Where to Begin
summary: "It's Hermione, alright, but so much older, with scars, and circles under her eyes, and - who is the redheaded boy standing next to her, holding her hand?" Dr. Granger, trying to figure out what a father does after he learns that his daughter's growing up without him.
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Hermione really should have thought this deeper.
That's an out-of-place thought for Hermione - she's Hermione Granger; she doesn't need to think deeper, she already does. But months ago, everything was so blurry and odd and frantic, days of fraught and worry. She had carefully thought through messing with her parents' memories - but apparently she hadn't thought through deep enough. It had been so emotionally pressing that she had completely forgotten about more, well, technical matters.
Like where in all of this bloody continent her parents would be.
She had told them to go to Australia - but goodness, Australia was, well, huge, even if it was the world's smallest continent.
This was going to be harder than she'd thought, way harder.
She feels a reassuring squeeze on her right hand. It's Ron.
"It's okay," he says. "Things don't go wrong for Hermione Granger. Right?"
She laughs. How ironic. Right.
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Open.
Wendell Wilkins knew what blindness was. Once, in the dental clinic he and his wife owned, a man had entered - one completely blind. He had relied on a stick to walk. He had been incredibly good at "seeing" without his eyes - but the man had admitted that it was difficult. Wendell had been impressed and fascinated, and at the same time, he had immediately appreciated the fact that both he and his wife could see. He would never encounter such an issue, being completely in possession of the gift of sight.
Well, he had been wrong. He hadn't had any gift of sight at all - all this time, he hadn't been able to see anything. Anything.
And now his eyes open, and with them, the floodgates of memory swing wide. And all of a sudden, he remembers. Hermione. That's his first thought. His second thought is Where am I? This sure doesn't look like England.
Turns out, he's in Australia. Sydney, Australia, in a little dental clinic similar to the one he owns in England - but not quite. His last memory as Timothy Granger is his daughter pointing a wand at him. The memories afterwards he can recall clear as day - but surely that can't be him? Why does his self from the past keep referring to himself as Wendell Wilkins? and how could he have left Hermione? And once again, why in the world is he in Australia?
"Mom? Dad? Do you remember me?"
"Hermione!" exclaims Margaret, his wife. Margaret, not Monica. "Of course I do!" And she leans in and gives her daughter a huge hug.
"Dad? what about you?" Hermione asks. Unlike his wife, he doesn't automatically lean in for a hug. Instead, he has a double take. It's Hermione, alright, but so much older, with scars, and circles under her eyes, and - who is the redheaded boy standing next to her, holding her hand?
"I remember you," he says slowly. "But will somebody please explain to me what's been going on?"
Hermione bites her lip. "A lot of stuff, Dad. I'm so sorry I wiped your memories, but there was war going on and I'm so sorry and I just wanted you to be safe!"
Margaret accepts this explanation without a second question, just more hugs. But Timothy can't seem to accept it. How could little Hermione do this to them? his little baby girl, doing this to them? War? And most shockingly, Hermione hadn't even told him anything about it. He'd thought that they could talk about anything together. They were a family. He was her father, the one that would comfort his little pigtailed girl after she came home from primary school crying that the children were teasing her about being a freak again.
"I don't understand."
With those three words, he can practically see his little baby girl's heart sink. "I'm so sorry, dad," she repeats, helplessly. She and the redheaded boy exchange glances. He takes her hand and gives her a reassuring nod.
Timothy thought that was his job, exchanging glances and holding hands and nodding reassuringly. He feels Margaret jab him in the ribs.
He sighs and smiles. "It's okay, Hermione. I know you have good intentions. Be prepared for a good grilling tomorrow, but today, why don't we just celebrate?"
He leans in, and gives Hermione a huge, incredibly tight, don't-leave-me-again hug. And he feels it - her wince, her flinch back, no matter how subtle she tries to make it. What has happened to her?
But since Hermione wants to ignore it, he chooses to ignore it too. There will be a time for questions later, right? He eyes the redheaded boy. Okay, just one more question.
"Hermione, last question for the day, but who's the boy?"
"Oh," Hermione answers, blushing. "I almost forgot to mention. This is Ronald Weasley - Ron - my boyfriend."
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Could things get any more awkward?
It's been exactly one day since she found her parents in Australia. They've caught a flight to England - on an airplane, not via portkey like when she and Ron came. So now they're about to board the airplane.
Ron is just full of questions at the airport. At first his curiosity and awe was adorable, but now it's starting to get a little annoying. Typical Ron.
"But it doesn't make any sense!" Ron is saying. "The airplane's got to weigh thousands - how can Muggles get it to move without magic?"
"Ron, there are ways to do things without magic," she repeats for what has to be the millionth time. She doesn't bother going on a long explanation of how an engine works and all that - Ron will just tune out for most of it and then repeat his question again.
That wasn't the awkward part, though. The awkward part was that she and Ron and her father were sitting in one row of three seats, while her mother was behind them. And they couldn't seem to make proper conversation. To be honest, it's been awkward with her father ever since she gave him back his memory. While her mother took it pretty lightly, understanding quickly and just trying to catch up with everything, her father was more suspicious. It was the same with the Ron situation - while her mother immediately squealed and starting crying about how her baby girl was going to have her own little babies, her father was more suspicious.
So, when the three of them got on the airplane together, naturally there would be zero conversation whatsoever.
"I'm still trying to understand, Hermione," her father finally says. "I'm still trying to understand why you had to wipe our memories. Surely there was another way?"
"I'm sorry," she repeats. She's tired of saying sorry. Maybe even more tired of saying sorry than she is of telling Ron that Muggles can do things without magic. "I just - well, I didn't want to lose you."
"But why didn't you tell us before you did it?" he asks.
"Well, um, well, you wouldn't have understood."
Her father frowns. Wrong answer, Hermione chides herself. But how can she explain? How can she explain the paranoia she was going through? That they were running out of time and wizards and witches everywhere were being tortured and killed? There were death eaters on the loose, and there was a puppet as their minister, and it was just impossible to know who to trust and who not to. How could she tell them about the brutality of Voldemort and what he had done? Hermione was giving herself a headache just thinking about it. The truth was, she didn't want to think about those dark days anymore - they were over. Period.
Why couldn't her father understand that?
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"Just tell him, Hermione. Can't be that hard. Hey Dad, I'm moving in with the Weasleys. See? I said it, no problem."
Hermione sighs. "Harry, it's not like that. my dad, he doesn't trust Ron - or the Weasleys."
"What? How can anyone not trust the Weasleys? they're the Weasleys," Harry says, playfully jabbing her in the elbow.
Another sigh, louder this time. "Harry, this isn't funny! My dad would probably kill me if I told him I was moving in. Having a father is complicated, okay?"
Harry clutches his heart. "Oh that one hurt, Hermione. That one hurt."
Hermione softens. "I'm sorry. You know I didn't mean it that way. I only meant -"
"It's okay, Hermione," says Harry. "I get it, I do. But, seriously, when are you going to tell him?"
For once, Hermione is stumped.
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"Margaret, where's Hermione?"
Timothy's question seems to penetrate the kitchen. Magaret, cooking a pasta, braces herself for the interrogation that is sure to come. It's always her stuck with the dirty work, isn't it?
"She's at the Weasleys, honey," she replies, as casually as possible.
As expected, Timothy blows up. "At the Weasleys? At this time at night? It's dinnertime! And she didn't tell me!"
"She told me, and she knew I would tell you," she answers, as reassuringly as possible. She stirs the sauce.
"Oh," her husband says, calming down. But Margaret doesn't relax yet - the eruption has only been postponed temporarily. And she braces herself for what is sure to be her husband's next question.
"Well, when is she coming back?"
"She isn't."
Cue eruption.
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How could she?
How could Hermione move in with the Weasleys? They've been reunited for hardly a month! And again, Hermione didn't bother to tell him - only Margaret. He'd thought he'd known Hermione.
The truth was, he didn't anymore. During those months between when he'd lost his memories and regained them, Hermione had changed. She wasn't the same anymore - she wasn't the innocent little girl with the large eyes and bushy hair, excitedly recounting stories of Hogwarts. She'd grown up - so fast. And the worst part was, he'd missed all of it. And now, he was faced with a woman with sunken eyes and a scar across her neck and stories that he couldn't even begin to imagine - stories he didn't know if he wanted to imagine.
Who was this girl?
Certainly not his little girl. Not his daddy's little girl.
"She has nightmares, you know. There are nights when she cries herself to sleep, or worse, can't sleep at all," Margaret says. "She said it wasn't working out here. At the Weasleys there are people who understand what she's going through."
How can Margaret say that so calmly?
"Timothy, it hurts me too. But it's my job as a mother to help her through, and right now it's what she needs. Space. One month isn't enough to heal from all the things she's been through."
But what has she been through? And why won't she let him in?
Instead she's got that boyfriend of hers - Ronald - to get her through.
How could she?
Then there's a knock at the door, and there appears Hermione, with an assortment of bags in her hands. "I thought long and hard about it. And I just, well, I couldn't just go like that. Thanks for covering, Mom."
Timothy should scold - he should be angry, he should be erupting. The girl almost left home without telling him. Instead, he asks, "How long until you will run out again?"
Hermione smiles feebly. He would like for her to say Never, Dad. Instead she says, "Maybe a week. I mean, I'll tell you before I go, of course. I'm sorry, but Dad, it's hard, sleeping here, alone..."
Timothy has nothing to say. How do you respond to that, when you don't even exactly know why she has trouble sleeping, what she's gone through? But Margaret grins and says, "Why don't we all camp out here tonight, in this living room? I'll bring out the sleeping bags. Oh, this will be so much fun!'
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The night is dark, and cold, and silent, and so empty, and for a minute, she forgets where she is.
Harry, dead, in Hagrid's arm, all hope for her cause gone. She's screaming and so is Ginny and Professor McGonagall and everybody else. Ron, abandoning them in the middle of the woods. Her running after him, shouting, crying, falling to her knees, but he's not coming back. Bellatrix Lestrange, pointing a wand at her. Her head is back as she cruelly laughs, her lips about to form the dreaded word for what seems the millionth time, Crucio!
Hermione wakes up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat and has to blink a few times to orient herself. She's in her living room, in a sleeping bag, her mother on one side in a separate sleeping bag, her father on the other, in his own sleeping bag. Her mother, always a deeper sleeper, is snoring lightly. It had been a dream. Only a dream. It's over now. It's all over now, those days are gone, it's all over, it's all over...
"Couldn't sleep?" whispers a voice near her. Her father.
"No," she whispers back. "Could you?"
Even in the dark she can see him shake his head. "No." Her father looks straight up, eyes open, stares at the ceiling, doesn't say anything else. If he were more eloquent maybe he would say something else, but he is not and so the silence envelops them.
She feels a hand find hers. She looks up at the ceiling where he is gazing, doesn't say anything about it. She doesn't have to.
She can still feel it - the memories - lingering underneath, just creeping, just waiting for the perfect opportunity to pop out. There are still problems to deal with, issues to address, questions to ask, and answers that she doesn't want to give to be given. In the morning she'll wake up in a cold sweat and probably argue with her father even more, and she doesn't even know if she'll be able to last another week in this place.
But for now, she feels safe.
For Kaia in the gift-giving extravaganza 2013. Hope you enjoyed. Also, I apologise for that ending. I really couldn't figure out how to end this, so that's why it's so cheesy.