It was a grungy, hazy, filthy night. Dirt seemed to coat the air itself, and the sky was a unpleasant shade of brown. It was uncomfortably hot and there was a fair share of insects, most of which bit or sucked blood. It should be said it was a sordid part of town. The ubiquitous stench—which one did forget about, in time—seemed at home here, as did the garbage caked on enough public spaces that it became impossible to overlook. Everything was in a state of disrepair; nothing, including the people, looked like it had ever seen better days; and the singular bus stop, situated across from an ugly little park which women walking home from work avoided out of fear for their safety, was no exception.
Under the flickering light of a lone streetlight a hunched old woman shuffled towards the bus stop and the ancient bench beside it. Despite the stifling heat, she wore a thick fur coat, the pelt now matted and ragged, speaking to the frequency with which she had worn it. On her head she had tied a faded red kerchief, out of which a few tufts of white hair could be seen, and in one hand she held a moth-eaten carpetbag whose contents were her only possessions. Her little carpet slippers inched forwards painfully slow, the bones obviously thin and brittle, and had there been another nearby, pity would surely have moved him to come forth and help her. As it was, she was all alone, and only the rats in their secret places watched her pathetic progress.
At long last she reached the bench and sat herself creakily with a prolonged sigh. The bus came only once every two hours by that particular stop, but she didn’t seem altogether concerned with getting anywhere in a hurry—or anywhere at all, for that matter. She folded her dried-up hands in her lap wearily, as comfortable as she could be, uncaring as to her surroundings or the hour, so long as she had a reliable seat.
She was free now from so many of the worries that plagued the populace, such as work, assault, family, or illness—the latter she had in abundance, so why worry about more? In exchange she was tied by pain, which never let up, even in sleep: pain in her inflamed joints, which ached especially in the incessant rain of London; in her heart, which could no longer be relied upon to keep time; in her bones, which warned her with each step one fell move and they would break; and everywhere else besides. So is life, and nothing taken for free.
She had just closed her heavily-lidded eyes, the colour almost indiscernible beneath thick cataracts, when the sound of footsteps drew close. She pulled her carpetbag closer to herself out of habit (not that she was concerned with theft, anymore) and opened one eye to gauge the newcomer to see if he would disturb her sleep. To her surprise, it was a young, pretty, well-dressed woman, who, despite the obvious shabbiness of the location, walked assuredly, without a sideways glance of worry at all the dark spaces where strange men might lurk, as all the rest did.
For some unknown reason, her body tensed at the sight of this seemingly-benign person in warning. She assessed the woman critically, hoping to figure out what made her so uneasy. Despite the youthful spring in her step and lack of wrinkles, she wore a wedding ring and seemed to have carry herself with that certain wisdom that only comes with age. At first glance she had seemed in her mid-twenties, but after a longer look, it was impossible to say. She could well have been middle-aged, though a very well-preserved speciman, if that were the case. Her clothing was sensible and the kind that was acceptable for any occasion, encompassing a yellow button-up blouse, a mid-length navy skirt, and matching navy slides. Her curly brown hair was tied up neatly in a bun at the nape of her neck, framing the sort of face that, while not breathtaking, was charming nonetheless, and got lovelier with age. Altogether not the type of person you expected to meet in such a place.
As she neared the bench, she nodded briskly at the older woman in greeting. The nod was not returned by the other, but she didn’t seem put-out, but rather accepting that senescence could bring unmovable pain. She seated herself neatly on the other end of the bench, crossing her ankles as she did so, though there was nothing juvenile in the action. The old woman wondered if this strange creature was going to start up some awkward, trivial banter, but again she was surprised, as her new companion held her silence. Whyever such a person, who was obviously well-off, would decide to take a public bus—and at this bus stop, too—at such a time was beyond comprehension.
A flash of jealousy shot through the old woman, startling her, as she took in this beautiful woman, her whole life laid out perfectly before her. Jealousy? She hadn’t felt that in…years, certainly; not since she had lost her dignity, and that had been ever-so-long-ago, almost out of memory, now. Beyond anything else the emotion jolted her. She had thought she had sunk as low as she could possibly go, with no more vanity or pride or beauty or power or anything else she had used to describe herself by in her earlier days left. Apparently some ember still glowed deep beneath, down where she had thought it extinguished. Yes, she was jealous: jealous that this woman had everything, when she herself had nothing.
‘Bellatrix.’ The single word stirred through decades of oblivion and forget, the result of time and the purposeful repression of painful memories. Bellatrix? Her head whipped around as fast as it could on her frail neck to stare at the woman who had spoken the word. The large, somehow majestic, brown eyes met hers head-on, head inclined in a stately matter. The woman nodded once to prove the moment had existed. ‘Doubtless you will have forgotten.’
No, she wanted to protest, no, I remember that name, I know I do; I think it was mine, but something held her back, a sudden, instinctive fear gripping at her heart, though from whence the fear originated, she couldn’t say.
‘My name is Hermione Granger.’ A pause. Another connection was threaded somewhere in the old woman, another stirring of recollection, though the grand design was not yet clear. ‘You and I—ah, knew each other—once, a very long time ago. Thirty years ago, in fact. Do you remember that?’ The old woman shook her head, still working furiously to put all the details into place. She did remember, in some way; maybe the name sounded familiar, or a face, thirty years younger, matched with the one before her now. And all the time that fear grew within her. Hermione Granger seemed so calm and kind, but a great power emanated off of her as well, and all Bellatrix could think was no, please, no, I am so weak now, why would you want to harm me, I have nothing…
Hermione sighed, a sort of sad, tired expression on her face as she crossed her arms over her chest and leaned back on the bench, watching the old face, like a dried peach pit, somehow so pitiful. ‘I told them…’ she murmured to herself, seemingly unaware she spoke aloud. ‘I told them I would…’ It was then that Bellatrix saw what was clenched in one of the woman’s hands. It was a polished stick of wood.
Wand! warned a voice from somewhere deep within her, an alarm going off, though her conscious had no idea why, had no idea what a wand was, either. She is indecisive, she is confused—leave now, while you still can! The voice within, imperious and cruel and cold, rang out the command, but the old body refused. I am too tired to flee, especially if I don’t know why, it seemed to groan. There’s nothing more she can do to me, except death; and that would be a welcome change.
‘I will be frank,’ Hermione said at last. ‘I came here intending to do—something, I’m not sure what it might have been. Maybe I would have dragged you to Azkaban—’ Azkaban? She forgets I don’t remember…except I know it’s awful, yes, I know that… ‘—Or perhaps killed you.’ The right hand gripped the wand tighter. ‘You see, Bellatrix, we’ve been looking for you for a very long time now.’ Looking for me? Why would you want to look for me? You, who have everything? I’m old and I’m weak. I have nothing. ‘I won’t bother you with the details, as that would accomplish nothing, and you’d only forget again later, with the dementia.’ Why does she talk like this when she knows I won’t understand? ‘Bellatrix. Well, the truth of the matter is, you and I were not friends.’ She cleared her throat. ‘The opposite, in fact.’ The women watched each other closely, somehow aware of a new tension forming between them, that was in fact an old tension, half-remembered.
‘Quite honestly, you—’ she paused, seeming to restrain herself, mulling over her words, trying to pick them carefully. ‘You were a different person then.’ As she spoke, strange disjointed pictures flitted through Bellatrix’s mind: flashes of green light, screams, an inhuman face, white and burned-looking. ‘But you’ve changed in thirty years. Anyone can see that. I don’t know why I expected otherwise.’ She laughed humourlessly. ‘I suppose I expected to see you in the Great Hall again, that same age—’ Hermione suddenly cut herself off once more, carefully self-editing.
‘Why—’ Bellatrix croaked, voice rasping from disuse. She tried again. ‘Why did I leave? Or—or, whatever I did? What did I do?’ The questions poured out of her suddenly, desperately, as the memories fought to free themselves. Here was the only person who could answer them.
‘You fled,’ Hermione replied gently. ‘Your side had lost. You could have surrendered, I suppose. But even at the time I never really expected you to do so. That was the way you were. You vanished, and even our most skilled Aurors couldn’t find you. It was only recently, long after we’d given up hope forever, that I found you’d be living among the Muggles, homeless, as it were.’ Hermione shook her head, eyes unable to leave that sunken face.
‘I don’t know what became of you after that Last Battle, Bellatrix. I think only you know the full story; or you did, once, though that is going too.’ All the words of hatred she had wanted to fling at this woman for years had been wasted. They had all been saved for the wrong person. That woman was gone, now, alive only in her memories. And though Hermione knew this old lady was also Bellatrix, the demon who had slaughtered so many so cruelly, she found she couldn’t speak her mind to the piteous creature who sat beside her on a bench somewhere in London’s poorest quarter.
‘Quite honestly, you were an awful woman, Bellatrix. But I think you’ve suffered greatly over the years; far worse than anything we could have done to you, in fact.’ She nodded in a satisfied, assured way. ‘These things work themselves out in the end, I suppose.’
I don’t remember what I did at all…but I know have borne many a suffering over the years…
It was at that moment that bright headlights suddenly shone out of the brown haze of the night, growing brighter and larger quickly as they approached, effectively breaking the scene. Hermione smiled sadly as she looked at that old face, eyes clouded, mind confused. ‘Well, I suppose your bus is here.’ She watched as the little old lady shuffled forward obediently to the open door, all memories of the conversation already fading, dropped a few coins into the till, and then disappeared into the innards of the machine. She kept on watching until the last red taillights had faded into the darkness, and then turned softly on her heel, vanishing with them.
At the Bus-Stop by Rhi for HP
Chapter Endnotes: I wrote this in a half-hour today...please tell me how it turned out!