Note: All that you recognise belong to JK Rowling.
The title is taken from Tania De Rozario's And the Walls Come Crumbling Down
Warning: Mentions of suicide and character death
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"Everything about you leads to home. Veins visible like tributaries running up your forearm. Skin mapping scars, creases, bends. And beyond the armour of your teeth, visceral constellations.'
Tania De Rozario, And the Walls Come Crumbling Down
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She had attended his funeral – 15 June 1998.
It was more of a memorial really, a memorial for those who died during, after, and because of the war. The list of the dead continued to grow longer and heavier as the days went by as bodies were found and identified, and as the injured collapsed from stress and complication. No one talked about those who took their own lives.
Those who had survived struggled to rebuild the world, the community, their lives. How do you do that? How do you move forward when the deaths, the horrors that you had witnessed clung onto you like chains, that wound themselves around your body, curled around your heart and dragging behind you with balls of steel attached to them?
The list grew and stopped. And those who survived (Hermione hated that word. Survive. They weren't exactly survivors, not really), had decided that a memorial was in place to honour the dead and possibly provide some form of closure for the living.
So many gone. Sirius, Lupin, Tonks, Fred, Mad-eye Moody, Lavender, Colin, Melissa, Flynn, Jacob, Rowan…the list grew and grew and grew, names both familiar and unfamiliar etched on the multitude of gravestones.
Snape. And there is Professor Snape. Severus Snape. Severus.
Harry had been the one who gave his eulogy. He spoke about his bravery, his role as a double agent ('he was Dumbledore's, never Voldemort's, never Tom Riddle's'), spoke about Lily Potter, about Snape's love for her.
Harry spoke about Snape, but never truly about him.
He did not know the side Severus Snape had carefully kept hidden and locked from the prying eyes of people. He was no witness to the way his eyes turn you liquid fire under their heavy, powerful gaze, no witness to the hushed whispers behind the dark orbs, no witness to the moon that seemed to reside in his eyes. He was no witness to the way his hands, calloused and rough yet so gentle as they held beakers full of potions and ingredients as if they were the singular purpose in the universe, was no witness to the way his hands caressed you, touched you, brought you to heights of ecstasy you had never known, then caught you as you shatter, holding you like how he held his potions, held you like you were his only beacon of light in the sea of darkness. He was no witness to the way the corners of his mouth curled into a smile, not the cruel smile that everyone was accustomed to, but a sincere one, so full of life and joy and simple (although simple was never Severus Snape). He was no witness to the way his body trembled with laughter, so rare but so ensnaring that you would do anything to hear that laughter and see his body change with it. He was no witness to the scars that mapped his body, lines that reside in solitude, lines that meet and diverge, lines that begged to be traced, as if they would lead to his heart, his soul, to him. He was no witness to the veins that ran up his arms, to every fold and bend and wrinkle of his skin, of skin stretched tight, of skin discoloured, of skin smooth and untouched, of protruding bones, of his body that felt like home.
Harry was no witness to the bravery, to the brilliance of Severus Snape.
And under the assault of the rain and wind, tears had stung Hermione Granger's eyes.
She wept. She wept for the dead, wept for the living, wept for all that was and all that would be. And she wept for him, for Severus Snape.
No one knew about him, about her, about them. No one thought that her tears would be for her (ex) Professor as she sobbed into the shoulders of Ron Weasley, who had placed an arm around her shoulders, pulling her close. Professor Snape was her secret, and she was his, which he literally took to his grave. When she closed her eyes, she could see them, together, in bed, by the fire, fingers entwined, lips against shoulders, lips against lips, body against body…
And she could see his death. Blood. His blood staining the ground, seeping into floorboards.
She watched in horror as You-Know-Who released his snake on Snape, watched as it sank its teeth into his exposed neck, watched as his red, red blood leaked from the gaping holes, as colour drained from his face, whatever little that it originally had, as his face contorted in pain, watched as his lips parted in a blood curling scream, as it is silenced, watched as he watched her, watched as his eyes begged her not to move, begged her to leave.
She could only watch. She could only watch the man she loved die. Every gasp he took felt like knives in her stomach.
'I regret it,' Voldemort said coldly. He turned away; no sadness in him, no remorse.
She wanted to kill him, right there, right now, even if it would cost her own life. It took every ounce of self-control that existed within herself to stop herself from doing something foolish.
And when Voldemort left, she had rushed to the barely alive professor. She could barely make him out through the veil of tears.
'Professor – Severus,' She croaked, her voice heavy with emotions.
Silver liquid oozed from his body, trickling down from his eyes, mouth, nose, ears. Hermione quickly conjured up a flask, her fingers trembling. 'Take this,' he said with immense difficulty, his voice barely audible.
The liquid flowed into the flask.
Her fingers found his, and her right hand reached for his cheek, cupping it as her thumb drew mini circles on his skin, a gesture she had often done in bed, his head on her lap. Cold. So cold.
'I love you,' threatened to drip from her lips. His eyes, however, stopped them.
This was it then? Even at the face of death, she still could not love him openly?
She had once said that she would keep them a secret. A secret that she would bring to her grave, if needed be.
She had thought that once the war was over, they could, you know, maybe forge something out of the past, moving forward, one step at the time into the future together.
She knew that he had expected himself to die. She just didn't want it to be true. But it was. He was dying before her, life seeping out of his body, a body so broken and bent that it could no longer contain his soul. And with him, she felt her soul leave her too.
She had read about soulmates. Love that is destined and fated, love that connects and binds and when one dies, so do the other.
She never believed in that concept.
But with him, she wished it were true. Soulmates. Destined lovers.
He had given her the universe. She found constellations in his eyes, felt the expansion and burn of the sun in his mouth, felt time stop and reverse and speed up. The universe burned when she was with him. And now that he is dying, the universe seemed to be eroding away too.
'Look at me,' he murmured.
She lifted her eyes, tears finding their way down her cheeks and falling onto his skin. His dark eyes met her and she could see, could feel the viscous love that poured out and enveloped her, warm and all-encompassing and safe.
No words were needed. She knew, oh, she knew.
The universe might crumble with his death but she would always find her way and rebuild, recreate the universe piece by piece with her own bare hands. She was Hermione Granger after all.
She would live. And she would do a darn good job of it.
For him, for their memories, for all who are gone.
That was what she had tried to do for the past seven years. She has tried to find her footing in a world torn by the war, even if it meant learning how to crawl, then walk all over again. It wasn't easy, not at all. The after effects of the war were long lasting and far reaching, leaking into quiet nights in the form of dreams – nightmares. It wasn't unusual to hear screams in the middle of the night. As people tried to heal, they had to confront what they feared, what had hurt, and what that feared and hurt materialised at night in their minds.
Dreamless Sleep and Sleeping draughts were in constant high demand.
Hermione was guilty of relying on them too. It was difficult not to, when images of her friends, of him, getting hurt and dying engulfed her consciousness once she is asleep. The mostly empty house did not help. The only comfort she had come from Crookshanks, and later, Dalia, a little black stray that decided that Hermione was worthy of her presence. Their warmth was a much-cherished presence on her bed, and sensitive to their human companion's (owner's) emotions, they would flicker their tails or lick at her face whenever she was plagued by her nightmares, which happened rather frequently, and trying their very best to free her from whatever that was causing her to cry out in her sleep, even if their actions weren't exactly effective all the time.
When she wasn't sleeping, she had first thrown herself into her studies, completing her N.E.W.T.S, then thrown herself into work. She was a potion maker for, providing them with potions that they needed, especially to cope with the surge in demands for sleep potions and calming droughts. She had found that the wizarding world was lacking in the mental health department, a gap that was increasingly salient after the war. And so she had thrown herself into further research, enrolling herself in private Muggle schools to complete her GCEs and A levels, then moving on to a Muggle University, specialising in psychology while completing her Masters in both Potions and Arithmancy.
Harry, Ron and Ginny often wondered how she had managed to cope with such copious amount of work.
She had to. She had to work to live, just like how they had relied on their Auror training and Quidditch.
It gave her a purpose.
She had a universe to rebuild after all.
Would He be proud of her?
Her heart clenched.
She had long since realised that she might not be able to let go of him. Everything reminded her of him. A poem she chanced upon while browsing the bookstore. The aroma of black coffee from the café. The sight and smell of his favourite tea (one sugar, no milk). Potions. The smell of Amortentia (fresh cut grass, new parchment, spearmint toothpaste, the potions classroom, him). Clothes that she thought would suit him. Shoes she thought he would like. Black. Green. Even Doctor Who reminded her of him, somehow. She did not know how.
Everything led to him. And he was gone. All that was left was the stain of tears on her cheeks. She had nothing of him to remember him by, only her memories which had begun to falter. His face and voice were starting to become fuzzy and she feared, she was terrified of the day in which she could no longer conjure him and their memories up in her mind. And so she continued to cling onto their memories, cling onto the wavering picture of him in her mind, keep the only photograph she had of him in her wallet.
It was May 2005. It was raining. It was dark.
She was curled up on her couch, a mug of tea in her hands, Doctor Who playing on the telly. She realised that Muggle TV series were comforting, a well-needed distraction from anything wizarding.
And when she thought she could finally, finally fall asleep, she heard a knock on her door and Crookshanks had dashed to it, staring at it intently.
She got up, crossed over to the door and opened it.
'Miss Granger,' the man said, voice like honey, voice soft and almost broken, voice tentative, voice carrying the world.