Angela had blossomed into a lovely girl. She had long smooth red hair that looked nothing like Hermione's hair or what Harry's crazy mop used to look like. She had Hermione's nose, ears and smile and Harry's sparkling green eyes. She wore oval shaped rimless glasses because she had inherited her father's horrible eyesight. She was pretty short like Harry to. Angela had Harry's skills with a broomstick.
James was also short, but with black hair and green eyes. He looked a lot like Hermione despite the color of his eyes and hair though. He refused to even touch a pair of glasses so Hermione paid the optometrist a few extra galleons and had gotten him contacts. He was a very handsome boy and Hermione could never keep up with all of his girlfriends. He was very book smart and usually the sensible child.
Ron had been there a good deal of the time when they were growing up. When Angela was a baby, she used to call him daddy, and nobody had expected that. When she grew older she realized that he wasn't her father, but still called him dad. Hermione deeply disapproved of this and that of course made her want to do it even more. James thought that calling Ron daddy was extremely childish and he had always him Ron. (Although it was 'Won' for a while with the childish lisp)
They had moved since Angela and James were born, and now they lived in a rather large that was too big for only three people, but they had all loved it so they moved in. Hermione now had her own very large workroom and one of the extra rooms had been converted into a library. No matter how much Angela had whined about living in a small town, Hermione had been reticent and ignored her daughter's complaints about Hogsmeade. James loved being in the small town like Hermione did. She felt to attached to this town to leave now.
"Were we a one night stand mom?" Angela asked one morning during their summer vacation prior to their sixth year of Hogwarts. Hermione spit out her juice all over her morning paper.
"What?"
Were James and me the product of a one night stand?" Angela asked again.
"No."
"So you do know who our real dad is then."
"Quello Bello," Hermione cooed to her daughter, using her pet name. (Italian for beautiful one) "Why don't you go upstairs and get your brush and a few hair ties. I would love to do your hair. It's been a long time." Angela sighed and left the kitchen. She never had understood why her mother wouldn't talk about her father. It's not as though she minded that much; she did have Ron, who was a great guy to talk to about Quidditch and things of that sort, which her mother avoided. She entered her room and grabbed her brush and about fifteen elastic hair ties.
Another thing she never understood about her mother was the fact that she just loved doing her hair. She supposed it was because her mom had chopped her own hair off when she had Angela. It was a cute stylish short cut that reached the middle of her neck and looked very good on her mother's pretty face. Angela heaved another sigh. Her mother was great. She seemed to always be there to listen, and didn't judge her. She was incredibly smart, and had a good job that paid well.
Angela walked slowly back down the big sweeping flight loving the sound her heels made on the marble. Her mother was sitting at the table still playing around with her hardboiled eggs. They didn't seem to want to be stuck by the fork. She looked up as Angela entered the room.
"Mom, tell me about Hogwarts when you were a kid. Jamie says that they didn't have that stupid no magic over the summer rule when his mom was at school.
"Sure. W had that rule then to. And you best keep to that rule. I had a-a-a friend when I was at school, and he only just got off the hook. He almost got expelled for what he did."
"Mom," James had arrived in the doorway of the living room. "You had friends that were guys?"
"Of course! Yeah- Ron is my best friend. We've known each other since we were eleven."
"Oh so only one," James said, looking a little put out.
"Only one? Most of my friends were guys in school. Neville, Seamus, Dean, Ron, and
H- H-" Hermione found she couldn't say the name.
"Wh- wh- who?" James asked. Hermione didn't answer his question. Hermione suddenly seemed to be very weak.
"Mom are you okay?" Angela asked urgently.
"What's the date?" She mumbled in a voice that didn't sound like it usually did.
"It's the tenth of July," James said quickly. Hermione's heart sank. It was the day Harry had left.
"Oh god." She moaned.
"Mom! What's up?" James asked and put an arm around her. "Having a bad day?"
"No." Hermione said and straitened up, her face streaked with slowly falling tears. "I'm fine. I'll be up in my room- working." She walked through the double doors out of the living room and started jogging up the stairs.
She opened the doors to her large room and walked over to her desk where sat a picture frame. The picture was of three smiling teenagers, but only two of them were showing in the frame. Hermione had made sure that Harry could not be seen. She grabbed the picture.
She was now trembling with sadness and frustration. She looked at the picture. She let out a burst of tears and with a racking sob and chucked the picture as hard as she could at the wall. The frame shattered, leaving the whole picture to be seen.
"What was that?" James and Angela asked at the same time.
"I think it was glass." Angela said.
"No really?" James said sarcastically.
"I'm scared, James. Have you ever seen mom act like that? One second okay, the next second manic depressive?"
"Yeah, I think so. It was last year- at around this time of year. That one day she locked herself in her room all day?"
"I remember that." Angela said after a second.
"What should we do? I can hear her crying from upstairs. It's never been that bad before."
"Leave her to her own devices?"
"I was thinking we would call Ron."
"How?" Angela asked.
"We could do the fire bubble."
"That's qualified as magic, you dumb ass." Angela said. "Say, doesn't Dad have a phone?"
"One of those muggle things? Yeah he does. But we don't."
"Yeah. I've seen one in the attic."
"Well what are we waiting for then?" They started heading up the stairs, until they reached the trap door on the ceiling that led to the attic. Angela sat on James shoulders so they could reach the pull to open it. She grabbed the little cord and yanked on it. The door opened and steps slid down.
"Age before beauty," Angela said and motioned to the stairs. James glared at her and went up first.
"You do realize you were born first." James pointed out as they started looking through the dusty boxes for the phone.
"But I'm still prettier than you." Angela said. "Ah! I've found it."
"Ah! I've found it!" James said putting on a high voice.
"Shut it you." Angela snapped. "What do we do with this thing now?" She was holding up the cord to the phone.
"Hold on a sec. I took Muggle Studies. We need to find eyeball."
"The what?"
"Okay not the eyeball but the- the-"
"The socket? You dork."
"Yeah the socket. D' you think mum has one up here?"
"Yeah, it's over there." Angela said and pointed to the outlet. They stuck the cord in.
"Isn't it supposed to ring now?"
"Do we have to push the little numbers?"
"What is Ron's number?"
"Hey look! There are names taped on the speed dial paper thingy." Angela exclaimed. "Let's see here," She started reading off the names. " … Mom and Dad…Ginny Weasley…Harry Potter? I didn't know mum knew him…Pizza…Minerva McGonagall…. Urgh, mom was friends with the headmaster? Oh- here it is! Ron Weasley!" The pressed the speed dial button and then pressed '6.'
"Is it ringing?" James asked urgently.
"Yeah. Shut up!" The phone started ringing. It took a while for it to pick up.
"Hello?" Ron's voice said from the other line.
"It worked? Wicked. Hi dad it's me, Angela."
"I didn't know you guys had a phone." Ron said.
"Angela. Tell him about mom." James hissed.
"Um, dad? Mom is being really weird."
"How so?" Ron asked.
"Oh let me talk. You're no good at this." James said and jerked the phone out of his sister's hand.
"Ron? Mom locked herself in her room and she's just in there, crying her eyes out. And we thought we heard glass breaking. What should we do?"
"What's the date?"
"The tenth." James said.
"Oh crap. I'll be over in a few seconds. Where are you guys? The attic?"
"Yeah."
"Okay. Bye."
"Bye Ron." He hung up the phone. Three seconds later there was a little pop and Ron was standing right next to Angela. She jumped.
"Oh- it's you." She said, relieved.
"I'm going to go out with your mother for a little while." Ron said.
"Not on a date, right?"
"Why would I date your mother at a time like this? Or anytime for that matter?"
"I dunno."
"So don't wait up for us tonight."
"Can do. Where are you going to go?"
"Into town. A little shopping a little...drinking."
"Um- I guess that's okay if it'll improve her mood." Angela said.
"Believe me. Now how do you get out of here?" Angela pointed to the trap door. "Oh- right-o." He climbed down the steps.
"Hermione?" Ron said and knocked lightly on her door.
"Go away." She said in a muffled, crying voice.
"Alohomora." He said and the door clicked unlocked. Hermione was lying on her bed sobbing and clutching a picture. Glass was shattered everywhere on the bed and Hermione's hand and left leg were bleeding from where it had nicked her, but she didn't seem to notice.
"Ron...It's been seventeen years to this very day. Where did he go?" She cried. "Why did he leave?"
"Honey." Ron went over to her and hugged his best friend. "You know Harry disappeared. He wouldn't leave us on purpose. You know that."
"So do you think he's...d-d-dead?" Hermione started sobbing more violently.
"Well it has been seventeen years...Let's go on a walk." He said and ushered her out the door. Angela and James watched Ron lead their mother out the door from the attic window.
"I wonder what's wrong with her." Angela said.
"P.M.S." James guessed. Angela laughed.
"Nobody has that bad of mood swings."
"Let's get out of here. The dust is giving me a headache." James said and coughed, spreading dust off of a pile of papers next to them.
"What're these?" Angela asked and picked up a few of them. "They're pictures of mom! Look at her! She looks almost our age. Like 18 or something." She flipped the picture over.
"She was 19." James said, reading over her shoulder. "Bring those downstairs. Let's see what's in there." They walked down the rickety latter and down the sweeping staircase into the living room. They sat in there for hours upon hours looking at all the old photos.
"Look, here's mom when she was erm- 17 in a ballet recital." Angela said and threw James the picture of Hermione in a tutu walking around on her toes.
There was suddenly a ring at the doorbell. "I'll get it." They said at the same time. They laughed and both went to get the door. Angela opened it. A short man with black hair was standing before him. He was wearing a pair of cracked glasses and looked very strong but almost starved. Angela wasn't sure if she trusted those fiery eyes behind the glasses. Her hand gripped the door's edge tighter as he surveyed the twins with wide eyes.
"Can we help you?" James asked tensely.
"I hope so. I your-" His eyes narrowed slightly for a moment as he looked at them again-
" Mother home?"
"No." James said.
"Are you sure?"
"Quite." Angela said.
"Odd. One would think that-" He thought for a moment, deciding whether or not to tell them something. " Never mind. Where did she go?"
"Who's asking?" James snapped.
"No one of consequence." The stranger shot back.
"Well, then why should we tell you where she is?" James asked. "I mean, as we have no idea who you are and what you want with our mother."
"And if you're one of those men who are trying to buy out our book store, it's not for sale."
"Hermione owns a book store?" The man shook with laughter. The smile lighted up his face and made him quite handsome. "That is so typical. And I thought she would end up as the Mistress of Magic or something more- ah- dignified."
"Owning a store is much more dignified than a lot of jobs out there. How dare you!" Angela snapped rather harshly.
"Did I say otherwise?"
"It was implied." Angela said. She wasn't sure why she was fighting with the stranger. He seemed to be nice and possibly trustworthy. He had this silvery glint in his eye that made both of the twins uncomfortable. It made you think of the glint that Dumbledore had in his eye, the one that let you know that he knew just about everything, including what you were going to say next.
"Hardly. Your mother and I are old school friends. I haven't seen her in quite a few years."
"A likely story." James spat.
"James, calm down." Angela hissed. "I don't think he means harm." The stranger's eyes widened and his jaw dropped.
"What did you say your name was?" He asked incredulously.
"James. What's it to you?" James snapped.
"Our mother is in town to day, with our father. We have some- er - some work we should be getting to. Good day sir." Slam. Angela snapped the door shut. They both watched the stranger walk down the dirt road until he was out of sight.
"Well that was weird." Angela said.
"No kidding." They went back to looking at the old pictures. They forgot all about dinner as they looked through the old photographs. They found a few newspaper clippings here and there. One of them looked like it had been drenched.
"Look at this one. 'Harry Potter gone missing; presumed dead.'" Angela read. "Wasn't he friends with mom? No wonder her and Ron never talk about him."
"That is really sad." James said agreeing. He glanced at the time and shook his head. "Well they're out late." As if on cue the front door opened and they heard their mother laughing. They exchanged glances and walked through the double doors into the entrance hall.
Hermione was rather red in the face and was in silent hysterics balancing herself on Ron's shoulder. Ron had a very pained and guilty look on his face and was very stiff.
"Mom?" James and Angela asked. Hermione turned to them.
"Oh hi kids." She said. "I had the most lovely evening with Ron." She giggled. Her voice was like she was on a roller coaster, the tone going up and down.
"Ron.." James said a slow as humanly possible. "What did you do to our mother?"
"One drink led to another, and she's- um not sad anymore, is she?" Ron said innocently and bit his lip. Hermione was still laughing.
"She is so drunk!" Angela said and clapped her hands together gleefully. "Excellent."
James was also short, but with black hair and green eyes. He looked a lot like Hermione despite the color of his eyes and hair though. He refused to even touch a pair of glasses so Hermione paid the optometrist a few extra galleons and had gotten him contacts. He was a very handsome boy and Hermione could never keep up with all of his girlfriends. He was very book smart and usually the sensible child.
Ron had been there a good deal of the time when they were growing up. When Angela was a baby, she used to call him daddy, and nobody had expected that. When she grew older she realized that he wasn't her father, but still called him dad. Hermione deeply disapproved of this and that of course made her want to do it even more. James thought that calling Ron daddy was extremely childish and he had always him Ron. (Although it was 'Won' for a while with the childish lisp)
They had moved since Angela and James were born, and now they lived in a rather large that was too big for only three people, but they had all loved it so they moved in. Hermione now had her own very large workroom and one of the extra rooms had been converted into a library. No matter how much Angela had whined about living in a small town, Hermione had been reticent and ignored her daughter's complaints about Hogsmeade. James loved being in the small town like Hermione did. She felt to attached to this town to leave now.
"Were we a one night stand mom?" Angela asked one morning during their summer vacation prior to their sixth year of Hogwarts. Hermione spit out her juice all over her morning paper.
"What?"
Were James and me the product of a one night stand?" Angela asked again.
"No."
"So you do know who our real dad is then."
"Quello Bello," Hermione cooed to her daughter, using her pet name. (Italian for beautiful one) "Why don't you go upstairs and get your brush and a few hair ties. I would love to do your hair. It's been a long time." Angela sighed and left the kitchen. She never had understood why her mother wouldn't talk about her father. It's not as though she minded that much; she did have Ron, who was a great guy to talk to about Quidditch and things of that sort, which her mother avoided. She entered her room and grabbed her brush and about fifteen elastic hair ties.
Another thing she never understood about her mother was the fact that she just loved doing her hair. She supposed it was because her mom had chopped her own hair off when she had Angela. It was a cute stylish short cut that reached the middle of her neck and looked very good on her mother's pretty face. Angela heaved another sigh. Her mother was great. She seemed to always be there to listen, and didn't judge her. She was incredibly smart, and had a good job that paid well.
Angela walked slowly back down the big sweeping flight loving the sound her heels made on the marble. Her mother was sitting at the table still playing around with her hardboiled eggs. They didn't seem to want to be stuck by the fork. She looked up as Angela entered the room.
"Mom, tell me about Hogwarts when you were a kid. Jamie says that they didn't have that stupid no magic over the summer rule when his mom was at school.
"Sure. W had that rule then to. And you best keep to that rule. I had a-a-a friend when I was at school, and he only just got off the hook. He almost got expelled for what he did."
"Mom," James had arrived in the doorway of the living room. "You had friends that were guys?"
"Of course! Yeah- Ron is my best friend. We've known each other since we were eleven."
"Oh so only one," James said, looking a little put out.
"Only one? Most of my friends were guys in school. Neville, Seamus, Dean, Ron, and
H- H-" Hermione found she couldn't say the name.
"Wh- wh- who?" James asked. Hermione didn't answer his question. Hermione suddenly seemed to be very weak.
"Mom are you okay?" Angela asked urgently.
"What's the date?" She mumbled in a voice that didn't sound like it usually did.
"It's the tenth of July," James said quickly. Hermione's heart sank. It was the day Harry had left.
"Oh god." She moaned.
"Mom! What's up?" James asked and put an arm around her. "Having a bad day?"
"No." Hermione said and straitened up, her face streaked with slowly falling tears. "I'm fine. I'll be up in my room- working." She walked through the double doors out of the living room and started jogging up the stairs.
She opened the doors to her large room and walked over to her desk where sat a picture frame. The picture was of three smiling teenagers, but only two of them were showing in the frame. Hermione had made sure that Harry could not be seen. She grabbed the picture.
She was now trembling with sadness and frustration. She looked at the picture. She let out a burst of tears and with a racking sob and chucked the picture as hard as she could at the wall. The frame shattered, leaving the whole picture to be seen.
"What was that?" James and Angela asked at the same time.
"I think it was glass." Angela said.
"No really?" James said sarcastically.
"I'm scared, James. Have you ever seen mom act like that? One second okay, the next second manic depressive?"
"Yeah, I think so. It was last year- at around this time of year. That one day she locked herself in her room all day?"
"I remember that." Angela said after a second.
"What should we do? I can hear her crying from upstairs. It's never been that bad before."
"Leave her to her own devices?"
"I was thinking we would call Ron."
"How?" Angela asked.
"We could do the fire bubble."
"That's qualified as magic, you dumb ass." Angela said. "Say, doesn't Dad have a phone?"
"One of those muggle things? Yeah he does. But we don't."
"Yeah. I've seen one in the attic."
"Well what are we waiting for then?" They started heading up the stairs, until they reached the trap door on the ceiling that led to the attic. Angela sat on James shoulders so they could reach the pull to open it. She grabbed the little cord and yanked on it. The door opened and steps slid down.
"Age before beauty," Angela said and motioned to the stairs. James glared at her and went up first.
"You do realize you were born first." James pointed out as they started looking through the dusty boxes for the phone.
"But I'm still prettier than you." Angela said. "Ah! I've found it."
"Ah! I've found it!" James said putting on a high voice.
"Shut it you." Angela snapped. "What do we do with this thing now?" She was holding up the cord to the phone.
"Hold on a sec. I took Muggle Studies. We need to find eyeball."
"The what?"
"Okay not the eyeball but the- the-"
"The socket? You dork."
"Yeah the socket. D' you think mum has one up here?"
"Yeah, it's over there." Angela said and pointed to the outlet. They stuck the cord in.
"Isn't it supposed to ring now?"
"Do we have to push the little numbers?"
"What is Ron's number?"
"Hey look! There are names taped on the speed dial paper thingy." Angela exclaimed. "Let's see here," She started reading off the names. " … Mom and Dad…Ginny Weasley…Harry Potter? I didn't know mum knew him…Pizza…Minerva McGonagall…. Urgh, mom was friends with the headmaster? Oh- here it is! Ron Weasley!" The pressed the speed dial button and then pressed '6.'
"Is it ringing?" James asked urgently.
"Yeah. Shut up!" The phone started ringing. It took a while for it to pick up.
"Hello?" Ron's voice said from the other line.
"It worked? Wicked. Hi dad it's me, Angela."
"I didn't know you guys had a phone." Ron said.
"Angela. Tell him about mom." James hissed.
"Um, dad? Mom is being really weird."
"How so?" Ron asked.
"Oh let me talk. You're no good at this." James said and jerked the phone out of his sister's hand.
"Ron? Mom locked herself in her room and she's just in there, crying her eyes out. And we thought we heard glass breaking. What should we do?"
"What's the date?"
"The tenth." James said.
"Oh crap. I'll be over in a few seconds. Where are you guys? The attic?"
"Yeah."
"Okay. Bye."
"Bye Ron." He hung up the phone. Three seconds later there was a little pop and Ron was standing right next to Angela. She jumped.
"Oh- it's you." She said, relieved.
"I'm going to go out with your mother for a little while." Ron said.
"Not on a date, right?"
"Why would I date your mother at a time like this? Or anytime for that matter?"
"I dunno."
"So don't wait up for us tonight."
"Can do. Where are you going to go?"
"Into town. A little shopping a little...drinking."
"Um- I guess that's okay if it'll improve her mood." Angela said.
"Believe me. Now how do you get out of here?" Angela pointed to the trap door. "Oh- right-o." He climbed down the steps.
"Hermione?" Ron said and knocked lightly on her door.
"Go away." She said in a muffled, crying voice.
"Alohomora." He said and the door clicked unlocked. Hermione was lying on her bed sobbing and clutching a picture. Glass was shattered everywhere on the bed and Hermione's hand and left leg were bleeding from where it had nicked her, but she didn't seem to notice.
"Ron...It's been seventeen years to this very day. Where did he go?" She cried. "Why did he leave?"
"Honey." Ron went over to her and hugged his best friend. "You know Harry disappeared. He wouldn't leave us on purpose. You know that."
"So do you think he's...d-d-dead?" Hermione started sobbing more violently.
"Well it has been seventeen years...Let's go on a walk." He said and ushered her out the door. Angela and James watched Ron lead their mother out the door from the attic window.
"I wonder what's wrong with her." Angela said.
"P.M.S." James guessed. Angela laughed.
"Nobody has that bad of mood swings."
"Let's get out of here. The dust is giving me a headache." James said and coughed, spreading dust off of a pile of papers next to them.
"What're these?" Angela asked and picked up a few of them. "They're pictures of mom! Look at her! She looks almost our age. Like 18 or something." She flipped the picture over.
"She was 19." James said, reading over her shoulder. "Bring those downstairs. Let's see what's in there." They walked down the rickety latter and down the sweeping staircase into the living room. They sat in there for hours upon hours looking at all the old photos.
"Look, here's mom when she was erm- 17 in a ballet recital." Angela said and threw James the picture of Hermione in a tutu walking around on her toes.
There was suddenly a ring at the doorbell. "I'll get it." They said at the same time. They laughed and both went to get the door. Angela opened it. A short man with black hair was standing before him. He was wearing a pair of cracked glasses and looked very strong but almost starved. Angela wasn't sure if she trusted those fiery eyes behind the glasses. Her hand gripped the door's edge tighter as he surveyed the twins with wide eyes.
"Can we help you?" James asked tensely.
"I hope so. I your-" His eyes narrowed slightly for a moment as he looked at them again-
" Mother home?"
"No." James said.
"Are you sure?"
"Quite." Angela said.
"Odd. One would think that-" He thought for a moment, deciding whether or not to tell them something. " Never mind. Where did she go?"
"Who's asking?" James snapped.
"No one of consequence." The stranger shot back.
"Well, then why should we tell you where she is?" James asked. "I mean, as we have no idea who you are and what you want with our mother."
"And if you're one of those men who are trying to buy out our book store, it's not for sale."
"Hermione owns a book store?" The man shook with laughter. The smile lighted up his face and made him quite handsome. "That is so typical. And I thought she would end up as the Mistress of Magic or something more- ah- dignified."
"Owning a store is much more dignified than a lot of jobs out there. How dare you!" Angela snapped rather harshly.
"Did I say otherwise?"
"It was implied." Angela said. She wasn't sure why she was fighting with the stranger. He seemed to be nice and possibly trustworthy. He had this silvery glint in his eye that made both of the twins uncomfortable. It made you think of the glint that Dumbledore had in his eye, the one that let you know that he knew just about everything, including what you were going to say next.
"Hardly. Your mother and I are old school friends. I haven't seen her in quite a few years."
"A likely story." James spat.
"James, calm down." Angela hissed. "I don't think he means harm." The stranger's eyes widened and his jaw dropped.
"What did you say your name was?" He asked incredulously.
"James. What's it to you?" James snapped.
"Our mother is in town to day, with our father. We have some- er - some work we should be getting to. Good day sir." Slam. Angela snapped the door shut. They both watched the stranger walk down the dirt road until he was out of sight.
"Well that was weird." Angela said.
"No kidding." They went back to looking at the old pictures. They forgot all about dinner as they looked through the old photographs. They found a few newspaper clippings here and there. One of them looked like it had been drenched.
"Look at this one. 'Harry Potter gone missing; presumed dead.'" Angela read. "Wasn't he friends with mom? No wonder her and Ron never talk about him."
"That is really sad." James said agreeing. He glanced at the time and shook his head. "Well they're out late." As if on cue the front door opened and they heard their mother laughing. They exchanged glances and walked through the double doors into the entrance hall.
Hermione was rather red in the face and was in silent hysterics balancing herself on Ron's shoulder. Ron had a very pained and guilty look on his face and was very stiff.
"Mom?" James and Angela asked. Hermione turned to them.
"Oh hi kids." She said. "I had the most lovely evening with Ron." She giggled. Her voice was like she was on a roller coaster, the tone going up and down.
"Ron.." James said a slow as humanly possible. "What did you do to our mother?"
"One drink led to another, and she's- um not sad anymore, is she?" Ron said innocently and bit his lip. Hermione was still laughing.
"She is so drunk!" Angela said and clapped her hands together gleefully. "Excellent."