First, a few things I would like to address before I begin. Yes, this will be yet another story I've pushing through, and, is one I have written about three years ago, and just recently re-discovered it through one of my periodically irritating bouts of writer's block. Originally, it served as a traditional non-disney/Harry Potter fic, until I had another spark of idea to develop this further. Yes, this is an AU fic, some magic will be involved, but that will be for you to find out later, and there's some normality unfortunately, but it's something different and I think you will enjoy it. Second, yes I am also almost done with the fourth chapter of "The Perils Of Pansy Parkinson" and, another chapter to "Skinny Love" will be posted as soon as I get enough time to write it all out, and you can bet Merlin's underpants, these are lengthy, and detailed fics as it could be. As one of my friends Sean says, 'never Pansy out on the details.' Anyyyywhhhhooooo, I hope you enjoy this (:
Chapter One
1995; Summer
Two-hundred, sixteen tiles. Two-hundred sixteen tiles, remained untouched by her delicate, artistic hands. Two-hundred sixteen tiles, were all that were left of the memories of him, and her broken childhood. Two hundred sixteen tiles, where she had almost lost the battle of her life with.
The light bags of her belongings fall to the floor, as well as she does, landing on her knees. Her hands find themselves on the floor, staring, feel the remains and ruins of her childhood bedroom. She shuts her toffee colored eyes softly, and sighs quietly in remembrance of what her room once was all too perfect. Perfect in the sense, it would have been ever little girl's dream dormitory to play pretend, and experiment with make-up, and racy attire, but instead of the wonderland it should have been, it had become something much darker than her mother could have imaged, when her belly was swollen with the young girl. The pastel pink and décor princesses serve as a solitary confine in which she had damned herself in once he had left. The shabby four wall bed post and wide assortment of donated toys from the church up the road made her feel claustrophobic. The forty eyes of each doll staring at her at night, taunting, teasing her, just as the girls in Primary school had done were the fuel behind her anosmatic bouts. And, even the pastel pink color, which was supposed to comfort her with love, and warmness, only made her feel even more alone, depressed and hopeless of the whole she had dug herself into over him.
She cursed herself mentally for letting him ruin her into shambles of a girl she had once been, and being as foolish enough to believe that every word he said to her had been the truth. She cursed herself for thinking of someone who left her without a trace of thought, without even the common curtsey of a simple goodbye. She cursed herself for thinking of someone who would never love her back. She remembered every feature of his, the silky blond hair that was never once out of place, his steel eyes that seemed to take her breath away, and his smile that seemed to melt any pain that ached her heart.
A soft rhymatic rasp on her door snaps her out of her thoughts and force her eyes back open. She sniffles quietly, brushing away the few tears that seemed to escape her eyes, as she looks around. The pastel pink walls which clouded her memory faded were gone, and in its place were blank walls, splayed with bright yellows, oranges, and lavenders of her artistic freedom. The freedom behind the four walls she was confined to, during that summer holidays. Her voice behind the silence.
"Hermione?" The soft voice trembles as she opens the door.
The bushy haired girl whips her head back, and catches the soft smile behind the pain and worry evidently placed on her mother's aged face. Jean Granger, had once been the most beautiful woman, that Hermione had ever seen, and strived to be with. But, the beauty had faded just as Hermione's voice had, and in place of Porcelain, wrinkless skin was sickly pale and worry wrinkles all over her face. "Tea's up darling, I made your favorite, and popped some chocolate biscuits as well." Her mother signs in BSL, as if her hearing was impaired.
She wasn't disabled, just depressed.
"I also thought we could talk about seeing that therapist, in Manchester.." she adds in, pausing shortly after, unsure of the reaction she may receive from her silent daughter.
Hermione could feel her blood boil at the innocent suggestion, and the air become seemingly thicker. Her cheeks burn a furious scarlet hue as she scrambles quickly to her feet. Her toffee eyes no longer representing the loving and contentness she felt in herself, but burned black with rage, disgust and hatred. She felt like screaming at the top of her lungs at her mother's extreme ignorance at the real reason her daughter never spoke. The reason behind her insomnia, her nightmares and the constant emptiness that was ever so constants in her, that made her rot slowly inside and out.
Her hands reached up as she signed to her mother with such fury, you could barely make out the signs she was formulating "I told you a thousand times! I don't need any bloody help, you daft inconsiderate woman!" She flops her hands back down at her sides, and clutches onto her tote bag.
"Hermione, please! I'm sorry, I just think it'd help. Hermione, wait!" Her mother cries clutching onto her daughter, only to be shoved back and glared at with those wild almond glazed eyes.
"It's a little too late to save me now, Mother." Hermione signs, before racing down the staircase, and rushing outside into the cloudy day with tears streaming down her face.
~.~
The breeze hit her immediately as she hopped off the Number Four Knight bus, straight into Kingston. Hermione had never contained the urge to rush off the bus as badly as she had whilst a very chatty Mister Eggerheart tried to engage a converstation with a very mute teenage girl on the multiple reason he hated the youth. Clearly, he was ignorant to the fact that Hermione was quite younger than she had appeared, making her also question how terribly she had looked.
A shiver rushes down her spine, and the girl reaches to rub her arms to regain some warmth within her body once more. After a moment of suffering, she reached deep within her bag, and pulled out a dark violet jumper, given to many years ago by her now best mate Luna Lovegood. A small smile found its way onto her pale pink lips as she thought about the small, airy like blonde girl who she met when she entered her Secondary school a year behind the others.
Hermione was quite small for a year seven, and quite too shy for most to connect with. She remembers her being introduced to her very zany art teacher introducing the girl to the class of other exceedingly talented young dancers, and artists. It made her heart ache with self-doubt as she looked around at the much prettier, tamed haired girls who could plié and twirl circles around the very amateur girl. She read deep into the dark glares from such bright eyes, snickers and whispers from the other girls doubting how talented Hermione could truly be considering she was accepted so late.
"Miss Granger," Her very French dance instructor took a single look up and down at her, from the very used ballet shoes, to the hairs finding their way from sticking out of her tight bun."Find a spot on the bar besides Miss Brown."
The small girl obeyed her leader and found a place besides the only person who had not had someone behind her. A girl with a very flawless tight bun, and piercing sapphire eyes and a dark look on her face as she looked up and down at the smaller girl with disgust purely painted on her face.
"First, begin to stretch out then, Miss Brown instructs Miss Granger on the current routine we are rehearsing for the upcoming showcase."
The taller girl smirks with all the attention given to her, clearly adding to her already popular status as a year two. Hermione quickly threw her leg gracefully onto the bar and began to stretch when her instructor barked at her peer.
"Five, six, seven, eight!"
The girl moved with such elegance and near perfection, self-doubt burned with every inch of Hermione's body. An À la seconde, a triple spin, and finally a jump Hermione had never seen in her life.,How could her mother even assume that her talent was at the potential of girls who dedicated their lives since they were mere infants to the decadence of ballet, when Hermione only began the whimsical art when she was seven and a half. Lost within the thoughts of her self esteem, Hermione couldn't realize she stopped stretching.
"GRANGER!"
The girl whipped her head up and stares quite blankly at her instructor for a few moments before realizing what she wanted from her. She quietly dismounted, and took her place at the center of the stage, feeling sixteen sets of eyes staring down every inch of her, judging her every move, making her even more anxious than she already was. She took her foot and placed it gently forward, from the tip of her toes to the palm of her foot.
Silence swept the room as she preformed À la seconde, so angelic like and delicately, it seemed as if she barely moved. Sweeping her foot across, and twisting her small wrist, she extended herself to reach past the tips of her small ballet shoed covered toes. Pushing herself, to the center again, the girl sighed and prepared to perform a jump she had never seen before.
Determined to nail it, the girl closed her eyes, took a brief spring before hopping up, and in mid-air forcing her legs up into a perfect jette leap. Time seemd to slow as a grin crossed her face, and in focusing on her landing, her eyes briefly met with her peers and she watched the girl with sharp blue eyes smirk quite evilly as she mouthed "fall".
And that was exactly what she did.
She tumbled like an inexperience beginner flat on her face onto the ground. Her cheeks burned a scarlet red, as she whimpers with pain and hears her peers rumble with laughter much to her embarrassment. As she looks back up, tears prickle within her toffee eyes as she makes a abrupt exit before anyone could coddle her with her mistake.
She scolded herself as she reached the girls restroom on the first floor on how superiorly idotic she could be in defocusing on a make it or break it leap. More tears slipped down her cheeks as she looked within the mirror and shouted mentally insults of how she thought she could make in such a school beyond, and above her.
"You are a failure, Hermione Granger." The voice within her head whispers to her as she whimpers.
"I don't think you are," The airy voice called out to her, causing Hermione to gasp, as the smaller girl came into view. Long blonde, messy ringlets following all the way down to her back, and a distant look holding in her bright eyes as if she was barely there Her dress rufled a bit and floating just barely above her knees, and her feet bare and exposed on the dirty floor.. "You spoke aloud, I'm 'fraid."
Hermione shut her eyes tightly, feeling her cheeks burn bright in embarrassment once more.
"Nothing to be ashamed about though, my dad says it's perfectly normal to talk to you, or so he tells me." The girl shrugs, and inches towards Hermione, and she has never felt more on full blast as she had in that moment.
She sighs in relief as she hears the tap run and the girl washing her hands. Hermione opens her eyes to find the porcelain white sink full of a rainbow of paint as the girl scrubbed it from underneath her fingernails and hands. "We all make mistakes, I remember when I was a first year here, instead of painting a forest as my professor would have preferred, I ended up getting lost within my imagination and drew a great wizard named Harry Potter defeating a dark, evil wizard named Voldemort., how bloody embarrassing." The girl giggled.
Hermione stares at the girl whilst she wiped her hands filling her with midndless chatter, as if they knew each other for years.
The girl thrust a tissue towards Hermione.
"Thank you." She says quietly, the first words she spoke in a long time.
"I'm Luna Lovegood by the way," She thrust her small hand forward.
Hermione clasps it, and they shake hands slowly "I'm Hermione Granger,"
Since that day on, Hermione and Luna became inseparable during their stays at their prestigious schools, and it was even Luna that helped Hermione discover her love for her art, and her vast amount of talent that lay hidden within her.
Hermione slips on the jumper, and begins her trek down the upscale neighborhood she once resided in before the many tragedies came ahead In her life. She had meant to drift so far out of the slums of London, and into the quiet, familiar upperclass suburbia of South Hampton. She just needed to get away from her mother, and the thoughts that were rushing back to her so quickly.
Rage burns within her at her mother's suggestion of therapy. How fucking daft could that woman fucking be? Was she too blind to see that the damage had been done and there would be no reoccuernce of the energetic, adorable, HAPPY Hermione Granger.
Happy.
The word would forever just be a foreign concept for her. Happiness would be forever replaced with emptiness, she felt in her heart. The emptiness in which contented every fiber of her existence and threatened to drown her everyday.
She looks around at the streat which was so hauntingly familiar to her as a child, and walks over to the striking tall, still entact former home. Her hands ghosted over the grassy plains in which she could remember a younger version of herself, laughing, smiling, prancing with a small platinum blonde haired boy, with sharp gray eyes before everything had been ripped from under her when she was eleven..
Her stomach churn and her heart aches with frustration. How could a boy, whom she spent so much of her life with, seemingly disappear wholly from her life, without a single goodbye or a precaution of his departure. Hermione could remember all to well, hearing the words from his less than polite father that he was gone, the same day, she also found out her Nana passed in her sleep.
A whimper escapes her lips, and she tries to hold it in until she looks up to find the for sign brightly infront of her. Rage burns within every fiber of her being once again, replacing her hurt, and she watches as the sun fades from view, and dark storm clouds form under her, as if the Earth was co-existing her pain. Vicious wind began to billow aroud her.
How fucking dare her mother put her nana's old home up for sale, after all the memories it provided, and after Nana asked for her home never to be sold with God took her within his arms? Of course it was her fucking mother, she was Nana's only girl, sole owner of all things Nana had left to her, except her gold locket that was wrapped around her neck.
Furious beyond recognition with her own feelings, the girl rose away from the home she sought, tossed her bag over her shoulder, and forced herself towards the bus station. Her mother would hear her, the voice Hermione had been hiding for so long, would finally be heard once again. As Hermione stood in the mist of her angry thoughts contemplating about what she would say to her mother, she hadn't noticed that a small wallet had blew through towards her feet, and nearly tripped her.
She gasps, and growls at the inantimate object. She picks it up, opens it and gasps in di"sbelief at the ID card before her.
"Draco Lucius Malfoy
918 Seeming Way
Wiltshire, England"
"Oi, out of my bloody wallet you—" The deep voice growls as feet stop down towards her. She stands up, and locks wide toffee on steel eyes.
"He—Hermione?"
With a scatter of her feet, the wallet slips from her finger tips, and she rushes away hoping that what she saw couldn't have been real.
She just ran into the platinum haired boy. Her first love, and best friend Draco Malfoy.