Our Little Wilkins (Part 2 of 2)
Title: Three Months Later: Our Little Wilkins (Part 2 of 2)
Author: kanedax
Spoilers: Deathly Hallows
Rating: PG-13 for mild language and content
Characters/Pairings: Ron/Hermione, Mr. & Mrs. Granger, Kingsley, Tonks
Summary: A baby's cry from upstairs makes Hermione realize that her plans were anything but simple
Notes: This is part two of two for this story. However, events from this story will probably reflect in my personal canon for any future post-TDH fic that I end up posting in these communities. I hope everyone enjoys. I do not own these characters (except for one); they belong to JK Rowling. Sweet Caroline is Neil Diamond. Do You Believe In Magic is Lovin’ Spoonful.
Three Months Later: Our Little Wilkins (1/2) / Previous Chapters / Eleven Months Later: Scrubbing Bubbles
“That was Dick Dale & The Deltones with ‘Miserlou,’ as performed on a ‘A Swingin’ Affair.’ A great piece taken from an otherwise horrible television show in 1963. Before that was ‘Time Is On My Side’ by Irma Thomas. Coming up on ‘Sounds of the Sixties’…”
“I think I have everything,” Hermione said as she walked back into the den. In her arms was cradled a rather large box, with various papers and picture frames poking out haphazardly.
“You’re sure?” Tonks said as she stood up from the floor and rolled Daniel Granger onto his side. “Even the locked up papers?”
“Yes,” Hermione said anxiously. “I… It took me a few minutes to get into their safe, but then I remembered to use an Alohamora.” She mentally chastised herself for that, something that normally would have come to her right away without her having to waste time trying to figure out the combination.
“Good thinking,” Tonks said absently as she pulled Daniel’s wallet from his back pocket. “Grab your mother’s purse, would you? We need to swap driver’s licenses, library cards, things like that.”
“How are you coming on the…?” Hermione asked as she walked to the front door to find Charlotte’s bag. She cut herself off, still not able to really talk about what they were doing to her parents yet.
“Almost done,” Tonks said. “Just need to get a seal in place and get everyone comfy cozy. Then we should be ready to go.”
“Here you are,” said Hermione, setting the purse down on the coffee table next to the notepad, on which she noticed Tonks’ scribbling handwriting jammed into every available space between her notes.
“Okay, then,” Tonks said, rubbing her hands together. “This should probably take another five minutes, ten tops. Just long enough for you to go and get changed.”
“I’m already dressed, Dora,” Hermione said, bemused. “I’ve been ready to leave since six a.m.”
Tonks looked over at Hermione, sliding her eyes up and down her t-shirt and jeans, and shook her head. “I’d suggest something a little more comfortable.”
“What do you mean?”
“How do I put this…?” Tonks said, tapping the tip of her wand on her chin. “How do you think Harry would feel if he had to try to cram himself into those jeans?”
“These wouldn’t fit him, he’s too… oh…” Hermione said with dawning comprehension.
“Unless you’re planning on stripping in front of him before you drink that Polyjuice, you’d probably be better with something more along the lines of a baggy sweatshirt and pants. A pair of pajama bottoms, something like that. And sandals, not trainers; his feet are a lot bigger than yours.”
“Good idea,” Hermione said, turning toward the stairs.
“Oh, and, um…” Tonks said, a little more delicately. “What are you wearing underneath?”
“Umm, a bra? Knickers?”
“Might want to go commando. I guarantee Fleur will be. Bloody veela,” she muttered under her breath.
“Yeah, I suppose those would probably hurt a bit, too,” Hermione said, blushing slightly. “Pinching.”
“There is that,” Tonks said. “We’ll also be sparing Harry the trauma of seeing what he looks like in a pair of your lacy unmentionables.”
Hermione, who was only wearing a simple set of white cottons, nonetheless had a mental image of Harry Potter dancing around Gryffindor Tower in her underwear, and couldn’t help breaking into a smile, the first she’d had since she woke up this morning.
“Once you and the other five start changing, it won’t be anything that Harry doesn’t see in the shower, he’ll be fine,” Tonks said reassuringly.
But what about me? Hermione thought, her face turning even more pink. It’s not anything I’ve seen before. Any of it…
“Besides,” Tonks said, leaning in. “Just tell Ron that you’re not wearing anything underneath, it’ll drive him nuts.”
Hermione felt like her face was going to burst into flame. She had hung out with Tonks on many occasions in the past few years, but this was the first time that anything regarding boys had come up. Anything regarding what Nymphadora must have recognized as that tension between her and Ron Weasley.
She stood rooted to the floor, debating asking Tonks about that line of thought or just bolting upstairs to avoid the same conversation when a familiar guitar riff started up on the kitchen radio.
Where to began, the man sang, I can’t begin to knowin
But then I know it’s growin’ strong
“This song,” said Hermione, turning to the kitchen. “My dad… it’s one of our favorites.”
Tonks looked up at Hermione. “Who is it?” she asked. Her father had given her some exposure to Muggle music (The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, and Led Zeppelin, mostly), but this was the first time she had heard this melody.
“Neil Diamond,” Hermione said quietly. “An American. ‘Baby In Blue Jeans,’ ‘Cracklin’ Rosie.’ Good singer.”
Was in the spring and spring became the summer
“It’s catchy,” Tonks said haltingly. “I’ll have to borrow it from you sometime.”
Who’d have believed you’d come along
“He used to sing it to me when I was little,” Hermione said, and Tonks noticed that tears were once again flowing down her cheeks. “When he was in a good mood, or when he was putting me to bed. Sometimes just in the middle of the kitchen, we’d dance with each other. He’d always put my name in there, because he knew I’d get frustrated with him. ‘Those aren’t the right words, Daddy!’ I’d always say… and he’d always laugh and kiss my forehead…”
Hands
Hermione sniffed deeply and wiped her eyes with the back of her hand.
Touchin hands
“I’m going to go change,” she whispered, and ran upstairs, running away from the music.
Reaching out
Tonks turned back to the Grangers, and thought it over quickly.
It shouldn’t take too much, Tonks decided, waving her wand around Daniel Granger’s head. Just a little feeling of déjà vu whenever he hears the song. Like he’s missing someone, even if he doesn’t remember who or why…
Touchin me
Touchin you…
“Hermione Caroline Wilkins,” Kingsley Shacklebolt read from the pink photo album he and Ron had found in the upstairs nursery. “Born May 5th, 1998.”
“Sweet Caroline,” Hermione sang under her breath, her voice shaky. “Bum, bum, bum…” She was sitting in the chair across from the couch, where Ron had lifted her after she had passed out. A glass of water was clutched in her hands, and she could see the ripples along the top; her hands were shaking worse than her voice was.
“May fifth,” Ron said, pacing around the living room, cradling the baby (My sister, Hermione corrected with a splash of dread) and patting her on the back. “She’s been around for four months…”
“And it would put her date of conception at late July or early August,” Kingsley said, continuing to flip through the pages of the book, studying the still, non-magical photographs with a detective’s eye.
“Not long after they left England,” Hermione moaned, the glass shaking harder. “Oh, God…”
“Hold her…” Ron said quickly, holding out baby Hermione to Kingsley. Shacklebolt hesitated, looking the baby up and down, then put the book down and took her from Ron’s hands. Ron then quickly ran to Hermione and kneeled down beside her.
“Calm down,” he said soothingly, taking the glass from her hand, which he set down on the table next to the Imprint crystals, and putting his hands in hers. “It’s going to be okay.”
“You have to admit,” said Kingsley, “It will make a convenient cover story. If any of your extended family wonders why their holiday ended up taking over a year…”
“God, this wasn’t supposed to happen,” cried Hermione. “How could this happen? I mean…”
“I think I could guess as to how it happened,” she heard Kingsley say, but her eyes never left her hands.
“We know how it happens, thanks, Kingsley,” said Ron sharply, carefully watching Hermione.
“That’s not how I meant it, Ronald,” he continued. “I’m just guessing that Wendell and Monica Wilkins, childless throughout their entire marriage, finally fulfilled their dream of moving to Australia. They arrive, and are happy they’re here. So they feel like it’s time for their next life goal. Start asking themselves, ‘why don’t we have children yet?’ So they start up fairly quick, and name her ‘Hermione’ because they think it’s a nice name for a girl.”
“But… but they don’t want any more,” Hermione said, her voice shaking. “They tried for years after I was born, but eventually decided that they were too old to be starting over again. They’re in their fifties…”
“Age doesn’t matter, believe me,” Ron said, running his hand through her hair. “My Mum would probably want to pop another Weasley out tomorrow if Dad hadn’t gotten fixed after Ginny was born. You can see it in her eyes whenever Teddy’s around.”
“What am I going to do?” Hermione asked him, her eyes and voice almost pleading.
“We’ll figure something out,” he said, leaning in so their foreheads touched. “We always do.”
“Um, Ronald…” Kingsley said. Ron and Hermione looked up to see him holding the baby at arm’s length, looking at her slightly cross-eyed. “Do you think you could take her back? She doesn’t seem to like me.”
“That’s because you’re holding her wrong,” Ron said as baby Hermione started crying. “Here, give…” He stood up and held his arms out.
“Sorry,” said Kingsley, gratefully handing her over and wiping his hands absently on his robe. “I’ve never been good with kids.”
“Just takes practice, that’s all,” said Ron, and baby Hermione stopped crying almost immediately as he cradled her to his chest.
“You’re good with her,” Hermione said, smiling despite herself as a wave of affection flowed through her toward the man she had only kissed for the first time a few months ago.
“Yeah, well,” he shrugged. “It’s not like I haven’t been paying attention on those nights when Andromeda brought little Teddy over to the Burrow.”
Hermione nodded. She and Harry had both been splitting time between Hogwarts, Grimmauld Place, and the Burrow since the battle had ended at the beginning of the summer. Unfortunately, there had been very few nights when her visits coincided with babysitting the Lupin’s orphaned son, so she hadn’t ever seen this side of him.
“Besides,” he said, bouncing the girl on his arm, “when you’re a Weasley there’s always a second cousin or someone’s great great niece to take care of at family gatherings. I don’t think there’s a one of us who doesn’t know how to change a diaper.”
“But, still,” Hermione said quietly, “It’s good to know you have it in you.”
Ron looked down at her and smiled. That could be ours someday, Hermione thought, and the urge to just jump up and kiss him, kiss him and do whatever else, damn whatever Kingsley thought, hit her so strongly that she had to tear her gaze away from Ron’s eyes.
Kingsley seemed to sense the sudden change in the room, too, because he cleared his throat a little too loudly and said, “So what we have to decide now is what to do about this little hitch in our plan. There are plenty of routes we can take. The easiest and most obvious would involve a second memory modification. Make Mr. and Mrs. Granger believe that they planned to have this child all along, and had it and raised it here in Australia while the three of you were off saving the world. Everyone knows what you were up to, Hermione, so we won’t have to worry about making people believe that you were here with them anymore.”
“That does sound like the easiest option,” said Ron, but Hermione shook her head.
“It can’t be that way,” she said. “My parents have been living a lie, a lie that I created, for the past year, just so that they could be protected. And so that I could be protected. I couldn’t live with myself knowing that they would be living another lie for the rest of their life, the rest of her life, just because I didn’t write a line in my notebook about them not wanting children.”
“Are you sure, Hermione?” Kingsley said. “It would be simple enough…”
“There have been too many secrets, too many lies,” said Hermione. “My family deserves better than that.”
“Okay,” Kingsley said, sighing, “That still gives us a few more choices. Some of which we can eliminate right away.”
“We could tell them she’s ours?” Ron said, and withered at the look Hermione gave him. “Sorry, just brainstorming.”
“And that would be one we can eliminate,” Kingsley said quickly. “There’s a possibility that ten, twenty, thirty years down the line, Hermione Caroline would find out that Ronald isn’t her biological father, and that her genetic code doesn’t match Hermione’s as closely as it would if she were her real mother.”
“Her what code?” Ron asked, dumbfounded.
“Muggle science, nothing important. Also, it’s a story that would fall apart as soon as Charlotte went to the gynecologist and he tells her that her body is showing signs of a recent birth, especially if she had a c-section. She would deny it, and then the authorities would get involved. A gynecological exam would also eliminate putting the baby up for adoption.”
“There are already enough orphans from this war,” Hermione said flatly, and felt the tears beginning to well up again.
“Which leaves two choices,” Kingsley said. “The first of which is doing what we had planned all along. Bring Mr. and Mrs. Granger back. Explain what has happened in the past year. Tell them about the child. See what happens from there.”
Hermione’s heart froze. She had no idea how her parents would react to knowing that the past year of their lives had been stolen from them, and that they had been given a new obligation in the meantime. Probably not well, at all. Thoughts of her father, getting on in years, dropping dead of a heart attack or a stroke from the shock of everything, flew to the front of her thoughts. Her mother screaming, crying, knowing that they can’t afford another daughter, that their lives were ruined. Images of disownment; being thrown out the door, her baby sister in tow, being told to never come back, that she was dead to them.
“And what’s the other option?” she whispered, knowing the answer already.
Kingsley sighed sadly. “The last option is permanent memory modification. Let them live their lives as Wendell, Monica, and Hermione Wilkins. Use the Imprint crystals to Obliviate any remnant of Charlotte and Daniel Granger from their minds, any remnant of England.”
“And my family?” Hermione asked. “My grandparents? My aunts and uncles?”
“They only know that you three went on holiday,” explained Kingsley. “We sent a couple letters after your parents left, to cover their tracks. After the Ministry fell, we sent a few more, telling your grandparents that your holiday was being extended. Didn’t explain why, didn’t say where you had gone. It would only take a few more letters, a few more documents, to say that the three of you don’t exist. Died in an accident, a house fire, along those lines. We can transfigure some convincing bodies, if the need arises; it’s something Aurors have to occasionally do in our line of work.
“And as for you, Hermione, you could just disappear. Sever most of your connections to the Muggle world. Maybe even modify Wendell and Monica’s memory a little more. Make you, I don’t know, a niece who likes to come visit her aunt and uncle on holiday occasionally…”
“Kingsley,” Ron said. He was looking at Hermione, whose head was in her hands. She had begun to shake uncontrollably. “I think the baby might need to lie down. Mind going to get a blanket from the crib upstairs?”
Kingsley stopped in mid-thought, looked between the two of them with dawning understanding. “Of course,” he said. “I apologize.”
“It’s fine,” Ron said. “You’re an Auror. It’s just a job.”
“Ronald…”
“Just… just take your time, yeah?”
Kingsley nodded, and slowly walked up the stairs. Ron readjusted baby Hermione in his arm, and walked back over to Hermione. With his free hand, he touched the top of her head, running his fingers soothingly through her hair, and she responded by reaching out, blindly and desperately clutching his leg. She pressed her face into his thigh, and began to sob.
“Oh, God,” Hermione cried, her voice muffled. “I screwed up, Ron. I screwed things up so badly…”
“No, you didn’t,” Ron said quietly. “You made the right choice.”
“It’s not looking like it from here.”
“It is from here,” Ron said. “They’re alive. We’re alive. After the Death Eaters saw you at the Lovegoods, they would have come after your parents just like they went after Neville’s Gran. Bringing them here, keeping their names out of it, probably saved their lives. Probably saved ours, too, because I know we wouldn’t have been able to go on if we knew they had been captured. The three of us probably would have staged some sort of half-assed rescue operation, gotten ourselves killed in the process. We’re Gryffindors, we’re noble and stupid that way.”
Hermione felt like she needed to protest that, but knew that she couldn’t. If she had learned her mother and father were under Death Eater control, she would have gone to any length…
“Do you… um…” Ron said bracingly, “Do you want to say hello to your sister?”
Hermione pulled her face away from Ron’s leg, a wet patch developing on his jeans from her tears, and looked up. After a few seconds thought she nodded slightly, realizing that she had barely looked at the child in all the time that the three of them had been talking. Like if she didn’t acknowledge her presence, then she really wasn’t there.
Ron bent down to one knee and carefully removed baby Hermione from his shoulder. Hermione took the baby and set her on her knee, propping her up from behind with one hand. Hermione Jean and Hermione Caroline studied each other’s faces in what Ron could only describe as awe.
Then Hermione began to laugh, and Hermione smiled.
“Hi, there,” she said, tears coming forward again. “Hi, Hermione. I’m your sister…”
“Guess we’ll have to straighten the name thing out somehow,” Ron said. “Might get confusing.”
“She’s beautiful,” Hermione whispered wetly as the baby began to grab for her bushy brown hair. “She’s got… she’s got my Dad’s eyes, his nose. Oh, look,” she said, running her hand gently over the scalp, where some hair was beginning to come in, “she’s blond like my Mum. They said I was the same way when I was a baby, but I darkened, maybe she will, too…”
“She’s got your smile,” Ron said, still kneeling down beside them.
“No, she’s got my Mum’s smile.”
“You both have the same smile,” said Ron, putting his hand on her leg. “I noticed it the first time I met your parents at Diagon Alley.”
“But we were twelve,” she said, smiling. “You were studying me even back then?”
“Something wrong with that?” Ron said defensively.
Hermione’s smile faded as she looked back at her sister. “What do you think I should do?” she asked Ron.
“I can’t answer that,” he said. “It’s your life. It’s your family.”
She turned to him, and she was kissing him. Her free hand, the one that wasn’t propping the baby up, clutched at the back of his neck as she pulled him tight to her. Their tongues met briefly, and he could feel the wetness of her tears on his face. His hands ran through her thick brown hair, and for a moment they were lost in each other.
After what felt like an eternity, Hermione pulled away, but leaned her forehead against his, her palm still against the back of his freckled neck. “You are my life,” she whispered. “And I want you to be a part of my family.”
“Is that a proposal?” asked Ron, smirking.
Hermione shook her head. “Not here, not now,” she said. “Proposals can wait. Besides, I’m old-fashioned when it comes to this kind of thing. Why do you think I didn’t ask you to the Yule Ball myself?”
“I could give a few reasons,” said Ron. “First among them being I was a major prat fourth year. And fifth. And sixth. First through third, now that I think about it…”
“I want you to ask me someday,” she said, looking into his eyes. “Just know that I’ll say yes.”
“I’ll mark a spot on my calendar,” he said, and this time it was he who kissed her.
“Ahem,” Kingsley said from the bottom of the stairs, a blanket draped over his arm. Ron and Hermione pulled away from each other, and Ron suddenly knew how Harry and Ginny must have felt about him on Harry’s birthday. He had a strong desire to Stun the interim Minister of Magic for a few more minutes.
Hermione must have felt the same way, too, because she wore the same look that Ginny had worn as she stood up and carried the baby to the blanket, which Kingsley had spread on the carpeted floor.
“So what do you think I should do?” she asked Ron as she lay Hermione down and sat down next to her with her legs crossed.
“Well, just so we’re clear that you’re only going to put my opinion in with the rest of your thoughts, and not leaving me to make the final decision.”
“Since when have I ever trusted you to make the final decision on anything, Ronald Weasley?” she said, but was smiling when she said it.
“Good point,” he said, smiling back.
“So,” she repeated. “What do you think I should do?”
Do you believe in magic in a young girl’s heart
How the music can free her whenever it starts
Merlin’s pants, Brian, Nymphadora Tonks thought as she made the final adjustments on Charlotte and Daniel. Why does everything you play today have to be so damn appropriate?
As she pulled Daniel’s arm across Charlotte, she heard a set of footsteps on the stairs. The Lovin’ Spoonful cut off in mid-word as Hermione shut off the radio in the kitchen.
“Ready to go, girl?” Tonks called.
“I think so,” Hermione replied, walking into the den. “How do I look?”
Tonks sized up Hermione’s baggy sweatshirt and pajama bottoms, her bushy hair now pulled back in a braid. “Yeah, that’ll definitely work,” she said.
“They look comfortable,” Hermione said as she looked down at her parents. Her father was now laying on the couch, Charlotte nestled against his chest. His arm was around her shoulders. “Almost like they fell asleep that way.”
“Well, that’s the point, isn’t it?” said Tonks. “Not a bad job, if I do say so myself. They wake up in an hour, discover that they somehow fell asleep watching…” she turned on the television with her wand, “The morning news. Their schedule to get to the airport will be tight, but luckily they packed their bags last night and they’re sitting right in the entryway. By the time we get out of Gringotts and to the Burrow, Mr. and Mrs. Wendell Wilkins will be boarding their flight bound, with a short layover in Hong Kong, for their new life outside of Melbourne, Australia.”
“Sounds… good,” Hermione said, leaning over to kiss her mom on the cheek. “Stay safe,” she whispered. “I’ll be back for you soon.”
“Have the box? And the Imprints?” Hermione nodded, took one last look back at her sleeping parents, then followed Nymphadora Tonks out the door, locking it behind her.
“We’ll make the trip to the bank as quick as we can,” Tonks explained as they walked down the front path. “We’re meeting up with Ron and Arthur at the Burrow, but we won’t see Remy or any of the others till we actually reach Surrey. Hestia and Dedalus are picking up the Dursleys in a few hours, so we can’t move until we know that they’re out of the house. But, God, it’ll be nice to see Harry again. Can’t wait to show him the ring…”
She turned to look at Hermione, who had stopped in the middle of the sidewalk. Tonks thought she might have been crying, but as she saw that, although she was looking back at her house sadly, her eyes were dry.
“They’ll be okay, Hermione,” Tonks said quietly. “You made a good decision…”
“How do we do it, Tonks?” Hermione asked, her eyes never leaving the house. “How do we, witches and wizards, live our lives, knowing that someone could change everything we’ve ever known with just…”
Tonks sighed, and put her hand on Hermione’s shoulder. “My dad’s lived on both sides of the world,” she said. “Just like you will, just like Harry will. And he says that magic doesn’t solve the world’s problems. It just replaces them with different ones. Magic can cure disease, regrow severed limbs, create something out of nothing. But it also puts a dangerous weapon in the hands of everyone over the age of eleven. A weapon that can destroy cities, create unspeakable horrors, kill another person with just a thought.
“It gives us the safety that comes with being able to fight injustice. It gives us the freedom to travel anywhere in the world by spinning on our heel. But it can also take a person’s mind, take a person’s body, take a person’s soul. There’s a reason the Statute of Secrecy exists, and it’s because humans can’t believe that magic doesn’t fix everything.
“So, no, we can’t know that we’re safe in our own minds. That we won’t wake up in another country, or wake up believing that we’re a Death Eater, or that we’re in love with someone we didn’t know existed when we went to bed. We can’t know that we won’t wake up thinking that we’re a chicken.
“All we can do is trust. Trust ourselves. Trust our friends. Trust our family. Believe that they have the best intentions, and that they would do anything to keep us from harm. And to know in our hearts that we’ll do the same for them.”
Hermione Wilkins squealed in glee as the glowing silver otter swam around above her head. She reached and swatted at the silver terrier as it sniffed and licked her face.
Hermione Granger and Ron Weasley, their Patronuses keeping watch on the child, stood hand-in-hand behind Kingsley Shacklebolt as he performed the final incantations on Wendell and Monica Wilkins. The two Imprint crystals he had held in his hand had long since disappeared.
“That should be all,” he said, standing up and putting his wand back into his robe.
“So what now?” Hermione asked. “When do they wake up?”
“The Stunning Spell wears off in about an hour,” Kingsley said. “But it can be safely removed at any time. I just figured you’d want to do the honors.”
Hermione nodded, took one last reassuring glance up at Ron’s face, and pulled her vine-and-dragon-heartstring wand from the back pocket of her jeans. She stepped forward as Kingsley took a counter-step back, now next to Ron, who patted him on the shoulder.
Hermione took a deep breath in, and when she exhaled it shook with her tight nerves.
Trust yourself, she thought. Trust your family. Know that they would do anything to keep you from harm, and that you would do the same for them.
She touched the tip of her wand to Charlotte Granger’s forehead.
“Rennervate.”
Charlotte’s eyes opened as Hermione touched Daniel Granger’s forehead.
“Rennervate.”
“Hermione?” Mrs. Granger said murkily.
“Did the spell work?” Mr. Granger asked, his voice sounding just as groggy. “Didn’t you just… oh, wait, I guess it did.” He looked around the living room, realizing quickly that they weren’t in Oxford anymore.
“Yes, it worked,” Hermione said. She looked up at Ron, who nodded reassuringly and put his hand on her shoulder.
“It’s been a year,” she said carefully to her parents.
Mrs. Granger’s jaw dropped. “A year? I was only expecting a few months, at most. And where are we?”
“A little over a year, actually,” Hermione continued, her confidence falling by the second, “And we have a lot of things to talk about, a lot of things to catch up on. But first… ummm…”
She heard a soft cry as Kingsley picked up Hermione Caroline and carried her over to the family.
“There’s someone I’d like you to meet.”
As Daniel and Charlotte Granger got their first look at their second daughter, Hermione saw what she had expected in their faces. Shock. Confusion. A complete and total loss for words.
What would come after that, she didn’t know, and she steeled herself for whatever would come.
But she saw familiarity in their faces. Like they had seen this child before, if only in a dream.
And Charlotte Granger smiled.
Three Months Later: Our Little Wilkins (1/2) / Previous Chapters / Eleven Months Later: Scrubbing Bubbles