I know, I know. I should be finishing my chapters but I just love one shot standalones. I find they hold so much more emotion, and to be honest I do not have the interest span to write chapter stories. I enjoy writing these. So, expect more.

Over the years she's learned to leave behind the past the best she could. To forget the audacity of fireworks that lit up the sky just hours after some of her very best friends still lay crusted to the earth. Burnt and broken in ways that you cannot even imagine (that she cannot even picture again without feeling sick). Explosions of vibrant colours in celebration of what was over, and she tried not laughing at how absurd it was to forget the fact that so many people still hadn't been scooped up off battlefield.

She remembers the final three minutes before it was truley over. How long it took between each minute. It made her realize just how deadly sixty seconds can really be in intervals.

One, a flowing river of red dripping above. Recognizale faces beneath the colour. She didn't even notice the same colour seeping through her robes. She felt hot with anger and gripped her wand more tightly than ever before. Screams echo'd around her and she ran towards the noise as best as she could track it. She failed to remember at that moment that sound bounces off surfaces hard enough to repel them in another direction. She hadn't found them fast enough.
Two, everything was so silent. She saw more red in this room than any other. It was almost as if the walls and carpet were that colour beforehand. But they weren't and the thought made her stomach lurch up into her throat. Stinging and burning. She could then faintly hear footsteps, many. She later found it had been the rest of the survivors who also didn't make it to the screaming in time. She still wonders what they thought as the walked in for the first time, seeing her like that. Seeing them like that. The walls, the floor, the bodies. The silence.
Three, a mass of black robes filled one section of the room. All fallen. Among the black was a hint of white that stung to look at it. She remembers thinking of how brave Harry was. He had defeated them. She was sure Neville had temporarily lost his stuttering and his awkwardness and had thrown out impressive spells. She knows Ron must have been great. Her left leg had been broken but she didn't realize it until she had fallen to her knee's screaming for revenge. Her left arm had also been broken and near shattered in many placed and she didn't realize it until she fell foreward ontop of Harrys lifeless body. She cried at the realization that Rons chest was not rising and falling in the pattern it would had his heart still been beating. She had dislocated her shoulder but did not realize it until someone had pulled her away from the wreckedge.

Within months people forgot about the ashes that had settled across everyones homes for so long. How hard it was to scrub away it all. It's been 3 years and the soot was as dark as ever for Hermione. She tried growing a garden in the backyard of her home but the yellow petals shone little through the black. She gave up trying.

Coming back to Hogwarts was a difficult thing for her to do. She knew it would be. The robes that held colours that didn't matter, they probably didn't know of what little those colours did. All they did was set you apart, but there was only one colour that pushed you together.

The castle lacked in original Professors from her time. Minerva, Severus, and Pomfry were the only left. Most of the others had died from the war. Some died from the people they lost in the war. Those people stayed home and forgot about the magic that inflicted such pain.

Hagrid had survived, but didn't teach. After Dumbledore fell her only visited the castle when he was lonely. Those times he spent infront of the portrait. She, however, believe that the portrait would never be enough. Not nearly.

Severus Snape would not enter the room of Dumbledores portrait. He barely walked past it. Once he was caught off guard just a few months ago while trying quickly to walk in and out of the room upon demand from Minerva to drop of the syllibus for next term when the portrait bellowed "Severus, my boy. How are you?"

She thought she saw a flicker of pain in his eyes as he mumbled and stocked out of the room.

Severus had been good company for Hermione. They talked often of books, and classrooms. And thankfully, never of the past. He never brought it up, and nor did she. She found herself growing fond of Severus over the last two years. He had become far more grateful, and kind. Which isn't saying much. He was still a bitter man and still lashed out insults left to right. But she found his eyes kinder. His gestures.

She knew he still felt responsible, and guilty. He never gave interviews around the time everyone tried writing books on the war. 'The final battle' they called it. They both knew there would be many battles, and many wars still to come. Hopefully in enither of their lifetimes. They prayed it was their final battle.

She sat across from Severus in the library. It was almost empty, since curfew was rounding the corner. They were discussing a small plant that Severus had shipped over for some potions he was working on.

"Why don't you let Hargrid take it for awhile, you know you cannot keep it in the dark with you," she said fiddling with the clasp on her bracelet.
"I do not think that oaf could take care of something this delicate."
"Why not? Hagrid is gentle, and kind. He could do it."

"I do not trust a man on his kindness alone, Miss Granger."
"Then shouldn't you trust him on his abilities, his past experiences. He's trusted you!"
"At his own fault. Everything anybody thinks about me is at their own risk. I treat everybody the same, certainly not every one of them trusts me." He had a point there.
"I trust you," her voice barely above a whisper.
"You shouldn't."

They had moved from the library, and began their rounds. It had proved better for Hermione when he joined her while she walked the castle at night. She sometimes found herself hearing the noise that she couldn't reach fast enough three years ago.

"Severus," she broke the silence. There had been a tension between them as of lately. She knew why, but wondered if he did.

He grunted a response.

"There's something I should tell you."

Again, a grunt.

"These two years working here, having your company," she didn't know the right words, "especially this last year. It's been, well great. I-"

She didn't know how to say it. She stopped and turned towards him. His face was tilted downward, looking at her.

"I like you," she blurted.

He sighed. "I can't say I despise your company as much as I did when you were a student."

"No, I mean. I.. like you. As in, more than f-friends."

"You don't."

"Yes, I do."

"No, you think you do. You're mind is fooled by muggle magazines that say you need something more than what-" he stopped, choosing his words "more than this."

"I'm trying to explain how I feel about you. Why do you have to be such a bastard?"

"Because that is who I am."
"I refuse to believe that you do not wish for love. For companionship," she stated, her eyes glazing over.

"I do not need it." was his simple answer. She could tell her was lying.

"All you need in life is love.." she said, her hands finding her way to his shoulders. He did not like this.
"I'm sure that water and oxygen cannot be replaced, and you are merely looking over these important facts for the sheer movement of this conversation?"
"Love, Severus.." she moved closer. "Happiness."

He grew angrier by the second and without knowing right away had her backed up painfully beside a large black door marked 'Supplies'.

"Do you know what I am capable of Miss Granger?" His left arm was under her chin, pinning her to the stone wall. Her face wrinkled in frustration as she struggled against him. "No, I suppose you don't.." he mused, his voice growing colder.
He released some pressure from his arm, but only a little. He didn't want her to choke, atleast not by his own arm.
"You have no idea who I am, and what this life has forced me to become.." his eyes were now closed "What little power I have over myself when it comes to this thing you call 'happiness'. How I cannot achieve it. I do not deserve such a thing, and it will not be wise for you to talk to me like that again lest you know what else I have little power over.."
With a swift movement he released her and stormed off.

She knew he was covering. She knew he just wanted to see if she was willing to fight for him. And she was.

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