The Epiphany

It had all started off horribly enough. In four short years, she'd lost her two best friends. One was killed after the defeat of Voldemort, his power so drained that he had welcomed death. She and her soon to be husband looked on. She'd been unable to keep her tears back.

Remus had been there too, watching them as they watched their best friend and savior to the Wizarding World die. Harry had gone into the fight in a kill or be killed state of mind, however, he had never expected Lucius Malfoy to be the one to kill him. He had only planned for Voldermort.

Four years later, he'd watched as she'd gotten the news that her husband had been killed by a rogue Death Eater, someone he'd been tracking, trying to maintain the fragile peace in their world. He had killed Lucius Malfoy that day, but not after he'd been caught in the cross fire and killed.

He'd offered her a shoulder to cry on. He knew how it felt to lose friends that way. He'd lost three. He hadn't asked for anything in return, but slowly they became friends. She had stopped crying so much and their conversations turned from death to books to historical studies. They met at least once a week, until she started dating someone from her year, Seamus Finnigan.

Remus remembered him from when he'd taught at Hogwarts. Remus didn't see what they had in common, but he didn't say anything. Instead, he offered Hermione what advice he had whenever she asked for it, which was very rare. They began meeting less and less as her relationship with Seamus progressed, and he missed her. He missed her intellect, her ideas, even the way she laughed whenever he would make a joke. However, the years before had been hard for her, so instead he remained her friend, her listening ear.

Then after almost two months of no contact, she showed up on his doorstep in the pouring rain. She was soaking wet and looked pensive.

"Hermione, are you all right?" Remus asked, opening the door for her, letting her in. She stepped in nodding.

"I've had an epiphany," she said, looking up at him, her teeth chattering.

"I'll fix you tea and fetch you a blanket, then you can tell me your epiphany," he told her, offering her a chair at the table. After pushing in her chair, he found an afghan on the couch and brought it to her, wrapping it around her.

"Thank you," she replied softly. He began boiling a pot of water.

"Still can't boil a kettle of water with magic?" she teased, teeth chattering. He smiled; he'd missed her so much.

"Not to save my life. I'm afraid it's the Muggle life for me," he said. He pulled out a chair from the table and sat down on it, propping his head up with his hands. "Sad but true."

"Nothing wrong with that," she replied. "It just takes a bit longer." They made polite conversation until the kettle began to whistle. He poured the water into two mugs and then pulled the tea leaves from his cracked formica cabinets. He made the tea and then handed her a mug of it. He waited for her to drink her tea before he asked her what her epiphany was. Finally, she had.

"May I ask what your sudden epiphany was about?" he asked, sipping his tea. "Now that you're properly warmed?"

She looked down. "I'm not in love with Seamus."

"Pardon?" Remus asked. He leaned forward and smelt stale alcohol on her breath. "Are you pissed?

"Perhaps," she replied, taking in another sip of her tea. "Only slightly. But I don't love Seamus."

"And when did you have this epiphany?" Remus asked, very conused at Hermione's out of character behavior. He began to take another sip of tea when Hermione began speaking.

"When he proposed."

Remus spit out his tea. "He proposed?"

"Yes, actually. He made a big ordeal of it, so of course I couldn't say no. I didn't want to embarrass him in front of everyone."

"Everyone?"

She looked him directly in the eye. "His entire family. It was really sweet though. But I'm not in love with him."

"You are more than slightly pissed," Remus said. "You're completely off your rocker."

She looked at her hand. "It's a lovely ring."

"How much have you drank?"

"Er...well I had three butterbeers and then I stopped at a pub on the way."

"You haven't had an epiphany; you're in a drunken stupor." Remus stood up, shaking his head. "C'mon off to bed with you. I'll send you back to Seamus' in the morning." He grabbed her arm, but she shook him off.

"I'm not going back to bloody Seamus's. I don't want this stupid ring. And I'm not in a drunken stupor. I don't love Seamus. I only thought I did because he reminds me of Ron. That's right, I convinced myself I loved Seamus because he reminds me of Ron. There you have it. The Great Hermione Granger-Weasley is going to marry someone because he reminds her of her dead husband."

"Tell him no then. Tell him you're still in love with Ron," Remus said, looking down at Hermione.

"It's not Ron that I'm in love with. Well, I do love Ron and I always will, but that's not who I'm in love with." Hermione turned around and headed towards the guest bedroom. Remus shook his head. A soaking wet, slightly pissed, and in vixen-from-hell mode Hermione was not what he expected to find on his doorstep this evening. Not at all. He headed to his bedroom and pulled his jumper over his head and took off his trousers. Pulling his blankets down, he crawled into bed, lying awake for hours trying to figure out how she wound up on his doorstep of all places.

Remus turned over and jumped when he turned over into someone. Hermione was perched at the edge of his bed.

"What are you doing here?" he asked, looking up at the clock. It read 'You should still be in bed' so he figured it was somewhere around 3 in the morning. "You should be asleep."

"I couldn't," she replied. She was wearing a large night shirt and pair of boxer shorts.
"Are you feeling well?" Remus asked, sitting up, brushing the hair from his face. "If you're going to be ill, I'll take you to the toilet."

"No I'm fine," she smiled. "I'm not pissed anymore either."
"Mmm, good to know," he replied sleepily. He moved so that he was sitting beside her now. "Have you changed your mind about Seamus yet?"

"I don't love him. Rather, I do love him. But I'm not in love with him, I never have been." She gave him a small smile, that he could see even in the darkness. "I've been fooling myself."

"I'm sure its just paranoia. Pre-marital jitters," Remus rationalized.

"No, its not," she replied sharply. "I know who I love."

"If you're that convinced," Remus said. "What makes you sure that you love someone else?"

"I can't stop thinking about him," she began. "And he's everything I've ever wanted. He makes me feel alive and mostly I can't imagine him ever leaving me." She looked down at the floor. "After...after Ron, I promised myself that I wouldn't get too attached to anyone. But he changed all that for me. I want to love someone. I want to wake up next to someone everyone morning. I want to have a family, even if it's only two people."

"Wow," Remus said. "That's...amazing. Who is he?"

Remus almost didn't hear her. She stood up and walked over to the door. Looking over her shoulder, she said the words that made his heart stop.

"It's you."

Remus hadn't known what to say or how to react. Instead, he just pretended that nothing between the two of them had changed. She did wind up breaking her engagement with Seamus. He'd been heart broken and had spread more than one nasty rumor about Hermione in a fashion that in no way surprised Remus.

Six months passed and Hermione began seeing someone new, someone Remus didn't know and someone he was never introduced to. She stopped coming around, and for the first time, Remus felt something besides his normal loneliness and missing her. Was it, perhaps, pangs of jealousy? He ignored it and instead focused on other things: books, his auto-biography, and keeping tabs on his favourite Quidditch team, the Magpies.

It wasn't until Hermione came to his house on another dark night. Only this time it was snowing and Hermione wasn't pissed and she didn't have news of an epiphany. She was crying.

Like the epiphany night a year before, he brought her a blanket and made her tea. She teased him about not being able to boil water and he bantered back all in the name of fun. Then she explained how Linus, that was his name, was having an affair. And she'd caught them together.

"That bastard!" Remus said, furious. "How dare he!"

"Remus, its okay," she said softly, wiping the tears from her eyes. "He's not worth getting angry about."

"But how could...how could he do that to you?"

"I don't want to talk about it anymore," she said softly. She looked up at him. "I don't suppose I could sleep with you tonight. I don't...I don't want to be alone."

"Of course," Remus said, cleaning up their mugs. "I'll be in there in a minute." He watched as she walked towards his bedroom, and he finished cleaning up the kitchen.

When he was done, he too made his way to his bedroom, pulling off his jumper and his trousers.

He climbed into bed next to Hermione. They made polite good nights and then they both turned away from the other. He closed his eyes and after a while was able to fall asleep.

When he woke it was light and there was an arm thrown across him. He felt Hermione's face burrowed into his shoulder. This was - there was only one word for it - nice. This was something he could get used to, he thought.

He shook his head. It would explain a lot, he mused, smiling to himself. The fact that he missed her so much when she was gone, the fact that he'd gotten so angry last night, that he missed the way she smiled, the way she smelled...he loved her. He was in love with her. He turned to face her and smiled as she opened her eyes.

"What are you grinning at?" she asked, yawning.

"You," he replied.

"And why's that?" she asked.

"Because I love you."

She sat up. "I tell you that I'm in love with you and it takes you a year to tell me you love me back! Do you expect me to bow down and worship the ground you walk on? How do you know that I still love you? Pompous arse." Hermione threw the blankets off and stood up quickly, catching him off guard.

He hadn't thought this through. She could not feel anything towards him now...maybe after a year she didn't love him anymore or maybe she wanted to get back together with Linus...and - oh he was incredibly stupid.

"Hermione, I'm sorry, I didn't...I mean -"

"Listen here Remus Lupin. I blame all of this completely and totally on you. I wait for six months for you to tell me you love me. Then I find someone new, and turn my affections towards him. Then after he's broken my heart, you tell me that you love me! After wasting all my time...I should hate you for this."

Remus cringed. "Hermione, I really, I shouldn't have expected for you to jump up and down and claim that you love me too. I really am sorry."

"Shut up," she snapped. Then she grinned. "Lucky for you, I still am in love with you. I just felt the need to make you sweat it out." Then in what seemed like three quick movements, she had her arms wrapped around him and was kissing him.