A/N: This was written for the 2015 HP Silencio fest on Livejournal (meaning I wasn't allowed to use any dialogue). My prompt was "THIS COUPLE are having loud sex AGAIN." As you will see, I chose to go in a more serious direction with the prompt. I hope you enjoy, even if Severus is missing in this one.
Thanks to my betas, AdelaideArcher and MelodyLePetit.
Her Private Symphony
The library of Grimmauld Place was nothing like it was when it was the home of the Order of the Pheonix. In fact, the whole house was transformed. No longer were the carpets threadbare and worn. The walls, previously adorned with ancient, peeling paper, were scrubbed and painted in bright colours: reds, yellows, blues, and greens. The shrunken elf heads were moved to a bedroom given to Kreacher in place of his hovel in the kitchen; Mrs. Black, impenetrable even to buckets of turpentine, had been covered with another, larger portrait of Sirius. The troll-leg umbrella stand, so often tripped over by Tonks, was painted shocking pink and left in place in her memory.
Despite all the changes, Hermione still considered it her safe house.
Her favourite place was the library, but that was only partially to do with the walls of books stacked end-to-end in the freshly stained mahogany shelves. No, what she loved most about the room was its nightly concerts.
For most of the day, one could hear nothing but the soft ticking of the grandfather clock that stood between the pair of sash windows opposite the fireplace. But after dinner, when the sun had swapped placed with the moon and her friends retired to their rooms, the monotone click-click-click of the pendulum was joined by a louder rhythm echoing through the ceiling.
It always began with footsteps, like a conductor tapping her wand against a music stand. Next the floorboards groaned as the inhabitants of the bedroom above shifted to the ancient four-poster; shortly it began to rock, its initial notes eventually turning into a bellowing meter, like a deep thrumming set of timpani. This was joined by a thudding drum of the headboard against the upstairs wall, and the tinkling of the glass trinkets on the library's mantle as they were knocked together by the vibrations. Ginny provided the keening melody to the allegro, while Harry's deep rumble punctuated the chorus, his voice like the soft strings of a cello.
It wasn't Mozart, but Hermione still considered it her own private symphony.
The first time she heard the music was the night after moving in. Wiping fresh tear tracks from her face, she fled to the library from her bedroom, hoping to lose herself in a book. She never expected to find solace in her friends' songs. Yet, despite the initial shock of overhearing Harry and Ginny's lovemaking, Hermione could not help but feel comforted by the sounds.
Outside of her evenings in the library, Hermione oscillated between overwhelming sadness and fear, and a bitter determination to make things right after too many years of wrong. Her friends saw her better face: not the one who curled up and cried in her bed every night in tears; not the one disturbed by too frequent nightmares; not the one so very afraid she would end up worthless and alone. Only for a brief moment did they see the daggers in her heart when she discovered the loss of her parents was permanent—her own fault—and when her fledgling relationship with Ron, so long craved for, was torn apart by misunderstandings and grief.
But sitting in the library, listening to Harry and Ginny's orchestra of love crashing and swelling overhead, all sharp drums and shrieking strings, all that faded away.
And really, was that so hard to believe?
Hermione didn't think so, not when the first movement sounded and their love was apparent in the chords. After all, wasn't love the most powerful magic of all?
The feelings may not have been hers, but that didn't seem to matter.
The music reminded her that the war had been worth something: not only the lives of her best friends, but the opportunity for them to love and live and fuck and laugh and sing and make music with the knowledge and security of a free world and a place to call home.
It gave her hope that one day she might get the same chance, and, perhaps, meet a man to make her own sweet music with.
So every night since the first, Hermione came to the library hoping that the thin ceiling and her two friends might play for her again. Thus far, she had never been disappointed.
Laying on the sofa, eyes unfocused and staring at the freshly painted ceiling, the music started, and Hermione felt her anxiety melt like water from her limbs.
As the first movement ended and the rocking above slowed and metered, Hermione's mind slipped free from the world, that dark aching cloud in her chest precipitated away. She closed her eyes, her back sinking into the plush velvet of the refurbished sofa, and the library faded to blackness until all her mind contained was the soothing, even rhythm of the adagio.
Soft sighs eventually bubbled the song into the playful third. This part always made Hermione smile. Harry's rumbling tenor set off Ginny's tinkling laugh, their voices like the dancing tune of an oboe and a flute amidst the burgeoning and often frenetic squeaking of the bed frame. This part never lasted long, but Hermione didn't mind.
The final movement was her favourite.
Upstairs Harry and Ginny's lovemaking built in a crescendo, moans and the hammering headboard melding into the rhythm of a heartbeat. The glassware on the mantel threatened to fall and break, the chandelier rocking dangerously, its swishing cord and tinkling crystals helping to bring the music to its conclusion.
Finally, like a canon, came Harry's great moan and Ginny's cry of ecstasy as the symphony reached its peak.
Hermione's body would tingle and arch against the couch in joined bliss, tendrils of hope exploding in her heart.
A few mumbles and squeaks as the instruments were packed away, and then it was over.
All that was left was the ticking of grandfather clock, counting out time.
Hermione's eyes would slowly drift open, blissful but for a moment before the black tendrils of uncertainty would curl their way into her veins and her body hummed once more with adrenalin.
Knowing there would be no encore, she would pad to her room, tears often dribbling down her cheeks before she met her bed. There was no use fighting them. She would just have wait for tomorrow, for another evening, another seat in the library, when her symphony would return for their next show.