Hermione closed her eyes and savored the rich flavor as the dark chocolate of her Bournville bar melted in her mouth. She sectioned off each square for private consumption. Each silky square was a victory against her mother's decade long anti-sugar regime. Hermione's was a guerrilla campaign. The fact this little victory was gained while the feathered version of her mother sat staring down at her from the tree across the way made it taste all the more delicious.
Imogen cried her call at her, as if the owl saw her blatant rule-breaking and disapproved. Hermione opened her eyes as if surprised to hear anything at all and cupped a hand around her ear as if straining to hear the bird. Imogen cried again.
'What was that?' the bushy-haired brunette seemed to say as she did the motion again. 'I can't quite hear .'
The owl flew away, back to its usual spot on the other side of the house.
"Another victory," Hermione said as she snapped off another dark square and popped it in her mouth after swallowing the first. She smiled and went back to studying the old textbook in front of her.
Momentum might be on her side today but things had not always gone so smoothly. In fact, it almost didn't happen at all. It was on their way home from King's Cross Station that the fires of war had been lit. On their way north and east, her father stopped to refuel at a gas station near Newmarket. Minnie the mini mint Mini Mark III was a hungry machine, one that was older than she was, and her father loved coincidences. His dental practice was on Newmarket Road, so of course they had to stop when the turnoff said Newmarket. The fact they were closer to Exning than Newmarket fell on deaf ears, as did the fact the two Newmarkets were on the same road, only 50 miles apart and therefore likely not a coincidence at all.
She had followed her father inside, more to be away from her mother - who stayed in the car - than to stretch her legs. Maybe it was the fact there was an entire other world out there which seemed to run counter to the way her mother operated, or perhaps it was simply the fact she had friends there, but ever since Hermione had stepped off the Hogwarts Express everything about the woman had been grating on her.
Cold, emotionless, and overly-logical, that was Dr. Puckle. She might be one of the best oral and maxillofacial surgeons in the country but her interpersonal skills left much to be desired. Her father had once said that her mother simply wasn't programmed for human interaction, a manufacturer's mistake and if only he could find her manual…
Her mother had never wanted kids, Hermione knew that. She had heard her say it when she was little. But it wasn't as if she hadn't tried, for years she had pushed herself: constantly studying, constantly revising, constantly drilling, trying to be the very image of her mother, desperately seeking some sign that she approved. There was always some criticism though: she had been too slow with her calculation, had delayed unnecessarily by asking for the word's etymology when it was obvious, she could have finished the game two moves faster had she really wanted to win.
"Curly Wurly?" her father asked, dragging her from her thoughts. Safely hidden from the car's view in the convenience store's candy aisle the man was finally free to indulge his sweet tooth. "It's chocolate-coated caramel goodness. You used to love them," he finished in a sing-song voice as he wagged the candy bar back and forth.
If four-out-of-five dentists recommended something, Dan Granger would say the exact opposite; then laughingly jest he'd have all the more teeth to clean when his patients made their next appointments. This strange outlook on life, coupled with a pair of overly expressive eyes and a head of hair that could only be called a small coiffed bush, led her to believe he was much more of a child's cartoon than a dentist. How he ended up married to her mother she'd never know but suspected there was some sort of contract negotiation or robotic testing involved.
"You're silly, Dad," she said as she took the candy bar away from him as if she were the parent and he were the child. After all, she had been five the last time she had eaten a Curly Wurly. He shrugged and went to the cashier to pay for his chips, drink, and the candy bar the lanky man would pocket before ever getting in sight of the car.
She had fully intended to put the candy bar back on the shelf when it happened, a quick clear Beep! from Minnie's horn. Her mother had summoned; they had taken too long. She grabbed something from the shelf and walked decisively up to the cashier next to her father.
"Is that all for you?" the cashier asked, ringing up the purchases.
"These too," Hermione said, adding two Curly Wurlies to the small pile.
.....
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