A/N: Hey guys! So So So sorry for the delay - my life took over slightly, I have a new job, but I've finally finished the next chapter. A huge thank you to everyone who has read so far, and who has taken the time to review. I'm loving all the feedback so keep it coming.

Anywho, I think you've waited long enough, I hope you enjoy,

xBx

DISCLAIMER: I own nothing. That is all.

~ Chapter 11: Opening Up ~

Harry sighed, and walked up behind Hermione. Silently he wrapped his arms around her as she placed the lasagne down on the cooker-top, holding her close he sighed, "I'm sorry" He whispered, "I didn't stop to think about your life here. But I went through a lot trying to find you – we all did. It hasn't been easy,"

"I'm sorry too," Hermione whispered, placing her arms across Harry's "We need to talk. Properly, Clearly we both have a lot of things we need to say to each other. We have to stop walking on eggshells."

"I can do that. Can you?"

"I'll have to. I'll tell you everything, what was going through my head when I left, why I thought it was right to leave, and what I did when I left. And you can ask me anything you want."

"And I will tell you everything that happened after you left. Everything, and if you don't feel guilty about leaving us without a word now, you will do when you know what the effect has been. I don't mean that in a nasty, spiteful way. Just that I know you, and I'm not going to water down the details for you. I can't if we have any chance of moving on from this."

"Okay." Hermione took a deep breath, "okay," she repeated. "Lets eat. And we'll talk."

Fifteen minutes later, Harry had cleared the table, and the pair were sat down facing each other, plates loaded with lasagne, wine glasses full, with a bottle of wine an a basket of bread sitting between them. A few moments of silence passed, before Harry finally broke it,

"Are you going to talk anytime soon?"

"I'm finding the right place to start:" Hermione assured him, "Everything happened so fast, all at once." Hermione took a deep breath, and began her narrative,

"I used to try and not think about our futures after the war, but I couldn't help it. I never knew if we were going to make it out alive, but I always liked to think we would. So whenever I let my mind slip, and I thought about life after the war, I saw you married to Ginny, and Myself married to Ron. I saw us having kids, the whole humdrum life-

"Then Ron died, and my future died with him, I didn't know what to do next. But the one thought that got me through it, was the thought of my parents returning. I was so positive I had done everything to keep them safe. I knew they would be returning anytime soon, and when they had settled back in, I would have people to help me through this – I knew I could get through anything with my parents by my side, and that one day, I would be able to see a different future again- But at that moment, at the funeral, all I could see was the rest of that day, I couldn't see tomorrow, or the day after. It's like it was a void, like that day was never going to end, I couldn't see how to move on. I was waiting for my parents; I knew they would be able to make it all OK-

"Then the Ministry official turned up, and told me my parents had died. In that moment I panicked. I couldn't think, I felt like I was suffocating, like the wizarding world had taken everything from me, and now it was trying to take me too. I realise that sounds crazy, but I don't know how else to describe it – I panicked, I felt like I needed to escape. Originally, I only planned to go away for a little while, a week or so, maybe a month, just to try and come to terms, to try and grieve, and move on. I just needed space to clear my head. So I ran out, without a word –I figured you knew be me well enough, that I'd gone for peace and quiet, and that I would be back in a few weeks. I expected to be back in a few weeks, I planned to come back truly I did. I don't know when I changed my mind, or what changed my mind, but something did.

"I didn't come here strait away, I travelled...well everywhere really: I went to Ireland first, went all around the southern coast on horseback – I know that sounds incredibly stupid, but it was something my mother had always wanted to do, I used to tell her it would take too long, that it wasn't practical, that we weren't living in the 18th century. But she was determined. I don't know what made me want to do it, I can't remember my rationalisations at that time, but I did it. It took a month, I went along the coast line, on country roads, sometimes I had to go further inland to get away from major traffic, stopping in little villages, in B&B's or houses with stable facilities. It was like another life. And I thrived on that–

"I ignored everything that had happened, it was as if my life, before the funeral, and my life after the funeral we two different lives. And this life, the after-life, it was pain free, it was worry free, and I needed that for a little bit longer. But I knew that I couldn't escape it forever, and in the back of my mind I knew I needed to try and face it. Which is why I came here - you know I used to come here all the time with my parents, when I was young, I thought this would help me face it, make me think about my parents. But when I got here, for the first time in seven years, the place had changed, it wasn't like I remembered, and I couldn't see my parents here, which made it easy to not think about them - I couldn't see them here, it was as if they had never been here-

"Once I got here I didn't want to leave. I saw this place was for sale, I had my trust fund money, which covered the asking price, and I still had money left over to do the place out. It was perfect for realising my childhood dream, so I went with it. The place was mine by the end of the week. I magicked up a few documents – muggle exam results and such, so that I would be able to have the right credentials to start up my own business – it was after that, that I stopped using magic; it felt good to have to work hard to get end results, instead of using magic. Doing everything the muggle way was somewhat therapeutic, it kept my mind and body busy, left little or no time to think-

"That's when I locked away all my school things, all my wizarding books, and my wand, in the closet-room. This place took a while, but after six months of paperwork pushing and constant renovating I had my business and my home. The time passed more quickly than I was aware of, I didn't give a thought about it, I just lived day by day, but once I got this place ready to open, I realised how long I had been gone, and I thought of contacting you, of coming back, but there was still a lot to do here, I wasn't sure if I could leave for a few days without any consequences - and, to tell the truth, I was scared of going back-

"So I left it. Every Christmas I thought about you all, every year on your birthday, on Ginny's birthday, I thought about going back, but the longer I left it the harder it was. I was scared, and I took the easy way out, I always found an excuse to not go. I buried my head in the sand. And somewhere down the line, I actually became happy here. So now it became even harder to leave, to go back, because I knew you would all want me to stay, and I couldn't. I can't, somewhere down the line this became more than a distraction, I enjoy this, I enjoy having my own business, I love it. And I can't give it up-

"I want to be part of your life, I want to be a part of Ginny's life again, I want to see the Weasleys again. But I can't give up my life here, it's…..it's my life. And it scares me that you want me to leave it behind. I was so thrilled that you walked back into my life when you did, but it scared me that the first thing you asked me to do was leave with you. I was so happy that you stayed, I was so happy that I got to know you again, but I couldn't let myself feel everything I wanted to feel, what I want to feel, because I was scared you would ask me to leave it all again. I need a compromise. I need you to help me compromise, I want you to think about, and accept a compromise."

Hermione became silent, she wasn't aware how long she had been talking, it was hard when she started, her sentences were disjointed, and stuttered, but the more she talked, the easier it was to keep going, and she felt relieved to finally tell Harry, to explain to someone, everything that had happened. But as her narrative came to the end, she found her words becoming disjointed once more, unsure as how best to describe he feelings and her wants at this moment in time, and she decided to quit before saying something senseless and confusing.

Harry sat and listened to her in silence, never interrupting her. Their plates were empty now, and Harry had kept the wine topped up throughout Hermione's speech, he took a sip of his drink, not sure how to start, his own promised narrative, nor how much of his own feelings he should tell her right away:

"I, erm….I never realised how attached you were to this place, I'm sorry about that. But if I'm to be truly honest with you, I was angry at you for leaving, angry at you for staying away, and I was angry at this place, for keeping you away." He started truthfully,

"When you left, you were able to forget, but you must know that we stayed behind with the constant reminders, and it was a very hard few months. And it didn't get much easier." Harry took a deep breath before continuing, recounting the events starting from her disappearance

"I was the one who noticed you had gone: I came to find you in early in the morning, I needed to talk to you, because I felt like I was intruding on the family grief. You were the one person who I could talk to. I did think you would come back soon enough, I knew you would have gone away to get some perspective, like you said, I trusted you would come back in a few weeks. I didn't say anything to anyone for a few hours, until they too had noticed you were gone, and then I covered for you: I told them all you needed some space, some time to come to terms with the death of your parents. I told them you'd be back in a few weeks, never thinking for a moment that you would never come home-

"A few weeks went by and you didn't come back. Another month went, and still you didn't come back. That's when we started to worry, and also when the Ministry got wind of your disappearance – they'd been trying to get in contact with you about joining the Magical Law Enforcement department, when they didn't hear anything back, they asked me if I knew where you were, I couldn't lie anymore, and I was getting worried myself-

"They arranged a search, which turned up nothing – of course by now you would have been here, with a new identity and a new look. The Daily Prophet got wind, and all sorts of stories started circulating, thinking you'd been taken by force, a possible act of revenge, but no body was ever found, and it soon became public knowledge that you had disappeared of your own choice. Of course, the fact that you never returned was always worrisome, and after the horror story theories printed in the prophet, every single one of us couldn't help but think that maybe something had happened to you" Harry paused to take another sip of wine, Hermione shifted uncomfortably in her seat at the thought of how much worry she had actually caused,

"I started to look for you; I was looking for you before the Ministry stepped in of course, and I continued to look for you after they had stopped - in fact once they stopped, I started looking for you more. Every spare minute I had was spent trying to figure where you would go, and when I had a weekend or a week spare, I would go trawling the country looking for any possible signs of you - suffice to say Ginny wasn't too pleased-

"Don't get me wrong" Harry added, hastily, "She was just as worried about you as I was, and she wanted to find you as much as I did. But the fact I spent every spare waking moment in search of you, instead of trying to fix our relationship, didn't go down to well with her. Our relationship went sour pretty much right after you left. We argued a lot, but we stayed together, because everyone expected us to be together, everyone thought we belonged together-

"But it wasn't working. We were both changed by the war – we both realised certain things about ourselves. We stayed together more out of habit than anything else. The Holyhead Harpies recruited Ginny, I was inducted strait into the Auror department, our jobs took up a lot of time, which pushed our relationship even more into the background-

"Our relationship was over long before we actually ended things, but we were able to ignore our issues for a while, as our new careers took off. But in the end we both knew whom I really wanted to be with. It wasn't long after our split that she met Robert, he's a player on another team, they had a lot in common, he's a couple of years older – he went to Hogwarts, but he was a 'claw, so we never really crossed paths. But he's a good guy, they started hanging out a lot, he gave her the attention she didn't get from me - the attention she deserved. And she's happy, so I'm happy for her. And I'm glad she could move on-

"And in truth it was a relief, I didn't have to feel guilty for being continually absent. And I could finally fully accept and admit to myself what everyone else had known for years - that I'm in love, and I have been for as long as I can remember." Harry finished; he'd found it surprisingly easy to keep going once he had started talking, and before he knew what he was saying, he was'declaring himself', not something he'd been planning to do.

Hermione was at a loss for words, trying to process what Harry had said: a knowledge of his feelings intensified her sense of guilt, as it obviously intensified the amount of hurt she had actually caused him – all these years she had pictured him happy with Ginny, barely missing her absence, in truth it had been just the opposite. It also made her question the extent of her own feelings - she was beginning to realise that she was in fact in love with Harry Potter, but she was yet unsure as to how long she had been in love with him,

She looked up, but instead of declaring herself to him, she managed to ask: "So, where do we go from here?"

A/N: Ok, so I know there was a lot of dialogue...or rather two pretty long monologues, but the next couple of chapters will see the story moving along. As you may have figured out, in the story we're now into the beginning of December - so the next couple of chapters will be a little bit Christmassy :) so I will try very hard to get them up by Christmas eve at the latest :)

Hope you enjoyed, please review, and I'll be posting soon

xBx