Unfolded (PG-13) Hermione/Krum
Title: Unfolded
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Hermione/Krum
Summary: Stories of her past unfolded shaking out the pain and laughter.
When Hermione was sixty four Kayla sat down upon her grandmother’s lap and asked for a story. Maybe it was the innocent tone of voice curiously begging for the attention and knowledge a story could provide or perhaps it was the weather, a crisp September day which still, forty years on, signaled the time of new beginnings. She at that moment, stepped beyond the images burned bright of cradling Ron, the wrong color red streaking his hair, or Harry turning his wand on himself, the only way of destroying the vessel he’d unwillingly become. So she’d looked down upon Kayla Krum, aged 5, the daughter of her son and began a tale about herself, a toilet, two boys, and the troll they’d outwitted when barely twice the age of this little slip of a girl.
Kayla giggled through, especially when she said loo, and asked for ice cream after. “Please Grandmummy Ninny,” she’d whined, ands skipped off to the kitchen after promising to brush once done.
He had sat down besides her at Fortescue's two months after it all. She hadn’t expected to see him anytime soon, foreign wizards knew to avoid their island for the time being. Wizarding Britain was still rebuilding and the shops on Diagon Alley had only opened three weeks before. Ginny had made her make the trip. Everyone thought she wasn’t quite right, she hasn’t cried yet, they’d whisper, and encouraged her to go out, so she’d leaned on the tall and steady redhead, though the younger woman, still a girl really, had lost just as much as she.
Ginny saw Corner at the counter and left her to say hello. The sun streaming through the nearby window should have made her feel bright and happy, but it just highlighted how big and alone the horizontal surface looked.
He appeared, sat down unasked and stated without even a hello, “I read Hogwarts, A History a few years back. It took me a good six months to make it all the way through the original English, but it’s a good book. Detailed.”
She couldn’t help keep a small smile from rising up. “Who was your favorite headmaster?”
“Aiden. He wanted the students to wear yellow robes. I like yellow.”
“Good choice.”
Pause, quiet. The town wasn’t bustling yet and she wondered if the decreased population would put that off for years. Ginny laughed from across the room; she’d been living louder to fill up the silences.
“What are you doing in England? Quidditch?”
“No, the games have not yet resumed, but I will not be playing when they do. I am working with a small London based firm specializing in commercial aspects of partial transformation.”
“Still harping on that?”
“Yes.” She could hear the improvements in his English. He must have been here during the War. She thought she remembered someone mentioning him at an Order meeting. Perhaps it had been during one of those few times near the end when she’d emerged for dinner before retreating into feverish study of musty manuscripts desperate to find any path to avoid the one Harry did eventually take to finally defeat Him.
“What are you reading now?”
“The Trial.”
He shook his head.
“It’s Muggle.” She didn’t want anymore grand battles with wands.
“Well,” he stated, standing in deference to Ginny’s return, “I shall read that next. Good day. See you later, Herm-own-ninny.”
He did. He found her at her new flat in Edinburgh to discuss it and they talked over dinner at her little kitchen table with the view Arthur’s Seat out the window.
But the land was flat when, ten months later, he held her sobbing. They were able to see the entire expanse of where the battle had been. She told Viktor, speaking into his round shoulders, how the green that bounced off of Harry’s glasses had been the same color as his eyes.
She hadn’t seemed to be able to stop crying after that. Her head fit just below his and he would be quiet and his silence would embrace her just like his muscled arms. A whole month had passed since they’d gone to the field, but as soon as he’d arrived she’d dissolved again.
“Sorry, sorry, sorry.” She repeated, shamed that she couldn’t hold herself together.
He pulled away, and catching her eyes, rebuked her litany, “Hermione, don’t be a ninny,” looking at her, he tried to soften his words, “but if you must, be my ninny.”
A moment later the full implications of what he may have said occurred to them both and they sat, frozen, only heartbeats and an occasional sniffle sounding.
“Do you want to?” He was suddenly subdued and unsure, like when he wandered up to her in the library one December evening and asked her, her, to the Ball.
“Yes,” and she was crying again and his dark eyebrows lurched for each other, but she continued, “Good, good, good.”
Afterwards he would tease her, calling her Ninny, or silly Ninny, or her favorite permutation, his Ninny. Ginny couldn’t understand it and once told her, “Really, Hermione, there must be some nickname other than Ninny that you can make from your name.” But she kept it all the same, loving its absurdity and the way it had arisen, though it did cause her problems when Ioan was in primary school.
She’d explained over and over that it was a special term, just for Mummy and Daddy, but he knew that it made her smile and wanted the same for his friends. They, though, didn’t enjoy being called a ninny, which in turn set off a massive row.
He was loving and loyal to a fault, but tempestuous and stubborn, prone to intense friendships beset by wicked fights. She privately thought of him as her Ron, while Nicolas resembled herself and Sofie, Viktor. It was during one such fight that she found him crying in his room, his tiny eight year olds body shaking with the force of his sobs.
“Oliver says he’s not my best friend anymore.”
“Oh, sweetie.” She sat down upon his carpet, hugged him close, and told him about too best friends, one who was jealous of the other, and their two month fight, resolved by, of all things, dragons.
“But Harry and Ron made up and they were as strong friends, if not stronger. They didn’t stop liking each other, things just got in the way. I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s what’s happening between you and Oliver.” That seemed to comfort Ioan and he followed her back into the kitchen, whose table she’d commandeered as a desk.
“Mummy, I didn’t know you knew Harry Potter.” He asked from the doorway. She looked up and turned toward him slowly.
“I did, Harry and Ron, they were, they were my friends.”
“That’s neat. Mummy, may I have some ice cream?”
Kayla gobbled down the sweet quickly, making a mess on her face. She helped the little girl clean up, teeth and all.
“Let’s take some out to Grandpa as well.” Kayla added from her perch on the conjured stool lifting her tall enough. They met the boys outside where a three on three Quidditch game was tripping above the lawn. Viktor flew down to meet them and accepted his sweet with a smile.
“What have you two been doing, Ninny?”
“Telling stories.”
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Hermione/Krum
Summary: Stories of her past unfolded shaking out the pain and laughter.
When Hermione was sixty four Kayla sat down upon her grandmother’s lap and asked for a story. Maybe it was the innocent tone of voice curiously begging for the attention and knowledge a story could provide or perhaps it was the weather, a crisp September day which still, forty years on, signaled the time of new beginnings. She at that moment, stepped beyond the images burned bright of cradling Ron, the wrong color red streaking his hair, or Harry turning his wand on himself, the only way of destroying the vessel he’d unwillingly become. So she’d looked down upon Kayla Krum, aged 5, the daughter of her son and began a tale about herself, a toilet, two boys, and the troll they’d outwitted when barely twice the age of this little slip of a girl.
Kayla giggled through, especially when she said loo, and asked for ice cream after. “Please Grandmummy Ninny,” she’d whined, ands skipped off to the kitchen after promising to brush once done.
He had sat down besides her at Fortescue's two months after it all. She hadn’t expected to see him anytime soon, foreign wizards knew to avoid their island for the time being. Wizarding Britain was still rebuilding and the shops on Diagon Alley had only opened three weeks before. Ginny had made her make the trip. Everyone thought she wasn’t quite right, she hasn’t cried yet, they’d whisper, and encouraged her to go out, so she’d leaned on the tall and steady redhead, though the younger woman, still a girl really, had lost just as much as she.
Ginny saw Corner at the counter and left her to say hello. The sun streaming through the nearby window should have made her feel bright and happy, but it just highlighted how big and alone the horizontal surface looked.
He appeared, sat down unasked and stated without even a hello, “I read Hogwarts, A History a few years back. It took me a good six months to make it all the way through the original English, but it’s a good book. Detailed.”
She couldn’t help keep a small smile from rising up. “Who was your favorite headmaster?”
“Aiden. He wanted the students to wear yellow robes. I like yellow.”
“Good choice.”
Pause, quiet. The town wasn’t bustling yet and she wondered if the decreased population would put that off for years. Ginny laughed from across the room; she’d been living louder to fill up the silences.
“What are you doing in England? Quidditch?”
“No, the games have not yet resumed, but I will not be playing when they do. I am working with a small London based firm specializing in commercial aspects of partial transformation.”
“Still harping on that?”
“Yes.” She could hear the improvements in his English. He must have been here during the War. She thought she remembered someone mentioning him at an Order meeting. Perhaps it had been during one of those few times near the end when she’d emerged for dinner before retreating into feverish study of musty manuscripts desperate to find any path to avoid the one Harry did eventually take to finally defeat Him.
“What are you reading now?”
“The Trial.”
He shook his head.
“It’s Muggle.” She didn’t want anymore grand battles with wands.
“Well,” he stated, standing in deference to Ginny’s return, “I shall read that next. Good day. See you later, Herm-own-ninny.”
He did. He found her at her new flat in Edinburgh to discuss it and they talked over dinner at her little kitchen table with the view Arthur’s Seat out the window.
But the land was flat when, ten months later, he held her sobbing. They were able to see the entire expanse of where the battle had been. She told Viktor, speaking into his round shoulders, how the green that bounced off of Harry’s glasses had been the same color as his eyes.
She hadn’t seemed to be able to stop crying after that. Her head fit just below his and he would be quiet and his silence would embrace her just like his muscled arms. A whole month had passed since they’d gone to the field, but as soon as he’d arrived she’d dissolved again.
“Sorry, sorry, sorry.” She repeated, shamed that she couldn’t hold herself together.
He pulled away, and catching her eyes, rebuked her litany, “Hermione, don’t be a ninny,” looking at her, he tried to soften his words, “but if you must, be my ninny.”
A moment later the full implications of what he may have said occurred to them both and they sat, frozen, only heartbeats and an occasional sniffle sounding.
“Do you want to?” He was suddenly subdued and unsure, like when he wandered up to her in the library one December evening and asked her, her, to the Ball.
“Yes,” and she was crying again and his dark eyebrows lurched for each other, but she continued, “Good, good, good.”
Afterwards he would tease her, calling her Ninny, or silly Ninny, or her favorite permutation, his Ninny. Ginny couldn’t understand it and once told her, “Really, Hermione, there must be some nickname other than Ninny that you can make from your name.” But she kept it all the same, loving its absurdity and the way it had arisen, though it did cause her problems when Ioan was in primary school.
She’d explained over and over that it was a special term, just for Mummy and Daddy, but he knew that it made her smile and wanted the same for his friends. They, though, didn’t enjoy being called a ninny, which in turn set off a massive row.
He was loving and loyal to a fault, but tempestuous and stubborn, prone to intense friendships beset by wicked fights. She privately thought of him as her Ron, while Nicolas resembled herself and Sofie, Viktor. It was during one such fight that she found him crying in his room, his tiny eight year olds body shaking with the force of his sobs.
“Oliver says he’s not my best friend anymore.”
“Oh, sweetie.” She sat down upon his carpet, hugged him close, and told him about too best friends, one who was jealous of the other, and their two month fight, resolved by, of all things, dragons.
“But Harry and Ron made up and they were as strong friends, if not stronger. They didn’t stop liking each other, things just got in the way. I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s what’s happening between you and Oliver.” That seemed to comfort Ioan and he followed her back into the kitchen, whose table she’d commandeered as a desk.
“Mummy, I didn’t know you knew Harry Potter.” He asked from the doorway. She looked up and turned toward him slowly.
“I did, Harry and Ron, they were, they were my friends.”
“That’s neat. Mummy, may I have some ice cream?”
Kayla gobbled down the sweet quickly, making a mess on her face. She helped the little girl clean up, teeth and all.
“Let’s take some out to Grandpa as well.” Kayla added from her perch on the conjured stool lifting her tall enough. They met the boys outside where a three on three Quidditch game was tripping above the lawn. Viktor flew down to meet them and accepted his sweet with a smile.
“What have you two been doing, Ninny?”
“Telling stories.”