Author's Note: As Beater 2 for Pride of Portree and per the rules posted in the thread, I'm writing prompts based off of the Seeker's favorite pairing, which is Harry/Hermione. I'm not necessarily going to go all goo-goo eyes and kitten kisses, but this fic will remain T so nothing too dark either. The prompt for this story is: 5) (quote) 'Wealth is the ability to fully experience life.' - Henry David Thoreau and 10) (word) memory
Rolling in It
Harry Potter stepped out of Gringotts Bank with his pockets full to bursting. For the first time since the Wizarding War had finally ended with Voldemort's corpse lying as still as stone in the rubble of the bloody battlefield at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, he had a spring in his step.
It was time to have some fun. All of the fun that money could buy, in fact.
"Harry James Potter! You get back here this second!" called a shrill voice from his right, and the spring abruptly disappeared.
Well, that was short-lived.
He turned to the source of the voice, his glasses catching the glare of the early morning sun in Diagon Alley.
"Hermione. I should have known. Whenever I'm about to have a bit of fun, who else but you can properly rain on my parade?" he muttered darkly, more to himself than anything.
The young woman stomped over, her snarls of auburn hair framing her face like a lion's mane. Stopping almost uncomfortably close to him, she narrowed her eyes and crossed her arms in a manner that would have been far more intimidating had Harry not stood at least a foot taller than her.
"What is this I hear about you dumping Ginny and acting like a right git to Ron?" she said scathingly, and Harry noticed that she had a thick tome wrapped in brown butcher paper with the distinctive seal of Bourgin and Blotts squeezed under her arm.
"Can't even spy on me properly without falling victim to the siren song of a bookstore, I see," he replied coolly, feeling somewhat torn when Hermione blushed angrily.
"That's neither here nor there!" she huffed loudly, "You're ruining your life! What's this I hear about you running about dropping Galleons like dragon dung? Your parents would die of shame if they weren't already dead!"
Harry's eyes narrowed. That was a low blow, even for her.
"You do know that the dead parents card can only be played so many times before it stops having an effect?" he replied darkly, even though it did still have an effect on him, not that he'd tell her that, "It shouldn't matter to you if I wanted to melt down all of my inheritance and turn it into a giant statue of Snape's nose! It's MY money, and I'll do what I want with it!"
"Harry, this doesn't sound like you at all. What happened to you?" Hermione said softly, and Harry felt his conviction start to waver.
She bit her lip, her eyes starting to shine with tears. She took some deep, shuddering breaths to calm herself, which to Harry were worse than her shouting angrily at him. At least he could use his outrage against her accusations even though he knew in his heart of hearts that she was right.
But he still wanted to do this. Wanted to be free for the first time in his life. And having full access to all of his family's wealth was going to help him do it.
"This...this isn't like you. You've never been obsessed with wealth or money," Hermione said sadly, her eyes still misty as she sniffed back tears.
"I don't owe you an explanation, you know," Harry replied coldly, his voice rising, "In fact, I don't owe anyone an explanation. Just in case your memory is faulty, let me remind you that I'm the Boy-Who-Lived who's now the Man-Who-Lived. I defeated goddamn Voldemort! Maybe, just maybe, I need some time to process the fact that my entire life has been tied up in prophecy and machinations larger than myself! Maybe I need some time to deal with the fact that the man I came to see as a father figure intended for me to die all along! Maybe, just maybe, I can't go back to Ginny or start on having the perfect fairy tale happily ever after until I've dealt with some of the shite that's clogging my head and keeping me from moving forward!"
"Harry...I didn't realize that's how you felt," she said softly, looking down at the ground at what was obviously a very interesting pebble.
"Maybe I just want to use my wealth to experience a life outside of being some sort of larger-than-life hero of fate that everyone wants to write epic stories about," Harry said somewhat sheepishly, looking at the same pebble as Hermione and thanking his lucky stars that she couldn't see that his face had gone slack with grief.
"What do you mean?" Hermione looked up and she could finally see how tired and sad he looked.
After all, Harry Potter was good at a great many things, but hiding his feelings was not one of them.
"Hermione- OOF!"
She'd tackled him around his middle before he could get the words out.
"I know you think I'm a bloody nuisance, and I'm not exactly your best mate the way that Ron is," Hermione said fiercely, squeezing Harry in a way that was both uncomfortable and comforting at the same time, "But Ron's still mad at you and he's never been particularly good at talking sense into you anyway. As loyal and good-hearted as he is, he still doesn't understand that sometimes you need someone who will challenge you just as much as you need someone who blindly goes along with every hare-brained scheme you come up with!"
"Ok, ok, gerrof, Hermione," Harry wheezed as her hold on him threatened to cut off the flow of oxygen to his brain.
People were starting to stare, because even though Harry had purchased rectangular glasses and was wearing a knitted cap pulled over his distinctive hair and scar to dissuade being publicly recognized, Hermione's distinctively bushy hair was a dead give away and with the way she kept saying his name without any real effort to control the volume of her voice, he was amazed that Rita Skeeter hadn't yet appeared with a pen and paper and her signature ability to twist the truth.
Hermione relented and stood back, her hand still clutching his right wrist as though she was afraid he'd disappear.
"Harry," she said, finally meeting his eyes, "I'm worried about you."
"Hermione, do you have some time?" Harry said abruptly, "I have something I want to show you."
She nodded and let him pull her along as he turned a corner, away from the gathering crowd of people and led her down an alleyway.
They snaked through side streets and alleyways that Hermione found confusing and disorienting, but still she clung to his wrist and let him take her onward. They ducked in through a tiny red door that she wouldn't have even noticed unless she'd been looking for it. A small brass plaque read "Positively Portkeys" in tiny engraved letters.
Inside, a small wizened witch with lanky hair and a pinched, pale face sat behind a counter, a gigantic cabinet behind her made up of tiny frosted glass doors with dim outlined shapes inside of each. She looked somewhat familiar, but Hermione couldn't place it.
"I'd like a portkey, Ms. Prince," Harry said, pulling out a somewhat massive leather bag of Galleons, "The usual parameters apply."
"Place, Mr. Potter?" the witch drawled, and Hermione felt a stab of recognition, though she still couldn't place where she recognized it from.
"Surprise me," Harry replied with a grin.
"As you wish," the witch said, turning and pulling out her wand.
One of the tiny doors opened silently and a clear blue glass doorknob floated down into the witch's hand.
"You may return whenever you wish," Ms. Prince said evenly, "Simply twist the knob counterclockwise twice."
"Thank you," Harry said, as he took the item and pocketed it quickly.
The sour-faced witch simply smirked in reply.
"Where are we going, Harry?" Hermione asked, her voice a little unsteady now as they left the shop.
"It's ok, Hermione," Harry replied, pulling the knob from his pocket, "We'll be back before suppertime. Do you trust me?"
"Of course. You're my best friend!" Hermione said fiercely, surprising both of them.
They touched the knob together and the familiar pulling sensation twisted them through the void to an unknown destination.
Hermione opened her eyes.
It was nearly dark outside. The sky shone red with the early evening sort of twilight which cast a friendly glow in the town spread before them. They stood on a hill overlooking a modest sprawl of buildings, a warm breeze was blowing so she didn't need to use a Warming Charm.
"Where are we?" she asked.
"Somewhere where no one knows who I am," Harry said, the relief in his voice palpable.
And suddenly Hermione realized exactly what Harry Potter was spending his money on.
"You...you just want to be…" she trailed off.
"I just want to be Harry," he said, smiling wistfully as they watched the last bit of orange dip below the horizon, "Just Harry."
Hermione drew him into a hug and smiled into the rough wool of his sweater as she squeezed him tightly.
"You'll always be Just Harry to me," she said softly, feeling him squeezing her back in equal measure.
"Now, then," Harry said with a grin that seemed to have shrugged off the weight of the world, "Let's go be nobodies for awhile!"
"You know," Hermione said, grinning back as they started down the hill, "I think I'd like that, Just Harry. I'd like that a lot."
And just like that, they were free.