Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or Supernatural.
December 2008.
Sunday dinner at the Weasley residence that week was an awkward affair, as it was recently whenever Hermione came by. She knew most of them still didn't understand what happened and why she was 'dead', and honestly, she couldn't blame them.
But she needed this.
As soon as her portkey touched ground in England, she called her father. Once past his chewing out of her over nearly dying, then falling out of the radar, he explained the rest of what happened at the warehouse after she left.
Dean was gravely injured, and has been hospitalized for several days. Sam had killed Alistair – though how, exactly, was still unclear. Uriel was a traitor, having killed the other Angels, and freed Alistair from his bonds so he could go after Hermione.
Apparently, Castiel confronted him, which led to a fight breaking out between the two. Judging by the fact that he remained alive to tell the tale, Hermione filled the blanks of who came on the upper hand and what happened to Uriel on her own.
She then told Bobby what were her plans for the near future.
"Ever since I came back, I was pushing away all thoughts of what happened in Hell," she said. "I… I can't change it, so I need to accept it, at the very least. I need to heal. And I can't do that in the States."
He wasn't happy about it, but at the very least, he understood.
At no point during the conversation did Hermione mention that she was the one to break the first seal.
As soon as everyone finished eating, Hermione moved to help with clearing out the plates. It was the least she could do, and it helped her get away from the uncomfortable silence that seemed to follow wherever she was.
Molly, for once, didn't object – and she kept not objecting when Ron stood up to help her.
"Are you okay?" he asked once he and Hermione were alone in the kitchen. "You seem… off."
Hermione stayed silent for a long moment, thinking of how to approach the subject.
"Could we talk, after everyone left for the night?" she finally asked.
Ron sighed. "Look, if this is about Jessica-Rose again –"
"It's not," Hermione said. "You're right about her, you always were. It's not safe to leave me alone with her anymore. And I… I think you deserve to know why."
Ron's brow furrowed. "Hermione," he started cautiously, "what is this about?"
"It's about the month I was dead," Hermione replied, making sure to avoid his eyes. "And the time I was… there."
Ron slowly put down the plated he was holding, moving closer to her.
"You know you don't have to," he said quietly.
"I need to," Hermione whispered back. "I hid so much from you… you deserve better. You deserve better than anyone."
"No, I don't."
"Yes, you do." Hermione moved her head to look at him, revealing the tears in her eyes. "Whatever might happen between us, no matter how many fights we'll have… you're the father of my child. Nothing will ever change that. And that means you deserve to know… to know why I can't be trusted around her."
Ron didn't say anything in reply, only taking Hermione's hand and leading her outside, dishes long forgotten. They both knew Molly could clean them with a flick of her wand better than they ever could.
They sat down on the grass, their shoulders touching. It was easier, they learned, to talk about the difficult things without seeing the reaction of the other side. Slowly, over the course of several hours, Hermione told Ron everything.
She told him about Hell. What it was really was like to be down there.
Halfway through her explanation about him not being truly able to grasp the horror that happened down there – that nobody could ever be able to get it, unless he was there – Harry stepped out of the Burrow to check up on them. Hermione stayed where she was sitting as Ron came up to him, speaking in hushed voices until Harry nodded and went away.
Hermione didn't dare to look at Ron as he sat down.
"I just told him we needed to talk," he said. "He and Ginny will watch Rosie for the night."
"You don't have to," Hermione said, feeling bad that even when she was doing the right thing, it seemed to hurt their daughter.
"Yeah, I do," Ron replied. "You're right, I need to know this. You're the mother of my child, and this is something that affects you, and will continue to affect you for a while. And that's without mentioning that you're my best friend."
Hermione only nodded, taking a moment to stop the tears that threatened to spill out of her eyes before moving on with her story.
"The Deal I made to get Dean out… it wasn't a normal Deal," she said, and Ron moved closer.
She told him about torturing souls, about Alistair teaching her, about the feeling she had when someone was on the rack before her, about how the horror and disgust she felt at first slowly turned into something else, how she dreaded those feelings were still inside of her – how she knew they were.
She told him the month she was dead meant ten years down in Hell, and he held her hand as she continued speaking.
It was like everything just spilled out, now that she was finally not holding back.
"Sometimes, I heard laughter. All those other torturers, they laughed. They enjoyed it. Sometimes, the laughter was hers." She didn't specify who, but she knew Ron understood. The scar on her arm burned just from thinking about it. "And sometimes… it was mine.
She told him about being pulled out of Hell, though she made sure not to specify who pulled her out in case the Angels were listening, about how it took her months to believe she was really out, about how she still sometimes woke up in the middle of the night, thinking she was still there.
Anna and the Angels. Seeing Alistair again, and him revealing her secret. The Angels, threatening to throw her back into the pit. The way Sam and Dean and even her father looked at her differently now, knowing what she did down there.
Then, she told him about the request the Angels came with last week, and how she agreed.
"I told myself I was doing it out of necessity, but I wasn't. I was doing it because I wanted to. I wanted to hurt him, to torture him. I wanted to hear him scream. And I did. And I enjoyed it."
The only thing Hermione kept back was how Alistair told her she was the one to break the first Seal and jumpstart the Apocalypse. That was something she was still coming to terms with herself, and she didn't feel like she would be able to tell anyone about it any time soon, not even him.
By the time she was done talking, the sun was already starting to light the skies.
For what felt like the longest time, they both sat silently, watching the sunrise like they used to do on their year on the run. Hermione felt the physical weight that fell off her as she spoke. It wasn't completely gone yet, but it was now bearable.
Finally, Ron spoke up.
"You need to heal," he said, and Hermione almost burst into tears at how there was no hint of judgement in his voice. "You were right. You're not fine, and you can't be trusted with yourself right now, let alone other people. You need to heal," he repeated. "But, 'Mione… you're not alone. I know you feel like you are, but you're not. You're not alone."
And for the first time in far too long, Hermione truly felt it.
January – May 2009.
"Healing is not linear," Ron would say, during those bad years following the War when she had a break down just as she thought things were getting better.
"Healing is not linear," he said now, as Hermione slowly started to come to terms with everything she did.
She couldn't turn back the clock. If she could, there was so much that she would have done differently, but she couldn't. She could only move forward.
So she did.
She stayed at the Burrow. Molly and Arthur received a shortened, heavily edited version of events. They knew that for her, it was more than a month, and they knew it still haunted her – both in her dreams and during the time she was with the brothers, literally – and they knew that the main source for her pain was now dead.
They knew she needed to forgive herself, or she would never move on.
Sunday dinners grounded her whenever she felt like she was going to slip away. Seeing almost all of the people she cared about sitting together, seeing Jessica… it reminded her what she was fighting for.
Not a physical fight, for once, but a never ending battle with herself.
During the weekdays, she helped Molly around the house, sat down to talk to Arthur about mundane Muggle things. It kept her sane, being able to talk, for once, about her life in America without the conversation moving to monsters, Angels and Demons.
Twice a week, she helped George at the store. Those days were the hardest, yet the most effective for her healing process. Being at the shop, building positive interactions with other people, even the occasional prank surprising her.
Not all surprises meant an attack. Not all explosions meant death. Not all screams were ones of pain. Not all laughter was evil.
George never once asked her what happened, not even when he found her frozen in the middle of the store, lost inside a world that existed only in her head. He, more than anyone, realized how it felt to lose a part of himself and try to learn how to lie without it, and though he knew the loss Hermione was going through was different, he also understood the need to figure it out on your own.
Whenever her mind took over, he sat down to talk to her. He spoke about how the shop in Hogsmeade was running well, about the young wizard that was running it for him and how he thought the boy deserved a raise. He spoke about the plan to open another shop in the States, and asked her for advice on approaching the American crowd and about where she thought it would be best to place it – New York? Salem? Washington? Los Angeles?
And slowly, Hermione felt herself answering his questions.
At nights, she still woke up in cold sweat, but it wasn't every night any more. It was every other night at first, then only twice a week, then once a week, then once every two.
The dreams weren't as clear any more. When she woke up, she could no longer remember the specifics of the torture she inflicted or went through. She still heard Alistair's voice, but his words were unclear. She could no longer hear Bellatrix laugh.
The first of May was a challenge. The anniversary of her death passed with her at Ron's flat, spending all day with Jessica-Rose to avoid thinking about how it felt to place a gun to her own head and pull the trigger.
The second of May was a whole different kind of challenge, as she went with Harry, Ron and the rest of the Weasleys to the memorial service held at Hogwarts. She held George's hand throughout the ceremony, and though it wasn't even close to paying him back for how he helped her, it was a start.
During the week that followed, Hermione felt the last of the weight lifting off her, as though she had passed some sort of test that only she knew about.
On the eighth of May, Dean called.