Author's Note: Written for…

Sophie's Bookshop Challenge. Prompts: Irony, "Angry people are not always wise.", vanity

Stories of Color Challenge. Prompts: baby blue, vermilion, cerulean, magenta, lime

Ultimate Hermione Competition II. Prompt: blind!Hermione

Color in the Dark

"Right through the door, that's it. Now we're going to walk straight ahead a few feet and we'll be in the den. There's a chair on your left, careful now."

"Ron, for Heaven's sake, I know the layout of my own home!" Hermione snapped. She felt his hand reluctantly leave her arm.

"I'm sorry," he said dejectedly. She sighed.

"No, I'm sorry. I'm not used to … to needing help," she admitted. She reached out her hand and was please when he took it at once and resumed leading her to a seat.

The healers had warned her early on after the accident that Hermione would need to learn to rely on others. She'd been insistent that she wouldn't. She was a proud witch and pleased with her independence. She didn't think twice about declining her mother's desire to move in, and her boss' offer of more time off.

Hermione would return to work exactly three weeks after her incident without sympathy or help, thank you very much.

Ron guided her into a seat, and Hermione let her hands run over the arms of the chair, feeling the scratchy fabric and knowing immediately that it was the blue denim chair with the butterbeer stain on the seat cushion.

"Can I get you something to drink? Or eat? You must be sick of hospital food by now," Ron fretted. She could feel his nearness, just as she had foe the past few weeks, keeping her steady but also making her feel claustrophobic.

"I'm not hungry." Her words were drowned out by the chiming of the grandfather clock a few feet away. It was noon. She smiled in Ron's general direction, hoping she was facing him. "You need to get going."

"Are you sure? I can ask Harry to do it instead…"

"Ron." She meant to sound forceful but it came out as more of a whine. "You promised we would do whatever it took to keep things the same for the kids. I got home in time for their arrival, and now you have to go and pick them up. You promised."

She heard him sigh, and suddenly his hand was on hers, squeezing gently.

"I know. I'm going, just … just promise me you'll send for Mrs. Watkins next door if you need anything? I already filled her in on the situation."

"Go!"

"I'm going, I'm going!"

Hermione smiled to herself when she heard the front door close and lock. And then she was alone, for what was probably the first time since the accident.

Cautiously, she reached a hand up to her face and felt around her eyes for scars or bumps, but felt nothing. She wondered if there were bruises, or something else she couldn't feel. Two days after the accident, when the first half of the healing had already taken place, she'd found herself alone with her healer for a moment and seized the opportunity to ask the question that had been gnawing at her.

"Do I look different?" she asked meekly.

The healer hadn't answered right away, confirming Hermione's fears that her blindness was too noticeable to get away with.

"Vanity doesn't suit you, my dear," the healer whispered then and patted Hermione's hand patronizingly. But she didn't understand.

It wasn't as if Hermione cared what she looked like – she hadn't for years. And now, she was told, she'd never have the luxury of knowing what she looked like again. But she had more to worry about that herself, like what Ron would think when he looked at her now, or their children. It was what worried her most now, alone in her house, waiting for them to come home from King's Cross.

Hermione had been very clear about not wanting to interrupt schools exams with news of her condition, which meant that Ron would be pulling the children aside for a long chat before they came home. But how would they react to finding out their mother had been blinded?

She imagined them as they'd looked on Christmas break in their knitted jumpers. Her baby Hugo, excitedly chattering on about all he'd learned during his first term, and teenage Rose, practicing hair-dying spells every chance she got. She imagined the pity in their baby blue eyes as they looked at her, and for the first time she found herself glad to be blind, so she'd never see that look for real.

:-:

The homecoming turned out much better than Hermione had imagined, only turning awkward during a slight fumble when she tried her hug they children. Hugo assured her the elbow hit him in the shoulder and hadn't done any damage.

Everyone seemed to be behaving normally from what she could tell, and Hermione couldn't have been happier.

Rose was the one to break the happy calm the family settled into after dinner.

"I just don't understand why someone would do this," she said.

Hermione automatically turned her head to look at her daughter. Suddenly she would have given anything to see her Rose again with her naturally vermilion hair streaked with cerulean, magenta, and lime. Just a few months ago she'd been furious to see the dye. Now she could never see it again.

'The irony,' she thought.

"There are some people," Ron began gently, "who don't like that your mother is muggle-born."

"It doesn't make any sense," Rose continued, her voice straining the way it did when she was frustrated. "It doesn't give them the right to attack people. They had to know they'd be arrested."

"Angry people are not always wise," said Hermione. She reached beside her to take Rose's hand and found her knee instead. "We can't judge people for the things they've done. There are things I did in my youth that I wish I hadn't, and I know your father feels the same."

"I do."

"The important thing is that we're all okay. Everything is going to be okay."

She would make it okay.