A Hero's Choice

A Hero's Choice

Part Two

Ron was in the house now.

The Weasleys had been staying at the Burrow (a Burrow which had been made much safer by a series of spells, he knew) with Mr. and Mrs. Weasley only stopping by during the days to meet with other members of the Order and look after him. Now, though, they moved into Grimmauld Place.

He had heard them moving their luggage in, Mrs. Weasley's familiar scolding tones audible through the walls and closed door.

He had also heard Mrs. Wealsey's hushed explanation to Ron about why Ron would be sharing a bedroom with Bill. "Harry's had to deal with so much lately; we'll just let him have that room to himself. Now, don't give me that look, Ron Weasley. Think of what Harry must be going through, the poor, dear boy."

Ron had knocked on the door once he'd arrived. "Harry, mate? It's me. Can I-er- come in?"

"Go away, Ron," he'd said in something rather approaching a snarl.

Ron had tried again a little while later, his voice sounding more hesitant but still concerned. "Harry? Are- are you okay?"

"I'm fine!" he snapped. "Just leave me alone!"

And Ron had. He hadn't knocked again in the last three hours.

From below, Harry heard the unmistakable sound of Mrs. Black's screeching something about allowing Mudblood filth into her house and knew Hermione had arrived.

Hermione was here.

And for the first time in his memory, he wished desperately that she weren't, that she were a thousand miles away. Hermione was here--and that meant he'd have to talk to her, would have to see her and Ron. She wouldn't give up, would simply make him face them. She was the only one who didn't tiptoe around him, the only person who simply refused to listen when he said, Go away. He knew that after this last year.

And that made his task that much harder. She was so loyal, strong-willed, and she always seemed to know what he was thinking. How was he supposed to lie to her? How was he supposed to end their friendship?

He stiffened automatically at the expected sound of her knock. "Harry? It's me. Can I come in?"

"I don't want to talk to you, Hermione," he said, injecting all the coldness he could muster into his tone.

A moment of silence and he began to hope that maybe she would simply go away and leave him in peace...

But then the door opened and he knew it had been a futile hope. This was Hermione after all and she cared too much, knew him too well, to listen when he said he didn't want to talk. It was damnably annoying, that, he decided.

Hermione walked in, moving immediately to sit next to him. Ron followed, although he hovered awkwardly just inside the door, closing it behind him.

"Harry, it's only us. You can talk to us, you know you can," she began gently.

"I don't want to talk," he said shortly, avoiding her gaze.

She stiffened slightly at his tone and was silent for a moment. He sensed when annoyance won out over her sympathy.

"You can't avoid us forever, you know, Harry," she said, her tone sharper than before.

He sternly kept his mouth shut so as not to retort, automatically, inanely, "Oh, can't I?" because he knew that she was right. He could hear her voice in his mind, telling him, You know she's right. You can't avoid them forever. And then could have glared impotently at whatever fate had decided that his rational mind would speak in her voice.

"We're your friends. We want to help," she continued, her voice softening as she put a hand on his arm.

No! He couldn't allow any more of her little touches, gestures of a friendship he needed to end as they were. He couldn't bear it. He leaped up from the bed, moving nearly as far away from both of them as he could in the not overly-large room.

"Don't say that!" he finally burst out, making himself glare at first her and then Ron. He needed to hurt them, needed to drive them away. "You can't help so don't try!"

He heard her intake of breath, saw her flinch slightly at the force of his anger, and forcibly repressed the urge to apologize. God, he couldn't stand knowing he'd hurt her. But he had to do it. For her sake.

He turned his attention and his cold gaze back to Ron because it was, for some inexplicable reason, easier to look at Ron while deliberately setting out to hurt his feelings than it was to look at Hermione. And he knew Ron well enough to know that it would be easier to drive Ron away.

"You can't help me! Think about it, Ron, you're too scared to even say his bloody name! Voldemort!" he said the name harshly, emphasizing it, and saw Ron go paler than he already was at the name. "Voldemort! Voldemort! See, you cringe on even hearing someone else say the name, let alone being able to say it yourself! How could you possibly help me? You can't, so just let me be!" He made his voice coldly mocking, steeling himself against the shock, the hurt and the anger he could see in Ron's eyes. "I don't want your help," he finished, lowering his voice to speak slowly with deliberate calm, more effective than shouting to convince Ron of his sincerity.

Ron's mouth opened, then closed again, before he flushed up to his ears and left the room, closing the door forcefully behind him.

I'm sorry, Ron, but it's for your sake I said all that.

Hermione had sucked in her breath sharply at his tirade at Ron, making a small sound of dismay when Ron left.

Harry took a breath, trying to close his mind and heart to caring, ignoring the part of him that was beating at the inside of his chest and shrieking, How could you say that to Ron? After everything you've been through together!

I had to! He shot back silently. I can't let them be hurt again because of their friendship with me! I have to do this!

He turned to Hermione although he avoided meeting her eyes. If he met her eyes, he knew he couldn't go through with this, knew she'd recognize the lies he said for what they were if she met his eyes.

"Why can't you understand when you're not wanted?" he lashed out at her. God, he hated himself for having to do this, for having to exploit knowing her so well that he knew just how to get under her defenses and wound her! "You don't understand and you can't help me either, anymore than Ron can. None of you can help me!"

Hermione flinched visibly as his words struck her with all the force of physical blows but she countered his insults. "Harry, you can't- you don't mean that," she protested, biting her lip to stop its trembling. "Why- why are you saying these things? Why are you so angry at us?" Her tone faltered despite all her efforts to keep it steady.

And for a fleeting moment, he wavered, the deep hurt and vulnerability in her voice reaching out and clawing at him. Dear Merlin, he couldn't do this to her. He couldn't be so cruel to her!

But only for a moment before he stiffened his resolve. He had to do this. He focused on the memory of her lying unconscious in the Department of Mysteries because of her loyalty to him and clung to that desperately, driving out any and all thoughts of anything else, trying to ignore her pain. (And, he suddenly thought, maybe it might be easier not to see her, easier not to be reminded as he was every time he looked at her that Sirius would be alive now if he had only listened to her...)

"I'm angry because I want to be left bloody alone and you have to keep sticking your bossy, nosy self where you're not wanted! What will it take to convince you to leave me the hell alone! I don't want you here, don't want to talk to you, don't want to be around you. Understand? Is that plain enough English for you to comprehend?" he jibed cruelly. "I want to be left alone," he repeated with intentional slowness and condescension as if he were speaking to an idiot.

An explosive silence followed during which he looked everywhere but at her and tried not to remember every horrible lie he had just said to her. Tried not to remember all the indications of her unwavering loyalty to him from the past five years of friendship. Tried not to think at all except to remind himself of just why he needed to do this.

He heard her take a shuddering breath and couldn't help but glance at her, only to wish he hadn't when the sight of her wounded look sent a piercing pain through his own chest. She bit her lip, blinking back tears furiously, opened her mouth, closed it and then rushed out of the room, letting the door close with a sharp click that sounded, to his ears, overly loud and terribly final.

It was done. He had done it, set out to end the two most important and precious relationships of his life.

And he'd succeeded. He was well and truly alone now.

Ron hated him with good reason. He'd hurt Hermione unforgivably and didn't doubt that it would be a good while before she even wanted to see him again, let alone talk to him.

For a moment, he simply stared blankly at the walls around him, as his mind and heart adjusted to the knowledge that now he was truly alone.

He heard echoes of his own ruthless words to his best friends. Former best friends, he corrected himself, with bitter honesty, flinching involuntarily at the phrase. He could hear echoes of the words he'd spoken to hurt them that had turned around and stabbed him as well, cruel words which were a double-edged sword...

See, you cringe on even hearing someone else say the name, let alone being able to say it yourself! How could you possibly help me?...

Why can't you understand when you're not wanted?... I'm angry because I want to be left bloody alone and you have to keep sticking your bossy, nosy self where you're not wanted!

Oh God! The things he'd said!

He felt his knees give way and half-stumbled his way to his bed where he collapsed, shudders beginning to rack his entire body in delayed reaction to the past 30 minutes of torture, as wave after wave of self-hatred, guilt, grief, and regret rolled over him.

He had done what he needed to do--but, dear Merlin, this was killing him! The images of Ron's and Hermione's faces tormented him, made even worse by the bombardment of memories from the past five years of their friendship of everything they had done for him, big and small, that demonstrated the depth of their friendship.

He remembered his relief on meeting Ron that first time on the Hogwarts Express, the immediate friendship that had formed. Remembered Hermione lying to Professor McGonagall about the troll in first year, that first act which had been the start of what would become the most precious relationship of his life. Remembered seeing Hermione Petrified in the Infirmary... Remembered Ron, his face paper-white from the strain, facing off against Sirius and declaring that if Sirius wanted to kill Harry, he'd have to kill both Ron and Hermione too... Remembered the inexpressible comfort of Hermione's simple trust in him in 4^th year when no one else had believed his protests that he hadn't entered his name into the Goblet... (He'd never thanked her for being the only person to stick by him in that entire fiasco--and now, he never could...) Remembered Hermione stepping in to save him from Umbridge using the Cruciatus...

And in those next few endless hours, Harry realized to the full just how precious Ron's and Hermione's friendship had been, how much they had meant to him.

He'd found out in the Second Task in 4^th year that Ron was the thing he would miss most and he'd always known Ron was important to him, the first friend he'd ever had. Ron was just- well, Ron, the person he talked to about Quidditch and just about everything else.

What he hadn't fully comprehended until now was how much Hermione meant to him. He'd thought, unconsciously, that Hermione's lying about the troll had been the start of the most precious relationship of his life--and now he faced that knowledge. Somehow, some time in the last year and half or so since the Second Task, Hermione had become the most important person in his life. She was the one he turned to automatically when bad things happened, the one he trusted more than anyone else, the person whose opinion he believed and respected the most... She was the voice of his conscience and his rational mind. He depended on her, needed her...

And that was why it had been marginally harder for him to hurt her than it had been to hurt Ron. Seeing Ron's pain had tormented him. Seeing Hermione's pain had killed him.

And God, but he had wounded her so deeply! He had seen it in her eyes that last moment before she ran out of the room, had seen the heartbreak and had hated himself for causing it. Hated knowing that he was the reason for the tears in her eyes.

But what else could he have done!

He needed her--and that meant he needed her to be safe. She wasn't safe as long as she was his best friend, couldn't be safe as long as she stayed close to him. He had already experienced some of the heart-stopping terror of seeing her unconscious and thinking she might be dead, enough to know that if anything really did happen to her, it would kill him.

He had to break her heart to keep her safe. He had to.

For no other reason would he have voluntarily caused her any pain. Merlin knew he would rather cut off his own arms than see her cry--but for her safety's sake, he would do anything. To protect her, he would do anything, say anything.

And he had.

He tried to feel relief that now, Ron and Hermione should be at much less risk--tried and failed.

All he felt, all he could feel, was a sick sort of despair.

He was alone now, as he should be, and he would stay alone until the end...