My Seemingly Normal Wife

ta "Every one of these apples are bad ones," grumbled Bernard, as he peered over the bins of apples at the local market. Each apple he had looked at was bruised or had various spots on it; he had not met one that was to his liking.

"Bernard, you're such a perfectionist," chided Madeline, haphazardly grabbing apples from the bins. "This one is fine--see? And this one too."

"No--no--that's awful, Madeline, look at it! It's too yellow! It'll go bad in a day..." He saw that his opinion meant nothing at the moment, as his wife knotted the bag and, with a meaningful look at him, dropped it into the cart.

"Next time, I'm going grocery shopping by myself," Madeline stated, now looking at a large display of organic cereals.

"Listen, Mads," said Bernard, his voice dropping to a whisper, "can't you just magic a tree or something? With perfect apples?"

Madeline stared at her husband. "You are hopeless, my dear, hopeless. I can't pull a tree out of thin air."

"You do it with chairs, though! All the time!" he exclaimed quite loudly, attracting the attention of an elderly couple nearby.

"We already own those chairs, Bernard. I can't pull something out of thin air unless it's ours, you see?" she asked, now moving on to the next aisle, which housed baking ingredients. "They're just apples, Bernie, let it go."

"Would Lockhart have anything to say about apples?" he asked mockingly.

"Darling, Lockhart has only written one book, and that's Wandering with Werewolves," she answered him, brushing off his sarcastic tones.

"When is he going to write more? Maybe he'll have something about trees in the next one," Bernard asked.

"Bernard--I told you, he's in Transylvania at the moment, indisposed, like I said before," she answered, plucking a bag of chocolate chips off of a shelf. "It's not likely that he'll have another book for years--he's still very young, you know, only 26 and he's already curing werewolves, who knows what he'll do next, amazing man..."

Bernard sighed. He took off his glasses and rubbed the lenses with his blue cotton shirt, then replaced them on the bridge of his nose. "I'll go get the milk, then. At least it's not bruised or spotted." He left his wife standing there, smiling at him as he left.

Madeline looked up and down the aisle for the sugar that she preferred; she paced and crouched, covering the aisle twice and not finding it. Then, she saw it: there on the very top shelf. She was at a mere five foot seven; the top shelf was much too high for her to reach. Bernard could have reached it, but he was rows away. She glanced around the aisle, and seeing no one, proceeded to sneak out her wand. As she was just about to perform a Summoning Charm, a hand grabbed her arm and pulled the wand away.

"Mads! Are you crazy?" asked her husband, who had just walked up the row she was in. "You told me that there are penalties for using magic in front of...what was the word?"

"Muggles," she sighed.

"Right, Muggles! And here you are, using it. You don't want to get fined those--that money you use--" he started.

"Galleons," she answered.

"Exactly!" he said. Ever since she had told him about the existence of the magical world, he had been very cautious about her actions. He had yet to visit a store for magical people, and was very eager to learn about the world that had been hidden from him.

"All right, then, will you get it for me, Bernie?" she asked him sweetly, pointing to the sugar at the very top shelf.

"Of course," he replied. He reached an arm up, and realized that he couldn't reach it either. "Er..." he said.

Madeline raised an eyebrow, and then took a fleeting glance around the aisle once more. She slipped out her wand and murmured "Accio", pointing at the sugar. It rolled over off the shelf and zoomed into her outstretched hand. "We won't be fined, Bernard. There weren't any Muggles around."

Bernard sighed again, and they proceeded to the next aisle, where they found rows upon rows of assorted candies.

"Too tempting," Madeline chuckled.

They pulled up into the checkout line, right behind a short woman with brownish-red hair, who was looking flustered as she single-handedly was trying to put groceries on the conveyer belt and keep her three children from scattering every which way. A little redheaded boy trundled down the back of the line, fearless as a lion, and was about to make his escape when Bernard caught him.

"Not so fast, captain," he chuckled at the little boy, who glared furiously at him through dark brown eyes. "Ma'm?" he said to the short woman. "I think this one is yours."

"Why I--thank you so much, I almost lost him," she said hurriedly, taking the boy from his arms and placing him into the cart, where two older boys were standing, both wearing distinct disgruntled expressions.

"Oh, Bernard, look," Madeline said, pointing to the older boys. "Twins."

Bernard smiled and placed a hand on his wife's shoulder and whispered "An owl and two cats are enough to take care of right now, Maddy."

The short woman had overheard them and turned. "Did you say owl?" she asked.

"Er--yes, he did," said Madeline. "Miss, the older one is halfway out of the cart--"

One of the twins was dangling precariously over the edge of the shopping cart, struggling to make his way to freedom.

"Freddy! Stop that, this instant!" the woman yelled, grabbing the twin and placing him back inside the cart. "Thank goodness Arthur's at home, I don't know what I would have done if I had Ginny and Percy with me too..."

"You have more?" asked Bernard, amazed, as he scratched his dark brown head.

"Yes, I have four more at home, two are away at school though--" she started.

"Hogwarts?" asked Madeline, comprehension spreading in her mind.

"Yes," answered the woman, looking stunned as she paid for her groceries. "I'm Molly Weasley." She stuck out her hand, which Bernard grabbed and shook with gusto.

"Goldsmith," he said excitedly; he had realized at the same time as Madeline that he was meeting a new witch, throwing all caution to the wind. "Bernard Goldsmith, this is my wife Madeline, she's a witch too--"

Madeline stamped Bernard's foot as hard as she could, and laughed aloud, as cashier gave them the oddest of looks. "Don't worry about Bernard, he hasn't had his medicine today," she said to the cashier. "Now darling," she drawled in a loud, slow voice, as though Bernard were hearing impaired and unable to understand what she was saying, "why don't you help Molly with her groceries and I'll meet you outside?"

"Just because I haven't had my medicine doesn't mean I can't hear," grumbled Bernard. He lifted the shopping bags out of the short woman's arms, aware that he had just uttered that his wife was a witch to the unsuspecting cashier.

"Thank you, thank you so much," said Mrs. Weasley, as she carted her little boys out of the store, Bernard following her with the groceries. Madeline paid the cashier for her own food. The cashier was shooting suspicious looks at Madeline as she pushed her cart and left the store as fast as she could.

Once outside, she stared around in the dim evening light for her husband and Molly Weasley. Standing near a turquoise car, Bernard was deep in conversation with Molly as he helped her strap the children inside.

"So your husband works at the Ministry of Magic?" Bernard was asking her eagerly, as Madeline approached with the cart.

"Yes, in the Misuse of Muggle Artifacts Office," smiled Molly as she tightened the youngest boy's seatbelt.

"My uncle works there," said Madeline, slipping into the conversation. "He works for the Floo Network. And my cousin's an Auror."

"An Auror, really? That's wonderful. I had no idea that there were any wizards or witches nearby Catchpole," exclaimed Molly.

"Yes, we live in Kent, actually, very close to here," said Madeline, extremely happy that she had met another witch.

"I'll give you our address, it would be wonderful if you could join my husband and I for dinner sometime," said Molly, taking out a scrap bit of parchment and a squashed quill from her large purse. She scribbled her address down and handed it to Madeline, who in turn wrote her own address down on another bit of paper and handed it to Molly.

"Of course we'll come to dinner, that would be fantastic. Bernard's a Muggle, if you couldn't tell already, he's exposing my secrets to the entire world," she said, laughing playfully at her husband, who smiled back at her.

"I think Arthur would love having you, Bernard," said Molly. "He'll bombard you with questions, no doubt, he's very interested in the Muggle world."

"I'm very interested in the wizarding world, Molly. We could make quite the pair!" Bernard said, laughing at the prospect.

"Well, I'll contact you right away, Madeline, very soon," said Mrs. Weasley, climbing into the car. "It was fantastic meeting you!"

Bernard shook her hand one last time and he and his wife watched her drive away, waving at her as she left. He took the cart from his wife and began pushing it towards their car, an old Cadillac.

"That was nice," said Madeline, placing her hand on her husband's and looking at him. "I feel peaceful knowing that there are more of my kind around."

He put his arm around his wife's shoulders and squeezed her close to him. "I'm glad for you, Madeline." He kissed her on the top of her head, piled the groceries into the car, and then sped off towards their home.