Note: Hello everybody, this is Meet the Squib, likely to be the final multi-chaptered story set in the Meet the... 'ficverse. For any newcomers, this is an AU 'ficverse in which Remus and Tonks survived the final battle. Teddy's wife is a muggle named Carrie, whose exploits and misadventures from the age of eleven have been explored in previous stories.
A chronological list of all stories in this series can be found on my profile.
We rejoin the Lupins around seventeen years after the events of Meet the Daughter! Shockingly, we have a change of perspective that may well prove controversial and foolish. But believe me when I say there is only so much drama a muggle like Carrie can cause in her life...
This story is dedicated to anybody who has ever read, reviewed, voted in a poll about, favourited or in any way enjoyed a story in the Meet the... series. Thank you for warming to my vast cast of OC characters, especially Carrie Winters! The first story, Meet the Lupins, was posted in June 2010, which means I've been writing these stories for over two years! The first ever reviewer was Kathryn Marie Black! To anybody who has been reading and reviewing from the beginning (and I think there might be one or two of you): Thank you! I honestly wouldn't bother writing as often as I do if it wasn't for readers like you. I'm still just as surprised as I was two years ago that so many people were interested in a story with a muggle protagonist! I hope you all enjoy this story, which as I said will likely be the last one, despite it being distinctly different from all those that came before it! It even lacks the traditional introduction with those immortal words "Because the Lupins were magical..."
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.
1: September the First
September the first had, and always would be, Pandora Lupin's least favourite day of the year.
She had spent this, her most hated of days, in the same fashion ever since she had been eleven years of age, and though now at the age of sixteen she had little reason to carry on the tradition she felt compelled to do so anyway.
Because her grandparents would be expecting her.
On the first day of September for the past six years Pandora had been taken to her grandparents' bungalow out in the country, where she would spend the majority of her day sitting with her grandfather Remus by the fire in the sitting room, reading books and eating far too many sweets that her Nana Dora offered her at random intervals throughout the day.
The tradition had started when she had been eleven and her big sister Imogen had been off once again for a new school year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry...
On her own.
Because in the previous months Pandora Christina Lupin had failed to receive her Hogwarts letter.
She would not be attending Hogwarts with her sister that year, or indeed any year. Because Pandora was a Squib.
"I won't go!" she'd shrieked and cried that morning when her mother Carrie had instructed her to put her shoes on, Imogen's trunk and caged owl sat waiting out on the front door step, ready for the family to head to King's Cross Station to wave Imogen off on the train. "I won't, I won't! They'll all look at me funny because I'm not going too! They'll think I'm a freak!"
"They'll think nothing of the sort, Sweetheart." her father had assured her as Imogen had slunk somewhat guiltily down the stairs, her black school cloak bearing the crest of Hufflepuff House draped over the crook of her arm. "You're not a freak, there's nothing wrong with you. Now get your shoes on, we'll be late if you don't hurry up!"
But Pandora had refused, shouted and sobbed so dreadfully that in the end the rest of the family gave up attempting to persuade her. She found herself ushered into the living room by her sister, who had grasped hold of her firmly by the shoulders as she had informed the sobbing girl:
"Mum's a muggle, Uncle Thom and Uncle Tim are muggles, Crazy Auntie Cleo is a muggle and so is the vast majority of the population of this planet, Pan. So believe me, you're not the freak! I am!" And with that Imogen had hugged her sister fiercely, demanded that she write every day and tell her all about her new muggle school, before bundling her into the floo and sending her off to her grandparents' house.
Imogen had only remained at Hogwarts for two more years before she had come of age and graduated, and yet every year since Pandora had still visited her grandparents on the first of September, the day that always reminded her of what she didn't have.
Despite the fact that her mother was a muggle and her father, who worked at the Ministry of Magic as an Auror, was often away working, Pandora always felt as if there was less magic going on at her grandparents' house, which always made her feel just a little bit better.
Remus and Dora Lupin had, ten years previously, moved out of their house in the town of Eddington where the rest of the family still lived, and bought a modest little bungalow in Kent. As a small child Pandora had been a little bemused by this drastic downsizing, but when she had informed her grandfather this he had chuckled and told her that they could not possibly have stayed in the old house; it was much too big and he struggled climbing the stairs with his knees being as stiff as they were. Pandora had soon concluded, however, that the new house was by far more fun than the old one. It had a very small garden itself, which her Nana Dora, despite claiming to hate gardening, spent the summer months cutting, pruning, planting and admiring now that she was retired from her position as Deputy Head of the Auror Department. Though the garden itself was small, the surrounding hills and countryside provided ample space to run and play.
But not on September the First. Because Pandora never felt like enjoying the countryside on a day like that.
On this particular September the First Pandora had very nearly broken with tradition and invited her sister Imogen to visit their grandparents with her, for the eldest Lupin sister had herself been in poor cheer that morning, owing to the fact that her boyfriend had just left the country for a week long holiday in the south of Spain.
Yet a selfish little part of Pandora had left her to enter the floo on her own, and it was alone her grandfather found her that morning as she climbed out of the fireplace in his cosy little sitting room, dusting the soot from the front of her jeans.
As he appeared to be most mornings, Remus Lupin was sat upon the sofa, reading that day's edition of the Daily Prophet through a pair of thin, golden-rimmed glasses with a permanent frown upon his brow.
Pandora half-skipped across the room and dropped down onto the sofa beside him, kicking off her shoes so that she could hug her legs to her chest, head coming to rest upon the old wizard's shoulder.
Remus turned a page of his newspaper as he observed:
"It's that time again, is it Lala?"
"Mm." the teenager mumbled, lips twitching towards a smile she couldn't quite manage.
Her grandfather had affectionately been referring to her as Lala for as long as she could remember, owing to one of her primary habits as a small child whenever sat upon his knee. Determined to distract him from his book, newspaper or chosen radio broadcast, she would first point and anything and everything she could lay her eyes upon, tugging at his jumper and asking: What's that, Grandad?
It's a goblin, Sweetheart, he'd explain patiently, the manager of Gringott's to be precise.
It's my pocket watch, Darling, it's on a chain, look, so I don't lose it.
It's Nana's lipstick...
...a photo album...
...a fire poker...
...my glasses case...
...nothing, Sweetheart. It's nothing.
And when she had run out of things to point at, the young Pandora would instead break out into quiet, tuneless song, just loud enough to be a distraction.
Lalala...
At the age of ten or so she had grown quite indignant about Remus' choice of nickname, which the entire family soon became inclined to use, and had forbidden them say it all together. But her grandfather had a habit of going conveniently deaf whenever she voiced her complaints and he also seemed entirely incapable of understanding the perils and embarrassment of being named after a Teletubby, which in itself was a creature the wizard seemed unable to grasp the concept of in the first place.
And so it was that Remus happily went on calling her Lala, but nobody else ever did. By now Pandora was entirely resigned to it, and was in actual fact rather fond of this term of endearment.
Remus ran his eyes over the articles upon the new page of the newspaper, before setting about folding it up and setting it down upon his lap.
"When do you go back to school?" he asked his granddaughter, reaching to pat her comfortingly upon the knee, and she mumbled dismally:
"Two days."
"What's that?"
"Two days, Grandad."
"Ah, I see. And are you looking forward to it?"
Pandora barely suppressed a bad-tempered huff. She had never enjoyed going to school, not even primary school back before she had known she was a Squib. Unlike Imogen, who had been home-schooled by their grandfather up until the age of eleven, Pandora had only been left in Remus' charge from the ages of four to seven, whereupon she had been deposited at Eddington Park Primary School and left to fit in best she could.
Pandora could still recall the day her mother and father had sat her down to tell her of this change.
"The thing is, love," Carrie had said as she sat sandwiched between the two of them on their sofa, "Grandad...well he's getting older, isn't he?"
Was he? Pandora hadn't been sure. Of course her grandfather had always been old, that was just what grandfathers were. But she hadn't really thought of him ageing in particular, it was more as if he had been old forever and would stay that way too. Old. Not older.
Not too old.
"As much as he loves you, he thinks he's just getting too old to spend every day keeping an eye on you whilst Mum and I are at work." Teddy had said, "And now Nana Dora only goes into the Ministry as a consultant once in a while...well that makes her pretty much retired, doesn't it Sweetheart? And when you're retired, like Nana and Grandad are, that means you've reached the stage in your life when you get to relax and...and take time to do things together, at your own pace."
"It's not the time to be looking after children for hours on end."
"Precisely. And you'll much prefer going to school, you really will! I wish I'd gone to school like that!"
"It's wonderful, love. Primary school is wonderful, it's the best type of school you ever get to go to! You'll make lots of friends and have so much fun!"
Pandora had refused to speak to Remus for an entire week after that.
She had blamed him for the horrific shake up of her life whole-heartedly and was quite convinced that she would never forgive him for it.
Looking back on it now, she was pretty sure that her reaction had hurt her grandfather substantially. He had visited her almost every day in that week, offered to take her to the local sweet shop, offered to read her stories, teach her chess, and had even fixed her smashed bedside mirror after she had thrown it to the ground in a temper, finally breaking her silence with a shriek of: You're the worst grandad in the whole entire world!
No indeed, Pandora Lupin had never enjoyed going to school.
"It'll be nice to see my friends, I suppose." she decided, that being the most cheerful response she could muster, but her tone gave her away because Remus promptly sighed and observed:
"You've never looked forward to it."
"Not really, no."
"Sorry?"
"I said not really, no, Grandad."
"Ah." The werewolf patted his granddaughter upon the knee and told her: "Nana's making tea if you want a cup."
"Yes please, Grandad."
"I'll just go and tell her you're here..." he said, easing himself slowly up out of the chair before heading towards the door to the kitchen, calling: "Dora? Dora, Pan's here! Pour an extra cup, won't you darling?"
Pandora watched him go, frowning deeply, her thoughts still lost recalling primary school and how she had hated it, and when he returned a few minutes later, clutching a large biscuit barrel crammed full of a wide array of different biscuits, she waited for him to sit back down beside her before she asked:
"Grandad?"
"Lala?"
"You remember when you told Mum and Dad you didn't want to teach me anymore, that they'd have to send me to primary school?"
Remus didn't respond for a long moment. He had, admittedly, been growing increasingly hard of hearing in the past few years, but Pandora was certain that he had heard her perfectly clearly.
"I don't remember it like that at all, Sweetheart." he told her eventually, sounding somewhat stung. "I never once told Mum and Dad I didn't want to teach you. We just agreed...as a family...that primary school would be what was best for you."
"Did you all know, back then?" Pandora asked, failing not to sound a little accusing despite herself. "Did you all know I was a Squib? Is that...is that why you made me go?!"
"No, no! We had no idea..."
"But I wasn't showing any signs of magic!"
"You were only seven, plenty of magical children don't show any signs of being magical until they are quite old. We had no idea you were a Squib, Lala. That had nothing to do with us sending you to school."
"Then why was it best for me? Imogen didn't go..."
"You weren't like Imogen. She was a boisterous little monster who spoke to anybody or anything that would listen! You, on the other hand, were a delicate little thing, awfully quiet and shy. Nana Dora used to walk you to the shops in the village and you'd be so shy you wouldn't so much as hand over your pocket money to the lady behind the counter in the newsagents! You needed bringing out of yourself, Sweetheart. You didn't need me keeping you wrapped up in cotton wool, for Merlin's sake! I couldn't imagine sending you off to...to Hogwarts or any school for that matter when you turned eleven! So Mum and Dad decided the best thing to do was to send you to primary school, to break you in gently." Remus reached to pull the lid from the biscuit barrel somewhat triumphantly before offering it to the girl sat beside him with a broad smile. "And look how you've turned out! Utterly delightful..."
"That's the definition of biased, right there." a voice from the doorway observed and as she selected herself a biscuit, Pandora looked up to watch her grandmother step into the room, carrying a trio of mugs.
"Oh be quiet!" her grandfather insisted, waving a dismissive hand in his wife's direction. "Don't you know what day it is?!"
"What's that, love?" Dora Lupin asked as she set the three mugs down upon the low coffee table.
"It's the First of September!" Remus announced grandly, and as she reached to tuck a stray strand of snowy too-white hair behind her ear, Dora broke out into a broad smile as she recalled:
"Ah, my favourite day of the year!"
"And mine." Remus agreed, leaving Pandora to struggle not to grimace.
"You can't beat the annual Spoil Pan Rotten Day, that's for sure!" Dora chuckled as she took a seat in a squashy armchair.
"It's the only day I get to eat at least ten different types of chocolate in one afternoon." Remus recalled, causing his wife to snap:
"I should hope not! It's Pan's chocolate, it's not for you! At your age, for Merlin's sake! Fancy getting diabetes, d'you?"
"She's a battleaxe, your Nana." Remus informed his granddaughter in a non-too quiet whisper, and in an equally non-too quiet whisper to make sure he heard every syllable correctly Pandora assured him:
"Don't worry Grandad, I'll sneak you some Honeyduke's Finest under the table at lunch."
"Dreadful girl!" Dora exclaimed, slapping her hands down upon the arms of the chair in emphasis as her husband reached once again for his newspaper with a chuckle. "Stop encouraging him and come here! Showing up here without a single word of greeting to me, whatever next?!"
Pandora reached to set the biscuit barrel down upon the coffee table before getting carefully to her feet. Crossing the room in just a few short strides she consented to leaning down to give her grandmother a firm hug.
"Hello Nana."
"Alright love?" the witch asked, leaning to hug her back, planting a firm kiss upon her cheek. "How's Mum?"
"She's fine."
"Getting on well at work, is she?"
"Yep. She wants to know if you and Grandad want to come for dinner tomorrow. She's got the afternoon off and says she's doing a roast."
"Sounds lovely. How about Imogen?"
"She's sulking because Jamie left for Spain yesterday."
"Hm. Well you tell her from me, won't you, that she's much too old to be mooning after boys in such a pathetic manner, d'you hear? Twenty one is no age for that sort of nonsense."
"Hypocrite." Remus muttered under his breath, but unlike him his wife's hearing was as clear as a whistle and she shot him a distinctly amused frown and elaborated:
"What I mean is at the age of twenty one Imogen should be more concerned with finding herself a decent job."
"You sound like Dad." Pandora sniggered, only for Remus to sigh heavily and mutter:
"Leave the poor girl alone, for Merlin's sake. She's got a job..."
"Dad says it isn't a proper job." Pandora pointed out a little smugly as she went back to sit down beside him, and her grandmother informed her:
"Dad's right, love."
"Dora...!"
"What? Ted is right, Remus, it's not a proper job at all!"
"You think anybody who doesn't join the Aurors doesn't have a proper job."
"No, I think sitting around on the sidelines of a Quidditch pitch polishing broomsticks and watching matches isn't any sort of a job at all!"
"That's what Dad says." Pandora said, causing Remus to sigh heavily again. "He says if she doesn't get herself a proper job and start contributing to the running of the house, so help him he'll pack her off to Uncle Charlie in Romania and get her to do some proper hard work. Immy says he won't be saying that when she's the Holyhead Harpies' star chaser and stinking rich! He told her if she was going to get offered a spot on the team they'd have snatched her up straight out of Hogwarts and she'd do well to forget the notion of Quidditch stardom and get some galleons in her vault instead."
"Here, here." Dora muttered, leaning back in her chair and allowing her eyes to drift closed. "Galleons don't grow on trees, Pan. And don't you forget it."
Despite his earlier defence of his eldest grandchild's behaviour, Remus murmured incoherent agreement and Pandora felt inclined to explain:
"She's not an idiot, Nana, Imogen knows about all of that. It's just...well..."
"She wants to impress that daft boy of hers."
"He's not really that daft, Nana..."
"I'm sure he isn't, Lala." Remus agreed, smiling faintly. "Your Nana just has a habit of being appallingly judgemental when the fancy takes her."
"Because he didn't pass first year Auror training?" Pandora guessed, eying her grandmother rather accusingly. "Is that why you don't like him, Nana?"
"Don't be silly, love." Dora murmured, yawning widely, before adding: "Shut up, Remus."
"I didn't say anything."
"You were going to, though." Opening her eyes, the former Deputy Head of Aurors fixed her youngest granddaughter with a firm look as she insisted: "I barely know him, but from what I hear Jamie Macmillan is a decent young man and if Immy likes him I'm sure I'd utterly adore him given half the chance. Now be an angel, won't you Sweetheart, and fetch my wand for me, I left it in the kitchen."
Pandora obediently slipped back out of her chair and made for the kitchen. She wondered just how right Remus was about Nana Dora, how much her opinion of Imogen's boyfriend had been affected by his failure to pass the first year of Auror training.
Nana Dora always held and maintained strong opinions about anything, everything and everyone. She was, as Remus said, something of a battleaxe and yet Pandora sometimes wondered if she had always been that way. Being judgemental by nature was a trait that leant itself to a distinctly closed mind, and yet Nana Dora had married a werewolf, welcomed muggles whole-heartedly into the family and, from what Pandora could tell, had barely blinked an eyelid when informed of the shameful news that her grandchild was a Squib. Nana Dora herself was, even these days, a decidedly unconventional character and had a habit of reminding her grandchildren: It takes all sorts to make a world, you know.
Pandora then supposed it had more to do with hard work and sheer grit; that Nana Dora was more inclined to judge a person in that sense and consequently that was why she didn't think much of Imogen's choice of boyfriend, or her choice of job. She wondered if she herself would turn out to be something of a disappointment in that respect, too.
Because when it came to working hard at school Pandora Lupin didn't always bother. She knew of course that her GSCEs were very, very important, partly out of common sense and partly because her mother reminded her of this fact on what seemed like an almost daily basis. But she found the whole process of going to school rather depressing. She never felt as if she quite fitted in with the other children, just like she didn't always feel she fitted in with her magical relations, either. She was stuck somewhere in the middle, trapped, and the notion that passing some more exams was just another step on in this constant limbo that was her life was a miserable one. Sometimes she felt as if she wanted to give up on everything, run away and make up her own rules, her own path she could fit in to perfectly. But even that would be awfully lonely.
As if her lack of ambition wasn't enough to make her a disappointment to her grandmother, Pandora mused as she shuffled into the kitchen and cast her eyes searchingly around in search of Dora's elusive wand, her choice of boyfriend would no doubt be massively disappointing too, should she ever get one.
Because she was certain that no half-decent boy would want her.
Having inherited not so much as a smidgen of magic from the Lupin gene pool, Pandora had instead been graced with some other physical attributes instead, more from Dora than anybody else. She had her grandmother's straight, mousey brown hair, rather pale skin, dark eyes and distinct lack of height.
Having not inherited Dora's ability to alter her appearance, Pandora hated the way she looked.
"I'm ugly." she'd inform her mother Carrie every once in a while, and the Lupin family's resident muggle would naturally respond:
"You're beautiful, love. You look like Nana Dora did, when she was young."
Pandora thought this was a downright lie, and she would tell her mother so.
"Nana Dora never looked this ugly." she'd complain dismally. "She always morphed herself to look much nicer."
"Are you calling your grandmother naturally ugly?" her mother would chuckle, as if it were not a serious talk at all. "I'll tell her that, shall I?"
It wasn't that Pandora honestly thought herself the most ugly girl in the world. It was more that she thought herself dreadfully plain, especially next to her sister Imogen who, having taken all the magical genes from one side of the family, looked a whole lot more like her muggle mother. Pandora was forever envious of Imogen's long, wavy chestnut hair, her rosy cheeks and warm brown eyes.
"You have the most wonderful eyes," Carrie would tell her once it had become apparent that her complaining was very serious indeed. "You ask your grandad about eyes like that, you'll see!"
"You've got your dad's eyes." Remus would tell her when Pandora did go to ask him about them. "And he got them from your nana. And you know, Lala, it doesn't matter how Nana Dora morphs, ever since I first set eyes upon her she's always had those eyes. And it never matters what colour hair she chooses or what she is wearing, that's what I think of first when I think of her. Her eyes."
"Are they pretty?" Pandora would ask rather disbelievingly, and the werewolf would assure her:
"They're utterly stunning."
Still, stunning eyes and not much else didn't seem to Pandora to be that much good luck. In fact in the grand scheme of things she thought herself one of the unluckiest people she knew. And that in itself would probably make her an abysmal failure, too. She was just that unlucky.
Nobody liked being a disappointment to their family. But Pandora had simply been born that way.
She retrieved the wand from it's hiding place behind the kettle, and stood for a moment turning it around in her hands, running a finger across the smooth wooden surface before grasping hold of it by the handle. When she had been younger she had once gotten into dreadful trouble with her father for taking this very object and running around her grandparents' garden, waving it around and pointing it at unsuspecting birds and plant life. She'd been given the Magic Wands Are Not Toys, Pandora speech, which these days seemed laughable because magic wands might just as well be toys for all the use they were to her.
Pandora glared down at the slim shaft of wood and for a moment imagined snapping it in half. Then she promptly winced and reminded herself not to be so bitter.
It was difficult, not being bitter about being born a Squib. Everybody was terribly sympathetic towards her about it, but at the same time they didn't seem to quite grasp how difficult a situation she was in. Indeed they didn't seem to make much of a distinction between being a Squib and being a muggle, which was probably thanks to the fact that Carrie was a muggle and had found herself a place within the Wizarding World successfully enough. And if Carrie could do it, why not Pandora too?
But Squibs and muggles were not the same. Pandora was not like her mother. Her mother had been born a muggle, just as her parents had expected. But nobody had expected a Squib in the family, nobody expected this oddity who never quite fitted in...
It was this comparison to her mother that made Pandora feel yet more bitter, because despite coming from a family of werewolves, metamorphmagi, muggles and Merlin knew what else, all of whom were individualistic and far from the norm, they all seemed compelled to group and normalise Pandora by labelling her as being just like Carrie. Pandora didn't want to be grouped, she didn't want to be labelled, assumed to be precisely what the rest of the family expected. She just wanted to be Pandora.
Even when she wasn't entirely sure exactly who Pandora was.
She returned to the sitting room to find the Daily Prophet had switched hands in her absence.
"I've never heard of anything of the sort." Nana Dora was telling her husband thoughtfully as she squinted down at one article or another. "What a brilliant idea! Why hasn't anybody thought of it before?"
"I don't know," Remus said as Pandora silently presented the wand to her grandmother, and the witch set the newspaper down upon her lap in order to accept the wand with a bright smile.
"You are an angel, Sweetheart!" she exclaimed, before leaning forward to wave the wand vaguely around above the now luke-warm mugs of tea, causing fresh steam to begin to rise from the suddenly hot liquid.
"I don't suppose people give that sort of thing enough thought, do they?" Remus went on as he leant slowly forward to retrieve his mug, only for Pandora to retrieve it for him, pressing it into his hand. "Of course at first everybody cared about the pure bloods, and now these days after the War we're all obsessed with muggle-borns and how we treat them..."
"These days after the War?" Nana Dora chuckled, shooting him a raised eyebrow. "You make it sound like Voldemort was only defeated yesterday, love!"
"I like to think it wasn't that long ago."
"It's been four and a half decades, Remus."
"I know, but that makes me feel appallingly old."
"You are appallingly old. Isn't he, Pan love?"
"Dumbledore lived to be a hundred and fifteen. I think by comparison that makes me a spring chicken."
Nana Dora puffed her cheeks in reluctant defeat, before taking a sip of tea and changing the subject.
"Come and take a look at this, Pan." she said, jabbing a finger at the newspaper upon her lap. "What d'you reckon? Sounds great if you ask me..."
Pandora shuffled back over to peer down at the paper, and found herself faced with an advertisement crammed into one corner of the page, dwarfed by a photograph of an array of distinctly bored looking Wizengamot officials who were at that year's Order of Merlin awards ceremony.
Society for the Enrichment and Wellbeing of Squibs – S.E.W.S the Seams Into Your Bright Future!
Support, Activities, Social Events and Opportunities For Squibs of All Ages
Pandora's nose wrinkled as she muttered:
"I think it sounds stupid."
"What's stupid about it?" Nana Dora asked, and Pandora folded her arms somewhat moodily across her chest.
"It's like...like counselling for freaks or something..."
"Don't say that, love..."
"And anyway, I don't see why Squibs need a...a society to...to make them feel included! Having one just makes it worse..."
"People set up all manner of groups and societies for different people, Lala. It's not as if this is the only one..."
"I think it's all stupid, separating people, grouping them! How are you meant to find a way to fit in with everybody else if you just...let yourself get sorted and stick with whatever label you get given?!"
"You'll be sorted into groups your entire life, Pan. We all are, that's just how society works. There's no point being bitter about it. Make the most of it, that's what I say."
Pandora offered her grandmother the worst look that she could muster.
"Is that what Grandad does, then? When society labels him a dark creature and decides to shun him for it? I bet he doesn't make much of that!"
Nana Dora suddenly seemed to become very preoccupied with rearranging the shawl about her shoulders, and Pandora suspected that should she care to look his way, which she certainly didn't have the nerve to, her grandfather was probably examining his slippers with extreme interest. There was a sizeable pause in which Pandora rather wished the floor would open up and swallow her for her big mouth, before Nana Dora looked back up at her and informed her:
"Well I'd rather Grandad made nothing of it than what the likes of Greyback and others did, wouldn't you?"
Pandora willed herself to open her mouth and mumble fierce agreement, but those apparently stunning eyes of her grandmother's were doing exactly that: the teenager felt incapable of doing or saying anything.
"Pan, love," the witch said at last, leaning back in her chair, "I know it's difficult...things being what they are...but you know by the time you get to be old like Grandad and me, when you've done a good amount of living...well you find yourself with a whole lot of things to be angry and bitter about..."
"Like what? What've you got to be bitter about?"
"Me personally?"
"Yes."
Nana Dora frowned deeply.
"Where to begin..." she muttered, only for Pandora to insist:
"From the beginning."
For a second the girl thought she might be scolded for being so abrupt, but instead the witch retrieved her cup of tea, fingers tapping thoughtfully against the rim of the cup.
"Right...well, for one thing I had a dull early childhood. Never got taken out much. Because of course when I was born Voldemort was still at large and even once he disappeared there were still Death Eaters being rounded up. Being so closely related to a bunch of them and having a small child, my parents were pretty paranoid. It was boring. I was always inside the house...I didn't mix with other children. And I resent that. I struggled fitting in by the time it came for me to go to Hogwarts. Those are meant to be the best years of your life and I never felt like it. And before I knew it they were gone forever and I felt deprived. Then of course I grew up, joined the Aurors, was dead proud of myself and thought people would respect me. They didn't. Nobody respected me when I was young, they just assumed I was stupid, that I didn't know what I was doing in life. Your grandad was the worst! Thought I was an air-head, thought I didn't know love when I saw it, thought I was too stupid to understand what sacrifice was...what had I been doing in the Order for the past few years?! Just because he was older than me he thought I was utterly naïve! It hurt. I might've loved him but I hated him for that! I could still hate him for it now, the pain it caused me! What else? The War. It ruined everything. Absolutely everything, my entire life was a mess and I spent a load of my time risking my life...watching a load of people dying and thinking it was going to be me next. What sort of a life was that, hm? A rubbish one, Pan, it was awful. What sort of a world is this, too, that it came to that? The world is an ugly place, I can tell you, it's scarred me and sometimes when I think about it I think I might just hate this world of ours, I really might! What about after the War, too? Well for starters I never made Head of the Auror Department. In fact Harry got promoted over me! What sort of a system is that? I'd been working for that for years, Pan, if that isn't something to be bitter about I don't know what is! I always fancied travelling, you know? During the War I used to think about what I'd do afterwards and I used to think I'd like to go travelling and see the world. Well I've not really seen very much of it. Because I've been relatively poor for most of my life. And I could've been well off, very comfortable if I hadn't married your grandad. And could I be bitter about it? Of course I could. I could resent your grandad for a whole load of things, I've missed out on a whole range of things thanks to deciding to marry him. I could resent that decision easily enough. I could be awfully bitter about it. And how come I've had a difficult time, after all I've done for society? How come it's not kinder to us? How is that fair? I retired...five, six years later than the average Auror, I get a shorter retirement than a load of other people I know! Why? Because your grandad hasn't earned a galleon in Merlin knows how long and if I didn't keep on working we'd be living in a shed at the bottom of your back garden, that's why! What've I done with my life? Work, work, work! Couldn't there be a bit more to it than that? And if there is, why couldn't I have it?! Why do so many rubbish things happen to me, hm? Why did I have to be away on a raid when my mum was taken ill?! Why didn't anybody think to find me faster so that I could've had an extra few hours with her before she died?! How come...how come I lost my dad the way I did all those years ago? How come I was clumsy enough to splinch myself one time and...and how come your mum got to survive...how come your Nanny Christine got to keep her daughter when I got to lose mine?"
The witch leant forward in her chair, eyes piercing again as she informed her granddaughter: "Because the world isn't fair, Pan. That's why. And what would become of me if I let myself feel hate and resentment and bitterness for all these rubbish things that happen to me in my life? What sort of...of bitter and twisted person would I become?! What would be the point in living at all if I couldn't put it all behind me and wake up with a smile on my face?" She reached to jab a finger at Pandora's chest, making the girl flinch a little. "You, Pandora Lupin, aren't even an adult yet! You've got an awful lot of living to do! You might think you've had enough bad luck already, but you'll have plenty of other things to resent fifty or so years from now! Don't you start being bitter so young! Because I'm telling you now you'll never make it in life, you really won't!"
Pandora felt rather as if she might just burst into tears. She probably looked it, too, because Nana Dora reached to straighten the cardigan about the girl's shoulders, smiling encouragingly as she insisted:
"Concentrate on what's good in life, Pan. All those things you've done that you can be proud of or the things you have that you can be grateful for! All those things you are going to achieve in the future, because you can! Because you will!"
"I don't...I can't imagine I'll ever..."
"You're going to achieve such wonderful things, Sweetheart. You might not see it now, but it's true."
Pandora watched disbelievingly as her grandmother eased herself up out of the chair, before enveloping the girl in a firm hug.
"Trust me, Pan." the witch whispered into the Squib's ear, one hand smoothing Pandora's mousey hair. "I know these things."
"No you don't." Pandora whispered back, attempting to blink back tears. "You're not a Seer."
And the witch gave a soft chuckle and assured her:
"No, I'm a whole lot better than that, Sweetheart. I'm your grandmother."
