I tightened my cloak against the early November chill as I walked slowly towards the little graveyard in Godric's Hollow. I wasn't in much of a hurry. I didn't really want to face what I had come here to face. I was here only a week ago, but that week felt like an eternity. I came to the funeral with every intention of saying my goodbyes, but I just couldn't. Goodbye just seems so final, it's as if once I say goodbye, I'm free to forget. I just couldn't bring myself to say it. I can't bring myself to let him go, so I won't. Ever. He may be dead, but that doesn't mean he's gone.
As I walk towards his headstone, I try to push the memories of a week ago out of my mind. I look to a large tree in a corner of the small cemetery and I know what lies beneath it. I make my way towards a headstone that I had hoped that I would never live to see.
It was a simple stone with a simple inscription, just as he would have wanted it to be. I knelt beside the newly dug grave and traced the words carved into the headstone and read the inscription that tore my heart to pieces.
Harry James Potter
July 31 1980 – October 31 1998
The tears fell silently down my face as I looked to the side of his grave to the graves of his parents. They could finally be together, just like Harry had always hoped for. I just sat there and cried. It was the only thing I could do. I needed my closure. I wasn't sure if this would give me that but I had to try. I needed to be at peace with his death, and I couldn't think of any other way.
"I'm here Harry. But you already know that don't you? This past week has been so hard. All I can think about is you. I can't figure out exactly how I feel right now. I can't decide if I want to love you or hate you. I know I love you, there's no denying it, but I want to hate you too. I want to hate you for leaving me alone. I want to hate all the gods above for taking you away from me. I want to hate, I do hate, that bastard who caused all this pain. Why you? Why couldn't they have picked someone else to rid the world of evil? Why did you have to be the Boy Who Lived? Why couldn't they let you be just Harry and let some other boy live?" I felt as if I couldn't go on. This is one of the hardest things I've ever had to do.
I sat there crying for a moment until I found my voice again. "We should have years, decades together instead we were only given seven years. Seven years of friendship and only a few moments of something more. I can still feel you in my arms and I can still taste your lips when you kissed me before the battle. I can hear your laugh and see your smile. I can hear you tell me that you love me, for the first and last time. I still have my memories to hold on to. But they shouldn't be only memories they should be realities.
The last few moments of your life are permanently embedded in my brain. I re-live it every time I close my eyes. I see you lying on the bloodstained grass. I run to you and pull you onto my lap. I feel the life leave you as I hold you in my arms, I see the light leave your beautiful emerald eyes, I watch you take your last breath and with it, you tell me that you love me. Then I feel you go limp.
Fate's cruel isn't it? You escape Him so many times and in the end, his ultimate end means yours as well, your end on the 7-year anniversary of the day you saved me from the troll and the day we became friends. That's what's so painful. Halloween used to be such a special day for me, the day I found my two greatest friends. But now it's a day that reminds me of the love I lost.
You were everything I wanted in a friend and so much more than I could have hoped for in something more. You were kind, caring, self-less, sweet, funny. You saw beyond the bossy know-it-all exterior to the insecure Hermione I tried so hard to hide from the world. I could tell you my darkest secrets and I knew they were safe with you. When I needed to talk, you were always there. We could talk about anything, everything, and nothing all at once. We had so many amazing times together, and so many painful ones too.
You held me as I sobbed into your shoulder when my parents were killed. We cried together at the news of Hagrid's death. We clung to each other as we sobbed uncontrollably over Ron's grave. We held each other at too many funerals to count. We mourned all of our losses together. We got through them all together. If it hadn't been for you, I don't know what I would have done.
But now your not here when I need you the most. You're not here to hold me and wipe my tears. You're not here to comfort me and tell me that everything will be all right. You're not here to make me get out of bed and get on with my life. You and Ron were my reason to keep going after I lost my mum and dad. Then you were my reason after we lost Ron. But who do I have now that I lost you?
I know you would want me to get on with my life, but I can't it's too hard. It's hard waking up to know that I won't see you. It's hard to walk into a room knowing that I won't hear your laugh. It's hard to live without you being here. It's hard to go on with the knowledge of how cruelly your life was taken from you. It's hard to live my life with the feeling that I could have saved yours.
That's right. I've convinced myself that there was something I could have done to save you. If only I would have researched harder, I could have found the answer. If only I would have tried harder. If only I would have been braver, stronger, smarter.
You're probably just as amazed at how I can blame myself for your death as I was amazed at how you found a way to blame yourself for anything that happened to anyone. None of those were truly your fault and I know deep down that your death isn't my fault either, but my mind controls everything as always. Big surprise huh? There was something I could have done. I know it.
I tried to prepare myself for this. I hoped it would never happen but I thought I should be prepared just in case. As strong and prepared as you were, there was the possibility that something could go wrong. I had planned out everything in my head. What I would do, how I would feel. I had no idea it would feel like this, like someone stuck a knife in my heart and is twisting with all their strength.
I never thought that I would want to be dead, but I do now. Well, I did. Being dead has to be better than this nothingness, than the pain and anguish and sorrow. I had every intention of killing myself. Ending this seemingly worthless existence. I came here to say 'goodbye for now and I'll be seeing you soon' but I've come to realize that my death won't accomplish anything.
I know you don't want that either. You want me to carry on and be the strong woman you know I can be and for your sake, I'll try. I'll try with everything I have to make my parents' lives and your and Ron's sacrifices worthwhile. I can't make any promises though.
I came here looking for closure and I think that I found it. I wasn't sure if I would, but I have. As hard as it is to accept that you're gone, it makes it a little easier to I know that I can come here and talk to you like I always used to."
I wiped the tears from my face and neck and stood and brushed the dust and leaves from my clothes. I looked down at the grave again.
"I love you Harry. I never got the chance to say it to you, but I know that you already know. You figured it out first. And you say you're not smart." I smiled for the first time in what felt like forever.
The wind rustled through the trees and whipped around my hair and I knew that he was there and knew that I loved him and that eased my pain further.
"I'll come back soon." And I turned away and made my way out of the cemetery. As I passed through the old iron gates, I felt as though a huge weight had been lifted from my shoulders. This was what had I needed after all.
I apparated back to my flat in London and attempted to get on with my life. For Harry.