Chapter 5: Discoveries and Regrets

Lavender and Hermione stood in the kitchen of what formally was 'her' house Hermione, who was initially eager to return in order to find Harry and try and salvage what was left of her relationship, was now uneasy at the prospect of facing him.

Doubt flooded her mind 'what if he rejects me?' 'Why didn't I just trust him?' She didn't know if she could take rejection.


Hermione glanced around the darkened kitchen, no light could be seen from any of the adjacent rooms and an eerie silence hung over them.

"I don't like this," Hermione whispered while clutching Lavenders hand. "Please," she begged. "Can we go?"

Lavender turned to Hermione, her face set, "No Hermione." She gripped her arm, "We're going to sort this now."

Hermione nodded solemnly. "Okay," she mumbled.

Lavender took hold of Hermione's over arm, gripping it tightly, "Look, Hermione," she began. "Only you can fix this. Now you can go in there, find Harry and pray that he will forgive your mistake." She took a breath, "Or you can leave and wonder what might have been."

Hermione shook her head, blinking back the tears that threatened to fall. "I don't know, what if he's angry? He's never doubted my faithfulness, not once, even though I've given him so many reasons to." She looked up at Lavender, "Remember the time when I was organising something for our first anniversary? I had to meet Ron secretly, so that Harry wouldn't suspect I was planning anything and you accused me of cheating with him?"

Lavender winced at the memory, but nodded slowly.

"Well," Hermione continued. "You remember how Harry reacted? Said that I'd never do anything of the sort, he believed, supported and 'trusted' me completely." Her voice became quiet, "And I've just gone left him under the false belief that he was seeing someone else, when in fact he was planning the opposite."

She raised a hand to wipe the tears falling from her eyes, "He'll hate me."

Lavender looked sympathetically at Hermione. "Any fool could see that he absolutely adores you," she said softly. "There's no way he could hate you."

Hermione looked up at her hopefully. "You think?" she asked meekly.

"You heard how desperate he sounded earlier."

Hermione nodded slightly in recognition. "I need to find him"

"I'll go look upstairs and you go to the living room, that's where I'm sure he'll be"

Lavender quickly made her way through the kitchen, towards the stairs; leaving Hermione alone in the kitchen.

Hermione took a deep breath and slowly made her way through the kitchen and over to the open door to the living room.

~~~~~~~~~

Hermione stood in the doorway leading in to the living room. She gazed in to the dimly lit room; it was late in the evening and all she could see was the faint outline of the coffee table as it reflected the light of the full moon.

She vaguely wondered why Harry had not come to meet her, after all the exchange in the kitchen had hardly been a quiet one. Perhaps, he was asleep she thought.

Her hand fumbled across the unlit wall until it found its destination: the light switch.

With one flick of her finger the light was on and every detail of the room became visible to her.

Her breath caught in her throat at the sight before her. The colour drained from her face and she could feel the strength in her legs failing. She gripped the doorframe tightly, her knuckles turning white in an effort to prevent her from collapsing as she surveyed the room.

At first sight the room looked almost exactly as it had the last time she had been there. However, photos were spread carelessly across the coffee table and on to the floor; the majority she noticed were of her and Harry. She soon became aware that many of the photos and large patches of the previously pale blue carped were now covered in a deep red liquid.

She knew what that liquid was; it filled her entire being with a sense of dread. Her hold on the frame failed and she fell forward to the ground. She didn't care, she knew what that liquid was; it was blood; Harry's blood.

She slowly looked up and wiped her eyes to clear her tear blurred vision. "This is my fault," she whispered.

"I'm sorry Harry."

She pulled her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around her legs; this couldn't be happening. She just wanted to shut everyone and everything out; she suddenly felt very alone. Moving her head down to her knees, she shut her eyes tightly trying to stop the free falling tears, but she was failing miserably, finally giving up; crying uncontrollably. She cried knowing that the man she loved more than anything else in her life, possibly more than life itself had died; all because of her.

Suddenly a thought occurred to her, causing her to freeze for a second time that night; Harry wasn't there. If he wasn't here, then where was he?

A sense of extreme anxiety filled her; he might still be alive, she had to find him and quickly.

She hurriedly wiped her eyes and held her hand up in front of her face trying to regain focus, but something else caught her eye.

On the very corner of the table lay a small brown envelope. On it she could clearly see the name 'Hermione' written in what was undoubtedly Harry's messy scrawl.

She took a deep breath, collected herself and crawled over to the edge of the table. She reached out with a shaky hand and gingerly picked up the envelope; it felt heavy, too heavy for it not to contain something other than paper. Rubbing her hand across the surface she felt a circular 'lump' underneath the brown parchment of the envelope

Over come with a new sense of fear and anxiety at what could be written inside, she slowly tore open the top and delicately extracted the letter from within.

'Could this be his last words' her body shivered at the thought. She didn't want to believe that the piece of paper that she held in her hands would be the last thing of Harry's she would ever own, even though all the evidence suggested that it was.

She closed her eyes and let the letter rest in her fingers; maybe if she put off reading the letter it would delay the inevitable and she would have a few more moments, clinging to the hope that Harry was still alive.

Sighing she opened her eyes; putting it off wouldn't make it any easier if the worst came to pass. Looking down at the slightly off white parchment she noticed that it was already soaked with her tears that had not ceased since her entry in to the room.

"Please…," she whispered as she unfolded the letter and began to read.

Dear Hermione

I don't know what to say, except: sorry. Sorry that you have to see this, sorry that I didn't tell you things when I should have, sorry for all the sadness I've caused and sorry that it's come to this. Maybe now you can find someone who is truly deserving of your love, unlike the coward that I turned out to be. I should be here, fighting for you, waiting for you, but I'm not. The truth is, Hermione; I'm tired of fighting. My whole life has been one long fight between one thing and another, I can't stand it anymore and now that you're gone I feel so alone; there's no reason to fight, nothing matters now. Maybe the item that accompanies this letter will provide some explanation.

I hope you can forgive me…someday, wherever we may meet.

Harry.


Hermione sat, staring at the letter; her whole body shaking, unable to comprehend the depth of feeling that Harry had for her or how important she was in his life. How could she have been so foolish not to have seen it?
'This is your entire fault' she chastised herself 'If only you hadn't been so weak; you might have been able to save him'.

A strangled sob escaped her lips, she knew it was true. If only she had given him a chance, then he might still be here.

"Please come back to me Harry." She whispered, closing her eyes; trying to picture his face one last time.


~~~~~~~~

"Oh my God!" Lavender screamed as she entered the living room. Having checked the rest of the house, she had come back to see where Hermione had gotten to, however this she had not expected.

"Hermione?" she asked gently, seeing her sitting on the floor shivering. Hermione looked up at her through bloodshot eyes, but made no response.

"What happened?" she asked again, stepping a little closer to her.

Hermione shook her head, her gaze drifting to the floor.

A faint 'pop' echoed through the room, both women looked up in time to see Ron run in from the kitchen.

~~~~~~

"Thank God I've found you," he said breathlessly, his voice trembling slightly. "I went back to the house, but you weren't there, so I could only assume..."

"Where's Harry?" Hermione asked, cutting Ron off mid sentence; her voice carrying more force then she herself though she could manage.

Ron swung round to face her, eying her sympathetically. "Hermione," he began, attempting to keep his voice steady. "I've taken him to hospital, he's..."

Hermione had apparated as soon as the word 'hospital' had left Ron's mouth, causing him to fall silent in surprise.

Lavender looked at Ron knowingly. There was only one place she could have gone, and that was where ever Harry was.

~~~~~~


A/N: Okay, I know I've been over 2-3 months in updating and even thought I've now updated it isn't really much(I'm not too happy with its length), so hopefully seeing as I pretty much have it all planned out I'll be able to upload the next chapter soon. If you feel the need to yell at me for taking so long in updating; my AIM name is in my profile. Please review.

Thank you


thefly