Smile

Smile

"I'm just so happy," Emily gushed. She had plastered a ridiculous grin onto her face in an attempt to look as happy as she professed. Her mouth was stretched to the extent that it looked almost painful, the corners of her eyes were lifted and every muscle in her face was involved in this overly happy-looking smile.

It was an absurd conversation - thoroughly ridiculous and completely meaningless. There was no other way to describe it. The first time Hermione had encountered this conversation, she had been absolutely awestruck and slightly amused, but it had long since lost any entertainment value. Hermione was well aware that she was no true master of human discourse; it had taken her some time to discover the beauty of diplomatic subtlety, but this was just plain odd. Grown women did not speak to each other like this. Did they? No, she was sure they didn't.

Had Hermione read the words of the conversation in a novel, she would have seriously doubted the author's grasp of language and general understanding of human communication, because people simply did not say such things, or adult people didn't at the very least. Except it seemed they did, or rather, Emily did whenever she was able to corner Hermione.

Hermione indignantly felt that she was too old for this sort of conversation - not that she considered twenty-eight to be particularly old, but they were adults and Hermione felt they should behave as such. Emily White had been a couple of years behind Hermione at Hogwarts. They had never had any contact with each other, but lately, Emily had taken it upon herself to corner Hermione and regale her with tales of her true and everlasting love. Hermione was not exactly sure how this always seemed to happen. Every time Hermione let her guard down or turned her back, Emily was there to tell her all about her wonderful relationship with Seamus Finnegan. It was enough to make any rational woman entertain homicidal fantasies.

"I mean, I just can't wait to see him every day. We have such a connection."

Had it been anyone else, Hermione would have long ago told her to piss off and just leave her be, but Emily's sincere simplicity often made Hermione pause. Emily was a nice enough person, but she also had the uncanny ability to make Hermione crazy. It wasn't the enraged crazy that Rabastan Lestrange had once extracted from her, but it was a polite, socially acceptable sort of crazy - the kind that would gently wait until it could release its fury upon a pillow within the safety of one's home.

"That's really wonderful, Emily," Hermione answered, with a diminutive tired smile and as much enthusiasm as she could muster, but it was a rather paltry attempt. She was as excited for Emily as she had been for Ron, who upon buying new Quidditch gloves, mercilessly subjected her to a forty-seven minute rave about the overall quality and versatility of said gloves.

"You just can't imagine. We are of one mind." Hermione stifled the urge to roll her eyes at Emily's profound statement, and instead smiled a fake little smile that might have looked like a sneer, from the right angle. It was the only smile she ever really needed any more - the kind that never really reached her eyes. Most people couldn't tell the difference, but Ron could, and sometimes Harry could.

"Have you ever felt so completely oh, just wonderful?" Emily, of course, didn't want for a response.

The last time they had shared this conversation, Hermione had not reined in her facial or verbal expressions, but Emily had taken no notice of them and continued on as though nothing had happened. Hermione had decided then that it was just easier to let Emily ramble on because she would she would get tired of her own wonderful situation after awhile. But it was becoming awfully hard for Hermione to hold her tongue.

"I want to have a really big wedding. Not just for me and for what I want," she said in slightly drunken earnestness. "I just want all our friends and family to know how much we love each other." Hermione nodded. Her eyes were glazed over, she could feel her brain slowly and methodically shutting down from sheer disinterest and she even suspected she could very well be drooling if she didn't get away soon.

"Because you know, we don't see much of our families and my mum thinks I'm making too much of this, but a wonderful wedding would show her just how much we mean to each other." There was an unwavering certainty in Emily's voice that was the tiniest bit frightening. Hermione looked over her shoulder to see if Harry or Ron might rescue her from the force of nature that was Emily White. However the two, along with Seamus and Neville were engaged in what they liked to call "a meeting of the minds" and what Hermione liked to call "a drinking game."

Emily grasped her arm. "I don't think people realize how in love we are. Seamus and I," she happily sighed, "we're meant for each other. It's in the stars," she finished knowingly, looking at the stars - somehow she managed this amazing feat despite the presence of a grimy ceiling between her and the stars. People really did fascinate and disturb Hermione sometimes.

"Er-" How does one respond to such a thing? "That is the single dumbest thing I've ever heard," didn't seem quite appropriate.

"That's great Emily." Hermione sighed. Her patience was wearing thin. The last place she wanted to be right now was in a slightly sleazy muggle pub torturing herself with Emily White's illogical reasoning. They always seemed to end up in some slightly sleazy muggle pub. It was never a good idea to take Harry places where unfamiliar witches and wizards would approach him and thank him for all he had done for the wizarding world. Usually, Harry would smile indulgently and quickly excuse himself, but on occasion, he would lash out and describe in harrowing detail exactly what he had done to vanquish Voldemort. Ron and Hermione had an unspoken agreement never to suggest wizarding establishments.

"Have you ever felt so in love?" Emily didn't wait for an answer. She never did. It was painfully obvious that Emily didn't care if Hermione had ever felt so in love. In a twisted way, it made Hermione want to laugh - it made her want to laugh at Emily and this fantasy world she had created. A world where good things actually happen to good people and happy endings are handed out like sweets to children. Everyone who understood the world knew real happiness was an impossibility, and Hermione understood the world.

Hermione knew she shouldn't, because at its heart it was cruel, but her perverted sense of justice overwhelmed her. "So when will you be having this wedding?" she asked, as she demurely sipped her drink.

Emily straightened her shoulders. "Well, I was thinking of a spring wedding and Seamus agrees with me." Her voice had lost a bit of that dreamy quality.

"So, he's proposed then?" Hermione asked, knowing full well that he had not, and most likely never would.

"Well, not yet, but you know Seamus, he's such a romantic. He'll want everything to be just perfect."

"Uh-huh." Hermione peeked over Emily's shoulder to see Seamus trying to pick a fight with Ron. It was a regular occurrence. Seamus would try to out-drink Ron, which was a good idea in the sense that swimming with hungry sharks while sporting open bloody wounds was a good idea, but Seamus insisted on defending his Irish heritage anyway. Hermione had little idea of what Seamus actually meant by this, but she suspected that it was just an excuse to fight with someone.

Seamus was short, slender and had a desk job. Ron was tall, broad and played professional Quidditch. Professional Quidditch players had relatively simple lives. They played Quidditch, drank, ate, slept and shagged groupies - usually in that order, although the first two were often interchangeable. So while Ron was pleasantly buzzing, Seamus was thoroughly pissed and he had a tendency to get rather belligerent in that state. Hermione never could understand why Seamus would choose Ron as his sparring partner, unless Seamus's objective was to find himself covered in dried blood and bruises in the morning. Hermione could understand a great many things, but Seamus Finnegan would always defy her brand of logic. Luckily for Ron, and unluckily for Seamus and his twisted hope for a fight, experience had taught Ron not to take him seriously.

"It's just - Hermione?" Emily pulled on Hermione's arm to bring her attention back to this oh-so-wonderful conversation. "I don't want to make you feel bad. I'm just happier than I ever thought I could be."

At this point, Emily circled back upon the conversation and repeated everything she had said up until this point as though Hermione must have missed at least one and very possibly several important points thus far.

"Did I ever tell you about the time that he bought me-"

If Hermione had been completely honest, she would admit to tuning Emily out, and unfortunately Hermione had become brutally honest with herself over the the last several years. As she thought on it, this annoying habit had manifested itself when Voldemort was defeated.

Hermione tried to think of viable excuses to get her out of her current predicament - "female problems" often worked when she needed to wheedle herself out of something with Harry and Ron, and while she enjoyed the stuttering and slightly red faces and Harry's obligatory pat on the shoulder and his wish for her to, er, uh well you know, take care of that, she doubted that it would work on Emily. A master strategist Emily was not, but she always anticipated all of Hermione's attempts at beautiful beautiful freedom.

"I mean if that isn't love, then why would-"

Emily continued talking, occasionally hugging herself to make a point. Hermione was not exactly sure what that point was supposed to be, but she was sure to smile and nod and nod and smile. Smiling and nodding seemed perfectly placating.

"Do you know what he said the other day? He said that we should-"

As the listened to Emily expound on the glory of love or some such crap, Hermione briefly wondered if she had angered some god in a previous life. Perhaps it was the God of All That is Utterly Useless like Snape's brand of shampoo, a Hufflepuff's sense of irony, and trite conversations with people trying to convince themselves they were in love. It all seemed very reasonable to Hermione at this point.

"I never imagined it could be like this-"

Hermione was going to kill Ron. He had promised her that he would not leave her to suffer in Emily's clutches alone. Hermione chanced a glance in his direction. It appeared Ron was trying his best to placate a somewhat flailing Seamus. In his efforts, Ron's gaze lit upon Hermione and he winked at her. Hermione curled her lip in a sneer which inexplicably caused Ron's smile to widen. For a moment, he looked like the boy she had once loved, but the expression evaporated when Seamus took a swing at him and he reverted back to the hard man he had become. Hermione reluctantly returned to Emily's ranting.

"I wish everyone could -"

It was coming. It always did with Emily. Hermione found that conversations with a certain type of woman always came to this point. It was where they were really going to get serious and have a heart-to-heart talk and give the invaluable and honest advice that only a girlfriend could give. It generally made Hermione nauseous. She didn't know how she could recognize the signs, it just happened. Perhaps it was the increasing volume of Emily's voice, or perhaps it was because Emily had exhausted all her lacking vocabulary allowed her, perhaps Emily sensed Hermione's growing indifference and unresponsiveness, or perhaps Emily actually was sincere. Hermione did not know and she most certainly did not care. She just wanted to leave.

"And you know," Emily said, placing her hand Hermione's arm, "you will find love too."

"Uh-huh." Gods, this always made her tired and quietly angry that Emily should be so presumptive. When Emily had first started telling her these things, Hermione had argued with her. Love and happiness were not simply guaranteed to good people. In most relationships that Hermione observed and experienced, the couple tricked themselves into believing that they had found "The One." Relationships staled and failed for all sorts of reasons - people didn't want to be alone, they often mistook lust for love and beauty for depth. Although she had her moments of weakness, often when she had spent yet another Saturday night alone or with people who made her feel alone, Hermione had no wish to deceive herself as Emily did and in the end, she knew she couldn't.

"You are such a wonderful person and he is out there. You can't not find him. I know it. I know it Hermione," she said, placing her hand over her heart. That stupid fake smile was still ever-present on her slightly lined face.

"Can't not?" Hermione found double negatives to be supremely irritating. They were a waste of perfectly good words.

Emily nodded. She was still smiling of course, but there was a real look of pity in her eyes.

Hermione's jaw tightened at the implication. Emily had never taken the time to learn that Hermione had once found love and she had been happier than she could have ever imagined, but it was all over now and she would never be able to recapture that feeling - the feeling that Hermione just knew Emily had never really experienced. If she had, she would not feel the need to torment others with her ridiculous rambling on what she believed was love.

"Yes," Emily said, smiling rather pityingly, "I know you don't believe me, but you will find it and you will be as happy as I am."

"And won't that be just lovely?" she said with slight rancour. Emily did not appear to notice. Hermione was slowly reaching whatever surpassed irritation. It was awfully exhausting to feign polite interest for so long. She was tired and cranky and just wanted to go home, put on her pyjamas and play with Crookshanks. A cranky old cat with fishy breath had to be better company than Emily.

"You're just such a wonderful woman and I know that sometimes men can't really see you for who you are. I mean if you would just encourage them a little and smile every now and then and if you would. . ." Emily reached her hand out in a vague gesture at Hermione's neck, and Hermione involuntarily winced, "if you would just. . .well, you know, there are some very useful spells."

As much as Hermione hated people bringing attention to her physical appearance in a pitying manner, she did enjoy seeing Emily's discomfort. Besides, Emily had never been so bold, and it seemed the conversation would morph into something entirely new this night and Hermione would be lying if she said she wasn't the tiniest bit intrigued.

"Just what Emily?" Hermione asked. Her tone was even, but her breath quickened in evil anticipation.

"Well, I mean, men wouldn't be so er, frightened of you if you would just have that scar taken care of." Emily smiled with warranted nervousness.

"Men are frightened of me because of my scar?" This was it; Hermione would not be having this conversation again.

"Well. . ." Emily started, her face twisted in pity and trepidation.

"And here I thought it was my malevolent attitude and general dislike of all humanity that frightened men away. Huh." Hermione shrugged and smiled, maliciously this time. "You learn something new everyday. Would you excuse me?"

Hermione turned her back on the slightly stunned young woman and pushed her way through the sweaty, smelly bodies as she made her way to the door, her heart beating wildly. Despite the now-hardened shell that protected her being, she didn't take joy in hurting people. For the most part, she just wanted them to leave her alone and they usually did, but Emily had simply gone too far.

In contrast to what she had told Emily, Hermione did not dislike all of humanity. She sometimes liked to tell herself that she did, because everything seemed so much simpler that way, but Hermione knew that it wasn't true.

Hermione snaked her way through the crowd. She hated wiggling her way between seemingly immovable bodies. Her first instinct was to leave this place; she doubted anyone would mark her absence, but Ron always worried when she left without word and sometimes even when she did. So, with a great sigh, she manoeuvred her way back to Harry and Ron's table.

Hermione fought against the drunk and jovial bodies and had her bum pinched one or twice by strangers who mistakenly believed themselves to possess some kind of overpowering sexual magnetism. She plopped herself down next to Ron, catching the end of a conversation between Emily and Seamus as they left the pub. Seamus was calling Emily all sorts of unsavoury names, while Emily was telling Seamus that she did everything for him and all she was asking for was a little appreciation. Emily's smile had finally disappeared from her pretty face. The couple continued their argument as they fought their way through the crowd. Harry and Neville looked at each other, shrugged and returned to their raucous laughter and heavy drinking.

Ron slung an arm around Hermione's shoulder and sighed. "I thought they'd never leave." Hermione nodded her assent as she stared at their retreating backs.

"So how was Emmy?" Ron asked flippantly.

"Same as always." Hermione continued to stare at the door through which they had left. For a few moments, Hermione felt unbelievably sorry for Emily and the lie that she had created for herself. But only for a few moments.

"Sorry about that, H. Seamus was a little more difficult than usual." In Ron's never-ending quest to find and appropriate nickname for Hermione, he had currently settled on "H" after going through Herm, Herms, Hermy, Mione, My, Mya, Nee and several other quite creative bastardized versions of "Hermione." Hermione herself didn't particularly like the current misnomer much, finding it to be terse and somewhat cold, however appropriate that might be.

"It's alright," she sighed. "Why does he do that anyway?"

"Do what?" Ron asked as he looked down at her.

"Why does he always want to fight with you?"

"He's angry. I suppose he feels guilty"

"About what?" Hermione watched as Harry slowly slid off his chair onto the dirty floor. He was unable to rescue himself from the fall. It would have been funny if it didn't happen nearly every night.

When Ron didn't respond, Hermione looked up at him. Ron's normally clear expression was inscrutable.

"You know why," he said evenly. Neville gave Harry a hand and heaved him back into his chair. The two must have shared the funniest joke known in human existence, because neither could stop laughing.

"Yeah, I guess I do." Fleeting images skittered across Hermione's mind - broken, mutilated bodies, people weeping in anguish, others staring blankly in grief. And Seamus. . . Seamus asking why this had to happen and why he couldn't have gotten there in time. Hermione quickly pushed those images out of her mind as she often did, but they were ever-present in the corners of her consciousness anyway. Hermione rested her head on Ron's shoulder and he tightened his grip on her, for which she was thankful. It had been nearly a decade since anyone needed to worry about midnight raids and random killings. But some things simply could not be forgotten and Hermione knew that time did not heal anything; people just found comfort in believing that it did. Seamus often appeared to be a perfectly sane, well-adjusted man, but he wasn't - he had lost more than she could imagine to Death Eaters - Hermione just needed reminding of it every now and then.

Ron absent-mindedly moved his thumb over the faded puckered scar that ran from Hermione's ear to her shoulder on the opposite side of her body. He was the only one Hermione would allow such liberties. It reminded her not of her scar and the actions that had precipitated it, but of their time in seventh year when she and Ron had first begun to explore each other. They had been so happy together - he had matured and she had mellowed and they met somewhere in the glorious middle. That had all ended many years ago now, after the defeat of Voldemort in fact, after they had both done things they hadn't thought themselves capable of, things they had once so thoroughly condemned, things for which they would always be ashamed and maybe the slightest bit tortured, but things done for the greater good.

Nothing had been said, nothing had been done - they just stopped being a couple. Neither was the person the other had once loved and Hermione remembered how she had felt so unworthy of him, so unworthy of anything worth having. But when he touched her like this, it reminded her of those times, those almost innocent and happy times - those times that she would never again experience. She was not in agony over those lost times; she did not spend innumerable nights mourning her lost innocence and goodness - it just was what it was.

Ron and Hermione sat together silently, surrounded on all sides by the cacophony of the pub. Crappy loud music blared from even crappier speakers and largely inconsequential conversations flew around them. They watched Harry and Neville pound down the ale. It wasn't an uncommon sight, but neither particularly wished to see it. Hermione was slightly relieved that Harry was a happy drunk tonight. Sometimes, he was less so. Sometimes he cried, sometimes he became violent and actually hurt people. Sometimes, Hermione wanted to cry for him and what he had become, but she never did. So there she and Ron sat, because it was the most they could do for Harry.

Hermione watched Harry and Neville slur and sway against each other as she overheard a conversation at the table behind her. She couldn't see them, but she could still hear them over the din of the pub. It sounded like a young man, but she couldn't be sure. He was telling his friends about his various sexual escapades in a rather loud and exuberant voice.

"She had the tightest arse I've ever had. Ha Ha. She was so fucking eager. It didn't take much to convince her. Ha Ha Ha."

Hermione wondered if the man knew that every encounter, on which he elaborated very briefly, sounded the same. Were all his accounts true, he might have rivalled Zeus in sexual conquest. The annoyance and disbelief was apparent in the voices of the other men. Hermione tried to find it amusing, because it really was, but she couldn't as it was also very pathetic. She could almost picture him - younger, fashionable and handsome, but nothing out of the common way. He made friends easily and he charmed his way through life with the confidence and arrogance such young men often possess for no good reason.

"Yeah, heard that one before, Tom. Ha Ha."

Tom's voice simply got louder and more insistent. The laughter became coarser and the implicit misogyny escalated. He would ask his mates why he would lie about such things. Hermione could think of a reason or two.

"You want their phone numbers?"

"What?" another man asked, slightly incredulous.

"I'll give you the phone numbers of the last five women I fucked. Ha Ha. They'll tell you how it was. Ha Ha Ha."

Hermione cringed against Ron's body. Ron gently moved his hand back and forth on her shoulder. People didn't say things like that, she was so sure. Real-live caricatures did not actually exist. She could understand his motives - his need to be a real man's man around the other men, his need to convince himself that he really was some sort of Sex God in spite of the fact that every encounter sounded like a poor imitation of shitty erotica.

Hermione remembered that as a child, she had thought adults had all the answers, they somehow had discovered some secret that children could not access. She remembered her mother telling her about the real world and how she would understand when she grew older. It was part of the reason for her obsessive reading and studying. She wanted to know. She wanted to know those clouded universal truths that made adults so much wiser and better than children and teenagers.

"I'm gonna let you all in on a little secret. See, you just have to know what women want. They think they want romance and flowers, but they really want a man to tell them what they want."

"So. . ."

Tom snorted. "They want what we want, mate. And I know what I want." Hermione heard grunting and could only assume that there was some humorous playacting following this declaration. Several men laughed at their secret knowledge of women.

Adults had no answers; they just let children believe they did for some twisted reason. Adults were just big children only harder, colder, less fun and uglier when it came to it. Hermione didn't want to cope with all this noise and nothingness any more. She didn't want to pretend to be interested in subjects that were of absolutely no interest. She didn't want to enable other people's lies. That's what she liked about Ron, he never lied to her, never asked her the meaninglessness to reply.(1) She couldn't help but lean in a little closer to him. Rarely did she allow herself such physical contact with another human being.

Ron sighed beside her. He tilted his head back against the hard wood of the wall and closed his eyes.

"People are funny, yeah?" Ron asked. There was something in his voice that wasn't often heard - Hermione couldn't place it.

"They are," Hermione answered. A muscle twitched in Ron's jaw.

"You came over here to tell me you want to go, yeah?" Ron asked, after several moments of relative silence.

"Yeah."

"I'll walk you home." They said their goodbyes to Harry and Neville. They assured them that they had indeed had a wonderful time and no, they didn't want to stay and partake in the good times that were sure to be had by all.

Ron and Hermione battled their way through the crowd and made it into the quiet cold street. Neither said a word as they began their journey to Hermione's flat. It was often this way for them. Conversation was unnecessary. It wasn't that they understood each other so perfectly that words would only muck-up their delicate understanding of each other; they just didn't have anything to say to one another. Neither was willing to subject the other to meaningless conversation.

Hermione tucked her head down and admired the dead brown weeds that were plentiful in the pavement. It was funny, the way things had ended up for her, for them. The three of them had once entertained such hope for the future amid overwhelming despair. They had worked to keep each other's spirits positive. They had protected each other. They had promised to always be there for the others. But they couldn't. Not a single one of them was a whole person any more and not a single one of them was capable of helping the others. Ron was cold, Harry was tormented and Hermione was bitter. They were all, to different degrees, functionally hopeless, but they pretended they weren't and as with miserable people everywhere, they didn't appear so.

They pretended they knew what the others were about and they pretended to be there for the others, but they weren't. Hermione didn't know how many more nights she could go to Harry's place and listen to him rant and rave on his own "disgusting nature." Her words and actions never soothed him. They played at some horrible intricate production that no one really understood and no one ever discussed outside of those tense moments. Hermione pulled her coat tightly around her.

Ron cleared his throat. "I'm quitting the League."

Hermione slowly raised her head. "What?"

"I'm quitting the League."

"I heard what you said," she responded, petulantly.

When he said nothing else, she continued, "Why are you quitting the League?"

"It's time."

"It's time?"

"It's just time."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

They walked on, their noses getting cold. Hermione stuffed her hands into her pockets.

"What're you going to do?"

"Dunno."

"Oh. Do you even have a place to stay any more? I mean, didn't you live in that Quidditch House or whatever it was called?"

"It's the League's house, and no, I'm not staying there any more." Hermione could hear his amused smile.

"Where are you going to live?"

"Dunno."

It was hard for Hermione to imagine Ron without Quidditch. Ron without Quidditch was . . .well she didn't rightly know, but he certainly wasn't the Ron she knew. The Ron she knew lived and breathed Quidditch - he battered his body and mind and sacrificed what little life he had for Quidditch. It was his entire freaking life and he was quitting. His nonchalant attitude was more than a little unnerving.

"No really, what are you going to do?"

"I don't know," Ron said, carefully articulating every word. He sounded like he was explaining a terribly difficult concept to an unruly child, like why we mustn't pour milk down our neighbor's trousers.

"But you must have some idea. I mean you have to get money and stuff. You'll need to get a job and a place to live."

"What, so I can be like you and work at a job that is so far beneath me that I could do it when I'm asleep?"

"Don't even start on me Ron," Hermione said, her voice tired and defeated. This was another conversation she occasionally had, often with her parents and some of her co-workers, but never with Ron. The difference was that unlike Emily, Ron actually had a point.

"Why not? Why do you keep working there? You know you're better than that."

"How many people do you think are out there that are better than their jobs huh? You think the majority of the population are just mindless drones? It doesn't matter Ron."

"Yes it does," he said with his old stubbornness.

"Listen, I don't particularly care, so I don't know why you have to." A job was a job - they all sucked. Nobody ever did anything. She'd done a stint in the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures in the Ministry of Magic. She was going to make a difference, she was going to take her reckless energy and free the house-elves and make better lives for them. She was going to work the system to create a better system. She had only become mired in paperwork and petty office politics. It had taken her all of five years to figure out that there were no differences to be made, so she gave up and got an office job that didn't require any moral indignation and crushing disappointment.

"Because I want better for you. Stupid woman." He mumbled the last bit.

"Oh, piss off, Ron."

"That's the best you can do is it?" He laughed, chuckled actually. Hermione straightened herself and pressed her lips in a cold hard line. She picked up her pace. It was a useless tactic because his legs were so much longer than hers anyway, but sometimes a girl just has to make a point, however thoroughly pointless it might actually be. Ron could be so infuriating sometimes and she absolutely hated it. They walked on in silence. Hermione didn't want to push him, because he would push back. Only harder. That was Ron for you.

"We're not doing this any more," Ron stated after several minutes.

"Doing what?" Hermione asked tersely, knowing that he understood by the tone of her voice that she didn't care what they would no longer be doing.

"You, me, Harry." Ron stepped in front of her. He put his large calloused hands on her shoulders, stopping her in her tracks. She jerked under his touch, but he would not release her. "We're almost thirty Hermione. It's time." He paused and looked up for a moment and sighed, "It's time." He finished with a sort of finality that Hermione could not understand.

This was definitely not the Ron she knew. The Ron she knew never really talked about anything of consequence. He talked about Quidditch.

"What the bloody hell does that mean?"

Ron merely grinned and slung an arm around her shoulder as they continued their walk back to her flat. Hermione's breath became slightly more shallow at the thought of what Ron was implying. A thought carefully constructed itself in her mind, an idea of what Ron was on about. It was a thought she had once entertained after the war, an idea that Ron would. . . dare she even think such a thing? An idea that Ron would . . . he would . . . that he would somehow make everything better for her . . . for them. It had been a fleeting childish thought even then, so Hermione quickly banished it. Rather than spark a flicker of hope that was sure to be extinguished, she decided that she really didn't know what Ron was implying anyway and labelled him a needlessly cryptic bastard.

As they walked in silence, Hermione redirected her thinking and tried to fathom what Ron meant when he kept talking about time. She glanced at him and noticed a serene smile on his face - she hadn't seen that one in a long time. Dear Merlin, she really hoped he hadn't wound up in some self-help seminar that promised narcissism under the guise of enlightenment. She looked up at him again. He was calm and he wasn't spouting any nonsense about self-actualization, clarification or balance - no, Ron wouldn't do that, he might be a bit thick at times, but he wouldn't do that. She hoped.

Ron offered no other explanations. They just kept walking in the cold night. Hermione stopped awkwardly in front of her building.

"Well, thanks for walking me home," Hermione said without looking at Ron. She shuffled her feet.

"I'm coming up with you."

"What?" Hermione's head snapped up. Ron never came up with her.

"You heard what I said." The bastard looked absolutely unflappable.

"Ron - what's going on? Are you going through some mid-life crisis or something?"

"No." Ron tugged at her hands, freeing them from her massive coat. "I told you, we're not doing this any more."

"I don't know what that means," she said. No one else might have noticed the desperation in her voice, but she was sure Ron did. He always noticed things about her other people missed.

"We're not wallowing in our own self-pity any more."

Hermione sighed, "It's not self-pity. It's reality."

Ron paused. "Maybe it is, but we deserve more."

"We don't deserve anything," she said quietly.

"Then we'll just take it, whether we deserve it or not," he replied, not missing a beat.

"You're not going to tell me that everything is going to be just fine, are you? Because it isn't, you know. Life doesn't work that way. There's no such thing as a happy ending." Hermione hated it when people told her that everything would be just fine - they were a bunch of delusional liars. People dealt with things so they could go to their soul-sucking jobs, raise their ungrateful children, and feel justified in telling themselves that their minuscule existence mattered, but it didn't make it real and it didn't make everything alright.

"I know that, but don't you want to have an existence that is more than barely tolerable? We can't do this to ourselves any more Hermione." He heart gave a little leap. Ron hadn't called her by her proper name in years. He firmly grasped her hands in his. "I'm not going to do it any more and I'm not going to let you and Harry do it any more either."

"What, are you going to save us all, Ron? Gods, I thought you had more sense than that. We can't go back to the way things used to be. We're not the same any more, Ron - you can't change that." Her tone was louder and more defensive than she had intended.

Ron took a step toward her. "I'm not trying to change that. You know I'm not talking some . . . bloody "let's all in love" shit here. I'm not talking about enlightenment, or "finding the wizard within," or whatever the hell it is those people talk about." He leaned over Hermione, surrounding her with his presence. "I'm talking. . . .I'm talking about getting over ourselves and-and the past. We're not the only people in the world who've ever done something regrettable you know." His breathing became heavy. "I miss you. I miss Harry. And I'm not going to let us do this any more," he finished in a whisper.

Hermione looked down at their conjoined hands. Ron was playing with her fingers like he used to so long ago. She didn't know why this was happening, she didn't know why he was pressing her so much and she didn't know why it had to be now. It didn't seem real to her - she was used to meaninglessness. God forbid, she could understand meaninglessness. But this was . . . this was dangerous.

"Ron," he breath was coming in shallow pants, "I can't forget-" She wanted to forget the things she had done, the things they had done, but she couldn't because she wouldn't allow herself to. If she let herself forget or tried to justify her actions, then she truly would be no better than what she had fought against. She wouldn't let that happen.

"I'm not asking you to."

"Then what do you want from me?"

"I wanna see you smile again."

"I smile," she protested weakly.

"A real one."

"Oh." A real one. He wanted her to be happy. She honestly didn't know if she was capable of happiness any more. She wanted it. Desperately. But it had been many years since she had let herself truly believe that.

"How?" she whispered.

"We'll figure something out."

They stood in front of Hermione's crumbling old building. Ron firmly held Hermione's limp, cold hands in his.

Hermione didn't want to think of anything, but unfortunately, Hermione was Hermione, and Hermione thought of everything. She didn't want to acknowledge the truth in what Ron was saying; she didn't want to think of the past or the bleak future she had created for herself. Her throat started to close and her chin quivered once or twice. Some small part of her screamed that this was not the way things worked - Ron couldn't really do anything for her in the end anyway. This was not real, this was not life. She couldn't give in to the lie. She couldn't be Emily or Tom and create a life in her mind that didn't exist in reality.

Hermione raised her head and met Ron's eyes. A half-cocked grin graced his face. Ron would never lie to her and he would never expect her to lie. This was Ron. He'd probably hex her nose into the next century if she tried to lie. At this moment, Hermione knew that she didn't have anything, so she moved to rest her head on Ron's chest. It was something. Ron lightly embraced her.

Ron cleared his throat. "You still have that lumpy sofa? You know, the one covered in cat hair and coffee stains that smells a little funny."

She nodded, not trusting her voice.

"Well, let's go then. I don't have a place right now, so I'm gonna stay with you for awhile."

"Okay." Hermione twined her arm through Ron's.

And she smiled a real smile, albeit tentatively.