There was chaos everywhere. Spells being thrown across the street, streaking various colors in the waning light of dusk. Dust and bits of damaged pavement and brick rained down and settled heavily over everything in sight.

I ducked behind a row of trashcans and began aiming spells at the nearest Death Eaters. Most were blocked by a shield charm or dodged, but watched as two masked figures fell unconscious to the street as my stunning charms hit their marks. I ducked down behind the cans and threw my arms over my head as one angered Death Eater's curse exploded the trashcan in front of me, scattering shards of metal all around me.

I jumped away from the cans and ran to the nearest storefront. Behind a sign for Madame Pip's Pompous Headwear, I peeked out into the street. I saw a few shopkeepers and civilians scurrying away, fleeing the alley, barely dodging spells as they flew toward them instead connecting with the walls of the shops just behind them resulting in more rubble and debris raining down. I stunned three Death Eaters from my hiding spot and cast protective charms over two fleeing boys, then turned to survey the closest threats.

There was a sudden stillness. Spells stopped flying across the street as the remaining Death Eaters apparated away, clearly outmatched. I saw a few fellow aurors looking about curiously from their places of hiding. Apparently, the fight was over. The head of my unit called for us to verify status. A fancy way of saying "tell me who's still here". We lost two. Ed Westpurt and Fadrin Pulkis were found dead next to the Cauldron Emporium both by the killing curse.

From there, we searched for civilians, the injured and the dead. Their numbers were much higher than ours. I must have leaned down to check the pulse of fifteen people, and all but four didn't have one anymore. This attack on Diagon Alley was unexpected, violent, and devastating. Voldemort's supporters still fought for a long dead cause. With their leader gone and their reputations ruined, there was only senseless killing and maiming; they took revenge on a society that made them powerless.

I leaned down over a large man, armed, but probably not properly trained for battle, his eyes were dull and his hand was cold. No pulse. He makes twelve. Then thirteen. If these trained men and women fell victim to the Death Eaters, I can't imagine how many Hogwarts-age students now lie dead in the streets of London. I felt sick as I turned away from my fourteenth, a middle-aged woman with a few bags scattered around her as if she had been shopping and had dropped them as she tried to flee. How long would it be before the family she was shopping for heard of her death? As I continued my rounds, I thought of my own family. My mum and dad, safely at home in Godric's Hollow after I sent my patronus to warn them about the attack. My little brother, Albus, who went to Egypt for a year with Rosie, Scorpius, and some friends from Hogwarts. Lily, who is in her last year at Hogwarts, home for the Christmas holiday. My aunts and uncles and cousins, none of whom, thankfully, were in Diagon Alley during the attack. I thought of my best friend, Ben, who is across the street kneeling, and checking the pulse of a young woman with chocolate brown hair.

No. My head snapped back around to look at the girl. Her hair was fanned out around her head.

No, no, no, no. I stood up from the ground to get a better look at her face, pale and marked with a gash above her right eyebrow and-

Merlin, please, no. Ben's eyes were full of tears.

I stood up and sprinted over to Ben. My heart was beating in my throat. I could hear my pulse in my ears but I couldn't hear anything else. My vision narrowed and focused only on Ben's hand feeling the base of her neck for signs of life and her face. Her beautiful, sleeping face. He looked up when I approached and, with sad eyes and a knowing glance, back down at her- Kirsten- Lily's best friend-17 years old-a girl with her whole life ahead of her.

At that moment, with a knot in my throat, I remembered how Lily brought home a new friend with bright, brown eyes for the summer after her first year and how I recognized the girl from the train when I teased her for having an American accent even though I thought it was really cool she was from America. And how the five of us: Kirsten, Lily, Albus, Ben and me, spent the summer by the pond, laughing and playing Quidditch. I remember how Kirsten, a first year who had barely ever been on a broom, and had certainly never played Quidditch before, caught the snitch during our first match in the backyard, and I remember how embarrassed Albus was for being beaten by a first year.

I remember how I woke up one morning over the Christmas holiday of my fourth year, and Lily and Kirsten were in the kitchen, covered in flour and frantically trying to figure out how to clean cookie dough off of the walls and ceiling and how it took us nearly the entire morning to scrub it clean before mum got home. And I remember how she used to be afraid of flying, until Lily begged me to teach her properly. I remember how our first attempt to desensitize her to it caused a bit of trauma when Lily convinced her to let me take her up on my broom and show her that flying wasn't scary when you knew how to do it. And how I laughed and she screamed as I barrel rolled the broom in the air. And I remember how I accidently dropped her when we were rolling and she broke her arm. I remember how she refused to ride my broom with me after that incident.

I remember being furious with her once for borrowing my broom without asking and getting it stuck in a tree in the backyard. I remember being so angry, I told her that she should just go home and stop coming over ALL THE TIME. And I remember how her eyes watered as she ran away from me. I also remember how painfully my head throbbed after Lily whacked it with her Charms book when she found out what I said. And how I found out just WHY Kirsten spent most of her holidays at our house. And I remember trying to find her for the better part of an hour to apologize, but discovered her laughing and playing with the gnomes in the garden and, instead of apologizing, I watched her for a half hour from behind a tree because she looked so carefree and innocent.

I remember during my cousin, Roxanne's birthday party, we played tag at the Burrow and when I was It, I chased Kirsten all the way to the pond back behind the house and tagged her, but in her haste to get away, she tripped on a rock by the edge of the pond and reached out to grab my sleeve for support only resulting in the two of us plunging into the chilly water.

I remember when Ben borrowed her book ("for a prop, not to read")and accidently got it wet and how she wouldn't talk to him for a week. I remember, in fourth year, when Lily told me that Kirsten was in love with me. And how I laughed and teased her and how Ben laughed at me for teasing her, claiming that it was just because I liked a second year and I was embarrassed to admit it. I remember waking up at two in the morning one night at the end of my fifth year because I heard some noise coming from the common room, and upon closer inspection, I discovered Kirsten curled up on the couch in front of the fire, quietly crying. I remember not knowing what to do, but not having the heart to leave her there, alone, so I fell asleep on the steps to the boy's dormitory for the entire night.

And I remember how she turned a blind eye to the snide insults and threats from a few students who hated her because her parents weren't wizards. And I remember how in 6th year, I almost saw her get cursed in the hallway. And I remember when she rescued me from Filch, saving my Quidditch career. And the next year, when I became captain and my team played the last match, I remember that she was cheering the loudest.

And I remember how when we won, she winked at me good-naturedly from the stands and made me think of that night she made it possible for me to play that game. And how when my team was surrounded by jovial classmates, and my girlfriend, Gwen, came up and kissed me, Kirsten disappeared and how I didn't see her again that day. And I remembered not really caring that much because she was just fifteen and I was seventeen and I had way more important things to worry about.

I remember how infuriated I was when I found her that night during the after-party, drunk off her arse, giggling and swinging a bottle of firewhiskey, singing horribly off-key. I remember furiously telling her to go to bed, but she wouldn't hear of it forcing me to grab my broom out of my dormitory, peel her away from the dirt bag trying to hit on her while she was plastered, throw her over my shoulder and fly her up their, myself.

I remember when I came home for every holiday after that, she was always there, sitting in my living room, reading, or playing chess with my dad, or perched at the kitchen table having a conversation with my mum. I remember when I came home to surprise Lily for her sixteenth birthday and I hadn't seen Kirsten in over a year, but I walked in and saw her lounging in an armchair, reading a book and how, for just a second, she took my breath away. And I remember how guilty I felt for looking at my little sister's best friend like that. And I remember how she looked up and saw me and how her concentrated frown that she always got when reading curved up into a huge smile. And how she stood up and dropped her book into the armchair, ran up and hugged me. And I hugged her back. I remember telling Ben that night how I looked at her and how he laughed and said 'I told you so'. But how, then, he told me if I screw with her, he'll kick my ass.

I remember how upset my family was when I told them I had to leave England for a year to train for the auror program in Bulgaria and Russia and Germany and France. I remember promising to write my mum, and hugging my dad and shaking hands with my brother because he was 'too old' for hugs. And I remember how Lily was crying and I told her it would be ok, and that I would send her letters and postcards all the time and that a year would go by faster than she could imagine. And how I kissed her on the forehead and hugged Kirsten, who also looked a bit teary, and left with the ministry employee to catch my 'flight' on a 'aroplane', when really, I would have preferred to ride my broom all the way to Bulgaria because that contraption was scary. And I remember how that was the last time I saw Kirsten for almost two years. I remembered all of that simultaneously, but it seemed much slower because the clips and images were running through my head and the world around me had slowed to almost a standstill.

I looked at Ben, wiping away tears from his eyes and listening for a heartbeat, just one tiny little sound that would give him hope. But the tears fell faster, and I realized what it meant. I kneeled next to my little sister's best friend and grabbed her wrist and I tried to find the veins to feel for, but my hands were shaking too much. Ben had since stood up. He put his hand on my shoulder and tried to coax me away. And he kept saying,

"C'mon, James. C'mon. They need our help. C'mon James," through his tears. But I ignored him and focused on moving my hands without shaking.

He tried to draw me up but I pushed him off and pressed two finger to her neck. Soft sobs wracked my body, but I focused on her neck, and my fingers, and her face, the face of a little girl I had known for many years. I was holding my breath and couldn't hear a sound coming from anywhere or anyone around me, including Ben. The only thing I could hear was the erratic beating of my own heart.

I put my head to her chest one more time, and I squeezed my eyes shut and listened, and it wasn't hard when I couldn't hear anything or anyone or Ben pleading with me to "C'mon". And I heard it. A faint, almost nonexistent flutter. At first, it surprised me so much, I straightened up. I thought it was my own heartbeat, or a cruel trick of my mind. I leaned down and heard it again. It was soft, and irregular, but it was there and I loved the beautiful sound of it and so I kept listening, and there was nothing more important than making sure I listened to each beautiful beat of her soft, erratic heart.

And Ben was crying now and he made to pull me back but I said his name and he didn't hear me. Head still pressed to her chest, catching every quiet flutter of her heart, I said his name again. And my bubble of silence popped and a million sounds flooded my ears. People crying and people yelling to one another and Ben, Ben was telling me that I had to get up, and there were medi-witches and people in stretchers and the soft thump of her heart was drowned out by the noise around us.

"James. Get up! C'mon James, we need to help. We're aurors. Please get up. J-"

"Ben!" I shouted, silencing him. I looked at him, eyes wide and hopeful.

"I hear it, Ben. It's there. I heard it!" I must have sounded a bit insane, but Ben could tell I wasn't crazy. His eyes widened and he kneeled again, putting his head on her chest, screwing up his eyes in concentration. Then, he opened them.

"That's impossible," he whispered. We looked at each other and he stood up and went to search for a medi-witch and I drew her to me and lifted her off of the cold, filthy ground.

A/N: Hey there! My name is GinnyWhetherby and I have a Harry Potter fanfiction problem. I'm an avid reader- I've been a member of for a number of years, but haven't published much of my own writing. Lose Myself in You is a fic I've been dabbling with and adding to whenever I could no longer suppress the urge to write, and I've finally plucked up the nerve to post it! I have to say, it feels kind of refreshing having other people read my scribblings-turned-stories! The first three chapters are up, and the next few are written and undergoing revision. I'm REALLY excited and nervous to see what reactions I get from this story! I'd like any kind of feedback you can give me. All is helpful and all is appreciated! Thank you fellow fanfictioners!

~oOo~GinnyWhetherby~oOo~