After the Fall

Disclaimer: Not Mine

After the Fall

The Seventh Christmas

Hermione lowered her head, tucking her chin into the collar of her coat as she walked across the square. It was cold. Bitter cold. She cursed herself for not grabbing her hat and gloves when she left this morning. She had planned to be gone only a few hours; now she looked up at the clock on the corner building and saw that it was almost dinnertime.

"Shite," she said aloud into her collar. She held one side of the collar in each hand and pushed the fabric closer around her mouth, blowing into the enclosed space to let the heat of her breath warm her fingers. She kept her eyes down to shield them from the north wind that swept down from the arctic, across vast expanses of frigid water, to settle like an icy claw over the city.

Her shift at the campus library was over hours ago, but when Bridget did not show up, again, Hermione had stayed. She needed the money and the extra few hours were that many more hours she would not have to fill by herself. It was now in the embrace of the warmth in the corner shop that she shivered and felt the cold more acutely.

With a deep sigh, she lowered her hands from her collar and stretched her chin up and away from the moist material. Picking up a basket and slipping the red plastic carry-all over her arm, she started up and down the aisles, taking only what she could carry against the cold and wind.

"Hi Jake," she said as she put her purchases on the checkout. "I see you got stuck working tonight."

"Yeah, it's dead slow is what it is." He put her purchases in a white plastic bag, all the while frowning.

"I know, I know." She rolled her eyes and dug for her money. Finally she found the ten-pound note she had shoved into her pocket only that morning, and handed it over, grinning sheepishly.

"You can't live on this stuff. You need to eat real food."

"I am tired. I am going home and going to bed." She arranged the loops of the plastic bag over her arm and tried to smile up at him. "Anyway, I am having a big meal tomorrow. We all eat too much on the hols."

"My Mum's been cooking for two weeks." He grinned and nodded. "Well, have a happy Christmas, Vickie, and if I don't see you, happy New Year."

"Same to you, Jake, happy Christmas," Hermione called back over her shoulder as she pushed the door and stepped out into the cold again.

He watched as she left the shop, knowing that she was lying again. She came in about three times a week, always alone and never buying enough of anything to feed two, sometimes not enough for one. He shook his head and turned back to the newspaper he kept under the counter, thinking of Christmas dinner at his Mum's. He looked back at the door and considered running after her and asking if she would join him but knew to do so she would have to give up her ruse of going home for her own Christmas meal. She would turn her too-thin, pinched face to his, tell another lie, and pretend to smile. He shrugged his shoulders and went back to his paper, only briefly wondering about her and why she had come here.

Hermione only had to cross two streets and turn up to the end of the pavement before she was home. She tucked her head down, feeling the cold worse now than it had been before the short respite of the grocery. She looked up to judge how far she had gone only to have her eyes tear in the cold. By the time her hand reached for her door she had to blow on her fingers again to warm them enough to turn the key and wipe the frozen tears from her face.

She managed to open the door and slide her hand over the wall until she found the switch and flicked on the lone lamp in her sitting area. Her apartment was what they called a studio, she had learned the day she had come to rent a flat. That was what they called the space over a garage, one room and a loo. Perhaps, she thought, trendy names made spaces no one else wanted, and had never come to see, more desirable. She had bargained and thought the reduction in price still left it costing more than it was worth.

Knowing she could not have them check with a past landlord, call her past employer, or verify her new name, she had laid down the cash and moved in with one case and a plastic bag. All her worldly possessions, she had laughed then, thinking how easy it would be to replace what she had lost.

That was before the reality of the grocery and heat and electric bills. That was before all the things she knew came back, said hello, and laughed at her for her misspent youth and foolishness and the fact that she had forgotten how to live here. She had not even known that laptop computers were required in class and hitting Send was the only way to turn in her assignments. She had spent one full day growling at the keyboard and another learning how to use the printer and scanner. She had paced and stormed until she stomped back down the hill to flay her arms at the clerk and rant of inferior products and the fact that nothing worked.

She had been embarrassed to see the grin and smirk that went with his chiding and a full explanation of connecting cables and throwing switches. She almost pushed him into the hallway as he kept explaining much more then she needed to know.

She wanted to curl up in her chair, wrapped up in a warm blanket, and read with the familiar weight of a book and the smell of the ink. She wanted to lick her finger, and peek at the next page and not see the glare of a computer screen. Now, she sat before the bright flat panel and flinched when advertisements popped up in front of what she was reading, telling her to click and point and meet the man of her dreams.

She put her grocery bag on the table, picked through it until she found the chocolate bar, and unwrapped it slowly. She remembered Remus making Harry eat some on the train, and how it had helped him recover from the grief and sadness that he felt. She took a bite and held it on her tongue, closing her eyes and letting its sweetness melt and run down her throat. She squeezed her eyes tighter to hold the tears, waiting for the sadness to leave her as it had Harry, and cursed again when it would not.

Her dinner was tea and the crackers she had carried from the grocery, leaving the tin of pears unopened. She opened the cupboard, grabbed the biscuits, and headed for the chair by the window. Often, she would sit and watch the headlights of the cars snake up the hill behind the city. Tonight she only saw what she did not want to see, and remembered what she did not want to remember.

There would be no presents on the foot of her bed, no sweater, no book, and no chocolate frogs, no one to come running into her room and wake her in peals of laughter. She had left and hid under a strange name, in a place no one would come, for a reason she did not even understand herself. She thought that in the spring she might go back to the other world if, like the snow, she could thaw. She leaned her head back on the chair and saw again the bodies lined in rows, and smelled the coppery blood, and heard the cries, and opened her eyes to watch the tranquil lights on the hill, unable to sleep again. She wondered why memories were the worst at this time of year. There had been no snow on the ground that night her world had cracked open and she had fallen.

No one had spoken of those last days, after the battle, after the dead lay in their graves. No one spoke of forgiveness, not to give to them but to give to self. They had held weapons, cast curses, killed, and not spoken of it although it sickened their souls. She had tried that one time, in the small back room of St. Mungo's, to talk to Snape, to ask him to explain why it should hurt so bad when they had been told it was right. Another Christmas was here now, the seventh since the battle.

.

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Severus had the elves deliver his yearly bottle of scotch to Minerva, and a bottle of wine for Poppy. The rest of the staff he gave Firewhiskey. He had given them the same thing for so many years it seemed a bad habit rather than a holiday celebration. The liquor store in Hogsmeade had filled his standard Christmas order, including one that he had forgot to cancel, not having thought of Hermione for a year.

He remembered last year how she had fled the room almost in tears, thinking no one noticed, and the way she had held her head, refusing to show she cared. He took a pull on his bottle, recalling his own words, and wished he could have that night to do over and still his tongue. He told himself it was the whiskey and the pain, but he did not even believe himself.

He would not go the Hall this year. Damn Minerva if she thought telling him the staff party was mandatory would make him change his mind and grovel like a fool. Minerva, like Albus, tried to keep him close and in doing so set him on edge and made it easier for his caustic words to be set loose. No, he thought, last year would be enough to last a life time.

He would not sit and listen to off-key holiday songs and stories of Christmases past. He would prefer to spend his night at the Hog's Head, but even there on this night it would be too full of false cheer. He held up the bottle of whiskey and saluted Albus' portrait that Minerva had seen fit to hang over his mantel last year, chuckling that it still hung facing the wall. He had come home from an evening at the Hog's Head furious to hear the old man's reprimand and in a fit on anger had banished him from spying.

He looked at the extra bottle again with the name tag hanging from its neck and wondered where she was. He knew she was not in Hogsmeade; the town was small enough that he would have seen her, or the rumours would have reached him. He knew no one in Diagon Ally would hire her. What businesses that were still there were either family run or held the same staff they had for years.

He tipped his bottle up again and thought she was no doubt in London. Then, walking over to the mantel, he flipped over the picture to ask Albus.

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Minerva said good night to the staff that had attended the Christmas staff party, disappointed at the turnout. Each year the staff became smaller, and each year more of the staff decided not to attend. This may be the last year she tried to have a staff party at all, she mused.

She was sure Neville would have left for the holidays if he had not felt compelled to stay for her sake. She had seen him in Hogsmeade with a much shorter witch, who from the back looked every bit like Luna Lovegood. Minerva had bit her tongue and refused to question him as much as she wanted to. On occasion she would have to call his name twice to get his attention at the dining table, knowing his mind was elsewhere. He would look at her tapping her fork impatiently and grimace at being caught in his daydream only to lower his head, smile, and find his dream again.

Two weeks ago, an owl had brought a missive asking for a reference. She had studied the note and wondered why Neville would need a reference until she learned from Snape that the return address was from a realty office in Diagon Alley. It seemed Mr. Longbottom was purchasing a home in Hogsmeade.

Minerva smiled and happily wrote a return letter praising the young man and vouching for his character. She tied the letter around the owl's leg and held out a treat. Then she quickly wrote another note to Neville, telling him it was time to bring his witch to Hogwarts and do the introductions. This was one more name she could take off her list and one wedding she would happily attend. She smiled, knowing how long it had been since he had been in a true family, and knew he deserved every bit of happiness he could wrest out of this world.

She thought of the last wedding she had attended for one of the Weasley boys and the sad ending to that celebration that Molly had planned for so long. the last time she had seen Molly was almost a year ago now. The pleasant witch seldom left her home, seldom could be seen in Diagon Alley, and seldom would drop by for a cup of tea as had been her habit. Minerva remembered her son as he lay on the floor, wrapped in the arms of his brother, and wondered how long it would take for Molly to come to terms with her grief for her son as she had for her brothers.

She took out her appointment book from her desk drawer and looked for an open afternoon. She felt like having a friend for tea and knew Molly would love the new tea she had found imported from Sri Lanka.