A/N: This is my version of the "eighth year" fic - a little different, but hopefully still enjoyable. Please consider letting me know what you think, I really appreciate feedback. J. K. Rowling owns everything Harry Potter-related; I just write for fun. :)

After the war, there were the funerals. Countless bodies to be buried; countless names to be engraved in stone; countless praises to be sung of the dead.

Then there were the parties. Elegant balls on which too much was spent, where too many reporters asked her questions and too many nameless people shook her hand. With the parties came the awards – the Order of Merlin, First Class, to be sure, plus a handful of other medals, and a Gringotts vault in which Galleons fell like rain in the Amazon.

Hermione Granger hated it all.

She hated the fact that she and her grieving friends couldn't mourn properly – reporters, Ministry officials, and even the general public swarmed the funerals, making it impossible for anyone to cry as they so desperately needed to without the entire Wizarding world bearing witness. She hated the parties even more – she was forced to find a new outfit for every event (Merlin forbid she be caught wearing the same thing twice in the Witch Weekly tabloids; she'd tried it once and the backlash had been both astounding and downright appalling), and she'd heard the deadly dull speeches so often she'd memorized them fifteen long dinners ago. The worst part was having to spend time in the company of hundreds of people whom she'd never met before but who conversed with her as if they'd known her all their lives. Couple that with the headlines she, Harry, and Ron created daily in nearly every major Wizarding publication, and almost nothing stayed private anymore.

As for the awards, she'd conceded that there was very little she could do. She'd accepted her Order of Merlin with a forced smile, then locked the thing away, resolving never to look at it again. The money, of course, was completely unnecessary – Hermione had saved a small but comfortable sum for herself over the years, and she was sure the unwanted Galleons should be used to repair war damages, not inflate her bank account – but the Ministry refused to take it back.

"You defeated You-Know-Who," an official had told her when she'd voiced her protestations. "It's the least we can do!"

"The least you can do is leave me alone," she'd thought, but she'd given up that particular fight nonetheless – it just wasn't worth it. Instead, she, Harry, and Ron had teamed up and anonymously donated a generous amount to three places sorely in need of finances: Gringotts, Hogwarts, and St. Mungo's. The first two, of course, had been badly damaged during the war – in the case of Gringotts, the damage was entirely the trio's fault, thanks to their adventures in the Lestrange vault, and they felt the need to make up for what they'd done, and Hogwarts was too much of a home for them to ignore. St. Mungo's had come to no harm but was now overflowing with patients suffering from effects related to Dark curses, and Hermione had been adamant that their donation would greatly help the Healers' research efforts. The contributions were as large as they dared, but as each of them now had a Gringotts vault to rival the Malfoys', they couldn't give too much without their identities being discovered. The last thing they wanted was another slew of headlines or a series of gaudy plaques in their "honor" at the three sites.

Of the immediate post-war efforts, the hardest part by far was the trials. As individuals highly involved in the war, Harry, Ron, and Hermione were often called to testify. The only trial Hermione willingly attended was that of the Malfoys – she'd thought long and hard about it, and although she couldn't deny Draco's status as her childhood bully and tormentor, she couldn't reconcile schoolyard grudges with a sentence in Azkaban. In all probability, Draco had saved their lives by refusing to identify them at the manor last Easter, and Hermione wasn't about to forget that so soon. Couple that with what Harry had told her and Ron about the night of Dumbledore's death, and she couldn't in good conscience stay silent with regards to her former nemesis.

Unfortunately, the Malfoy trial was by far one of the most straightforward of the summer. Narcissa had been cleared first, after Harry had related the events in the Forbidden Forest – if Narcissa hadn't lied, he'd argued, Voldemort would have killed him for real, leaving the Dark side victorious. Sparing the Chosen One's life clearly held high merit in the eyes of the jury, as Narcissa had been cleared of all charges.

Draco was next. Harry told the assembly what had really happened the night Dumbledore died, and Hermione gave an account of their stay at Malfoy Manor as well as the trio's observations of Draco's slow but steady breakdown during their sixth year. She wasn't sure if being a minor made a difference in the Wizarding world, but she made sure the jury was aware of Draco's age when certain events occurred just in case. Ron hadn't had much to add, but he contributed positively as he could – he still hated Malfoy but had to admit that Harry's point about the Slytherin's aversion to murder was believable. In the end, Draco had been sentenced to house arrest for the remainder of the summer and all school vacations for the upcoming year should he decide to return to Hogwarts, or for the duration of one calendar year if he did not.

Lucius had been tried last, and it was here that the trio found the most difficulty, because none of them really had anything positive to say about the elder Malfoy. Hermione recalled his sneer as he realized what her parents were, his inhumane treatment of Dobby, his contempt as he knowingly gave Ginny Weasley a harmful Dark object, and his eagerness for his son to identify her and her friends just a few short months ago. Try as she might to find a redeeming quality, she came up short. In the end, she left the testifying to others with more knowledge than she and didn't say anything at all. After much deliberation, Lucius had been given one year of house arrest – an exceptionally light sentence given his history, she thought, but she wasn't about to extend the already too-long trial by arguing against the verdict.

The night after the Malfoys' trial, Hermione flopped down on her bed at the Burrow, completely exhausted.

"I don't know how much longer I can do this, Gin," she groaned, sinking back into the pillows.

"Honestly Hermione, I don't know how you've made it this far," came the response. "If I were you, I'd have left the country by now."

"You know I can't do that," Hermione protested. "There's still so much to be done-"

"Hermione," Ginny interrupted, "You've already saved the Wizarding world – anything else they expect of you is just too much, after what you've been through. I know you have this compulsive need to help, but you need to take some time for yourself too."

"I – you're right, Gin," Hermione conceded. "It's just hard, after being in the thick of it for so long, to even think of cutting back as an option."

"What do you want, Hermione? For yourself?" The question was simple but loaded at the same time. Hermione had been so focused on the Horcrux hunt, on fulfilling her promise to Harry, that she hadn't given her own desires much thought in quite a while.

"I want to find my parents," she finally said. "I know it'll be hard, but I won't be able to live with myself if I don't at least try. I want to do it alone – Harry and Ron probably won't understand, but I need to get away for a bit. And then…" What came next? It was so hard to think about day-to-day things when you'd just come out of a war.

"I want things to be normal for once," she decided. To her surprise, Ginny snorted.

"Hermione, you live in the Wizarding world," the redhead said. "There's no such thing as 'normal'." Hermione laughed.

"True," she conceded. "Alright then, I'd like things to be as close to normal as they can get around here." She paused and looked at her friend. "It's good to see you smile again, Gin," she said softly. The Weasleys had been hit hard by Fred's loss, and the mood at the Burrow had been highly subdued for quite some time. Hermione had been grateful for Molly's offer to stay for as long as she needed – she couldn't face her parents' house alone – but she often felt like an outsider intruding on their pain. Any semblance of a smile, a feeble attempt at a joke, was a beacon of hope for the distraught family.

"Thank you, Hermione." Ginny squeezed her friend's hand affectionately. "It's been hard, but I'm getting through; we all are. If you don't mind, I think I'd like to try to find that semblance of normal with you." Hermione smiled and squeezed back.

"Of course."