Again, I know it's been forever, but I had hit a bit of writer's block. I
began to write up this chapter and realized that I had no idea where I
wanted it to go. So, I had to take the time to write it all out, pretty
much to see what exactly I wanted to happen and when I wanted it to happen.
I know that's a bad excuse, but it is true. I took all that time so that
now my updates should be more frequent. So, here is the next installment
of An Act of Desperation. Enjoy!
Disclaimer: It still all belongs to J.K. Rowlings, of course. What did you expect?
Chapter 9: A Meeting and a Cause
Hermione settled herself in the room she figured she was to share with Evie, sitting cross-legged on the rather squishy couch with her fingers absently toying with a bit of fringe on a long outdated throw pillow. She wondered how the Order could be so happy, even so soon after a rather devastating blow. Of course, she knew that it seemed a bit egotistical to presume that Ron was worth so much to the Order, but she also knew that he had been on friendly terms with all of the people in there, whether or not he knew them well. She had figured that they'd be a bit more on the grim side, as the professors and remaining Weasleys had been. And yet, it did her heart some good to see people who were willing to be happy, even in the face of such pain and sadness. The thoughts, all similar, flashed through her head quickly, not staying long enough to be analyzed nor having too much for her to truly worry about.
But there was one thought that kept her most occupied. She had kissed Remus Lupin. Of course, he was her husband, so it was perfectly all right, but the point was that she had kissed him and her late husband wasn't even dead a week. Her fingers continued to fiddle with the frayed bits of avocado green yarn on the pillow beside her. And as she fretted, without really realizing it, snatches of yarn ripped and were shredded by her nervous fingers, a habit she'd picked up in school when she had nothing to do and a stray bit of parchment.
She sighed and dutifully scooped up the small pile and emptied her hands into a nearby rubbish bin. The act triggered some strange fleeting memory and, before she knew it, she found herself tearing up and sniffling. She wanted to stop crying, but the tears were deaf to her wishes. Then, just as suddenly as the tears started, they were replaced by anger; anger at being so weak, anger at the stupid bits of yarn reminding her for some unknown reason of Ron, anger at everything that happened to meet her eyes. She felt a strange desire to totally destroy the pillow the yarn had come from and she couldn't rid herself of the odd want until she found her hands gripping the pillow and pulling it apart. Aghast, she flung the pillow from her and left the room quickly.
Once out of the room that belonged to her new stepdaughter, she shut the door and leaned her forehead against it, willing her tears and anger to disappear. Taking deep gulping breaths, she finally began to feel her heart slow and the adrenaline to quit pumping through her body. She pushed back strands of loose curls from her face as she stood straight. And then it sort of hit her, what she had done.
She blushed fiercely; glad no one could see her or what she had done. She'd sat upstairs for nearly a half of an hour, but she had had to fight herself just to stay put and not wander down into the kitchen to see what the meeting was about. Sure, she was often startled out of a day dream by the raucous laughter that erupted from below her, but she couldn't make out anything beyond that. Now, though, after her disastrous attempt to stay put, a bit of an adventure into the meeting seemed just the thing to do. It would be more comforting to be with others, not to mention the fact that if she should even start to think of something less than pleasant, all of the people there would be enough to successfully distract her until the thought had passed.
Her mind finally made up, she quietly made her way to the top of the stairs, only to be scared out of her wits by a loud "Hiya!" coming from the vicinity of her feet. She gave a most girlish squeal and a backwards hop before she realized that it was only Evie. Trying to regain her dignity, Hermione placed her hands on her hips and stared down at the young girl, just short of glaring.
"What do you think you're doing, young lady?" she asked sharply, in no mood to have to put up with any nonsense.
The child looked up at her innocently, or, at least, as innocently as she could possibly look. "I'm just sittin'."
"Sitting, are you?" Hermione asked skeptically. She was on the verge of telling Evie to go play in her room when she distinctly heard the voices of the people in the kitchen talking rather loudly. Then she understood. "Just sitting, eh? Looks to me as if you were eavesdropping on your daddy and his friends."
Evie looked up at Hermione pleadingly, begging with her eyes not to be turned in for her minor indiscretion. And, in her rather soft manner, Hermione smiled gently and lifted the girl to her feet. "Off to your room now, Evie. You go on and play and I'll come up there in a little bit. All right?"
The child nodded eagerly, glad to not be in any trouble, and practically ran to her room. Hermione smiled at the child slowly. So much like her mother. After a minute of absent thought, she stood and carefully made her way down the stairs and into the boisterous kitchen.
Though she'd only been gone a rather long while, perhaps forty minutes, everyone looked as if they had all just arrived. They were still laughing over silly jokes and hadn't even begun to get down to business. Hermione looked around at them all, taking in the smiles and the laughter. It was almost foreign to her ears in some strange way. She searched through the crowd and made out the plump figure of Hannah beside the wirier frame of her husband. She saw the drooped figure of Percy Weasley, and the even more stooped figure of his brother Fred. Then, after what seemed forever, she saw Remus. He was chatting with the green haired wizard and the sickeningly perfect couple that had been very enthusiastic with his story of Hannah and Harry earlier in the evening. Though she stood in the doorway, half in the shadow, he somehow knew she was there and looked up. Their eyes locked from across the room. He quickly excused himself from the conversation and hurried over to her.
"Are you all right? Has something happened?" He asked her fretfully. She almost smiled at his concern.
"No, nothing's happened. I just couldn't stand to be in that room anymore." She tried a shaky, almost apologetic, grin. "Too much time for thought."
He gave her an understanding glance and led her to a bit of bench between Dumbledore and, to her disgust, Professor Snape. He gave her a trademark sneer and opened his mouth for some scathing remark, but she silenced him with a pointed look at the bruised flesh on his face. His eyes grew furious, but he shut his mouth. Hermione smiled sweetly in return.
Just then, she heard the sound of clapping and her head snapped up to see Remus clapping his hands together loudly, trying to get the attention of the Order so that their meeting might finally begin. After a few minutes as everyone settled themselves as comfortably as possible, the meeting began. Remus gestured to Dumbledore as he sat and the Headmaster stood. Not one sound escaped anyone as the most respected personage in all of England began to speak.
"As I am sure all of you know the Death Eater attacks have increased. More and more wizarding AND Muggle homes have been found with the Dark Mark hovering over them. Despite the fact that Voldemort is, to our knowledge, destroyed, his evil remains in the form of a new leader, a man who, if he is not in fact Voldemort himself, looks amazingly the same. Now, many of us have formed our own opinions on the identity of this new Dark wizard, but most suspect that he is none other than our own Lucius Malfoy. In light of his new 'Muggleborn Law,' it has become even more apparent that his prejudices of old are just as strong today as they were before. And our theories seem to finally have ground. I should like to invite anyone with thoughts on this matter to speak now. Perhaps a 'brainstorm' will help us formulate some new ideas that are closer to the actual truth."
The room, quieter than it had ever been, stayed silent for nearly a minute before a mysteriously dusky woman stood to face the Headmaster with cool and deep eyes. "If it is indeed Lucius Malfoy that we must be wary of," she began in a surprisingly deep and husky voice, "then perhaps we should do a bit of sleuthing in the Ministry. As you all know, I serve as one of the Minister's lower assistants, but I'm sure I could do a bit of investigating. As could many of you with Ministry jobs. I may be new to the Order, but I, too, suspect the Minister of some less than pure activities."
An outcry of both agreement and disagreement broke through the eerie silence of the kitchen. Many of the younger members whole heartedly agreed with the woman's thought, while the elder members thought it too risky a chance. If she were found out, the whole Order could be in danger. Hermione, on the other hand, only stared at the woman. This new member gave her, well, to be completely honest, the heebie-jeebies. It wasn't so much her dark beauty or her unnaturally deep voice as it was her eyes. They were too cool, as they she had no emotion at all. Snape could seem somewhat cool, Malfoys could seem very cool, but the only eyes she had ever seen so cool as hers were Voldemort's that one time she'd seen him during that Last Battle. Hermione didn't trust this woman.
During her study of the young Ministry worker, she missed a good part of the conversation. In fact, she missed just about all of it. When she began once again to listen, she heard them forming a plan. A plan to send about five or ten of the Ministry working members of the Order on a bit of a scouting mission to watch the Minister and to keep a close, and I mean VERY close, eye on him. They were planning on sending a sort of spy in to speak with him even! That was too much for Hermione. This plan was too much like the scheme that had taken her husband from her. They'd gone in expecting to ambush, to scout them out before attacking and it had gotten one of them killed. For some reason she couldn't fathom, she felt a sense of dread that the outcome of this mission would be no different from its predecessor.
"No!" she cried, standing straight. All eyes turned to her, wide and disbelieving that the usually quiet and reserved Hermione would be so loud and so against their plan. "You will NOT do this! Please, you will not." Her hands were shaking as the gripped her robes to her side. Both Remus and Harry hurried to her, trying to set her down again, trying to make her be quiet, even if only for a little bit. But they should have remembered that when Hermione Granger had something in her mind, nothing could stop her from saying it. She shook off the two men and stood her ground, though a bit more shakily and wobbly than before.
"Don't you realize what this plan sounds like? Don't you realize what could happen? Don't you realize that people could be lost? I lost my husband to a plan such as this, a plan that shouldn't have gone wrong, a plan that should have only taken an hour to complete. I lost the man I LOVED to a stupid idea that sounds remarkably similar to this one. Will you not take into consideration that people could die? I don't know why I feel this way, it's never struck me like this before, but I feel, no, I KNOW, that someone, if not all of you, will die in this folly. I--I can't allow this to happen. Not while I have breath left in my body."
The room was once again overcome with silence. Every eye was on Hermione and every mouth was open slightly in shock. All except for the Ministry woman. She was looking at Hermione with something akin to respect or maybe something closer to pride. It only furthered Hermione's distrust for her.
A few seconds passed while everyone processed this information, and then the room practically erupted. Everyone began talking at once. Some tried to comfort Hermione, others tried to tell her that victory always had sacrifice, others tried to think of a different plan, others continued to work on the plan they had already begun. The sound and what she was feeling was a bit overwhelming. She sat down shakily, bumping into Remus, Snape, Harry and Dumbledore on her way down.
From there on, the meeting went downhill. No one could speak of anything but what Hermione had said and everything had sort of reached an impasse. Nothing new was brought up and, eventually, Dumbledore simply told everyone that it had been a rather stressful night and that everyone just ought to go home. And they did, in very good time.
Within ten minutes, all save Harry, Hannah, Molly, Remus, and Hermione were gone, much to Hermione's relief. They all sat companionably around the table, trying to pretend that Hermione's little outbreak had never happened, but it wasn't entirely working. Hermione still shook, Hannah looked near to tears, and both Harry and Molly looked desperately pale. Overall, no one except Remus really seemed in any condition to speak.
He turned to Hermione and put an arm comfortingly around her shoulders, but it didn't look as if she noticed. "Hermione," he said, "you have to try to live your life the way it should be lived. Do you understand what I'm telling you?" He didn't wait for a response. "You have to keep being Hermione and not someone overcome with grief." She opened her mouth to speak, but he continued as though he hadn't noticed. "You have to understand that life still goes on and that you're a part of it. And that the people that make up your life have a mission in front of them. A mission to better the lives of all Wizardkind, and that sometimes sacrifices must be made to achieve this goal. It's all part of the risk we take, becoming a member of the Order. We all must understand that we could lose anyone at any given time and that sometimes risks must be taken to further ourselves. And if that risk sometimes ends up costing a life, at least they died doing what was right. Just like Ron did."
Though he had put his thoughts rather eloquently, they didn't have the effect he thought they might. Instead of Hermione smiling at him shakily and telling him that she understood, she was in a rage. She leapt from her chair and stared him down, fury clearly visible in her eyes.
"You expect me to just take that as a good reason for Ron's death? Do you really think that this--this stupid Order justifies his not being here to live with me, with all of us? I--I can't believe you! I thought you, of all people, could understand. I thought that since you lost your wife early in your marriage that you could somehow sympathize with me, understand how I felt! But you're just like the rest of them! I--" She stopped and ran out of the kitchen and up the stairs. Remus, being the ever faithful man he is, followed her. She knew it and stopped in front of the door to Evie's room.
Her breath came in gulping gasps as she turned to face him. She took in the shock on his face as he noticed the tears on hers. "You're just like the rest of those people down there today. They think it some great adventure, some great honor, to die for a cause that will never be fully realized. I thought that maybe you would be different. I thought that you had a mind of your own, one that was separate from the masses. But you're no different. You're just like the rest of them. And there's nothing you can say that will make me feel any better." She turned from him again and reached for the doorknob, but his hand stopped her. He spun her around to face him again.
"I may not be any different, Hermione, but I know how much it hurts to lose someone you love. Nearly everyone down there tonight knows what it feels like. But they're willing to go on trying to make things better. It doesn't matter if the cause is never fully realized. The point is that things change for the better. The point of being part of the Order is that you WANT to make things better. And if I have to die to make things better for my little daughter," he pointed to the door as his voice rose to nearly a shout, "then I will. I will do whatever it takes to make this world worth living in for her. Ron understood that. He understood that he may have to die to make it better for you and children that you may have had. You, on the other hand, still haven't figured that out yet." He let her go harshly, staring into her eyes fiercely.
For a moment, neither of them moved. Then Hermione, faster than he thought she could do, turned, opened the door, stepped in, and promptly slammed the door in his face.
Well, there it is. I hope that it has satisfied all of you, my faithful readers and reviewers. Please review some more to tell me what you think. I always appreciate it.
Oh, and by the way, I saw Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban on Monday, finally, and I thought that it was fantastic. Far better than the first two movies by far. I can't wait for the next one!
Disclaimer: It still all belongs to J.K. Rowlings, of course. What did you expect?
Chapter 9: A Meeting and a Cause
Hermione settled herself in the room she figured she was to share with Evie, sitting cross-legged on the rather squishy couch with her fingers absently toying with a bit of fringe on a long outdated throw pillow. She wondered how the Order could be so happy, even so soon after a rather devastating blow. Of course, she knew that it seemed a bit egotistical to presume that Ron was worth so much to the Order, but she also knew that he had been on friendly terms with all of the people in there, whether or not he knew them well. She had figured that they'd be a bit more on the grim side, as the professors and remaining Weasleys had been. And yet, it did her heart some good to see people who were willing to be happy, even in the face of such pain and sadness. The thoughts, all similar, flashed through her head quickly, not staying long enough to be analyzed nor having too much for her to truly worry about.
But there was one thought that kept her most occupied. She had kissed Remus Lupin. Of course, he was her husband, so it was perfectly all right, but the point was that she had kissed him and her late husband wasn't even dead a week. Her fingers continued to fiddle with the frayed bits of avocado green yarn on the pillow beside her. And as she fretted, without really realizing it, snatches of yarn ripped and were shredded by her nervous fingers, a habit she'd picked up in school when she had nothing to do and a stray bit of parchment.
She sighed and dutifully scooped up the small pile and emptied her hands into a nearby rubbish bin. The act triggered some strange fleeting memory and, before she knew it, she found herself tearing up and sniffling. She wanted to stop crying, but the tears were deaf to her wishes. Then, just as suddenly as the tears started, they were replaced by anger; anger at being so weak, anger at the stupid bits of yarn reminding her for some unknown reason of Ron, anger at everything that happened to meet her eyes. She felt a strange desire to totally destroy the pillow the yarn had come from and she couldn't rid herself of the odd want until she found her hands gripping the pillow and pulling it apart. Aghast, she flung the pillow from her and left the room quickly.
Once out of the room that belonged to her new stepdaughter, she shut the door and leaned her forehead against it, willing her tears and anger to disappear. Taking deep gulping breaths, she finally began to feel her heart slow and the adrenaline to quit pumping through her body. She pushed back strands of loose curls from her face as she stood straight. And then it sort of hit her, what she had done.
She blushed fiercely; glad no one could see her or what she had done. She'd sat upstairs for nearly a half of an hour, but she had had to fight herself just to stay put and not wander down into the kitchen to see what the meeting was about. Sure, she was often startled out of a day dream by the raucous laughter that erupted from below her, but she couldn't make out anything beyond that. Now, though, after her disastrous attempt to stay put, a bit of an adventure into the meeting seemed just the thing to do. It would be more comforting to be with others, not to mention the fact that if she should even start to think of something less than pleasant, all of the people there would be enough to successfully distract her until the thought had passed.
Her mind finally made up, she quietly made her way to the top of the stairs, only to be scared out of her wits by a loud "Hiya!" coming from the vicinity of her feet. She gave a most girlish squeal and a backwards hop before she realized that it was only Evie. Trying to regain her dignity, Hermione placed her hands on her hips and stared down at the young girl, just short of glaring.
"What do you think you're doing, young lady?" she asked sharply, in no mood to have to put up with any nonsense.
The child looked up at her innocently, or, at least, as innocently as she could possibly look. "I'm just sittin'."
"Sitting, are you?" Hermione asked skeptically. She was on the verge of telling Evie to go play in her room when she distinctly heard the voices of the people in the kitchen talking rather loudly. Then she understood. "Just sitting, eh? Looks to me as if you were eavesdropping on your daddy and his friends."
Evie looked up at Hermione pleadingly, begging with her eyes not to be turned in for her minor indiscretion. And, in her rather soft manner, Hermione smiled gently and lifted the girl to her feet. "Off to your room now, Evie. You go on and play and I'll come up there in a little bit. All right?"
The child nodded eagerly, glad to not be in any trouble, and practically ran to her room. Hermione smiled at the child slowly. So much like her mother. After a minute of absent thought, she stood and carefully made her way down the stairs and into the boisterous kitchen.
Though she'd only been gone a rather long while, perhaps forty minutes, everyone looked as if they had all just arrived. They were still laughing over silly jokes and hadn't even begun to get down to business. Hermione looked around at them all, taking in the smiles and the laughter. It was almost foreign to her ears in some strange way. She searched through the crowd and made out the plump figure of Hannah beside the wirier frame of her husband. She saw the drooped figure of Percy Weasley, and the even more stooped figure of his brother Fred. Then, after what seemed forever, she saw Remus. He was chatting with the green haired wizard and the sickeningly perfect couple that had been very enthusiastic with his story of Hannah and Harry earlier in the evening. Though she stood in the doorway, half in the shadow, he somehow knew she was there and looked up. Their eyes locked from across the room. He quickly excused himself from the conversation and hurried over to her.
"Are you all right? Has something happened?" He asked her fretfully. She almost smiled at his concern.
"No, nothing's happened. I just couldn't stand to be in that room anymore." She tried a shaky, almost apologetic, grin. "Too much time for thought."
He gave her an understanding glance and led her to a bit of bench between Dumbledore and, to her disgust, Professor Snape. He gave her a trademark sneer and opened his mouth for some scathing remark, but she silenced him with a pointed look at the bruised flesh on his face. His eyes grew furious, but he shut his mouth. Hermione smiled sweetly in return.
Just then, she heard the sound of clapping and her head snapped up to see Remus clapping his hands together loudly, trying to get the attention of the Order so that their meeting might finally begin. After a few minutes as everyone settled themselves as comfortably as possible, the meeting began. Remus gestured to Dumbledore as he sat and the Headmaster stood. Not one sound escaped anyone as the most respected personage in all of England began to speak.
"As I am sure all of you know the Death Eater attacks have increased. More and more wizarding AND Muggle homes have been found with the Dark Mark hovering over them. Despite the fact that Voldemort is, to our knowledge, destroyed, his evil remains in the form of a new leader, a man who, if he is not in fact Voldemort himself, looks amazingly the same. Now, many of us have formed our own opinions on the identity of this new Dark wizard, but most suspect that he is none other than our own Lucius Malfoy. In light of his new 'Muggleborn Law,' it has become even more apparent that his prejudices of old are just as strong today as they were before. And our theories seem to finally have ground. I should like to invite anyone with thoughts on this matter to speak now. Perhaps a 'brainstorm' will help us formulate some new ideas that are closer to the actual truth."
The room, quieter than it had ever been, stayed silent for nearly a minute before a mysteriously dusky woman stood to face the Headmaster with cool and deep eyes. "If it is indeed Lucius Malfoy that we must be wary of," she began in a surprisingly deep and husky voice, "then perhaps we should do a bit of sleuthing in the Ministry. As you all know, I serve as one of the Minister's lower assistants, but I'm sure I could do a bit of investigating. As could many of you with Ministry jobs. I may be new to the Order, but I, too, suspect the Minister of some less than pure activities."
An outcry of both agreement and disagreement broke through the eerie silence of the kitchen. Many of the younger members whole heartedly agreed with the woman's thought, while the elder members thought it too risky a chance. If she were found out, the whole Order could be in danger. Hermione, on the other hand, only stared at the woman. This new member gave her, well, to be completely honest, the heebie-jeebies. It wasn't so much her dark beauty or her unnaturally deep voice as it was her eyes. They were too cool, as they she had no emotion at all. Snape could seem somewhat cool, Malfoys could seem very cool, but the only eyes she had ever seen so cool as hers were Voldemort's that one time she'd seen him during that Last Battle. Hermione didn't trust this woman.
During her study of the young Ministry worker, she missed a good part of the conversation. In fact, she missed just about all of it. When she began once again to listen, she heard them forming a plan. A plan to send about five or ten of the Ministry working members of the Order on a bit of a scouting mission to watch the Minister and to keep a close, and I mean VERY close, eye on him. They were planning on sending a sort of spy in to speak with him even! That was too much for Hermione. This plan was too much like the scheme that had taken her husband from her. They'd gone in expecting to ambush, to scout them out before attacking and it had gotten one of them killed. For some reason she couldn't fathom, she felt a sense of dread that the outcome of this mission would be no different from its predecessor.
"No!" she cried, standing straight. All eyes turned to her, wide and disbelieving that the usually quiet and reserved Hermione would be so loud and so against their plan. "You will NOT do this! Please, you will not." Her hands were shaking as the gripped her robes to her side. Both Remus and Harry hurried to her, trying to set her down again, trying to make her be quiet, even if only for a little bit. But they should have remembered that when Hermione Granger had something in her mind, nothing could stop her from saying it. She shook off the two men and stood her ground, though a bit more shakily and wobbly than before.
"Don't you realize what this plan sounds like? Don't you realize what could happen? Don't you realize that people could be lost? I lost my husband to a plan such as this, a plan that shouldn't have gone wrong, a plan that should have only taken an hour to complete. I lost the man I LOVED to a stupid idea that sounds remarkably similar to this one. Will you not take into consideration that people could die? I don't know why I feel this way, it's never struck me like this before, but I feel, no, I KNOW, that someone, if not all of you, will die in this folly. I--I can't allow this to happen. Not while I have breath left in my body."
The room was once again overcome with silence. Every eye was on Hermione and every mouth was open slightly in shock. All except for the Ministry woman. She was looking at Hermione with something akin to respect or maybe something closer to pride. It only furthered Hermione's distrust for her.
A few seconds passed while everyone processed this information, and then the room practically erupted. Everyone began talking at once. Some tried to comfort Hermione, others tried to tell her that victory always had sacrifice, others tried to think of a different plan, others continued to work on the plan they had already begun. The sound and what she was feeling was a bit overwhelming. She sat down shakily, bumping into Remus, Snape, Harry and Dumbledore on her way down.
From there on, the meeting went downhill. No one could speak of anything but what Hermione had said and everything had sort of reached an impasse. Nothing new was brought up and, eventually, Dumbledore simply told everyone that it had been a rather stressful night and that everyone just ought to go home. And they did, in very good time.
Within ten minutes, all save Harry, Hannah, Molly, Remus, and Hermione were gone, much to Hermione's relief. They all sat companionably around the table, trying to pretend that Hermione's little outbreak had never happened, but it wasn't entirely working. Hermione still shook, Hannah looked near to tears, and both Harry and Molly looked desperately pale. Overall, no one except Remus really seemed in any condition to speak.
He turned to Hermione and put an arm comfortingly around her shoulders, but it didn't look as if she noticed. "Hermione," he said, "you have to try to live your life the way it should be lived. Do you understand what I'm telling you?" He didn't wait for a response. "You have to keep being Hermione and not someone overcome with grief." She opened her mouth to speak, but he continued as though he hadn't noticed. "You have to understand that life still goes on and that you're a part of it. And that the people that make up your life have a mission in front of them. A mission to better the lives of all Wizardkind, and that sometimes sacrifices must be made to achieve this goal. It's all part of the risk we take, becoming a member of the Order. We all must understand that we could lose anyone at any given time and that sometimes risks must be taken to further ourselves. And if that risk sometimes ends up costing a life, at least they died doing what was right. Just like Ron did."
Though he had put his thoughts rather eloquently, they didn't have the effect he thought they might. Instead of Hermione smiling at him shakily and telling him that she understood, she was in a rage. She leapt from her chair and stared him down, fury clearly visible in her eyes.
"You expect me to just take that as a good reason for Ron's death? Do you really think that this--this stupid Order justifies his not being here to live with me, with all of us? I--I can't believe you! I thought you, of all people, could understand. I thought that since you lost your wife early in your marriage that you could somehow sympathize with me, understand how I felt! But you're just like the rest of them! I--" She stopped and ran out of the kitchen and up the stairs. Remus, being the ever faithful man he is, followed her. She knew it and stopped in front of the door to Evie's room.
Her breath came in gulping gasps as she turned to face him. She took in the shock on his face as he noticed the tears on hers. "You're just like the rest of those people down there today. They think it some great adventure, some great honor, to die for a cause that will never be fully realized. I thought that maybe you would be different. I thought that you had a mind of your own, one that was separate from the masses. But you're no different. You're just like the rest of them. And there's nothing you can say that will make me feel any better." She turned from him again and reached for the doorknob, but his hand stopped her. He spun her around to face him again.
"I may not be any different, Hermione, but I know how much it hurts to lose someone you love. Nearly everyone down there tonight knows what it feels like. But they're willing to go on trying to make things better. It doesn't matter if the cause is never fully realized. The point is that things change for the better. The point of being part of the Order is that you WANT to make things better. And if I have to die to make things better for my little daughter," he pointed to the door as his voice rose to nearly a shout, "then I will. I will do whatever it takes to make this world worth living in for her. Ron understood that. He understood that he may have to die to make it better for you and children that you may have had. You, on the other hand, still haven't figured that out yet." He let her go harshly, staring into her eyes fiercely.
For a moment, neither of them moved. Then Hermione, faster than he thought she could do, turned, opened the door, stepped in, and promptly slammed the door in his face.
Well, there it is. I hope that it has satisfied all of you, my faithful readers and reviewers. Please review some more to tell me what you think. I always appreciate it.
Oh, and by the way, I saw Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban on Monday, finally, and I thought that it was fantastic. Far better than the first two movies by far. I can't wait for the next one!