She fell into Moaning Myrtle's memory quite suddenly and hit the ground hard. Hermione groaned as she stood up and looked around the world of the ghost who haunted the girls Lavatory. Myrtle had been Muggle-born which meant that both of Moaning Myrtle's parents were non-magical people. Hermione could relate to this small piece of Myrtle's history because she was also Muggle-born.
Hermione worked at the cramp in her neck when she came to a standing position from the floor of a Muggle home. The home looked as if it had all of the common essentials but Hermione didn't see any pictures of the family hanging on the walls and she didn't hear any laughter coming from any of the rooms. It appeared as if Moaning Myrtle was an only child. The living room was bare except for a gray sofa sitting in the corner. The carpet color matched the sofa and the walls were white and didn't have any adornments hanging on any of them to lighten up the area. Hermione felt the dreary environment which clung to the house like a heavy blanket and shivered.
She realized there were three people who lived in the house during the next few minutes when a younger Myrtle stepped into the living room. She had come from one of the hallway bedrooms and Hermione noticed that her pearl rimmed glasses were the only thing that sparkled in the home of the Muggle-born witch. The girl looked to be about four or five years old at the most and slightly more delicate than Hermione had remembered her. But other than her height and her more fragile younger appearance, Myrtle hadn't changed much over the years.
A woman and a man who both looked to be in there early forties entered the house suddenly and talked to each other in synchronized patterns. The woman was average in build, and she stood at about five feet seven inches. The man wore spectacles and he was about the same height as the woman with a lean physical appearance. They both held briefcases and Hermione figured they must have just come home from an office job of some sort.
It was a bit daunting when the woman walked straight through Hermione as if she were a ghost. The woman wasn't even fazed in the slightest as she placed her briefcase on the desk in the corner of the room and sat down dialing a number on one of the two phones in their home, and chattering to someone on the other end of the line in a business-like manner. No one in the room could see her, and when she said, "Hello," out loud they did not respond so they couldn't hear her either.
They could however see and hear Moaning Myrtle. The girl was in human form, no longer a ghost and she fidgeted with her hair as she went over to the woman and tugged on the sleeve of her blouse. "Mother, can you make me a sandwich please? It's already a few hours after dinner time and I'm getting hungry."
Her mother had dark hair much like Moaning Myrtle's and the same wide dark eyes, but she wore no spectacles. She talked into the phone and completely ignored her daughter, so Myrtle turned to her father. "Can someone please make me a sandwich? My stomach is getting hungry and it's making noises." As if on cue, Myrtle's stomach growled and she looked at her father who was on the second house phone and said, "See, did you hear that?"
He barely took a minute to say, "Not now Myrtle." Before he turned back to the person he was talking to on the other end of the line without missing a beat.
Myrtle sighed and said, "Alright then. I'll make my own sandwich. Why would anyone care enough to make something for me?"
Her father sighed with annoyance when he placed his hand over the speaker of the second phone in the house and glanced over at his daughter, "Myrtle didn't I say, not now? You need to be quiet when I'm talking on the phone can't you see how important this call is?"
Myrtle nodded mutely and opened the fridge. She made a peanut butter sandwich and sat at the kitchen table alone, picking at the bread and watching her mother work at the desk. Her father had moved out onto the patio in the back of the house and took the phone with him, pacing on the other side of the glass doors as he talked to his business associate. Myrtle sighed and said so quietly that Hermione thought she had heard her wrong when she said, "Am I always going to be invisible, everywhere I go?"
Hermione watched the five year old version of Moaning Myrtle sitting at the kitchen table and eating a meager meal alone and her heart ached for the poor girl. Did no one in her life, show any real affection for her? Hermione frowned at the idea and heard her mother speak up to the girl from across the room. Ah good, maybe someone was going to start paying attention to her after all.
Myrtle's mother set her phone aside and went through her briefcase as she looked with irritation at her daughter and said, "Are you forever going to be moaning about everything Myrtle? I can't hear myself think when you mumble to yourself constantly like you do, it's simply intolerable, all of that grumbling, and moaning. It's not natural."
The girl's mother rolled her eyes when her daughter mumbled something else under her breath that sounded like, "So I'm Moaning Myrtle now to you am I mother? I suppose that's suitable for you, but one thing you'll remember though, I'm not natural mother. I'm not a Muggle like you, I'm magical born and a witch."
Hermione didn't think her mother heard Myrtle's small declaration because the woman turned back to her briefcase and her work and paid no attention to the little girl at the kitchen table. Sighing a second time Myrtle said repetitively to herself, "I'm Moaning Myrtle now am I? Well then, so be it."
Hermione gasped as she felt the memory being completely torn from her. She spiraled and fell back into her own world with heart stopping abruptness. Falling onto the edges of the penseive Hermione took a moment to breath and said out loud, "So that's how she became Moaning Myrtle?"
Feeling sorry for the poor girl, she found herself wanting to know more about her. She supposed Dumbledore was right when he mentioned the small fact that a ghost had their own memories to worry about. It made sense. After all, a ghost had only the memories of what happened to them in their past life to keep them company, and Hermione was growing more curious about more of Moaning Myrtle's memories. She sneaked a peak over at the small group of glass vial's labeled Moaning Myrtle and saw that Dumbledore had left out a total of three of them for her inspection.
Hermione wondered what other heart wrenching experiences Myrtle had to endure during her short years of life. How many more people turned their backs to the girl and ignored her, acting as if she were invisible to them, already a ghost lurking in the shadows?
Her thoughts distracted her and Hermione turned back to the task at hand. She took the second vial and thought, one memory down, two more to go. She took a deep breath before she entered the next memory and thought, here goes nothing?