August Hands

(The Fall from Innocence)

They walked for some time through the garden. Arthur led Hermione through the clean beige pathway and around shrubs dotted with tiny red flowers. She looked around, holding her notepad to her chest. The sun was starting to dip into the horizon. The sky was bruised across from where the sun was, showing a brushstroke of nighttime.

A man crouched near the end of the garden. Although it was a large area, it was not the largest Hermione had ever seen. Compared to Hogwarts' fields, this was a minute speck in a starry sky. The man raised a potted plant and set it aside. His long hair was set in a loose ponytail, gliding down one of his shoulders. His young, soft face was spotted with soil. He was new, Hermione could tell. He still didn't have the leathery, pock-marked face of a laborer yet. But, from Arthur's affirming nod and the rows of colorful, varying flowers that lined the road, he was talented.

They reached a rose bush, by which sat an elegant white chair with curled arms. Soft red petals decorated the edges. Arthur sat down and motioned for her to join him. The late afternoon breeze ruffled her hair. She sat down, setting the notepad on her lap.

His eyes tipped towards the sky, watching the colors drain and shift. For the first time, his face looked old. Hermione noticed, with a good deal of surprise, that small lines branched off from his eyes and mouth. His lips were pale and scarred. A knotted scar trailed down from the back of his head and around his neck. His arms were spotted, resting in his lap.

The image shattered when his eyes swung back to look at her. He smiled. His eyes were full of light and mischief, and, strangely enough, magic. Hermione thought back to her teachers, her friends, herself. Their eyes were the same as muggles, mostly. When she looked at them she didn't see the glitter she saw now. The radiance, the airy delight that swam in him. This man seemed to be made of magic.

Her lips parted. She wanted to comment on it.

But he tore away before she could.

"It's lovely today." She muttered, to that her mouth didn't hang open.

Arthur nodded.

"Yes," he leaned back with a sigh, "an adequate temperature. My bones aren't quite brittle enough to sense much change. My skin's too calloused to feel subtle changes between hot and cold."

Hermione blushed. "Oh, I didn't meant to."

"No, of course you didn't. And I was stating a fact, not an accusation." He grinned again, the same boyish, whimsical look he gave her earlier. "Don't worry, dear."

The man shifted and moved on to the next bare stretch of dirt. He dug his fingers into the dirt, upturned it, and gently, as if holding an infant, set a new, fresh green stem into the earth. She watched him work for a while. He didn't seem aware that eyes were pinned on him. Also, that one of the maids that dusted the outside of the house, batting away cobwebs, kept her gaze pinned to him fervently.

Hermione turned to Arthur. He didn't appear prepared to share the next part. His expression shifted between content, to pinched with pain, to curious, then back to simply content. Hermione didn't know what to say or do.

Finally, Arthur began to speak.

"You must think I'm utterly spoiled from my wealth."

"No, I think you've earned it." Hermione replied quickly.

Arthur raised his canopy of eyebrows.

She laced her fingers, looking directly at him. She felt as if she was seeing a grandfather, if her grandfather was a werewolf, semi-wizard with dangerously green eyes. "You worked for this. I remember what the book said about you. And you seem to have suffered your share, that is, if you believe in that, having balance. But I think you're just fine. Not that my opinion should matter much to you, granted, I am only me."

Arthur didn't say anything for some time. When he spoke again, he launched back into his story.

Mother said nothing. She took Alice in one hand, her little five-year-old palm cradled in her large one. She grabbed my shoulder and pushed me forwards. We left our small home. Alice asked a thousand questions, wondering where she was going, where, why. Would she get something sweet? She laughed in excitement.

She remembered how on days Mother felt especially wakeful and alert she would take us into London. She would walk us around and then take us to a festival. We would play games and she would throw darts with marvelous accuracy. No magic involved. She had a talent there. She would win plush bears and lambs for Alice. Alice would go home with two or three of them. Even if the sky was gray and moody, Alice would clear it away with her bright smile. The plushes crowded her tiny frame. She never grew out of her nearly boyish body.

After the games Mother would buy us ice-cream or candy. We would eat it happily, soaking up each moment of childhood fun. When we returned home we would watch a movie or play games. Alice knew these days were best. Other days she would turn solemn, quieter, but not devoid of happiness. When Mother neglected her and I fed and bathed her, she would cling to my neck.

"Why is mummy sad?" She would whisper in my ear.

I would hug her and set her down. She would rest against my lap. I pulled a brush through her soft flaxen hair.

"Alice, mummy is a little tired. That's all. She works hard for us." I blatantly lied.

Alice peered at me curiously. I was terrified that she tore through my rouse and could see the core of deceit and bitterness I held. I never found out if she did.

That day, we didn't go to the festival. I already could tell. I could tell from the distant, cold gaze and the removed smiles she gave us. She had filled her purse with something, I could see a paper bag poking out from the top.

We walked for some time, taking the underground under the autumnal night sky. She did this wordlessly. I thought about what she wanted to do, my heart sinking. I was so young. I had just made a new friend after losing the last one. I was wounded, trying to lick my cuts clean while hiding in my cave. I wasn't ready for what mother wanted to do. She stopped being Mother, warm mummy, and became cold, removed mother. Someone I attributed my blood and misfortune to. Someone that I said gave me life on official documents. Someone who I pinpointed as the cause for everything wrong. From her now wispy hair and round, narrow eyes.

Once in London she took us to a faded building. A tall woman opened the door. I was taken aback. She wasn't beautiful. She had full hips and a tight red dress, but her face was plain, even haggard. I didn't like her. Her eyes swung to Alice, who was trembling next to me. Tears rolled down her cheeks. She knew what was happening before I did. Her small hand reached for me. I was too shocked to take it.

Of everything I regret, I regret this most. I regret being too frozen with shock and fear to grab my sister's hand and, possibly, run away. I regret watching on as mother pushed her forwards, handing the paper bag over. Alice ended up in the arms of another woman, one who was taller and skinner, and much nicer, than the first one. Alice was weeping, mostly out of confusion. Her tiny hands shook. I looked a mother, anger rising in me like a tide. The door shut, something fell into mother's hands. Money. Greed. Carelessness smothered down into sheets of paper. The door shut. The door shut. The door shut. I wanted to tear it open and force my way through, begging, screaming, wanting my sister back.

I stared at mother, wanting to hit her, but too afraid to do that.

She stared at me.

"What do you want me to do?" She asked. Her eyes were dry. I think if she had shed a single tear I would have felt sympathy for her. But she didn't. She didn't care.

"Get her back." I said. I felt riled up.

She grinned, lopsided. Her mind had already begun to melt some time ago.

"Why? So you can tear her up like a dog with a new toy?"

My blood froze. My fists tightened.

"Don't play stupid, Arthur." She said. "You know how you get. I'm the only one that can handle you. Without me, you would be dead. Dead meat on the side of the road. You'd be broken and you'd have hurt so many people. Especially her. Do you want to her to be in the same house with you when you turn evil? When you show your true colors?"

I didn't understand her sudden, uncharacteristic meanness then. Now I know the guilt she felt. She tried to cover it up. She had tried so hard to be a good mother. She failed, miserably. Now all she could do was pin the blame on me, like I did to her. She didn't believe what she said. She needed to say something or else she would have collapsed out of her own misery. She had been wounded so many times before that the slightest prodding released fresh blood.

"Better than if you raised her." I said weakly.

I thought I felt better. She had given up the girl for adoption. My sister no longer my sister. My sister no longer remembering me. I felt bad again. At least she would be safe, from both me and mother. She wouldn't have to hide from me, even though I was the only one could care for her. We had no friends to call for. She would be safer. Possibly.

As we walked away I saw two young men walk up to the door. I wondered if they were adopting. I glanced at them over my shoulder.

"Move." She said, nudging me in the shoulder. I stumbled forwards.

"What if they take Alice?" I whispered, scrambling for comfort of any kind. "They don't look safe."

Mother didn't look back.

"Move." She repeated.

I stumbled forth again. The door opened again, this time a pretty young girl with tight brown curls and makeup on her cheeks smiled at them. Her eyes narrowed. They followed me, briefly. She stared into my eyes. She turned back to the men, welcomed them in.

Later, when I thought back, I broke through the veil of innocence and I realized the true nature of the sordid house.

Arthur fell silent. Hermione knew what he meant.

"Was she a witch?" She asked.

Arthur shrugged. "I never saw her again. I don't know. I would think so. That's how blood works, doesn't it? I ended up a werewolf with barely enough magic so that I wasn't classified as 'squib' and she must have been a powerful witch. I think. That would seem fair."

He paused.

"Then again, nothing she had was fair."

He looked down.

"Maybe she was allowed to go to Hogwarts," Hermione asked, eyes widening. "Then she could escape that place."

"Perhaps." A glimmer of hope escaped through his flashing smile.

"Does she remember you?"

"Doubtful." The hope was snuffed at once. "I wish I could have given her something to remember me by. Maybe a toy or a necklace."

"You were a child. Don't be hard on yourself." Hermione said at once.

Then she bit her tongue. Embarrassment rinsed her. Who was she to say such things to him? To comfort a man so much older, wiser, better than her? She had no experience. Not really.

"You know my parents don't remember me either." Hermione said.

Arthur turned to her. "They don't?"

She stared at a patch of cyclamens. Their curved pink petals standing up. Their fragile, bent stems holding their pretty heads high. She wanted to pick on and cradle it in her palm. She didn't move.

"When I went with Harry and Ron I took away their memory. I effaced myself from their photos, their lives. So they wouldn't worry or miss me."

"For the better?"

"At the time."

"In a way, mother forgot about me, too…"