The Paths We Take
By Dorothy Pepperpot
Hello. It's me again. And again this is an adapted story from one I wrote a few years ago. This is a follow up to "Saturday Night At Hermiones". It's told in the first person POV. Any reviews would be very welcome.
Disclaimer – Characters belong to JKR, not me. Not doing this for money so no profit.
I believe that everybody is a master of their own destiny. They have to be. If I wasn't then I wouldn't be in the situation that I'm in now. My best friend has just left my flat after telling me that he was in love with me. It was plainly obvious that he had been thinking about it for some time; it wasn't spontaneous, he didn't just blurt it out. He told me that I make him complete, that I'm his soul mate and that he couldn't live his life without me in it.
I wasn't ready for what he was telling me and I just sat there with a dumb look on my face. It was like a bomb had been dropped and I had know idea what to do. And then he kissed me with an intensity so fierce that I thought that I'd melt in the heat of it. But no sooner as he kissed me, he was gone. Gone. Left me there dumbstruck with a void surrounding me that wasn't there before. There was only one thing that could fill it and he had just left. Why had he affected me like this? My normal rational thought process had been turned on its head and had left me a gibbering wreck. I had been totally disarmed but what he had said to me was starting to sink in and now I was able to comprehend the enormous magnitude of it. He loved me. He loved ME. I always knew that in the back of my mind but I couldn't admit to myself that I had any feelings like that about him.
The first day that I walked into that compartment on the train and all through our school lives I had developed a crush on him; but as time went on and we got older and the war loomed heavy over our heads, I pushed the feelings to the back of my conciousness and I wouldn't let them rise again. Events brought about by the second rise of Voldermort only served to strengthen the bond between us. And from that unbreakable bond came this unspoken love that neither of us had the fortitude to mention or face. Until he did. And now I don't know what to do.
I'm on autopilot. I'm walking. I have no destination in mind. In fact I have nothing on my mind except for what he said to me. I keep replaying tonights events in my head, trying to come to a logical conclusion but I can't. I need to figure this out before I see him again. I just want to run away and hide from this but I can't do that. I can't let this ruin our friendship. We know each other too well for that.
I'm still walking, still thinking. I don't know how much time has passed but by the time I've stopped walking I realise that I've stopped outside his place. My mind is made up. I apparate inside.
I know he knows I'm here. I stand there for a long time before I knock. He answers the doors almost immediately; he knows how long I've been standing there. We look at each other for a few intense moments, the unspoken hanging between us, not needing to be said. I have to finish what he started back at my flat. I pull his head to mine and we devour each other. Talking isn't needed as the inevitable begins to unfold and neither of us can or wants to hold it back anymore. The unexplained elements of our relationship unravels right there, on the floor of his living room.
Something has awoken in me; something completely raw and new that I'm having trouble comprehending but I don't care about it. Not anymore. There is a new Hermione Granger, one that is not a stickler for the rules, one that has a blatent disregard for others to get what she wants. I am lying in the arms of my lover, still where we started hours ago. Tonight has been a complete revelation to me. A passion has surfaced in me that I like too much; a passion that I will, from now on, save exclusively for him. Talking can be saved for later, right now all I want to do is bask in the glorious afterglow. I haven't felt like this ever before, it's strong and far too intense but I'm not minding. I don't think we've said a word to each other since all this started when I turned up at the door. We are so in tune with each other that words are not needed as we move in the circle that is tonight's programme of events for us. If we are masters of our own destiny, then let destiny take its own path and we can see where it leads us. For now we are destined to live this life together. Together we have the strength to take what life throw at us, absorb it and throw it back tenfold. If certain people find out about us then it's over, not romantically speaking but this is one thing certain factions would not waste the opportunity on. To know we are together would make it easier for them. There are still people in this country that want us dead. We have to keep the quiet, how long for is anybody's guess. But right now, in my reality, it's just him and me. We are one. As fatigue overtakes me and I fall into a languig sleep, I am safe in the knowledge that all this will be here in the morning. The curveballs that destiny has for us can be thrown back later.