Disclaimer: I'm not JK Rowling. (Wink, wink). Definitely not. (Nudge, nudge). Seriously, though. I own nothing.
Happy birthday to you,
Happy birthday to you.
Happy birthday dear Hermione,
Happy birthday to you!
The restaurant laughed as someone (Hermione, they supposed) blushed furiously while two identical redheads continued singing, having decided to serenade her with a special birthday song that was sung to the tune of a very slow funeral march. A young woman with red hair the same fiery shade as the twins began throwing pieces of bread at them, apparently irritated, but the small smile on her face betrayed her amusement. When the two young men finished their song, every table burst into an appreciative round of applause, chuckling even more as they stood up and bowed.
Groaning, the pretty brunette pulled the one nearest her back to his seat and indicated with a sweep of her hand that the other should do the same. With a twinkle in his eye he obliged, yet as soon as he sat down the other shot back up, grabbing Hermione's arm and pulling her to her feet.
"Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you Hermione Granger!" He ducked a blow coming from the brunette.
"Fred Weasley, I am going to kill you," she muttered. He merely winked.
The cheers eventually died out and Hermione was able to force a loudly protesting Fred back into his seat. The table burst into laughter as she sat down with a sigh. Hermione glared at them. Another redhead, noticing this, wiped the tears from his eyes and placed his hand on top of hers.
"Come on, Mione. It was funny," he said. She stared stonily back at him. Shaking his head, he decided to attempt conversation with someone less prone to annoyance.
Unwilling to join his sister's conversation with her boyfriend, a Healer, who was prattling on about a new cure for spattergroit, and avoiding the twins' eyes for fear he might laugh again, Ron was left to stare blankly at his plate and wonder how long it would take the food to come. He was starving. Really, he could have eaten a hippogriff. His reflections about how hippogriff might taste were interrupted when he felt a squeeze on his hand. Looking up, he saw himself staring into the dancing eyes of his girlfriend.
"A regular Loony Lovegood, isn't he?" she asked, inclining her head towards Ginny's boyfriend who was trying to explain to Ginny what, precisely, spattergroit was. Ron smiled as Luna, who was sitting on the other side of Richard began arguing with him about how best to treat spattergroit. Ginny looked as if she was trying very hard not to role her eyes. He looked back at Hermione and scrunched his nose.
"A Galleon says he's not really a Healer."
Hermione laughed. "Better than the last one though," she remarked grimly. They shook their heads in silence for a moment as they remembered Willy, a self-proclaimed "Ministry man," who had turned out to be an alcoholic Ginny had picked up at a pub, and whose experience with the Ministry ended at getting fined for breeding dragons in his back yard.
"True," Ron replied. After all, anyone was better than Willy. He grinned suddenly. "Remember when I had spattergroit?"
Hermione frowned for a moment, trying desperately to remember when her boyfriend had contracted spattergroit. Remembering that there was no such thing as spattergroit, she opened her mouth to argue when suddenly an image of a portrait shouting at Ron and an irate Ron shouting back flew into her mind. Her face cleared into a dazzling smile.
Noticing this, Ron continued. "He was a nutter, that one." His face darkened as he mumbled, "Naked, indeed."
Hermione burst into a fit of giggles. Ron's ears went red.
Beaming up at him, she spoke. "Harry and I were in stitches," she exclaimed. It took a moment for her to realize what she had said. Ron's face had darkened again. They sat awkwardly for a minute before Hermione timidly spoke.
"I wish he were here, Ron." At her words Ron looked up into her shining eyes. Trying to push images of his best friend out of his mind, Ron stroked her cheek, doing his best to comfort her.
They had never really recovered when Harry left. Ron's jaw tightened thinking about it. He remembered vividly the wild celebrations as everyone heard that Voldemort had been truly defeated. Everyone went mad. One day they had been fearing the Voldemort would never be vanquished, the next rumors were spreading like wildfire that Harry Potter, The-Boy-Who-Lived, had fought and defeated the most powerful wizard the world had ever seen.
'Not everyone was so happy, though,' Ron thought. Over the next few days Harry spoke to no one and had a dead expression on his face. Ron would have been more than willing to share Harry's burden with him, whatever it was, but Harry isolated himself from everyone.
One day, not a week after he had defeated Voldemort, Harry disappeared. Everyone had been convinced at first that he was abducted by remaining Death Eaters who wanted revenge, but that theory was quashed when they found a note that Harry had left. Ron had the words memorized.
I've gone and I won't be coming back. Please don't waste your efforts searching for me, as I have taken steps to insure that you can't find me. I could never explain in a note why I must leave, nor would I attempt it, as I believe you are better off not knowing. Just remember that I would never leave any of you without good reason.
That was all. Four sentences on a crumpled piece of parchment was all that the world had heard from Harry Potter.
Disregarding the note's instructions, a search party had been organized immediately, just in case it was a kidnapping. All their efforts had been fruitless, however, just as the note had said they would be.
No one knew why Harry had left, and all had taken it badly. Ron had locked himself in his room and refused to come out. Hermione didn't stop crying for days. The twins were very fervent in their searching. The spoke to no one and devoted all their efforts to finding him. Ginny stomped around throwing and smashing things whenever she could. She snapped at people who spoke to her, and could be heard yelling from her room in the middle of the night.
Ron thought that Ginny had taken it the worst. She had been in love with him even though he had told her that he couldn't endanger her by having a relationship with her. Ginny had probably thought that Harry would go back to her when Voldemort was defeated. His departure had deeply grieved her, and Ginny defended herself the only way she knew how. She became very, very angry.
Her feelings still manifested themselves seven years later. She jumped from boyfriend to boyfriend, unable to love any because she still loved Harry. She had never quite given up hope that he would one day come back. Everyone else unanimously agreed that she would be destined to disappointment.
Ron was pulled roughly back into the present by the presentation of a large play of food under his nose. Greedily grabbing his fork and knife, he exchanged a sad glance with Hermione. Resolving to keep the tone light for her birthday, Ron began conversing with the others about happier things, and Hermione was only too happy to jump in.
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The man sat on a rough wooden chair and gazed out his window. His eyes found a lawn ornament across the street that bore striking resemblance to a garden gnome. His lips curved upward as memories flooded his mind.
He saw himself, much younger, carefully picking a gnome up. The twelve-year-old Harry began walking towards a wall where he was going to set the ugly thing down. He saw the gnome take advantage of the fact that Harry was not a Weasley who would compete to see if he could throw gnomes the furthest and bite his twelve-year-old self. He remembered the pain of the gnome's sharp teeth as they tore into his skin. He saw himself spinning wildly, trying his hardest to get it off. Harry remembered the relief he felt when the gnome went flying, and he recalled that he barely heard the Weasley twins' cries of admiration as the gnome went soaring over the fence and landed a good fifty feet away.
Harry still remembered that summer vividly. He remembered Molly Weasley fussing over him as if he were her favorite son. His eyes closed as he realized that Molly Weasley would treat him with nothing but contempt if she met him now. He knew that if he saw her again all she would be able to think about would be the fact that he was responsible for the deaths of her husband and two of her sons. Tears started running down his cheeks as horrible images of death flashed through his head.
His eyes shot open as he registered a loud sound that indicated one of his windows had been broken. He stood up slowly.
'No,' he thought to himself. 'I won't think of that anymore.'
Harry Potter promised himself this every day. And every day he was once more besieged by memories of a life he had left long ago.