Last Man Standing

Dean Thomas sat on his bed, celebrating his first New Year's Eve since leaving Hogwarts. He was drunk, as was fitting for the occasion, but he was also alone. He could have gone round to the pubs and parties with his brothers, but he felt it might dampen everyone's spirits should he finally get around to ending it all.

While it was technically his choice to stay in tonight, he didn't see it that way at all. He'd had his friends stolen from him, snatched away, and not one of them had made the choice to leave. Well, he supposed Harry had made the choice, but the others... It wasn't fair.

He finished the bottle, and tossed it towards the rubbish can. Unfortunately, his aim was none to good, and judging by the rubbish strewn about the room, it hadn't been for a very long time.

No wonder his mother was worried. Getting to his feet, he kicked the trash into the corner and heaped it into the can until it was overflowing. Outside he could hear the revelers cheering in the New Year. There was a knock on the door.

"Dean? Dean, you've visitors." His mother was an angel, and one he hardly knew. Course, she was probably thinking the same thing. Where had her little angel gone? That was the cruel part of it; he'd been gone so long he didn't know anyone anymore. Not like he'd known his classmates.

"Tell them to go. I don't want to see anyone." There would be some from the neighbourhood who would want to see him, he supposed. Until he was eleven, he'd run the streets, playing football, smoking nicked fags, while trying to be a geezer. That'd all changed for him, but not for his old friends.

He couldn't speak with them, see them and hear them laugh, without the twisting pain. These were his oldest friends, but they weren't good enough. He missed Seamus, Harry, Ron... all the Gryffindor's, really. And the others from his year. And the others.

They were dead to everyone else, but to Dean, they were missing. Just that. Unaccounted for at the moment, soon to be returned. As soon as he drank a few more bottles.

"Dean," a voice called. He knew it, but couldn't place it. "Thomas, open the door, or we'll open it for you."

"No. Just go away. I'll call tomorrow, if you want," he said.

"We're coming in," the voice warned, and Dean smirked, thinking of the weight of the door, and the Charm what locked it. No one was coming in.

But the door opened easily. Three people came through, gasping at the stench of rotten food and stale booze.

"Oh, my," Susan Bones said heavily. "Thomas, you're a mess!" The other two with her, both Ravenclaws, nodded their agreement.

What would they know about it? Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff had seen very light casualties. Now, if a fellow Gryffindor came to say it, it would mean something.

"Go 'way," Dean threatened. Trespassers. There weren't any fellow Gryffindor's to tell him off for his appearance or his odor or his manners.

"Dean, come with us, please?" Padma asked. "We're going to the grave."

The grave, Parvati's twin said. Identical, absolutely identical. Same hair, eyes, voice, speech, and yet, Dean hated Padma, a vague, hollow copy of his lovely Parvati. Parvati had been the sweetest girl in the year, mixed in with the smartest girl and the prettiest girl. Gryffindor had been lucky that year.

They'd also had Harry, who had been a great wizard, even so young as they were. And Neville, a clown, an exasperation, a true and strong friend. Ron Weasley, who was all temper and tension, with the right thing to say to a bloke, though rarely to a bird. And Seamus...

A fast friend, to be sure, they'd decided at breakfast the first day of school that they'd help each other through the day. Looking back, he didn't quite remember how daunting Hogwarts had seemed to his eleven-year-old self, but he was glad that he'd been scared.

He was worried he'd never get over the fear he felt now, facing the world without the family he had arranged around himself for so long. He'd expected that tonight, they'd be together. Seamus and Lavender would be married by now; Hermione well on her way to freeing every last House-Elf and putting herself out of work; Harry and Ron either studying to become Auror's or playing Quidditch for rival teams; Neville would probably forget the meeting place, and stumble in late; Parvati would look fabulous, her robes matching her bag, matching her shoes, matching her nails.

And instead, he had Susan, Padma and Mandy holding their noses and telling him to go visit the grave.

"Not on your bloody life!" Dean shouted savagely. Even to his own ears he sounded like a wounded animal. Surely they'd leave.

"Thomas, you haven't been yet. We know that," Susan said, as if that cleared it up.

"And why do you think not?" Dean demanded. "What reason do I have for visiting the place the Ministry dumped body parts and people what couldn't be identified?"

"Closure?" Mandy Brocklehurst suggested.

"Closure?" Dean mimicked. "Did you look about as you walked through the area?" They nodded, eyes wide, seeming quite pleased they'd survived the dark walk. "Did you see all the abandoned, boarded up, blackened, burnt buildings?" Again they nodded.

"That's closure."

The girls looked at each other, as if they'd expected him to be glad they'd come to take him to the grave. As if he hadn't gone for lack of company. Padma came and placed her hand on his arm, and it burned as if it burnt.

"We all lost people, Dean. And we all shared those who were lost. It isn't right that you-" Dean tore himself away. "It isn't fair that you try to soak up all the grief, Dean."

"Oh. Well, I hadn't known that's what I was doing," he sneered, twisting the top of a bottle and taking a swig. "How many of our Ravenclaws might be buried in the grave, Padma? One or two? I heard that Terry Boot imagines that his arm might be there. Very tragic."

"Thomas, I'm really sorry about this, but it's for your own good," Susan said, twitching her wand and catching Dean unawares.

They Apparated straight to the grave, and Dean was screaming for his release, albeit in a muffled way. The air was crisp and cold, and he hadn't more than an old, thin jumper and old, thin trousers.

"Take me back, you bitches!" Dean shouted the moment Susan untied him. He still had the whiskey bottle in his hand, and Mandy and Padma did a fine job of ducking as it sailed viciously over their heads, spilling amber liquid on them. "Take me back!"

"Don't be a child," Mandy said, trying to regain her composure. He'd never liked her anyway, always acting like a prim schoolteacher, so he didn't think their relationship was damaged by the words he called her. Her face burned crimson, and she fled east, towards the grave.

Padma tried next. "I know you loved her, Dean, but you have to let go. We all do. This will help you, as it did me." Since he had nothing more to throw at her but words, and they weren't good enough, he launched himself at her. At Parvati's twin.

Susan Stunned him again, giving Padma a chance to run after Mandy. In a moment, they'd probably both be gone, and be congratulating themselves on having remembered the fallen. Susan stayed behind, releasing him quickly, and grabbing his hand.

"It's hard, I know. I love them all, just as much as you must." She stroked his face, which was covered in sweat and silent tears. "They talk about letting go, as if it's a choice, or even a possibility. But its not, and if it were, I shouldn't think it would be preferable."

"Then why have you done this?" Dean demanded, grasping her hands that stroked his face. "Why force me to come where I can't go?" Instead of answering, Susan lifted him to his feet, and together they walked. Susan staggered with him, as if she too were drunk.

Suddenly, Dean felt much better, like he could finally take a deep breath after holding his last for months.

"Cheering Charms," Susan warned. "The Ministry isn't making it easier on us." Still, they kept walking, until they reached a mound of earth, covered with snow and dead grass. Dean made to stop, but Susan kept going, until they were at the top of the mound.

At the top of the grave.

"How many do they figure are buried here?" Dean said conversationally, trying to ignore the fact that they were sitting on said people.

"About three hundred, and more then that with the body parts and bits," Susan said, pulling a bottle out of her pocket. "I nicked it from your room, sorry," she said.

They sat quietly drinking for a few minutes, until Dean began pouring the drink on the mound.

"What are you doing?" Susan asked in horror, watching the liquor soak into the snow and dirt and melt away.

"Seamus always talked about what his first taste of whiskey would be like. I doubt he expected there would be dirt mixed in, but that's what he gets for missing it."

Susan laughed, and took the bottle. "Justin always said he'd get me drunk one night and see what I could do," she explained as she poured the drink first down her throat, then on the ground. "Cheers."

For about an hour they sat on top of the grave, remembering funny moments they might have shared. They detailed what they had done during the short and brutal war. They confessed that they were both scared of the future. They promised to keep in touch.

Dean woke the next morning in his own room, in his own bed. But, sometime between Susan pushing him into his bed and him waking up, the room had been cleared out and scrubbed down. He could smell the scent of Mrs. Scower's Magical Mess Remover. The window was open, allowing angry gusts of fresh air into the room, and the sheets he slept on were clean and crisp.

Dean groaned, got out of bed, and went down for breakfast. The Daily Prophet was sitting, waiting for him, thick red circles scrawled around positions he was qualified for. His mother beamed at him when she came into the kitchen.

"Did you make any New Year's resolutions?" his mother asked.

"No. They were made for me," he replied, a small smile on his lips.