I Miss You

Chapter 11

Hermione stood, icy wind whipping around her face. It was the beginning of November, and things were starting to get cold. Staring out from the topmost point of the castle, she thought about all the things she had just heard from Harry... things she had no idea he had felt.

            Memory

"So, Harry... care to explain what happened?"

Harry chuckled. "Er... not particularly, Hermione, but I don't think I'm going to be able to get out of it."

The room was filled with awkward silence. Hermione waited for Harry to begin.

He swallowed. "All right, then'.

"First of all, this was in absolutely no way yours or Ron's fault. All over the summer, I would just lie in bed thinking about how just knowing me had screwed everyone's lives up. Sirius died, everyone at the Department of Mysteries that day were put into serious danger, and I didn't know what to do. The Dursleys... well, they didn't give a flying rat's arse about me or anything that happens to me. I had nowhere to go, nothing to do. Sure, I could write letters and all but that's some pretty heavy stuff to write in just a letter. It's better to keep that kind of thing to yourself, you know? I thought I could deal with it, but I couldn't. I started... I started to..."

He paused, trying to figure out if there was any sort of way that he could say it without really having to say it.

"I started cutting myself," he said, all in a rush. "I had no outlet for my pain except for that. It was this feeling... like there was so much mixed up inside of me, so much that I felt, and this was the only way that I could let it out. Release of emotional pain through physical pain. It was a release. Then Ron wrote me and invited me to stay for the remainder of the summer. I couldn't just do... it... when I was over there with him. So I stopped. I had to. I used glamours every morning before everyone was awake to see this-"he drew back his sleeves to show all of the scars that he had on his arms "-and tried to be as normal, and as happy as I could be. Sure, I had my moody moments, but they just wrote it off as mourning. I was sad because Sirius had died. Okay. Sure, great excuse."

Hermione had her hand over her mouth and was resisting the urge to just fling herself on Harry and hug him until his eyeballs popped out. He had been carrying so much on his shoulders... look at his arms! She had been so stupid! Not paying any attention to what he had been doing... this was all her fault. She was being a horrible friend. But she didn't know! How was she supposed to know when he had been so good at hiding it?

"When I got back to school and saw you and everyone else, I was okay for a while. But then... then you left. Without an explanation. I was screwed over. What was I supposed to do? I held out for a long time, though. That night I talked to you on the phone... it was that same night that I did... it... again for the first time since I had left the Dursleys. I had gone to bed, and I had this horrible dream." He closed his eyes, remembering. "Let's just say, well, everyone died. I killed them. You, Ron, Sirius, everyone. It was me. I pointed my wand at them and said 'Avada Kedavra.' I woke up in a sweat and finally I couldn't take it anymore. I did it. I had sworn that I wouldn't again, but I did. And Ron didn't even notice that I never came outside anymore, and barely moved. He's with Luna now, you know," Harry added offhandedly. "That's why he was gone all the time. Spending time with her, instead. Which is understandable, I guess. She is his girlfriend and all.'

"Well, that pretty much sums it all up. Except... earlier today, when you walked in on me. I had pretty much decided that my life was screwed. Nothing was going right, and I was hurting everyone that I loved. So I decided I wanted to kill myself," he said, his voice cracking. "Being the selfish person that I am, I didn't think of how anybody else would feel about that. Of course not. It was me, me, me." Harry leaned over and put his head in his hands.

Hermione moved next to him and enveloped him in a hug, much like the one they had shared that first night back at Hogwarts, and stayed there until he couldn't cry anymore.

Hermione was crying, the tears flowing freely down her cheeks, and sniffling. She wiped her nose on her sleeve, and leaned over the railing to take a look at the Hogwarts grounds. Someone put a hand on her shoulder, and she jumped, almost falling over. She probably would have, had the hands not caught her and brought her back.

She turned around and saw Harry smiling at her. It wasn't a genuine smile, but it was a try. "Did I scare you?" he asked solemnly.

"Yes... well... perhaps a bit. I didn't know that anybody else knew about this place besides me."

"I knew that," he said, smiling. "I knew you came up here, but I never bothered you. I figured you came up here to de-stress. It really is very peaceful up here," he sighed. "Look, there's something else I forgot to tell you. I... there was a bigger reason for me wanting to... to... kill myself. Dumbledore just came to me earlier today and informed me that Voldemort was out to get me. That he was coming very soon. You remember how the Sorting Hat was missing earlier in the year?" Hermione nodded. "Well, it turns out that it was found in the house of Lucius Malfoy... and it's spitting truths to anyone who wants to know them. Dumbledore thinks that they used the Sorting Hat to get into people's heads... and to give them information about people's heads that it had already been in. Namely me."

"Oh, Harry," she said, and started to sob. "I've missed you... God only knows what might have happened if I hadn't come in time..."

"I know, Hermione. I know."

«.:.:.:.»

Author's Note: OMGZZZ!!!!!13048531 I'm writing this at 10:00 at night on Friday because I've been procrastinating. I'm such a horrible person. XD So, Opal, hope this cleared things up for you. I honestly hadn't considered that before. There's me, being daft. Anyways, I'm going to end this thing pretty soon. I'm running out of ideas for it- okay, I lied, there's a sequel after Harry vanquishes Voldy. Whoops, I didn't say that. But anyways, yeah, I'm gonna finish it soon and it's going to pick up after graduation.