~ Chapter 1 – A New Life ~
This is now Hermione's life, the life she would have made for herself if she had never got her Hogwarts letter all those years ago:
No longer Hermione Granger, with the big bushy brown hair; she was now Jennifer Parker, the large curls had been replaced with straight, long, caramel-coloured locks (Muggle substitutes for magic were often less than impressive compared to the Wizarding way, but hair straighteners were an ingenious exception). She was now living in a small coastal village, where she owned a small cafe, complete with a library-come-bookshop at one side of the small establishment – something she had dreamed of running when she was a young girl, long before she discovered she was a witch.
Robin Hood's Bay was a small Yorkshire village on the east coast of England, and had always been Hermione's favourite holiday place ever since she was a child; somewhere she had always dreamed of someday settling there, starting up her own business. She had wanted a complete clean break from everything that had contributed tor her parents', and Ron's, death, and this was the perfect opportunity.
Over the ten years, Hermione, or as she is now known: Jennifer, had become fully integrated into the community: everybody knew her, everybody loved her, even summer regulars saw her as a friend they must visit upon their arrival into the Bay. For ten years Jennifer lived as if magic didn't exist, happily immersed in everyday Muggle life; but however much one denies, however much one ignores the painful memories of the past, they will never completely disappear. For that which does not want to be hidden shall always find a way to appear.
With the cleaning finished, the store locked up and everything ready for opening the next day, Jennifer entered the apartment above her beloved store, thinking about taking a long, very well deserved, hot bath. As she reached the hallway of her home, Crookshanks (feeling somewhat neglected, as today had been extremely busy, leaving Jennifer no time to attend to his idle want for attention) ran to Jennifer's side and began constantly curling around her ankles mewing softly.
"I'm sorry Crookshanks, it's midsummer, you know how busy we get. And look at the time! You must be starving." A certain style of 'mew' signalled Crookshanks' agreement.
"Well, lets get you some dinner then, and something for myself come to think of it" she added as her stomach gave a particularly loud growl.
Crookshanks, instead of going to the kitchen as he usually did, made his way into Hermione's bedroom, to the wall length mirror hung at one end, and began scratching, loud enough to be heard from the other room; this odd behaviour had been getting more frequent these past few weeks.
"Crookshanks" Jennifer said with a sigh, hearing from the kitchen, and knowing exactly what the intelligent feline was doing, "how many times? stop that, you're not getting back there. I'm not getting back there. It's sealed for a reason, I'm a Muggle now, so we do things, all things, the Muggle way."
Sometimes, Jennifer missed 'being Hermione' she missed the friends she left behind. And sometimes it's just so much easier to summon things than having to move. She missed the reliability of owl post, (the Muggle post not as efficient as it used to be). But Jennifer's life was definitely a lot less complicated and chaotic; now she had a strict routine, up at 7am, cafe open at 9, a whole day of earning a living and catching up on what little gossip a small village has to offer, then closing up at 6-30 in the evening and getting ready to do the whole thing again. So it had been for nearly ten years, today had been no different, and tomorrow was expected to be the same, as was every day to follow.
What Jennifer didn't know was that the winds were about to change, and her simple existence was going to get just a little more complicated.