A.N.: I am well aware that this is probably AU.
Disclaimer: Don't own Harry Potter or the KT Tunstall lyrics (in speech marks).
The war is over, and we have won.
What will our lives be now that it's done?
The room where happy memories were once shared
is now the room we run to, scared.
They felt like zombies as they walked through the portrait hole. Gryffindor Tower was lucky to have survived the battle. Even so, the common room bared the signs of the war: spells had ripped through cushions and left feathers everywhere; dust and bricks covered the floor. It looked nothing like it had done that very first time they had set foot in the luscious red room, all those years ago.
The sofa, however, was untouched, and it was to this lonely piece of furniture that the three of them gravitated, sitting opposite the empty fireplace.
We take our seats, and, for a moment, we are young again.
How carefree and innocent we all were back then;
now the ones we laughed with are up in the sky.
It isn't fair - shouldn't we have been the ones to die?
Hermione laid her head on Ron's shoulder, staring into the empty grate. Time seemed to stop to allow them to grieve, as though it were the only kind power in this dark yet now peaceful world. As an eerie silence descended over them, they forgot that they were covered in dirt and blood.
Our heads are filled with the names of the lost:
so many of our friends who paid the ultimate cost.
We'd sung songs of hope when we slept in our tent.
Now all that's left is the Phoenix Lament.
It is not easy to execute a three-way hug on a sofa, but it is amazing the feats that can be achieved in times of such woe. The three of them were lying on their sides, all facing the fireplace. It was not easy to forget the memories of staring into that fire and waiting for a friendly face to appear in its depths.
Now the grate was empty, and they felt hollow as the fireplace was; worse than if a Dementor had been nearby.
Our lives have been leading up to this,
a victory far too sweet to miss:
but a victory caressed by death's violent touch -
is it really supposed to hurt this much?
"Pain was built to last", but we'll be fine;
all we need to heal over is time.
It's been seven years, but it's finally done.
The war is over, but it doesn't feel like we've won.