Word Count: 642
Performing Arts: Tropes. All a dream
Alice knows that Augusta is so proud of her and her work. Augusta even brings Neville to her and Frank's office to show their young son what his parents do. Alice wishes she could be home, but there's so much to do. She'll get home one day, though sometimes, a voice tells her that she won't. Too busy, she answers, before the voice can answer for her. Though she wishes more than anything that Neville would smile when he saw her. Is he not proud of their work? Didn't he read about their battle with the chimera last month? Alice hopes that he's just worried about his parents. But she won't stop, she can't. She'll keep on travelling with Frank and fighting against...well, evil. (The word Lestrange sometimes creeps up in her thoughts and Alice knows it's important even if she can't quite say how.)
Alice remembers the first memento she gave Neville. A small patch of demiguise fur. Neville had smiled at her, marvelled at the way the fur shimmered and disappeared and reappeared. He had smiled so well that day and his thank you had been so sincere. Though when she had tried to tell him of their adventure to get the fur, he seemed to be listening to something else, nodding in all the wrong places. She wasn't really a good storyteller. Maybe she just made the story boring. Frank would often look at her with a blank expression when she spoke to him. Sometimes it worried her, but then she would tell herself she was just being silly.
But now, Neville can barely raise a smile when he sees his parents. It pains her, maybe they really have become too distant. Maybe she really should get home. Neville is growing up and she feels like she hasn't seen any of it. But every time she tries to ask to leave the words catch in her throat and she can't get them out. Why she needs to ask, she doesn't quite know. Auror policy, just one of those things. The answer the voice in her head would give scares her.
Alice doesn't know whether to try and impress her son with more and more incredible gifts or to just give up and give small tokens. No matter what she does, it's the same small ghost of a smile on his face. In her heart, Alice knows that he really wants his parents home. She'll try and get Christmas scheduled off. That'll make him smile, just like she wants. She hates that she doesn't know her own son well enough to know what he wants.
But Neville gives that same, small ghost of a smile when she presents him with the news they'll get to spend Christmas together. She feels her thoughts slowing as nothing changes. An old, forgotten ghost of pain in the back of her head that threatens to overwhelm if she lets it out. The thoughts quickly circle again, almost desperate to cover that pain up. She looks at Augusta, who is just frowning at the note Neville's holding. Oh. Alice feels her heart sink, leaving a void in her chest so she can't breath. Their work is more important. But it's only one day. Surely she can spend one day with her son. Neville pockets the note, at least. Maybe he will come. She'll need to remember to get a present.
Her and Frank will pick something up the next time they're out. Maybe they'll see the golden haired adventurer with the dazzling smile. Or the man with flames for hair who lives in a burrow. Augusta really is proud of her, and Frank. They're heroes, Alice only wishes that Neville would be proud of her as well. One day she'll get home. One day.