A/N: Hi kids! I think I already posted a chapter this week but I don't remember... eh, who cares! Bit of a time jump here, just an FYI. Thanks for all your wonderful reviews!
Tallyho!
Chapter 4:
October 1998
"And then Ron sneezed on him, causing him to fall backwards into a cauldron and get stuck in the cauldron!" Harry explained, while Hermione laughed. "Needless to say, that was one of the easier missions we've had so far," Harry finished.
Hermione wiped away a tear and shook her head. "Well, you can be sure you'll never be bored in the Aurors." She began to giggle again. "Ron sneezed on him?!"
Harry laughed and nodded. "Believe me, Dolohov was just as disgusted as I was."
Hermione smirked at that. "Well, it serves him right, if you ask me." Harry nodded in agreement.
The two sat in silence for a few minutes before Hermione spoke again. "Have you thought about what you're going to do with this place now that all the dark artefacts are gone?" she asked.
Harry looked around the drawing room and sighed. Number 12 Grimmauld Place had been a sort of-home for him ever since the end of the war but something about it didn't feel right. There was too much history there, and not all of it good. It was too big, too empty, and too sad. In all honesty, Harry hated living there; but he had nowhere else to go.
He sighed. "I think I'm going to give it over to the Ministry. Maybe talk to Kingsley about turning it into a orphanage. But I want it to be a place where the orphans are cared for and loved. I don't want more kids to have to go through what I went through."
"And they shouldn't have to," Hermione finished for him. She put her hand on his and squeezed. "I think that's a wonderful idea, Harry. But where are you going to go?"
He shrugged. "I'll probably rent a flat out in Diagon Alley or something. Merlin knows I have more than enough money from what both Sirius and my parents left me to be able to pay for it."
"And Kreacher?" she asked.
He smiled at her concern for the little elf. "I'll give him the choice of coming with me, staying here and working with the orphanage, or going to Hogwarts full time."
"What do you think he'll choose?" she asked.
Harry thought about that. "Something tells me he'll want to stay here but we'll see. That little elf is full of surprises."
She chuckled at that and nodded. Kreacher was still wary around her but after Harry had told him to be nice to Hermione, he had made an effort to be polite to her and not sneer or call her nasty names when her back was turned. She was proud of the little elf, considering how badly he had treated her when they first met.
"You ready?" Harry asked, pulling her out of her thoughts.
She looked at the clock on the wall and saw that it was just after six. She nodded and stood. "Yeah, I'm ready."
Harry stood and took her hand in his before apparating them out of the house and onto the quiet streets of Godric's Hollow. Voices of small children could be heard around the village and shopkeepers and patrons wandered around and spoke to each other happily. Hermione smiled at the life that seemed to have developed over the last few months since the end of the war.
The Ministry had come in and cleaned up a lot of the damage that had been done during the Christmas Eve attack with Nagini. Bathilda Bagshot had been laid to rest, her house cleaned and permanently closed, while the rest of the village was reopened to the public and many wizards and their families had come to live there, allowing the economy to pick back up slowly but surely. The village still had a way's to go but it had come quite a long way since Harry and Hermione had last seen it in December.
With their arms linked, Harry and Hermione walked to the small cemetery where James and Lily were buried. Tonight was Halloween and seventeen years since the Potters had been murdered. Harry had decided that he was going to start making an annual trip to visit his parents every Halloween; when he brought it up to Hermione, she had volunteered to go with him and he accepted wholeheartedly. He didn't say it out loud but Hermione knew he'd prefer to have someone there with him as he visited his parents. It made the trip a little easier.
"Hey mum," he said. "Hey dad. You remember Hermione," he gestured to her. She smiled and gave the tombstones a small wave. "Hello, Mr. and Mrs. Potter."
"They would have wanted you to call them James and Lily," he said.
She chuckled. "What makes you say that?"
He shrugged. "Man's intuition."
She laughed a little louder this time, causing a small smile to grow on Harry's lips. He turned back to the headstones and sat down, Hermione sitting with him, as he began to tell them about the war and how Voldemort was finally gone for good. They spent almost an hour and a half in the cemetery; Harry talked, Hermione listened, and they both imagined that the ghosts of James and Lily could hear Harry's story.
By the time the sun had begun to set, Harry had finished his story. He stood up and dusted his trousers off while Hermione conjured up a bouquet of flowers to rest on the Potter's graves. Then, she stood up next to Harry and linked her arm with his. "They'd be so proud of you, Harry," she said. "I'm sure that, wherever they are, James, Sirius, and Remus are cheering while Lily looks on proud."
"And Pettigrew?" Harry asked, his voice curious.
Hermione shrugged. "Whose to say where he is. I like to think he and your parents and Sirius and Remus and everyone else he wronged made peace with each other but we'll never know, I suppose."
Harry chuckled. "What?" Hermione asked.
"You're beginning to sound like Luna," he smirked.
She thought about it for a moment then shrugged. "I suppose it did sound a little Luna-ish."
He laughed and, together, they walked out of the cemetery and down the streets of Godric's Hollow. They talked as they walked until they reached Potter Cottage in the village. They stopped and looked at it for a minute before Harry sighed. "What are you thinking?" Hermione asked.
"I just… I wish they were here," he said, quietly. Hermione slid her hand down Harry's arm and linked her fingers with his. She didn't have any words of wisdom for him so, instead, she rested her head on his shoulder and wrapped her free hand around his arm in a gesture of support. He smiled at that and rested his head against hers.
They stood, staring at the cottage, until a couple and their two young children walked by. The pair smiled at the family then looked back to each other. "You ready to go?" Hermione asked.
Harry nodded and they apparated out of Godric's Hollow, leaving the abandoned and broken cottage behind.
November 1998
"I have nightmares. Horrible nightmares where I have to relive some of the worst moments of the war," Hermione said.
Melody nodded and wrote a note down on her parchment. "What moments in particular?" she asked. Hermione took a deep breath before responding.
Her nightmares were getting worse and the potions weren't helping as much anymore. She was half tempted to keep taking them but knew how dangerous it could become if she kept increasing her dosages. So, instead, she looked for an alternative and found Healer Melody Laster in Dorset, a halfblood witch who studied human psychology, among other things, at Oxford University before returning to the Wizarding World to start her own business as a Mind Healer (or therapist, in the muggle world). She went into hiding during the war but kept her practice going for her closest clients who were desperate for answers in a time of turmoil. Hermione was so relieved when she found Melody that she nearly broke down into tears. Now, as she sat in Melody's office, she tried to resist that urge.
"I was tortured during the war. Bellatrix Lestrange used the Cruciatus curse on me several times and carved the word mudblood into my arm to remind me what I was. To remind me who I am." She could feel the tears forming in her eyes and took a shaky breath to hold them back. "A- after she died, the word vanished; but I can still feel her knife in my arm. I can still hear her cackling in the distance and I can still see her standing above me, smiling with glee as I screamed in pain, begging her to stop. I begged and pleaded and prayed to any god that would listen to make the pain stop. But by the time it did, I couldn't tell the difference anymore." She wiped away a stray tear. "I relive that one a lot."
Melody nodded, noticing the tears that Hermione was fighting. "What else?" she pushed.
Hermione sniffed. "The final battle. The faces; all I see are the faces. My friends, classmates, professors… they're all dead. I see Hagrid carrying Harry's limp body back to the castle, Lavender Brown's mutilated body after being killed by Greyback, Fred, little Colin Creevy-" she choked on Colin's name and clenched her hand into a fist. "He was so young. We all were- are. It's- it's not fair."
"Have you cried, Hermione?" Melody asked.
Hermione looked at her and furrowed her brows. "C-cried?" Melody nodded and Hermione thought for a moment. "N-no, I haven't. I mean, I did when I got my parents back but that was more a cry of relief, really. Otherwise, no."
"Why do you think that is?"
"I- I don't need to; I don't deserve to. I didn't lose nearly as much as everyone else did. My best friend lost his brother, my godson is an orphan while his grandmother lost her husband, her daughter, and her son-in-law within months of each other; my other best friend died and then came back from the dead." She swallowed and shook her head. "I got my parents back, I survived the war, which is more than others can say. I don't have a reason to cry."
Melody's lips pursed and she nodded, writing something down on her parchment before setting it aside and clasping her fingers together in her lap. "Hermione, I want to deviate away from your nightmares for a moment and, instead, discuss what you just told me."
Hermione nodded.
"You just told me that you don't feel that you deserve to cry because you didn't lose as much in the war compared to others but from, what I gather, you have just as much reason to cry, if not more reason. You were tortured, you lived in a tent in the middle of nowhere for months on end, barely surviving on what food you could find, you fought in a war, you watched people you knew die right in front of you; I'm honestly surprised you haven't cried yet." At Hermione's confused expression, Melody explained. "Crying is a release of tension and stress. I think part of the reason you're having these nightmares, along with the slight PTSD you seem to be experiencing, is you haven't released the tension you've had in your system for Merlin knows how long. From what you've told me, you seem to be the rock for all of your friends, right?" Hermione nodded. "While that's an admirable trait, Hermione, I think you've taken that on like a duty rather than just being a helping hand. You're so used to being the strong one out of your group of friends that allowing yourself a moment of weakness just isn't something you've even considered doing. And I think that's your problem."
"Because I don't allow myself to be anything but strong?" Hermione summed up.
Melody nodded. "Yes; being strong is good but it's okay to not be too. You don't always have to be everyone's support system. And that's not to say that crying makes you weak. I'm a firm believer in the opposite, actually; I think that crying is an incredibly strong thing to do because you're allowing yourself to just let go, which is an incredible feeling, once you do."
Hermione looked down at her hands and shrugged. "I'm not sure I know how to be anything but strong anymore…"
"Then maybe you should find someone you feel comfortable letting go with. If you can't cry, write out what you're feeling or what you wish you were feeling. Once you've done that, grab a friend, go to the middle of nowhere and burn it. Even if you don't cry, burning that note will help you relax."
"What's the friend supposed to do while I burn it?" she asked.
Melody chuckled. "Moral support, I suppose. I just think it's always good to have a friend with you whenever you're doing something highly emotional. Just in case you need a hug or something." Hermione smiled at that a little. "Don't be afriad to cry, Hermione," Melody said as their session came to a close. "It may help you more than you know."
P.S. Facecast for Melody Laster is on the WCN Pinterest board.
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