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"Ron! what are you doing?" Ron was still tightly gripping Hermione's arm after they both appeared in her kitchen.
"It think it's my turn for a question. Where the hell are we and why the hell are you Hermione all of a sudden?" He continued gripping her arm, wanting to keep her in the room as she struggled to release herself and run.
"Ron, please! Just...just...leave! You not even supposed to be here. You not supposed to see me like this!" Hermione was on the verge of tears. And she continued to struggle, but Ron spin her around so she was facing him and gripped both of her upper arms. She could not help but look him in the eyes- his eyes which were staring directly into hers. Struck by how sad and tired they looked, she stopped her struggling. Tears persisted with their exit from her tear ducts, and her vision became blurred. Unable to stand the pain she saw in his face, pain she caused, she had to look away.
"Do you know how long I've been wanting to see you? How long we all have? We didn't know if you were alive or dead or had amnesia..." Ron began an angry and frustrated rant with Hermione abruptly cut off.
"Well I'm fine. See, here I am, in my own house, happy, healthy, fine. So you don't have to worry anymore. You can go back to Harry and your family and tell them that you saw me, and spoke with me and that I'm perfectly happy, and that everyone should stop looking for me."
"Somehow I don't think it's that easy. What happened back at my house? Why were you 'Julie' one minute and Hermione the next?" He spat the name Julie in disgust.
Hermione sighed. She would have to tell him. Even if she wanted to just apparate somewhere else she could only stay away so long. She would need to come back at some point, and knowing Ron's stubbornness he would proably still be right there in the kitchen waiting for her.
"Fine. I'll tell you everything. Just let go of me," she tried to wrench herself from his arms, but he kept his grip. "I'm not gonna run away, Ron. Let go." She was angry now. He had discovered her. No one was supposed to have discovered her, and now she had no choice but to tell him everything. After what seemed like ten minutes of a stare off between the two, though actually it was only a few seconds, Ron let her go. Hermione sat herself at the kitchen table and looked from Ron to the chair across from her expectantly. "Well? Are you going to sit any time soon?" She did not care that she was being a bitch even though deep down she knew he did not deserve it. It would be easier to stay mad at him if he was mad at her. And she wanted to stay mad, she wanted to get him to leave her alone and never come back.
Ron stood a moment longer, consciously defying her, letting her know that she could not control him, before he sat in the chair.
"So, what do you want to know?"
"Merlin!" Ron cried out, exasperated, "You know damn well what I want to know, Hermione."
"Humor me, Ron," her voice was dripping with hatred, though it was more toward herself than him.
"Fine. We'll play it your way. Let's see. To start off with, where the hell are we? Why the hell did you pretend to be someone else? Why the hell did you look like someone else? Why were you going to leave with out telling anyone who you really were? You did you leave in the first place?" With every question Ron's face became a brighter shade of red as it seemed his blood was about to boil over. Hermione's calm and poised demeanor at the opposite end of the table did not help his temper any either. She simply sat there, hands folded together in front of him, spine in a straight line. He finished his questions breathing heavily, obviously overcome with emotion- anger mostly, but also a few other emotions Hermoine could not quite place.
"Okay. Well, to answer your first question, we are in Juliet, Iowa- we're in the States. This is where I live now, and where I have lived for five years. Obviously, this is my house. When I disappeared, I wanted to make sure I would not be found, so I figured I'd choose a place that wasn't even on a map. A little farming town of less than 100 people and 3 hours away from the closest metropolis. That's how I ended up here." Ron opened his mouth, but never got a word out as Hermione held up a hand signaling him to stop. "There will be time for you to talk later. You asked me a question, quite a few actually, and now you have to let me answer." She looked at Ron, waiting for an objection, but he merely folded his arms, slouched back in his chair, and waited for her to continue. She continued, "So I changed how I looked, to make sure that no one would ever recognize me, as well as my name," at that Ron grunted, but Hermione ignored him and continued, "and I cut off all ties with the magical world- well, except for getting the Daily Prophet, but I needed it to keep up with what's going on. Two days ago was the first time in nearly 5 years I used magic."
"I used it to apparate to Hogwarts so I could attend Professor Dumbledore's funeral. I knew I owed it to him. He had been to good a friend and role-model to not go. So I made it through the whole thing with no one recognizing me until I was just about to leave, and someone taps me on the shoulder and says, 'Hermione?', and I think, 'shit' and turn around to see Ginny."
"Ginny knew who you were the whole time?" Ron spattered in disbelief.
"Ron, really. You're going to have to stop these outbursts or I'm gonna stop talking to you."
"Ginny knew?" He asked again.
Hermione sighed and rolled her eyes, still playing the 'this-is-the-most-obvious-thing-in-the-world' game, "Yes, Ron. Ginny knew. Now can I continue?" She didn't wait for a response, "Thank you. Now, where was I?" she paused for a moment pretending to think, pretending that telling him all this was eating her alive from the inside. "Oh, right- Ginny. So Ginny comes up to me and she completely realizes it's me , and so I drag her off to tell her that she must forget that she saw me and never mention it to anyone, but you know Ginny. She simply refused. I told her that she didn't understand, that no one could understand unless they had been where we had been that night, but she just would not give up. Then your mother came over and she thankfully did not recognized me- she didn't have her glasses on- and Ginny introduced me as her friend Julie from the states, and then she invited me for dinner, and you know your mother, almost as stubborn as Gin, she wouldn't take no for an answer. And once I got to your house I was getting especially nervous because I was sure that you and Harry would recognize me, so I did a little detective work in the Twin's room, and I found a bottle of Ivan's Identity Ilixer. I could have 4 people see me differently that what I really am for 24 hours. So naturally, I chose you, Harry, and your parent. Well, everything went off without a hitch, until Ginny stole my purse and left it at the house, forcing me to come back to get it. She didn't know about the Ilixer, and assumed the more time I spent with you, you would be able to realize who I was. And I suppose she was sort of right, since tonight the time limit ran out, and here we are in my kitchen." Ron sat in disbelief, but Hermione took it upon herself to assume that his silence meant satisfaction, and hoped she could trick him into leaving. Standing up and pushing in her chair, she began, "Well, now that you've got your answers, if you could just leave and-"
"Why?"
Maybe it wouldn't be that easy. Pretending to be confused, Hermione responded, "Why?"
"Why did you leave?" His voice broke halfway through speaking, and Hermione, though she could not bring herself to look at him, was almost certain there were tears forming in his eyes.
Stay strong, Hermione. "I guess I just got tired of the wizarding world," she replied, shrugging and continuing to play it cool.
"You're a terrible liar."
"I'm not-"
"I think I deserve the truth. Don't you?"
She nodded, and pulled out her chair, taking her seat once again. But this time she did not have the cool demeanor. She was visibly scared. He did deserve the truth. He had been too good a friend for too long. She knew that she had to be honest, as much as she'd like to continue lying.
Swallowing hard, she looked up. This time her barriers were down, and her eyes were glazed over with tears; her eyes burned by the saltiness. "I couldn't live a lie, Ron."
At that comment, Ron could not help but let out an indignant guffaw of disbelief. "Couldn't live a lie? What are you doing here?" The anger was rising again.
"I'm talking about lying to millions of people who think we're their saviors when we all know that we aren't!"
"I'm not lying to anyone, Hermione!"
"Yes, you are! And apparently you're also lying to yourself!"
"And what exactly am I lying about? And why don't I know about it? Huh?" The tension between the two was at it's breaking point.
"HE'S NOT DEAD RON!" and with that last comment, Hermione could no longer keep her tears from falling, and she broke into small controlled sobs. Putting her hands over her face in exasperation. The two stayed silent for a long time. Ron, who was still uncomfortable around crying woman, was also enraged by what her last comment implied. Every few seconds Hermione would sniffle and draw in a ragged breath. Ron stayed silent.
After awhile, Ron realized someone needed to speak or they would be there forever. "Uh...Hermione, he is dead. I don't know where you would have gotten the idea he wasn't. Maybe you black out for a little while and no one reali-"
"I didn't black out, Ron." Her voice was quiet and strained from crying, but strong and confident none the less.
"Well, the I don't know why you would think he wasn't dead when everyone knows-"
"There was no body," she said, quite rationally- simply stating a fact.
Ron mouthed wordlessly for a moment before he got his wits about him and spoke. "Well, of course there was no body. He was a spirit, not an actual being. We couldn't find a body if there was no body in the first place!" Ron was beginning to get upset again, but Hermione would not- or perhaps it was could not- take the bait.
"He was a spirit all the other times Harry fought him because he was building up strength. We all knew that the final showdown would be against him as a human. And if he was human there should have been a body."
"We didn't know for sure he'd be human. We just- no, actually you just assumed it would be and we went along with it since you normally we right about things like that. But you're not infallible, Hermione. You could have been- no were, wrong. He's dead."
"Ron. Listen to yourself. You're contradicting yourself left and right. The only way we could have killed him would be if he was human. You can't kill a spirit. So either he was human and we failed to kill him, or he was a spirit and we didn't kill him, because we couldn't. No matter which happened he's still not dead, yet you and Harry continued to lead millions of people into a false sense of security! And I couldn't be a part of that! I couldn't have that on my conscience!" She had started crying, once again upset.
Ron didn't have time or patience to give her sympathy, and even though it broke his heart to see her so upset, he was still upset at her. "Then what happened to him? Why hasn't he or his goons been causing trouble or even been seen since?"
"We may not have killed him, but we drained him pretty bad. He's probably needed a lot of time to recuperate, so he's lying low. He'll want the next attack to be a surprise, therefore, no activity beforehand by anyone associated with him. Let people let down their guards. Let the ministry become a bit lax on their Auror and police training. It all makes it easy for world domination to occur easier the next time. You played right into his hands- letting everyone think there was no more threats. It'll be so easy now. It was the best thing that could have happened to him."
Ron breathed heavily. "So if your right, and I'm not saying you are, but if you were, and you were so sure that you were, you decide to handle it by leaving the country and allowing everyone to fend for themselves?"
Hermione's was quiet and dejected when she answered, "What could I do? Everyone was so happy, and I tried mentioning something to Harry and he brushed it aside. I knew you would both react exactly like you just did. And I couldn't very well go out and make a mockery of both of you by telling everyone you were lying. I'd be made a fool out of. The black cloud in a world of blue sky." Ron was not looking at her, and biting the inside of his lip the way he often did when he was deep in thought. "Ron, you know I'm right. You and Harry aren't stupid. You had to have realized that something was wrong after we escaped. I understand why you didn't want to admit it at the time- not with everything going to so well- but can you honestly tell me now that you didn't?"
Ron's voice was just as quiet as hers when he responded. "I thought you made a mistake in thinking he would be human. I wanted you to have made a mistake. Merlin, we'd been fighting for 7 years. I wanted so bad for it to be over. Just to be normal. Have a normal life after all the years of abnormality. To be able to live without fear."
"And I didn't? Ron, we had to grow up so fast. I would have loved for everything to slow down. To...finish the things we started," she ventured, meaningfully looking at him. "But I couldn't lie about it because I would still know that it wasn't over. Not really. Not forever."
"We were so worried, Harry and I. Everyone else too, of course, but especially Harry and I. We didn't understand why you left- or if you left for that matter, or if you had been kidnapped or something. Thought maybe you had...died."
"I didn't know what else to do. It was scary for me as well. I'm used having all the answers, thinking levelheadedly, and yet for the life of me I could not think of a suitable way out. So I just left."
Sighing heavily and shaking his head, Ron said, "So, your back and Voldermort is still alive. What do we do now?"
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A/N: Yay! this will be up today just like I promised! Hope you enjoyed it. I'm not sure when the next chapter will be up. Please review!