one
When he meets her first, she is loud and kind of obnoxious but he can't muster any anger towards her. Not really. She has kind eyes, he thinks, and her teeth are a bit too large, but she reminds him of the fairies in an old Muggle book his father used to read to him and it makes him feel sort of safe. He notices that her hair is like a thing all its own. It's wild and bushy and free and it tickles her elbows when she moves and if you asked, he'd probably tell you that that was the first part of her he fell in love with.
two
The years pass and they form two points of a perfect triangle. There are three of them and they keep each other up and carry on together. Neither of them are at the top and they're so often overlooked but they like it here, in their corners, holding Harry up high. And if it gives them a chance to stand back and avoid each other's gazes discreetly, then so be it.
That first year, she comes back after a long summer apart and her skin is brown and healthy and her hair has golden fibres woven through. She looks different, and so much the same. She looks happy. He laughs when he sees her because her hair only reaches past her shoulders now and if he doesn't laugh he might cry because she's changing and he's not ready to grow up.
You could say he's being overdramatic and you could say he cares too much. But you could also say that he doesn't want to see the one person who's just hisfade into the darkness or, god forbid, dance into the light. (And okay, she's a little bit Harry's too but she's more his and he can't explain it).
three
The next few years he does what he can and from the corner of his eyes he watches her grow. He is fourteen when he notices that she's less hard angles and knobbly knees, more curves and eyelashes and goofy smiles. She doesn't cut her hair again and it tangles in the wind and dances around her when she's excited, or angry, or moving in any way at all. It's a bit like her aura, her shadow, and he often sees her hair in all its bushy, crazy, brown glory before he sees her.
It's strange, he muses, how safe it makes him feel to see her hair long and free (like when they were children, before the lights went out on the world and the future).
He tells her once. Or at least, he tries to, but he can't make the words seem right outside his own head.
"I love your hair long."
"Thank you," she smiles, and oh Merlin, her smiles are lovely and there's something differentthere but he doesn't care because she's beautiful.
"It makes me... I mean, I feel like - a - a- I'm a safe?"
And he's blown it again, hasn't he? But she just raises an eyebrow and laughs and bounds away in a whirl of chestnut.
four
The hunt is long and the days are hard. The locket is heavy on his chest and resentment is heavy on his mind. He's stuck in a tent "on the run" but going bloody nowhere and he's angry and fed up and she's making him feel like she's choosing and, oh god, it hurts.
He watches her. She works so hard, bending her brain around puzzles that don't exist and making do with the little food they have. He thinks she's never looked more beautiful than right now, with her concentration forming lines on her forehead and her determination sitting stubbornly on her lips. But her hair is twisted into angry, hasty braids behind her and he thinks it's kind of funny (and kind of sad) and a perfect metaphor. Because here she is, so beautiful and lovely and amazing and tied up and trapped and changed. And yes, she's never been more beautiful to him, but he's so very aware that he's not the only one looking.
When he spits the words, they taste like bile and dishonesty, and as he turns to leave he sees her tears and hears her cries and wonders when she'd last let her hair down.
five
He comes back and he's so very sorry. She sends him looks full of hurt and annoyance and anger and apologies all her own. He resigns himself to agreeing with her every word in hopes that she'll love him back. He thinks maybe she already does. But then he thinks back and remembers Riddle-Hermione and you are nothing and he feels sick.
She's like my sister. I love her like a sister…and he can breathe again.
six
He watches her do battle with her hair flying about her, a fierce shield around her arms. She looks like a Muggle film star, a hero, and he falls in love with her just a little bit more because she's everything he's ever dreamed of and she's saving his life right now. He doesn't think she can get any more beautiful and his heart squeezes every time she calls his name because she's his and he thinks she might know it.
seven
They've won, they've finished, it's all over and suddenly life seems kind of empty and pointless. The future is this long, winding path before him and he doesn't particularly want to walk it. Not alone.
She disappears for a few weeks and he understands. They all want to be alone, and she needs her family and he needs his, and it's okay because she sends him letters and signs them "with love".
When she comes back her hair is gone. It's cropped short to her face like a boy's, it's tickling the nape of her neck and it's sticking up haphazardly and happily. It's darker at the roots, and he thinks it's strange to see her face without a flyaway frame. She looks older, wiser. Her eyes are clearer and he wonders if they've always been this brown, this thoughtful, this perfect.
And he can't help it, and he never thought he'd believe it, but-
"You're beautiful," he whispers and it's like a new beginning.
She kisses him and laughs and he runs his fingers over her short spikes. And he was wrong before. She's more beautiful now than ever.