Here at the End

By

Ahn Na Blue

Rated PG-13

Chapter Two: I Take Thee, Phlegm

Disclaimer: Do I have to do a new one of these every time?

Also, due to the surprising popularity of ‘Harry Potter and the Ginormous Catfight’, I’ve decided to include a mini ‘ginormous catfight’ later in this fic. Who knew that people wanted to see Ginny get her butt kicked so bad?

“Hermione? Are you ready?” Harry was knocking on the door to Hagrid’s hut. Hermione had insisted on going down to make certain that the half-giant was all right before they left for the Burrow. He didn’t know why. These days, when Hagrid wasn’t drunk he was sleeping, and as he stood outside the door, Harry could hear some very distinctive snores issuing from inside. The door creaked open.

“Yes, Harry,” Hermione whispered, glancing back over her shoulder. “But come in and sign something before we go.”

Harry followed her inside and bent down to read the piece of parchment laid out on the wooden table. It read:

Dear Hagrid,

Harry and I have to go to the Burrow a few days early to help out with the wedding. I’ve left plenty of extra treacle fudge, a pumpkin pie, and four puddings, if you get hungry. There’s also a large store of COFFEE.

We hope to see you at the wedding, we know that all of the Weasleys would love it if you came.

Signed,

And Hermione

P.S., Don’t forget to feed Buckbeak.

“You see,” she said, tapping the parchment. “I’ve left a place for you to sign.”

“Sure,” said Harry, feeling a little bit guilty that he hadn’t thought of doing more to help Hagrid. He looked down at Hermione’s sleeve and saw more grey feathers stuck to it. “You know, I can feed him now. You don’t have to.”

“No, I- I don’t mind. Really, I can’t get enough of those dead ferrets.”

Harry watched her curiously as she weighted the parchment down with a large piece of treacle fudge. It was no secret that she had never been particularly comfortable around hippogriffs. Or any large, four-legged animals for that matter.

“Don’t you think you left enough sweets?” Harry asked.

Hermione frowned. “Since-” she paused. “It’s all he’ll eat.”

“He’s going to outgrow his hut.”

Hermione made a face that was close to a smirk. “Oh Harry,” she said and pulled him out the door.

They were going to Apparate out of Hogsmeade.

“You know, we could have always traveled by floo powder,” Hermione mused.

“But Apparation is so much cooler. And less messy,” Harry stated.

“Yes, I suppose so.” Hermione gave a thoughtful pause. “Are you nervous about seeing Ginny?”

Harry looked down at the ground. “I’m mostly hoping that the Burrow is so busy that we don’t have time to say two words to each other.”

Hermione smiled. “Well, stay close to Mrs. Weasley. I’m sure she’ll manage to keep you occupied.” She stopped walking. They were on the entrance road to the village. “Are you ready?”

Harry nodded, and Hermione grabbed his hand. “What are you doing?”

“You don’t have a license yet! Don’t tell me you thought I was just going to let you go Apparating willy nilly all over the place with no license!”

Harry groaned.

“Harry we could get in serious trouble. It’s side-along or floo powder, all right?”

“All right, Hermione,” Harry sulked.

“Good, now if you’ll just take my hand-”

But Harry had other ideas. Before she could finish her sentence, he grabbed the whole bit of her, and pressed her to his side.

“Harry!” she squealed, but she was too late. He triple D’d, and they were sucked through a bottle en route to the Burrow.

*********************************************

“You were completely right about that side-along Apparition, Hermione,” Harry chuckled after they had regained their bearings. She gave him a very disdainful look.

“That was extremely irresponsible! What if I had let go of my suitcase? What if I had pulled free of you? Half of me might have been left back in Hogsmeade!” She was very worked up, and was giving him little punches in the arm, almost unconsciously. Harry laughed.

“It wasn’t that bad! Aren’t you impressed with my skills of Apparition? Come on, we’ll Apparate into the house together. Side-along now,” he said, laughing harder as he reached for her amidst a flurry of blows from her little fists.

“Harry,” she shrieked, and now she was laughing too, “We’re only twenty feet from the door!”

“What’s with all this racket?”

Harry and Hermione abruptly stopped wrestling. Standing in the open doorway, was Ron, and peeking out from behind him, was Ginny.

“Oh, hi Ron,” Harry said, waving. “Hi Ginny.”

Ron and Ginny walked down the path to greet them. “Hi Harry,” Ginny said softly, and he thought that she looked a little sad. He glanced away, trying to find anything to look at besides her eyes. Beside him, Hermione was very flushed, probably at seeing Ron again, he supposed.

“Well, where have you two come from?” Ron asked, a little suspiciously. “I thought you were still at your Aunt and Uncle’s.”

“I was,” Harry said, and then told them both of how he had decided to go back to Hogwarts, and how he had found Hermione there.

“So you came together,” Ginny said carefully, looking first at Harry and then at Hermione.

“Well sure. We were both at Hogwarts, weren’t we?”

“Of course. And you Apparated here, Harry, I knew you’d be good at it.”

Harry felt a blush rising into his cheeks. “Er, I’m not too bad, I guess. That’s what Hermione and I were fighting about. She doesn’t want me to go Apparating around without a license.”

“The last thing you need is more trouble from the Ministry, Harry,” Hermione scolded, and Ginny and Harry exchanged looks.

“Some things never change, I guess,” Ginny smirked.

Harry smiled, but Hermione said briskly, “I’m going to go and see if Mrs. Weasley needs any help.” She started off towards the house, and then, almost as an afterthought said, “Ron, do you want to come with me?”

“Maybe we should go too,” Harry said. “That’s why we’re here early, after all.” Together the four of them walked into the house, Hermione leading the way and walking very fast. Harry couldn’t be sure, but he thought that he saw Ginny’s face fall when he said that he was only here early to help with the wedding. He smiled. Even though he knew they couldn’t be together, it made him feel good to know that he wasn’t the only one who regretted it.

*****************************************

The two days before the wedding passed so quickly and exhaustingly that Harry could scarcely believe it. Hermione and Ginny were being kept busy with the flowers, cutting and arranging them, and then soaking them in Rejuvenating Solution, to ensure that they stayed fresh throughout the ceremony. Harry spent most of the time in the yard and garden with Ron, Fred, and George. As it happened, the gnomes were extremely attracted to the solution soaked flowers, and had to be expelled almost on the hour, until Fred had the brilliant idea of building a ‘gnome moat’ filled with gnome repellent, all around the ceremony grounds and the house. Bill was scarcely seen, always off having a cigar or two with Mr. Weasley. Mrs. Weasley was monitoring everyone’s progress, and making the final arrangements for the food and the music. Fleur was continually skipping across the lawn or through the house, smiling at everyone, and saying “Oh, it will be just perfect! It will be ze most wonderful day of our lives! I am so ‘appy!” And everyone wanted to slap her.

*********

The day of the wedding, Harry smoothed out his dress robes, and looked in the mirror. Downstairs, he could hear the rest of the Burrow moving around. Once or twice he could hear Molly roar out something like, “Get a move on, you lunkheads!” and assumed that Fred and George were up.

Harry had lingered in Ron’s room well past breakfast, wanting to stay out of the way. Everything was in place, and today he was just a guest. Ron had risen and dressed hours earlier, in much nicer dress robes than he had worn to the Yule Ball three years earlier, mumbled something like, “bloody marriage, rather be puking slugs than go through this again,” and then trudged downstairs to join the fray.

When it seemed like things were about to get started (Harry could hear the first of the guests arriving to the loud and joyous exclamations of Mrs. Weasley), he opened the door.

“Hermione!”

“Harry!” she said, surprised. He had almost run into her. He couldn’t help noticing that she looked very nice in her pale blue dress robes. Her hair was swept up onto the top of her head, with very pretty curls hanging down and little flowers laced through the plaits.

“Er, were you going down?”

“Yes, I was coming to get you. You’re supposed to be my date, remember?”

“Oh, right,” Harry smiled. Although when he had agreed to go with her, he hadn’t counted on her looking so pretty. He gallantly held out his arm. “Shall we?”

Hermione giggled. “Thank you, sir. You look very nice in your robes, Harry.”

“Er, thanks,” Harry swallowed, and wondered why it was so hard to talk all of a sudden. “You, um, you look really nice too.”

“I do?”

“Yes,” he said, and paused to look at her. She was smiling at him softly and he noticed the way she was biting her lower lip. “You look really, really nice.”

“Harry! Hermione!”

They looked away from each other quickly, and Harry pulled his arm away and stepped back.

“Are you guys coming down? They’re going to start seating people.”

Harry was speechless. Ginny looked fantastic. He couldn’t stop looking at her in her green bridesmaid’s dress, with her flaming red hair curling on her shoulders. He vaguely heard Hermione say that yes, they were coming, but he couldn’t say anything. He could barely nod.

He snapped out of his frozen state when Hermione pushed roughly past him, saying very loudly that she’d meet him downstairs. She stormed past Ginny without a word.

“What was that about?” Ginny said.

“I have no idea,” Harry said honestly.

**********

The ceremony was lovely. The turnout was good too, even with a war on. Tonks and Lupin had turned up, and so had most of the Hogwarts staff. Even Mad-Eye Moody made an appearance, his wonky magic eye flaring at the sight of Fleur in her pristine white gown.

Throughout the vows, Harry tried desperately to keep from stealing glances at Ginny, all to no avail. Once or twice she caught him, and blushed, causing Harry to clear his throat with embarrassment. Hermione was sitting beside him, but she didn’t say a thing. In fact, she hadn’t talked to him at all since this morning in the stairway. She just sat, stone-faced, her hands linked together in her lap.

At the reception, which was held in the garden, Fleur wrapped Harry in a hug and kiss. “Oh ‘Arry, zank you so much for coming! It was so beautiful, no? My gown is perfect, yes?”

“Erm, yes,” Harry said sheepishly.

“And ‘Ermioneee, zank you for the ‘elp with ze flowers! Zey are perfect, no?”

“Yes, perfect Fleur, everything was perfect,” Hermione smiled, and hugged Bill, who looked much better since the attack. The scars were quickly fading from an angry red to a pearly pink.

Harry was watching Ginny, who was talking animatedly to some older people, who, because of their faded red hair, he assumed to be relations.

“Oh Harry,” Hermione exclaimed. “It’s Hagrid! He came!” She was pointing excitedly to the gate, which Hagrid was currently trying to fit through.

“What?” Harry said, distracted by Ginny’s hair, blowing in the breeze.

Hermione sighed. “I don’t know why you just don’t go over there.”

Harry thought she sounded a little annoyed, so he said, “No, you’re right, we should go say hi to Hagrid, make sure he’s been feeding Buckbeak.”

“You mean ‘Witherwings’. There are people from the Ministry here, Harry.”

Harry glanced around suspiciously at the faces of the guests. Hermione always thought of everything.

“Hermione! Harry!” Hagrid boomed, having made his way through the gate (with minimal cracking of the wood).

“Hello Hagrid,” they said together. “How are you? We’re so glad you could make it.”

“Oh, I wouldn’ta missed this for the world,” the half-giant said, seeming much better, and not drunk at all. “And I have to thank you two, especially you, Hermione, for looking after me and Bu-Witherwings the way you did.”

“It was the least I could do Hagrid. Haven’t you always looked out for us?” Hermione smiled, and then exchanged a look with Harry. Although Hagrid was always doing his best to help them, he had gotten them into an equal measure of sticky situations. The incident with Grawp sprang immediately to mind.

“Anyways, I had to come over and thank ye,” Hagrid said, smoothing the lapels on his enormous jacket. “Now if ye’ll excuse me, I promised someone a dance.”

Harry looked over his shoulder, and saw Madame Maxime blushing a short distance away, her head up over all of the other guests. “Sure Hagrid. Have fun.”

Harry and Hermione watched him go, and then turned to each other as the music played. He supposed they should dance, and he knew that she probably wouldn’t turn him down, but for some reason he still felt nervous asking her. “Hermione-”

“Yes?”

“Do you-”

“Hey, Harry, that was some ceremony eh? I thought I was going to pass out from boredom standing up there for so long.” Ron walked up, a happy grin on his face, and Harry could tell that he really was happy for his brother. “But at least the gnome-moat seems to be holding. I haven’t seen a single one of those little buggers.”

“Nope. Fred is a real genius.”

“I wouldn’t say genius. He’s a real something though.” Ron said, and then looked a little pale. “You know, my little sister could use a dance. She’s been fending off Angus McFadden for the last half hour.”

“I don’t know if I should,” Harry said, looking over to where Ginny was, and she did look very uncomfortable talking to a rather short boy with blond hair. As he continued to watch, he could vaguely hear Hermione scolding Ron about something.

“Oh come off it Hermione,” Ron was saying when Harry tuned back in. “I was coming over here to ask you to dance, but if you’re going to be like that-”

Harry smiled. “Just go,” he said to her. “I’ll be okay.”

Hermione glanced over at Ginny before nodding and following Ron to the dance floor.

Harry spent a few minutes watching them, Hermione looked very uncomfortable as Ron kept stepping on her toes, and lingering by the punch bowl, being uncomfortable himself. He couldn’t decide whether or not he should go and talk to Ginny. It seemed false not to, but then again, if he did- and then he glanced up at her, and she was tossing her hair over her shoulder. The lovely sight of it made Harry make up his mind. He stalked onto the dance floor.

“Ron, I need to cut in.”

“What?”

“I need to dance with Hermione,” Harry said, almost desperately.

“Well, I don’t know why you can’t wait for the next song,” Ron said sulkily. “And what about Ginny? She’s still being cornered by McFadden.”

“I’m sure she can handle it,” Hermione said, pulling out of Ron’s grasp. “What’s going on Harry? What’s happening?”

Ron was still put out. “I don’t know why you need to-”

“Listen, Ron,” Harry said quickly. “I know you don’t, but I need her. Just be a friend, okay? I need her.” And then he slipped into Ron’s space and swept Hermione away in a waltz.

“All right, Harry,” Hermione whispered. “What did you need me for? What’s going on? Is everything okay?”

“Yes,” he said.

“Then what?” Hermione asked. “And why do you keep glancing at Ginny?”

“What are you talking about?”

Hermione abruptly stopped dancing. “You keep glancing at her. You’re not trying to use me to make her jealous, are you?” Hermione’s lip was beginning to tremble.

“No!” Harry exclaimed, although, he supposed that what he had been doing was using Hermione to distract himself from Ginny, and from the look on Hermione’s face, that explanation wouldn’t be too much better. “I- I just need to talk to you. About what I’m going to do.” He could see Hermione drop her guard, but not completely.

“If that’s true Harry,” she said. “Then we should go somewhere and talk. We shouldn’t be out here on the dance floor to be seen and overheard.”

“Okay,” Harry said, relieved, and she led him out of the garden and across the gnome moat, out into a field.

*********

“I was thinking of leaving here after the wedding to go to Godric’s Hollow,” Harry said, trying to talk quietly. He doubted that anyone could overhear, but he couldn’t be sure, because Hermione had scowled when he had suggested using Muffliato.

“And?” Hermione said, her face filling with concern.

“And, I don’t know how to feel about seeing my parents. About seeing their graves, and the place that they-” Harry stopped.

“Were murdered by Voldemort,” Hermione said boldly. “Of course you don’t know how to feel. I can’t even imagine what that must be like, Harry.”

“I almost feel like I should go alone, but I’m scared to.”

“And it’s out of the question. Ron and I already said we’d be there with you. And we will be. If you want to go inside and pack now we can be ready.”

Harry’s heart felt very big, just as it always did when he realized how loyal his friends were. “I don’t know what I intend to do there. Maybe just think. Maybe just tell them, tell them that I intend to fight….that I won’t let them down.”

“You could never let them down, Harry,” Hermione said softly, and reached out to touch his shoulder.

“You’re going back to Godric’s Hollow?!”

Harry looked up in surprise to see Ginny.

“What are you doing here?” Hermione asked, and Ginny looked at her sharply.

“What do you mean? This is my house!” Ginny said, rather defensively, walking up to Harry, but Harry knew what Hermione meant. They rarely discussed serious issues in the presence of anyone but themselves, and Ron. Later he’d try to explain that to Ginny, so she wouldn’t be angry with her.

“I want to come with you,” Ginny said loudly.

“Your mother would never let you,” Harry said, and to his surprise, Ginny threw her arms around his neck.

“I know,” Ginny said shrilly. “But you can’t go alone!”

“I’ll be with him,” Hermione said, and Harry felt Ginny’s arms tighten.

Ginny pulled away to look at Hermione over her shoulder. “Well, that’s good at least. He’ll be glad to have his friends there. But I know he’d rather have me there too, wouldn’t you?”

“Er, of course I would,” Harry stammered. Ginny was looking deeply into his eyes. “I’m, I’m leaving right away,” he added, hoping that she might hug him again.

“Promise to be careful,” Ginny said, and then paused. “Harry, I know we’re not together any more. I know we’re not a couple. But I also know that there’s only one reason why we’re not, and I’d really, really like to kiss you right now,” she whispered, but even though she was whispering, Harry was sure that Hermione could hear her very plainly. He looked into Ginny’s eyes.

“I know,” he said. “And I would too. But we shouldn’t.” And he pulled out of her grasp, looking away from her, towards Hermione, who was looking away from him, and who, for some reason, had turned very pale.

************************************************

A/N: All right, I imagine that chapter was mostly frustrating. I know it was frustrating for me. Could that little brat interrupt any more? We are SO building up for a catfight. At least a mini catfight. I’m trying to stay true to the series, so I don’t think there can be a ginormous one, but there will definitely be something going down! Next time, we’ll be at Godric’s Hollow.

And for those of you who requested longer chapters….how was this for you? Long enough? Too long?

Also, maybe I’m turning into a theorist myself, but did anyone else notice how jealous Ron was when Harry and Hermione were alone together in HBP? I’ve only read it once and that still jumped out. Anyways, I’ll leave that to the forums. GO THEORISTS!