It took two attempts at the spell-lifting charm to bring Jean Granger back into existence. She kept flapping around like a wet hen when two psychologically unstable British youths seemed to have reduced her husband to a gibbering wreck with a wooden stick. Needless to say, she joined him in the emotional outpour three minutes later, when Robert Granger was right as rain.

At least, he was no longer shaking.

The receptionist came in twenty minutes of sobbing and unintelligible slurry mid-wail utterances with a tray of mugs of coffee and a deeply concerned look on her face, as though she'd found a Rocky Horror drag parade in the surgery. She cautiously balanced the coffees on the instrument tray and left, nodding nervously to Ron, who was the only person in the room who was not on the floor in a blubbering heap.

Twenty minutes was how long it took for Hermione's parents to snap into entirely different mental states.

Jean Granger stood up and, out of nowhere, commanded "sit."

Hermione, whose eyes were pink and whose face was wet, looked puzzled. "Mum?"

"I said sit."

Hermione gulped and hauled herself off the floor. She slid into the dentists' chair, her eyes locked on her mother. She did not lean back.

Mrs Granger took a deep breath. "I want to know what you did to me and your father."

Hermione grimaced. "Mum, look, it's..."

"No, you look," she said firmly. "I want to know what you did to me and your father. Whatever it was, I know it was you. I want to know what it was and why you did it. Please don't sugar-coat the details. I have a right to know why my husband and I forgot we had a daughter."

Her voice didn't break, but wateriness returned to her eyes. Hermione looked shocked.

"We..." she croaked. "We... I... I did it to keep you safe."

"Did what?"

Hermione gulped. "Erased me from your memories."

Mrs Granger flinched, as though her stomach had churned. She didn't say anything for a long few seconds. She merely breathed deeply.

"Why... did you to that, Hermione?"

"To protect you," she said firmly.

Mrs Granger was visibly shaking now. "I'm afraid I don't understand."

Another tear slid down Hermione's cheek.

Mrs Granger's hand twitched. Ron's did too, instinctively. Man or woman, if anybody hurt Hermione, he wasn't going to stand by and let it happen. Not anymore.

"And... you sent us to Australia... why?"

Hermione was shrinking away from her. "They were going to torture you."

The coffee and dental instruments went flying across the room in an instant, with a loud crash, as Mrs Granger's fist smashed against the tray.

"THIS IS THE PROBLEM I HAVE, HERMIONE!" she shrieked at her cowering daughter. "I DON'T KNOW WHO "THEY" ARE, BECAUSE YOU NEVER TELL ME! WHY DOES A BUNCH OF PEOPLE WANT TO TORTURE ME, WHEN I HAVE NEVER DONE ANYTHING?! WHAT DID YOU DO TO GET US INTO THIS MESS?!"

"HEY!" barked Ron, coming to stand in between Mrs Granger and his daughter. "That's not fair. You can't expect Hermione to explain seven years worth of struggle in a few sentences. Calm down."

Mrs Granger stared at him, bewildered. Then she looked to Hermione. "Who the hell is this?!"

"Ron," she said weakly. Ron feared for her. She didn't sound right, but he daren't spare a glance towards her. Her mother was sizing him up.

"You've got a nerve intervening in my family affairs, boy," she said in a low voice.

"Just looking after Hermione," said Ron quickly. "I didn't want her to come to Australia alone... never wanted to intervene."

Mrs Granger was standing tall now. Not quite as tall as Ron but still, Ron got the impression that she'd taken this stance before.

Light danced in her welling tears as she trembled. "You're with her."

It meant more than it sounded. Ron nodded, making a conscious effort to keep eye contact.

Tears fell from Mrs Granger's eyes. "Did they hurt her?"

Ron said nothing. He couldn't lie. Not after all of this.

His silence answered her question. A sob escaped her. "What did they do?"

"Mum, please-" began Hermione, standing up.

"No..." Mrs Granger whimpered, taking a step back from both of them. As she did so, she seemed to shrink into the meek woman she used to be. Small and despairing.

"Mum, please let me explain..." Hermione's voice was on the verge of breaking too. "You don't understand how hard it was for me to-"

"You wait 'til you're a mother, Hermione!" Mrs Granger squeaked. "You never forget the day you meet your baby! It was the best day of my life, you know! And do you know what I remember? I remember looking into your eyes and promising that I'd never stop loving you and now I've spent a whole year not knowing or caring if you were safe or happy..."

Mrs Granger, tears pouring down her face, sobs wracking her body, stumbled out of the room and down the corridor. Hermione stared after her, stunned at the catastrophe of this reunion.

Ron remembered the fourth member of the party and whirled round, only to find Robert Granger sitting on the floor still, his face a sickly shade of grey.

"You OK, Mr Granger?" he asked dumbly.

Ron saw Hermione spin back round to watch her father's reaction eagerly. This day could get worse, and it all depended on Mr Granger.

Mr Granger blinked slowly, like a drowning man sinking into his final sleep. "We have another child. He was our world this morning," he said numbly.

"He still can be, Dad..." Hermione whimpered, her face contorting as she fought back more tears. "and..." she trailed off.

"Our lives will never be the same again," mused Mr Granger.

Ron didn't wait to gauge Hermione's reaction. He just shuffled across the floor over to her and threw an arm around her waist. She kept crying, but gripped Ron's arm tightly, like the harness on a roller coaster.

Her knees buckled and Ron sank to the floor with her in front of Mr Granger, but then Mr Granger sniffed and shrugged. "Oh well. Lots to be done."

Hermione fell silent.

"What?" asked Ron.

"Where are you staying, you two?"

"Er..."

"In a... tent."

He glanced between them. "Ah."

He wasn't delirious. He seemed to be weighing things up in his mind. Then, he nodded to himself and used the dentists' chair to pull himself up to standing. Hermione and Ron followed, amazed but cautious.

Mr Granger looked straight at his daughter. "This young man's right, Hermione," he said calmly, re-adopting his British accent. His memories of fatherhood in England must've flooded back by now. "It'll take more than a discussion over coffee to explain what's been going on. I just... I'm... sorry."

Hermione blinked rapidly. "You're sorry?!"

Mr Granger nodded.

"What for?!"

Mr Granger waved her off. "Go and find your mother. She'll be round the back. This young man is staying with me."

"Daddy-"

"I'm fine, darling. Talk to your mother. She's a tricky one."

Ron tried desperately not to whine like a lost puppy as Hermione charged from the room.

oOo

The room was silent for a horribly long time. Mr Granger sat in the chair with his face in his hands. Ron didn't dare disturb him. If it had been him, he'd have fainted or screamed or done something equally embarrassing. That's why he was waiting for Hermione' dad to crack like his wife had.

"Sorry, lad," mumbled Mr Granger. He rubbed his face and sat up. "Rough day at the office."

Ron laughed unnecessarily loudly: compensating for Mr Granger's missing hysteria.

"I... feel like I should be waiting until... I don't know, until this madness starts to make a bit more sense before doing the embarrassing Dad speech. Maybe I'll wait. Oh, I don't know..." Mr Granger sighed.

He looked back up at Ron. "Where's the other one, then?"

"Er... other what, Sir?"

Mr Granger chuckled. "There's no need for "Sir", Ron, it's just 'Robert'. The other boy. There were always two of you as I recall. Then again, my memory isn't what it once was..." he chuckled again.

Ron smiled.

"Harry, wasn't it? The important one... is he alright?"

Ron swallowed, trying hard to ignore the painful stab in his gut at Mr Granger's choice of words.

Mr Granger smiled. "You know what I mean. The Special One. The Godly One. Whatever your lot used to call him..."

Ron smirked amusedly. "The Chosen One."

"Ah yes. What a load of toss."

Ron laughed.

Mr Granger sighed. "I suppose I shouldn't comment. I haven't a clue about how things in your world work. Maybe The Chosen One means something significant over there..."

Ron swallowed. "It's the same world, Mr Granger. We all... we all live in the same world. We're not as separate as you might think."

Mr Granger gave him a funny look. "You've got it bad for her, boy."

Ron blushed, to his mortification, and shrugged. "Yeah I do. But they're my beliefs anyway. It's how I was raised, you know."

Mr Granger smiled. "Believe it or not, I remember your parents."

Ron raised his eyebrows. "Yeah?"

"Yup. Excellent people. All of you. You, your sister, those rowdy twins..." Mr Granger chuckled. "They were arguing over whether those magic jelly beans were poisonous to muggles or not."

Ron's smile remained, to his surprise. He ached all over, of course, but it was nice to learn things about the twins. It made it feel like Fred wasn't lost forever.

"Before... before any of this happened..." began Mr Granger cautiously. "Hermione was scared. Something big was happening."

Ron said nothing.

"I know that there's plenty of time for her to tell us what was going on and... and..." Mr Granger took a deep breath. "I know there's going to be things that she doesn't want to tell us. I... I need you to be honest with me here, Ron. Do I... do I really want to know everything that happened?"

Ron looked up at him. He looked to be bracing himself. That, and almost pleading.

"Hermione's not in any danger anymore. She's safe and... fine."

Horrid images of Hermione's incessant weeping, screaming and days of numb silence assaulted his mind and he struggled to remain composed. Raw emotion leaked through the cracks and was visible to Mr Granger, who swallowed and nodded.

"I see."

"But as I said, she's fine. We all are. There's no threat any more. We... we made sure of it."

Mr Granger took a deep breath. "Sounds exciting!" he grinned, injecting a bit of humour into the conversation through irony. "I sense it'll have to wait. Speaking of which..." Mr Granger stood up and walked round to the counter at the back. Out of a drawer, he pulled out a pen and notepad. He quickly. scribbled on it.

"This is our address... bloody hell, what happened to our house in England?!"

"Er..."

"No, no, never mind," Mr Granger said quickly. "It can wait until this evening. Six o'clock. I'll cook something. Then we can ask some questions and Hermione can... she can meet our son."

Ron nodded, taking the paper from him. They both turned to go and find the women, but Hermione was already standing in the doorway.

"She doesn't want to talk to me," she said coolly. "We should leave."

oOo

A/N: Oops that was short please don't hate me.

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