I crept slowly up to the door of Garrett's house. The door was slightly ajar, and I pushed it open and continued on inside. The entire house was completely dark.

"Garrett?" I called out hesitantly. I stopped and listened for a moment, but I could hear no sound at all other than my own breathing. "Hello? Is anyone here?"

The whole scene felt extremely eerie to me, but I tried to brush off the feeling I was getting. I found my way into the living room and switched on the light.

The breath caught in my throat at the sight in front of me. There, lying on the floor, not moving a muscle, was Garrett.

I could feel my heart beating in my ears and my pulse racing as I flew across the room and knelt next to him. "Garrett," I whispered, cupping his face in my hands. "Are you okay?"

But there was no answer. His eyes remained closed, and his lips did not form the familiar smile that I knew so well. There were no reassuring words, no attempt to make me feel better this time.

I lay my head on his chest and tried desperately to hear a heartbeat, or some sort of sign that would let me know he would be okay. There was nothing. I had to face my worst fears- Garrett was dead.

I clutched his cold shoulders and touched my forehead to his, and kissed him gently once on the lips with more passion than I ever had when he was alive. Tears streamed down my face as I held on to him, not letting go of one of my dearest friends.

"Please don't be dead," I whispered in his ear, knowing that he wouldn't respond. "Garrett, wake up. I'm here. I need you."

I don't know how long I lay there with my arms around his lifeless body, hoping against all hopes that I would wake up any moment and discover that everything that had happened had only been a dream.

It seemed ages ago that I was sitting at a table in the Leaky Cauldron, surrounded by my friends and yet crying on the inside. That all seemed so far away, and so silly now. I had sobbed over a man that I meant nothing to, and I had been angry that my life wasn't perfect, the way I wanted it to be. Now I'd lost one of the closest people in my life.

I took Garrett's hand in mine and closed my eyes, lying right there on the floor next to him. I didn't mean to fall asleep, but the fright and anxiety I had just experienced had exhausted me, and I fell into a restless slumber.

When I awoke the next morning I did not want to open eyes. I was unsure why, but I just had a terrible feeling in the pit of my stomach, and I felt that I didn't want to live this day to come. I felt a hand in my hand, a hand that I had held so many times and knew so well. But it was different now. Now that hand was cold and lifeless. With a jolt I remembered all the events of the night before and my eyes flew open.

Garrett's body was right there next to mine. It was sickening to realize the man that was supposed to be my husband was now dead. He had died believing I loved him, and I was glad I had not done anything stupid to make him upset. In a strange way, knowing that he was no longer living made it easier to convince myself that I had loved him the way he wanted me to. Deep down in my heart of hearts I knew it wasn't true, but it was just a little bit easier to deal with.

I kept on holding his hand in mine. I looked down at it to feel his skin for the last time. Suddenly I noticed something glimmer on his wrist. Upon closer examination I discovered that the necklace that had been stolen from me all those years ago was wrapped tightly around his arm. I dropped his hand and watched it land softly on the carpet.

"No," I whispered. "Garrett, who killed you? Please… it couldn't have been Tom… it just couldn't have." Tom may have been strange, he may have stolen from people, and he may have broken my heart, but I did not believe he had killed Garrett.

"Phoebe!" gasped a voice from the doorway. I looked up and Catherine was standing there, looking shocked.

Seeing her there only seemed to make things worse. She was intruding on a scene that felt so intimately private, but more than that, seeing her there made everything that had happened seem more real. All the pain and the hurt came back again, and I choked up at the realization that I would have to explain what was going on.

"What happened?" she asked quietly. "You never came home last night, and didn't send me a quick note or anything so I was a little worried. I decided I'd stop by this morning."

"I… don't… know," I sobbed, barely able to get the words out and trying not to choke on my tears. "I just… came by… and he was here… like this… exactly like this… I've no idea…"

Catherine came over to me and gently led me into the next room and set me down at the kitchen table. She summoned some food from the pantry to her. "Here. Try and eat something, I'm sure you haven't eaten. I'll be right back."

With that, she apparated away. I sat motionless at the kitchen table. My stomach was churning too much and had too many knots in it to try and force anything down. After what seemed like eons Catherine came back, accompanied by a middle-aged looking wizard. "This is Charles," she said softly. "He's an auror, and he has to ask you a few questions."

Charles looked at me kindly and said, "I'm so sorry about your loss. I know it must be hard for you, but I hope you'll try and answer some questions so we can discover the culprit of this murder."

I shuddered at the cold word, but nodded my head all the same. Charles continued, "Tell me exactly what happened."

I dried my eyes and tried my best to explain what had happened, my voice only wavering a few times. "I was with Garrett and a group of friends on Friday night, and he left while I was in the bathroom. One of the people I was with told me he had to leave suddenly, but that he wanted me to stop by his house the next evening. So Saturday night I walked down here, accompanied part of the way by Catherine. We saw some green sparks in the distance but thought it was nothing. She left, but as I got closer to Garrett's house I realized the sparks were actually directly above his roof and they formed a green skull with a snake coming out of the mouth."

The auror looked a bit puzzled. "Really? Some sort of symbol was in the sky?" I nodded. "Okay. What happened next?"

"The door was open a crack, so I went inside. Everything was dark. I turned on the light in the living room and found Garrett's body there." I couldn't go on after that, but there was nothing else to be said. Catherine came over and hugged me, and Charles sat nearby looking a little uncomfortable.

Finally he turned to me and said, "Just a few more questions. I'm very sorry to have to do this to you. Unfortunately, you'll probably have to repeat your story a few more times in court or somewhere else. Now, what is Garrett's full name?"

"Garrett James Allen."

"And what is your relationship to him? Were you his girlfriend?"

"Fiancé," I mumbled.

"What is the name of that person that told you Garrett had left suddenly Friday night?"

"Nathan Palmer."

Charles began writing something down on some parchment. "Do you have any reason to believe that Nathan might have killed Garrett?"

"None at all," I said immediately.

"Do you have any idea who would've done this? Did he have any known enemies?"

I thought fleetingly of Tom, but I bit my tongue and held myself back from saying his name. I had no reason to believe him to be a murderer, and I did not want to bring him back into my life for any reason if I could help it. I said nothing.

Charles examined the body and then came back, saying, "It seems clear to me that he was indeed murdered. There is no trace of a struggle or of any sort of injury at all. It could only have been done by the Avada Kedavra curse."

I gulped nervously. Charles said, "I will have a mortician stop by later this afternoon to remove the body from the house."

The mortician did indeed stop by that afternoon, bringing a beautiful wooden coffin with him. He asked me if I wanted to change the outfit that Garrett was wearing, but I told him I wanted the clothes to remain the same. His mother and I had decided the vigil would be a closed casket affair anyway.

The mortician did ask me if I wanted the \ necklace found around Garrett's wrist. I violently shook my head no. I never wanted to see that necklace again- it would remind me of all the pain that Tom had caused me, and all the hurt I'd gone through due to Garrett's death. The necklace was buried deep into the earth with Garrett, never to bother me again.

Garrett's body was lifted and slowly placed into the coffin. It was the last time I would ever see him.

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A/N: Well. The first thing I want to let you know is that this story isn't over yet. There's still another two chapters or so to go.

This chapter was the easiest and the hardest one to write all at once. I really wanted to put some real emotion into it, and I hope it worked, at least a little bit. Let me know in your reviews.