Ron leaned against the wall, looking around and trying, trying desperately to remember. The sky was a hue of orange, wide and cloudless, though it was barely six in the evening. Their village, not even much of a small town, had not gone ignored. Located somewhat close to Dusseldorf, which had suffered heavily, Ron's house had itself been destroyed; if his parents had been there, they would have died. Here though, standing in the dying autumn sunlight, nearly three years after the last of the bombs, everything and nothing had changed all at once. From here, it looked like a ghost town; with barely a few houses occupied.

He was thinking about playing football here, so many years back. Chasing behind the postman on his cycle, listening to Mama bickering, the smell of fresh bread from the bakery. Riding those rusty old bikes, the thrill on finding a pfennig, endless summer days. God, they had been so happy.

The bakery seemed to be there though; and Ron stumbled across the broken stones of the pavement. Another thing he'd forgotten. There was only stale bread and an unsmiling face.

("We'll sell the property. And move somewhere else. Somewhere away.")

What was left? Who was left? The streets were clean, the houses empty. No one wanted to stay, no one wanted to be reminded, but in the end where else would they go? He saw yellow, and broken homes, and tried to think that he didn't deserve the cold feeling of guilt settling in his stomach, but the truth had never been easy to face. Maybe he had done no wrong, maybe he had never killed a civillian, never hated, but to the end; till he had been caught; he had only been survive survive survive.

They had all stayed quiet, and now, no one would speak for them. (He deserved it though; he deserved it and more because this was a wrong, a guilt that echoed in all of them.)

He did not recognize this place; because when he'd been here, everything was warm and crooked, in a comfortable way, you knew where the pavement had broken, you knew the shortcuts, you knew where not to linger, you knew where you had to heil Hitler, and where you didn't need to, you knew everything, and it was a safe, safe world.

Why had he even come here? For a last glimpse of something he'd once called home? Reassurance?

It had been nearly six months since he'd been released, and yet, he could not come here, he could not look at this place after seeing so many fall. What was hunger, what was death, what was suffering, what was pain, when it was suddenly your life?

'Ron?'

He turned, to find Erika Kraus standing across the pavement, a cigarette between her lips. Erika was taller than he remembered, her cheeks gaunt, the faint sign of a long scar spreading across her forearm. She was standing on the broken pavement, among all the old homes. Erika was older than him, that much he remembered, a year older than him at school. He could vividly remember her slapping a boy when she was eight for hitting her brother. And once, chucking apple cores from high up a tree at running thieves.

'Weasley? Is that you?' she repeated. Ron gave a wave.

'Everyone thought you were dead,' she said, by way of greeting, now stubbing the cigarette under her toe. Her brown hair was open, rolling down her shoulders. She waved a hand in front of his face.

'Hey, don't you remember? Erika, your neighbour? Erika Kraus? Remember my brother at the very least? Rolf?'

'Ja, ja, I do,' he said, now looking up, into her eyes. 'We played football.'

She gave a short, bark like laugh. 'Ja, he's dead.'

'I'm sorry,' Erika had loved her brother like life.

There was no emotion on her face. 'It's been nearly five years. Didn't expect to see you here, anyway?'

'I- We were caught by the Soviets,' he said. Erika pursed her lips. 'I've only been released a few months ago. Mama and Papa managed to get a flat in Dusseldorf.'

'Thats... probably for the best, I suppose. Mine are still here though, I'm visiting.' Her lip curled slightly. 'They're not letting me get a job,' she said under her breath. Ron pretended he didn't hear her. 'Want me to be the perfect little girl.'

'You're married?'

She nodded. 'Oh well, its been difficult. I have a daughter, you know. Sending her to a good school and things, I- ja, its been hard.'

'It has,' he agreed. A new rule, an old feeling of defeat, of death, of misery. To think they had once sat here and worried about goals and schoolwork, and rude teachers. To think they had once been fearless and true. To think they'd once been boys.

'We'll meet again, I suppose, hmm?'

'Ja, sure, Erika.' She waved, and he continued across the street. Ron did not miss the way she looked at his leg. He limped across the street, reaching the field where he and Hermione had spent so much time together. He tried not to think of the screams.

It was like another slap to the face, looking at the dying branches of the apple tree, the tree that had once been green and fresh, with shiny apples dangling. It might be autumn, but there were no leaves to shed. He braced his bad leg, before swinging over the fence. Ron's leg ached, but he ignored it, because this was a place he had dreamed of so many times, that now he was here, he wanted to be young again.

(he wanted to be young with her.)

The first time he ate home, he vomited it all.

Mama didn't meet his eye for days.

'He's dead, Mama. None of us want it to be true, we know, but-'

'Bill.' said Papa shortly. Bill turned to face his father, lip curling slightly. Beside him, Ron and Charlie were standing together, silent. What was there to say, where were the words? It was his fault, he had asked where his brother was. He had known this.

'Papa, this is false hope, and you know it! We've talked to all of his colleagues, even asked if he was suddenly drafted or something-'

'We thought he was dead too!' said Mama, and Ron did not wince. Charlie shook his head, a hand slung over his shoulder. 'We thought he was dead for two years, till that letter came!'

("Dear Mama and-")

'He killed himself. That's it; he killed himself-'

'Percy would never-' She started, but cut herself short suddenly. They did not know; she did not know. Silence enveloped the room, and Ron found that he couldn't find it in him, to look anyone in the eye.

("We thought you were dead.")

They had already buried him in their minds, in their hearts Ron was dead. Standing here, with his brother screaming about another, he wondered if it would ever become normal. In this old home, he felt like a ghost. His fingers were so cold.

'They killed him,' she said now, voice soft. 'They did it, I know.'

Who are "they" Mama? Us? He didn't voice this thought aloud.

'They killed my son.'

None of them argued.

They took them out to help rebuilding once, for barely two weeks. He remembered the man next to him being shot for trying to run. He had pretended the blood seeping on his shirt didn't bother him.

(Why could he remember that like yesterday and not her voice? Why couldn't he remember which room had been George's but the image of a dead friend so vivid in his eyes? Why?)

Considering the chemicals for the past weeks, clearing through the rubble here was not much work. It was methodical, without much thought, and for a while, there was nothing, only an aloof sense of normalcy, though this was the farthest thing from his normal.

A young girl was watching them from her house across. She probably wasn't more than five, her dark hair in a braid, as she observed what they were doing, soft whistling on her lips. Her eyes darted from the glitter of glass to their uniforms, the grey of stones to the white of snow, finally landing on the colourful glass fallen, shining in the last of the light. Her eyes met his, her lips curving into a wide toothed smile. Her tiny, milky incisor was missing.

It was the first thing of beauty he had seen in years, and even as he cut his palm on the shard of glass, he found an involuntary smile lighting on his face.

It hurt to smile. But he smiled back anyway.

'Back!' came a loud voice. 'Continue tomorrow!' shouted the officer in broken German. Ron looked up at the sky, a myriad of dark and light, stained glass. It was barely seven. Luck seemed to be with him today.

This time he winked at the girl, clumsy and graceless.

There was only the memory of her last grin the next day.

'We were just kids, I suppose,' said Ginny, her voice not at all familiar. Ron didn't remember. He didn't remember the way she always slurred words where the s and t were immediately after each other, the way she called out their names, how she said her n's, almost like an afterthought. He didn't remember hearing her voice so low either. He didn't seem to remember a lot of things now.

'You were a kid. I lost my youth there.' He said. Ginny shrugged, crossing her legs. 'You were doing what you had to, Ron. If you were wrong, so were we.' Here she gave a scornful laugh. Something else he didn't seem to remember. 'I made the bullets you tossers shot,' she said. 'The people who pretend they have no blood on their hands are the ones who have the most.'

He bit his tongue, and didn't say anything. In his mind, the screams echoed.

It felt like the cold was seeping in his bones. Probably was, he thought wryly, looking at the thin fog of his breath. He was breathing. Alive. (Why?) Looking up at the patched up ceiling, bundled up beside the others in a small, cramped, filthy bunker, all he could think was home.

They would let him write now, they had said. He tried to think of it; Dear Mama and-

He couldn't.

("You really should improve your writing, Ron,' teased Hermione.

"The only letter I'm writing is to you. You'll understand; isn't that enough?")

Hermione had tiny writing. She called it neat, he called it ant like-

He couldn't open his eyes. He didn't remember; no use pretending to.

And with his bad leg, he had never been of much use. Who wanted a cripple? They would send him back. Home. He would go home. He couldn't feel his fingers. But he was going home. No more piling up corpses, blown up legs and arms like pieces of dolls, no more scavenging amongst rubble, none of those burning chemicals. None of the watery soup filled with roaches, or the constant screams from the other side. No bullets. He wouldn't try to steal anymore because if they caught him this time, they'd shoot him. No, they'd torture him to death, like they weren't doing that anyway.

He couldn't think, he couldn't sleep. He was going insane; her voice was loud and clear in his head, like she was right here. There. He was insane.

He woke up with a fever the next morning. It saved his life, but it took Erik's.

'Hand me the wrench, will you, Ron?' This he remembered. Papa's voice was the same, calm, and here, in the little shed, this was home he knew. It had been a week since he'd come home. Papa was repairing one of those rusted bikes that had symbolized summer evenings, and the years hadn't been kind to it; the wheel rims were literally brown. The chain links made an attempt at moving.

It was probably useless to spend an afternoon repairing it, but that was Papa. He liked the work behind it, the logic, the slow step by step of it.

Papa gave a deep breath. 'I well, been meaning to tell you Ron. That girl...'

'Which girl?'

Papa sighed, and the silver in his hair stood out. 'The Jewish girl you brought home-'

'Yes, the Jewish girl I was not supposed to meet-'

'Ron, it was- then'

'So?'

'Didn't mean you stopped, did you?' he shot suddenly, then sighed again. Ron had no idea what to make of this revelation. 'Sorry,' he said, voice back to the monotone. 'but I think you should know. The girl, well, they left in 38, remember?'

Disappeared, more like. At any rate, he nodded.

'Well, they came for the father. They said the girl had died in 1941, they showed us her papers, and said they were searching for the father.'

'They questioned you about her father?' He asked, thinking about the tall, brown eyed man who had saved Frau Hoffman's daughter and was probably dead now.

'Ja,' he said. 'We said the truth; we didn't know where they were, and they had left three years ago. But he showed us the papers. The daughter was dead.'

Ron had never felt so cold.

'What is there to be proud of?' asked Fred harshly. In the blue of his eyes, he could only see the deathly cold, burning snowflakes of ash. 'What is there to remember him but hate?'

'Don't,' said Ron, but he knew as well as Fred that that would be hypocrisy on both their sides. Staring at the empty grave, only a marker, they both knew. 'We were all wrong. But he's our brother.'

'He died for nothing,' said Fred bitterly, and it seemed like even his blind eye could see today. 'For nothing.'

Ron limped to the tree, breath catching in his throat, pain momentarily forgotten at the glance of familiar brown hair. Did he remember her? Had her hair always been this short? Could he trust himself?

("The daughter was dead.")

Well, he thought bitterly. If this was a hallucination, he deserved it all.

Those small rumours of the SS shooting Jews in forests, leaving them in dug up trenches, or letting them starve in the labour camps had once driven him mad, had robbed his sleep. It was only now, it was only months ago, that he had heard the real numbers, the real stories, the lost names. He couldn't bring himself to look at himself the same way again. Because if he'd been drafted there; would he have done the same thing? Could he kill? Yes. So many? Could he? Would he do it in fear of death? The things we're capable of, he thought wryly now.

He shook his head, bile raising in his throat.

Ron moved a little further, his shoes rustling the rakes of dead leaves. She turned. Dead, she was supposed to be dead. Dead in 1941, more than seven years ago. He was not supposed to be seeing her like this. He was going insane, that was it. He was going insane, probably got a fever again, but this time he would not be going home, no...

("Erik? Wake up? Wake up, please-"

Why was everything so cold?)

He was hallucinating. Those brown eyes had never been that huge, the eyes that had once been full of passion, full of life had never looked so hard. The skin had never been that pale, criss crossed scars lining her cheek, a long white one cutting though her eyebrow. Their eyes met. She was dead, Hermione Granger had been dead for the past seven years.

He said it out loud. Fragments of your imaginations didn't talk. Dead people did not talk.

'You're supposed to be dead.'

She blinked, before letting out a harsh laugh. 'Is that what you want?'

'No, my father said-'

'Probably came and asked for me, did they?' she said. Ron nodded.

What else could he say? Apologize? He didn't deserve that either. Probably should just leave, he thought. Just turn, and jump over the fence and go home, and tell Papa we can sell the house, and just... forget?

How? When all he wanted to do was stay here, and look at her like a thousand years would never be enough. He had starved to see her face, trying to remember the details in those long, bitter nights. He was selfish, he was being greedy, because his eyes drunk in the sight of her hungrily, he could drink in this to death, he could stare at her for a thousand years. Do you remember her face, Ron? Her voice? Those goddamn eyes-

Ron limped another step. She moved the slightest bit to the right. He took this as a silent invitation, and sat down. She did not object. The fields were bathed in the autumn light, dry and parched, much like his throat.

'Why did you come back?'

The silence was echoing in his mind now, and he waited, waited, and everything seemed to go black now; like it was enveloping him. A last note died on her breath. His leg gave another stab of pain. Ron ignored it.

'To see you,' she rasped, and now he knew it; he did not remember her voice. In his memories, she was loud, and bossy, and brave, but never, low, never rough. Her tone was cruel, mocking, but beneath it all, there was something he did not recognize. He tried to pretend he wasn't being hopeful.

'I was happy here,' she said now, tone softer, true, her eyes looking further, over the fields with dried grass, and the fading sun. 'I was happy here once. I want to remember that.'

Hermione leaned against the tree trunk, twisting her fingers. He did not miss the full sleeves. It was all adding to the suffocating feeling lodging itself in his chest.

'Its all gone though. The tree, the houses, the people...' she said. She did not need to complete the sentence. He knew the last word was you. Now she turned to meet his eyes; and he did not know whether he had expected to see those in the flesh like this. He did not remember. In his mind, the air was freezing, his hands were numb.

'I suppose I should hate you,' she said after a dry silence. He did not think it was a good thing. 'I tried, and once, I remember, I wrote this whole letter. How I cursed you, your country, your family. How I wanted you to burn, to suffer. The long list of things you were guilty for. But I thought that would be unfair even then because I knew you, and you were not the monster I saw in my dreams. I wrote it anyway. So much hate. It was easy.'

'Ich-' he started, but his throat was still dry. She ignored this, and continued. 'Funny, you know, seeing you here, I can't bring out the words. It's like it was easier to hate the image of you in my mind than you here.'

'I was in the Heer,' he said instead, as though he was giving her desperate proof for her to hate him. Did he want her to hate him? No. But did he deserve that pain? Yes. 'In the Wehrmacht.'

'What happened to your leg then?' she asked, ignoring the last statement.

'I got shot. The bone didn't set right.'

'I suppose you were lucky. The ones with us didn't miss the targets.'

'So,' ventured Ron, after another spell of quiet. 'Do you?'

'Do I what?'

'Hate me?'

'Oh Ron,' A sad smile flickered on her face.

'How could I?'

'Believe me,' she started, twisting her fingers idly, full sleeves on. 'I did for a while. I've tried hard to hate you, but this- this isn't what I thought. I suppose I hate the image of you; perfect soldier; perfect little citizen. But I still couldn't. You were constant in my little world, but then even that world had been stripped away from me. I know how people can change, I know how people can still be good, how they can sink so low they don't recognize themselves. But there's a difference; you're not the nameless cruel officer, because God, you, you were my best friend Ron. You're the kid who punched a boy's face because he called me a filthy Jew ten, more, years ago. But you also fought for the very people who think I shouldn't live. Shall I tell you something? A German hid me and my Papa in their basement for a year. A German also took me away from my home. A German also killed a kid in front of my eyes. Worse? They say so, but I'm also German, aren't I?'

'You say you know me. But do you?'

'Do you?' she countered

'The things I've seen, Ron, they're nothing in front of your little experiences. I didn't think you would be here. I came to remember, I meet my ghosts instead. Have you ever seen little children die for picking up a potato skin? They hanged this ten year old boy for it; called it stealing. Have you seen so much smoke you forget to breath? So many people, so many souls, so many lives, scattered in the air, in the smoke, in the ground? But I've also seen other things you know. People who gave bread when their stomachs were empty. People who died because they didn't want to leave their loved ones, who stood in the face of death and smiled. It's what I've seen.'

'This isn't a competition, Hermione. We all have our monsters.'

'No one wins in a war, Ron. Only probably lost one of your brothers, didn't you?' Hermione's tone was casual, like she was asking him the date.

("And we'll do it. When all this is over.")

'Ja,' he said, and the word was another huge weight on him. The sound of his mother wailing was something etched in his mind like stone. What was left?

'Which one?' The way she said it was like asking him which one he preferred, as though they'd had a choice. When? Ron felt like laughing in her face. He thought he could see the snow, the last of whatever he had seen.

He cleared his throat, and said his name. 'George. And Percy.'

'The twin?' He nodded.

'I think I remember him. He was the one with those lame jokes? I think I remember, something about a muffin and stuff...'

'And Percy- He was the best in school, I remember...'

' What about your father?' He asked, voice coming out defensive and harsh.

She froze, hands twisted together tightly. Her mouth opened, and he could hear her breath, but it was in gasps, raw, silent gasps.

He realized she was crying. Silent, silent tears.

'Hermione- I - I'm sorry-'

She waved a hand. 'Not your fault; I was goading you; oh my god; that's - that's so wrong- worse; god I knew them-'

She took another deep breath, and she was suddenly brusque but the act fell before even starting. She was playing with the cuffs of her sleeves, and he remembered this. She always did it when she was nervous.

'He is most probably dead.' She said, voice dropping to a broken whisper. 'We were both deported, but I had to go first so I don't know if they did take him, if he stayed there in Theriesenstadt, he might have survived, but he wasn't that important, so I don't know, he was already so weak, he couldn't have survived the camps, they'd have taken him straight to death-'

'Oh,' she broke off now, eyes hard, tears long since disappeared. 'He's probably dead.'

'I can help,' he said quietly. 'Check with the registers and stuff.'

'I've tried,' she said. 'The thing is, when we left here, Papa had planned to immigrate along with his friends. But all of them said that they were sending back the ships, they were refusing the refugees. Papa then wrote to his friends,'

She took another deep breath, her hoarse voice turning brusque with the words and continued.

'Most of them didn't answer, his Jewish friends were very few, and they never answered. Only a few wrote back. Then the War started. All the Jews in the big cities were living in separate corners. He had originally planned for us to go to the countryside; you know, rural, sparse areas after selling the clinic. It was looted though, after he was fired. It wasn't going well; and in 1941, they started the deportations.'

She didn't meet his eyes, his throat was dry.

'Papa arranged things- a friend of his said he would hide us- He worked and there were only his elderly parents; who didn't mind. Papa decided that it would be best if we were both considered legally dead; we had already left the designated address. They would soon come for us, he said, so he found a man who would forge papers. I was no longer just Hermione Granger now I had to add Sarah to my name- my non Jewish name. We got mine forged, but then Herr Kugner- his friend informed that the man was missing; considered dead.'

'Papa said it was not of much harm, it was only him they would come for, and we went into hiding. We lived in that basement for more than a year. 41 was fine, we were not damaged much. 1942, there were serious talks of air raids and shelters. Herr Kugner was conscripted. It would not do, said Papa, they had already risked enough. We left.'

'We had planned to the country again but it wasnt long, before we were caught and deported. We were a little lucky in that regard though, we were sent to Terezin; Theriesenstadt, probably because Papa was a Doctor.'

'I was already in the army then, by 1942.'

'Yeah, I suppose you were conscripted in the army by then, hmm? Well, Theriesenstadt was mainly for propoganda, for the old, the big names. I heard, later on, that even the Red Cross visited there. All a hoax. When we were there it was horrible; cramped, so dirty. Potatoes were like diamonds. But over there, we had a fragmented version of reality; impromptu schools, lessons and stuff. The old got lesser rations and for a while, then gave most of those to the children. I remember small things- a butterfly, stained glass, they even tried teaching Hebrew for a while, and every time I saw the letters, it was like the Fuhrer himself could hear us mouthing the words, see our fingers tracing the letters. And when we were there, the corpses were left unburied for days. They didn't look like humans, when you starve to death. There's nothing left in that body, those eyes. Only pain.

We had Jewish self administration. They could choose, you know, choose who to deport.'

'Around early 43, I was deported to a labour camp. Then was the last time I saw Papa. I did not cry- barely said anything, and before I could think of anything I was already suffocating in a train car. Four days, packed so tight together, with only the bucket in the centre. The stink was unbearable.

Hard, long days. But I survived. Starved and bruised, but I lived. We slept in these barracks, all congested. The soup was water, and it wasn't much. We licked those bowls clean. But I lived.' She repeated, her eyes far away.

'Then came worser hell. Mid 44- I was sent to Auschwitz. Made just to kill, to starve to death; to work to death. Arbeit macht frei.'

Here she stopped. Her mouth was open, hands twisted together still, a statue.

'Don't, ' she said softly. 'Don't apologise; don't say anything. It's over. It's all over.'

'I'm horrible,' she muttered. 'Horrible. Goading you; that's what I'm doing-'

'Hermione,' he exhaled, and he ached to touch her hand, but he did not. He could not face the scars today. 'It's fine. Go on.'

'Ja,' she said softly. 'I remember these girls on the ramp, you know. Not more than six. Brown hair, blue eyes, all alone. Zwillingen. They were so goddamn beautiful. What you call angelic. All smoke. So much to see, so much to live for, so much. All smoke.'

'And then, cold, cold winter. The Red army was coming, they said. The dying were left. The rest of us were taken to march, to walk in the freezing weather, starving, dying to the camps inside Germany. The woman beside me was half dead. She was hallucinating, I think, because she kept talking about warm beds and sweets. Her lips were cracked dry, but she kept mumbling. Me- I couldn't walk another step; my feet were all blistered. And my fingers, they were bleeding, they were ice. I was so cold. Only my breath fogging- I'm alive. Alive.

'Took my chance. We were walking though a small, half empty village. Most of the houses we walked past were abandoned. The woman beside me dropped dead; the one behind her tripped and fell. I ran. An abandoned chicken coop, I think, and I crawled inside, huddled tight on the dirty ground. The officers did not bother to count, but I heard the sound of the whip, and another hard drop. I did not dare breathe till the sound of footsteps stopped. But my breath fogged up then and I said the words out. I lived.'

'I thought of you a lot.' He started, voice slow, words heavy. 'And I kept thinking I would forget- your voice; your face. We heard lots of rumours, and I'll tell you, even after knowing the real thing; I just couldn't believe it. I'm not going to pretend I know how you feel. But despite all, I know you, Hermione. You've changed, so have I. I know captivity- I was a POW in a Soviet camp for more than four years. I was scared. I didn't think I would live when so many if my friends died in front of my eyes. I didn't think I would survive when I couldn't find a reason to live. But I don't regret living, now. Now, I want to live.'

'You want to forget.' She said. 'But I want to remember. Don't you? Walking to school together, here, those fresh apples, your brothers' with their pranks, so many days we spent here. This was like our very own tree, you remember? I couldn't enter my old home, Ron. Couldn't face the ghosts, because even though the home was broken, ransacked, I could see Papa everywhere. Everywhere. And everything we had, all gone.

'But here, here I was true. I was good here, I was happy here with you. We were good here.'

The sky was darkening, orange shifting to hues of red, darkening into the black of night, pale moon etched. Her words echoed in his ears. There was time.

'It's getting late,' he said instead.

'Ja, we should get going. '

She stood up, her eyes meeting his. 'I'll be late otherwise.'

He got up too now, bracing his leg.

'Ja,' he agreed, and there was only silence as they looked at each other.

'Will you come back?' He asked now.

'Ja,' she nodded, her eyes taking the scene in, hands tightly held together. 'Ja, I will. Here's my address.'

She took his hand, fingers clasping around his. It was water to his parched throat. A dry bed unprepared for such rain.

'Nice meeting you be back?'

'Ja,' She smiled, and it shone in her eyes. Maybe it was nothing. But maybe it was everything too. There was time. He was alive. She was alive. They had time.

'I will.'

He split open the envelope, the bright sunlight streaming in. The casual sound of Ginny chatting and the rhythmic wails of the chain Papa was repairing filled the background.

Dear Ron...

A smile lit his lips, as he read through the words. Her handwriting was still ant like.

It was still Hermione.