Note: Somewhat non-linear timeline, jumping ahead years within the same passage.

Chapter 5

"So, actually, therefore, the course of wisdom, what is really sensible, is to let go, is to commit oneself, to give oneself up and that's quite mad."

xXx

All endings are beginnings. But no one said beginnings bring about better.

The end of the term signals the beginning of War. Dumbledore's death signals an end to their childhoods, thrust into an adulthood no seventeen-year-old can prepare for.

"Do you think he would have done it? Draco?"

Her guilt is innumerable. She's partly responsible; she knew, she didn't tell, she could have stopped this.

"No," says Harry, quelching her worries more than he knows. "He was lowering his wand. In the end, it was Snape … It was always Snape."

But he still let Death Eaters into Hogwarts. Still pledged hateful allegiance, lied to everyone for months like his life depended on it.

Because it did.

The phrase exists for a reason.

Ron and Lavender's ending is another beginning, although it takes Hermione a year to realise for what.

The following year passes like a decade, bringing enough grief to last ten lifetimes.

Before long, they're standing in the Great Hall after Voldemort's downfall. Harry's alive; the War is won. Victory brings new life into the veins of Hogwarts, but it's bandaged by death.

Grey meets brown from afar, and it's the first time they've looked at one another since Draco's near-death in the Room of Requirement. Utter panic replaces her unease, acutely aware of Ron's hand laced with her own.

Draco flashes her a look. Regret or jealousy or anger, perhaps a hybrid of all three.

She squeezes Ron's hand, a silent gloat.

See … he does want me; the world is as it should be. But will it ever feel normal again? Will she ever forget those horrors? The mistakes.

Draco turns away from Hermione, says something to Narcissa – as if the private conversation communicated through looks alone didn't just happen.

Her body thinks of it sometimes; of him and the library and that broken glass stained floor of the Astronomy Tower. She wonders if he's thinking the same, late some nights, inhaling the forbidden memory until his chest constricts and lungs burn.

She rushes headfirst with Ron, as if replacing memories and sensations might equate to forgetting.

Even after his gentle assertion, "I don't mind waiting, 'Mione – honest," she wastes no time, pulling Ron into the nearest empty bedroom when they're alone at Grimmauld Place.

She's waited long enough.

The act is enjoyable, although she wishes certain lewd memories didn't flash through her mind … Wishes he'd fist her hair, or whisper a tease under his breath, or crook his fingers inside her before they started.

He makes an incorrect assumption from the beginning.

"It didn't hurt at all?" asks Ron once it's over, pillow-talk turning tenuous. Apparently, their first time had gone different than his and Lavander's ...

She can't pinpoint why she doesn't correct him. Or even explain the many fallacies – societal expectations and worshipped maidenhood; myths of Muggle temptresses and Pureblood chastity. She considers blaming other things. Her own fingers, vigorous exercise, riding broomsticks and dragons …

She settles on the truth with a healthy dose of omission. "No. Everyone's different."

When she doesn't tell him immediately, she knows she never can. Some secrets are best locked tighter than Azkaban and taken nowhere but to the grave.

Falling for Ron comes effortlessly. Loving him is like tumbling down a verdant hill, soft and safe – no jagged rocks or scattered trees warning of impending wreckage.

It's like riding a Ferris wheel. There's only one, unique and antique – its views are stunning, and each drop is safe. There's no motion sickness; no dips or loops that lurch stomachs into throats. Rickety roller coasters are fun in the moment, but she's always nauseous after stepping off.

She can count on one hand the number of times she sees Draco Malfoy in the years following.

It's 2001, at the Ministry's annual Christmas ball. Draco's standing beside a pretty brunette who looks positively spellbound while hanging onto his every word.

Hermione blinks, stunned.

Is that Daphne Greengrass's sister? That Ravenclaw second year who almost accepted a S.P.E.W. badge until Daphne slapped it out of her hand and chided Hermione. 'Stay away from us, freak.'

The younger Greengrass sister glances over, catching Hermione's blatant gawking.

She quelches panic because she swears there's a tiny smirk on the other witch's face. Her own expression reflects guilt. Draco doesn't notice the silent interaction, and Hermione quickly retreats to Ron.

"Are you alright?" he asks.

"Fine," she says, chugging the rest of her champagne and watching her engagement ring dance in the light.

All is as it should be.

It's 2006, and it has to be the hottest spring in existence.

April feels like August, and Hermione's sure she might self-implode: four days past her due date and trying to pick out a birthday present for Teddy in Diagon Alley.

She's back and forth, between a broomstick and an enchanted stuffed dog that performs tricks like a real one. The shop's bell interrupts her focus.

Oh, bloody fucking hell.

Hermione almost knocks over a display of slowed snitches and balloon-light bludgers.

Why today?

She considers getting on all fours and sneaking away. Regrettably, being pregnant (and rivalling sizes with the knight-bus) doesn't make for an inconspicuous escape.

Draco sees her first, and within seconds she's back in month three, dodging waves of intractable morning sickness while flooding with unexpected emotion.

Astoria Greengrass – Malfoy now – is beside him, wearing a sundress which looks far too Muggle for a Malfoy. She's pregnant too, but skinner than Hermione's ever been, looking as if one of those balloon-bludgers is shoved beneath her dress.

"You good?" asks Ginny, walking down the aisle with a sleeping Albus strapped to her chest.

"Fine," says Hermione, a hand on her tightening stomach. "But I ... I think I might be having a contraction."

Ginny beams. "Godric, I hope so. We'll just owl order something– let's go."

All is as it should be.

It's 2017, and those same children are off to Hogwarts.

"So that's little Scorpius," says Ron under his breath. "Make sure you beat him in every test, Rosie. Thank God you inherited your mother's brains."

"Ron, for heaven's sake," says Hermione, resisting an eye roll. "Don't try to turn them against each other before they've even started school!"

Not like it would make a shred of difference.

It's 2019, and the first time she's said anything to him in over twenty years.

The Hogwarts express is packed with students ready for the start of term. Ron, Harry, and George all remain engrossed in conversations about quidditch, unaware when she slips off.

She sees Draco standing alone. It's only a small push through the crowd before she's standing beside him.

"Hi," says Hermione, the greeting awkward and impromptu. He looks up, stunned for a moment before regaining composure.

"Hello."

"I …" She swallows, blurting out something that sounds right. "I'm so sorry for your loss."

Because really, no way he remembers what she said a lifetime ago.

'You deserve every brutal reality this life gives you.'

No one deserves to be a widower before forty.

What else do you say? The obituary was beautifully written? She sounded like an incredible person? Are you not sleeping? It sure looks like it.

"If you need anything …" she trails off, having nothing to really offer.

"Thank you. I'm fine, Granger."

It's Granger-Weasley now, but she doesn't correct him. The whistle of the Hogwarts express breaks her reverie. It's off.

When she walks back to her small army, Ron looks at her in disbelief.

"Were you just talking to Malfoy?"

"His wife just died. Don't be rude," Hermione hisses. "I gave my condolences. You might do well to consider giving the same."

Ron huffs. The Hogwarts express transforming into a plane and flying their children to Antarctica was more likely.

It's 2021, and the changing seasons bring changing winds. Cold and harsh, she's unsure when a rough patch became their new normal.

All is ... broken.

The suggestion of a vow renewal starts it – the imaginary baby to save their marriage. It's equally useless.

She and Ron have been on the brink of breakage for years. Staying together for the children proved easier during the pre-Hogwarts years, but ever since Hugo left, it's been an uphill battle.

She's realised so much over the years: they make one another worse, neither is happy, and life's too short to spend baiting and bickering.

But when screaming turns to silence, she knows it's truly over.

The suggestion comes after a particularly tense dinner, Hermione snapping at Ron's failure to use a cleaning charm before setting his plate in the sink. A fight ensues, and he tells her he wants to talk.

"I think, maybe … maybe we should spend some time apart," says Ron with the heaviest of hearts. "Just … a month or so. Clear our heads."

He wants her to fight it, to break down and scream instead of maintaining agonising apathy.

"A separation seems pointless," says Hermione after a long pause. She rips off the bandage. "I want a divorce, Ronald."

She always did prefer clean breaks.

He wears a devastated expression, on the verge of tears.

She explains how a separation would elongate the inevitable. Finishes off with, "You're happier without me."

Ron argues, back-peddling from his original statement. "That's not true."

"It is … You drink too much; I work way too much … we do anything possible to avoid one another while at home, especially with Rose and Hugo away. Hell, the last time we had sex was on my birthday, seven months ago –"

"You want sex? We can have sex every day if you want."

"I don't …" She leaves out the 'at least not with you.' "That's the problem."

They go back and forth, round and round. She's drained, and so is he.

"You'll find someone better," she insists, ready to end the discussion. She'll sign the papers, right then and there, but he's not giving up without a fight.

"It's not that. It's just – blimey, Hermione …" He looks lost, searching for something to say. "I can't even stand the thought of us sleeping with other people."

The remark irritates her. It's possessive, in a way that triggers wisdom to give way.

"Oh, please - won't be the first time."

She doesn't know what she intends by the comment. Maybe to hurt him. Once the words are out, she wishes for nothing but the ability to suck them back in.

"You had an affair?"

"Of course not!" she flushes, realising only then how bad it sounded. "I meant … er – before we were together."

She wants to suck those words back in, too.

"Before … what? That's impossible? You were a virgin."

"No. You just never asked."

"I – WHAT? With who? Krum? Merlin, Hermione, you were Rose's age – "

"No! I ..." She trails off, thinking up an excuse as her mind turns to static.

Ron goes silent, ghostly pale when he speaks next.

"N-no …" he chokes out. "Oh. My. Fucking –"

"What, Ronald?"

He stares at her like she's standing over a dead body, knife in hand.

"When was the last time?" Ron demands suddenly. "Or are you still sleeping with him?"

She matches his paleness, sweating like the kitchen's a sauna.

He doesn't know. No way he actually knows … My god, but his words sound so sure – does he?

"I … n-no." Her stammering reflects guilt. "Of course, not –"

"I'm such a fucking idiot. You two must have a real laugh about it, don't you? Poor, stupid Ron. We've got him fooled – and for all this time."

She shuts her mouth, calculates what to say next.

"Does Ginny know?"

Realisation dawns.

"RON, NO –"

"And to think," he begins, tears glistening with betrayal. "I believed two teenagers, facing literal death and sharing a tent for months, wouldn't start fucking –"

"WE DIDN'T!"

It's an old wound, ripped open with fresh salt poured over it. She tries to get a handle on the situation.

"I haven't so much as kissed Harry. You seriously think we'd keep that from you?"

"You've kept a lot from me, apparently."

Too true.

"I Ron – no, it wasn't Harry. It … I – it was – "

When the omission becomes a lie.

" – it was a Muggle boy … He lived down the street from my parents. A, er — family friend. The summer after sixth year."

"A Muggle?" he repeats.

"Yes. Can we drop this ridiculous subject now?"

But Ron headstrong suspicion doesn't waver.

"Really? So what was his name?"

"His name? Er – it was Bradley ... Bradley Barnes."

xXx

Announcing divorce feels like announcing a death; people shoot apologetic looks and say 'sorry' like a reflex. Molly takes the news worst, bursting into tears. Following a close second are Harry and Ginny.

'But our Friday night dinners –'

'Won't change a bit. Ron and I are still friends.'

She doesn't miss the side-swiped glances Ron gives during those dinners, worst when she strikes up a conversation with Harry.

Ron ruminates on their discussion, and proof of his unwillingness to drop the subject comes a week later.

She's all moved out and relaxing in her newly decorated flat (having given Ron the house) with a book in hand and a glass of wine on her coffee table.

The pop of appiration startles her. She grabs her wand, jumping off the couch in self-defence as Ron storms up.

"My God!" says Hermione, catching her breath. "Can't you call first? This isn't your house."

She's about to berate him about boundaries and the utter lack of privacy, distracted when he tosses something on her coffee table.

"What's that?" she raises an eyebrow, studying the folded piece of parchment.

"Guess where I just was."

She's about to answer, 'running from a serial killer, I hope?' but swallows the sarcastic remark.

"At the joke shop?" she guesses.

"At your parents' house."

She frowns. "Why?"

"Told your mum you'd asked me to go there and look through your old school stuff in the attic … Said you wanted Rose to have your used textbooks – left good notes in the margins, and whatnot."

"What? Why –"

"I was trying to find those journals; the ones from when we were Horcrux hunting. I figured there had to be evidence of you and Harry's relationship in there somewhere."

"WHAT? Have you gone utterly mad? I told you – "

"Right, never fucked Harry. Problem is, I don't think I can believe anything you say ... ever again –"

Her face falls.

" – because you're a fucking liar, Hermione."

"What are you talking about?"

"That."

He points wildly to the parchment before she sighs and picks it up with defeat.

"What in the word is thi – "

Her jaw snaps shut, speechless as she reads.

The slanted, cursive scrawl is unmistakable.

You win.

I'll do anything. Take whatever help you're offering … Fake my own death, run away and live like a Muggle, hold your fucking hand in the middle of the great hall while everyone watches. I don't care. None of it matters anyway.

You were right …

It's you. It's always been you.

Meet me atop the Astronomy Tower at midnight.

Ron's red-faced and fuming when she looks up. Her thoughts race, bile rising with realisation.

"Where did you find this?" she demands.

"In a pocket, inside a gaping hole – that tattered schoolbag you always shoved way too many books inside of. Wouldn't have found it without a locating charm … You and your family can't use a rubbish bin, can you?"

Truth is, she never went through her old stuff that year. She hid everything inside a trunk, shoved inside her parent's attic, and never looked through it again. Bigger things were happening back then.

"I've never seen this before in my life."

It's true. It hurts how true it is. She stays neutral, thinks up an excuse – she'll say it's not hers. She found it on the ground. After all, there aren't names; nothing points toward him.

Ron begins pacing a hole in her new flat's flooring.

"Of course, I think to myself: 'ok proof' … Figured Harry just wrote in cursive, case anyone found that note –"

"Ron! Harry didn't –"

"I know," he says as if spitting up acid. "Because I kept looking … Then I found this – buried at the bottom of your trunk."

Ron removes a scroll from his back pocket, the material yellow with age, and bent in about seven different directions. He angrily unrolls the other parchment paper and tosses it down on the coffee table.

Her heart misses a beat.

Oh, no.

She stares, the note and the scroll now sitting beside each other for comparison. The latter has Draco Malfoy's name gracing its top, an ungraded transfiguration essay below.

"I didn't even need to cast a handwriting comparison charm," he says through gritted teeth.

She laughs inappropriately right then – contemplates telling Ron the Department of Magical Law Enforcement really did lose a fantastic Auror. He's unamused.

"Malfoy?" He's unhinged, pacing manically. "You and … MALFOY?"

Hermione looks down, as if the carpet fibres hold hidden answers she can't give.

"Did you sleep with him?" Ron asks before she replies.

"It … I-I – well – "

"It's a fucking yes or no question, Hermione."

"Yes. I did. We did – once. Twenty-five years ago."

She may as well have fought alongside Voldemort. At least in Ron's eyes, the sins were equivalent.

"A … 'MUGGLE BOY'?" He reiterates her ridiculous lie from earlier. "A fucking – 'family friend'? MALFOY? Hermione, he was a Death Eater! Trying to kill Dumbledore. Almost offed Katie and me in the process – "

"You think I don't know that!" This time, she's equally unhinged. "You think it was … was planned? Like it was some malicious scheme we drafted? Who would choose that? Who would willingly fall for someone so blatantly wrong – "

"Oh? So it was falling in love now?"

"I … No, I didn't say that."

Ron's glances at the note, looking back at her with a broken-hearted declaration.

"You didn't have to."

xXx

Even long after Ron left, she can't sleep.

She has a busy workday tomorrow: four proposals to read through, lunch with the Muggle Prime Minister, and a meeting with McGonagall to discuss permits necessary to include adolescent dragons within the N.E.W.T. Care of Magical Creatures curriculum. None of that so much grazes her consciousness.

She's read every line of that note, again and again. Memorised each world, thinking of the slant to his lettering – 'I'm ambidextrous you know, Granger' – and the way his hand must have looked while writing it.

She contemplates writing a letter, firmly deciding against it. What good will it do?

Besides, how do you write 'I love my children, but I can't stop wondering … what if?'

You don't. You never let that thought escape.

It feels like holding the worst type of secret, heaviest in her book of many.

Fantasy – what could have been – induces earth-shattering visions. Them, back in sixth year, taking on everything: the world, his parents, death itself. Them, back for eighth year: adorning the mystery of finding love where it isn't supposed to be.

It's lost love and pain. What ifs aren't healthy, but this one tastes like sweet poison, and she drinks it like wine.

She'll drive herself mad by daybreak, unable to take it any longer.

"Bloody hell," Hermione whispers to nothing but darkness.

The idea was wild, but so is she, her newfound disposition unshakable and mental ... but 'imprudence' could title her memoir, and she no longer cared. Adrenaline brings abandon, and she rises from bed like a schoolgirl about to run into a dragon's lair.

Hermione walks over to her fireplace, tossing down reason alongside green Floo powder.

xXx

The guest entry of Malfoy Manor reminds her of Buckingham Palace – the last school trip she took before Hogwarts. She finds herself tracing the fireplace's mantle, examining the ornate decorations as she waits.

She doesn't wait long, spinning around when she hears footsteps approaching.

"Granger?"

He's worried, as anyone would be. The Minister of Magic appearing at one's home, at one in the morning and dressed in a nightgown and robes, would horrify most anyone.

Especially considering tears begin streaming down her face the moment he walks up.

"Did something happen?" he asks, reaching the point of panic. "Is Scorpiu –"

"Everything's fine."

An obvious lie on her part, and he can tell.

"Then why – "

"You didn't try hard enough!" she interrupts, certain she sounds on the verge of mental collapse by then.

"I … what? Are you –"

"You never tried! Never said shit. Not once, not really. And I didn't … And we didn't –"

"Hey, relax. Breathe." He puts his hands up to halt her rambling. "What are you talking abo –"

"This, you stupid idiot."

Hermione walks closer, slamming the note into his chest. He catches the parchment before it falls.

"Granger …" He trails off, Adam's apple bobbing. "What's this about?"

She ignores him, pacing like Ron earlier.

"Who does that, hm? Shoves a note bigger than the world into my schoolbag and expects me to find it?"

He goes to say something, but she doesn't let him.

"So then, I have to see it, twenty-five years later, and wonder what would have happened …. If I had dug a bit deeper; if there wasn't a gaping hole in the centre pocket; if I had read what you said."

What if.

Maybe he'd be dead … Maybe they'd all be dead, their world in dystopian ruin. There's no way of knowing.

"You never saw this?" he asks after a break of deafening silence.

She snaps, borderline hysterical as the words fall out.

"You're absolute rubbish at passing notes, Draco Malfoy!"

"I –"

"No. Shut up – I came here to say something." Before losing her nerve entirely, she blurts out a confession. "It was always you too, Draco."

All those long years ago.

"And I figured you should know: it certainly wasn't for lack of want," she calms ever so slightly, " … the reason I left you waiting."

In the Astronomy Tower – just like that night, spent gazing at the stars and each other.

He's still beautiful, shrouded in clearer skies and brighter moonlight, those peaked summits still flashing caution.

"Maybe I'm still waiting."

He smirks and she's madness, taking that old olive branch and uncaring about thorns or tendrils or poisonous fruit.

"Then prove it," she whispers, the unsteady demand like ice on her scorched tongue.

A shake of his head, a smile neither of them can resist.

"So bossy, Granger."

All as it should be.

"You love it, Malfoy."

"So … we come to the strange conclusion – in madness, lies sanity."

A/N: Thanks for reading! I know this story won't be everyone's cup of tea, and the ending leaves more questions than answers. I may do an epilogue eventually, we'll see.

Let me know what you think! I appreciate all reviews - love it or flame it.

Until next time ...

~ MMM