Sorry I haven't updated in so long. I've been busy with work and am actually moving out of home this weekend so I haven't had a lot of time to write for this story. I have now ever been writing some new material which will be posted over the next couple of weeks.
A couple of people have messed me recently about this story so here is an update. I'm sorry it took so long to get back on track but I know where I'm going with it now and have an ending in sight!
Please se forgive any spelling errors or horrible grammar as I don't have a beta and am really just too lazy to actually go through and check it myself it may get done in the future when my laptop is repaired, but for right now I'm on an iPad and typing on this mother fucker is annoying.
Enjoy the instalment. The next should be in about two weeks so stay tuned!
It was Christmas time and Hermione didn't know how the time had passed so fast. She had been in the past for three months now and she'd already found herself in a relationship with a marauder, friends with Harry's mother and totally in over her head. She had no idea how she hadn't let something important slip yet. Like how Sirius was going to spend twelve years in prison or that lily and James were going to die at the hands of Voldemort. She found that all these secrets, all these things that, if she told anyone, would change the time line, were at the tip of her tongue all day long.
.It was getting more and more difficult not to tell them what she knew. She was getting more involved with them, becoming more attached to them and she knew things that would break them if she said something. And if she didn't say anything and she went back to her time, what would Remus and Sirius think? Would they hate her for holding the information that could have saved them so much heart ache and pain? Would they hold it against her? Would they never talk to her again? Had they already known her from their past? Or was it as she went through their past that new memories were created? There were so many questions that she didn't have the answers to and it made her frustrated all the time.
"Hermione are you coming?" Asked a soft bight voice that belonged to Lily Evans. Hermione looked up to see the green eyed woman that would soon become her best friends mother and smiled.
"Yeah, I was just finished packing." She said as she clicked shut the trunk that Poppy had been so kind as to led to her. She stood up and flicked her wand so that her trunk floated up into the air and followed her as they both made their way out of the castle and to the carriages that would take them to the hogsmead train station.
"So James tells me that you're spending the holidays with him and Sirius." Lily said and Hermione just nodded. She was still stewing over her earlier thoughts concerning her secrets, so didn't really feel like talking.
"You seem nervous. Don't worry though, James's parents are lovely. Dorea is the sweetest woman you'll ever meet and Charlus is so charming and kind. They'll love you i just know it." Lily said and Hermione couldn't help but wonder how she was so optimistic all the time. Hermione found it refreshing though, and she loved that lily always had a positive spin on any bad situation. It always seemed to lift her pessimistic spirits.
"You're right. Thanks Lily." Hermione said, not mentioning that she wasn't nervous about meeting the potters. She didn't really want to be coerced into telling the red head all her secrets, as she had been about more menial things these past months. She found it disturbing how good lily was at getting information out of people, some might think she was using the imperious curse or veritascerum.
They got onto the train soon after and sat in a carriage with the marauders. Hermione was sitting next to Remus, her head on his shoulder and tracing patterns on his hand sitting in her lap. He was talking with Sirius and James about some prank they were planning and lily was reading. Hermione didn't know where Peter was, and right now she really didn't care. She didn't want this to end. And she knew it would. She would find a way home and then she would have to leave them all to their fate and who knows how they'll treat her when she returns to her time. She was dreading it, especially the thought of lily and James. She would get to see them grow into amazing people and parents and she would never see them again if she returned. It made her want to cry.
"Hey, what's wrong?" Remus whispered as he wrapped an arm around her shoulder and kissed her hair.
"Nothing, nothing." Hermione said, wiping the tears that had fallen down her cheeks.
"You smell of distress, frustration and sadness Mia. Of course there's something wrong." Remus said and Hermione sighed. She should know better than to try lying to another werewolf. Hermione hated that he could rad her so easily, though she could do the same to him.
"Just thinking about home." She said and Remus squeazed her shoulder sympathetically.
"Don't worry little Mia. I'll keep you distracted." He said and Hermione couldn't help the smile that graced her lips at the thought of what his distraction might entail.
"Thank you Remus." She said and he smiled down at her.
They arrived at kings cross faster than Hermione would have liked and then James was hurrying her way from Remus, towards his parents.
From afar, they looked like an elderly couple, though you could still see the youthful aura surrounding them. Mrs potter was taller than Hermione head imagined and had darker features, more reminiscing of the blacks than anything Hermione associated with the potters. She was all elegance and grace, and Hermione was slightly reminded of sirius's mother portrait at Grimmauld place when the woman wasn't speaking or looking sour, though Mrs potter radiated friendliness that Mrs Black obviously didn't have.
Mr Potter was the spitting image of James,and Hermione knew that this was were the genes were passed from. Hermione could just imagine that this is what Harry would look like when he aged too and it made Hermione smile.
"And you must be Hermione. We've heard a lot about you my dear." mr Potter said stepping forward to greet her with a shake of his hand. Hermione shook it with a smile thought nervous it was.
"Thank you for having me for the holidays Mr Potter. I'm very greatful." Hermione replied to which the charming man chuckled.
"No worries love. And call me Charlus." He said with a wink and Hermione couldn't help but look at James and raise an eyebrow, questioning the similar actions. He just shook his head in exasperation at his fathers antics.
"And you must call me Dorea as well. I couldn't bear it if you called me Mrs Potter. It reminds me to much of Charlus's mother and I honestly can't stand the awful woman." Dorea said, taking Hermione is a hug that caught her unawares. Hermione stiffened at the unexpected contact, still jumpy from her newly instilled lycanthropy but settled into it as she took in a deep breath. Dorea smelt like wild flowers and peppermint tea, just like her own mother did and Hermione couldn't help but feel like crying at the thought of her mother.
When Dorea pulled back to see that she was so distressed she frowned in confusion.
"What ever is the matter dear? I've never known my hugs to cause someone to cry before." She said gently, taking her cheek in her hand and caressing her lightly.
"I'm sorry, you just smell like my mother." She said as she wiped away her tears and laughed at the oddness of her statement. Dorea laughed to.
"Ah, I heard what happened to them, I'm so sorry for your lost. Feel free to smell me any time you wish." She said with a gleam in her eyes as he tapped her nose knowingly. Hermione looked over at James, wondering if he'd told them about her condition.
"Alright then lads, you get the trunks while Hermione and I get to know each other." Dorea demanded and wound her arm through Hermione's, pulling her forward and out of the station, not waiting for a reply.
With all the energy that the older woman had, Hermione would have never known she was nearer to sixty years old than thirty.
They got to the Potter mansion in record time, apperating into the driveway. Hermione fell in love with the place almost instantly. The white building stood proud with the windows outlined with dark brown wooden frames. There was a forest behind the house and a nice garden out the front full of flowers. Hermione guessed that Dorea spent a lot of time tending to them and that was why she smelled like them.
"It's beautiful." Hermione said and all of the Potters smiled fondly at the house.
They made their way inside and the boys showed her up to a spare room then left her to get settled in. Soon after she found herself wandering around the house, sticky eating if you will.
"Hermione, is that you?" Asked a voice that Hermione identified as Charlus. She poked her head through the door his voice had come from and then gapped in awe. She had found the library and it was glorious. Shelves and shelves of books lined the walls and rows up on rows filled up the space of the room, with only a opulent of arm chairs and a fire place in one corner. Charlus was reading in one of the chairs, looking quite snug with his legs tucked up underneath him and a blanket over his lap.
"Ah there you are. James mentioned in one of his letters that you like books almost as much if not more than Remus and lily. What do you think?" He asked and Hermione just beamed at him as she sat down in one of the other chairs.
"It's wonderful." She said.
"I'm glad you think so." He said. Closing his book and setting it in his lap.
"What are you reading?" She asked him and he smiled a bit
"The theory and practice of time travel in the modern world." He said and Hermione raised her eyebrows.
"That sounds interesting. Do you have many books on time travel?" She asked and he nodded.
" I work in the time room at the ministry so it's my job to have books on the subject. I'm currently writing one actually. It's about theoretical return. If you travel back in time, can you return to your original or do you have to wait until time catches up to you. It's all very interesting to research." He said and Hermione's eyes widened.
It was just her luck that she'd run into someone that was studying the exact thing she needed to do in order to return home.
"Hermione!" A voice yelled as two boys ran into the room with huge smiles on their faces. Before Hermione could ask any more questions, she was dragged away...