The Sweetest Downfall

No Time For Love

[NOTE: Here's chapter one of my new story! I hope you guys like this. If anyone will be gracious and lovely to help out a non-artistic author and make a cover for this, I'll love you FOREVER.]

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Her fingertips were drumming at a rhythm of one, two, three on the surface of her tidy desk. She crossed her legs as she leaned against the back of her chair, her left foot tapping the same rhythm that her fingers were. A sigh escaped her, a frown creasing her forehead as she glanced at the grandfather-clock tucked in the corner of her furthest wall. She got quite a lot of teasing for having the muggle contraption in her office, but she always shushed them; after all, it had a very special meaning to her (even if they didn't know).

Two years ago, after a fatal car crash that claimed the lives of her parents, Hermione got rid of everything from their dentistry practice and home—she didn't want storage space filled with memories that would eventually give her a grudge against Life over the untimely passing of her parents. Everything went, except the clock; it had been a Christmas gift to her father from her mother, something she'd found in an antique shop that was meant to jokingly represent her father's old-fashioned personality. It was quite an eccentric thing: smooth, mahogany wood that was shaped into arches at the head and that had grooves throughout the thick body. Behind the glass, the functioning parts of the clock were yellow-gold, tarnishing quite a bit as time went on. It was a huge ugly thing to have about, but Hermione never minded—well, not until that very moment when its ticking was withering her patience.

With her brown eyes narrowed at the thing, Hermione's left hand reached for the wand that rested a few inches away. Once her fingers had grasped her wand, she glared at the clock, acting as if it had an actual face and they were having a staring contest that would then declare one of them the winner. And just as she was thinking of a nonverbal to throw at the thing, to destroy and silence its noise that was driving her mad, the door to her office opened.

"—We're here!"

"—Sorry we're late."

She scowled at the grandfather-clock with something that said you-win-this-time before she turned to the newcomers. Once she noticed them, her scowl transformed into a deep, parental frown. "Are you kidding me? You kept me waiting an hour so that you could get food?"

"I told you she'd get upset," Harry huffed at Ron.

The redhead shrugged carelessly, back-kicking Hermione's door in order for it to shut so he and his two best friends would have some privacy. He'd been carrying a stack of folders, but that didn't impede Ron from eating. A pastry was in his mouth, chewing it ungracefully, appearing like a snake trying to swallow its dinner.

Dropping the archives upon Hermione's desk, ignoring the loud thud it made and the immediate tumble of her quill and inkpot onto the floor, Ron grinned sheepishly at her. "We brought you a snack, too," he managed through his mouth stuffed with food.

The brunette kept her frown as she summoned the things Ron had knocked off her desk. With frustration, she yanked the first file from the hefty stack and opened it. "How can someone who is supposedly invisible and mundane, have so many affiliations in the Wizardying and Muggle worlds?"

Before getting straight to work—which was Hermione's approach to everything—Harry threw a frown of his own at Ron, something that resembled a don't-anger-her-you-moron look."Well," he began, taking a seat from across Hermione, "it helps that he is a Metamorphmagus with a keen ability to charm his new encounters. He created connections with his victims, developing relationships with them, and from them sprouted...well, children. Those children grew up, and you sort of get the point. They are either his relatives or people who are still infatuated with him."