Upside Down Mirror: Granger Yet

Puzzle Pieces

"What?" Hermione found her bewilderment growing, still caught off guard at having seen her father doing something which felt self-destructive and harmful, even though she knew he'd not intended for his actions to be that way, nor had she liked noticing the way his eyes were glazed over and his vision unfocused, which always meant a migraine. However, he'd tried very hard to hide them from her—she simply knew. "I'm not old enough to Apparate legally yet."

His eyes blinked, remaining unfocused, but he almost looked her in the eye, which was never a good thing given how she knew he hated making eye contact just as much as Jules did.

Hermione took a deep breath. "And you should know that, right?"

"Right," he nodded, smiling only to cringe and suck in his breath, a hand going to the back of his head.

"Oh," Hermione said, swallowing, becoming slightly concerned about what that indicated. "Dad, are you talking about yourself? What happened?"

"I crashed and burned big time," he said, looking away and somewhat nervous.

Hermione frowned, sitting down on the bed and slipping her wand into her jeans pocket. "You crashed and burned?"

He started to nod his head, only to switch to a shake, meaning nodding his head was a bad idea.

"And you ended up hitting your head."

"Also hit it a few moments ago on Sirius' hard skull, I think." And there was a laugh there as if she wasn't privy to some kind of joke.

"It's not funny."

"No, it is," he insisted. "Sirius' hard skull."

"Dad, concentrate."

"Sorry." He sighed, continuing to look away, before saying. "Children shouldn't be parenting the parent."

She wanted to say it was the big deal he was making it out to be, that he thought it to be, yet there was that part of her that was frustrated with him for not knowing certain things. Nor did she know where to begin asking the questions she wanted to ask. She glanced away, finally saying, "You say it as if that's a bad thing."

"I know you hate me."

"And that would be because?" Hermione asked, deciding to gauge what he could discern of her feelings.

"Because I was a Death Eater?" he said.

"Was?" she turned her head.

"Well," he said, suddenly placing a hand on his chin, thinking over something an average person wouldn't have to think, while his left hand remained stationary. "How to put this?"

"You mean you're a former Death Eater?" Hermione asked.

"Yes, but how to put that?" he said, not realizing he'd effectively already said what he wanted to say. "Um, I could say I don't follow him anymore, but I don't have any way to prove it, particularly since there's a spell keeping me from leaving."

"Well, that explains why you didn't return home to mom like you said you would," Hermione said, stunned. What she didn't sound as if she didn't know how he'd react, not to mention there was some level of doubt in her mind, was, "You don't have to prove you're not following him anymore." Not when she didn't understand any of his motives.

"Sorry. I..." he started to say.

A blush spread across her face. "Please don't say you want to have sex with mom again!"