THE GRANGERS' PLACE
Hermione sat on the veranda, hands wrapped around a cold glass of kale and carrot juice. Water gushed down from the sky, fat, heavy raindrops, bigger than any she'd ever seen before.
It was still hot, but the rain brought a cool breeze, a blessing on her overheated brain. Brightly coloured birds, green and red, some with flashes of yellow or blue, huddled damply on the veranda railing, ruffled and wet, waiting out the downpour.
She'd never seen birds like these.
Sometimes, when she stayed the night here, she'd go into the garden with her parents, and watch the floods of multi-coloured birds against the vibrant stone-fruit sky, apricots, peaches, plums, struck through with orange and purple. She'd breathe the green growing smell of the plants, everything crisp and fresh and living, and feel the air, warm and wet clinging to her skin and curling through her hair.
She ate a lot of avocado with lemon and salt, on a kind of bread her parents called kamut.
She humoured the crystal-loving clairvoyant neighbour, and gradually met other people in the hillside community, magic and non-magic alike. It was a peculiar fusion of cultures and technologies. Australian scruffiness with Israeli sense of family, Italian love of food, and peculiarly Canadian manners. The internet signal was boosted magically, and some of the people living there were gamers, there purely for the extremely fast connection speeds. Hermione knew there was something of a legal question mark over this community, that it breached the International Statute of Secrecy, but no-one seemed to care very much. According to the couple a few driveways over, ex-lawyers by trade, there was an annual raid for illegal magical-muggle hybrid objects, but by-and-large they were left alone. Persistence seemed to be the key.
A surprisingly high number of the people living there had at some point been obliviated. Some had recovered partial memory, like her parents, and some had not recovered at all, and had built new lives there in the hills, surrounded by people who knew and understood the challenges of living in the grey zone between muggle and magic and memory. Some of them had been obliviated by the government, years ago, and had managed to retain enough memory to keep the little spark of the community alive, hanging on and welcoming people searching for balance.
Hermione sat and listened to the rain, feeling tension wash away, and calm take its place. It was so far away from the battlefields of England, the clamour of London, the cold of the nights in the tent, and all the pain and anguish of their year on the run.
The others were enjoying the novelty of this funny hinterland community. Harry seemed perversely fascinated by the spiders and snakes, and Hermione was beginning to suspect he had a danger addiction. His favourites were the wallabies though. He'd wander through the properties after them, mesmerised by their behaviour and manners.
It seemed odd really, because he'd always been a bit indifferent to care of magical creatures, and it wasn't as though he'd ever swap a broom for a hippogriff.
"What is it about them?" she'd asked, one evening, as they watched them hop and feed and lounge around, like a family of people in a different physical form, just going about their business.
Harry had blinked and scratched his head, sunset glinting off his glasses.
"Dunno really. I guess they just look… free."
And she thought she understood what he meant.
So different. So far away.
Ron spent a lot of time hanging out at a place a few driveways down. The woman who lived there, Maggie, ran a café in Mullum, selling raw vegan food. He'd gravitated there quite naturally, and had gone quite pink with flattery when Maggie had declared he had an excellent palate, and asked him to taste test all her newest inventions.
Apparently, being willing to eat anything, and prepared to say it tasted awful, was a rare talent.
Hermione chastised herself quietly- that wasn't kind. Perhaps he did have some way with food? It was hard to tell what he was good at exactly. He was still so…
Pared down to defeat Voldemort or die trying.
She supposed she was too, in her own way.
So used to study, and fear, and panic. So used to intense responsibility and split-second decision making that could mean life or death.
If she could grant him the space to experiment, to try something new, discover a new talent… if Harry could find a fascination in wildlife all of a sudden… what was there that she might find?
Ginny spent her days at the beach. George meanly said she was farming freckles.
George spent his days with Ahaana. Seeing the sights. Sky diving. Paragliding. All the muggle flying options really. Broomless days spent trying to chase the cobwebs out of his mind.
Hermione sat and watched the rain.
They weren't coming back to Britain. They were happy here, in their little wilderness, surrounded by people who both understood and didn't understand them. They belonged. They planted fruit trees and wore crocs, and did the dentistry thing part time. They were happy.
Hermione felt the calm rush of the rain all around. Soothing. Steady.
It would be so easy to stay here, out the back of beyond, eating mangoes and macadamia nuts, and watching the birds.
Her parents were staying.
Her parents. The ones she'd abused with her magic.
They had a new life.
They were healing.
They were staying.
Hermione gazed out into the grey-green of the rain, seeing and unseeing.
Who am I, without the study, without the Dark Lord to be defeated? Who was I before magic? Who will I become if I go home? Can I go home now, if they're staying here? They only half remember me… how can I leave when there's so much to rebuild- I want it to be better this time. They don't remember all the tears, all the arguments. They don't remember what it was like when they lost their memories. We could be a family here, where being a witch or a muggle or a squib is almost a sidenote…
As she stared, wrapped quietly in her rolling thoughts, he appeared, running and slipping in the mud, drenched completely, massive and masculine and alarmingly powerful. This was not a version of him she knew well. It was almost as though, distracted by the pummelling of the rain, he'd forgotten to make himself seem small. Hermione tipped her head to the side, considering, like a bird.
Then he was up the steps, shaking his hair like a dog, and grinning guiltily, and glancing down at the grass and mud plastered all over his long, long legs.
What happens to us if I stay?
