The Magic Umbrella

"In the meantime, in between time, ain't we got fun?"

He was walking through a grove of cherry trees, making his way slowly up and down the rows. The sun shone down on him brightly, the air was warm and clear, and there was no one in sight.

The boy sighed contentedly, his hands in his trouser pockets; looking all about. The trees seemed to emanate contentedness and the world was just right for anything. Birds sang overhead and the sun's position in the sky told him fall was far from being just around the corner.

Breathing deeply to catch the smell of the cherries once more, he found himself practically choking on something unbearably stifling; he couldn't see anymore, the sun and trees and sky were gone, but there was still the loveliest of scents and that horrible opression--

Percy jolted awake. Pale streams of early dawn fell through the bedcurtains, across the covers and onto the pillow his head was resting upon, throwing it into a shiny black mirage. And then it slowly dawned on him.

Living flat across his face, like thick, black streams of water rippling in the icy light, were the long wavy tresses of Hemmingway.

"Oh, great..." Pulling the thick strands from his face, Percy proceeded to tuck Hemmingway's hair back onto her side of the bed. And another revelation struck him. Hemmingway was not on the respective side of the bed she had been on the night before.

But then again, neither was he. They were both in the center of the bed, covers pulled up to their chins and bedcurtains pulled tight to block out the cold; Percy was very vexed at her audacity and would have woken her simply for the task of chiding her moving around all night.

Of course, it didn't help that he wasn't on his side, either, but it was still very strange to have gone to sleep the night before inched as far away from the girl as possible, only to awaken and discover she was practically slumbering with her arms thrown around his ribcage.

Percy looked down at her carefully. So she was sleeping with her arms around him, in an almost protective sort of way, but rather awkward. Sweet, nonetheless; he smiled down at her, wistful, and almost didn't catch himself bending his head to see if her hair really smelled like cherries.

He pulled back almost instantly, feeling guilt, regret, and something he couldn't quite place, but was very sharp. It was definitely not a Percy-ism, and the feeling of uncertainty and uneasiness grew until he remembered he was trying to get away from her.

Percy winced and tried to free himself from her. She had her arms around him very tight, it was true, but he surely didn't want to wake her. He tactfully attempted to slide out from her clasp, but her arms tightened their hold and it was not possible.

"Oh, come on, dear...your boss needs his arm back--heh, heh...no, no--no, must have it back! Ye--Come on! Yes, let go of me! Theeere you go...no, that way! Silly girl..." Percy was about to swing his feet onto the floor and throw open the curtains in celebration of his freedom from Hemmingway when he heard something very peculiar, and turned his head.

Leaning closer to her face, he detected signs of a faint smile on her lips. She was giggling, trying very hard not to, but failing miserably. He sighed, disgusted, and shoved her over to the other side of the bed. Hemmingway's giggles turned into full-out, uncontrollable laughter very quickly.

"Why did you do that?" he asked insistently, trying hard not to laugh with her commotion. She wiped a few tears from her eyes and coughed.

"Oh, I'm so sorry, Sir." She laughed. "You have the oddest looking cowlick, I'm sorry!--I couldn't help but laugh!" He irritably reached up to jerk the cowlick out. She laughed again and threw open the bedcurtains on her side of the bed.

"Isn't it lovely!" she cried, stretching her arms upward and moving to the window.

"What's lovely?" asked Percy carefully, still sitting on the covers while cleaning his glasses on his dressing robe.

"Why, the morning, of course!" she replied, spinning to smile contentedly at him and then turn back to the window. The sunlight fell across her face and into her arms, almost like a Madonna and Child, thought Percy as he watched her.

Did she know he had been watching her feign sleep? The thought of any distinction in her mind between a struggle to get away from her and amicable dazedness from just having woken up sent cold spells throughout his nerves.

In any case, he was finally going home after having spent 48 hours under her blue and watchful eyes. Percy was about to start packing his things when Hemmingway, not turning from her post at the window, said,

"You know, sir, the train isn't running today." He stopped folding his shirt.

"What?"

"The train's not running."

"And why not?" he said, arms akimbo. She didn't frown, but oddly enough, wasn't smiling.

"The conductor went home to eat his Boxing Day breakfast. It's a holiday. I'm surprised we got on the train yesterday at all."

"Oh, bully for him, then. We'll Apparate." A thought suddenly occured to him.

"Wait...if we took the train yesterday...but it isn't running today and we have to Apparate, why didn't we Apparate here yesterday?" There was a long pause.

"Because, Sir," said Hemmingway with a sigh, "Hogsmeade is Apparition-proof. There are magical and invisible walls around it." She shrugged.

"However you look at it, Sir, we're on vacation. Wouldn't you rather go visiting in Hogsmeade than go back to work?"

"Who would I visit in Hogsmeade?" said Percy, hurrying about the room and collecting his things, "I don't know anyone here, they're all at Hogwarts and don't particularly care to see me, anyway." He became aware of the fact that Hemmingway was watching him very closely as he darted from one side of the room to the other.

"Are you sure? Don't you want to go ice skating? I hear the pond's lovely."

Percy stopped dead in the middle of the room. Ice skating. There was one thing he didn't have to try hard to be good at, and that was it; it brought back a few memories too many of the pre-Percy days. He looked quickly out the window at the now full sun on the horizon. Apparition only took a few minutes, they had all day.

What did he have to lose?

*****

"I cannot believe you talked me into this."

"What do you mean, I talked you into this? I believe you were the one who suggested it in the first place, Hemmingway. Now come out of there." He heard her sigh softly from behind the partition in the shop. The store bell clanged as a few more skaters entered, chattering and rosy cheeked.

Percy had long since donned a light blue pair of speed skates, and was now waiting for Hemmingway to put her skates on. He was very curious as to why she seemed so shy, but was absolutely determined he would go ice skating within the next 24 hours.

"But I look awful!" she cried, "I can't believe they make us wear these stupid skirts. It's far too short and I really don't like it!" Percy sighed. Since when were girls so picky about themselves? Oh, now he remembered. Since the beginning of time.

"You wear it because you skate. Now, come out."

"No."

"Hemmingway--"

"It's too short!"

"At least come out and let me see whatever it is you've got on, for crying out loud. Please," he said when she tried to protest. At last, though, she seemed to consent and he heard the curtain being yanked quickly back. He turned around, saying,

"You look fi--" and stopped short, doing a sort of double take. For there, standing in the doorway, inspecting her three-quarters sleeves irritatedly, stood Hemmingway. But it wasn't really Hemmingway, thought Percy. She wasn't the secretary anymore. She was...he couldn't think of a word to describe what she was, from pearl white and silver ice skates to tan hose and simple blue skating skirt.

"You're right, it's awful," she said sharply when she looked at him, taking his astonishment for agreement in her indignancy. She was quite wrong, he thought. It was a stunning combination.

"No, no! It's...quite nice," he said, watching her turn around and inspect the backs of her skates.

"Well, I suppose it should be alright, it's not as though I'm the greatest skater ever." She gave her skate ties one last tug, and stood to go with him to the ice. Percy started across the room, but stopped when he realized she wasn't following him. He turned.

"What?" he said, curious. She was giving him a strange look; her head tilted to one side, as if he were walking funny. "What's wrong?" Hemmingway shook her head suddenly.

"Nothing, come on." Percy shrugged as she strode past him to the pond outside.

Surprisingly, there were very few people on the ice when they finally reached it. It was just as Percy remembered it from Hogsmeade trips on Saturday, wide in both directions and facing the edge of town, away from any houses or shops.

Sighing and watching his breath float away in a white encompassing cloud, Percy struck out onto the ice for the first time in a long time, he had to admit. Ah, speed skating. He had never taken real lessons of course, the only way Percy had ever discovered he was remotely good at it was the time the twins tricked him into going to the top of Mount Dismemberment (as they had coined it), the first time he had ever been on skates.

Amazingly enough, to his great pride and the twins' great dismay (they were grounded for months after the incident), not only did he go careening down the road on the hill at what was probably record speed for a 10 year old, he found himself running on the skates at the last stretch of the hill and speeding along the paved road at the bottom of it, totally at ease.

Percy turned on the nice blue skates, away from the memory of that to see Hemmingway executing a spin on the other side of the pond. Her ponytail swung out behind her in a large brown arc, and the skirt she seemed to like very much now spun around her like a top.

It was a strange thing to be skating with his secretary when they were on official Ministry business. Percy glided smoothly across the black ice to where she had stopped and was tugging on the edges of her skates again.

"What's wrong?" She grimaced.

"Blasted skates, I think they're too big, but I'm not sure." He pulled off his gloves and tilted his head sideways to inspect them.

"No, they seem to be fine. Are they too long, do you think?" Percy straightened. Hemmingway leaned forward into the skates and balanced on her toes.

"Not really. They just feel...odd, is all. I suppose I'm not quite used to figure skates," she answered.

"You don't skate often?"

"Not really; I was a spoiled little girl, I played golf." He blinked.

"Golf?"

"Oh yes, Muggle sport. Men seem to like it more than women, it involves hitting a ball with a large stick." She shrugged slightly. "Brings out the ancient primality, I suppose."

"Ah, I think I know what you're talking about. Where did you play it?" She smiled briefly.

"Vanguardia Downs, I know that sounds like a race track. It was a...resort, if I remember correctly, my parents took me there over the summers once in awhile. They tried to get me to play tennis, absolutely horrid game. I always lost."

"Why do you like it so much?" They were now skating slowly across the ice to view the edge of the town, it was noon and the sun was slanted in the sky. Hemmingway shrugged again and half-blushed.

"To tell you...the absolute truth," she said slowly and with an increasing smile, "I liked all those young instructors who wore plus-fours or sports knickerbockers." She laughed melodiously. "They wore the cutest knee-high argyle socks, too..." He rolled his eyes and turned in a huge circle around her.

"So you didn't ice skate."

"Oh, never after the lessons. I took lessons for a little while; figure skating looks pretty only when you're up to it. I ice skate like I'm on rollerskates, the two are very different sports." Percy looked quite amused with this.

"And they teach you to waltz on ice? Or fox trot, perhaps?" Hemmingway blinked and looked pleasantly surprised at his remarks.

"Waltz? Fox trot? On ice? What next, shall we tango, then?" Percy skated along on one foot.

"Sounds like it would be a bit difficult."

"I know how to fox trot on ice, although it takes awhile to get used to it." He grinned suddenly, stopping on his heel.

"Do you?" he said. "Oh." The conversation sort of died in the thereafter, and Percy skated off to see if the tree the prefects had planted was still on the side of the pond.

He noted later on, however, that Hemmingway had chosen to continue trying to remember some of the spinning techniques she had learned over the years. Percy watched her for a few moments, struck by her gracefulness. Even from a distance, he could see her face, revolving at each half-turn.

Hemmingway stuck her toe into the ice and stopped herself immediately. She seemed distressed by something; Percy stopped on his heel to watch her.

"Sir!" she called from the great distance. "Si-ir!"

"Wha-at?" he replied through mittened hands. She said something he couldn't hear, he skated foward a few feet and she became rather hysterical, calling to him and now he really couldn't hear her. She pointed to his feet.

Percy looked down suddenly, totally out of impulse, and in that instant fell, quickly and suddenly into the dark pond. Oh, damn, he thought before he hit unconsciousness, broken ice.

*****

It was after five o'clock when the doctor arrived to inspect the Personal Assistant. Vivian had been sitting in the window, trying her damndest to ignore the comatose Sir on the bed, but had eventually yanked the bedcurtains closed due to her inability to concentrate on the stars.

"It is a mere concussion," said the surgeon pompously when he had finished poking her boss on the head, "Nothing to worry about."

"Shall I give him something when he wakes up?" she said, wishing he would leave after she had spent half the day wishing he would show up. The doctor adjusted his wire rimmed glasses at this.

"Painkillers for the hairline fracture in the ankle, and some food." Doctor had a rather large nose that caused his voice to be somewhat high-pitched and wavering; Vivian had to force herself with great brutality not to burst out laughing whenever he spoke with his wheezing voice.

"Oh," he said, just as he turned to leave, "There is a slight chance that the patient may experience slight delusion. It is nothing to worry about as it is from the medicine I have given him, it will go away when he wakes up quite properly. Believe me, although the medicinal properties of the serum are revered among many," here he paused to sniff and straighten himself importantly, "The side effects are sometimes...bewildering."

Vivian thanked the MD profusely and shut the door behind him, sighing with relief and almost laughing out loud again. The Sir? Delusional? She couldn't quite imagine such a thing happening. Perhaps one of her other superiors, but certainly not this one.

"You won't go absolutely bonkers on me, will you, Sir?" she said, sitting on the bed and lighting a fire with her wand. "That would be quite impossible." Vivian was about to stand and go downstairs to the pub for a spot of dinner when she noticed a slight stirring coming from him.

Before she could do anything at all, his eyes suddenly opened, sharply and quickly, and he sat straight up in bed. This was very surprising, but nonetheless, she thought, he was probably better already. He turned, and saw her there.

"Hemmingway!" he cried, somehow delighted to see her sitting next to him.

"Sir?" she said, completely and utterly confused.

"Hemmingway, it is a lovely morning, we should go driving in the country!" he cried in a strange voice. The Sir seemed unusually perky and he was beginning to scare her.

"Driving?!" she exclaimed, "Now, really, Sir! You ought to lie down, you've broken your ankle and you've got a lump on your head!"

"But I feel wonderful!" he said in a cheerful voice. Now she was beginning to think perhaps she should have suspected him to be the delusional one all along.

"Sir..." But she couldn't get another word in. The Sir was feeling chipper and, apparently, harmonious. Before she could stop him, he burst forth into rapturous melody.

"Tell me that I'm you're oown, my babyyyy!"

"What?!" He gave an elaborate pause.

"Hello, my baby! Hello, my honey! Hello, my ragtime, summertime gal! Send me a kiss by wire, honey, my heart's on fire!" She stared at him, openmouthed, his surprisingly clear and beautifully toned tenor voice ringing through the room. Vivian wondered for a fleeting moment if they would be thrown out of the hotel for this.

"If you refuse me, honey, you'll lose me! Then you'll be left alone, oh baby, telephone and tell me I'm your ooown!"

And with that, he gave an elaborate gesture, threw his arms around her, and did the unthinkable. The Sir, her boss, her superior in everything, the uptight, pompous, dignified stiff who corrected her every move and dictated practically her whole lifestyle, kissed her.

This was something totally unexpected and rather...she couldn't think of the word. It was extremely...weird, had she fallen asleep or something? Reflecting on the events leading up to such an odd event, she suddenly realized --for a horribly shocking and heart-stopping half second-- that it was rather pleasant.

Though peppermint and basil wasn't exactly the greatest combination, it made for an interestingly cold and very long and slow...well, that was best left unsaid. She had never even remotely considered him the type to be in the "know", as it might have been said, either. Apparently he had (or had had) a girlfriend of some sort, as these things did not come naturally, if her memories did not mislead her.

And as quickly and frighteningly unexpected as it had begun, he let go, yawned for what seemed to be a whole minute, fell back onto the pillow, and began snoring very loudly. Vivian stared at his sleeping form until she remembered to close her mouth so she didn't look like a codfish.

"You're absolutely bonkers," she said, and sat for a few more minutes watching him sleep before yanking the bedcurtains closed once more and retreating to the pub for a three hour dinner and contemplation session.

*****

"Sir?" What now? he thought. More papers for Mister Crouch? Was he waking up? Oh, it had been a dream. A horrible, horrible dream, Percy mused as Hemmingway's face focused into view. "Sir?" she lay her hand across his forehead.

"Hemmingway?" He heard her sigh, was it with relief? "Oh, god..." He sat up, or rather attempted to. Something was most definitely wrong. He was damp and cold and his head hurt and he couldn't move his ankle--oh, someone was going to get it for this.

Where in the hell was he? Percy had woken up from some horrid dream that had begun to take on nightmarish qualities, and he couldn't see at all. Had he lost his glasses somewhere along the way back?

"Where are we?" he whined. She wouldn't stop pushing on his forehead, it was really irritating and he really couldn't see without his glasses, where were they?

"Shhh...you're back in the room. Stay still, you've got a concussion from hitting your head on the ice." Percy couldn't register half of what she had just said, but figured it would be best to do what she told him until she turned her back, maybe then he could make a run for it and go back to the pond to look for his glasses.

He lay still for a few moments, trying to measure exactly how much pressure he could put on his hurting ankle before it would give way and trying to remember how far away the skate shop was. Percy let his pupils adjust to the light.

The room swam before his eyes; it was dark outside and there was a fire in the fireplace--he was back in the room, lying on the bed with the covers over him. Letting his eyes droop shut, he heard her sigh again and felt her lean on her elbow into the pillow his head was resting on.

Maybe he'd stay just a little longer while she was there, he thought. She wasn't as hysterical as usual, and she had put something warm on his forehead. Percy opened his eyes again and gazed blearily into her pair of worried-looking blue eyes. Rather like the pond in summer. He yawned, despite himself.

What was she so worried about?

"What time is it?" he whispered, barely hearing himself.

"Forty after nine, sir."

"Don't call me sir..."

"We're staying another night, we can't get you home because the trains aren't running."

"Why not?" Hemmingway hesitated, and continued in a strangely motherly voice.

"Because the man who runs the trains is eating his Boxing Day Dinner." she smoothed his hair back from the lump on his head.

"But why?"

"Because he must, sir. He must. And you should sleep."

"I don't want to..." he was very tired, but he wanted to stay up and talk to her.

"Go to sleep, sir."

"Don't want to..."

"Shhh..." she said nothing more, but kissed his forehead and blew out the lamp next to his bedside.