fic: harry potter/fight club crossover.
This is either the best HP/Fight Club crossover fic you'll ever read, or the worst. I've yet to decide. Oh, and looked over by sioniann.
tourists and tourist guides
marla singer/hermione granger, pg
disclaimer: Rowling and Chuck Palahniuk own.
---
"You could do so much good in the Muggle world," her mother told her.
"Mum," she said, frustrated, "I'm a witch and Muggles aren't allowed to see magic. How could I possibly help them with my magic?"
Her mother smiled. "Of course not magic, darling, but you're so clever. Not many of us Muggles are."
She was 12 then.
--
She's 17 and reads a Muggle novel at home, there is a girl and she has cancer and Hermione thinks, what is cancer.
She studies cancer, she studies parasites, melanoma, every incurable Muggle illness that is out there and then she goes to her mother (it hits her so hard that some things magic can't heal and some things medicine can't heal and some things just destroy you from the inside and there's nothing you can do about it).
I just want to help, she thinks because in the world after Voldemort, there aren't enough people to help each other.
--
"My name is Hermione Granger and I organise these meetings. Nice to meet you all," she says and doesn't mean it. "Do we have any new members today?"
One.
A woman in her twenties raises her skinny hand, she's got big lips and dark hair. She's smoking a cigarette, tightening her lips around it so it doesn't hang from the side of her mouth. She looks nothing short of dangerous, attractive and fake.
Hermione corrects her glasses (she's not sure why she wears them, it's not like she's got anything to hide apart from everything, but telling her real name and then hiding behind glasses doesn't seem like an awfully clever thing to do).
She's been doing this for over two years and knows a tourist when she sees one. She lets the woman introduce herself anyway. To see if she even knows what melanoma even is. She seemed very ignorant in last Wednesday's blood parasites. Hermione knows everything about blood parasites, it's the first group she started organising. She doesn't know as much about melanoma but it hardly matters anymore, she's too far in.
"My name is Orla," the woman says, fingering the hem of her black dress awkwardly. An act, Hermione guesses.
"Hello, Orla," echoes around the room.
Hermione is suddenly watching a re-run. Words can't come out of Orla's mouth. Can't. Won't. She has nothing more to say. Hermione stands up, places her hands on both of Orla's shoulders.
"It's okay," she whispers and as the woman, "Orla", the tourist, walks back to her seat, she tells the group, "let's all thank Orla. I'm sure we all know what she must be going through."
Nothing. A big fat nothing is what Orla's going through.
--
She's wearing a red wig so it must be Friday.
"Hello, I'm Ginny Weasley as you all know by now. Do we have any new members here tonight?"
A familiar hand rises.
It's Orla (Susan, Hannah, Marietta).
A constant deja vu. Only the name changes (as does her own, her hair, the ways she acts - overly sweet when she's being Lavender, straightforward but compassionate when Pansy and she honestly, honestly can't say why it began to spiral down in this direction, this cheating and lying but she just wants to help).
"Hello, Gloria," echoes around the room.
"Everyone, it's time to go into groups of two or three and please, feel safe enough to cry or say whatever you feel you need to save. Everyone is here for everyone tonight." She flicks her hair back and turns around, suddenly facing Orla (Hannah, Gloria, Susan).
"Hello," the other woman says. "My name is Marla," she continues, whispering.
"I am onto you," Hermione replies venomously, folding her hands over her chest, but Marla just laughs.
"And what are you? Where is your medical license? Your Psychology degree?"
Hermione stares blankly. "At least I'm helping them, not myself!" she shoots back.
"Helping is a funny thing," Marla mutters, lighting a new cigarette, "I mean, after all, one could just say we're both addicted to this helping thing."
"That is ridiculous," Hermione snorts.
"Three times a week is called a hobby," Marla says, walking away with a papercupful of coffee, cigarette hanging between her fingers, "but five times? That's an addiction."
--
They keep each other's secrets and Tuesdays Hermione is Luna Lovegood and Wednesdays she's Pansy Parkinson and nothing really changes, including Marla.
Marla. Her tears staining Hermione's favourite sweater, dropping cigarette ash on her bag.
Marla. Her make-up smudged and her face blank as she walks away from Hermione and everyone else, leaving nothing but cigarette smoke vanishing slowly and a crumpled papercup that had missed the litterbin.
--
They talk after certain meetings, tuberculosis mostly, the one with the room with the big brown sofa.
Marla is from the States, she travelled to Britain originally with a former boyfriend, an artist.
“He painted death cult members having sex with each other,” Marla tells her and Hermione blushes a bit. “Death cult members and witches.”
Hermione just smiles.
--
"I never see you anymore," Ron says when they have coffee, glaring at her furiously over the table and Hermione shrugs.
"My parents need me, it's just really tough right now."
"I spoke to your parents, there is nothing wrong with your grandmother!" Ron snaps. "And what about me and Harry? You can't just quit being a witch! There are people who, well, we all really miss you."
"I know, I'm sorry," she says, not really meaning it. Harry is fine. Ron is fine, too, if he'd just stop obsessing. He's got everything he's ever wanted and she isn't an enormous part of the equation.
It's Marla's fault, she wants to tell him but he wouldn't understand. She promises to visit him and Harry more often, she swears, she says she'll call the Ministry for jobs and maybe the Daily Prophet, too.
Promise. She's become a liar and a fraud and it's all because of Marla.
--
She needs to let go. She needs to really let go like all the people in the meetings let go, crying, sobbing, tearing things apart just to stop internalizing the pain they're going through.
Hermione isn't in pain but she realises there are some things that are hard to mend. Her life is a mess.
Marla's caused it. Marla with her helping addictions, Marla with her cigarette smell and her tear stains and Marla making her like the Muggle world and Marla Marla Marla she could either hex Marla or slap Marla or kiss Marla or just be held by Marla while she cries.
She does the latter two and promises herself she'll do the former two later, one day.
Promise.
--
What Hermione knows about Muggle religion is not too much but she knows what sin is and Marla is a whole lot of sin from the way she speaks words, each word so round and soft and seducing to the way she makes love, never too kind, never too gentle and so different from the boys.
The boys, Hermione remembers how they played, kisses and touching and how they never went past a certain limit with each other but always with her they were free because it was Hermione, just Hermione, their Hermione and it was love but so different.
So different from the kind of love that tears you apart and then makes you whole, the kind of love they always had for each other. The love Hermione had always been watching.
With Marla it isn't tearing and mending but it held the potential of both and that was good enough.
--
It's one morning in Marla's small apartment and Marla is half-way through her morning cigarette. There is an air of casualty in the room, like it's used to this lazy morning atmosphere. Hermione slides her hands around Marla and kisses her, tasting smoke and she knows they're so wrong for each other, so unfitting in every single way and then she smiles because maybe that's the reason it feels so good.
When she opens her eyes, Marla isn't smiling.
"I have to go to the States," she says, takes a drag, adds, "permanently. It's mom. Something's up with her. I think she might die."
Hermione nods and says nothing.
"You know what one Indian tribe did back in the 1600s? I read this from Time magazine and it said that they noticed how addicted the tribe leaders had become to smoking and since they feared addiction, they moved to a place that was near a white man's settlement and they all quit smoking to show that they had moved on."
Hermione stares at Marla, vaguely remembering what Time magazine is and Marla continues, "Know what happened next? They started buying booze from the white man. From one habit to another. See? That's just how it goes. As a cleansing ritual, we should both break a habit. If I'm going to quit smoking, what will you do?"
Hermione wants to say, I'm quitting you but instead says, "I'll get rid of my helping addiction."
Marla smiles. "That sounds good."
--
It's Saturday and she's Hermione Granger.
It's Tuesday and she's Hermione Granger, having dinner with Ron Weasley and Harry Potter. Ron's cooked so of course the dinner has a bit of a weird taste but he swears it was the book that his mother gave him, the one written by "her darling Gilderoy". She smiles and eats more and looks at Harry, who's smiling too.
It's Wednesday and she's Hermione Granger, sleeping between her boys (they said they always found there to be something missing and that was her and this may not be true, Hermione doesn't think it is but it hardly matters now when she's between her boys because that's what they are), once again and it'll get some taking used to.
(A year later Hermione doesn't pick up the phone and doesn't get to hear Marla dying. Doesn't get to save Marla from dying. Tyler picks up the phone. Tyler saves.)
tourists and tourist guides
marla singer/hermione granger, pg
disclaimer: Rowling and Chuck Palahniuk own.
---
"You could do so much good in the Muggle world," her mother told her.
"Mum," she said, frustrated, "I'm a witch and Muggles aren't allowed to see magic. How could I possibly help them with my magic?"
Her mother smiled. "Of course not magic, darling, but you're so clever. Not many of us Muggles are."
She was 12 then.
--
She's 17 and reads a Muggle novel at home, there is a girl and she has cancer and Hermione thinks, what is cancer.
She studies cancer, she studies parasites, melanoma, every incurable Muggle illness that is out there and then she goes to her mother (it hits her so hard that some things magic can't heal and some things medicine can't heal and some things just destroy you from the inside and there's nothing you can do about it).
I just want to help, she thinks because in the world after Voldemort, there aren't enough people to help each other.
--
"My name is Hermione Granger and I organise these meetings. Nice to meet you all," she says and doesn't mean it. "Do we have any new members today?"
One.
A woman in her twenties raises her skinny hand, she's got big lips and dark hair. She's smoking a cigarette, tightening her lips around it so it doesn't hang from the side of her mouth. She looks nothing short of dangerous, attractive and fake.
Hermione corrects her glasses (she's not sure why she wears them, it's not like she's got anything to hide apart from everything, but telling her real name and then hiding behind glasses doesn't seem like an awfully clever thing to do).
She's been doing this for over two years and knows a tourist when she sees one. She lets the woman introduce herself anyway. To see if she even knows what melanoma even is. She seemed very ignorant in last Wednesday's blood parasites. Hermione knows everything about blood parasites, it's the first group she started organising. She doesn't know as much about melanoma but it hardly matters anymore, she's too far in.
"My name is Orla," the woman says, fingering the hem of her black dress awkwardly. An act, Hermione guesses.
"Hello, Orla," echoes around the room.
Hermione is suddenly watching a re-run. Words can't come out of Orla's mouth. Can't. Won't. She has nothing more to say. Hermione stands up, places her hands on both of Orla's shoulders.
"It's okay," she whispers and as the woman, "Orla", the tourist, walks back to her seat, she tells the group, "let's all thank Orla. I'm sure we all know what she must be going through."
Nothing. A big fat nothing is what Orla's going through.
--
She's wearing a red wig so it must be Friday.
"Hello, I'm Ginny Weasley as you all know by now. Do we have any new members here tonight?"
A familiar hand rises.
It's Orla (Susan, Hannah, Marietta).
A constant deja vu. Only the name changes (as does her own, her hair, the ways she acts - overly sweet when she's being Lavender, straightforward but compassionate when Pansy and she honestly, honestly can't say why it began to spiral down in this direction, this cheating and lying but she just wants to help).
"Hello, Gloria," echoes around the room.
"Everyone, it's time to go into groups of two or three and please, feel safe enough to cry or say whatever you feel you need to save. Everyone is here for everyone tonight." She flicks her hair back and turns around, suddenly facing Orla (Hannah, Gloria, Susan).
"Hello," the other woman says. "My name is Marla," she continues, whispering.
"I am onto you," Hermione replies venomously, folding her hands over her chest, but Marla just laughs.
"And what are you? Where is your medical license? Your Psychology degree?"
Hermione stares blankly. "At least I'm helping them, not myself!" she shoots back.
"Helping is a funny thing," Marla mutters, lighting a new cigarette, "I mean, after all, one could just say we're both addicted to this helping thing."
"That is ridiculous," Hermione snorts.
"Three times a week is called a hobby," Marla says, walking away with a papercupful of coffee, cigarette hanging between her fingers, "but five times? That's an addiction."
--
They keep each other's secrets and Tuesdays Hermione is Luna Lovegood and Wednesdays she's Pansy Parkinson and nothing really changes, including Marla.
Marla. Her tears staining Hermione's favourite sweater, dropping cigarette ash on her bag.
Marla. Her make-up smudged and her face blank as she walks away from Hermione and everyone else, leaving nothing but cigarette smoke vanishing slowly and a crumpled papercup that had missed the litterbin.
--
They talk after certain meetings, tuberculosis mostly, the one with the room with the big brown sofa.
Marla is from the States, she travelled to Britain originally with a former boyfriend, an artist.
“He painted death cult members having sex with each other,” Marla tells her and Hermione blushes a bit. “Death cult members and witches.”
Hermione just smiles.
--
"I never see you anymore," Ron says when they have coffee, glaring at her furiously over the table and Hermione shrugs.
"My parents need me, it's just really tough right now."
"I spoke to your parents, there is nothing wrong with your grandmother!" Ron snaps. "And what about me and Harry? You can't just quit being a witch! There are people who, well, we all really miss you."
"I know, I'm sorry," she says, not really meaning it. Harry is fine. Ron is fine, too, if he'd just stop obsessing. He's got everything he's ever wanted and she isn't an enormous part of the equation.
It's Marla's fault, she wants to tell him but he wouldn't understand. She promises to visit him and Harry more often, she swears, she says she'll call the Ministry for jobs and maybe the Daily Prophet, too.
Promise. She's become a liar and a fraud and it's all because of Marla.
--
She needs to let go. She needs to really let go like all the people in the meetings let go, crying, sobbing, tearing things apart just to stop internalizing the pain they're going through.
Hermione isn't in pain but she realises there are some things that are hard to mend. Her life is a mess.
Marla's caused it. Marla with her helping addictions, Marla with her cigarette smell and her tear stains and Marla making her like the Muggle world and Marla Marla Marla she could either hex Marla or slap Marla or kiss Marla or just be held by Marla while she cries.
She does the latter two and promises herself she'll do the former two later, one day.
Promise.
--
What Hermione knows about Muggle religion is not too much but she knows what sin is and Marla is a whole lot of sin from the way she speaks words, each word so round and soft and seducing to the way she makes love, never too kind, never too gentle and so different from the boys.
The boys, Hermione remembers how they played, kisses and touching and how they never went past a certain limit with each other but always with her they were free because it was Hermione, just Hermione, their Hermione and it was love but so different.
So different from the kind of love that tears you apart and then makes you whole, the kind of love they always had for each other. The love Hermione had always been watching.
With Marla it isn't tearing and mending but it held the potential of both and that was good enough.
--
It's one morning in Marla's small apartment and Marla is half-way through her morning cigarette. There is an air of casualty in the room, like it's used to this lazy morning atmosphere. Hermione slides her hands around Marla and kisses her, tasting smoke and she knows they're so wrong for each other, so unfitting in every single way and then she smiles because maybe that's the reason it feels so good.
When she opens her eyes, Marla isn't smiling.
"I have to go to the States," she says, takes a drag, adds, "permanently. It's mom. Something's up with her. I think she might die."
Hermione nods and says nothing.
"You know what one Indian tribe did back in the 1600s? I read this from Time magazine and it said that they noticed how addicted the tribe leaders had become to smoking and since they feared addiction, they moved to a place that was near a white man's settlement and they all quit smoking to show that they had moved on."
Hermione stares at Marla, vaguely remembering what Time magazine is and Marla continues, "Know what happened next? They started buying booze from the white man. From one habit to another. See? That's just how it goes. As a cleansing ritual, we should both break a habit. If I'm going to quit smoking, what will you do?"
Hermione wants to say, I'm quitting you but instead says, "I'll get rid of my helping addiction."
Marla smiles. "That sounds good."
--
It's Saturday and she's Hermione Granger.
It's Tuesday and she's Hermione Granger, having dinner with Ron Weasley and Harry Potter. Ron's cooked so of course the dinner has a bit of a weird taste but he swears it was the book that his mother gave him, the one written by "her darling Gilderoy". She smiles and eats more and looks at Harry, who's smiling too.
It's Wednesday and she's Hermione Granger, sleeping between her boys (they said they always found there to be something missing and that was her and this may not be true, Hermione doesn't think it is but it hardly matters now when she's between her boys because that's what they are), once again and it'll get some taking used to.
(A year later Hermione doesn't pick up the phone and doesn't get to hear Marla dying. Doesn't get to save Marla from dying. Tyler picks up the phone. Tyler saves.)