A/N: A one-shot I wrote and edited last night :) Finished the final sheen of polishing this morning and decided to go ahead and put it up. Inspired by this show choir song from school that kept repeating itself endlessly in my head, so I decided to do something about it. After I wrote this, it stopped. (Blessed silence in my head now. Haha.)
Harry/Hermione if you squint and tilt your head. Lots of squinting though. I wrote it mostly friendship.
Living My Life My Way
It's my life
It's now or never,
I ain't gonna live forever.
I just wanna live while I'm alive
'Cause it's my life.
Hermione Granger POV ::
It's been two years since the war, but most of the time I still feel jittery inside. It's almost a wary feeling, leftover from all the times we had to protect ourselves. I finally decide on 'restless' as the best way to describe the feeling that continually assaults me and keeps me up at night, the feeling that won't let me relax.
Right now, it's nearing midnight, and I'm laying in bed. It's the perfect temperature in my flat, but that doesn't bring sleep any closer. I stare at the ceiling and will myself to relax enough to dreamlessly sleep. It takes forever.
When I wake up in the morning, I hope, as I do every morning, that this will be the day. Today, I will feel normal again. But I don't – the caged feeling is back, like a bad rerun. It made me feel nervous to be in a building, something that did take me forever to get over. I still do feel nervous, a bit, it's just not as strong as it used to be. I make a split-second decision and call off work. Today, I'm going to do something about it. I haven't told anyone about the restlessness; I haven't expected anyone else to understand. So I go to someone who I know will understand, even if he doesn't feel the same way.
I go visit Harry. I probably should have told him about this before, but I know why I haven't. I want to appear strong in front of Harry. I don't want him to worry about me.
There's a blonde woman leaving his flat as I Apparate on the street sidewalk, and I know how he's been dealing with that restlessness. I shake my head with a smile I save only for the moments I throw my hands in the air and exclaim, "Guys!" Even at 20 years old, guys still think sex solves everything eventually.
When I knock, he answers immediately, his face scrunched up in confusion. I snort at his expression, and then he grins broadly as he pulls the door open wide for me.
"Hi, Hermione." He says. "Wasn't expecting you."
"I wasn't expecting to come." I tell him.
He raises an eyebrow, but says nothing. Really, he didn't have to – I can't always read Harry's thoughts, but this one was loud and clear: Hermione doesn't make many instant decisions.
I follow Harry into the kitchen as he fixes me a cup of coffee. His grin is still as boyish as ever as he hands me the cup. I glance at it and laugh – he still remembers how I like my coffee, a little coffee with my cream and sugar.
We sit across from each other at his kitchen table, and I set my coffee cup down.
"I haven't told anyone else." I begin. "To be honest, I was hoping it would go away."
I pause, and he looks at me compassionately, simply waiting for me to continue. I revel in the silence. For a moment, that silence is a sigh of relief. It's just like Harry to give me time enough to tell him of my problems, just like the old times when we were teenagers and I'd been in one problem or another. Right now, I'm grateful for that.
"Every day, I have this restless feeling. The one that says I need to be out there, doing something for the war. I just can't find anything to do. Every time I begin something, like cleaning my apartment, I abandon it halfway through, because it's too ordinary for my life. Something tells me I should be doing something else, and I can't force myself to continue such a mundane task when other people might be in trouble and I could help."
Harry looks at me with a familiar expression of understanding and misery. He adjusts his glasses.
"It's the same for me. Every day." He finally tells me, with a hollow ring to his voice. "I want to put more wards up, because I think surely this isn't enough to protect us. Or I hear a noise and like Mad-Eye Moody, I'm ready to claim dark wizards are attacking me. And then I remember in a rush, the war's over. And I find exercise."
We need a laugh, so I provide it. I tilt my head and haughtily smirk. "Sex might be your escape, Harry, but it isn't permanent." I inform him in my best Hogwarts-schoolgirl impression of me at 14, lecturing him and Ron again on the evils of cheating. Harry laughs at me and the memories while I smile, glad to get a laugh out of him.
Then he shrugs. "It lets me sleep at night." He says seriously.
I nod and give my half-smile, the crooked one, to show him it's okay if it helps him get through another day – or night.
I expel a long breath then. "It's not an escape for me." I study the ceiling.
"Hermione." He spoke up, and the tone of his voice makes me look at him. Suddenly he sounds alive, even content. He moves his hand over mine, and quietly says, "Someday it'll go away. Someday, we'll just be able to live our lives again. Okay?"
I smile, an unreserved smile for once, and he tugs my hair like he used to at Hogwarts. After promising to come to his next Quidditch game, I go home.
And somehow, that's all it takes to comfort me – the knowledge that someone out there, someone close to me, feels the same way I do. After that talk, my caginess died down considerably, enough for me to become happy at work again. I smile. I think I'll start spending more breakfasts at Harry's. or maybe I'll invite him over here. I survey my flat – I'd better clean first, though. And this time, I'll get all the way through because I won't be plagued by a sense that tells me something's not right – a long outdated sense.
Because living my life my way after the war is right.
(It's my life)
My heart is like an open highway
Like Frankie said, "I did it my way"
I just wanna live while I'm alive
'Cause it's my life!
- Bon Jovi
A/N: Reviewing gives you good karma. Hehe. This story's actually pretty different than anything I've tried before. I liked the result, but feel free to let me know how you feel about it. :)