Graduation was not quite the hoopla she'd expected it to be. She'd never been to a Hogwarts graduation before. Usually the end of her school year was wrought with chaos from whatever brush with Voldemort they were caught up in and so they were too busy to bother watching people they weren't especially close to graduate. She figured it would be similar to Muggle ceremonies. They'd walk across a stage in a stifling robe with their families looking on. But when the seventh years were gathered together in the great hall, Dumbledore told them that their parents wouldn't be invited nor would most of the younger grades. Only the fifth and sixth years could attend if they wanted, but generally they declined.

It would just be the students and the professors in a small, sentimental ceremony that gave them leave of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry and allowed the professors to acknowledge them as adults, no longer students in their care. Hermione looked forward to that. It might make her transition with Severus easier for everyone to accept. They were given new, highly formal school robes by the elves. They were adult dress robes that were one piece rather than fastening in front with the Hogwarts crest, not their houses crest, on the front.

The day came and was warm. The robes were still stifling, but she didn't care. And then, quite suddenly it seemed to Hermione, it was over. She looked down to look at the roll of official parchment in her grasp. It was tied off with red ribbon because she was a Gryffindor but really, she was no longer a student and therefore belonged to no house. She wanted to untie the ribbon and look at every letter printed there but she didn't want to upset the perfection of the roll so instead she tucked it away.

People were milling around with the same surprised look she wore on her face. Some were eating from the buffet; some were talking and laughing, some soliciting some last advice from professors. Some had left immediately to pack – to ready themselves for their long awaited departure. Hermione looked for Ron, but he wasn't there. Part of her wanted to search him out, talk to him one last time but she didn't. She let him go.

The crowd started to thin and so she extracted herself from the conversation Luna was trying to engage her in and made her way to the edge of the room, to the western wall, where he waited quietly for her.

"Are you ready?" he asked, not wanting to rush her out of these last, lingering moments.

"Quite," she said and so he placed his hand on the small of her back and led her out of the great hall. By nightfall, the train had left and Hermione had not been aboard. If anyone had still wondered at the nature of Hermione Granger and Severus Snape's relationship, this action answered any residual questions. Andrew, no longer head boy, had looked for her on the train but was unsurprised when he didn't find her. He quickly forgot her, though, at the prospect of seeing his family once again.

Hermione, no longer head girl, was used to the castle deserted. Instead of leaving, she'd simply had her things packed and sent down to the dungeons. The elves left her luggage in the small room that had once belonged to her. Snape had a hot meal sent to his quarters. She changed out of her uniform (for the last time) and into a pair of worn, broken-in jeans and a long sleeve, hooded shirt, black, that was soft and comfortable.

She sat across from him and they ate in silence. He didn't force her to talk about anything and she, for once, wasn't sure what to say. She was happy, relieved, sad, and unsure how to proceed.

"When do you hear from the Ministry?" he asked, finally, pouring her a cup of after meal tea.

"A few weeks. I ordered a rush on my NEWT results," she said.

"Wise of you," he agreed. She nodded, yawned. "I thought you might leave tonight," he said. Her eyes widened.

"Did you not want me to…?"

"I'm pleased you stayed," he assured her. "I just thought perhaps you'd want to see your family. Are you tired?"

"A bit," she admitted. "Is there anything left for you to do tonight?"

"No," he said. And so, he took her to bed.

oooo

They had only been intimate twice and always timidly and rushed. They were renegades, sneaks, perpetually bending the rules and that in itself was a kind of enjoyment but not the lasting kind. It was not how they always wanted it to be. For all of Hermione's interests, and there were many, sex had never really made it on to her radar. She'd read about it, of course, but from a scientific point of view. She wanted to know how it worked. Once she'd learned that, she filed it away and moved on. Ron had been far more interested during their brief courtship but she had flatly refused and broke it off when she realized that she would never want that with Ron.

Now, though, she was quite interested and she wanted to be good at it. She wanted it to be good for Snape. She knew very little of Snape's sexual history. She assumed that he was at least more experienced than she, but she wasn't sure how to go about asking for more of his history. She wasn't even sure she wanted to know.

She would think on it. She believed honesty was the best policy and certainly Snape didn't appreciate being lied to. As for now, he was removing his shirt, button by button, and Hermione felt overwhelmingly shy. This act between them was not new, per se, but she felt as if he was seeing her for this first time. Last time she'd been so forward and emboldened but she couldn't find that fire within herself now.

He noticed, but to him it seemed as if she was having second thoughts. He ceased undressing and sat down on the edge of the bed, facing away from her. Seeing his fear, the rejection written plainly across his face, she sat next to him and leaned her head on his shoulder.

"I just want this so much," she said. "I feel like I've been waiting forever. Ever since that first day, when I was sick and you held me after class to ask me about it. Do you remember that?" she asked.

"Yes. I knew what was wrong. I'd known for weeks but I kept hoping I was wrong," he said.

"You cared even then," she said.

"Despite myself," he agreed.

"You were… not kind, exactly, but I could see that you cared and even though I was sick, I wanted to know that man. Not Professor Snape, but that man who cared."

"Did I not become that man for you?" he asked.

"I never thought I would fall in love with you," she continued. "That I would throw all caution to the wind."

"No one is forcing you to be here," he said, a little bitterly.

"Don't you understand? I never want to be anywhere but with you! And I'm so scared it's going to be yanked away." He turned and looked at her.

"I won't let that happen," he said.

"Promise me?" she said, smiling faintly. He leaned down and kissed her instead, but she took that as a yes.

oooo

It was unusual for a trainee to get an assignment like the one Hermione had, but her supervisor had said something about 'unusual circumstances.' Nothing was ever explicitly stated in the Department of Mysteries, Hermione was figuring out, you were given an assignment, a place to go, a person to find, and what you were supposed to do revealed itself. Hermione, mostly, read up on old case files or did things around the office. Labeling, shelving, casting spells. It took her a week to figure out the layout of the place and she had been there once in her fifth year at Hogwarts. She'd been with the Unspeakables for almost six months now. She loved it, it was perfect for her, and she came to work eager to learn every morning.

This morning, though, she was apparating to a small country home in a mostly Muggle area, looking for a small, broken down wooden house. She hoped she would understand what she was supposed to do next when she got there. Trainees nearly never went out into the field and she was even more surprised when told she was going alone but the 'unusual circumstances' required it. Her supervisor assured her she would be in no danger. That she would understand in time.

Finally, she found the house and after fighting her way through the thick foliage growing over the path, she knocked on the door. She didn't expect it to open, anyone to be living there, but finally, after much commotion inside, the door flew open. Hermione had her wand up and the gruff looking man was in the same position. He was filthy, in Muggle clothes with unruly hair and a thick, dark beard. He dropped his wand first.

"Hermione?" She was confused for a moment; this weirdo knew her? But there was something in the tone of his voice, in the color of his eyes.

"HARRY!" She screamed, launching herself at him, and hugging him tightly, despite the smell. He hugged her back mostly out of shock and she finally let go, tears in her eyes. "Harry," she said again, just because it felt nice to say his name without worrying he was dead.

"What are you doing here?" he asked, looking her up and down again. "Are those ministry robes?"

She looked down at her black robes. They were unremarkable, meant to blend in to normal wizarding society. The only thing that marked her as a trainee was the thin strip of silver fabric across her shoulders. They didn't look like normal ministry robes but she wasn't surprised that Harry recognized them as such. Anyway, she understood why an unspeakable was sent to find Harry Potter and she understood why they sent her.

"Harry, it's time," she said, calmly.

"I'm not going back," he said, moving into the house.

"God, Harry, where are we?" she asked, disgusted. Her wand hand itched to cast a few simple cleaning spells before she dared to touch anything.

"Voldemort's house," he said, calmly. She looked around, instantly repulsed. Underneath the filth and the normal decay of an ancient, unkempt house there were signs of battle. Broken beams and scorched walls.

"Is this where…?" but she didn't have to finish the sentence. She knew it to be true. This is where the final battle had taken place. Not at Hogwarts where she was safe in the arms of Severus Snape, but here between a boy and a monster. Against all hope, the boy had won but Harry had come back here to let himself fester for almost a year. Now it was her job to get him to leave. She sat down next to him on the decaying sofa. He watched the window like it was a television. "This is really unacceptable."

"I didn't ask your opinion," he said.

"When have I ever waited for someone to want my opinion?" she asked. She pointed her wand at the table before them, littered with rotting food and back issues of news papers and cleared it with her wand. At least now nothing was rotting in her direct line of vision. "So, don't you want to at least know what I've been up to? About Dumbledore? About Ginny and Ron?" she asked. He didn't respond. "I'm engaged," she blurted. This caught his attention and he looked at her hand, at the ring that she'd worn for almost the same amount of time he'd been gone.

"Blimey," he said. "I wasn't even sure you liked boys, Hermione."

"Ha ha," she said, happy to hear him say something. "I want you to be in our lives, Harry. It's time for you to come back."

"I'm not ready," he said. "Dumbledore said…"

"I have no doubt Dumbledore arranged this meeting in the first place," she said. "Please, Harry."

"I have nothing to come back to," he said.

"You have everything," she countered. "No one is going to make you tell what happened."

"I can't talk about it," he said.

"You won't have to," she said. "It's time." He looked down into his lap, he bit his lip. His eyes were bright but he nodded.

Hermione had not been wrong about her assumption that Dumbledore was behind having Harry come back into normal, not hermit-like wizarding society. He was waiting at the department of mysteries, sitting in the office of her supervisor. Harry seemed to draw strength from the older man (it had always been that way) and though Dumbledore thanked her for her assistance, Harry was whisked away and her supervisor told her she could go home early if she wanted to. This was rare and so, worried, she gathered her things and apparated home.

She couldn't live in the castle and that she understood. This was her first year out and there were still tons of students who knew her and her and Snape's relationship was so scandalous in the first place that she just took a flat in Hogsmeade and only went to the school on weekends during times she would least likely be seen. He spent a few nights a week with her, on nights he didn't have to patrol and it was good. Besides, if he went through the tunnel in the shrieking shack, he could be within the castle walls in nine minutes, in case of an emergency.

They would be married in the summer. There would be no lavish wedding, not even a traditional wizarding ritual. They would merely go to the town hall in Hogsmeade and sign a few documents. It would be done, quietly, tastefully. Time would pass, and perhaps after enough years, Hermione would move into Snape's quarters at Hogwarts or perhaps he would leave his teaching position of nearly two decades and they would find a small house, together. It didn't matter right now for Harry was back, Hermione was home, and on the sofa was a tall, dark man reading a book and Hermione Granger was in love.

the end.