Angel

I still miss her. It feels like it was only yesterday; I remember every single event as if it was a constant movie in my mind. The sounds, the picture, the smell, the feeling, everything tucked away in my brain. Maybe there will be a time when I can open the door and let those feelings come forward, but now? Now it's much too painful to even think about it.

I always wanted a childhood, one far from danger, and full of love. I found love upon entering my first year at Hogwarts.

I found her, and Ron too. She was my best friend, and even when everything that could go wrong -did, she was always there to make everything right again. That's all I needed -her and Ron, but now she's gone and I don't know what to do anymore. My life feels so lost without her constant guidance. Reprimanding us when we were in danger from losing. Losing a pawn, losing a queen, losing a king, losing our homework, losing our...lives.

If she had one fault, it would definitely be that she had always wanted to be perfect. If only she knew that she was already equivalent to an A+ in my mind. In my book, she would've passed every subject from schoolwork to loving her friends. Maybe that's what killed her. Us, her friends...

We finally had finished our last year at Hogwarts.

We knew from the start she was Head Girl material, the best in class. She wanted more than that even -she wanted to be the best in the world.

I wish that summer was longer; the summer after Hogwarts. We had our stolen childhood to live.

Voldemort was no longer here; no more danger for we had finished him off, and now it was our turn to live the way we wanted too...freely.

She came up with the idea to get our Muggle Driver licenses. It wasn't often a wizard would get one, after all that is what Apparition is for, but she wanted to show everyone that she could do anything in her way.
Ron and I went along with it; we'd do anything for her. It's funny actually; maybe that summer did last forever.

We returned to the Muggle world, living in a Muggle house, just the three of us, attending a Muggle driving school. We found it to be easily after Hogwarts, but the lack of using magic seemed to bug us all.

When we finally passed the class we decide to drive up to the London countryside to spend a week camping at a place where we could do anything we wanted. It would be the last week of the summer, and then we'd go our own ways. Each of us planning to start our own lives, but we knew we'd always be around for each other.

It wasn't her fault of course.

She was the best driver in our class; we knew she'd keep us safe as we putted along that dirt road. I can still remember the car that came hurdling towards us as we crossed the intersection.

The look on her face as she knew that there was nothing left to do but wait for the impact to hit home.

The car smashed into her side and sent her along with the side of the car flying into myself and onto the passengers seat. At first I didn't think I heard it, but after our mangled car came to a hurdling stop, I knew what she had done.

It was a simple charm.

Not meant to save anyone's life, it was just something to shield others from on-coming danger, but it did its part. Ron and I emerged from the wreckage, barely even hurt.

What tore me up the most was seeing her lying there, covered in bits and pieces of the car; we both dropped to her side and talked to her. Telling her to hold on and come back to us -that we'd use magic and then Apparate her to a safer location. I was reaching for my wand when she grabbed my hand.

Her hand was cold. Very cold.

Nonetheless, despite her going through all the pain, she still managed to look perfect. She was smiling at us, and I couldn't begin to conceive how she could smile with all those tears in her eyes.

She took the wand from my hand and spoke to me.

Her voice soft and peaceful, a far cry from the surroundings.

"It's too late," she said, she took my hand and Ron grabbed her other one, "It's too late, don't worry about me. You'll be fine. Both of you will be fine,"

We pled with her, tears streaming from our eyes, falling aimless to the ground. If only I would have begged a little harder, but she didn't want it. I guess she knew she was too far-gone for any sort of magic to save her.

At that moment I would have given up anything in the world to save her, but the minutes seemed to me like hours and then to my extreme dismay...she was gone.

She died in our arms, as a soft rain began to fall, and the sound of an ambulance's siren was coming from the distance.

They told us that she was lucky she lived as long as she did. The Muggle doctors explained what had happened to her. All I heard was, internal injuries, smashed lungs, and deflated heart.

Everything.

The wizard explanation was more of the same, and I asked them if magic could have saved her, as if I was trying to justify not using magic. They said no amounts of magic could have done anything more then save her the pain, I wish I would have saved her the pain, but judging by the look on her face as she died, I don't think she was in any.

I was lucky to have Ron with me, and at the same time I knew he was thinking the same. We had the task of going through her belongings at the house we shared.

Just like her, she had a will already made, explaining what to do if anything happened. She left almost everything to us, pictures, books; anything she had and kept dear to her was now ours.

We were sitting in her old room, roaming through boxes of things; it had almost been a month to the day.

Ron was looking at a picture of the three of us sitting in the library. If she wasn't with us, she was in the library, and on that day the two of us had joined her. We were sitting at one of the tables, piles of books stacked next to us. Each of us wearing that tired smile, we all knew to well. There wasn't any doubt that she was my angel, she saved my life more times then I could count. She always had the right answer, and knew exactly what to do. If it wasn't for her, I know I wouldn't have lived to see my last day at Hogwarts.

Ron started to cry as he looked at the picture, I was sitting next to him and we were silent as the tears descended our faces.

"She's an angel you know," I finally said to him, my voice coming through as a tough whisperer, "She saved us, she protected us, even in the car," I hadn't known if Ron heard her yell the spell out, but the look on his face told me he had.

"I know," he said softly, "But why is she gone now? She still should be here, we weren't finished yet,"

"I don't know all the answers, but I think that maybe it was her time to protect someone else. Maybe we don't need her anymore. Maybe someone needed her more,"

I tried to let that sink into my own mind, but I was selfish in return. I was wrong, I needed her.

"I needed her Harry, and I know you did too," Ron read my mind.

"I know...it's the only thing that I can think of Ron, that maybe she was really an angel, and now she's needed somewhere else. But I know she's always here with us,"

"I can feel her sometimes, when I'm thinking. I even think I hear her talking," Ron admitted laying the picture in another box and turning to me, "You're right Harry, she was our angel,"

Sometimes I find myself driving around, but no matter what thoughts in my mind, I end up in the same place.

The same intersection that senses the movie in my head. No one barely drives down it anymore, so there is always time for me to get out of the car and look around. Sometimes it helps to be able to stand there again, part of me thinking if I try hard enough I can go back and fix it, make it better some how.

But that's the kind of magic that isn't real. No matter how many times we'd go back and fix it, she'd still be gone, and I'd still be standing here, tears in my eyes staring at the memorial in her honor.

Muggles do it all the time I heard, when someone dies in a car crash, something's placed at the site. A constant remembrance of what was lost there. Ron and I put it there two months after it happened, and without any magic as the years went by there it stood, and there it will forever stand, a picture nailed to a small cross sitting silently in the grass, the picture of an angel.