At the end of the corridor, the closed door was waiting. The man hesitated, before taking a first tentative step towards it. It wouldn't be that scary. That was his mantra, and he repeated it to himself four times before taking that important second step. His palms were sweaty. Dear God, who got sweaty palms at a time like that? It was supposed to be one of the happiest days in his rather short life thus far… and he was as nervous as a teenager on his first date.

He chuckled under his breath, the thought calming his nerves a little. He remembered his first date. He remembered it like it was only yesterday. In fact, he could still smell the mix of butterbeer and her subtle perfume… the perfume had been his undoing. Sweet, exotic and secret- so that you had to get really close to the wearer, to have even a hope of distinguishing the different flavours of it. Of course… he had got rather close. Yes. He had definitely gotten close enough, and that smell was to stick in his mind for years afterwards, reminding him of that night.

In fact, he remembered everything in scents. At that precise moment in time, in that simply decorated corridor outside the cheap flat, he could smell a hundred different perfumes. The most prominent was the smell of cigarette smoke that seeped into the carpets and the walls. He breathed it in, wanting to savour it, wishing he had his lighter on him. Then he mentally kicked himself. What kind of man lit up a cigarette when there was a baby in the vicinity? That annoying voice in his head scolded him for his insensitive thoughts. A half-amused smirk graced the man's face as he realised who the voice reminded him of. His mother. Another laugh escaped his lips, which were almost blue from the cold.

Anyone watching from the outside would have thought he was mentally unstable. He took a couple of steps forward and a couple of steps back, contemplating his next move. He wanted to go inside, apologise, move on with his life. He wanted HER. He wanted to be with her, and he wanted her to tell him that it would all be OK. He wanted her to forgive him for waiting so long. It had been seven months. Seven long months of feeling lost, and homeless. Seven months of trying to forget, or trying to tell himself to do the right thing, or not deciding on either. Remembering that, he realised that a couple more minutes pacing around outside her flat wouldn't hurt. After all, it was natural to be afraid.
He hadn't expected to feel any sort of obligation. He'd laughed drunkenly in her face when she gave him the news, and he had vague memories of accusing her with sleeping with everyone, and trying to trick him into marriage. That had hurt her, he knew it. He'd felt her pain as if it was his own. It felt like cruciatus, aimed directly at his heart. He'd known then that he loved her. He just had to make sure he was worthy of her. Her and the baby.

Alison Meredith Chrysanthemum. He shuddered to himself as the name of the child entered his mind. Awful name for a child. His mother's voice sounded in his head again, as he grimaced. A child? Your child. And if you hadn't left the girl, you would have chosen a less appalling name, hmm? He couldn't think of a suitable comeback, so he sighed. He hated it when his mother was right.

Maybe he was mentally unstable, he wondered, as he reflected on the past half hour. He had been standing dithering in the dark (and frankly, far too cold) hallway, muttering to himself. He had had a lengthy conversation with his dead mother and was currently thinking up baby names for a child, a child that he had sworn he would never have anything to do with. Life was strange. But then again, so was he.

I suppose that to understand the man's slightly warped train of thought, you would have to understand the man. 'The man', at only twenty years old, was technically hardly more than a boy. He was the kind of handsome that made old ladies on street corners swoon, and made even the most faithful of women take a second look. She had always described him as beautiful, and in truth he was. It was what allowed him to get away with his inability to make a decision, and indulge in frivolous debauchery. He was her everything, her beautiful everything. And he had left her when she needed him the most.

He remembered that, shutting his eyes. A soft tear ran down his face and his hand came into contact with the doorknob. Putting the newly-cut key into the lock, he felt a surge of love manifest itself inside his heart. He could hear a baby crying. His baby.

Oh yes. He embraced the scent that assaulted his nostrils. A sweet, exotic perfume mingled with the bitter cigarette smell. He heard a barely audible gasp from the corner of the room, and caught her chocolate eyes. She lowered her wand, a mixture of curiosity and anguish and something indistinguishable reflected in the orbs. They both knew why he'd come. A single look at his dishevelled state and her shaky wand hand would have sealed the deal. She didn't tell him she loved him, not yet. And he couldn't help smiling as he stood in the doorway. Yes, it was the happiest day of his life. He was finally home.

She stepped into the corridor. Anger consumed her as she saw the familiar grey walls. They were a little more shabby looking than they had been when she had first lived there. Then again, when she had first moved in she was just a girl, barely out of school. She had been proud to have a place of her own, without needing her famous name or famous friends to help pay for it. Back then, she had looked down to the doorway with hope. Hope that one day, things would get better.

Things had gotten better, she bitterly reflected. For a short period of time after the war, when Harry had beaten Voldemort and Ron had finally decided he was over her, she had been okay. She would even have gone as far as to describe herself as blissfully happy the day Draco Malfoy decided to take some responsibility and get his head out of his arse.

Yes, things had got better. And then, they had got worse. Worse than she ever could have imagined. Imagine someone ripping your heart out, then tearing it into tiny pieces, then giving it back. Imagine loving them with all of the little pieces, and then having that love thrown back in your face by a cruel twist of fate. Multiply that pain by ten and you may begin to understand. That's what she told her father when he had tried to set her up with every muggle dentist below the age of forty. He had told her that she was still young, that she could forget what had happened and start again. But she knew it wouldn't work. Because no man would ever be able to argue with her and love her like him, and no child would ever be as perfect as Ally. Merlin. She missed them so.

She had not been back to the flat in the three years since she had moved out. It surprised her, as she walked calmly down the long corridor, to see the flowers outside of the door. It was strange to think that someone else now lived in the poky little haven, that new people were making new memories there. Her barely contained anger rose up in her throat again, and tears pricked the backs of her eyes. What gave them the right? It was THEIR place, it was sacred. Nothing could ever compare to what had already happened there.

She breathed in deeply, trying to remember that moment. It had been exactly seven years ago that he had gone back to her. Her senses reached out for the familiar smell of cigarette smoke, but could not find it. Instead, the stuffy hall was filled with the smell of the calendula bunch by the door, and the plant fertiliser that was feeding it before it could be put into water. Her eyes flew open, as she panicked. The cigarette smell, his smell. It was gone. Where had it gone? That smell had been there since before she moved in, it wasn't likely to just disappear. It had to be those flowers… they were covering the bittersweet smell of her love.

She cursed the flowers as she threw them across the hall. She sank to the floor, tears flowing freely now from her eyes, as a string of particularly nasty expletives came out of her pretty mouth. How was she supposed to say goodbye if he wasn't there? She exhaled slowly, as she fumbled around in her pocket. She carried a packet of cigarettes everywhere with her, although she didn't smoke. That way she knew she could never forget.

As she lit the cigarette, smelling him once again in the place where it all began, her anger subsided. Sobs began to shake her thin frame as great rivulets of tears ran down her face. Merlin, she missed him. She picked up the flowers carefully, arranging them so as to hide her presence from the owner. They were not calendulas, she realised out of the blue. A wry smile tugged at the corners of her mouth, as she tried to place why exactly that thought had come to her at that precise time.

Sadness washed over her as she placed the flowers back on the floor. Chrysanthemums, she realised. The flowers were chrysanthemums. The heaviness lifted from her heart, as she thanked the fates. They were giving her her goodbye.

She bid farewell to the man, and the child that she had loved so desperately, in the hallway where she had shared many kisses and exclamations and taken about a hundred snapshots. She turned on her heel, wiping her eyes, taking a vial of potion from her bag. She hated to play Juliet, and she had the feeling that Draco was cheekily reprimanding her from the heavens for being a walking cliché. She didn't care though- it was what she had to do, to be with them again, and she was more than prepared to do it.
She wandered to a window near the stairwell, looking out at the lone tree. She had kissed him there so many times…She had been reading under that tree, the day Voldemort's only remaining follower killed his son and grandchild.
She pushed out all thoughts of Lucius Malfoy as she ascended the stairwell, preparing to say goodbye to the cruel world, and join her family in a better one. A lone tear ran down her face, and she wiped at it absent-mindedly. Merlin, she missed him…

She missed him so, so much.

So much, in fact, that almost eight years after helping to kill one of the most evil wizards to walk the earth, she left it, dying a potion of his own creation. Hermione Malfoy's suicide would certainly make the Daily Prophet, but Harry knew she had gone peacefully. He had stood under that very tree, with Ron, heads hung in sorrow, and in joy- for Hermione was back with the man and child she had so adored.

And, at the end of the corridor, the closed door was waiting. Waiting for new memories, new promises, and new love. Though no couple like them would ever cross the threshold, though nobody there would ever go through the exquisite pain of the heartbreak Hermione and Draco endured, the door stood, waiting. Welcoming, warm, and just a little comforting. It stood waiting to be opened once more.