A/N: Submission for the Houses Competition
House: Ravenclaw
Year: 7
Category: Standard
Prompt: Musical – Mamma Mia
Word Count: 1920
A/N: This fic is based loosely on the song 'our last summer' and the scene from the film where it appears. Where the dad candidates reminisce about their time with Hermione. For the purpose of this fic, Rose is not a Weasley but a Granger like Hermione. The reasoning for dad choices: There are a Harry and a Bill in the film and Draco because of Dramione! It is also Muggle!AU.
Rose couldn't believe she had managed to away with it. All these years, her mother had dodged the subject of her father. But she was soon to be married, and she wanted her father at her wedding.
So, Rose had decided to take matters into her own hands. As she sat on the pier near her mother's house on the Gold Coast of Australia, she looked down at the worn leather diary that she'd found in her mother's cupboard, hidden away from view. She pushed the brown, bushy hair she shared with her mother out of her face as she opened the diary and read the entries once more.
It listed three separate love affairs, short but passionate, just after Hermione had finished school. They were all people she either went to school with in England, or knew through her school friends. A few weeks after school ended, she'd moved to Australia to live with her parents, who had moved there at the start of her graduating year. It was there that Hermione had found out that she was pregnant. Why Hermione had kept Rose's father a secret, she didn't know, but Rose was determined to find out before she got married so that the hole in her heart could be mended.
Now, these three men had flown across to Australia, under the guise of Rose's mother inviting them for old time's sake to her daughter's wedding. Rose thought it would be visible when she first saw them—like a spark of connection or at least some familial recognition to tell which man was her father—but now, Rose was even more lost. The three men were just as stumped, and they had quickly drawn the conclusion that one of them was probably her father, but which of them was it?
On the yacht, docked at the very pier she was sitting on, were her three father candidates. Under the blazing Australian sun, a man with glasses, a mop of scruffy black hair and a strange lightning bolt scar was surveying the horizon. Harry Potter was her mother's best friend. Rose got up from where she sat and walked over to him.
"I could get used to this view," he said to her softly, pausing from the horizon for a moment to look at her with a gentle smile. "I'm glad you invited me. I have missed your mother."
"I'm glad you could come. I always wondered about Mum's life before she moved here and had me." Rose sat down on a chair behind Harry, her hands resting on the leather diary.
"I've known your mum ever since we started secondary school together. We had our moments where we didn't get on, but I wouldn't have made it through school without her. She was the brains in our trio." He smiled with a fondness for the memories that came forward when he thought of that time.
Rose nodded; the trio was something that was mentioned a lot in her mum's diary. They had a best friend who was called Ron Weasley, whose brother was one of the candidates.
Harry turned to look at her, seemingly studying her appearance, trying to see if he could be her father. Rose had inherited not only her mother's hair but also her eyes, so it was hard to tell.
"I remember that summer before your mum left like it was yesterday. We went on a road trip through the West Country. I went to spend some time with her before she left for Australia." Rose watched as he smiled fondly at the horizon.
"We had just stopped at a little inn somewhere in Devon when it started to rain. We had to share a room, as they were all booked. I had long harboured a crush for your mum, but I thought that she didn't think of me that way. It turns out she did, and we shared a short but sweet affair." He looked over at Rose and ruffled his hair nervously.
"It ended as quickly as it began. I was due to start training at the police academy, and your mum flew out to live over here with your grandparents. I tried to get in touch several times without any luck. That is, until you sent that letter."
Rose watched him thoughtfully. There was so much of him she could see in herself, but she could also see it in the other two potential dads. She couldn't bring herself to ask the question she wanted to ask more than anything.
Behind her, she heard someone shuffling around below deck and looked over to see dad number two – he had an aristocratic look to him, blonde hair that was slicked back, and a tall and elegant posture. His name was Draco Malfoy, and he had also gone to school with her mum. The difference was that they were not friends; if anything, they were closer to enemies.
Rose stood up and thanked Harry for his story, then she climbed into the cabin of the yacht. "Hello, Draco," she said, walking over to grab a drink from the fridge and sitting down at the table with him. He surveyed her in a calculated way. He didn't seem happy to be reunited with Harry as the two men kept their distance.
"I suppose you want to hear my story too? Like you just got from Potter?" he asked with a sour expression. Rose nodded with a faint smile.
"Well, we were in separate houses at school. Academic rivals, for the most part, but teasing your mum back in the day was just an added benefit of provoking Potter. As time went on, I grew more and more impressed by your mum, her intelligence, her spirit and, of course, her beauty. I come from an old aristocratic family, and they did not look kindly on your mum, who had a different social background. This made me foolishly bully her even more when I was younger. As I grew older, I wanted to ask her out but I knew what the fallout would be from such a decision."
He shifted in his seat, obviously uncomfortable sharing all this "That summer, we met in secret. It turned out she liked me as much as I liked her and, well, I wanted her to stay. I wanted to marry her, but my parents had arranged a marriage with a similar family behind my back. Your mum left without a word. She hadn't told me where in Australia she was moving, and this was before we had social media so it was damn near impossible to find her. I never expected to get a letter from her, or I should say, you, twenty years later." He spoke with a smile which reminded Rose of what she had read in her mum's diary, that he was a sneaky, devious man. She read his expression as he approved.
"She never mentioned me? Or who your father is?" he asked, broaching the question Rose couldn't ask.
"No, she always dodged the question. I found you through her old diaries," she said, looking slightly guilty for doing this to her mum without asking her first. Her reaction upon seeing the three men had been anything but positive, especially when she saw Draco. From the snippets Rose had heard from Hermione's conversation with her friends, Draco had broken her heart and it seemed like she hadn't gotten over it.
"I'm not surprised. I don't think she's ever forgiven me for not fighting my family on the arranged marriage at the time, even though I never went through with it," he said, rearranging the paper in front of him, obviously needing something to use his nervous energy on.
"I would love to say that I am your father–I would," Draco said, reaching over and placing a hand briefly on hers. "But as you can see, I was not her only partner that summer. She never mentioned that she was also spending time with Potter and that Weasley back then." His sour expression returned for a moment.
"You look a lot like your mother, so it's hard to tell. Regardless, I think highly of you and we will get to the bottom of this. If you are my daughter, I will make sure you are properly cared for... and I want to get to know you better. That is, if your mother will let me," he said with a tentative grin.
Considering that he and the two other men were banned from the Granger house right now, it didn't seem likely.
Rose smiled at him, "Thank you, Draco. Even if you aren't my father, I am glad that I got to meet you. And don't give up on Mum, I think she still loves you." She winked at him and headed out onto the deck. She had one more candidate to talk to before she had to get back to the island for more wedding preparations.
Her last potential father stood steering a yacht. He was tall as well, with long red hair and freckles. Bill Weasley was his name, the older brother of her mum's other best friend, Ron. He was the adventurous sort, travelling all over the world; it was his yacht they were sailing on.
"I thought the weather was too nice for this beauty to sit still in the water," he said with a big grin. Rose walked over to him and he offered her the wheel. "Here, give it a try." He guided her hands to the spokes of the wheel and kept a watchful eye on her and the direction the ship was sailing in.
"I love this area. I was here before, twenty years ago," he said with a knowing smile. "I was over here for work—I'm an archaeologist," he added for clarification. "It was just over there by those cliffs that I met your mum," He pointed to a sharp cliff face about a mile out. Rose recognised them as the cliffs she often jumped off of during the summer.
"I knew her as my little brother's best friend and hadn't expected to meet her here. We kept each other company during my short stay here, since she was feeling homesick and I was a connection to home. Plus, I am a lot of fun," he said. "I took her out to the sites I was working on and she helped out there. What we had was brief, but meaningful. We filled a void each of us had in that last summer before we had to move on with our lives."
Bill took back the wheel as they started to veer off course. "I never expected to find her with a daughter—you look just like her. Though the dates add up, and you could be mine," he said, looking at her with a kind fondness like he was hoping it was true. "I would be lucky if you are," he said with a grin, placing an arm around her shoulders.
After talking to the three of them, she still had no idea who it could be. She moved away from Bill and sat down near the bow of the yacht as she watched the three men. All of them cared for her mother in their own way and, through her mum, they cared for her. She was no closer to an answer, but one thing Rose did know was, she was lucky to have these three men in her life.