Hermione stood beside her husband Ron waving happily as the Hogwarts Express departed from Platform 9 3/4 with a great plume of smoke. She fondly remembered her first day on the Hogwart's express, running around like a bossy little know-it-all, secretly scared to death to enter a world that she and her parents previously knew nothing of.
She knew Hogwarts would hold many grand mysteries, adventures and friendships for her children, but they would be safe now, the evil times were behind them. Harry's scar had not pained him in 19 years. All was well.
And yet suddenly, Hermione felt herself lifting from the fog of the cheery Hogwarts express. She realized she was disappearing bit by bit, and neither her adoring husband nor her loving friends could even see that she was vanishing. They merely continued to wave happily at the departing train. She tried to shout out but nothing came from her mouth as she had now entirely disappeared.
She heard the screeching laughter of Belletrix Lestrange laughing in her ear and she felt the pain of torture creep though her entire body.
Hermione felt strong hands grabbing her shoulders, and she was ripped from the dream suddenly and back into reality. She wasn't married to Ron, she was still eighteen years old and The Boy Who Lived, Then Died, Then Lived Again was shaking her awake, staring at her with his emerald green eyes.
"Hermione! Wake up!" Harry urged.
She gasped for air, unable to fully recollect her surroundings, and he slowly let go of her shoulders so she could slowly sink back into the soft mattress of the her bed at the Burrow. She felt slightly embarrassed suddenly and drew the covers up around her shoulders, wondering who else she may have woken up.
"Bad dreams?" he asked, lazily flopping down at the foot of the bed. She felt relieved that his concerned eyes were no longer on her.
"Nothing to fret over" she responded dully.
"Maybe you should try taking some of that dreamless sleep potion" he advised.
"Sounds like something I'd say to you" she snorted, finally feeling less scared and a bit more settled.
"Except that I'm just making a suggestion" he noted. "You, on the other hand, would have phrased it as a demand."
She laughed and the cold feeling of fear finally passed. Once more she had the sudden overwhelming feeling of happiness that Harry had survived. There had been so much doubt, for so long, that any of them would survive, but especially him. At a point it seemed inevitable that he must die to save them all, but she was inexpressibly pleased that he had prevailed in the end. She had spent so many years of her life protecting him, helping him, standing by his side. She couldn't imagine how empty life would feel without him.
"Did I wake you?" she finally asked from the dark, watching how the silver moonlight still poured through the drapes.
"No, I haven't been sleeping well" he confessed. There had been a time when he had been reluctant to tell her many things, knowing how she would fuss over him. But after all those nights camping in the woods, after standing besides his parent's grave with her at his side, and facing death many times together, it seemed silly to lie and be shy about such things.
"Well, then maybe it's you who needs dreamless sleep" she scoffed, sitting upright and realizing she wouldn't be falling back asleep anytime soon. She studied him lying there at the foot of her bed, sprawled out like an athlete after a long run. His raven hair fell across his face and she couldn't tell if his eyes were open or closed.
"I'm afraid to ignore my dreams. I'm afraid that if I don't dream, I'll start to forget about them. All of them."
There was a silent pause and she moved down the bed, curling up beside him. "You could never forget them Harry. They will never be forgotten."
"I can hardly remember anything about my parents. I have seen them in the pensieve, and in the Mirror of Erised and such, but I have no real memories of my own"
"You were one when they died Harry!" Hermione exclaimed.
"I know... it's foolish, I just don't want the same to happen for Sirius or Lupin or Dumbledore..." as he listed names he felt his throat clench up and so he stopped talking and looked away from her, seeking comfort in the dark shadowy nothingness of the room.
"I sometimes worry that I will forget my parents" she admitted. "I know they're alive and well, but it's like they are as lost to me as I am to them. I think sometimes, if I ever have kids, they will never know their grandparents. And it's... it's terrible because they were really great parents." She found suddenly that tears were gliding down her cheeks and she wiped them away hastily, but not before Harry's eyes had returned to her face to see them gleaming in the eerie moonlight.
"I'm sorry" he whispered, not sure what else to say or do.
"For Merlin's sake Harry, don't apologize, it's not your fault, how many times do we have to go over this?"
Until I believe it he thought to himself, but he kept his lips sealed. Instead, he said, "We're just so young to have given up so very much."
There was a long silence in the room as a gradual breeze lifted the curtain and drifted through the room. It would be Fred's funeral that day, and the hour approached with increasing dread. Harry was having a difficult time being at the Weasley's. He knew that those who died did not die for him, they died for a cause they believed in. But since he was a baby he had become the face of a resistance that had ended in success, but also much pain and bloodshed. He knew that for some old friends, he was difficult to even look at. Ginny was amongst them.
Harry was not angry for the discomfort others felt so recently in the aftermath of the great battle. He entirely understood how strong a reminder he was of all that had happened. He could hardly look at his own face in the mirror without feeling a flood of remorse for the lives lost, and that irritating, lingering feeling that maybe if things had been done slightly different, or somewhat quicker.
But he tried to squash all that doubt. If he had learned one thing since he had discovered his fate as the Boy Who Lived, it was that destiny was unavoidable. Things fell into place and there was nothing a measly bespectacled boy could do about it but try his best and fight with all his courage.
And then there was the other thing... was it really all over? Well, that he also tried not to think about. Evil had many faces besides Voldemort.
Unknown to Harry, Hermione lay beside him thinking very much the same. Some people were out celebrating the end of the dark lord, others were out mourning the losses of their loved ones. But still others were collecting in the darkness, plotting and planning. Those types would always be out there, but Harry would always fight them. She knew this just as surely as she knew that she would stand by his side as he did.
She gave a loud yawn and realized maybe there would be sleep after all. She buried her face against Harry's shoulder, breathing in that scent of cut grass and something difficult to place that was so clearly Harry. He was alive, and that would have to give her the hope to get through the grief for now.
IN the morning, Hermione awoke to find herself curled up at the end of her bed like Crookshanks taking a nap. Harry was long gone, not even a trace of his body warmth left on the sheets. As she rose to get ready, it felt like a rock had sunk to the bottom of her stomach. She was not ready to face Fred's funeral. She felt vaguely ill, but steadied herself. She would need to be strong for Ron, and her logical mind resolved that she would do just that.
She dressed in a black dress and black heels, giving herself a long gaze in the mirror as though to steady her nerves before leaving the solitude of the Weasley's guest bedroom. A knock came on the door and she knew it was time to face the day.
She opened the door to see an unusually pale Ron standing solemnly on the other side.
"Oh Ron!" she exclaimed, her heart breaking to see him in such pain. She threw her arms around his neck and he squeezed her close to him. "Sit down Ron, I'll fix your tie."
In his distress, much less than his tie was awry. His shirt looked wrinkled and his shoes needed polishing, but she did not admonish him as she normally would. She quietly set about using magic to tidy him up and then grabbed her brush to carefully smooth his fiery red locks out of his face. She ended by slowly re-doing his tie, hoping that the calmness of her actions would give him some measure of comfort to rest his thoughts in.
"I- I can't bear it Hermione" he suddenly stuttered, and then tears flowed freely from his eyes, and he tried to bow his head to keep her from seeing his anguish.
"I know Ron" she whispered, sitting beside him and wrapping her arms around him once more.
"George is just, so dead inside without Fred. They were two sides of the same coin. It's like when we lost one we lost the other as well."
"He'll get better Ron" she assured him, slowly rubbing his back. "It may be a long while but George is strong, just as Fred was. You just need to be there to remind him of who he is, remind him that he can still be George, even without Fred."
Ron took a long, teary inhalation and nodded. "You're right Hermione."
"Are you agreeing with me Mr. Weasley?" she joked quietly, hoping to ease the tension. "I never thought I see the day."
He smiled slightly through his tears and then leaned over to kiss her. She welcomed the embrace. They still hadn't had the time to discuss what they were to each other. Part of her still had reservations from being abandoned by him during the hunt for the horocruxes. Yet, she had always known that despite being hot headed Ron was a truly good soul, and even his foul moods stemmed from a great deal of passion. And she had admired him since they were children and he sacrificed himself during the chess match. She wanted to be in love with Ronald Weasley; she was just still determining if she was.
After their lips parted she took his hand in hers and led him out of the room and down to meet with the rest of the family so they might apparate together.
THE funeral was about as somber as could be expected. Mrs. Weasley cried hysterically as Mr. Weasley weakly attempted to comfort her. Bill and Charlie spoke of their brother, his bravery, his wild sense of humor, his skills on the Quidditch pitch and success as a businessman.
Ron held Hermione's hand with such ferocity that at times she felt it might break, but she ignored the pain and allowed him to cling to her. It seemed to her that his hand within hers was all that was keeping him from crumbling to the wet soil on which they stood. A storm had passed through just before the ceremony, and now blackened sky slowly separated over their heads, allowing yellow light to slowly melt through the clouds and down onto the heads of those mourning below.
Ginny stood with tears silently pouring down her fair white skin. She stood slightly apart from the rest of her family, and Harry ached with the desire to hold her, comfort her. He felt powerless as those he loved expressed their grief around a corpse that had once been filled with so much life. He felt his hands tremble with a mixture of sorrow and rage at the loss of life and innocence. He stuffed his hands deep into his pockets to control them and kept his face from showing the battle that raged inside. He needed to be their hero right now, not a 17 year old emotional boy.
He saw Ginny look up through her long red hair, and her eyes met his for an brief moment. The pain he saw there sent a jolt though his body and nearly took a step backwards. Then she took her eyes quickly away from him and they remained fixed on Fred's coffin for the rest of the funeral.
How many more of these will there be? Harry wondered to himself as the casket was lowered into the dark soil. He had seen Lupin and Tonks buried already along with many others. Fred's body was the last to find it's way into the ground. He wanted to hope that this would be the last friend he would ever have to bury, but it was hard to believe. He had born into a world plagued by death; first his parents, then Cedric, Dumbledore...
Listing every life lost was a waste of time and he knew it. He remembered what Dumbledore's ghost had told him, "Do not pity the dead, Harry. Pity the living, and, above all, those who live without love." He couldn't allow things like fear of death turn him insane as it had Tom Riddle. No, wherever Fred was, he had found a peace that those still alive seemed far from.
When the funeral ended, Harry sought out Ginny from the crowds of people. When she saw him approaching she looked caught between running away and running into his arms, and as a result she simply stood there motionless.
"I think, wherever Fred is now, he has a lot of people laughing" Harry said, not wanting to offer the usual lame "I'm sorry for your loss."
Ginny tried to smile at the thought and that only made the tears flow more furiously. She reached out and found Harry's wrist, grabbing it tightly. He laid his hand gently on her shoulder and after what felt like an eternity of her battling her emotions she buried her face in his chest, her tears dampening through his black button up and onto his skin.
"I-I'm sorry Harry" she wept softly.
"There's nothing to be sorry for. We don't have to talk about it now." He rubbed her back slowly, their two bodies almost swaying as the sky opened up and warm sun poured down upon them.
"No, I've been terrible to you since the battle. I feel so lost."
"I know you Ginny Weasley. You're one of the strongest people I know. If you're lost right now, it's only for a little while. And when you decide what it is you want, I'll listen."
"Thank-you Harry" she whispered. She reached up and kissed him on the cheek very softly, and then turned and walked away to rejoin the rest of the Weasleys as they tried to comfort one another. Harry slowly approached Fred's headstone, and he knelt down in front of it, trying to think of what he wanted to say.
"I've seen a bit of death at this point I suppose. I'm still confused about it... I'm uncertain if you can see, or hear, or feel any of what is happening with the living. In many ways, I hope you can't. I hope your concerns with this tangled up world have ended, and that wherever you are, my parents and Sirius and Dumbledore and the rest are there, and you're all at peace. That's what I hope." He ended a bit lamely, and when he rose to his feet he sensed that Hermione was standing a few feet behind him.
"I think the Weasley's need some family time" she said, and Harry nodded in agreement. Harry and Hermione were practically part of the Weasley family, but in truth they were both just orphans. Hermione's parents had no memory of her, they were just as much a war casualty to her as Harry's parents were to him.
He linked arms with Hermione and they walked from the graveyard together. "Let's get a drink" he offered.
As they left the graveyard, Dumbledore's words echoed through his mind once more. "To the well-organized mind, death is but the next great adventure."