The Boy-Who-No-One-Sees

Ernie has always done the right thing, so why does no one remember him.

PG

Notes: Happy Birthday faith! You were talking just the other day about how you couldn't find any Ernie/Hannah stories so, for your birthday I made one just for you. And you know any one you want to share it with.

Ernie never thought of himself as a background character. He never once thought that just because he wasn't the-boy-who-lived or because he didn't belong to the heroic troupe of Harry's followers that he didn't matter to the world. Ernie only ever did what he thought was right, he denounced Harry only when all the evidence pointed to Harry being the Heir of Slytherin, he was quick to retract his accusation once he knew it wasn't true. Ernie only stood by his principles, by his family taught knowledge of goodness and how you always stand and fight against injustice and evil. He thought that meant something. Ernie hated himself for being wrong.

It's at the Battle of Hogsmeade two years after the war really began. Three years after Dumbledore had been murdered. That Ernie figures out the truth.

Ernie was use to sitting and waiting, though he was quick to mention to anyone who would listen that this wasn't how they described war in history books. In books everything is condensed, melted down to numbers that looks so small in the vast space of distant time. So now Ernie can't figure out which is worse the way days, months can pass before a battle begins or the battles themselves. Sometimes it takes so long in between battles he can almost forget that there's a war at all. He can't say if it's hate or fear that makes his face go red and his knees get weak after two weeks without even a tussle. Maybe it's instinct that tells him, that these are the times to be most afraid because the more it seems like the end is near, the closer, he feels, the end will come. Only it will be in blood and curses and Ernie doesn't know how much more blood he can see without wanting to give up.

Then the day comes, it's been three months since the battle at Diagon Alley, thrity-two dead, and that's all Ernie can remember from the Dail Prophet's featured story. But the Battle of Hogsmeade lasts three days and two nights. Ernie knows the truth about being background when he watches Dennis Creevy fall, hit once,

twice,

three times, or is it a dozen because Ernie's lost count, and all he really truly knows is Dennis is dead.

Ernie reads the Daily Prophet and sees the glaring headline about Harry's miraculous truimph at the battle, how it was the boy-who-lived that saved the day again.

Ernie notices that there isn't even one mention of Dennis, he watches as Colin grieves and Harry throws the paper into a camp fire. Ernie knows that history and newspapers don't remember boys-who-die, or the boys-that-fade-away because they're nothing more than backgrounds to Harry Potter.

Ernie has know Hannah almost all his life. They share passion for chocolate frogs and the collector's cards, for Bernie Botts and the face that people have when they get a really nasty one. They both read muggle comic books but would never tell anyone else. But Ernie knows that just because he's know Hannah so long, means nothing to anyone but them. Ernie isn't important to the world at large and he can't see beyond the battlefield and the boys-who-fade-away. He can't see far enough to notice the-girl-who's-always-always-been-right-there.

The war is over at last but Ernie can't quite figure out how to live in a world as a background character. He knows he can't keep up with the Savior-of-the-Wizarding-World Harry Potter and his new wife Loony-Luna. He can't hope to be remembered when no one speaks of anything other than the redeemed Draco Malfoy and his Shakespeare like love affair with Ginny Weasley. Ernie is tired of being unknown, unseen for all he has done. For all he has sacrificed to the good fight. In the name of right, and true and pure. Ernie knows for a fact that Harry didn't win the war on his own, because Ernie and ever other faceless solider who aren't important enough to have a name fought right along side the famed Harry. And Ernie has always been good, never done anything bad, never needed to be redeemed , so why is it that Ernie is always secondary to everyone else.

"Look here." Hannah calls to him. She passes him over a chocolate frog card. On it Harry is dodging in and out of the frame looking embarrassed.

"That's nice." Ernie grunts.

"What's wrong?"

"Nothing."

"Well, obviously it's something."

"It's just,"He pauses and tries to think of a way to say how unimportant he feels."I don't matter."

Hannah blinks at him. Her mouth opens and she looks almost as if she might cry.

"Of course you do!"

"Not really. Not to the world." Ernie stretches out his arms as if he could circle the world with his limbs.

"You mean, compared to Harry." Hannah says as she holds up the card.

"Well...yes."

"Is it so important, to matter to everyone in the whole wizarding world?"

"I always wanted too. I just wanted to be remembered. I don't want to be faceless and nameless. Just another easily forgotten soldier." Ernie looks at her, and thinks if he only had the words to explain what it's like to be a nobody and to die so only other nobodies remembered you.

"You're not. Harry remembers you. And me. I remember you, Ernie. I never, never, never forgot you."

"It's not the same, Hannah."

"Don't you remember that old saying. To the world you may be someone but to someone you may be the world. You're my world, Ernie. I have loved almost my whole life. Isn't it better to be remember by someone who loves you, than to face the kind of up and down life Harry and Luna have with the press everyday." Hannah pauses and takes his hand,"You and I, we have it easy. No one ever wonders about us. No one wants to know what were up to or mocks us when we mess up. It's just us, Ernie. Just me and you."

Ernie knows what being background means, he knows that the world won't recall two Hufflepuff soldiers or the way they fought and sacrificed. But Ernie also knows that he has always done what is right, gave whatever was needed to give good a fighting chance. And Ernie knows that being loved by just one someone is better than being known by the whole world.