The Taking of Tea

CHAPTER TWO: THE ART OF LOSING



The art of losing isn’t hard to master;

so many things seem filled with the intent

to be lost that their loss is no disaster



Lose something every day. Accept the fluster

of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.

The art of losing isn’t hard to master.



Then practice losing farther, losing faster:

places, and names, and where it is you meant

to travel. None of these will bring disaster.



I lost my mother’s watch. And look! My last, or

next-to-last, of three loved houses went.

The art of losing isn’t hard to master.



I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,

some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.

I miss them, but it wasn’t a disaster.



---Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture

I love) I shan’t have lied. It’s evident

the art of losing’s not too hard to master

though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster.







“Just you, then?” The hostess asked needlessly.



“Just me.” Hermione answered, and followed the woman to a small table at the edge of the patio. It was Saturday, and after rising early to finish the essays that needed grading, she decided to treat herself to a meal away from the adolescent raucous of Hogwarts.



The restaurant wasn’t so elegant that dining alone would seem bizarre, but it was still unusual. However the food was excellent, and Hermione endured the awkwardness of eating alone on principal. She was hungry, for Merlin’s sake, and the idea that she should somehow be embarrassed to be solitary in a restaurant was pure ridiculousness. Besides, she thought sourly, settling into the lonely table, she was doing a service for future spinster generations.



Around her were the sounds of conversation and clinking glasses, forks against plates, the scrape of chairs moving, the steady, low din of noise from the street. Above her was the sweetness of gardenia from a trellis that shaded the patio. Seated at the edge of its iron fence, Hermione could see witches and wizards going from shop to shop, some carrying bags, some children, one young man carrying an enormous load of broomsticks. It was, despite the lack of company, a pleasant place to take a meal. She ordered the roast lamb and a large glass of wine, and was just tucking in when Lucius Malfoy came into view.



He was, as always, the picture of aristocratic elegance. His pale hair fell obediently behind the patrician angles of his face, and the dark fabric of his robes looked like satin. He spotted her, and she met his gaze frankly, despite the powerful temptation to turn away.



“Miss Granger.” He said, pausing beside her table. “Dining alone, I see?”



As an adult, Hermione felt obliged to be polite, a nicety which had never occurred to her in childhood. Lucius had never been anything but an extraordinary nuisance to Hermione, making veiled threats about her safety, less subtle references to her heritage, and causing trouble only the half of which she could reliably attribute to the man. To say that she disliked him would be a considerable understatement. But last year, Draco had been sent to Azkaban for killing a wizard with an Avada Kedavra, and Hermione felt a bit of pity for him. Despite all of his money and influence, not to mention his downright pitiful pleas for mercy, Lucius had been unable to spare his son from the cruelty of imprisonment. Hermione hadn’t seen hide or hair of him since the end of Draco’s trial, and she wondered how his sentence had affected the ever-proud patriarch.



“I am.” She answered him, “and enjoying it thoroughly.”



“That’s admirable.” Lucius chuckled, to her great surprise. “It takes great strength of character to dine alone, Miss Granger.” Hermione shrugged, and in response, he added, “but you of all people typify such strength.” She straightened up in her chair, feeling the skin on her arms prickle. Such a response was not at all like him, and it was bizarre enough to seem ominous.



“If I didn’t know better, Mr. Malfoy, I’d say you were buttering me up.” She replied, keeping her tone civil.



“Lucky that you do, then.”



“Do I?”



“Now, Miss Granger,” he drawled. “Surely a man so forthright as myself would never do such a thing.” For the first time Hermione could recall in the history of their strained acquaintance, Malfoy seemed to be using sarcasm for the sake of mirth rather than condescension. Her mouth was open in an “o” of confused surprise, and on that realization she shut it quick enough to hear her teeth snap against each other. Stalling for time to formulate a response, she took a sip of her wine, setting it down again with a hand that wasn’t entirely steady.



“If there’s something you’re after, Mr. Malfoy—and I’m certain that there is—I’d rather you simply tell me outright. I don’t enjoy suspense.”



Rather than answer, Lucius gave her a frank appraisal. When he’d seen her last she still looked like a child, and as she was Draco’s age, it was odd to realize that she was now fully grown. Though she was rightfully wary, the spite and pomposity he remembered was gone, as was the insecurity of youth. She was, by all accounts, an extraordinarily talented witch, which no doubt left her feeling rather isolated in the climate of ineptitude that was Hogwarts. It was—second to her lineage, of course—her doggedly persistent sense of morality that truly irritated him.



“No, I can see that you don’t.” He finally said, leaving her further mystified. “Well, Miss Granger, I’ll leave you to your meal.” And with a nod, he walked off down the wide street of Diagon Alley.



Hermione turned to look after him, wondering if she hadn’t just seen a doppelganger. Shrugging again, and ignoring the now curious stares of several patrons, she finished her meal.







Monday came and she had another, with considerably more company. Meals in the Great Hall were the organized chaos that any school cafeteria would be. As evening fell and the hall’s enchanted sky turned to night the students rushed in, jostling, pushing, shouting, and finally settling into their cliques. Food was spilled and occasionally thrown, flatware was dropped and plates were invariably broken. Charmed notes flew over the noise of shouts and laughter and intimate conversations. Each member of the staff and faculty—with the possible exception of Mr. Filch—would smile at least once during the meal as the melodramas of adolescence played out before them, remembering their own childhood, which seemed at once strikingly similar and shockingly far away.



Running a bit late, Hermione entered the hall and took the seat beside Remus Lupin.



“Hermione,” Minerva McGonagall exclaimed shrilly, “what on earth has happened to your hair?”



Pulling her seat closer to the staff table, Hermione touched the patch of green that now interrupted her brown locks.



“Potions accident,” she told the headmistress. “The students were brewing Eire’s Elixir, and one of the cauldrons sort of,” she made a gesture of explosion with her hands, “It should come out in a few washes.”



“You’d do Tonks proud, Hermione.” Remus Lupin chuckled beside her.



“Do be sure to tell her all about it, then.” Hermione quipped, though her face wore a good-natured smile.



“I will.” Remus grinned, and Hermione viciously quashed whatever fluttered in her chest. A large part the attraction was his voice. It was rich with the unusual cadence from the traces of his northern accent, and the warmth of its tenor. In her dreamier moments, that voice was softest cotton, and Hermione wrapped it tight around herself.



“Do you know,” she began, “I had the strangest conversation on Saturday. Well, bit of conversation, anyway.”



“Oh? With whom?”



“Lucius Malfoy, if you can believe it.”



“Malfoy? You’re kidding. What did he want?” Remus wondered, trying to keep his tone from sounding demanding, which he didn’t manage particularly well.



“I’ve no idea. I was having lunch at Twelfth Night, out on the patio, and he came by and commented that I was—” She paused. Wouldn’t do to tell Remus that she’d been dining alone. “Enjoying the day,” she fumbled. “We exchanged pleasantries, so to speak, and then he left. It was very strange.”



“I’m sure.” Remus agreed, feeling unsettled. “Watch out for that one, Hermione. Not that I need to tell you.” He ran a hand through his shaggy hair in a trademark gesture of frustration.



“No, you don’t.” She agreed, her voice turning ponderous. What in Merlin’s name had Lucius been up to? Certainly something.



Remus considered the woman next to him. She was a popular teacher, though rumored to be rather exacting, and seemed to have settled in comfortably at Hogwarts. Her sometimes excessive confidence had settled with adulthood, and had transformed into an easy self-assuredness that made her a soothing presence, much like her mentor, who was now headmistress.



Although Remus didn’t like to imagine Hermione ending up a spinster like McGonagall. He knew that Hermione and Ron could never have made a lasting match, but it surprised him that the potions mistress remained unattached. Besides her obvious intelligence, Hermione was beautiful. Her hair had grown quite long, now reaching her waist, but its weight had pulled the curls into something much more manageable and very lovely. She was very slight, and would certainly never be buxom, but her body was unmistakably feminine, and her dark eyes were warm and kind. The features of her face reminded Remus very much of the sculptures from Pompeii—fine and delicate and unflinchingly even. Combined with her sure carriage, it was often hard to believe that she was muggle-born. Unlike himself, Remus reflected, who seemed in a constant state of dishevelment, despite his blue blood.



“Speaking of the elder Malfoy,” Filius Flitwick leaned across the table and toward Hermione, “have you seen the society page of today’s Prophet?”



Setting down her tea and looking in Filius’ direction, Hermione laughed.



“I’ve never had any cause to read the society pages, as I don’t keep especially glamorous company,” she gave the little man a mirthful smile, “so no, I haven’t. Why?”



“Narcissa Malfoy!” He exclaimed, his voice breaking into a childish squeal. “She’s left him, you know. It’s all this to-do about Draco’s being in Azkaban; she’s gone to France, and is demanding a divorce.”



“And all the money she can carry, I’m sure.” Remus frowned.



“Oh yes.” Flitwick said, gesturing wildly with his fork, a piece of roast beef flapping at its end and sputtering gravy in their direction. “Claims she can’t bear the idea that Draco’s a criminal, although it’s as clear as the nose on her face that Lucius is a—”



“Professor Flitwick.” McGonagall interrupted sharply, pinching her wrinkled face into even sharper relief. Flitwick flinched in retreat, turning his eyes back to his plate.



A/N: The poem that began this chapter is Elizabeth Bishop’s “One Art.”