The basic ideas are J.K. Rowling's. Most of the setting and the plot are mine.
I have no idea when it got that far. There were nights, pure nights of unintentional bliss. There were days, those days of purposeful ignorance. There were the people we never told, and the stories we never dreamed, and the real life we never would have believed ourselves had it not happened.
I learned a lot that summer. About me. About him. About love, and about life.
I learned it all.
I wonder where he is now.
I had an internship at a wizarding hospital that summer. My dreams of becoming a healer had finally come true, and I was living away from home and alone for the first time.
I had gotten the internship through a friend of Professor McGonagall's who ran the hospital. They were delighted to have me, as she said. They seemed happy enough when I arrived.
My duties were the usual ones. I was expected to arrive, promptly on time if not earlier, every day, and do exactly what it was my supervisor instructed me to do. I'd find the list on a scroll of parchment at my makeshift desk, and I'd get straight to work. It was usually menial jobs, such as offering food and water or administering potions, but occasionally I'd get to perform some of the easier healing spells. Those were good experiences for me.
My favorite part of the job, though, was the people. I met amazing people that summer, and I learned an amazing amount from each of them. I'd say each of them, in each of their little ways, changed the course of my life forever. But I suppose that's just the way things go right out of school. We're all set up for all these life changes, and all that's left is finding the people who start them.
No one, though, changed my life quite like he did.
Even if it had to end.
He worked in the potions preparation sector of the hospital, on Professor Snape's recommendation. When I retrieved my potions to administer to the patients, he always was the one to give them to me. In the beginning, of course, this was rather awkward.
"What the bloody hell are you doing here?" he asked on that first day.
"Same as you, I suppose," I responded. "Though I'd like to ask you the same."
I wondered from day one what had possessed them to allow someone of his reputation and ill repute to even set foot inside the place.
"Snape," he responded.
"McGonagall," I responded.
"Figures." We hadn't meant to say it together. I recall almost smiling in response, and nearly seeing him smile in return. But he was a Malfoy, and I was a muggleborn, and those sorts of interactions just didn't happen.
So I took the potions from his hand, and I administered them to my patients as per orders.
And that was life for that summer. Day in, day out. We saw each other, and it was just one of those small encounters.
I never expected anything more.
One of my favorite patients was a little girl named Clarissa. She was in the hospital for an illness we had yet to determine, but the potions seemed to dull her pain a bit.
That little girl was one of the most vivacious little children I've ever met. She was six years old that summer, with this glossy brown, curly hair and the brightest brown eyes. Her smile lit up an entire room, and her voice alone emitted smiles from everyone who met her. I, of course, was no exception.
"Why hello there," she said that first day I met her. "I'm Clarissa Mayborn. Who are you?"
Smiling at the sweet girl, I responded, "My name is Hermione Granger. How are you doing this morning?"
"Oh, I'm just fine, thanks," she responded. "How are you?"
"I'm just fine as well, thank you very much." She smiled at my response. "So tell me, who taught you such great manners?"
She beamed. "My mummy did," she responded. "While she was still alive."
"Oh, really?" I asked as politely as I could manage. I couldn't even imagine still being so upbeat had either of my parents died.
"Yep," she responded. I imagined she was quite a bouncy girl before her illness. "She had the muggle cancer."
"I see," I replied, still trying to decide how to react.
"Mummy was a muggle," the child added matter-of-factly. "And Daddy's a pureblood."
Children always have such a way of giving too much information.
"Daddy's family never liked Mummy much, but they seem to like me all right." Her little face was pursed in thought. "Would you like a muggle woman if you met her?"
I laughed whole-heartedly. "Yes," I replied. "I imagine I would."
"Good," she responded. "Me too."
She seemed content with our conversation at that point as she took the cup with her potion. Swallowing it, she smiled at me again. "Thanks, Herminy," she said.
I smiled at her pronunciation. "You're welcome, Sweetheart," I said.
"I'll see you tomorrow?" Her hopeful eyes nearly brought me to tears.
"Of course you will," I responded sweetly.
"Good," she said.
I smiled once more and left the room.
"That girl in room 312," I said to the healer on duty, "do we have any idea why she's here?"
"Clarissa?"
"Yes, that's her name."
"Such a darling little girl, isn't she?" The old woman smiled at the thought.
"That she is," I responded.
"Well, I should be off," the healer said.
It wasn't until she was already around the corner that I realized she had never answered me.
A/N: Hey everyone. Brand new story. A little short, but it's just the start to see how it goes. Hopefully I'll have time to update fairly regularly. Let me know what you think, though. Thanks!