Inspired by the changing of seasons by the direction of poA.
It is summer and there is a feeling of eternity.
He was standing on the platform, suitcase in hand, head bowed, black hair curling around his neck.
She walked towards him slowly, not wanting to alert him to her presence because she loved watching him, loved that europhia and affection that shot through her veins and made the edge of her fingers tingle with something she had no words for.
He did not notice her approaching and she stood there for a moment, cloaked in memory, suddenly afraid of what the new year would bring but excited too- of the things they would see together.
You and I.
"Hermione."
And then the smile that she had come to know so well.
And in that instant she forgot her fears and ran into his arms, savouring the warmth of his cheek barely brushing against her own.
And it was like the first time that she had met him, where the electricity he had created in her flowed and did not stop.
She wished she never had to let go.
"Ron! You brute-," she spluttered, half in mock anger and half in merriment as Ron came rushing through the doors of the carriage, his baggage crashing down abruptly on her foot. It was good to see him again, that familiar red shock of hair, the same sheepish smile and the scent that he brought with him.
She could never place her finger on what it was that bothered her so much when they were together.
No, no, we have everything.
But there is no we.
There is only you and I.
It was like a disease and she felt feverish often, a kind of slow burning chill that would work its way out like the crawl of a serpant and she would see day and night and not know the difference.
Like kissing the embers of a warm fire on a winter's day and feeling nothing no matter how hard you tried.
It was swallowing her whole but on the outside she played in the snow, cheered her heart out at Quidditch matches, toiled away with her books, popped her hand up for the eighteenth time in Potions and Hermione Granger was as normal as normal could possibly be.
And she was beginning to despair that no one would ever notice.
There is only so little between the alive and the living dead.
"Ron, please," she brushes him off impatiently, too wearied and irritated by the grating effect of a long day. But her heart stops for a moment when she sees the crestfallen expression that Ron tries to hide with the rolling of eyes and the shrugging of his shoulders.
Ron, ron.
She does not what to say to him, that she loves him more than she loved anyone else but that her heart no longer belongs to love, that something had changed somehow.
So she hurries away, taking her scars with her and leaving him with his.
She stops him in the hallway, her hands cold and everything seems brighter than usual. The cool drift of a startling warm autumn's day fills the empty spaces with cinammon and cider and its sharp, bittersweet taste is tangible in her mouth. She tries to say something but the words do not come. He looks at her closely, concerned and worried but there is something else there that she has not noticed before - he is preoccuiped with something and it had nothing to do with the Dark Lord.
She starts to cry and he's alarmed, his beautiful green eyes widening in shock and bewilderment, his arm falls awkwardly over one of her shoulders. It is a brotherly hug and it comforts her and the awkwardness somehow feels right. He offers her a tissue and she sniffs and laughs abit at how ridiculous the situation was. They don't talk about it after that but they both know something had changed and it was not just the seasons.
She finds herself avoiding being with Ron and Harry at the same time because it makes her feel uncomfortable when there had once been only dependency.
She blames herself for her weakness, at being unable to separate love from destiny, not knowing if the two were to meet at some cosmic point or if they were two ends of a string that had snapped and would never meet again.
She wonders if she could be considered lucky and if destiny had anything to do with that.
The days pass slowly, tortourously and she screams inside as if drops of wax was tearing her flesh.
But everything is silent, except for the slow flakes of snow that graze the gilded windows of Hogwarts.
She had taken to sitting crosslegged in a deserted part of the library, the pile of books stifling her and she is happy because it distracts her from the pain.
Studying was uncomplicated.
"Hermione."
She does not trust herself to look up. He does not go but stands there, fidgeting and she remembers how she finds his stammer and awkardness endearing but they're like ghosts from the past and she cannot conjour enough to make her feel alive again.
He moves into the seat opposite her and there's a picture in his hand. They were young then, her wild, unruly hair and large teeth, his red hair and squinted eyes, Harry's dark black hair and beautiful green eyes.
They were so beautiful then.
The picture almost brings tears to her eyes but she doesn't because impossible lies between them, unspoken but like broken glass on a milky way. Impassable.
She is still headstrong but the certainity has gone out of her.
They both get up to leave.
He does not take the picture.
Neither does she.
There is no we.
Only you and I.
Someone has to take the plunge.
Winter comes and goes.
The pain comes and goes.
She has not seen Ron since the picture. She does not want to see him. It's like the finished episode of a long running tragedy.
Except it was a fairy tale at first.
Until you created You and I.
The sky is bluer than she remembers it to be. The sun warms her veins and her eyes are brighter than they have been in a while. She looks in the mirror and smiles. There is something about today that she liked, it was like she had woken to the sound of chirping medleys, songs about sunshine and first love, and the stirrings in her relighted and there was something there that had not been there before.
She does not find him in the usual places and she is impatient to find him now and it seems as if her flesh could not wait to be part of his.
People call to her in the hallway but she does not wait.
She finds him but it is all wrong.
He is standing close to Cho, looking at her the way he used to look at me.
"Hermione," and it is not the right voice but she finds herself clinging on to the nearest morning glory, the way a blind man clings on to the thing nearest to him.
He comes over to take her hand and embrace her, she returns it, her tears falling gently to the ground, her hands clutching him and he takes it for something else- desire, love, affection.
He does not notice the dark haired boy and the shiny black haired girl behind them. Does not notice how Hermione's tears fall and darken the maroon shade of his robes, the way blood had darkened the robe of Harry last Spring.
She is at least, grateful for that.
She thinks he doesn't see but he does.
He sees Harry and Cho together, had known for months.
He is only a abandoned log on a vast ocean that she clings on to for now. There is an island in sight and although she does not see that yet, he knows that someday, somehow, she will swim towards it and he will drift with the morning.
He does not know love anymore.
I love you, Hermione often says, tossing her hair and looking at him seriously.
But he knows that all the while, love had been their biggest pretense.