OH CAPTAIN MY CAPTAIN - HERMIONE'S STORY - CHAPTER THREE

He is gone. The words are so stark, so complete, so final. Every sound I hear, I whip around hoping to see him again, to have his eyes smile back at me, to have his arms wrap themselves around my waist. And then I remember, and then it comes back to me shuddering and painful that I will never see him again. The real agony is that I don't even know if he is dead. Death, at least has a ring of peace to it, of eternal rest. And I know, know in my heart that peace is what he craved for the most. In all his troubled turbulent life, all he ever wanted was tranquility.

Now he is lost, lost somewhere in the darkness outside. Lost and alone, and I know, somewhere deep within, that it is forever. I never got the chance to tell him how much I loved him, never, even when he poured out his heart to me, I never said a word. I always was the strong one, the intelligent, balanced one who kept things sane. I guess I was afraid that if I spoke, somewhere, on some level, that sanity would shatter. I thought we never needed sanity more than now, when sorrow was immanent, when pain pervaded our lives. I was wrong. It is when tragedy is at its peak that man needs to laugh most. But

The ship is anchor'd safe and sound, its voyage closed and done,
From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won


People are milling all around me now, celebrating, rejoicing. How can they be happy at a time like this? I answer myself - how not. They have been released from the deepest, gravest horror that could have consumed them. So many dead, so many martyrs in this war against evil. What difference can one more death make to the multitudes? But I mourn, and I know that I do not mourn alone.

Listen to them sing outside, the jubilation, the joy, the glory. Listen to them as they celebrate the beginning of a new world.

For you bouquets and ribbon'd wreaths- for you the shores
A-crowding,
For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning.

But you will never see them now. You will be a hero, and then a memory, and then you will disappear into the annals of time. You will be but a name - a name which will stir a chord in the heart of everyone who is true, kind and just.

I remember telling you once that you were a great wizard. Later I was to reiterate by saying that perhaps you were the greatest. That was my mistake. Every time I spoke those words, you felt that my love for you was an infatuation, a childish hero-worship that would disappear with the coming of age, wisdom and experience. How wrong you were! I didn't love you because you were the Boy who lived. I loved you because in your eyes I could see the need, the hunger to be loved. I loved you because every time I held you, I was holding that wonderful person that I had known all my life. I had known…

I shouldn't be so shattered. After all every time I let you out of my sight, it was with the knowledge that I might not see you again, but then again every time you proved me wrong. You were back smiling bright and wonderful, and it was like we had never been apart. You always seemed to convince me that you were invincible. I suppose you were. After all you did have an unconquerable soul.

The same fire that drove you on to meet every challenge, to bridge every wall, the same fire that lit a nation. The fire that I saw every time I looked into your eyes. Can that fire be quenched by any evil? The one last hope that you have given me is that with your death, you have lit that fire in the hearts of millions of young wizards. You have given them an icon, an idol.

Even as I say these words I see your eyes smile at me, soft and tender. Some are born leaders, some achieve leadership, some have leadership thrust upon them. All three are true of you. You would never have refused to be the warrior of the light, because you were never able to let anyone down. Your bitterest enemies couldn't help but respect you, and your friends couldn't help but adore you. Even the one man who you believed betrayed you did so under the deepest of duress.

I never told you this, but I came to you in Azkaban only after receiving a letter from him. It was a letter which only could be written for you. It was the letter of a broken man, shattered by what he had done to the only reason he had ever really loved. It was a life gone waste, of a soul gone hollow and if you had read the letter, it would have broken your heart, as it broke mine. Then I had a heart which could be broken. Now it is lost in the nightfall with you.

There are others who come to me now to commiserate on my loss. All those tragic eyes trained on me, none of them able to say the pitying words that would be appropriate at such a time. He came too, the man you held closest to your heart. Your guide, your mentor, your patron, of course he came. I hoped that he at least would be able to meet my eyes, but he too turned away. Now I am truly alone.

He always told me that you would survive, and I suppose you did. You survived eternally in the form each man craves to survive in, each man but you. Bards will sing of you, poets will write of you, mothers will soothe their children with your name. But I, only I and a handful of others will remember you as something other than just the Boy who lived. We will remember you as the Boy who loved.

So rejoice sweet world, rejoice for the new lease to life that has been given to you through the blood, sweat, toil and tears of so many, and in particular of one. Yes indeed,

Exult O shores, and ring O bells!
But I with mournful tread,
Walk the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.