EPILOGUE I: "CHO MARRIED A MUGGLE"
By monkeymouse
NB: JKRowling built the Potterverse; I'm just redecorating one of the rooms. In this case, though, since I'm speculating on the Potterverse without guidance from JKRowling, it's more like I'm building a new wing onto the house.
Rated: R for brief sexual content
Spoilers: None
xxx
Cho stayed remarkably close to the plan she outlined to her parents at Hogwarts. She joined the Tutshill Tornados as a Reserve Seeker, then in six months time was able to play her first professional match. In the interim she practiced harder than she ever had at Hogwarts. She saw that the level of play in professional Quidditch was much faster and much more aggressive than she was used to. She also saw that newspaper accounts of a match bore little resemblance to what really happened on the pitch.
Cho's training mixed Quidditch practice in Tutshill and sessions in the basement walking on teacups. One discipline sharpened her for the other, and in November 1998, when she played her first match as a Seeker for the Tornados, still using her old school broom, the crowd went from amused laughter to stunned silence to hearty cheering in short order. Quoting a piece that appeared in the Christmas Annual edition of "Which Broomstick," their Welsh correspondent wrote: "A Seeker who is about to turn twenty, riding a Comet 260. This sounds like a May-December marriage doomed to fail. And yet Chang of Tutshill achieved miracles during her debut—nothing less. We expect to see continued stellar performances from her."
Cho, however, was as good as her word. She was indeed sought out by the press—from the "Prophet" to sporting magazines, from "Witch Weekly" to "The Quibbler." In each interview, she never failed to work in the history of some stellar Quidditch player, past or present, who was Half-and-Half or even Muggle-born. It never overshadowed her performance, but she saw that it always made it into print—or, in the case of the Wizarding Wireless Network, on the air.
She also spent the first two years shuttling back and forth between Tutshill and Diagon Alley, helping her parents out in the shoppe three days a week on average. Finally, there was a bit of a family row at Christmas 1999, when Cho's mother suggested that she move out of the family home; in fact, out of Diagon Alley altogether. "There's no need to come over so often," Lotus said. "We can certainly take care of ourselves. We've had enough practice at it." They yelled at each other for several hours until Mister Chang tried to calm the troubled waters. "You're twenty years old now, and you should do what people your age do. Go out on your own, see to your own meals and hobbies and entertainment. You'll always be welcome here, of course, but you've still got some growing to do."
Cho had actually been thinking the same thoughts since she joined Tutshill, but hadn't wanted to seem as if she was deserting the family. So, with their knowledge and blessings, she went on her 21st birthday to an agent, who showed her a small fourth-floor walkup apartment. She furnished it, placed her books on Chinese and British magic on the shelves, and (one of the reasons for getting this place) setting up a roost under the eaves for Quan Yin.
After five years with the Tornados, Cho announced her retirement from Quidditch. She wasn't injured, and she was only about twenty-five years old. Nor did she say that the game had become boring; the way she played proved she didn't believe that. All she would say was a variation of what she told "Which Broomstick": that "there's something else I need to do." She just didn't yet have an idea what that might be.
Also in her twenty-fifth year the Daily Prophet carried the announcement that Harry Potter was marrying Ginevra Weasley. Harry, who had been something of a globetrotting Auror for the Ministry since leaving Hogwarts, announced his intention to settle down in his home on Grimmauld Place.
Cho had sent him several owls over the years, but he never answered. He was most likely out of the country, Cho decided; either that, or Ginny intercepted the messages.
Harry and Ginny's wedding was a private ceremony in the house at Grimmauld Place. Dozens of gifts from well-wishers came to the house, including a rare book: a limited edition copy of Eunice Murray's autobiography, "The Broom Gets All the Credit." This edition had been suppressed by the Ministry; in the mid 20th century, the wizarding world was supposedly not ready to learn that Eunice Murray's secretary had also been her lover.
The book contained no inscription to indicate the sender; just a plain white card. Inside the card, at the bottom, an ink drawing of a swan circled endlessly; above it was the simple message: "May Heaven bless you, Harry Potter. RS"
Harry understood at once: RS stood for "Ravenclaw Seeker"; he had taught the Ravenclaw Seeker in Dumbledore's Army to produce a Swan Patronus. He hid the book in plain sight, among a dozen other Quidditch books. He kept the card in a locked drawer of the desk in his study. Some nights, when the house was asleep, he would take out the card and just look at the swan drawing, swimming back and forth.
The night of the wedding, as celebration went on in Grimmauld Place until after midnight, Cho Chang walked down Grimmauld Place, stopped in front of Number 12, and softly said, "Goodbye, Harry."
Cho and Harry never saw each other again.
xxx
She had a small circle of friends who she saw; mainly, other women she had known at Hogwarts. These included Penelope Clearwater, Marietta Edgecombe, and Diana Fairweather. Penny, whose parents were both on the faculty at Cambridge, lived with them; the others, like Cho, lived in their own apartments scattered near London's West End theater district. Once or twice a month, they would spend an afternoon shopping, attending a matinee, or having a late lunch. They usually went to a restaurant where the waitstaff were aspiring actors who would sing for the diners who requested showtunes. Cho would usually request a song titled "We've Got Magic To Do;" it was a private joke.
Cho didn't know about musical theatre just by going to matinees. She found a hobby that was also a way of spending some of the money she made as a professional Seeker—and it was a lot of money. She gave half of it to her parents, and used the rest for rent, food, clothing, theatre tickets, and music. Specifically, she bought a top of the line compact disc player, a good pair of speakers, and a collection of CDs that eventually numbered well over a hundred.
Cho's musical education was improvised: if she found someone whose music she liked, she bought more discs by that person. She also ended up buying a lot of disappointing discs, some just for the cover art, but she could never bring herself to throw them away once she'd bought them. Eventually, a used CD store opened up just a few doors down from The Three Broomsticks, on the Muggle side; that was where she ended up buying a lot of discs.
That was also where she met Ryan Lin.
xxx
Once or twice a week, depending on her time and finances, she would stop into "Twice Around," the used disc store, to see what was there. Turnover was slow to leave but quick to arrive; Londoners sold used discs back to the shop and other discs arrived weekly, mostly from overseas. The two-man staff, both Asian, was busy cataloguing the incoming discs, and finding shelf space for them. There was always something playing over the shop's system.
This was one of the main reasons Cho liked to hang about there. None of her witching friends followed Muggle music, so she was on her own. She'd spend the better part of the time there looking through rows and rows of discs, to see if a familiar name caught her eye. Sometimes, she'd find a jewel case with interesting artwork, but she soon learned that the quality of the art seldom matched the quality of the music. So the first few times she was there, she ended up being served by Jeremy, who always seemed distracted by one thing or another: other customers, the telephone, the weather. He seemed to be the older of the two storekeepers, but also the more scatterbrained.
She finally was served by Ryan on her fifth visit to the shop. At the time, she noticed that she was, like herself, an Asian in his mid-twenties. He thought that she was very pretty, and she thought he was rather handsome. As he was making change for her purchase, though, a fight broke out near the door, where Jeremy had grabbed hold of a couple of teenagers who were trying to sneak out with discs in their coats. Fortunately, a constable was just outside; unfortunately, it took so long to sort out that, as the constable left with the teens in tow, Cho left also, without her change.
About two weeks later she went back to the shop, but left almost at once when Ryan put a Metallica disc on the store's sound system. Ryan had definitely noticed this strikingly attractive woman whose tastes were absolutely unpredictable and who apparently owned no plastic and always paid in cash. She would be a much harder customer than most to get to know, so he started an experiment, watching for her to come in, then switching the music on the store system to try to find what caught her attention. He tried first by playing whatever was on Top of the Pops, not realizing that Cho wouldn't have heard any of these bands on the WWN. Then it was dance music, then modern jazz.
What finally did the trick was an accident. Cho was shuffling through some discs when Ryan was asked to preview an old, somewhat edgy jazz disc of music by George Russell. It had only been on a few seconds when Cho looked up with—and Ryan recognized it—a look of recognition; she knew this tune. More importantly, a look of fascination: she wanted to hear more! Ryan got the customer a clean copy of the disc and kept that one playing. As soon as the customer left, Cho approached the register.
"I, I know that tune," she began, rather hesitantly. "Miles Davis, isn't it?"
Ryan checked the disc; the first track, "Nardis," was still playing. "Yeh, he wrote that," he said in a kind of Cockney accent, "but this is a different arrangement."
"Very different," Cho nodded, "and I rather like it. Who's performing that?"
"Bandleader named George Russell. Interesting bloke; tried to invent his own music theory."
"Can you DO that?"
They chatted about the music for ten or fifteen minutes before Cho bought the disc and left—but not before Cho and Ryan exchanged names. The rock had finally started rolling down the hill; now it was just a matter of time.
All the little formalities followed that: longer chats about topics other than music, then about each other. Ryan was ethnically Chinese but his parents had come over to London from Malaysia; like Cho, he was the first of his family born in Britain. Cho, for her part, told just enough of her story not to violate the Secrecy Statutes; she said she'd gone to school up near the Scottish border, talked vaguely of sports as a hobby but couldn't pretend to have ever played anything Muggle; it would have been too easy to check. So those first few dates meant Cho was walking a tightrope: there was only a little she could say, and a lot that she couldn't.
Still, she mentioned that one boyfriend in school had been killed in an accident, and another had left her after a few months for somebody else.
"So, you're lookin' about, eh?"
"I hadn't thought about it," Cho said, sipping her coffee, "until recently."
At that moment, both Cho and Ryan had made up their minds to see how far this might go; Cho, however, was still on a tightrope.
So it went for a few more weeks, each one inching closer and closer to the other, until one night, at two in the morning, Penny Clearwater got a Floo call. "Penny, it's Cho."
Penelope Clearwater was in her bedroom but walked in her nightgown to the parlour where the hearth was connected to the Floo Network. She was surprised to see Cho looking like some sort of aboriginal, squatting in front of the grate, resting on the balls of her feet. Also like some sort of aboriginal, Cho was naked.
"Erm, Cho, are you all right?"
"Never better," she smiled.
"Ah. Then I suppose you and Ryan…" Cho nodded. "He's not still there, is he?"
"No, he just left. Had to drive out to Heathrow, pick up some discs from America for the shop."
"And did you, well, did he take you where you were supposed to go?"
Cho's smile broadened slightly. "We took each other. Four times."
"YOU JAMMY LITTLE THING!" Penny squealed; if she could have, she would have reached into the grate to hug Cho's image. "Well, come on, then."
"What?"
"Details! Details!"
"In a minute. I called about something serious."
"How serious?"
"Penny, have you ever told any of your friends?"
"About being a witch? Never."
"Why not?"
"Not because of the Statutes, certainly. Mostly because, well, it just never came up."
"But you could have mentioned it."
"A bit tough to work that into the conversation. 'Who do you favour in the by-election? Oh, by the way…'"
"I know," Cho sighed. "And it was one thing to have a boyfriend who was a wizard, but Ryan … well … I really love him."
"No doubts?"
"Only about what I'm going to do. I HAVE to tell him; it just doesn't seem right to keep it from him, but we've grown up hearing all these stories about Magic-Muggle marriages going wrong."
Penny yawned despite herself. "Sorry. Maybe we'll think clearer in the light of day."
"I doubt it, but can I call back later if I'm still confused?"
"Of course! If two Ravenclaw girls can't figure something out…"
"You're a great friend, Penny; thank you."
"You can thank your great friend by telling her all the DETAILS!"
xxx
They talked on and off until just after noon. Cho was determined to tell Ryan about herself, and knew it was dangerous territory. Still she felt better after talking with Penny about it.
Six o'clock that evening, Ryan knocked on Cho's door as they'd planned. All they'd agreed was that Cho would serve them another home-cooked meal and then "see what happens." Yet, as soon as Cho opened the door, they were in each other's arms, lips together as if glued. Part of Cho wanted to forget about the plan, at least for one more night. But then her apprehensions got the better of her.
"Ryan, wait. Sit down, please; we have to talk."
Ryan, looking puzzled but not annoyed yet, sat on the sofa. Cho pulled a chair away from the dining table and sat across from him.
"Ryan, I've thought about last night a lot, and, believe me, I want to be with you. But there's something you really have to know about me first. There's something about me I've been keeping from you, something that affects both of us…"
Ryan interrupted: "Oh, cripes; you're positive, ain't yeh?"
"What? NO! This isn't a disease! I mean, it's more like a genetic thing. Nobody understands it, really…"
"Cho, where are we going with this?"
"I'll just tell you, then," Cho sighed deeply. She looked down at her hands, then into Ryan's eyes. "I'm a witch."
Ryan was silent for a few seconds, then said, "You mean that lot that goes out to Stonehenge?"
"I didn't say Wiccan; I said a witch. I'm a traditional, broom riding, spell casting, mixing up potions in a cauldron witch. Been one all my life."
Again Ryan sat still, for a few seconds. Then, without the expression on his face changing a bit, he straightened one leg, pointing his foot straight at Cho.
"RYAN!"
"Go on; pull it, then. The sock's got a goat's head in a pentagram on it!"
"I'm serious!"
"Well, I can't exactly take yer word for it. Do something; something … witchy."
"No, I won't. There's nothing I can do now that you'd believe, no matter how much magic is involved. You'd probably say it was a stage illusion I'd rigged up today."
"Fine; then we can have the demonstration at my place."
"No good, for the same reason. You'd think I snuck in there today." She walked over to where Ryan was sitting and put her hands on his shoulders. "I hate being blunt about this, but: Ryan, do you love me?"
He reached up and took her hands in his. "Came as a bit of a surprise to me, but, yeh, I do."
"Then you'll have to trust me; the only way you'll believe what I say is if you step into a world that's been hidden from you: my world. A place where you can see hundreds, thousands of witches and wizards."
"What do you mean, a Black Mass?"
"No," Cho smiled, "a Quarter-Final."
"A what?"
xxx
"Good evening witches and wizards, and welcome to the first quarter-final match for this year's Quidditch Cup. It's an all-Welsh match tonight, as the Tutshill Tornados defend their league championship against the Caerphilly Catapults. The Cats are having a bang-up year so far, but nobody has ever seen this seven against the Tornados. It could be anybody's guess who catches the Snitch."
That Saturday, just at sunset, Cho and Ryan, who had spent the previous night and most of the day at a bed and breakfast in Tutshill, walked across a field to a stadium Ryan knew hadn't been there the day before when they drove down from London. Not only did they recognize her, but ticket-takers and stadium staff called Cho by name; they wanted to let her in for free, but she insisted on paying for herself and Ryan, using coins the like of which he had never seen. Cho and Ryan had brought some bottled water from town, but they bought some biscuits and cheese (from a Caerphilly cheesemaker who'd just started sponsoring the Catapults that year) and took a seat.
Cho tried to explain Quidditch to Ryan, but every time the announcer mentioned a term he didn't know, Ryan asked about it, so her explanation was rather disjointed. In the middle of that, while waiting for the match to begin, something like a Jumbotron screen appeared to hover over the pitch, and on the screen were Cho and Ryan!
"And here's a face familiar to the home crowd. Seeker Cho Chang, who helped give the team five cups in a row during her time, has come back to watch the quarter-final, and brought a right handsome friend for company. Give them both a hand, and let's try to give them a really bang-up match tonight!"
They kissed publicly—very publicly—for the first time; Ryan's head was swimming, not totally because he was trying to understand Quidditch.
Just then more than a dozen people flew into the stadium on brooms: seven in green robes, seven in powder-blue. The referee blew a whistle, and threw something golden, small and almost invisible into the night sky above the pitch.
xxx
Forty-five minutes later, Ryan still sat slack-jawed and staring straight ahead after watching his first Quidditch match. The stands were emptying, but Cho sat next to him, waiting for him to … do or say something, anything.
Finally, she asked, "Ryan, how … how do you feel?"
"How do I feel?" he said with more than a little bitterness in his voice. "I feel like Marco F***ing Polo, thanks for asking. Like I just travelled across the known world, hoping to show off the glories of European civilisation, and I get to Beijing and the guard says, 'Civilisation? Sorry, mate, but we got one of those already. But you're welcome to stop by the gift stand on your way out, maybe get some noodles.'"
"Ryan, what am I supposed to say to that?"
"I'm sorry, Cho. The truth is, yeh, I love you, and yeh, I thought a life together would be the absolute top. But I've seen all this, and it's your world, and, and, how can I compete with that? What have I got to offer?"
Cho again kissed Ryan passionately, and without the rest of the stadium watching. "You offer me that," she said softly, smiling. "You offer me your love, and I value that more than all the matches I ever played. You offer me a life with you, and I say yes, yes, Ryan, yes!"
They finally left the stadium; shortly after they did so, it vanished. "Well," Ryan said as they walked back to town hand in hand, "how are we going to work this?"
"We should be able to figure it out."
"Maybe you can stand for Parliament."
"Pull the other one, Ryan."
xxx
A/N: "We've Got Magic To Do" is, of course, the opening song of "Pippin", a show scored by Stephen Schwartz, who also wrote "Wicked" and "Godspell."
Ryan Lin is my own invention, just to be able to do something with JKR's "Cho married a Muggle" line yet have it come out with grace and dignity for all concerned.
As my readers should know by now, though, I am a hopeless Harry/Cho shipper, mainly because the Canon goes that way so very well. There are Harry/Ginny indications of course, but JKR doesn't seem as committed to them, and so neither am I.
Coming soon: another post-Hallows Epilogue, bringing Harry and Cho together again…