"Ms. Granger seems fine, we won't need to keep her overnight. After she wakes up, give her the proper forms and have her discharged."
"Understood Doctor Sundstrom." Hermione heard snippets of conversation while drifting in and out of consciousness. She quietly stirred and her eyes fluttered open, darting to and from all corners of the room suspiciously. Her vision was slightly blurred, so she lifted a slender hand towards her eyes and rubbed gently, vaguely aware of a figure coming towards her.
"Mom! What happened? They said you fell and had a concussion, are you okay?" Hermione, in her groggy state, slowly tried piecing together her current situation *okay, she's calling me Mom…well I guess that wasn't a dream earlier, and I'm obviously in a hospital, I've fallen, I've had a concussion, perhaps a bit of amnesia…oh, no need to stay here any longer than necessary. But the last thing I remember…oh shit! That little thing! He did this! If I just go back to Hogwarts, I can find him and make him fix this… *
"Hogwarts! We need to go to Hogwarts!" Hermione blurted out to her somewhat frazzled-looking daughter.
"What's Hogwarts, Mom?" the girl slowly put her hands around her mother's chin and turned the older woman's face to make her look her directly in the eye. "Listen to me, Mom, I am your daughter, my name is Winter W Granger. Your name is Hermione Anne Granger. We live in Boston, Massachusetts…" the girl's voice trailed off as her mother nodded along with her, sucking in every piece of information. "Mom, you need to pull yourself together, here." Winter continued to scan her mother's face, looking for the slightest hint of recognition, while slowly becoming more frightened. Hermione, not wanting to alarm the beautiful girl claiming to be her daughter, suddenly snapped back into the present, into what supposedly was, for now, reality.
"Winter, relax. I know who I am, I know who you are, just relax, everything is going to be fine. Now, I know you are thoroughly enjoying acting so very condescending towards me, so get over it, and call that doctor in here, I want to get out of here." Hermione had already made up her mind to play along, though she made this decision solely based on the small face gazing upon her own, calling her mother. Her newfound voice and statement received a sigh of relief from the young girl who smiled warmly at her mother, and proceeded out of the room in search of the doctor. When Winter returned, it was not with a doctor, but with a large, mannish looking nurse, who had a clipboard and a bulky plastic bag.
"Sign here," the nurse commanded, watching Hermione slowly sign her name agreeing that she understood the treatments she had received and that she should not fall asleep for at least 12 hours. The nurse nodded at Hermione and handed her the bag, which Hermione began to dig through like a lost treasure. Clothes, shoes, aha! A purse! She reached into the small black back, rummaging around for any bits of information she could get. Hermione opened the small leather wallet she had pulled out of the purse, flipping through a stack of plastic, credit cards, library card, gym card…license! She looked down onto her own familiar face and read the address out loud, thankful her daughter seemed to be of an age where she would know how to find their home, because Hermione wasn't going to be able to.
The two women walked towards the main entrance of the hospita quietly, both brains moving a million miles a minute. Hermione decided to slowly begin feeling out her predicament, "So, um, Winter, do you have any plans tonight?" Hermione expectantly looked down at the girl, gazing intently on the face that looked like the perfect mix of herself and Ron. Winter shook her head, pushed open the door to exit onto the street, and began walking towards the subway. Hermione continued, "Maybe we could do something with your father?" Winter shot Hermione a look of pure shock and outrage.
"WHAT?? What are you talking about, my father? What father, Mom? How hard did you hit your head? It's just you and me…just like it's always been…" Winter's voice faded off softly, as her pace quickened toward the trains. Hermione called after her daughter,
"Wait!" Hermione quickened her pace to catch up, she followed her daughter onto the train, and found a seat, luckily it wasn't rush hour. "I'm sorry. I must have forgotten. I'm really sorry Winter."
"Yeah, just save it." The two spent the rest of the trip home in silence, from the train to the apartment neither spoke a word. Upon entering a lovely apartment, Hermione was complimenting herself on her decorating skills as she heard a door slam to one of the bedrooms. She sat down on the soft light green couch, and let out a deep breath. The living room was fairly large, and almost every wall was lined with bookshelves, except for a small space left for a television. Most of the shelves were filled with books of all sizes, though a few shelves had picture frames on them, filled with laughing smiling people. Hermione slipped her shoes off and padded over to these shelves. She scanned the pictures, looking for a familiar face, and found none. All the pictures were of her daughter, Winter. Winter at a soccer game, Winter's first dance recital, Winter on the beach. Not one gave her a clue as to her standing in the Wizarding world. Looking around the apartment, except for her daughter's room, whose door was closed and had a "do not enter" sign on it, Hermione found herself completely surrounded by the muggle world, without a trace of magic at all, she couldn't even find her wand.
Hermione
became distraught at this knowledge, and starting searching high and low,
looking for her most treasured possession.
There weren't many hiding places in the apartment, as she was extremely
organized. She went into her bedroom
and sat down on a nice queen sized bed. Hermione's eyes combed the room, searching to no avail. She let her head down, gazing into her own
lap, her vision wandered over to the bedside table, and the single drawer occupying
it. She reached for the drawer, pulled
it out, hoping against all hope she would find her wand there. She was met by a mostly empty drawer with a blank
beige book inside. Hermione picked up
the worn book, and opened it up to be met with her own writing. * Well, it's
not my wand, but it's as close to a jackpot as I'll get today…* Hermiones eyes rolled over the pages of her
own journal, filling her in on the details of her own life up to this
point. She finished reading the last
sentence and drifted off to sleep, millions of thoughts floating in her head,
and that last sentence repeating itself and repeating itself over and over
again: "I don't know what I've done with my life, but worse yet, I don't know what
I've done to my daughter…"