Home, just get home. These were the thoughts coursing through Hermione Granger's mind. She had always loved work but today something seemed tedious about shelving book after book. Yes, the stereotype had finally come to pass, she was a librarian just like everyone had suspected. After Harry and Voldemort had both been killed on graduation night, she had immersed herself in work. The Order of the Phoenix had been disbanded quickly after that night, having no cause to bring everyone together with Voldemort gone. Grief had torn apart her friendship with Ron, each not being able to see the other without memories of their departed friend bombarding their minds. What she wouldn't give for just one more day, even one more hour, with her lost friends. Even losing her eyebrows in a game of Exploding Snap would have been better than the loneliness that consumed her.

Her keys clicked, and Tama came to greet her, barking and wagging her tail. The Siberian husky she had bought her first winter in the new home had been her only companion for the past three years. Hermione dropped her key chain into the dish near the door and walked down the hallway into the kitchen. She put the kettle on, and pushed the blinking light on her answering machine. She was met with the familiar voice of her best friend Susan. She could barely make out Susan's voice above the racket of the pub in the background.

"Hermione, you need to get out more! All you ever do is make tea and read." At this Hermione looked down to her freshly brewed cup of Earl Grey and had to laugh, Susan knew her too well. "Occasionally you will spice things up and watch a movie, but let's face it, you're only 20 and even more boring then my 85 year old grandmother. Come down to the pub, have a drink, pick up a guy. There's a cute blonde here who seems a little lonely. You know that if you don't come here that I will just have to show up in a drunken stupor and trash the place, so your best bet would be to get your ass down here ASAP! Cheers!" click

Hermione laughed despite the fat that she didn't really feel like bar hopping tonight. She knew that Susan would keep her word however, so for the sake of her furniture, she went upstairs and began to sift through her clothes, trying to find something that didn't scream "Old lady!" or worse, "I'm a librarian!" She finally settled on an olive skirt that went to the knees and an old Rolling Stones tee shirt. It didn't quite match but she thought that it gave it a certain charm. Once her outfit problem was sorted, there were still the questionable areas of hair and makeup. Both were not her fortes, so she put on some mascara and lip-gloss and left it that. She pulled out the rubber band from her bun and left her hair the way it fell. The look for tonight was, "I could care less, and I am only doing this for my couch," but Hermione wore it well. She bent down and quickly said good-bye to Tama. She grabbed her keys and headed off towards the pub.

The smoke in the bar made her cough, and she thought about how long it would take to get the smell out of her clothing. Susan was right, she thought, I really am an old lady. Pretty soon she was going to own 22 cats and talk to her plants. God, she already had plants! The cycle was already beginning!

"Hey you!" Susan said as she handed her friend a pint of beer. "I thought I would bully you into coming by saying I would trash your flat. God forbid I touch your IKEA furnished abode."

Hermione took a long sip of her beer and looked around the pub. The prospects were low, but she found a few cute ones.

"It's West Elm, not IKEA," Hermione corrected Susan.

"You ARE and old woman," her friend mumbled. Hermione didn't hear her though because across the pub, she had caught a glimpse of a blond haired man who made her breath catch in her throat. She couldn't see his face, but her had a well-toned body that would only have come from lots of athletics and wavy hair that reached his shoulders. He reminded her of someone, but she couldn't remember whom. Just then, a pair of hands clasped her from behind.

"Hey Drew," she said not turning around. "I should have known you would be lurking somewhere." Andrew was a friend of Susan who had been recently introduced to her in the hopes of having sparks fly between the two. Drew might have seen fireworks, but hers seemed to have been drenched since she only got the creepy vibe from him.

"You wound me with your words, mistress," Drew replied, feigning a blow to the heart. It was all and act since a minute later her was hitting on some blonde woman farther down the bar.

"He does bounce back quickly, doesn't he?" Hermione asked.

"He never was much deeper than a kiddy pool," Susan replied.

"It's nice to know how you think of me since you tried to set me up with that shallow fool not too long ago. Couldn't you have just put a hit on me? At that would have had some dignity." Hermione said. She was still glancing at the blonde stranger every so often to make sure he was still there, and was vaguely aware that Susan had launched into her story of the day.

"…………and then giant dolphins ate everyone after catching them in huge tune nets. Earth to Hermione!" Susan cried to her spaced out friend. "If you want to talk to him so badly, just do so."

"How did you know I was checking him out?" She asked.

"You mean besides the fact that you have been drooling over him for the past 10 minutes and making no effort to hide it, I could tell he was your type from the minute I stepped into the bar and saw him." Susan explained. "Tall, athletic, handsome. Not dark, that's one strike against him, but with an ass like that who would care if he's a little bit albino?"

Hermione uttered a shocked, "Susan!" but couldn't' help but laugh. As if hearing their conversation, the blonde man bent down to pick up the chalk and winked at Hermione. She blushed and quickly looked away, embarrassed that she had been caught starring. He must have seen through her clothing and gotten a glimpse of her inner cat loving, plant talking self, and decided to tempt her with something she would never get from a whiskered friend named Crookshanks the Second. Damn him, damn him to hell. Hermione took another big sip from her beer, the nectar of the gods, but she decided that she needed something a little stronger to take away the pain of today. It was the anniversary of Harry's death, which explained why no matter how hard the concentrated, thoughts of Harry kept circling in her mind. It was hard to comprehend that it had been three years since she had last seen him, hugged him. She closed her eyes and tried to wash the memories of the three of them on the lawn laughing or studying in the library trying to pass their OWLS.

"Give me a bit of my friend Jack," she told the bar tender, already having a bit of a slur. Lightweight was underestimating the amount of liquor it took to get Hermione drunk. She took the shot, and downed it with a sour expression on her face.

"Another please," she asked. With seven shots down the hole, on top of the beer she had as a warm up, the pleasant buzz was making everything in her mind slow and fuzzy. She knew she was even Drew was looking attractive; never a sober thought she told herself. The blonde was still at the pool table, but for some reason didn't' seem to be playing any more. He was arguing with a player next to him, and it seemed to Hermione that it soon would be taken "outside". God, the corny jokes; yet another peachy side affect of the buzz in her mind. She would take the bad sense of humor over the loneliness however. It was then Hermione became aware that she no longer saw Susan anywhere in the pub. She stumbled around to where Drew was flirting with the same blonde bimbo from earlier. "Drew, have hav ha h hav wow! Have you seen Susan?" She finally spat out. Never in he life had she ever found the word "have" to be quite as hard to pronounce.

Drew laughed, but told her that he hadn't seen Susan since she had left with some red headed guy. Hermione was starting to get angry. Wasn't the entire reason she came here so that she would avoid getting her home trashed by her drunken friend, when instead she got trashed herself? Susan had just up and left her there on her own, knowing full well that she couldn't take her liquor, and now she was going to have to do the most loathsome thing on earth, ask for a ride home from Drew. No doubt her would think of it as a secret message to get him into bed, not that she ever wanted to get that whale into bed, but he would see it that way none the less. She had all but taken the breath to utter the gut wrenching words when she suddenly had the feeling that she was going to be sick.

Hermione bolted towards the bathroom at top speed and was just in time to see this morning's lunch and breakfast come back up to say hello. After spending several heart to heart moments with that oh so cuddly porcelain masterpiece, she felt like she would be all right to get outside. Screw Drew, hey that rhymes, she could get home on her won, hell she only lived about one block away. The cool air on her head felt nice, and helped to calm her and sober her up. She stumbled down the street, thanking the gods that she hadn't worn heels to the pub tonight. One false step however and she was flat on her face.

"Looks like you got quite the skid mark my friend," a voice commented from behind her. "If I didn't know any better I would say that you are completely tanked."

Hermione didn't have the strength nor the time to share witty banter with this new hooligan, god even drunk she was 80, so instead she pushed herself to her feet. Blood was slowly streaming into one of her eyes, so she couldn't see the stranger very clearly, but she would be damned if she was going to ruin this shirt by getting blood on it. All she knew was that he was wearing something either blue, yellow, green or…..any other color known to man.

"Can you just leave me alone? I'm sure there are many women that find it attractive having a man make fun of them while their own blood is partially blinding them, but sadly I am not one of them." Hermione said.

"Don't you think that you might need some help getting home? I mean unless you are trying to con the insurance company into giving you free plastic surgery by ruining your face on the asphalt, I thought you might want some help."

"You think you are so funny, don't you creep? Well," Hermione looked frantically around he small bag to find something to keep the strange man at bay. So far she had nothing threatening but a lip-gloss and a tampon. She was guessing that the lip-gloss would go farther, so she took it and chucked at the man's head.

"Are you seriously trying to ward me off with a lip gloss?" He laughed, easily catching the clear glass vial, and reading the label. "Juicy Tubes, well I think you are going to have to throw it a little harder, and be a little bit more sober if you mean to injure me."

Shit, she thought. She had no more weapons, and she had lost her favorite lip-gloss too. Damn, why must I be spited so?

"Why do you want to help me so badly?" She asked, finally deciding to sacrifice her shirt to wipe the blood from her eye. When she finally looked back at the man, she noticed it was the blonde man from the pub.

"Well, something about you starring at my ass for about 20 minutes, kind of led to believe you wanted to talk. Sorry if I got the wrong impression," he smirked. "So when you stumbled out before I had time to introduce myself, I thought I might be able to catch you before you got to far away. Little did I know I would find you bleeding on the ground only 20 feet from the door."

"I think I can get back on my own, thank you," Hermione replied stiffly. "But thank you for trying to help me, despite the reasoning for doing so was delusional." She turned around and started to walk home again once more. She couldn't' help thinking though, Susan is going to pay for this.

Well, what do you all think of my new story? I have another chapter that will be out within a few days. This is a little easier at the moment to write than the Lily/James one, since it is a little freer to write with. Something about only having Hogwarts to write at can sometimes get a little constricting. Anyway, I'm thinking that I need at least 5-10 reviews before I put up the next chapter. Hopefully you won't have to wait long, so review and it will come quicker. elyse