Title: Possible

Word Count: 2850

Rating: PG-13

Disclaimer: Not mine.

A/N: I owed Somigliana a 500 word ficlet on a silly bet I made with her the... it kind of evolved a bit. I hope you enjoy it.

Percy hesitated just inside the gate. He really shouldn't be so nervous; this was his home, he had grown up here. He shouldn't be afraid to come home. And yet he was. It was a feeling he was getting more and more used to, in the last several months. Ever since the end of the war, since he had been injured before the so-called Final Battle, the once-unfamiliar feeling feathered along his senses and fluttered in his chest often, making his once steady hands shake and a nervous tic twitch in his jaw.

He took a deep breath, rubbing his face and wincing as his fingers traced the thick scar that bisected one cheek, and let it out with a shaky sigh. He shouldn't be here, this was a mistake. He started to turn around, open the gate, despite the fact that the invitation was burning a hole in his pocket, but was stopped by an open, friendly voice calling his name.

"Percy!" He reluctantly turned back, fingering the piece of parchment in his robe with shaking fingers.

He could have left without ever being noticed, but the moment his name was called, the whole group gathered under the shade of the trees quieted and turned as one to stare at him. He froze like a deer in the wandlight, with every member of his immediate family looking at him with varying degrees of wariness, dislike and even hate.

One figure broke away from the group, the owner of the voice that had called out his name. "Hey," Hermione said quietly, reaching out a hand for his. He gave it automatically, unconsciously clinging to the one vestige of friendliness available, the only one he knew for certain that he could rely on. "Don't let them get to you ... they really do want you here."

Well, it sure didn't look like it, he thought to himself, but let himself be pulled forward. He was proved somewhat wrong, at least, a moment later when Bill approached with a smile of greeting on his face. "Hey Percy, long time," he greeted, shaking his hand. "I've missed you. I'm glad you could make it to Leila's naming party."

Percy blinked, surprised at the warmth of the welcome he was receiving from his eldest brother, though they had always been closer in some ways than the others. "I-- I, um, wouldn't have wished to miss it," Percy replied, internally cursing the slight stammer, also new.

"Hey Perce." A strong hand clapped his back and he unconsciously jerked, the tic going off in his jaw. Hermione squeezed his hand tightly in reassurance, even as his ears reddened with embarrassment at his lapse. "Sorry, mate," Charlie said, running a hand through spiky short hair in obvious chagrin. "I didn't reali-"

Percy managed to wave away the apology. "Not your fault," he said more firmly than before, though he still burned at his continued problems. "It happens." Keep the sentences short, safer that way.

Charlie still shifted uncomfortably. Everyone had heard about what had happened to Percy months before, how he had been caught by Death Eaters while trying to communicate some vital information to the Order, like he had been doing for a couple of years, spying through the Ministry at Dumbledore's request. A request that had caused him to estrange himself from his family, for the cause.

And the cause had gotten him tortured, nearly killed, and still haunted much of his waking and sleeping life. And now was bringing him back to his family, and he wasn't sure his nerves could take it. "We're really sorry," said a small voice at his other side, and he nearly flinched again, and he knew Hermione had to regret taking his hand, because his grip had to be life-strangling. It was Ginny, and he marveled both that she had gotten so tall and pretty at the same time as he wondered at how petite she still was, and about the strength she still seemed to radiate.

"Y-you should have been sorry before this happened," he said, running a thumb down the scar on his cheek, the only real external manifestation visible from his trauma. He couldn't help but feel a lingering anger, resentment, at the things his family had said and done to him, on the assumption that he had turned his back on them.

"Zey are stubborn, you should be knowing zis," a distinctively French voice spoke as a beautiful silvery-blonde snaked one arm around Bill's waist, the other occupied by the most beautiful little girl. "Zey do not realize many tings, until somet'ing iz 'appening." She looked up at her husband's scarred face, absently kissing one on his jaw. They had not accepted her, until Bill had that run in with Fenrir.

When Percy did not speak, Fleur sighed. "I am 'appy you have come, Percy. I never got to be thanking you properly for your wedding card and present."

As one, the family that surrounded him--which was making him quite uncomfortable--turned to look at him again, in shock. "You bought them a wedding present?" Ron blurted out from somewhere to the right of Ginny.

"Yes, Ronald … I did what I could when I could, believe it or not." The words came out whole and clipped this time, though his hands shook harder, one in his pocket, one grasped in his youngest brother's good friend's.

Ron turned to glare at Bill. "And you said nothing?"

"I shouldn't have had to," Bill replied quietly. He'd always understood Percy better than any of the others, being the next quietest and studious of the brood.

"But--" Ron started to say something, and Percy simply couldn't take it any more. His family was too much, especially now.

He pulled his hand from Hermione's. "I can't do this," he muttered, and his long legs took him quickly away, almost fleeing, headed towards the gate. For a moment, no one moved for surprise, most of his family shocked by his abrupt departure.

He was stopped by a gentle hand on his arm again, and he leaned against the gate, bracing himself against it, closing his eyes and clenching his jaw, setting off the tic again. He was startled but not scared to feel a set of arms encircle his waist, a slim form pressed against his tense back. For once, she didn't say a thing.

"Why are you here?" he asked her. "Why do you keep coming after me?"

She'd been there for a long time, longer than his family had been willing to recognize him again. She'd found out shortly after Dumbledore's death, somehow, about his role in things, had met with him surreptitiously, had helped him out. She'd been the one to vouch for him after his attack, with the rest of the Order, and to visit him regularly while he recovered. He'd reciprocated the best he could, when the last battle had ended and she'd been in the intensive ward for some of the hexes she'd received. He'd had to wait, watch, sneak in when he could, to avoid his family who also visited.

She was quiet for a long moment. "You were my first friend at Hogwarts," she started quietly. "I never believed … I never really thought you would do what you did, not after that." She laughed softly. "And I had the silliest crush on you when I was in second year … it wasn't just Lockhart I put hearts around. I was crushed when I found out you were seeing Penelope."

Percy had to wonder where this was going, but her chattering was taking his mind off some of what had just happened. "Is it so hard to believe that I found you to be a good friend every time I needed you most? That I'm trying to be the same to you?"

He let out another deep breath, eyes still closed. "It is," he said, again sticking to the shortest possible words.

"Percy, I know you can do this … I know you want to do this. Please give them a chance. Give yourself a chance." Her hands touched him, turned him around to face her, as she spoke. That he allowed her this close, after everything, was a show of how much he had grown to trust her in the past year and a half.

He opened his eyes now, intense blue searching intense brown. Her face was so fresh, alive, vibrant, her bushy brown hair everywhere. He reached up to tuck a curl behind her ear, hand lingering ever-so-slightly. "You believe in me way too much, you know," he told her seriously. She simply laughed and shook her head at him.

"Nah. Never. You've just forgotten, Mr. Perfect Head Boy, how much you really know," she teased him gently, earning the faintest of smiles, but the smile creased into a frown after a moment as he looked down at her, suddenly aware of how close she was to him again.

"What?" she asked. "Do I have ink on my nose again?" She made to reach up and touch the oft-offending appendage but he stopped her.

Her eyes met his instantly at his touch, and he caught a guilty flush to her skin, so close. He'd wondered, especially in the last months, if he was the only one that felt something. He forgot about his family, so close by, as he traced her jaw with an almost-steady finger, a furrow in his brow as he studied her like he would the texts he still read avidly. "You had a crush on me," he said.

She blushed slightly and nodded. "I got over it. But ..." she hurried after seeing the vulnerable, almost hurt look in his eyes, "but, I've found myself ... um ... I mean ..." That she was the one stammering now, out of nervousness, was oddly reassuring to him.

"Falling for a friend?" he said quietly, stating what he'd been feeling for quite some time, finding a different sort of bravery in himself to take the chance and state it out loud. Perhaps it was because they were far away from the others right now, or maybe the time was finally right and the stars had lined up, but when it came to Hermione, he wasn't afraid, or nervous, like he was often times in the world these days, though every day saw a little improvement here or there.

She let out a breath. "Yes. I'm afraid I've quite fallen for you in the last year or so," the admission was given with another blush. "I ... didn't want to say anything. I was ... afraid," i you would think I pitied you /i , the words were left unspoken, but oddly enough, understood. Percy had railed on it in private quite a few times in the last few months.

He knew her better than to think she pitied him, though. She'd bribed, cajoled, smacked and nagged him into doing things these past months that someone who simply pitied him would have stopped doing long ago. She'd listened to him whinge, and whinged at him in return ... they had become good friends, if the title of good friend could be given to someone you fantasized about at night.

"Good ... I'm not alone then," he said, and though his words weren't specific, she didn't need them to be, she knew what he meant. She smiled, that broad, warm smile, at him, reaching up to caress the scar on his cheek. He didn't flinch this time, as he often did. He wanted to kiss her, badly, but needed to make sure of one more thing. "Ron?"

"He never stood a chance next to you," she said without hesitation, and for the first time in a long while, he felt completely calm, at peace. Leaning down, he forced himself to forget everything but the woman that had been there for him, unfailingly, whenever he had needed her. He brushed his lips across hers gently first, then a little more firmly, the faintest promise of more in his lingering, and he rested his forehead on hers.

"Please, Percy ... come back." His eyes closed and he breathed in, the light scent of her hair and her skin.

"Alright. For you, I ... I'll try," he said.

She rewarded him with a brilliant smile and he thought that, perhaps, he could successfully bridge the valley that the war had put between him and his family. It might not be easy, but with her to share the burden with, it might just be possible.