Forty-Four

Day: 1558; Hour: 20

"About time they released you."

A huff of a laugh. "Too worried about me to sleep, Granger?"

"You wish. I was plotting my revenge."

"Mm," and he really does sound excited by this. "Care to share?"

"Is it sharing time, then?"

He knows her too well. He knows she's crossed the line of playfulness or coming up with hollow threats because he remains silent. His belt clinks off something and there's a rustle of fabric, though he hasn't lain down yet.

"Why did it take them five hours to release you?" And he probably knows that she really means 'what are you and Harry not telling me?'

"It took them about twenty minutes."

"Oh."

"Potter and I went for a drink."

She blinks three times at the bedside table. "Really?"

He makes a noise of amusement, and the bed sinks down. "Really. On the other side of the house."

She glares at him. "You were here for the last five hours?" she asks, but then it sounds too needy, too demanding of his presence, and so: "That's..." weird, "good."

He huffs a laugh, and she wonders if he can read her mind now that he's been inside of it. Then she wonders what he and Harry happened to talk about when the only things they share in common are her and the war, and no one likes to talk about the war. Oh, God. She really hopes Harry didn't give him some big brother speech or something.

"I haven't decided if Potter is less annoying when he's drunk, or just easier to deal with when I am."

They were together for hours. Was it the first time they had done something like this? Or is it just because they had something to discuss, and then a mission to try and forget?

He doesn't seem distant with her, and she wonders if it's the alcohol, or if she's wrong, or if he doesn't feel the need to be. "Well, I'm sure since you're no longer caught up in trying to prove you're better than him, he's-"

"I've never tried to prove I was better than Potter. I already knew it. Anyone who didn't was an idiot, and therefore, not worth my attempt in the first place."

"Oh, is that what you tell yourself?"

She can feel his glower against the back of her head. "It's what I know. But no worries, Granger, I don't hold the past against you."

She fists the blanket, staring down at the white of her knuckles. "You're so gracious."

"I'm aware. Your mental handicap is no fault of your own, no matter how annoying it is, drunk or sober."

"You stink."

The bed bounces, and he snorts. "Worst comeback yet, Granger. I see you're slowly deteriorating with time. I can't say I'm surprised."

"I meant you literally stink, git. Like alcohol."

"Well, let's see, Granger... I've mentioned drink, drunk-"

"I see you're annoying both drunk and sober, then."

"Perhaps if you stop trying to prove yourself better than- What was that?"

"I said I'm going to start storing these memories, so when you annoy me to death, they can put you in Azkaban for it."

"That's cute, Granger. However, I'm sure they will see it was in self-defense. Temporary insanity due to overexposure of Hermione Granger. Show them a couple memories and watch how fast I get out."

She glares at the far wall, muttering names under her breath, and hitches the blankets higher. Maybe she'll just have to remind him of this later. When he's kissing her, or he looks at her like he wants to consume her, or he's throwing her onto some bed. Oh, no, Malfoy, she will say. I don't want you to be overexposed.

"Amber, by the way."

"What?" Who is Amber?

"The color of your eyes, when you're turned on. Amber." He mutters something then about paint labels, a safe house, and brown.

She flops over onto her back, and looks up at his own, listening to the sound of his laces untying. She has to think about it far longer than her brain should take, and then she remembers wondering about it when he showed her his memory the other night.

"What made you think of that?" Because she doesn't know what else to say, and thanking him just sounds odd.

"I was wondering what was going on in your head. And then I weighed my options for tonight," he grunts as he pulls a boot off, and it thuds against the floor, "by contemplating just how tired and drunk I am." Grunt, thud. "Then I remembered."

"Speaking of remembering, and minds, and such," she starts, and he sighs. "What was the memory you blocked?"

Because she's pretty sure she knows exactly what it is. For a few seconds when he had been gone, she thought of not asking, but it's impossible for her to not confirm it. And if he's trying to keep it from her, there's not going to be a time he's more likely to tell her than when he's drunk; she can only remember three times she's seen him drunk in four years, and she's not waiting until the next chance rolls around. No matter how risky it might be now.

He rests his elbows on his knees and scratches his head, picking the clock off the table to inspect the time. The fact that he couldn't make out the numbers without picking it up says a lot about how much alcohol he managed to consume tonight, she thinks. "I'll tell you tomorrow."

She really expected him to not tell her at all. She had been fully prepared on trying to dig it out of Harry. And she knows the only secret they'd try to keep from her has to be about her. If it's about some unrelated event that happened on the mission they were on, Draco has the same clearance to know as she does, and there's no reason to hide it.

"Promise?"

He leans back, shoving his pants down his legs and flings them across the room with a kick of his foot. He pushes his hair away from his eyes and crawls into bed, plopping face first into the pillow. She might have laughed at him had she not been wondering why he didn't take off his shirt. "Romus."

She opens her mouth to respond, but a short squeak comes out instead when his arm flashes out to grab her, dragging her against his side. He moves his face out of the pillows, and she can feel his chin at the top of her head as he wiggles deeper into the blankets. She's stiff against him.

"Do-"

"If you don't shut up and go to sleep, I'll suffocate you with this pillow," he mutters, and she's pretty sure he just growled at the yawn that took up the second half of his sentence.

"I just-" she starts to say, and then cries out at the sharp pain in her hip.

She elbows him when he gives that low, evil snicker she pretends to hate. She ruins the effect when she reaches up a tentative hand to run her fingers over his ribs, and he's asleep before seeking revenge.

Day: 1559; Hour: 6

She greets Draco's morning face with her eyes wide and her spine straight. He groans, rolls back over, and promptly falls asleep. His shoulders are bare, and she knows he must have yanked his shirt off some time in the night. He rarely sleeps with one on unless he's too exhausted to remove any clothing at all.

She barely resists the urge to pull the blanket back, and she might have had she not thought it would wake him up.

Day: 1559; Hour: 8

As soon as her wand alerts her to the fact that he's awake, she brings tea the exact way in which he likes it and two aspirins from her own stock. He glares at the quirk of her mouth from his ruffled hair, bloodshot eyes, sluggish movements, and the lines on his face from the wrinkles in the pillow. He pushes up and leans against the headboard, the sheet falling just below the elastic of his underwear, and she examines his skin in the harsh light of day.

His shoulder and upper arm are still covered in a dark, painful bruise, though the edges are browning. A knot of a bruise puffs out from the swollen right side of his jaw, and purple blooms along his nose, smudging near-black lines beneath his eyes. Purple circles his left eye, the skin puffy, and the lid half covering his grumpy look. Both of his sides are covered with bruises along his ribs, and she can count five new scars along his chest.

He gives her a look, and she notices the little worried noises coming from her. She thrusts the tea out as distraction and he accepts it. His first sip is tentative, but he gulps the second.

"Swot," he rasps out, like she hasn't seen him make his tea a thousand times.

He gives a distrustful look to the two pills in her palm, and she rolls her eyes at him. "For your headache. The only thing it might do besides that is make you a little more alert. Just swallow, don't chew."

"I've taken Muggle medicine before." He sniffs, plucking the pills from her hand.

"Yes, well, Seamus and Dean once convinced Ron you had to insert them in the rectum, so..."

His face scrunches up in distaste, and he closes his eyes when the sun decides to clear the clouds and burst bright light into the room. She had thought about drawing the curtains, but then decided it would make him sleep longer, and she's too anxious to wait.

"When have I ever given the impression that I was as gullible or challenged as Weasley?"

She purses her lips at him, but it's pretty impossible to gather up any anger when he looks so wounded from their imprisonment. "I've been hanging out with Ron all morning. I don't think he was very pleased you seemed to have a boys night without him."

"Potter invited him. He declined." He looks like he would care more about discussing scented candles than Ron.

"Oh." It doesn't surprise her in the least. "Well, you'll grow on him." Maybe. One day.

He snorts. "I'm not a fungus, Granger."

"Beg to differ." She gives him a half-smile, and he glares over the rim of his cup.

"There's no point in telling you this, but Novak found out, and if you run into him, I'd rather you know what he's accusing you of." Draco starts like he's repeating a boring fact sheet, and she takes a seat on the edge of the bed, more nervous now that he wouldn't meet her eyes. "You were under Imperius." Yes. "Potter, myself, and two Aurors were chained up. One of them was already dead. They gave you a knife-"

"Oh, my God," she whispers, screws her eyes shut tight.

"You broke through the Curse in about two minutes – it- The Death Eater had been behind you to watch, and you actually...stabbed him in the side of the face. There was a struggle." He eyes the large, swollen bruise covering her cheek and jaw. "You kept yelling for Weasley. I'm assuming he was wherever you came from, so you might want to ask him what happened before that. Another Death Eater came in, saw the dead one on the ground, and that's when your ribs were broken. He dragged you out. After that...let's just say I never thought someone's freakishly long toes would make me a happy man."

"What did I do?" He stares at the wild look she's giving him in silence, and her eyes drop to his chest just as quickly as her heart to her stomach. "It was you, wasn't it?" Silence, his face perfectly blank, and she launches off the bed like her presence could burn him.

"Gra-"

"I knew it." Her voice is a whisper, but it comes out heavy, and she stares at the scars on his skin. "The apology thing, I knew it. I forgot that night, but I remembered at the Ministry, and I remembered Harry, and I knew there was no other reason you could say something about an apology if I-"

"Grang-"

"Was that me?" She points at his chest.

"No."

"You're lying!"

"Granger, the most annoying part of it was that you were going to pull this later, so do us both a favor and-"

"I stabbed you! I-"

"They were superficial, you were fighting it the entire time. You were Cursed, it happens. It happened to you with Potter. It's not a big deal, and that's why I didn't bother telling you. It doesn't matter."

It doesn't matter. She must have said that to Harry five dozen times the other day. No, it's not like she would have ever done that willingly, but she had. They had forced her to hurt him. Does he look at her and see it replaying in his mind, like her when she looks at Harry now? She doesn't think of it as Harry, she doesn't blame Harry, but she sees it. Even now, is he actively working to make it disappear from his head as completely as it has from hers? And why can't she remember? She must have...must have sliced at him, stabbed at him, and she can't remember something like that?

"Let me see."

"What?" He looks at her like she must be insane, and it only grows into deeper lines when she crawls up the length of his legs to hover over his lap.

She presses her fingers very carefully to his cheeks, their eye contact solid. "Let me see."

"No."

"Dra-"

"There's no reason for you-"

"If I did it, I want to see it!"

"You don't need to."

"I want to!"

"No, you don't! What is that memory going to do for you? I've been inside your head, Granger, you're like an emotional time bomb, and I'm not going to be the one to set you off and deal with-"

"Jus-"

"Let it go."

"I wa-"

"This is why we didn't tell you! It. Doesn't. Matter. You had as much power over your actions as Potter did with that whip. You go on and on about Potter taking on too much for other people, and all this shit, when you are the same. Way. You don't need to feel bad about it. You don't need to remember it. It's over. Let- Why the hell are you crying?"

"I'm not crying!" she snaps, blinking furiously.

His head hits the headboard with a groan. She stares at the long scar below his collarbone, setting her jaw. "I have an appointment with a Healer tomorrow to remove them."

She reaches out, her thumb traveling the line, and her breath rattles a bit. She understands what Harry had felt now. That anger at her own self for not being strong enough to stop in time. Draco had probably said things to try and break her out of it, had made sounds of pain. She had eventually, but she should have right away. She should have the moment she was ordered to hurt him at all.

She expects more from herself. She has thought about it since she left the interrogation room, knowing, and hardly slept all night, playing it out in her mind. Had it been a wand? A whip? She hadn't thought of a knife, but she had imagined that scream he gave under the Cruciatus, and he had given it to her, down the length of her arm.

"I'm sorry." Her voice sounds a little clogged and wet, and he groans again.

"Most people can't break the Curse no matter what it forces them to do. It's the reason Death Eaters with dozens of kills get off when they claim they were under it. People have killed their mothers, their wives, their children. You look like an idiot, apologizing for a few cuts before managing to break out of it. Stop with the pity party. It's highly annoying."

If he's being honest in saying the cuts weren't too deep, that she had been fighting it the whole time, the curse couldn't have been too strong on her. She should have broken it sooner. If it had been worse... If she hadn't broken it... God, if she hadn't.

"I'm so-"

"If you apologize again, I'm going to tell Potter you reacted as if you did some horribly unforgivable thing to me. I wonder what he'll think of it. Your view of how guilty a person is when they hurt someone under a curse that takes away control of their actions. I think he'll be fairly interested."

He's glaring at her harder than the anger she can conjure to return it properly. She knows it's an empty threat, that it's a point.

"Do you see it?" She lifts her chin. "When you look at me, do you-"

"No."

"You haven't remembered it when you looked at me, not once, since-"

"It's not the part I remember."

They stare at one another until she drops her eyes to his finger, rubbing back and forth along the curve of his mug. She doesn't ask him what part he does remember then, because out of the possibilities that she knows, there are none she wants to remember herself. And not once had he let on that it disturbs him, that he's thinking about it, or has treated her differently or acted oddly. She believes him, because she thinks he's the sort to be honest about it. Even if he's lying about it for whatever reason, she's been looking for the hint of it too closely to have not found it by now.

All of them have encountered a fellow Phoenix or Auror put under Imperius during a battle, casting the Killing Curse at their own side. No one ever blames them. It's just a tactic of war, and like all things in war, there are victims. But she had been clinging to the hope that it would never be her. Especially to someone like him, or her friends, or her old professors, and most of all to anyone it would be too late to save.

"My life sucks," she mutters. "I-"

He laughs at her. Actually laughs at her.

She stares at him, snapping her mouth shut, and shoves him in his good shoulder. She scowls, but the way his whole body is shaking and his eyes are squeezed shut forms a tugging sensation at the corner of her mouth that she fights. It's like he lights up the room, and her stomach does these weird things, and her breathing gets strange. He bends his head to cackle in the space between them, and she tugs on his hair, annoyed because she wants to cry, and the last thing she wants to do right now is feel the burden lessen.

"It's not funny," she says, and he laughs harder.

Day: 1559; Hour: 21

When he sleeps, she holds her hand over the silver glint of scars in the moonlight. She imagines a knife in her hand, and she moves quickly in slashes and stabs, but she still can't picture it. A part of her is glad she can't remember, though she knows this is a weak thought. Draco seems as unaffected by it as she had told Harry she was, but she feels that she should carry the memory as well, so he's not alone in it.

She rests her head against his chest, staring down at the rise and fall of his stomach, and moves an arm around his waist. Ba-dump, ba-dump, ba-dump, she mouths to the calm beat beneath her ear. He grunts in his sleep, his hand edging under her shirt and up her back. His fingers spread out between her shoulder blades, pressing her closer, and she finally closes her eyes.

Day: 1560; Hour: 11

"Maybe there isn't a spy." Ron rubs his thumb in a circle at the middle of his forehead, staring down at the remnants of his lunch.

"You can't really believe that, Ron." Harry's eyes glint, and for a second, she remembers sixth year and how he wouldn't shut up about Draco Malfoy. She huffs a breath at the thought.

"Activating the coin could have been a fluke. If someone put the wrong mission number, and-"

"I doubt it, and plus-"

"Maybe the Death Eaters caught on when everyone started to Portkey in. We made a lot of noise-"

"Fine, let's just say that's right," Harry snaps. "Why wouldn't they question us? They would have tortured information out of us. Locations, plans, strategies, everything. So why not?"

"Maybe..." Ron's eyes flicker to her, and she drops her own, wide and unblinking to the table. "No offense, Hermione, but they could have gotten everything out of you, and you just don't remember. They took your memory because they didn't want us to know what they know now."

"Personally, I don't want to think we've been fighting for years against people so dense. They should know that we would assume they know everything, no matter what. It seems a lot of trouble to erase Hermione's memories for something like that."

"I-" she tries, not really knowing what she's going to say anyway.

"That's true."

"They took out the whole first day, up until before they took us. They must have thought she had been catching on, or maybe she had multiple encounters with the traitor. That's the sort of information they erase memories because of." When Harry convinces himself of something, there is little they can do to convince him otherwise.

Ron nods, burying his head in his hands for a moment. "All the team members, and backup, came out innocent. I doubt the spy was one of the people who died. So that means it could be...anyone but us."

Hermione clears her throat, trying to shake the uncomfortable feeling that settles over her bones. She hates not remembering things. A day of memories, gone forever from her head. Not that she wanted to relive the experience of someone turning her back to ribbons or anything, but she would like to know if she told them anything. She doesn't think she would, but she can't even know for sure.

"I want to make a list of all the people who have come through Headquarters, or accessed the Minister's floor at the Ministry in the past week. They came up with the mission in the past week, so if the Death Eaters were warned about the mission beforehand...the person would have had to look at the documents in that frame of time."

"That's a lot of people, Hermione." Ron gives her an incredulous look, because he never did care for anything involving parchment, research, and work.

"We can narrow it down by likelihood. We'll start with the guards who are always in front of the doors to the file room here and at the Ministry. We'll make sure none of them left the door unguarded at any time, and that they don't have a skip in their memories. If nothing suspicious comes of that, we're definitely looking at one of the Stiffs."

"Lupin said the interrogation reports state that none of the team members told anyone outside of the team about the mission. The meeting room is always covered by Silencing charms, and Lupin and I were the only ones to handle the folder outside of that room." Harry pulls at his hair, shoving his glasses up his nose as if he were too impatient to even give that time.

"What about Lupin's office? Did he leave the folder there at any time?" Ron asks, his blue eyes swerving over her head at the creak behind her.

"This must be some form of the conversation you three would have before you were about to get into a spectacularly dangerous situation." McGonagall's smile is grim as she rounds the table, peering at them over her glasses. "All the guards are being questioned now. I assure you that this is not the first spy we have suffered, and nothing we can't handle. The three of you have enough going on, without taking this on as well."

"Yes, Professor," Harry mutters, too occupied with his thoughts to notice what he said, or the amused look thrown his way.

"If we can be of any help-" Hermione starts.

"We'll be sure to let you know." McGonagall pats her shoulder, sends a disapproving look toward Ron and Harry, and heads for the kitchen.

"So, er... What do you imagine the Death Eaters used to eat at this table?" Ron asks, aware that McGonagall can still hear their conversation.

"Whatever humans normally eat, Ronald."

Day: 1561; Hour: 14

Everyone's on alert. She doesn't hear of a single mission for days. Ron reminds them of what Draco said about well-connected people with a significant look toward McGonagall's office. Hermione doesn't talk to him for two days. Harry decides they'll try to break into the filing room to see if they can, and if anyone will notice, if nothing comes out of the guards. When Hermione points out the risks, Harry informs her that he's doing it alone, like the traitor would have, but she still sets up a contact coin in case he needs her. Molly drags Ron to the Burrow, and Harry and Hermione exchange guilty looks after they adamantly decline.

Whispers breath down every corridor of the Ministry, Headquarters, and the safe houses. There aren't many names that aren't brought up harshly, from Harry Potter down to Harry 'Twatter'.

Day: 1561; Hour: 17

"Don't even think about it, Granger."

She glares, dropping her hand from its inch toward his biscuits. "I just wanted one."

"That's nice," Draco mutters, flipping another page of the ancient looking book in his lap.

"You should be used to this by now. You should just fork it over as-"

She narrows her eyes to slits when his mouth starts moving silently over the words he's reading. She raises her nose at him and marches off for the kitchen, taking her book with her.

Day: 1561; Hour: 18

She plops down on the couch next to him, balancing her plate on her knees. She flips open her book on the armrest, nonchalantly waving the scent of her fresh biscuits toward him with her other hand. She had to make two batches after the bottomless pits of Harry, Ron, and Lupin followed the smell. She barely escaped with the ones she has.

She moans softly as she bites into the soft, sweet warmth of the treat. She devours it like it's the best thing she's ever tasted, smacking her lips and humming happily. She's halfway through her second when he stands, leaving his book open and on the table. She looks at him for the first time, watching him swagger from the room.

He's back when she's about to finish her third, and she looks over at the gulping noise. He smacks his lips, the glass of milk clinking as he sets it on the table. She swallows, her throat and mouth dry, as she eyes his drink.

"Thankfully, I managed to get a glass of milk before McGonagall continued siphoning the last of it down her throat like it came from the fountain of youth."

"Here," Hermione growls, knocking the plate into his arm.

He looks over at it, his tongue poking into his cheek, like he has to think about it or something. "I don't know, Granger. You might be the spy, after all. Having my lover poison me is a hackn-"

"Malfoy, I will poke you in the eye if you do not hand me-"

"You'll poke me in the eye?"

"Yes. With this finger." She raises the index of her right hand, and curls it menacingly at him.

He raises an eyebrow at her, his right eye twitching twice with his incredulous look. "Do it."

"What?"

"Do it."

She opens her mouth to question his sanity, and growls at him instead. Sadly, shoving the biscuit in his mouth doesn't take the smug grin off his face for more than three seconds. She snatches the glass and glares at him.

Day: 1562; Hour: 1

She has a dream. There's someone on the ground, a face unknown but a body that is familiar, and a stranger tells her there was a battle, a fight, something terrible. And Hermione runs through the woods like they are about to burn all down and take her with them in a crackling storm of flames and ash, and the pounding of feet and breath behind her is Neville. I can't lose someone else, I can't lose another one, she yells, cries, and Neville flashes through the trees after her. There are bodies on the ground, piled in a pool, and she grabs them each in turn by soaked collars and cold arms, and none of them are who she's looking for.

She wakes to an empty room, a layer of sweat over her forehead, and silence beyond her gasps for breath. She throws the blanket off of her, turning on the lights quickly, and stares at the ceiling as her heartbeat rages.

Day: 1562; Hour: 16

He finds her by the lake, under a swirl of orange and red leaves. The jumper Molly made her years ago is hanging off her, dark red, and a large, golden 'H' across the front. His own is dark green, the Slytherin crest over the left breast, and she finds it a bit...ironic. This could almost be Hogwarts, if they had been different people then. Maybe if they had grown up after the war. Maybe it would make perfect sense.

He holds up the book she had left in the house, a feather sticking out between the pages she had last read. She looks at it for a moment, then tangles her fingers into the hem of her jumper.

"I'm not trying to forget things." She says it in a harsh way, because there had been a half hour used up of her life contemplating what it would be like if she did.

Just the worst ones. The ones she dreamt about before she woke up feeling like something inside of her was dying and yelling out for her to save it. That slow, sinking burn that she sometimes feels even when she's not actively remembering anything at all.

"The traitor," she says, and the wind bogs it down, blows it out. "They think I knew who it was."

He shoves his left hand in his pocket. His right stays out, the one he would reach for his wand for. She looks at it in the holster at his side, the ridges around the handle, and wonders if the gloss where his thumb pushes has worn out like it has on hers.

"They said it was one of the Aurors who died, but they don't have any proof. It was just process of elimination. But I don't know why they would try to hide my memories of that if they were just going to kill-"

"There are several reasons why they might have killed him after they hadn't planned on it. And they didn't hide your memories, Granger, they removed them." He looks up at the sky, at the grey or the leaves spinning above their heads, or the bird diving toward a tree. "There's no skip in your memories, it's seamless. They removed them completely." He moves his arm out a little, and the book slips to between his side and forearm. "There's nothing you can do to get them back."

She had been afraid of that. Any magic involving the mind is dangerous, and she has read of quite a few things she hadn't been willing to risk, but there are some she wanted to try after researching more thoroughly. Hermione is the sort who hates when she needs to know something and can't find the right book right away. When she needs to know it and it's already inside her mind?

She had to try. She wonders how skilled Draco is to be sure there's nothing left behind. He had cast the spell, so he must either not be skilled enough to just look at her and enter her mind, or he had done it for her sake to know when he was.

He's staring at her when she looks up from the water, and the arch of his eyebrow tells her he knows what she's thinking without any spell at all. "Do you know what happens when magic doesn't find a target in your mind, or are-"

"Of course I know. It can cause brain damage, bleeding, affect or even eliminate any or all of your senses. It can make you forget memories, or force you to remember random ones continuously, or-"

"And that sounds like a good plan to you?" He tilts his head. "There's a reason-"

"It's obviously not the desired outcome, but if there's a trace-"

"There's not."

"If it's a weaker potion or spell, it's most likely to cause the mildest side-effects-"

"You're willing to take that risk?"

She breathes in as deeply as she can, then releases it in a punch of air. She knows she can't take the risk now. He might be wrong, but if he's right... And it's not like she can check herself, or have someone else do it. As far as she's concerned, she'll never let another person in her head.

"No. Even if it's the lesser side-effects, I don't want to forget anything else. If it's a spell or potion to remember lost memories, and there are none that it can find to be buried, it'll cause me to remember...remember the ones I bury." Constantly.

It's bad enough when they break out of the wreckage she puts them under, by themselves or from the simplest things. A bark of sound, a candle flame, a shadow, a laugh that sounds just like..., an expression that would be said by..., a thing that would be loved if... If. And. But.

Sometimes she's afraid to stop and think. She's afraid to look beyond the immediate of whatever is happening, because she'll catch a glimpse of blue and see Neville's eyes squinted, and a busted grin that couldn't notice the wound enough to stop from smiling. And then she'll feel like her heart dug itself out of her chest.

"And I bury a lot, I suppose," she mutters, leaving a track in the dirt with the toe of her shoe. "I keep ignoring things. Pushing them back and pushing them back, because I'm afraid I won't be able to even function if I don't. I think I should mourn for everyone more, because they deserved for me to, and because I might need to. Then I think about how it won't do me any good, and I should just keep pushing it away so I can finish the war."

He sniffs, maybe from the cold or maybe from the silence. "You think breaking down, becoming a patient at Mungo's for a couple months, is going to make you feel less guilty? It's not. Look at Weasley's brother – won't come out of his room, speak to anyone, broke his wand. What is that doing for anyone? This war broke everything. Letting it break you isn't going to fix shit."

She kicks a stone into the water, and watches it fade into the murkiness below. A red fish darts toward the disturbance, swimming circles. "Sometimes things need to be destroyed in order to save it."

Like the world. Like him.

"Granger, we're in the fucking fallout." His eyes scan across the lake, back and forth, like he can see it all in front and around them. "It doesn't get much more destroyed than this. Isn't that your bleeding heart cue to start saving?"

"It's just... Sometimes... Shouldn't it kill me?" She sighs, shoving her hair back from her face, angry that she can't find the right words to say.

"Like you'd let it." He's smirking at her, and her cheeks turn red. Not from arousal, or embarrassment, just warmth. The kind of warmth that starts from the inside and surprises you.

"It still feels surreal. After all this time, losing any of them...surreal. Like I still can't believe it. Sometimes it really hits me, and other times I just can't believe it's actually my life. They say that there's steps for grief, but I'm at step one, then the last step, then step three...in the span of ten minutes, I'm all over the board and back again. How's that for normal?" She pauses, watching the fish dart away. "I scare myself."

She would like to know if it's the same for him. If sometimes he sees Neville, or Pansy, or looks in the mirror and thinks of his father. If he dreams of the ones he used to dream beside, and remembers how he watched them die. She thinks he must. But she also thinks he'll never say it, because he buries it down too.

"There's no right way to grieve, or handle war, or move on, or die. Some of us will turn into psychopaths, some of us will be George Weasley, and some of us won't have an idea about who we are. We've been fighting in a war for four years. There's no such thing as normal anymore."

Hermione nods, again feeling the connection that ties them all together. They are all destined for that road of unknowing after the war too. They are all going to either crumble to ash or build skyscrapers of themselves. They are all sort of screwed, and scared, and messed up.

"I should be happy." He turns his head toward her, and she glances at him before fixing her eyes on the lake. "When I went...Dean... When Seamus...when Seamus gave his life for me, Dean told me not to waste it. He meant for me to shut up, and the Death Eaters outside the door, but... But I think I'm supposed to be happy. I think I'm supposed to make it worth it. Seamus, and all the sacrifices, and my friends, and the war. I'm supposed to make it worth it."

There isn't a better way to honor their memory. She just has to remember to be happy. She has to keep reminding herself to work for that. To not waste the life she still has. She has to laugh even when it hurts, because she promised them. Because she can't let it kill her.

"Does that count toward not dying of hypothermia?"

She snorts, loudly, looking up at him. "What is with you and dying of hypothermia? You bring it up-"

"It's an embarrassing way to die. It's like, death by bees. Or death by slippers."

She huffs a laugh, and shakes her head at him as they exchange a look. "Hypothermia is a serious-"

"Hence my suggestion to go inside."

"Yo-"

"Implied suggestion."

The look she gives him might be mocking, and she flinches away when he shifts toward her. His eyebrows dart up, and his hand is quick to follow, but she jumps back before he can reach her. They stare at one another for a split second before he moves again, and she breaks for the manor with a yelp, his feet pounding behind her the entire way.