Never the Twain Shall Meet

One of the first things Marcus did when he graduated was see a magical dentist and get his rather animalistic teeth fixed. Due to the 'teeth healer', as she called herself, his face became less snarling and more stoic.

She also took the time to fix his eye brows by spelling the uni-brow into two eye brows as was the norm.

He let his hair grow a bit, but not too much and kept in shape. His college years were so different from his Hogwarts days. Then it was all about Slytherin, Quidditch and war; no time for play (by play I mean witches).

At university, he was fighting them off with a stick. He knew he wasn't handsome in the traditional sense and he could still be rather crass, but his size and reservation made him overly attractive to the softer gender. He took the opportunity to bed as many willing birds as possible. Pucey was a proud man… or so he told Marcus often enough.

These days Marcus found himself having a late dinner with the Grangers more often than not. Sometime he didn't see Pucey for days. They both worked late into the evening and with Marcus additional training and study, he sometimes didn't go to sleep until the wee hours of the morning.

He enjoyed dinners with the affectionate couple. Mr. Granger – David, was fair, direct and tolerant of his intern. Marcus respected the man immensely. David's kind smile to his patients and quick expertise when working on their teeth with skilled dexterity had, even the frightened children coming back regularly… and without tears; though Marcus had seen on one occasion with a particularly obstinate brat, David bitten. The demon's… ahem, child's teeth had pierced the skin and David had needed stitches.

He surprised Marcus that day while at the hospital, instead of calling his wife he called his daughter, Mya.

Marcus could hear the girl giggle over the phone and ask if he was ok.

Marcus smirked at the tender smile his mentor wore as he spoke to his daughter.

He chuckled when he heard her ask her father if Marcus was bitten as well by the 'snot nosed monster' and if he was alright.

David assured her that he was the only injured party and that Marcus was doing well.

Janey teased him for several days afterward about his 'near death experience'. She teased him during the day at work, in front of patients and during dinner, her humor over the event was insatiable.

She even called Mya one night during dinner when David accidently poked the stitches with his fork.

He hissed in pain provoking a fit of giggles from his wife.

She promptly whipped out her phone and quickly relayed the happenings to her daughter; putting the phone on speaker, the two Granger women giggled and giggled at their beloved patriarchs' distress.

Marcus thought Mya had a pretty laugh. It turned out to be infectious as well, because he ended up chuckling too; he tried to fight it, but in the end lost the battle.

He was particularly drawn to Mrs. Granger. She was warm and caring and treated him like he fit in there. She told him shortly after they hired him that she felt like she was the son she'd always wanted, but couldn't have.

He had been unable to respond due to the lump in his throat at the time. No one in his past had ever been glad to have him around, with the exception of his friends.

She spoke of her daughter often giving Marcus the feeling that she was up to something.

He didn't mind though, he felt himself becoming more and more ingrained into the Granger way of life and he couldn't say he didn't relish the feeling of belonging as well as liking the idea of this woman… quickly becoming a mother figure to him though he would never admit it out loud; fussing over him and worrying for his welfare.

Marcus found himself envying this close-knit family of three. Even though their daughter was attending a boarding school far away, they never failed to keep her informed and she always called them letting them know what she was up to or if something happened.

They were so open with each other; it was a completely foreign feeling for Marcus.

The first time he spoke to Mya she had called the office and her parents were not available, so she, instead of hanging up, chatted him up instead.

"Granger Dentistry, This is Marcus May I help you?" he answered.

Pause, "Hello?" he prompted.

"Hi Marcus, it's Mya… Granger. David and Janey's daughter?" she asked tentatively making him chuckle. She has a nice voice he thought.

"Yes ma'am, I've heard." He said his voice deep and smooth, not wanting to end the conversation just yet.

"Oh, well are either of them available?"

"No, I'm sorry, they both have patients. May I take a message?" he asked twirling the pencil around in his fingers.

She sighed, "No, I was just bored, I have a break between classes." She said

"Which classes?" he asked.

He heard her quick intake of breath and wasn't sure if it was a good thing (he was amenable to relieving her boredom) or a bad thing (she didn't want to talk to a stranger)… in the next moment it proved to be good, because she started talking and didn't let up for ten minutes.

He found himself leaned over the counter, phone to his ear with a goofy smile plastered on his face listening to her melodic voice telling him about her snarky chemistry teacher, who she had for three hours straight three times a week; her group of friends preen and primp trying to gather the attentions of the opposite sex; her former best friends who took every opportunity to glare and judge her and her current preening group of friends; the fact that she was the female part of student body president.

She explained that there were two; a girl and a boy and they were constantly running interference between long standing rivalries inside the student body.

She added that the male part of the student body presidents was something a kin to a Greek God in the looks department, he was prettier than most of the girls in the school and had both female and male students swoon at the very mention of his name.

He had laughed at that and asked if she swooned as well.

She huffed and said, "He whines… a lot." This had him laughing all the more.

He thought it all sounded a lot like Hogwarts and mentally shrugged thinking it wasn't so different from a regular muggle school after all.

"Do you have someone you swoon over then?" he asked completely out of character for him, but he did it anyway.

She sighed again, "No." she sounded like she wanted to say more on the subject but instead, "I should let you go, I haven't let you get a word in edgewise, Marcus." She said.

He liked the way his name sounded in her voice.

He chuckled, "I liked listening." He said.

He was suddenly curious, "What do you look like Mya?"

"A book worm" she answered too quickly.

He furrowed his brows, "You realize I'm picturing a green worm with round glasses poking its head out of a hole from inside a red apple holding a book with two tiny little arms and white gloves on its hands, right?"

She laughed outright at his description, "Well then I'll leave you with that picture in your mind. Bye Marcus."

He snorted amused, "Bye Mya." He said and hung up the phone.

He turned to find Janey standing in the hallway grinning from ear to ear.

Before he could come up with something to say that would put an end to all of her dreams of matchmaking, she turned and bounced to her husbands office shutting the door.

"Oh boy." He said resigned and opened the book in front of him detailing the finer points of lip reconstruction.

Most of the regular patients were used to his size by now so he hadn't accidently made any children scream in terror as of late, but he still found many staring at him unabashedly and it made him uncomfortable.

A few times Janey walked in to find someone blatantly staring and Marcus shifting his feet not knowing what to do.

Her warm manner came to the rescue, with a gentle touch to his forearm and a smile to the perpetrator staring, she would ask, "Can I get you anything?"

A week after the phone conversation with Mya he received a letter mixed in with the general office mail. It was from Mya.

He opened it eagerly, but not too eagerly and smiled when he unfolded a picture of a little green worm poking its head from a hole inside a red apple. It had round black glasses a toothy smile and in its tiny arms was an upside down book.

The bottom of the page had elegant script that read:

Just so you don't forget!

He taped it to the wall in his small office that the Grangers had surprised him with only a few weeks before.

Janey walked in the day after, smiled at him for standing when she entered and stopped when she saw the picture, "Awww that's cute. Who's it from?" She asked though he had a sneaking suspicion she knew exactly who it was from.

"Mya. She said she looked like a bookworm, so…" he said feeling the need to explain.

Janey nodded trying to hide her excitement, "Yes, she is quite… studious. She's coming for the Halloween weekend."

Silence.

Janey sighed in mock imposition, "we'll have dinner, but that weekend is always busy for us. Maybe you two could hang out a bit… you know so she won't be so bored. She doesn't have many friends here her age; I would consider it a personal favor." She added.

He just gawked at her… he was almost positive Janey Granger would have been placed in Slytherin had she been a witch. He wondered how much Mya knew of her mothers scheming.

"Of course." he replied.

He wanted to meet her, but he wasn't sure he wanted to hang out with her for any length of time. It was tiresome keeping his magic a secret so when he was off he usually stayed in wizarding London with Pucey, Malfoy and Zabini.

The woman, he had come to see as a second mother – as much as she worried over him- clapped and smiled flouncing out of his office to her own.

He groaned quietly and dropped his head to the desk, What did I just get myself into?