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Red Summer of 19	By : bk11 Category: Harry Potter > Het - Male/Female > Draco/Hermione Views: 2142 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 1-Red Summer of 19
- 2-part 2
- 3-part 3
- 4-part 4
- 5-part 5
- 6-part 6
- 7-part 7
- 8-part 8
- 9-part 9
- 4
- 5
- 6
Disclaimer: Don't own them. J. K. Rowling does.

Title: Red Summer of 19

Email: bkeleven11@yahoo.com

Rating: R

Spoilers: Anything. Everything.

Summary: Boy meets Girl again during the summer of twenty-three. And they remember the summer of nineteen.
Notes: There's a line in here that is lifted from Langston Hughes' "Note on Commerical Theatre." The real lines are:
You've taken my blues and gone--

You sing 'em on Broadway

And you sing 'em in Hollywood Bowl,

And you mixed 'em up with symphonies

And you fixed 'em

So they don't sound like me.
Not the whole piece, just so you know, but a snip.
Infinite Thanks to: Meggie, who constantly cheered me up with her edits.

- - - - -

She was handcuffed. Hand-stuffed. Stuffed up. Fucked. Up. Her wand was on the other side of the room, behind a bent metal table leg. Perhaps (looking at this poetically) a whole other world away. But the other side of the room was realistically only a few meters away, just as drab and gray and this side. She woke to the smell of gasoline and oil and . . . that antiseptic cotton smell of hospitals . . . of sickness and death. The static of a broken television set rattled in the background. Rattled like a baby�s toy. A Toyland. Send our boys overseas! The Glory. The Reputation. The Ideology.

The first thought that entered her mind: Am I dead? Is this hell?

And when she took a gasping breath and gagged on her own spit, she realized that she wasn't. Spit dries up or something, when you�re dead. That was her reasoning. Artificial streetlamp light had somehow managed to sneak in between broken glass and bent wire fences. It create a jarring wind chime pattern that danced against the walls as water droplets plunked into the muddy puddle next to her thigh. Drip drip drip. Plucked. Fucked.

She breathed as quietly as possible, arms braced against the wall so that she could sit up. There was a dark hunched over figure just three feet away. And she made a move to crawl over and check for a pulse. But it didn't matter. She was being watched. Like Foucault�s Panopticism. Orwell�s Big Brother. Blue pill or red pill, little girl. Like a dirty insignificant ant under a microscope. Anthill. Ant farm. Farm boy. Clark Kent. Superman.

Stop. Think.

I�m not Superman.

"Well, well, look who finally woke up." A hand caressed her cheek, and she jerked away. A dark face moved his head back to the silent figure opposite Hermione. The three of them stared at each other. The third was all wide brown eyes and a vacant stare. She was dead. Not more than a day. Not less than an hour. "What did you say, darling?" His ears perked up. "Kill the Mudblood?" He skipped over and kissed the corpse, sliding his tongue over the rough edges of her rough pouty lips. His dark dark eyes darkened. "Fantastic idea, Sarah."

Sarah?

The Deatheater grinned. "Speechless? And in front of your mum, no less."

She closed her eyes tightly. Sarah? Who's Sarah? My mother's name isn't Sarah! That isn't my mother!

�Open you eyes, little girl. Open those blind eyes, Mudblood.�

Go away!

�Stop hiding.�

Why are you doing this?

�Why not?�

It�s not right.

�That doesn�t matter.�

Just seven scant hours ago, she had been walking the streets with Neville. They had just picked up dinner for everyone. Harry wasn�t picky, allergic to peanuts, but otherwise wasn�t all that selective. Ron had an iron stomach and could eat anything that used to have a tail--as long as there were no bones. McGonagall though, had developed an intense dislike for red meat. Dean had told her that he walked in on Lupin throwing up in the toilet stall the last time she brought back steak. Snape didn�t even eat meat--period. Moody could stand ground up meat, stuff that didn�t have bones or a face to stare back at him. Bill could eat fish. Tonks drowned her chicken with lots of liquor. Needless to say, it was incredibly difficult to satisfy all of them. So she usually brought back tuna that she would attack with a fork and cut off its head and tail before feeding it to Moody, Bill, and McGonagall. Snape would get a salads--or variations of a salad. Tonk would get a bottle of whiskey to last a week. She�d usually share that with everyone but Harry (Harry didn�t drink. Ever). The rest of them, they�d hunt and peck for whatever struck their fancy.

�Hey!� He slapped her with the back of his hand. �Pay attention.�

God, it can't be Mum.

God.

�Maybe you�ll learn something.�

So this is how it ends.

�Just so we�re clear, I hate you. I loathe everything about you.�

Eyes opened, she stared back at her captor. She had never seen him before. Not that it mattered. He was the hired assassin of a creature that didn't deem her worthy enough to snap her neck himself. It didn't matter the face.

It doesn't matter who kills you because afterwards, you're too dead to care.

The voice edged closer. "You shouldn't have been there. This is your fault, you know. You should've just minded your own business. We saw you, you know. Little girl murderer," he spat. �It�s not funny at all.�

She shook her head. Muttered curses and vehement denials.

I didn't push her.

�You did.�

I didn't.

�You did.�

I couldn't hold onto her.

�You didn�t want to hold onto her.�

She slipped.

They broke you, Dean used to say. Would mess up you psychologically before they beat you. (Stoned you. Crucified you. Burned you.) They�d efficiently obliterate you. Kill everything they hated about you. Why do you think I can�t speak Swahili? Or Afrikaan? I can�t even speak colonized French. They told me it was wrong to be anything that wasn�t like them. Become civilized. Gotta speak English. English is the language of the Gods.

�You wanted her to.�

I tried.

�Not hard enough.�

I�m sorry.

"Pathetic excuses. All of them. Stupid whore." His hand arched down and her hand snapped back hard against the brick wall behind her. "Filthy Mudblood."

He, in black boots--leather, stepped back. Eyes glinted in the light. He laughed.

"I suppose you'd like this done the Muggle way, then? Sarah certainly did. No killing curse for her. Just a bullet through the temple. Splattered everywhere you know. I honestly don't see the appeal of your method. So messy.�

A bent pipe descended in slow motion and slams into the back of her neck. Thump. She hit the ground on her side, and fleetingly wondered why she was still conscious. Thump.

"Shut up, Sarah!" he yelled to the body. "I am hitting her hard!"

They�re elitist, Dean used to say. Made you feel bad if you were stupid enough to ask, �Can I go to the bathroom?� instead of, �May I go to the restroom?� I used to really mess up �whom� and �who.� Dean used to laugh over this bit. Felt like I�d get socially castrated when I couldn�t pronounce �specific�. It always sounded like S�Pacifics. I was only eight! God! Maybe it was all in my head. Maybe didn�t laugh a little bit harder when little Dean-boy made the mistakes instead of blondie-Seamus. Maybe the teacher didn�t look at me weird. Maybe maybe maybe. But I always wonder, I still wonder, if they look at me and they see a difference. You know . . . that difference. Little black boy. Little wizard black boy. I�m not their standard you know. It�s bad enough to be an abomination in the eyes of God. Worst is that I look it. I don�t look like their standard, you know. No matter what, I�m always . . .

Bent pipe digging into the small of her back. Slamming underneath her jaw. A bitten tongue and the taste of metallic blood. Crack of bones. Bruises crawling over her skin like an infestation. Thump.

. . . lacking.

Christmas ornaments. Misty clouds. Voldemort and Christmas ornaments and misty clouds. Shiny hammers. Slippery knives. Laughing Pansy. Broken-hearted. Jagged rocks. Mistletoe. Red hollies. Mistletoe's deadly if you eat it. Weak ledge. Hot needle and syringe. So much blood. Shattering glass. Pansy and needles and weak ledges and jagged rocks. I didn't push her. I didn't. I couldn't hold on to her. She slipped. I tried. Broken ornaments and broken glass and broken needles. Thump.

"And broken mummy!" He laughed.

She closed her eyes again.

I�m sorry, Mummy.

I�m so sorry.

"Look at me." Deep dark voice gripped the back of her head in a fistful of hair. "You really shouldn't have been there," he repeated. "This is all your fault. Why did you do it? Why?"

Because it�s the right thing to do.

�There is no �right� thing, stupid girl!�

You�re a murderer.

�I don�t care! Don�t you understand? How can I make you realize this? I�m justified. I�m wholly justified. They killed us first. They stole us and they mocked us and they spit in our faces. They never wanted us.�

Shut up. Stop it.

�I don�t care if it�s a massacre! I don�t care if it�s a fucking genocide! They started it. They broke us. They hunted and burned and raped and murdered us. They�re not allowed this! It�s not fair. They�re not allowed to cower when they started it all.�

You�re wrong.

�And they wouldn�t leave us alone. As long as they exist, they will continue to persecute us. Taint our blood with their poison. It has got to STOP. It has to. Or else we�re doomed. All of us. I can�t . . . I can�t stand it anymore. I can�t stand watching my people die. I�m sorry. I can�t.�

No.

�How can I make you realize this?�

No.

�It�s the truth.�

She swore at him, told him what he was, what he could do, and where he could do it. He merely laughed because he found it hilariously funny. And then she said words that made him mad.

Freak of Nature.

Godless.

Spawn.

Evil.

And he kicked her for it. Hard. Her stomach caved in and she fell back to the ground. Dirt and mud in her eyes and in her mouth. He grabbed her cuffs and used them to yank her back up into sitting position. "Sarah wants me to cut you," he said coldly, gesturing to the hunched over figure.

Part of her realized that she was dying. A smaller part of her knew that her mum was dead (Mummy, I�m so sorry), and her dad . . . maybe it was already too late. Part of her wanted the bullet soon. Part of her sort of believed that she would deserve it--for killing Pansy.

But that doesn't matter. She kills him later.

He flicks open a gleaming pocketknife and touches her bare arm with the side of the blade. "The more I look at it logically, the more obvious it becomes that I am right. That the Lord is right. You're not a stupid girl, Hermione Granger. That is also a fact. But look at this! This blunt killing instrument. So inhumane and savage. This instrument made specifically to split a warm living body down the center. Tell me, Miss Granger, how can you fault us for cleansing the world of such flawed creatures? You have a shorter lifespan. You�re more prone to birth defects. You�re a breed of alcoholics and rapists. You�re savage. You burned us at the stake without giving us a second thought. Bred your offspring to hate and kill. And now you cry because we�re returning the favor? I see you, and I realize that you're not stupid. But you're as flawed as they are. You're dirtied with the same sins, you filthy little Mudblood. For that, you don�t deserve to live. The world�s already a scary place, and I don�t want my children to grow up scared of being burned at the stake." Here, he leaned down. �Social Darwinism, darling. Learn it.�

They killed a part of me, Dean used to say, by making me ashamed to be different. They killed me (not just with burnings and slavery). They killed with their organized education. He used to laugh at this. Dressed me up, stole my blues, put her in a fancy party dress, and made her perform for them. They dressed me up and civilized me up, as if there was something wrong with me to begin with, he used to spit. God, how is that fair?

She shook her head violently.

The first cut was the worst. The anticipation of the unknown. That Last Frontier! Ha ha ha. The blade slid gently over her unharmed skin, and then it was pushed down. Hard.

"You deserve this. Every bit of this. You're pathetic. You sacrificed Pansy Parkinson's life for a bunch of nameless twits. Why, Miss Granger? Because Pansy's one life isn't worth a hundred Muggles? Or because you just didn't like her? Is it a cold number�s game, then? Did you forget to look in the faces of the children?"

Dirty metal pushing past the layers of skin on her forearm. Blood dripped. Thick.

"You're a hypocrite. Just like them. You deserve this. Harder?"

She panicked. She cried and screamed. I didn't want to do it! Metal grinding against raw skin. The blade was blunt, and she could hear a voice above her prodding on for more pressure. I was so confused. More pressure. I wasn't fast enough. Harder. More pressure! I wasn't smart enough. Harder! More! I wasn't strong enough.

And just as she was about to pass out. . . .

Boot slamming, bending--manipulating--her spine. I never meant for this. Fist breaking open skin. Blood leaking onto her tongue. Salt. gasp. swallow. gasp. A piece of metal slamming into the side of her head. She felt her teeth rattle. gasp. Oh God, this is it. This is the end. Blunt fingernails tearing the skin of her exposed cheek. Oh God, oh God, ohGodohGodohGod I'm so sorry, Pansy.

On their way home with the food, Neville had paused to stare at the side of a building. She was annoyed, the plastic bag was digging into the cut on her palm and he was just doing his typical staring out into space thing. She followed his line of sight and saw a poster hanging on the wall. It had a picture of Fudge and he had his arms crossed in . . . professionalism? Underneath the third button of his vest, the poster had said, �We need you,� as he urgently nodded, all grim-like. She had scoffed.

"STOP." Her voice broke out in the midst of blows and hits. He blinked at her, dazed and breathing hard. And she saw an opportunity.

Her foot managed to trip his ankle. He fell to the ground, spitting black mud.

In her peripheral, black metal. Dark dark metal. She picked it up with her cuffed hand. A hard heel came down on her wrist.

"That's a brilliant idea. They told me you were a clever girl." He bent down and closed his hand over her broken one. He manipulated her thumbs and they pulled down the safety together. Click.

"Hold on, all right?" He slipped his hand in his coat and pulled out a tiny silver key. He unlocked her cuffs . . . and then squeezed her broken wrist. She cried.

And then he aimed the barrel at her mother's body.

She protested. Don't make me. Stop, for God's sake. Don't. Her left hand pounded on his shoulder fruitlessly. Adrenaline couldn't dull the pain. Each time her fist made contact with his arm, a dozen little bones shifted in her wrist and ground against each other like nails against slate. He squeezed her hand harder. She screamed.

"Hush now. She's already dead, you know. She was a screamer, too, you know."

No . . . stop! Damn it . . . stop!

"You have to press harder, darling."

Stop!

She had scoffed. Propaganda, she had told Neville. Vapid ideological brainwashing, she had said. False patriotism, she had decreed (but then, was that redundant? Did patriotism exist anymore?). This sort of thing has been repeatedly been used as a method to recruit soldiers, she had told him. In fact, back during the first World War--and then Neville had snapped at her. Told her to shut up. First and last time.

�Pay attention.� He pressed his lips to her ear, "Remember this," he whispered hotly, "it's your hand holding the gun. That's your finger pressing on the trigger. You're the one who's going to kill her." He chuckled.

No. She hiccupped.

"You know, Miss Granger, the truth of the matter is that you could've stopped this. If only you really wanted to. What has stopped you from dropping this gun and kicking my ass? You just don't want it enough." He squeezed harder for emphasis. And then, "Death becomes you, my dear." Quietly. Softly. Purposefully. Gently, he said it.

No!

The first and last time Neville actually snapped at her, it started with, shut up, Hermione, he had said. I�m not stupid you know. You always act like I�m some fucking moron because I don�t know your big words and read all the fancy books that you�ve read. I�m not stupid! I�m not. You can read all the books you want, Hermione, you can twist and pretty up the English language all you want. But the language is already fucked up with its blatant sexism and racism. I ain�t gonna keep stupid archaic words around just because it�s proper. There isn�t a glory in it. It doesn�t make sense. Fuck. Fuck it. Fuck you. Fuck him. Fuck them all. We�re all fucked. I�m not gonna be like that. I will say what I want and how I want to say it without fancy terms and crap. Because you know what? Books don�t show you shit. Read all you want about fucking sonnets, empty tragedies, and vapid epic poems. You won�t know. You�ll never know until you stand in a cold cold corridor and have some Healer tell you there aren�t enough �resources�--shit about generators and half-lives and duplicative cells. Well, I�m too stupid to understand any of that shit. All I know is they tell me they have to let my parents die because Fudge�s government doesn�t want to pay for it anymore. Fuck it, Hermione. Compose me a poem. Make me feel better with your fancy words!

A loud shot.

And the body slammed against the wall from the impact of the bullet. And she felt slick viscous blood on her lip. It was her own.

"She was already dead," he repeated.

She lunged. They both go down. Him on top and suffocating her. Grinning and laughing. The gun trapped beneath her spine. He felt around for it. Rough hands on her thighs. Her butt. Her hips. Her ribcage. Fingers over her breasts, to her neck. Big hands clamped around her neck. Squeezing. gasp.cough.gasp. Squeezing.

I didn�t know that being smart meant you had to know all sorts of facts, Hermione. I didn�t know that being smart meant you had to speak properly. I didn�t know that being smart entailed fitting in a mould. I�ll never be smart, then. To be smart is to be like a Death Eater. Oh, pardon me. To be intelligent. My stupid mistake. I�m a pathetic idiot. They�ve got their pride and their banners and they�ve got their principles. They have a purpose to do all this. What have I got? I�m just a stupid little boy forever chasing for his mummy and daddy and is he really that stupid? Can�t even open his stupid little eyes to see that Mummy and Daddy are never coming back. It�d be so much easier to have a damn purpose. Blame a purpose. Blame a reason. You can�t blame dead people.

Another loud shot.

What they don't always show in films is that, when a body gets shot, it gets carried along with the bullet's momentum. She shot him point blank. He flew up nearly a foot before falling back down to her body like a piece of lead, eyes still open, staring at her. The shot was clean and straight, as if she had skewered him. The bullet had torn through his chest and the escape left an eight-inch crater over his left lung. The momentum had knocked him high enough so he died before he actually hit her body.

Big brown eyes with unbidden tears stared up at the ceiling for six minutes. Sticky blood coating her hands, her face. And then she pushed his stiff body off of her. Still laughing at her.

She retched next to the body.

It took two hours to crawl to the door with a broken leg and bruised ribs. It took thirty minutes for Harry to find her. And it took half a second to say, "I quit, Harry. I can't do this anymore. I�m out. For good."

I hate Shakespeare, Neville had said, I wish he�d go fuck himself in his grave. And I really wish he�s a crappy lay. He had thrown the poster of Fudge one last contemptuous look before he raised his hand to roughly wipe his eyes, not caring if she saw or not. Maybe I�m selfish, he whispered. Maybe I am really stupid. But that�s just what I think. Then again, I�m not smart as you are, Hermione.

She had never felt stupider.

Lying on that cold cement ground, she finally really understood what point Dean had been trying to make. Sure, she had gasped horrifically, shed a bit of tears for an eight-year-old boy, but she empathized. She didn�t really understand. Lying on that cold cement ground, she really understood Dean and Neville�s pain. And her heart broke for them.

It nearly killed her to realize this. She was infantile. Stupid. Girl with a yellow halter-top, who thought she was a woman of the world. Stupid immature little girl. Little girl who knew nothing. Who read the stories but never saw it. Never felt the hot vice-grip of futility. The world was gray, not black and white, idiot. It will forever be gray. Even if they win. Even if they aren�t decimated to ash.

Even when they begin to pick up to pieces, when they try to move on . . . the world will still be gray. The beautiful Deans will always be made to feel shamed about who they are . . . the beautiful Nevilles will still be tricked into believing they are fools. Foolish. Silly rabbit. Bunnies and carrots. Snowman snot. Cold. Cold cold cold war.

She couldn�t fight the good fight anymore. Not for such a world.

I�m sorry, Mummy.

I�m so sorry.

- - - - -

(07-19-04)

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Red Summer of 19