A Single White Rose

A Single White Rose

By: Serenity Turner

Disclaimer: Look for it in my profile.

Dedication: I dedicate this fic to Aire, someone who I have been friends with for three years now and who I've always looked up to when it came to writing. She inspired this fic in small yet significant ways (such as the rose idea). I love ya, girl!

Summary: A oneshot HP/HG.

Hermione Granger was your ordinary teenage girl...well, as ordinary as a witch was considered to be. She loved spending time with the girls, just hanging out with her mum for an hour or two, and talking about boys. Her love for books and school had cast a shadow on the rest of her personality when it came to people who didn't know her or didn't want to know her. When other teens met her they were often turned off by her eagerness of education and overwhelming intellect. Sometimes they followed in the footsteps of people like Draco Malfoy and mocked her. What they didn't know, what they couldn't see, was that she was the same as them. They considered her to be a freak, a nerd, someone who wasn't worth getting to know. This was how Hermione's life had always gone...until she met Harry and Ron.

When Hermione first met Harry Potter and Ronald Weasley, they did not like her. Like everyone else, they thought of her as a snobby, brainy teachers'-pet, but within a few months they got to see the sentimental, raw Hermione that people had been neglecting for years. As the years went on, the trio grew closer and fought new challenges in life. Hermione dated a famous Quidditch player, and game-opponent to Harry, in their fourth year, a relationship which created steel barriers between her and Ron. Harry dated his long-term crush, a witch from Ravenclaw, in their fifth year, just to be broken up with in a matter of a few months. Ron went out with an obnoxious girl in their House who called him "Won-Won" in their sixth year. Each year they triumphed after accomplishing the temporary defeat of Lord Voldemort. Each year they overcame different obstacles, and in the end they always came out stronger. Hermione's biggest problem, however, wasn't the challenges that Voldemort had caused year after year; it was something, or rather someone that she had to face every day - Harry. Every since they had befriended each other in their first year she had felt something for him. She wasn't quite sure about what it was up until the point when she had gone out with Viktor Krum; the look in his eyes every time he saw them together broke her heart. After she and Viktor decided to be friends Harry began his...whatever it was, with Cho, and then Hermione decided that, even if he had feelings for her before, he didn't anymore. Ten years later all three of them had become Aurors, a career that had interested them since their fourth year, and they were Animagi. Ron was engaged to a pretty girl that he met during the training courses, and Harry and Hermione were to be in his wedding. At one point Hermione had stepped back and observed everything that had happened since they turned twenty-one. She noted how much they had grown and matured, how they had done it together, and how much they still had to do and how far they still had to go.

More interesting to look at was their relationships. She and Ron had always had a combustible friendship. They always managed to find something to argue about, yet they always seemed to put out the fire before it spread too far. Ron and Harry were inseparable, like Sirius and Harry's father had been, and were still creating mischief; at times Hermione felt like their mother, telling them to think before they act, and at other times she was right there, giggling with them. When she was with them she felt warm and whole.

Hermione had always been school-girlish when it came to guys. She would sit there at night, unable to sleep, wondering if they're thinking about her. She would play "What-If?" by herself and think up what their kids would be like, where they would live, what kind of wedding they would have... There was one boy in particular whom she always thought about, and, although she didn't learn it until they were twenty-four years of age, he always thought about her.

Their first date was kind of awkward, what with them having been good friends and all, and yet it was just like she had imagined. As she sat there, looking into those brilliant pools of green, she realized that it wasn't just lust or a crush; it was for real. Hermione Granger was in love with Harry Potter. Harry had felt it as well, but he, being the gentleman, did not act impulsively. He took her to beautiful, exotic places and bought her white roses, her favourite, for three years. On their three-year anniversary he presented her with a beautiful, 2-karat diamond ring. Their wedding was a beautiful, traditional ceremony, and they would have led a beautiful life, had it not been for the accident.

It was no accident at all. It was committed out of pure, cruel intentions, and there was nothing Harry could have done about it. A year after the wedding she had gone skiing with her parents in the French Alps. Harry ached to go along, but duty was calling. He kissed her at the airport, told her that he would pick her up the following Sunday, and, just as she was boarding, said, "I love you." Little did he know that they would be his last words to her. Someone had crept up behind her, tortured her, and then uttered those two, horrifying words. Someone had murdered her. Harry knew that they did it out of hatred toward him, but why her? He'd rather she lived out a full, happy life, even if it meant sacrificing himself for her sake. Then he realized that by doing so he would not be providing her with a full, happy life, but rather a cold, lonely one. Harry vowed that he would one day find whoever did it and make him pay.

As Harry stood by her coffin he reflected back to when they were still at Hogwarts. He remembered all those rules that they broke, all those jokes that they made, all the times that they had to rescue Neville from a sinking stair or a wall disguised as a door. He remembered how great their friendship was. Then newer, fresher memories began to creep into the back of his mind, sitting by the fireplace, sipping hot cocoa, his arm meshing perfectly with her waist. He thought of what could have been, if they would have had children and what they would have been like. He glanced down at his wife, her pale, lifeless complexion contrasting with the deep, rich chocolate colored coffin. Hands shaking, he lifted one of hers and slid a single white rose into her grasp. As he kissed her pale, cold hand Harry felt a hand on his shoulder, and, one single tear glistening down his cheek, he turned to see his best friend of fourteen years. It was too much; his tears began to flow more freely. Ron pulled him to a tight embrace, then led him slowly away from the site. Harry turned to look at his beloved wife for the last time. He had time to whisper, "Goodbye, my love," before they closed the lid.

Harry never married again. Nor did he fall in love with any other woman. Every year on their anniversary, her birthday, and September 1^st, he would stop by her grave. He would talk to her for hours, about anything and everything. And before he left he'd always leave a single white rose.