Disclaimer: Everything you recognize from the Harry Potter books, obviously, belongs to J. K. Rowling.

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All three of them go different ways after the war. Well, Hermione goes a different way from the other two. Harry and Ron move into Grimmauld Place, and start Auror training, getting their NEWTs through the Ministry. Ginny moves into Grimmauld Place too. Hermione tries not to be jealous that Ginny will be there with them, while Hermione's off finishing her education at Hogwarts.

It's a small comfort that Harry doesn't show any interest in Ginny as a woman. Then again, Harry doesn't show much interest in anything. Not since he defeated Voldemort with his own spell.

He goes drinking with Ron every Friday. And the rest of the time, when he isn't at the Weasleys' for dinner, or at work, he's sitting in front of the fire at Grimmauld Place.

One day he comes into her room while she's studying, preparing to make up her seventh year, which hasn't started yet. Hermione was always one to try to get ahead.

"How do you do it?" he asks, flopping down on her bed, getting his scent all over her pillow, his shoes hanging off the end of the bed.

"Do what?" she asks, turning to him.

"Live," he says, putting a hand over his face.

She gets up from her desk, and, abandoning her work, goes to lay by him on the bed. He reaches out and pulls her to him, hugging her with his chin on the top of his head. Holding her the way he did so many nights while they were on the run.

"Harry," she sighs.

"I don't know how to be okay anymore," he tells her. "Is it weird that it felt more normal to be at war than it is now, when the bogeyman's gone?"

"It wasn't easy peasy," she says, and feels a moment of triumph as his body shakes with laughter.

"You'll be okay, Harry," she says. "It'll all be okay."

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Harry has to work on September 1st. So, Ron is the one who drives her to the train, who helps her with her trunk.

And who professes his love for her just before the whistle blows.

"I'm sorry," she tells him. "I…I just don't know."

Ginny stops her just inside the train door. "Ginny," she says, surprised. "I thought you were just going to do your NEWTs at the Ministry…"

"Mum talked me out of it," she blushes. "I don't think she wants me and Harry to be living together just yet, even if you and Ron are there too."

Hermione nods. She can't think of anything else to say.

"I'm supposed to tell you that you're going to be Head Girl," Ginny says, handing Hermione a pin. Hermione stares at it, remembering how much she used to want that position, that honour.

"Thank you," she says, taking it from the redhead and pinning it to her robes.

"There's a compartment for the Heads," Ginny says. "Good luck." She grins as she walks away, and Hermione wonders what the girl knows that she doesn't.

Her question is answered when she walks into the compartment, and Draco Malfoy stands to meet her.

"Granger," he says coldly, but civilly.

"Malfoy," she responds, and they shake hands as if they're business associates.

"I look forward to this year," he says. Then, he flashes a sharp smile. "It should be fun."

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Minerva McGonagall pulls her aside after the Sorting Feast. She says things like, 'inter-house unity', 'war recovery', 'united front', 'pardoned', 'I hoped you could help them accept him', as explanation for Draco.

"It's okay," Hermione says. "I think we'll work quite well together."

If it's partially a lie, she hopes that she'll be able to make it a truth.

And as the year passes, she realises that she and Malfoy do work quite well together, even though he disappears every Thursday, Friday, and Saturday at half-past nine to do who knows what.

She reads her letters while Malfoy's gone. Not in the Great Hall; definitely not while he's around. She doesn't want anyone to see her reactions to the words inside each letter.

Ron's letters come once a week. He complains about his training, asks about her classes, and ends every letter with 'I love you', or, 'Forever yours'.

Harry's letters come every day. At first he worries about being clingy, telling her that after seeing her every day for so long, he misses her.

She tells him not to worry. His letters are stories, more so than Ron's, and so much more entertaining. He tells her every little detail of his work day, with funny little anecdotes about fellow Aurors, Ron, and a tortoiseshell kitten that seems to have decided that Grimmauld Place is its home.

He tells her about how he's starting to train as an animagus. She researches in the Hogwarts library, then sends him a list of titles to buy.

Then she asks if he would mind if she became one too.

He doesn't.

They write back and forth, stories in every letter. Hermione laughs, cries, and howls with indignance reading his letters. They come every day; she reads them every Thursday, Friday, and Saturday at half-past nine.

At the end of one letter, after a month solid of writing every day, Harry ends saying, I know you don't read them as soon as you get them, and I don't mind. If it gets to be too much, just let me know. I'm writing just because I need someone to say, at the end of every day, that it'll be okay.

She responds in verse. She ends saying, 'You're a poet and you don't know it'. Then she says, It'll be okay, Harry.

And she hopes, with all her heart, that it will be.

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One day, Draco's attacked. He's all right, there's no harm done, but he won't tell Hermione where he was when it happened. All he'll say is, "Michael Corner's a right git."

He pulls out some fine, aged Firewhiskey, and together, they get very, very pissed.

"I'm soooorrryyyy," he says while on his way to the bath. "Fo' callin' you mudblood."

"S'fine." She waves him off. "T'wasn't yer fault."

Michael Corner is a git who gets expelled in the middle of his seventh year for attacking another student. Hermione may have had something to do with it. What can she say? Drunk childhood bullies apologizing strikes a chord.

"He's a Death Eater!" he bellows when he leaves. "A bloody Death Eater!"

But Hermione Granger is Draco Malfoy's best friend. The Head Boy and Head Girl. And Harry Potter himself sends Draco updates on his mother, who Harry visits every Sunday.

House confinement suits her, Harry confides in Hermione after his first visit. She's starting a garden, both flowers and food. We had tea in the back garden. I never thought I'd see Narcissa Malfoy in overalls and boots and gardening gloves, sipping tea like she was the queen of England.

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Hermione goes home to Grimmauld Place for Christmas. Ron picks her up from the station. She's disappointed, but she hugs Ron anyways, hoping he won't renew the feelings he professed to her in September.

They go straight to Grimmauld Place. Harry isn't there, and when Hermione asks where he is, Ron just shrugs, moving closer. Hermione excuses herself, using her trunks as an excuse.

Harry doesn't get home until late, but when he does get home, Hermione can hear him galloping up the stairs taking them two at a time. She opens the door, laughing, just before Harry bursts in, wrapping her up in a bear hug that lifts her off her feet.

"Ah, I missed you," Harry says, inhaling.

"I missed you too," she replies. She can't stop smiling as Harry lets go and takes a step back, examining her from head to toe.

She observes him too. Gone is the boy Harry, who fought a monster. The Harry who was so dead inside after the war. This Harry is full of life, mature.

"You look so much better!" Hermione says.

"Thank you," he replies, taking a bow. "Gardening is as good for me as it is for Narcissa. That's where I was; she invited me over for tea, to introduce me to some of her friends. I didn't realise that you were coming home today until after I told her I'd be there." He chuckles, his eyes sparkling. "And, you know, no one cancels on Narcissa."

"I didn't know you were so close," Hermione says as they move to sit, her on the bed and him straddling the desk chair.

"We weren't, really," he says. "I had to go by to get her to sign some paperwork for the Auror office; that's when I first started visiting. She just seemed so lonely, keeping me as long as she could, for tea, to show me the gardens, to pick my brain for news of the outside world."

Hermione can't imagine being back at Malfoy Manor and not completely shutting down. "It was okay," Harry says, looking at her seriously. "We had a very open heart to heart about it the second time I visited. She's completely redone the room; it's so much lighter and airier in there now. It might just be one of my favorite places in the house."

Hermione tries to smile, but she's remembering the smell of Bellatrix's sweat and her own blood, and she's shaking.

Then Harry is there. "It's okay," she says shakily as he hugs her to him. "It'll be okay.

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There's an awful moment, days before Christmas, when she remembers her parents. She hasn't seen them since the war ended, when they, ever so politely, told her they'd rather stay in Australia after she returned their memories.

Nothing's come in the mail from them, even though she sent them a nice Christmas card that didn't even have moving pictures with a gift card.

There's a moment when she thinks it was all a dream, that they're dead. Then she calls their business, and they answer as Wendell and Monica Wilkins.

Turns out she did a better memory job than she thought, and a worse job at the cure.

She cries all day that day. Ron avoids her; he has a mind block against crying women for some reason.

Harry brings her soup, and sits with her, hugging her. "Should I call Ginny?" he asks nervously, when she gets to the point where she's crying about how she'll never be able to ask her mother questions about sex again, and her mother will never meet her babies.

That stops her in her tracks. "Ginny's not here?" she asks. She's only been here a couple days, spending most of her time in her room. She thought Ginny lived here.

"No," Harry shakes his head. "She's got a mystery boyfriend she's staying with. Apparently we get to meet him at the dinner at the Weasleys' on Christmas."

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Hermione is happy to see Ginny on Christmas. And she bursts into hysterical laughter when she realises Ginny's mystery boyfriend is Draco Malfoy. Draco doesn't think it's that funny, and starts puffing up like a peacock. When Ginny calms him down with a hand on his arm, Hermione starts to think they might be better matched than she thought.

They all exchange gifts after dinner, squeezing into the living room. It's a tight fit, with people sitting on the floor and in laps. Everyone's here; Andromeda and Teddy, George and his girlfriend Angelina, Percy and his wife, Charlie, Mr. and Mrs. Weasley, Ginny and Draco, Ron, Harry, Hermione, Bill and Fleur, and Fleur's little sister Gabrielle, who's staying with Bill and Fleur for the holidays.

It's mayhem, ripping paper and oohs and ahs over gifts. Little Teddy decides to jump up and down and throw the wrapping paper about toward the end.

Hermione has a pile of presents, but not one of them are from Harry.

After a night of excitement, Andromeda and Teddy start the rounds of goodbyes. After thanking Mrs. Weasley for having her, Hermione makes her escape to the hall heading to the kitchen fireplace.

She stops in her tracks. Harry's under the mistletoe…with Gabrielle. Hermione's cheeks turn red as she remembers the crush the little Veela had on Harry. She takes a deep breath as she continues down the hall, ignoring the door with the mistletoe. As she walks past, Harry pulls away from Gabrielle, putting his hands on the girl's shoulders.

She gets to the floo, and throws a handful into the fire.

"Hermione, wait." She hears Harry call her, but she ignores him.

"Grimmauld Place," she says into the fire, then jumps through.

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Hermione races out of the fireplace at Grimmauld Place, heading for the stairs, juggling her gifts. She's the first one back; Ron's still with his family, and she doesn't know where Harry is.

"Hermione!" Harry calls, and her question is answered. She pauses on the stairs, back straight, even though all her instincts are telling her to rush up the stairs and get to the safety of her room. Harry wouldn't bother her in there.

But she waits a second too long. Harry is close enough to grab her arm, and turn her to him. She faces him, a step above.

"It's okay, Harry," she says softly. "I understand. You don't need to explain yourself to me."

"No, you don't understand," Harry says in a rush, still holding her arm. "It wasn't normal mistletoe…George put a spell or something under it, if you go under it, you get stuck, and the next person past has to kiss you to get out."

"Oh," Hermione says.

"Gabrielle was just the next person to pass," he says. "I was – " he clears his throat, embarrassed. "I was trying to catch you."

"Oh," Hermione says, quieter, looking into the green eyes of her best friend.

"Here," he says, holding out a red wrapped package. "Open it."

She opens it, and inside are earrings and a necklace, bold gold and red lions. "Oh," she breathes. "They're beautiful."

"You're welcome," Harry says quietly, softly. He places a fingertip on her chin, lifting it to look at him. He leans in, and kisses her.

And it's everything she ever dreamed, everything she ever imagined.

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Hermione thinks of that kiss, their first kiss, as she stands in front of her groom at the altar.

"I do," she says.

She thinks of the day Harry proposed. She was being miserable after one of her bills she proposed to the Minister failed to pass. He took her out for a picnic in a picturesque muggle park, and tried to distract her from her failure. When all else failed, he asked her to marry him.

She stopped thinking about the bill after that.

"I do," he says, looking at his bride with brilliant green eyes.

"You may kiss the bride."

And this kiss, the one that binds them, is every bit as perfect as their first.

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Later, they're swaying on the dance floor. Looking around her, Hermione sighs.

"You okay?" Harry asks. "Regret it yet?" He grins at her.

"Not one tiny bit," she replies.

"Then we're okay," Harry says.

"More than okay," she corrects. "We're close to perfect."

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a/n: Part 2 of 2. Read and Review :)