Author's Note: I do not and never will own Harry Potter.
Written for the Occasion-a-Day Competition/Challenge. September 2 prompt: Write something directly set after the end of either wizarding war.
It's days before anyone realizes that Harry's missing. He's a prop, a gilded hero to place upon a pedestal, and as such, it's not like his presence is really required, is it? It's a tacit understanding, and it's days before anybody notices that he's vanished. It's three more days before anyone notices that Luna Lovegood isn't to be found, either. Of course, nobody puts the two together. Luna's probably off with her father or something, the assumption runs, and Harry's just grieving.
Harry is grieving. But he's running, too. He doesn't know why. It's just what feels right and he's spent so long listening to his instincts. At least all the broken ones. He skirts around cities and towns, erasing his footprints from the dirt. He wants to be forgotten, an elegy to what was. The wizarding world has no more need of its saviour.
Luna catches up one morning and he still has no idea how. He just wakes up, still cradled in the boughs of an old tree, and Luna's sitting cross-legged on a branch next to him, back against the trunk and her eyes closed. Her hair's dirty and there are rips in her stockings, but she's there. When he says her name, her wand's digging into the base of his throat before he's even aware that she's moved.
"Sorry," she whispers, sliding it back into her sleeve. She looks exhausted, and Harry feels a twinge of guilt. "Just..." She doesn't say anything more and he doesn't need her to. The war has changed them all.
She doesn't ask him to go back, and he doesn't ask her to stay. He doesn't tell her to leave though, and he doesn't realise how accustomed he has become to her presence until he wakes up one morning and she's not there.
She didn't have to stay, his mind tells him, but it's a hollow thought. He huddles against the base of a tree for hours until she comes back, only in her socks, holding a very hastily-wrapped present in both hands. It isn't until he sees the happy birthday balloons on the paper that he remembers it's his birthday.
"Happy birthday, Harry," she whispers, letting the box tip out of her hands and into his lap with a thump. "Sorry I was gone so long."
"It's all right," he says, smiling to show it really is, before gently peeling off the paper, revealing a glossy-covered book. Harry Potter: The Legend blares the cover, but it's written by Hermione, and co-written by too many names to count, and he doesn't know he's crying until Luna wipes away his tears with the corner of her sleeve.
"I thought you might like to know you're remembered," she says and Harry nods. It's not time to go back yet. But it's close.