Oblivious

Chapter 7: Plot of the Squib Revealed

-R-

One morning, two months later, when the mail arrives at breakfast, a large, foreign gray owl swoops down in front of Hermione, holding out its leg for her to remove the piece of parchment tied to it. She casts a quizzical look from Mum to me and settles on Dad. He nods and says, "Go on, read it." Shrugging, she removes the parchment and unrolls it. She reads it and gasps, almost dropping it into her eggs. She then turns to me with wide eyes.

"What is it, Hermione? Let me see that." I almost have to pry the note from her clenched hands. On it is written a letter in neat, even handwriting. It reads:

Dear Hermione,

I might not know exactly how this works, but if you get this, it obviously did work. I had to search all over the find one of these ruddy owl posts.

I am sorry about what happened. It was selfish of me not to take into account your feelings. You obviously love Ron very much, and I accept that. Please accept my apology, Hermione. You are my daughter, and I love you very much. If you get this, please come home to receive my personal apologies. But please, come alone. I might accept your decisions, but it still makes me nervous to have strange wizards in my home.

Love always,

Mum

I look up, as stunned as Hermione.

"What does it say?" Fred, George, and Ginny say in unison.

I read the letter to them and Mum and Dad. They, too, find this sudden change of heart surprising. Hermione rises quickly from the table, almost knocking over her chair. I drop the note and follow her, saying, "Where are you going?"

"I must go home. I can't pass up this opportunity. I must find out what was wrong with her."

Once in my room, she starts throwing things into her trunk. I grab her wrist in mid-throw, and she looks up at me for the first time. Glancing down at my hand on her arm, she says, "Let me go."

I move closer to her. "Hermione, please. Think about this. You can't just go rushing off, answering to her beck and call. That's exactly what she wants! The wedding is just weeks away. Please consider --"

"Ron! Please, let me go!" She jerks her arm out of my grasp and slams her trunk shut.

"Hermione!" I say loudly, causing her to whirl around. "Please," I continue, stepping forward and taking her hands, "please don't leave like this. I couldn't stand for you to leave like this."

The fire in her eyes immediately softens. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to snap at you." She collapses into my arms. "I love you, Ron. You know that. Never forget that, no matter what happens."

"I love you, too, Hermione. I'll be here waiting for you when you return."

She lifts her head and locks me in a passionate kiss, sending a flash of heat throughout my body. It is very rare for her to kiss me like this. All too soon, she pulls back and smiles, flushed. Gathering her things and grabbing onto her trunk, she Disapparates from my room.

~H~

When I arrive at my parents' house, I notice that I am standing outside on the lawn. Glancing around hurriedly to make sure no one saw, I ponder why I couldn't Apparate inside the house; it is almost as if there is a magical block on the house. That's ridiculous, I muse to myself, laughing at my own presumption. Stepping up to the front door, I try the knob, finding it locked. I ring the doorbell and wait for an answer. After a few moments, Mum quickly peeks out of the living room window through the curtains. Then I hear the door unlocking before me.

"Hermione, dear!" Mum exclaims, throwing open the door, an all-too-enthusiastic smile on her face.

Immediately, I know something is amiss, but I keep my suspicions quiet. I allow her to embrace me and take my trunk. Leading me inside to the living room, she insists that I sit down and relax, let her take my trunk up to my room, and bring me some food. When she returns, she's holding a tray of biscuits, a pitcher of milk, and a couple of glasses. She pours the milk and hands me a glass, insisting that I take three biscuits.

"Eat up, dear. I've read that Apparating is hard work."

I choke on the biscuit in my mouth and look incredulously at her. "Wh-what did you say?"

"Don't act so surprised. I've been reading up on the wizarding world, to see what the fuss is all about. It seems quite interesting. In fact, I have someone you should meet," she says, standing and disappearing into the kitchen momentarily. She reappears with a pale-faced man dressed in charcoal robes and matching pointed hat perched on his head. He has dark gray eyes the same shade of his robes and jet-black hair that matches his pencil-thin moustache and goatee. Something about him seems oddly familiar, something in the eyes . . .

"This is Mr. Flomay."

He holds out a black-gloved hand and says in an oily sort of voice, "It's a pleasure to meet you, Miss Granger. I have heard so much about you, being such a close friend of the famous Harry Potter. Your mother here came to me after your quarrel, desperate to come up with a way to get you back home. She loves you very much, you know."

He finally releases my hand, and I eye him warily, hovering my now-free hand over where my wand lies inside my robes. He sees this and smiles unnaturally, as if smiling causes him pain. "There is no need to feel threatened, Miss Granger."

For the first time, I notice that my father is nowhere to be seen, as the last time I was here. "Where's Dad?"

Mum smiles, almost wickedly, and says, "He is indisposed at the moment, dear."

Then, within the blink of an eye, the pale man Summons my wand from my robes, pulls out his own wand, and yells, "Petrificus Totalus!" I become paralyzed and fall to the floor.

Mum comes over and stands over me, looking down almost sadly. Then she kneels and says, "I'm sorry I've had to do this, dear. I never have been very fond of magic, but it seemed the only way to get you to realize. I have employed this gentleman to help me get you to realize. Oh, and I'm sorry, but I lied. This gentleman --" She motions to the pale man. "-- is really named Malfoy. Perhaps you know him?"

When the pale man walks over and leans over me, I see his black hair turning to blonde, his facial hair disappearing, and his bone structure morphing. All at once, Draco Malfoy is standing over me, sneering and smiling maliciously simultaneously, his silver eyes glittering malevolently.

Polyjuice potion, I think to myself. My own mother. How could she?

"You might be asking yourself how your own mother could be doing this to you," Mum starts. "There are some things you need to understand, some things I've never told you. But first, do you think that if Mr. Malfoy grants you movement again that you can keep still long to listen? If so, nod." She laughs briefly at her own joke, then the serious tone returns to her voice. "There would be no need for you to try to escape, by Apparition or otherwise; the whole house has been magically sealed, which is why you couldn't Apparate inside the house. Now, Mr. Malfoy . . ."

Malfoy seems to be taking great amusement in having such control over me, but he does as Mum requests. It takes me a few moments before I can really move again after I stretch my muscles. I sit down on the couch, keeping one eye on Mum, the other on Malfoy, who is standing over to the side with his arms crossed in front of him inside his wide robe sleeves, watching with great interest.

"Now, dear, to what I need to tell you. This may come as a bit of a shock, but your grandparents, great-grandparents, and even further back, were all wizards."

This revelation hits me like a ton of bricks. Wizards? But how can that be? Then Mum would be, too, unless she's a . . .

"Yes, my dear, I see you understand. I am a squib, a magic-less wizard, a disgrace in the eyes of all warlock-kind. The summer after I turned eleven, I was so anxious to receive my Hogwarts letter, as had my older sisters and brother before me. But it never came. 'Maybe it just got lost in the owl post,' my mum tried to reassure me. 'It's been known to happen. Or maybe they feel you're just not ready yet. That happened to a friend of mine. Let's wait until next year.'

"But it didn't come the next year either. Or the year after that. Or ever. It was determined that I was a squib. I was devastated, but my parents tried their best to console me, to say it wasn't my fault. I couldn't stand the disgrace of it all and ran away when I was fourteen. A Muggle orphanage took me in until I turned seventeen and was released as an adult.

"When I met your father two years later, I thought I would be able to live a normal life, albeit as a Muggle. We had you almost immediately, and you were the light of my life. Things were going perfectly, until you turned eleven and received your Hogwarts letter. I didn't let on, but I was wildly bitter about it. 'How could it be?' I asked myself. 'Why couldn't I have gotten the magic, too?' I just didn't understand. As you know, I didn't want you to go, but your father took up for you. I was out-voted, but that didn't mean that I had to be happy about it. And I wasn't at all.

"When you graduated, I thought it was all over, that I could finally get past that disgrace. But you went off and found a wizard to marry, and I had had enough. When you left, I vowed that I would find a way to keep you from having the life I had always wanted. One day when I was in Knockturn Alley, I ran across Mrs. Malfoy, Draco's mother. She and I had been close as children, as our parents had been good friends. We chatted a bit, and she mentioned that she had a son who said that he knew you. I went to him, and he agreed to help me. He schemed up this whole plan, and I set it into action by delivering that letter, which leads us to where we are now."

"The next step in this plan," Malfoy speaks up eagerly, "is to get rid of Weasley. Having taken a sample of your handwriting from some of your Transfiguration notes and purchasing this Handwriting-Emulating Quill --" He pulls an acid green feather and a roll of parchment out of his robes. "-- all I have to do now is allow the quill to absorb your handwriting, like so." He puts the quill onto the parchment, and it soaks up all the ink from the parchment. "Now, all I have to do is write with this quill, and anything I write will come out in your handwriting." He demonstrates on the parchment, writing, "Dear Ron."

He cackles maniacally, kneeling down and placing the quill and parchment down on the coffee table. "Now watch as I rid you of that redheaded pest and his whole destitute clan." He places the quill against the parchment again and continues to write. When he's finished, he hands it to Mum to read, smiling that foul smile of his. "Is this satisfactory, Mrs. Granger?" I read over her shoulder:

Dear Ron,

I am writing you this letter just to let you know that I am not coming back. I don't intend you marry you, nor did I ever. I never had any feelings for you; I never loved you. It was all an act to get back at my one and only true love. I felt that if I could just convince myself to follow through with this marriage that I could forget about him. But I just can't force myself into a union in which I feel nothing. He came to me and finally professed his love and asked me to marry him. The moment that happened, the wedding token you had given me became visible and fell off my finger.

Don't try to contact my family or me. Please forward this request to Harry and Ginny and anyone else who might try. I am closing myself off from the entire wizarding world and will have a partial Memory Charm placed on me to make me forget about the past seven years, to forget all about you, Harry, and everyone else. So even if you do try to contact me, I won't remember you. Don't waste your and my time.

Hermione

After Mum finishes reading the letter, she looks at Malfoy and smiles. "This is quite satisfactory, Draco. Would you please make sure this gets to Mr. Weasley? Hermione and I have business to take care of."

He bows deeply. "Yes, Ma'am." With that, he disappears with a pop.

Mum turns to me, smiling with what normally would be a warm smile. "Now, dear, you were inquiring about your father?"