Next
by Wendy

We don't graduate.

There's the train ride home, and the End of Year prizegiving. But no one says who got the most NEWTs, or is the cleverest or the funniest.

But it was never like those films Aunt Petunia loved, with the popular guy and the unlikely (but still stunningly gorgeous) girl tripping off afterwards. We don't get to wear the silly hats and gowns. I mean, University graduates do. But plain old Harry Potter, ex-saviour of the Universe, isn't going to University.

I don't suppose I know where I'm going now. The Ministry offered me a place. I can just see it now. Open this flower show, Harry. Just another photo opportunity for the Minister from Australia. Yes, we do have Harry Potter working here. You know he defeated Voldemort. Yes, we can say it now he is dead and gone. Dead and gone.

The nights I wake up sweat soaked and choking kind of put paid to the "gone" comment. Deep breathing and warming my cold arms against Ron's back seem to help dispell any lingering effects though.

We all know that Hermione is the cleverest. She's not just going to University. She's going to University in America. She says that she always meant to go there, and that saving the world kind of took away any time as she had to sleep and research and heal. And they have a fantastic facility over there. And it's all ramps and that'll mean she can use the wheelchair when she's tired.

I don't think they want me to stay at Hogwarts. Snape, who never changed at all, yet became the best of us all during the war, mockingly sneered that I could teach Defence Against the Dark Arts. After all, I'd managed to go through enough teachers. There will not be a change this year. Remus looks happy to be back.

Eventually it's just the three of us on Platform 9 and 3/4 for the last time.

"It's not the last time. We can still use the train to get to Hogsmeade." Ron points out.

We hold in tight against a pillar watching reunions with families, younger brothers and sisters looking on enviously and wishing themselves at Hogwarts already.

I don't need to go home to Privet Close. I'm no longer a dependent. I'm independantly wealthy. And from here I'm heading to Diagon Alley and a room at the Leaky Cauldron and...

"What do we do next?" Hermione is looking for her parents in the crowd. She can't manage her luggage and her crutches.

"Keep in touch, I suppose." Ron shuffles his feet, looking like the first year I first met again.

"Well, we have to leave the Platform sometime." We all walk towards the exit.

"See you during the summer? Afterwards?" Ron sounds desperate.

"I'll send you an owl once I get settled. And to you, Hermione." But she's gone, her family swooping down to check that she's still all there, and nothing more got broken in the last three weeks. "There's your Mum. Ginny's already there."

"I'm going to miss you, Harry. You know I will." He hugs me, awkward with the whole "public display of affection" thing still, and heads off.

And it's just me, watching the last seven years of my life just kind of drift off. We don't graduate. I guess we did that a month ago.

 

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