Disclaimer: See past chapters.
It had been too long.
Two years to be exact.
That's seven hundred and thirty days.
One million, fifty one thousand, eight hundred and ninety seven point fifty three minutes.
Sixty three million, one hundred and thirteen thousand, eight hundred and fifty one point nine seconds.
And believe me, I have counted.
There are only twenty four hours in one day, but for me, that's twenty four hours of pain and suffering. But then again, it's probably nothing compared to what she could be going through right now.
It's the two year anniversary today, and as I look at myself in the mirror I wonder where all the time went because even though every minute without her is agonizing, it's gone too quickly. And because every single second of the day she is gone, it's one step closer to everyone believing her to be dead. Because I don't want that to be true, she's not dead... she cannot be dead. And even though everyone else thinks it, even though a service has been held for her missing, alive body, even though everyone completely hammers it into my head every single day, I still refuse to believe it.
My Hermione is not dead.
She's just... gone.
Where? You may ask.. well, I don't know but I know for a fact she's still out there, somewhere...
People look at me strangely when I am the only one who believes in something that is seemingly impossible but when you love someone, when you love someone more than anyone else in the entire world.. when you love someone more than life itself, then you just know when they're dead.
Which is why Harry and I are the only people left who are still looking, still hoping, still waiting, still dreaming. People ask how we know she's okay, how we know that she is alive, and I tell them the same thing every single time - I feel her. I see her. I almost hear her sometimes. I just know.
Dreams – my dreams are filled with her laughing and smiling, but other times I wake up sweating and crying as I can feel the pain she is going through. I find myself in a dark, small cell with chains around my arms and legs as I lay on the cold, concrete floor. Pain throbs through my body as I try and close my eyes, forgetting about the day ahead of me and just focusing on the one thing I want more than anything else – my freedom.
And then I wake up, and although I have never seen the girls face, I know it's her. I know it's Hermione.
She is alive.
I know she is.
~ .. ~
The light stings your eyes as you stumble out of the building, lifting up your weak arms to cover your face as you try to get used to the sudden turn of events. One minute you're laying on the cold floor of your small cell, chained up and bleeding and the next you're being dragged up the stairs quickly as someone grabs you in their arms and takes you outside.
Outside? Surely that must mean you are free. Free from pain, free from grief, free from him. But then you find yourself wondering if you are ever going to be free from that, because memories live on and sometimes memories can be so much stronger than the actual event.
Hermione agrees with that more than anything, sometimes she would find herself in a daze, never really understanding what was going on, never knowing what to do, where she was, who to be. Sometimes, she would find herself waking up and forgetting, and sometimes she would look around her tiny cell and just accept it as her life from now on.
But memories, memories are different. Memories can either play out in vivid shots, causing you to stumble a little in shock, causing you to shake your head in disbelief as you think back to that time, causing you to bite down on your lip in wonder or they can blur into one and hit you in just a second.
Memories are awful things if you think about it, memories hurt, memories stay, memories always find a way back to the front of your mind. You can never forget.
She thinks about running back, accepting her life as a slave and awaiting for the day he kills her or lets her die. She thinks about pulling out of his arms and going back into the house, running down the stairs and inside her cell, locking herself in there so she cannot be taken away from the life she has become so accustomed to.
But something makes her stay, something makes her move her arm from her face and look up at the blue sky – marvelling at the beautiful, perfect sky. She starts to notice things she never had before; the odd butterfly roaming past, or the small flowers in bloom, or the way the clouds changed just a little.
She had missed the way everything felt as well, the breeze lightly tickled her exposed skin, leaving goosebumps as she shivered a little, curling up into a tight ball in the persons arms.
To live or to die?
To stay or to run?
She wanted Ron, she knew that much, she needed to see him again, she had to kiss him once more, she had to be in his muscular arms. She needed him more than she had ever needed anyone, or anything.
She heaved a deep sigh, closing her eyes to the world as she thought about everything that had happened over the two years. Tears fell from her eyes as she thought about how much she could have done instead, how much time had been wasted. She thought about who she could be right now, where she could be in her life. Would she be married to Ron? Would she be working for the Ministry? Would she have found her parents? Would she be anything?
She held in a sob, her hand leaving her side to clamp over her mouth as she tried to stop herself. Two whole years had come and gone, and now she wasn't Hermione from before. She was Hermione; another victim of war, a victim of the fight between dark and light. Nothing would ever be the same. She would never be the same.
She had managed to convince herself Ron had moved on, she would knock on his front door and his girlfriend would answer, grinning at Hermione as she told her it was too late – Ron had moved on. She had imagined the whole scene in her mind so many times when she was locked in that cell. Ron would shake his head and tell her that she couldn't have expected him to wait forever, and she would run off, wishing she had just died.
Death; it was a funny word, something that no longer scared her but as the same time, the whole prospect perplexed her. Did she want to die? Did she want to live? She had decided a long time ago, after her fourth suicide attempt, that she didn't want to do either. Something was telling her to live, something was stopping her from dying but at the same time, she was stopping herself from living. But, why would she want to live when there is no life beyond the four walls she found herself trapped in? Why would she want to live when all that awaited for her was pain, pain and more pain.
Tears would fall.
Blood would pour.
Screams would echo.
Shouts could be heard.
But inside those four walls, she was safe, nobody could hurt her apart from herself. Nothing would get to her. She would cover her ears, close her eyes and curl up in a ball until someone came for her the next morning. She was safe for a few hours. And she was afraid, she was afraid that all of it would be taken from her. Safety would leave, and more fear would replace it.
She bit down on her lip as they came to a stop, ignoring the voices she could hear as she thought back to her seventeen year old self. She had dreams, hopes, aspirations. This Hermione had nothing, she just had a past, a present and no future. This Hermione would never make it on her own out there, she wasn't going to make it past the first day without someone holding her up.
She wanted to feel loved, she wanted to be safe, she wanted to love someone. She needed all the normal things but how could that happen when you're stuck in a continual time loop, always remembering the sound of that belt cracking down on your back? The sound of your torturers moans of pleasure playing in your mind over and over again, like a broken record? How could you forget the past when it is what made you who you are? How can you have a future when you feel this worthless? This helpless?