She couldn't stand it. She watched as he slowly killed himself, trying in some twisted way to join the brother he had lost. Hermione looked, as she had done so many times in the past, on the boy she had admired all these years drink his life away.
The rest of the family was in so much grief as well that they had overlooked the true turmoil that was now driving George Weasley into the darkest of abysses. Only Hermione was able to detect this undeniable pain, how could she not, all her eyes could do were fall upon this once happy soul. For the past six months George had been sinking lower and lower due to all the drinking he had been doing. Tonight she had followed him here, to this middle of nowhere bar with its dirty windows and dusty tables. He really went out of his way didn't he? Thghout Herminone. She decided that it was time to face the music and confront him at last.
Herminone walked slowly toward George, thankful for the rain beating against the windows covering the sound of her steps. Once she was right behind him she took her right hand and was about to tap his left shoulder when unexpectedly George swept his chair around and was staring Hermione striaght in the face. She stared in disbelief, she wasn't prepared for that.
"You know if you're going to sneak up on someone, you should probably make sure that they are not sitting in front of a mirror." Said George, his words just slightly slurred, he had dark circles under his eyes and it was obvious to anyone who saw him that he didn't take any care in his appearance. She could have kicked hereself for not checking to see if there was a mirror behind the bar. He gave Herminone this quizical look that she couldn't place as a sign that the alcohol had started to take its affect or if he was truly pondering why she was there.
"George, I know what you've been doing and I think that you should stop."
George huffed and said, "What would you know about it."
"I know that you've been drinking every night and you haven't been keeping up the shop like, it's a real wreck, I know that after everything that happened …" George had gotten up and started for the door, Hermione started after him.
"George, wait don't go" she ran after him into the pouring rain. She looked around and saw his hunched figure walking down the road. Hermione jogged down the road, mud splattering her jeans as she did, by the time she reached George she was soaked through and so was George. "George, I know that you're hurt, I know that what you're going through must be just so terrible, I know that Fred was…." But what Hermione knew Fred was, was never said for at the sound of Fred's name George had whipped around to face Hermione, his face had a look of extreme anger and unmaskable pain.
"You know nothing!! You have no idea what it's like, to have the person you was your best friend, your other half, everything you have ever known and everything you have ever been… Just one day be gone." He screamed everything that had been bottled up inside him since that horrible day six months ago. "You have no idea what it's been like for me!!" Suddenly Hermione realized that George wasn't yelling at her, he had thrown his head up at that last comment. All Hermione could do was watch as six months of pain was finally getting some relief.
"How could you! Why would you leave me like this?" he had stopped yelling and had begun to sob. "How could you leave me with no chance to say good-bye, how could you leave me all alone" Hermione walked up to George and threw her arms around him as he lost all control. He began to cry fully now, letting all his pain go as Hermione held him. Hermione began to sink into the ground both George's height and weight working against her. They stayed like that for a while, the rain falling down on the broken heart of the boy who was forced to be a man and the girl who had saved him from himself.
