Flower Petals

Epilogue

Ginny Longbottom learned a spell to nurse a hangover perfectly the morning after her wedding, which had become in the prettiest of terms, a rager. She became one of the greatest quidditch players of all time. Wearing her late brother Fred's number on the field and a yellow ribbon in her hair for who some say, a lost lover.
Paula watches her games with fervor in the permanent residence hall of the hospital and loves to visit Ginny and the kids when she is able to go on medial leave, which is not often, but sweeter than every flavored beans.

Neville tended to his gardens and his Ladybug, and was altogether the happiest he could have been, preparing meals and speaking to Luna through Howlers back in forth from the Malfoy Manor. He may not be famous for defeating Nagini, but he is excited to be known as a wizard who adores his lovely wife and his (so far) 4 young witches who are just as quick witted as their mother, except for Mariposa, who is quiet and kind, but the first to capture a spider and let it out when her sisters shriek.

Luna decorated the manor in garish wind chimes and sun catchers so that the old place was never again silent, she filled a greenhouse with small bunnies. Her son loves magical creatures and catalogs them in a sketchbook where he draws the outline of the beast and his mother writes the descriptions which he can't yet spell. Together they venture into the once forbidden forest, where his father has built him a treehouse. The boy is gentle, and patient, and every bit at kind as his mother. An old piano was the centerpiece of the new Malfoy dining hall which hosted benefits to a charity dubbed 'Brotherhood over Blood' started by a wizard who Luna thinks is roguishly handsome.

Malfoy had his hands full managing an organization, but overflowing after the birth of Aurora, who they named after the sunrise because she was the light of his life. The dawn of a new era. She was the fastest Malfoy yet in the quidditch field, so much so that the kids called her phantom, quick and with hair as white as a ghost. Coaching at Hogwarts was not the way he imagined he would be a good alumni, but he enjoyed every last second of being her father, and a husband. Working to make the Malfoy name something Aurora and his beloved boy grew to be proud of.

Hermione wrote a book, or two. Non-surprisingly she became the face of the young witches and wizards who defended Hogwarts all those years ago. She had the words where everybody else failed, she had the motive to honor the late Harry Potter as more then the chosen one, as a friend and a lover, and as a boy who loved his sister. On her last speech tour she ran into a familiar face among the crowd, George Weasley, who made her laugh for the first time in a long while. They grew together through grief, intertwining their sorrows and their joys until they could not be separated by a wand or a sword. The lovely independent Granger is set to be a Weasley by the end of this year, and Molly is in crisis trying to plan yet another wedding.

Ron spent the next years cursing Harry for every minor inconvenience. A dish broke? Must be Harry, pissed at me again. The baby is crying? Must be her uncle playing with her until the late hours. Poppy was a beautiful baby, and she looked like Harry. Devilish! And he lived, that spirit of Harry Potter in this little girl who was clumsy and hilarious and awkward, the girl who was fiercely loyal. After two more children Alstroemeria coaxed Ron out of a bigger family. Their house sits in a clearing, carved out of a old church covered wall to wall in windows with a view of the meadow out front. In the afternoons Alstroemeria plays with the kids, she tells them stories of the brother who chased away demons, and she chases theirs away too. So through the sacrifice of the boy who lived, his sister finally gets to. Under the Sun, away from cameras and newspapers and tabloids, letting Hermione take hold of the interviews and sitting back to enjoy a life well lived.

And eventually, at the bleached white King's Cross, Harry holds out his hand to his sister, and she sees for the first time the proud eyes of her parents, who she has outlived by decades, and is at peace.