Chapter Text
She was fading away. She shivered, huddling closer underneath her threadbare blanket behind the muggle dumpster she had taken shelter in.
Hermione Granger never expected to be homeless after the war.
How she ended up where she was today was complicated. She hardly could remember anymore how it happened; it felt like eons ago to her.
She remembered her parents' faces — angry at her, looking at her as if she was a stranger. She remembered sudden flashes of light — coming from where or from whom, she had no idea. She remembered blood. Lots of it.
She remembered her parents on the ground — she never got to find out if they were alright and safe — and alive (but Hermione always quickly brushed that thought away). She remembered police sirens and more lights and hands grabbing at her and people shouting and more distressed, angry faces targeting her with blame. Shaming her.
She remembered running. More flashes of lights. Her wand broke. She had had to leave it behind when she dropped it while being chased.
She remembered being turned away. Arguments with friends. They didn't understand. More running away. Lots of cold. She lived in the forest for a while. Then on the streets and in abandoned homes for even longer. She didn't remember how she survived without her wand. She just did.
She just existed. And she'd been existing on her own, ever since.
Hermione didn't like thinking about that frantic, confusing day with her parents, or any of the days or weeks or months that came after. She didn't like thinking about the past — not even yesterday. She could hardly remember what happened the day before anyway. She lived in the moment and she daydreamed about a future that never would be.
Dreams were all she had these days.
Hermione shivered again, as she drifted off to sleep. She hoped the morning would be better — as she always did. She would be stronger tomorrow than she was yesterday, she thought to herself dreamily.
She had no hope, really. But her daydreams gave her joy. Nowadays, Hermione finally understood why Luna Lovegood had been the way that she was at Hogwarts. Lucky her. Luna was thriving overseas these days, last Hermione had heard before she'd gone off alone to retrieve her parents after the war.
As Hermione slept restlessly behind her dumpster sanctuary, the world kept moving, quiet but steady.
Hermione didn't know that soon her luck would turn around, from the unlikeliest of occurrences.