Disclaimer: Like much of the world's population, I wish I owned Harry Potter. Sadly, this is not the case.

Hermione's intention upon reaching Grimmauld Place was to remind Harry (again) that this need to sequester himself off every year shouldn't extend to her. Instead, she choked on a lungful of dust the moment she entered the hallway, screwing up her nose as she coughed. The smells weren't overwhelming or distinctive, nor were they especially pleasant. With a faint exhalation of breath, she crossed to the drawing room. Night had fallen, and any light that would've come in through large windows was blocked by drawn curtains. The dust from the hallway was here as well, hanging in the air and covering every object. Completing the homey picture was Harry Potter. He sat on the floor between two couches, surrounded by a small mess of newspapers. There was a bottle in his hand, which he set down as he looked at her. His tiny half-smile only fueled Hermione's exasperation.

"Honestly," she muttered. A few quick waves of her wand had most of the lamps working and flames burning in the hearth. Belatedly, she noticed that he'd used the piano and bench as a table, abandoning several dirty plates there. Banishing those to the kitchen below, Hermione cast a simple but thorough cleaning charm, turning her attention to Harry the moment she'd made the place habitable. "The Chosen One, all powerful savior of the wizarding world, who can't be bothered to cast a first year cleaning spell. If your hoards of worshippers only knew the truth."

"Good evening to you too, Hermione." Standing, he crossed to her side, opening his mouth to say more. Then Hermione's hands were on either side of his face, pulling it down with surprising force. "Oi! Take it easy. What exactly are you doing?"

Hermione waited a few seconds before answering, releasing her grip as she did. "Finding out how drunk you are."

"Ah," said Harry, rubbing the left side of his face as he circled around to unclasp Hermione's cloak. "Have I passed the test then?"

Raising an eyebrow at his thoughtfulness, Hermione noted the clarity she'd found in green eyes, the warmth of breath that carried only the faintest scent of alcohol. "Yes," she admitted, a reluctant smile pulling at the corner of her lips. "Where's Kreacher?" she asked, knowing the house elf wouldn't stand for this kind of mess.

"I sent him away."

"Harry!"

"An errand, Hermione," he said, curtailing her speech on elfish rights. "He's off telling every news and radio outlet he can find that I'm taking a holiday in Bora Bora."

"Bora Bora?" she repeated, following Harry as he folded her cloak and moved across the room.

"I hit the globe upstairs with a spell, Bora Bora was the part that got scorched, " he replied, pausing in the act of draping her garment over a couch arm. "Hermione, what's this?"

Coming up next to him, Hermione made a face at the bit of whitish slime gracing the back of her cloak. Removing the filth with another small flick of her wand, she found it harder to banish the scowl on her face. "Bloody reporters cornered me outside the Ministry this morning. I lost patience."

Grinning, Harry finished with the cloak, gesturing for her to take a seat on the sofa. "Which curse was it?"

"You remember the Mudblood incident second year?"

Did he remember Malfoy spouting off, Ron trying to defend Hermione, and Ron puking up slugs for several hours thereafter? No, why would he? "I have a vague recollection."

"Well. Fortunately my wand wasn't broken when I cast that spell."

Harry joined her on the couch. The scattered newspapers he'd been reading were now stacked in a neat pile, and he took a page from the top as he spoke. "Hermione, I'm all for confusing and cursing the journalists, but don't you think doing it that way is a little…"

"Masochistic?"

"Sure. That."

Hermione smiled sadly. "Ron and I spoke earlier today. We do that fairly often now, with a minimal amount of awkward tension. It's been six months, Harry."

"I know. As long as you're okay." Their eyes held a few seconds longer before the Prophet's front page regained his attention. "Time doesn't heal everything."

Hermione didn't need to look at the print. Every headline was always the same today. A year since the Battle of Hogwarts, the fall of the Dark Lord. Two years. Three. "No, but you could do a better job of helping it along. Isn't it masochistic of you to brood in this house alone on the toughest night of the year?"

"I don't brood in this house every year."

"Choosing a different place in which to brood doesn't actually improve the situation."

Harry shrugged, setting the paper aside with a wry smile. "I'm not brooding alone. Doesn't that count as improvement?"

"I suppose," Hermione replied. "It would count for more if I didn't have to chase you down every year. It would certainly simplify things." Last year she'd found him near his parents' home in Godric's Hollow, another house he owned but rarely entered. On the first anniversary of that last fight, there'd been a memorial at the newly rebuilt Hogwarts. He'd made an appearance, then pretended to disappear. She'd found him skulking around at the edge of the Forbidden Forest, nearly breaking an ankle when she tripped on the Invisibility Cloak.

"Hermione, if you cared that much about simplicity, you'd never have stayed friends with Ron and I."

"Fair point," Hermione conceded, sharing a wry chuckle with her best friend before turning serious again. "You've talked to Ron?"

"Of course."

Hermione nodded. The question was solely reflex. The three of them always talked tonight, even if they weren't in the same room. "The offer to stay at the Burrow?"

"You know it's always there." A pause. "Would you like to take Mrs. Weasley up on it?"

Harry wasn't quite meeting her eyes anymore. She touched his forearm, squeezing lightly. "If I didn't want to be here, I wouldn't be." Even while she and Ron were together, Hermione always felt like an appearance tonight would mean intruding on the family's grief. So she and Harry dealt with their sadness together, and she did her best to keep him from shredding himself to bits. "You could be there if you wanted. None of them blame you for Fred."

"I know."

Hermione blinked. That was easier than usual. "Really?"

"Yes."

She blinked again. "Are you sure?"

"Yes," Harry assured her, pulling a sad smile. "I'm simplifying things for you. Happy?"

It wasn't possible for any of them to be truly content tonight, so Hermione felt no need to answer the question. Instead, she asked one of her own. "You know they don't blame you. Do you know that it wasn't your fault?"

"Most of the time," Harry said after a slight pause. "It's harder to know that today though."

Hermione's fingers drifted down Harry's arm, settling at the back of his hand. Apparently she could skip the speech about misplaced responsibility this year. She'd wasted a considerable amount of time honing it over the last few weeks, but that didn't mean she wasn't thrilled with the progress. It seemed that with enough repetition, she could actually penetrate that thick skull of his.

Unless it wasn't her doing.

"Did you talk to Ginny about this?"

"Talked, yes, but not in the way you're thinking. Ginny and I speak fairly often now with a minimal amount of awkward tension. Apparently she's seeing Dean Thomas again."

"And how does that make you feel?"

Harry shrugged, grabbing the bottle he'd left on the floor. "I'd think the same way you feel about Ron seeing Luna. They both deserve to be happy, even if they can't find that with us."

He was doing it again, not exactly looking at her. "I suppose it's hard to think of happiness at all tonight."

Harry uncapped the bottle, nodding. "Yes, it's hard." A pause. "Be impossible if you weren't here."

"That's sweet of you to say," Hermione replied as he raised the bottle in her direction and took a small sip. "Does this mean I shouldn't scold you for being too lazy to conjure up some glasses?" Before Harry could answer, she snatched the drink from his hand, downing a healthy amount of firewhiskey.

With a swish of his wand and a bemused expression, Harry summoned two tumblers from the kitchen, handing one to Hermione and taking the bottle in return. "Guess it's good that I hadn't really touched this before you arrived." Familiar smiles were exchanged as he poured for both of them. Then he went to set the bottle down, and his eyes again found the papers, remembrances of all the deaths. "To those we lost."

Hermione lifted her own glass, watching the surge of emotions play out on Harry's face. "To what they died for," she added. "To what we gained because of them." The smile that earned her was genuine, the first she'd seen that reached all the way to his eyes. She studied those eyes now, as intensely as she had any book over the years, basking in the warmth she found there.

The firelight accentuated cheeks that were already flushed red. Halfway through a second bottle of firewhiskey, Harry again found himself on the floor, back braced against the sofa and Hermione leaning heavily against his right arm. For awhile, they'd done what their friends would've wanted, recalling good times shared with the lost. Hermione had slid off the couch while recounting some of Fred's more creative exploits. Then she'd released a small burp, which she wouldn't acknowledge. After refusing to call it a hiccup for the third time, Harry found himself yanked to the ground amidst a pleasant combination of laughter and curses.

Nearly an hour after falling to the floor, they'd descended into this bout of silence. Flashes of all the lost Order members who used to frequent this room kept Harry from true relaxation, but he did enjoy a sort of calm. Hermione's breathing was close by, and that was enough to quell the worst of his heartache. The drinks were catching up with him, making his eyelids heavy. He was close to letting them drop, giving in to the soothing effect of Hermione presence when the object of his thoughts spoke up.

"Tell me something."

Her words came slower than normal, but Harry's brain still struggled to catch up. "Huh?"

"Tell me something I don't know."

Harry looked down at her, long chestnut curls taking up most of his view. "Why?"

Hermione shrugged against her friend's arm. "Because I'm tipsy and I asked you to."

"You know everything," he answered honestly.

"Oh don't exaggerate. I'm not talking about books or studies. Tell me something I don't know about you."

Harry considered these new parameters. "You know everything," he repeated. This earned him a sound thump to the chest. Catching her hand before she could try a repeat attack, Harry wondered at the absurdity of this. When Ron joined them for the occasional drink, it usually ended with one or all of them improvising a medley of God Save the Queen and the Hogwarts school song. Without Ron's influence, Hermione's endless search for knowledge was again on display. Harry almost told her again that he had nothing to offer. Then he glanced down at her hand in his. The scars left by Umbridge's blood quill still lingered on his skin.

Even with a fair amount of firewhiskey in her, Hermione could still catch him in a lie.

Risking another beating, he let her hand go, immediately missing the contact. "I had nightmares that you'd left. Nearly every night."

"What?" Hermione asked, taking her turn at confusion.

"When we looked for the Horcruxes," Harry explained, unsure why he was doing it. He could've said anything; there'd been no conscious choice to go with this answer. "After Ron left. From the moment you stayed with me, I was waiting for you to change your mind. I'd dream that you were gone, then spend all day waiting for you to say you'd had enough."

"That wasn't an option."

The reply was long in coming, so soft that Harry strained to hear it even in the quiet surrounding them. Knowing the logical part of his brain wouldn't operate at full capacity, Harry still made an effort at full understanding. It wasn't an option. Not, 'it never even crossed my mind.' He hated knowing what he'd done to her all those months, the pain she endured out of obligation to him. He didn't realize those thoughts had been voiced until the pressure on his arm disappeared.

"Honestly," said Hermione, only slightly awkward as she fought with alcohol and stiffness to sit up and look at him properly. "I thought you were done with all this useless guilt."

"I said I was working on it, not that I was done with it," Harry retorted, not quite sure that he'd said anything of the sort.

"I love you, you fool. I couldn't very well leave you fumbling about in the woods like a chicken with a lost head, could I?"

Harry got stuck on her declaration of love for a few seconds before the obvious struck. Of course she loved him. As a friend, a brother, all the usual terms. "I'm glad you were smart enough to have that lack of confidence in me," he said. Hermione made a noise in the back of her throat, one that Harry couldn't decipher. Her next words kept him from trying too hard.

"I still have nightmares sometimes. That it wasn't a ruse when Hagrid brought you out of the Forest."

Harry closed his eyes to her words, swallowing. Did she think that one tough admission deserved another? "I almost took you up on it. When you offered to come with me."

"You didn't though."

"I didn't want you seeing…that. And there was still the snake to take care of." For some reason, there was doubt in her eyes. Doubt didn't suit Hermione at all. "I wasn't risking anything by leaving it to you and the others," he said, feeling the drinks far less than he had mere moments before. "You hadn't let me down yet. You never have."

He was talking about her. Just her. Despite everything Ron, the Order, and the D.A did to help, he wasn't speaking about them. He shouldn't speak at all; his tone was giving too much away. Hermione's response wasn't especially helpful in shutting him up.

"Neither have you."

He had though. He'd wanted things he couldn't have. It started when they'd spent weeks together in that bloody tent, the Horcrux draining them more and more as the days passed. Later he'd blame the shift in feelings on loneliness and desperation. It was easy enough to do while they were occupied with post-war life and their respective Weasleys. Still, things never quite realigned as they had before. Then Hermione split with Ron, citing the changes in both of them, their lack of communication.

Ginny gave him a similar speech not long after her brother's breakup, making Harry wonder if Hermione and his ex had traded notes. "I almost kissed you in the tent. When we danced."

He didn't want to say that. It simply entered his head and left his mouth. Because he'd almost kissed her, then felt awful about it, traitorous to both of his best friends, not to mention Ginny. He felt much worse the next time he thought about being with her, when there wasn't a spare Horcrux to blame. Biting his lip, Harry clamped down on further outbursts, knowing he'd already crossed a line he couldn't return from.

Hermione eyed him for a long time, saying nothing. Then, "You think this is news?"

Harry blinked, shaking his head. And she still claimed a lack of total knowledge. "You knew?"

"Yes."

"You didn't say anything."

"Neither did you."

"We were running for our lives, me without Ginny, you crying for Ron every night. And I was supposed to tell you after seven years that I might want…more? I thought you'd slap me before I got two words out." Which seemed a legitimate concern considering all the times she'd hit him tonight when they weren't sharing major revelations.

"No. Of course not. We were both under incredible strain. Between that and the damn necklace, we could hardly be expected to trust our feelings."

Harry nodded along, though Hermione seemed to be talking more to herself than him. Then he stopped nodding, mouth falling slightly open. "Our feelings?" he repeated, sure the pounding in his ears had mucked up his perceptions.

"Yes, our feelings," she confirmed. "You couldn't tell how confused I was after that night?"

"We barely spoke about anything that didn't involve Horcruxes! You hardly looked at me, and when you did, you looked miserable."

"Because I was! Miserable and confused!"

Hermione closed her eyes, counting backwards from ten under her breath. Harry watched her, still processing the idea of Hermione being unsure about anything for more than two minutes at a time. "Are you now?" he asked, once he had her gaze again. "Confused I mean?"

"I can't say."

Well, that cleared things up. Opening his mouth to say something he would've regretted later, Harry was cut off by Hermione.

"Thank God neither of us acted back then. It would've been impulsive and desperate and horrible to Ron and Ginny. But now…"

"Now what?" Harry asked, thinking for once that the wheels he saw grinding along in Hermione's head were taking too long to do their jobs. On the verge of prodding her again, Harry froze as her hands went to either side of his face. Thankfully the move was gentler than before, when she'd nearly broken his neck while testing his sobriety.

"Don't move."

Harry obeyed the softly murmured instruction. He would've stayed frozen without it.

"I've got to test out a theory," Hermione continued. Then she leaned forward, lips meeting his.

Harry dearly hoped that the order to remain still didn't apply to his mouth as well. He reacted on instinct, hands tangling in soft tresses as Hermione's fingers ran though his already messy hair. The kiss was hesitant, but exhilarating. She tasted like whiskey and warmth, like familiarity suddenly made different. When she moved to pull back, Harry didn't stop her, though not for lack of wanting. Luckily she didn't go far, and Harry took heart in the fact that their foreheads were almost touching. "Well," he said after endless seconds of breathing in her presence and awaiting some kind of response. "What's the verdict then? Was my kissing satisfactory?"

The reference to their fifth year and the conversation after Harry's kiss with Cho brought a chuckle to Hermione's lips, just before she again pressed them to Harry's. "Definitely more than satisfactory," she said. "Though I already suspected as much."

"You've had suspicions about my ability to kiss?"

"Not suspicions exactly. Bits of information. From Ginny."

Harry battled conflicting emotions of satisfaction and horror. He hadn't thought they'd traded notes about that. "What was the theory then?" he asked, trying to banish an image of the two women discussing his more private qualities. "If you weren't testing my ability to snog, then what?"

Hermione ducked her head. Skin that was already rosier than usual turned a deeper shade of crimson. "I wasn't sure how you'd feel about it."

"Question answered, I hope," he murmured, placing a finger under her chin and a kiss to her temple. "You could've just asked, you know. Not that I'm complaining."

"Yes, I guess I could've. You've always been so good about expressing your emotions."

Unbidden, another image from after that other kiss took hold. That night Hermione had criticized Ron's emotional range rather than his own. "Ron's going to kill me," he stated, groaning as he leaned back against the couch.

Hermione's eyes rolled to the ceiling. "Lovely knowing where your mind is at a time like this. But don't worry, Ronald and I have come to an understanding."

"You came to an understanding with Ron. About snogging me."

"Essentially. When we spoke earlier, he said that he'd always want my happiness above everything else, that he wished the best to both of us."

"Ron said that?" The Ron who'd been ready to duel him for Hermione's affections a few years before? The one who'd likely helped bring about these feelings for her by leaving them and forcing Harry to realize how desperately he needed her?

"Yes," Hermione replied, carefully drawing the word out. "He also said that if someone else was going to be pawing at me, he'd prefer it was someone who'd

be proper about it."

Oh. That sounded more like Ron. "He didn't say anything to me."

"It's the anniversary of Fred's death, Harry. I imagine he's going through enough without engaging in one of those ridiculous, mumbling grunt fests that pass for meaningful conversation between you two so he could give you his blessing to shag me."

Harry's eyebrows climbed towards his hairline.

"Not that we're going to do that," Hermione rushed on. "Not now at least. Or any time in the immediate future. That's not…Ginny sends us her best. as well."

"Ginny knows too? How long were you planning this? Who else knows?"

"Firstly, you're the one that expressed a desire to kiss me, so it can hardly be said that I planned anything. Ginny confronted me shortly after the two of you broke up, asking about my feelings. She thought that you might reciprocate."

Harry frowned, mulling over her words. "She said that, did she?"

"Actually she said that any pea-brained git, including her brother, could see that our feelings for each other had changed. She said we'd best get on with it, and she expressed hope that I'd do a better job talking sense into you than she ever had."

Ah. That exchange was easier to picture. "Shortly after I broke up with Ginny…" he repeated. "You've been carrying this around for months then."

"Years, possibly, depending on perspective. Ginny and Ron seemed to think that you had, too."

"Well obviously they were right. But if you didn't plan on talking to me-"

"I wasn't going to risk our friendship based on Ron's assertion that you might fancy me. He's hardly the authority when it comes to interpreting others' feelings."

"And Ginny?"

A shrug followed a self-conscious bow of the head. "I'd hoped you'd prove them right or wrong before I had to, provide me with more evidence."

Another frown marred Harry's features. "All you've said about my lack of emotional intelligence, and your plan was to wait for me to make the first move?"

"It was a short-term plan," Hermione retorted a tad defensively. Then, in a different tone with a triumphant smile. "And it worked, didn't it?"

Yes, he guessed it did. He had been the one to bring up that night in the tent. "You're brilliant, I've always told you." Hermione blushed and Harry ginned, leading her into another deep kiss, this one much surer than the first. Then it hit him again, where they were. When they were. His brief explosion of pure, unadulterated bliss threatened to fizzle out.

Hermione touched the mouth she'd just explored, brought a hand up to brush wild bangs from Harry's eyes. "They'd want us to live, Harry. To make good memories in memory of them. Even tonight."

Harry smiled again. It still floored him sometimes, how she always seemed to know his thoughts. "Brilliant," he repeated, touching her cheek and enjoying the way it curved under his fingers. "So what now?"

"I have no idea," she mused. "I never actually envisioned this conversation going so well. I will tell you that since it has, I have no intention of hunting you down next year. I won't be chasing you here, or to the school, or to Bora bloody Bora. We'll face the good and the bad of this night together, like rational thinking adults, without me having to guess where you've holed up next. Understood?"

"Yes," said Harry. "But again, in my defense, I was never really hiding from you. Knew you'd find me eventually."

"Yes well, still. Let's try to simplify things next year, shall we?"

"Hermione," he said, combing a hand through her hair. "I think you might've had too much to drink. Haven't we already gone over how much value you actually put on simplicity?"

With an exasperated sigh, Hermione pushed Harry back against the couch, sealing their lips again. Surprised by the force of the move, Harry upset the remnants of their earlier activities. Two bottles of firewhiskey (only one of which was empty), spilled to the floor, along with two mostly-empty glasses that rolled across the room and into the hallway of Grimmauld Place.

It would be many, many hours before Harry or Hermione noticed this.

Fin

Author's Note: This is my second Potter fic, first in a small eternity, so please be kind. Rowling's recent comments confirming what us Harry/Hermione fans already knew reignited my interest in a big way, forcing me to get this out of my system. That said, I'm not super happy with it, as it went in a direction I'm not sure about. Still, hopefully a few of you enjoy it, and it leads to future H/Hr fics that I'm more satisfied with. Reviews are always appreciated, just keep things civil and constructive please.