"I guess I'm looking for something, what? I don't know. But it's probably coffee. Or chocolate. Or both, at the saaaame time." - Neville, when Susan asked why he kept traveling instead of settling down.

The last person he expected to find doing dishes at his kitchen sink when he arrived home from the hospital was Hannah. The Concussion Draught worked well, his head barely hurt at all after the hit he took but still... he spent the better part of a day knocked out. The disorientation had him stepping back out onto his patio before re-entering through the back door.

She was still there, bright pink rubber gloves fitted on her hands as the sink faucet ran hot water. Doing dishes. Her legs looked tan and long underneath her tight shorts and yellow tank top and he wondered how big of a mistake he made by breaking up with her.

When Hannah turned her head, looking at him over her bare shoulder, he noticed immediately how good she looked. Far better than him in every way, all made up. No sleepless nights to be seen on her face. She definitely hadn't been spending her day cooped up at the hospital.

She said, "Hey."

"... Hey Hannah."

She turned back to the ungodly pile of dishes in his sink and continued scrubbing. "Gin told Hermione who told Susie who told Terry who told Ernie who came over and told me that you'd been sent to St. Mungo's."

"Oh yeah?"

Setting his stuff on the old wooden kitchen table, the potion ingredients saved by Gin and his torn t-shirt, he couldn't stop himself from walking over to join her at the sink. Drying the dishes she washed by hand.

"I went to Mungo's but chickened out when I spotted Auggie in the waiting room, so I came here instead. This place is a mess baby."

They both sucked in a breath. He was feeling more and more confused by the minute and she wasn't ready to admit it was over. But they always used pet names for each other, it came out of habit. This just happened to be the first time post break-up.

"I know," he said a full minute later, choosing to ignore the slip-up and how uncomfortable it made them.

Out of the corner of his eye he could tell she was frowning, using the scrubbing motions to work out her confusion, to work up to whatever she wanted to say. He tried to prepare himself for anything. The last time they spoke, she was yelling at him as she threw his stuff through the Floo. Before that he told her he didn't love her and wanted to end their relationship.

He couldn't imagine what she could possibly want to say to him.

She handed him a plate to dry and moved on to the next dish. "I cleaned up your Floo room. I'm sorry I broke all your things. I shouldn't have done that."

"I don't blame you."

"Are you hurt?" she asked cautiously.

Yes. He didn't understand his feelings and that was before whatever the hellish voice was inside his head. He wanted Hannah to be happy, to flourish. He wanted to be friends with her and be in her life. Not as a boyfriend. Not as a lover. But being around her made his gut cramp uncomfortably, the air tense between them. If he wasn't in love with her, then what the hell did he feel during their relationship? Was it only sexual attraction, and he was just a moron only thinking with his cock?

"I mean," she pointed a round, pink gloved finger at her forehead.

"Oh-" he coughed. "Yeah, I'm fine."

"Oh-good."

"Yeah-good."

"Yeah."

Her posture drooped towards the sink, her scrubbing coming to a stop. "Nev, Ginny told Hermione who told Susan who told me that you kissed someone."

"Hannah it wasn't like that."

"She kissed you?"

"No, I'm not sleeping and I'm hearing-"

"Not sleeping well doesn't translate to you kissing another woman-"

"It wasn't me, Hannah Banana-"

"Don't call me that. Don't call me by that name-"

"I'm sorry, I don't know how to do this-"

"You broke up with me three weeks ago and now you're what? Seeing someone else?"

"No! Not at all!"

"So just… kissing?" She finally looked up at him, brown eyes turning wet. "Kissing someone else. Who is she?"

"Pansy Parkinson," he answered softly because he wasn't going to lie to her.

Surprise turned to anger turned to tears in an instant, a strange keening sound coming from Hannah's throat. Like she couldn't believe it. Angrily, she pulled off her rubber gloves and threw them into the sink, turning off the faucet with force enough to make the pipes groan.

"I can't believe how much of an idiot I am!" she shouted, stomping out of the room. "Coming here, cleaning up the mess I made, and you're seeing Pansy Parkinson!"

He followed her down the hallway at a complete loss of what to say as she broke down into sobs, big hiccuping sobs. "Hannah, I'm not seeing anyone!"

She bee-lined straight for the front door, her fists curling. "Wait, Hannah, don't Apparate, you're upset!"

"It's not even been a month since we broke up and you're already seeing other people and I'm the dumped idiot who came to clean your house while you were in the hospital," she wailed.

Head turning woozy, he jogged down the hallway to catch up, stopping her just before she opened the front door. "Hannah, wait. I'm not seeing anyone. I couldn't. I swear it isn't what you think!"

She jerked out of his hold and pulled the door open hard enough to ram into his foot. The sharp pain made him hop up onto his opposite foot. "Ouch! Hannah!"

"Oh you're not seeing anyone," she mocked. "You couldn't, you swear it isn't what I think? What a load of—ugh!"

Hannah shoved him hard enough to tip him over before she rushed away. He landed hard on his side, rolling over onto his back with a loud groan. Just his luck to end up at St. Mungo's for the second time in a day. His head started throbbing again as his foot screamed in pain but someone was clearing their throat followed by a loud crack that signaled Hannah's Apparation.

He looked up from his position, sprawled out on the floor, and into the face of Draco Malfoy, Pansy Parkinson, and two others he didn't immediately recognize. Who must have been coming up the walkway just in time for Hannah to make her get away. Goddesses only knew what she was thinking now.

"This day just keeps getting better and better."

The two he didn't recognize rolled their eyes at each other and split up, each walking in the opposite direction around his house. "Hey! Where are they going?"

"Securing the property," Malfoy answered dryly. "May we come in?"

"No," he groaned again, rolling up and onto his feet, shaking his head as if it would make it stop spinning. "Who are they and what are they doing?"

"They're my bodyguards," Pansy spoke up, though her voice quivered as if in fear. "They're here to protect me."

"Bodyguards?" he jumped down the stairs that led from his front door and watched as the two slowly circled his home as if looking for weak points, wands out expertly. "Why do you need bodyguards to come see me?"

He realized then that one of the guards was the dark woman from earlier, the one who knocked him out. No wonder everyone thought she was a child. The witch had a bright blue ribbon in her hair tied into a sweet bow. Add in her petite height and the fact that she was blowing bright pink bubbles with her gum. She looked kind of like a kid, a heavily muscled one that could kick ass at a moment's notice.

"Don't answer that, Pansy. Mr. Longbottom, do you have any associates with The Brotherhood of the Chosen?"

"Associates? With who? What?" Neville rubbed the back of his head in frustration and stumbled over to the small sitting area in the front yard. It was made private by the overgrown hedges that circled the two benches and water fountain that didn't work. He kept meaning to fix it up. Eventually.

Malfoy helped Pansy to the furthest bench, putting himself directly in between her and Neville before taking the seat directly to her left. While his head continued to spin, it was still clear to him that Draco Malfoy would absolutely step in to protect Pansy. The question was why and what she needed protecting from. "Give me a moment please."

He didn't want to delay whatever strange conversation that was about to happen, one between him and two people he had never gotten along with and hadn't thought of in several years. But he hit his head again when Hannah pushed him and the resulting headache made him want to hurl.

"Are you alright?" Pansy asked, and again he caught that trace of fear. A slight quiver in her voice that definitely sounded like… panic. "I thought you were sent to the hospital."

"They gave me a Concussion Draught, I'll be fine. Just tired."

Then he finally looked at her. Pansy Parkinson. Dark, wavy black hair pinned back at the sides and trembling pink lips. But her eyes seemed more silver than the plain gray he remembered. Immediately he was reminded of the final battle at Hogwarts, and how truly scared the witch had been when they all stood in the Great Hall. Impossible, but she seemed even more afraid now.

What could she possibly be afraid of? Especially from him? Here at Longbottom Keep?

"Why are you tired, Mr. Longbottom?"

"Do I need my own legal representation here?" he asked Malfoy, suddenly realizing how outnumbered he was. 4 to 1, one of them already having gotten the jump on him that day, despite what he told his Gran.

"Your head is quite swollen," Pansy leaned toward him, eyes squinting as she examined his forehead.

Moonlit eyes like a kitty cat, but beneath that pale skin is the spirit of my wife, chump.

...

WIFE!?

"Focus, Longbottom, focus," he muttered to himself. Janus Thickey was knocking.

The voice seemed much quieter than it had been before, and he wondered if maybe getting knocked around helped keep the force settled. After all, he was sitting across from Pansy, not kissing her, or calling her by a different name.

"Well Bubblegum over there knocked me out earlier, in case you've forgotten?" he said out loud. But in his head he reminded himself that he wasn't married. He'd never been married. He wasn't currently married or planning to get married.

Not.

Married.

"I haven't forgotten," Pansy said sternly, crossing her arms. It erased that trace of fear from her voice though. Something he quite enjoyed. Then she said, "Nor have I forgotten why it happened."

Said in such a way he couldn't ignore he was the reason he got knocked the hell out by a miniature bubblegum blowing witch.

"Yes," he started. "I am tired."

Then he looked right into Pansy's witchy silver eyes. The voice in his head was right. They looked like the silver of the moon. "I've been having a lot of dreams lately."

Back shooting straight up, she pinched her lips together as her eyes went wide. "Dreams?"

Another throat clearing. The other bodyguard, tall and blonde like a statue with eyes that didn't miss a thing stood at the entrance to the sitting area. "Perhaps that has something to do with it, boss."

He pointed to Pansy's hand. Neville's eyes went right to the silver and gold links that circled her wrist. An exact match to the one on his wrist. He placed his arm next to hers. "Where did you…"

He looked up and caught the moment when Pansy's silver eyes faded to a pale gray before turning into a deep green. Her face turned softer, a smile pushing up the edges of her plump lips. Were they plumped before? She said,"Gus?" in a honeyed foreign accent.

It was the only warning he got before she launched herself right at him. For the third time that day, his head hit the ground, rattling his brain, but he didn't mind this time.

Because Pansy Parkinson was straddling him, kissing him with a fiery passion he had never experienced before in his life. And then, without his permission, the force inside of him spread out and took over his body and mind and he responded to her passion with his own.

Mattie stepped in next to Gerry and Draco, looking down at the two idiot lovebirds rolling around in the grass like teenagers. "No history huh?"

Draco tilted his head. "That is not Pansy."

"Should we… stop them?"