After another standard day of work in the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, Hermione Apparated to her apartment. She changed from her robes to a blouse and a nice pair of slacks and Apparated into an abandoned building about three blocks away. From there, she walked home, hopefully convincing any prying neighbours that she had a nice, normal Muggle job.
When she got home - for the second time - Hermione sat down on her couch and pulled out a book. After she had read about one hundred pages, she replaced her bookmark and rolled her head in a circle to work out the soreness.
When she stopped, she was shocked to see that the little ghost-but-not-a-ghost had returned. “Hullo, Mackenzie,” Hermione said quietly. “I’ve got to go and meet a friend of mine for dinner, but when I come back home I’d like it if you would talk to me. I’d like to help you, but I really can’t if I don’t know what’s wrong.”
The girl simply stared solemnly at Hermione. She walked into her bedroom - only to find Mackenzie sitting at the foot of her bed again.
“Mackenzie, you need to go into the other room. I’ve got to get changed,” Hermione said, struggling to keep the annoyance out of her voice. The little girl sat there, a slight smirk on her face, and watched her.
“Oh, for Merlin’s sake, Mackenzie, you aren’t being very cooperative now, so when I get home I want you to be the PICTURE of perfection,” Hermione said sternly. She Transfigured her Muggle clothes into a pair of robes, and putting on her travelling cloak, fled her apartment.
I can’t Transfigure my clothes every day. I can only hope that she’ll leave me alone… Or I can figure out why she’s a ghost but not a ghost and help her to move on. Either way, I better do it fast. It’s kind of creepy having a little girl stare at you constantly when you don’t even know her name, Hermione thought as she walked to the abandoned building.
Mentally shaking herself for getting so off-track, she quickly Apparated into Hogsmeade, where she and Ron were having dinner.
“So there’s a ghost in your apartment in Muggle London but it’s not really a ghost and it won’t talk to you so you can’t figure out what it is,” Ron said, accurately summarizing about twenty minutes of Hermione’s explanation in a single sentence.
“Yes. And it’s rather disconcerting to have a little girl gaping at you constantly when you don’t know the slightest thing about her.”
“Did you try giving her a quill and a piece of parchment? Maybe she’s lost her voice, or won’t talk, or whatever, but that doesn’t mean you can’t try to communicate with her in other ways.”
Hermione stared at her boyfriend. “Ronald, that’s brilliant! I don’t know why I didn’t think of that.” She leaned across the table and kissed him. “Thank you. Do you want to come back to my place and see Mackenzie? Maybe she just doesn’t like females.”
“Or maybe she doesn’t trust adults and she won’t talk to either of us. But it’s worth a shot. But if she won’t talk to me, I’m sure Andromeda will let us borrow Teddy for an hour or so.”
“He might just work. Oh, isn’t his birthday tomorrow?”
“Yup. The little guy will turn four,” replied Ron.
Hermione sighed. “Sometimes it feels like it’s been so long… but sometimes I feel like it all happened yesterday.”
Ron reached for her hand. “I know what you mean. I feel the same way. Sometimes I’ll look around when we’re all sitting down to dinner and wonder why we aren’t waiting for Remus and Tonks.”
She squeezed Ron’s hand. “Well, shall we go see if she’ll talk to you?” asked Hermione.
“Sure. Let me just get the check, and then we’ll go.”
“Mackenzie?” called Hermione as she and Ron entered her apartment. “Mackenzie, I’ve brought someone to play with us.”
Before going home, Hermione had popped into a game store in Hogsmeade and bought the wizarding version of Candyland. This Candyland had moving pictures, and the pieces moved for you. If anything would get this girl to talk, this would.
She and Ron set up the game, and after running into her room to put away her purse, she returned.
“Nothing, huh?” she asked.
Ron’s eyes grew big. “Not quite. She’s behind you.”
Hermione whipped around. “Hullo, Mackenzie,” she said, bending down so that they were eye to eye. “This is my friend Ron, and he brought us a game. Do you like games?”
She said nothing, but her eyes brightened. Hermione took it as a good sign. “Which colour would you like to be?” she asked, holding out the four game pieces.
She hesitantly reached out her hand and pointed to the red piece. “Red? Okay. And Ron, what colour would you like to be?”
Ron smiled. “I’d like to be the green one,” he replied.
“Alright, then, and I’ll be the blue one,” Hermione said cheerfully, putting the three pieces down.
The three played Candyland for hours, doing their best to avoid traps like the Molasses Swamp, where their game pieces would stick, groaning when they had to go back and eat plums with Plumpy, and cheering whenever they drew Queen Frostine’s card, who brought their piece to her palace near the King and gave them ice cream floats.
Everyone had won two games, and it was decided that the winner of this game would be the Candyland Champion, when Mackenzie drew the Queen Frostine card.
Smiling widely as Queen Frostine fed her playing piece ice cream floats, Mackenzie said her first word.
“Elizabeth.”
“Is that your name?” asked Ron, who was trying to hide the fact that he had to go back to the Peppermint Forest.
The little girl nodded. “Okay, then. You know, Elizabeth really is a beautiful name. Do you know your last name?” questioned Hermione while pulling Ron’s hand from behind his back and uncrumpling the Mr. Mint card.
Elizabeth’s eyes grew wide, but she nodded again.
“Will you tell us?” asked Ron.
Elizabeth shook her head vigorously.
“Why not, Elizabeth? You can trust us,” said Hermione gently.
“Names are forbidden,” she whispered. “Please forget I said a forbidden word,” she begged as she faded away.
“Well, we got a name. But that girl,” said Ron grumpily as he watched his character make peppermint flutes with Mr. Mint, “is a complete and total mystery.”
“A mystery that I have to solve,” Hermione said grimly.
The Little Girl In White by hermione210
Chapter Notes: I do not own Harry Potter or any of the people/place/things that you recognize. Nor do I own Candyland, though my inner four-year-old loves it. I do, however, own Elizabeth, though the concept of her was prompted by the wonderful Kristy / butter_beer_drinker. As always, love to Kristy and to my awesome beta, Katie / harrypotterfangirl21.