Notice: J. K. Rowling is one of the few authors who has been able to captivate a wide audience with her books about Harry Potter and the amazing world of witchcraft and wizardry. Through this world she has created she has captured the imaginations of not only children, but also adults and young adults all over the world. She has created the world this story takes place in and most of the characters, so you must give her the credit and not me. Any characters mentioned that are not in any of the first, second, third or fourth books are mine. Enjoy the story.
~lizz~
Hermione Granger and Her Muggle Family
Holiday at Hermione's
"Hermione! Hurry up and get ready! They'll be arriving any moment!" Geraldine Granger shouted upstairs to her daughter. She then said under her breath," Though I haven't any idea how they shall be coming."
"Don't worry, Mum, I'll be down in a second!" With that she ran a brush through her hair and ran down the stairs to join her parents in the kitchen. When she got down there she noticed her mother frantically cleaning the counter yet again and her father, Alistare Granger, sitting at the kitchen table reading the London Daily. "Mum, how many times must I tell you? They're not going to care if the house is spotless or not; these are my best friends we're talking about, not the Queen." Hermione said reassuringly.
"Oh, yes, I know, dear, but they are, after all, our guests." She replied, now inspecting the dishes to make sure there were no chips, "but I mean, they can just use magic to clean, so they're probably used to having their houses immaculately clean. And isn't that Harry boy famous or something? What'll he think if the place is dirty?"
"Honey, listen to this!" exclaimed Alistare, who had suddenly spoken from his newspaper, " There's an article in here about a man was found dead in Little Hangleton last week. 'He was found in abandon house people refer to as the Riddle House. The Riddle family- John, Linda, and Thomas Riddle lived there for many years. They were found mysteriously dead about 50 years ago. The only other person who had a key to the house was the gardener, Frank Bryce, but few believe it was he whom committed it.' He was the one found dead. 'The family also had a maid who refused to give her name, but she only worked during the day so it would have been nearly impossible for her to have done it.
" ' After the Riddles died, Frank continued his job taking care of the grounds as family after family moved in and out. After about three families or so moved in and out, he still kept his previous job. A villager then reported him missing and a search of the grounds was eventually established. After about a day, he was found in one of the bedrooms.
After an autopsy, they could find no reason for death. There seem to be no medical causes or evidence of suicide or murder.' Weird huh?"
"Yes, dear, but couldn't you have told us this later? Our guests will be arriving momentarily." said Geraldine as if the whole story had been a complete waste of time. She had now moved on to cups.
"That is amazing, Dad, you mean he just, died? Like that?" Hermione said interested, peering at the paper from over her father's shoulder.
" Well, dear, it appears so now, doesn't it?" he replied giving the paper one final look then carefully folding it and placing it on the table next to him.
"Mum, I told you! You don't have to be so stressed out about Harry coming." she said grabbing a cup from her mother's hand before she finished examining it. She noticed a chip but didn't say anything in fear that her mother would panic. " First of all, Harry lives with his aunt and uncle and neither of them are magical. And second of all, Harry is famous, but he's also very modest, and trust me, he won' t care." she said in a matter of fact voice looking at her mother. " Mum, just take my advice and stop obsessing over every little detail."
"You know, Hermione's right dear," Alistare piped in taking a sip of his tea and picking up his paper once again. " You needn't worry about her friends, it'll all work out just fine, don't fret, Geraldine."
"Oh, I guess you're right. I'll go and get ready then." and she disappeared upstairs.
"Was she this nervous the last time we had company?" Alistare said to his daughter after his wife left.
Hermione then got herself some breakfast and sat down at the table. She was really too excited to eat but knew if she didn't eat her parents would watch her to make sure she ate a whole piece of toast or something- she figured this was much easier. She then thought about how much fun it would be to have my friends over. I had never had any friends from school stay over before- and sadly, it was making my mother paranoid.
It then occurred to her that Ron and Ginny were accustomed to magic as a part of every day life and might not be used to having to hide their knowledge of witches and wizards. She hoped it wouldn't be too hard for them to get used to a muggle environment. Ron and Ginny were two of the seven Weasly children. They were pure bloods and lived in the Burrow, a wizard neighborhood, where they didn't have to face the daily challenge of pretending to be a muggle.
She and Harry however were brought up differently. Hermione was muggle born and Harry was raised by his non- magical relatives who would have nothing to do with even the mention of magic. Neither Hermione nor Harry had know they were witch and wizard until the Hogwarts acceptance letters arrived- Harry's with great difficulty. They had been surprised at its arrival but not at all disappointed.
The only reason Hermione was nervous at all was because she wanted her guests to feel as much at home as possible and hoped the muggle environment wouldn't be too difficult for Ron and Ginny to adapt to. They wouldn't have to pretend to be muggles at home though, that was for sure. Hermione's parents knew she and her friends were wizards and witches. So did her older brothers, Trevor and Timothy, but they were on holiday in the United States. Too bad, though, they would have liked very much to meet her magical friends.
Suddenly a loud noise interrupted her thoughts and she no longer had time to worry about any of it. The sound had come from the adjacent room, the living room, and immediately guessed they were there.
Forgetting her cereal, she dashed into the living room to greet her guests.
"What on earth-" she heard her mother gasp from the stairway. She then looked at her husband and then they both proceeded to the living room to find her daughter along with two boys whom, they presumed, were Hermione's friends. But almost immediately after they arrived their attention was directed to their fireplace. A young girl with flaming red hair had just walked out of the fire- even thought they were both sure there had been no fire before.
"They're here!" Hermione chimed greeting her friends. Another person walked out of the fire but she was not one of Hermione's friends from school. She was a round, plump lady with flaming red hair.
After Hermione gave each of her friends a hug, she introduced them to her parents one by one. First was the woman- whom was obviously in some relation to the flaming red haired children. She was not very tall, but seemed to be quite cheerful. As Hermione introduced Mrs. Weasly to her parents she greeted both with a sturdy handshake.
"Hello, very pleased to meet you, I'm Molly Weasly- Ron and Ginny's mother. Arthur would've come too, but I didn't want to make you too uncomfortable with him asking questions about all your muggle things ("What's that she just said?" Geraldine said with clenched teeth. " Oh, it's a wizarding term- Hermione's used it a few times." Alistare said back in the same manor.) so I thought I'd come alone instead, very pleased to meet you."
"And you," said Alistare.
"The pleasure's all mine." Geraldine managed still wondering how they'd arrived.
"Mum, Dad, now I'd like you to meet my friends from school." While introducing them, she pointed to each with her hand. The first person she pointed to was the young girl with the bright red hair and brown eyes ( who they figured was Molly's daughter) introducing her as Ginny, a third year. She next pointed to a boy- unmistakably Ginny's brother. He also had flaming red hair and brown eyes. He was also the tallest of the three. His name was Ron. The last of Hermione's friends was a boy with dark hair and amazingly bright green eyes. But the most interesting thing about this boy was the odd lightning shaped scar on his forehead. And this boy- with the lightning shaped scar- was Harry Potter.
Geraldine and Alistare Granger both nodded approvingly. "Nice to meet you all." said Alistare. "Hermione, dear, why don't you show your guests to their rooms eh?" he continued.
"Okay, Dad, come this way, follow me." She said to Ginny, Ron and Harry. As they began to lug their trunks up the stairs, Mrs. Weasly began talking again.
"So they'll spend the rest of July here and then we'll come to get them and take them to our house for the Quidditch World Cup and the rest of summer."
Geraldine Granger still looking dazed at the fireplace wondering how anyone could survive walking through fire quickly shook it off and looked back to Mrs. Weasly. "Um, yes, yes, that'll be fine. We'll have them all packed and ready when you come three weeks from today."
"Well, then, I'll be off now," began Mrs. Weasly, " don't want to worry anyone being late. I'll see you soon. Thanks again. So I'll be back-" she said kissing Ron on the forehead, "in a few weeks-" she proceeded with her good-byes and gave Ginny a kiss also, not noticing Ron fiercely trying to rub lipstick off his forehead. "Now be good you two, and Harry I know I don't have to worry about you." She then gave Harry a kiss. "And Hermione, see you soon," another kiss, "Geraldine, Alistare- pleasure to have met you." And almost before they could say goodbye, there was a small sound and she disappeared (she really apparated but Mr. & Mrs. Granger didn't know this was what it was called, for they are muggles.)
"Well," Mrs. Granger said turning towards each person as she spoke, "it is so nice having you here as guests, Ron, Harry, Ginny." She was no longer nervous and jumpy, or at least she seemed to do a good job of pretending not to be.
"Okay, if you follow me, I'll show you to your rooms. Right this way." Hermione said helping her friends up the stairs with their luggage.
-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-
Once upstairs Hermione led them down the hall of closed doors to their rooms. Near the end, Hermione stopped in front of a door, as did the others, and opened it. "Harry, Ron- you'll be staying in my brothers' room. Trevor and Timmy are on holiday for the summer. Make yourselves at home. If you need us, we'll be right across the hall in my room. The bathroom is the next door over from yours if you need to use it." She said and with that closed the door behind her. They could still hear Hermione talking in the hall even though the door was closed. She was talking to Ginny, "You'll be staying in my room. I hope that's okay, if we hadn't been redoing the guests' room you would have had that room but it's a mess in there with all the carpet torn up and all....." She kept talking, but Harry and Ron had stopped listening.
Ron had basically been distracted when he noticed all the unusual muggle things that surrounded him. "Wow!" he said amazed pointing to a rounded object on the bureau, "my Dad has one of these! You shake it up and- oh," he added, now disappointed as he finished shaking up the snowglobe. "But in the one my Dad has the figures move after you shake it..."
"Well ours usually don't." said Harry plopping himself down on one of the two twin beds- the one nearest to the window, "Mind if I have this bed, Ron?"
"Oh, er- sure, whatever." Ron replied as he began examining another object. this one was much larger and consisted of three main pieces. The two pieces on either side had a screen like covering of black. The middle piece had many knobs, buttons and compartments that seemed to somehow open but how they opened he hadn't a clue. "Ah!" he said jumping back from the cassette tape door immediately after it had suddenly opened after he'd accidentally pressed the eject button.
"What?" Harry said as if being awaken from a distant world. "Oh, Dudley has one of those- it's called a sound system or something- plays music." He got up off the bed and studied it, "Although he was sure to keep me away from it- never able to get a close look at one before." he added as he pushed the cassette door back into place. He then ran one of his fingers along the top of one of the speakers and let out a long whistle, "But I know it wasn't this good."
Further exploring the room, Ron went over to the desk and picked up a small piece of paper. It was quite unusual with a picture of a lady in red ink and a ridged white rim around it. There were several of these lying on the desk and each had a different picture and a number in the corner. "Hey, Harry," Ron said distracting Harry's attention from the marvelous sound system.
"Huh?" replied Harry.
"What are these?" he asked turning it over to feel the texture of the paper on the back.
"Oh, those? They're just stamps."
"They're whats?"
"Stamps- used for muggle mail."
"Oh, do they deliver the letters then? Like and owl? How do they work? Can they fly- achoo!" Ron then sneezed all over his hands and the stamp. He quickly wiped his hands off on hid striped shirt. He then went back to examining the stamp.
"Um... not exactly.... see, you lick the back of it and then stick it on the letter. And then you put it in a mailbox so the postman can-"
"Wait! What's a mailbox?" Ron said struggling to get the stamp unstuck from his hand.
"Oh, never mind."
by ~lizz~