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"To life! To life! L'chaim!"
Hermione laughed merrily as she hoisted Padma's chair into the air, aided by five other women. Her shoulder kept knocking into Parvati, who was holding onto her sister's hand to aid her balance as she went higher, but that only heightened the amusement of both former Gryffindors.
Up above, Anthony and Padma beamed at each other as they were bounced by their friends and relatives, Anthony raising his arm to twirl a napkin that his cousin had handed him while Padma simply chose to cling to her chair and her twin.
"L'chaim! L'chaim! To life!"
The women let Padma back down. Hermione lost her balance as she bent to return the chair leg to the floor and fell against Parvati, who had just been released by her twin. Parvati quickly caught her former roommate, but both women stumbled backward until they were steadied by Lavender, who had refrained from joining the heavy-lifting for very good reason. Hermione's arm came to rest against Lavender's swollen belly, and she took a moment to appreciate it and the life within before giggling with her friends.
Behind them, the circle of dancing proceeded around and around, men in elegant suits and achkans flanked by women in beautiful dresses and sarees. Two cultures had blended in a beautiful mosaic of traditions throughout the ceremony, and now created a colorful collage of revelry as they danced to a song that celebrated their very existence and capacity for joy.
And it hit Hermione then. It hit her as she watched Parvati dash forward to embrace her ecstatic sister. As she watched Ron approach from where he'd been helping lift Anthony's chair and wrap his arms around his pregnant wife, kissing her cheek. As she watched couples and families and lifelong friends delight in their companionship.
"To life!"
That was what this was all about. To life! To living! To choosing to live and experience love and joy and compassion and community with the people who inspired those feelings!
And she went looking for one particular person, finding him on the edge of the crowd. His green eyes locked onto her as soon as she was in sight, and his applause faltered as his curiosity arose at her determined approach.
"I need to talk to you." She took his hand, leading him away from the revelry until she didn't need to shout for him to easily hear her.
"What is it?" he asked when she released him, some concern appearing in his eyes. It was still instinctive for him to feel that concern as soon as something unexpected emerged, especially when it was something that pertained to her.
She took a deep breath. "I was wrong."
His eyebrows shot up. In all the years they'd known each other, he could probably count on one hand the number of times she'd made that particular admission. "About what?"
She opened her mouth and then closed it again.
She stood at the edge of the Black Lake, her arms crossed and her glare roving over the smooth, empty surface of the water.
"Hermione?" She didn't turn as he came up beside her, keeping a safe enough distance between them so that she wouldn't feel crowded.
When she didn't respond in any way, he sighed. "Ron told me what happened."
"Oh."
"I'm sorry."
"Don't be."
He stared at her. "What?"
"You shouldn't be sorry. You should be happy. Your best friend has realized that he's in love with his ex, the same ex whom he was too dense and immature to even appreciate when they actually dated."
"Hermione..."
"I was waiting for him to mature! I was waiting for him to reach this exact bloody point when he could recognize his feelings without being petulant! When he could admit to how he felt without getting stuck in the same cyclical argument that's been going on for years! But he was supposed to be maturing for me, recognizing those feelings for me, not for the girl whom he couldn't get away from fast enough two years ago!"
Harry didn't say anything to that.
"And the worst part is that it makes so much more sense! She's also matured, and she's on his level! She's his equal! She'll dote on him instead of dragging him along! She's supportive instead of stubborn, benevolent instead of bossy! She's exactly the sort of person that he's wanted me to be all along! So of course, as soon as he was mature enough to recognize how he felt, he would also realize that she was the much better match for him than I am!"
Harry still stayed silent.
She rounded on him. "Now would be a good time to say something!"
"I'm sorry."
"Something other than that!"
He opened his mouth and then closed it again, staring at the water as he struggled. "I feel like an arsehole."
Her frown deepened. "Why?"
He struggled for another long moment. "Because I'm happy about this," he said finally. "Not just happy, I'm bloody ecstatic, and not just because Ron is happy with Lavender, but because he isn't with you. Because it was hard for me, so damn hard, and I refused to say why, refused to even think about why. I thought that I was going to die, I was sure of it, and it would be okay because you two would be happy together. But then I came back and I beat the bastard and you were still..."
She stared at him. "Harry?"
"You never asked why I didn't get back together with Ginny."
"You didn't seem like you wanted to tell me, and I didn't want to pry. It wasn't my business."
He sighed. "Except that it was. We didn't get back together because she knew that my heart belonged to someone else. She knew it long before I was willing to admit it to myself. She knew that there was one person whom I always turned to first, whose happiness mattered to me more than anyone else's, whose companionship I was never able to handle not having. And not just because she was essential to me beating the damn prophecy."
Hermione stood frozen.
"And still, I had to spend months watching her wait for bloody Ron, no matter how many times he had hurt her, until today, until it all came to a stop at long, long last. And I'm such an arsehole for feeling so damn happy about that when you're hurting, but I'm..." Finally, he pulled his eyes off the water and met her dumbstruck gaze. "I'm in love with you."
It was too much. White noise filled her head. "Are you having me on?"
"No, I'm not."
She clutched at her temples, trying to make sense of it. "Are you serious right now? What is it, Blindside Hermione Day?"
"No..."
She shut her eyes, trying to steady herself in a world that suddenly felt upside-down. How long had she wanted this? How much had she wanted this when she was fourteen, fifteen, sixteen? Until she gave up because he never showed the slightest hint of returning her feelings, so she instead turned her attention to the boy who showed actual interest in her, even though he was far too much of a prat to be worthy of her yet?
How had everything suddenly gotten completely reversed?
She laughed humorlessly. "I can't do this."
"Hermione..."
She opened her eyes and glared at him. "I can't do this! N.E.W.T.s are right around the corner! I need to focus on my studies, on starting my career, on fixing this bloody country that has been ruined by so much more than just the Death Eaters! I need to fix a society that relies on slavery and prejudice in order to maintain its way of life! I need to do all of that, I can't handle being blindsided by confessions of perceived emotions! I can't be slowed down by lovesick boys! I need to just be me, myself, doing what I do best, alone!"
Now it was his turn to stare at her in shock.
"You're my best friend, Harry, and I love you in that way, but that's it. Maybe it was different once, but you didn't show the least bit of interest back then, and I don't have time now to worry about missed opportunities. I need to just keep moving forward without any surprises or regrets weighing me down. And maybe we'll revisit this conversation once I've fixed our world, once I have time to think about it, but not before then."
He opened his mouth, but then closed it again. There were tears in his eyes, and she couldn't let herself watch them fall.
"I'll see you later," she told him, and turned away and walked back to the castle.
It was four years since then, four years of beating her oars against the current, of pulling her hair out trying to change a society that didn't want to change. Her attempts at legislation had been soundly voted down, and she had been laughed out of the Wizengamot chamber on more than one occasion. Hero or not, Order of Merlin member or not, she was still the Muggle-born, still the outsider, still the radical whose ideas about modernity and common decency were too outlandish to be endorsed.
And through it all, Harry remained, always being there as the shoulder she could cry on or the arms that would hug her each time she needed such a gesture. And she kept things strictly platonic between them, strictly adherent to the decision that she made on the shore of the lake, that she refused to contemplate revisiting no matter how much he proved that he was still her rock, her anchor against the waves of hopelessness and apathy.
And over time, her ardor faded into acceptance. She could only fight so hard for so long, only stress so much over impossibilities. She learned to embrace small victories. She learned to appreciate that she was a survivor, that she could still laugh and enjoy her hobbies and hug her friends and share in their joy. She got to a place where she felt utter delight as she watched Ron and Lavender bond their lives and futures to each other, regardless of her shared history with them. Where she cried tears of happiness when the pregnancy was announced. Where she laughed and cheered and shouted as she and Parvati and Lisa and Sue guided Padma through an utterly chaotic hen night.
But she was still a work in progress.
...until now, she told herself.
Because now she understood. No, she had already understood, but now she decided that it was time to acknowledge that understanding, perhaps years after she should have done so. Because life was short and needed to be celebrated, to be embraced. Because love was eternal but opportunities to find it were fleeting.
Because there was a whole bloody song, countless songs really, about celebrating life, and it was time she listened to their message.
To life! To living! To grasping love and happiness and passion! To finding clarity and community and companionship! To harmony!
"I was wrong," she repeated, staring into those intense green eyes, "when we spoke all those years ago by the lake."
"No you weren't." Those eyes dropped. "I shouldn't have blindsided you like that, confessed to you like that when you were heartbroken."
"I wasn't. And you weren't wrong to do that. Maybe it wasn't the most tactful thing, but you were seizing an opportunity, being brave and honest, and the very last thing that I should have done was tell you it was too little, too late."
"Look, it's okay. It's okay, Hermione. I get that I missed my—"
"No, it isn't. Because I wasn't over you. I could never get over you. And I was wrong for turning away from the possibility, for rejecting a chance at this." She gestured towards where Anthony and Padma were again beaming at each other, surrounded by Ron and Lavender and a bunch of other couples. "Because this is what matters. Living matters. Loving matters. Happiness matters. That was what I should have embraced years ago."
She stepped closer to him, raising her hands to cup his face. "I'm in love with you, Harry. And that's the simplest, most basic thing that I never should have ignored no matter what else I was trying to do at the time. And the fact that you kept being there for me even when I was ignoring it, when I was hurting you... You deserve better than that. You do! So I'm so sorry, and I'm done with prioritizing anything above you, above love, above living."
She could get no further than that, because he was kissing her now. And she fell into the kiss, wrapping her arms around him and pulling him as close as she could. And there were cheers from the dance floor, and Ron's voice shouting loudly, "About bloody time you idiots!" and ensuing laughter.
And as they parted, they shared a beaming smile, one that matched Anthony and Padma's as they spoke their vows earlier tonight, that matched Ron and Lavender's as they anticipated the arrival of their beautiful baby. Because they were finally making that same decision, the decision to embrace life and all of the greatest wonders that it had to offer. To grab happiness with both hands and hold on forever. To love.
"To life!"