1. Talking To The Moon

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No matter how she tried, she couldn't sleep. Hermione Granger had tried bloody everything she could think of—potions, teas, meditating, exercising, reading, listening to music. Nothing bloody worked, and she was lying in her little cot bed in The Burrow, wide awake listening to what sounded like a lion growling upstairs but what she knew was Ron's snoring. 

He had no trouble sleeping. 

She listened again to the sounds coming from the room she currently lay in. Ginny sniffling in her dreaming state after another night of crying herself to sleep thinking of Fred. Every night was the same. Ginny would head upstairs with her best friends, Luna and Hermione. She would change into her pyjamas and brush her teeth before climbing into bed, whispering goodnight and turning to face the wall. Silence would fall over the room and after about 10-15 minutes after Ginny had assumed Hermione and Luna were sleeping, she would sob. Sob until she fell into an exhausted sleep. 

And every night, Hermione's heart would break for her best friend. 

Hermione couldn't take much more of it. She tried. Merlin knows she had tried but being here. In this house, surrounded by the pain and heartache was becoming stifling. She just knew that she absolutely no where else to go. 

Swinging her legs over the edge of her bed, she stood up and pulled on a woollen shawl or blanket off the chair before tip toeing to the door and slipping out. Maybe if she had a warm glass of milk, she would become sleepy. She turned on the spot outside the bedroom and Apparated into the kitchen. If she had taken the stairs she would have woken everyone in the house, even the ghoul in the attic. 

She used her wand to accio the milk from the counter top and a cup from the cupboard. She tapped her finger against the counter top and watched as the milk poured into the cup and immediately began boiling, heating itself. 

She lifted the cup and blew into it as she lifted it to her lips. She paused however as she looked out the window. A figure was standing in the garden. And not just any figure. A figure she knew all too well. The person she considered at this stage of her life, her family. 

Harry James Potter. 

She quickly gulped the contents of the mug and placed it into the sink before she opened the back door and headed out of the side of the house and around to where Harry was standing, looking up at the stars. 

"You can't sleep either Hermione?" He asked with a small smile on his lips, not even having to turn around to know that it was the brown-haired witch approaching him. 

At first, she didn't speak. She stood next to him and slipped her arm through his. "No," she sighed leaning her head on his shoulder. He turned his head to kiss the top of hers. She looked up at the stars the same as him. He had a deep look of concentration on his face and his eyes were red and puffy. 

He had obviously been crying.

"Harry..." She started as she squeezed him tighter, but she wasn't entirely sure what to say to him. What do you say to someone who had been through what they had been through? Where the heck do you even begin?

"It's killing me, Hermione," he whispered. She lifted her head to look at him. To really look at him. He looked like her...like he hadn't slept in weeks. And since the battle was only a few weeks ago, she was guessing he probably hadn't.

After the final battle, they never had a minute to rest. The bodies of their loved ones: Fred, Remus, Tonks, classmates, family members of classmates and even house elves, centaurs, and other mystical creatures had to be removed. Those injured had to be sent to St. Mungos. Other people had to be consoled as they found out their loved ones didn't make it. 

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