A Wonderful Fortuitous Love

Epilogue

Note: If you aren't one for bittersweet endings and just want a plain, sweet and simple Dramione ending, skip this and proceed to the alternative ending.

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"I will not wait to love as best as I can. We thought we were young and that there would be time to love well sometime in the future. This is a terrible way to think. It is no way to live, to wait to love."

- Dave Eggers

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Hermione was late. And not the five minutes kind of late, but the twenty-two minutes precisely kind of late. She might have tried to blame Ronald if it weren't for the owl arriving at five this morning calling him in. In compensation, she put the blame to Crookshanks (she did after all trip over him and then spill his breakfast everywhere) before she realised that was absurd. She had slept in, something she did not do often aside from third year. Then she had forgotten where her favourite maroon blouse was; then found her best pair of stockings had somehow gained a tear in the twelve hours she'd hung them in her closet; then she opened the fridge to find Ron had drunk all the milk with a little apologetic note stuck to one of the shelves. The note might have once brought on a grin, but today it had her crumpling the pink piece of paper.

And so now she was running through the halls, apologising profusely as she bumped and nudged people. She even thought she made a man spill coffee over himself from the cry of pain she heard behind her, but she could do little more than yell a second sorry over her shoulder. She felt her bun bop up and down vigorously, knew that pieces of hair were coming out, tried to keep strands from sticking to her mouth, but her hands were full of files and books from her old office (which she, naturally, dropped, and in response she would, naturally, swear).

It was her first day at the Ministry of Magic, and needless to say leaving a path of destruction was not how she pictured making first impressions. 

The Promotion of Elfish Welfare was left in Alexis' hands now. Hermione had not lost her passion for elves, but there comes a time in everyone's life when they know, just know without an explanation like how someone knows it would be impossible to stand on a cloud without really understanding the scientific evidence, that they have done all they can, and that it is time to move on. Nothing lasts forever. Her old boss Mr. Jennings had even left, Derek Armstrong was definitely not returning and neither were other employees Hermione had befriended. What made things even stranger was Bun Woman had retired, replaced by some clueless blonde Hermione had been told. But that was life, wasn't it? People leave and new ones replace them.

Little Zane was now over a year old, and Hermione having had the honour of being his godmother was also lucky enough have heard his first word. If it was even deemed a word. Blaise was sure he had tried to say 'Slytherin' while looking through old Hogwarts photographs one afternoon. Pansy smirked triumphantly and high-fived Blaise, declaring, "My baby is destined for great things!" then directing at Hermione, "You'd better tell Potter's kid to watch out." Ginny was six months pregnant and getting more and more violent by the day. Every time Hermione and Ron saw them they always left with Ron red-faced and cursing his sister. It they had been explosive before, it was nothing to now. Even Harry was jumpy, but he was still happier than she'd seen him in a long time.

With most Death Eaters locked up things were almost, dare she think it, boring. There were still bad wizards out there and supporters of Voldemort's views, obviously. That would take decades to change, but things were where they should be. Life was finally working out, except for the fact that she was terribly late.

When the last elevator she would need to take opened, she burst through. It was a lot more crowded than the others she'd taken, however, and her shoulder shoved into some tall woman's as they both made to exit and then she was pushed into the big man on her other side. She tried to keep walking even as she felt herself still stumbling from the trip, and the result had her banging roughly into another person.