Tears of Loss, Joy of Gain

July 31, 2012: Ten Years Later

It was a busy morning in Diagon Alley, but that was usual near the beginning of the school year, which is what time of year it was now. A red-haired man walked with his wife and daughter towards Flourish and Blotts, but, no, this is not the same red-haired man we left off with last time. This was a brother, by the name of George, of the betrayed groom, and later on, he would have the shock of his life, or so he thought at the time of what had happened. After going to the bookstore, they next went to Quality Quidditch Supplies because Rich Weasley, the son of George and Alicia (formerly known as Spinnet) Weasley wanted a broom to play Quidditch.

"Must get it from his old man and his mother," George chortled before stopping abruptly. Alicia and Rich, not noticing this, kept walking until they bumped into him from behind. "Why'd you stop, dad?" Rich asked, and George, too stunned to form words, pointed at the register for the reason of his stop.

There, behind the register, was Harry-or so George thought then. The man was handsome and had black messy hair and glasses. George immediately went up and grabbed the front of his robes, ignoring the shocked, "George!" from his wife. He was too busy in wanting to throttle this man for what he had done to his brother.

"Bet you thought you'd never be found again, Harry," George said. The man gaped at him like a fish and tried to remove George's hands from his robes, but George was holding them tight.

"I don't know what you're talking about," the man said, still struggling against the hold George had on him. Finally, his glasses crashed to the floor, and George saw it wasn't Harry at all, because this man had brown eyes and no scar on his forehead. He looked at the man's wrist, and there was no scar from a bludger hitting him there in seventh year. Madame Pomfrey had told Harry then that there was no magic capable of getting rid of it, and no Muggle care able to either.

He finally let the man go and, the man, straightening his robes, pushed the alarm underneath the counter. Almost immediately two Aurors came in, and a teenager came in from behind the shop, saying, "Are you okay, dad?"

George's heart sank. Dad. This couldn't be Harry after all, this girl was at least 16 years old, and the almost-wedding had happened only 10 years before. The Aurors came to the register and asked, "What is the problem here, Sam?" Sam straightened up and pointed at George. "This man attacked me for some reason," he asked.

George tried to explain himself. "I thought he was somebody else," he said, but the Aurors had already grabbed him by both arms and were starting to lead him away to a magical police car, or the AurCar. His wife and son looked after him, shocked, as he shouted over his shoulder, "Hopefully I'll be home for dinner!"

Rich looked at his mother and asked her, "Mum, why was dad trying to kill that man up there?" Alicia just shook her head in disbelief before saying, "I don't know, honey. I don't know."

A few miles away-The Burrow

Ron Weasley, the best way of putting it, was shocked. He had heard what had happened at the Quidditch store and was shocked because not only was George his brother, Sam Jackson was a good friend of his and he wondered why George would ever consider choking him. I mean, sure Sam had a resemblance to Harry, but Ron had just about forgiven him and wouldn't have considered choking Harry's life away to be a good thing to do. In fact, one of the reasons Ron had befriended Sam was because he looked like Harry, to prove that he wasn't still mad at him. Ron knew that Harry legitimately loved Hermione, wherever he was, and Ron also knew that himself, he probably didn't love her like Harry.

Anyway, Ron had a new love interest as the star keeper for the Chudley Cannons. His new love interest was somebody who had been a Ravenclaw at school and really pretty goofy, Luna Lovegood. He knew that they both legitimately loved each other, and he was considering proposing to Luna sometime soon. Speak of the devil, here she was. "Hiya honey," she said.

Luna had calmed down quite a bit and was really less goofy than she had used to be. She still had a silly streak to her, though, as a couple of years ago, she had taken over the business end of Weasley Wizard Wheezes. She controlled the budget, smart Ravenclaw she was, and let George and Fred run the register, control the customers and make up new pranks.

Ron grinned as she arrived-he really did love the girl, ahem, sorry, woman, and they had yet another date tonight. Ron threw on his overcoat and they flooed to where they were going, all thoughts of George in prison, perhaps facing a trial, Sam getting choked and Harry and Hermione god-knows-where momentarily forgotten.

Speaking of George, let's go back to him in the interrogation room at the Ministry of Magic.

George was sorry. He truly was, for what he had done. However, he wasn't sorry about wanting to wring Harry's neck for what he had done. Right now, he was being interrogated by two people who you would never have expected to become Aurors from when they had been in Hogwarts. One was Neville Longbottom.

Neville had changed from a chubby boy to, well, a chubby man. He was better at magic than he had been, though he sometimes could make a mistake with his potions. The other Auror was Lavender Brown, who, well, is there any way to describe Lavender from when she was in school other than a pretty head with nothing inside? She was still a pretty head and had slightly more things inside.

Nevertheless, the two were still good detectives. Right now, they were doing the good-cop bad-cop thing- Lavender as the good cop, and-George had to try not to laugh at this one- Neville as the bad cop. The reason George had to stifle his laughter was because he was remembering Neville from school, and that Neville wasn't at all threatening.

"What's the laughter about?" Neville asked harshly. George recoiled-maybe Neville hadn't been threatening at school, but now, there was a very noticeable difference. He was taller and had slimmed down a little, but not a lot. He had some muscles, but not many. George realized it was Neville's attitude that had changed. No longer was he the round-faced boy searching for his toad.

"Nothing Nev," George said, and Neville backed off a little bit. Now Lavender stepped forward, saying, "I know you didn't want to kill that man, but it still doesn't excuse it, does it?" she asked softly. George shook his head, and then he realized just why they send Lavender in against male suspects. George felt disgusted- he was married after all.

"Now, you thought it was Harry, didn't you?" she asked. George nodded, and yes, here came Neville, with the bad cop routine, bellowing: "And why would you want to kill Harry? He was your brother's best friend throughout school, or have you forgotten that while making jokes, Wheeze Boy?"

This made George angry, as he jumped up and said-"Are you daft? Or have you forgotten what he did to my brother? He ripped my brother's heart out and stomped all over it-at the wedding where he was supposed to be the best man!" With this, he lunged forward, but Neville tackled him and shouted: "Lock him up for the night! He could be homicidal!"

Now George was in a cage, and he thought horrible thoughts about getting Harry, wherever he was, for hurting his brother.

Los Angeles, California-America, about 7 or 8 hours difference.

Henry Parker, better known in the wizarding world as Harry Potter, but after the events of 10 years before, he lived in the Muggle world, adjusted his sunglasses as he stopped the car in front of his house. He walked in the beautiful house and shouted, "Honey, I'm home!" to his girlfriend of the past 10 years, Hermione Granger.

He heard the sound of running feet and saw his girlfriend enter the room just then. "Hi Harry," she said, giving him a kiss. Harry smiled, putting a hand in his pocket to make sure "it" was still there. "It" was.

Hermione was nervous. All day long, she had been planning a surprise party for Harry, because it was his birthday. She had invited all of his friends, and everybody had arrived while he was out getting something that she hadn't known what it was. She covered his eyes, ignoring his protests, and led him into the kitchen. Suddenly, there was a shout of:

"SURPRISE!"

Harry was surprised. Everybody from his job at the Los Angeles Times as sports journalist was there, as well as all the neighbors and other friends. They were gathered around the kitchen, and Harry saw a cake there.

It was a good party, and when Harry blew out the candles, he wished: "I wish we can go back and hold our heads up high in the wizarding world." He blew out all the candles, naturally. When it was time for the people to go, Harry was a little bit sorry, but not much. He had something he needed to do.

After everybody had left, Hermione and Harry sat down on the couch, exhausted from the excitement. At last, Harry was ready. He reached into his pocket, secretly pulled "it" out, and dropped "it." He knelt down to pick "it" up, opened "it", and Hermione gasped as she waited for the words she knew he was going to say:

"Hermione Granger, will you marry me?"