A/N: For those reading live, make sure you read chapter 9 - FFN was having issues last weekend and I'm not sure if that effected the chapter appearing in order.
Music that is played in this chapter: 1. The album "Rubber Soul" (The Beatles), specifically the song "In My Life"; 2. "Led Zeppelin II" (album) and; 3. "I Need You" by America
50 km west of Aberdeen
October 21, 2006
"This is useless!" Hermione exclaimed, frustrated and nursing a massive headache.
"It's not useless." Draco argued.
It had been a week since Hermione started attempting to recover her memory. Three days ago, she had remembered reading Little Women on the drive to the camp site with her parents. Since then, they had not made progress, but her sessions now ended with mind-numbing headaches.
"I'm starting to think I'm not a witch," she mumbled, massaging her temples.
Draco disagreed. "The headaches are a good sign! They mean we're onto something!"
"How do you suppose?" Hermione asked, frustrated.
"I assume it's the spell fighting back," Draco suggested.
Hermione rolled her eyes. She found her willingness to accept Draco's 'theories' and 'assumptions' had been decreasing in direct correlation with their continued lack of progress.
"Let's stop for the day," she said in a tone that brooked no debate. They had fallen into a routine – she worked on her experiments while he read in the morning, and then after lunch they worked on her memories. They had only been working for an hour this time before she called it quits.
She grabbed an aspirin and sat down, eyes closed and attempting to consider the facts again. There was no empirical data suggesting she was a witch. She had tested her blood, and there was no indication she currently was or ever had been magical. If she had the resources, she would have sought a bone marrow biopsy. While the tests she was able to perform didn't conclusively confirm nor deny she was a witch, it constantly nagged at her nonetheless.
However, she had been able to successfully recollect a number of childhood memories. Beyond the morning of the car accident, she now remembered a few other benign moments, the common threads of which seemed to be her stuffed Otter, Freckles. She didn't doubt the authenticity of the memories.
Because Draco had been able to effectively help her recover her lost memories, and given the existence of a mysterious scar on her face, she found herself willing to entertain his suggestion that she was a witch whose powers had been removed. For the time being at least.
When she wasn't working on her experiments, which she refused to give up, or her lost memories, she was mulling over the possible reasons for her assignment. Assuming she was a witch and her powers had been removed, there were a few options. It was possible the Corps discovered proximity to her caused magicals to lose their powers, panicked, and sent her to the Uninhabitable Zone.
But that didn't make sense to her! After all, if it was something so innocent, wouldn't they just tell her? Sure, she would have questions, but she would be willing to comply with any tests or other requirements asked of her. And everything on her spotless service record would indicate this.
Given this, she had considered another theory - that someone higher up in the Corps chain of command was aware of why she impacted others' magic but had decided not to tell her. Instead, they offered her what she would view as the ultimate research opportunity, while also effectively quarantining her in the uninhabitable zone.
If this was the case, the question still remained: was the Corps itself responsible for her condition? Of course, this begged the question of when her condition started. Was it related to the car crash, like Draco suspected? This at least suggested that the Corps as an institution was not responsible for her current predicament, leading her to what she considered her most 'optimistic' theory – that a small group of individuals were responsible for whatever happened to her magic.
If this was not the case, if the Corps was somehow responsible for her condition and ensured she remained ignorant throughout her enlistment, it suggested a dark underbelly to an incredibly powerful organization responsible for the protection of the entire WEA.
Regardless of the answer, she had decided she would not apprise the Corps of her suspicions. She continued to report in to her Captain as required, keeping him informed of Draco's situation as clinically as possible and otherwise attempting to behave as though nothing had changed.
She did worry that one of the Corps members involved in her 'situation' had been made aware of Draco's presence and would intervene in some way, but thus far she had no reason to believe this was the case. Perhaps the wizards assumed since the Death Eater was powerless, there wouldn't be an issue? Or maybe they were simply waiting - not willing to sound the alarm.
And finally, the question that kept her up at night: why? Why, if she were a witch, would her powers and memories have been removed? What could possibly have happened to justify such a thing?
"Is your head feeling any better?" Draco asked.
Hermione blinked, coming out of her thoughts. "Yes." She cracked her neck left to right. She looked to the wizard, still an enigma for all she tried to understand him. Despite his bluster and abhorrent prejudice, there were moments when he showed kindness, when she felt he was trying to help her not for any personal gain but for her.
Of course, there were also times when he refused to look her in the eye, when she was sure he was holding back some truth or detail. "Can I ask you something?"
He looked startled. "I guess."
"What was it like?" Hermione asked.
"What was what like?"
"Life with the Death Eaters," she clarified.
"I mean, what's anyone's life like? We had school, I had friends, I eventually became a soldier, I left." He shrugged.
She shook her head. "No – like, the little things. I had that stuffed Otter that I took everywhere and I love Star Wars. What did you do for fun?"
Draco looked reluctant to answer so she prodded him. "I'm not asking you to reveal state secrets. Just – I'm curious is all."
He nodded and furrowed his brows before responding. "My very best friend Theo and I used to explore Hogwarts – like endlessly. Hogwarts is brilliant – full of secret passageways and some of the greatest wizarding portraits known. When we were younger, we would play hide and seek. It was – incredible to have the run of the place. I'm sure it was impressive when it was an actual school, but as two kids, the empty castle was like living a story." Draco smiled fondly at the memory.
"What else?" Hermione asked, leaning in and intrigued.
"Hmm," he mumbled, a slight smirk playing on his features, "did I ever tell you I have a sweet tooth?"
"What?!" she exclaimed. "No!" For some reason she found the information entirely incongruous with the serious Draco Malfoy she had come to know.
"Yes," he confirmed. "As a child, my father always used sweets as a bribe. I was a bit spoiled. I remember when my father told me we were moving to Hogsmeade, I was so excited because of the sweets shop there. I didn't realize that the shop would no longer be there. But my friend Goyle, his mum is a brilliant potioneer, and she'd make me these chocolates just like the shop used to. Eventually, as we evolved to become self-sufficient, she opened her own shop - but I remember in those first few years, when there was still so much fear and uncertainty, her chocolates made me think everything was going to be okay."
Hermione considered this and gave a small smile. "Thank you."
"So, have I passed?" he asked, his tone flat.
"Sorry?" she sputtered in response to his sudden shift.
"Did I pass whatever test this was?" Draco drawled once again.
"It wasn't a test," she bit back.
"Then what was it?"
"I just want to get to know you!" Hermione defended.
"Oh really?"
"Yes!"
"Why?"
"Ugh." Her arms flew in the air in exasperation. "I don't know! You confuse me sometimes. I'm a naturally curious person. Is that okay? Do I have to have a reason to make civil conversation?"
"Well then, what about you?" Draco asked.
"You've received a front row seat to all my memories!" she cried out.
"No – not those. After the Event. What then? What did you do for fun when the world was ending?" he asked, his words mocking but challenging.
She glared at him but thought about it nonetheless. "Well, I didn't really have friends growing up. But I did have books," she told him.
"That's pathetic, Granger."
She narrowed her eyes in response. "Well, I was studious. And kids didn't like me." She paused. "But I did love music. After the crash, when I moved in with the Dursleys, I found a box of records that belonged to my parents. When the Dursleys left me alone, I would sit in the living room and just play the records and imagine a different world." She looked him in the eye, satisfied his shit eating grin had dissipated.
"What's a record?" Draco asked.
"It's a – device used to play music," Hermione explained.
"Like a – radio?" he asked, confused.
"Do you all have music?" Hermione asked, eyes wide.
"Of course we have music!" Draco claimed.
"Okay – so do you listen to music?" Hermione clarified.
"What do you mean?" Draco asked.
"Like, if you're having a bad day or maybe you got dumped, do you sit in your room with your favorite song on repeat? Or -" she paused, "or when you hear a really good song and it reminds you of the first time you heard it and you can actually feel the way you felt that time."
Draco looked at her like she had grown a second head. "No." He then elaborated slightly. "I mean, the only times I can recall listening to music are at a wedding, or a dinner party or cotillion," he explained.
Hermione looked oddly excited, "I'll be right back." She jogged to her room and returned minutes later carrying a large box and some square envelopes. She plugged in the box and turned her attention back towards Draco. "So this," she pointed towards the box, "is a record player, it plays music."
He squinted his eyes, looking bored. She gave him a pleading look and he relented, nodding in understanding. "And these," she now pointed to the envelopes, "are records. Typically, each one will hold a series of songs written by one artist. There have been – hundreds of thousands of records made in all sorts of genres – rock, disco, pop."
"Would I be correct to assume records are a muggle Invention?" Draco clarified.
"Well, yes," Hermione noted, "though since the Event, many witches and wizards have taken up singing and otherwise enjoy music. Unfortunately, the music industry still hasn't fully recovered, so we're more or less stuck with whatever music was produced before 1989." Hermione shrugged.
Draco watched as she took one of the albums out of its jacket and placed it on the record player - Rubber Soul. There was static, and then music and singing. He looked at the spinning record curiously, but then shifted his gaze to watch Hermione. She let the song go on for a moment and then moved the tonearm over, completely focused on her task. A new song started - "In My Life" - and she breathed out, smiling. She sat back on her chair and closed her eyes, her face a mask of serenity.
It was a version of Hermione he had never seen before. He was most familiar with the studious scientist and the know-it-all swot. He had more recently realized there was another side of her – vulnerable, insecure, a victim to her own need for order in a chaotic world. Now though, he saw something he couldn't necessarily reconcile with the rest of her. As she sat and swayed lightly to the music, a single tear streamed down her cheek, and he saw for the first time that she was a woman, more than - or completely separate from - being a witch or a Muggle.
As if reading his thoughts, she grew instantly self-conscious, swiping the solitary tear away and shaking herself out of her reverie. She looked at Draco, sitting up straight and asked, "So? What did you think?"
He wasn't sure what to say. He didn't really have any context. It wasn't like anything he'd ever heard before, though he did find himself curious to hear more. "It was interesting."
She looked disappointed. "Just – interesting?"
He shrugged. "It was – unlike anything I've ever heard. I guess in a way it was startling? Will you play something else?"
She nodded, removing the disc and putting in another - Led Zepplin II. She let the music play from the start this time and seemed more focused on watching Draco's response to the music than necessarily enjoying it herself. She frowned as his eyebrows furrowed in confusion.
"What is it?" she asked.
"It's just," he started, not sure what to say. "How do you dance to this?"
She laughed. "What?"
He narrowed his eyes at her but still clarified, "I just – isn't the point of music having something to dance to?"
She looked thoughtful for a moment before she responded. "I guess in my world, dancing is something you do when the music moves you to do so." And before he knew it, she was digging back through her albums. She had another disc on the player and, satisfied the song she wanted was playing - "I Need You"by America, she turned to Draco. "Is this better?" she asked.
He shrugged. "Maybe."
"Well," she said, grabbing his hand, "let's find out." Before he realized what was happening, she was dragging him off the couch and onto the small bit of open floor space between the coffee table and the TV. He wasn't sure what she expected of him, and he was frankly unnerved by the whole situation.
"Relax," she said, placing his right hand on her left hip and holding his left hand with her right. She led them around their small space, right in time with the music. As the dance continued, Draco found himself relaxing and letting himself enjoy it.
"When did you learn to dance?" he asked.
"Hmm," she considered and gave a playful smile, "at some point in secondary I imagine. I may not have had much in the way of friends, but there were always boys willing to dance."
At one point, she broke their pattern and used his arm to swing herself around, before returning to her previous stance with a smirk. His smile in response was genuine, and they continued their rather clumsy dance. Towards the end of the song, Hermione started to simply sway back and forth against Draco, his sleeves rolled up and hands holding her waist.
"This song," she started, "it was my parent's first dance at their wedding. I don't recall the wedding of course, but they placed a post-it note on the album, almost carelessly. Just 'first dance,' like they were worried they would grow old and senile and forget.
"Sometimes, when I think about that car ride and that fateful camping trip, I try and imagine a different life, one where there was no car crash. I imagine my parents telling me to go to sleep while they stayed outside and played this on a portable boombox and swayed under the moonlight. And I imagine the young version of me, watching them from the tent and appreciating them for all they were."
He saw tears in her eyes, but she was smiling through them, moved by the what if. As they swayed, with Hermione caught up in a world that would never be, the record player came to a stop. Jolted, they both stepped away from each other and at that moment, Hermione's mind in the forest with her parents, she saw Draco's Dark Mark.
And she remembered.
"Hermione?" She heard Draco's voice calling to her but it was like she was underwater. She saw him standing there – his face transforming from amused to skeptical to worried. But to her, he was like a two dimensional figure in the television, something she could see but not interact with.
She was consumed in an impossible memory. Ten year old her wore yellow footie pajamas with that pink cardigan on top, the fall air making for a cool evening. She was peeking out of her tent, spying on her parents like any self-respecting ten-year-old would when they heard voices.
But what she saw didn't make sense. There were a man and a woman, holding wands, the woman's exposed forearm bearing the same mark Draco's did. She saw her parents, on the ground in utter agony. The memory was silent but she could see the screams on their faces. And she felt herself scream.
Crack! All around the cabin, glass shattered. The record snapped in half and the clay bowls holding their macaroni and cheese fell to pieces. She screamed as her memory self did – a torrent of emotions carrying her.
"HERMIONE!" She recognized the voice and in some way, knew it was relevant, knew she should take some action. But her memory self and her current self couldn't decide. Threat she thought, and unconsciously a piece of glass came rushing out of the kitchen and landed at the other person's throat.
"Hermione... please," Draco pleaded, and only then did Hermione open her eyes and witness the awesome destruction she had caused. She looked into Draco's eyes, seeing genuine pleading in them, and found herself once again firmly in the present. Her breathing returned to normal and the glass piece dropped from Draco's neck. He immediately grabbed at his throat before turning to Hermione, hands held up. "Hermione?"
"I remembered something, Draco," she whispered.
"Oh?" he asked, unsure what to say, for the first time truly afraid.
"I don't think my parents died in a car accident." She sounded numb. "It looks like your theory was right. It seems I'm a witch."
A/N: Thank you to my Beta, ElizColl for everything.
I hope you all enjoyed Hermione's revelation(s). I love any and all reviews/comments!