CHAPTER DEDICATION(S):

This final chapter is dedicated to all of you. Thank you for bearing with the lengthy hiatuses that came with this story and thank you for accompanying me on the journey of this story! It has been a pleasure. – MV

Chapter 24 – The Girl of My Dreams

Total and complete darkness eclipsed his mind as Harry found himself drowning in blackness of his thoughts. He spent what seemed like hours calling out for Elaine – for anyone – to help him escape from the shadows from which he was now trapped. Was he stuck forever in this nightmarish state?

No, he told himself, he couldn't be. If he were, she would save him. She would help him escape back to reality! She did it all the time, right? Just before the dream became too real, he would be pulled out of his dreams.

But why was nothing happening now?

This dream – or rather, nightmare – was becoming all too real, and yet, still no savior. Still no Elaine… Harry could feel the darkness engulf his lungs as he continued to call out for help. It was almost choking him!

"Elaine…" he coughed out. "Please… my subconscious really was trying to tell me something. Please… you have to listen to me!"

Silence once more.

What was he expecting though? Harry fell to his knees, crawling desperately to find a way out. He felt like he was suffocating because of the darkness that surrounded him. Where was the pure light he saw in his dreams days before? Where was she?

"Elaine!" he stifled, his gaze weakly skating across the darkened horizon. "I need you! You are the girl of my dreams; it was always you."

Harry was growing frailer with every breath he took. After a short while, he felt as though his head was too heavy to keep up. And soon, Harry collapsed to the ground. His face pressed against the cold floor as his eyelid grew heavier.

Continuing to call out for Elaine, Harry curled up into a tight ball and slowly began to shut his eyes. Though he fought to keep them open, his body gave up the fight. Just as he was about to shut his eyes, a bright light emerged from the darkness – but it was too late. Harry had permanently slipped into the darkness.

"Elaine…" he muttered to himself, his eyes still shut tightly. "Elaine…"

His eye fluttered open as Harry felt a cool, damp compress smoothed out across the top of his forehead. He stared at the high ceiling above him as he felt a familiar warm surround his body.

"Rise and shine, Sleeping Beauty," Ginny greeted sarcastically, slowly removing the compress.

Harry pushed himself up from the bed, forcing himself to face Ginny. Where were they? He scanned his surroundings and concluded there was only one place in the castle he could possibly be.

"Hermione and Ron brought you in last night," she explained as Madam Pomfrey huffed about the Hospital Wing. Ginny and Harry both watched as she aided the other patients. "They figured you took a nasty blow to the head and they raced you here immediately."

Confusion dawned on Harry as Ginny proceeded to explain. Why was she even being civil with him? Harry winced as a familiar dullness in the back of his head began to throb. He gaped at the youngest Weasley as he tried to justify her well-mannered behavior.

Perhaps she felt sorry for him, he thought. Or maybe she realized that she was overreacting! Harry mentally smacked himself for even suggesting the latter.

"Ginny," he hacked, his voice still frail, "where's Elaine?"

Almost instantly, Harry regret bringing her up around Ginny. He watched as a fire grew violently in her eyes.

"Oh," she hissed. "Harry, she's the reason you're in here."

Before Harry could explain to Ginny that it wasn't Elaine's fault, Hermione and Ron burst through the doors of the Hospital Wing. The two of them struggled to make their way over to Harry as they carried two trays full of food.

"Thank goodness you're awake!" Hermione remarked, dumping the food on Harry's lap. "You gave us all a scare last night when you collapsed."

Now what was she talking about? Harry scratched the back of his head as Ron plopped himself into the chair beside Harry's bed. The jet-black haired boy touched his forehead, trying to recall what happened the night before. How could he have given them all a scare if only he and Elaine were at the scene?

Maybe she rushed to get them the moment it happened…

"He's asking for her," Ginny mumbled to Hermione and Ron.

Hermione bit her lip nervously while Ron's facial features hardened. Harry was baffled at the reactions his friends were having toward Elaine. It just didn't add up – what happened?

"Guys," Harry found the strength to speak up once again, "I have to apologize to her. I feel terrible for what I did."

"Are you mental?" Ron barked at Harry through a mouthful of toast. "That bloody girl owes you the apology."

Shooting Ron a dumbfounded look, Harry shook his head. He could not believe his friends. Where did they get off saying things like that? Surely, they did not believe that Elaine purposely landed him in the Hospital Wing during their time alone together.

"What are you talking about?" Harry shot back. "I hurt her!"

"You're the one in the Hospital Wing!" Hermione remarked.

His friends continued to gawk at him. Harry began to explain what happened the night before in the Gryffindor Common Room. He even told Hermione and Ron about the things that Elaine had told him. He spoke apologized to Ginny for hurting her in the process. And Harry told them everything that happened over the course of the past year – from the reason he started looking for his dream girl to the moment he knew his search was over.

However, this only caused the bewildered stares to worsen. Ron and Ginny exchanged a look with Hermione, half-expecting her to figure out what was wrong with Harry.

"Harry…" Hermione sucked in some air before going on. "… I don't know what you're talking about, but you're not in here because you hit your head in the common room. You're in here because you hit your head after the duel with Malfoy last night…"

Harry felt his whole world crumbling. What was Hermione trying to say? He felt himself getting weaker again as he put the pieces together himself. Had he just imagined everything?

"But when I asked about Elaine, you all reacted!" Harry remarked, finding a sliver of hope. "She exists! Run up to your dorm and get her, Hermione! She can tell you everything! From how my parents defeated Voldemort last year to what happened last night! I know she will; I'm not imagining anything."

Hermione tightly shut her eyes as she shook her head. Ron and Ginny stared at each other before staring back at the floor.

"Harry," Ginny began, "… you're the Boy Who Lived for a reason. That scar on your head is proof enough…"

Scar…? Oh no. Harry felt his stomach tighten as realization dawned on him. Ron and Hermione weren't dating. He and Ginny had never gone out – same went for all the other girls. That also meant that Voldemort was still out there. It meant that his parents were still dead. And now, he was in the Hospital Wing because he apparently hit his head on the floor… but that still didn't answer why they reacted the way the had.

"But… Elaine," Harry whispered softly. "… she's out there."

While the world around him seemed to shatter away, his friends explained to him the impossibilities of his story. So it was all a dream? The throbbing in the back of Harry's head worsened the more he thought about it. Slowly, it was all starting to make sense. His inability to feel any physical pain, his impotence to remember anything that Elaine mentioned from his past, everything was starting to make sense!

And it killed him.

Just then, Ron cleared his throat, snapping Harry back to reality. Ginny stood at the foot of the hospital bed, crossing her arms furiously across her chest. Hermione, who sat at Harry's bedside, stiffened as she pursed her lips together tightly. Although Ron continued to stuff food in his face, it was obvious there was an unspoken tension that suddenly surrounded the air.

Harry scanned the Hospital Wing to see what had changed the atmosphere. Madam Pomfrey was no longer hustling and bustling about the room; she was now assisting someone at the far end of the wing. But that couldn't be why his friends were so angry, he reasoned.

Then, his eyes fell upon the girl with whom Madam Pomfrey was speaking. His heart stopped as she scratched the back of her head. Her long light-brown curls cascaded just a little past her shoulders. Her brown eyes – though filled with worry and guilt – were still as mesmerizing as he had remembered. However, a frown slowly began to form on his face when he took a good look at the girl.

The Boy Who Lived panicked silently as Madam Pomfrey began to approach him – the girl trailing closely behind. What was he supposed to say? If he was in a duel with Malfoy, why were his friends blaming her?

"Mr. Potter," the caregiver's stern voice echoed the eerily quiet room, "you have another visitor."

Poking her head out from behind Madam Pomfrey's shoulder, the girl sent Harry an apologetic smile. His friends continued to glare at her as Madam Pomfrey retreated back to the other patients. Harry sighed; it was now or never.

The frown on Harry's face only grew worse as he caught a better glimpse at the girl he knew as Elaine. He had hoped that it had been a trick of the light, but the closer she stepped toward him, the clearer it became. She wasn't a Gryffindor; she was a Ravenclaw. His thoughts only began to exacerbate as he thought of all the other possible alternations his subconscious had made.

"Hello…" the girl greeted meekly, the apologetic smile still plastered on her face. "I'm… the girl who ran into you last night. And I apologize completely for all of this; I'm such a klutz…! I should have been watching where I was going-."

But suddenly, Harry didn't care. He could care less about any of the changes his mind made to this girl. He knew that it gave him a chance he didn't have in his dreams: the chance to get to know her.

"It was my own fault," Harry replied.

Ron, Hermione and Ginny shot Harry looks of disbelief. He was the one in the hospital bed and he was taking the blame! He understood their shock, but Harry also understood that it was probably more his fault that it was Elaine's. If he hadn't gotten caught up in trying to beat Malfoy to a pulp, he might've seen the petite Ravenclaw.

Harry sensed that he and Elaine wouldn't get anywhere with a conversation with his friends glaring at her like she was Malfoy. Scratching the back of his neck, Harry politely dismissed his friends, explaining to them that he would see them in the common room sometime later. And although they were somewhat outraged by this, Harry was completely unmoved by it.

There was something drawing him to the girl; he wanted to get to know her. He wasn't going to waste time looking for the one when the universe had practically given him another chance at it. And he certainly was not going to waste anytime with this one.

As the trio left Harry, the Ravenclaw smiled at Harry. "How rude of me!" she squeaked. "I'm Elle - Elle Port."

Her name was Elle Port? Harry extended his hand to hers. "Harry Potter," he said. "Forgive me for saying this, but I thought your name was Elaine."

She giggled. "My full name is Elle Layne Port, so I can see why you thought that."

Elle was nothing like Elaine was. Sure, they looked the same but they were two entirely different people. And to Harry, that was okay. Honestly, it was perfect.

"I'd like to believe this is the start of a weird, but beautiful friendship," she said. "It's pleasure to meet you, by the way."

"Oh, we've met before," Harry replied with a happy sigh. He thought back to everything he had gone through in the course of one night. A smile slowly began to form on his face as Harry continued to stare at the sweet, shy, placid Ravenclaw that stood before him. Maybe she wasn't Elaine, but she did resemble someone else from his dream – someone Harry thought he would never be able to put a face to.

"We have?" Elle wondered, a familiar smile appearing on her face.

"Once upon a dream…"

AUTHOR'S NOTE

[REWRITTEN]: July 19, 2014
[REPUBLISHED]: July 19, 2014
[LAST UPDATED]: July 19, 2014
[WORD COUNT]: 2,096+ words without a/n, summary, disclaimer and dedications.

[MV COMMENTS]: thank you for everything, you guys. keep a lookout for the newest hp-fanfic i've got coming out. it'll be out shortly. thank you guys again for your amazing support. i love you all! ~ xoxo, mv.