A/N: Enjoy!!!!

Chapter 23

Hermione made her way down the hall her face was determined and she was flanked by all of her friends. Christmas had brought all back together just like she had hoped. Ron and Harry stood by her left while Fred and George were on her right. Fred's fingers were twined with her own and they were headed towards Professor Lupin's room. Hermione was pretty sure he still had one of the boggarts from class that day and she was determined to face it again. She felt as if she had grown up since that day in September. She would face the boggart one last time to prove that she had.

When they reached the door to the Defense room Fred pulled her closer. "Are you sure about this Princess?" He asked her, dropping his voice low enough so only she could hear.

She smiled up at him and nodded. Harry was opening the door and she walked inside. "Professor?" She called to the empty room. "Are you in here?"

She heard a crash and looked up as the door to Lupin's office swung open. "Miss Granger? Is there anything I can help you with?" He asked as he walked down the steps.

"Actually I wanted to face the Boggart one last time." She told him "I know you've kept one on hand to teach Harry the Patronus charm and I was hoping that I could use it."

Lupin looked pensive for a moment before he nodded his head. "Are you sure about this Hermione?" He asked.

"Yes Professor." Lupin smiled and moved back to his office. He came back out the door with a trunk floating behind him.

"Now everyone else stand back. Hermione come forward and stand just there." He directed her. "Are you ready?"

She stood in the middle of the room as Lupin came forward and lowered the trunk to the ground. Looking up she glanced at her professor and nodded her head. Lupin nodded back and flicked his wand. The trunk flew open with a crash and smoke rose up. Hermione stood there, nervous to see what form the boggart would take. It shifted again and again until it began to take shape. Became tall, with a witch's hat and soon a face appeared, stern and reproving. In it's hand was scroll of parchment.

"Miss Granger! You have failed every last one of your exams! How dare you come to this testing without preparation!" The thing shrieked, a Scottish brogue thick in it's throat. "It is the finally decision of the headmaster and the governers of this school, that you will be expelled!"

She stood there, staring at the shape of her favorite professor. A part of her watched on shocked, what she was seeing now was really just a tamer version of her original boggart. What was she still insecure about? Hermione couldn't imagine what sort of failure she was afraid of but she knew that this was the first hurdle to confronting it and moving on.

She glanced to the side, everyone was watching her. Confusion played across their faces, she hadn't moved and she knew they wanted to know why. She gave them a smile and turned back to the boggart who was still shrieking away.

"- Listen to me young lady! You're a disgrace! A disgrace to witches and wizards everywhere! You don't deserve your magic!"

Those words stung, Hermione could easily admit she visibly flinched as those words hit home. But it didn't matter she'd prove them all wrong in the end. She squared her shoulders and closed her eyes. Breathing deeply she thought of all her friends and the confidence she had gained in these few short months. Exhaling slowly she looked at the boggart and raised her wand. "Why don't you shut up!" She growled.

"Well I ne-!" The thing shrieked.

"Ridikulus!" She called out. A zipper appeared and firmly closed the things mouth, but it didn't end there. Zippers appeared everywhere, soon the arms were pinned and then the legs. They closed the sleeves and bottom of the robe. It went on until the boggart was wriggling on the floor and it howled behind the zipper when the first laugh sounded. Again and again the laughter came, increasing and getting louder until with a pop it disappeared.

When the laughter ended Hermione was scooped up into Fred's arms and he pressed their lips together in a kiss. She could barely breath when it ended and her lips were tingling with pleasure. "Well done." Fred mumbled into her hair and twirled her in his arms. When he released her she was hugged firmly by everyone and her cheeks were kissed repeatedly. Finally she landed in front of Lupin and he placed a hand on her shoulder.

"You did very well Miss Gran- Hermione. Really well." Hermione smiled and threw her arms around the professor and hugged him. Lupin's face was flaming as she looked up at him.

"Thank you professor. I'm sorry." She whispered quietly and ignored his confusion. Lupin was a good man, she could tell. No matter what he was, that didn't make him a monster. As she pulled away and glanced at her friends she took in the proud smiles and the love that radiated from them. She said her goodbyes to Lupin and they left to head to dinner . The last thing she thought of as she tucked into her food, glancing at the high table, was she really did need to tell McGonagall about that broom.

Finite

A/N: I wanted to go out with a bang and I think I've achieved that. This chapter took a bit to write, I wanted it to be as perfect as possible as far as the ending and story goes. But I have a special request, this story was a pet project of mine for about a year. I know you must be surprised I only started posting in july, but I had been planning the plot and how I wanted the story to feel since about January of last year. It started as just a note in my ideas for stories which read: Hermione's Boggart is the twins. That was it and I took it from there. It became this and I pretty proud of the results. This is my first real stab at writing fan fiction. Well fiction in general really. I do have a special request and I'm hoping to achieve my goal but I know sometimes it just won't happen. I wrote this story for myself at first and soon I began writing it for the fans, and now I would really love to see all the people who never reviewed, reviewed all the time and reviewed every now and again to review this final chapter. It's my way of celebrating the end to my first piece of fan fiction. I know some of my alerters aren't big reviewers and honestly that's okay I really really don't mind at all if you can't find it in yourself to review because you snaky or because you can't find anything to say. I just want this story to go out with a bang! THAT is my goal.

*******REVIEW PLEASE AND I'LL SEE YOU IN THE SEQUEL(or some of my other stories I'll hopefully release soon)*********