the last verse ; harry potter [2]

epilogue ; the watching gods

{nineteen years later}

Diana Potter, The Girl Who Came Back From The Dead, had never been inside Platform 9 and 3/4. She had often wondered what it looked like, back when she was a soldier. Harry and Ron and Hermione and Ginny and all of her other friends would come whistling into Hogsmeade Station on the bright red train, coming in from the fog that marred the farthest tracks. She often imagined the bustling children, excited for their next year at the wonderful school of witchcraft and wizardry.

And as she stood on the other side of the brick wall, watching steam billow from the train like a faucet spilling water, it was just as she had hoped, just as she had dreamed. She saw everyone she had faught with; Luna, with that Scamander boy; Dean Thomas, who the Potters smiled at. She saw Ron and Hermione, shamelessly bickering with slight grins on their faces as Rose told Hugo that he wasn't allowed to Hogwarts just yet.

"I'm sorry, Hugo," said Rose. She was a very pretty girl, and smart like her mother. She had a painfully similar look in her eyes, though, that the Weasley twins had had.

"Ah, it's the rest of the gang!"

Ron beamed at them, obviously delighted to be back in the old train station that harbored so many memories.

"Sorry we're late, Teddy couldn't decide what color to change his hair to," said Harry, the same boyish smile on his lips after all of these years. Diana watched the old trio. They had aged, but they were finally happy.

"Oh, come here, then!" said Hermione, pulling the two of them into a tight hug. "And don't think I've forgotten about you---"

She snatched two of the three Potter children into an embrace, but James had managed to dodge away.

"Where's Ginny?" Diana asked Ron. He shrugged, waving a hand.

"Her last owl said she and her girlfriend were following the Chudley Cannons around the world. Though, you know how they are---they can never stay too long in one place. They could be in the damn Arctic by now, for all I know."

"Mum," whined a child behind Diana. "Why do the boys get to go and I don't?"

"You'll be boarding that train in no time," said Diana, taking Lily Vera's hand.

The train bellowed a ten-minute warning.

"Tell James that I won't be in Slytherin!"

"James," said Harry boredly, "stop terrorizing your brother."

"You'll write to me, won't you?" asked Albus in a worried tone.

"Every day, if you'd like," said Diana.

"Not every day, James said---"

"Don't listen to anything your brother says," said Harry with a grin. "He likes a laugh."

James Sirius Potter, the eldest of the three children, was quite similar to the men he was named after.

"Hey, hey," said Ron in an indelicate whisper, "Look who it is."

He nodded toward something behind Diana and Harry. They turned, along with Hermione, to see.