Author's Note: This is a short chapter, but I really like it. I enjoyed making Harry feel incredibly guilty. Oh, and his sentiments at the end of this chapter are the basis for the sequel- if I ever settle down to getting that written. Enjoy!

Disclaimer: I have absolutely no idea why Alana nicknamed Harry "Hal," but I have the sneaking suspicion I stole the name from a book I once read. If I did, please don't sic the author on me!

I understood why you hated me; more than understood, actually. I had lied to you, cheapened every moment we'd ever shared, and then, when I had your trust, I betrayed you to your greatest enemy. How could you not loathe me? You would have been a saint if you did not, and I had never made the mistake of assuming you were a saint, Hal.

Upon seeing his nickname, which Alana had used for some reason neither of them remembered, Harry smiled to himself. He had been so caught up in remembering her as Lady Montblanc, Madam Malfoy, the Wishgiver, that he had very nearly forgotten her as nothing more than his Lana.

His smile faded then. Maybe Alana hadn't been the only one to betray them. He had found it easy, so very easy, to believe the worst of Alana, and to hate her for it. His hatred had fueled him for so long that it had blinded him to her utterly. It wasn't Alana that he hated, he realized; it had been the image of her that he'd created in his mind.

Maybe he was just as guilty as she for the murders of Hal and Lana.

I thought I had been prepared to accept your detestation. But the cold, slow-burning anger I'd been imagining for five years was nothing like the vitriolic hatred with which I was met.

I tried to shake it off, but your anger left me shaken and surprised. I'd spent five years trying to comfort myself with thoughts that my betrayal wasn't that bad, because I'd never completely won you over, I'd never meant that much to you. But upon finding you alive, the depth and strength of your anger and hatred forced me to realize the severity of my betrayal. I had to face what I had done to you, and take responsibility for it, before I could even begin to think of making things right.

I spent my days going about my job for the Order. I spent my nights thinking and dreaming of you. When you died, a part of me had died with you. I know you probably won't believe that. But with you died my vivacity, my joy, my hope. When you died, I became what you accused me of being-- cold, distant, haughty, less than human.

When I found you alive, though, I discovered that that part of myself-- the part that had constituted your Lana-- wasn't dead, as I'd thought. It had merely been buried, along with all the other memories, feelings, and parts of me that had once been yours.

January 06, 2019

Harry closed the journal, guilt weighing him down. He'd made so many mistakes where Alana was concerned; how could he ever ask her forgiveness?

"I gotta get outta here," he muttered.

He grabbed his broom, but quickly realized there was nowhere on the castle grounds he could go to escape. Groaning, he threw down his Starsweeper 3000 and picked up a bag of Floo Powder.

"5692 Victoria Grove," he said, throwing a handful of powder on the flames.

One dizzying moment later and he was in the kitchen of Ron and Hermione's home, and he was being attacked by his favorite neice.

"Unca Hawwy! Unca Hawwy!" Molly lisped, giggling. "Mama, Unca Hawwy came to see me!"
"I can see that, Molly," a pregnant Hermione said as she straightened away from the stove. "Go wash up for dinner."

Molly scampered off excitedly, leaving Harry and Hermione alone.

"What's wrong?" Hermione asked knowingly.
"I had to get away," Harry said, sinking into a chair and burying his face in his hands.
"Away from work?"
"From her."

Hermione nodded silently, knowing to whom Harry was referring. He'd told Ron and Hermione about the journal at Christmas, and ever since, Hermione had been dying of curiosity, burning to know what Alana had said, and how Harry was reacting.

"I'm so confused, Hermione," he sighed. "I should hate her. I should want her dead, or back in Azkaban."
"But you don't," Hermione said.
"Not at all," he shook his head. "I read what she wrote, and… it hurts me, Hermione. It hurts to think of her in pain. And then I find myself thinking back, over everything- the Ministry days, our engagement, James- somehow, I can't believe that she was faking it all. But… if she wasn't faking it…" He groaned. "If she wasn't faking it, then it had to be real. And if that's the case, then that means that I destroyed it, I betrayed her as much as she did me."
"But Harry… Alana's the one who threw it all away," Hermione said. "She gave you up to Voldemort."
"And I refused to give her a chance to explain herself," Harry returned. "I cut her out of my life, and James along with her."

He fell silent, then. Yes, he was every bit as guilty as Alana, whether anyone else accepted that truth or not. He knew now what Alana had learned eleven years ago- despite it all, neither of them had been faking anything. They had built that relationship together.

And together they had destroyed it.

Which meant that any hopes of rebuilding what they had broken would entail a joint effort. But perhaps they could resurrect Hal and Lana after all.