Title: Realising what you have, once it's gone

Rating: PG-13 (I think :b)

Authors notes: Well this will, eventually, be a R/HR fic. Actually it is all the way through but what I should have said is, they will get together eventually.

What happens when you know something is wrong but you can't seem to let go? What do you do when the person you love is only loving half of you? What do you do when that person promised themselves to you, and you to them? Do you continue to live the lie, to keep up the act that everyone else seems to believe? Or do you walk away and never look back? These are the questions I face everyday and honestly, it seems I've lost apart of myself with these thoughts. I was always one for questions, it's true but there seemed to be no questions that I couldn't find the answer to.

I don't know how it got like this, it seemed to fall into place and it seemed like the right thing to do. Everyone was doing it, thinking that it would be their last chance to find someone before the great battle. Now that I think back on it, I'm starting to think whether I meant any of it at all. Maybe I thought I'd never have to live with the consequences of my actions because, frankly, I didn't think I would have a life to look forward too. It wasn't always this way, we were happy in the beginning, it seemed we could face the world together and we did, literally. We had Harry and we fought side by side, all three of us. I remember it like it was yesterday no matter how hard I try to forget that fateful day.

The sky had grown dark and was stained with red as the sun slowly began to set. Red. The colour that would soon stain the ground and forever change the meaning of life for me. Lights seemed to be firing in all directions, screams of pain and pleas for help were everywhere. There was just so much pain, so much terror. The trio which I once treasured seemed to dissolve within seconds in the destruction that lay before me. I wanted to go, to go with him to make sure everything would be alright but I couldn't. I had my job and he had his. "He told me" I repeated to myself over and over, as I tried to muster the strength to repeat the spell. I tried to help, I really did. I said the spell, over and over to try and give Harry safe passage through the battle and straight to Voldemort. I thought I could handle this but I'd never faced so much death in my life, people begged and pleaded to me for help but I couldn't. I just kept repeating that damn spell!

I shot up suddenly in my bed, clammy complexion and hair matted. A single tear slowly slid down my cheek as I inhaled sharply. "It was just a dream" I assured myself in a weak whisper but I couldn't be further from the truth. That had happened 5 years ago, when I was no more that 17. The day that changed the wizarding world forever, the falling of the Dark Lord "but what was the cost?" I muttered as I hear my husband grunt in his sleep. The trade mark red hair was scattered across the pillow and the moonlight that crept through the curtain illuminated his features beautifully. Why did that face not reassure me as it once did? Why had the arms that use to offer me safety and warmth, instead now only offered me a feeling that resembled the freezing mornings of winter? My face is nothing more than a blank expression, like a book full of faded, empty pages. I'm merely a shell of who I once was, and who do I blame? The man lying next to me. I know it's wrong and I don't doubt that I love him but one of us has changed. Why is it that you can remember the bad times like the drop of the hat but it seems the good times simply fade away into the grey? That's how I feel, faded and jaded.

Wiping the tear from my face I stand, shuffle across the room as the moonlight gives me safe passage to the bathroom. Shutting the door I come face to face with what is wrong with my life. My reflection. Blaming Ron wasn't the answer, the shadow of a woman is what's to blame. I reach out to touch the mirror, hoping that again this is another dream and I'll wake up back to how things were, but alas my fingers touch the sheet of cold glass. My finger-tips linger for a few moments, trying to feel anything but the cold that has entered my heart. At first I thought it was normal, that most newly weds feel like this even after facing such a disaster but as the years past I knew this wasn't right. For weeks after he left us I simply locked myself in my room and Ron did the same, we didn't speak for weeks except for a gesture or two but as time past he seemed to deal with it. He wasn't the same, I never thought he would be but he was getting better. That's what I loved about him, he had so much strength no matter how much he tried to deny it.

The shadow of a smile tugged loosely at my lips but is soon disappeared as I thought about everything I'd done to try and feel something again. Anything, except for this emptiness and nothingness. Nothing seemed to work, I even tried sleuthing with the enemy and if anything I felt worse. I didn't feel angry over the fact I'd slept with him, the man who had done nothing but make me feel like crap from the day I met him. Draco Malfoy. He wanted to hurt Ron as much as possible and I wanted to feel something that I'd not felt with Ron for a long, long time. Yet still nothing. I didn't tell Ron, I wanted to but I couldn't come to make myself do it.

I've come to realise that if I want to change, I need to cut off the past. That's the thing that has been haunting me for the past five years and I can't do that with Ron. I can't cling on to my past feelings for him.

I know now, that the day Harry died, was the day he took me with him.

I glance at myself one last time "I deserve it" I say to myself before I slowly slide down the wall and curl into a ball "It's all my fault….."

Authors notes: Okay, honesty please. Do you like it, hate it? Is it too much information for my first chapter, or too little? Lost on anything? Hate my writing? Please review it :)