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THE LILAC DRESS

Memory Charms weren't everybody's cup of tea. There were types, of course, which could be performed by most people, like the simple 'Obliviate' that Lockhart had been proficient at. It got harder as you got more and more precise, the clearer and more stark you tried to make the line between the chunk of memory that had been wiped and the parts which hadn't.

And then there was the difficult process of reversing the charm; a reversible charm was even harder to cast, and recalling wiped memory without causing permanent brain damage was a tedious process that could only be performed by highly skilled wizards with specializations in that particular field. Unless you were Hermione Granger, that is.

She'd read it all up, you could almost say she was confident. She definitely would have been, if it wasn't her parents she was going to have to cast the spell on soon.

The door creaked open, and a pretty middle aged woman with flyaway hair stuck her face into the room.

"Hermione?"

"Yes, Mum?"

"You've been shut up in your room all morning, dear. Is there anything...?"

"I'm quite all right, Mum."

Her mother, looking concerned, entered the room, and seated herself upon the bed.

"Dear, is this about your friend Ron again?"

It was a way out, an opportunity to explain away her preoccupation, so Hermione, never one to miss heaven-sent chances, took it.

"Well... yes, Mum..."

"Oh, darling," said Mrs. Granger, threading her fingers through her daughter's bushy brown hair affectionately. "I'm sure he likes you, you know. No boy writes to any girl, best friend or not, the amount he's written to you over the summer, unless they like that girl."

Hermione allowed herself a grin. It was true; ever since the Incident of the Bezoar, she and Ron had been growing ever-increasingly closer. He made no effort to hide his fierce protectiveness of her any longer; nor did he try to hurt her or make her jealous any more. Coming that dangerously close to death had changed Ron somewhat... he was more mature on many levels, no doubt about it. He wasn't and awkward gangly teenage boy anymore, but a young man who had grown to fit his skin. Yet, he was still Ron, the same old funny, self-deprecating, witty individual who had managed to keep Hermione's heart with himself for so long.

"Yes, Mum, Ron. He's such a git sometimes,"

Mrs Granger smiled a wicked smile of the sort that sometimes graced Hermione's own face. It looked strangely fitting on both countenances, although if you hadn't seen them at it, you wouldn't be able to imagine either of them looking like that.

"They're all gits sometimes. What, is he having the usual trouble asking you out?"

Hermione would never understand how her Mum knew so much about her tangled excuse for a love life. She knew better than to ask, although sometimes she wondered whether her mum was part witch, and, if so, whether she had seer tendencies.

Mrs. Granger appeared to be deep in thought.

"There's the wedding you still have to attend, isn't there?" she asked, apparently forming a plan in her mind.

"Yeah, his brother Bill's, I told you--"

"Yes. Well, weddings are occasions when you can dress up... dance, and all that, you know?"

"It would take several million You-Know-Whos to get him to pluck up the courage to ask me to dance, Mum," said Hermione drily.

"Not if you look so pretty he can't think straight," said Mrs. Granger grimly, getting up. "I have something you might like... it was what I wore to my best friend's wedding, where I met your father for the first time."

She was out of the room before Hermione could say 'bezoar'.

Hermione looked back at Mind Games: Charms to alter mindstate. She's miss her, she knew. She'd miss the feel of her fingers in her hair, and her soft voice most people knew not to judge her by. But Hermione was brave, and she knew this step was necessary. Worry would only slow her down while hunting for the Horcruxes. This way, they'd be safe, and they'd be happy. even if she never saw them again, it would ENSURE their safety and happiness. It. Was. Necessary. Unlike, for instance, the tears that were threatening to fall from her brown eyes, eyes that she'd managed to keep glazed over with a completely blank expression for the entirety of the holidays before this.

Mrs. Granger strode back into the room; Hermione blinked fiercely. Making sure her eyes were as dry as she could make them, she looked up at her mother, trying to take in every last detail, just in case she never saw her again. Mrs. Granger was holding a bundle of lilac cloth, which she now shook out and lay on the bed.
"There. It's a bit old fashioned, but I daresay you can modernize it with respect to today's witch fahions, or whatever, with your wand there, now that you're of wizarding age, eh?" she smiled at her daughter, and Hermione tried to think of anything other than the horrible-- BUT NECESSARY-- task that awaited her. She cast her mind around, and it landed on shoes... her mother's favourite pair, strappy, and with heels three inches tall. Mrs. Granger had bought them at a sale five years ago, they had become her signature footwear since then. To think of Hermione's mum was to think of a pair of dainty feet in their strappy, heeley sandals, clip-clopping into the house after a busy day of performing root canals.

"Mum, d'you think I can borrow your shoes for the wedding too? The three inch heel sandals?"

Mrs. Granger looked at her sternly, but her look melted, and she said, "Well, just this once. After which I want them back immediately. Intact."

"Yes, Mum,"

Hermione got off her bed and flung her arms around her mother. Mrs. Granger hugged her back.

"I love you, Mum." whispered Hermione, giving way to a tear or two. "Try not to forget that,"

"Of course not, dear. I love you too."

After all, safety was necessary, but so was love, and affection, and family, and that was what she, Hermione, was fighting for.