I was running. That was all I could think. I was running, my feet splashing wetly on the leaf-strewn ground, the branches on the spindly trees I passed catching on my light blue summer dress, which now had suspicious red stains on it. My breath was coming in short puffs but I had no inclination to stop. None at all. In fact, if I did, I would probably be murdered in cold blood by the hoard of Death Eaters who were hot on my trail. Okay, I wouldn't call the two of them a hoard exactly, but they were more than my poor, under aged self could handle.

It was the summer between fifth and sixth year. After Sirius' death I hadn't felt much inclination to go back to Grimmauld Place. It seemed like I would be intruding, so instead I went to my parents little cottage.

My parents. Thinking about them made my heart pang painfully in my chest and made my feet involuntarily slow down before I picked up the pace again. I could feel the familiar sensation of tears in my eyes – god knows I'd cried enough as it was – but I blinked them away with a small sigh.

Suddenly there was a flash of green light to my left and I was shoved forward with a hard body pressing me into the ground as whoever it was fired another spell.

From the hard muscles in his stomach, I could tell that it was probably a man – or just a woman who loved sport – and in the corner of my eye I saw a bit of red-brown hair. It wasn't red enough to belong to a Weasley, nor brown enough to be from someone like Lupin. Nor was it almost-black like Harry's. Who else, however, would have saved me from the death that should have been awaiting me?

XxX

It was getting too much for me. I had been searching for her since the Daily Prophet had deemed her missing, but still I couldn't find her. Who, you may ask, would be able to get me, Oliver Wood, to search high and low for her? Well, the answer is simple. Hermione Granger.

Even when I was at Hogwarts, she was the one person every girl wanted to be and every boy wanted – with the possible exception of the Slytherins. But she didn't even realise it. She always had slightly bushy hair but in later life it had softened into curls, and in first year she had had beaver teeth but, due to a little potion from Madam Pomfrey, that had been rectified. She never cared what anyone thought of her, and kept her nose in a book at all times.

She was different.

When I saw her running away from those Death Eaters because she was too young to do magic outside of school, I literally saw red. In an instant I shot two stunning spells at them and shoved her to the ground, landing heavily on top.

I quickly rolled off and stared at her for a moment. Her cheeks were flushed and rosy from running but it gave her a glow that I had never seen on anyone else, and her hair fell around her face in wild curls.

"Oliver, right?" she asked breathlessly, moving to her feet as I did the same.

"Yeah," I replied listlessly, tying the two unconscious Death Eaters to the nearest tree before turning back again.

"Thank you."

Her voice was quiet, unnaturally so, and her face was so close that I could see every individual fleck of gold in her eyes. Without thinking about it, because if I did I would have chickened out, I pulled her towards me and gently put my lips to her.

That was our first kiss, standing under the trees as the rain began to fall, but it was the first of many. Many more were to come before I could eventually call her my wife.

Hermione Jean Wood; it had a ring to it.