hogwarts school of witchcraft and wizardry - assignment 2

horology - task 3

Task 3 - Time Balls: Giant time balls were installed on top of notable observatories like Greenwich to signal a particular time of the day, which was then used by regular folks to sync their clocks and watches. Prompt: Write about losing track of something - time, a person, whatever you decide!


May 03, 1998

The exhiliration is the only thing that's keeping Hermione breathing.

If she stops too long, thinks too hard, the images from yesterday run through her mind. If she dwells on those for longer than she has to, she thinks about her previous years at Hogwarts and wishes this one was as peaceful as the others. Then, inevitably, her parents flash through her mind. (edited)

She's memorized their address, could recite it by heart. The image of their house is burned in her mind, their clueless smiles and unburdened eyes.

The next few days are hectic. She's slightly distant from everything that passes outside of her little bubble in the infirmary, where she uses her limited healing knowledge to fix broken ankles and awkward comforting skills to try and fix broken hearts. She's terrible at it, but when children's blurred eyes give her a newfound determination.

Later that night, as the moon hangs low over the sky, she drafts a letter to her parents. She knows she'll never send it - they don't know her, they don't know the things she talks about in it - but she folds it up and slides it into a makeshift envelope, writing their new address on the front. She pauses, then writes their old address in the corner as a return address.

She feels her eyes glaze over.


"Do you think…we should visit them?"

Hermione blinks. "Huh?"

"Your parents," Harry clarifies. "Like…it's been a while. We have some free time before Hogwarts starts up again. It might do you good."

She shrugs. She's a little numb to the idea of her parents now, the singe rushing through her anytime she thinks about them in their new homey house in Australia, not knowing they ever had a child.

"Hey," he continues on. "What's their address?"

She laughs. As much as she desperately wants to believe that there's a future in which she sits down with her parents at afternoon tea, talking about her academics and their lives over scones, it's just not true.

For Harry's sake, she begins rattling off the address. It's seared into her head at this point, nights of staring at it and thinking.

Then she stops, because -

Because she doesn't remember.

She only recalls their area and their street.


Three years later, two years of not thinking about Australia or her parents or Obliviating them, she only remembers the area.