Unwanted

The streets of Muggle London were loud, louder than she was used to after living at Grimmauld Place and Spinner's End, then her incarceration in St. Mungo's. It was spitting rain and snow at the same time and she shivered. The cloak was fairly heavy, but not quite warm enough for the weather. She smiled and started walking down the sidewalk, avoiding the eyes and looks of people walking toward her.

Hermione had walked around the city, randomly going down one street, taking another, going in a different direction. Her home was gone, so that was out, and of course Headquarters only had the traitors there, so safety wasn't going to come from that quarter. She frowned after a couple of hours walking. She was cold, wet, hungry, sore from her hospitalization, and didn't have a pound to her name, much less a galleon. But she knew that she couldn't use her magic to relieve any of those situations. Once she did, Aurors would find her, and return her to *him*. She looked up through the whirling snow and noticed two men coming toward her, intent on their faces.

Shaking her head 'no', over and over, she withdrew Harry's wand and stupified them both, not caring if she was noticed by Muggles. "I have to get out of here, I have to go, I have to leave, I can't stay." She mumbled over and over, yanking her cloak off, now hot and sweaty. Wildly looking round, catching the eyes of scared Muggles around her, she lifted the wand and muttered an incantation, thinking hard about where she wanted to go. Just before she Apparated away, she dropped Harry's wand, her last coherent thought was knowing that she'd be able to be followed with the magical device in her possession.

The wand clattered to the cobblestone, the Muggles gasped and some even screamed as the young woman with wild eyes disappeared right before them. Aurors showed up less than two minutes later to find two wizards knocked out, fifteen muggles who needed memory modifications, a sodden witch's cloak abandoned on the ground and an unidentified wand lying on top of it.


A/N~~Thanks to every one for the wonderful reviews! I've been going back and checking for tiny errors, that my wonderful friend Kimber has pointed out to me while she has been reading. As much as I'd like Hermione to 'snap out of it' as some reviewers have said, this isn't a story of 'love heals all wounds, not even maternal love'. She was traumatized (her parents' murder will come back into the story in the near future, along with *her* feelings and point of view during Snape's rape of her), found out she was pregnant, and didn't receive the proper medical/psychological care she desperately needed. She's not going to get well overnight, unfortunately. Although this is a wizard/witch story, I'm setting them in the 'real world', with real world repercussions. Please be patients....real life here is still taking up tons of time.
Again thanks for the reviews.
Marti!