NINETEEN YEARS LATER
A tired-looking redheaded man sat at the end of a long bar in a dodgy pub located in an even dodgier part of London. He had to be in his mid to late thirties and there was a look of quiet desperation on his face as he picked up his sixth glass of Firewhiskey. In the blink of an eye the glass was empty. Fitting, since the glass tended to be 'half-empty' these days. The man sighed as he slammed the glass down, a grimace on his face. They didn't call it Firewhiskey merely because it had a nice ring to it.
"Would you like another?" a soft voice asked him. Hannah Abbott-Longbottom, the landlady, appeared from the shadows. So much had changed.
"Not sure, Hannah," the redhead responded, wondering why she always seemed so happy to be alive; he remembered that she had been a Hufflepuff when they attended Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
Ron Weasley's gaze concentrated on the bartender as he thought about Hogwarts. Nineteen years ago he would have never thought that he would be in the situation he was... It was almost a sure thing that the Order of the Phoenix and their allies would have defeated Lord Voldemort and his Death Eaters. Harry Potter, his best friend, was the Boy Who Lived. It turned out that the Boy Who Lived failed to live up to his title. When the clattering of a wand against the stone floor of the Great Hall was heard, everything changed. The Wizarding World died along with Harry Potter on that fateful day.
"I need another one," Ron said, blinking himself out of the trance-like state that he had been in. "At least I'm keeping you in business, eh?"
Hannah gave him a pitying smile and went to get Ron a fresh glass of his favourite drink. She truly did pity him and his situation. He had the love of his life, Hermione Granger, ripped from his arms in the middle of Diagon Alley; this happened soon after the Battle of Hogwarts.
"Here you are, Ron."
"Thank you..."
As if he knew what Hannah had been thinking about, his thoughts immediately went to Hermione. Was she even still alive? The Death Eaters had achieved their mission of purging the Wizarding World of Muggleborn witches and wizards to encampments where the victims were either tortured, maimed, or murdered. To put it simply, if you were found out to not be of Pureblood or Half-Blood Wizarding decent, you had no chance of surviving. As much as Ron would like to count his blessings to be a Pureblood, not to mention alive, he was finding it hard to see how drinking himself to death was any better.
He blamed himself for Hermione's fate. If he had not felt the daft and untimely urge to check in on his older brother George without a disguise such as the Polyjuice Potion, she would still be with him. George had lost much more than an ear during the war: his best friend and his twin, Fred Weasley, had been murdered during the Battle of Hogwarts. Hermione had tried to warn Ron against the stupidity of leaving their hideout to comfort his brother but he was too blinded by grief to listen.
Lifting his glass, Ron swirled the brownish-red liquid in way Severus Snape, his Potions Master from Hogwarts, had taught him. He studied the motion for a moment before he drank his poison.
"Sometimes I think that with each additional drink, there's more of a chance of them coming back," he said to no one.
The door leading out to Charing Cross Road opened and a stocky man entered, heading directly for Hannah.
"Neville!" the landlady exclaimed happily, nearly jumping over the bar to embrace her husband.
Ron looked up from his drink, observing the couple. He gave Neville a nod.
"I forgot to grab my things," Neville said, his cheeks nearly as red as radishes. He had the worst memory. "I can't very well teach without my things."
Hannah giggled and pulled a briefcase out from behind the bar. She had been married to Neville Longbottm long enough to know that she had to remember things for him.
"I can't believe you're teaching there," Ron said to Neville. His voice carried across the empty pub.
"Ron," Neville said breathlessly as he made his way over to his old friend.
"The place is overrun with Death Eaters," Ron continued after he took another swig of his drink. "And that wicked Umbridge is in charge of the bleedin' place. I just can't believe you teach there."
"Someone needs to protect the students," Neville solemnly admitted, running a hand through his thinning hair. "Hardly any of the professors that taught us are there."
"I know."
Neville gazed at Ron, pitying him. He knew how much his friend had lost and he wished he could help him more than giving him a frequent drinker's discount.
"I have to go," he said, patting Ron on the back. "Come and visit?"
"Right," Ron said in a tone that was almost as dry as his glass.
Neville gave his wife a hug and kiss before he left the Leaky Cauldron.
Ron stared at his empty glass and thought about Hogwarts. As soon as the war had ended and Severus Snape, the former headmaster, was killed, Voldemort had put Dolores Umbridge in charge of Hogwarts. In Ron's fifth year, she had been a tyrannical Ministry of Magic plant who hated children and only cared about pursuing her own interests. When her placement as headmistress was announced, it was apparent that there was no safe place to hide. No one was safe from the Death Eaters.
After his victory, the Dark Lord ordered all Muggleborns to be rounded up. When Ron and Hermione found out, they were as cautious as ever and even took shelter in Germany most of the time. Hermione had been to Hamburg with her family in her youth and decided that the further away from London they were, the better. For a while, the two of them lived an illusion of happiness. It worked until Ron received a letter from George stating that he was going to close his shop in Diagon Alley. The couple exchanged some words, Ron remembered that he had felt panic and anger, and Disapparated to his brother's shop. Unfortunately, Hermione followed him.
As she was ripped out of Ron's arms merely minutes after they met up, Ron remembered screaming and trying to fight off the Death Eaters that had surrounded them. Hermione, always the one with quick reflexes, was outmatched by the villains. Ron remembered that one of them was a woman, perhaps Bellatrix Lestrange, who laughed manically as she swore at Hermione and snapped her wand in half. For a witch or wizard, this was like losing a limb. Hermione sobbed as they dragged her down a dark alleyway and the Death Eater who had grabbed ahold of Ron forced him to watch the others abuse her. There were many screams from the two of them before the Death Eaters Disapparated, taking Hermione with them. Hermione's screams haunted Ron every night.
Ron lifted up a cigarette and put it between his lips.
"Do you mind?" he asked Hannah.
"No one's even in here to care," she replied with a shrug.
The comforting smell of sulfur surrounded Ron as he lit his cigarette with a match. Since Hermione had gone, he had decided to pick up using Muggle items as some sort of respect for his lost love. It was like some sort of drawn out memorial service. He inhaled a breath of smoke and looked at his empty glass, sighing. He wondered how hard it would be to 'Avada Kedavra' one's self.
The door to the road opened again.
"I knew you would be here," an airy voice said from the doorway.
A woman stood there with her dirty blond hair that was straggly and formed into a pixie-like cut. She came closer to the redheaded man as she unbuttoned her bright yellow coat. The colour of the coat was in sick dichotomy with the atmosphere of the bar and the other people inhabiting it.
"Luna."
"Ron."
She sat down, folding the coat on her lap. Instead of striking up a conversation with her old friend, she merely stared into his eyes.
"I'm going to need another drink, Hannah," Ron deadpanned as he broke eye contact and held his head in his hands.
"That will kill you," Luna said mystically as the bartender refilled Ron's glass.
"Your point is?"
Luna hesitated before she asked Ron if he had read the Daily Prophet that day.
"Of course not, Lovegood. I want nothing to do with those bastards. It's all self-righteous propaganda on their end and I don't have an appetite for it."
"Hermione's dead. She died a long time ago... They did a writeup of the deceased today," Luna said in barely a whisper. She looked down at her lap. "I thought you should know. If magic can't bring her back, drinking can't."
Ron had been in the process of drinking when his glass fell to the floor, shattering. His heart, already broken, fractured into more pieces than the glass had. He looked down at the mess he had made and then over at Luna who was silently crying. Silently he sat there with no expression on his face. About five minutes of silence, he dug his hand into his pocket, quietly sat five Galleons on the bar, and stood up.
"Ron-" Hannah and Luna started before the man Disapparated.
He reappeared on the main street of Hogsmede Village that lead up to Hogwarts. It was dead silent as he walked down the road.
"I did nothing for you," he spoke, looking at the ground as he walked. "I failed you and I was weak. You suffered for years... Years that I thought you had died. I always had the hope that you would one day reappear. It was childish. You didn't deserve this, Hermione. You didn't deserve me. I don't deserve to be alive. For eighteen years your screams have haunted me."
Ron looked up at the shadow of Hogwarts that loomed ahead of him. It was impossible to think that it used to have a welcoming glow about it. His hand went to his pocket and he extracted his wand, studying it. He was nearing Hogwarts' gates.
"This is where we met and fell in love. This is where he died and both of us with him. Is there any better place to be?" he said to an imaginary Hermione. "This is where we were positive that we would have had a future together, the three of us. I know I've had a lot to drink, but I feel like it's the only way we can talk anymore."
Stepping up to the gates, he grabbed ahold of one the bars, peering through. The grounds of Hogwarts were vast and dark. He twirled his wand playfully between his fingers as he looked up at the castle.
"Hermione," he breathed, his grip loosening on the gate. "You'll think this selfish of me."
Suddenly, his wand stopped twirling. He slowly raised it so that it pointed at his own heart. Eyes still focused on Hogwarts, he stood there in the dark.
"Avada Kedavra."