Sirius. He was important to you,” Hermione said carefully.

“And Ginny isn’t,” he completed the thought.

“I didn’t mean that.”

“No,” he agreed. He knew she hadn’t. “But it is true,” he admitted with a sudden burst of candor that surprised even himself. “I fancied Ginny but really, when it came down to it, she wasn’t that important to me.” He stopped and then finished, “Not like you and Ron and Sirius and Remus.” As always, he felt the stab of grief—mingled in with guilt—at the thought of both Sirius and Remus, although now the grief over Sirius was duller.

Hermione reached over and squeezed his arm lightly in silent sympathy. Because she knew—as always—even without his telling her.

“I’m sorry.”

And somehow he knew, too, that her quiet words were for what he’d just admitted about Ginny and not for the mention of Sirius and Remus. Not because she didn’t grieve for Sirius and Remus but because she knew he wouldn’t care to talk about it then.

“It’s okay.” Because it really was. Somehow. Surprisingly. He didn’t want to hurt Ginny but he was… fine… Whatever he had felt for Ginny had just faded away, so that when he thought about her now, tried to remember what he and Ginny had had before, it was with an odd sort of detachment, as if he were trying to remember something that had happened to some other person. “I think… it was rather silly of me… to think that Ginny and I could just go right back to being together after the War as if it had never happened.”

“Not so silly. I think we all get through hard times by imagining that when they’re over, we can just go back to the past.”

He slanted a glance at her. “You’re not going to say that it’s an irrational thing to do?”

Her lips curved slightly. “Well, it is, but that’s never mattered for what people think. And how did you know that’s what I would say?”

“I’ve got to have learned something from having spent the last seven years with you.”

“To somehow make up for the torture of having me around all the time?” she riposted.

He lifted a shoulder in a noncommittal half-shrug. “You said it, not me,” he deadpanned before his expression and his tone abruptly changed. “I wouldn’t say it, you know—that it was hard to spend so much time with you.”

“I know you wouldn’t. It would be rude to say that to my face,” she said lightly.

“And I am the soul of politeness,” he quipped, falling in with her humor, accepting that she didn’t want the conversation to become too solemn. With all the more ease because he knew that, joking aside, she knew he wouldn’t think that.

He didn’t think that. He had spent almost every day of the past few years with her because he knew he needed her cleverness—and because he knew she was too loyal to leave him—but he suddenly found himself realizing, to the full, that it wasn’t only that. Yes, he had needed her, but more than that, he liked being with her. He enjoyed her company.

A rather daft sort of revelation to have about one of his best friends but true and, somehow, it felt… significant.

He had a sudden flash of memory—of their 4th year when he and Ron had been estranged and he’d thought how there was much more studying and much less fun with Hermione as his only companion. It had been true, then.

He hadn’t thought about it since—tucked the disloyal thought into the back of his mind with only the lingering belief, in some tiny corner of his mind, that Ron was the best friend he had chosen, the best friend whose company he really preferred, and Hermione was the best friend who had chosen him, or somehow been chosen for him.

But now—because of a silly, teasing statement—he found himself really thinking about it. And realizing it wasn’t true anymore.

Yes, it was true that Hermione’s company was more serious than Ron’s—would always be true, no doubt. But she had changed, some of the edges of her seriousness, her know-it-all bossiness, worn away, softened. She’d learned to be more humorous. And he had changed too, become more serious in his turn, and learned to trust his rash impulses less and her thoughtful planning more. And he’d realized his own weakness and, in so doing, learned to appreciate her rather quiet strength.

Funny, it almost seemed as if they had both changed, grown up in their different ways, to end up… on the same level, side by side.

Really, when had he started to think about things like… like Hermione always did?

Well, there were worse people in the world to start to imitate, he thought philosophically with a mental shrug and smile.

“Are you sorry?” she asked.

He blinked at her. “About what?”

“About you and Ginny. Sorry that you can’t just go back to the girl who’s waited for you.”

He made a face. “If you put it like that, then of course I’m sorry,” he stalled, deliberately misunderstanding her.

She narrowed her eyes at him. “Don’t be thick, Harry; you know that’s not what I meant.”

He laughed briefly, amused almost in spite of himself at how quickly Hermione could go from sounding sympathetic to irritated—and not so amused at the thought that Hermione was one of the few—the very few—people he knew who would use that tone with him now. He sobered quickly though, answering her question with the honesty it deserved. “I’m sorry if it means that Ginny’s going to be hurt or disappointed. I never wanted that.” He paused and then sighed, making an aimless motion with his hands. “Honestly, I think… I’m more sorry to think I’ll be disappointing Mr. and Mrs. Weasley. After everything they’ve done for me…”

“They might be disappointed, Harry, but they’ll understand. They won’t hold a grudge against you.”

He slanted a glance at her. “The way Mrs. Weasley didn’t hold a grudge against you in 4th year when Rita Skeeter wrote that garbage story about you and me?”

She made a gesture as if to brush that aside. “That’s ancient history, Harry. I can’t even believe you remember that. And it’s different and was based on a misunderstanding. If what Rita Skeeter wrote had been true, I’d have deserved it. You haven’t lied to Ginny or deceived her in any way and you did break up with Ginny before all this started.”

“Sort of,” he agreed, not entirely convinced. “We never said anything about it but I thought… I think we both expected that the break up was only until the War was over.”

“Maybe you did both think that,” Hermione agreed gently, “but things change. People change.” She hesitated and then asked, “Do you think… did Ginny say anything to you while we were at the Burrow?”

“No, she didn’t say anything, but we weren’t exactly alone much either. I… I was sort of avoiding being alone with her,” he admitted reluctantly.

“Then I think she’ll understand. Ginny’s not dumb, Harry. If you were avoiding her, she’d have noticed.”

He grimaced. “Great. So I can be the git who broke up with her and then avoided her like she had the plague. Yes, I’m sure the Weasleys will love me for that.”

“Don’t think like that, Harry. You didn’t do anything wrong. You broke up with her honestly, you didn’t make any promises to her or ask her to wait for you. It might not be easy, it might be awkward for you and Ginny for a little while, but you shouldn’t blame yourself.”

“I don’t want to hurt her,” he reiterated, the guilt he felt over Ginny—over what he didn’t feel for Ginny anymore—not at all lessened by what she’d said.

“If it would make you feel better, you could always write her a letter, breaking up with her for good,” Hermione suggested in a carefully neutral tone.

“‘Dear Ginny, it’s over. Your friend, Harry.’ Like that?” he retorted, and then laughed in spite of himself at the impossible bluntness of it.

“Exactly like that,” she agreed, deadpan, before she spoiled the effect by laughing.

And he had to laugh again too, his heart abruptly feeling lighter, some of his determined gloom dispelled. After all, Hermione was probably right. She knew Ginny, was friends with Ginny—and wasn’t she generally right when it came to people? She’d known to trust Remus, had known not to trust Mr. Crouch all those years ago. And he trusted her.

“You’re right,” he said now. “I am sorry to disappoint Ginny but it is over. It’ll be awkward but…” he made a helpless gesture. “Anyway, I’m not sure it’d be fair to expect anyone to put up with me now, not when I can’t really enjoy myself and I can’t sleep through a night without nightmares.”

“Don’t say that, Harry. Ron and I are putting up with you just fine, as you put it.”

He gave her a slight smile. “That’s because you’re so used to putting up with me, you don’t know any better.”

She gave a deliberately teasing laugh. “Hey, if Ron and I were going to get tired of dealing with you, we’d both be long gone by now.”

“I know. Sticking with me might be the only daft thing I’ve ever known you to do.” He tried to sound joking but the humor came out somewhat flat.

He felt her sudden sharp glance but she only said, her tone deliberately light, “How do you know I was sticking with you and not just sticking with Ron to make sure he didn’t get himself into too much trouble?”

“If that’s what you were trying to do, you didn’t do a very good job of it. You should have kept Ron and yourself as far away from me as possible,” he blurted out, an edge to his voice that he couldn’t soften.

“Don’t, Harry!” she retorted, her voice sharp. She paused and then added, in a softer, although still firm, tone, “Don’t say that. Don’t even think that.”

He sighed, slumping back onto the couch. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have brought it up,” he conceded. He left unsaid that he didn’t think he could stop thinking it but for now, let it pass. He didn’t want to get into an argument with Hermione—as he knew he would over this—not now, at least. He didn’t want to disturb the fragile peace he’d found in this talk with Hermione, the sort of peace he never felt during the day.

He felt her glance and knew she’d noticed his omission—of course she’d noticed. “No, you shouldn’t have,” she said, her tone milder now. “Not unless you want to fight with me.”

His sudden tension eased at this indication that she wasn’t going to press him on this, would let it pass, at least for now. He let out a huff of breath that might have been a laugh if it had been allowed to grow up, falling in with the thread of conciliatory humor in her tone. “I don’t. You’d hex me into next week.”

“See? You do know better than to annoy me by saying silly things like that.” There was a smile in her voice.

And he had to smile too, almost involuntarily, in response to her smile.

A comfortable silence fell as he let his head fall back against the couch. It was quiet, the quiet of the middle of the night, quieter even than it usually was at the Burrow at this hour. At the Burrow, there was always more noise, whether it was the soft creaks of the house settling or the quiet murmurs that came from people turning over or shifting in their sleep or the occasional snores of Mr. Weasley.

And for almost the first time, he didn’t find himself mentally populating the silence with an encroaching threat, didn’t find himself imagining an enemy in every wisp of sound or even in the absence of sound.

It was just… quiet… quiet that wasn’t threatening or ominous or tense but just a simple fact. It was quiet… but more than that, even, he felt… what was it? But even as he thought it, he realized what it was he felt—strange as it was, even amazing.

He felt safe… Somehow. He didn’t know why or how but he did.

He let his eyes close, feeling the peace seep into him, soothe him. Safe…

Of course it didn’t last.

He jerked awake—he had slept, dreamlessly—but awoke abruptly, feeling a fleeting instant of panic, of dismay—how could he have let himself sleep, just lower his guard like that? Anything could have—

In the next instant, reality returned and he sank back down on the couch from where he’d already half-arisen. He looked over to see that Hermione was sleeping. Soundly, he could see in the weak, gray light beginning to filter through the curtains.

He wondered if she was cold—the blanket he had brought down from his bedroom last night was on the couch beside him—but after a moment, he decided not to cover her with it. The room wasn’t cold and, more importantly, he didn’t want to risk waking her up by covering her with the blanket. He knew what a light sleeper she was—what a light sleeper she had become in this past year, just as he had become. He would just let her sleep.

In the meantime, he studied her with a care he had never been able to use before. Studied her so he noted the shadows under her eyes, proof if he’d needed it of her own inability to sleep. More than that, though, he realized to the full just how hard she was trying during the day, trying to act normal, trying not to be afraid, trying to disguise and bury what she was truly feeling. He felt a sharp twist of dismay and guilt. He hadn’t realized, hadn’t thought, just how much effort Hermione was putting into her behavior, to be as strong as she was. He was so accustomed to her stoicism, her calm steadiness—but now he realized that even at night, with only him, when he knew she lowered her guard more, relaxed more, she was still trying. He could see it in the difference in her face, in her expression, a difference he couldn’t explain or otherwise put into words except to say that now, in sleep, when she wasn’t trying, she looked softer. Younger. More vulnerable. And he had become so used to the subtle indications of strain in her face during the day—it was rather as if her skin grew infinitesimally tighter over her features— that he’d ceased to notice it at all, until now, when it was gone.

It was a glimpse of a Hermione no one, certainly not him, really knew, a Hermione whose defenses were entirely down, who was—for a short while— worry-free and at peace.

He felt a throb of emotion and found himself thinking that at this moment, he didn’t want anything else. For the first time, he really felt, not just that the War was over but that they had won. He felt… happy… And it somehow didn’t matter that he still couldn’t really relax or that the wizarding world was in the slow, painful process of rebuilding itself after the War or that they had lost too many people and that the grief over those losses was still fresh—or more accurately, all those grim realities mattered less. All that really mattered to him at that moment was this—that Hermione was safe, unharmed, and sleeping peacefully.

He didn’t know how or when it had happened, that Hermione’s safety and her peace of mind meant so much to him—but somehow, it did.

He glanced at the light filtering in through the curtains. It was still early. It would be a couple hours before the day would really begin.

He could go out to recheck the wards or otherwise take a look around. Part of him wanted to, the part of him that never quite lost the sense of impending danger.

But for once, that part of him was subdued.

He settled back onto the couch, not to try to sleep himself but simply to watch her sleep. That was all. He watched her sleep. And he was happy.

~To be continued…~

Disclaimer: See Chapter 1.

Author’s Note: Thank you all for reading and reviewing. Here’s the latest chapter in which we see a little more of Ron and in which I indulge my love of the Marauders a little. Enjoy!

Living Past the End

~Chapter 5~

Harry had stilled.

He had just finished putting up a ward when he’d just… stopped. Hermione glanced at him, a question on her lips, when she realized what he was staring at. She caught her breath in sudden understanding.

The full moon.

Quickly, she finished putting up the last of the wards and then moved to stand beside him. She didn’t speak—somehow, it didn’t feel like a moment to break the silence—but she lifted her hand to touch his arm for a moment before letting her hand fall. He didn’t respond to her touch, didn’t react in any way, so that in anyone else, she might have wondered if they were even aware that she was there, but this was Harry. So she only waited, standing next to him, seeing the way his features had tightened into an expression of grief.

And after a minute, his hand—but only his hand—moved, sought hers, and then curled his fingers around hers.

They stood there like that, holding hands, for another few minutes and then he blinked, sighed, and turned his head to look at her.

“Let’s go inside,” she said gently. “I’m beginning to get cold,” she fibbed.

He didn’t respond in words, only turned, not releasing his grip on her hand, so they could walk back into the cottage.

He released her hand when they were inside, settling on the couch in the front room as they had every night for the past few nights.

Harry leaned back against the couch with a soft sigh, closing his eyes briefly.

She stayed quiet, sensing that he didn’t feel much like talking, and so they sat in silence for a while. A silence that was comfortable but somehow sad as well, as for a fleeting, uncharacteristically fanciful moment, she could almost imagine that the spirits of all the people who had died in the War were crowding into the room. So many people, many of whom she’d never even met, and some—like Fred and Professor Lupin and Tonks and Headmaster Dumbledore—whom she had known and cared about.

Oh, how much they had lost… Not just the people that had died but something else, more delicate and infinitely precious—a sense of innocence. Not even innocence as in an ignorance that evil existed in the world but innocence in the sense of a youthful confidence that right would prevail and any sort of belief in their own longevity. She had expressed it to Harry in one of their nights at the Burrow, this feeling that she had aged beyond her years, and she knew, better than anyone almost, that Harry had aged too.

She glanced at him, noting yet again the physical marks the stresses of the last year had left on his face and seeing the shadowed—haunted— expression, so familiar now, in his eyes.

Yes, they had lost so much. Lost so much that they could never get back and all they could do was hope, in that blind way of people who didn’t know what else to do, that what they gained would somehow prove to be worth all they had lost.

But finally, he broke the silence. “A sickle for your thoughts,” he offered quietly.

She looked at him, hesitating with sudden reluctance to tell him, to say anything that might add to his own grief, before she settled for responding, “How do you know I’m thinking anything at all?”

He gave her a look. “You’re always thinking.”

She gave up the futile attempt to be evasive and admitted, “I was thinking of everyone that we lost, what a high price we paid for peace.”

“It was a high price, too high…” He looked, and sounded, bleak.

But somehow, strange as it was, given what they had been talking about, she felt her heart lifting a little. They had paid a high price—but at that moment, hearing him say it had been too high, all she could think was that it wasn’t true. For all that they had lost, the price had not been too high because… because Harry had survived.

She felt guilt twist inside her at the thought—it seemed so selfish, so wrong—but there it was. In spite of everything else, in spite of the fact that so many other people—even people she had truly liked and cared for, like Fred and Professor Lupin and Sirius—had been lost, at that moment, she could only feel gratitude and, yes, relief that the price had not been higher, that Harry had survived.

Harry—and Ron and the other Weasleys, of course.

They had all paid a price and even the survivors would never be the same again, she knew, but in the end, she thought, all that really mattered to her was that Harry had survived. Not the same—he would never be a boy again, she knew, had seen too much, suffered too much, that even if the nightmares improved, even when he learned to relax and move forward, he would do so as a man, older than his years. But he was alive, could finally live a life without the constant threat of Voldemort hanging over him, could finally do whatever he might want to do without fear. He could be happy.

And for the first time, she felt, not only that the War was over and that they were safe, but that they had won. Odd to feel that now, weeks after the fact, and yet perhaps not at all. At first, they had all been too exhausted to feel much of anything and then, the immediate aftermath had been too full of grief over those they had lost and the lingering nightmares and fears to feel much in the way of relief or anything else. But now, after all the years she had spent wanting nothing so much as she wanted Harry to be safe—now, he was safe so how could she feel anything but relief?

She glanced at Harry and felt another swift curl of guilt, promptly scolding herself for her own selfishness in thinking only about her own feelings over Harry having survived when Harry himself was grieving for people they had both known and cared about.

“He was the last, real link to my parents.”

“I know,” she murmured quietly—and as always, concern for him swiftly drowned out anything she felt for herself.

“He was the first person who really talked to me about them, gave me any sense of what they had been like.” Harry blinked rapidly and then sighed. “I just… he had only just gotten some happiness and then…”

She said nothing—after all, what was there to say? Harry wasn’t speaking in order to get a response, was more thinking aloud.

She thought of Professor Lupin—Remus—too, remembering how tired he’d looked whenever the full moon had come around, and more than that, remembering the way he had looked at Harry sometimes, from the moment they had met in their Third Year and after that, as if he were seeing not Harry at all but an odd reincarnation of James. Every once in a while, usually after Harry had done or said something characteristic, Remus had looked at Harry oddly, and Hermione had realized that what she knew as a characteristic look or gesture of Harry’s was something Harry had inherited from his father and that was what Remus saw.

She suddenly remembered, too, that lesson with the boggart in their Third Year and wondering why Professor Lupin would be frightened of a crystal ball. A faint, rather sad smile curved her lips at the thought. Frightened of a crystal ball— not exactly.

“What is it?”

She looked up at Harry. “I just remembered the boggart in Third Year and how I wondered why Remus would be frightened of a crystal ball.”

“But you figured it out. When did you figure it out, Hermione?”

Hermione frowned a little. “I don’t remember exactly when. I just… knew it one day when everything came together in my mind, his looking tired and Snape’s potions and everything.”

“You never thought to tell me and Ron?”

She made a wry sort of face. “If I remember correctly, it may have been around the time when neither of you liked me much because I had gone to Professor McGonagall about your Firebolt.”

Harry grimaced. “Oh, right. I’m sorry about that.”

She glanced at him with a sudden smile. “Don’t look so guilty, Harry. I’m not mad at you over that and anyway, it’s ancient history.”

“Yeah,” he agreed and then was silent for a moment. “You never told Remus that you’d figured it out either, did you?”

“No. I didn’t mention it to anyone.”

“Why not?”

Hermione lifted her shoulders into an almost-shrug. “What was the point? I liked Remus and we all trusted him and it wasn’t my secret to tell. It was his. He didn’t want people to know and I thought he wouldn’t be happy to know that I knew, even if I wasn’t going to tell anyone, so I didn’t mention it.”

She felt Harry’s glance. “You’re very clever,” he blurted out.

She had to laugh and gave him a teasing look. “Thank you but did you just figure that out?”

He smiled briefly. “No, but it’s worth repeating.” He paused and then added, “Remus told me once that you reminded him of my mum a little. My mum figured out about him and didn’t mention it to him for a while either.”

Hermione straightened a little. Harry so rarely spoke about his parents at all. Even for her, she tried to avoid any references to his parents. It was one of the few—really, the very few—topics that were generally off limits between them, she knew.

“Oh,” was all she ventured to say, carefully.

He was silent for a while, for so long that she’d begun to think he would say nothing further about either Remus or his mother, but then he began, speaking slowly, a little less than fluidly, “It was at Christmas of their Sixth Year, Remus told me. Mum and Remus were friends… but Mum mostly just tolerated my Dad then. Remus, Dad and the… others… were in Gryffindor common room.”

Hermione nodded, her heart pinching a little at how Harry avoided mentioning Sirius’s name, out of grief, and Pettigrew’s name for the obvious reasons.

“Mum came up and gave Remus a Christmas gift. It was… one of those chain necklace-type things that some fellows wear, more common back then, Remus said. It was silver. And before Remus or anyone else could react, Mum said she wanted to see him try it on and put it on him. Remus said… he said he expected it to burn and almost leaped to his feet… but then, it didn’t. It didn’t hurt him at all.”

“It was white gold,” Hermione guessed.

He glanced at her. “Yeah. I’d never even heard of it before Remus told me this story. He said he and everyone else just stared at Mum for a minute and then Mum said… Mum just smiled and said, ‘it’s white gold. Did you really think I would be silly enough or mean enough to get you anything silver?’ And that was when Remus realized that Mum had figured it out and just not mentioned anything to him or anyone until then.”

Hermione smiled. “That’s… nice.”

“Remus said that was really when Mum started to become friends with all of them, not just him.”

“That makes sense. There’s nothing like sharing a secret to become friends.”

“Oh, I don’t know. I’ve also found that fighting a cave troll is a pretty good way to become friends,” Harry commented with a faint smile.

She slanted a smile at him. “That works too.”

His returning smile was fleeting before he sobered, looking away for a long few minutes. The silence stretched on until Hermione started to think that, after all, he wouldn’t say anything more. He had already said more about his parents than she ever remembered him saying in all the years she’d known him.

“I don’t know…” he finally began haltingly, “many stories like that about… my parents… you know… It—it meant… something… that Remus had known them so well… I just… miss him now…” His voice trailed off with the faintest tremble, something she wasn’t sure she’d ever heard from him before.

She sighed but didn’t say anything, could not think of anything to say. A swell of sympathy, of understanding, closed up her throat.

She couldn’t speak but she reached over and grasped his hand.

And so they sat in silence, each thinking their own thoughts, but connected by their joined hands.

Hermione stared at the floor, her heart aching for Harry and the thought of all he had lost.

And yet mingled in with her pain was a poignant thread of happiness that Harry had shared all he had with her just now. She knew better than anyone that Harry generally didn’t talk about those wounds that cut the deepest, which was why Harry never really talked about his parents, only rarely spoke about Sirius anymore. So the fact that Harry had talked to her as he had now… meant something. It spoke of a level of trust that went deeper, perhaps, somehow, than even she would have expected, a level of trust that Harry didn’t quite feel with Ron. She knew, treasured the knowledge—although it was never spoken in so many words—that Harry tended to be more open with her alone about those things which troubled him most. She wasn’t sure exactly when it had begun or even why it was so, but for once in her life, she didn’t try to analyze it further. She could only be thankful for it, keeping the belief that Harry could confide in her tucked safely into a corner of her heart.

She wasn’t sure how long they sat like that, in silence, but it was long enough that the grief that had seemed to thicken the air dissipated somewhat, leaving just a simple sense of comfort behind.

The sound was faint, just barely recognizable as a strangled shout. And it shattered the silence and the comfort in an instant.

Their eyes met, both of them instantly tense and alert.

“Ron.” She was never sure which of them said the name aloud, which of them only mouthed it in sudden dismay. But it didn’t matter. They were both on their feet and running for the door and up the stairs before the single syllable was finished.

Harry thrust open the door of Ron’s room, rushing inside with Hermione following just on his heels.

“Ron!”

Now the name did escape both their lips in messy unison and Ron jerked awake with a start and a gasp, looking around a little wildly before his gaze focused on the two of them.

She sensed Harry’s tension abruptly relaxing as he sank into a chair while she crossed the room to sit at the foot of the bed.

Ron lifted a hand to push his hair back, his breath still coming somewhat fast. “Did I cry out?” he finally asked after a long minute, his voice not quite himself.

“Are you okay?” she asked in response.

He sighed even as he nodded. “It was just a nightmare.”

“I didn’t—I didn’t know you had nightmares,” Harry spoke up, his voice almost cracking in spite of his effort to sound calm.

Ron glanced at Harry, the ghost of a wry smile just touching his lips. “I don’t, not that often. But I guess I’ve spent too much time with you and nightmares are contagious.”

Harry sucked in his breath and Hermione somehow sensed him stiffen. “I’m sorry,” he blurted out and then abruptly stood up and left the room with almost as much suddenness as he’d entered it.

Leaving Ron to stare after him with surprise and dismay written large on his features.

Hermione sighed, torn between the wish to follow Harry and make sure he was okay and the sense that she should stay with Ron, at least a little longer. “Oh Ron, did you have to say that?”

“It was a joke!” Ron protested, his expression changing to defensiveness. “I didn’t really mean it, not like that.”

She sighed again. “I know that.” And she did—she had from the moment he’d said it. Ron could be blunt but unless he lost his temper, it wasn’t like him to be intentionally cutting. For the most part, when Ron said something hurtful, it was out of thoughtlessness, even obliviousness, not malice.

And she suspected Harry would have known that too—or he would, once he got over his instinctive hurt. But would he—could he—get over his hurt?

“Did Harry have to overreact like that?”

“That’s not fair, Ron. You may not have meant it like that but you didn’t sound like you were joking either.”

“Oh come on, Hermione!” Ron flared with some irritation. “Harry’s known me for 7 years now; he ought to know when I’m joking and when I’m not.”

“Maybe he would if he were really himself, but he’s not himself. Not really. Not yet. You know that. Can’t you see that?”

Ron’s expression settled into a rather mulish one. “Don’t you ever get tired of having to treat Harry like he’s made of glass and will shatter if anyone so much as looks at him funny? We’re his friends but we shouldn’t have to babysit him.”

She glared at Ron. “Honestly, Ron, you can be such an insensitive clod. You know all that Harry’s been through in the last couple years. If ever anyone was entitled to being a little fragile right now, it’s him! And if you don’t want to be around to help Harry get back to normal, then you can just leave!”

Their eyes clashed for a long, fraught moment and for a second, she thought Ron might actually decide to do just that and leave. She held her breath—but then he gave in, his eyes dropping as he slumped back. “Okay, Hermione, you win,” he conceded. “Don’t look at me like that. I couldn’t really desert Harry now, you know.”

She relaxed, unbending enough to give Ron the faint beginnings of a smile. “Good.”

He gave her a sideways look. “Y’know, you’re really scary when you’re angry.”

“Well, don’t say stupid things and I won’t need to get angry.”

“Sorry.” He paused and then sighed. “I know Harry’s still having a bit of a hard time but it’s a little wearing to have to tiptoe around him.”

She sighed. “It’s only been a couple weeks since everything ended. Give him some more time.”

“How much more time will he need? The War ended almost a month ago now. I could understand the first couple days but really, I thought he’d be over it by now.”

And there Ron went again, showcasing his masterful insensitivity. She sternly bit back her annoyance—getting into a fight with Ron wasn’t going to help, would only trigger Ron’s stubbornness—and said with forced calm, “You of all people know that Harry’s been fighting this War for years and a month is not that long a time.” She paused and then added more softly, “You know everything was so much harder for Harry than it was even for us.”

“Yeah, I suppose,” Ron admitted with something less than grace but admitting it nonetheless.

She could have quibbled with his grudging acknowledgment but changed the subject instead. “What do you still have nightmares about?”

Ron shrugged a little, his fingers picking absently at the covers. “Things that happened in the War.” He paused and then added very quietly, “Fred.”

“I’m sorry,” was all she could think to say, equally quietly.

“I know.” He was silent for a long moment and then said with a visible effort to sound unaffected, “I’m sorry if I woke you up.”

“You didn’t,” she assured him. “Harry and I were just talking.”

Ron’s eyebrows lifted as he glanced at the window and the darkness outside. “It’s the middle of the night!”

She hesitated, a little reluctant to say that she and Harry had spent almost every night in a while together talking. It wasn’t a secret, of course, but it was also not something either of them mentioned during the day or to anyone else. “It’s the full moon tonight,” she settled for saying instead. Which was true. And if Ron took that to mean that tonight was unusual for that reason, well, there was nothing technically untrue about that. Tonight had been different—sadder—than the other nights. She pushed aside the little niggle of discomfort at her parsing her words.

Ron’s expression blanked as the implication of this hit him and then he winced a little. “Was Harry all right?”

“He misses Remus and everyone else.”

Ron winced again. “And then I had to make that joke about my nightmares. You—you’d better go make sure he’s okay now.”

“Will you be able to go back to sleep?”

Ron lifted his shoulders, his expression turning to one of manufactured insouciance. “I’m an insensitive clod, remember? Nothing can keep me awake at night for long.”

She felt a sudden rush of affection for him. “You’re only an insensitive clod some of the time. Seriously, Ron, will you be able to sleep?”

“I’ll be fine,” he said firmly and more seriously. “One nightmare a night is usually my record.”

She managed a slight smile. “Okay, then.”

Ron waved a hand. “Go make sure Harry’s not beating himself up.”

“Goodnight, Ron.” On an impulse, she bent forward and kissed his cheek quickly before standing up.

Ron pretended to make a face at her. “Night, Hermione.”

She gave him a last, small smile before she left to find Harry.

Harry wasn’t in his room. Nor was he in the front room.

She hesitated and then tried the front door—unlocked—and stepped outside, her heart clenching a little at this evidence of how badly Harry had reacted to Ron’s thoughtless words. Harry didn’t like being outside at night so for him to have fled the cottage had a significance she hated to think of.

He was outside.

He had transfigured something into a bench—which, she noted, he had placed just inside the wards they had put up—and he still had his wand in his hand, looking rather as if he were guarding the cottage.

He also looked as starkly, forbiddingly alone as she could ever remember seeing. So alone that she hesitated for a moment, wondering if this was one of those times when Harry needed to be left alone, before she figuratively stiffened her spine and went to join him.

“Nice job at transfiguration,” she commented with studied casualness as she sat down on the bench.

He didn’t respond, his silence for once as unwelcoming as a physical blow could have been.

She sternly suppressed the flicker of hurt she felt. It wasn’t about her. Harry wasn’t trying to hurt her.

She discarded any idea of trying to pretend either of them didn’t know what had driven him outside. “He didn’t mean it the way it sounded,” she ventured softly, carefully.

Harry still didn’t respond, was silent for another excruciatingly long minute. But then just as she began to think he wouldn’t respond, he did.

“I know,” he admitted briefly.

Her heart squeezed painfully at this proof that Harry had been able to see past his own reaction, had been able to think clearly in spite of his emotions.

“He might not have meant it but he was right.”

“No, he wasn’t. His nightmares aren’t your fault.”

“How could it not be my fault?!” he exploded, leaping to his feet in agitation. “It is my fault that you and Ron were in so much danger! It was because of me, because you were friends with me. Other people—Terry Boot, Justin, Cho, everyone else at Hogwarts—weren’t nearly as involved as you were. Even Ginny—she was safer because I pushed her away so she wasn’t a part of it all. You—you were in danger because of me so of course it’s my fault!”

“No, it’s not,” she objected, deliberately not raising her voice, trying, hoping, that her own calm would calm Harry as well.

“How can you say that! Can you honestly tell me that you would have been in just as much danger if we’d never become friends?” he demanded hotly.

She wanted to lie. But she met his eyes—she couldn’t lie to him, not about this, not about anything so important—“No, I can’t.”

“Then don’t tell me it’s not my fault!”

She stood up as well, her ability to pretend to be calm abruptly leaving her. “Stop it, Harry! Just stop it!”

He blinked, apparently surprised enough that she was yelling at him—a change to be sure since she usually went out of her way to be sympathetic, even when she disagreed with him—that he abruptly closed his mouth and just stared.

“Saying we were in more danger because we were your friends does not mean that it’s your fault we were in danger! You didn’t force us to stay with you and let me tell you something, Harry, nothing you said could have stopped us from helping you! So don’t you dare blame yourself for our being in danger! Yes, we stayed with you because we’re your friends but we chose to stay. I chose to stay with you and help you and I did it knowing that it would be dangerous but I also knew it was the right thing to do. Not everything is about you!”

“I don’t think that!” he shot back. “But being friends with me made you targets, made Voldemort want to come after you, and it haunts me!” His voice cracked slightly on the intensity of the last words. “The thought of what could have happened—what did happen to you and Ron—because of me. I can’t forget it and I can’t stop caring that it was because of me! I can’t―”

“I would have been a target anyway, even if we hadn’t been friends! I’m a Muggle-born and I was head of our class; do you really think Voldemort would have just let me alone? And it’s not like any of the Weasleys have ever exactly been on the list of Death Eaters’ favorite people. It wasn’t about you, Harry, so you shouldn’t blame yourself. We were your friends before any of this even started so what were we supposed to do? Just abandon you in the middle of a war?”

“Yes! Maybe you should have!” he flared with fleeting anger before it was replaced with weary despondence. “It would have been better—you would have been safer if you had.”

Any last traces of annoyance at Harry’s stubbornness and his persistent self-blame dissipated at the look on his face, the stark torment, on it. She closed the distance between them to grip his arms, her tone softening. “You have to believe me, Harry. Ron doesn’t blame you. I don’t blame you. Nothing that happened to any of us was your fault. If you could have, wouldn’t you have protected us, saved us?”

“You know I would have.”

“You see? It wasn’t your fault. You would have done anything—you would have taken any curse or hex to save us. You would have died,” she added very softly.

He stiffened and jerked a little but her hold on his arms prevented him from moving away.

“Listen to me, Harry. Nothing that happened to us was your fault, none of the danger, none of our nightmares.”

Harry let out a shuddering breath, closing his eyes for a moment, before opening them to meet her gaze. “That’s… easy to say but it’s harder for me to believe. I can’t—I can’t feel that it’s not my fault.”

“Then just believe me. I say it’s not your fault and you shouldn’t blame yourself. Trust me, Harry.”

“I do trust you. I’ll—I’ll try to believe it.”

“Okay.” She managed a faint smile. “Try… and when you have trouble, I’ll remind you.”

His lips twitched slightly. “That, I can believe.” He paused. “I guess we’ll have this argument again and again.” He managed a self-deprecating semblance of a smile. “I’m thick-headed, you know.”

“How about whenever I think you’re starting to blame yourself, I’ll say something to remind you not to blame yourself?”

“Like ‘don’t be a prat, Harry’?”

“That won’t work. I’m sure I’ll have other reasons to say that than just because you’re starting to blame yourself again.”

He gave a glimmer of a smile. “Okay, then what will you say?”

“How about I say, ‘remember Damon and Pythias’?” she suggested on sudden inspiration.

He frowned. “What’s Damon and Pythias?”

“Damon and Pythias are legendary best friends from a story about ancient Greece who were each willing to die to save the other’s life.” She lifted one shoulder. “It seems fitting for you.”

“I’m not that good a friend. If I were, I wouldn’t have been constantly dragging you and Ron into danger with me.”

“Harry, remember Damon and Pythias.”

He grimaced. “I know, sorry. I just…”

“You forgot,” she finished for him.

“And you reminded me, just like you said you would,” he returned.

“You know me. I’m always right so it would save time if you would just listen to what I say all the time,” she said lightly.

She was rewarded for this by a brief laugh that sounded rather as if it had been startled out of him before he sobered. After a moment, he tipped his head back, with a motion as if his neck was too tired to continue holding his head up, and sighed.

“Thank you,” he said abruptly, breaking the brief silence and meeting her eyes again.

“For what?”

“For… staying with me in spite of everything, for helping me. For telling me when you think I’m being a prat.”

She shrugged off his words, abruptly self-conscious from the sudden intensity of his gaze, in spite of the attempt at lightness in his words. “It’s what friends do.”

“No. It’s not. It’s what best friends do.” He hesitated. “You’ve—you’ve been the best friend anyone could ever have.”

Her first instinct was to make some quip, make light of it—and in all honesty, what else could she have done? Leaving Harry had never been an option.

But any sort of bantering response died in her throat at the look in his eyes. She wasn’t sure—she found it hard to think—but she didn’t think he’d ever looked at her like this before, not with this sort of focused intensity, this warmth of affection. He looked at her as if, just for this moment, she was the only other person in the world.

“You’re welcome,” she finally settled for murmuring, for lack of any better response.

He managed a slight twist of a smile. “You don’t have to look so shocked that I’m thanking you. After all you’ve done, thanking you is the least I can do.”

“I wasn’t expecting to be thanked.”

He grimaced. “I know I’ve been an ungrateful—”

“No, that wasn’t what I meant,” she interrupted him. “I meant that I didn’t help you because I wanted gratitude. It was never—you saved my life too, you know.”

“If you’re talking about the cave troll…”

“It’s not only that. What about the basilisk in Second Year or —”

“The basilisk was you saving me; if it hadn’t been for you figuring it out, I would have gone into the Chamber not knowing what I was going up against and I’d have been snake food in a minute.”

She waved off his interruption with her hand. “Anyway, whatever I might have done to help you, I had my own selfish motivations too.”

He gave her an openly skeptical look. “What possible selfish reason could you have had for risking your own life to help me?”

She glanced away, suddenly—irrationally—a little uncomfortable and unable to hold his gaze as she answered. “I’d never really had friends before you and Ron. Before Hogwarts, I was basically always alone. It’s why I got used to having books as my main company. Then I met you.” She finally looked back at Harry, managing a somewhat shaky smile. “You and Ron were the first friends I’d ever had so what was I supposed to do? Just let some barking mad Slytherin get to you, leaving me alone again?” She tried for a joking tone but was aware that she was only marginally successful.

“Hermione, I—” he closed his mouth and then opened it again, visibly rethinking whatever he’d been about to say before he finally responded, “You and Ron were my first friends too.”

She gave him a real smile which he returned. “See? So we’re even.”

“When you put it like that, yeah, I guess so.”

She linked her arm with his in a companionable gesture. “Come on, let’s go back inside. You weren’t planning on keeping watch out here all night, were you?”

He didn’t answer in words, just kept pace beside her as they returned inside and, again, settled on the couch in the front room.

A brief silence fell that he broke by asking, “Was Ron okay?”

“Yeah, he’ll be fine. As he put it, one nightmare a night is usually his limit.”

He let out a brief huff of laughter that somehow sounded only half-amused. “Lucky him.”

“Ron’s going to be okay, you know, Harry. We’re all going to be okay. The nightmares will go away and we can just get on with our lives. We’re safe now and we’ll be able to live and have fun.”

“I know.”

He sounded certain, almost amazingly certain, as if she had just informed him what year it was rather than assuring him of something she knew he worried about. She gave him a questioning look but before she could ask, he added, with a commendably straight face, “You just told me so and I know you’re always right.”

She laughed, nudging him with her shoulder. “Good boy, you’re learning.”

His lips quirked. “I do have fleeting moments of intelligence.”

She would have grinned at him but instead found herself yawning.

“We should probably try to get some sleep,” he offered.

“Aren’t you tired too?” she asked as they walked upstairs.

He sobered, his face abruptly changing to make him look older. “Always,” he said briefly.

She mentally kicked herself for the inane question. Of course he was tired. She could see it in the shadows under his eyes and aside from all that, she of all people knew how little sleep he generally got.

“I think I’ve forgotten what it feels like not to be tired,” he admitted, his voice low, almost as if he were more speaking to himself than to her.

“Oh, Harry…” was all she could say, the two words little more than a sigh.

They had reached his door and paused as she studied him, suddenly swamped with a tidal wave of concern for him. She wished she could wave her wand and bring him peace, for a fleeting moment even thought wildly of casting a spell on him or erasing his memories or something—but no, she couldn’t do that to Harry.

“Do you think you’ll be able to sleep a little?”

He met her eyes and his face softened, his eyes warming. “I think so. You don’t have to worry about me so much.”

“I can’t seem to help it,” she blurted out unthinkingly, her thoughts scattering as she felt her cheeks flushing, her heart fluttering at the way he was looking at her, the affection in his gaze. In the dim hallway, she was suddenly incredibly, breathlessly conscious that it was the middle of the night, that they were alone, and standing closely enough together that it would take less than a step, a mere shifting of bodies, before they would be close enough to kiss…

He rested his hand on her shoulder for a moment. “Good night, Hermione.”

“Good night,” she managed to say automatically before she turned and walked down to her own room.

She felt abruptly let down, her spirits deflated, not so much because of what had not happened but at the possible significance of it not happening. She knew what she felt—but what about him? Oh, she knew he trusted her and cared about her but how much did that mean?

She pictured his expression again, heard the affection in his voice.

It could have been nothing more and nothing less than the fondness of a brother.

In fact—she tried to remember—hadn’t Harry’s expression looked rather like what she’d occasionally seen in Bill’s or Charlie’s face when they looked at Ginny? Even the way Ron treated Ginny, the careless ease mingled in with the affection, affection that was so engrained that it was never even thought about or questioned or put into words.

She sighed as she got into bed, telling herself it didn’t matter. She hadn’t lost anything; nothing was different between them if Harry thought of her like a sister.

Like a sister. Funny, growing up alone, Hermione had spent the better part of her life wishing for a sibling. Now, the thought that she might be like a sibling to someone only hurt.

Which was silly and irrational, she told herself briskly. She was Harry’s best friend; she was like a sister to him. As she’d always been.

And that was enough. It would be enough for her. Really, it would.

And if her throat felt uncomfortably tight, her eyes abruptly pricking a little… well, that had nothing to do with anything.

She turned over onto her side and closed her eyes, willing herself to sleep.

She was Harry’s best friend. As she always had been, as she always would be. And that would be enough for her.

~To be continued…~

Disclaimer: See Chapter 1.

Living Past the End

~Chapter 6~

“Crucio.”

“No! Hermione!”

Harry started awake on his cry, bolting upright and then stumbling out of his bed only to crash heavily against the wall.

He couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t breathe. He felt as if he were being strangled. He yanked at the collar of his shirt, ripping it, but it didn’t help. Air. He needed air!

Outside!

He attempted to move but his knees buckled beneath him as his fingers scrabbled madly at the wall.

His chest hurt and he suddenly wondered wildly if this was what it felt like to have a heart attack. He couldn’t get enough air into his lungs, felt as if his ribs and his chest were being compressed.

He panted and gasped for air but could never get enough of it. He couldn’t see, his eyes narrowing, his vision dotted with tiny points of light.

Through the sound of his own harsh gasps for air, the mad sound of his heart pounding, the screams he could still hear in his head, he vaguely heard his door open.

“Harry!”

He still couldn’t see but in the next moment, he felt her beside him, felt her hand on his back.

He clutched at his chest. “I… can’t… breathe!” he wheezed out.

“It’s okay, Harry. Slow your breathing down. Inhale. Hold it. Exhale.”

She was barking mad! He couldn’t breathe and she wanted him to slow his breathing?!

“Inhale. Exhale. Slowly, Harry.”

He didn’t understand. She was barking mad—she had to be—but he listened to her. And he did what she said.

Forced himself—in defiance of every instinct, everything he wanted to do—to inhale slowly, hold the breath for a couple seconds, and then exhale just as slowly. Inhale. Exhale. In. Out.

He felt her hand on his back, rubbing in slow, comforting circles. “Breathe, Harry. In and out.”

And slowly—amazingly—it helped. The spots clouding his vision faded and he blinked rapidly as his vision returned. It was too dark for him to see very clearly; her face was just a pale oval in the darkness. But he didn’t need to see her. His mind filled in her features where they were indistinguishable in the darkness. He focused on her face, his mind superimposing the concerned expression he knew she would have, as he controlled his breathing, feeling the tightness in his chest ease little by little. And also little by little, the screams he heard in his head quieted.

“I’m here, Harry. Just keep breathing, in and out, slowly. In and out…” she kept up her murmuring, as well as the warm pressure of her hand on his back.

Belatedly, he became aware that she was adjusting her breathing to his, imitating the slow, deep, steady breaths he was forcing himself to take. Something softened inside him at this indication of empathy, of solidarity. He still felt jumpy, tense—but he was no longer alone.

“Feeling better?” she finally asked, softly.

He managed to nod a little jerkily.

“Let’s sit down.” She slipped her arm around his back, providing some added support for his still somewhat shaky knees as they made it the couple steps back to collapse heavily onto his bed. Or more accurately, he collapsed like a puppet with its strings cut while she sat down normally.

A silence fell. He no longer needed to concentrate quite so much to keep his breathing even, his heart wasn’t pounding quite so fast anymore. But he still felt tense, his calm a ragged façade. He could feel it, the tendrils of the panic, the heart-wrenching terror he’d felt, hovering just at the fringes of his mind, not gone but biding its time.

“This was where I first saw the ocean. My grandparents had just rented this place for the first time and my parents and I flew out here for a week in the summer.”

He blinked and turned to stare at her, confused, at this non-sequitur, the apparent randomness of it. Except this was Hermione and she was never random. She wasn’t looking at him—he could just make out her profile as she looked down towards the floor—as she went on, softly.

“I’d never seen the ocean before. My grandfather tried to get me to go into the water but I refused. I was terrified and wouldn’t set foot in the water. I must have been all of 5 years old or so at the time, I think. My grandfather pleaded and cajoled but I was stubborn and insisted that I wouldn’t walk one step into the ocean. Finally my grandfather promised me that he and my Nana would never ever ask me to do anything that wasn’t safe or was dangerous for me to do. And then he picked me up and promised me that he wouldn’t put me down until I asked him to. Then, still holding me, he walked slowly into the ocean.”

He still wasn’t quite sure where she was going with this but couldn’t help listening. Her voice was quiet. She had, he thought with some surprise, a pretty voice. He’d never noticed it before but there, in the dark, where he couldn’t really see her as anything much more than a darker shadow, her voice was lovely. Like the sound of water to a man dying of thirst in the desert.

“I almost strangled him with every step he took into the water but I didn’t cry out and he kept on going. He didn’t stop until the water was just deep enough that it came to about where my knees were as he carried me. By then, I couldn’t help but be curious at the way the waves moved and that nothing bad had happened. So when he stopped and checked with me, I finally said he could keep on going and he did, until the water was almost level with our shoulders. I was still a little scared but my grandfather only laughed a little as he said, ‘you see, ‘Mione, isn’t this fun?’”

“Your grandfather called you ‘Mione?” he interrupted, forgetting himself in that moment of surprise.

“My family almost always called me ‘Mione when I was little. My parents only started calling me Hermione when I started Hogwarts and my grandparents still tend to call me ‘Mione.”

“You never let us call you ‘Mione.” He distinctly remembered one time in Second Year when Ron had been trying to wheedle Hermione into letting him look at her essay and Ron had pleaded, “Aww, come on, ‘Mione, please…” And Hermione had given Ron one of her patented looks, the one Harry had mentally named her spider glare, and Ron had—as always, when he was on the receiving end of that particular look—surrendered and retreated with the haste that had inspired Harry’s name for the look. Ron had dropped the subject of the essay and he and Ron had both finished their essays laboriously, without so much as daring to ask Hermione a question. And neither of them had ever dared to call Hermione ‘Mione again.

“You never really asked and, anyway, it was my little kid nickname. It would have been silly to keep using it at Hogwarts. We didn’t call Ron Ronniekins either.”

“Not unless we wanted to make fun of him,” he interjected.

She laughed a little and he managed a slight smile. And realized as he did so what Hermione had intended by telling him this story from her childhood; she had wanted to distract him from his panic. And it was working. He felt calmer, no longer needing to focus so much on the pace of his breathing.

He reached out on impulse and gripped Hermione’s hand, squeezing it briefly. “I can’t imagine you being so scared of the ocean.”

“Oh I was. At the time, pretty much all I knew was that the ocean was deep, deeper than rivers like the Thames, and I had this idea that it meant the land just ended, dropped off like a cliff at the water’s edge. So I thought if we took one step too far into the water, the land would end and we’d step right off the cliff and fall into the depths of the ocean. So of course, I was terrified.”

He could hear her smile in her voice. He could picture it, a smaller version of the Hermione he had first met, little Hermione—no, little ‘Mione—lifting her chin as she refused to walk into the ocean and then the gradual conquering of her fears.

“I wasn’t much of a Gryffindor back then,” she quipped lightly.

“Yes, you were,” he blurted out. “You could have stopped your grandfather from picking you up at all or you could have stopped him from going any further when he stopped to check but you didn’t. You were still scared of falling into the ocean but you didn’t stop him.”

“My grandfather promised I’d be all right.”

“Still. When—” he broke off abruptly but then went on, his voice a shade rougher, quieter, “when Dudley didn’t want to do something because he was scared, he’d throw tantrums, shrieking and crying, ‘til he got his way.” He couldn’t quite believe he was saying it—he never usually talked about Dudley—but somehow, in the dark, with only Hermione there, the words simply came. And part of it, he realized, was that his fears—the things that haunted him—no longer involved the Dursleys. Not really, not anymore. He might not be comfortable—he suspected he never would be comfortable—talking about the Dursleys, but at least the thought of them didn’t close his throat.

“Oh,” was all Hermione murmured even as she squeezed his hand for a moment. And he knew she realized what it meant both that he’d mentioned Dudley at all—but that she also wasn’t going to press him on it. He felt a sudden rush of affection and gratitude—and wondered, not for the first time, just what he would do without her. She was—of course, she was—his best friend but more and more, he realized she was more than that. Somehow. Ron was his best friend too, just as certainly, but he knew without thinking that he would never be able to talk about any of this with Ron. Ron would not—could not—understand. Hermione was different. Hermione was more. How much more or what “more” even meant, he didn’t know. Some part of him still shied away from even thinking it. She was just… more… and “more” was undefined. And it was fine that way.

“Tell me more about your grandparents,” he finally said.

“My grandparents are great. I loved visiting their house because I loved my grandfather’s study. It was full of books. Both my grandparents loved to read and, more than even my parents did, encouraged me to read all I wanted to. They were both teachers, my Nana taught secondary school and my grandfather taught history at university.”

“So bossiness and liking to lecture people runs in the family.”

She laughed and bumped him with her shoulder. “If I’m anything like my grandparents, I’ll take it as a compliment.”

“I meant it as one,” he said quietly.

“Grampa was a great story teller. He told me stories from Greek mythology and the Arthurian legends but most often, he told me about history whenever I visited. About the lost princes in the Tower, about Henry VIII and his six wives, about Guy Fawkes and his Gunpowder Plot, about Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, and about Eleanor of Aquitaine and all her adventures.” Her voice softened until he could hear a smile in her voice. “He used to call me his little Gloriana because he knew that the stories he told me about Elizabeth I were always my favorite. He told me that she proved what no one had really thought was possible until then, that a woman could be just as clever and just as powerful as any king of England had ever been and that he never wanted me to forget that. The summer after our Second Year was his 70th birthday and to surprise him at his birthday party, I memorized Elizabeth’s speech at Tilbury to recite to him.”

“What speech?”

“It was just before the Spanish Armada and troops had gathered to try to prepare for the invasion of England. Elizabeth went out to Tilbury to where the troops were and gave what’s probably her most famous speech.”

“Do you still remember it?”

“Honestly, Harry, it’s not…”

“Please. I want to hear it. I’ve never heard of it before.”

He somehow sensed her slight flush but after another moment’s hesitation, she began. “My loving people, we have been persuaded by some that are careful of our safety, to take heed how we commit our selves to armed multitudes, for fear of treachery…”

He had asked mostly out of idle curiosity and a wish to keep being distracted but he listened with an interest that surprised him. She started out rather haltingly, her voice a little uncertain, but soon the old-fashioned phrasing flowed quite naturally. “I know I have the body but of a weak and feeble woman; but I have the heart and stomach of a king, and of a king of England too, and think foul scorn that Parma or Spain, or any prince of Europe, should dare to invade the borders of my realm…”

He’d never cared much about history, either Muggle or magical, but now, listening to Hermione, he couldn’t help but get some sense of the drama of the speech. Not because Hermione was any sort of actress, able to imbue the words with dramatic power; she wasn’t. She sounded amazingly matter-of-fact as she recited the speech. It was more because he could hear all of Hermione’s love of history as she spoke, couldn’t help but be amazed at how she remembered this, in spite of the fact that she had memorized it years ago, before the War had started.

And there was something oddly… comforting… about that. When he often felt as if he’d thought of nothing else but the War for almost his entire life, when he sometimes wondered if he even knew who he was when he wasn’t Harry Potter, the Boy Fighting Voldemort, it was comforting to be faced with this evidence that yes, there had been life before the War, life that wasn’t part of the War, and Hermione still remembered it.

It was comforting. It was also off-putting as he wondered, a little sickly and not for the first time, just what Hermione was doing being friends with people like him and Ron. Hermione, who was so clever, who enjoyed history, and was reciting from memory a speech given some 400 years ago, a speech he’d never even heard of before!

She finished and he stayed silent, just staring at her—or what he could see of her, which was little more than her profile—for a moment.

“Did I put you to sleep? I told you it wasn’t—”

“How can you stand to hang out with us? What are you doing, being friends with an idiot like me?” he blurted out. “You—listen to you talk about history and stuff and I—I don’t know anything about that and—”

“Harry, stop it.” she interrupted him quickly. “You’re not an idiot and as for why I’m friends with you, we’ve already been over this, remember?”

He frowned. “What—”

“It’s because there are more important things than books and cleverness. Cleverness doesn’t mean much on its own. Tom Riddle was clever too.”

He stiffened, jerking in spite of himself at the name. Oddly. He didn’t react like that at the thought or mention of Voldemort but something about the human name, Tom Riddle, bothered him. Maybe because Voldemort no longer sounded—or looked—like a human but Tom Riddle was just another boy’s name. Maybe because he was still bothered by the superficial similarities between him and Tom Riddle—half-bloods with unhappy childhoods, both Parselmouths… Whatever the reason, he reacted, releasing her hand as he jerked as if he’d been electrocuted.

He heard her sigh and then after a moment, she started again. “Anyway, you shouldn’t focus so much on my cleverness as if you’re stupid. We’re not that different, you know. We’re both Gryffindors too, remember. The Sorting Hat could have put me in Ravenclaw but it didn’t.”

“Lucky for me,” he finally said. He tried to imagine Hermione being sorted into Ravenclaw—possibly never becoming friends with her. He felt a slight shudder go through him at the thought. Thank all the Fates that the Sorting Hat had put Hermione in Gryff—

“Why did the Sorting Hat put you in Gryffindor?” he blurted out. “Not—not that you’re not brave but it just… you know… at first thought, it does seem like you belong in Ravenclaw…”

“I know. Other people have said so too and I’ve wondered about it too.” She paused and then added, “I was surprised when the Sorting Hat announced Gryffindor.”

He turned to look at her. “You were?”

“Of course. Well, Hogwarts: a History explained about the different Houses and I’d assumed in reading it that I belonged in Ravenclaw.” He saw her shrug. “Loving to read, studious—I sounded like the perfect Ravenclaw.”

He smiled. “Yeah, you do. Did the Sorting Hat say anything to you before it sorted you?”

“Mm, just that I was an interesting one. That was really all it said before it announced Gryffindor. But I’ve thought about it and I think I’ve figured it out.”

He grinned to himself. Of course she had. “Then why were you Sorted into Gryffindor?”

“Because Gryffindor was where I would grow the most, as a person. If I’d been Sorted into Ravenclaw, I wouldn’t have needed to really change or grow up much. I’d have been surrounded by people who studied just like me; I’d never have gotten into trouble…”

“That’s true. Ron and I were always the ones to drag you into trouble.”

“You didn’t drag me; I walked into trouble right beside you,” she retorted.

A laugh escaped him before he’d even realized it, amused—and somehow warmed too—by this flash of spirit. So very Hermione.

He sensed rather than saw her answering smile before she went on. “But because I was Sorted into Gryffindor, I had to grow up, surrounded by people who weren’t exactly like me. It pushed me so I didn’t study as much—”

“You studied plenty,” he interrupted her rather dryly.

“Not as much as I would have if I’d been in Ravenclaw. I think… being Sorted into Gryffindor… well, it made me become the person I had the potential to become but wouldn’t have been otherwise, if that makes sense.”

“It makes sense.”

“It’s the same with Neville too. On the surface, he seems more like a Hufflepuff; he has the same sort of bone-deep loyalty and he’s not competitive or aggressive or outgoing. But he has hidden depths and now—”

“He’s just as much a Gryffindor as any of us are,” he finished for her.

“Yeah. He grew up, just like I did.”

“And I stayed exactly the same,” he quipped. “Reckless and impulsive then and now.”

She laughed. “Some people are hopeless.”

“Maybe it just means some people didn’t need to change and started out perfect.”

She bumped him with her shoulder. “Perfectly egotistical, you mean,” she teased.

He nudged her back with his shoulder. “Hey, I’ll have you know a lot of people think I’m quite a swell fellow.”

She laughed again as they engaged in a playful mock-tussle, pushing against each other with their shoulders, that ended in what amounted to an armistice as he flung his arm around her shoulders as her head settled against his shoulder.

A comfortable, companionable silence fell as he let his head rest against her hair. And he realized that now, finally, he felt calm again. His heart was no longer racing. He was… at ease again, the tension and the last lingering tendrils of panic gone, dissolved.

Thanks to Hermione and her distracting, deliberately lighthearted conversation.

“Any more stories from your childhood and your grandparents?”

“You mean, I haven’t bored you yet?”

“No, not yet.” And somehow, he was suddenly very sure that she never could bore him. “I bet you were really cute back then, ‘Mione.” He used the childhood pet name deliberately, half-teasingly. He’d never even dreamed of using the word ‘cute’ to describe Hermione before—would probably have scoffed at the very idea—but somehow, it just came out and he was a little amazed to discover that he really meant it.

He sensed her slight smile. “Just don’t call me that when Ron is around. I don’t need him making fun of me.”

“Fair enough. It’ll be our secret,” he answered easily—and sincerely. He didn’t want Ron calling her ‘Mione. He didn’t want Ron knowing stories about the little girl Hermione had once been, the girl who’d been afraid to go into the ocean, the girl who’d grown up hearing stories from English history at her grandfather’s knee. He didn’t want Ron discovering the smooth loveliness of Hermione’s quiet voice speaking in the darkness.

It was utterly selfish of him. To say nothing of irrational. It wasn’t as if Hermione’s childhood stories were secrets. And yet… his reaction to the thought of Ron seeing this side of Hermione, of Ron calling her ‘Mione, was immediate and visceral. And negative.

He didn’t know why—and at the moment, he didn’t care to analyze it either. He just knew he didn’t like the idea. He wanted to be the only one who knew these stories, wanted to be the only person outside of her family who could call her ‘Mione.

Merlin, when had he suddenly become possessive about Hermione? He’d never felt possessive about her before! She’d always been Ron’s best friend just as much as she was his; she generally spent as much time with Ron as she did with him, teased Ron just as much as she teased him. And she was the first girl Ron had really fancied. None of which had ever bothered him in the slightest before.

Crazy! He mentally shook himself, shoving any such stupid thoughts out of his head. Hermione was his best friend and Ron’s best friend. That was all.

She laughed softly, thankfully distracting him. “Well, there’s one story. If you ever meet my grandfather, he’ll probably tell it to you. I think he’s told it to everyone he’s ever met for more than ten years now. It’s his favorite story of me from when I was little. I don’t remember it myself but I’ve heard it so many times that it’s like I remember it.”

“What’s the story?”

“I was staying over at my grandparents’ house and my grandfather read me the story of the Wild Swans by Hans Christian Andersen and—”

“What’s the story about?” he interrupted her.

H felt her glance. “Oh. You never heard the story?”

“No.” And found himself adding, “The Dursleys didn’t spend a lot of time reading stories.” He vaguely remembered Aunt Petunia reading some stories to Dudley when they’d been very young but he had never been included for this, had heard some stories only as a result of surreptitiously eavesdropping from outside of Dudley’s bedroom. Amazingly, he remembered this and felt rather detached from it, almost as if it had happened to some other boy. Not to him, the Harry who was sitting here now with Hermione. That other Harry, who had never had any friends, had always been desperately hoping for, seeking, scraps of basic human kindness, never mind friendship and affection. That other Harry could never have even imagined, let alone hoped for, a friendship like this, of being able to sit next to someone and talk to them in the darkness about nothing in particular and yet have it mean… everything…

He sensed her slight hesitation, the sudden increase of tension in her, at the mention of the Dursleys, but she didn’t respond otherwise. “The Wild Swans is about a princess named Eliza who had eleven brothers. Their father, the king, married again—”

“Let me guess, he married a wicked stepmother who hated Eliza for being the most beautiful girl the world had ever seen,” he interjected a little dryly.

Hermione laughed. “Right on both counts. At any rate, the wicked stepmother used a spell to get rid of Eliza’s brothers and they turned into swans. The stepmother told lies about the brothers to the king who basically disowned his sons on hearing about it. Then the stepmother went after Eliza. She tried to use another spell but that didn’t work because Eliza was too good and pure so the stepmother instead had Eliza be smeared with something like mud to turn her hair and skin dark and make her look terrible. The king didn’t recognize Eliza on seeing her like that and so Eliza was essentially banished from the castle. She wandered alone until she came to a pond in a forest and took a bath and was restored to herself. By that time, it was night and just then, she heard a noise and hid.”

“Is this where Eliza gets rescued by a prince?”

“Not quite. Instead, eleven swans landed on the pond and then were immediately turned back into their original selves so Eliza was reunited with her brothers, who explained to her that their stepmother had cast a spell to turn them into swans during the day but at night they turned back into men so they always needed to make sure they were on land and not flying when sunset came. Eliza immediately wanted to know what she could do to break the spell and save her brothers.”

“She sounds rather more like your type of princess.”

“That’s what my grandfather thought too when he read it to me. Anyway, the brothers flew with Eliza to a distant land to escape their stepmother. And then Eliza prayed about how to break the spell on her brothers and finally, she was told by an old woman that the way to break the spell was to take a bunch of stinging nettles and weave them into coats for her brothers and if she threw the eleven coats of nettles over the swans, the spell would be broken and they would turn back into humans. But she wasn’t supposed to speak even one word while she made the eleven coats or her brothers would die. So Eliza set out to save her brothers and started making the nettle coats and stopped talking. And one day, the king of that land was out hunting and he saw Eliza and thought she was the most beautiful girl he’d ever seen so he lifted her up onto his horse and took her away to his castle.”

“Of course he did,” he commented wryly.

“Right. Anyway, the king dressed Eliza up in the finest clothes and gave her all sorts of luxuries and he also ordered his servants to take the pile of nettles she’d been found with and put them in her room as well since she seemed to care about them so much. The king married Eliza and afterwards, continued to treat her well while she stayed silent and worked on the coats. The king’s chief minister didn’t like Eliza and suspected she was some sort of witch who’d ensnared the king and set out to poison the king’s mind against Eliza.”

“Naturally, because otherwise it would all be too easy.”

“Right,” Hermione agreed and he heard the slight smile in her voice before she went on. “So the next night, the king and the chief minister followed Eliza as she went to the graveyard to get more nettles. The next day, Eliza was arrested and taken away from the palace on a cart for public trial and condemnation as a witch but all the while, Eliza never said a word and kept on sewing the nettles into coats. Suddenly, eleven swans appeared and surrounded Eliza while she was on the cart.”

“Nice of her brothers to finally show up.”

“She threw the nettle coats over her brothers and they all turned back into their normal selves, except for one, the youngest of the brothers, who still had one arm that was a swan’s wing because Eliza had run out of nettles and didn’t finish making the last sleeve for the coat. Having done this, Eliza finally spoke up to assert her innocence and then promptly fainted while her brothers explained what had happened to them and what Eliza had done for them.”

“And they all lived happily ever after?”

“Pretty much,” Hermione agreed, a smile in her voice. “Anyway, so my grandfather read me this story and when he was done, he asked me what I thought about it. And I wrinkled up my nose and announced that I didn’t like it at all. He asked me why and I answered, ‘the kings were dumb.’”

He laughed. “‘The kings were dumb,’” he repeated. “That’s what you said?”

“Yes, just that. My grandfather laughed so hard he almost fell over and when he got his breath back, he asked me to explain why I thought the kings were dumb. So I said that the first king, the father, was dumb because he shouldn’t have believed the bad queen and he was dumb for not recognizing Eliza just because she was dirty. As I put it, ‘I get dirty too and Mummy and Daddy still recognize me.’”

“You got dirty? Don’t tell me you were playing in the dirt!” he said with exaggerated shock. “I thought you always stayed inside and read.”

“Well, this was before I had really learned to read so I spent quite a bit of time outside playing. Poor Mum. I went through a brief phase of being fascinated at how dirt could turn into mud if you just added anything liquid to it so I got in trouble a few times because I went outside and poured my juice into the ground just to see if it would turn dirt into mud like water did. It wasn’t, as you might imagine, the cleanest scientific experiment.”

He burst out laughing, picturing a miniature Hermione pouring juice into the ground with the same familiar expression of concentration he already knew so well wrinkling her forehead.

She laughed as well. “At any rate, I went on to explain that I didn’t like the other king either.”

“You didn’t like that he believed Eliza was a witch just for going to the graveyard?” he guessed.

“Actually, no, I said he was dumb because he decided to marry her when he’d never even heard her talk and the only thing he knew about her was that she was pretty and being pretty is a silly reason to like someone.”

He laughed again, entirely able to picture a very small version of Hermione and the serious expression on her face as she criticized a fairy tale. “How old were you when this happened?”

“Around four.”

“So you’ve always been a precocious know-it-all,” he teased.

“I guess you could say that. But I never did like fairy tales involving beautiful princesses much. I guess some part of me always realized that I wasn’t very pretty myself so—”

“Yes you are,” he blurted out unthinkingly, interrupting her. “Why would you say that?”

“Oh, well, thanks, but you don’t need to say that just because we’re friends.”

“I’m not. Of course you’re pretty.” He said it almost automatically, as a simple statement of fact. Which it was, not that he bothered to think about it much. Hermione was simply Hermione and he never really thought about her appearance any more than he analyzed the brightness and location of the sun. It was just one of the simple underlying realities of life. But then he stopped and looked at her, at what he could see her in the dim gray light of encroaching dawn filtering in through the curtains. He knew her face, of course. He probably knew her face better than he knew his own—and yet, somehow, for some reason, looking at her at that moment, he suddenly forgot how to breathe.

Pretty? No… Hermione wasn’t pretty. “Pretty” was a simple thing, an uncomplicated thing, a conventional thing. “Pretty” was a word to describe Ginny or Cho or Parvati or Lavender. Hermione… well, Hermione wasn’t like that. Her face was… different… from simple prettiness. Her eyes were just slightly too large, her chin a shade too pointed, the curve of her jaw ever so slightly too defined. And yes, her hair was a little too untamable. With all that—no, Hermione wasn’t pretty. She was… something more than that, better than that.

She was… she was… He mentally floundered for a word to describe her before he gave up. He didn’t know what word to use but he found himself thinking that he just… liked the way she looked. He suddenly knew that there was no one whose face he would rather see—in good times and in bad times, at all times and every day.

He didn’t know what that meant—it meant something—and he was suddenly flustered, uncomfortable, as if all his thoughts were plainly written on his face.

“Anyway, it’s not just me who thinks you’re pretty,” he hastily added. “Viktor Krum did too, remember? He didn’t spend all that time in the Library watching you before asking you to the Yule Ball because he liked the way you talked.”

She laughed softly, reminiscently. “Oh, Viktor, yes, I suppose he did think I was pretty.”

Harry mentally frowned, promptly—and irrationally—regretting that he’d ever brought the subject of Krum up in the first place. He didn’t like the way Hermione’s expression had softened, the way she called him Viktor. And he really didn’t like the thought that Krum had apparently noticed that Hermione was pretty so quickly, not when it had taken himself years to realize the same thing.

Bloody hell, he was sounding just like Ron in that fight he’d had with Hermione after the Yule Ball. He was sounding—he was—jealous. Jealous! Ridiculous!

He squelched the thought immediately. He wasn’t jealous. He’d never been jealous. Not about Hermione. He refused to be jealous over Hermione.

“And I’m sure Ron thinks you’re pretty too,” he hastily added, wanting to bring the subject away from Krum.

Hermione made an exaggeratedly skeptical face. “I sometimes think that I might as well be a walking, talking book as far as Ron is concerned.”

“Well, maybe he thinks you’re a pretty walking, talking book,” Harry quipped.

She laughed and he grinned, ridiculously pleased with himself for having made her laugh. He liked to hear her laugh and see her smile—which was only natural after the last year when neither of them had had much reason to laugh or smile. Or so he told himself. He just couldn’t quite believe it, the otherwise reasonable explanation somehow sounding hollow.

And as he looked at Hermione’s laughing face, he was suddenly sure that not only must Ron think Hermione was pretty but that Ron must still fancy Hermione too. How could he not? A fellow would have to be blind, barking mad, and an idiot not to fancy Hermione. Hermione with her cleverness and her kindness and her loyalty, to say nothing of her smile.

Hermione had said that she didn’t fancy Ron like that but if Ron still did fancy Hermione… Harry suddenly, desperately, needed to know if Ron still fancied Hermione. Because… because he just wanted to know.

His eyes had drifted to the window and he noted idly that it was nearing 4 a.m. It was rather sad proof of just how little he’d been sleeping that he could estimate the time so exactly just based on the quality of the light filtering in through the curtains.

“You’re not sleepy?” he blurted out. “I’ve kept you up again for half the night.”

“It’s okay, Harry. I can stay if you want me to.”

“Stay,” he answered immediately and only realized after he’d said it that he really meant it. He didn’t know if he would manage to fall asleep again but the thought of being left alone, alone with the near-constant nightmares lurking, had something in him almost shuddering away. No, he didn’t want her to leave. It was selfish of him—he should, no doubt, let her return to her room to get some sleep—but he couldn’t seem to help it.

“Okay.”

A comfortable silence settled over them for a few minutes, a silence that he finally broke as another question occurred to him.

“Hermione, before, when I thought—when you came in, how did you know what to do? How did you know how to help me?” He had almost blurted out ‘when he had thought he was having a heart attack’ but he couldn’t say that. It sounded ridiculous. Crazy.

“When you were having a panic attack?” she finished gently. “I had researched it.”

“When I was having a panic attack,” he repeated. “How did—what made you research that?”

“Do you remember that day early this summer when I made Bill and Fleur take me to the local library by the Burrow?”

“Yeah,” he said a little uncertainly. He did vaguely remember a day when she had said she was bored and asked where the nearest library was. Ron had, he remembered now, given her a hard time for wanting to spend her free time in a library, of all places, when it was the summer. But Hermione had prevailed and Bill and Fleur had agreed to accompany her—Bill to show her the way and Fleur to keep Bill company.

“I went to the library that day to look up whatever information I could find about soldiers returning from war or other people dealing with traumatic experiences.”

He drew back to gape at her. “You—but how did you know?” That had been long before he had first run into Hermione at night, when he had been doing everything he could to act relaxed and unaffected. He had thought that he’d been rather good at it too.

She gave him a look. “I know you, Harry, and I know what you look like when you’re having trouble sleeping at night.”

Of course she knew. Silly of him to even ask.

She focused her gaze absently on the floor. “So I researched it. It was a Muggle library, naturally, but people are largely the same in the way they deal with traumatic experiences. The descriptions of the trouble soldiers have in returning after a war all sounded familiar.”

She didn’t say it but he knew it without her saying so, that she had spent those hours at the library researching for his sake—to help him in the aftermath of the war just as much as she had helped him during the war.

He felt a rush of warmth in his chest. It was so… like her… not only to notice that he was having trouble sleeping but then quietly, without even mentioning it, to try to help him.

“Hermione, I… you…” he began but then trailed off, not quite sure what he wanted to say or what he could say.

“It wasn’t just for you, Harry. I was having nightmares too,” she added matter-of-factly. And characteristically.

“Still. Thank you,” he said, “for wanting to help and for staying.” And then, on a surge of affection and gratitude, he did something he’d never done before and brushed his lips against her cheek.

She flushed and gave him a small smile. “Always.”

Always. He found himself thinking that the one word summarized their entire relationship. With all that had happened, with all they had been through—she was here beside him, his best friend.

Always. And for the moment, nothing more needed to be said.

~To be continued…~

Disclaimer: See Chapter 1.

Living Past The End

~Chapter 7~

The sound of the telephone made them all start, Ron nearly leaping out of his chair.

Harry met Hermione’s amused gaze as she laughed and stood up. “Relax, Ron. It’s just the phone. It must be my parents. They said they would ring.”

Hermione disappeared into the kitchen while Ron grimaced a little. “I don’t know how Muggles got used to talking to a piece of plastic in their hand.”

Harry grinned. “It’s not that much different from talking to someone’s disembodied head for a Floo call.”

“But for a Floo call, you can still see the person you’re talking to.”

Harry shrugged. “Anyway, it’s not like phones are a new thing; they’ve been around for ages now so people have gotten used to it.”

“I suppose.” Ron looked and sounded skeptical but said nothing more, only taking another gulp of Gini, the French lemonade-like soda Hermione had insisted they try.

Harry glanced toward the door to make sure Hermione wasn’t returning before blurting out, “Say, Ron, can I ask you something?”

“What’s up, mate?”

“D’you still fancy Hermione?”

Ron choked on his drink. “What?!” He gaped at Harry. “Why the blazes would you ask me that?”

“You fancied Hermione before… I just… I thought you and Hermione were only waiting for the War and all that to be over before…” he trailed off, making an awkward motion with his hand.

Ron had the nerve to chuckle in Harry’s face at his discomfiture. “Have I been acting like I fancied Hermione?”

Harry shrugged. “I don’t know. You and Hermione haven’t been fighting as much.”

“We’ve had less to fight about. Doesn’t mean I still fancy her and I know she doesn’t still fancy me, if she ever did.”

Harry stared at Ron. “She did. You know she did.”

Ron squirmed a little. “Yeah, I guess. But she doesn’t now and don’t look at me like that. Hermione’s my best friend too, y’know.”

“I know.” And then added, the words practically escaping of their own volition, “You really don’t still fancy her? Why not?”

Ron gave Harry an odd look. “She’s… a little scary, y’know, and she’s always… thinking…”

Harry abruptly laughed. “That’s a bad thing?”

Ron chuckled too. “No, I just meant…” he paused and sobered, “I always felt like she was thinking about a million things other than me, even when it was just the two of us. And half the time, I never really understood what she meant or knew what she was thinking and that got… annoying.” He shrugged. “I dunno how to explain it but me and Hermione… just never worked… And now… it’s like you said, Hermione’s practically like a sister—she’s annoying, we fight, and she’s always there.”

“Hermione’s not my sister,” Harry blurted out unthinkingly, with a vehemence that shocked him. And shocked Ron even more, from the looks of it. Harry felt himself coloring and looked away, taking a drink more because he needed to do something than because he was thirsty. Bloody stupid… why had he said that?

“Bloody hell, Harry, you—do you fancy Hermione?”

“No!” he blurted out too quickly—and then, “I don’t know.”

Ron frowned. “But what about Ginny then?”

“We broke up after 6^th year and then… I don’t know. We didn’t see her much at all during the War and… that’s all,” he ended lamely. “I don’t know. It’s… different now. I’m different now.”

“Okay…” Ron didn’t look like he understood but he didn’t look angry either. Which was something, Harry supposed.

Hell, he was confused about all this too so it was no wonder that Ron found it confusing.

“Y’know, you could tell me if you fancy Hermione,” Ron said carefully after a moment. “I wouldn’t—I don’t care—you could tell me,” he finished awkwardly.

“I don’t… me and Hermione, there’s nothing to tell.” And there wasn’t, really. He and Hermione were only best friends. Still. That was all.

Besides, Harry suddenly thought with a pang of… of something, whatever it was he felt or might feel for Hermione, there was no reason to think that she felt anything other than simple friendship for him. She had helped him and comforted him and—and saved him… somehow… but that was just what Hermione did. It was just the sort of person Hermione was. It was, as she’d said, what friends did… Friends. His chest suddenly—irrationally—felt a little hollow at the thought.

Ron slanted a glance at Harry. “Do you want there to be something to tell between you and Hermione?”

“I don’t know.”

“Why’d you ask if I fancied Hermione if you don’t fancy her?”

“I just wanted to know!” he burst out, exasperated now. “I just… Hermione’s been really… great with… with everything and I just… I want her to be happy,” he finished, not very fluently.

“So do I,” Ron agreed equably, “but in case you hadn’t noticed, I’m not very good at making Hermione happy. Irritating Hermione is more what I do.”

“Not always. You make her laugh too.”

“Hermione’s my friend,” Ron shrugged flippantly. “Anyways, making her laugh isn’t that important. Hermione’s never been the most fun person in the world.”

Harry bit back the automatic defense of Hermione that rose to his lips, sternly quashing his spurt of temper at Ron’s careless dismissal of Hermione. He knew Ron wasn’t insulting Hermione. “Well, I’m hardly the most fun person in the world either,” he said instead, trying to sound humorous.

Ron gave an exaggerated sigh. “I know. I don’t know how I’ve put up with you over the past few years.”

Harry balled up his napkin and tossed it at Ron, pretending offense, relieved as he was that Ron had been distracted from the topic of Hermione. “Hey, I’ll have you know that I’m famous for my wit and charm!”

Ron snickered. “I can honestly say that I’ve never found you to be charming in the entire time I’ve known you.”

“Prat.”

“It’s not my fault that you’re boring! You shouldn’t call people names just for telling the truth,” Ron managed to say, sounding amazingly prim, a moment before he dissolved into guffaws.

Harry laughed too, forgetting his earlier irritation with Ron. Ron was daft when it came to Hermione, that was all. Besides, it wasn’t as if he wanted Ron to fancy Hermione.

“What’s so funny?” Hermione asked as she returned to the room.

“Ron was imitating Percy.”

“Harry was acting like Lockhart,” Ron answered at the exact same time.

Hermione laughed. “Okay.”

Harry studied her, wondering. Had her laugh sounded a little forced?

“How are your parents?” Ron asked.

“Oh, they’re fine. They say hello and that they hope we’re having a good time.”

Harry inwardly frowned. There had been a flicker of—of something—that crossed her face before she answered and her tone had been a shade too casual.

As if she’d sensed his gaze, she glanced at him and gave him a small smile.

A smile which, for once, he didn’t return and her smile faded as she shook her head almost imperceptibly.

Everything’s fine, Harry.

Part of his mind wondered when this sort of almost-telepathy had started, when he’d developed this ability to read her thoughts in her face as if she’d spoken aloud. The rest of his mind was preoccupied with the thought that something was wrong. Something was wrong—and Hermione didn’t want to talk about it.

With Ron there, Harry wasn’t going to bring it up—he knew better than that. He would ask her later, he mentally resolved.

“I hope you told them that I’ve been deliberately and cruelly prevented from spending my days at the beach and instead been dragged against my will to all sorts of historical places,” Ron interjected, his tone implying that ‘historical places’ were the equivalent of torture.

“How’d you guess?” Hermione deadpanned. “That’s exactly what I told them.”

Her lips weren’t smiling but Harry could see the spark of humor in her eyes and the way the corners of her lips were tipped up ever so slightly and… And he couldn’t look away from her, from the subtle indications of her amusement to the familiar tilt of her head as she looked at Ron. He didn’t know what was wrong with Ron; Hermione wasn’t loud or rowdy in her humor but she was funny and… fun. How was it even possible that Ron didn’t see this? For that matter, how had he not noticed it until now? How had he not realized that Hermione was… mesmerizing… somehow?

“Good. I would hate to think that you’re minimizing my suffering,” Ron said in an exaggeratedly languishing tone.

Now Hermione laughed. “I wouldn’t dream of it, Ron. You’re quite a martyr.”

“And since I’ve suffered in silence for so long, can we please spend the day at the beach tomorrow?” Ron pleaded, adopting the look of a pitiful puppy.

Hermione glanced at Harry. “What do you think, Harry? Should we have mercy on poor, suffering Ron?” She was smiling but he could see concern in her eyes.

The beach—an open space where they’d be surrounded by strangers with nowhere to hide. And where it would be hard to keep his wand with him. They’d make a perfect target. He wasn’t ready. He wasn’t…

He glanced at Ron, who was looking hopeful, to Hermione, who had such sympathy in her eyes—and he felt a sudden flash of annoyance. At himself, at his own fragility.

“Yes, let’s,” he agreed recklessly.

He caught Hermione’s questioning glance. Are you sure?

He managed a reassuring grin. “Well, we could make Ron beg some more but I decided to be nice.”

Ron snorted. “That would make a nice change.”

Harry slanted a mock threatening look at Ron. “I could still change my mind. I hear there are some old castles nearby that we haven’t seen yet.”

“Oh no, not more old castles!” Ron pretended to cower in fear. “Haven’t I been bored enough?”

“They’re not boring, they’re fascinating,” Hermione corrected, a grin tugging at her lips.

Ron shot her a supremely skeptical look. “If you say so.”

Harry snickered and then laughed and felt himself relax further. They could go to the beach and they would be fine. The War was over, he told himself for what must have been the billionth time. There was no real danger anymore…

The rest of the evening passed quickly, companionably, with the three of them idly talking. It felt like old times, could have been any of the times when the three of them had been hanging out in the Gryffindor Common Room before the War had really started. This—the Trio—had not changed. They had all grown closer and had grown up, changed as they had been by the War, but at least, Harry thought, they were all still here, still best friends. And after all, that friendship was still the same.

Or not.

Hermione laughed at some quip of Ron’s and he glanced at her, his gaze inexorably drawn to her at the sound of her laugh. She had just taken a drink and something about the light made her lips seem to glisten, caught at glints of gold and mahogany in her hair. His mind barely registered her laughing rejoinder to Ron, preoccupied as he was with the spark of amusement dancing in her eyes, the curve of her lips. She was so… lovely… yes, that was the right word. More than simple prettiness, less intimidating than outright beauty. She was lovely—and he had the sudden thought that he could happily spend the rest of his life looking at her, watching the play of expression across her face…

The rest of his life! He abruptly realized what he’d been thinking—and who he’d been thinking it about—and mentally pulled himself up short. Oh no. No no no. He wasn’t going there. He was over-reacting to the relief of the War being over and Hermione being safe. That was all. He wasn’t going to—he didn’t need to—shouldn’t be—thinking in those terms. For that matter, he didn’t know what he really felt for Hermione anyway, whether this was just the friendship and gratitude from the last seven years or if it was something more, if something else had changed.

Maybe, after all, he had been too preoccupied, too busy, too worried with the War and everything else, to really see or notice Hermione until now. And now that the War was over, now that he could relax a little more, he was just noticing. It didn’t have to mean anything more than that.

She was, as she’d always been, his best friend. And she was lovely. That could be all it was.

“Well, I’m going to shower and then sleep,” Ron announced. “G’night, you two.”

“Good night, Ron.”

Harry blinked out of his reverie. “Oh. G’night, Ron.”

Hermione glanced at him after they heard the sound of a door closing upstairs. “Are you sure about going to the beach tomorrow? If you’re not ready, we don’t have to. I can think of an excuse or something.”

“Ron might hex you if you tried to keep him from the beach.”

“I’m better at dueling than he is so I think I’ll take my chances.” She sobered. “Seriously, Harry, are you sure you’re ready?”

He met her eyes. “Yes.” And realized at that moment that he meant it. Oddly, as until then, he would have sworn that no, he really wasn’t ready to spend the day in an open space surrounded by strangers, but somehow, looking at her, he thought he really was ready. Or he could be ready. “I can’t keep hiding and avoiding things that make me nervous or I’d never go anywhere. I don’t… I don’t want that. I want to move on. And I can’t keep being afraid.”

“It doesn’t mean you have to force yourself when you’re not ready.”

“I think… I think I am ready. I will be ready.” He shrugged and made an aimless gesture with one hand, not quite sure how to explain himself. “I just… it’s like you said, we get better. And you’ll be there. You’ll help.” And after all, maybe that was really it. He would be ready because he knew Hermione would be there too and she would help keep his waking nightmares away. He didn’t expect it would be easy but he thought—he hoped—he just might manage to relax enough to enjoy himself. Another tentative step towards reclaiming—or just creating—the normal life he’d never really been able to enjoy.

She gave him a soft smile, her eyes warm and alight with approval—and seeing it made his entire chest feel oddly lighter, buoyant even. “Trying to live up to being a Gryffindor?” was all she said, lightly enough.

He shrugged one shoulder. “Maybe I am being reckless but I hate being afraid.” He paused and added somewhat more seriously, “Besides, it’s what Ron wants to do and after… everything, it’s the least I can do.”

Hermione’s face changed. “Damon and Pythias,” was all she said mildly, before adding more forcefully, “I hope you don’t think you owe us anything!”

“Only my life,” he said with an attempt at lightness.

“You don’t owe us anything, let alone your life! If anything, we all owe you. You saved us. You’re the—”

“Don’t!” he interrupted her sharply. “Don’t call me The Hero or the Boy Who Lived or—or any of that rot. Don’t you ever—” he broke off and then added with forced calm, “I don’t want to hear that from you.”

She had paled slightly but she met his gaze steadily. “I wasn’t going to call you that. I was only going to say that you’re the one who ensured we’d win the War.”

He sighed a little, his anger leaving him as quickly as it had flared up. “I couldn’t have done it without you, you know. You and Ron,” he added with a mental wince at how much of an afterthought Ron had been—and yet, in spite of his obscure guilt at the thought, it was true. “And I’m not talking about your research or—or your spell-work. I just mean… I would have given up or—or just gone barking mad or something if it hadn’t been for you.”

He managed a faint smile. “People say I defeated Voldemort and won the War. I say that you won the War and I was just the fellow who did the recklessly stupid stuff that somehow allowed us to win.”

“Oh, Harry…” She looked rather as if she wanted to cry—alarmingly so—but then she blinked and her lips trembled into the semblance of a smile. “Does that make me the Heroine then?”

She said it lightly, even jokingly—as of course she would. But he didn’t smile. “Yes,” he said simply and entirely seriously. “You are the Heroine.”

Oh bloody… He hadn’t thought but now she really looked as if she were going to cry and he was suddenly terrified, to say nothing of dismayed. He hated seeing Hermione cry. In sudden panic, he tried frantically to think of something to say to make her laugh. “If I have to be saddled with a bunch of annoying titles, I’m thinking of sending a petition to the Daily Prophet and all the other wizarding newspapers that you should also get a title of your own. Something like The Girl Who Saved The Boy Who Lived or The Girl Whose Brain Defeated The Dark Lord or to be really brief, The Great Brain.”

He was rewarded for this piece of nonsense as she burst out laughing. “The Great Brain?” she almost spluttered.

He grinned and shrugged. “Hey, it works. You do have a great brain.”

“The Great Brain sounds like the name of some sort of vaunted cartoon villain so I think I’ll pass.”

“How about She Who Is Always Right, then?”

She assumed an expression of mock hauteur. “I like the sound of that. Yes, that can be my new title.”

“I’ll write to the Daily Prophet tomorrow, informing them.”

She laughed. “They might actually listen, knowing how everyone’s been falling over themselves to anoint you the greatest thing since sliced bread.”

“Are you saying I’m not the greatest thing since sliced bread? I think I’m hurt,” he said, adopting an injured expression.

She grinned at him, leaning over to pat his hand. “Poor Harry. Did your ego just suffer a blow?”

“My ego is very sensitive.” He couldn’t keep a straight face after that and gave in to his laughter, laughter that eventually faded as they just grinned at each other.

A comfortable silence settled in the room, a silence that was, as always, perfectly companionable. And he found himself thinking that it was amazing how… nice… it was—for lack of a better word—to just sit here with Hermione, not talking or doing anything in particular but just sitting in quiet friendship. It was the sort of moment that the War, with all its attendant dangers and stresses, had made impossible and he hadn’t stopped to realize until now just how much he’d missed the quieter moments. He had thought about how he missed having fun, missed being able to play Quidditch, missed being able to sleep in—hell, at times, he’d even missed the routine of having classes to go to, missed a time when the next homework assignment was his biggest worry. But it had never occurred to him to miss the quiet times.

He glanced at Hermione to see the rather pensive expression on her face as she traced idle patterns on the table with her finger.

“Hermione.”

She looked up at him with a quick smile. “Hmm?”

“Are your parents really all right? There’s nothing wrong?”

“They’re fine, Harry. Why do you ask?”

“Before, when you came back from talking to them, you looked… upset. There’s really nothing wrong?”

“It’s nothing, Harry. Really.”

He inwardly frowned as he studied her, not quite sure why he didn’t believe her reassurance. He just knew he didn’t. There was something bothering her, he was even more sure of that now than he had been before he’d asked.

“I thought I was supposed to be the one who always insists that nothing’s wrong,” he finally said.

He said it—and meant it—lightly enough but it suddenly occurred to him just how true the words were. He knew that he didn’t confide in people easily; the enforced habits of a lifetime when there had never been anyone to confide in weren’t so easily overcome. Talking about the things which bothered him came somewhat easier now but only to Hermione and Ron, to a somewhat lesser extent. For the first time, it occurred to him that after all, he and Hermione were alike in their reticence—in stark contrast to Ron, who was the proverbial open book. Hermione didn’t really talk about things that bothered her either, whether it was due to her independent streak or reluctance to show vulnerability, he wasn’t sure.

Or maybe, he thought with a sudden chill, it wasn’t that Hermione was reticent but that she was reticent with him. Maybe she didn’t trust him enough or thought he wouldn’t care… “Hermione… you know you can tell me anything, right?”

She gave him a flash of a smile. “I know.”

“If there’s something bothering you, I’d want to know, you know,” he said rather awkwardly. “I’d want to help, the way you always help me.”

Her lips trembled into a pale smile. “Thanks, Harry, but it’s not something you can really help with.”

“I could try. I’d—I’d do a lot to try to help you.” He would do anything for her. He supposed it had been true for a while now and after all they’d been through together, it shouldn’t have felt like a revelation at all—but somehow, it did. They had all risked their lives for each other more times than he cared to count so it really shouldn’t seem new—it wasn’t new. And yet… something about knowing it, thinking it so explicitly, felt… significant…

“It’s just… My parents want me to come home,” she admitted in something of a rush.

Oh. Her parents. He felt that little pang of… something… that he occasionally felt when people spoke about their parents, about a relationship with their parents. It wasn’t anything quite as ignoble as envy, more just an odd niggling sense of being… left out…

Hermione had spent a couple days with her parents just after everything had ended, after she had brought them home again. It had never occurred to him until now—in his own self-centeredness—to wonder at the fact that even then, to say nothing of afterwards, she’d spent most nights at the Burrow. Now, belatedly, he realized—and wondered. He had never questioned it; having Hermione around was so normal and he’d been so thankful that she was there and—to be honest—had been too wrapped up in his own difficulties to spare much of a thought for anyone else.

“They… miss you?” he ventured a little tentatively. It was the easiest thing he could think of. “Yes. No. I mean, yes, they do, but that’s not exactly why they want me at home. It’s just… I’ve spent so little time with them these past few years and that… bothers them. More than ever after this last year.”

“They weren’t… angry with you?” He’d never asked how her parents had reacted when she had brought them back home. Not really. He had asked, rather perfunctorily, if her parents were all right but he had never really asked how they felt about… all of it. He realized that now with a growing sense of dismay and self-loathing. He was a git. A completely self-centered arse.

She sighed and grimaced a little. “No, they weren’t angry, just… sad and disappointed.”

“Which is worse,” he inserted with a sudden flash of insight and empathy.

She glanced at him. “Yes,” she agreed. “You’re right.”

“Try not to sound so surprised.”

The corners of her lips curved in a ghost of a smile. “Sorry.”

“No, it’s okay. I haven’t given you much reason to think I would understand.” He paused and then added, quietly, “When Remus caught me sneaking into Hogsmeade in Third Year, he—he wasn’t angry but he was disappointed… that I had risked my life so carelessly. And that… was worse. I’d rather have gotten a detention with Snape.” He looked away, swallowing the lump of emotion at the mention of Remus and the memories… Memories of Third Year had gotten so painful now, after what had happened to Sirius and now Remus too.

She reached over and squeezed his hand briefly.

“You should go,” he blurted out. “Stay with your parents.” He went on, not quite looking at her and speaking quickly. “I’ll be okay. We’ve had a week of holiday and Ron and I can just go back and stay at the Burrow. Don’t worry about me. You should be with your parents.”

“I’m not going anywhere.”

“But they’re your parents. They’re your family. It’s not like you’d be leaving me alone. Ron will be there and the rest of the Weasleys. I’ll be fine,” he reiterated, infusing his voice with more certainty than he felt. Never mind that Ron and the Weasleys had never really been able to comfort him before, nor had he really even wanted them to know how haunted he still was by the War. But that didn’t matter. What mattered was Hermione.

“Harry…”

“Your parents are… your family. They—you should spend more time with them. I don’t—I don’t want you to have to fight with your parents because of me.” And that was really it. He didn’t want Hermione to be at odds with her parents, not because of him.

“Oh Harry, you don’t understand…” she sighed.

“What don’t I understand? Your parents want you to go home, spend some time with them. But you’re staying here instead.”

“I’m not staying because of you. I’m staying because of me.”

He frowned. “What…”

“I’m staying because I can’t leave!”

“Why can’t—”

“Because I’m still too afraid!” she burst out. “Because even during the day, I need to be able to see you so I know you’re safe! Even though I know the War is over and there’s nothing to worry about, I can’t believe it unless I’m with you and can see you! I can’t!” Her voice cracked alarmingly on the last word and she abruptly ran out of the room.

He felt as if he’d been Petrified in his chair but her leaving galvanized him into action and he leaped up out of his chair so fast his chair almost fell over as he ran after her. “Hermione!”

He caught up with her steps into the front room and grabbed her arm. “Hermione!”

She stopped, not fighting his grip, but kept her face steadfastly turned away and he lifted his hand to touch her chin gently. Her eyes flashed up to his and he realized, with a sick twist of his heart, that there were tears in her eyes. Tears because of him.

He abruptly wrapped his arms around her, hugging her. “God, Hermione, I’m sorry.”

She gave a muffled sniff before she hugged him back, burying her face in his shoulder for a moment.

“I’m a git. I’m sorry,” he said again as he drew back after a moment to look at her. “I didn’t mean to pressure you like that. I didn’t know.” He hadn’t known—but he should have.

“You are a git—but I knew that already.”

And just like that, he knew she’d forgiven him. More, that she wasn’t upset with him. He relaxed, the knot in his chest loosening a little.

He kept his arm around her shoulder as they walked over to the couch to sit down and after a moment, she settled her head against his shoulder. He tightened his arm around her almost instinctively.

“I’m sorry,” he reiterated. “I didn’t mean to…”

“You can stop apologizing, Harry,” she sighed. “I know you didn’t mean to make it harder. It’s okay.”

“No, it’s not okay. It’s not okay that I made it harder for you. It’s not okay to make you feel guilty about staying. I—I should have realized…”

“How could you have known? I haven’t said anything and I’ve been trying to hide it. I hate how afraid I still am, how stupid it is to still be afraid.”

“I should have known because—because I feel that way too. Whenever I’ve lost sight of you—or Ron—during these past few days, I’ve panicked until I saw you again.” He paused. “And it’s not stupid. You’re never stupid. Didn’t we agree that we weren’t going to blame ourselves for still feeling afraid?”

She managed a wan smile. “Yeah, we did.”

“But it is hard.”

She nodded against his shoulder but didn’t say anything else.

He let his cheek rest against her hair, keeping his arm around her shoulder. The way he felt now, he might never let her go again. He was so used to thinking of Hermione as being stronger than he was, braver than he was. And she was strong and she was brave. But he needed to remember that she was afraid too.

“Your parents aren’t upset with you for not staying with them?” he asked quietly.

“No,” she said slowly. “I almost wish they were. I just feel guilty about it all. I should spend time with my parents but I can’t leave. And I don’t want them to worry about me either so I haven’t really known how to explain to them why I can’t stay with them.” She sighed. “I just… don’t know what to do, Harry.”

At any other time, he might have made a teasing remark about how he’d never heard her say that before but now, laughter was the furthest thing from his mind. It was almost physically painful to hear the uncertainty, the vulnerability, in her voice, so far removed from her usual decisiveness. And he needed to help her. How, he didn’t know. Hermione had been right when she said it wasn’t really something he could help with. But he needed to do something.

“What if I went with you?” he suggested impulsively. He hadn’t stopped to think but the moment he said it, the vague beginnings of an idea began to form in his mind.

She lifted her head to stare at him but he went on, cutting off the objection he could see forming on her lips. “If your parents wouldn’t mind. We could Apparate back to London and then go to your home and spend a day with your parents before coming back here. That way, you would still get to spend some time with your parents.”

“But Harry, this is supposed to be a holiday for you. I can’t ask you to—”

“You’re not asking,” he interrupted her. “I’m offering. It’ll allow you to spend some time with your parents, even if it’s just a day.”

“What about Ron?”

“As long as your parents don’t mind, I’m sure he’d come too if we asked him. If not, he can spend the day at the beach ogling the girls in bikinis.”

“You wouldn’t rather spend the day at the beach ogling the girls in bikinis too?” she asked teasingly.

He shrugged one shoulder. “Nah. You’re more important. The girls in bikinis will still be there another day.”

She smiled. “I’ll talk to my parents tomorrow and see what they say. Thanks, Harry. I have felt bad about spending so little time with my parents.”

“It’s nothing. I want you to be able to spend more time with your parents. I—” He stopped, hesitated, and then added, his voice suddenly a little rough, “I’d give almost anything to be able to have just a little more time with my parents.”

She sucked in her breath and gave him a stricken look. “Oh, Harry, I—”

“I know,” he interrupted the apology he knew she was about to make. “It’s okay. I didn’t mean—it’s important to spend time with your parents. That’s all I meant,” he finished quietly.

She reached over and squeezed his hand, still looking rather distressed.

And because he wanted to make her smile again, he quickly added, “Besides, I’m sure your parents have lots of stories of when you were little and I want to hear more about little ‘Mione.”

She did more than smile, she laughed, flushing a little. “Now you’re making me regret agreeing to this.”

“Too late now.”

“Even if I tell you that my parents only keep sugar-free snacks in the house and never serve dessert?”

“I once had cake for breakfast every day for a week so I think I can afford to miss a few desserts.”

“Why on earth did you do that?”

He abruptly sobered. “Dudley went through a phase where he insisted on having cake for breakfast for more than a month,” he explained briefly.

“You said you had cake for breakfast for a week, not a month.”

“I did,” he affirmed flatly before he stopped and then went on, trying to sound nonchalant, “By the last week, even Dudley was tired of cake so he stopped throwing tantrums at the very idea of my getting some and Uncle Vernon was away on a business trip so Aunt Petunia let me have a small slice of cake for my breakfast.”

“I hate your relatives, Harry,” she said with a level of vindictiveness that startled him—and somehow comforted him too.

“I don’t like them much either,” he admitted with amazing ease. He didn’t understand it but something about her anger—anger on his behalf—allowed him to think of the Dursleys without the usual morass of emotion. He could think about the Dursleys with something approaching calm, almost indifference.

Because he really wasn’t alone anymore. He found himself suddenly remembering that one of the ways in which he’d comforted himself in those times when he’d been shoved into the hall closet or after Uncle Vernon had been particularly harsh had been to imagine having someone who could—who would—defend him. Usually he had imagined his parents somehow coming back, imagined the way his dad—built up in his mind to be a near-mythical hero, of course—would make Uncle Vernon cower. All those times when all he’d wanted had been a friend, someone to take his side. And now he did have someone to take his side, friends who would—who already had—stayed with him through everything. And it made all the difference.

“Do you have any good memories from when you were little?” Hermione’s quiet question interrupted his thoughts.

He turned to look at her, the word ‘no’ automatically rising to his lips, before he stopped, stayed by a reluctance to sadden her, as he knew the answer would. He didn’t think anyone had ever asked him that before and he needed to really think about it. “A few,” he finally answered, almost as if he could hardly believe it. “When I was really little, Aunt Petunia ruffled my hair a couple times.” He stopped, suddenly remembering with a tightness in his throat how much those few, fleeting gestures had meant to him then. How he had savored them in memory, over and over again, those pitifully few gestures that had made him feel… cared for…

“She wasn’t always mean before… before the weird stuff started happening, when my magic started to show itself. She was… better… when Uncle Vernon wasn’t around. She mostly just ignored me. And I didn’t mind that so much.” He paused again and then went on, with a little more animation, “There were days when I was left alone at the house all day because Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon took Dudley somewhere. I liked that. I could watch the telly or play with some of Dudley’s toys and just do what I wanted.”

“I’m glad. Everyone should have some good memories from childhood.”

“It’s all right, you know,” he said, responding more to her still rather subdued tone than to her words. “It was a long time ago.”

And of course, it was true. He had not lived with the Dursleys for years; he hardly ever thought about them anymore. He certainly had no plans ever to see them again. Those years were done. Over. And that was all.

Hermione shifted, settling more comfortably against him, and he readjusted his arm around her shoulders. And the moment seemed to punctuate his idle thoughts about how far removed he was from those years with the Dursleys.

Oddly, it wasn’t even because of the reminder that he wasn’t alone, the solid warmth of Hermione against him. Of course that was different too—back then, he’d had no friends and no one who cared about him—but he suddenly found himself thinking that maybe the biggest difference was that back then, he hadn’t cared about anyone else either. It had been lonely, isolating, not to have anyone care about him—it suddenly occurred to him that it had been even more isolating not to care about anyone else either. He hadn’t liked the Dursleys—he’d actively hated Dudley and his uncle—and while he’d felt the occasional qualms of guilt over his inability to like them—they were, after all, the only family he had and his aunt and uncle had taken him in—those had always been easily and quickly banished by some fresh example of the fact that the Dursleys didn’t like him either.

All of which had made it easy for him to focus solely on himself. At primary school, before Hogwarts had changed everything, he’d been solitary, mostly as a result of Dudley’s bullying but also because he simply didn’t pay much attention to anyone else. Being left alone by the Dursleys had been the closest he’d come to happiness so he’d done what he could to be left alone at school too. He hadn’t been actively mean—he’d seen enough of Dudley’s example to recoil from that—but neither had he done anything to help anyone else. He hadn’t been the only target of bullying by Dudley and his little gang of thugs and at those times, he’d never done anything, only been thankful that Dudley was ignoring him in favor of tormenting someone else.

Hermione was different. He remembered how she’d admitted that she hadn’t really had friends before Hogwarts either—but when Neville had lost his frog on that first trip on the Hogwarts Express, it had been Hermione who had actively stepped in to help Neville by looking for it. That mental image of Hermione when he’d first met her—her matter-of-fact question of whether anyone had seen a frog—rose up in his mind and he had to smile. Funny—how a question over a lost frog had marked the beginning of the most important friendship he’d ever had.

Hermione said he had a “saving people thing”—and it was as true as just about everything else she said—but he found himself thinking that his “saving people thing” was generally limited to things that involved physical danger. Helping people in a way that didn’t involve doing something reckless—that rarely occurred to him.

He should do better about that, think more about other people, think more about Hermione. He should be there for her, help her, as she had always, always, helped him. He should try to be as good a friend to her as she had been to him.

He turned to glance down at her and then abruptly stilled as he realized she’d fallen asleep. Her eyes were closed, her breathing slow and even. And he was suddenly afraid to breathe or move so much as a muscle in case it would wake her.

He stared down at what he could see of her face. Some strands of hair had fallen over her face and he could see them fluttering with her every breath but he didn’t dare move to brush them aside. She looked… so young, he suddenly thought. Young and vulnerable—two adjectives he hardly ever associated with her—as she was nestled against him. His chest filled with… with something… some emotion he couldn’t identify, didn’t really care to try to identify at that moment except to be amazed that she trusted him so much—felt safe enough with him, beside him, to sleep while leaning against him like this.

He didn’t know how long he sat like that, hardly daring to breathe, as she slept. But after a while, it occurred to him that she would probably wake up with a crick in her neck if she stayed in her current position. She would be more comfortable in her own bed.

He hesitated, torn between wanting her to be comfortable and hating to wake her up. He knew better than anyone how tired she must be, how little sleep she’d gotten in the past few nights, having stayed up with him. And she was sleeping so peacefully now, he hated to wake her up in case she wasn’t able to fall back into a dreamless sleep. Goodness knew, it happened often enough to him.

He frowned as he watched her, debating a little longer. He knew she was normally a light sleeper but she was sleeping so soundly now and was tired enough… Maybe… Moving very slowly, with as much care as if he were about to touch something so delicate it would shatter if he so much as breathed on it wrong, he shifted, sliding his free arm beneath Hermione’s legs so he was carrying her as he stood up.

And then froze as she stirred against him. “Mm, what—Harry?” she mumbled, still mostly asleep.

The sound of his name in her fuzzy, sleep-fogged voice did funny things to his insides for some reason but he ignored it as he only whispered, his voice as soft as he could make it, “Ssh, go back to sleep, Hermione.”

“Mm-kay,” she mumbled vaguely into his shoulder.

She seemed to be drifting asleep again so after a moment, he began to move, his steps slow and careful, his every sense attuned to her every breath and the weight of her in his arms. He paused, allowing himself a brief moment of triumph as he made it to the top of the stairs without waking her up or otherwise disturbing her, and then made his way with marginally more ease down the hall to her room. He held his breath as he lay her down in her bed with excruciating care and then straightened up, watching as she shifted, curling up onto her side.

She was lying on top of the blanket but he didn’t dare move her again so he could pull the blanket out from beneath her and after a moment, he went quickly to his own room and grabbed the quilt from his own bed and returned, covering her with the quilt carefully.

Only to freeze with the quilt still in his grasp when she stirred, making a small restless movement. “Harry?”

“Yes,” he breathed, the word barely more than a breath of sound, as he finished covering her with the quilt. He waited, frozen in place, bent over her, for a few long minutes, but then slowly straightened up as her breathing evened out.

“Stay.” He froze again at the murmur, indistinct enough that he couldn’t be quite sure he’d heard it.

She was still sleeping but then the faintest shadow of a frown creased her brow. He suddenly remembered how she’d admitted that she needed to see him so as not to be afraid, how she’d told him that he kept her nightmares away, as she did for him. He kept her nightmares away…

He couldn’t speak, his throat suddenly tight, and anyway, he didn’t want to speak, afraid that any sound would disturb her. But he bent over her and ever so carefully, brushed some hair away from her face, the tips of his fingers skimming over her temple with a feather-light touch. And amazingly, her expression cleared, smoothed out, as if even in sleep, she could feel the warmth of the rush of emotion clogging his throat.

He glanced around her room, his gaze falling on the chair tucked into the far corner of the room. Quickly, he used his wand to make the chair float up across the room and then had it set down carefully in the nearest corner where it would afford him a view of Hermione’s face.

And then—just as she’d asked—he stayed.

~To be continued…~

Disclaimer: See Chapter 1.

Living Past The End

~Chapter 8~

Hermione awoke as a shaft of sunlight fell across her face. She felt a little disoriented, conscious of feeling that something was… not wrong, just… off, different… And realized as she returned to full consciousness that it was because she felt… rested.

She didn’t know the last time she’d felt so rested in the morning. It had been months—a year, maybe? She didn’t remember.

She scrunched her eyes against the sun, turning her face into the pillow in a sudden, childish impulse to delay opening her eyes—and then stopped.

Her pillow.

She opened her eyes. She was in her room, in her bed. How had—the last thing she remembered was sitting on the couch in the front room with Harry. They’d been talking. She remembered the rush of mingled sympathy and protective anger she’d felt as she thought about the way Harry’s relatives had treated him. Her heart had squeezed a little at how lonely he must have been all those years. Even though he’d been telling of the “good” things, of being happier when he was left alone, she’d thought of how lonely that must have been. It wasn’t that she didn’t know and understand that it was possible to be happy while completely alone. She had some fond memories from her own childhood when she’d been alone with her books and her toys—but for Harry, all his positive memories involved being alone because he’d been miserable when his relatives were around. She’d suddenly remembered Harry as she’d first seen him, remembered how young and small he’d looked in his cousin’s oversized clothing—remembered the look of surprise in his eyes sometimes at an occasional friendly word or gesture. She’d known before that Harry had been treated badly by his relatives but last night had been the first time she’d really felt as if she understood the scope and depth of his relatives’ mistreatment of him and just how bleak and lonely Harry’s childhood must have been. It had hurt her with an almost physical pain to think of it and all she could do was silently promise herself that Harry would never be left that alone and friendless again.

And then… She must have fallen asleep. She was, she realized, lying on top of the blanket on her bed, being covered instead by the quilt she recognized as being from Harry’s room.

Harry.

She moved her head and saw him. He was sitting in a chair, sleeping, his head resting against the wall, his lips slightly parted.

Had he—he must have carried her up to her room, she realized. She had a vague, rather dream-like memory of being lifted—it must not have been a dream after all. She felt herself flush with a mixture of embarrassment and surprise and confusion. He could have woken her up but instead he had carried her. And covered her with the blanket from his own room. And then stayed, as if to guard her from nightmares. She felt another rush of warmth, from affection this time. He really could be so… sweet.

She studied him as he slept, noticing that his glasses had slipped to be slightly crooked. His hair was its usual mess, making her want to comb her fingers through it. She studied him and for once, maybe because the knowledge that he’d carried her up to her room was still warming her heart or maybe simply because he was safely asleep and she didn’t need to fear that her expression would reveal her thoughts, she didn’t even try to deny her own reaction to looking at him. Didn’t try not to acknowledge the way her heart fluttered, her breath became a little shallow, her skin heated. She didn’t even try to deny that she wanted to kiss him, that she just wanted him…

He stirred and then blinked his eyes a few times before his gaze focused and met hers.

For just a moment, neither of them spoke, just looked at each other as she suddenly forgot to breathe.

“G’morning,” he finally said.

And she felt a swift curl of heat in her body at the husky, sleep-roughened sound of his voice. God, he sounded… sexy… like that and then blushed at the thought.

“Good morning,” she managed to say and then found herself blurting out, “You carried me up to my room.” If she’d thought about it, she would have phrased it as a question but the words slipped out before she’d thought.

An expression that was something like a shoulder-less shrug crossed his face. “You were tired. I thought you’d sleep better in your bed.”

“You could have woken me up.”

His gaze dropped, one hand rather restlessly pleating a fold in his trousers. “You were sleeping so soundly, I didn’t want to disturb you.” He looked—and sounded—rather… shy? She couldn’t remember when—if ever—Harry had last seemed shy. Not that Harry was overly given to boldness or insouciance but she would have sworn that they’d been friends for too long for him to feel shy around her. But maybe—she almost caught her breath on a surge of poignant hope—maybe this sudden shyness was a sign that their friendship was shifting, changing. That he was beginning to wonder if they were only friends.

“Thanks,” she said softly.

“Anytime.” He looked back up at her and—and something about the look in his eyes made her heart skip a beat, her breath catching in her throat. The air suddenly felt thick, heavy, as if it were being filled with unspoken words, unacknowledged feelings…

“How’d you sleep?”

“Did you sleep okay?”

They both spoke at once, the questions overlapping, and the tension abruptly eased as they both laughed.

“Did you manage to sleep?” she asked, speaking first.

“Yeah, I did. What about you?”

She smiled. “I slept through the night. I think it’s the first full night’s sleep I’ve had in months.”

“Good, I’m glad.”

“You—you stayed here all night.” It came out sounding like something halfway between a statement and a question.

He lifted one shoulder into a shrug. “I wanted to make sure you didn’t have nightmares.”

“Thanks.”

“You’ve stayed to help me with my nightmares so we’re even now,” he returned with a faint upwards quirk of his mouth.

“Still. Thanks, Harry.”

He glanced at the window, at the bright sunshine outside. “It looks like it’ll be a perfect day to go to the beach,” he said, changing the subject so obviously that she suddenly realized he really was uncomfortable with this, with whatever had changed between them after he’d carried her up to her room and then stayed with her as she slept. Something had changed, not because of what he’d done but rather because of what it meant, what it revealed—and now, he was uncomfortable.

She felt a sudden, almost unaccountable pang of loss. She knew what she felt and what she wanted, what she hoped for—and yet… for a fleeting second, all she could think was that their friendship—the solid, dependable friendship they’d always had—was somehow over.

She forcibly pushed the irrational thought out of her mind and sat up. She was being ridiculous. They were still best friends. “Harry, are you sure you’re ready to spend the day at the beach? It’s a public place and there’ll be lots of other people around and, well, you know…” She trailed off rather awkwardly, not wanting to say that he didn’t deal well with large crowds.

He made a slight face. “I don’t know,” he admitted after a moment. “But I guess we’ll find out,” he finished with an attempt at bravado.

“We don’t have to go, if you really don’t feel ready for it. I can—I’ll think of some excuse and Ron will give in, you know he will.”

“No, it’s okay. I—I want to find out if I can do this. And—and it’s what Ron wants to do. He’s put up with doing what we want to do for days now and…” He shrugged a little. “It’s what Ron wants to do,” he said again, as if that simple fact settled the matter. Which, as far as Harry was concerned, it did.

“It’s okay, Harry, you don’t have to explain. Ron’s my best friend too and I know…” she hesitated for an almost imperceptible second and then finished, “I know Ron comes first for you.” Because she did know it. It wasn’t something that had ever been put into words between them but it was an underlying truth of the Trio and had been since the beginning. She didn’t even mind it. She knew she was Harry’s best friend—and maybe, maybe, something more than that now—but she also knew that Ron was—had been—Harry’s first friend. And Harry’s loyalty to Ron was bone-deep.

“No, he doesn’t,” Harry said slowly, an odd note in his voice making her glance at him. He looked… a little surprised and the tinge of shyness was back in his face. “You do.” He sounded somewhat uncertain, as if he were still trying to convince himself of it, but then he repeated himself. “You come first for me.”

She blinked and found herself blurting out, “But I know that’s not true!”

He gaped at her. “What—why on earth would you say that? I think I would know better than anyone.”

“Because—” she waved a hand a little, a weird, frustrated gesture as if to emphasize her point—“Ron’s your first friend and—and the one you’ll miss the most.”

He frowned. “What are you talking about?”

She let out a breath, her voice quiet. “The Second Task,” she said briefly and then added, hurriedly, “It’s okay, Harry. Ron’s my best friend too and—”

He cut her off by laughing abruptly. “Hermione, don’t be daft.”

“What—”

“That was ages ago.”

“It wasn’t that long ago.”

He sighed, his face changing until he suddenly looked much older than his years. “It feels like centuries ago.”

Her face and her voice softened with understanding. “Yeah, I know.”

He sat back in his chair, running a restless hand through his air. “Things are different now. I’m—we’re all different now.”

It was true, of course, but some things hadn’t changed and she’d thought Harry’s loyalty to Ron was one of them. She hesitated for a moment but then blurted out, “I really come first with you?”

“I don’t care so much if I can’t enjoy myself at the beach today since it’s what Ron wants to do but if you said you didn’t want to go, I’d tell Ron we weren’t going.” He gave her a faint, rather sober smile. “Just don’t tell Ron, okay?”

She had to laugh a little. “Okay. Harry?”

“Hmm?”

“You come first with me too.”

“Thank you,” he said quietly.

There was something a little odd in his face and she realized with a little shock just how moved he was—and for a fleeting second, he was once again the little boy with broken glasses who had never known what it was like to have anyone care about him. Her heart clenched.

“And you can’t tell Ron that either,” she added quickly, wanting to banish the shadows from his eyes.

Now he smiled for real, his eyes clearing. “I won’t,” he promised.

She returned his smile and there was a brief silence before he stood up, stretching a little. And she found herself abruptly distracted as his t-shirt rode up, revealing a strip of pale skin at his waist.

“We may as well start getting ready for the day,” he said as he straightened.

She scrambled up off her bed in a flurry of movement so he wouldn’t catch her staring—oh who was she kidding, she’d been ogling him—and busied herself haphazardly folding his quilt up.

“Here, you’d better take this back to your room,” she managed to say, striving to sound matter-of-fact, as she handed him his quilt.

“Thanks. I’ll see you downstairs in a bit.” He gave her a fleeting smile as he left and she sank back onto her bed, annoyed at herself now. She couldn’t keep reacting like this! She’d gotten so good at ignoring her physical attraction to Harry, tamping down and generally refusing to acknowledge her reaction to him, so much that she usually succeeded in pretending she didn’t react at all. He was only her best friend. That was all. And she wasn’t about to risk their friendship by giving any indication that she thought about him as anything other than a friend.

Anyway, he didn’t care about her as anything more than his best friend. Or at least he hadn’t used to. But maybe, maybe that was changing…

Her gaze fell on the chair he’d spent the night in—to keep her nightmares away. And she heard his voice as he’d told her, “You come first for me.”

He’d been talking about their friendship, she knew. He hadn’t meant anything more than that. And she would have sworn that she didn’t mind that Ron’s friendship came first for Harry, would have sworn that it didn’t matter.

And yet, knowing that her friendship came first… It wasn’t all she wanted from Harry but for now, for that moment, it was enough.

~

Harry felt himself steadily getting more tense as they approached the beach. It was too open. There were too many people around. His gaze swiftly scanned the scene, taking in the location of all the people, making quick mental notes of what they were doing, if anyone looked like a potential threat.

A potential threat. He inwardly laughed although it wasn’t out of amusement. At this point, every stranger appeared to be a potential threat to him!

“Now this is my idea of a vacation!” Ron’s voice drew his gaze and he had to grin at Ron’s unbridled enthusiasm.

He glanced over at Hermione and felt his smile fade. She had tilted her face up to the sun as if she were a flower basking in its warmth, her eyes closed, her lips slightly curved. And the sight of her at that moment hit him with all the force of a punch. He reeled, suddenly feeling a little light-headed, as for a fleeting moment, everything else faded and nothing and no one else existed in the world but her.

It was only a second before she opened her eyes and smiled at Ron. “It is a beautiful day,” she agreed.”

“Yeah, it is beautiful,” he heard someone say and realized belatedly that the words had come from him—and he was still staring at Hermione.

His voice had sounded odd, a little unlike himself, he knew, and he immediately felt Hermione’s concerned glance and he managed a quick reassuring smile.

She didn’t look particularly reassured and he guessed she could see that he was still feeling a little… off-balance. But for once, it wasn’t out of nervousness over being out in the open but because he was still amazed at how strongly he’d reacted to Hermione in that moment. He couldn’t—he didn’t feel that way about her. Did he?

“Why don’t we go to the end of the beach where it should be less crowded?” she suggested.

“That’s fine,” Ron agreed and they set off across the sand. And he quickly forgot about his reaction to Hermione as his usual reaction to a crowd set in. It was too bloody open on the beach; there was no shelter, nowhere to hide.

The beach was crowded—it looked like half the people in France had decided to descend on this one spot today—and he frowned, automatically adjusting his pace to keep slightly behind Ron and Hermione. He could hear them exchanging a few idle words but he didn’t try to listen, too preoccupied with their surroundings. With guarding their backs, as always.

He heard a distant shout and then the sound of running footsteps behind him and reacted instinctively, jumping back as he whirled around, his wand at the ready.

A football spun past him followed by a fellow with blond hair who flashed him an odd look before he caught up the football and kicked it back towards where another fellow was obviously waiting. Harry hastily lowered his wand, trying to calm himself. There was no attack, just an errant football being kicked around by a couple young men.

A hand touched his arm and he started again, turning sharply only to relax marginally—and feel like an idiot—when he realized it had been Ron.

“Harry, you—” Ron began, his face a mask of alarm and dismay and concern.

“I’m fine,” Harry interrupted Ron sharply before he could finish whatever he’d been about to say and saw the effect of his harsh tone in the way Ron’s expression changed, his hand dropping as he stepped back. And something about Ron’s expression irritated him further. Ron was giving him that careful look, eyeing him with the wariness usually reserved for poisonous or otherwise lethal predators. “I’m fine!” he snapped again. “Let’s keep going.”

Ron’s face closed off as he began walking and Harry hesitated, expecting Hermione to follow Ron but she didn’t.

Of course she didn’t. She stayed beside him as he followed Ron.

“You shouldn’t be angry at us.”

He turned to her, his mouth opening in automatic defensiveness at her tone—but then the words died in his throat. He couldn’t be angry at her, not now, not with that understanding look on her face. “Sorry.”

“You don’t have to apologize to me.”

And of course she was right. He glanced at Ron’s stiff back, hesitated, and then Hermione linked her arm through his, keeping him beside her as she quickened her steps to catch up with Ron.

“Sorry. I’m a git,” he offered.

“Yeah, you really are,” Ron agreed with a slight bite in his tone. “I don’t know how we put up with you.”

There was a beat of silence. Harry felt Ron’s glance. “You going to be okay, then?”

And he knew Ron was over his brief flare of temper. He forced a smile for Ron’s and Hermione’s benefit. “I’ll be fine,” he answered firmly. Neither of them looked particularly convinced and he glanced away, looking for some way to distract them or convince them—or both. “Anyway,” he added, gesturing to a couple of bikini-clad girls sunbathing, “not even I’m crazy enough to think people like that are threatening.”

Ron glanced at the girls, one of whom chose that moment to turn over onto her back, and his step hitched for a moment as he stared. Distraction accomplished.

“Careful, Ron, you’ll trip over your tongue,” Hermione advised.

Ron pulled his gaze away, assuming a mock-injured expression. “What? I was just looking. A fellow would have to be dead not to look.”

“Looking and drooling, you mean,” Hermione teased.

Ron turned red but gamely tried to defend himself. “I was not drooling!”

Hermione only laughed and Harry felt himself smiling automatically, feeling a bubble of happiness well up in his chest, momentarily cutting through his tension. When had he started reacting like this to the sight of Hermione’s smile, the brightness of her eyes, the sound of her laugh? He couldn’t even pretend to himself that it could be explained away by their friendship. He’d never reacted to anyone’s smile the way he did to Hermione’s. Not even Ginny’s at the height of his fancying her. Not even when he’d sometimes felt as if Ginny were a magnet for his eyes and he’d jealously noted every one of her smiles. But even then, he hadn’t reacted to Ginny’s smile—cared about Ginny’s smiles—the way he did now to Hermione’s, the rush of warmth in his chest.

His thoughts were abruptly jerked back to the present as he heard a shout behind them, his shoulders jerking in automatic reaction as he snapped his head around. He forcibly kept his wand down by his side, even as his fist clenched tighter.

It was nothing threatening, just another tourist hailing a friend of his, and he turned his head back, catching Hermione’s concerned gaze.

He forced a smile. “See, I’m getting better,” he said with manufactured lightness. “Another couple false alarms and I won’t react at all.”

She managed a forced smile in response. “I’m impressed.”

“You should be. My self-control is a marvel to behold.”

He was rewarded for this display of exaggerated vanity with a laugh that somehow soothed his ruffled nerves, calming him until he began to feel cautiously optimistic that he might be able to relax enough to enjoy the day after all. As long as he could see her smile and hear her laugh, he thought.

“This looks like a nice spot,” Ron announced. “What do you two think?”

“It works for me,” Hermione agreed. “Harry?”

He glanced around, noting that they had come nearly to the end of the beach. They were within throwing distance of where the sand gave way to rocks and just past the thinning groups of people. Ron was watching him with expectation and anticipation clearly written on his face. It was as good a spot as any, he supposed, and they wouldn’t be completely surrounded by strangers. “This looks great,” he said with manufactured enthusiasm.

“Finally! Hermione, you’ve got the towels?”

“Give me just a second, Ron,” Hermione rejoined mildly. “The ocean isn’t going to disappear in the next minute if you don’t get into it.” As she spoke, she had taken out one of the towels they’d brought and with a quick glance around, used her wand to enlarge the towel until it was the size of a blanket and spread it out on the sand.

Ron was practically dancing with impatience, Harry noted with a spurt of amusement, as Ron stripped off his shirt so he was wearing only his swim trunks.

Ron glanced at Harry. “Harry, you coming for a swim?”

He opened his mouth to agree—he was in his swim trunks too—but then froze. He couldn’t take his wand with him into the ocean. He would be wandless. Defenseless. “I can’t!” he blurted out.

“You can’t swim?”

“No, I can’t go into the water. I just can’t.” He was breathing faster, his pulse racing in immediate reaction to the very thought of leaving his wand behind. His fist was clenched around his wand and he realized, belatedly, that his hand was trembling slightly from the force of his grip.

He was peripherally aware of Hermione’s glance and then she reached out, her hand closing around the fist wrapped around his wand, stilling the slight tremors. “It’s okay, Harry. Why don’t we just stay on the beach and make a sand castle instead? I always loved making sand castles.”

“But—” Ron began before abruptly falling silent and Harry knew that Hermione had just shot Ron a look because Ron paused before agreeing with rather patently false cheer, “All right. Making a sand castle sounds like fun.”

Harry jerked his head into a nod. He hated that he reacted like this, hated that even the thought of leaving his wand behind made him so crazy. Hated knowing that he was keeping Ron from doing what he wanted to do. He forcibly slowed his breathing down, loosening his fist from its death-grip on his wand one muscle at a time. “How do we—” he broke off, swallowing, and then started again, trying to sound more like himself. “What do we need to make a sand castle?”

“Oh nothing really, just some water to help us shape the sand the way we want to.” Hermione released his fist after a gentle pressure of her hand. “I’ll just go bring back a couple buckets of water.”

She dug into the bag they’d brought to carry food for lunch and pulled out two plastic bags, quickly transfiguring them into two buckets. And Harry felt a twinge of mild amusement cutting through his lingering tension as he saw that she’d made the buckets the Gryffindor colors of red and gold. That done, she glanced at him, meeting his eyes. “I’ll be right back. You can pick out where you want to build the sand castle.”

Harry looked at Ron. “Sorry,” he explained rather briefly. “I can’t go anywhere without my wand.”

Ron’s slightly frowning expression cleared as he glanced at Harry’s fist, still clenching his wand. “Oh right. I hadn’t thought of that.”

“I hadn’t thought of it until just now either,” Harry managed with an attempt at lightness. “How do we make a sand castle then?”

Ron’s lips quirked. “You think I know? I’ve never made a sand castle in my life. I think Hermione’s going to be the expert on it.”

Harry felt his lips curving into a real smile at that. “Hermione’s the expert at everything.”

“Yeah. It’s bloody annoying at times,” Ron pretended to grouse but his grin gave him away.

Harry looked away, his gaze finding Hermione automatically. He squinted a little into the sun, tensing slightly as he realized that there were a few people in the ocean ahead of where Hermione was going. He knew she had her wand with her but her hands were full with the two buckets and—he eyed the expanse of sand between them and the water with sudden alarm. “Go catch up with Hermione,” he suggested with quick urgency.

Ron blinked at him. “I think she can carry two buckets of water.”

“I just—don’t like her going off alone.”

“What? You think someone’s going to ambush—”

“Don’t even say it,” Harry cut Ron’s incredulous and half-teasing question off quickly. “Just—don’t.” He knew he was overreacting but he couldn’t just shrug off his vague apprehension, even as his mind shied away from putting it into so many words.

“She can take care of herself.”

“Still. Just—go with her. Please.”

“Okay,” Ron agreed, setting off at an easy lope. “But if Hermione gets annoyed, I’m blaming you,” he added, glancing back.

Ron caught up with Hermione in another minute, falling into step beside her. Harry saw Hermione glance over at Ron in some surprise and Ron answering with a gesture of his hand. But Hermione didn’t look back at him so he knew Ron hadn’t told Hermione the truth about why Ron had joined her.

Harry supposed he should sit down on the towel while waiting instead of standing around like some sort of statue but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. Not yet. He needed to stay standing, stay alert as he watched Ron and Hermione’s retreating figures.

Some part of him knew he was being irrational. They were on a beach surrounded by Muggles and no one knew where they were. And even if something were to happen, it wasn’t as if being seated would slow down his reaction time as he knew all too well. And yet—being seated might mean it took him another second before he could be up and on his feet and he knew all too well that sometimes it didn’t take more than a second for everything to change. So he stayed standing. And watched as Ron playfully splashed Hermione with water and as Hermione splashed Ron back in retaliation before filling the buckets and handing one over to Ron. That done, they turned to walk back and even at that distance, he could see the grins on their faces.

Ron made some sort of teasing remark and he saw Hermione laugh even as she elbowed him in response. And Harry reacted—again—to the sight of Hermione laughing, even at that distance, felt the bubble of warmth fill his chest and his tension ease a little.

She paused, lifting her arm to point something out to Ron, and Harry froze, his mouth suddenly going dry. Her shirt was wet and clinging to her, lovingly outlining the curve of her waist and her hips and—and… He pulled his eyes away only to find himself fixating on her legs—had her shorts always been that short and had she always had legs that looked like—well, that looked like that?

Merlin, she was so… hot. Something hit him in the chest with all the force of a blow, making him feel as if he couldn’t breathe—oh, who was he kidding, it was lust. Lust for Hermione that had hit him so hard and so fast he was almost dizzy with it. He wanted Hermione.

No. Oh no no no no no. He wasn’t—he couldn’t—he didn’t think about Hermione that way. She was his best friend and—and he never wanted that to change and—and he wanted her.

He suddenly remembered Ron’s question the night before and how he’d answered that he didn’t know. Now he did. He did fancy Hermione.

He tore his eyes away from her, needing to look away, needing to think about something else, to try to shove all these… thoughts… about Hermione into the deepest corner of his mind so he could act normally around her. Not that looking away from her helped much—the image of her seemed to have been seared onto his brain. Instead he sat down and started playing with the sand, sifting his left hand through it then creating small piles and systematically flattening them out again with as much concentration as if Professor McGonagall herself were going to be judging him on his precision.

From somewhere behind him, there was a sudden blast of noise, a sharp crack like a car backfiring that slashed straight through the center of his nerves making him jump, his heart race—

Screaming. He heard screaming, the sound of terror and danger, but he couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe—why couldn’t he breathe—his chest had shrunk or his lungs had collapsed or—or something—and he couldn’t do anything, only listen to the screaming…

He fell forward onto his hands but his arms wouldn’t hold him up and instead he collapsed, curling forward over his knees until his head nearly brushed the sand. And tried to draw breath into his lungs, gasping. He was suffocating! He was going to suffocate and die right there on the beach. He was dizzy. Spots danced through his vision, gathering and clouding it up until his vision grayed out…

“Harry! It’s okay. It’s me. It’s Hermione. Harry!”

He heard the voice cutting through the fog, felt an almost painful pressure on his arm that momentarily distracted him and slowly, belatedly realized it was from her hand gripping it.

She spoke quietly but firmly into his ear. “Breathe through your nose, Harry, slowly. It’s okay. Just breathe. In and out.”

He shut his eyes, trying to force himself to listen, to follow her instructions in spite of every instinct. It didn’t come easily. He gasped and hiccupped, his chest and lungs seeming to fight against him, against everything, in order to get more air. Blindly, he moved his hand, finding hers and then gripping it as if it were a lifeline and he was drowning. She returned the pressure, squeezing his fingers, and he focused on that, on the pressure of her hand, the one solid, stable thing in a tilting, unstable world. Focused on the solidness of her grip until he almost forgot to worry that he couldn’t breathe, making it easier to slow his breathing down.

In and out. Just like she’d said. In and out.

“It’s okay, Harry. Just keep breathing, slowly. Slowly. It’s okay. Just keep breathing. You’re going to be fine. No one else is watching; it’s just me and you and Ron.”

He belatedly became aware that she had kept up a running stream of words, a sort of mantra of soothing nothings that hadn’t even impinged on his consciousness as actual words until now. The mention of Ron distracted him, sharply reminding him that of course Ron was there too, that Ron had seen him collapse, that Ron was watching. He should have been mortified—he was sure he would be mortified later—would feel the heat of embarrassment at the thought of having gone to pieces like he had in front of Ron. But that would have taken an energy he didn’t have at the moment, still too focused on controlling his breathing, on staying still and calm.

He was still holding Hermione’s hand, although his grip was too tight to be justified by the term, holding. He realized too that her other hand was on his back, moving in slow, soothing circles.

“Hermione, I—” he finally managed to say, or almost wheeze, his voice sounding shaky and unlike himself. He wasn’t sure what he was about to say—that he was sorry, that he was grateful, that he was better now—but she stopped him.

“It’s okay, Harry. Don’t try to talk until you’ve got your breath back.” And he had the sudden, odd sense that she understood, that she knew what he’d been about to say even if he didn’t really know it himself. That sense of being understood somehow acted as a balm on his shredded nerves, soothed him, calmed him as almost nothing else could. He didn’t know why it should, just accepted that somehow, for whatever reason, at that moment, it did. And he needed it, needed her. He needed her so much.

He suddenly remembered—a little flicker of awareness leaping to life inside him, making him freshly conscious of the warmth of her hand on his back, her nearness—what he’d realized before this had all happened, that flash of lust for Hermione. It was… not gone but dormant, for now—terror had a way of doing that, he reflected with a twist of bleak humor—but he suspected, no he knew, it would be back. Now that he’d looked at Hermione like that, thought of her like that, he couldn’t go back to viewing her purely platonically.

But it didn’t matter. Lust was one thing—a powerful thing—he was still a teenage boy—but he couldn’t risk his friendship with Hermione. He needed her too much. He didn’t think he could bear it if their friendship changed, if things with him and Hermione turned… awkward at best, the way they had with Cho and with Ginny. He wasn’t happy about the fact that he was never quite comfortable around Ginny anymore but he could handle it. He’d never relied on Ginny, never needed her. Hermione was different. And he couldn’t lose her.

A little tentatively, cautiously, he opened his eyes, blinking as he almost swore the sun had gotten brighter, but he could see again, the spots that had clouded his vision gone. He could see again and more than that, he realized, he could hear, the sounds of the rest of the world rushing back into his consciousness. The steady sound of the waves, the cry of the occasional sea gull, the soft rise and fall of people’s voices, the occasional sound of passing cars from the street behind them.

He held his breath for a few seconds, testing himself, before letting it out again. His heart was still beating faster than he’d like, he still felt too jittery and… fragile, as if his composure were being held together by pieces of string and could fall apart all too quickly. But he was better.

Moving slowly, deliberately, he lifted his head, straightening up to meet Hermione’s worried gaze.

He couldn’t quite manage a smile but tried for a twitch of his lips. “I think… I’m all right now. Thanks.” And as if to prove it, he finally released her hand, letting go as he sat up straight.

She gave him a small smile but her eyes were still dark, concerned. “Okay, if you’re sure, that’s good.”

He turned to look up at Ron, standing just beside and in front of him, still holding the two buckets as if he’d been frozen in place. And inwardly winced a little at the look on Ron’s face, the stark dismay and worry mingled in with nervousness.

“Merlin, Harry, you—what happened? You just… I’d never seen… what was that?” Ron stammered.

“Ron!” Hermione rebuked sharply. “Don’t—”

“No, it’s okay,” Harry interrupted her. “It was…” he automatically glanced at Hermione, the quiet understanding in her eyes somehow steadying him, before looking back up at Ron, “a panic attack. I… er… don’t react well to being startled,” he finished with a slight twist of his lips.

“Are you… okay, then, now?” Ron asked carefully.

He nodded and finally managed to produce something like the ghost of a smile. “I’m… better now. I’ll be okay.”

Ron didn’t look entirely reassured. “D’you want to leave, go back to the cottage? Or something?”

“No,” he answered quickly.

“But Harry…”

“No. I said we’d spend the day at the beach and we’re going to spend the day at the beach. I’ll be fine. Really. I can do this.” Becoming aware he was protesting too much, he turned to Hermione with an attempt at a smile. “So how do we make a sand castle, then?”

Her eyes were still concerned but she answered him, silently falling in with what he wanted. “When sand is damp, it can be molded into shapes and structures pretty easily so we can start by clearing a fairly shallow pit about the size of however big we want to build our sand castle to be.”

“Can we make a sand castle version of Hogwarts?”

That got her to smile a little. “I don’t see why not. That’s a good idea.”

She moved to kneel on the sand a little bit in front of him. “Here, Ron, you can put down the buckets and come help me clear a pit.”

Harry was peripherally aware of Ron doing so but his eyes were caught and held by her hand as she stretched forward to push a pile of sand out of the way. He leaned forward and quickly grasped her wrist, holding her arm still as he looked at her hand, the hand he’d been gripping, that was still painfully red. He sucked in a sharp breath, guilt stabbing at him. “Hermione, I—Merlin, Hermione, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have—”

She tugged her arm free with a quick movement. “It’s okay, Harry. Honestly. It doesn’t hurt; it looks worse than it feels.”

“But it—”

“Don’t worry about it, really, Harry. I’m not hurt.”

“Still. I’m so—”

“Don’t you dare apologize,” she interrupted him.

He felt a flicker of something like amusement at her words. “It really doesn’t hurt?”

“You wouldn’t hurt me,” she responded, her voice softening.

Which was true, of course. He wouldn’t hurt her. Not intentionally, not ever.

“So can we start making a sand castle of Hogwarts?” Ron interjected now.

Harry glanced at Ron, managing a smile. It felt a little shaky on his lips but it was still a smile. “Okay.”

And so they did. And it was… fun. In spite of his lingering nervousness and occasional starts, he managed to have some fun, even while out in public with strangers around and nowhere to hide. It wasn’t perfect but it was a start.

~To be continued…~

Disclaimer: See Chapter 1.

A/N: Happy New Year, everyone. Thank you, as always, for reading. As long as you keep reading, I’ll keep writing (slowly, admittedly) but writing. I promise!

Living Past the End

~Chapter 9~

Hermione started as the quiet of the night was abruptly shattered as Harry burst out of the cottage.

His eyes immediately found her and she saw the relief flash across his face before his expression clouded again. “What the hell are you doing out here?! You shouldn’t—” He broke off, his words strangling in his throat as if there was too much to say, all the emotions that wanted expressing at the same time choking him. He was breathing hard—too hard—and she realized that he was trying to calm himself, trying so hard that—her eyes narrowed and her breath caught—his hands were trembling.

She leaped up, her book tumbling forgotten to the ground, as she closed the distance between them in a few long steps, gripping his arms. “Harry! It’s okay. I’m right here.”

He gave a few gasping, shuddering breaths and then she found herself abruptly hauled into his arms. She couldn’t even characterize it as a hug; there was too much desperation in it and no softness in his grasp. He clutched her the way a drowning man would clutch a life-saver, as if she were the only thing keeping him upright. Clutched her so tightly she could feel the way his heart was thudding, could feel the slight tremors that shook him.

She couldn’t quite hug him back; his arms had imprisoned hers to her side but she held him as much as she could, gripping his shirt, her face buried in his shoulder. It was, for the moment, all she could do. She couldn’t take away his panic entirely but she could lend him her strength when he needed it. She could let herself be held when he needed to hold on to something.

It was a long few minutes before she felt his trembling ease, felt some of the desperation leave his arms. Slowly, as if he needed to order one muscle at a time to cooperate, he released her, straightening as he stepped back a little.

“I’m sorry,” he blurted out. “I just—I was dreaming. We—were ambushed and we—we got separated and I couldn’t—I couldn’t find you and I didn’t know what had happened to you and—and then I woke up and you—you weren’t in your room and you weren’t in the front room either and I—I didn’t know where you were…”

“I couldn’t sleep and it was starting to feel stuffy inside so I came outside.”

He nodded jerkily. “You shouldn’t—I don’t like you going outside alone.”

“I have my wand with me. I can take care of myself.”

“What if you were outnumbered? What if you were surprised and disarmed? What if—”

His voice rose with every word until she interrupted him. “Harry, stop it!”

He stopped, gulping in a breath, before shutting his eyes, his inner struggle visible as he tried to calm himself. And it was her turn to hug him, closing the distance between them in one step.

“Okay, Harry. I’ll be careful and I’ll try not to go anywhere alone,” she agreed. And it was a little amazing how easy it was to give in and make such a promise. For his sake, because he needed the reassurance.

He gave a few shuddering breaths, his arms going around her. “Thank you,” was all he said but it was enough. She could hear that he understood her concession and that it meant something to him.

“Let’s go back inside,” she suggested.

“Yes, let’s.”

He released her and she quickly retrieved her book before they both walked back to the cottage.

Harry dropped down onto the couch with a sigh, tipping his head back as he shut his eyes. He looked tired. That is, he always looked tired these days but he looked more so than usual now. She could see faint lines of tension bracketing his mouth, his features looking as if they’d been etched in acid. And her heart hurt to see it.

“Why don’t you go back to bed, Harry, try to get some more sleep?” she ventured gently.

His eyes flew open, his head jerking up. “No!” He paused, swallowed. “I can’t sleep. I know I can’t sleep. Not now. I’d just dream again.”

“I could stay with you,” she offered without thinking. “If that would help…”

“It probably would but I can’t—you don’t have to—”

“I don’t mind,” she interrupted him. “Honestly, I don’t. Anyway, I’d still manage to get some sleep too.” She stood up and reached for his hand, tugging him up with her. “Come on, Harry.”

“Hermione, I…” he began in rather token resistance as he let himself be pulled up the stairs.

“No arguing, Harry. You need to get some rest.”

“Yes, Miss Prefect,” he returned, a faint thread of teasing in his tone, sounding more like himself.

“Very good. 10 points to Gryffindor,” she said lightly.

“Only 10? I think I deserve more points than that for being forced to risk having more nightmares.” He tried to make light of it but failed and she inwardly winced a little.

She retained her grip on his hand until they were inside his room. “Get into bed, Harry. I’ll stay right here,” she promised.

He made a slightly wry face before he complied, sliding under the covers of his bed. She waited until he was lying down before settling on the window seat. “Try to get some sleep, Harry.”

He pushed himself up until he was sitting up straight. “Wait. You’re going to spend the night there?”

“I said I’d stay with you, didn’t I?”

“Yeah, but…” he broke off, hesitated, and then after a moment, pushed aside the covers of his bed. “Here. You can stay here.”

She stared, feeling herself flush with embarrassment and something else. “Harry, that’s your bed,” was all she said inanely.

His lips twitched a little at that. “I can’t make you spend the night on the window seat while I get the bed. Besides, we’ve slept in the same tent. Just think of it as a smaller version of a tent. It’s not like there isn’t enough room.”

“But…”

“If you’re spending the night on the window seat, then so will I.”

He meant it too. She could hear it in his voice, see it in his expression, even though the way he kept his eyes focused slightly off her face told her that he felt something of the same awkwardness she did.

“All right,” she gave in, moving to sit on the bed. She couldn’t make him spend the night sitting up. Not when he looked as tired as he did. Not when she knew how little sleep he tended to get. “Anyway, I’m like your sister so it shouldn’t mean anything.” She inwardly winced. Even to her own ears, she sounded more like she was trying to convince herself rather than saying something she actually believed.

His eyes focused on her for a moment, studying her, before he said, “You’re not my sister.”

It was, she told herself, just a statement of the literal truth. He didn’t necessarily mean anything more by it. And she shouldn’t convince herself that he did; it would only make sharing a bed more awkward than it already was.

He scooted over and she settled into the bed, moving a little gingerly, carefully. The bed was wide enough that they could both lie on their backs with a few inches separating their shoulders.

“More comfortable than the window seat, right?”

She let out a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding. “Yeah, it is.” She paused and then asked, more quietly, “Do you think you’ll be able to sleep?”

He sighed. “I don’t know. I’m just… afraid to go to sleep,” he admitted, so softly she could barely hear him.

“I know and it’s okay. Just try… and if you do have nightmares, I’ll be right here.”

She heard him let out a soft breath. “Thanks, Hermione.”

A silence fell as she lay there, listening to the sound of him breathing and trying not to be so conscious of his closeness. In spite of the space between them, she swore she could somehow sense the warmth of his body and she could definitely feel every shift or restless movement he made. It felt… odd… sharing a bed with someone. She hadn’t shared a bed with anyone in years, not since she’d been very young and allowed to sleep in her parents’ bed as a special treat. Of course it was different and novel to share a bed but it wasn’t a bad thing either. For a few minutes, she closed her eyes and let herself pretend that she was in Harry’s bed not just for comfort or to protect him from nightmares but because he wanted her…

“Hermione?” He broke the silence after a little while.

“Hmm?”

“Did you want to sleep or do you mind if we talk?”

“Of course we can talk.”

He was silent for a moment and then said, “Your parents were really nice to me today.”

Surprise startled a brief laugh out of her. “What were you expecting? You’re my friend so of course, they’d be nice to you.”

She felt him move his shoulders in a shrug. “Well, since I’ve spent most of the last few years getting you into danger, it’s not like your parents have much reason to like me.”

“Harry…”

“I know, I know. Damon and Pythias.”

She smiled slightly. “If you know, then you should also understand that my parents wouldn’t blame you either. They don’t blame you. Besides, my parents know me and I think they understand that you couldn’t have done anything to stop me from staying with you, no matter what the risk.”

“Still. Even if they don’t blame me, they don’t know me so I didn’t really expect them to be nice to me.”

Understanding suddenly broke over her, like lightning illuminating the darkness. Harry never really expected kindness. He never expected to be treated well, not even as a result of common courtesy or basic decency. She remembered with a pang his surprise whenever he received any gifts. Even now, he never really expected gifts for Christmas or his birthday. And after all, why would he, after the way his own relatives had treated him? She felt the surge of protective anger she always felt when she thought about Harry’s relatives but all she said was, “They know more about you than you think, Harry. Do you really think I’ve never talked about you and Ron with my parents?”

“You and your parents are close, aren’t you?”

“We used to be.”

She felt him turn his head to stare at her. “What do you mean, you used to be? Aren’t you still?”

She suppressed a grimace. She hadn’t meant to say that. With anyone else, she probably wouldn’t have, would just have answered, yes, simply, and been done with it, but with Harry, the habit of candor was ingrained. She trusted him enough that she hardly ever thought to edit her words.

“I’m not sure,” she finally admitted, trying to put into words what had only been a vague feeling, never really expressed and one she’d generally tried to avoid thinking about. “I just… feel like I’ve grown apart from them lately. I love them, of course, but I just… they’re Muggles and—and I don’t really know how to tell them—or if I even really want them to know—just how dangerous things really were for us or… or anything. And after this last year… I just feel like it’s gotten worse and I think they sense it too because I feel like they’ve been treating me a little differently.”

He was silent for a while and she was suddenly a little abashed at how much she’d told him, how involved her explanation had been. But then he asked, rather diffidently, “You said your parents weren’t angry with you. How have they been treating you differently? They didn’t—I didn’t notice anything today but I don’t really know your parents.” He paused and then added, “Your dad said he’d always known that you had the makings of a heroine in you.”

“My dad said that to you? When?”

“It was when you were in the kitchen helping your Mum clean up after lunch. Ron had gone to the loo so your dad and I were left alone.”

“Oh. He really said that to you?”

“Yeah. He said… he thanked me for being such a good friend to you.”

“What did you say to that?”

“I said that it wasn’t up to me but that you just wouldn’t leave me and Ron alone almost from the moment we met.”

She laughed a little, elbowing him. “Honestly, Harry! What did you really say?”

She sensed his abrupt return to seriousness, heard it in his quiet tone. “I told him that you saved my life.”

“Oh. You didn’t have to tell my dad that.”

“What else could I have told him?” he asked. “It’s the truth.”

“I didn’t—that’s not really—”

“You did,” he interrupted her flatly. “You saved me.” He paused and then added, a thread of teasing entering his tone, “I was there, remember? I think I would know.”

“I couldn’t have done anything else.”

She felt him turn his head to look at her. “Yes, you could have. You didn’t have to stay, didn’t have to help me the way you did. You could have been safe, or at least safer. You could have stayed behind the way Ginny—” he broke off abruptly almost before he’d finished saying her name.

She sensed his sudden dismay, his swift flare of guilt at what he’d just blurted out. She knew he hadn’t meant to say that, knew it hadn’t even occurred to him to think of it that way until now. He didn’t blame Ginny, had never blamed Ginny. Any more than he would have blamed her if she had, as he’d said, stayed behind.

Except she could never have done it. It had never even occurred to her as a choice or a conscious decision on her part to stay with him.

“That was never an option for me,” she said quietly. “Anyway, the Death Eaters knew who I was, knew I was Muggle-born and your friend. I wouldn’t have been that safe.”

“Still. You didn’t have to be in the front lines but you stayed and you saved me. I just thought…” she felt him shrug. “I thought your parents should know that.”

“Thanks.”

He was silent for a moment and then he asked, a little uncertainly, “You really think your parents are upset with you, treating you differently?”

She sighed, swallowing back a sudden tightness in her throat, the sudden prickling of her eyes. She wouldn’t cry. She wasn’t going to cry; she hardly ever cried and she wasn’t about to now. “I don’t know but it feels… different… They just seem a little… distant to me.”

“You think it’s because of this last year?”

“What else could it be? It’s only started since— since I brought them home again.”

“I can’t believe that. I just… I don’t think your parents are upset with you.”

“What would you know about it?” she retorted in a sudden flare of irritation at his persistent doubt of what she said. She hadn’t asked him—how would he know her parents better than she did!

He didn’t move, didn’t say anything, didn’t respond in any way.

But she had the sudden sense that the temperature in the room had gotten colder—and belatedly realized how her words had sounded, how he must have understood them.

She turned onto her side to face him, forgetting entirely any self-consciousness at how close they now were in her remorse. She had hurt him—how could she have hurt him like that! And about one of the very few subjects that they never really spoke of. She knew what his parents—the loss of his parents—meant to him, knew that even with her, he hardly ever mentioned his parents. As much as he trusted her, as much as he confided in her—and she knew he did—the loss of his parents remained a sort of No-man’s-land, a subject even she rarely ventured near. “Oh Harry, I’m sorry! I didn’t mean it like that! I wasn’t thinking about your parents at all. I just meant that I know my parents better than you do. That was all I meant but I shouldn’t have said it. I’m sorry.”

For a moment that seemed to stretch on forever, he didn’t respond and she reached out a tentative hand to touch his arm. “I really am sorry, Harry. I—I’d never want to hurt you, you know.”

He sighed and after a moment, reached up with his hand to grip hers briefly. “I know. It’s okay.”

“I still shouldn’t have said it. I think I just… whenever I think about this last year, it upsets me. And the whole thing with my parents—it’s just hard…”

He was silent for a long minute and then he finally responded, his voice quiet, thoughtful, as if he were measuring each word before he spoke it. “You’re right that I don’t know your parents that well and you know them better but I don’t think your parents blame you in any way. Your dad said he knew you’d be a great heroine. I thought… I thought he sounded proud of you.”

“You—you really think he sounded proud?”

“Yeah. And why wouldn’t he be proud of you?”

“Oh Harry, that’s sweet but after what I did to my parents…”

He shifted, turning to face her. “What you did to your parents. Hermione, you make it sound like you hexed them and then dumped their bodies in the Thames for the sake of a couple Galleons. What you did, you were trying to keep your parents safe.”

“Harry, I tampered with my parents’ memories. I—”

“I know what you did. I’m just saying, you did it to keep them safe.”

“I practically stole their lives from them, Harry!”

“They have their lives back now and who knows what might have happened to them if you hadn’t done what you did to protect them?”

“You don’t know that. Nobody knows what really would have happened.”

“Is that really a chance you wanted to take? It was your parents’ lives we’re talking about. I don’t think—that’s not a risk worth taking.”

She sniffed, her throat feeling tight, her eyes stinging. “You’re just saying that to make me feel better.”

“That’s not true. I mean, I do want you to feel better, but I wouldn’t lie to you.” He paused and then said, quietly, “I watched your parents and listened to them when they talked to you today. They may not like what you did but I think they understand why you felt you needed to do it. They’ve forgiven you, Hermione. I think—I think it’s time you forgave yourself.”

She sucked in a sharp breath. Forgive herself. Was that really it? She wanted to argue, to deny it, insist that she knew her parents better than he did—and yet…

She couldn’t dismiss his words so easily. She knew she hadn’t forgiven herself; she knew, much as she had avoided putting it into words, that her own guilt was why she hadn’t spent much time with her parents since bringing them home again.

And she trusted Harry. She trusted his opinion and she could believe that he might see her relationship with her parents more clearly than she could right now. She… cared too much, felt too much, worried too much that she really might have ruined her relationship with her parents.

She let out a shuddering breath. “Maybe you’re right, Harry.”

She had been telling herself that her parents had been acting awkwardly, that there was a new distance between them—but maybe that distance had been put there by her, that her parents’ awkwardness had been, if not outright invented by her, but magnified by her own guilt.

She tried for a small laugh that came out sounding rather more like a sob. “When did you get to be so clever, Harry?”

“I’m not,” he denied immediately. “But I do know you. Besides,” he added with a touch of forced wry humor in his tone, “if there’s anything I know about, it’s feeling guilty.”

“Oh, Harry!” She flung an arm across him in an impulsive hug, her face ending up pressed against his shoulder.

He lifted his hand to pat her arm a couple times before simply resting his hand on her arm in a gesture that somehow seemed like returning her hug.

“Hermione,” he sighed after a moment, “you shouldn’t feel guilty about what you did. I know… on paper, in black and white, what you did sounds wrong but if we’ve learned anything over the past few years, it’s that we don’t live in a black and white world. You kept your parents safe. That’s… that’s not something to feel guilty over.”

“Thanks, Harry,” she said softly, her voice slightly muffled against his shoulder. “You’re… really sweet, you know that?”

He shifted a little and she sensed his sudden unease. “I’m really not,” he denied quickly. “It’s not about that. It’s just…” he paused, hesitated, and then finally went on, so quietly she could barely hear him, even from as close to him as she was. “I know what it’s like to feel guilty, to feel… haunted by the past, by things you’ve done or should have done… And I just… I don’t want you to feel that. You shouldn’t feel like that. You shouldn’t ever feel like that.” He broke off abruptly while she belatedly realized that she’d forgotten to breathe while he’d been speaking and took a breath. She couldn’t remember ever hearing him say such a thing, couldn’t remember hearing him speak with such suppressed intensity.

“Oh, Harry…” she finally breathed, not sure what else she could say, how else she could respond.

“You kept your parents safe, Hermione; you did what you thought was right. You always do.” He paused and then added, deliberately injecting a teasing note to his voice, “It’s an annoying habit of yours too.”

She choked on a half-laugh and briefly tightened her arm around him before she released him, rolling back over to lie on her back. “Thanks.”

“I meant it,” he said quietly. “You did the right thing, Hermione. Vol—” he briefly faltered but then continued on, forcibly pushing the name out, “Voldemort wouldn’t have left your parents alone and you couldn’t have kept them safe all the time.”

“That’s what I keep telling myself,” she admitted.

She sensed his faint smile. “You should listen to yourself since you know you’re always right.”

“I try but it’s not that easy, is it?”

He sighed. “No, it’s not.”

She echoed his sigh and after a moment, dared to shift closer to him so she could rest her head against his shoulder. “Thanks, Harry. I do feel better.”

“I’m glad,” he murmured quietly.

She said nothing more and a comfortable silence settled over them. And it was comfortable. She might have expected to feel more self-conscious to be literally sharing a bed with Harry but over the course of talking to him, that had slowly faded away for the most part. Whatever else, he was still Harry and somehow, for whatever reason, she was almost always comfortable with him. She couldn’t think of anyone else in the world with whom she was so at ease. It was no wonder that she loved him.

Her thoughts abruptly broke off, retreating and then tentatively moving forward again. She loved him. It wasn’t a surprise, exactly. She had known, been aware of, this change, this deepening in her feelings for Harry for days, even weeks now. And yet, for all that, it was a little surprising. She had always avoided putting her feelings into so many words, skirted around an explicit admission. And now it had just slipped out.

She loved him. And he… well, she didn’t know what he felt for her exactly, didn’t know if he could care for her as anything more than his best friend. She could only hope…

She thought about their conversation, what he’d said and how he’d said it, and felt a bubble of warmth fill her chest. Maybe he didn’t love her quite as she loved him but she was his best friend and that meant a lot. She knew Harry, knew how guarded he could be, how chary he was with his trust and his confidences. But not with her.

And she loved that. She loved knowing he confided in her, loved the way he tried so hard to comfort her, loved that he was willing to force himself to talk about things he would rather not talk about in order to comfort her.

Maybe he didn’t love her the way she loved him but he cared about her, cared about her and trusted her in a way he cared about and trusted no one else, she knew, and for now, that really was enough. She let her eyes drift closed as she listened to the steady sound of his breathing, letting it lull her into sleep.

It started with fear, the sudden dread that pierced her heart, when she realized she couldn’t see Harry or Ron. They had been right there but she’d paused to admire the view and when she looked back, they were gone. She hurried on, dodging the crowds of people, looking for the familiar messy black hair or red head looming over most others in the crowd.

And then she heard the first scream.

Heard the first scream and rushed forward, her heart suddenly in her throat as the crowd seemed to dissipate before her until she could see— And it was her turn to scream.

“Hermione.”

She jerked awake, disoriented and panicked, her breath coming fast, and it took a moment for her mind to register where she was and that the voice she’d heard had been Harry’s. Harry, who was leaning over her, his face a pale blur in the darkness of the room.

A shuddering breath escaped her on something halfway between a gasp and a sob. “Harry.” In an abrupt movement, she dove towards him in an awkward hug that knocked him onto his back, her face ending up buried in his shoulder.

“It’s okay, Hermione,” she vaguely heard him murmur. “I’m fine.”

She became aware of the solid warmth of his against her, the reassuring pressure of one arm around her back, holding her. He was there, he was alive, he was safe.

And suddenly she was crying, harsh, jagged sobs being wrenched from her chest as she clutched him tighter. He was safe, he was safe, he was safe…

Like a summer thunderstorm, the bout of sobbing was intense but passed quickly, leaving her feeling drained from the sudden surge of emotions. After her sobs had slowed and then ceased, she stayed where she was, resting against him, quiescent now.

“Hey,” she heard him ask softly after a long few minutes, “are you all right?”

She let out an uneven sigh. “Yeah, I’m okay.” After a few moments, she added, “Sorry for breaking down like that.”

“You don’t need to apologize for that.” He hesitated and then asked, “Was it a bad nightmare?”

“No, at least no worse than usual. I just… I’ve been so afraid and I’m so… glad that you’re okay but I just can’t—”

“You can’t stop feeling afraid,” he finished for her quietly. “I know. I can’t either.”

“I keep telling myself and telling myself that I’ll stop feeling afraid and stop having nightmares so often. I know it’s not rational and… and I know we’re all safe now… but I can’t stop it.” She gave a small little laugh that ended on something more like a sob. “I guess I’m not as rational as I always thought.”

“You are rational,” he told her, his arms tightening around her a little. “You are but your dreams aren’t. Even—even before the nightmares, dreams never made sense. That doesn’t mean you’re not rational. You are. You’ll always be my rational, sensible Hermione.”

She sniffed a little even as she smiled, her heart warming at how he had called her “his,” an accidental, thoughtless endearment as it was. She doubted he had even noticed it.

“Besides,” he added with an attempt at lightness, “you have to be the sensible one. Ron and I are the impulsive, thoughtless ones, remember? We need you to be sensible so we don’t go off and do stupid things.”

She managed a small laugh, a little shaky but a real laugh all the same. “It’s good to know why you keep me around.”

“We keep you around for more than that.”

She was silent for a moment before she shifted into a more comfortable position, moving so she was lying beside him. “Did I wake you up?”

“No. I wasn’t sleeping,” he answered and there was something bleak in his voice.

“Oh, Harry, I’m sorry,” was all she could think to say, rather inadequately.

“It’s okay. It’s not your fault.”

She sensed him hesitate and then he asked, very quietly, “What happens in your nightmares?”

She paused and then answered evasively, “I told you already; my nightmares are about you.”

“I know, but I meant… what actually happens, what frightens you so much about them?” He hesitated and then added, hurriedly, “If you want to tell me. You don’t have to. I just… wondered…”

She sighed. She understood what he was asking but actually talking about her nightmares, putting her fears into words… “No, I know what you meant. I just… it’s not easy to talk about.” “I know. Sorry, you don’t have to tell me.”

She was silent for a moment and then—“Do you remember Mrs. Weasley’s boggart?”

“Yeah, I remember,” he said, the words sounding rather forced.

“That’s basically what I see… My nightmares are the same as my boggart,” she added, somehow finding it… easier… to talk about in terms of a boggart than as the nightmare vision that haunted her dreams.

“Your boggart… it’s different now than what it used to be.” He paused. “I guess all of our boggarts would be.”

“No, it’s not,” she corrected automatically, unthinkingly. “My boggart’s always been the same.”

She sensed him frown and then he turned his head to stare at her. “What? That can’t be right.”

It was her turn to be confused. “Why not?”

“You said… your boggart used to be Professor McGonagall telling you you’d failed all your exams.”

She blinked, frowned, and then remembered. She had said that. She’d forgotten. “Oh right. I forgot I said that. I… honestly, Harry, I—uh—lied about what my boggart was that time.”

“You lied?” he repeated as if the concept were utterly foreign to him. “But you don’t lie.”

“I try not to but I did that time. I—I didn’t want to tell you and Ron about it then.”

“What was your boggart then, really?”

“The same as Mrs. Weasley’s. That’s what scared me so much. It’s what still scares me.”

“Even back then in Third Year? I wasn’t… nothing really dangerous happened to us that year.”

“No, I guess not, but I didn’t know that then. We all thought you were in danger because of—” she broke off abruptly and then finished, more quietly, “Sirius. Remember?”

“Yeah, I remember,” he said, so softly the words were barely audible.

She inwardly winced. Any mention of Sirius and Remus still hurt him. She could hear it in his voice, the thread of poignant grief that always laced his voice whenever either of them was mentioned.

“I worried about you so much that year,” she found herself admitting. “We didn’t know how he’d escaped Azkaban and I read so much about how it was impregnable and no one had ever escaped from it and then, to think that the one person who somehow managed it was also a threat to you… I think, by the time we actually met him, I was half-convinced he was some sort of super-wizard, more powerful and more cunning than anyone we’d ever heard of.”

“You never told me that.”

She shrugged one shoulder. “What would have been the point? Anyway, it was silly of me. When I think of all the time I wasted that year because I was worried—I don’t know what I was thinking to think using a Time-Turner that year was also a good idea.”

“You may have been wrong about Sirius but it wasn’t silly of you. I—that was really—it means a lot that you worried about me so much. You—you shouldn’t be sorry about that. I—it means a lot,” he repeated.

“I’m glad.”

He was silent for a long moment and then blurted out, “I never had anyone to worry about me before Hogwarts, you know. Whenever I could get away, I used to stay outside until nighttime, just wandering around the neighborhood, because I knew the Dursleys didn’t care what I did or where I was. I… I used to see other kids getting called inside once it started getting dark or being scolded for going too far and it seemed so… nice… to have someone that cared enough to worry.”

“Oh, Harry, I’m so—”

“It’s okay,” he interrupted her. “It really doesn’t bother me that much anymore. I just—I thought—not that I like you being worried but it—it just means a lot to me to know that you worried so much, even back then before—before everything really started.”

“You’re my best friend. Of course I’d worry about you—and Ron,” she added as an almost imperceptible afterthought.

“Thanks for that.”

“Always,” she promised.

“Always,” he repeated.

And then neither of them said anything more, just waited out the rest of the night until morning arrived, but somehow, that was all they needed.

~To be continued…~

A/N 2: I am losing track of how many times I’ve written H/Hr having this conversation about what Hermione’s boggart was in Third Year but it really is canon, as far as I’m concerned, and somehow it keeps feeling appropriate to have them talk about it.

Fair warning, I plan to up the rating of this fic in the next chapter with what you’ve all been waiting for…

Disclaimer: See Chapter 1.

Author’s Note: Apologies for the long wait for this chapter. And as promised, this chapter has what you’ve all been waiting for—and smut too. I hope it’s worth the wait!

Living Past the End

~Chapter 10~

Harry jerked awake with a sharp gasp. His chest was tight, the blanket weighting him down, smothering him.

He surged upright, flinging the blanket away from him, as he tried to catch his breath. He clutched at his chest in an automatic, instinctive gesture.

Bloody damn, it was happening again.

His chest felt tight, as if it were being squeezed, his lungs collapsing even as he tried desperately to suck in air. He couldn’t. His lungs had stopped working—why had they stopped working?! He felt as if he were trying to suck molasses through a straw. And it hurt—it bloody well physically hurt as if his heart was trying to break free from his chest or his ribs had cracked or—

“Harry?”

He heard her voice as if it were far away, through the haze of dizziness and his own thundering heartbeats and shallow wheezing for breaths. And then he felt her arm going around his back, heard her voice in his ear.

Her familiar, calming voice. “It’s okay, Harry. It’s all going to be okay. Just breathe. You know how to do this. Just breathe in and then out.”

In and then out. It was hard—everything in his body seemed to want to fight against it—he couldn’t breathe, he needed to breathe more, faster, to get more air, he shouldn’t be slowing down!

But he listened to her. In spite of everything, his panic, his fears—or even, in a strange way, because of everything—he listened to her. It was one thing he’d learned in these last years, one thing he trusted in spite of everything. She was the one thing he trusted even when he knew nothing else, trusted nothing else. By now, his instinct to trust her, to listen to her, was engrained into him deeper than anything else and it was somehow enough to help him override the panicked messages of his body that he couldn’t breathe and needed to breathe more.

So he forced himself to listen, to do as she said. Forced himself to breathe in time with her words. In. And then out.

But with his panic over suffocating receding, the other terror—the one that had woken him—intruded and he felt another sharp stab of unreasoning fear.

He couldn’t—he couldn’t—

In an abrupt movement, he shifted, turning just enough so he could wrap his arms around her, tugging her in against him with a suddenness that made her grunt softly into his shoulder as he clutched her. Clutched her and let the solid warmth of her, the reassurance of her presence—there, with him, alive, safe—sink into him, seep into the cracks in his fragile hold on calm and fill them. She was like glue holding him together and without her, his tenuous ability to function, to get through each day, would shatter like glass.

He was, he realized belatedly, trembling slightly as he held her, the tremors becoming more noticeable now that his chest wasn’t heaving as he fought to breathe. And as his heartbeat slowly returned to normal, he realized, too, that she was murmuring to him, her voice soft and half-muffled against his shoulder.

“We’re safe, Harry. We’re all going to be okay. We’ll be fine…” Just those words, over and over, in a quietly reassuring mantra.

He needed her so much. He couldn’t—he could not lose her.

A slight shudder passed through him at the thought, his fingers tightening on her.

He wasn’t sure how much time passed before he realized he was calmer, he could breathe normally, his head clearing enough that he realized just how tightly he’d been holding her and that—

His thoughts abruptly froze, his mind blanking—or not blanking so much as focusing, everything in him zeroing in on one thing to the exclusion of all else.

She. Wasn’t. Wearing. A bra.

He could feel her—her breasts—oh Merlin oh damn he could feel her breasts— flattened against him and—and it was quite clear that there were only two layers of cloth, their pyjama shirts, separating them—and he couldn’t decide whether to bless or curse the fact that it was summer and their shirts were so obviously thin.

He was suddenly hot, forgetting entirely his panic, his terror, his nightmare, everything that haunted him, so he was only conscious of her and how close they were and that he wanted her.

He released her, letting her go and pulling away as if he’d been burned—and he felt as if he had been, swore he could still feel the way her breasts had felt against him, could still feel the twin points of her nip—he cut off the word, the thought. No no no oh no, he would not think it, had not noticed it.

This was Hermione, his best friend, not some random girl whom he could lust after. He could not—he would not think that way about Hermione.

He could sense her looking at him, sense her confusion and—hurt? He winced, suddenly thankful that it was too dark for him to see her face. If he saw her face, if he saw that he’d actually hurt her, he might just do something irretrievably stupid—like kiss her.

He yanked his thoughts away from that. He needed a distraction. Now.

“Talk to me,” he blurted out. “I need a distraction.”

“Okay,” she said slowly. She paused for a moment and then finally began, “I got my Hogwarts letter here. My parents, grandparents, and I had come down for a week on holiday and right in the middle of it, this letter arrived and, well, I guess I knew that my life would never be the same.”

“What was it like for you?” he asked, suddenly amazed that he’d never asked her about this before, to find out what the normal Muggle-born, non-Hagrid-involving experience of getting the letter from Hogwarts was like. And welcoming this neutral topic to focus on, all the better that it was from so long ago from when his friendship with Hermione had been so completely platonic, so simple.

“It was a shock but in an odd way, it was also a relief. To have an explanation for the weird things that kept happening to me, the weird things I kept causing. To know that I wasn’t just… a freak.”

“You’re not a freak.”

“I know that now,” she said and he heard the slight smile in her voice. “So it was a relief for me. I think it was just a shock for my parents and grandparents. Luckily, the letter came with a packet of information, a FAQ for Muggle-borns, and it gave a brief history of Hogwarts and the separation between the Muggle and Magical worlds, and detailed instructions for how to get to Diagon Alley, that sort of thing. Mum didn’t really want me to go—it was so new and they knew nothing about the magical world and she wasn’t too keen about the idea of me going to a boarding school—but my Dad and my grandfather and I managed to convince her, at least to let me try it. My parents told me that if I didn’t like it after the first year, I could leave and just go back to my old primary school and we’d never talk about it again.”

“Did you really think you might not like Hogwarts, that you’d leave it after the first year?” He felt a sudden chill go through him at the thought of that, of trying to get through the other years of Hogwarts without Hermione. He would probably have been dead long before now…

“I… I thought about it,” she admitted after a moment. “For the first few weeks at Hogwarts, I thought about it and a couple times, I even thought I’d decided, for sure, to leave after just a year.”

He gaped. “You—you did? What—what happened?”

He sensed rather than saw her smile, heard it in her voice as she answered. “A cave troll happened.”

He gaped. “You mean us, me and Ron happened?” he asked, incredulously and ungrammatically.

He heard her soft laugh and then he felt her move closer to him, her arm going around his shoulders in a quick companionable hug as she leaned her head against his arm for a moment. “Yes, you. It was the one thing I really hoped for, really wanted, from Hogwarts—real friends. Learning about magic was great, of course, and I liked it but it was still just studying and I could study, not the same things but the normal Muggle subjects, at home and be with my family. I thought… since I could really be happy studying pretty much anywhere, if I was still going to be alone with no friends, then I may as well be alone with no friends at home where I wouldn’t also be homesick.”

He hadn’t known that—how could he not have known, how could he not have seen that she was lonely all those years ago? How could he not have recognized that she was friendless, as he had always been? “I didn’t… I didn’t know it was that bad for you those first few weeks,” he managed to say.

She shrugged—was it possible to hear a shrug?—and yet somehow, he knew that she shrugged even though he couldn’t quite see her. “I never mentioned it but yeah, I was pretty lonely at first so I did think about leaving. I liked Hogwarts itself but I’d always liked school so Hogwarts was almost like every other school I’d been to in that sense and some of the magical experiences were frightening too and not all that fun to learn about. But then I got to know you and Ron and, well, that changed everything. Having real friends—that was different. I’d never really had friends before and I’d always wanted them and I knew I couldn’t leave Hogwarts after that.”

He was suddenly almost dizzy with relief that she hadn’t left, that she’d stayed, but even so, couldn’t keep from blurting out, “Even though Ron and I still thought you were kind of annoying that first year?”

“I was annoying our first year,” she admitted candidly. “But you and Ron put up with me anyway.”

“No, you weren’t,” he said quickly. “You were just… yourself.” Funny but when he remembered First Year and what Hermione had been like then—yes, she had been a know-it-all but now, thinking about it, what he really remembered was her loyalty, how much she’d helped him… A know-it-all, yes, but a know-it-all who hadn’t let him go face danger alone, who had, somehow, given him courage when he needed it…

“Mum asked, after First Year, if I really wanted to stay at Hogwarts. I think she knew the answer already from my letters but she had to ask and I told her that I couldn’t possibly leave yo—leave Hogwarts after all that had happened and I didn’t want to either.”

“I’m glad. I’m—really glad you didn’t leave,” was all he could think to say, entirely inadequately. And he was. He had acknowledged before that he would very likely have ended up dead, several times over, long before now if it hadn’t been for her—but somehow, now, the hypothetical possibility of it struck him forcefully, a retroactive shiver going through him over a danger narrowly avoided. Knowing that she really had thought about leaving the magical world, about leaving Hogwarts… Knowing how close it had really been especially since he had to admit that he and Ron had not been the best of friends to Hermione that first year… He remembered all the times he’d found Hermione to be irritating, all the times he hadn’t listened to her—but she had stayed.

She laughed softly and he felt her give his arm a playful nudge with her elbow. “I know you are. I’m glad I stayed too.”

“You’re glad? Why are you glad? You—you ended up in a lot of… trouble… because you stayed,” he blurted out, opting for the lesser word and wanting to avoid saying outright that she wouldn’t have been in danger of her life so frequently if she’d left. He knew she didn’t blame him for it but he could hardly believe that some part of her had not wished she could be safe, could have avoided all the fear and the danger by leaving Hogwarts—and he had to admit that if she had left Hogwarts after First Year, he might not have thought much about it or missed her all that much at the time. Blind, stupid git that he had been. She had a happy home to return to, unlike him; Hogwarts with all its dangers was not the sort of haven for her as it had been for him.

“Of course I’m glad I stayed at Hogwarts, Harry. We ran into trouble but, well, I used to think sometimes that it was an adventure too and it was never boring.”

He stared at her—or stared into the darkness at where he knew she was, a more solid shadow in the dark room, his throat suddenly feeling tight as a wave of emotion, a mixture of awe and affection and tenderness, engulfed him. He couldn’t even have said exactly why he was reacting so strongly but the depth and simplicity of her courage right then amazed him. To call being petrified by a basilisk an adventure… He knew her too well to think that she might have been unaware of the very real dangers they had faced or that she might have deliberately made light of them to somehow trick herself into not feeling afraid. No, she would have known and considered the risks back then—just as she had always known and considered the dangers they faced and it had not made a difference.

Unlike him, who had not really understood any of the risks or the dangers until this past year or so and had never really stopped to consider it either, as if some part of him had known that if he’d stopped to think about it, he wouldn’t have gone on, would have run. His bravery, such as it was, had been the product of ignorance and impulse and instinct and desperation.

Her bravery was different, a knowing courage, a thoughtful courage.

One hand lifted, almost of its own volition, and certainly without his having consciously decided what he was about to do, touching her hair and then her cheek, lightly. He sensed rather than heard her slight intake of breath, felt her utter stillness…

He kissed her. He couldn’t even have said why except that, at that moment, with his throat still feeling tight with emotion and then, on a more instinctive level, realizing that she’d reacted to his touch, the subconscious realization that his touch, as relatively platonic as it was, could affect her so strongly—he simply couldn’t not kiss her at that moment.

His hand cupped her cheek, his lips found hers, his eyes closed, her lips softened and clung to his and—

And his brain belatedly caught up to what he was doing—stupid, stupid, so stupid!—and he tore himself away from her, almost yanking his hand back.

“God, Hermione, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have don’t that! I didn’t mean to do that and I shouldn’t have done it!” he blurted out in a frantic rush of words, as if by speaking he could somehow blot out the memory of her lips or the way he swore he could still feel the pressure and the slight movement of her lips against his as she—his thoughts momentarily stuttered—kissed him back…

She didn’t say anything for a long minute and he was torn between a wish that he could see her face and desperate gratitude that he couldn’t see her face—no, that wasn’t true. He wasn’t torn, he didn’t want to see her face right then, was immediately certain that seeing her face would only make this worse somehow.

“It’s okay, Harry,” she finally said in a voice that sounded preternaturally composed. “You don’t need to apologize for not fancying me like that. I know I’m―”

“What―are you daft?” he interrupted her, his bafflement getting the better of his tact and his sense, “I never said I don’t fancy you or that I didn’t want to kiss you; I only said that I shouldn’t have done it!”

“You—you wanted to kiss me?”

His brain belatedly caught up to reality, shrieking a warning that he really shouldn’t answer that. “I shouldn’t have,” was all he said again.

“But why?” She hesitated and then said, “You know Ron and I aren’t—”

“It’s not that,” he interrupted her. “It’s because I can’t risk losing you. I—with Cho, even with Ginny, it didn’t… matter. Not as much. I didn’t—I don’t need them but you—you’re different. I—I do need you and I―”

She kissed him. One moment, words, somewhat incoherent and rambling as they were, were spilling from his mouth, the next, his words were cut off, swallowed, by her lips, as she kissed him. Her lips were somehow soft and forceful all at once and then she licked his lower lip and his lips parted automatically as she deepened the kiss and… and… the last remaining thoughts in his head disintegrated, leaving only want behind.

All the reasons he’d told himself he couldn’t do this, all the risks—hell, what was left of his sanity to say nothing of the entire rest of the world faded away and all he was aware of was her, of the softness of her lips, the taste of her, the touch of her hands on his cheek and then her fingers tangling in his hair… Heat and lust were spiraling up inside him, streaking through him like bolts of lightning. Good God, the fuzzy thought drifted through his mind, if he’d had any idea that kissing Hermione would feel like this, he would have kissed her years ago…

She was the one to break off the kiss and he felt the loss of her lips against his like a physical blow before his brain woke up and he realized—right, he hadn’t wanted to do this… At the moment, he was finding it hard to remember why but he had his reasons. And once he could think again, he would remember them.

She rested her forehead against his and he could hear that her breath was coming fast—as was his—could feel the soft, rapid puff of her breath against his lips—and he had to forcibly shove aside the impulse to change the angle of his head and close the distance between their lips.

No no no no, he wasn’t going to do that. He wasn’t going to kiss her anymore. Again. Really. He wasn’t. He wouldn’t kiss her again. Somehow.

“Harry, I—I don’t know what will happen to us after this but I promise you, no matter what, I’ll always—always—be your friend. I can’t imagine not being friends with you.”

“Neither can I,” he admitted automatically—before his brain caught up to his mouth and he belatedly realized that it was true. He wasn’t entirely sure how much of his certainty was from—the “thinking” of his, er, lower body that just wanted to keep on with the kissing—but he knew it was true. He hadn’t been able to imagine not being friends with Hermione for months, even years, now. But that didn’t make it any easier to risk changing the most important friendship of his life.

“I—I need you too, Harry. And I—”

“You do?” he interrupted her almost in spite of himself. He was so used to thinking that he needed her but somehow he’d never thought, never even dared to hope really, that she might need him too.

“Of course I do. You’re my best friend and I’ve tried to tell myself it—this—wasn’t worth the risk but I just… I can’t help… caring and… and wanting this and I—I care about you too much not to try…”

It was, he thought, the most… uncertain, diffident thing he’d ever heard her say and entirely unlike her usual decisive tone. She sounded… different. Vulnerable. Yes, that was the word. She—strong, confident, brave Hermione—was vulnerable. Because of him, because she… cared… cared so much about him…

And that was really what did it. It wasn’t the surge of exhilaration he felt at her confession that she wanted this—wanted to kiss him like this—although that was powerful enough to make him feel almost dizzy at the thought. But it wasn’t that. He might—probably, possibly, maybe—have resisted that. It was her tone, more than her words, that did it. Part of him might still be—was still terrified at the thought of risking their friendship, at the thought that if she realized she could do so much better than him, if she got tired of dealing with his nightmares and his lingering guilt, he could lose her or their friendship would become the awkward pseudo-friendship that was his relationship with Ginny right now. But he could not hurt Hermione. She was… vulnerable… she cared about him—and if he turned her away, he would hurt her. And he couldn’t do it.

“Hermione, I—are you sure? I mean, you—I’m kind of… a mess and, well, I know I can be a git and—you won’t get tired of me?”

“Oh, honestly, Harry!”

He couldn’t help smiling slightly at this return to the Hermione he knew so well—and then fleetingly wondered if there was something wrong with him to find her somewhat exasperated tone to be so comforting.

“I know you, remember? We fought a War together and spent almost every minute of the past year together—if I were going to get tired of you, I think it would have happened by now.”

He kissed her. There was no other possible response to what she’d just said, to the adorable—adorable?—thread of exasperation mingled in with affection in her tone. At least not for him, not at that moment. He lifted his hand to cup her face, tilting it just enough so he could, and he kissed her. And she made a soft sound in the back of her throat and kissed him back, pressing herself against him.

His other hand slid around her waist, keeping her against him, and almost of its own volition, his fingers found the hem of her pyjama top and slid inside to touch the bare skin of her back. Oh Merlin… His eyes almost rolled back in his head from the sheer rush of pleasure. Her skin was so smooth, so soft, so warm to the touch. He could become addicted to the feel of her skin under his hands.

His hand cupped the back of her neck beneath her hair and then skimmed down the lithe line of her spine as she shifted closer to him, his hand sliding to explore the curve of her waist and the flare of her hip. The memory, the mental image of her at the beach a few days earlier, of the way she’d looked with her wet shirt clinging to her, flashed through his mind. And he was momentarily stunned, amazed all over again, that this was Hermione he was kissing like this, touching like this. Hermione he wanted like this, after years of platonic friendship.

His other hand had wandered at will over the bare skin of her back—dear Merlin, the feel of her skin, the heat of it, the smoothness of it beneath his hand… He was addicted to it, addicted to her, could never get enough of the feel of her, as his hand ventured further, deeper within her loose pyjama top until he abruptly realized that his hand had wandered to the side of her—of her breast.

Sudden panic gripped him—this was Hermione and he couldn’t—wouldn’t—go that far, pressure her like that! It didn’t matter what he wanted; all that mattered was her and he wouldn’t go any further, do anything more, than what she wanted, was comfortable with.

Anyway, it wasn’t as if kissing her like this and touching the bare skin of her back wasn’t heady enough. He let his hand slide back down her back, retreating from how far it had ventured beneath her top.

Her hands had been in his hair but then they left him as she broke off the kiss and he froze—oh God, he knew he’d gone too far, done too much—but then he felt her fingers wrapping around his wrists and before he could blink or breathe or think anything, she brought his hands up to cup her breasts through her flimsy top.

Oh gods…

He thought he might choke on his own tongue as he gasped, his breath—to say nothing of what little remained of his sanity—leaving him in a rush.

She was incredible.

It was his last coherent thought as she gave a soft moan and then arched, pressing herself further into his hands. And any last hope he had of resisting, of stopping, died a quick death.

He cupped her breasts, learning the shape of them, the weight of them. Her breasts were small but… but… perfect… He could feel her nipples harden beneath her pyjama top and, on an impulse, gently pinched them between his fingers and she gave a soft, breathless cry.

“Harry,” she panted, “I want…. Let’s get out of these clothes.”

God, yes… He’d never in his life heard anything more erotic than those words and more than the words, the way she’d said them, the husky, breathless want in them.

He caught her shoulders, tugging her to him for a quick, hard kiss. “Yes,” he breathed against her lips. “Yes,” he repeated and then blurted out, inanely, “I want you.”

She let out a huff of breath that was halfway between a laugh and a sigh. “I want to feel your skin.”

He changed his mind. No, that was definitely the most erotic thing he’d ever heard in his life and it ripped a groan from him as he released her. He almost tore off his shirt—vaguely surprised that he didn’t rip it in his impatience—and then fumbled to push off his pyjama bottoms.

He could sense Hermione’s movements next to him, heard the faint rustling and then the soft plop of her pyjamas being dropped on the floor and the sound of it, the awareness that she was taking off her clothes, ratcheted up the tension, his arousal spiking to near painful heights.

Taking off his shorts was a more clumsy exercise than he would have liked, his hands almost trembling from impatience and lust, but he managed it and then almost groaned at the sheer relief of his arousal being freed from the confines of his shorts before he flung them away.

It was still too dark in the room for him to see anything but really, they didn’t need to see, he found himself thinking vaguely, suddenly convinced that even without it, he would sense her, would be drawn to her like a magnet.

His hand found her shoulder, her hand found his arm, and he was tugging her to him or she was tugging him to her—they were both just reaching for the other as they fell back together onto the bed, landing in a messy tangle.

She landed awkwardly half on top of him, her elbow finding his ribs, and he grunted and she let out a half-laugh. “Sorry.”

“’s okay,” he rasped as he shifted, rolled, until he was the one half over her, the length of his body pressed against hers.

No, he couldn’t see her but he didn’t feel like he needed to see her. He could feel her, feel the heat of her skin and the softness of it, feel the length of her legs against his, feel the curve of her waist and hips under his hands. He could feel her and he already felt like he might explode right then and there; he was suddenly, even irrationally, convinced that if he could see her too, the sight of her would really be the end of him.

And there was an added eroticism, too, to the darkness, the inability to see heightening all his other senses until he felt hyper-aware of every inch where their bodies touched. He could hear her every breath, swore he could feel her heart beat.

“Harry…” she breathed and then he felt her reaching for him, her arms sliding around him as she pressed herself closer against him. God…

One of his hands slid into her hair as his mouth found hers and he kissed her, hard, his tongue sliding into her mouth, tasting her, claiming her, until he had to break away just to breathe. But he didn’t go far, too addicted to the feel of her, the taste of her. He only slid his lips to her cheek, pressing soft, slightly damp, kisses, down to her chin and then along the line of her jaw, his lips finding the slight hollow just in front of her ear and then letting his tongue flick out to lightly trace the whorl of her ear before returning to her temple.

“You’re so… lovely,” he breathed against her skin. Funny, how he had become so used to thinking of her as being lovely that the words came so readily to his lips even now when he could have sworn he wasn’t capable of a coherent thought.

All the while, she’d gasped and then panted but at his words she laughed suddenly, softly, and he froze, pulling back slightly, confused.

“Hermione?”

“You can’t even see me. And I know I’m not—”

He cut her off with another kiss, fairly quickly, but lingering with enough force that he knew she could feel all his passion. “I know what you look like and you are lovely. You’ve always been lovely; I was just too stupid to see it.”

“Oh, Harry…”

“Besides,” he added, letting his hand skim down her body in a light caress of the side of her breast, her waist, her hips, her thigh, “you feel lovely too. I don’t need to see you to know it.”

“Oh, Harry,” she said again in something like a moan and it was her turn to kiss him, flattening her lips against his and pressing herself against him with a force that knocked the breath from his body and him onto his back. And then she was lying half on top of him, her breasts flattened against his chest as one hand wandered over his chest, pausing to lightly pinch one of his nipples—he groaned—and then down his stomach until her hand—her evil, wonderful hand—closed around him and his entire body jerked.

“Hermione!” he choked out.

She paused—while he tried to suck in air and not choke on his own tongue in the process—and then slowly, too slowly, she let her hand move on him, stroking along the length of him and then feathering her fingers along the end of his aching arousal—

And he grabbed her wrist with his hand, pulling her away from his body. “Enough!” he groaned. “I can’t—” He gulped for breath and for some last remaining tendrils of sanity. “It’s your turn,” he managed to gasp.

He moved one hand to her shoulder to push her gently back and then it was his turn to touch her, to explore her, more than he had already. He cupped her breasts—small and perfect—shaped them and then replaced his hand with his mouth, tasting her, running his tongue around her nipple, and then gently sucking.

She cried out, arching her back as her hand came up to tangle in his hair holding him in place. And he smiled slightly against her breast, feeling an odd, amazing thrill go through him at the realization that she liked what he was doing. She liked it… And suddenly all he wanted in the world was to learn more of what she liked, to please her again, more.

He scattered kisses across her chest to repeat his caresses on her other breast, licking her, savoring her.

His hand slipped down her body, caressing the soft skin of her stomach and then down, tracing her hips and her thighs.

She moaned and stirred, pressing closer to him, her thighs parting. “Harry,” she panted. “I want… touch me.”

He almost stopped breathing but he let his hand stray, smoothing over her thigh and then finally, carefully, touching the center of her. She was so… so hot, so wet, so slick…

Oh God oh God oh God oh Merlin… He felt like his heart were trying to pound its way out of his chest, his lungs frozen, and he swore his eyes almost crossed. This was Hermione and he was—he was touching her, touching her there and… and…

“I don’t… tell me what to do,” he blurted out and he knew he was blushing, was, for the first time, thankful for the dark that didn’t let her see that. He couldn’t believe he’d said it but he had to—he needed to know what to do. He didn’t know much but he knew it wasn’t always… er, good… for girls but this was Hermione and she mattered to him too much. He needed to make this good for her.

“I… I just… move your hand... touch me more…”

He did. Carefully, tentatively, at first, and then with more confidence as she stirred against him and moaned. He explored her with gentle fingers and then, almost by accident, one finger slipped inside her. And oh Merlin, she was so wet, so tight… He thought he might explode himself just from touching her even though she hadn’t tried to touch him in minutes.

She cried out sharply, her hips arching. “Yes… oh, yes…”

His thumb passed over a small nub of flesh and she—she shrieked. There was no other word for it and he froze, suddenly terrified that he’d done something wrong, that he’d hurt her.

But then she gasped, “That… do that again…”

She had liked that. Warmth burst inside his chest and if it made any sense, he felt as if his very heart were smiling even though his features felt frozen, unable to move, too focused on her, on the feel of her. Emboldened, encouraged—and desperately aroused—he moved his thumb again, finding that nub of flesh, rubbing against it—and she shrieked again and then she was gasping, almost sobbing, her wet passage tightening around his finger, her body arching as her hands clutched at him.

She had just… He had made her… come, he thought fuzzily. If he could have, if it hadn’t felt like his face was frozen into a rictus of pained arousal, he would have been grinning like a maniac. He was almost dizzy with arousal and triumph and pleasure and possessiveness and joy.

On the surge of fierce emotion, he forgot all else, forgot any uncertainty, just flattened himself against her, crushing his lips against hers as he kissed her with all the added passion from knowing he had made her come.

The thought, the words, were the hottest, sexiest thing and he swore sent another jolt of desperate desire sizzling through him, setting his every nerve on fire before pooling in his groin. God, he needed her. Needed to be inside her. He was going to die if he didn’t come as well.

He could feel her, the hot, wet center of her, against him and he rocked against her, his hips thrusting in mindless, brainless instinct. And then he thought his heart would explode from wonder and gratitude as he felt her hips shift beneath him, arching, wordlessly guiding him until just the tip of him found her, slid into her, and then he lost his mind and plunged forward―

She stiffened and cried out—not from pleasure, he didn’t know how but somehow he knew that, could hear the difference in her tone—and he froze again, the thought of her pain ripping through his haze of desperate wanting. Oh God oh no, he’d hurt her. He was an idiot, an arse, and he didn’t deserve her.

“Hermione? Are you… okay?” he managed to choke out. He was in physical pain. It was torture. He needed to move, needed to come, thought he would go insane or… or something if he didn’t explode soon but he couldn’t hurt her, would rather die than hurt her…

She was breathing in soft, shallow pants, still stiff beneath him. “I’m… fine…”

No, she wasn’t. He didn’t know much but he knew that. He could feel it in her stiffness, the tension in her body, feel it in the sudden added pressure of her hands on him.

It was… for him, he suddenly realized. She was reassuring him, comforting him. As she always reassured him and comforted him. Even after he had just hurt her, even though he knew she was still distinctly uncomfortable, at best, if not in outright pain, at worst.

He felt a sudden swell of painful tenderness that almost drowned out his arousal and lowered his lips to hers, kissing her softly, gently, and then moving on to touch his lips in feather-light caresses to her nose, her eyelids, the corner of her eyebrow, her cheek. Oh, Hermione…

She slid one hand into his hair, bringing his lips back to hers, as she kissed him, softly, and then with more passion.

And then amazingly, he felt her body stir, shifting and softening beneath him. And she broke off their kiss to breathe, “It’s okay, Harry. I’m okay. I want this. I want you.”

I want this. I want you.

He’d never heard anything more beautiful in his life. He released the breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding in a gasp, kissing her again, as he let himself move, his hips finding an instinctive rhythm.

She returned his gasp and then she was clutching him, her hands moving from his hair to his shoulders down his back and then up again in restless caresses. He could hear her soft pants, feel her breath against his cheek…

And then he almost felt as if he were going blind and deaf and he could no longer hear her panting, couldn’t hear anything except for the roaring of his own blood, his own heartbeat in his ears. He was trembling, he was dying, he was burning, he was exploding inside her with a last thrust…

He collapsed on top of her, boneless, breathless, brainless. He felt drained, emptied, as if he had given her his entire life, his mind, his heart, even his soul…

He wasn’t sure how long it was before he regained some ability to think and realized he must be too heavy for her, lying on top of her as he was, and managed to roll over onto his back.

In an unspoken accord, more instinctive than out of conscious decision, they shifted, rearranging themselves more comfortably, as she ended up nestled against him, her head resting on his shoulder.

He let his eyes close, the better to enjoy the feel of her pressed against him, the solid warmth of her delicious curves. It felt… amazing… just as amazing but in a different way if that made any sense than it had been to touch her, to be inside her… but there was something about this, an intimacy, about feeling her body against his. A sort of lazy, even sleepy eroticism about feeling her breasts—amazing, beautiful breasts—flattened against him. Not to do anything or actively caress her—he was still too sated for that but just to feel her.

He curved his arm around her, settling her just that tiniest bit closer against him, his fingers idly finding and playing with her hair. His other hand found hers where it rested on his chest, tangling his fingers with hers, and then bringing her hand to his lips so he could press a kiss to her palm. Her fingers automatically curved around his cheek in a caress of sorts and he felt her breath against his skin as she sighed a little, heard a soft humming sound that he could only describe as a purr. He felt a flowering of tenderness and something like joy in his chest at the sound—he’d never known that Hermione would purr like that—and turned his head just enough to brush his lips against the top of her head.

This was peace, he realized vaguely. Deep, drugging peace and… and happiness… of the sort he couldn’t remember ever feeling before…

The fuzzy thought drifted into his mind that he never wanted to move again, could happily stay like this—just like this—forever. Wanted to be with her—with Hermione—like this forever.

And then with a little more clarity, he realized—Hermione! It was Hermione he’d touched and caressed and… and shagged…

He wasn’t quite sure why the thought suddenly struck him as being significant. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t been aware, hadn’t always known, that it was Hermione’s body he was exploring—he’d been more than aware of it. He suspected—no, he was sure that this, everything they had just done, wouldn’t have meant so much to him if it had been with anyone else. Only with Hermione…

But for whatever reason, he did feel like it was important, somehow, to realize, again, that this was Hermione. Hermione, who had been his platonic best friend for so long. Hermione, who was now his… what? His thoughts were still sluggish, he couldn’t think of a word to describe what Hermione was to him now.

“Hermione,” he murmured before he’d even realized he was going to.

“Mmm?” She didn’t move, only made a sort of inquiring sound in the back of her throat. And something about the sound seemed to settle inside his chest, warming it.

He smiled slightly, automatically, his eyes still closed. He was just… content… “Nothing. I just wanted to make sure it was really you.”

He felt her lips curve into a smile against his skin—and felt the tingle of heat that went through him in response all over his body. God, that was… hot…

“It’s me and I’m not going anywhere,” she murmured.

“Good. That’s good.” It sounded like… the best thing ever. It sounded like all he wanted in the world, this warmth, this peace, with Hermione.

He didn’t know how much time went by as he drifted… not fully awake but not quite asleep either, always pleasantly conscious of the warmth of her against him, the feel of her curves against him.

He could feel her breathing becoming deep and even, a slight, rhythmic stirring of the air against his skin.

She stirred, nestling against him, and then a sleepy murmur. “Love you.”

His eyes snapped open as he was abruptly jolted back into full awareness. Did she—had she really—she had just said she loved him.

The words were echoing in his mind almost as if they’d been shouted rather than the soft, rather fuzzy, whisper they had been. Love you. Love you. Love you…

He turned his head on the pillow as much as he could without moving anything else, not wanting to disturb her. The room was still too dark for him to see much beyond the indistinct pale oval of her face but he stared at her anyway, his mind filling in what he couldn’t see.

She loved him? She loved him.

He heard the words in his mind again—love you—savored them. He’d never heard the words before, he suddenly realized, at least not to remember. He supposed his parents must have said them to him but he couldn’t remember it. And since then… no one had ever told him, said those words.

Until now. Until Hermione.

Hermione loved him.

It was… amazing. Even miraculous. Not only to hear the words but to know that Hermione—Hermione—loved him. Amazing because it was Hermione and he knew how loyal she was, how caring she was, how honest she was… Amazing because he knew that if she said it, she meant it, and if she meant it…

Hermione loved him—and that meant it would be the truest, deepest, strongest thing in the world… And he was the luckiest person in the world.

She loved him. And he loved her.

It should have felt like a revelation. He’d never thought the words, never realized or thought to identify all he felt for Hermione as love. But now, he knew it—and somehow felt as if he’d always known it. Of course he loved her. There was no other way to describe all she meant to him, all he felt for her. More than friendship, more than affection, more than loyalty, more than gratitude, and much more than simple lust… He loved her. Of course he did. It suddenly seemed like the most natural, most obvious thing in the world.

His name was Harry Potter. The sun rose in the east. Water was wet. He loved Hermione.

He felt a bubble of laughter in his chest at the seeming absurdity of his thoughts and bit it back, not wanting to wake her up.

He loved Hermione. And she loved him.

Love you.

His entire life, he suddenly felt, had been leading up to this—everything he’d done, everything he’d been through—it had all been for this. For this moment, for this knowledge, for this love.

And of course it had been Hermione who was the first person to say those words to him. It could only have been Hermione. It had always been meant to be Hermione.

Images, memories, flickered through his mind. More important things… friendship and bravery and— oh, Harry! Hermione’s face just before she’d hugged him—the first time in his memory that anyone had hugged him.

The look on Hermione’s face, the tears streaking her face, when he saw her after—after everything that had happened at the end of Fourth Year, on that terrible night, the worst night of his life until then.

And Hermione’s face just before she’d kissed his cheek the first time—the first time in his memory that anyone had kissed him. He suddenly remembered the fleeting touch of her lips to his cheek, the brief warmth of her nearness.

And—with an inward shudder—other memories came winging into his mind, tearing at his newfound contentment: the sound of her scream, the way she’d looked under the Cruciatus…

He yanked his mind away from those memories, focusing instead on the reality of her against him at that moment—and found that, for once, it wasn’t hard to do. The terror of his memories receded, vanished, as quickly as a mist disappeared in sunlight She was here, with him; she was safe. He tightened his arm almost imperceptibly around her, careful not to disturb her, as he focused on her. Focused on the warmth of her bare skin against him, focused on the steady sound of her breathing. Focused on the memory of her words. Love you…

He closed his eyes, relaxing further into the mattress. He was with her and there was nothing more he wanted.

“I love you, ‘Mione.” And he wasn’t sure if he only thought the words or actually murmured them aloud. Not that it mattered.

I love you.

After all these years, after all they had been through together, after all the smiles and the laughter and the tears and the dangers…

A memory drifted back into his mind. He knew how to finish her sentence. There were more important things, like friendship and bravery and love…

And on that vague thought, he slept.

~To be continued…~

A/N 2: No, this fic isn’t over yet, but it is winding down. At this point, I think there’ll be just a couple more chapters before this fic will (finally) be done.

Disclaimer: See Chapter 1.

Author’s Note: Prepare yourself for a chapter of fluff and smut and basically no plot whatsoever. I wasn’t planning on this chapter being so plot-less but, well, H/Hr had other ideas. Enjoy!

Living Past the End

~Chapter 11~

An errant ray of sunlight slipped in past the drawn curtains and shone on Hermione’s face.

A slight frown creased her brow as she turned her head away, resisting the tug of consciousness, only to find her nose half squashed against something hard. And she awoke, her eyes opening.

Oh…

Her nose was pressed against Harry’s shoulder. Harry’s bare shoulder.

She felt what was probably a rather dreamy smile curve her lips as the memory of the night before returned to her mind in a rush.

Harry was asleep. Moving cautiously so as not to disturb him, she shifted a little away from him, curling one arm beneath her head to get a better view of his face.

As always in the few times she’d seen him sleeping, she was struck by how different he looked in sleep. He looked younger in sleep but even so, he didn’t look young. It made her newly conscious of just how much the stresses of the past couple years had aged his face beyond his years, even in sleep but especially so when he was awake. She couldn’t help thinking that the lines around his eyes, the way his skin looked stretched tight across his cheekbones, were evidence of the price he had paid for these years of becoming so familiar with the darkest aspects of magic and humanity in defiance of his true nature.

He stirred slightly in his sleep, his head turning fractionally away from her as a sighing breath soughed from his parted lips.

She found herself focusing on his lips, a flush of heat spreading through her entire body. She wanted him. She was a little amazed at how much she wanted him, the ferocity of the lust she felt. She’d known, of course, that she was physically attracted to Harry, but she was still accustomed to thinking of Harry in terms of her emotional attachment to him, so used to thinking of him as the best friend she cared for so much and less used to thinking of him as a physical, sensual being. Now, though, after last night, she didn’t think she’d ever be able to look at him or think of him again without remembering the way he’d kissed her, remembering the feel of his lips and his hands on her skin…

Almost of its own volition, one hand stretched out, wanting to touch his face, trace his familiar features with her fingers—but then she stopped, her hand hovering little more than an inch above his face.

No, she couldn’t touch him now. She knew what a light sleeper he was and how little sleep he tended to get these days. And she knew if she touched him, he would wake up and she couldn’t—she wouldn’t—cut short his sleep now.

She drew her hand back. No, she wouldn’t wake him up.

Besides, she thought with an inward smile, she could touch him all she wanted once he woke up. She didn’t have to try to hide her physical reaction to Harry anymore. She hugged that knowledge to herself, savored it. And savored even more the fact that amazingly—thrillingly—Harry wanted her too.

She had been so convinced for so long that Harry would never see her as being a girl, never view her in anything other than a purely platonic light. So convinced that even after he’d kissed her, she still couldn’t believe he’d really wanted to do it rather than it just being a thoughtless impulse for friendship or comfort or whatever—the mistake of a moment and immediately regretted. She didn’t think—no, she knew Harry wouldn’t deliberately lead her on to think he cared more than he did or that he might use her for purely physical purposes—but for all that, she also knew Harry’s impulsive streak. She knew the way Harry sometimes acted on the impulse of a split second, out of pure instinct, without stopping to think, and how that tendency led him into trouble. And when Harry had broken off their kiss so quickly—just after she’d realized that Harry was kissing her—and started babbling an apology, it had seemed so… inevitable that the kiss might have been a meaningless, instantly regretted impulse.

But then… to learn that, after all, while it might have been an impulse, it hadn’t been meaningless at all, had been, if anything, all too meaningful…

At that moment, in the surge of joy she’d felt, she really could not have done anything else except kiss him—finally—the way she’d wanted to kiss him for months. And for all the times she’d thought about kissing Harry, touching Harry, nothing could have prepared her for the reality of it. The reality of his lips and his hands and his body…

She felt herself flush at the thought, her body melting, tingling, with remembered pleasure…

And then, as if tugged out of sleep by the force of her wanting him, he woke up. Startled awake, really.

It was a little shocking—and a little saddening—the way he jerked awake, going from sleep to complete alertness in the space of an instant, the immediate return of tension to his body as if he was, in that split second, completely battle-ready.

He turned his head sharply and saw her—and relaxed with almost as much suddenness as he had awoken. “Oh.” The word escaped him in something of a sigh.

She met his eyes, seeing the way the shadows in his eyes retreated, faded, as his eyes became clearer and softer than she could ever remember seeing before, a change all the more noticeable now, without the usual barrier of his glasses.

She felt herself blushing hotly under his gaze, suddenly feeling a little shy, self-conscious, at the new softness in his expression. “Hi,” she finally whispered, inanely, needing to break the silence.

“You’re here,” he breathed in response and there was something like wonder in his tone.

He shifted, turning onto his side to face her more fully, and then lifted one hand to touch his fingers to her cheek in a fleeting, feather-light caress. And there was something like wonder in his touch too.

Her breath and her heart seemed to flutter a little at his touch.

“You slept,” she said softly after another long moment of silence stretched out between them.

“I did.”

She felt her heart pinch a little at the thread of surprise in his tone. And on the swell of tenderness, she reached out her hand to touch him the way she’d wanted to since she’d woken up. The way she’d wanted to touch him for years, really.

His eyes closed at her touch as her fingers gently brushed a lock of his unruly hair away from his eyes then traced his eyebrow before skating down his temple. Funny, how even now, when she knew she could touch him so much more intimately, it was being able to touch him like this—simple, barely-more-than-platonic touches—that meant so much to her. Her thumb lightly stroked the bridge of his nose and then down to touch the dent just above his upper lip. He reached up and caught her hand in his, pressing a kiss to her palm, and she caught her breath at the sensation, the way sparks of desire tingled up her entire arm. She’d never known her palm could be such an erogenous spot but she suspected she’d never forget it again.

He opened his eyes and his expression abruptly changed, his eyes darkening. She followed his gaze to realize, belatedly, that the movement of her arm had caused the blanket to slide down and that, with her arm still extended, he now had a clear view of her bare breasts.

She felt herself blushing even hotter than she had before, her entire body burning with an odd mixture of self-consciousness, arousal, and the beginnings of embarrassment. It had been so much easier to be uninhibited, to invite his touch so openly, in the darkness. Now in the light of the morning…

She could have retrieved her arm, Harry’s grip on her hand having slackened in his distraction, and shielded herself from his gaze. She could have—but she didn’t. In spite of her self-consciousness, in spite of her sudden, uncharacteristic shyness, she didn’t cover herself. Because whatever else, she wanted to be with Harry like this, wanted it enough that it easily over-rode her instinctive modesty.

“God, Hermione,” he finally rasped with a sort of reverent enthusiasm. “I told you you’re lovely.”

She felt his words as if it were a touch, felt her nipples tightening, her insides seeming to liquefy with desire. And she couldn’t help the soft moan of arousal that escaped her lips.

His eyes darkened and flared at the sound and then he reached for her, his fingertips lightly resting on her breast and then tracing a delicate circle, his touch oddly hesitant, as if this was the first time he’d touched her so intimately and he wasn’t sure she would let him. Little tendrils of fire seemed to streak out along her every nerve ending at his touch. He brushed his fingers across her peaked nipples once, twice, until she gasped, a fresh shiver of want streaking through her and pooling between her thighs.

It was stunning, how her entire body reacted to his touch and to his expression, the look of totally focused intensity on his face as he stared at her, as if memorizing the way her body looked and learning the reactions of her body to his touch were the only things in the entire world that mattered to him.

Oh, the way he looked at her… She felt… beautiful. More than that, she felt desirable. Sexy. For the first time in her life. And in some small corner of her, she dimly realized that she’d wanted to feel beautiful, perhaps all her life. And now, she did. Because of Harry. And it was thrilling and, somehow, arousing too.

Only Harry, she thought fuzzily. Only Harry could arouse her so much with just looking at her… In some small corner of her mind that still retained some coherence, she knew that lust was universal and arousal a natural thing—and yet, at that moment, she was somehow sure, too, that this—this unfurling of warmth and knee-weakening desire inside her from his touch and his look—this was unique to them. This was about him and her and somehow, irrationally, she couldn’t help but feel that she was meant to be with him like this. Meant to have him touch her like this, his hands exploring, learning, the curves of her breasts, the hardened peaks of her nipples, the soft skin of her stomach…

He was learning her body the way he already knew her personality and her thoughts… And something about the thought made her suddenly desperate to learn him too.

Her hand had fallen to rest on his bare shoulder but now she moved it, sliding down his arm in a long caress that also served to push the blanket further down, baring them both to the other’s gaze.

And just as he had watched her, studied her, it was her turn now to study him, letting her gaze roam over his chest and then down his flat stomach to his jutting arousal. Harry wanted her. And somehow, even though after the night before and all that had happened this morning, she had already known that he wanted her, even as much as she wanted him, seeing the proof of his desire amazed her all over again.

Oh Lord… It was… him, she thought inanely, any ability to think coherently leaving her brain completely. She was seeing all of him now and he was… He was… She couldn’t think of a word. All she knew was that she burned with wanting to touch him all over.

She let her hand sweep across his chest, brushing her fingers over his flat nipples as he had done to her, and he made a sound like a strangled moan. Her hand wandered further, down his stomach, feeling his muscles contracting automatically at her touch.

He had lost weight, she realized, rather inconsequentially. She knew she had lost weight in the last year but she hadn’t known that he had too. It hadn’t been apparent when he was clothed but now, she could see that it was true. It was evident in the hollows above his slim hips, in the way she could feel his ribs so easily in running her hand down his stomach.

Her heart pinched a little and in the surge of tenderness, she reached for him, sliding closer so she could kiss him, softly at first, and then with more passion, as she felt his arm tightening around her.

She broke off the kiss only to drag her lips down his chin and then further, scattering soft kisses along the line of his jaw and then sliding further down to kiss his throat, her lips parting so she could touch her tongue lightly to the delicate skin just below his Adam’s apple. She felt it bob as he swallowed, a half-strangled groan issuing from his throat, and she smiled slightly against his skin, thrilling at this power to arouse him.

Her hands hadn’t been still either, making their own way south, as she let her hands wander freely over his chest and his stomach and then down, her fingers tracing down his thigh and then up again. Her wrist brushed lightly against his rampant arousal and he moaned, his hips jerking a little, and she gave in to the wordless begging of his body by circling her fingers around him delicately at first. He gave another strangled groan and she closed her hand around him with more firmness and stroked.

“Hermione!” he choked out, her name roughened, blurred into something rather less than three syllables. His hips stirred and his hand clutched convulsively at the sheets.

She touched him with more boldness, her hand stroking along his length, exploring the velvet hardness of him. She felt something like exultation rushing through her veins, glorying in this, in knowing she was pleasuring him like this. She wanted to give him pleasure, wanted to give him everything.

He cried out and then he grabbed her wrist in his hand, pulling her away from him.

“Stop. Please,” he gasped, his breath coming shallow and fast.

His arms pulled her in and up, his lips finding hers as he kissed her more forcefully than he had before.

She pressed herself against him. She could not get close enough; she felt as if even crawling inside his body wouldn’t be close enough for her. She wanted to be even closer, wanted more, and without thought, acting purely on instinct and desire, she slid one leg over his. His thigh slipped between hers, coming dangerously close to the core of her, and she broke off the kiss to gasp at the heat and the friction.

And then, with a boldness that surprised her when she remembered it later but didn’t occur to her then, too preoccupied with wanting to touch him more, taste him, she shifted to straddle him fully.

He sucked in his breath sharply and she looked up to meet his wide eyes, looking almost black with desire.

“Hermione, you—” he almost croaked.

Something about the way he was staring at her—as if she was the most beautiful, amazing thing he’d ever seen, as if she was a goddess, a siren—filled her with an odd confidence, an odd sort of knowledge. As if her body, in timeless instinct, knew what to do even as she really didn’t. His hands had fallen to her hips, holding her, as she rose up and then slid down over him, around him. She let out a soft hiss of breath at a twinge of not-quite-pain, more a little discomfort, as her body adjusted again to this invasion, the muscles in her thighs stretching to this new position.

But then his fingers tightened a little convulsively on her hips, his hips rising beneath her, and she gasped, any discomfort forgotten in the fresh tingle of sensation at the feeling of him inside her.

And her body took over, rocking above him in a mindless, instinctive rhythm, as his hips thrust up to meet hers. The world narrowed, faded around her, until all that existed was the harsh sounds of their breathing, of the sensation of his body inside her, the wonderful, thrilling heat and friction of their joined bodies.

She felt the pressure—the pleasure—building, building, inside her until it finally burst, sheer sensation roaring through her body as if a starburst of pure physical pleasure had exploded inside her. She was vaguely aware of his hands clutching her with sudden convulsive force, his hips thrusting one last time, and then there was a flood of warmth inside her as a hoarse cry ripped from his throat.

She slumped on top of him, her suddenly boneless body draping over his, as the burst of tingling sensation slowly faded.

She felt woolly-headed from the mind-stealing pleasure so it was some time—she didn’t know how much time—before she gradually realized where she was and murmured, “Am I too heavy for you?”

“No, stay,” he mumbled a little thickly. “I like feeling you on top of me.”

The words surprised a soft laugh from her and she lifted her head a little to look at him, although it seemed to take an inordinate amount of energy to do so. Was he—he was blushing, his cheeks reddening a little. It was… endearing, adorable, even. And she couldn’t help but ask, “You like having me on top of you?”

“No. I mean, yes. I mean, that didn’t come out right,” he blurted out and then grimaced a little. “I just… I like being like this,” he finished a little awkwardly.

She smiled slightly, lowering her head again to nestle against his shoulder. A little inarticulate as he had been, she understood. She liked being like this too, liked the closeness of it, liked the sensation of his heart beating against hers, liked the feeling of almost sinking into him, as if their bodies were melding together. She liked the solid heat of him beneath her, liked the warmth and the weight of his arms around her. She liked it all. She loved it all, loved him.

“I love you, you know,” she heard him mumble.

It was such a perfect reflection of what she’d been thinking that for a moment, she hardly registered that he’d spoken or exactly what he’d said. It seemed like a full minute, maybe even more than that, passed before she realized—he… he loved her? He hadn’t just said that, had he? She lifted her head again to stare at him. His eyes had been closed but at her movement, he opened them.

“You do?” she asked a little breathlessly.

He blinked, a faint frown of confusion flitting across his face. “Do I what?”

“You said… you love me.”

He opened his mouth, closed it, and then opened it again. “I do.” And somehow there was both wonder and certainty in his tone.

“Oh, Harry…” It was all she could think to say, somehow, and all she could do was kiss him, although her lips landed more on his chin than on his lips, until he lifted his head, one hand sliding up her back to cup the back of her neck, and kissed her, softly. “I love you,” she whispered against his lips when the kiss ended.

Emotion flared in his eyes as he just stared at her for a long moment, in which she could almost see the confused welter of thoughts flooding his mind, but all he said, sighed really, was her name, “Hermione…” Just her name but something about his tone made it seem eloquent.

A few strands of her hair slid down, fell over her face, and he tucked them behind her ear with unthinking tenderness, his hand lightly cupping her cheek. And if she had had any lingering doubts about his sincerity, they would have been banished in that instant.

Harry loved her. After all these years, after all these months of futilely trying to convince herself that being Harry’s best friend, knowing he trusted her and confided in her more than anyone else, would be enough for her.

Funny, she would have expected that the happiness she felt would have been reflected in the brightest of smiles but somehow, the moment felt too solemn for smiles. The knowledge that Harry loved her meant too much to her to make her feel like smiling.

“I didn’t know…” The sighing words slipped from her lips without her thinking about it.

Confusion flickered across his face. “You didn’t know what?”

“I didn’t think you would ever think of me like this, that you would ever love me.”

“Why not?”

“Well, we’ve just been best friends for so long,” she began slowly, trying to put into words some of her mostly unexpressed beliefs, “and I’m not like Cho or Ginny. I’m not… interested in Quidditch or… or very pret—”

“No,” he interrupted her. “You’re not like Cho or Ginny. You’re… better than they are. Quidditch and all that—that’s not that important.”

“Don’t let Ron hear you say that Quidditch isn’t important. He might disown you from being his friend.”

He laughed and she felt the rumble of his laughter in his chest.

She smiled helplessly back at him, her heart reacting as it always did to the sight and sound of his laugh.

“That’s why you’re better,” he said a little abruptly.

A slight frown drew her brows together. “What?”

“You make me laugh,” he explained simply. “With Cho or Ginny, I didn’t, somehow. And I can talk to you. I didn’t—couldn’t—really talk to them.”

“Oh, Harry…” A smile trembled on her lips as she reached up and did something she’d wanted to do for years, running her fingers lightly through his messy hair. “You really are sweet, you know.”

His lips twisted into a rather rueful half-smile. “I think it makes me sound daft. I mean, I didn’t know anything about Cho except what she looked like and that she played Quidditch but I fancied her anyway. No wonder me and Cho ended up crashing and burning so fast.”

“Poor Cho. I feel bad for her.”

He grimaced a little. “I know I was a git to her.”

“Oh, Harry, no, that wasn’t what I meant,” she blurted out quickly. “I just meant… she had a really hard time after—well, after what happened to Cedric.”

His expression darkened at this mention of Cedric—of all that had happened at the end of Fourth Year. And saying the words brought back all the memories of that night and, in spite of how much time had passed since then, she felt a slight shudder go through her. On an impulse of tenderness—and so much relief it almost clogged her throat—she lowered her head to kiss him lightly, her lips landing half on his lower lip and half on his chin. One of his hands tangled in her hair as he lifted his head to kiss her fully on the lips, tenderly.

“I was so glad you survived that night,” she whispered, the words coming almost unbidden to her lips, as the kiss ended.

“I know,” he returned quietly.

She’d never thought about it before, but now, the memory seemed to take on a new significance, a new power. “Cho must have been watching, too, at the Final Task; she must have seen you and Cedric both disappear and… and then you came back and Cedric…” she trailed off, her throat suddenly tight with a flood of newfound empathy. “She… I don’t know how she did it, coming back to Hogwarts after what happened to Cedric. I—I don’t think I could have.”

“You’re amazing, you know that,” he suddenly said, quietly.

She blinked at him, seeing a new, odd sort of softness and a wonder on his face. He was looking at her as if he’d never really seen her before. She felt herself flush. “No, I—what? Why—why do you say that?” she stammered, her thoughts scattering at the look in his eyes.

“You’re so… nice.”

She felt a small smile curve her lips at this statement, even as she felt her heart melt, more moved by this so-characteristic, rather lame compliment than she would have been by the most eloquent speech from anyone else.

“You… care so much about other people,” he went on, less than fluently. “Even now, years afterwards, you… care about how other people felt.”

“I didn’t think about how Cho felt at the time.”

“Yes, you did. You noticed, you understood why Cho was crying a lot in Fifth Year.”

“A lot of people noticed. And I understood because I knew how she felt.”

“You knew how she—you fancied Cedric too? You didn’t, did you?”

Her lips twisted into something approaching a faint smile, her heart squeezing a little with affection. “Not because of Cedric, Harry, because of you.”

“Me? I was fine.”

“I meant because I knew how scared she must have been that night. I remember how scared I was when I saw you and Cedric disappear like that. I don’t think I’ve ever been so scared and there was a moment after you came back that I thought—I thought you hadn’t, that you’d been the one to…” She trailed off, a slight shiver of recollection going through her, not able to say the terrible word, not even now.

His expression softened, one of his hands moving to cup her cheek tenderly. “I never thought about what it was like for you watching. I remember seeing your face, seeing that you’d been crying, afterwards.”

“I think that was really when I knew, when I decided,” she found herself admitting.

“Decided what?”

“That no matter what happened, I would stay with you. When you and Cedric disappeared, I was so scared and it was worse because I didn’t know what was happening. I only knew it was bad and I was left to imagine the worst and know that I couldn’t help you. I couldn’t do anything to help you. And I think… that was when I decided that whatever else happened, I wanted to stay with you so if you were in danger, I would know it and I could at least try to help you. I just… never wanted to be left behind to worry and not be able to help.”

“You did help. You helped more than—I’ll never be able to tell you just how much you helped.”

Her lips trembled into a small smile even as she felt tears pricking at the back of her eyes. “I’m glad. It was all I wanted, to be able to help you.”

“Hermione,” he breathed in a trembling sigh, “I… you…” he trailed off, visibly searching for words to express the emotions she could see crowding into his eyes and his expression. After a moment, he gave up, his hand sliding behind her neck as he lifted his head to kiss her, softly, tenderly.

Afterwards, Hermione lowered her head, nestling against the little hollow where his neck met his shoulder. She felt his hand move, idly stroking her hair.

They lay there in silence for a little while, Hermione comfortably curled up against Harry’s chest while Harry’s fingers idly played with Hermione’s hair.

“’Mione,” he breathed after a long moment, so softly that she almost felt the word as a little ruffle of air more than she heard it. His tone transformed her childhood pet name into an endearment and a caress all at once. She smiled inwardly. He had spoken so softly that the syllables blurred and blended together so she could almost imagine he had said, mine, instead. Because she was his—his friend, his confidante, his… lover… It was an uncharacteristically sentimental thing for her to think but at that moment, it seemed only natural, fitting with the mood of the morning.

Hermione lazily watched the play of shadows on the wall as the sunlight from outside brightened and slowly crept further into the room. And it was evidence of how sluggish her mind was that it took her a little while to register the increasingly bright sunlight.

“We should probably get up,” she said quietly.

He didn’t immediately respond and then— “Do we have to?” Harry groused, only half-jokingly. “Why can’t we just stay in bed all day and let Ron amuse himself today?”

She poked him in the side teasingly. “Lazy bones,” she quipped and then sobered a little, as she lifted her head to meet his eyes. “What are we going to tell Ron about this, us?”

He sobered too. “I’ll tell him the truth,” he said simply.

“You—we can talk to him together,” she offered.

“No. I—I feel like I need to talk to him myself. It’s just… he’s my best friend,” he explained a little awkwardly.

“He’s my best friend too.”

“I know. It’s not that. I just… it’s a bloke thing. I—I feel like I need to talk to him myself. Especially after he asked me the other day if I fancied you.”

“Really? Ron asked you that? When?”

“The other evening when your parents rang up.”

“Why would he ask you that? He doesn’t care,” she blurted out and then added, “not like that, at least.” She didn’t mean that Ron didn’t care about her at all, only that it was unlike Ron to think to ask about something as, well, sentimental as fancying someone.

“He asked because I’d asked him if he still fancied you.”

“But I told you that Ron and I weren’t… like that anymore. I told you we were just friends.”

“You told me that you didn’t care about him like that. That didn’t mean that he might not still fancy you. And you’re… you. How could he not fancy you?”

“Oh, Harry…” A smile of helpless affection trembled on her lips. “That’s… so sweet…”

Surprisingly, endearingly, he cut his eyes briefly away from hers, color rising in his cheeks. “Yeah, well,” he demurred awkwardly, “I had to ask. I just… wanted to know.”

“And he told you he didn’t fancy me like that anymore.”

“Yeah, but that’s because he’s daft.”

She choked on a laugh. “Honestly, Harry, you shouldn’t say that,” her rational mind compelling her to chide him, although she couldn’t make her tone sound anything other than loving, not disapproving at all. “It doesn’t work like that. You know it doesn’t. A couple months ago, you didn’t fancy me either.”

“A couple months ago, I was an idiot. You know how thick-headed I am.”

How else could she possibly respond to such a statement than to kiss him? And so she did, thrilling in the knowledge that now she could kiss him whenever she wanted to.

She drew back, smiling into his eyes. “What did you tell Ron when he asked if you fancied me?”

His lips curved into a wry expression. “I told him I didn’t know.”

She laughed softly. “Did you really not know or did you just not want to talk about it?”

“I really didn’t know.”

“When did you—” she began and then stopped, coloring.

“When did I figure it out?” he finished for her. “Honestly? At the beach the first time we made a sand castle.”

“Really? That was days ago. You didn’t—you never said—”

“I told you I wasn’t going to risk our friendship over a little thing like lust.”

She smirked, raising her eyebrows. She couldn’t help it. “A little thing?”

He laughed softly, his hands sweeping down her back in a leisurely caress that sent a shiver of delicious sensation through her. “Okay, fine, a big thing like lust.”

“It is a big thing, isn’t it?” She lifted a hand to trace his lips with her finger. “I knew I wanted you,” she found herself admitting, feeling herself flushing. Part of her couldn’t believe she was saying as much but her habit of frankness with Harry was ingrained. “But I didn’t know, didn’t realize just how much I would feel, just how powerful lust was.”

One corner of his lips twitched upward slightly, a spark entering his eyes. “Should I take that as a compliment?”

She bit back a laugh but a smile still escaped as she tapped his nose teasingly with one finger. “Someone’s very vain.”

He caught her hand in his, kissing her fingertips. “I didn’t know I could want you so much either so maybe it’s you that’s good in bed.”

This time, she did laugh and then dropped a quick kiss on his lips. “Flatterer,” she accused him affectionately, before she reluctantly forced herself to move, sliding off him and sitting up.

She felt herself blushing as she retrieved her scattered pyjamas and put them on again. She sensed him watching her but kept her face turned away from him and after a moment, she heard him sit up as well, putting on his glasses.

Suddenly feeling unaccountably shy—ridiculously so, given the events of the morning—she didn’t quite look at him as she said, rather awkwardly, “So I guess I’ll see you downstairs in a little while.”

He had hastily put on his shorts again and then stopped her, catching her hand. “Hermione.”

She turned back, finally looking directly at him, only to see that his gaze and his attention had fallen to the bed, and to the few dark stains on the sheets.

Oh, right. She blushed again, even as she realized that whatever he’d been about to say when he stopped her had apparently been entirely forgotten as he turned back to her, a stricken expression on his face. “I made you bleed? God, Hermione, I—”

And she forgot any awkwardness she felt in the sudden rush of love, her heart squeezing a little, even as she cut off his words with a soft kiss. “I’m fine, Harry. That happens when it’s… a girl’s first time,” she explained, somewhat less than fluently. “It hurt a little at first but did I seem like I was in pain this morning?”

“No, but…” he trailed off, not looking particularly reassured. “I just… I didn’t know I’d made you bleed.”

Using her wand, she performed a quick cleaning spell, getting rid of the stains. “See, Harry? The blood’s gone and I’m fine.”

He had the grace to look a trifle embarrassed now. “Sorry. I guess I overreacted a little.”

She allowed herself a small smile. “Just a little,” she teased gently.

The faint beginnings of a smile just touched his lips. “I just…” he trailed off and then met her eyes, finishing soberly, “I hate to see you bleed. I hate to even think of you being hurt in any way.”

“Oh, Harry…” She brushed her lips against his, softly, reassuringly. “I hate to think of you being hurt too so I guess that makes us even.”

He managed a real smile at that. “Right.”

“I’ll see you downstairs.”

“’Mione,” he blurted out just as she reached the door. She turned back to look at him. “I—I really do love you, you know,” he finished, not quite fluently.

She felt her expression soften, let him see all the emotion she felt in her face. “I know. I love you too.”

And then she slipped out of the room, reluctantly forcing herself to let the day begin for real.

~

Ron ambled downstairs, yawning, and Harry glanced at Hermione before he volunteered, “Ron and I can go into town to buy breakfast for us.”

Ron blinked but agreed. “Sounds good, mate.”

It would be his opportunity to talk to Ron alone but Harry felt a sudden return of nervousness as he thought about leaving Hermione alone. Unprotected. Even though the wards were still up and he, of all people, knew how capable she was, he couldn’t just stop his visceral reaction to leaving Hermione alone. He stepped towards Hermione. “Stay inside,” he told her with soft intensity. “And try to stay away from the windows.”

For a moment, he could see that she wanted to protest, say that she could take care of herself, but then she nodded, once. “All right.”

“Thanks.” He wanted to kiss her for her acquiescence, knew she’d agreed only for his sake, so he wouldn’t worry too much. But he couldn’t, too conscious that Ron was right there, so he settled for squeezing her hand briefly. “We’ll be back soon.”

She managed a smile. “Hurry up. I’m hungry.”

He returned her smile, even as he was momentarily distracted at the way her lips curved. “We’ll hurry.”

Once outside, he felt his heart lifting even more than it already had at the sight of Hermione’s smile, his mood brightening in automatic reaction to the sunlight. He tilted his head up to the sun, newly conscious of the beauty of the day. “It’s a nice day.”

He sensed Ron’s curious glance and returned the look to see Ron studying him, an odd expression on his face. “What?”

Ron blinked. “You look… happy.”

He had to laugh a little. “Is that such a strange thing?”

“Well… a little, yeah,” Ron admitted and then managed more normally, “I guess this holiday has been good for you.”

He thought about Hermione, the past night, the new trust that he would wake up from nightmares to see her face, and had to smile. “Yeah, it has been.”

“Good. Clever of Hermione but then I guess she’s always clever at knowing what you need, isn’t she?”

There was his opening but he found himself blanking on what to say, how to tell Ron. Tell Ron what, exactly? That he had shagged Hermione? He mentally snorted—there was no way he would say that. Even thinking it seemed somehow wrong. That Hermione was his girlfriend now? Funny, but even that didn’t seem quite right. Hermione was… his everything.

“Say, Ron, speaking of Hermione, I—er—Hermione and I—I need to tell you that Hermione and I are… together now.”

He ventured a glance at Ron to see that Ron was—smirking?

“I knew you fancied Hermione.”

Fancied her—of course, it was true. He opened his mouth to agree and just leave it at that—but he suddenly remembered Hermione saying, “It was all I wanted, to be able to help you,” saw again the look on her face as she’d said it. And he realized he couldn’t—didn’t want to—somehow soften or play down his feelings for Hermione. She meant too much to him. “It’s—it’s not just that,” he began. “I—I love her,” he blurted out.

Ron stopped as abruptly as if he’d run into a wall. Slowly, he turned to stare at Harry, gaping a little. “You—what?”

Harry met Ron’s eyes. “I love her,” he repeated.

Ron blinked, his mouth closing and then opening again. “Does she—wait, no, don’t tell me. I don’t need to—” he broke off and then finished, a little awkwardly, “I know you’ve always come first for her.”

And even though there wasn’t even a particle of reproach in his tone, Harry found himself feeling obscurely guilty. “Ron, I—you know she cares about you,” he said.

Ron waved a hand in the air in a rather dismissive gesture. “Yeah, I know. I care about her too.” Ron met Harry’s eyes, a half-rueful expression on his face. “Me and Hermione—we’re just friends, you know, and that’s all we’ll ever be. And it’s not—I know it’s better that way.”

“Ron…”

Ron looked away, starting to walk again. “It’s okay, Harry.”

Harry supposed he should leave it at that. After all, Ron said it was okay—what more was he really expecting? And yet, he found himself blurting out, “You—you really don’t mind?” He waited tensely for Ron’s answer. He knew now that Hermione meant too much to him for Ron’s answer to really make a difference—but to be at outs with Ron would have been a high price to pay. A price he knew he would pay without question—as important as Ron still was, Hermione came first for him, as he’d told her days ago—but it would still hurt.

Ron paused and then after a long moment, asked, “Just… does she make you happy?”

“Yes.” He could feel what was probably a silly smile spreading over his face at the bare thought of her and just how happy she’d made him. And he spared a brief moment to be thankful that Ron wasn’t looking at him, was keeping his eyes fixed ahead of them.

“Okay. That’s… all right, then,” Ron said a little jerkily and then said nothing more.

After a couple seconds, Harry looked over at Ron. “You’re not going to ask if I make her happy?”

Now Ron slanted a rather sarcastic glance at Harry. “This is Hermione we’re talking about. I’m sure if you didn’t make her happy, we’d both know about it pretty damn quickly. She’s not exactly shy about telling us when she thinks we’re being prats.”

He had to laugh. “Fair point.”

Ron was silent for a minute and then said abruptly, “I wasn’t good at it. Hopefully you’ll be better.”

“At what?”

“Making Hermione happy.” He paused and then went on, speaking not quite naturally, “I didn’t make her happy. I annoyed her and half the time, I didn’t understand what I did or why she was annoyed, and that pissed me off so I deliberately set out to annoy her and it just kept getting worse.”

It was the most Harry had ever heard Ron say about his break-up with Hermione—for that matter, it was the most either of them had ever said about the break-up. Hermione had never told him much more than saying it hadn’t worked out. “Ron, you…”

Ron glanced at him, meeting his eyes frankly. “I was a git to her,” he admitted rather gruffly. “I hope you’re better, manage to make her happy.”

He remembered the way Hermione had smiled at him that morning, remembered the way his heart warmed and seemed to become buoyant in his chest at the sight of her smile. If anyone had asked before today, he would have said that of course he knew Hermione’s smiles but her smile this morning had been… different. Luminous was the only word that came to mind. His throat was suddenly a little tight with emotion. And he could only think that he would do anything to see that smile on her face every day. “I hope I make her happy too,” was all he could say.

“You’ve always been better at understanding Hermione than I am,” Ron offered a little awkwardly.

Harry stared at Ron for a moment. However true the words might be—and he wasn’t sure about that—it was the first time either of them had ever put such a thing into words.

“This is… different,” Harry finally said. Which was true too.

Ron didn’t respond for a moment, only looked at Harry with an odd expression on his face.

“What is it?” Harry finally asked.

Ron blinked, seeming to remember himself. “You—you really do care about Hermione a lot, don’t you?” There was a slight change of intonation in his voice as he said the word, care, that betrayed a brief struggle with his discomfort at using the word “love.”

Harry felt heat rising to his cheeks for no reason he could really identify except that he could hardly believe he was talking about emotions like this with Ron. But for all that, it was maybe the easiest question he’d ever had to answer. “Yeah, I do,” he said quietly.

Ron nodded—and then kept on nodding for just long enough to make Harry nervous all over again.

But then Ron looked squarely at him and then, surprisingly, cracked a small grin. “You can stop looking so nervous, Harry. It really is okay, y’know. Just don’t start snogging in front of me all the time or anything.”

Harry relaxed and returned Ron’s smile. “Okay.” His steps quickened. “Come on, let’s hurry. I don’t want to leave Hermione alone for too long.”

“Anyway, I’m hungry so the sooner we get some food, the better,” Ron agreed.

Harry laughed a little. “That too.”

They were mostly silent on the way to the bakery and back, only exchanging a few idle comments. And Harry found himself smiling a little to himself over nothing—and everything—a strange, unfamiliar sense of… of optimism filling his heart. On thinking about it, he wasn’t sure he’d ever looked forward to the future before, not really, never really expected anything good might happen. And even now, he was tense and not fully at ease, his fears, his nightmares, momentarily pushed to the background but still there, ever-present. He was still haunted by the War. But for almost the first time, he could accept that and still believe, with almost amazing confidence, that things would get better. He would get better.

He had Ron and Hermione—Hermione, who loved him. And with her, because of her, he somehow knew he was going to be fine.

~To be continued…~

A/N 2: I don’t think I’ll ever get over my love of writing H/Hr talking about their Hogwarts years. I can only hope it isn’t getting too boring or repetitive. As always, thanks for reading!