A/N: So even though Ancient Fading Lines is on hiatus until I finish my senior thesis, I've been so struck by the Chemistry & Timing updates recently that I had to do my own fic illustrating the vibe that it was giving me. Hope you enjoy!

The first time Remus met Hermione, he saw a glimpse of Lily in her eyes. Not too much, of course, but she was young and eager and fiery, and he hadn't seen that sort of passion in anyone for a long time.

He hinted at this thought to Dumbledore not long after he arrived at Hogwarts, but he stopped just short of drawing out the connection.

"Harry's really made a place for himself here," he mused. "Hermione and Ron, they… they seem like good friends. Seeing them together almost brings me back to my time here."

And Dumbledore smiled just slightly. Sadly. "Be careful, Remus. He's not James."

"I never said he was."

It would have been easier if Harry was the one who steered his thoughts toward the past. But as it was, Harry had nothing to do with the childish daydreams that came to the surface almost as soon as he began teaching—

Lily claiming a seat across from him in the library during their first year. Over and over again, every day, until, eventually, he tired of standing up and leaving. And then she began to catch his eye and smile. And then they began to exchange whispered words, questions about homework first, and then genuine chit-chat.

She was the reason that James first broke the silence that hung between Remus and the other boys in the dormitory.

"Hey Lupin, you're friends with Evans, aren't you?"

Remus had been so surprised to hear someone described as his friend that he didn't know how to respond at first. But then: "Oh, uh, I suppose."

"She's pretty, don't you think?"

A pause. "I hadn't really thought about it."

He had. But James never bothered to ask again, and it wasn't until much later that Remus felt that he might have missed out on something by not admitting to it.

Lily had guessed that he was a werewolf too.

She didn't learn before the lads, but by fourth year, he wasn't surprised that that she felt compelled to do a little research. It was too big of a pattern to ignore.

He told her, too: "You're the brightest witch I know."

Lily blushed and murmured "thank you," but her smile lit up the room.

Harry, Ron, and Hermione all did a fair amount of growing up after their third year. By the time Remus encountered Hermione at Grimmauld Place, something about her demeanor had shifted. He lost the sense of Lily, the sense of nostalgia.

He actually got to know Hermione then, when he found himself sitting beside her at the dinner table or in faltering moments when they crossed paths on the stairs. It was strange, how different she became when he allowed herself to glimpse past the ghost in her gaze—past the gentle, warm look of a Muggleborn witch who was outraged that he was ashamed of the wolf inside of him, rather than discomfited by the wolf itself.

Only a few days before they were due to return to Hogwarts, he found himself invading on a private moment which the other two parties did not fully realize they were sharing. Hermione and Ron, casting a few furtive glances at one another over the course of an evening. Both played it off, each time, as a larger scan of the room.

So, Remus mused. She truly wasn't Lily. She wasn't Lily at all.

"She snogged me."

Remus blinked a few times in quick succession. "Who?"

"Lily, mate, who else? On our walk back from Hogsmeade just now."

"Oh. Well there you are, then."

James was too pleased to take this poorly. "You're in a strange mood, Moony. I really think you should have joined Padfoot and Wormtail, gotten out of the castle."

"I'm fine. Just tired."

Only a month before, Lily had sat across from him in the candlelight of the library, reaching across the table to wipe away a dab of ink that he'd rubbed onto his cheek. And it had seemed, for just a moment…

But then he recoiled. Because he had forgotten himself for a moment, but he knew that she deserved better than him. He didn't want to draw anything out, if there was even anything there to begin with.

Perhaps there was never anything there.

"Just very tired."

Molly was yelling at him again. He'd just about lost patience for it: his relationship with Nymphadora – or lack thereof – was none of her business.

Hermione and Ginny's entrance was, therefore, a welcome interruption, as Molly at least had the sense to acknowledge that it was none of their business. She wandered off to retrieve some basil from the garden, muttering to herself.

"What was Mum going on about?" Ginny asked him.

"Something on which she cannot justify having an opinion. Would either of you like some tea?"

Remus left earlier than he'd planned to that evening, in part because of Molly's attempts to get him alone to keep yelling…

But also because long after Ginny moved past his peculiar comment, no doubt tucking it away to consider with the others later, Hermione kept looking at him, a calculating look on her face.

"How did you know to find me here?"

Lily raised her eyebrows at him. "You're not going to invite me in first?"

Remus stepped away from the threshold just enough so that she could squeeze inside, but he didn't move from the vestibule once she'd entered.

"You told me about this cottage in our fifth year. You said that your parents brought you here every summer and that you knew you could always come here if you needed some quiet time to think. And when James, Sirius, and Peter all realized that none of us have heard from you in over a week… I thought it would be worth a look."

She fell silent, and he knew what she wanted to ask him, but he was not going to make it easy, so he simply blinked down at her. Her face was half in shadow, tinted yellow by the setting sun coming in from the windows.

"Please don't make me say it."

"Say what, Lily?"

"Remus…" A hint of exasperation in her voice. "James is convinced you've finally gone off to pout about Dumbledore not giving you the librarian position, and I didn't know whether to tell him that I think he's wrong."

"Do you."

She looked at him hard, and they stood in a stubborn silence for what felt like eons. The sun was just sinking below the horizon when Lily finally said, "James's mother is looking forward to seeing you at the wedding. He promised her your first dance."

He swallowed and nodded. "I wouldn't miss it."

War.

He nearly lost himself in it, overwhelmed by the loss of friends and loved ones.

He felt shame for the wolf in him, shame in a way that he hadn't felt since his fellow Marauders began to make his transformations bearable.

The only thing that made his days worthwhile was visiting James and Lily and playing with Harry.

The only thing that made his days worthwhile was curling up with his head close to Dora's lap, his hand pressed to her stomach so that he could feel the baby kick.

He thought of Voldemort, hunting down James and Lily, and there was a part of him that spent a moment after each visit wondering whether it would be the last time he ever saw them.

He thought of Voldemort, hunting down Harry, Ron, and Hermione, and—

No. Not Ron.

When he found out that Ron was staying with Bill and Fleur, he knew that it would be easy to judge him for abandoning his friends. But the first time Ron saw him, Remus found himself being pulled into such a tight embrace.

"They're better off without me," Ron mumbled before Remus could even say anything.

Remus thought of Hermione, his throat tight. It felt silly – the trio had been missing for some time, and they had held up thus far – but for the first time since Voldemort's return to power, he found himself terrified.

He couldn't even articulate why.

A dull silence hung over Hogwarts, punctuated mostly by the tears of witches and wizards facing their dead loved ones. Voldemort's defeat proved to be a moment of catharsis, but in part, it gave people more liberty to weep.

They sat curled up on the floor on opposite sides of the Great Hall, two of many people sobbing over limp forms.

Somehow, Hermione found Remus first. He was surprised to feel her hand on his shoulder. When he looked up, her eyes were still glistening with tears. "I'm sorry."

He glanced over to the other end of the hall, took in the sight of the Weasleys and Harry, still huddled together. "And I'm sorry," he murmured.

She hugged him, and he squeezed his eyes shut as she tucked her head into the space between his shoulder and his neck. His hand drifted thoughtlessly to stroke her hair, and she said nothing about it. He couldn't say which one of them began to cry again first, but soon enough, both were in tears, and they clung to each other.

"I'm sorry about your mother, Remus."

Remus kept his eyes on James and Harry, trying to feign interest in the infant's enthusiastic reactions to small magic tricks.

"My mother's been ill for a while now, Lily. You know that. I'm more concerned about you and James—is it true that Dumbledore's convinced you to go into hiding?"

She surprised him by settling her hand on his arm. "That can't mean that it's easy for you. I know you, Remus. I can tell when you're holding back."

"I know." He finally looked her in the eye, and he nearly broke down at the concern and affection that he saw there. But as it was—"I appreciate your concern. But I didn't come here to talk about my mother. Let me fret over you three right now."

Lily acquiesced, but Remus got the sense – that whole evening – that she was walking on eggshells with him.

Remus barely saw Hermione for about two years. It was quick hellos when they crossed paths at the Ministry or at the Burrow on Christmas—not that first Christmas, of course, because no matter how much Molly twisted Hermione's arm, she couldn't bring herself to go.

And then he ran into her in a seaside Muggle town, dithering over meats at the deli.

"I wouldn't have thought I'd run into you here," he mused, daring to give her a gentle smile. It was the first time he'd really smiled at her since before the war.

"Oh, my parents brought me here on holiday a few times when I was young. I thought it might be a nice place to get away from everything for a week."

Remus considered her for a moment. "If you'd be willing to make an exception for dinner tonight, I'm staying in a cottage on the beach…"

Her eyes shone. "That sounds lovely."

Hermione arrived in the late afternoon, and she lingered well after Remus put Teddy to bed. They sat on opposite sides of his sofa, Remus leaning in and Hermione with her legs tucked up under her as they sipped cup after cup of tea.

It was not that she reminded him of Lily. Or at least, he was mostly certain that it wasn't that she reminded him of Lily.

But she was a bright spot in a rather bleak world. And Remus found that he was willing, in a new way, to seek out brightness.

It didn't hurt that Hermione was always happy to see him. She still kept Harry and the Weasleys at arms' length, but not him.

He asked her why, once.

"Because you don't treat me like I've lost anything."

Yes, he realized. That's exactly what struck him about her, too.

At some point, Remus found that his throat got tight every time he saw Hermione. He found himself swallowing hard before he spoke to her and his eyes following her figure as she strode across a room. And sometimes it seemed, just for a moment…

But he didn't want to presume. They'd built up such a rapport in the years since the war. If he was misreading, he'd ruin one of the best things that had happened in his life.

It was winter. Hermione had invited Remus to her flat, and Teddy was with his grandparents, so their preparation of dinner was more playful and distracted than usual—the beef was a bit overdone and the vegetables were too soggy, but neither of them cared.

After dinner, she wanted to show him a book that she'd been meaning to recommend "for ages," so she crouched down on the floor beside one of her bookshelves. He joined her, and hours later, they found themselves still sitting there together, too caught up in conversation to even think to stand up.

Maybe there was something in her laugh. Maybe it was something about the way she glowed in the dim light. But something about that moment made Remus's heart swell, and in a brief lull in conversation, Remus's features grew soft and he murmured, "Hermione…"

He was at a loss for anything more, but she surprised him. She leaned forward, pressing one hand on his knee as she brought her face close to his. There was a brief instant in which she paused, and the centimeters between them stretched into infinity.

Remus bridged the gap, and the sun shone through him.