The Fallout by EveryThursday (reposted)

Thirty-Four

Day: 1493; Hour: 8

Hermione blinks, startled, and lowers her hand. "Ron...you were talking to Shiver?"

"What?"

"Shiver...the Auror, staying in this room. He's planning the miss--"

"Oh, no. I didn't know whose room it was... I thought it might be open."

Ron was usually very focused unless one of two things walked by him - a woman or food. If it happened to be a woman with food, whatever he had previously been focusing on became a lost cause to his attention. Ever since he came back, anything drew his attention away. He was constantly scanning every detail around him, like something might jump out from the peeling wallpaper and launch at him.

She knows that she should expect this. While she understands, she can't help but feel that he should be more relaxed with her. It's disconcerting to see one of your best friends of the last decade become cautious and wary of you. She wishes that her friendship, or anything in the world, could be strong enough to stop that. She wants to be the thing he can hold on to, but she doesn't know if he will let her be.

"No, tough luck with that. Harry put your trunk in the room with him. I think it's the one by the kitchen... You can ask him at dinner. Is Shiver in there?"

"Tough luck," he repeats, a small smile pushing its way onto his face. She grins back at him, at the smile, but he's moving away before he can see it.

Day: 1493; Hour: 14

"He has some memory loss."

"How much?" Hermione asks, pulling her knees to her chin on the old couch. Her toes fit perfectly inside a torn slot in the cushion. She doesn't know how many times she's slid her foot inside of it while interrupting Draco's viewing pleasure of infomercials.

The sound had gone out on the television at some point and a commercial plays of a woman running through a wheat field, endlessly in silence. Harry sits beside her, his arm pressed into her leg, and his hat pulled low on his head. His glasses are clenched in his hand as he rubs his eyes in exhaustion or frustration.

"I'm not sure. I don't want to ask too many questions and freak him out, just in case it's a lot. He already has to take that calming draught for his anxiety. I know he doesn't really remember the Graveyard. I know he remembers the mission we went on before that, but he doesn't remember getting freaked out by the spiders on him when we were there."

"It's normal to block some things out. It's the mind's way of coping. Not to mention... Well, we don't know what happened to him, Harry. It could have...affected things."

"Yeah," he says softly, bending forward to rest his forearms on his legs. "I think I'm going to bring him with me to the psychiatrist."

Hermione feels her shoulders go back in surprise, turning her head to look down at the back of his head. "You're seeing a psychiatrist?"

"A 'Transitionist', they call them. The Ministry sent one while I was still in hospital. Lupin asked me to talk to this guy... I didn't want to, but I did, because they wouldn't let me leave until they made sure I was alright. It helps, a little. I can tell him the worst thing in the world and he's under magical oath to never tell another living thing. There's no judgment, or..."

"Or?"

"I don't know. It was hard at first, but then it was kind of nice. Someone to tell me what way was up, but still be unattached. It's sort of like...talking to yourself. Talking it out. Having things make sense or just... I feel better when I leave. I think more clearly. I start moving on. I guess that's the point."