Looks like she's been through it.
Chapter 1
“Shoot you down and then they sigh, and say “She looks like she’s been through it.”
Nothing New - Taylor Swift
Hermione had plans that did not include being 22 and just starting an entry-level job at the Ministry of Magic. The problem is that she wasn’t quite sure if she remembered them. Her mother always had said her aspirations had been bright yet near maniacal. Although, when she had kept surpassing all others her age and older, it was hard to ever believe she would not accomplish them. The advice she should have heeded included backup plans, or not to dream so linearly and rigidly. She admits that if something did not go according to plan, it would not be her plan, the future she imagined, anymore. The halt in her life was not for lack of drive, motivation, or any of the usual culprits that found other individuals off the track of success. It was the act of planning too much, being too sure, and not knowing what to do when the parts of the future she has long laid out for herself went astray. And to think it was all because of– Hermione stopped the thought before it pushed her right into the bathroom, where she would claim sick and use her War Heroine status to get her first day moved to one that did not involve a breakdown and a pub.
Taking a deep breath, she pushed open the heavy black doors in the subbasement of the Ministry. Starkly aware that it wasn not the Department of Mysteries but an old, musty, slow yet somehow bustling, room of Archives. If you asked her later about how she started her first day, her manager, or anything to do with the events afterward, she would not be able to recall them. A heaviness had enveloped her and emanated from within, driving her through the hours in a state of dissociation. It was as if some part of her core could not accept that she would simply be filing and refiling the accomplishments of others, mistakes, accidents, expense reports—everything that showed everyone else was moving as she stood stagnant in the midst of it all. The night before, like many others, Harry had said any step was a step in the right direction. Her disinterest and apathy hung like a fog over the dinner table, prompting Ginny to sigh and lay a sunburnt, freckled hand over Hermione’s wrist. The brunette had no fight left in her, seeming as dead, heavy, and rotten as the dreams she used to float upon. If she were honest, she only took this job because it was the only one that did not prompt anxiety in her or have any real levels of advancement. In this job, she could still be invisible. The idea of trying, wishing, finding herself again… It wasn’t plausible.
—
Hermione stumbled into her flat that evening, trying to ignore the dark mass developing within her. Her reality set in somewhere between filing the shift’s last document and stepping through the door. She had left hurriedly, the only quick movements she’s made all day. She hoped her shorn-off hair and removal from society kept her unnoticed on the trip upstairs to the apparition points. Right as she started her apparition turn, two hazel eyes met hers and widened in recognition from across the atrium. She could not place them, though familiar. The glance she got of the girl with the long dark hair did not provide any clues as to who might have seen her. Tying her collarbone-length hair into a low bun, she stopped in the kitchen to pour a glass of cranberry juice before crawling onto the couch and setting the glass on the coffee table. Hoping to be faster than her mind, she leaned over and reached into the cabinet that might be a tad too close to her lounging area if any healthy individual were to analyze the layout of her flat. Rolling her eyes, she grabbed the bottle of vodka and poured a generous amount over the cranberry juice. The depressive cosmo, she thought as she eyed the lime and triple sec just out of her reach. She placed the bottle of alcohol at the foot of the couch, tipping her head back without attempting to mix the drink, knowing she was drinking for efficiency instead of pleasure.
She sat for an unknown amount of time, relishing in the thought that the overpoured 1:1 ratio was beginning to ease some of her worries. As she was about to turn on her magically-enhanced telly and pour another, her Floo chimed. “Shite!” she exclaimed, scrambling to reach it before someone stuck their head in or climbed through.
A moment before her vinewood wand touched the bricks to disable it, Ginny Weasley in all her exuberance stepped out, still halfway through a goodbye to Harry. She gave Hermione a once-over before placing her hands on her hips. “I’ve heard all the excuses before ‘Mione. Going to fight me on my presence this time?” Hermione stood there, swaying slightly, knowing there was nothing she could really do besides let the redhead pass. She pulled up her Occulemency walls as much as possible and shrugged dismissively, leaving Ginny in the entryway before walking into her kitchen to grab another mixer. “Oh, real classy! Open bottles are the new Art Deco, right?” Ginny called out. Hermione gritted her teeth as she poured a liquid she didn’t pay attention to when choosing before she returned to her living room. In another life, she assumed she would have lectured Ginny about the inaccuracy of her dig as friends laughed. As it was, she just made her way out and grabbed a different bottle out of the cabinet instead of attempting to grab the one Ginny just took a swig out of. Orange juice, she thought, wouldn’t have been my first choice. “Are you mixing the alcohol with the juice or the juice with the alcohol?” The redhead continued, judgemental ‘because she cared.’
“You know Gin, you just drank my liquor straight. Looking to be a bit hypocritical tonight, are you?” Hermione shot back, swirling the liquid around her glass once before taking a long sip. A little fell over the side, as her first pour was now working through her veins, but she was still able to lean back and meet Ginny’s steely gaze with one of her own.
“I am not arguing with the smartest woman anyone will have the pleasure to meet on how I am nowhere near the criteria of an alcoholic. Your orange juice is now barely the color of the diluted apple juice Mom gave us as kids, and that is all I have to say on the matter.” The loveseat she was placed on completed the square of Hermione’s living room: the television on the far wall opposite Hermione’s placement, the cabinet of liquor to her right (feet away from the window to be in easy reach), and Ginny on the loveseat facing the incriminating cabinet. All surrounded the table that held evidence of the brunette’s last glass. “Are you going to speak at all?” Ginny inquired.
Hermione pulled down the throw blanket, and silently laid down. She turned toward the back of the couch with the air of someone smart enough to be self-aware of her own behavior, yet still somehow lacking the desire to care. There may come a day when she accepts support from one of her last friends. The only thing she is sure of is that today is not that day.