Godric's Hollow
RonI can't bear to sit down, as Hermione is; I know that if I try to be still, I will explode, I will yell, and I will be more angry, more hurt, than I already am. That's what I expected from Harry, a few months ago, after Dumbledore died. I expected him to sulk, to rage, just like he did after Sirius's death. Somewhere along the line, though, he changed.
He didn't tell us much about finding that fake Horcrux, I realize now, as I stare at his silhouette, outlined against the rage of color on a horizon that has just swallowed the sun. The outlines, the basics, yes, but he didn't tell us everything; I can tell. He's become so quiet, so withdrawn; my jokes can't reach him, not anymore. Hermione can't help him, either. He won't rest, she says, until he's killed Voldemort. It would help, I think sardonically, if the man was mortal.
That is what we're helping him for, Hermione's brisk voice says in my mind, the one that's all businesslike even though I know that she's hurting, perhaps more deeply than I am. Most definitely deeper than I am. Goddamn it, but that bookworm can hurt, even though she thinks that no one ever sees. She can't hide anything from me, even though she thinks she can, even though she thinks that I'm an insensitive wart.
The bark of the tree is rough against my back through my cloak, and I grimace as I realize that I am possibly going to be sleeping on much rougher ground than this in the year to come. Suddenly I hope, viciously, that Voldemort will feel all of our pain when he dies, that Voldemort will have to go through every agony that every person he's ever tortured or that his followers have ever tortured has felt. I hope, even more viciously, that Voldemort will feel every terrible pain that he has inflicted on my best friends, and on Harry.
I know, though, that Voldemort can never feel that pain, for he is no longer man, and only man can feel the extent of hurt that we have all been through.
"May he then always know pain in his most terrible Hell," I whisper viciously, shifting slightly against the tree so that I can turn to look at Hermione again, knowing that she is thinking of a million things and that she is hurting. My heart goes out to her, and I want nothing more than to help her through it, to help her heal and cope. However I can help, I wish to. I've never really felt that before except for with her. No matter how many rows we've gotten into, no matter how many rocky times our friendship has seen, I have always wanted to help her forever, and only her. That was what I never felt with Lavender; we had the snogging part down pat, but I could never feel for her the way I feel for Hermione.
I hear a barely audible sniff, almost carried away on the wind, and my heart throbs. Finally, I know, my moment has come to help her. With a last glance at my best friend, his head now bowed and his whisper of, "Dumbledore…" carrying toward me on the wind, I turn away from the tree I've been resting on and softly approach Hermione, who is now crying freely, her tears dancing in the moonlight over the leaves of autumn.
I sit down next to her, but she doesn't look up, only curling into herself, her arms around her legs and her forehead against her knees, her small frame shaking with soft sobs. She probably doesn't even know I'm there, not with the blinding pain that I know is drenching her. Finally, I reach out and touch her shoulder, but my hand doesn't stop there; I let it creep along until my arm is wrapped firmly around her, and I pull her against me. Although she is still sobbing, her body relaxes, and she buries her face in my shoulder as I wrap my other arm around her, stroking her hair. I feel her arms around me, too, and I feel tears of my own slipping down my face and into her tangle of hair, blown gently by a cool, indifferent autumn wind.
No word passes between us, but as we cry in one another's arms, I feel warmth light in my soul once again at long last, and finally I can whisper the words that I have been longing to say for years now: "I love you, Hermione."
The smile on her weakened-with-pain features is enough to sustain me for eternity when she tips her face up towards mine and says through her tears, "I love you too, Ron."