Disclaimer: All credit for characters and world belong to the genius that is J.K. Rowling. Otherwise, plot is mine. :)
Authors Note: To all my faithful readers. Hello again! I've been away so long I'm sure you've all forgotten about me. I was rereading my story and was pretty unhappy with some of my continuity errors, issues with canon of the books, and grammatical mistakes. I took some time to go through it all and revamp a little bit. I'll be reuploading everything and more, hopefully a little more consistently now that I'm happier with the story. Thank you all for being so patient and supportive. This is a tough semester for me, academically and socially, and the feedback here, both positive and constructive is wonderful help and support. Please please please review! :)
Chapter One: In the Beginning
Neville's point of view.
After spending the night tossing and turning, Neville rolled out of his bed. Yawning and rubbing his eyes, he stumbled toward the washbasin and absentmindedly poured water in the bowl. As he glanced out the window, the recollection of his dream faded away as the view of the early morning sun illuminating the waters of the surrounding sea distracted him. The opalescent beauty of the water shimmering and winking in the dawn left him lost in thought. However, clarity returned to him as the water began to slosh over the brim of the bowl and onto the floor, drenching his socks.
Muttering curses to himself, he wondered why he was so bloody prone to accidents. Irritated, Neville quickly splashed water on his face, rubbing the grit of sleep from the corners of his eyes and shuffled toward the bureau to dig out dry socks.
Unintentionally slamming the drawer shut, he haphazardly tried to pull his socks off while standing up. An exploit of poise that even the most graceful people would have trouble with, a few seconds of hopping around on one foot eventually turned into Neville collapsed on the floor after loosing his balance while skidding through the puddle he had created moment ago.
"Bugger it all, s-s-stupid, foul, awful, piece of…," Neville exclaimed after air returned to his lungs. Hauling himself back to his feet, he grabbed his wand off the top of his dressed.
"Tergeo ." Neville mumbled, pointing his wand at the puddle and siphoning the water from the ground back into the bowl where it sloshed momentarily and disappeared.
Plopping down on the chest at the foot of his bed, he pulled the wet socks off and replaced them, sighing as an ache developed in his rear from his unfortunate fall.
Looking up, eyes gleamed in the doorway of his room and a handsome grey cat strolled into the room acting almost as if her brows were raised at his shouting then twined herself between his feet purring adoringly.
"Hewwo pwetty girl," Neville cooed and while grinning, he scooped the cat up in his arms. Her name was Chloe and she never failed to bring a smile to his face.
Her mrrow of response was quickly muffled by him holding her close and nuzzling his nose into the soft fur at the ruff of her neck.
Graceful, charming, and regal made her the opposite of him in most every way, plus as a member of the breed Russian Blue, she was basically impervious to most common feline illnesses whereas he only avoiding weekly colds by spending most of his time in the sun and drinking orange juice daily.
Most wizards preferred pumpkin juice, but he found that the taste had never really grown on him and Gran was constantly trying both muggle and magical means of making Neville into the kind of boy that would give the Longbottom name the kind of respect it once had commanded, which started with attempting to battle his perpetually runny nose.
Ignoring her squirming, the thought of Gran caused his insides to twinge.
Thinking about Gran was rough, even over three years later. Gran had given him Chloe a few weeks before she passed away.
His relationship with his grandmother had been difficult. She had never been the motherly type and most of the time he thought she had forgotten what it was like to be young. Over the years, she constantly compared him to his peers, his father, even the brilliant Harry Potter, his old friend from school. He knew that when she died, that she was terribly proud of him and who he grew up to be and he still missed her terribly. She was practically the only family he had ever had aside from the smattering of relatives, the best of them, Uncle Algie, had once dropped him out of window.
A disgruntled meow brought his attention back to Chloe whose now narrowed and irritated sea green eyes had given her the name since it meant green or new shoot. After some research he had found that Cloe was a common epithet for the Greek goddess Demeter who was actually real and just a witch, who much like him had a gift with plants.
Releasing his hold on her, she climbed onto his now broad shoulders and rubbed his ear with her nose, giving him a "wet willy" causing him to flinch. Leaping off his shoulder onto the bed, her wide eyes stared at him as if reading his mind until he was thoroughly alarmed.
Quickly he swished his wand, making the bed, leaving Chloe trapped under the covers, a little game they had perfected over the years. With a chuckle, Neville watched as she darted back and forth under the covers until she found the edge and dropped out between the sheets with a huff.
Mock fuming, she glared at Neville and with a swish of her tail left the room, looking back at the last second with a small mrrow signaling that she was not really mad but would be if he was not quick with her breakfast.
With her exit, Neville turned back to the chest of drawers and pulled out a white tee shirt and some khaki slacks. Turning to change, the full length mirror in the corner of his room caught his eye. Perched on top was his grandmother's famous vulture hat, but that was not what had garnered his attention. His reflection had.
Still toothy, Neville grinned amused by his still crooked teeth. Gran had always refused to let him have them fixed, mostly because she thought they looked like his mothers. Other than his awkward smile, Neville had grown up quite a bit.
No longer the pale awkward chubby little boy, like all other men as they hit their late teens, Neville's shoulders broadened and his abundance of baby chubbiness melted away. A year of virtually no food and constant running from the Carrows at age 17 had lost him a lot of excess weight and his work with the Ministry after the battle had given him some muscle tone. Catching on the run death eaters had been hard work.
Along with the bad memories, Neville had gained a rather impressive amount of scars, the most obvious being the ones around his wrists. After the holiday-break of his 7th year when Luna and Ginny had left him the sole leader of Dumbledore's Army, any time he showed up to class he received automatic detentions from usually from Alecto Carrow who taught Muggle Studies a class in which he had often rebelled. As the deputy headmistress as a special treat she allowed Filch to take care of him, and he promptly hung him by his wrists from the ceiling in the entrance to the dungeon. Despite the fact that he was too tall to be truly hanging, he stood there in chains for a week. Least noticeable, however, was the scar on his right forearm reading, "Blood traitor." That one he had gotten during a detention with Amycus Carrow who had borrowed ex-Professor Umbridge's sadistic feather quill.
Neville's dirty blonde hair was trimmed short and though it was not neat, it happened to always look okay no matter what, in a purposely disheveled kind of way. He was tan due to the fact that he spent more time outside than inside and his current home was in a region where the weather was always warm.
He had no real need to shave and due to his work with plants, his hands were tough and callused and yet his nails were kept short and clean and his hygiene was impeccable, mostly due to him learning all sorts of useful cleaning spells due to him klutzy tendencies.
He realized that many people had thought he had grown up quite a bit and for the better. Professor Sprout had once joked to him that he'd be a catch for any girl he fancied, but he had rolled his eyes. She was just being motherly and complimenting him.
Neville had never considered himself particularly attractive and today was no exception. Pulling the shirt on, he looked away from the mirror in disgust, lost in recollections from school.
Neville had longed for warmth, peace, quiet, and his own place for as long as he could remember and had found it on this small island in the Mediterranean. He had always been shy, but not in a scared way, more in a he felt awkward around people. He was clumsy, forgetful, and had a propensity for breaking things around him, but he was neither stupid nor cowardly as many people had thought for a long time during his schooling.
People in addition to calling him fat, stupid, ugly, and a laundry list of other names often questioned why he was put into Gryffindor in the first place. Even his friend Justin Finch-Fletchly suggested one day in Herbology class, the one that Hufflepuffs and Gryffindors always shared, that maybe he ought to look into switching houses, maybe the Sorting Hat had been wrong. That one had stung in particular due to his recollection of the Sorting Hat being adamant he be placed in Gryffindor despite his conviction that he was more of a Hufflepuff.
As usual, Hermione defended him, which had only made the situation worse. Hermione had always defended him and part of him was flattered she noticed him, but another part of him would always silently kick himself for letting a girl, particularly Hermione see him vulnerable.
Neville supposed he had always had a crush on Hermione. She was his first friend and he was hers. He knew she was far closer to Harry and Ron, but he took pride in the fact that even they spent a month ignoring and teasing her before they realized how wonderful he always knew she was. When she was done helping those two with their work, she would always spare a minute to answer a question of his or look over his Transfiguration homework since he never quite got the knack of it. He remembered fondly the time she whispered directions for a Shrinking Potion to him so that Snape, who terrified him the most, would not use Neville's own work to kill his toad Trevor.
The list of astounding memories of Hermione went on: the time she defended him from Mad-Eye, the time she hugged him after he got ten points for Gryffindor at the end of the first year, the time she had caused him to get those ten points, which was one he did not remember quite as fondly as the others. However Hermione was probably long married to Ron and having red-headed children while at the same time discovering the cure for the common cold and finding three more uses for dragon blood. But as the years had gone by and he hadn't heard from her, he had resigned himself to being lonely. He didn't think anyone else would ever compare to her and who would look at him twice anyways?
Shaken out of his reverie by a loud howl from downstairs, he quickly pulled on his shirt and trousers and walked downstairs to feed his melodramatic cat. After feeding her, he wandered outside admiring the scenery and plopped down on the ground. With an excellent view of his property and his orchard he lost himself in recollection.