Hello!

Thanks for all the quality constructive reviews people, well helpful, marvelous, love to you all! Here's the next installment. I'm not sure about the whole wizards and religion thing. That could be quite interesting if we ever find that out! Anyway I've used a church for the funeral, not that it's a major point...anyway.

Again let me know what you think...One to go!

Sarah XxXxX ;)

Chapter 6 – Unbelievably silent

The funeral was arranged for the 8th of July, exactly a week after Ron had died. The days that led up to the funeral went in a blur; looking back I couldn't tell you what happened, I have the odd flash of a memory but nothing solid. What I do remember is coming across to other people as incredibly calm and with an air of coping marvellously, whilst other people broke down on a regular basis.

We had lost people in the war, of course we had, and their deaths were horrendous to live through, but in some way they were easier to accept because we had been in the middle of a very nasty and bloody war. Ron's death was shocking and caused a huge amount of unrest throughout the wizarding population because the war was long finished. He had been murdered in cold blood.

The day after he died Remus had come to see me. I was lying in bed at the Burrow, having been put there by Harry after I fell asleep out of exhaustion. When Remus arrived he refused to leave until he had spoken to me.

When he walked into the room I was awake and staring at the ceiling, tears were streaming down my face but I made no attempt to stop them or wipe them away. He sat on the edge of my bed and took my hand in his.

'Hermione, I…I know you don't want to hear any of what I'm about to say at the minute. When I lost Nymph-…Tonks, I didn't want to hear any of it either, but I now understand why people said it to me.'

I wasn't really listening, but I knew he was there and some of the words were registering somewhere in my brain.

'I know you are in so much pain right now and you can't even begin to imagine how you're even going to get out of this bed, never mind get on with your life, but you will do. When you're ready you will do and that's the start of the next chapter in your life. You have no idea what that'll be at the minute, and that scares you. No one who has been affected by this knows, but there will be a next chapter.'

He stopped to compose himself. When he fell silent I found myself turning my head an inch so I could look at him. His eyes were glistening with tears and he was looking out the window that was giving light and warmth to the small room, as if trying to gain strength from the sunlight.

'Hermione, if you ever want to talk, I'm here, I know exactly how you're feeling, and as much as it's hard to understand, I'm living proof that life goes on. It's been seven years since I lost her and I still think about her every single day, but when I do, I see her smiling and laughing, I remember her the way she would want to be remembered, and every day I smile because of her. I know that's what she wants wherever she is. You will get through this. I promise you that.'

He moved to stand up but I grabbed hold of his hand before he moved it. He stopped and sat back down not saying a word, just waiting for me to.

'We were going to start a family. We had just decided. There was going to be me and him and a child. Our child. A child we would love everyday and get to watch growing up. He was going to teach them to play Quidditch and I was going to make sure they did well at school when they went to Hogwarts. He wanted three children and when they were all grown up and making us the proudest parents in the world we were going to grow old together. It might not have been perfect, it might have been hard, but we wanted it so much.'

Somehow through the tears that were still falling from my eyes my voice had stayed steady throughout my revelation.

Remus looked at me, I don't think he knew what to say, but I could see he felt like he needed to say something.

'Hermione this is probably the hardest thing you will ever have to go through, but there are people who will be right next to you every step of the way. You won't go through this alone, and eventually, I don't know when, you will wake up one morning and instead of crying or being angry, you will smile when you remember him and the times you had together.'

He stood and when I didn't make any attempts to make him stay he left, closing the door quietly behind him.

The morning of the funeral came and it was the first morning I had woken up without crying as soon as I opened my eyes.

When we arrived at the church I watched as Bill, Charlie, Fred, George, Percy and Harry carried the coffin into the church. I followed, Ginny holding on to my arm as we walked. Arthur and Molly followed us, Arthur whispering words of comfort to Molly who was quietly sobbing into her handkerchief.

The ceremony went as smoothly as could be expected. George said a few words on behalf of the Weasley brothers, and Ginny said a few on behalf of herself, Molly and Arthur. Lastly Harry got up and started his speech. As much as I had listened to the others and had felt the pain in the words spoken by George and Ginny, it wasn't until Harry spoke that I started to cry. He talked about their first meeting on the train to Hogwarts and how a bushy haired know-it-all had come bustling into their carriage interrupting their very important conversation. I smiled through my tears, but only for a second.

Harry had asked if I wanted him to say a few words from me, I had said he could say what he wanted because I knew whatever he said would be right. He spoke about Ron in the way he deserved to be spoken about, like a hero, like a brother, like a best friend and like the best husband in the world.

As he talked tears continued to fall down my face and onto my hands, which were linked and lying in my lap. When he finished, the coffin was taken into the graveyard and he was buried alongside the other members of the Weasley family that had been laid to rest.

His wake was held at the Burrow, but I didn't spend much time inside with everyone who had come to celebrate Ron's life. I walked through the garden and up the hill we had scrambled up the day we went to the Quidditch World Cup. It was in the small wood at the top of the hill that Ron had proposed to me. It was a warm day and first he had shown me something he had carved into one of the trees when we had first officially started seeing each other – namely the day of Bill and Fleur's wedding. He had scratched a heart into the bark and put our initials inside it. As much as it was cliché I didn't care, I loved the gesture and I loved him.

I found the tree and sat down under it. As much as I tried not to I cried yet again, the same way I had since the day Ron died, silently, with no sobbing, just tears falling from my eyes. I sat under the tree for what must have been over an hour before going back to the Burrow.

As I walked down the hill I remembered what Remus had said, whether I liked it or not this was the next chapter in my life. The first chapter without Ron and without the plans we had dreamed about together. From that day on when I cried about Ron I cried in the same way.

That was the sixth way I cried – Unbelievably silent.

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