You were always wanting to do what was right. You always wanted to please us, and as I watched your face shine when you handed me yet another test paper speckled with ticks and 'Excellent!'s, I realized that that was the reason. To please us.
You were good all your life, never making a fuss, never answering back. In a way you were the perfect child.
My beautiful daughter.
Your face as you looked at the barrier, determined, frightened. You even had a little smile on your face, as though you were getting ready to say, "Oh, I knew it was just a joke all along," though I knew, in the way only mothers know, that such a pronouncement would break all your dreams. You knew you were different, yet there you were, praying to find a place where you fitted in.
All your letters, full of chatter about school and those two friends of yours, those two boys.
We grew apart, I know. I was just a mediocre background figure to be pitied for knowing nothing of the world of colour.
'You wouldn't understand' you say dismissively, and I want to scream, I know! But I so want to!
Your letter The chatter you used to pour int your pen, lessons, teachers, grades, friends. They all gave leeway to talk of death, war and fighting.
I know that it's coming, you wrote once, and I know that you'll beg me to leave it all, I have no place in this. But it isn't about me surviving, Mum. Have you ever been part of something so much bigger than yourself. I can't leave. If we all ran and hoped that others would do the job for us, then soon there wouldn't be any others. I've got to be one of those people who doesn't run.
You're hanging onto your trunk, standing awkwardly, wand clutched in your hand, other arm holding a pile of books so large that you constantly have to hitch them up.
"I'll be back soon," you say unconvincingly. Then you point your wand at the fireplace, and mutter some incomprehensible word. Then as a strange blue fire roars up in our long-unlit grate, you give me one final look. You pick up your trunk, twisting your ankles as it weighs you down lopsidedly, and step into the fire. And you're sucked once again into that world that I'll never be a part of.
'I'll be back soon' you said.
But the thing is, Hermione, that;s the first wrong answer you ever gave.
Because I know you won't.
Just a random little one shot I found lurking in my folder, which I decided to complete. I can't stand Hermione, frankly, but hey, you can't disobey the muse now, can you?