There's air, but no way to breathe it. Like there's sunlight, and everything's still dark. People laughing and talking without making noise and it wasn't funny or worth saying, anyway. How can everything look so normal when nothing is the same?

I can't breathe. I can't.

My feet strike something solid, I stumble, and I'm moving upwards.

The stairs. Good. If I can just get to the dormitory... I can't even say why, exactly, just that my brain is caving in and the only thing for it is to be in that room.

Ten more stairs. Four more. One. There, at the end of the hall.

Finally.

It is better, now that I'm here. This is my home, this is where she was never allowed, except only that once or twice. It's almost like it's safe.

I can't think about seeing her here, twelve years old and opening Christmas presents with us, because I'm not going to cry. I mean, I am, but I want to think I'm not, because it won't do any good and I don't want to be that poor pathetic sod who just gets dumped, just like that, and can't do anything but fall apart.

It's good there's no one here. All I need is some time. I can pull myself together, so no one has to see.

I still feel like I'm trapped inside a glass box, mad and senseless and so separated from everything that I thought was real. My feet have taken over, though, so I can still stumble to the bed and drop down on the pillow, curling my knees up to my eye sockets and wrists around my ankles, so I don't have to look at a world where she doesn't want me.

Her voice keeps repeating in my head, telling me there's someone else. I can still see the regret and pain in her face, like she wishes it weren't true, like she couldn't change it if she just damn well would take it all back and stay with me.

I hear what comes next, too, no matter how much I try and block it out. I don't want to remember begging her, humiliating myself, feeling I'd literally thrown myself on the floor at her feet. Seeing the look on her face like I had. Watching her close her eyes, for that endless moment, like it's her pain when it's my heart she's just shattered.

"Hermione," my voice says, "if there's someone else ... look, I can handle that. We can see other people. I trust you. Just... don't. Don't leave me."

It takes on a desperate tone, even adds, "please," just like that, like words are my only lifeline, like she'll still respect me after I lay myself at her mercy this way.

I've broken now, sitting here alone in the dormitory, and I don't remember doing it, but I've started crying and it won't stop. I'm just glad there's no one to see because I hate myself for it. It's pointless to be so weak when I know it's not going to bring her back to me.

I don't remember hearing the door, either, but I've just realised I'm actually not alone, and this isn't my bed, either. I know it because Harry's here, his hand is on my shoulder, just that, all awkward-like because he never was good with people, but I've never minded that and it's something that he's here at all.

I don't know how I even ended up on Harry's bed instead of mine, but it must be the same way that I really did know the moment he walked into the room, that there's always been something about him that drew me in. Something about him that I immediately recognised as home.

This awful little voice tries to suggest that Harry is the 'someone else' Hermione has in mind, but I push that idea away, because if it weren't for his hand resting lightly on my shoulder, his weight denting the bed next to me, I think I would have flown apart already. So I just don't think about who it is, and I just don't think about anything, and I start to take some oxygen, which is good, so maybe I can lift my head now.

Harry looks worried, the way he always does, only now it's for me, and that's worse somehow because he has so many bigger problems, but better, too, because it makes me feel real to know he sees me. His eyes catch mine and I can't hold them, but look down to where the tears have left darkened trails on my jeans. I cough out a sort of strangled laugh that was supposed to sound better than that.

"Ron? What's happened, mate?"

Which means he doesn't know, and there's no way I can tell him. I can't even form the words in my mind. I've failed at the only thing I ever thought I did well, and if he knows it, then he'll never see me again like someone who can do anything worthwhile. I can't lose that, too, so I don't bother trying to speak.

All I do is shake my head, looking away so I can pretend not to be crying again. He notices, though, Harry always notices, and that's when he offers to get Hermione for me. Which is how I end up losing it completely.

I don't even mean to lean on him, but I know he's there, and next thing I'm cradled in his lap, and I'm way too big for this, but he finds a way to sort of hold me there, one arm around and under my shoulder, supporting my head in his elbow, and the other hand is rubbing lightly up and down my spine, and maybe Harry's a lot better at this sort of thing than I thought.

"She -" I try to say, because it isn't fair for him not to know, but the sobs start again, and he just makes shushing noises and rubs a little more slowly.

"She said - Harry, she said -"

"Sh, Ron, it's alright."

Which of course it isn't, so I just shake my head and cry harder and my throat hurts and my head aches and I wish I could stop but it just keeps pouring out of me.

"I can't -" I gasp, because he has to know how it feels. "It was supposed to be always."

Just like that, he knows. He was never good at these things, just like I never was, only now he's brilliant at it and I don't have to tell him, which makes it so much better I'm crying from relief.

"I know, Ron. I know it was."

His voice is so soft and so gentle and I never knew Harry could do this, just be here, without crusading and being heroic and saving the world. Except that this is heroic, probably the best thing he's ever done for me, even better than saving my baby sister in the Chamber or chasing Sirius into the Shrieking Shack after me.

I want to tell him so, but every time I think of Harry, I think of Hermione, and all the things that I had planned for the future in that idle sort of way where I thought she would always be part of it. The words just won't come.

I want to tell him, but I can't think of a way, and now I don't really mind because he hasn't stopped rubbing my back or whispering "Sh, it's alright," and if he keeps saying it, then maybe it is.

My head still aches, in the back by my neck where all the tension settled, but I'm starting to relax into Harry's hands. I'm trying not to think of how I made a desperate last-resort of a try to pull Hermione close, how I tried to make her words not true by holding her the way I'd so recently got used to doing. I can't help seeing the look in her eyes as she pushed my hands back to my own sides, can't help breaking down one more time as I finally understand that I'll never get to have her in my arms again.

I wanted Hermione to see how much it hurt to lose her, how I'll never feel anything but pain again if she's gone from my life, but after one final glance over her shoulder, she just walked away and left me standing there.

Now Harry sees, and there's something really good about that.

It's amazing, how I just know Harry will be here as long as I need. Even with everything else he has to do, and with all the times I�ve been a prat and misunderstood and been angry with him, he's always been on my side.

My tears are drying, and my lungs are working again. Harry's robes smell like clean laundry and the wind outside, and they're all covered in wet patches from me crying all over him. A deep breath expands my ribs against Harry's hand, and that feels better than anything has in a long time.

My right hand pushes my hair away from my face so I can wipe my eyes, then plants itself on the bedspread, helping me up to a sitting position. My left hand comes up to wipe tears away, too, and I'm feeling all foolish and silly and really quite embarrassed at what a mess I am.

So I look at Harry to say 'Thanks,' and to smile a sheepish smile that tells him what an arse I feel for carrying on. Harry's just looking at me, though, with flecks of sunlight in those deep green eyes of his, and I don't feel so stupid anymore.

I forget about all the times I thought he didn't understand or I thought he believed himself better than me because he's Harry Potter and I'm not. I only think about how he didn't look like anybody when I first saw him, just some other new kid in school, and he treated me like just another kid, too, someone who was equally as important as he was. I think about how, when I'm not being too stupid to notice, I know that he has really always treated me exactly the same way.

When Harry's tender expression turns to a smile, the sun shines on me, too, and this new kind of warmth grows in my heart until the ache is gone.

One of Harry's hands brushes the side of my face, pushing away tears that I missed, but instead of returning to my back or to his own lap, the hand just stays there on my cheek.

I've never seen eyes that colour on anyone else.

Suddenly, I hear an echo of Hermione's voice in my head, saying the same horrible words she said to me before. Only now they sound different, and I think I know why she looked so sad.

"I can't do this anymore, Ron. We can't. I - there's someone else. I think there always has been. And I can't do this anymore."

Harry's palm is so warm against my cheek. That same lock of hair has fallen into his left eye again, the one that always does.

Oh, Hermione. I didn't know. Hermione, I'm so sorry.