Disclaimer: I do not own, nor make any profit from, Harry Potter. It is the property of J.K. Rowling, Warner Bros., etc. (Note: I will not repeat this in future chapters.)

A/N: This contains spoilers from Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Parts 1 & 2. If you have not seen them and do not wish your viewing to be spoiled somewhat, then read no further!

Otherwise…

I saw both parts of Deathly Hallows and loved them! Certainly my favorite Potter films so far. I adore the scene in which Harry and Hermione are dancing in the tent. I imagine that the dancing part came days, perhaps weeks, after Ron's departure. (The song when they dance is O Children by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds. I suggest listening to it while reading or beforehand.) This story is an alternate path (emotionally speaking) that Harry and Hermione might have taken at this point in the tale. I take things from the movies and books as I see fit. Now, onward!

Preface: Inescapable

Everything about the universe seemed steel gray; hard and strong and filled with unforgiving coldness. Dismal hours and days went past, in the wake of a tragedy that had been unexpected even in such dark times. Why hadn't the world gone cold and dead? How could there still be birds singing and animals rustling their way through the undergrowth? Could anyone understand the loss of a friendship that had been more like brotherhood? Harry asked himself these questions over and over again each day that passed by without Ron Weasley standing beside him and Hermione, but found no answers in the wilderness surrounding the tent.

Little discussion could take place anymore that would not turn right back around to the exact moment in time that their redheaded friend had left. This was what it all boiled down to, really. With Ron's flight, their entire world had changed. The revolution of the earth could well have rearranged without their notice, so lost were they in their broken trio, now a duo for the foreseeable future.

Hermione's tears tore at his heart a little more each time he saw or heard them escape her; she was in so much pain. Ron's leaving had cost her far more than it had Harry. He could admit that much to himself. Even though Ron's departure raised previously unspoken doubts and worries, even if losing a surrogate brother hurt more than any curse, Harry knew it was nothing compared to losing the one person with whom someone had intended to spend a lifetime. As early a stage as the relationship had been in, it was obvious just how Hermione had felt about the youngest of the Weasley brothers. Whether Harry's attention span the last several months had improved or he had simply spent more time in his best female friend's presence last year, he knew how much she cared about Ron. And if he hadn't known before the present circumstances, it was definitely no secret anymore.

How Ron had missed Hermione's feelings was confusing. Wasn't it obvious? Or had Harry been so highly strung by the other dramatic events in his life throughout school that he had been secretly hoping to watch something beautiful bloom out of something horrible? Because Ron and Hermione's relationship had always had a certain amount of horrible to it, Harry had to confess internally. Arguing and biting sarcasm far more often were their methods of communication than sweet talk and lazy romance. The beauty of love had forever seemed a great deal too lofty of a stretch between his two best friends.

Perhaps Harry had recognized his own inability to create such beauty, for fear of losing it before he ever had the chance to properly seize it, and so turned to his best friends to make something wonderful together. Was that so delusional? Harry was not sure, but it definitely did not sound very practical. Though Hermione's emotions about Ron could not be mistaken, maybe Harry really was living vicariously through them…

They never spoke of it. Hermione's feelings, that is. Not exactly a topic of conversation to mention casually when you were on the run, hungry, lonely, lost, and missing the object of those feelings, now was it? Harry didn't dare even say Ron's name, for fear of setting off those bewildering tears that his bushy-haired friend could let loose.

Much as he felt a need to comfort her somehow, Harry Potter was not a very sensitive type of guy in the arena of a woman's emotional climate. (With Cho Chang, the situation had been a perfect disaster. And with Ginny… well, she was tough enough to not take his less intuitive reactions personally.) Such was the case when he had let slip a mention of how infuriating the wireless radio was becoming, armed only with depressing news of death and destruction or the sadly incommunicable noise of static. Hermione had promptly burst into tears, through which she had barely been able to explain the connection that the radio held to their absentee best friend and his habit of poring over the thing. Harry had not said a word against the little piece of mechanical wizardry since.

There it was again. Static and confusion were the only things that had been heard from it as yet… as well as the most depressing wizarding news imaginable in Harry's mind. Missing persons, entire families destroyed or imprisoned for nothing more than the fact that they had a muggle relative somewhere in the world. People were fighting, but they were losing more than they could hope to win in a lifetime, let alone a few months. For days, the little wireless radio had driven Harry positively mad with its gloomy, gray announcements. In his anger, fear, frustration, and depression, along with the locket's dark effects, he had almost jumped down Ron's throat some time prior for it. It seemed a little thing to endure now, compared to the absence of a brother. Even if the radio only ever consistently filled their eardrums with pronouncements of dread or with fuzzy, indistinct, cacophonic sounds that did no one any earthly good.

Of a sudden, however, the wireless was not sounding off with mumbo-jumbo or names of wizards and witches who had been taken away or murdered. Beside Hermione's hunched body, the beginnings of a song were coming in. A piece of music that had some unbelievable strand of hope already twining among its opening notes. Hermione's head lowered further onto her knees as the lyrics came into play, while at the same time Harry lifted his face to gaze at her sad stance with more clarity.

She was so terribly lonely looking. Small, fragile, and hurt best described her now. Even after those times that Ron and Hermione had a huge blowout argument, she had never looked like this helpless little girl before. It made him feel entirely useless. How could he help her when he was unable to help himself? And yet... the song was becoming so inexorably stuck in his mind. Hard though it was to push aside Ron's betrayal, as much of a challenge as it would be to forget for a little while, Harry knew he could do it. He simply had to. Hermione needed him to. For the sacrifice she had made by staying, Harry must.

Standing quietly and hesitantly, hands shaking and knees ready to melt with nerves, Harry moved slowly toward his best friend. The song went on, leaking hope and courage of a different sort into the young wizard's veins, and before he could register the fact he was standing in front of Hermione. In spite of the words flowing through his mind, his vocal chords refused to work. Disregarding this point as minor compared to his ultimate goal, Harry held out his hands to draw his only companion onto her feet. Uncomprehending, but offering no words of reproach or curious queries, Hermione placed her fingers trustingly into his palms and allowed herself to be pulled up.

The tune on the radio, so melancholy and yet still incomprehensibly encouraging, compelled Harry to removed that blasted locket from his friend's slender neck. Reaching up to do just that, he was struck with a strange urge to put it on himself, but he stamped it down wildly. The only urge he wanted to follow was the one that could help Hermione somehow escape her gloom, even if only for a short time.

Successfully transferring the locket onto the bed rather than his own throat, Harry reached back to take his friend's hands in his own. Her incomprehension continued until the bespectacled wizard began to move in some semblance of a dance. Harry had absolutely no idea if he matched the beat or had any kind of decent rhythm. Hell, he didn't even know if he was actually doing anything remotely considered a dance move. At the Yule Ball he had danced once and barely even glanced at the other dancers on the floor after sitting down. Whatever he was doing, Hermione now understood clearly what her dark-haired friend was attempting. Her face was a picture of vague, bland amusement with a tiny, sly half-smile which did nothing to bolster Harry's confidence in the off-handed plan he concocted.

Persistence and a bit of idiocy paid off, however, when a small but genuine smile lit up Hermione's face at his increasingly nonsensical physicality. Further he went in his so-called dancing and the further her lips stretched. And there... there! She laughed! A slight giggle and breathy laughter rolled into one package. Giddy with his unanticipated success, Harry began to twirl them both around with vigor and as much grace as he could muster. The motions even began to feel fun and exciting; a release of pent up energy they had no other way to expend. Harry wondered why he had never enjoyed dancing before, but swiftly realized that it was because he was with good company now; someone who wouldn't laugh at him condescendingly no matter how stupid he came to look. In front of a crowd of onlookers in formal wear and lacking the knowledge of the art was certainly not the place that could happen.

But here and now, with Hermione laughing – not at him, but with him – Harry felt it was the absolute perfect place to let loose and enjoy himself no matter how foolish he may have looked to an outside or how terrible the world outside may be.

Quite frankly – although he was loath to admit it – even with Ginny this had not been a possibility. Something about Ginny was slightly stiff and vaguely uncomfortable. The best times with her were those moments when she was arguing with fiery vigor or her cheeky wit came to the fore. That was all Ginny seemed capable of allowing in the company of others. Not that Hermione didn't have her awkward moments, but it was different in some strange way. Whereas Ginny could not soften for another's sentiments, Hermione could let loose a rage of emotions and show compassion on even the strangest living creatures.

It was this kindness, this caring, that made Hermione special. In a world full of cruel, unfriendly people with nothing but their own interests at heart, Hermione stood out as a girl of substance.

While his thoughts became more serious, leaping down from their high, happy pedestal, Harry noticed the song took the same route. The rhythm slowed and quieted, the voices scampered softly into oblivion, and as the last bright laugh between he and his best friend faded away to bleak, reminiscent smiles, Harry felt the depression seep back into the tent and their very spirits. They both settled their head against each other's shoulders, as if praying that the music would lead them back into that time of freedom they had just experienced. Neither of them wanted to let go, Harry knew that much just by Hermione's stance. Tension lined her arms, her hands grasped his shoulder and the fingers of his left hand with immense pressure, and her back arched with an unnaturally tight curve.

Then the song was over. Liveliness and joy fled and static returned; now the uncertainty crept over them like Devil's Snare. Ready to squeeze from them all the life they had.

Hermione pulled back from him so slowly that Harry imagined he could feel each strand of her bushy hair as it fell away from his shoulder to lay back against her own. Lucky the static of the radio crowded their ears, else Harry knew the awkwardness would become unbearable between them.

"I... I'm sorry, Hermione," he blurted out of the blue. He didn't know why he was apologizing exactly. Only that his invitation to dance had formed a knot in his stomach that had nothing to do with Ron's absence and everything to do with the sudden nearness of his other best friend... Only that dancing always brought a certain level of intimacy that Harry now realized would be inescapable with Hermione from that point forward. "That was... I shouldn't have done that. I know it was out of order. I'll just–"

"Harry, what on earth are you talking about?" Hermione interrupted him with a decidedly businesslike air about her. "There's no reason to apologize. Nothing's changed with us."

But as she headed outside to take watch, Harry felt the lie in the very depths of his bones.

For him, everything had changed.

A/N: It's really nice to post the bits of stories I have written so far. It's like a weight off my back. And I love this scene, so it was even better. :D

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