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"Your brother is coming to see you.
The girl with the platinum blonde hair stared at the mediwitch with vacant blue eyes. She had no other initial reaction other than to look at the woman in the doorway. The empty gaze gave her chills in a way that no other resident could. Tentatively, she opened her mouth to ask if the girl had heard her and suddenly found herself on the leafy end of a long twig. The blue eyes sparkled with life now and the mediwitch held her breath, locked in an intense staring contest.
"No!" the girl said simply before darting around the woman and into the hall. She held her arms out to her sides as if she were balancing.
Or flying, the witch thought to herself.
Mira was an enigma at St. Mungo's. She had been left in the hospital's care at the approximate age of ten with the only identification on her person being a slip of parchment reading, 'My name is Mira.' No one had seen who had left her. Mira wouldn't speak. In fact, she would flinch and scream at every touch and throw a fit at the sight of a wand- hiding, cowering, even biting and scratching to get away from it. Now a woman, Mira was much better; sociable, talking, but still not altogether there. Having stayed at the hospital for twenty-three years, she was the longest residing patient of the Janus Thickey Ward after Frank and Alice Longbottom.
She was also the only Squib.
The Ministry did not keep Squib birth records, so it had been impossible to track down or prove the girl's family, though rumors had spread after the death of a girl with the same name.
Normally, the hospital didn't take on the poor things as most magical families sent them away or encouraged them to live among Muggles. There had been several cases of children being abandoned at the hospital for being Squibs- the faculty normally turned them over to Muggle orphanages if no one volunteered to take them in.
This had never been an option for Mira. Not in her state of mind. Everyone loved her most of the time; she brightened up the whole ward- until she had one of her fits.
" Crucio! "
The mediwitch tore down the hall after Mira to the next room- Gilderoy Lockhart's room.
" Crucio! Crucio! Crucio, crucio, crucio! " Mira's voice rang out. She brandished her stick.
" Obliviate! O-bliviate! O-bli-vi-ate! " joined the voice of the memory impaired author. He was wielding a very care-worn peacock feather quill and it quivered with every syllable.
The object of their spells seemed to be a newly placed fern some unlearned intern had seen fit to add to the room. The woman heaved a sigh of relief that it wasn't a poor visitor again.
Suddenly the duo stopped, eyeing the plant suspiciously. "I believe it's learned its lesson," Mira stated after a moment.
"Indeed," Lockhart replied, stowing his quill.
"No one likes a sneak!" Mira proclaimed loudly, shaking her twig at the fern. "It's not nice to wander around without permission!"
This statement was particularly odd coming from a woman who did just that.
Mira straightened and clapped Lockhart on the back. "Brilliant to work with you again, Professor!"
"And lovely to be at your side, Inspector!" the former teacher replied, flashing his dazzling smile. Spell damage or not, it still made plenty a witch go weak at the knees, even at his age. "Did you want an autograph? With joined-up writing?"
"Not today, old boy! I'm late for tea!"
"Oh, well, yes. Carry on."
But she was gone before he finished. The mediwitch went into the hall to watch her.
By now, the article in the Daily Prophet had circulated throughout the hospital, the claims from Narcissa Malfoy that Mira was her daughter, tortured by her convicted husband. She told a story about faking the girl’s death with a transfigured stuffed selkie so that she could obtain a legitimate death certificate. She had done it to save her daughter’s life, as the article went, for their peers would not have let them let her live, even among muggles.
And in twenty-three years, Mira had never had a visitor.
Professor Neville Longbottom would often stop to see her when he visited his parents in appreciation of the girl visiting them , but that was all.
But today, Draco Malfoy had arrived at the hospital, quite frazzled. He had looked to be in a state of half dress, his trousers being for bed and his jacket inside out.
And he had demanded to see his sister.
~*~
Your brother is coming. Your brother is coming. Your brother is coming.
No matter what she was doing, the words ceased to repeat round and round in her mind until she felt her head might explode.
What did it mean?
Brother. She had a brother? Of course she did. She supposed everyone had a brother somewhere.
Who was this brother? Vague memories of a little blonde boy faded in and out of her mind's eye as she wandered the hall of her ward, searching for distraction, for something to remove the words from her head.
But where? Where? Where could she go?
Why wouldn't the words leave?
" Crucio! " She pointed her 'wand' at an unsuspecting orderly and saw the appropriate flinch. She did not dally to explain or hear response, but continued on.
"Brother... Brother... Brother, brother, brother...," she murmured to herself over and over, trying to think, to remember. So many years, so much fog in her head, but it still wouldn't wash the words away. Away, away!
Your brother is coming. Your brother is coming.
"Not as good as your brother... Filthy! Filthy! " she hissed at herself. " Filthy little Squib! "
She gasped at the words. She had never spoken them before, so why were they so familiar to her? And why couldn't she get them to leave?
Your brother is coming. Filthy Squib. Leave, words, leave, leave, leave!
Mira glanced at her surroundings, wondering where she was for a moment. A man suddenly burst from a nearby room and hopped in front of her, staring with wild eyes.
"Quack!" he quacked. Mira tilted her head, momentarily confused. "Quack! Quack, quack, quack..."
The man waddled away. Ducky Chorley. She nodded to her own affirmation and turned smartly to her right and marched into the room directly across from her.
"Please excuse my tardiness," she said with a graceful curtsy.
Brother. Squib. Filthy. Filthy!
She took hold of a not-so-comfy armchair and dragged it across the wooden floor until it was nicely situated between the two beds. In the space between the two stood a sturdy little table on which had been left a tray containing one teapot, one sugar bowl, one creamer, three teacups atop three saucers, and one small plate of cucumber sandwiches, for which Mira had a particular fondness.
Brother is coming. Filthy Squib.
Mira leaned forward and took the teapot, pouring a measured amount into each cup. Into her own, she put two sugars and a splash of cream. Into another, she put just cream. In the last, just sugar. She picked up her cup and took a sip, smiling.
“I do love tea time.”
Neither Frank nor Alice drank their tea, but it was rude not to serve the tea and they liked to be included, even if they didn’t drink it.
“You seem agitated today,” Alice said. Her mouth did not move, but Mira heard the words anyway. She always heard the words. It was why she had first started visiting the Longbottoms - to see who was talking.
“A plant snuck into the Professor’s room,” Mira answered. “It was rude.”
She sipped more of her tea.
“What are the words you’re screaming, then?” Frank asked.
Filthy. Filthy Squib.
Mira screwed her face up. “No… no!” she cried, slamming closed a door. It was in her head, but the sound echoed.
Frank’s eyes peered at her, brow furrowing. The healers said the Longbottoms were insane, but Mira found them completely rational. Too rational, sometimes. Too knowing. It was just that what they thought about doing didn’t match with what they’re bodies did. Like Frank, as he sat up in bed and reached for a cucumber sandwich. Instead of bringing it to his mouth, he let it fall, the sandwich falling apart on the tray. He looked back at her.
“No,” she said again, but she opened the door just a bit.
Brother is coming. Filthy little squib.
“I won’t ask. But it feels like it hurts.”
“No… no.” She gulped at her tea, still hot. It burned her throat.
“The boy will be here soon,” Alice said. She looked bashful as she reached to her bedside table for a piece of gum. She unwrapped it and tossed the gum away, holding the wrapper up. “He likes these.”
Boy. Not as good as the boy. Brother. Worthless - worthless! Squib!
“It hurts,” Frank said. “Why?”
“I don’t know,” Mira said hollowly. “I don’t want to. No brother! I don’t want to see him!”
She huffed and set her tea down. On the table, on the other side of the tea tray, sat the book they read. It was an old, leather, reddish brown cover that simply said Holy Bible . It didn’t even have the author’s name on the cover. Mira would read from it to Alice and Frank sometimes. Sometimes, Neville would visit and read to all of them. He was a good storyteller.
Mira reached for the book now and turned it over in her hands. It was in the chapel down the road from their house that he used to take her. They would pray that she was a proper pureblood. Then he would pull out the stick from his robes and-
Worthless. No daughter of mine will be a squib! Heaven does not want squibs!
Heaven. Mira’s hands had curved the old tome around into a circle. It was a rather floppy thing and bent easily, though the gesture hadn’t been intentional. The book shook in her hands and she realized it was because she was shaking.
Heaven does not want squibs.
“That word. Why do you keep dwelling on it?” Alice asked.
“What shall we read today?” Mira asked in return. She smoothed the book flat and opened to a random place in the middle
“It hurts,” Frank said.
“Psalm is always nice,” she said, thumbing through the pages. She pronounced it puh-saalm. Neville had told her the proper pronunciation, but it didn’t sound correct to her. “I sought the Lord, and he heard me, and delivered me from all my fears.”
Well, that wasn’t what God did at all. Who wrote this part? When neither Frank nor Alice seemed inclined to ask more questions, Mira ran her finger down the page, looking for something else.
“The eyes of the Lord are upon the righteous, and his ears are open unto their cry.”
That seemed more accurate. Obviously Mira was not the righteous. That was why He couldn’t hear her when she had cried.
Filthy! Crucio!
“The face of the Lord is against them that do evil, to cut off the remembrance of them from the earth. The righteous cry, and the Lord heareth, and delivereth them out of all their troubles.”
So she must be evil and God delivered her family from her.
“The Lord is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart; and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit.”
Being a squib broke their hearts.
“You are forgetting,” Frank said softly. “God loves you.”
“Heaven does not want a squib,” Mira replied automatically.
“Heaven wants everyone,” Alice said. She was twisting the gum wrapper between her fingers and smiling. “Besides. Your legilimency is too good to be a squib.”
“My what?” Mira asked, making a face.
“M… Mira?”
~*~
Draco had been at St. Mungo’s for hours. He didn’t imagine it would be so hard to come here and see Mira, but when a story like the one in The Prophet was everywhere and someone had been a patient for as long as Mira had on top of her never once having a visitor-
“How was I supposed to know to visit her? I went to her funeral when I was six .”
There was a lot of skepticism about his showing up. Apparently, despite the ‘heart-wrenching’ interview, his own mother had not come to the hospital and it had been days since the story ran. How many times did he have to explain that he had a child at home and couldn’t give a rat’s fart about reading the paper every day? He had sent an owl home to update Hermione twice now, hoping she didn’t think he had just abandoned her with his one year old. Draco hadn’t even had a full minute to process everything he and Hermione had discussed last night.
Or everything they had done last night.
Merlin’s beard, he could only hope she didn’t regret it.
Presently, he was telling his story for the fifth time, this time to the head of the Janus Thickey ward herself.
“My name is Draco Malfoy,” he said. “When I was six years old, my sister died. This morning, a friend was checking on me and asked how I was handling the news that Mira was alive. When I asked what the bloody hell they were talking about, they sorted through a stack of Prophets like… Like this-”
Draco indicated with his hands, leaving the space of about fifteen centimeters between his palms.
“Because, I’m sorry, I have a one year old and my wife has passed away and my son is more important than reading the paper! A couple more and they were all getting chucked in the bin, never to be read at all!” He tossed his hands up in exasperation. “I need to cancel my subscription, but I keep forgetting.”
He sighed and sat back in his chair, exhausted with the whole thing. If he had known which ward to go to to begin with, he didn’t think he would have had much trouble at all walking straight there and simply… finding her on his own. Instead, he had barged in, breathless and frantic, demanding from the first person he saw that he was Mira’s brother and please take him to see her right away! Not the best approach, but it had felt desperate. One headline had pulled his whole world from beneath his feet.
His sister was alive . His son had an aunt . And were his father not already in Azkaban, Draco would make sure he went. Mother would be lucky not to end up there as well.
Enid Nettles looked at him over the top of her glasses in a way that reminded him disturbingly of Professor McGonagall. The woman was maybe in her fifties, her brown hair ribboned with silver from her temples. She folded her hands together, fingers laced and took a deep breath through her nose. Draco braced himself to be tossed out.
“Mr. Malfoy, I believe you are being genuine. You’ll have to excuse the rest of the staff. The day Mira was left here, the staff then knew who she was. They couldn’t prove it. We had no records. The state she was left here in made it impossible to send her to a life with muggles. The interview with your mother has stirred up a lot of emotions in the hospital with the staff that still remember. And for the record, I do not believe a six year old had anything to do with what happened.”
She afforded him a kind smile and he supposed it could be something of a kind thing to not believe that a child would be capable of leaving another child in a -how had the article put it? Near catatonic state .
“After two decades of therapy, Mira has shown significant improvement, but this is the only home she has ever known. To her, we are the only family she has. And the staff has grown rather fond and protective of her. She might look at you and have no idea who you are and you should be prepared for that.” Her gaze narrowed and her lips pursed. “You look a lot like your father. She might also look at you and have a fit. You should be prepared for that, too. Mira will not be the girl you remember.”
The older woman paused, giving her statements time to sink in. Giving Draco time to reconsider.
“I’m not going to say I don’t want to bring her home with me, but I also understand she needs the treatment she receives here. I just… I want a relationship with my sister. I want my son to know his aunt. I want the chance to try.” He tried to imagine what it would feel like if she didn’t recognize him. What it would feel like if she was afraid of him. But then, what if she knew him? That was worth the risk, wasn’t it?
“Alright.” Enid stood and smoothed down her green robes. “Please follow me.”
Draco followed after her, trying to remember where they were going so he wouldn’t need to be escorted in the future. They came up to an empty room where a mediwitch was tidying up and setting a lovely looking fern in the window.
“Intern Foley,” Enid snapped, making Draco jump a little. “You cannot place plants in the patient’s rooms. Especially when they aren’t in them to know there has been a change. I’ve already heard about one episode today, are you trying to trigger another?”
The intern flushed deeply and snatched up the fern, not making eye contact. “No, ma’am. I’m sorry. I forgot that rule…”
“You need to remember it if you’re going to last in this ward. Have you seen Mira?”
Now the intern looked up and checked the watch on her wrist. “Not since earlier, but it is tea time.”
“Right.” She turned to Draco. “This is Mira’s room. You cannot bring her anything permanent that would stay in this room without both the hospital’s knowledge or hers. Follow me.”
She started off again and Draco followed. Enid stopped by a couple of rooms, including that of his Second Year defense against the dark arts teacher, Gilderoy Lockhart. Everywhere she stopped, she greeted the occupant and asked after them, then turned to Draco to tell him the relationship Mira had with that person. Apparently, she and Lockhart were quite fond of each other, which was odd to him.
He realized with a start that Enid was giving him a look into what his sister’s life looked like at the hospital. She already had more friends than he did. It both warmed his heart and depressed him. But then, how much better had his life been on the outside? He had a permanent brand on his arm to show for his weakness to the whims of the same man who had put his sister in this place. He had a scar on his chest that someone he had called an enemy had left behind.
Enid stopped by an open door and stood next to it, gesturing inside with her head.
“She has come here everyday since she could walk on her own again. No one knows why. No one knows how she knew to come here. But the Longbottoms are her favorite people and they seem to adore her as well. Just watch a moment…”
Draco did. He watched her talk to them like she could hear their replies. Similarly, their faces changed in reaction as if they understood and were communicating back somehow. He watched her pick up a book and start to read to them from it. The Longbottoms reacted to her, smiling or frowning.
“Heaven does not want a squib,” Mira said and Draco’s heart broke.
It was exactly something his father would say. He would go to that church in their little hamlet and pretend to be so pious and righteous and worthy . Only the pure were worthy. Only the powerful. Only the strong.
“Mira,” he whispered. Then, louder as he stepped into the room, “Mira!”
“Mr. Malfoy,” Enid hissed, but he ignored her. His heart was in his throat and all he could think of was the last day he had seen her. Father had been taking her to the church. Why, he couldn’t remember. Knowing what he knew now… It was likely his last effort to get her magic to manifest.
She turned her head to look at him and he watched as her face changed from confusion to incomprehension, recognition to fear. The moment seemed to stretch forever and he was afraid to move or speak. She seemed paralyzed, frozen like a statue.
She was so much older, looking her full in the face, he almost didn’t recognize the little girl she used to be. Her features favored their mother. Her eyes were the same, except that they didn’t look at him with any kindness of a sibling. They were full of terror like he was the demon from her nightmares.
Did he look that much like their father?
“Mira, I-”
“No,” she said, her voice a whisper that grew louder with each word. “No. No, no, no, no! No! NO! NO, NO, NO! ”
A cup of tea flew at him. He barely dodged it. It crashed to the floor behind him. The saucer hit him full in the chest, not really doing much damage, but still surprising him. He caught it in his hands before it could fall.
“Filthy! Disgusting!” She grabbed at the other two cups and threw them with all her strength. “Worthless! Filthy squib! Disgusting, disgusting, DISGUSTING! WORTHLESS GIRL!”
When she had run out of things on the tray to chuck at him, she snatched up what looked like a small branch from a tree, leaves still attached to the end.
“Someone get me a calming draught!” he heard Enid call.
“Leave her alone!” he said. He stared at his sister with wide eyes and open mouth as the rage poured from her, the words he had no doubt had come from none other than Lucius Malfoy.
“Crucio!” she screeched, pointing the twig at him. The leaves shook and quivered with the motion. She shook and quivered. “Crucio! Crucio! CRUCIO! ”
Pain bloomed in Draco’s chest. It wasn’t anything like the real curse, but it hurt . He grabbed at the place where it burned and curled under his skin, staring in an awestruck sort of wonder.
You have to really mean it, his aunt’s voice whispered in his ear.
Tears were streaming down Mira’s cheeks, her face twisted in pain. The Longbottoms were long since on their feet, looking very much like they were trying to console her.
“ CRUCIO, CRUCIO, CRUCIO! ”
A stab of pain went through him with each utterance. Mira stumbled backwards.
“ I hate you! I hate- I hate- your heaven! ”
The heavy book came hurling at him next. It missed badly, but that wasn’t the point. Draco was crying, he realized. It wasn’t just the curse that had impossibly hit him, it was everything. It was how she couldn’t even see him. The broken, heart wrenching things she said. It was the overwhelming guilt of a six year old, unable to understand the horror story he had been living in.
~*~
“Your heaven doesn’t want me!” she sobbed. She sank to the floor, the anger draining out of her. Alice wrapped a protective arm around her shoulders. “Your heaven doesn’t want me! Doesn’t want me! Filthy! Filth-!”
Brother is coming. Lies. Liars!
“Breathe, dear,” Frank said, sitting down on the floor next to her.
Her father had sat, too, on his knees, on the floor, staring. Always staring. His face was all wrong. Not like she knew it. The hard look, the judgement, the words, always the words that hurt and stabbed and pained.
“Mira? Mira!”
The boy was here. The Longbottom boy. Man now. Still the boy. Alice’s boy. His face filled her field of vision, blocking out anything else. Blocking out the father. He held her face with warm hands.
“He’s such a good boy,” Alice said fondly.
Mira struggled to draw air and calm down, but she held Neville’s gaze.
“Your heaven doesn’t want me,” she said, her voice small and weak.
“Heaven loves you,” Neville said sternly. “My gran says so and you know her. She thinks she’s never wrong.”
He smiled at her. He really was a good boy. Worthy. Clean. Not like her.
“Mr. Malfoy, you need to leave!”
“I- I’m sorry, I- Oh, Merlin…Mira…”
Her gaze slid over Neville’s shoulder. The man was so similar looking to her father, but just now, crumpled on his knees, looking so… unlike himself, Mira wondered if she was wrong. There was much wrong. His hair wasn’t nearly so long. His clothes were too bright. Where was his cane? He seemed younger suddenly, like a little boy. Like a-
Your brother is coming.
“Draco,” she choked.
Neville turned and looked at the man behind him as if he hadn’t known he was there. Then he looked back to Mira.
“That’s Draco Malfoy,” he said. “Frenemy of yours?”
“Frenemy?” she echoed.
“A friend you like to curse sometimes?”
“Oh, no, I don’t- I wouldn’t- my brother-” She looked at the man again. An orderly was helping him to his feet, taking him by the arm. “Draco?”
He looked at her, distraught clear on his face. She marveled at how different he looked. He was so tall! The feelings that had consumed her moments before seemed to disappear and she tapped almost excitedly on Neville’s arm.
“It’s Draco! Frank, Alice, it’s Draco!”
She scrambled to her feet, gently pulling arms and hands away from her. Her brother looked at her in confusion and something else as she approached.
“How did you get so tall for a six year old?”
He hesitated, looking to the orderly who glanced to someone outside the room before letting him go. Draco frowned and then turned fully toward Mira.
“I grew up,” he told her. “You did, too. I’m just taller than you now.”
“You are not! I will always be taller than a shrimp like-” And then she realized she was looking up at him. The words fell away from her lips. “But you’re six…”
“You watched Neville grow up, right?” he asked. “I went to school with him.”
She frowned and looked between Neville and Draco. They did appear to be similar ages and Neville was always older than he was the last time she saw him. It was hard to keep track because he didn’t live here with his family.
“Why did you take so long?”
Suddenly, Draco’s eyes were shining and he really looked like the six year old she knew.
“I didn’t know,” he said. “I didn’t know and I’m sorry . I didn’t know and… And that’s not good enough.”
“Heaven… Heaven doesn’t want-”
“Yes it does!” he said vehemently. “It wants you! It loves you. I love you.”
Everything was unusually quiet. Frank and Alice weren’t talking to her. The room felt like it was holding its breath. Mira reached up and wiped at the wetness on the blond man’s face. It was odd to touch him. Mira didn’t really like to touch others. Only certain people were allowed. But she had to touch him, to make sure he was real.
It seemed impossible that this was the face of her brother, but it could only be his.
“Draco…”
And then she hugged him, surprising herself with the action. Her head barely reached his shoulder.
“Draco,” she said again, but it sounded odd. Choked. Painful. She squeezed him tighter. Was she crying again? “Draco!”
Arms wrapped tightly around her and she cried. Where had all their time gone?
He’s alive! Alive! Unharmed, unhurt, just a little sad in his eyes. A little sad is better than dead. A little sad is better than pain.
Filthy little squib-!
Draco was alive.
He was all the heaven Mira needed.