Bridges
Chapter Seven: Building A Bridge
"I just got a Floo from that Intercessor - Rafferty? - from St. Mungo's," Ron said, as he reentered the Archives. Harry looked up from the pile of parchment he'd been immersed in, clearly interested.
"Has Annemarie's grandmother put in an appearance yet?"
"She just left. Finnuala said she wasn't there ten minutes. And seemed pretty annoyed when Finnuala wouldn't leave the room too." Harry noticed Ron's use of the Intercessor's first name, but didn't comment. Something glinted fiercely in his eyes.
"Was she? Good. What did they talk about?"
"Nothing important," Ron answered. "Apparently, Mrs. Ludlow came to see her granddaughter because it's what was expected."
Just like Aunt Petunia, Harry thought with distaste.
"Anyway, it's getting late. Have you found Annemarie's birth records?" Ron asked.
"Yeah," Harry answered, holding up the paper in question. The entry on it was as brief as Lily Catherine's had been, but one thing had jumped out at him immediately. "Hermione and Tabitha were in the hospital at the same time," he blurted suddenly. Ron's eyebrows arched in interest.
"Really? So, so Annemarie and - and - yours…erm," he tried to phrase carefully, "were born on the same day?"
"No, they were born just a few hours apart, but Annemarie was born on the third of March at 11:48. Lily - " his voice quivered slightly, and he sighed. "Lily was born after midnight, at 12:17… on the fourth."
"I wonder if Hermione knew her then. Tabitha was probably already working at St. Mungo's, but Hermione hadn't finished her Healer training yet," Ron speculated. Harry was looking at the parchment in irritation.
"Isn't there any more information? These records don't tell you much."
"You can expand the file with your wand, if you've got authorization," Ron informed him. "Just tap the entry twice and access it with your password."
Harry gave him a withering look.
"That would have been nice to know earlier," he grumbled, and Ron spread his hands in a wide shrug of innocence.
He followed Ron's instruction, and the record on Annemarie suddenly lengthened, shoving the names above and below it out of the way. Now, Harry was not only looking at her name, parents' names, and date and time of birth, but he could also see length, weight, hair and eye color, presiding Healer, Mediwitch in charge, procedures performed and potions given. He stared at it blankly for a moment, and then dove for the adjacent pile of parchment, searching for Lily's record.
"Where's the copy you made?" Ron asked, clearly able to tell exactly what he was doing.
"Left it at Hermione's," Harry mumbled, only halfway paying attention. He tapped his wand on the parchment, and it too expanded. "Who has access to these records?" His eyes roved eagerly to Father's Name, hoping on this more protected document, that it might be different, but it still read Not Given.
"Aurors have periodic access, like we have now," Ron replied. "Parents have access, next of kin or guardians if the parents are gone…oh, and the presiding Healers too. What?"
Harry had started, and done a double-take, looking back and forth between the two entries that he now held, one in each hand.
"The same Healer delivered both babies," he said.
"That makes sense," Ron replied. "If they were born less than an hour apart, it's likely the same Healer would have been on shift for both of them."
"Alan Callaghan," Harry said, half to himself. "I'll bet that's hard to say five times fast." His eyes trailed down the rest of the entry, wanting and at the same time not wanting to read how they had discovered Lily Catherine's heart defect, how they had tried first standard treatments and then aggressive treatments, only to have everything fail. A tiny notation at the end of the record read Death Indexed Separately. It was inked in a different color, and Harry felt sure that wands with password access could instantly Summon the corresponding record.
He tapped the damning phrase twice, and his muttered password caused a sudden rustling from a pile of neatly rolled and stacked scrolls on a nearby shelf. One of them unfurled itself and soared through the air like a magic carpet, skimming to a halt on the countertop in front of him.
The record was succinct, listing the baby's name, her mother's name, and cause and time of death. He tapped it, half in hope and half in dread, but the record did not provide any more information. The Healer's signature sprawled in illegible jet ink across the bottom of the page, with his name neatly printed beneath it, and a gold seal with the St. Mungo's crest affixed to the bottom corner.
"Alan Callaghan," he read again, taking a perverse pleasure in the way it rolled off his tongue. He thought that perhaps the time difference between Australia and England was finally getting to him.
Ron had pulled a crumpled wad of parchment from the pocket of his robes, and was jotting notes on it, from time to time consulting the birth records of Annemarie Ludlow. At Harry's utterance, he snapped his head up, with an exclamation of,
"Wait - who?"
"The Healer that delivered the babies," Harry said, eying Ron somewhat warily at the incredulity of his question. "The Healer that signed off on … on the death certificate. Alan Callaghan."
"Alan Callaghan… why that's - I can't believe she… and I never once…" Ron spluttered, clearly at a loss. "She dated him," he finally blurted. "He knew, and he never said a thing." Clearly, Healer-patient confidentiality did not mean much to Ron. "I knew I never liked him. I just thought it was because he was a smarmy, cocky bastard, who thought he was better than everyone else, in that posh apartment in Galleon Court, talking down his nose at anyone who wasn't a Healer too…" Ron's rant subsided into grumbled imprecations at Hermione's ex-boyfriend.
"She dated the Healer who delivered our baby? Why would she - ? Wouldn't that just remind her - ?"
"He seems like a bloke who would horn in on emotionally vulnerable women," Ron said sagely, with an air of distrust. Harry eyed Ron with askance, clearly wondering when Hermione had ever seemed emotionally vulnerable. She seemed about as vulnerable as a Hungarian Horntail today, he thought.
"Of course," Ron added, "they didn't date until recently. Only about six months or so ago, as a matter of fact. Maybe she couldn't handle it - it didn't last very long… not that anybody lasts long with Hermione …" he trailed off and shot a stricken glance at Harry, who waved off the untoward comment.
Harry tried to parse how he felt about Hermione seeing other people - and more specifically, one who had been there at a time when he should have been - but found that he was too emotionally wrung out to feel anything else. He looked down at the birth and death records for his daughter, and numbly began to duplicate them again.
Ron parted his robes to shove his hands into the pockets of his pants, his face stamped with sympathy.
"Listen, Harry…" he began slowly, his voice heavy with concern. "It's past five - everyone will be leaving. We can head back to see Annemarie again tomorrow. A bunch of the old Hogwarts gang usually gets together on Fridays, down at this pub in Diagon Alley. You don't need to be holed up at the Leaky Cauldron all by yourself tonight. Come with me. Everyone will be dead set on seeing you."
"Everyone?" Harry asked, with arched brow and unmistakable meaning in his tone.
"She hardly ever comes," Ron answered, not even pretending that he didn't know what Harry was talking about. "You know Hermione, long hours, extra research - why spend time doing something as frivolous as hanging about with school chums and getting pissed?"
Harry thought with a pang what had happened the last time Hermione had done something frivolous. No wonder she retreated back behind her Studious Hermione armor. How did Alan Callaghan manage to pierce that?
"All right," Harry agreed grudgingly, feeling some semblance of anticipation begin to warm his blood. He could do with a few rounds in cheery company, where he could try to forget that he'd ever fathered a child. He folded the duplicated records carefully, and tucked them into his robes; as an afterthought, he duplicated Annemarie's as well, and added it to the others. He remembered the impish gleam in her eyes, Wait til I tell Gwendolyn… and a smile came to his lips in spite of his gloomy mood. He looked at Ron with slightly lighter eyes. "Let's go."
*~~~~~*
"So…" Harry said, drawing out the word and leaving it to dangle there awkwardly. They were both slouched companionably on the sofa, alone in the new flat, as Ron had gone to help Fred and George with a delivery. He toyed with a loose thread on the corner of the sofa cushion, and wondered what would happen if he kept pulling at it. He could not look at Hermione, who was reclined, with a book propped across her knees, against the other arm of the sofa, but might as well have been miles away.
Forty-eight hours ago she was in my arms, Harry thought, trying not to think about the way that had made him feel. It had been two days, and things had never been more stilted between them. It was as if both of them thought things should change, but neither wanted to make the first move to do so, each of them afraid of what might happen when the axis shifted.
"So…?" Hermione's echo had an interrogative lilt at the end.
"About the other night…" Harry forced the words through an unwilling throat. "I'm sorry…" he managed, and then could go no further. He wasn't really sure what he was sorry for - for the way he'd handled it afterward, for it happening at all, for it not happening sooner - or again?
And then there was his conversation with Ginny…
Hermione has done everything you've wanted for so long. I'm not sure she knows how to live differently.
Did she ever tell you that she wanted to be a Healer?
"You've done nothing to be sorry for," Hermione chirped, her voice sounding chipper and brittle. Her eyes seemed very bright.
"I've - I'd … taken advantage…" he stammered, hating the way the words came out, clumsily formal.
"Harry Potter! Do you really think that I'd ever let you take advantage? That I'd ever do anything I didn't want to do? Even for you?" Now the tone was snippy, and Harry relaxed. This sounded more like the Hermione he was used to.
But Ginny's words still resounded in his head, the leftover shimmery noise after the striking of a gong. I'm not sure she knows how to live differently.
"It's just - I think that…you know, maybe it - maybe it's too fast and - and too soon… too soon after - you know… everything and all. And I don't - that is to say, you should…"
Hot color rushed into his face as he ground to a halt. He seized on his utter embarrassment as proof that he was doing the right thing. He'd never felt this undone just talking to Hermione before. It was further evidence that they'd come dangerously close to mucking up a beautiful companionship, further evidence that Hermione really would do anything for him, and he should release her from this self-imposed exile.
"Of course," Hermione replied immediately, her tone sounding very natural and off-hand. "There's absolutely no reason for us to turn this into some huge…thing."
"Right," Harry answered, trying to sound as emphatic about it as she had. Trust Hermione to always look at a situation logically.
"I'm willing to forget about it if you are," she teased him, rosy-cheeked, as she leaned forward and held out her hand, as if to seal the deal. He took it, not as a lover, but as a gesture of friendly camaraderie, and they shook once, twice.
"It's forgotten," he told her in like manner, as something in the region of his stomach twisted painfully. He thought longingly of his nebulously planned holiday, where he had wistfully inserted Hermione's presence.
You're being a selfish prat, Potter, he told himself in a Malfoy voice. She wants to be a Healer; she has a chance to do that now. And knowing Hermione, she'd rather be in a difficult training program than off doing who knows what with me.
He risked a glance at her, but she had resumed her position propped against the other end of the sofa, and was intent on her book once again. She appeared to be unaware that he was even still in the room, and he watched, transfixed, as she reached up to dab at her eye with her sleeve.
"Hermione, what's wrong?" he asked, fearing - hoping? - that the easy way out of their mess was, in fact, not what she wanted.
She looked up at him, and her lips twisted into a self-deprecating half-smile, as she rolled her eyes at herself.
"Sad chapter," she replied laconically.
*~~~~~*
The lighting in the Dragon's Snout spilled, richly yellow, from numerous lanterns, and burnished the surfaces of the worn wooden booths and counters with a warm orange patina.
"Like dragon-fire, see?" Ron explained happily, obviously thrilled that Harry had agreed to come. There were more than a few double takes at his entrance, but the sight of the tall, ginger-haired Auror at his side must have been enough to discourage approach. At the sight of a large corner booth, filled to overflowing with old friends, Harry felt his mood ease slightly, though he couldn't help but still see the clinical words, Granger, Lily Catherine, as if they'd been branded on his retinas.
The pub was noisy, in a jocular and raucous fashion, and his friends added to the din when they saw him. A chorus of remonstration went up, berating his communication skills, his woeful failure to visit, and his shameful and rude secretiveness. Harry returned the salutations in kind, freezing only slightly as he saw Ginny in the corner, sandwiched between Neville and Dean.
She seemed to go momentarily rigid, and strangely, Harry thought, something like guilt flashed in her face, before she pasted on a welcoming smile and called out,
"Welcome back, Harry!"
He nodded his thanks at her, and wondered while on earth the sight of Ginny should make him feel so uneasy. He looked anxiously toward the door, which had just disgorged another slew of merrymakers. Hermione was not among them.
She hardly ever comes, Harry reminded himself of Ron's words.
"First round is on me," he called out.
"As it should be!" Seamus declared, and Harry made his way toward the bar. The barkeep's substantial eyebrows rose to his hairline, when he recognized Harry, but he made no comment as he took the order.
Their booth had been out of his line of sight while he got the drinks, but as it came back into view, his heart stopped for an eternal moment, and then began to slam against his chest in a slow, painful rhythm.
She had come.
She was standing at the table, with her back to him, one hand gesturing in mid-air as she spoke. Her handbag was still slung on her shoulder, and Harry felt hopeful. Maybe she would not stay. Ron was seated on the outer edge of the booth, watching him over Hermione's shoulder with wide, panicked, yet apologetic eyes. Harry took a half-step back, barely feeling the tray in his numb hands; if he could just stay at the bar, until she was gone.
"Oy, quit yer dawdling," Seamus bellowed suddenly, waving him over. "Service is lousy tonight."
Hermione half-turned, and Harry saw the lines of her shoulders go rigid when she realized who was behind her. She lifted her chin, and said,
"Ha - Harry," by way of greeting, her voice trembling only slightly.
"Hello, Hermione," he managed to say, as if they had not had a huge, emotional confrontation earlier that afternoon. He took the opportunity to spear Ron with an accusing glance.
"I - I was just about to tell everyone that I - I can't stay, but I wanted to stop by and say hello," Hermione continued in that high, tight voice. The Weasleys seemed to notice the odd, restrained tension between the two of them, but nobody commented. Seamus said,
"Hermione, it's the bloody weekend. Can't you let up for just a bit?"
"You know me, Seamus," Hermione laughed. It rang falsely in Harry's ears. She thumbed her purse strap more securely on her shoulder, and turned to go.
Harry maneuvered past her, and set the tray of drinks down with a hasty clunk, turning in one smooth motion while everyone else was distracted by the arrival of the alcohol, and grabbing Hermione by the elbow.
"You don't have to do this," he said in a low voice, meant for her ears alone. "They're your friends. I've been - I'm not -" He lifted his hands in irritation, and sighed. "I'll go."
"You haven't seen them in ages," Hermione said wearily. "Ginny hasn't taken her eyes off of you yet. I'm sure you'd like to - "
"Don't do that," he cut her off suddenly and harshly. "Don't play the martyr with me. You're the one who cut me out, who decided that you knew what I wanted, and made the decision not to tell me about…things," he tacked on, glancing around as he pulled her further away from their booth, and lowering his voice.
"Are we going to go over this again?" she asked. Her voice sounded bored and annoyed, but her brilliant dark eyes were miserable. "I told you already how painful - "
"Yeah, you seem like you've been in a lot of pain," Harry said sarcastically. "So much that you went out with the Healer that - that signed her death certificate."
Hermione's nostrils flared with surprise, but she covered it well.
"Somebody has a big mouth," she said, cutting a glance over at Ron, who was trying to be a convincing part of their noisy party, while keeping an eye on them at the same time. "It's not as if he were the reason she died. And if it makes you feel any better, I couldn't hack it, okay? We went out for a month…and it was - it was just too much." She cocked a sardonic eyebrow at him. "Is this what you've been doing, researching me instead of working on your case?"
"Healer Callaghan delivered Annemarie Ludlow less than an hour before you - before our…" He didn't seem to know what to say next, but was eager to defend his work ethic. "You told me you worked with Tabitha; you didn't tell me you were both in labor at the same time."
"I didn't know her then," Hermione said in a tired voice, as if she were weary of discussing this with him.
"Do you have a picture?" he blurted suddenly, and then looked sorry that he'd asked. "Or - or could I see - I mean, visit where she - she - " He couldn't bring himself to say the word `buried'.
Something like compassion and empathy flitted across Hermione's face.
"Harry, I - maybe, it's better not to dredge up the past. You didn't even know about her until today - you couldn't feel that - " She stopped; Harry's eyes were blazing with intensity.
"You don't know what I'm capable of feeling - you haven't known for 12 years, and maybe you didn't even know then. Even now, even with all you've - all that's happened, I still lo - " He stopped abruptly, but it was plain to both of them what he had been about to say. Color was awash in Hermione's cheeks.
"Harry, what we shared was lovely, but it's been over for a long time." That mechanical note, that studied detachment was back in her voice. "There's been too much water under the bridge for us to try - for us to get back - it's just not possible, Harry, and I'm sorry, but…"
A trilling chime interrupted her, and she stared around blankly for a moment, before scrabbling inside her purse. A moment later, she had produced a key, which was glowing luminescently and producing the musical tones. She regarded it with crinkled brows, obviously mystified, but then said,
"I've got to go."
"What's going on?" Harry asked, as if on automatic pilot. His Auror instinct had come instantly awake, and, whatever the key was, he knew it wasn't a standard Healer summons.
Hermione looked on the verge of telling him that it was none of his business, but her concern put a hold on her issues with him.
"It's … it's Alan's key," she said with a sigh, as if she figured that his reaction to that would be less than positive. "I'd - I'd forgotten I even had it. It was a security measure, set to his wards, so that if anyone - " She looked worried again, and shook her head. "I would have thought he'd have removed me from the wards ages ago."
"And that means…?" Harry prompted her.
"Something's happened to him. He was always a little paranoid, and I thought he was being rather silly, but… I guess I should go make sure everything's okay."
Alarms were blaring inside Harry's head, and he reflexively reached inside his pocket to check his wand.
"You're certainly not going over there alone," he said resolutely. She opened her mouth as if to argue, and then seemed to realize that it would be wasted effort.
"Come on then," she sighed in resignation, extending her hand to him. He took it, but did not clasp it, threading his fingers between hers instead, as she Apparated them both away.
TBC
Well, this chapter got long, so hopefully, it's worth the wait. We finally got moved in, only to find the computer had been broken, and then the phone company screwed up our internet service! It's been a crazy month.
You may leave a review on your way out, if you like!
lorien
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