Neville quietly opened the door and entered the ward, as he had done so many times before. This time, however, was different. This time, he could give them the news he had been longing to tell them for so very long.
He sat down in the chair that had been set between his parents' beds, and watched them sleep for a moment, imagining that if he called their names, they might wake, as if they had never been cursed at all.
"Mum? Dad?" he tried tentatively.
At the answering silence, he shook himself lightly, dispelling his fanciful notions and preparing himself to deliver his message.
"The war is over. We won. I destroyed one of V-Voldemort's horcruxes, his snake, with the sword of Godric Gryffindor. I think you'd be proud. At least, I like to think you would."
He paused, some small part of him hoping, praying to hear some affirmation that he had truly, finally become a man whom his parents could be proud of.
Greeted once more with an uncomfortable, unbearable silence, he pressed on.
"And Lestrange – she's dead. Mrs. Weasley got her, in the end. I thought I'd feel more…satisfaction that she finally got what she deserved, but we have lost so many that it's hard to feel anything anymore. And you're still not awake. You're still – I still can't -"
He broke off. A solitary tear leaked out of the corner of his eye, and he didn't bother to brush it away. Instead, he stared at the ceiling as it trickled down his cheek.
"That's the thing, isn't it? So many lives lost, taken, and for what? One man may have begun this war, but he alone could never have waged it. It was ordinary people, torturing and killing their own kind.
"Sometimes I wished that you'd just died too. Died, and gone on to whatever comes after, rather than stayed here to waste away, alive, but unable to live, in a world so full of darkness. Then I feel terrible for even thinking such a thing.
"But the truth is, I love you, and I wanted with all my heart for you to be proud of me. To become a man that you would gladly call your son. I realise now that that can never be. Maybe you would be proud of me, if you could see me now. Maybe you wouldn't. Either way, I'll never hear you say it. It's time for me to let go of that dream, to stop trying to make you proud, and start trying to be the man I want to be."
He drew in a deep, shuddering breath, and looked back down to his parents.
His mother was sitting up, smiling vacantly at a spot on the wall above his head. Her face was thin and worn, overlarge eyes framed by a cloud of wispy white hair.
He smiled sadly, and sat a while, watching her hum to herself and stare off into space, his father comatose as usual in the bed to her right.
When the light through the window had begun to take on the deep glow of evening, he stood up to leave. As he turned, a hand caught his sleeve.
His mother, staring into his eyes as though trying desperately to remember something, pressed something into his open hand. He looked down. It was a crumpled gum wrapper.
"Pop," said Alice Longbottom.
Her son choked back a sob. "Thanks, Mum," he whispered, slipping the wrapper into his pocket.