This had been rattling around in my mind for so long. I hope you like it.
Peter Pan Syndrome
She woke, so drained, that she barely remembered her name.
It was Hannah.
She was in a too-lumpy bed that smelled like ash, with flat pillows, and a pilled comforter that scratched at her bare legs. Another motel. She couldn't recall the details of any others, but she somehow knew this was merely one in a long series. Hannah lingered on the covers for a moment, eyes closed, taking in the sensation of the starch and the smell as if it were the first time she'd ever experienced them. Maybe it was. Yet there was an odd comfort in the feeling, and though she knew that it was seedy and unpleasant, she couldn't help but feel utterly safe here, in this strange place.
At long last, she allowed her eyes to slide open.
The room was wonderfully average. A bed, two nightstands, a blocky, coloured television. A cramped bathroom, and a closet that was abysmally empty. None of this seemed to deter her comfort. A pair of shoes waited at the foot of the bed, so she pulled them on, grabbed the room key and marched out the door.
Food was first on her list. Sustenance. She didn't feel overly-hungry, which meant she had eaten recently… but she couldn't quite recall…. Trying to push her mind back to yesterday was like trying to push a boulder up a mountain, so she brushed a hand over her brow and thought nothing of it.
The grocery store was relatively empty; it was an odd hour of the day. She filled a basket with fruits and vegetables, some packs of peanuts, anything that looked ready to eat. Only when she got in line did she wonder how she would pay. But there was money in her pocket, she remembered suddenly. There was always money in her pocket; she wasn't poor. Her parents had given it to her. Her parents… for some reason, she couldn't picture them. Their faces darted away from her, like trying to grasp a bubble on the surface of water. How strange….
Days passed like this, and weeks. She always had money, and her hotel room was clean, and there was always food to eat.
That was it. Nothing ever sunk past the surface of her day. Whenever she tried to recall a memory, her breathing would become shallow, her head would hurt… so she thought about nothing. It all felt like a dream, one that she never woke up from.
It was what she saw at night that seemed real. Her dreams. There were always people that she felt so attached to, there—though they couldn't have been relatives; one was scrawny and bespectacled, and one had flaming red hair. There were others, too, though those two boys appeared the most. She didn't know their names, and yet she knew them better than herself.
But they were always in danger. Everyone was always in danger. She didn't understand why.
The preoccupation began to drift into her everyday life, and sometimes, Hannah was so distracted that she would momentarily forget who she was, where she was.
One day, she felt a hand snatch her wrist, and, startled, she turned to face the stranger.
"Granger?"
The man's chin-length blond hair was dishevelled, though his appearance was well-kept. His skin was even whiter than the hairs tickling his chin, and his grey eyes were pale, as well. He struck her as a washed-out watercolour, faded in the sun. And what was with the cloak, as black as he was white? He was a walking illogicality, light and dark, white and black….
Despite the strange turn of her thoughts, she felt… very frightened. As if the mere vision of him spelled danger. As if he wished to hurt her. Her muscles seized and froze her in place on instinct that sprang from nowhere.
"Granger," he said again, "is it really you?" His voice held anything but danger; indeed, he sounded so relieved, she couldn't help but wonder who this Granger was, why she was so important to him.
The shock wore off, and she warily asked him, "Do I know you?" It was his turn to pause, with a pronounced flinch, as if she had struck him. Hannah took the opportunity to withdraw her hand and take a cautionary step back. She even grasped her purse with both hands, though he didn't seem to need her money.
"Don't you remember me, Granger?" he intoned, eyes so wretchedly intense that she almost wanted to be that person for him, just to ease his mysterious sorrow. He half-reached for her again, but decided against it, allowing it to drop back. The question hung between them.
"No," she said at length. "No, you're mistaken. My name's Parker, not… not her. Whatever you said."
"You don't know her? Know of her? You look so much…." When he stepped towards her, Hannah recoiled on instinct. His face changed abruptly. "I'm sorry. You're…. Forgive me." The foreboding atmosphere switched off like a light, and he rose up so self-importantly, she was afraid the previous experience had all been a joke. "Of course, you couldn't be her. Pardon me." With a swish of his ridiculous cloak, he trailed off, and disappeared into the crowd at once, though her eyes struggled to follow him. He reminded her… something about him reminded her… of something….
All day that feeling stuck, and all day, more and more things seemed to nag her, tease her mind to its limits. A stick swung about by a child. Melting ice cream. An ugly, orange stray. A man with round spectacles. A tavern, tucked away in a corner. The smell of damp trees. When a little girl shrieked with laughter on a playground, Hannah almost wept in terror. What was wrong with her? What was happening?
She arrived at home, or rather, at the motel, and pulled out an orange to eat. Or, rather, to peel—she wasn't hungry, she was confused. The juice sprayed as her short nails dug into the rind. Already, the smell was all around her.
Oranges. Curly hair, on an older woman peeling it for her. A man with a brilliant smile, reading just beside them. Oranges had always been her favourite.
Hannah blinked. Then, with disgust that she couldn't pretend to understand, she threw the orange in the garbage and opted for a shower instead, if only to rid herself of the smell. The humid air hung thick as the water heater kicked in. She peeled off her clothes leisurely, hardly paying attention to where she tossed them. Her nails still smelled of orange rind. With a sigh, Hannah turned to the mirror and, for the first time that week, looked at herself. Truly looked, the way that people never seem to look in mirrors. The young woman that stared back was average. Brown eyes, a bit larger than normal. A small mouth. A mass of curly, dark hair, heavy with moisture. Round cheeks, with a smattering of the lightest freckles, faded from the winter.
She frowned at herself.
"Freckles? I don't have…." And her words froze.
Yes, she did. She always had. Little splotches that always frustrated her in the summer, but her dad always said they made her beautiful. Her father. A dentist. And her mother as well. A tidy house tucked away in a small city. She didn't want freckles at school. She didn't want to stand out any more there—at that school unlike any other, full of magic and wisdom—until—
She screamed.
Her real name was Hermione, Hermione Granger, and she was a witch—a witch that had been forced to hide because of her blood, because of who she was, and she was so scared of what they would do to her, what they had done to them—all her friends dead, the Wizarding World taken over, controlled, choked and killed, and she was only one of the hundreds being hunted, she'd been so fucking scared, but here it was safe, it was just out of his reach… but Harry, and Ron, oh god, Ron, they didn't make it, they had been taken—and she'd killed as well, killed to survive without them, without her family; her family had been missing for years, and so had some of her friends. She remembered, then, all of those she had lost, their faces, their names—they came back, one by one, a reel of loss and longing—
In an instant, she Apparated to a new place, and while she was twisting, whirling, sobbing, she cast an Obliviate and a Confundus, both so strong—
She woke, so drained, that she barely remembered her name.
It was Amelia.
Thank you for reading.