Chapter 2

Chapter 2

The months flew by, and before Hermione knew it, it was Christmas. So much had happened during the last seven months since the end of the war that it was a relief to have a season of happiness, even if it was a bit forced. No one really wanted to celebrate, not with Fred, Tonks, and Remus gone, but life had to go on for everyone's sanity. Hermione sat in the sitting room of the Burrow, watching Harry and Ginny, freshly married, enjoy their first Christmas together.

"Why you two would want to be here makes no sense," Ron said to them as he tucked into his third piece of pumpkin pie. "If it were me, I would be with my wife still on our honeymoon."

Hermione's face felt warm. Ron had been dropping hints ever since Harry and Ginny's wedding during the first week of December. She was trying to accept Ron's advancement of their relationship, but the dream in her head of living happily ever after wasn't sterling in reality. It was embarrassing to go to dinner in public since he ate like a pig. Then, there were his moods. He was so very self-deprecating. Hermione spent most of her time reassuring him he was fine the way he was and that he should not try and size himself up to Harry so much.

On the other hand, Ron made her laugh, and he did love her. Their sex life was also getting better. At first, it had been just a nightmare of painful, humiliating experimentations that had left Hermione sore and in tears. But after a month, she'd stopped bleeding during intercourse, and they'd eventually found her g-spot, which made it so much more interesting and pleasurable; they were shagging like jackrabbits, and Ron excelled at giving a good pounding. Of course, it would have been better if he had not done that when she had been a virgin.

Every time she thought about it, she cringed. She had screamed her head off and bawled like a baby, but Ron had insisted in carrying on and getting it over and done with. She had curled up into a protective ball afterwards and cried herself to sleep as he had snored next to her. The following day, she had been in terrible pain and was bleeding so badly, she couldn't go to work. Ron, of course, wanted another go, but Hermione had been terrified to let him touch her. After two weeks, she'd slathered a warming lubrication on herself while Ron had washed up in the bathroom before the main event. It had been still agonizing, but at least, she hadn't screamed like he was killing her.

Ron knew only one mode of sex: hard, fast, and good. What he lacked in the art of drawing out the act to make it last longer, he made up in spades with his stamina. The wizard could shag the whole daylong. Hermione wondered at times if he didn't just walk around all the time with a stiffie. She couldn't wear skirts anymore. Ron would have those up around her waist and her underwear pushed to the side in a heartbeat. Then, before she knew it, she would be full of hot, throbbing Ron, fucking the shit out of her against a wall somewhere. He knew exactly how to trigger her orgasm, and she would be screaming out her release in less than a minute. Once she was screaming, he would finally bring himself to orgasm. The whole interlude would last around five minutes. Sex had so far been a blur of grabbing, thrusting, sweating and messy jumbled bits of combined pleasure and embarrassing words Ron liked to shout out as he hammered inside her. After four months, she had discovered that she had finally grown to handle Ron's rough treatment of her and that she was very easy to satisfy physically. However physically sating the sex was, she had never once felt emotionally fulfilled.

As time passed, Hermione had begun to think of the pros and cons of their relationship. Ron wasn't interested in learning as she was, and he never had been. Ancient Runes still fascinated her, as did Wizarding History and Charms. Then there was Potions.

Hermione groaned inwardly as she sipped on her wine. No one mentioned Professor Snape, potions, dark arts, dark magic, billowing robes, bats, or even words like "git" or "greasy"...anything that could make Harry think about Professor Snape. He had been thoroughly devastated when the dark wizard's body had not been recovered. Harry had poured hours, weeks, and months into the search, but he and the Ministry had always come up empty. All that had been recovered was a broken ebony wand that had been the Potions master's outside of Dufftown, just a few kilometers south of Hogwarts. Harry had taken the Elder Wand he had placed in Dumbledore's Tomb, and he had used it one last time to repair Snape's wand and had hidden the Potions master's wand in a secret location along with the owner's memories.

The month prior to that discovery had been the worst, in Hermione's estimation. She had thought things could not possibly become more upsetting for Harry as she, Ron, and Ginny had wandered with him, searching for clues, and then had sat in the gallery as each Death Eater who had been captured alive stood trial. Harry had frequently whispered or passed notes to the prosecution for information concerning the missing professor, but each time, they all had left disappointed.

The discovery of the broken wand, made in July, had prompted the Wizengamot to formally declare Severus Tobias Snape legally dead. When Harry had been notified about the formal proceedings by Arthur Weasley, he had made his way to the Ministry of Magic on the day of the judgment in his best robes to petition the Wizengamot to hold off their pronouncement.

"Hermione, please! Neither Ron nor anyone of us has been able to get through to Harry. You must make him see reason. Going down there will only make things worse!" Molly pleaded while Hermione tried to rest from another rough night of sex with Ronald. She felt bruised and battered. The last thing she needed to do was run down to the Ministry of Magic and try to hold Harry back when he was on a mission.

They sat in silence as they drank their firewhiskey in silence. Later that night, after Hermione told Ron she wasn't in the mood, she went to her old bed, which was the room next to Ginny's. She was lulled to sleep listening to the muted whispers, gasps, and the gentle, rhythmic movements of the bed next door to hers.

Harry's mourning for the man he had hated for so long had grown to mammoth proportions, bordering on the obsessive. He had begun to revere the wizard, taking up whatever causes he could to exonerate his name and give him posthumously the recognition he'd never received in life. Harry had again argued in front of the Wizengamot for Snape's portrait to be painted and hung with the other former Headmasters and Headmistresses of Hogwarts. The memory of the last debacle had still been fresh on the Wizengamot's mind, and although they'd expressed their feelings against it, considering Snape had abandoned his post, they'd conceded defeat once Harry had declared them all hypocrites, and never should Severus Snape's name be marred in his presence again. When questioned about the silvery memories of the Potions master encased in a thick crystal phial, along with the ebony wand he had repaired in a secret hiding place, Harry had refused to divulge his hiding place. He had declared the memories his property, given to him by Professor Snape, and as for the wand, he had declared it was safer not to be in the open where it might be misused.

Harry's increasing fragile mental state had not been lost on any of the Weasleys or Hermione...neither the flaw in Harry's logic. He had wanted the death of Severus Snape to be acknowledged in court through the work of a portrait, but he still held onto the hope that the elusive and mysterious dark wizard who had protected him his whole life was still out there...somewhere. However, he continued to maintain he was only holding the Wizengamot responsible for their decisions.

"They wanted him to be dead, well, Severus Snape shall get every thing due him!" he had said viciously when first approached by Hermione and Ron.

Ginny had been the one to take Harry and get his head on straight again. Once they had resumed their relationship after that terrible day at the Ministry, Ginny had sensed she was losing the man she had loved to an obsession over Professor Snape. Her tender loving ways had awakened Harry when she'd taken him to her bed. Molly and Arthur had turned a blind eye that Harry was sleeping with their daughter when it had seemed he was getting better as the days had passed. Even now, months later, Hermione still couldn't bear to tell them to use a Silencing Spell. First, she was embarrassed to say to Ginny she could hear them making love, but secondly, the fact was that it was all so tender and erotic soothed and fulfilled a deep need inside of her that she was too ashamed to analyze why. Harry cried a lot a first, his emotions were too tangled up, but he and Ginny would talk, and although Hermione couldn't understand the words, the humming sound of love carried through the wall that separated them and touched her heart.

After the talking would be the lovemaking, and Harry was, by how Ginny sounded, a tender and giving lover. There were no screams of a frenzied coupling, as it was between Ronald and her. They seemed to make love how they talked to each other, biting and sniping every other sentence. For Harry and Ginny, they were by no means dispassionate; it was just they were gentle in their ardor. Ginny's voice would gasp and whisper Harry's name in a way that made Hermione know she was in ecstasy. Harry, likewise, was as enthusiastic. His sounds were as guttural as Ron's, just softer and gentler. Hermione was in awe every night they made love. It was sad that she didn't have that with Ron, but still she enjoyed living vicariously through Ginny and Harry's lovemaking and genuinely felt happy for them.

By October, Harry had seemed awakened from his haze of grief and depression, and Ginny's comfort and love had given him a certain amount of peace of mind. They all knew he would never be the Harry he had been before the war, but he had his moments of light-heartedness that gave all of them hope. He and Ginny had married at the beginning of December, and Harry was finally smiling and happy again, but all it took was for some damn idiot to mention Severus Snape, and Harry would be at a loss. The grief and the pain would begin to overwhelm him, and he would look frightened and lost until Ginny would touch his arm, and then he would smile and take a deep breath to steady himself.

Hermione continued to sit on the couch, listening to Celestina Warbeck sing on the wireless, wondering why Harry could not free Professor Snape from his mind. For a while, the Weasleys had thought it was just a matter of time until Harry pulled himself out of his pain. But now, seven months after the final battle, Harry's mood had plateaued. Life went on with Harry not quite as mentally stable as they had hoped. Ginny believed Harry couldn't bring himself to forgive...not Professor Snape, of course, but himself. Whenever Harry thought of Snape, he would grow melancholy and despondent. The story of holding the dying wizard in his arms, looking eye to eye as his memories of his true love, Harry's mum, spilled out into the bottle Hermione had conjured had been told a hundred times over.

There had been a time Hermione went through the same feeling of guilt and sadness over the loss of such a brave man, but life had to go on. For the others, it was a slow process...but a sure one. For Harry Potter, the inability to forgive himself ate away at his mind and soul. No one knew when or if it would ever end.