Missing You

***DISCLAIMER*** the characters and locations (save one) are
not mine, but I wouldn’t mind owning Alan… (Hear that, Rima?style=\'mso-spacerun:yes\'> Turn him over and no one will get hurt!)

A/N: I’m still kinda
new at the fanfic thing, so please don’t flame me!style=\'mso-spacerun:yes\'> Thanks so much to all who reviewed my first
story - Emmie, if you’re out there, please feel free to do corrections, I’m a
bit of a perfectionist myself but there’s a lot I forget sometimes!style=\'mso-spacerun:yes\'> And yes, I enjoyed the movie (boo-hoo, not
enough Sevvie! But the study-hall scene style=\'mso-bidi-font-weight:normal\'>was priceless) and look forward to the
next ones where his role expands!

This story will be kinda long, and a romance (aww!) to boot,
but there will be lemonade enough for all, I promise.style=\'mso-spacerun:yes\'> It won’t be the insta-smut of my last story,
but I’m sure I can come up with something to capture the imagination….!

Here goes…..

***********************************************************

Hermione
raced through the smoking rubble formerly known as Hogsmeade, frantically
looking for her family. “style=\'mso-bidi-font-style:normal\'>Where are you?????”style=\'mso-spacerun:yes\'> She screamed, tears tracing muddy trails down
her dirt and blood covered cheeks. She
had thought she saw them earlier, when the battle still raged close to the
Shrieking Shack. Her husband had taken
their two-year-old twins away from Hogwarts and to safety when the wards had
begun to fail, and his eyes had been full of fear for her when she had told him
that she would stay and make sure the Death Eaters would not follow them.style=\'mso-spacerun:yes\'> He was supposed to take them to safety, he style=\'mso-bidi-font-style:normal\'>had to have made it, she told herself
feverishly, shaking with terror as she ran.

Her last conversation with him had ended with a hurried kiss
and embrace, followed by her flinging the chain of her ever-present Time Turner
around his neck as he turned to scoop up their crying children.style=\'mso-spacerun:yes\'> “Mummy! Mummy!”style=\'mso-spacerun:yes\'> They had called, grasping their father’s
robes tightly. That had been the last
time she had seen her darling babies.

Arriving at the “safe” house they had set up, she had found
the door blasted off the hinges and the Dark Mark hovering above the roof….

The sudden sound of boots on gravel was all the warning she
had as two Death Eaters came around the corner – in a flash, she pressed
herself against the side of a tree, terrified.
Then she heard what they were saying.

“Well, he almost made it, ‘ey, Goyle?”style=\'mso-spacerun:yes\'> A dark laugh floated into the night.

His companion laughed along with him.style=\'mso-spacerun:yes\'> “Yes, almost.
The look on his face!”

More laughter.

“Well, I can’t say it don’t serve him right, taking up with
a Mud-Blood like that.”

The blood drained from Hermione’s face and she grasped the
bark of the tree to keep from falling.

“Well, there won’t be any more half-breeds to grow up around
here…he tried to protect the little brats but they went right along after him,
screaming their heads off,” Goyle chuckled.

Grasping her wand with rising fury, Hermione launched
herself around the tree and pointed it, screaming “Avada Kedavra!” with all the
feeling she had left inside her.

The flash of green light lit up the hillside.

***************************

Stumbling back to Hogwarts, she absently noticed that the
wards had been reset and stepped calmly over the corpses she encountered on her
way to her living quarters. As she
continued on her way without slowing, her mind vaguely recognized Dumbledore
looking at her with tear-filled eyes as she passed.style=\'mso-spacerun:yes\'> Once inside the rooms where she used to live
with her family, she didn’t stop until she reached the thick photo album filled
with wizard photographs. Flipping it open,
she looked numbly down at the picture of her wedding day and her handsome
husband. Tears began to drip slowly down
her face and land on the pictures, and she let out a sob as she turned the page
to find the picture she had been searching for.
There they were, all three of them, the dearest loves of her heart.style=\'mso-spacerun:yes\'> The wizard in the photo cradled the twins
with the utmost care, looking out at her lovingly and glancing down at the
children he held in his arms to smile at his good fortune.

She trailed her fingertips over the picture.style=\'mso-spacerun:yes\'> Sweet Contessa, such a beautiful little
girl. Salazar, so serious, and turning
out to be a little gentleman. And her
beloved husband, whom she had known since the age of eleven.

“Severus,” she whispered, knowing at last how it feels when
your heart breaks.