Chapter 10: Time for some talks

(Cullen's home)

In a room at the end of the floor, an alarm went off. The clock showed 7:00 am. Esme, who was sitting downstairs in the family area, heard someone hitting the alarm off. The family made a habit out of it to try and be especially quiet at night time, when Bella decided to sleep over. The alarm was the sign for everyone, that they could stop being extra silent.

Esme got up and walked over to their kitchen, to prepare some breakfast for the girl. She knew Bella would complain and insist that she was old enough to make her own breakfast, but Esme just had nothing else to do and enjoyed caring for the human.

As she just poured some orange juice in a glass, she saw Jasper and Alice walking up to her. Jasper sat on the counter, smiling like the devil that ate all the candy when no one was looking.

"Okay what are you up to?" Esme glared at them both as Alice danced around her.

"Jasper and I thought a vacation would be nice. Some sibling-bonding time." She smiled innocently. And Esme raised a questioning brow.

"When and where to and most importantly why?" She had no good feeling by the way her children came up with this request. As suddenly, she found herself in a generous mood. She rolled her eyes. "Jasper stop that!"

The young man laughed as his mother shushed him out of the kitchen. "Sorry Alice! I tried to help you" he said with an apologetic voice as he got forced to leave.

Alice was on her own now to set the plan to motion. "You know that everyone is a bit moody lately. It drives Jasper nuts! And we thought a trip with only us and Bella would be nice to smooth things. Maybe to Italy. Bella could get to know where her name-origin lays."

Esme frowned as she put a plate, the juice and a bowl with some fruits on Bella's usual place. "I mean this doesn't sound like a bad idea" She gave in "but don't you think it would annoy Rose and Emmett? You would have to take a lot of breaks for her sake and no party nights, she needs sleep." Esme was contemplating her daughters idea.

"Who needs sleep?" A less melodic voice asked, stopped by a yawn.

"Good morning Bella, dear" Esme greeted, friendly as Alice already interrupted.

"You need sleep! Even when wo go on vacation! What would you say to a trip to Italy with us?" Alice asked, knowing that Esme could not deny Bella any wish.

"Alice!" Esme complained. "We didn't finish discussing that, yet."

"When?" Rose entered the kitchen as well, not able to tune out the talk that was going on.

Esme started to feel horribly ignored by her children. "Rose, no! not you too!" She argued.

"Next week!" Alice suggested happily that their mom just got outnumbered. "We would have 2 days off of school anyway and only would miss 3. We can convince Charlie, because Bella got an A on her last test."

Bella blinked confused "I did?...yay!"

Alice smiled at her knowing she double surprised her human friend with this information.

Esme decided to try one more time "but you know exactly well, that your dad will be coming home then. You would miss his arrival." She was a little shocked that their kids doesn't seem to care.

Rose was thinking for a second "But it's not like he won't be there when we get back, right?" Alice nodded in agreement.

Time to give up, Esme thought "Okay okay if you insist. I think it would be nice if you all get to spend some time together". Everyone was already about to cheer when she continued "BUT you will take breaks, all of you, when Bella gets tired. You wont leave your brother behind with her. And you let her sleep at night!" She ordered now in a more commanding tone than before, so they had to take her warning serious.

Bella felt like a heavy stone, that got tied to everyone's ankle suddenly, but didn't want to complain about a free vacation.

Esme glared longer at Rose than at anyone else. The blond woman just sighed annoyed. "Yes mom, I will look out for the human" she answered, sarcastically hugging a more than startled Bella from behind, giving a fake smile."

"Good." Esme smiled "make sure you are all back by Saturday and talk to Charlie"

And suddenly she was looking forward to a week to spend alone with her husband….maybe Alice had not only evil plans in mind.

…..

(Hogwarts)

Carlisle suddenly felt unusual nervous as he waited for the headmaster to show up. After his talk with Hermione the other day, he made the decision to try and speak to the headmaster about her foster family issue. He called Alice to ask her how to approach this topic best, and she already knew what he was up to. His sudden determination must have set off a vision in her.

She assured him that he should speak to the headmaster and she would handle things at home. He trusted his daughter to know what's best and agreed to leave things to her.

So now he sat here, anticipating a talk about the future of a girl, he wasn't even sure would want this. Maybe he should have spoken to her first. Was this even a wise idea? He already had 5 children at home…..6 if he counted Bella and this girl here was so much younger and she already was scared of him, what if she would be scared for her life at the idea of living with 7 vampires. This was a stupid idea. He should just leave.

And then he heard someone clearing his throat. The headmaster walked up to him, shook his hand and sat behind his desk. Carlisle took the same big chair he occupied last time. "Good morning headmaster, thank you, that you make time for me." He greeted the old man.

The wizard smiled "Oh, nothing to thank for, I awaited your visit." There was a shine in his eyes, as he looked over his glasses.

"you awaited me?" Doctor Cullen was puzzled. "Why, if you don't mind me asking?"

A mischievously grin spread on the headmasters lips. "I just had a feeling you would want to talk to me." He hinted. "it seems like the talk you had with young miss Granger at the hospital was quite inspiring. She was in a remarkable good mood ever since."

Carlisle felt praised for something that was not worth the honor, but it made him remember, how happy the witch talked away, during their question game. Suddenly he felt bad for considering to just leave things as they are. He gathered his thoughts and focused on why he came here in the first place.

"That is why I am here to talk to you, headmaster." He began and got surprised by an unexpected response.

"You want to ask me if you could serve as foster family." Dumbledore stated. It was clearly no question.

Carlisle blinked blankly, despite the fact that he didn't need to blink. "Yes. How did you….." he recalled their previous talk for a moment. "OH!" he exclaimed louder than normal for him "You planned that all along, didn't you!" he felt betrayed and perplexed at once. He couldn't help but admire that skill of manipulation.

The headmaster laughed in this grandfatherly manner again "I just knew it would fit together pretty well. More of a feeling than a plan really."

He sounded honest, but Carlisle just could not believe that excuse for a second.

The wizard continued "Good thing, everything is practically ready for her to move. All that is missing is a family to take her in." he gave a wink.

Now the vampire felt like a train without a railroad. "So how did you want to go on from here?" still convinced the elder had a plan.

And he did! "We already talked with miss Granger, she is supposed to drop out of school for the rest of this semester as soon as we found someone who is willing to take her in. So she can settle in, in her new home and get to know the people. She is diligent and clever enough to keep her schoolwork up at home. After Christmas she is supposed to be in Ilvermorny…they know about her situation and have everything set up for her arrival." The headmaster looked out of his window as if he was mentally going through a check list. "I can't promise that she will adapt instantly over there, she maybe has to repeat a year."

Carlisle was a little overwhelmed by so much information and by how easily the wizard was ready to hand over a child…a living human child. "You really expect this to work out smoothly, don't you?" Carlisle asked a little critical. "You are aware that we are 7 vampires. It's not really the safest kind of family environment." Now he wondered about himself…..why exactly did he try to talk his family bad?

The headmaster gave him a nearly disapproving stare "It's not more dangerous than living in a wizard family, believe me doctor." He laughed. "My suggestion would be, that you ask her . If she agrees, take her home with you. If she doesn't like it she still can come back to us. And of cource you can contact us if there are any problems or questions"

He could agree with this plan. Still never in his over 300 years he felt so tricked. Entirely confused and not sure if this was a win or not, he allowed the headmaster to lead him to meet Hermione.

…

The Gryffindor sat in the third row in her transfiguration class, trying to focus while she kept getting distracted by Harry. Harry tried to explain the current spell to Neville, but kept asking her for more detailed explanations. And then there was Ron, who was sitting in the last row, still not speaking to either of them and glaring angrily at Hermione's back. She practically could feel his stare burning.

The class went on like this for a while, until a knock at the door pulled Professor McGonagall's attention away from class.

Everyone turned around to look, who it was, that dared to disturbed Minerva McGonagall's lesson. Hermione had none of this curiosity and kept perfecting her notes. But Harry elbowed her.

"Mione! Look there" Annoyed she huffed but turned to see who it was. Somewhat shocked she let her quill fall on the paper, when she saw doctor Cullen, standing next to the headmaster. She somehow knew that they came for her even before the Professor spoke up.

"Miss Granger, would you come here for a minute, please?" The older Woman requested and like a remote controlled toy, Hermione got up and stalked out of the class room. She tried to ignore all the curious stares of her classmates, but couldn't ignore one particular pair of eyes.

Ron's glare turned from anger to confusion and then to a fearful look, that she couldn't quite place.

She reached the door and slipped out "Yes, professor?" She eyed the three adults.

"come back in when you are done here." Her head of house ordered, and went back to her class, closing the door behind her.

Hermione saw her headmaster's friendly smile and a rather unhappy looking doctor Cullen. All color left her face. "Is…..Is something wrong with me?" She asked distraught. It was the only reason she could come up with, that made the Doctor visit her here, in school…..during class.

Carlisle stared at the girl with a rather blank look. Suddenly he had to laugh. It never occurred to him that she would interpret his visit this way.

Dumbledore laid a hand on the girls shoulder. "Oh no! That's not at all the reason!" he chuckled amused. "I will leave you two alone to talk. You can find me in my office, when u are done" he addressed Carlisle and then walked away, humming a weird melody.

Curiosity bubbled up in Hermione's thoughts. "Then why are you here?" She asked the blond man.

His face seemed friendlier now. "Come lets walk a bit, while we talk" he let Hermione choose a direction and started walking. After a few steps, as he felt out of reach for little spies, he spoke up. "I am not here because of your last visit in the hospital" he started and then felt the need to correct himself. "Well no that's not entirely true. I am, but because of the talk we had."

He could see some conclusions forming in the girls head, as her expression went from a puzzled look to an understanding 'oh'.

He continued "Your headmaster told me a few things about you when I was here last time and after our talk this week, I could count one and one together slowly." He knew that she had an idea what he was up to. "You know I have a big family."

Hermione stayed silent waiting for more input, she didn't want to experience any embarrassment if she got the situation wrong after all.

When she didn't say anything he kept going. "Since you already know that we are vampires, you probably could guess that all my kids are adopted."

No she didn't know, because she didn't think about that, Hermione had to admit to herself. But it made perfect sense!

Now Carlisle stopped walking and knelt down to be able to look in her face. "Now I was thinking after our talk and came to the conclusion, that it wouldn't hurt to add one more member to our lovely patchwork family, if this is what you want as well." He offered.

Hermione didn't move for a while, just staring at him. Still somewhat scared to run into some kind of trap here. It took a few seconds until she actually trusted her own thought to get his intention right.

When she finally was sure she got it, she couldn't really think clear. She jumped forward, closed her arms around the man's neck and hugged him with all the gratitude she had. When she finally let go again she smiled wide, but her eyes gathered unshed tears. "really?" She asked in utter disbelief. "You really would do that?"

….

Carlisle nervousness fell off of him, when the young witch fell around his neck and hugged him. It was a weird sensation that startled him but at the same time felt just right. The little warm human that tried to hug him with all strength, which wasn't much compared to the hugs Alice attacked him with. He felt relieve take over. For a while the vampire was honestly scared that the child would not want him or his family.

When she let go of him, he could see the tears in her eyes and all doubts washed away. He did the right thing! He took a few minutes to convince her that he was serious and that there was no reason to cry, even though it was sheer happiness that caused her reaction.