I am not JKR; therefore I do not own HP. It'd be nice, but alas, that's not the way of things.
.x. Surrealism .x.
It was cruelly surreal to be standing at platforms nine and ten that morning at quarter to eleven, staring at the brick divider between the two and knowing full well that the Hogwarts Express was waiting for them behind it. It was almost like something out of a dream, to be standing there and knowing that she wouldn't be crossing the barrier for a seventh time. She had dropped out of Hogwarts—waiving her duties as the next Head Girl—more than two months ago, but it hadn't quite hit her then. Even when she hadn't gotten her letter or gone to Diagon Alley to shop for books and materials, it hadn't quite clicked. Only now that she was standing here staring at Platform Nine and Three-Quarters and about to board a different train that the fact that she was never going back to school was sinking in.
"Hermione!"
Harry's rushed, frazzled voice broke her reverie and she turned away, running with her small bag of clothes onto the train at platform ten. The locomotive was a dark forest green, so harsh in hue that it was almost black—the exact opposite of the Hogwarts Express. It was not full of giggling teens, but rather sparsely populated by old, middle-aged men and women who were already beginning to doze off twenty minutes before the train left the station. As she looked around, she knew that there was no denying that she was starting a new phase of her life now. This bleak train could only take her to bleak places. She followed Harry and Ron through the compartments as they made their way as far back as possible, looking sadly at her surroundings as she went. She wished, for once, that she hadn't walked out of Divination that day in third year. She wished that she could know what awaited her and her friends.
"What were you looking at, Hermione?" Ron asked her as they stopped and began to put their luggage into overhead compartments.
"What do you mean?"
"Outside the train. You stopped for a good five minutes—Harry and I had already gone halfway down it when we realized we'd lost you somewhere along the way."
"Oh… I was just looking at…at nothing."
Ron and Harry exchanged a look and Hermione turned timidly away, willing for them not to figure out what had so captured her attention. She didn't want Harry to think that she lacked heart.
"Hermione, are you sure you're alright?" Harry asked her gently. "You look pale."
"Harry, I'm fine."
"You don't have to come with," he whispered. "You still have ten minutes."
Her head snapped up. "What are you talking about?"
"It's ten-fifty. You still have ten minutes to get on the train to school. It's not too late."
"I want to be here," she said, her voice low and full of the sound of tears that she didn't want to shed.
"Hermione…I'd understand."
She was silent for a few moments, her eyes drinking in the sight of the navy blue carpet covering the floor of the aisle. "I have to go," she whispered.
Harry looked at her and nodded before she turned and headed down the aisle. "Hermione!" She whipped around. "Aren't you forgetting something?" he asked, pointing to the overhead compartment where her bag was.
"I'm just going to the loo," she said quietly before turning around again. She trod slowly until she had closed the door to her compartment and entered the next, at which point she broke into a blind dash, ignoring the stares of her fellow passengers. She was trying so hard to fight back tears…
When she finally reached the loo, she didn't wait a moment to slump to the floor behind the closed door, burying her head in her arms and sobbing for everything that had happened—everything that was going to happen. A sudden, wild banging came through the cheap aluminum door. "Someone's in here," she mumbled miserably, not bothering to raise her head.
"It's Ron," a gentle voice called through the door. Hermione raised her head gently.
"Didn't you trust me when I said that I wasn't leaving?"
"I trusted you. I just wanted to make sure that you're alright," he said.
She unlocked the door with an outstretched leg and carefully put it back in place before muttering, "Come in, if you like."
Ron pushed the door open slowly and quietly, looking at her sadly before closing the door behind him again and crouching down on the floor beside her. He reached over and put his hand over hers, squeezing it slightly. At his touch, all of her carefully constructed defenses broke again and she dissolved into sobs.
"Shhhhh," he whispered, and she leaned into him. He patted her back, unsure of what to do. The entire room, all the way down to the floor, was made of aluminum and the lighting was dim. It was not the altogether most comfortable place to sit and cry, but Hermione wasn't thinking about that.
"It's all gone… Hogwarts, graduation, my Head Girl badge, classes, being valedictorian… What's going to happen, Ron, when the war's over and we need to live our lives? How are we going to get jobs? We won't even have finished school."
He put two fingers beneath her chin and pulled her face up near his, looking at her intensely. "No matter what happens, I'm sure that you'll manage to do just fine. You're the smartest witch I know."
She smiled slightly before burying her head in his chest again, shaking with sobs as he rocked her in his arms and somehow made the world just a little bit brighter with the sound of his voice in her ear.