Summary: We all know that Luna Lovegood married Rolf Scamander, and that Neville Longbottom married Hannah Abbott. But what about before their marriages? This is a story about love, marriage, people, and the things that happen in the life of a housemaid. Slightly AU.
HPFC "Poetry for Prompt" Challenge
Rules:
You must get the idea for the story from the poem.
You don't need to insert any part of the poem into the story. Instead, you could just write a story about what the poem is about, or how the poem makes you feel. It just needs to be clear that the poem has prompted the story.
Any rating, any length, any pairing.
Poem:
'A Woman's Work' by Dorothy Nimmo
Will you forgive me that I did not run
to welcome you as you came in the door?
Forgive I did not sew your buttons on
and left a mess strewn on the kitchen floor?
A woman's work is never done
and there is more.
The things I did I should have left undone
the things I lost that I could not restore;
Will you forgive I wasn't any fun?
Will you forgive I couldn't give you more?
A woman's work is never done
and there is more.
I never finished what I had begun,
I could not keep the promises I swore,
so we fought battles neither of us won
and I said 'Sorry!' and you banged the door.
A woman's work is never done
and there is more.
But in the empty space now you are gone
I find the time I didn't have before.
I lock the house and walk out to the sun
where the sea beats upon a wider shore
and woman's work is never done,
not any more.
XXXXXX
The house was a mess. Clothes splayed everywhere, mixing with Quidditch brooms, wizarding plants, and dirty socks. In a corner, on an old crickety desk, were piles and piles of the Daily Prophet, some smeared with coffee, others ripped, burned, torn, or generally disheveled. In the rooms above were beds, unmade, full of the remnants of the lives of those who inhabited the cramped, two-bedroom house. Rumpled furniture in one room, dirt in the broom cupboard, and even in the third, in the little room they used as an office, were papers and letters – all scattered about and strewn all over the floor.
And standing in the middle of it all was Luna Longbottom.
She'd admit, this wasn't the life she'd thought she'd live. The lives of housewives and cleaners – that was for comely women like Mrs. Weasely, women who were born with the know-how necessary to run life a house. These women possessed a magic separate, it seemed, than Luna's own. Her's, which she'd spent years cultivating to fight the dark forces, was a far cry from cleaning stains and kitchen messes.
Yet when this new life of hers had started, she'd embraced it with open arms. After a lifetime of fighting evil and being sure you'd loose, she'd thought that being a housemaid would be a nice change of pace. And sure, at first, it really was. No one trying to kill you, no chases, no dark nights, no worry or stress or anger.
Nothing, really, but boredom.
It had creeped on her really, her realization that she wasn't satisfied with her life. Reaching out it's gentle tendrils, it slowly settled in on her life, causing her to yearn for adventure, to dream of the dangerous once more – if only so she could feel alive again. She wanted to live, to be free – to escape, though she didn't realize it at the beginning. Because even on her most unhappy days there was always her driving force: her husband. Neville Longbottom had suffered as much as anyone in the war, if not more. He'd been valiant, so valiant, and so brave during the war. He'd been her hero. Of course, it was such a surprise that he'd fallen in love with her; after all, who could see the nerdy-boy-turned-handsome-war-hero falling in love with the air-headed-girl? But he did, and it was the most wonderful thing in the world. Luna loved him, she knew she did, with all her heart. He was the reason she pulled through every day. He was the reason that ever day, she managed to clean the house. He was the reason she was happy with it all.
She would do anything for him.
And for a long time, she did. Not even realizing what she was truly giving up she cooked and cleaned for him, washed his clothes for him, sat like a good, prim, perfect little wife for him. She did everything he asked and more. Until one day, she didn't.
Really, it was an accident. One thing she'd never cared about before becoming a housewife was reading – in her previous life, there was always something else to do. But now that cooking and cleaning had become her domain, she'd found herself extraordinarily interested in books – if only because of the escape they allowed into a more interesting life. It was one such day that she got lost in her book – and consequently forgot to clean the house before her husband arrived.
Oh such fury! Luna had never seen anything like it. Sure, she'd expected him to be unhappy with her – but the anger he'd displayed… she could still remember it to this day.
This is your only job! I work to protect our world, and you're supposed to work to keep them clean and healthy! He'd yelled at her, face red with anger. He'd come from working the Auror office – apparently nearly dying several times and then saving the world wasn't enough for Neville. I toil away for hours, and this is how you repay me? She'd groveled at his feet, of course, but at the time she hadn't recognized it was groveling. She'd only seen it as begging forgiveness that she so desperately needed, after such a heinous crime.
Oh how naïve she'd been.
It had gotten worse of course. What was a one-time-occasion spiraled into a monthly mistake, then a weekly slip-up. Her utter horror at leaving the house a mess slowly melted away into a slow chagrin, as the tendrils slowly wound themselves into her life – forcing her to become aware of what it truly meant to live.
Throughout her entire discovery, life continued as it always had. Every day, Neville went off to work. He'd always been an energetic man, always laughing and smiling. The war had taken away the laughter, and Voldemort the smiling – until all she was left with was the shell of the man she'd once loved. Every day, he'd leave with a kiss, and come home roaring, complaining about the house, the mess, and – more often than not – her. After a few months of what then became a daily occurrence, she'd grown used to them all. You're no good. What kind of woman doesn't know how to clean a house? A donkey could do a better job! And her own personal favorite, I wish I'd never married you.
It took her more than a year to realize that yearning in her own mind. It was slow in coming, but it was powerful: the need to get away from this man, who was ruining her life. She'd cleaned for him, cooked for him, but in the end it turned out she was never good enough. Never good enough at housekeeping. Never good enough at being a wife. Never good enough at hiding her true abilities – true potentials.
It had been building for a long time, coming for a long time, but standing there in that living room, on that fateful day, Luna Lovegood realized that she truly, utterly, and irrevocably was done with the man she'd married.
Looking back, she hadn't been afraid to start her life in the war. Instead she'd embraced the changes with open arms, transforming from air-headed Ravenclaw as easily as a Wrackspurt confuses innocent victims. She hadn't been afraid to start her life as a housekeeper and wife. Instead, she'd eagerly married Neville, and proceeded to attack their house as if she could protect her husband – and save her marriage – in the process. And now, as she headed out, alone once more, into the world, she realized she wasn't afraid for this either. It was something she'd never known, but whatever it was, she would face it bravely. She was ready for change, ready to walk into the sun, ready to discover a new world – a wider shore. She was ready to turn her back to her previous life, as she had two times before. As Luna Longbottom – no, just Luna now – stood in the middle of her living room, she realized she was ready for whatever life threw at her – ready to never be a housemaid again.