*I.

Lavender Brown.

Seamus just stared silently while Parvati sobbed quietly beside him. He couldn't believe it. He thought they had been lucky that they all survived. But they didn't. Not all of them.

Her eyes were closed. Her lips were turned slightly downwards. Her body was bent at an unnatural angle. A spot of red gleamed where the werewolf Fenrir Greyback tried to bite her before Hermione Granger blasted him away. It almost seemed like she was sleeping. Almost.

Her limp cold hand lay in his. He held it tightly as if it were his lifeline. As if he were her lifeline. He wanted to be her lifeline. Then at least she wouldn't be dead.

He was supposed to protect her. He tried to protect her. But he failed miserably.

"You ready?"

He gripped her hand tightly as she bounced up and down on her feet, her face uncharacteristically determined. "Aye, I am. The question should be, 'are you ready?'"

She frowned at him. "I'm not fragile, Seamus. You know that. If I were, Ron Weasley would've shattered me long ago."

"But it wasn't real. I knew it then. I know it now."

She laughed bitterly. "Really? Everyone else fell for it. Even poor Ron, himself. Like I would actually be that clingy of a girlfriend and make up such ridiculous nicknames. If that were the case, you'd be sick of hearing me call you 'Seamy' or something like that."

He shuddered, glad that she never ever called him that. "If that were the case, you wouldn't be my girlfriend for so long. I know the real you. You may be girly and gossipy like so many girls our age, but you've got a courageous soul within you."

"How else do you think I got into Gryffindor?"

"Don't expect me to not protect you during the battle."

"…I'm never going to get you off my back, aren't I?"

"You love me."

"Yes, I do. I love you, Seamus."

"Love you too, Lavender."

He still loved her at this moment. Even though, it should've been past tense. Nothing would stop him from loving her.

At her funeral, he gave a heartfelt speech about how she made everything better, including himself. His last words for it were "A lavender smells sweet, always. Just like she will always be our hearts – especially mine. Everywhere I will go, I will smell lavender flowers and think of her and how much I will always love her – no matter what."

Because she was his first – and only true love. Nothing could change that.

Not even the girl who wailed for her lost love beside him in the destroyed castle.

**II.

Marley O'Brien.

Seamus's heart felt as if it were ripped into quarters for it was the second time. The healers looked at him in pity, but he ignored them. They didn't understand his pain. They didn't understand how much he needed her.

She lay in the bed, her eyes closed and an accepting smile on her face. It pained him, that smile. She was waiting for this for a long time. They had each other for eight years. Eight whole years of comfort and understanding. A deep friendship like no other that turned into a romance of necessity. They knew that they couldn't be happy with anyone else again, but together it was almost something. Almost.

He remembered meeting her. A student below him in Ravenclaw, she fought in the battle alongside her underaged boyfriend but something went wrong. He never asked for details, just like she never did. Still, it was all they could hope for.

"I'm so lonely, Seamus. And I know you are too."

"We have each other, don't we?"

"You know that we'll never be whole again. Friendships, sometimes, are meaningless."

"Now that's not true. We've healed each other a bit, yeah?"

"I guess. But it's not enough, Seamus. I think you know where I'm going with this?"

"Are you sure, Marley?"

She shook her head, her dark brown hair rippling in his face. "I'm never sure, Seamus. My mind's too tired. But I know I need someone who I can at least fake love. And that person's you."

He did the only thing he could of to respond to that. He kissed her. And it felt right – sort of. But most importantly, it felt great.

Marley abandoned him, though. How could she leave him with nothing? A sound of a baby's crying brought him out of his thoughts.

"Sir," said a healer who entered the room holding a bundle of blankets. "Your daughter."

Seamus blinked. "Was there any way possible to…to save…"

The healer sighed sadly. "It was either her or the baby. She asked us to save the baby."

It was a sacrifice. He held his arms out for his daughter. The baby wailed as she left the healer's arms but calmed as soon as she settled in his. Her eyes blinked as she looked up at his face. He nearly cried – not for Marley's death but for his daughter's wonder into the world that she would soon discover was not as nice and perfect as she would perceive it to be. Her eyes – blue like his. The rest, he knew, would be Marley's.

He looked to Marley's body on the bed and approached it. The healers just watched. At her bedside, he leaned into her ear and whispered, "I'll take good care of her. Have fun with Colin."

To the baby he said, "Welcome to the world, Amy Marley Finnigan."

***III.

Amy Finnigan.

Seamus peered tiredly into the young woman's face that hovered above him, her face worried and tear-streaked. Her new wedding ring gleamed on her left hand, and her stomach bulged just enough to show her pregnancy. He felt old just by seeing that, not to mention the fact that he was already weakened enough from the dragonpox.

"Daddy," the woman said, her hand gripping his tightly. "They say any day now. Any day. I don't know which one is worse; waiting for it to happen or to lose you already. At least you're still alive when waiting for it to happen but who knows how long it'll last?"

She was crying, which pained him even more than the disease itself. "It'll happen when it'll happen, Amy. I'm so sorry that it has to happen this way."

"Are you? You'll get to be with Lavender again – and Mum."

"I won't have you."

"You'd better listen to him, Amy. No one has their life complete without you."

Seamus silently thanked the redheaded Weasley (really, there were too many of them in his daughter's generation) who sat in the chair near the door, despite still holding resentment for him stealing his daughter's heart. Oh well, at least Amy had her mother's sharp temper (or at least the short temper her mother had before losing Colin) to keep him in line. "You listen to him, Amy."

"I've thanked myself for not listening to him multiple times before."

It was an attempt at humour, and her husband grasped onto it quickly. "And the one time you did listen to me got you hitched in the end, didn't it?"

A forced smirk came over her face as she looked over to him. "And because of that, I still question my sanity."

"Yeah, because you rejected me so many times in the past!"

"Fred Lee Weasley, you'd better –"

Seamus hacked. And hacked. Flashes of spell light shot in the air, sounding the alarms. Amy shrieked as she bent over him. "DADDY, NO!"

Healers rushed in and pulled her away. His vision began to blur rapidly. He couldn't breathe. It was time. He knew it.

Take care of her, Fred Weasley.

Lavender.

"I'm here. I love you."

Marley.

"I'm here. We're happy. I love you (like the sister I never had)."

Amy.

"I'd better not see you here for at least another fifty years. Your daddy loves you."

*Date is 2 May 1998

**Date is 21 August 2006

***Date is 16 December 2030

AN: This was something I've had in my head for a while. I put together Seamus and Lavender, but Lavender died in the Battle of Hogwarts and I had to figure something out for my OC Amy Finnigan. That's when I came up with the idea of her mother being someone who lost a loved one in the battle as well and gave her Amy's middle name Marley. Then ideas just started forming then, including Lavender playing the part of Ron's overly clingy girlfriend (he had no idea she was using him like he was using her) to make Seamus jealous after they broke up.

AN 2: I hoped you readers enjoyed this. Reviews (preferably ones that are more thoughtful than simple one- or two-worded compliments) are greatly appreciated and thanks in advance to those of who do!